Seriously?

via The Economist (via my mom, thanks!):

MUCH fanfare greeted the $388m made by Christie's post-war and contemporary evening sale in New York earlier this month-its highest total ever. Few seemed to notice that the auction was unprecedented in another way: it had ten lots by eight women artists, amounting to a male-to-female ratio of five-to-one. (Sotheby's evening sale offered a more typical display of male-domination with an 11-to-one ratio.) Yet proceeds on all the works by women artists in the Christie's sale tallied up to a mere $17m-less than 5% of the total and not even half the price achieved that night by a single picture of two naked women by Yves Klein. Indeed, depictions of women often command the highest prices, whereas works by them do not.

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Going to the Moooovies: A Strategy

Flickr Creative Commons License photo by puuikibeach

I live in the northeast. My momma always said "March blows in like a lion and out like a lamb," but usually the month ends cold, in heaps of frost-covered mud. This year it was nearly ninety in mid-March, and I was on the beach wondering why I hadn't thought to bring my bikini. If the year continues in its current fashion, the summer heat is going to be out-of-control oppressive. That means it's perfect movie-watching weather, but with tickets costing upwards of 10 dollars a pop it pays to choose wisely. In the spirit of generosity and in anticipation of a truly scorching summer, I hereby lay out my five-point strategy for finding the best films to get you through the heat.

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Collaborative Consumption

via Seth Lemmons on flickrThere are many ways in which the word "share" has taken on new meaning in recent years. This article, "Meet the Collaborative Consumer," which I recently wrote for Fortune.com, explores how the language around "collaborative consumption" (which I posted a TED video about previously) can often conflate touchy-feely ideas of sharing with a kind of relationship monetization made possible by the internet.

Reality Bends

Reality bends for you

but it is all, all bent already.

Certainly,

this is the way it works.

Even steel, it rusts.

And culture, it rusts.

Certainly, certainly.

We forgot

nothing is certain.

Just this.

The world turns by forgetting.

But I forget, you know.

I forget.

A Letter to ThirtySomethings from a TwentySomething

 

Most of you can empathize with my rants about the pains of being in your twenties because you’re here with me. Who's tired?! Thought so. Whereas, the rest of you would like to pat me on the head and say, “Aw, I remember those times.” And I'm specifically talking to you thirty somethings. We all know that you know better than us. I mean, aren’t the twenties just plowing through an amateur experience-buffet of life lessons in order to reach the clarity soaked thirties? So, I ask all of you who were born in 1982 or before to tell me about how green the grass is on the other side. Where, exactly, is all of our twenties prep work going?

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fakers

We're really still having this argument.

During a strange life-transition phase in NYC I wrote copy for Victoria's Secret catalogue (pause for laughter) and I used to get page copies with models' rather perfect bodies decorated in red pen, sorority style, circling nooks and crannies to be manipulated and airbrushed away. 

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letters

I love my mother and I don't write her enough letters. I've owned the URL savethepostoffice.us for 2+ years because empty mailboxes make me sad and I thought one day to document that old fashioned, hand written, lick-stamped giving and receiving.

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Photos of the Body

A really interesting piece on the NYT Lens blog about photographer Jen Davis's self portraits. Check it out.

Produce, Produce, Produce!

On the 25th I'm heading to Buffalo (where once, en route, I threatened to piss in a cup if they didn't pull the bus over) for a "Life After AmeriCorps" training to hear about how my Next Step should be another year of living in poverty. I can confidently say that I will not be pursing another year of service. It's not because I think it sucks, I'm just not the AmeriCorps type (clearly, I'm a bad ass and don't care for social justice). I wish I could have been that perfect golden child that could enter a flailing, outdated nonprofit and give it a makeover using my naive idealism, social media skills, and a PowerPoint, but meh. Who's got the energy for such back patting? Overall, working at three different sites this year has been a "great experience," but I'm just not into it. 

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College Dating, Game Playing, and How Modern Technology Can Make You Crazy

I had a funny relationship with a guy I call “Staple”. He had a septum piercing at the time we met, which looked to me like he was reckless with a stapler and accidentally got his nose. Despite this, I thought he was a real catch. Aside from my freshman roommate, he was the first person I met when I arrived at school. We first crossed paths on the steps of our university chapel at an ice cream social. My roommate, myself, and some other freshman had formed a circle on the steps when Staple decided to join in. He sat right in the center of the circle and said nothing, not even an introduction. I asked his name. He was painfully awkward and painfully good-looking.

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