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Ainda sob o efeito do lançamento do disco de Neil Young (mesmo sem nunca ter sido muito fã do moço), eis que me dou conta de como Bush Junior já rendeu versos e cifras da música pop norte-americana, and I mean pop! Trata-se de uma figura inspiradora... percebam:
Mosh, Eminem (essa saiu pouco antes da Guerra do Iraque, tipo um ou dois dias antes, na internet)
And as we proceed,
To Mosh through this desert storm,
In these closing statements, if they should argue
Let us beg to differ
As we set aside our differences
And assemble our own army
To disarm this Weapon of Mass Destruction
That we call our President, for the present
And Mosh for the future of our next generation
To speak and be heard
Mr. President, Mr. Senator
Do you guy's hear us...hear us...
When the President talks to God, Bright Eyes (Conor Oberst, que é praticamente a banda inteira, tem um histórico de letras do gênero)
When the President talks to God,
Are the conversations brief or long?
Does he ask to rape our women's rights?
And send poor farm kids off to die?
Does God suggest an oil hike?
When the President talks to God?
Dear Mr. President, Pink (olha Pink aí!)
How do you sleep while the rest of us cry
How do you dream when a mother has no chance to say goodbye
How do you walk with your head held high
Can you even look me in the eye
Let me tell you bout hard work
Minimum wage with a baby on the way
Let me tell you bout hard work
Rebuilding your house after the bombs took them away
Let me tell you bout hard work
Building a bed out of a cardboard box
Let's impeach the president, Neil Young (don't need to say much)
Let's impeach the president
For hijacking our religion and using it to get elected
Dividing our country into colors
And still leaving black people neglected
Thank god he's racking down on steroids
Since he sold his old baseball team
There's lot of people looking at big trouble
But of course the president is clean
Thank God
em tempo: no último fim de semana, Madonna subiu ao palco do Coachella e fez uma pequena modificação em I Love New York e, no lugar de "Just go to Texas, isn't that where they golf?", ela retirou a metáfora e foi direto no assunto: "Just go to Texas and suck George Bush's Dick!"
Foram publicadas nesta última semana os cartuns que ganharam o concurso anti-semita, em resposta àqueles outros anti-muçulmanos que despertaram fundamentalismos em nome ora do livre discurso, ora da religião. As imagens desse último concurso não aliviam a barra dos judeus. E para ler opiniões de artistas (alguns judeus) sobre o fato, clique aqui.
Dois grandes lançamentos fonográficos ontem deram mais o que falar do que o que ouvir, e por dois motivos bem distintos (que, no fim das contas, são iguais em suas mensagens de contestação): primeiro, a estréia do hino norte-americano em espanhol, Nuestro Himno, que pode ser escutado aqui. "Sus estrellas, sus franjas, la libertad, somos iguales/ Somos hermanos, es nuestro himno", diz a letra por cima da mesma melodia da música que se tornou tão ou mais popular que La Marseillaise. É a periferia tentando se incluir em uma nação sem línguas...assim cantam as Rosas e Marias que limpam o chão das Susans e Bridgets. Ainda na sexta, Mr. Neil Young lançou mais um álbum, que provoca tanto pelo nome quanto pelo modelo de distribuição escolhido: Living With War foi lançado na internet, free of charge. Isso mesmo, livre de qualquer tipo de pagamento. Segundo o próprio cantor, trata-se de seu "metal folk protest album". Entre outras coisas, ele canta um versinho muito bonitinho that goes like that: "Let's Impeach the President."
Lembrando outro compositor não menos provocativo: "It's the end of the world as we know it..."
Essa é pra dar uma forcinha ao iSummit 2006 que vai acontecer nos próximos dias 23, 24 e 25 de junho no Rio de Janeiro. iOque? iSummit é um encontro de todas as pessoas decididas a fazer da rede um ambiente de compartilhamento de idéias e criações. Na prática: um bocado de gente que trabalha com ferramentas wiki, software livre, advogados do código aberto e, acrescentando as definições de Lawrence Lessig: the Free Culture kids, A2K heroes... Para saber mais sobre o evento visite a página do encontro.
Saiu esta semana a capa do disco já há algum tempo anunciado e há eternidades esperado (mesmo que em sonho): Where's Neil When You Need Him? Sim, Neil, onde está você quando, em pesadelos, buscamos os Eternos que nos encerram? Onde??? Na voz de Tori Amos, amiga de longa data de Neil Gaiman (amiga, amiga...), que canta a última faixa do disco com a música Sister Named Desire. A lista completa das faixas é a seguinte:
1 Rasputina - Coraline
2 ThouShaltNot - When Everyone Forgets
3 Tapping The Vein - Trader Boy
4 Lunascape - Raven Star
5 Deine Lakaien - A Fish Called Prince
6 Thea Gilmore - Even Gods Do
7 Rose Berlin (feat. Curve) - Coraline
8 Schandmaul - Magda Treadgolds Mdrchen
9 Hungry Lucy - We Won't Go
10 Voltaire w/The Oddz - Come Sweet Death
11 Future Bible Heroes - Mr. Punch
12 Razed in Black - The Endless
13 The Cruxshadows - Wake the White Queen
14 Ego Likeness - You Better Leave the Stars Alone
15 Azam Ali - The Cold Black Key
16 Joachim Witt - Vandemar
17 Tori Amos - Sister Named Desire (New Master)
Todo mundo MAAAAAAAAAALLLL!
Confirmado: Próxima edição do SuperHeroCon no Recife será mesmo no Centro de Convenções, o que dá ao evento uma outra dimensão (a quarta?). Os rapazes fizeram até uma promo pra divulgar o evento na rede. E, claro, mesmo começando dias depois da final da Copa, e arriscando lembrar dias amargos (vai que a coisa desanda), a imagem de divulgação do evento está toda pautada na idéia de futebol.
Nota rápida: saiu a lista dos indicados à 18ª edição do HQ Mix... dois festivais de Pernambuco concorrendo na categoria Salão, Allan Sieber em SEIS categorias (incluindo esta aqui) e, se vocês deram uma olhada atenta à categoria Jornalista Especializado no Segmento...
Naif Al-Mutawa was born and raised in Kuwait City, one the busiest financial and trade centers in the Middle East which became worldwide known for being the field where Mr. Bush, the First, dropped his so-called precision-guided munitions (oil-guided actually). Mutawa became headline when, at the beggining of this year, he announced The 99 Project, a comic series with 99 superheroes, each personifying one of the 99 qualities that Muslims believe Allah embodies. The guy went to The NY Times, answered many interviews and, well, replied my e-mail with answers that are crucial to understand comics market when religion and the 'West vs. East culture' pops up in debate. And yes, Mutawa will be in Brazil next June, for the International Comics and Humor Festival of Pernambuco. So, clap your hands and say yeah to Mr. Mutawa:
Your name is now best known for The 99 project. And reading some of the others interviews made with you, I found lots of questions about how would the comic market react to an Islamic story with a superhero team. When you get into such a project, what's the importance of thinking about market and partnerships?
Great question! That is all I think about! There are many considerations-both for the Western audience as well as the Islamic one. For the Islamic audience it was very important that I get buy in from a handful of Islamic Scholars. I am currently preparing for a second round of financing for Teshkeel Media Group and have purposefully chosen to go through an Islamic Bank and not a conventional one. The 99 project has already been granted Sharia Board approval from a large and well respected Islamic Bank which I will be announcing in the coming month. This approval goes a long way with conservative readers who may be on the fence regarding my project.
Further, I was approached with support from government officials from various Western countries. I agreed to meet with these officials and thanked them for their support but asked that they only support they give me is moral, not financial. I was worried that getting open support from various Western governments would somehow backfire with half my market-that in the Islamic World. I have support from Western governments, from Islamic governments and Islamic Sharia boards.
Initially, I had a hard time initially in attracting Western talent for an Islamic project. It wasn’t until I bought Cracked magazine that the Western talent realized that I was a serious investor that did not take myself too seriously. That I was not out to preach Islam. Investing in Monty Sarhan’s, my best friend and lawyer’s, vision of the new Cracked opened new doors for Teshkeel Media Group. I had interest from Western writers and artists to work with me in developing my vision of The 99. Equally important, I hired Mike Hobson, the former publisher of Marvel as my advisor and Sven Larsen, the former director of marketing at Marvel as my COO. This translated into deals with Marvel and Archie and soon DC comics to Arabize their content. This meant that not only would The 99 be developed by top tier talent-it would be cross promoted with the best of the best.
When I raised my first round of financing 2 years ago I made sure that all the money I raised would come from even keeled liberal individuals who would leave my vision alone and not interfere. I disallowed conservative Islamic money into the company and I retained control as the largest shareholder to make sure my vision does not turn into someone else’s reality.
The western shapes and models of superheroes and the Islamic culture between the lines. How do they get together in The 99?
The 99 characters are from 99 countries. It is a myth that all Islamic women dress like nuns. In fact, there are as many liberal Islamic women as there are conservative. Walk through any mall in the Gulf and you will see what I mean. Arab culture and Islam are too often forced as one and the same. There are as many versions of Islam as there are people who want to identify themselves as Moslem. It is my firm belief that no one sect has a monopoly on the truth. They should all be allowed equal access to practice their versions of Islam without forcing it down everyone else’s throat. Roughly half of the 99 will be women. Of them, 9 will wear a hijab (head scarf) in 9 different ways!
One of them will cover half her hair, like they do in some parts of Iran and Pakistan, one of them will wear a wig like they do in Egypt, one will show her bangs from under the hijab like they do in the United Arab Emirates, one will wear a more Sunni hijab, one will wear a Shiite one. One will even wear a burqa-her name is Batina. One of the 99 attributes of Allah is Al-Baten “The hidden.” Batina is indeed hidden under her burqa! The irony here is that each sect believes that their way of wearing the hijab is the proper way and all the others are wrong. In The 99 everyone is respectful of every one else’s traditions, even of characters who wear Western styles as there is absolutely nothing wrong with the way millions of Muslim women choose to express their identity by showing heir hair and wearing Western cloths.
Each of the 99 heroes you'll be introducing in the comics have not only a different attribute of Allah, but different nationalities, so that it could raise the subject of multiculturalism. And people now say words such as tolerance to talk about conciliating differences. How does a comic book focused on the idea of people with superpowers (hence, different from common people) cope with the idea of a worldwide community instead of tolerating the difference?
Although the characters are superheroes there is a quite distinct feeling in “this could be any one of us” feeling in the stories. It is my intent for children all over the world - Muslim or otherwise - to identify with and emulate the 99 attributes of Allah...attributes like generosity, wisdom, compassion, mercy...attributes that any culture would be proud to have. The Western media is too focused on intolerance and violence as the attributes of Islam. And in fact, the linking of people from Al-Qaeda to Islam is akin to linking Nazism to Christianity. Every culture has its bad apples. It is my job to promote the goodness inherent in a civilization that has tabooed itself out of touch with the rest of humanity by listening to the thoughts of people who think that thinking is the work of the devil. The negative selection process that has given us this new breed of intolerant religious leaders can only be reversed by tapping into the same wealth that is available to all of us-the wealth in the Quran and to spin it in positive ways to compete with the hatred. This can not come from the outside- only from within.
There will be cross cultural considerations like the hijab example above- and there will be various “I do things this way...why do you do them that way” in the story lines. There will also be examples of characters who want to use their power instead of others and teamwork has to be beaten into them as an ethos. So the cross cultural-tolerance based message will come through in both the interaction of the characters with each other as well as with the common folk.
Name a few people who you think influenced your work as an artist.
My favorite living author-by a long shot- is Pat Conroy. His writing has a way of playing my emotions like a violin. He does to the heart what Dan Brown does to the mind. I recently bought a cookbook he put out just to read it! I am also a fan of Dan Brown.
Do you know any Brazilian comic artist?
I know Mike Deodato, but not personally.
V for Vendetta, A for Anarchy. ** Imperdível!**
As Gaimanetes, ou como diria o pequeno artigo da Wired, The Gamines.
Quando a Warner Brothers se junta à McFarlane Toys para lembrar dos melhores anos Hanna-Barbera.
[[Apesar de não ser gaúcho, e sim paulista, Fabio Zimbres faz parte daquela turma de Poa que resolveu dar um bundalelê às regras e formatos do mercado e, com isso, conquistou o mesmo mercado. Zimbres é da turma de Allan Sieber, Otto Guerra e todo aquele povo que surgiu de fanzines muy locos. Seu traço é ainda mais cru que o de Sieber e seu humor ainda mais caótico.]]
[[Ângela Lago, ou Angel Lake (na versão em inglês do site). A moça tem o melhor site que uma ilustradora e animadora pode ter. E é com as animações que ela cria o site. É tudo meio didático, pra que crianças possam usar (Ângela faz muita ilustração para livros infantis), e a melhor parte é aquela do joguinho do ABCD (a que tem um lixinho que come as letras do nome de uma pessoa que você não gosta e....é melhor ver a página).]]
Peter Kuper said 'yes I do' and now we'll have him here in Brazil by the next june when the International Comics and Humor Festival of Pernambuco starts. He co-founded the political comics magazine World War 3 Illustrated with Seth Tobocman, is the name behind many of the illustrations published in American press and is also the first guy who had the guts to adapt Kafka's Metamorphosis (and other Kafka's stories) to comics (Brazilian edition here). Not to mention one of his latest creations, Richie Bush, a real 'metamorphosis' between Richie Rich and a cockroach. Ops, my mistake: between Richie Rich and Bush Junior. So I sent him an e-mail with a few questions and, gently, he answered me. So, it goes like one, two.. one, two, three...
I understand you have been writing and drawing about political aspects of life since World War 3 Illustrated (or even before it) and I believe many of your illustrations graphically reflects that concern. If you were the world itself (I know this sounds a little insane) how would you picture a self-portrait?
A beautiful face with a very bad cold.
Talking a little bit more about political graphics. Do you know works from Joe Sacco and Marjane Satrapi? Do you think comics can grow on raising political subjects?
Yes I am a fan of both artists--I've known Joe for many years and recently published him in an issue I edited of World War 3. I think journalism in comics and autobiography are ideal for this medium and one of many ways that comics will expand. Comics can illuminate complex political subjects and may inform a whole new generation of readers about the world situation, in both a personal and political way.
Richie Bush... How much of a president is he?
A cartoon character seemed approprite to depict George W. Bush since he seems to be living in a fictious world where everything he does is right and justifiable. Here in reality however he is a lying murderer who is robbing our country and undermining democracy. Nothing cartoonish about that!
Do you have an opinion about the Gordon Lee case?
Thank goodness for the comicbook legal defense fund and this is one of the many reasons I'm glad I live in NYC.
How did the invitation come up for you to be here?
I was invited a few years back and for some reason I was not able to attend, so I'm glad they extended the invitation again.
Do you know any Brazilian illustrator or comic artist?
Not really, but I hope to change this on my visit!
Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, nos anos 20 do século passado, desenhou aquelas inglesas e vermelhas cabines de telefone que, enfim, falam mais sobre a Inglaterra do que a casa de número 10 da Downing Street londrina. Pois agora que o governo inglês está querendo tirar das ruas as charmosas cabines londrinas, entra em ação mais uma vez o artista plástico (ou artivista) Banksy, sempre pronto a criar interferências urbanas de protesto. E, como vocês podem ver, telefones também choram lágrimas de sangue.
...um celular na mão. Ou um iPod, um playstation, tudo que tiver um monitor pequenininho. É o International Portable Film Festival abrindo inscrições para qualquer pessoa inscrever seu vídeo feito para esse tipo de mídia portátil. Ou, como eles mesmo explicam: This is the perfect forum for new ideas and new directions in film and we actively encourage those filmmakers who are unafraid to venture into the deep, beyond the known boundaries of film and the cinema, to submit. Those films that best express themselves through the portable medium will be considered for pre-selection.
A novidade da ferramenta wiki é a criação do Lostpedia, sim, um guia COMPLETO de Lost. Todo o profile dos personagens, locais distintos da ilha, mistérios, paródias, enfim, o máximo. Mas, atenção, tá tudo de acordo com os episódios que vão ao ar nos EUA. Portanto, major spoilers pra quem assiste ao seriado no Brasil pela AXN (ou parou na Globo).
Sim, saiu a lista do Eisner Awards 2006. E, no meio de tantas revistas, livros e nomes, destacaria o seguinte: Marjane Satrapi concorrendo na categoria livro-baseado-em-realidade com sua nova história: Embroideries (desenho de página interna na imagem acima). O francês Joann Sfar, que foi recentemente lançado aqui no Brasil pela Jorge Zahar, e concorre em duas categorias (só que em uma delas, a de melhor edição-de-história-estrangeira, ele disputa com ele mesmo). Uma das duas historinhas de Sfar que concorrem ao título é O Gato do Rabino, agora em português. Ponto também para a disputa de Secret Friend Society, quadrinhos online na categoria...quadrinhos online. E nem precisaria falar que nomes como Warren Ellis, Alan Moore e Grant Morrison estão em várias categorias, incluindo a de melhor roteiristas. Chega a ser chato :-P
Enviado pelo pessoal do CMI: o link para o vídeo que fizeram do Cordel da TV Digital. São seis minutos de imagens que trazem, entre outras coisas, uma ilustração bem meiga de Hélio Costa viajando no balão mágico da Globo.
Olhem só essa: começa amanhã, em Cannes, uma a feira do audiovisual MipTV. E aí, quando o pessoal da organização do evento abriu as caixas onde estava o material promocional da série Weeds, entraram em cena as "autoridades francesas" que, sem titubear, lacraram tudo de volta e confiscaram as camisas e bonés da série. Tudo porque, claro, havia malévolas folhas de maconhas impressas neles. Weeds, by the way, é uma série sobre uma dona de casa que, para sustentar os filhos, vende a erva em questão.
A Newspaper Association of America divulgou nesta segunda alguns números referentes ao acesso de internautas a sites de notícias. Segundo a pesquisa, uma em cada três pessoas conectadas visita diariamente uma página de notícias. E que, de janeiro a dezembro de 2005, o número de acessos a websites de jornais aumentou 21%. Eu não digo é nada. Parem as máquinas ou, melhor ainda, siga aquele táxi!
"A gente está aqui para louvar Bush, e não para ridicularizá-lo". Nos Estados Unidos, 1º de abril é coisa séria! E, portanto, aí vai o link para uma série de cartuns feitos especialmente para este dia, tomando como personagem principal o grande imperador de todos os tempos.
Obs: os cartuns foram patrocinados por uma entidade chamada: "Apóie o presidente porque ele é o presidente." Mas, como tudo que diz respeito ao governo Bush, a entidade só funciona assim, de mentirinha.
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