Pam Longobardi creates art with plastic objects collected on beaches. Her work reveals just how big our oceans’ plastic problem has become.
Click to open slideshow. Photos reprinted with permission of Pam Longobardi.
Harmony: Here are a few things we’ve read about you: Artist, advocate, professor, surfer. How would you describe yourself?
Longobardi: Those are all true, and to that list I would add seeker and activist. I put myself into both extreme and ordinary environments because I just want to know—to learn as much as possible about the mysteries of the planet while I am here, to stare closely and watch nature going about its business is most fascinating and humbling. And activist, because in all of those situations, even the most remote and pristine and wild, you see the heavy hand of human waste and lack of foresight, and to this I have outrage that I can’t contain. How can we be so stupid with our capabilities and intelligence to wreck the magic engine of nature on this planet we are riding on? We have to do better than that. (more…)
Arguably more so than any other Light and Space artist Mr. Wheeler has made the quest to create a sense of absence — to enable people to perceive space and light in ways they normally cannot — a primary obsession. And his explorations of it were deeply influential in the formation of the loose movement of Los Angeles artists who began to work with light.—Randy Kennedy in the New York Times on Wheeler’s current show at David Zwirner.
Jan 30, 2012 | Categories: Creative Culture | Comments Off on Doug Wheeler, SA MI 75 DZ NY 12
I’m completely hooked on the still image. When I see a surf movie I always want to press the pause button. In the ocean everything is in constant motion—myself, the wave, the surfer, the light. Surfing is never static, it is all about movement, even so, we (or at least I) can never remember a whole wave/ride. I remember fragments, instants frozen in time. Here, I believe, lies one of the still photographic image’s real strengths, for it enables me to capture some kind of essence, the kind of essence that gets deeply embedded in our minds at the time of experience, the essence I see in a surf movie when I want to press the pause button.
Since 2004, the Origami Whales Project (OWP) founded by Peggy Oki, has worked to raise awareness concerning threats to cetaceans (dolphins and whales) through its “Curtain of 36,000 Origami Whales.” Created by thousands of concerned citizens across the globe and exhibited throughout the world, this large-scale public art project serves as a powerful visual statement and memorial for the thousands of individual whales killed since the 1986 ban on commercial whaling. As urgent need for cetacean rights activities arise, the Origami Whales Project has expanded with additional outreach and education programs, creating “Curtains” of origami dolphins and whales in United States, Dominica, and New Zealand. To learn more, go here.
From Wikipedia: Teahupoʻo (pronounced cho-po) is a world-renowned surfing location off the South West of the island of Tahiti, French Polynesia, southern Pacific Ocean. It is known for its heavy, glassy waves, often reaching 2 to 3 m (7 to 10 ft) and higher. It is the site of the annual Billabong Pro Tahiti surf competition, part of the World Championship Tour (WCT) of the ASP World Tour professional surfing circuit.
In Chris Bryan‘s video from last year’s Billabong tour you’ll see that the waves do indeed get way, way higher than 7-10 feet.
Mary Heilmann, Winter Surf, San Francisco, 2006, oil on canvas 121.92 x 76.2 cm
“Each of my paintings can be seen as an autobiographical marker, a cue, by which I evoke a moment from my past, or my projected future, each a charm to conjure a mental reality and to give it physical form.†— Mary Heilmann
Jan 23, 2012 | Categories: Creative Culture, Surfing | Comments Off on Mary Heilmann, Winter Surf, San Francisco
I’m completely hooked on the still image. When I see a surf movie I always want to press the pause button. In the ocean everything is in constant motion—myself, the wave, the surfer, the light. Surfing is never static, it is all about movement, even so, we (or at least I) can never remember a whole wave/ride. I remember fragments, instants frozen in time. Here, I believe, lies one of the still photographic image’s real strengths, for it enables me to capture some kind of essence, the kind of essence that gets deeply embedded in our minds at the time of experience, the essence I see in a surf movie when I want to press the pause button.
Since 2004, the Origami Whales Project (OWP) founded by 
I’d rather stalk with a camera than a gun.—Toni Frissell
