Laura Kikauka (b. 1963) is a Canadian installation and performance artist. Hairbrain 2000 (1993) is a costume featuring a life-sized metal harness, a kitchen colander, a custom electric circuit triggered by ball-bearings, 48 electromagnets, a power pack and several spray cans of silver paint. For those of a technical bent, here's a later diagram that explains it all.
Weng-Ying Tsai (1928-2013) was a Chinese-American artist working in Cybernetics (the science of circular causal processes, i.e. where a systems outputs become inputs thus influencing its outputs) and Kinetics (movement and motion). His best known work features stainless steel rods and lighting, sometimes subtle, sometimes not. A small electrical motor within each sculpture powers movement, often sound activated.
In a darkened gallery environment, the illuminated sculptures shimmer and vibrate, making the spectator feel like they have entered an underwater cave teeming with eerie, alien life.
The first Tarkan stories appeared in 1967 in a daily strip in the popular Turkish newspaper Hürriyet.
By 1973, there was a weekly full colour comic published across Europe, including in the UK, where it cost 3p. The comic (presumably aimed at adults rather than kids, as it can get slightly racy) ran for at least 25 issues, and. God help me, I have the first 10.
Issue 3 (pictured) has Tarkan and his hairy mate Mario being crucified by the Romans for being better at fighting than them. Don't be concerned, though, Mario is known as 'The Birdman' and hundreds of his trained pigeons are about to swoop down and cause chaos. In the confusion, our heroes will be set free, and there will be more scrapping, presumably in a city square that is now now slick with bird shit.
From Tarkan: Sword Of Mars (1969), an early entry from a series of preposterous but enjoyable Turkish historical adventures featuring an invincible and beautifully coiffured Hun warrior.
From Big Magnum, Kuroiwa Sensei, d. Kazuhiko Yamaguchi (1985)
Big Magnum, Kuroiwa Sensei has all of the subtlety of a big budget episode of Rentaghost starring Cannon and Ball. A big talking teacher in a cowboy hat tries to bring order to an unruly school with a 44 Magnum, although he turns out to be a snivelling coward who wears a nappy. Later on, the mantle is taken up by a weedy bespectacled guy who, after extreme provocation, becomes a leather clad vigilante super hero. After triumphing in a big Western type fight that has elements of Mad Max, he flies off in a private plane to tame another school. It's all based on a very popular Manga series, so it must make sense to someone.
Anyway, when the insufferable 'kids' of the school aren't causing mayhem in class, they are at a local nightclub, body popping and breakdancing to a bland and boring new wave J-pop disco band where most of the members wear WW2 German uniforms.
An idle and slightly redundant threat from the 1968 Captain Scarlet annual. I mean, what does 'World Peace' even look like? It's not something anyone alive is actually familiar with. The how-d'you-do with The Mysterons takes place in 2068, by the way, so even with a superhuman effort it's hard to imagine that we'll have sorted things out by then.
I've always loved this show, which is one of the most nihilistic and violent programmes of all time, which is not what you might expect from something with puppets.
Thirty years after the publication of Theodore Sturgeon's original story, 1974 was a mad time for the Killdozer franchise, with an ABC TV-Movie of the week in February, and a Marvel tie in comic in April. To be fair, it's been pretty quiet on the Killdozer front since then, but I live in hope of a revival.
To set the scene: a rough-hewn set of construction workers are put on a deserted island to construct a runway. Their bulldozer becomes possessed by an alien intelligence, and goes on a kill crazy rampage. It gets very messy very quickly, and there is a lot of squishing.
My brother used to be a digger driver, he says stuff like this happens more often than you'd think.
Just look at the state of that interior design, it's worse than the Overlook Hotel. No wonder everyone had a permanent migraine in the 1970s.
This is from Chandler, a not in itself very interesting neo noir movie from 1971. It does, however. star the superb Warren Oates, so is well worth watching once, just don't expect to pick up any usable DIY ideas.
'You abandoned me, love don't live here anymore'
I've just watched the 1988 Gary Busey action thriller Bulletproof. Busey plays McBain, a secret agent turned maverick cop. It starts with him breaking up an illegal arms deal. Villain Danny Trejo shouts 'Who the fuck are you?' and McBain shouts back 'I'm your worst nightmare, butthorn!'. Trejo dies in a ball of flame when McBain throws a grenade into the back of the ice cream van the baddies are using as a getaway vehicle.
McBain gets shot in the shoulder during the raid but refuses medical attention, instead going home where a beautiful lady is waiting for him in a bubble bath. He takes a swig of whiskey, then pulls out the bullet with a pair of forceps. He washes the extracted slug and drops it in a jar that has between 10 and 15 other old bullets in it. He then makes love to the beautiful lady and afterwards she says 'You may be bulletproof, McBain, but you're certainly not love-proof'. Oh, and later on there's a flashback where he's playing a sax solo on a beach.
That's all I have to say, really, I just wanted to tell someone.
