StyleFiles@Unkster - PropArt The Cuban Way

A little-known fascination of mine, is a curiosity and appreciation of Propaganda Art.

In the Socialist states of the former Soviet Union, China and Cuba, Propaganda Art, especially in the form of posters, flourished because the combined artistic talent of the countries' artists were reaped to publicise all that was good about the Marxist way.

China had Mao plastered all over the country. The USSR, the moustachio-ed Lenin and Stalin. And Cuba, well, a trip to Bangkok's Chatuchak Market would attest to the almost Canonization of Che Guevera, CIA-executed and trusted lieutenant of Fidel Castro. I think Mr Guevera is the Bob Marley of Socialism due to his iconic popularity.

My interest in Prop-Art is not so much in the ideology it hopes to transmit. But in its use of designs, colors and imagination to convey ideas. The Cubans, to me, best embody this concept. So today when I discovered a shop that sourced for and imports original Cuban poster-prints, I was estatic.

Until I saw that they were going for SGD$120 a prop..err..I mean a pop. Without framing!

Sigh.


With Cuba - Raul Martínez, 1966


Mobile Cinema - Eduardo Muñoz Bachs, 1969


All To The Square - A. Prieto, 1970


A Forest Is Growing - Antonio Reboiro, 1967


Position 1- Eduardo Muñoz Bachs, 1967


Better Not To Be, Than Not To Be A Revolutionary - René Mederos, 1968


A Week Of Solidarity With The Peoples Of Asia - Jesus Forjans, 1967

UnkReads - Hyper Rev

The latest edition of the RX8 after-market 'Bible' is in...






Let the Mods begin!!!

Kikou Prints

After a week in my new office, the place still looks cold and sterile.

My window sill is devoid of plants, there are no pictures on my wall and my desk is pretty spartan, apart from a nice 20inch flat-screen monitor and a keyboard that is. You could have 2 teams of cockroaches play a game of football on the table-top.



And so, instead of going out and buying myself a couple of nice prints and portraits, I decided to put up one of my own.



Photographs of my car : S$2 per 5R print.
Picture Frame from IKEA : S$25
Visual Impact on Wall for S$35 : Will tell you guys tommorrow when I put it up in office.

=))

Unkers & Vino - Label Me This, Label Me That

Idle hands are the Devil's workshop.

I am thinking of getting one of these Wine record books where you can paste the labels off the bottles you have finished and write some details about the vino that has already been processed and excreted.

Quite cool I suppose to flip the scrapbook 5 years down the road and remember you had that fantastic Bordeaux at Les Amis on your Anniversary or a fruity Reisling in office to celebrate the demise of that mean boss. Some of the artwork on these labels are actually quite interesting and exquisite too. Perhaps when I have collected enough, I can do a Wine Label Mosaic and have it framed up and displayed.



A couple of niggly things though.

1. Is it a little nerdy to be doing something like this? Hell we used to laugh at Stamp Collectors.

2. I'm pretty sure I'll make a mess out of peeling the damn labels off the bottles. Don't want to be doing a jigsaw do we?

3. How do you get the wine cafe to actually pass you the label of a bottle of which you had only ordered one glass? You know a great tasting House Pour for example and when you don't want to drink too much before driving.

Hmmmm...

TREK 6000

Fell in love with him on Saturday at Treknology. And before I knew it, he now sits in my kitchen.

Handles like a dream, brakes resolutely on demand (man I dig those Avid BB5 discs) and accelerates faster upslope than some old scooters. Plus in his mean metallic orange, he just screams take me out for a spin! Can't wait to do a little off-roading though.



Full Specs below :

Frameset

Size : 19.5" (Large)
Frame : Alpha Super Light Racing (SLR) Aluminium
Front Suspension : RockShox Dart 1 with preload, 100mm

Wheels

Rims : Shimano M475 disc hubs; Bontrager Ranger rims
Tyres : Bontrager Jones ACX, 26x2.1", 27 tpi

Drivetrain

Shifters : Shimano Deore, 9 speed
Front Derailleur : Shimano Deore
Rear Derailleur : Shimano Deore
Crank : Shimano M442 44/32/22
Cassette : SRAM PG950 11-34, 9 speed
Pedals : Alloy platform

Components

Saddle : Bontrager Select
Seat Post : Bontrager Sport
Handlebars : Bontrager Crowbar Sport, 25mm rise
Stem : Bontrager Sport, 10 degree
Headset : Slimstak with semi-cartridge bearings, sealed
Brakeset : Avid BB-5, mechanical disc with alloy levers

Like cars and motorcycles, there is an endless amount of stuff u can add or modify to your bike. And gosh I think I'm on that poisonous path already. My first zhng (modification) which I got the bike shop to install straightaway was TREK's Incite 8i Wireless Computer. With a sensor mounted near the wheel rim, information on trip distance, elapsed time and current/maximum/average speed is transmitted wirelessly to a display unit mounted on the handle bar. Kewl!



More to come, I fear.

Chasing Cars in My Head

The fact that I am thinking about changing cars aside, I have been doing a different kind of car chasing - daydreaming in my head, about stuff. I often joke that I am approaching my midlife crisis, but I wonder if its already here!

Why are we never satisfied with their current condition? Maybe I am generalizing here but most people I know always talk about upgrading - new phone, bigger car, sell the flat buy a condo, dumb the bitch get a slut (i mean french bitch car to get a japanese slut car) so on and so forth.

Don't get me wrong. I am not chastising or putting them down. I am one of them. I believe my standard of living is above average by Singaporean standards and I am grateful for what I have. But nothing I have now is manna from heaven. Everything I have I have achieved through my own hard work, sweating blood and breathing crap all these years. No one gave me anything - I had to go out and take it. Yet, I am not 'rich' or 'well to do'. Life every month is a struggle. Yes high costs are due to our choices - renting a condo instead of a flat for example. But it is because we want a better life that we work and work and work isn't it? It would be kind of a weird idea to work hard and put everything away and life like a pauper...

So I want more? More time, more money, better car etc etc etc. Is it greed? Because 80% of the population probably have a harder time to make ends meet every month despite their choices (compared to my situation where its because of my choices).

Shouldn't I be happy with what I have instead of chasing cars in my head?





Song: Chasing Cars

We'll do it all
Everything
On our own

We don't need
Anything
Or anyone

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

I don't quite know
How to say
How I feel

Those three words
Are said too much
They're not enough

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life

Let's waste time
Chasing cars
Around our heads

I need your grace
To remind me
To find my own

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life

All that I am
All that I ever was
Is here in your perfect eyes, they're all I can see

I don't know where
Confused about how as well
Just know that these things will never change for us at all

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?

A Diver's Core

Indulged myself in a divers' core set of fins, mask and snorkel today. The stuff is from ScubaPro, somewhat of a class-leader in the world of diving equiptment.

And not cheap either, if I may add.



Top of the range Twin Jet Max split fins. Double the power but doubly less leg work because of advanced ScubaPro engineering that gives it rigidity for thrust and yet flexibility for comfort and energy conservation.


The ScubaPro Clear Vu all-round vision half mask. Excellent excellent visability but most importantly, it fits on the face like a dream.


Phoenix Dry Snorkel. It'll take a complete and prolonged dunking in the water to wet this one..Or else dry as a bone.


5mm Delta Club booties. Very rugged and to be used with the open-ended, strap-on Twin Jet fins. Can also double up as intertidal/mangrove flat explorers as they glide over the shore.

The Caffeine 2

My current fascination.

Well if I am going to take the sport up seriously, I might as well do it in style with a US hand-crafted Cannondale right? Wrong! At 3500 bucks, I have to force myself to say I Don't Love You (to bits) =))



Spent 2 hours at the shop today. Drooling my pants off...=/

Deceptively Beng

But so much fun! =))

My new silver Cut-out stickers on Kikou....Juvenile-ly Yours....=P





I give myself 3 days before I will probably peel them off...=))

t-Robot

Yes, its our world, but their war.

The Autobots and Decepticons are coming to the Big Screen. 28 June to be exact. Can't wait!



To tie in with the Robotic fetish, we are organizing a Cinema excursion to catch the metallic ones slugging it out. Plus a mass car decal buy of the Autobot and Decepticon logos to adorn the windows or windshield.

And I went out yesterday to get myself an Optimus Prime. Managed to get my hands on this Takara beauty which is manufactured for the Japanese Domestic Market. Not cheap! =/





So let's Transform! And Roll Out! =))

So Yummylicious It Hurts

Leica, the epitome of atas-ness in Camera-dom.

The company pioneered the 35mm SLRs still in the market today way back in 1924. Thousands of iconic photographs have been shot on the marque's equally iconic M-series cameras. Leica is so atas they take years just to come out with a new model. Well don't blame them. Who would tinker with a winning design and formula?

So it was with much aplomp that the company announced the M8 in Sep 2006. Its first digital M-series baby ever. The lure of the mega-pixel age was just too persistent a force I suspect, even for a brand so steeped in heritage and tradition.



And what a Blardy Beaut!

Its a Range-Finder, not a Single Lens Reflex camera. Pls google to find out what Range-Finding means. Its too complicated to explain here =)) Being a RF, it has a svelte body because there is no need for the complex mirror-mechanism seen in SLRs. The lenses can also be built smaller and the baby is one silent killer, none of the shutter noise associated with its SLR-brethren. There is also an uninterrupted view of the subject through the viewfinder, unlike the spilt-second black-out in SLRs when the mirror adjusts to let light impinge on the sensor.

That's why RFs have been the camera of choice for old-skool photo-journalists the world over. They do have their limitations with close-ups and Macro shots though.



Even the all-black style looks good. But give me the vintage, old silver chrome look any day. The M8 is so elegantly understated and timeless-ly chic, it hurts.

Pity it costs the price of 6 EOS400Ds...FARK! =))

So Kewt

Couldn't resist. Adidas for 6-9 month-old babies. Start 'em young I say! =))

Bought them for a friend's daughter. Hope she likes it =)

Kewl Stuff For A Kewl Home 5

Philippe Starck’s famous chair was designed in 1984 for Café Costes in Paris. The chair was designed with only 3 legs to make it easier to wait on tables without waiters tripping on the protrusions.

Café Costes is located within the famous Hotel Costes where uber-hip in-house DJ Stéphane Pompougnac has released several albums of re-mixed chill-out tunes for the party set.

I shudder to think how much one chair would cost. If I remember correctly, saw it going for about $1000+ a pop. Sheesh!

Kewl Stuff For A Kewl Home 4

The FIORE partition wall is designed by Fabrizio Bertero, Andrea Panto and Simona Marzoli for Zanotta.

It is constructed from a laser-cut steel panel which is varnished white. May use it to partition the study into 2 work spaces =)

Kewl Stuff For A Kewl Home 3

Cactus! by Alessi. Its a pretty kewl citrus basket.



The Juicy Salif. Designed by Philippe Starck for Alessi. Not very practical but oodles oodles of chic-ness. Easy to clean also but messy =))

Kewl Stuff For A Kewl Home 2

Castore Floor Lamp from Italian designers Artemide

Kewl Stuff For A Kewl Home 1

Ok so we haven't actually decided which apartment to buy yet. But until we get it, here are some kewl stuff we can really live with. Over the next few months, will hint hint abit incase anyone is thinking of getting that house-warming gift =))

Can plan rite? =P

First up, the Bose Companion 5 Multi-media Speaker System

UnkStuff - Abraham 606 Kopter

Ok I just up-sized my heli-hobby on Saturday.

Compared to the Picoo-Z, this fella's a whole new ball-game. For starters, flying it indoors will put all your household plants at risk of being shaved bald =)) But at least it won't get blown off-course with a draft from the window. And good luck to you if the thing comes straight for your head.



What next? An AH-64D Apache Longbow complete with Hellfire missles and Hydra 70 rockets? =))