Black and White TV Generation Have Monochrome Dreams

TV in Hotel Room - Galax, Virginia © Lee Friedlander

A new study concludes the color of the media you consume between the ages of three and ten plays a crucial role in determining the visual perceptual properties of your dreams.

Only 4.4 per cent of the under-25s' dreams were black and white. The over-55s who had had access to colour TV and film during their childhood also reported a very low proportion of just 7.3 per cent.

But the over-55s who had only had access to black-and-white media reported dreaming in black and white roughly a quarter of the time.

Even though they would have spent only a few hours a day watching TV or films, their attention and emotional engagement would have been heightened during this time, leaving a deeper imprint on their mind.

I wonder if a new generation will be streaming dreams in pop-ups, interstitials, and embeds. Via.

Worst Reality Show Ever

Psycho Hitchhiker (Coming or Going), 2007 © Douglas Gordon

A gallery friend of mine received this notice casting artists for a new reality TV show.

Gallery HD and Illuminations Media are looking for two Fearless, Charismatic, Passionate & Informed ARTISTS to take the definitive chutzpah road trip.

Two Artist/Art Racers must cross the US in 40 days, surviving only on Art. Armed with art materials, cameras and a $1 dollar budget, the Artist/Art Racers must “trade” Art for food, shelter and other artworks.

Starting on opposite coasts (one in NYC and one in LA), the Art Racers’ odyssey culminates in a home-city exhibition of all the works they have created and collected along the way. The winner is the Artist/Art Racer who sells/trades the most artwork. Or at least the one who survives.

Looking for great communicators who interact well with all sorts of people and can make smart commentary as life happens. Intelligent, sassy and witty are good too. All participants must live in the New York or Los Angeles areas, be at least 21 years old and a US citizen or legal resident alien.

If this is you, please submit the following:

• recent photo (no older than 6 months)
• bio or resume
• sample of your art (photo reproduction okay)
• short essay explaining why you are an Art Racer
• be sure to include your full name, home city and phone number

Please send all ASAP to: subs@barbarabarnacasting.com

ART RACE shoots May 26 – July 11 for appx 40 days on the road + up to 5 add’l shoot days & voice over. Each Art Racer will receive $20,000 US for participating.

This has to be the lamest premise ever, but these shows tend to use premise merely as a vehicle to toss dynamite in the laps of the emotionally unstable. For this show I imagine they will cast a fierce gay waif and pit him against a butterfly-tatooed free spirit chick, strip them of their meds and then film them on a 40 day train wreck as they create, cry, stab, starve, fuck, suck and sell their way across the heartland of USA. You know, all the worst stereotypes about artists in one glorious made-for-TV odyssey. Set your TiVo now.

Chris Jordan...On the Rachael Ray Show?!?

3,805 Rachel Ray's Equals One Chris Jordan © John Gordon

Photographic artist and gallery mate, Chris Jordan, has been making the TV circuit of late to promote his new Running the Numbers series. He has been seen on the Colbert Report, Bill Moyer's Journal and now the Rachael Ray Show.

That's right. The Rachael Ray Show. These are strange times indeed.

Chris was featured on Rachael Ray's "How Cool Is He?" segment. Check out the video, but be warned. If you are sickened by Rachael Ray's brand of cloyingly saccharined idiot-speak, you may want to turn down the volume.

Martin Parr Meets Reality TV

© Martin Parr

Martin Parr has signed up to be a judge on a new reality TV show, Picture This, on Channel 4 in Britain. From the Independent:

Musicals and opera have already been given the reality television treatment; now it is the turn of photography. A new Channel 4 series, Picture This, takes six wannabe snappers and sets them assignments over the course of three weeks, eliminating the unsuccessful contestants until just two remain to battle it out for the prize.

Martin Parr, the acclaimed photographer best known for his colourful pictures of British seaside life, is one of the three judges on the show.

The documentary photographer became involved with Picture This because he believes that photography is not given the prominence it deserves in the UK, whereas in other European countries and in the United States it is celebrated as an important art form.

Before agreeing to take part, Parr met the programme-makers several times to discuss the concept. "My thinking was that if we've got this very good slot to give oxygen to photography, it's probably good to be involved to make sure it's not bad. TV-makers usually don't know much about photography," he says.

Judging by the judges alone Picture This promises to be a cut above the weak sauce that is VH1's The Shot, but has Martin jumped the shark here? Do you buy his giving "oxygen to photography" line or is this the natural next step for an artist who has made a career of celebrating and subverting the excesses of our culture?