Really wishing I was in or about London these days. I would absolutely love to see Emma McNally‘s latest exhibition at Mummery + Schnelle. Running from 15 April to 29 May, Emma is presenting her most recent works which as you can see, are a continuation of her previous amazing graphite on paper pieces.

The sheer size is impressive, and as you look closer and closer, the amount of detail is simply staggering. I’m very exited to see her continuing to do well and if you’re in the UK in the next month, either living or traveling to (assuming you have some volcanic co-operation), I highly recommend swinging through to be amazed.

Simply being that I believe work like this should be disseminated as much as humanly possible, I wanted to share 12 minutes 29 seconds of pure visual bliss. The entire video is CG which in and of itself is absolutely amazing, only improved upon by an amazing score. And I do recommend watching it on the largest possible display. It will blow your mind.

The Sight Below‘s latest album has just been released, entitled It All Falls Apart, and is just the sort of follow up album that you’d expect from this Seattle-based recluse. Building on his previous EP, and album, 2008′s Glider, TSB has developed a more complex soundscape that has solidified his work as some of the best in the post-ambient/shoegaze world. Shimmer, the album’s opening piece, stands out as one of the most striking tracks, with it’s reverb-laden strings and surging low-end; a very strong statement to begin the adventure.

The most impressive, albeit, restrained track has got to be the 13 minute finale, Stagger. A quintessential Sight Below movement, this Eno-esque scape highlighted by a low-fi loop underbelly to a submarine-pulse with the slightest hint of breakbeat, all baked together to create the perfect score to any 3AM bout of insomnia.

Fervent by The Sight Below

Unfortunately, no one seems to be immune. The case made in the program regarding the escalation of the perils of Martha Stewart over that of Ken Lay is a poignant one if nothing else. More recently the American Democrats have recently employed the same tactics, focusing the upcoming election on “emotional revelations” and “camera presence” rather than legislative platforms.Unfortunately charisma as a major factor in society is nothing new (see section A.1.d). The distinction being a factor as opposed to the entire basis for the process of making a determination.  The need for substance behind the façade has all but disappeared. Ultimately, once this ethical ‘gold standard’ had been removed, the fluctuations and potential outcomes become noticeably more volatile. The rationale that, one could argue, guided the intellectuals to making the greater good possible has been overridden by popularity and charm.  

The program presents the view that it is in fact the rhetoric surrounding the current dialogue in American politics that is in fact most dangerous. Not the stances themselves. 

 As someone who feels that for an individual to believe they are capable of instituting any measurable amount of change in the universal sense is laughable, if not borderline delusional, and that my general outlook on existence can be summed up as a blip on some cosmic radar screen, the only real impact that can be made on an interpersonal level is information. Information to cause as little friction as possible. Using the homo-centric example of a society, a la a group of humans living in close physical proximity, the larger it becomes, the more organic the energy that flows through it. Humans, on an individual level, are a contradiction in most contexts. A human being is at odds with most everything surround it and only when it acknowledges this and makes an informed decision to begin fighting against the very basis of how it defines itself, will it start the journey towards knowledge.

 My endgame is not to elevate my soapbox, turn up the volume on my microphone or attempt to climb to a higher mountaintop. In fact, it’s quite the contrary. By creating this electronic instance of ones and zeroes, I hope to give thoughts, ideas, perspectives that I think are beneficial to the greater Integral one tiny, insignificant conduit to as many of the Greens, Blacks and Whites as possible.

My equation begins…