In 2009, Arby's commissioned artist Phil Hansen to paint a version of the Mona Lisa using grease from the burgers of 14 of their competitors. He called his creation Mona Greasa.
Another curious fact about Hansen. According to wikipedia, while in high school he managed to cause himself nerve damage because of his obsession with pointillism.
Transgender Canadian artist Cassils will display the following installation at New York's Ronald Feldman Fine Arts gallery on Sept. 16. Description from the artist's website:
The centerpiece is PISSED, a minimalist glass cube containing 200 gallons of urine: a collection of all the liquid the artist has passed since the Trump administration rescinded an Obama-era executive order allowing transgender students to use the bathroom matching their chosen gender identities. The sculpture is contextualized by audio recordings from the Virginia school board and the Fourth Court of Appeals articulating the ignorance and biases that run through every level of judicial proceedings.
My first thought was, that's a lot of pee. Trump rescinded Obama's executive order on Feb. 22. So 206 days will have passed between the rescinding and the exhibit on Sep 16, which means Cassils, in turn, must be passing about a gallon of urine per day. According to MedlinePlus, it's normal to excrete about half-a-gallon a day, assuming you're drinking 2 liters of water a day. Cassils must be drinking about 4 liters of water a day to be peeing that much.
My second thought was that urine art is one of those things that Chuck would describe as no longer weird.
Posted By: Alex - Sun Aug 20, 2017 -
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Category: Art
"Hints of drugginess in the eyes, and suggestions of Sapphic eroticism laid on with a trowel, created a sultry visual cocktail that appealed equally to celebrities of the order of Rudolph Valentino, Joan Crawford and King George VI, all of whom had their portraits painted, and the general public."
New Zealand artist Kirsty Lillico recently won the annual Parkin Drawing Prize, which netted her $20,000. The question her win has raised is, was her piece, titled "State Block," actually a drawing? It consisted of pieces of carpet draped over string.
Lillico said, "Drawing, to me, it's not just about a pencil and paper. I'm using a knife and carpet and hanging it in a space to achieve the same ends."
The prize's patron, Chris Parkin, admits that the piece stretches the definition of a drawing, but he notes it was "still lines, at the end of the day... somebody has taken a knife, and started a line and taken it for a walk."
In 1632 Rembrandt painted a portrait of Jacob de Gheyn III, an engraver living in Utrecht. The portrait is quite small, measuring approximately 12 by 10 inches. As a result, it's relatively easy to steal and has earned the nickname "The Takeaway Rembrandt" because of the number of times it's been swiped.
The painting has been given the moniker "takeaway Rembrandt" as it has been stolen four times since 1966 – the most recorded of any painting.
Between 14 August 1981 and 3 September 1981 the painting was taken from Dulwich Picture Gallery and retrieved when police arrested four men in a taxi who had the painting with them. A little under two years later a burglar smashed a skylight and descended through it into the art gallery, using a crowbar to remove the painting from the wall. The police arrived within three minutes but were too late to apprehend the thief. The painting was missing for three years, eventually being found on 8 October 1986 in a luggage rack at the train station of a British army garrison in Münster, Germany.
The other two times, the painting was found once underneath a bench in a graveyard in Streatham, and once on the back of a bicycle. Each time the painting has been returned anonymously with more than one person being charged for its disappearance.
Paul Di Filippo
Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1.