rob ray

Derek Lowe's "Things I Won't Work With" is an amazing list of blog posts detailing all the crazy things chemicals can do to you.

For example his chlorine trifluoride post starts off this way...

"Let's put it this way: during World War II, the Germans were very interested in using it in self-igniting flamethrowers, but found it too nasty to work with. It is apparently about the most vigorous fluorinating agent known, and is much more difficult to handle than fluorine gas. That’s one of those statements you don’t get to hear very often, and it should be enough to make any sensible chemist turn around smartly and head down the hall in the other direction."

Ha! There's a pretty funny/cool article in this Friday's Chicago Tribune on Hyde Park Arts Center's Artist Run show. While I haven't seen the show, I've heard from a lot of folks the show is awesome. Big props to HPAC and Allison Peters Quinn and Britton Bertran for taking on the show - it must of been brutal (and also fascinating) to curate.

Philip had sent me an email saying "Your cooler is in the HPAC." as I had given it to him on loan to use for shows at VONZWECK after I stopped doing shows at DEADTECH. Funnily this gets a mention in the article. "And VONZWECK, amid the remains of its defunct gallery, lists a beer cooler on “permanent loan” from Deadtech."

Yay! Bucky's Animal Spirit is on Wooster Collective!

Woop! Bucky's Animal Spirit is featured on Hack A Day!

Just saw Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky last night at Kuma's. It was totally great eating the first burger I've had in 8 years while watching this splatterfest.

Hey Hey! I'm extremely pleased to announce my new experimental short Canaries in the Coalmine will be screening at Chicago Filmmaker's Onion City Experimental Film Festival in Chicago June 16th - 20th, 2009!

5243 N. Clark St.Chicago, IL 60640 [map]

If you're in Chicago during that time make sure to check out the fest. You can see last year's award winners on their Call for Entries page.

Woop!

Last night I enjoyed a delicious beer with Jen, Colleen, Adele, Rebecca and Doug. It was a fascinating swirl of discussion about the red dots in chicken eggs, making mole, and cyptozoology; and a great way to slide into the Memorial Day holiday.

I was amazed to learn that Colleen and Adele's place is atop the stairs made infamous in The Three Stooges "An Ache In Every Stake" episode. For you Three Stooges fans, this is the episode where Larry, Curly and Moe try to deliver blocks of ice up an insanely long flight of stairs on a hot day, turning the block of ice into a tiny melted cube at the top. This episode would always crack me up as a kid and here I was at the top of those stairs sipping Maudite!

I found the original 1941 black and white episode on crackle (below) and the 2004 colorized version on YouTube and more detail than you've ever wanted to know about the episode on wikipedia.

Woo hoo!

My new 12 minute video "Canaries in the Coalmine" has been selected for screening at the DIGIT 2009 Digital Media Exhibition and is the winner of their "Excellence in Cinematography" prize

If you're near the area, you can check it out from Friday June 12 through July 4th

Delaware Arts Center 37 Main Street Narrowsburg, NY. [google map]

I'm accepting submissions for my new "anarchists cookbook" collection of recipes (a better title forthcoming). I would love to get your recipes and your thoughts on their relationship to governance!

This is a continuation of a piece I created last year titled "These cookies are, like, tha bomb." examining chocolate chip cookies and nuclear weaponry as the primary American intellectual exports of WWII.

Please email me if you're intrigued! (Submissions accepted through August 30th 2009)

NOTE: and by recipes, i mean for eating. Not for blowing shit up and picking locks. There's already an anarchist cookbook filled with all that stuff.

Still wondering what the hell I'm talking about? Here are some thoughts that got me to this point.

• Food as a unique fetish object and delivery mechanism for an idea about the world.
• Foods you prepare for a specific task (ex: a meal you like cook for collaborators while working with a group - and any thoughts you have about why that meal is reflective of group.)
• Food/recipes with a unique history.
• Food as a socio-political weapon.
• Food used in torture.
• Food used as embargo.
• How does a certain food resonate in our collective memory? ex: Apple Pie
• Military MRE recipes/preparation methods.
• Bio-engineered foods. Good/Evil/Neither?
• A friend of mine Deb and I had a great little email exchange about the religious symbology of "Hot Cross Buns". She whipped up a tasty looking batch of Anarchy Cross Buns that combine the classic hot cross bun with the and the Anarchist Black Cross.

"Without You I Am Nothing" has gotten a thoughtful write-up by Albert Stabler in Proximity Magazine! The show features my "Undisclosed Locations #1" piece among others.

The show is curated by Anne Elizabeth Moore. The Chicago show is at The Green Lantern Gallery in Chicago, IL [map] The show is travelling to Providence this year as well.

Bert's comment on "Undisclosed Locations #1"

"Rob Ray, who ran Chicago’s amazing tech-art space, Deadtech, for about ten years, created a stunningly crafted 3-D paper piece extolling viewers to start their own DIY art and performance spaces."