l’Art Pour le Blart
Ach, I guess we shouldn’t let this one get too stale. Can’t finish everything to a high degree of doneness.
Ed Morrissey, HotAir:
Picture of the dayI got this earlier tonight from Hot Air reader Dave T in Los Angeles, who swears he saw this across the street from CBS Studios in West Hollywood. He sent it from his iPhone, with this note:
I’m always surprised to see conservative guerilla art in LA. But considering it’s only been a week since O’Keefe and Giles’ first ACORN tape was released, seeing this was downright shocking.
If this is on the level, it’s certainly positioned for maximum effect:
It’s not that it’s difficult to fool Special Ed. In fact he’s learned to fool himself, to foolsturbate, since entering Michelle Malkin’s employ and therefore her clutches, and finding himself required to spin the balls and honk the horns like the other seals there.1
But it’s interesting, given the suspicion raised at Eastsider LA that the anti-Acorn stencilings are just Fairey being airy, that is to say artsturbating, to see that Hot Air reader Dave T believed implicitly that they were markings of his own tribe,2 yet further, that he found them “shocking.” It’s, uh, like, a verbatim Acorn logo with an ironic label underneath. If this is shocking, then what is it when you’re chased up the basement stairs by skeletons on pogo sticks?
No, but being a wingnut, Dave T would naturally find it difficult to say, “I haven’t seen anything like this before, and don’t know where it came from.” Because as conservatives always remind liberals, they deal in ‘facts’ (i.e. certainties), while we are all about ‘feelings’ and ‘relativism’ (i.e., the sense of imperfect knowledge and unsettled fate that divides us from the Medieval — meaning the wingnut and his theological reasoning and neo-feudalist social ideals — and that makes the ancient Greeks seem the most, among historical kladoi,3 like people we’d enjoy hanging out with).
Instead, he had to wedge in an imaginary continuum of “conservative guerilla art” that he thinks must exist and therefore does, although he would truthfully be surprised to see some, and so is surprised whenever he does see some of it, every single time, for instance here with this super-surprising anti-Acorn stencil.
It’s not that conservative guerilla art is unknown. It’s that Hot Air reader Dave T seems like that guy.
On the level or not, it made my evening.
Update: Via Midas in the comments, Media Bistro reports it’s legit — and it’s gone viral in LA:
The link goes to a Mediabistro Fishbowl LA report on the same Eastsider LA piece, and does not report:
1) That it is legit,
2) That it has ‘gone viral’ in LA.
Ah well. You get the feeling that the guys at HotAir are on a bit of a treadmill, in terms of Malkin yelling at them for not meeting quota.
Let’s go to Free Republic and see what the even-slightly-more-crazies are saying:
Free Republic:
Anti-ACORN Guerilla Art Popping Up in LAOne example of Anti-ACORN Guerilla Art Popping Up in LA. For the other photo visit Hot Air.
To: Minus_The_Bear
I believe they are photoshopped.
They were both done with the same stencil if they were in fact painted.
However, if you zoom in you will see the pixelation pattern in and around the grafitti is different from the rest of the photo. It’s especially evident in the photo of the wall and photographer.
18 posted on Thursday, September 17, 2009 10:14:05 PM by sonofagun
To: sonofagun
I doubt they were Photoshopped. But I have no way to vouch for them. Multiple LA blogs have reported on it.
The photographer in the photo is Gary Leonard who is somewhat of a celebrity photog. His photo may show up online at some point.
22 posted on Thursday, September 17, 2009 10:22:10 PM by Minus_The_Bear
To: Minus_The_Bear
I doubt they were Photoshopped.
Anybody with photo editing software can download these pics and look at them. I’m convinced they’re frauds.
I’ll see if I can figure out how to post a close up.
Like I said, the pic with the photographer shows a very obvious pixelation problem in and around the grafitti when zoomed in. It was pasted on the wall via PC, not paint.
The otherphoto has some dappled sunlight all over the sidewalk and the monument, but the paint doesn’t show the dappled sunlight pattern save for one spot that looks like the perpetrator tried to airbrush in with a photo editor.
24 posted on Thursday, September 17, 2009 10:35:57 PM by sonofagun
And some nefarious plotter would try to photographically fake a stenciled design on a flat surface in order to…? Oh, why ask why. The closeup above isn’t exactly what he was talking about, but uh, neither is anything else if you see what I’m saying. Urk, plurf.
1Alas, not long ago, Morrissey was considered an ‘honest conservative’ and a good-faith arguer, while today his writing and therefore thinking (if you accept Orwell’s equivocation of the two, and additionally the proposition that Morrissey still engages in thinking) is no longer about what he thinks conservatives would be right to do next, but about why you should think the things they just did are right. It’s spaded full of the figurative Orf! Orf! and the clapping of the flippers by which wingnuts recognize one another and form, less figuratively, into their natural multicellular mode of life.
2 The wingnut in plural is by nature an angry and irrational mob (although not necessarily a harmful or even unpleasant one), exuberant in its ability to cooperate and act collectively, even totally arbitrarily if it pleases, in just the way that the wingnut in atomized, unicellular form is normally too alienated and islanded unto himself to do — too independent in the sense of having achieved a lone stubbornness against society telling him what to think or who to be, while being surlily dependent on life’s bosses and gym teachers, life’s cops and DMV clerks, in telling him what to do.
The proto-wingnut is also so weak in conviction as to be attracted by the blame siren of a Limbaugh, a Coughlin, a Charles Lindbergh in his color-shirted Baroque mood — by the nearly invariant solicitation of the political right as it scoops up the disenchanted who have been abandoned by liberalism. These are the anomied victims of so-called late capitalism’s rapid absorption and dissolution of home, family, society, values, and all that is solid, that melts in Marxian fashion into air: “Are you angry?” the pitch goes, “Do you feel like you’ve been spun around once too often? Do you have less than you naturally deserve? Well, friend, we want you with us.” This is the thrift of the so-called Producer Class: It never restores what it destroys, but it sure recycles its garbage.
The wingnut mob is a mode of life similar to that achieved by the mycetozoans, the amoeba-like organisms that compound into slime molds and are thus able creep metazoically across the forest floor. It would be more similar if slime molds were deployed and directed via remote control by some weird, aggressive fungus that wanted to clear the area of competitor species.
Another way not unprofitably to look at it: They come together to form a giant stubot, i.e. a robot made of stupid. These are good for menacing cities (or countrysides — why not?), but if you form one to try to get a bridge built or a literacy project funded, if you order one to do anything positive or constructive, it will set about doing random, weird things (like trying to defund bridge construction in order to let bridges compete to build each other, then deciding that literacy looks ‘a little racy’ and writing broadsides against it, meanwhile growing wrathful against what must clearly be a secret cabal of bridge saboteurs) until it’s really just menacing the city anyway. Without constant goading and incitement to anger, a stubot will lose interest in itself and fall apart.
2 I.e., Echtes Flügelnuss, or l’Art Cru et Fou des Ailes-Ecrous.
3 A made-up Greek plural of klados, or clade, that came from a failed pun on the related taxonomic word, taxon, as in ‘a taxon-spend liberal’ or in the worst failure of all, ‘a middle-klados taxon cut.’ Oh, don’t look at me like that; it’s not like I’m Mr. Quality on the best of days.
if you accept Orwell’s equivocation of the two
Shirley you mean ‘conflation’.
It’s, uh, like, a verbatim Acorn logo with an ironic label underneath
“Verbatim”??!! But, but, the typeface is wrong!!
the paint doesn’t show the dappled sunlight pattern
Could this be because the sunlight is falling on the other side of the monument?
then what is it when you’re chased up the basement stairs by skeletons on pogo sticks?
Best. Harryhausen sequence. Evar.
Could this be because the sunlight is falling on the other side of the monument?
Braggart.
It can’t be conservative guerrilla art, there are no misspellings.
A made-up Greek plural of klados, or clade, that came from a failed pun on the related taxonomic word, taxon, as in ‘a taxon-spend liberal’ or in the worst failure of all, ‘a middle-klados taxon cut.’
Freaky, man, I had been looking up cladograms for some smartassery on the thread preceding this one. Synchronicity of snark!
It would be more similar to this if slime molds were deployed and directed via remote control by some that wanted to clear the area of competitor species.
How about flying monkeys, deployed by an evil witch?
~
Monkeys are too sapient to be compared to wingnuts.
How about Rupert Murdoch = evil witch?
~
The Right’s entire decision-making philosophy for the last fifty years, summed up in just nine words.
Also, the flying monkeys are happy to be free of the Wicked Witch once Dorothy melts her. If the monkeys were wingnuts, they’d name an airport after the old crone.
Wait, wingnuts like graffiti now? I thought it was vandalism that only those people engage in?
There’s a lot of butthurt in Special Ed’s Kiddie Corps of Commenters, as well. Seems to be going around (see Allahpundit’s commenters via previous post–if you really need to).
Ah, kerning. This stencil really has them confused, doesn’t it? And correct me if you know otherwise, but I am reading this not as right-wing art but more of that of ironic urban art (i.e., not right wing, but “above mere politics.”).
Or something.
dappled sunlight all over the sidewalk and the monument
Sweet jesus goddamn fucking key-rist, you Freeper cretin, it’s not a monument, it’s a traffic signal control box.
Monument! Tell us more about your acute “kerning” ability. Gaaah!!
The ironic tag beneath pretty much proves it’s non-wing, wouldn’t you say? Unless the stencil, too, is more flipperBelieve me, the average clown driving down the street doesn’t know from ACORN.
Upon further kerning I can confirm that the HA photo is indeed of the southeast corner of Beverly & Fairfax (City of L. A., not WeHo, & CBS Television City, not CBS Studio Center, which is in Studio City) & that isn’t fucking sunlight “dappling” the “monument,” it’s X yrs. of paint, glue, signage, bird poop, air pollution, rust blah blah. Indeed, the sun may never have shone directly on that side of the box.
(Had this been posted 18 hrs. ago, I would gladly have gone the ten or so blks. out of my way to get a photo of it myself. Ah well.)
Ha ha, need to sleep, not rant here.
cn srsly gt pic tomor later if needed.
it’s not a monument, it’s a traffic signal control box.
Not mutually exclusive. To the downtrodden winger patriots, it’s a monument to the many times they’ve been stuck in traffic jams caused by socialest control of the
means of productiontraffic lights.caused by socialest control of the means of production traffic lights.
The most social among us want them to spend more time together, socializing.
The most social among us want them to spend more time together, socializing.
I can only assume you meant “socialestizing.”
I thought it was vandalism that only those people engage in?
OH NOES VIOLATIN’ PRIVATE PROPERTY AYN RAND WOULD KICK YOUR ASSES!!!!11
*sigh* These people really are pitiful, aren’t they?
“I’m always surprised to see conservative guerilla art in LA.”
“If this is on the level, it’s certainly positioned for maximum effect:”
I am always surprised to see conservative guerrilla art because it’s a fundamental contradiction of terms so deep that such things cannot not exist unless accidentally formed by galactic levels on coincidental happenstance. No such thing exists in nature, but only when nature malfunctions.
“If this is on the level” translates in this instance to “I don’t know what I am looking at, I cannot put it in any terrestrial-based context, and hope, hope, hope that it does not cause me any butthurt.”
I can only assume you meant “socialestizing.”
Of course I did. Really. Or at least, now I do.
it’s a fundamental contradiction of terms so deep that such things cannot not exist
And that’s my cue to whip out old Ambrose:
[Sigh]
“by galactic levels oF coincidental happenstance…”
the sense of imperfect knowledge and unsettled fate that divides us from the Medved
Which is how I read it in passing and I like my version better so fitz’d.
Arrgh.
“Such things cannot
notexist…”Autumn! Whose dappl’d sunlight reveals
The stencil-mounted mon’ments
Of pixellated prom’scuity – hark!
Soft! A john! Alas: no nookie.
also, that’s one magic stencil. the center of the “O” and the inside of the acorn just float perfectly in place. my memory of stenciling from grade school seem to indicate that things like that need to be connected with a little bridge of paper, other wise, an “O” is just a hole. kern that, mofos.
So some kid dressed like a pimp came to an ACORN office and borrowed money to build a whoretrafficsignalcontrolbox?
and it’s gone viral in LA:
So we have three reported instances? Or two?
The word “viral” does not mean what you think it means.
Are you sure they aren’t just angry because they keep going to these sites labeled “ACORN FUNDED PROSTITUTION ZONE” and finding that they still have to pay the hookers?
also, that’s one magic stencil. the center of the “O” and the inside of the acorn just float perfectly in place
You know, you’re right – but as long as it keep The Krazy Kerning Kommandos busy, I really don’t care if it violates physics.
they still have to pay the hookers?
There are some things even hookers won’t do.
There are some things even hookers won’t do.
I seem to recall someone – maybe Nina Hartley – saying conservatives were the worst fucks she’d ever had.
What with wetsuits and diapers and wide stances, who could doubt it?
also, that’s one magic stencil. the center of the “O” and the inside of the acorn just float perfectly in place.
You can do that with a stencil made of something stronger than paper by having the connecting link out of the plane of the figure…but I doubt that anyone went to that much trouble here.
There are some things even hookers won’t do.
I seem to recall someone – maybe Nina Hartley – saying conservatives were the worst fucks she’d ever had.
After they get done fucking the American people they don’t, pace Jagger, have that much jam.
During the Bush years we had Department of Defense funded prostitution zones and Department of the Interior funded prostitution zones, but those were only for the people who had proven themselves worthy in the capitalist hierarchy. The socialist regime of Obama however has brought us these Acorn funded prostitution zones that are open to just anybody. JUST LIKE HITLER!
Added another graf in the notes, btw. [darting into hole in baseboard]
Acorn funded prostitution zones.
A pubic option
“And that’s my cue to whip out old Ambrose”
Is that what the kids are calling it these days.
,,,[darting into hole in baseboard]
Like a delightful little cartoon mouse with the cutest little ears and the sweetest expression on his face? asifthehaplesscatcouldevergetya(pretend there’sabunchassuperscripherethatidon’tknowhowtodo). I rate for you.
Does our President condone prostitution? Next on Talon News Network.
OK, this one has gone so meta I can’t even follow it.
But, yeah, I’m laughing if the wingnuts think some grafitti in Echo Park (one of the sites of this stencil) is conservatives speaking truth to power.
Does our President condone prostitution?
Certainly, as a Marxist, he believes that the workers control the means of reproduction.
Huh. I thought prostitution operated on a pay-for-service model, not on the basis of external funding. I suppose the ACORN funding is in lieu of the significant reduction in venture funds available to start-up prostitution rings this quarter.
I AM somewhat concerned about how this sort of injection of public capital might align incentives in unanticipated ways. Consider what the ACORN funded prostitute might be willing to do for twenty bucks as opposed to a typical crack-whore’s incentive to provide a more, er, compelling experience.
In general, I guess I’m with Ronnie here. This government takeover of of the pimp-and-prostitution business cannot be good for the free market for rimjobs….
mikey
Ah. The stubots are foolsturbating. All is clear now.
From this & similar statements I’ve seen in many of your posts, I regret to inform you that it is very likely that a mutation of your 11th chromosome means that you bear the Canadian Gene … researchers are unable to determine if this mutation is hereditary, but please try not to panic. There are coping strategies available to help you deal with your elevated IQ & increased lifespan.
A team working out of the Mayo Clinic have theorized that the establishment of a 24-hour Hannah Montana Channel may lead to effective therapy, if not a vaccine … so you may not have long to wait for help.
If you feel a need for counseling, you can start here.
It can’t be conservative guerrilla art, there are no misspellings.
Highly recommended: here’s a great compendium of wingnut misspellings.
Authoritarian graffiti?
On the level or not, it made my evening.
We’re past the IOKIYAR event horizon and spaghettifying into it’s ok if it seems vaguely Republicanish without actually looking into it. Heck, we may be long past that point, too, and I just can’t tell anymore.
The unfortunate side effect of so many Republican politicians losing thier jobs in the last election cycle was a devastating drop in the prostitution business. As the industry was deemed “to big to fail” obviously it was entitled to TARP bailout money.
From this & similar statements I’ve seen in many of your posts, I regret to inform you that it is very likely that a mutation of your 11th chromosome means that you bear the Canadian Gene
I figured it meant he doesn’t ever read his own work, but you might be right.
Hasn’t anybody noticed that there is nothing connecting the center knockouts of the letters A, O, and R (as well as the middle parts of the Acorn logo) to the edge of this “stencil”? Are we to believe that this is a 6 piece stencil that needs to be carefully lined up and anchored in place by double-stick tape before you can spray paint. Sounds like a pretty involved and time-consuming operation for a “guerrilla” artist. Or maybe it’s a team of guerrilla artists — three of them hold the various parts of the stencil in place while a fourth sprays the paint. They’re obviously highly organized and well trained because the stencil elements are all perfectly aligned, and there is no evidence of blocked spray patterns from all those hands holding all those stencil parts in place. I suspect they must be former Navy SEALS.
Whoever did this may have been inspired by news from Taiwan. A few months ago the interior ministry proposed setting up a “legal prostitution zone.”
And I guess one could say Rhode Island has a prostitution zone, too, in this case, anywhere indoors.
There’s nothing better than some whack-a-doodle wingnut who has spent too much time watching CSI:Miami and thinks he can deconstruct any digital image on his $79 monitor with a magnifying glass.
There is truly no depth to which their stupidity cannot sink.
thinks he can deconstruct any digital image taken with a camera-phone on his $79 monitor with a magnifying glass
Fixt for great accuracy.
No, rest assured, we’re nowhere near peak wingnut.
Indeed, the Navy SEAL unemployment problem is beginning to wrack the major metropolitan areas on both coasts. Gangs of angry, unemployed SEALs running wild in the streets, tagging monuments to broadband communications, stealing bicycles and pizza, panhandling to gather enough money for another jug of Myoplex….
mikey
No, rest assured, we’re nowhere near peak
wingnutstubot.Fecksed to comply with new footnote.
I dunno. A “giant Stubot?” May need to find a giant Zombot. Anyone with an idea on that?
And I guess one could say Rhode Island has a prostitution zone, too, in this case, anywhere indoors.
Including Providence City Hall, if I have any unnerstanin’ of politics down thet way.
The Zombot would be great if bits didn’t keep dropping off.
Zombot bits. A problem. To be sure. Duct tape?
Also interesting to me, living as I do in L.A.: political graffiti art usually first appears on the west side. This stuff is popping up downtown/east side. Downtown east side can certainly be artsy, but for shocking the public, nothing beats the west side. Plus, downtown/east side would have to be in spanish too if they want to stir people up.
As a former graphic artist, I’d have to agree that I don’t know a quick way to get a stencil that doesn’t have connectors, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be done. I haven’t worked in the field for a while.
Perhaps coincidental to this graffiti appearing, the previously fabulous LA Weekly magazine has been taken over by some Murdock wanna be, and become an outlet for wingnut propaganda.
Probably ketamine, but I think the combination of Ajax, Miracle-Gro and Raid will do that too, if taken in sufficient quantities.
And yeah, that’s one hell of a stencil for it to be wannabe wingnut warriors.
It also looks more like a phone terminal block
boxmonument than a traffic lightboxmonument to me, but what do I know?As a former graphic artist, I’d have to agree that I don’t know a quick way to get a stencil that doesn’t have connectors, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be done
Peel ‘n’ stick paper, like for labels? Shallowly cut letters, pull off backing, stick to surface, pull off rest of paper, spray and then pull off “inside” bits.
But no, the edges look too fuzzy.
Maybe it’s a silkscreen stencil? Kept in a backpack or portfolio, along with paints. That wouldn’t be too much of a pain to carry and set up/take down quickly.
Yeah, LA Weekly tab now Fox news. Cover story put out by new owner Peter Jamison:
WEATHERMEN’S TICKING TIME BOMB
The investigation into a cop killing in the ’70s leads to a Chicago law professor involved in the early stages of Barack Obama’s political career
If the Acorn graffiti is covered heavily in the next LA Weekly edition, I’d suspect a put-up job.
Silkscreen would work, but a silkscreen is big and bulky. That Acorn logo is huge, and the words under the logo would have to be on a separate screen. That’s two screens needed, and they have to be held up and leveled by at least two people, with a third to run the squeegee for the print job. It also means that the surface would have to be very even to get a good print out of it.
Also, it would be good for only one print at any location, since the screens would be full of ink, with the screen vertical. What a mess that would make. I don’t think that’s practical and a quick method of attacking with graffiti.
The snark is so thick you can cut it with a knife.
I saw another pic of a brick wall with this on it a day or two ago. I can’t remember where, though. Arrgh.
It’s not really that hard to do the stencil like that, but I do think it beyond the ken of most wingnuts. For that matter, I think the why of doing it that well is beyond their ken. If it is wignuts rather than irony, and really – who can tell anymore, I at least give them credit for craftsmanship.
Who you calling thick, buddy?
And put that damn knife away ‘fore I slap you silly.
I saw another pic of a brick wall with this on it a day or two ago. I can’t remember where, though. Arrgh.
Maybe down a couple of posts?
I’ll keep my eyes peeled here on the west side for this to appear and if it does, I’ll do NCSI forensics on it, wearing my junior sadlynaught badge and give an official report.
Silkscreen would work, but a silkscreen is big and bulky. That Acorn logo is huge, and the words under the logo would have to be on a separate screen. That’s two screens needed, and they have to be held up and leveled by at least two people, with a third to run the squeegee for the print job. It also means that the surface would have to be very even to get a good print out of it.
Also, it would be good for only one print at any location, since the screens would be full of ink, with the screen vertical. What a mess that would make. I don’t think that’s practical and a quick method of attacking with graffiti.
Actually I was thinking of silkscreen with spraypaint, not squeegee’d ink – sure the screen would be big, but carry it in one of those big portfolio things and you’d look like nothing more than an art student on the way to class or studio.
…that could work.
…but might clog the pores of the screen?
Lol, me wakey uppey some time soon.
It’s always in the last place ya look, ain’t it.
Two stencils. One for the logo, the other w/ the ironic things (words).
also, that’s one magic stencil. the center of the “O” and the inside of the acorn just float perfectly in place
You can use threads (anchored at both ends with tape) to hold the centres of the letters in place. Or so I am advised.
Quoted for Great Justice!
You win the Internet today.
You’d think that a journalist at a major newspaper might be interested in who’s funding the ratfuckers.
Oh, I forgot.
We had a rattling good time!
*clack* *clack* *clack* *clack* *clack* *clack* *clack*
Didn’t know where else to post this, but did you know the little wannabe whore Hannah Giles is the daughter of this guy? How the past haunts us. By the way, he’s a cool dad, but he’s not so cool that he would let his daughter do this when she’s 15. He waited until she was almost old enough to drink before he put her out on the corner. And to think I was worried about his kids when Sadly, No! mocked him lo those years ago.
Malkkkin makes me look like a piker!
Wait, are we in favor of the stencil or agin’ it?
They come together to form a giant stubot, i.e. a robot made of stupid….
this is the single best description of the right-wing flotsam rick perlstein called our historic crazy that i’ve seen in ages. ages, sir.