The most recent aired episode of America’s Next Top Model (February 27, 2008) had the contestants model as homeless people.
Again, WTF.
I hate people who pretend to be homeless, and in doing so think that they are taking part in a great social experiment (see: TYRA BANKS).
Here’s Tyra the drama queen on her experience as a homeless person.
HOMELESSNESS IS NOT AN EXPERIMENT.
People who are homeless don’t choose to be homeless and they can’t just pack up their things and decide to quit whenever they want, unlike those who are just pretending. No matter how far one may go in attempting to live the life of a homeless person, the fact remains that that person is not homeless and in effect has immediately undermined the purpose of their experiment in the first place.
Think about it: A homeless person does not KNOW for a fact that at the end of any given day, they can go back to a HOUSE/STUDIO/WHATEVER and relax and think over the events that have taken place that day. Somebody who is pretending to be homeless does in fact have this luxury and if anything were to go extremely wrong during their experience, the option is always there to pull the plug and walk away. HOMELESS PEOPLE CANNOT DO THAT.
If anything, these “trials of homelessness” just serve to elevate the person doing the experiment. Really now, what good comes from this? Nothing. Experiments like this just reveal to the person that they’ve been a douche bag all their life because they came to the realization — through the “humbling” experience — that they were mistreating others. We surely don’t need models pushing the stereotype further.
Chris Jordan, the celebrated artist that creates large-scale portraits of America using various consumer goods has released two new works for 2008.
The two new representations of American waste are “Plastic Cups” and “Barbie Dolls”.
“Plastic Cups” is 60×90″ and depicts one million plastic cups (the number used on airline flights in the US every six hours).
“Plastic Cups” in its entirety
“Plastic Cups” at actual size
“Barbie Dolls” is 60×80″ and depicts 32,000 Barbies (equal to the number of elective breast augmentation surgeries performed monthly in the US in 2006).
“Barbie Dolls” in its entirety, forming a pair of breasts.
“Barbie Dolls” at actual size
I’m always in awe of Chris Jordan’s work. Hopefully he continues to make some more insightful works of art throughout 2008.
I was trying to find a video of the balloon tank that I posted, but what I ended up watching instead was this video of a water balloon launcher/cannon/whatever.
There’s a company that’s selling a version of this and calling it the Balloon Bazooka.
The water balloon launcher uses compressed air to shoot water balloons up to 500 feet! The item costs $99.95 at the most basic level and the price goes up to $199.95 for the most powerful version.
Somebody needs to make a water balloon machine gun…NOW.
This balloon tank was part of a 2007 exhibition put on by Inges Idee, a group of 4 German artists who create various public art projects. [via]
The balloon tank is made by German artist Hans Hemmert. At the end of the exhibition, the balloons were popped and the balloon tank was reduced to a pile of stretchy, colorful goodness.
Mark Daye posts and erects makeshift street signs around Toronto to educate and make people aware of the area’s homeless. [via]
The signs look like any standard city sign but a closer look reveals statistics on homelessness or an urge for the passerby to take notice of those less fortunate than themselves. You can see more photos of Mark Daye’s homeless sign project at Flickr.
