Tiji, more from the same ad campaign

New billboards in Paris present the 2nd leg of the amazing Tiji (a kid's channel) campaign. I already mentionned this visuals here last year.


This drawings are signed by Richard N'Go under the artistic supervision of Pierrette Diaz for the agency DDB. Kuddoes.


This last one is probably my favorite... I didn't see it in the streets though. A special shout-outs to the parents?

The Futur Triangle of the Porte de Versailles

The news just broke. A fantastic glass triangle should be built in the Parc des Expositions de la Porte de Versailles, in Paris. This 180-meter tall skyscrappers should host hotels (for the numerous business visitors), conference rooms, temporary offices, shopping areas, etc.

This project is signed Herzog & De Meuron (they built Beijing's famous "Bird's Nest") and could rise in 2010-2012.

I find this project a lot more exciting than the future (ecological, but black and square-shaped) tower designed by Jean Nouvel on the Défense business district. I can't wait to see this bridge between Paris's XVth arrondissement, and the suburband cities of Vanves and Issy-Les-Moulineaux... According to Paris's mayor Bertrand Delanoë, some 5,000 jobs should be created.

New Tahiti 80 album

Tahiti 80's first single, "Heartbeat"


This small band from Rennes, France, is already releasing its fourth album (many more EPs in between). The first one, released in 1999, had caught my ear with the perfect "Heartbeat".

"Big Day", first single of the album Fosbury (2005)


After a short 2 year hyatus during which Xavier Boyer was working on a solo project (Axe Riverboy), the original lineup is back.

"1,000 Times", one of my favorite Tahiti 80 songs, on the album "Wallpaper For The Soul", the most electronic opus to date, in 2002

The new album, Activity Center, is just out. Its more rocky sounds still capture the etheral and fun spirit of Tahiti 80.

"Changes", with a rather cool video (2005)


Their official website, click here.
For their MySpace, it's here.

Lehman Brothers - New York City

The business bank Lehman Brothers closes its doors...
I'm wondering what's gonna happen to the superb building in which it had its New York offices next to Times Square.










Untwist is the company that manufactured this LED screens. More info on their website: http://www.untwist.com/

They did it!

Dots Obsession

La Grande Halle de la Villette in Paris presents an installation by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama in the frame of its "intercultural dialog: when different types of madness meet".

Dots Obsessions is a multitude of inflattable pink baloons with black dots, some of which you can enter, see pictures below.

Kusama, who's considered at the avant-garde of Japanese art scene started her work in the 1950s with Andy Warhol. She stages her nightmares and child hallucinations (such as dots). She states that her "life is like a dot, lost among thousands of other dots".

Kusama hovers between minimal virtuosity and destructive madness... In 1973, ill, she goes home to Japan and destroys many of her pieces. She's been living ever since in an instution that treats insanity by artistic expression. She's had a workshop built next to her clinic.

These huge pink bubbles provoke a weird feeling in every visitor, they're first surprised and amused, walking through this light and imposing figures. The dots then almost subjugate and absorb the audience's attention. On a screen, a short movies shows us the artist in a pink wig reciting a daunting poem.


The artist's website: click here.
Through Aug. 17, 2008 only at the Grande Halle de la Villette in Paris (metro Porte de Pantin). Hurry, no entry fee, closes at 10 pm.

Erwin Olaf - Paradise

Erwin Olaf is a Dutch photographer born in 1959.


Olaf lives in Amsterdam since 1980, his work got praised in 1988 with the "Chessmen" series, showing naked bodies (obese or pregnant women, young and vivid young men) enbodying the different pawns of a dusty chess game.


Through his work, the artist explores different themes like gender, sensuality, humor, despair and grace...


"Paradise", that I chose to represent here, is a series of photographs from 2001 focusing on a dark and baroque world inhabited by obscure clowns that express both happiness and sadness.


Erwin Olaf also got some attention in 1999 with the flamboyant and provocative visuals of a Diesel campaign that won the Lion d'Argent in Cannes. We also remember his beautiful white and red creations for Lavazza.


Olaf twork on video too, he directed some more or less disturbing shorts in the 2000s.


To close the series, the artist presented a series of portraits of the characters of the scenes. Important: click on the images to enlarge them, they're quite big, enabling you to observe the details of those peculiar faces.


Erwin Olaf's website: click here!

True Blood in September on HBO!

A VERY exciting news for "Six Feet Under" fans, like me! Alan Ball, the creator of the most upsetting show on tv ever, is back with "True Blood", the adaptation of Charlaine Harris's novels "Southern Vampires Mysteries" in September on American premium channel HBO.

The marketing campaign for the new show is like SFU's first episode in 2001, with fake ads. Here, it's about a synthetic blood that a Japanese lab developped in order to enable vampires to live among humans (promising, right?). Here's the fake site: trubeverage.com



Another video shows a poor little vampire kicked out of a regular dating website... (here: lovebitten.net). I love the double entendres on how difference is treated, I also love the double (even triple) sense to the word "suck"...



Here's a promo a little more classical that (I admit) reminds me a little of Buffy, but let's trust Mr. Ball and his irresistible cast (lead by Anna Paquin from "The Piano" and "X-Men") on this one. To be continued...

Olympics: Matthew Mitcham

On the cover of the American influential gay monthly The Advocate: Matthew Mitcham (born March 2, 1988 in Brisbane) who recently came out of the closet. One can understand why the (gay) blogosphere suddenly got super interested in this discipline and most particularly to this young talent ;)

The interview states that Mitcham does not want to be compared with Greg Louganis, an American diver born in 1960 who came out in the 90s. Which is a shame cause Louganis posed naked in Playgirl in 1987 before starting writing books...

Below, some nice dives during the 2008 Shenzhen competition.



Good luck for the games Matthew!!

Pete Burns, the Ultimate Queer Diva

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