In the most general diversification, graffiti can be described as the art of letters and the art of images. This means that paintings can be created either as words or as pictures. Depending on the graffiti style and genre, artists use various painting material and colors to represent their works. The major thing is to hand the idea down to the targeted groups. For example, even a single world ‘Peace’ painted in bubble graffiti style might represent the ideas for the end of war; the targeted groups here can be all interested parties, starting from the governing bodies, and finishing with ethnic minorities or religious groups.

The most difficult but expressive genre of graffiti art is piece style. It is a way to represent the ideas and notions in the form of abstract painting. That major peculiarity of this style is seen in application of three colors only. The artist has to depict and hand down his ideas only with the help of three basic colors he chooses.

To continue, there are up to a dozen of other graffiti styles which include wild style, stencil, tag, and blockbuster style. Wild style is considered to be rather popular as the ideas are represented in the form of fanciful arrows, lines and objects. Not infrequently those objects are painted in 3-D style to give the image more volume. Stencil style is probably the simplest one and even small children can master this graffiti technique. This style presupposes the employment of stencils which give accurate spelling of words.

Tag graffiti style has rather wide prevalence and can be found everywhere. This style presumes the application of weird curlicues and various fonts which are usually created by means of sprays, pencils, markers or oil paints. Finally, blockbuster graffiti style might be ambiguous for some people. This is because this genre takes large space on a wall or fence and uses engraved letters which are sometimes difficult to discern.

Nowadays there are dedicated services, such as Knees Up, helping people in searching out and hiring bands for various events. Those services are called to accomplish the whole spectrum of tasks connected with the organization of music live events, starting from the list of bands for hire, and finishing with the event management and contract signing procedures. Hence, when you have any special occasion and just would like to gladden your dear people, or when you have a grandiose corporate event and would like to create a real party, hiring a band or a single artist is the most beneficial option.

Why choosing exactly such services if there are a lot more things which can bring elation and excitement? In fact, it’s impossible to give a single answer to this question, but it’s obvious that music live shows are always exciting and entertaining. The major advantage of services making business on organizing various music events is that potential customers have a perfect opportunity to choose among hundreds and thousands of artists and bands to satisfy their needs. For example, hiring a rock band for your son/daughter’s birthday party will be a stunning surprise for all guests. Corporate events will get some refinement with soul or blues live shows. And, your wedding ceremony might become the most gentle and unforgettable one with a band of instrumentalists. Every whim to your taste!

To continue, hiring live music show via the Internet services like Knees Up will save you a lot of time. The only requirement from you is to choose the signer or band you like and make an online inquiry. The rest will be done by the team of professionals who cut teeth on organizing such types of events. You may totally entrust the management of all issues to the service team as they will make the lion’s share of work associated with finding and hiring the artist. You won’t have to search for the contacts of the band’s representative, you won’t have to arrange a meeting for negotiation, and of course, you won’t have to prepare all necessary documentation to close the legal deal. All those details are managed by the service team. Do you need any other proofs?!

Clay is a quite popular material with children nowadays. My means of clay it’s possible to create real masterpieces of different shapes and sizes. The popularity of this material is explained by easy handling and room for creativity. Children who do not like symmetric forms are allowed to create asymmetric abstract characters or things. However, rather often kids are more fascinated by sculptures of super heroes and their beloved movie starts.

In order to create clay masterpiece, it’s necessary to imagine the person, character or thing first. A simple draft made by pencil will help in identifying the future form of the creation. Further on, it’s useful to make a template from some material (better metallic) and only then start filling that template with clay medley. After the work is done, it’s vital to let the creation dry out; once it gets dry, it’s possible to decorate it by means of paints, fabrics, accessories, buttons, spangles, etc.

Clay is a perfect material for building small-size and middle-size castles. Such castles serve as the decoration to any room style and add some zest to any interior design. With the purpose to create a miniature castle, you’ll need a wooden platform to support the sculpture. The sculpture of a castle can be created as interesting as feasible due to decorations and due to incorporation of various parts to the structure: windows, doors, steps, tunnels, and so forth.

Before setting about the activity of preparing castle sculptures, you or your kids should think over diverse novice ideas in design and shaping of the future clay structure. A clay castle can be made out of a sole piece or various parts may be joined together. Parts that are frequently thrown away as rubbish may be employed to decorate the clay castle. Besides, the main part of brilliant ideas emerges and is embodied in the process of creating clay castles.

Portrait painting itself is not the initial stage of the whole process. Visual projection of the future portrait and definite drafts are necessary to determine what background, perspective and mood to use for the painting. Contemporary artists frequently use photographs of people they are painting; however, live scenes and natural emotions will give more effect in a portrait. In addition, the chosen by you background will play major role in creation of the portrait mood.

The next stage in portrait painting is making a sketch of the prospective portrait. Sketches are usually made with the help of mild pencils or charcoal. Those tools facilitate in accentuation and emphasis on the peculiar features of a face. It’s always feasible to correct or remove something at this stage as the paint is so far not applied. Making a sketch is rather vital for the future portrait as the artists defines the contours and dimensions of the item which further on will be used as the basis.

The third stage involves the creation of the background. The background plays an essential role, especially the coloring, as it reflects the mood and the genre of the painting. This point should be thought over in details as it usually reflects the personality of a person. It should be mentioned that a ground is not merely the background itself which you’re going to cover. The ground might as well embrace clothing, interior details or parts of the painting that have a less importance.

The final stage is actually portrait painting. This step is principally a four fold activity since you start painting the face. Facial chief features go the first and are given appropriate locations: eyes, nose, eyebrows and chin. The next move is to add the coloring and light to the facial features and it’s typically done with the assistance of darker and polygonal tints and hues. Detailing all features is the next move; it is also done with the help of shades and light. The final move is to make the background and facial features merged with each other.

Stress, depression and lack of time are the constant companions of every contemporary person. Sometimes there is no one to talk about feelings and worries, so books become our closest friends. Self-help books helped millions of people worldwide, nevertheless there are still skeptics who affirm that those books have placebo effect but in reality, they do not help so much. All the advice given in such literature may assist some part of readers but be absolutely useless for the other part. This is due to the character and psyche peculiarities of every individual.

Despite the existence of skeptic viewpoints, the advantages of self-help books are considered threefold: changing mood, ability towards introspection and finding the way out. Self-help books raise spirits of hundreds, thousands of readers. That is because such books are based on personal experience of the author and testimonials of average people. Reading about the problems of other people, the reader understands that he is not alone, that there are other people just around him who feel the misery of life due to some circumstances.

Introspection is the term used in psychology to denote the ability of a person to analyze one’s own deeds, thoughts and conduct. Self-help books facilitate people in opening this ability to better understand one’s soul and mind. When the reader gets that understanding, he subconsciously reaches some level of nirvana since every thought and step might be explained by the human nature.

Finally, self-help books do not only describe other people’s experience, their emotions and suffers, they offer all possible way outs of the existing problems. And what is more important, those way outs are proven by the author’s own experience. Therefore, it is possible to find the answer to all your questions and decide on the most suitable resolution to your specific problems.

Taking landscape shot is not a simple task. There should be a special inclination towards making simple shots a real masterpiece. In addition, a photographer, starting his path in landscape shots, must learn the tips helpful in taking photos of real worth.

A photographer must remember that landscape photos differ dramatically from other types of photos. That is why, the techniques and tactics applied to the process of shooting are divergent. Prima facie, a photographer must choose the appropriate lens for taking shots. It’s advisable to choose wide-angle lens that allow capturing objects more distinctly; in addition, wide angle is used to convert a simple shot into a panorama.

To continue, landscape shots require huge accuracy as far as the slightest blow of wind might spoil the shot. In order to reach the 100% accuracy, it’s necessary to use supporting equipment like tripod camera stand. It will ensure that no natural phenomena will interfere into the creation of landscape masterpiece.

Timing of photography is of great significance when it goes about landscape shooting. Not all periods are favorable for shooting since the coloring and effects differ substantially. The best period to shoot is early morning and early evening. This time the sun doesn’t give much light which prevents undesirable specs. Besides, at this time of day the colors are more saturated and the contours are more distinct.

Finally, it is feasible to make shots not only of static objects but also of moving ones. For instance, waterfall cascades will have a perfect view if taken correctly. Surely, making a good landscape shot requires patience and time, so it’s recommended to choose weekend or vacation time for completely dedicating yourself to photography.

Low-budget films are produced not only by big companies but also by students of cinematographic departments and amateur filmmakers. Creating amateur films does not imply the refusal from human resources and attraction of investments. It is possible to refuse from high spending on expensive cars, actors or hotels, but it is impossible to refuse from imagination, creativity and employment of filmmaking equipment.

The first step in amateur filmmaking is determining what format and style the movie will be. It can be a drama, a horror film or love story. After the conceptualization of the movie type, it’s necessary to write a script; this might be done by one person or several persons if there are several plots.

To continue, film producers should find the appropriate locations with the account of all scenes that would be shot. Certainly, low budget won’t allow renting lodgings in prestigious districts, although it’s feasible to ornament the premises with necessary decorations. Hiring actors and crew is not an easy task. One should select the actors which would correspond to the images and the idea the author longs to instill. Crew will create the film from the start, so it’s needful to hire only reliable and responsible people. After this, start scheduling your shooting days: when this or that scene will be created. Make detailed scheduling for each of the actors, so there were no gaps between shootings.

When all the above mentioned points are accomplished successfully, it’s high time for shooting. Shooting will take a lot of time because the film director might have different points concerning each scene and shot. Finally, when the shooting process is over, the work on editing and attachment of film shots starts. This also takes much time, but on condition of persistent work, the result will be satisfactory.

Just a few years ago, a visitor curious about Frank Lobdell’s 15 April 1962, in the Oakland Museum of California, could have scanned its wall label to read this description of the painting: “A tightly coiled form struggles against the confines of the canvas. Thick paint, hot colors, hard lines, and a gouged surface reinforce the sense of uneasiness. They express the artist’s view of the human condition as a struggle for meaning and dignity.”

But in the four years since that text was written, curators at the Oakland Museum and countless other art institutions have initiated a quiet revolution in the way they engage and converse with visitors about the treasures in their care. These institutions are working hard to move away from what Graham W. J. Beal, director of the Detroit Institute of Arts, calls “the priestly voice of absolute authority.” Their aim now is to provide information and context about the works—and then encourage people to respond to them in their own way.

The Lobdell label was one of many given a makeover in conjunction with the reopening of the Oakland Museum. It now reads: “The horrors of Frank Lobdell’s firsthand experiences of World War II affected him deeply. With roughly coiled lines, intense colors, and a scabrous surface, Lobdell seems to be expressing the struggle of humankind, as raw paint strokes metamorphose into gnashing teeth in headless jaws.”

Gone are the formal language about painting and the pronouncement about Lobdell’s intentions. Instead, the new label places the making of the work into the context of Lobdell’s own experience and that of his times. Even the word “seems” in the final sentence cues the viewer that other interpretations of the painting are possible.

As art museums have become destinations for more socially and culturally diverse audiences, they have been working hard not only to attract visitors but also to keep them engaged once they are inside. They have come to realize that visitors who feel bored, overwhelmed, confused, or stupid are unlikely to return. “Interpretation should be the biggest priority,” says Sara Bodinson, director of interpretation and research at New York’s Museum of Modern Art.

Using both staff members and outside experts, these institutions are running focus groups and observing people strolling through the galleries. They have clocked how much time viewers spend in front of an object and how much time they spend reading a label, and noted whether they look back at an object after reading about it.

They know how many words visitors can tolerate in object labels (about 50), room labels (no more than 150), or longer introductory texts (300 is the maximum). They know that most visitors spend ten seconds in front of an object—seven to read the label, three to examine the thing itself. They know that for most people museum fatigue sets in after about 45 minutes. And they have learned that the issues and questions on the minds of visitors are often the most basic:

* I don’t know where to start.
* I don’t know what to look at first.
* Have I looked at this long enough?
* What does circa mean?
* Your labels make me feel stupid.
* How did the artist make this?
* Why would a museum put this on display?
* Is this really art?

“We cannot make assumptions today about what people know,” says Geri Thomas, founder of the art consulting and staffing firm Thomas & Associates.

The Detroit Institute of Arts determined in 2000 that it needed to reexamine its own assumptions about visitors—and wound up giving the museum a complete makeover. Curators, educators, community members, security guards, and marketing experts were assigned to cross-departmental teams to generate ideas about how each gallery might be made more comprehensible and welcoming. Outside consultants helped with strategy and research.

Staff members succeeded in developing a range of interpretive strategies, including a spectacular high-tech projection designed to draw people into the undervisited decorative-arts wing. At that installation, visitors sit around a virtual dining table and “participate” in an 18th-century French feast, with courses served on the same porcelain plates they see in the display cases lining the room.

In other communities, museums such as the Oakland Museum or Houston’s Museum of Fine Arts are convening local panels to help write and vet labels.

The museums also want to introduce the voices of artists into the viewing experience. “One of the things people tell us is that they want to connect with the artist,” says Nancy J. Blomberg, curator of native arts at the Denver Art Museum. With master teacher Heather Nielsen, Blomberg is reinstalling the collection to focus on the artists behind the objects. A large touch-screen version of Jaune Quick-to-See Smith’s 2004 painting Trade Canoe for Don Quixote, for example, will allow visitors to zoom in on specific sections and hear the artist talk about them.

A pioneer of the new interpretive methods is the Newark Museum, which hoped to make its collection of 12,000 objects more relevant to its increasingly blue-collar community. In 1992, when the museum began restoring the Ballantine House, an 1885 mansion that anchors one side of its campus, a team was created to rethink how to guide visitors through the grand rooms full of such esoteric treasures as a peacock chair from the Philippines and silver-gilt gas sconces. Decorative arts curator Ulysses Grant Dietz and his team reoriented the traditional focus of the exhibition from “house” to “home,” hoping to touch on the ways in which all people construct comfort and shelter for themselves and their families.

Rather than identifying each object with the classic “tombstone” label (artist-date-medium), the team came up with three ways to convey information. The first is a fictional narrative about a housemaid displayed in a storybook, with a new page opening in each room. The maid’s daily chores, such as laying coal fires or polishing silver, cumulatively create a sense of the activity in a grand home in the 19th century. Wall quotations in each room also draw attention to themes such as “Are we doing the ‘right’ thing?” which introduces information about the etiquette of the period and invites visitors to think about how manners have changed. Finally, traditional information is presented in each room in a laminated flip chart that challenges visitors to take up a kind of treasure hunt: “Can you guess what no. 3 is?”

Even at the more conservative Metropolitan Museum of Art, director Thomas Campbell stresses that “it is incumbent on us as an institution to be much more sensitive to the diverse audiences that come here.” He and his staff are reviewing a visitor-experience study that addresses everything from banners to maps to the signage that directs people around the museum. “The second component of the study is a new look at the way we deliver the didactic information,” Campbell says. “We want to be engaging our audience. Even a small anecdote can make a difference.”

Contemporary-art museums have generally lagged in adopting new interpretation practices, even though visitors frequently complain that the work stumps them, that they don’t know where—or why—to look. “For visitors who aren’t familiar with contemporary art, there’s a feeling that they’re being tricked,” acknowledges Whitney Museum education director Kathryn Potts. “Our job is to strike a balance between the artist’s wishes and our responsibility as an institution to make the work accessible to the public.” That balance, she adds, “isn’t so easy to get right.” Roni Horn’s recent retrospective, for example, was given the spare installation the artist wanted. Labels were clustered at the entrance to each gallery, rather than displayed next to individual works. An introductory wall panel, video interviews with the artist, and a take-home brochure were also available.

Situated at the far end of the interpretation spectrum is Houston’s Menil Collection, which has no education department and no docents. Its founders, John and Dominique de Menil, believed that art objects had an inherent spiritual life of their own. “Perhaps only silence and love do justice to a great work of art,” Dominique once said. The museum upholds this founding philosophy: labels are minimal and works are hung relatively low so that they “address the viewer’s body in a direct way,” according to associate curator Kristina Van Dyke. “And we hang work minimally, so you can have a one-on-one experience with a work of art.”

Other contemporary institutions, such as the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, have come to see language as critical to their mission. The Walker now assigns “audience engagement” teams, composed of designers, marketers, editors, and curators, to come up with interpretation plans for each exhibition. “And we’re very sensitive about the language we use,” says chief curator Darsie Alexander. “We’re not talking to each other. We’re talking to a person who could be entering the space for the first time, or a person who’s got a very sophisticated frame of reference.”

At the Art Institute of Chicago, whose contemporary-art collection recently expanded into a spacious new wing, curators have begun using the security staff, museum educators, and visitor-services employees to provide interpretive help to viewers encountering such challenging works as Robert Gober’s 800-square-foot installation Untitled (1989–96). As part of the expansion, new interpretive labels of up to 150 words have been created for every object on view. “We strive very much to include as much specific information about a work as we can. And we try to include the artist’s voice as much as possible,” says Lisa Dorin, assistant curator of contemporary art.

Other institutions tackle the “I’ll never understand this” response to contemporary art by quoting artists in their labels, by featuring a response from a community member, or by asking a viewer for his or her own thoughts about a work. In Oakland, for instance, poet Jaime Cortez was hired to write “personal perspective” labels for pieces in the collection; they not only convey his experience looking at a work, but suggest a way of looking for other viewers. “This is a hard working sculpture,” Cortez wrote about Ruth Asawa’s woven copper wire sculpture Untitled (1959). “It is defining an inside space without enclosing that space. It is turning its own shadow into art. It is showing you many faces as you circle it. It is taking the delicate art of crocheting and making it lift weights. Most of all, it is using one plain piece of wire to map a winding path of transformation.”

But retrofitting centuries of museum practices with new interpretation strategies requires time, money, precious gallery space, the support of the entire institution, and firm direction from the top. “This kind of wholesale change—which is putting the visitor at the center of our thinking—is an attitudinal change,” says Kelly McKinley, director of education and public programming at the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto.

At the Oakland Museum, executive director Lori Fogarty acknowledges that team-based interpretive practices “put the curator more in the role of a kind of moderator rather than a sole author. Curators are experts in their fields, and in an art museum the curator typically develops an entire project. That’s a lot of authority and control to let go of.”

Teamwork demands time to study visitor needs before an exhibition, as well as follow-up evaluations to determine what has succeeded and what has failed. Some museums, such as the Detroit Institute, have even hired full-time evaluators to ensure that new interpretation strategies live up to their promise. And, increasingly, institutions such as Oakland are using visitors to test-drive new galleries, where signage can be tweaked even after they open.

The wall-label revolution does have its detractors. Some worry that scholarship will suffer and that writing will be “dumbed down” for the widest public. In a 2009 exhibition review, for example, New York Times critic Ken Johnson disparaged the Newark Museum’s irksome “curatorial commentary.” Educated visitors who liked their local institutions just the way they were complain that valuable treasures have been consigned to storage so that signs can be bigger and exhibitions more interactive. Still others long for the exalted hush that hung over the galleries—a hush that increasingly is being replaced by conversation and activity.

But the majority of visitors are telling museums that they can’t relate to endless corridors of objects that appear to have been born with their labels. Audiences now want to touch the art, to have conversations in the galleries, to make their own work in response to what they see, to peer into the inner workings of a museum, to converse with artists and challenge curators.

And museums are listening. Visitors should keep their eyes on those little labels—and the new touch screens, videos, and activity stations that supplement them—as they increasingly are invited into what museum consultant Douglas Worts has called “a new form of partnership” that activates “the muses within all of us.”

Over the past week, dozens of brightly-painted pianos have appeared on the streets of London and New York.

In a square next to St Paul’s Cathedral, in the City of London, a man wanders over to an upright piano, plays three notes and then walks quickly away. Nearby, at the Millennium Bridge, a group of Spanish students crash out the chords of Deep Purple’s Smoke on the Water, segueing into Beethoven’s For Elise.

Chopsticks is noticeable by its absence. The street pianos are the brainchild of British artist Luke Jerram whose Play Me, I’m Yours project has been touring cities globally since 2008. This year the project is being presented simultaneously in London and New York. “This isn’t about me and my creativity,” says Jerram, speaking by phone from a piano in New York’s Times Square. “The pianos act as a blank canvas for everyone else’s creativity. This is an opportunity for people to express themselves and connect with one other. You get strangers giving each other piano lessons.” It can lead to unexpected results. “There were two journalists who met over a piano in Sydney who recently got married.”

In London, 21 street pianos have been placed in public gardens, streets and squares until 10 July 2010 to celebrate the City of London Festival. In New York, there are 60 pianos in the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island. “I’ve just met Cyndi Lauper – she was playing a piano in Times Square,” says Jerram. “There are lots of people who are trying to play all the pianos in one day – so there’s a lot of fun to be had.” He adds: “I’ve got another eight more cities to go this year – Belfast, all the way to Cincinnati. It costs 10 times as much to do it here as in London because of the level of bureaucracy.”

Street performers

At London’s Millennium Bridge piano, a man sits and plays an improvised piece that captivates a passing skateboarder. The impromptu pianist is Maximilian White, an Italian living in London. “I think it’s a brilliant idea,” he says. “A lot of people are too embarrassed to play but they’ve got a lot of hidden talent. Sometimes encouragement comes from within, but sometimes you need help.” Jonathan Brandon, a student in London, strikes up a tune at the same piano. “I think it’s a really neat idea. I play music in general, so I’m always attracted to the opportunity to sit down and play an instrument whenever I can.”

Canadian Ryan Ard, visiting from Ottawa, plays a simple melody from a song he’s writing on the guitar. “A lot of times I walk past music shops and I want to walk inside and play an instrument to kill 10 minutes – so it’s great to have it out on the street like this.” From 1-4 July, the Millennium Bridge piano will be linked by webcam with the piano in Times Square. Although the pianos are out on the streets for several days, Luke Jerram says vandalism hasn’t been a major problem. “We’ve had one or two vandalised in Bristol, but with the 60 in New York there’s been no problems so far. “In Sao Paulo a piano costs a year’s wage and none were stolen – what’s important is the art project reaches a diverse audience. “You’ve to take some risks to be able to reach people who don’t ordinarily get access to art and go to galleries.” After the event the pianos are donated to local schools and community groups.

From BBC Arts.

Family spokesman Mickey Cottrell says Allen died at his Hollywood home on Sunday.

Allen played Buzz Gunderson in the 1955 movie. His character loses a knife fight with Dean’s and dies when his stolen car plunges off a cliff during a “chicken run” challenge.

Allen had a number of other TV and film roles before turning to television directing in 1969. In 1984, he won an Emmy for directing an episode of “Hill Street Blues.”

He also directed the two-hour pilot for “Star Trek: The Next Generation” as well as episodes of that series and the follow up, “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.”