Friday 31 December 2010

more online censorship

‎.... I discover my entire FLICKR collection has been marked "RESTRICTED" and is therefore currently INVISIBLE except for ONE IMAGE ... 6 fucking years I've been with flickr without a problem ... http://www.flickr.com/photos/russell-higgs/

Sunday 26 December 2010

xmas day 2000

I'm naked in Brixton prison;

a nun says to me, through my cell door, "why don't you put some #clothes on and get a #job."

Monday 20 December 2010

compulsory religion in school

... in the "religious knowledge" class at my school in the 1970s I just used to wiggle my pen to make it look as though I was writing stuff down. I had page after page of wiggly pen lines.

... in church at my school in the 1970s I often used to read science fiction novels by Michael Moorcock :)

Friday 10 December 2010

Monday 22 November 2010

Ian Richardson

"Sir Ian Richardson has final resting place in row A"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/stage/2010/nov/22/sir-ian-richardson-rsc-theatre

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-11809603

"New £112m Royal Shakespeare theatre to open its doors this week, with actor's ashes buried in the foundation"

... back in about 1978, when I briefly experienced a period without a home of my own, I sometimes used to pass Ian and Maroussia on the stairs :) they were off on tour and I was moving in as a temporary guest in their central London flat :)

... my beautiful great big Yamaha CS30 synth lived in Ian's flat for awhile in the late 70s :)

... I watched the first transmission night of Channel 4 upstairs in their south London house. I was on mushrooms I think :)

... Ian and Maroussia came to see my band performing in the early 80s. Was it the gig at the Broadway in Hammersmith?

... he used to make me laugh :)

... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_City_%281998_film%29

... Ian's eldest grand daughter and me ... greeting the pope in London earlier this year :) http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=6759865&l=814cadbcc4&id=526724739

... his preferential choice of furniture was very alien to me though :) What was it? Edwardian perhaps :) Very very camp. Like a museum :)

Saturday 20 November 2010

Commonplace episodes 1-9

Commonplace episode 1

... from the pages of the print edition of the Hackney Citizen

... Commonplace episodes 1 - 9

... http://www.flickr.com/photos/folkushackney/

Friday 12 November 2010

Uni

when I eventually got round to enjoying 3 years of Westminster Uni, 1998-2001, I climaxed by HANDwriting my final year's thesis while I was in a prison segregation cell, Brixton, continuously naked for a month, for the duration of the Uni Xmas Holidays :)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2001/jan/05/guardianletters1

"what is #HigherEducation for? They all assume that the point of higher education is better earnings" ...

http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/9774/

Monday 1 November 2010

ME LEAF

... from the pages of 999 DAYS in 3 minutes;

... comes just one day;

... "ME LEAF" ...

http://www.onelifephotos.com/ruSSeLLhiGGs

... plus ... NEW FUMETTI ... THE GREAT OUTDOORS

Stik's street people in Hackney, meet Krishnamurti, samhain 2010

http://www.flickr.com/photos/russell-higgs/5131996114/

Wednesday 27 October 2010

NOTHING by Russell Higgs



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V46LNUYZ4G8

... an improvised vocal video performance from 2007 mashed with an instrumental from 2009, plus subtitles

Sunday 24 October 2010

belonging

I've always been an in-betweener, never feeling I belong in any social group; I have a feeling of distance from educated professional types, just as much as I have a feeling of distance from people I presume to be tabloid readers etc. I try not to pander to my assumptions and prejudices etc, but nonetheless I'm always an outsider.

... most of my relatives are what I'd call tabloid readers and most of my friends tend to come from middle class backgrounds.

... the first time I ever really became conscious of class was during my 3rd time in prison in 1985. During my first two prison sentences I was mostly just locked in a cell, but my 3rd time inside I was assigned work as a cleaner/food server, and therefore I mixed with more people inside on a daily basis.

There was a most bizarre period at the beginning when almost everybody in prison caricatured my voice. They'd greet me pitched way down low and they'd say "okay yar Harrods." Of course this just made me laugh, because it was surreal and nothing to do with my actual reality :)

... plus ... the alienation is of course added to by being gay in a world where we are dependent upon the heterosexual majority eventually evolving enough to legislate our fucking human equality one day.

... I mean, don't get me wrong, I LOVE being me, I really do and always have done. I think I'm lucky to be me etc and I've always enjoyed my own company. But nonetheless "belonging" feels nice (I assume:) I think belonging has become a topic for me since both my parents died.

Friday 22 October 2010

PLAY

‎... I've known since last weekend that I didn't make it to the jury's final 25 videos in the first Guggenheim Youtube PLAY biennial. Naturally I felt a bit deflated for awhile. But, hey, it was great being shortlisted...

‎... http://youtube-global.blogspot.com/2010/10/jury-selection-for-youtube-play.html

... http://www.youtube.com/play

... http://www.guggenheim.org/new-york/interact/participate/youtube-play

Wednesday 20 October 2010

back in the bath

"Russell Higgs In The Bath" has now been put back online by Youtube, after a false accusation of Hate Speech where I couldn't access my channel until I had "agreed" that I'd violated Youtube's guidelines; plus that pesky nazi anthem swastika video that had been prominently positioned next to my "999 Days" for the past 7 months has now been removed by Youtube.

... in the bath http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFzXdK2wh0I

... 999 days http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1e0O6OWUL3k

Friday 8 October 2010

dah dah

... I like serendipitous options with my narrative intakes;

the option to interrupt the narratives;

I think that is one reason why my 2 most recent cinema experiences felt on some levels to be too restrictive and controlling; perhaps too ideologically 1920s/1930s (the global birth of talkies AND public relations etc );

me leaf

http://www.onelifephotos.com/ruSSeLLhiGGs

Tuesday 5 October 2010

bath time


... my 2006 video RUSSELL HIGGS IN THE BATH which was accused of a "guideline violation" and was *removed* from Youtube on Fri after 4 years there, is still viewable @ http://www.e4.com/video/lPbTCZdQbQHb5plu23s4Hd/play.e4

Sunday 3 October 2010

the talkies

... my 2 most recent cinema experiences have both made me very conscious of being trapped in a seat with no option to press pause.

... and not even an alternative screen to look at from time to time.

... nor a window to gaze out of.

‎... in many ways the cinema experience is quite bossy and controlling.

Friday 1 October 2010

... a wild day

.... Today Google is "highlighting" my 999 DAYS video on its iGoogle pages

... while simultaneously today I awoke to discover my 2006 Youtube video "Russell Higgs in the Bath" (my low budget Bill Viola tribute) has been accused of a "guideline violation" and is blocked ...

999 Days: Russell Higgs Urban Barbarian
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1e0O6OWUL3k

is shortlisted for Guggenheim Youtube PLAY
http://www.youtube.com/play

meanwhile when "in the bath" is unblocked it should be viewable here
http://conformandobey.co.uk/indoors.html

and my Youtube channel is
http://www.youtube.com/russellhiggs

Wednesday 25 August 2010

Colourful Greek Statues

Original Greek statues were brightly painted, but after thousands of years, those paints have worn away...

http://io9.com/5616498/ultraviolet-light-reveals-how-ancient-greek-statues-really-looked

Friday 20 August 2010

Infants Blood

Blood is a part of all of our lives. You drink it, you bathe in it, you give it to your children...so shouldn't you be confident you're getting the highest quality blood possible? Blood from premium infants and genuine virgins, bursting with health and flavor?

http://infants-blood.info/

Tuesday 3 August 2010

The catalogue of UK Entrances to Hell

http://www.entrances2hell.co.uk/

Photographs of entrances to Hell from around the UK with historical info and analysis

Friday 28 May 2010

EQUIVEILLANCE

"The teaching of certain thoughts and ideas has often been regarded as a crime. And, since Roman times, certain kinds of what we might like to call Free Speech have been regarded as crime."

"But not only is speaking often prohibited, sometimes so is taking notes, or remembering what is spoken."

"At the WTO meetings in Washington for instance, police orders heard over the police radio requested the seizing or destruction of reporters' written notes, and many instances of attempted willful destruction of photographic and video evidence have been perpetrated by both the police, the military, and by others."

Sousveillance can be understood by the following simple experiment:

1- enter the regime;
2- ask them why they have surveillance cameras there;
3- accept a typical response such as "Why are you so paranoid? Only criminals and terrorists are afraid of cameras.";
4- photograph the respondent;
5- observe reaction.

Friday 21 May 2010

Many Palestinian "Ghandis" are in their graves

...Palestinian nonviolence relies on global non-silence. The world cannot expect Palestinians to abandon violence while remaining silent on Israel's repression of nonviolent activists...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/may/21/palestinian-nonviolence-israeli-repression

Palestinian Gandhis are likely to be found in prisons after being repressed by Israeli soldiers or police or in the hospital after being brutally beaten or worse.

plus...

Michael Mansfield's letter to Nick Clegg on Palestine

"As deputy PM, Nick Clegg, it is your duty to live up to your own words on the daily atrocities happening in the occupied territories."

FREE RANGE CHILDREN

Take your kids to the park, and leave them there

A New York writer has caused a storm by encouraging parents to leave their kids in parks tomorrow.


Lenore Skenazy, who was branded ‘America’s Worst Mom’ after she wrote in the New York Post about letting her nine-year-old son ride the NY subway alone, has declared this Saturday to be the first-ever ‘Take Our Children To The Park And Leave Them There’ day. She has been caught up in a maelstrom of media attention since she announced the ‘holiday’ on her Free Range Kids website last week. Here, she explains why she’s doing it.

Monday 17 May 2010

As an old junk pusher told me, "Watch whose money you pick up."

Free art from oil

Tate Modern was forced to close down parts of its No Soul For Sale tenth anniversary exhibition on Saturday (15 May) whilst it struggled to remove dozens of dead fish and oil-soaked birds hanging from huge black balloons let loose in the Turbine Hall.

communique

"EVERY DAY TATE SCRUBS CLEAN BP'S PUBLIC IMAGE WITH THE DETERGENT OF COOL PROGRESSIVE CULTURE."

http://twitter.com/liberatetate

Scientists have raised urgent new concerns over the latest efforts to mitigate the catastrophic oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico caused by the oil rig explosion on BP's Deepwater Horizon. Latest efforts to limit the environmental damage involve an untried deep-water technique, using a toxic dispersant that they believe may damage ocean life.

Scientists said they had found vast underwater plumes of oil, one 10 miles (16km) long and a mile wide. Researchers from the National Institute for Undersea Science and Technology said they had detected the slicks lurking just beneath the surface of the sea and at depths of 4,000ft (1,200m). Chemical dispersants BP has been dumping underwater may be preventing the oil from rising to the top of the ocean, the scientists said. The find suggests the scale of the potential environmental disaster is much worse than previously feared since the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig blew up on 20 April, killing 11 workers.

To celebrate Tate Modern's 10th birthday, our readers put their questions to its director, Nicholas Serota

"In a time of climate change, will you stop sponsorship by oil companies so we can visit Tate and enjoy great art without being complicit in climate chaos?"

Nicholas Serota replies... "The first thing to say is we have support from BP, which as a company is looking at renewable energy as well as using up fossil fuels and using oil. We have long had support from them and are not intending to abandon it."

Sunday 2 May 2010

The Hidden

http://newslite.tv/2010/04/07/family-accidentally-discover-c.html

A family have uncovered a church which has been hidden under their Victorian home in Shropshire for 100 years, under a metre-long rectangle metal grid in their hallway.

The hole under the grid was just big enough for son Gareth, 20, to squeeze down and see what was under their living room. And then he followed a staircase in the chapel and came out of a cupboard in the dining room.

Glass Microbiology

http://www.lukejerram.com/projects/glass_microbiology

transparent glass sculptures created to contemplate the global impact of each disease and to consider how the artificial colouring of scientific imagery affects our understanding of phenomena.

Retro Graphic Novel Cover Concepts

http://fonografiks.deviantart.com/gallery/#Paperbacks

LAND

http://landlesspeasants.org/

Land is power. We do not own the land.
The land of the nation is not held for our benefit nor on our behalf.

10 thinking traps

http://litemind.com/thinking-traps/

"Our minds set up many traps for us. Unless we’re aware of them, these traps can seriously hinder our ability to think rationally, leading us to bad reasoning and making stupid decisions. Features of our minds that are meant to help us may, eventually, get us into trouble."

Saturday 1 May 2010

MAY DAY

MAY DAY

A Fox photographed in my neighbourhood, east London, on May Day.