Art

I’ll admit that the actual GIF by Momma Tried  is perfectly web safe. But it sets up documentation of a NSFW butt tattoo, that might just be the most beautiful inking I’ve ever seen. This image comes from their tumblr account, which doesn’t seem too active, but we’ll use this as an excuse to plug Momma Tried Magazine’s Instagram account, which takes glamor to a new unsettling level. In it, you’ll see a grocery store cake with eyelashes, a women wearing pearlescent teeth, and passed out dog in mardi gras garb. It’s really just about the best thing out there.

Okay, who is buying &#8220;I &#8220;spot&#8221; Damien Hirst&#8221; t-shirts for their kids and why??? <ul> <li>This seems pretty big for creatives in Sacramento: $500,000 has been allocated to a pilot program that will fund art, tech and food projects with a public benefit. [The Sacramento Bee]</li> </ul> <ul> <li>A kinda sorta rags to riches story about art dealer Peter Loughrey, who began his career as a stunt man living out of his van, got life-threatening cancer, and is now a rich art dealer. [CNBC]</li> </ul> <ul> <li>Governor&#8217;s Island will remain open for the fall for the first time ever. [Curbed]</li> </ul> <ul> <li>Dorothea and Leo Rabkin Foundation has awarded grants to $50,000 each to eight arts journalists. The prize totals $400,000. Winners are Phong Bui (publisher of...</li></ul>

Apple is always looking to diversify their emoji collections. In the past few updates, we&#8217;ve seen new pictograms specifying everything from lesbian moms to personalized skin tones for emoticons. They ditched the gun emoji. And most usefully, added a taco. But this latest update seems to be taking things in a slightly more absurd direction? We can now send each other djinns, elves, a T-Rex, zombies, and somebody doing yoga. [Though, to be fair, I did find this GIF in an article with a more predictably-Apple headline: &#8220;Apple&#8217;s new emojis include a breastfeeding mother and a woman in hijab&#8220;.] But when will finally have a button for breastfeeding hijab-wearing same-sex-parenting dinosaurs with variable skin...

LOS ANGELES- Someone once described L.A. to me as feeling “less like a city, and more like post-apocalyptic suburbia.” Given the doom-and-gloom tenor of national political and global crises, it&#8217;s no surprise that this place has become such a topic of fascination for the art world.  Below its veneer of conspicuous consumption, it’s a city known for cults, secret societies, and a near-Biblical litany of pending natural and climate-change-related disasters. Los Angeles is where the American Dream was symbolically forged, and unravels splendidly. I can’t think of a better artist to inaugurate an institution here—one housed in a trippy, abandoned 1960s Masonic lodge, no less—than longtime...

<ul> <li>Baltimore Clayworks, a much-beloved ceramic studio and education nonprofit, is filing for chapter 7 bankruptcy after 37 years. Frustratingly, it seems like the board didn’t cooperate with the community in attempting to resolve their cash flow problems, and instead were relying on a real estate deal that fell through. [The Baltimore Sun]</li> <li>Speaking of closures/real estate deals, The Hard Times continues to roll out the best headlines on the internet: “Record Store You Didn’t Shop at Becomes Condo You Can’t Afford”. [The Hard Times]</li> <li>I guess this is what it looks like when a reporter who begins with no knowledge of the art world writes about the art world’s transition to online sales. That...</li></ul>