Saatchi Showdown - Vote Now!

Chicago based Alice Mcmahon White, is the artist of this great portrait from "The White Album" series. This piece is a tribute to the Kent State May 4th, 1970 murders - 4 dead in Ohio.

The model is my son and currently a student at Kent State. "You say you'll change the constitution Well, you know We all want to change your head You tell me it's the institution Well, you know You better free you mind instead Don't you know it's gonna be all right" ~ John Lennon and the Beatles

Saatchi Galley Showdown. It is a great democratic competition. Artists from across the world put their art on a website and then the public votes for it.

Vote for this picture in the Saatchi Showdown.

See more of Alice's work at AM White Studio.

White males still rule the newsrooms

White males still top of the media ladder

Johannesburg - White male journalists are paid more and hold more top positions in South Africa's newsrooms, with black women the furthest down the ladder, a SA National Editors Forum gender audit found.

On average women earn 21 percent less than men (R184 387 versus R233 737), occupy less than 30 percent of top management and make up one out of three senior managers - despite roughly equal gender numbers in newsrooms.

The Glass Ceiling Two study of nine media houses found that black women tend to earn 25 percent less than white men and account for a "mere" six percent of newsroom top and senior management.

Read more in Business Report

Just a few laughs to get to the weekend

Chinese Whispers or Firewalls or Something

Wikipeadia says Chinese whispers or Telephone is a game in which each successive participant secretly whispers to the next a phrase or sentence whispered to them by the preceding participant.

Photographic Chinese Whispers, says Kevan, is a version of the Chinese Whispers game where, instead of people whispering a sentence to one another along a line, participants take a digital photograph and pass it on, the next person attempting to take as similar a photo as possible.

This doesn't actually have anything to do with either, but the word-association thing got me and it was hard to stop.

This is a website called Great Firewall of China

Here you can test any website in realtime to see if it is censored in China. I believe one gets strange results. Try it for yourself and let me know.

Off The Wall in Durban

ArtSpace, Durban - that gallery off Umgeni Road - behind Waste Centre is truly becoming a home from home for the unheard voices - the independents - next Monday 7 May at 6:30pm they are inviting all ART, GRAFFITI & COMIX-LOVIN’ FRIENDS to PULL IN FOR

OFF THE WALL 2

OFF THE WALL 2 features more than 20 artists, both established and up-&-coming, including (at last count): Zapiro, Rico, Themba Siwela, Wesley van Eeden, Jason Bronkhorst, Ewok, Alastair Findlay, Ben Hodson, Tyron Love , N.D.Mazin, Jeff Rankin, Andrew Mogridge, Mogorosi Motshumi, Jeremy Nel, Mike Scott, Wild Beast, Luke Molver, Leonora van Staden, Senyol, Scott Siveright, Ross Turpin, Adelle O’Connell, Thabani Gumede, Andrew Schnetler, Alastair Laird, and Unknown Graf Writers…

SKETCHBOOK VIEWINGS: The artists’ original sketchbooks will be displayed behind glass at the opening event. But for those who wish to browse through these original works of art, the artists will be showing their sketchbooks at the gallery during the day on Monday 7 May, before the exhibition opening. Thereafter, the sketchbooks may be viewed at the gallery on request and under supervision for the duration of the exhibition.

RESPONSIBLE GRAFFITI PROJECT: Cape Town street art guru Senyol and Durban graf-X ranter Ewok will be running a “Responsible Grafitti” workshop in the gallery on Sunday, 6 May. The mural art produced on that day will be on exhibition for the duration of the show.

THE SKETCHBOOK PROJECT: Most of the work on exhibition will relate back to the sketchbook pages the participating artists have been posting onto this blog since November 2006.


3 Millar Road (off Umgeni next to Waste Centre)
Durban 4001
Tel: 031-312-0793
artspace_durban@yahoo.com
Gallery Hours: Monday - Friday 10am - 4pm Saturday and Public Holidays 10am -1pm

Happy May Day - Workers Day

We observe May Day or Workers Day on 1 May to commemorate the historic struggle of working people in South Africa and the rest of the world. Workers everywhere in the world are remembering their struggles and their victories and mobilising for a better future.

This day also marks an awareness of the common class struggle existing in all countries.

May Day was born from the struggle for the eight-hour day. That struggle, in turn, emerged as part and parcel of the working class itself.

In the United States, where May Day was born, Philadelphia carpenters struck in 1791 for the ten-hour day. By the 1830s, this had become a general demand. In 1835, workers in Philadelphia organized a general strike, led by Irish coal heavers. Their banners read, "From 6 to 6, ten hours work and two hours for meals."

May Day as a modern working class celebration and commemoration began from the 1886 events in Chicago where workers were demonstrating for an eight hour day. Police attacked these striking workers from the McCormack Harvester Co., killing six.

On May 4th at a demonstration in Haymarket Square to protest the police brutality, a bomb exploded in the middle of a crowd of police killing eight. The police arrested eight anarchist trade unionists claiming they threw the bombs. To this day the subject is still one of controversy. Whether the anarchist workers were guilty or innocent was irrelevant. According to the authorities they were agitators, fomenting revolution and stirring up the working class, and they had to be taught a lesson. Albert Parsons, August Spies, George Engle and Adolph Fischer were found guilty and executed by the State of Illinois.

Today is a day for the Workers to Rest ( and for freelancers to try to catch up on their work).

Happy Worker's Day!

New Marketing Directory

In an effort to address and help rectify the current status of the marketing industry and turn it on its head, the Journal of Marketing (the official title of the new Marketing Association) has taken the proverbial bull by the horns and, in association with Absa, is publishing the Marketers Red Book – allegedly the country’s first ever comprehensive directory of senior marketing executives.
This A5-size publication, which is intended to become an annual, will be a reference book for the business community and it is believed that its introduction will go a long way to elevating the discipline and changing perceptions of the industry.

The Marketers Red Book, which launches this month, has been edited by Jeremy Maggs and published by Future Publishing. It includes over 70 pages of individual marketer’s resumes, a brief synopsis of their marketing and brand philosophy, as well as details on the company’s team and products. Part of the book covers key strategic insights from leading marketers, as well as easy to read advertising and marketing statistics.

Distribution will be to a list of 5000 of the country’s leading marketers who currently receive the Journal of Marketing. Additional mailing lists being targeted include: advertising agencies, research Houses, GCIS, and ACA.