How to make death squads & torture centers (video)

Posted by Pinky.

A lot of times the media talks about paramilitary death squads and torture centers as if they exist within a historical vaccuum. They just "are" - they are not discussed in terms of how they come into being - who orders their formation and why, how they are funded, who comprises their membership, and so on. So it is very important to watch and discuss reports like the following one, which was produced by the Guardian UK and BBC Arabic and just released today. In this report we learn how U.S. leaders created a system of torture and murder within the larger framework of occupation in post-invasion Iraq.

Watch the video (length: 51 minutes) at the Guardian website.

mmm - I'm sure many people will be interested in this report primarily because U.S. Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld and General David Petraeus (the 'stars' of this report, so to speak) happen to be very famous people. But to me actually individuals are often the most easily interchangeable parts within these kinds of horror stories...

Anyone familiar with the history of U.S.-style terror - against the peoples of Vietnam, Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, [...complete your own list here...], and of course we must include Native Americans on this list as well - will be left to wonder if any of these war crimes will ever be punished.

Side note: Much of the information in the Guardian/BBC report would probably never have been researched, let alone made available to the public at all, had it not been for Bradley Manning and Wikileaks. For exposing the truth Bradley Manning is now in a U.S. prison.

~pinky

Hugo Chávez (1954–2013) died.

Posted by Pinky.

Hugo Chávez died of cancer yesterday. He has been a big influence on our thinking.

Although Bunny and I have never been to Venezuela - or anywhere else in South America for that matter - we have been trying our best to study about resistance to U.S. imperialism in that part of the world for several years. I still hope to go there one day to see with my eyes what is happening there.

Chávez holds a miniature copy of the 1999 Venezuelan Constitution at the 2005 World Social Forum held in Brazil. (photo and caption from Wikipedia)

"I believe it's better to die in battle, rather than hold aloft a very revolutionary and very pure banner, and do nothing - that position often strikes me as very convenient, a good excuse... Try and make your revolution, go into combat, advance a little, even if it's only a millimetre, in the right direction, instead of dreaming about utopias..." - Hugo Chávez, as quoted by Tariq Ali

Bunny died.

Posted by Pinky.

Bunny died on Friday afternoon, January 25. It's still hard for me to think of what to write, but I want to write something for all of you who have been in contact with us, providing Bunny with so many kind words of support and encouragement. I want to share with all of you how Bunny died, because she died magnificently.

As some of you may know Bunny had a lot of physical problems these past few years - first arthritis, then diabetes, and then about a year and a half ago she also found out that she has cancer. She did traditional Chinese medicine and chemotherapy for a while, but finally decided to stop all her treatment when the doctor told her she also found (via ultrasound) a rapidly growing tumor in her main artery and that it was already obstructing about 90% of the blood-flow from her heart to her body. Shortly after that she survived a severe episode of congestive heart failure. The emergency room doctor told us she had no time left, that death could come at any moment. This was over six months ago.

When we found out Bunny had cancer I just cried and cried, but she said to me, "Don't be afraid. I'm going to show you how to die."

Bunny was calm until the very end. Even as her body became weaker - "wasting away" the doctors called it - her spirit seemed to steadily become larger and more powerful. There were so many times that Bunny was in a lot of discomfort or pain but she never complained even once. She was so strong. We spent the last few months enjoying every moment together, working as hard as possible. Now everything is in order, and the Pinky Show can continue, even without Bunny.

Three days before she died she began fasting - no food or water. I made a soft bed for her in a cardboard box and she laid down in it, and for the last three days she didn't move much. I told her everything I wanted to say. She didn't say anything. And when she was ready, she left. She left so quietly for a moment I wasn't sure if she was gone or if she was just sleeping. As always, she did everything exactly the way she wanted.

Looking back I guess I can see now that Bunny had been preparing for death her whole life. She used to say, "We come into this life alone and we will leave alone." I used to feel a little bit lonely and afraid when she'd say things like that. But now she's gone and I am realizing that she wasn't trying to make me afraid, she was just trying to move me towards preparing for death too. I wish she had told me exactly how to die, or how to face death without fear. When I realize how far away I am from understanding these things, and how much suffering she endured, I think Bunny made herself into a good example because she loved us so much.

Kim and I covered Bunny in a blanket and we took her in the box to her doctor, Dr. Wendy, who took care of Bunny's cremation. A few days later we got a telephone call that we could return to pick up Bunny's ashes. When we got there we were shocked to see that they had put Bunny in a tiny metal can. Bunny used to be so big, now she is in a little can. Somehow I don't like it, I think when I am feeling stronger I will try to find something better to put Bunny in.

It's so quiet around here now. I find myself feeling sad and missing her so much, but when I think about how she lived and died, I feel nothing but happiness and respect for her, my friend.

Much love,
pinky

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Wheelchair Lady's cat.

Posted by Pinky.

We received a bunch of e-mails about Bunny's crocheted cat toys the past few days, ever since I posted the photos of the toy she made for Myles Kitten. Since people seem to like Bunny's toys I will post this one too - it's the first "big toy" she made. (She made a lot of miniature dolls before this one, to work out details like how to make the shape of the ears, how to attach the arms, and so on.)

Bunny crocheted this doll for Wheelchair Lady, who sleeps with it every night. This cat's had lots of names already, because Wheelchair Lady's short term memory isn't so good, so almost everyday she gives her a new name. It's cute because the nurses at the hospital, when they make WL's bed in the morning sometimes they rest this cat's head on the pillow and pull the blanket up over her to make her look very comfortable. This way when WL gets back to her bed she can feel happy that this cat looks like she's been waiting for her.

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I borrowed Cat X this morning so I could photograph it. (I asked permission first.) After I photographed it I realized it's pretty dirty, so I'm going to wash it...

I'll try to photograph & share whatever new things we make around here.

Take care,
pinky

PS welcome Myles to Earth.

Posted by Pinky.

I thought I posted this earlier but somehow managed to lose this entry in my desktop clutter.

This past October 1st our very good friends had a kitten. They asked Bunny and me to name him. We suggested the name Myles, to honor Myles Horton. So his name is Myles. He's now 3 2/3 months old and super cute.

Side story: When Bunny and I were trying to think of names we like, we realized that practically all of our heros have spent time in prison. Some of them spent a LONG time in prison - some of them are actually still in prison, and some of them even ended up dying in prison. It's sad to think about, but such a concrete reminder of the price sometimes paid for speaking truth to power.

Anyway, I wanted to show you this toy Bunny crocheted for Myles. It's wool yarn stuffed with wool roving and it's about 7 inches tall. And yes, that's a cape she's wearing.

pinky

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For some reason Bunny decided to crochet a cape for this cat.

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The back.

Whoops, the "new year" part already zoomed by.

Posted by Pinky.

Wow, I feel like I blinked and suddenly 2+ weeks of 2013 has already disappeared. One of my new year resolutions is to consistently make entries here in our project diary, so I am already kind of flopping on this one. Bunny and I have been working a lot on the new Pinky Show website, the new PS online store, the new project and also the new project's store.

A few people e-mailed us after my last entry asking us what our new "secret project" is. It's actually not a secret at all so I'll talk about it a bit now.

To make a looong story short, we want the Pinky Show to be financially stable and we've decided to make and sell objects as a means to achieve that. Bunny had the idea that she wanted to make "nice leather wallets" and bags. (I put that in quotes because personally I think anything made out of leather by definition can't be nice - they're gross! Have you seen how leather is made?) So anyway since I don't like harming animals Bunny agreed to develop wallets and stuff that are not made of animal parts. We found a very nice substitute material that functions like leather but the good thing is you don't have to kill a cow in order to make a bunch of wallets. The material also doesn't require a lot of harmful chemicals and water to produce, so it's far friendlier to the environment than anything else we've been able to find.

Anyway, Bunny and I have been making lots of drawings and prototypes the past few months. This is a very early pattern we were working out with paper. We're trying to keep all of our designs as compact and clean as possible.

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I’m finding out that designing useful objects is a lot of fun! ~p.

New PS website; a parallel project

Posted by Pinky.

This is the last day of 2012. Wow, what a lot of changes going on around here lately, sometimes I have a hard time keeping things sorted out. This is a time of many transitions for us.

Although Bunny's body is becoming weaker and developing new problems, her spirit continues to be very, very strong. Thank you to everybody who has sent her nice e-mail wishes. Lately however, she has become uninterested in blogging and is instead very focused on spending all her time preparing the rest of us for life without her. We realize now that she won't be able to finish the war toys project (150+ toys takes a really long time to crochet; she promises to finish them in her next life) so instead she has been working with me to put everything in place that will allow me to keep the Pinky Show moving forward after she is gone. We've developed new workflows for everything but there is still a thousand small loose ends that need attending to.

Toy number 001.​

Probably the biggest single thing that we have been working on is trying to develop something that will help sustain the Pinky Show financially. Over the years we have seen so many great projects that we really respect slowly fall apart or stop entirely because of lack of funding. We don't want to be like that too. It's been difficult running the Pinky Show on donations alone but for many reasons we are also not interested in charging people for information, adding advertising to our website, chasing grants, and so on. So after much research and discussion Bunny and I have decided to take a big step and create a side business that will be organized and run according to our own values. Hopefully it will generate enough money to keep our educational programming going. I'm sure it will be difficult though; personally I seem to have a problem with money - don't like it, don't want it, don't want to even talk or think about it. But I have been working very hard to change my attitude, because if I don't, I'm sure the Pinky Show will eventually disappear like so many others. We will unveil this new parallel project during the Spring.

Bunny is almost finished with re-making the Pinky Show website. This will be version 3.0. It looks nice, and it will work a lot better.

The past few weeks Kim has been helping me clean up around here. Everyday we do a little bit together. So 2013 will start out a little tidier than years past. It was a real struggle to get myself to clean up because I have been feeling more depressed the past few months. Things were getting pretty out of control - thank goodness for Kim's energy otherwise this place would still be filthy. Actually now it is not so bad.

I am feeling a complicated mix of emotions at the moment. I continue to be amazed by Bunny's strength and focus. Sometimes I feel like giving up but deep down I know everything is going to be okay. I am trying to concentrate on what needs to be done and I hear Daisy's voice in my head: "Fulfill your obligations!" So right now it is infrastructure work, which I understand is necessary to make the Pinky Show stronger and more meaningful. Bunny and I feel like we have an obligation to make the Pinky Show survive long-term because, 1) we do believe that our work is important; and 2) we also believe that it is too easy to do a project for a short time but then give up on it and then re-assimilate into the dominant system when it gets too hard to continue. If we can really figure out a way to keep the Pinky Show going long-term, then we will be able to say, okay, look, it really _is_ possible for a small-scale, independent project to sustain itself, and here is a nice example! We have always had difficulty trying to convince people that dropping out of the system and making your own future is anything more than just a nice-sounding-but-ultimately-unrealistic idea. Maybe if we can make the Pinky Show into a tiny but concrete example of how it can be done, maybe deciding to take on this kind of weird life-work might seem a little less scary? I'm not sure. This all continues to be an experiment.

I wish everyone reading this my sincerest best wishes for a good 2013. My love to you all,
pinky

....................................

NOTE FROM BUNNY: Pinky is really good at talking about me like I am already dead. Obviously I'm going to die but then who knows, you might die before you even finish reading this sentence. (Still here? That's how I feel.) I have all kinds of things that I’m still working on, some with Pinky or Kim, some by myself. I (or someone else) will post them later. A few years ago I came across these words by the Shawnee leader Tecumseh. Perhaps you’ve seen these words before.

"Live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart.
Trouble no one about his religion.
Respect others in their views and demand that they respect yours.
Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life.
Seek to make your life long and of service to your people.
Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide.
Always give a word or sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend, or even a stranger, if in a lonely place.
Show respect to all people, but grovel to none.
When you rise in the morning, give thanks for the light, for your life, for your strength.
Give thanks for your food and for the joy of living.
If you see no reason to give thanks, the fault lies in yourself.
Touch not the poisonous firewater that makes wise ones turn to fools and robs their spirit of its vision.
When your time comes to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way.
Sing your death song, and die like a hero going home."

I wish you all a happy new year. Tomorrow is my birthday. I will be 12 years old.
~Bunny.

Photo report: Truth is Concrete in Graz, Austria

Posted by Pinky.

Hi everybody. Bunny and I were scheduled to go to Austria for 10 days to attend a big political-art/artistic-politics program at the Steirischer herbst festival in Graz. However, Bunny's health has been so bad lately that she became too weak to travel and had to stay home. I went by myself, which was a very lonely feeling, especially when I was riding the airplane and when it was time to eat. And when I got to Graz to be honest I kind of had a hard time focusing on the programming. But I did manage to meet a lot of wonderful people and was exposed to an enormous amount of new ideas attending the 24-hour-a-day talks, workshops, and meetings. It was very intense and I didn't sleep much but I feel like I learned so much in a very short amount of time. When I got back Bunny asked me to tell her, in excruciating detail, every little thing that I could remember from the whole trip. So I did that.

Below I've included a few photos from the trip. Special thanks to Graz-area cats who took the time to keep me company and show me around their beautiful city. (Thank you for the photos!) Graz is a UNESCO World Heritage site and has a lot of stunning architecture - Middle Ages, Renaissance, and Baroque, all mixed in between modern and contemporary stuff. Pretty neat, but I didn't photograph many buildings, I figure that's what postcards are for. Mostly I took pictures of food...

Like this thing. I think this was the first meal I ate in Graz. I got it at a nice bakery on Jacominiplatz. It has fluffy cream cheese in it. The tea was flavored with pear and mint, which might not sound so good, but it turned out to be a really nice combination.

This area had a lot of small cafes and imbiss stands so I ate here quite a few times. I like street food.

Speaking of take-away food, I noticed a lot of people eating Chinese food out of a paper-box while walking down the street. Bunny and I saw the same thing in Berlin but that time we didn't have a chance to eat any of it. I like Chinese food and I think it's always interesting to eat it in different countries, to see how it changes to become "local food". This time I got to eat "nudelbox mit gemüse" at 2am in the morning - I think  that just means noodles in a box with vegetables. It actually tasted a lot like ordinary chow mien, but more salty because they poured a sauce over it.

One thing that I thought was kind of odd is that many of the Asia-cusine restaurants in Graz serve sushi, even if they're Vietnamese, Thai, Chinese, or whatever. I didn't get to eat any sushi.

This is me sitting in front of the venue, were I gave our Pinky Show presentation. A lot of people came and I think they liked the presentation because they did a lot of clapping and whoop-whoop stuff when it was over, which was really nice. Of course I also met with local area cats, which also went well. We met behind the Opera Hall, which is just down the street. The tall thing in the photo is 'The Bloghouse' - a temporary tower built out of scaffolding and discarded windows - inside Radio Helsinki broadcasted a radio show for the duration of the event, and on the upper levels growing things as an act of biological disobedience.

Here's me having technical difficulties before the start of my lecture.

The Truth is Concrete event poster features Bunny's war toy and was plastered all over the city, which was pretty neat to see. The cat on the poster is printed approximately life-size, so it really kept catching my eye by surprise whenever I passed by one on the street. I really wish Bunny could have come to Graz because it really was something to see thousands of people walking around with the festival's newspaper-size program with her cat on the cover! [Download the PDF version of the program here.]

Here's some nice cat graffiti...

I took a photo of this statue of four birds talking to each other for Bunny. This statue is by the Schloßberg - an extremely interesting area with lots of very old buildings & structures.

Here I'm standing right next to the birds-statue, pointing my camera up towards the famous Graz clock tower. I wanted to walk up the old, winding stone stairs and visit the clock tower but I had just eaten a piece of apple strudel so I was too full.

Graz has some of the most beautiful old doors I have ever seen. I wish I could go back just to take photos of doors! This one is on a church built around 1696.

This is a small sculpture of a cat-in-a-shoe that I saw in the window of an antique shop. Don't I kind of look like this cat? Anyway, Graz has a lot of antique shops which are really fun to visit, but I kind of feel bad because I never buy anything.

I arrived at the airport at 3:30am in the morning for my 6am flight out of Graz - way too early! So I sat in this giant toy airplane until it was time to go.

This is a very large pretzel I bought to eat at the airport in Frankfurt. It was so chewy that by the time I finished eating it two hours later my whole face was really tired. But I enjoyed it.

So that's the last photo I have from the trip. My big hope is that Bunny will start feeling stronger so that we can do these trips together again.

Finally, I wanted to extend our gratitude to Florian Malzacher, co-curator of the project, for inviting us to participate and giving us this great learning opportunity, and of course to make new friends and alliances. Everything at Steirischer herbst seemed to run near-perfect, even though this was easily the most complex program we have ever been a part of. The responsible team should be acknowledged!: Theresa Adamski, Markus Boxler, Christine Conrad-Eybesfeld, Lisa Dreier, Katrin Ecker-Eckhofen, Hannah Ertl, Anne Faucheret, Philipp Forthuber, Lina Maria Gärtner, Kerstin Geder, Roland Gfrerer, Adina Hasler, Anja Herman, Cornelia Iber, Dominik Jutz, Veronica Kaup-Hasler, Kira Kirsch, Matti Kruse, Martin Ladinig, Florian Malzacher, Karl Masten, Christiane Mörth, Maria Motter, Arno Muchwitsch, Heide Oberegger, Vesna Pajičić, Sithara Pathirana, Kirsten Patent, Andreas R. Peternell, Petra Pölzl, Danica Radat, Angelika Raffer, Johanna Rainer, Sabine Reisner, Anthony Saxton, Hermann Schapek, Maria Schneeweiß, Susanne Spörker, Annika Strassmair, Gerda Strobl, Christian Sundl, Artemis Vakianis, and Florian Wimmer. Thank you to everyone at steirischer herbst from the bottom of our hearts!

That's all for now, though I promise to write again soon. Bunny and I send our love.​

Bunny is finally out of the hospital

Posted by Kim.

I'm taking over for Bunny until she starts feeling better.

As some of you may know, Bunny has been very sick the past year or two. She has a lot of health problems - hyperthyroidism, arthritis, diabetes, and cancer. It's a lot of problems to manage all at once but I always say if anybody can defeat cancer it's Bunny. About two weeks ago though Bunny started having difficulty breathing. It got so bad that we took her to the hospital. The doctors did some tests and found out that she was having heart failure. They used big needles to drain fluid from her lungs and chest cavity. She got very weak and looked awful. I was really scared, I even thought Bunny was going to die. But like I said Bunny is very strong, and with the help of some new medicine she pulled through and this morning the doctors finally discharged her from the hospital. Now she's back in her own bed resting. Bunny told me to thank everyone who has been calling and sending nice wishes.

Pinky will have to go to Graz by herself. Bunny will stay home and rest, and I will take care of her.

~kk

Pinky Show at Truth is Concrete (Graz, Austria)

Posted by Bunny.

Pinky and I have been invited to present at the steirischer herbst "Truth is Concrete" project in Graz, Austria. What is “Truth is concrete”?

"Truth is concrete" is a 24-hour, 7-day marathon camp: for 170 hours more than 200 artists, activists and theorists lecture, perform, play, produce, discuss and collect useful strategies and tactics in art and politics... The marathon is the centre, surrounded by a camp-like living and working environment, a social space with its own needs and timings... The programme of the marathon is accompanied by one-day-workshops, several durational projects and an exhibition. And – most important – by a parallel "Open marathon" that is based on self-organisation: its content is produced entirely by the participants – everybody is welcome to fill the slots, spontaneously or a couple of days in advance..." - from the Truth is Concrete website

Who else will be there? Funny you should ask...

Hans Abbing (NL), Milan Adamčiak (SK), Udi Aloni (IL), Valery Alzaga (MEX), Ulf Aminde (D), Burak Arikan (TR), ArtLeaks, Awesome Tapes From Africa (USA), Babi Badalov (AZ), Zdenka Badovinac (SLO), Zbynék Baladrán (CZ), Anette Baldauf (A), Katherine Ball (USA), Stéphane Bérard (F), Ellen Blumenstein / Haben und Brauchen (D), Katya Bondarenko / Teatr.doc (RUS), Leah Borromeo (GB), Jakob Braeuer (D), Christoph Braun (D), Reinhard Braun (A), Ondrej Buddeus (CZ), Loulou Chérinet (S), Chimurenga (ZA), Carlos Celdran (RP), Center for Political Beauty (D), common spring collective (D), Luigi Coppola (B/I), Critical Practice (GB), Minerva Cuevas (MEX), Sibylle Dahrendorf (D), Eyal Danon (IL), Diedrich Diederichsen (D), Jens Dietrich / IIMP - International Institute of Political Murder (D), Annie Dorsen (USA), eclectic electric collective (D), Róza El-Hassan (H/SYR), Rana El Nemr (ET), Oriana Eliçabe / Enmedio Collective (ES), Shady El Noshokaty (ET), Köken Ergun (TR/D), Charles Esche (NL/GB), Tim Etchells (GB), Everday Rebellion (A), Marcelo Expósito (AR), Eleonora Fabião (BR), Nick Farr (USA), Femen (UA), Joanna Figiel (GB/PL), Noah Fischer (USA), Dirk Fleischmann (ROK/D), Davis Freeman (B), Isabelle Fremeaux / The Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination (F), Fun-Da-Mental (GB), Alexandra Galkina (RUS), Loreto Garín Guzmán / Etcétera... (AR), Vjekoslav Gašparović / pulska grupa (HR), Federico Geller (AR), Mariam Ghani (USA), Adrienne Goehler (D), Jennifer González (USA), Julieta Gonzalez (VE), Janna Graham / Ultra-red (GB/CAN), Hafiz (ID), The Haircut Before The Party (GB), Gary Hall (GB), Christian Hanussek (D), Paul Harfleet (GB), Stefano Harney (GB), Vít Havranek (CZ), Adrian Heathfield (GB), Carl Hegemann (D), Herr Bogensberger (D/A), Stefan Hertmans (B), Pia Hierzegger (A), Herwig G. Hoeller (A), Edgar Honetschläger (A), Sam Hopkins (I/KE), Hor 29 Novembar (A), Khaled Hourani (PS), Hector Huerga (ES), Iconoclasistas (AR), The Israeli Center for Digital Art in Holon (IL), Irwin (SLO), Janez Janša (SLO), Khaled Jarrar (PS), Anna Jermolaewa (A/RUS), Jeudi Noir (F), John Jordan / The Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination (GB/F), Kaddu Yaraax (SN), Don Karl aka Stone (D), Kavecs (GR), Jerry Killick (GB), Jisun Kim (ROK), Guido Kleene (NL), Dmytri Kleiner / Telekommunisten (CA/DE), Nikolai Klimeniouk (RUS/UA), Bettina Knaup (D), The Kominas (USA), Michał Kozłowski / Free Slow University Warsaw (PL), Omer Krieger (IL), Leo Kühberger (A), André Lepecki (USA/BR), André Éric Létourneau (CAN), Lexxus Légal (CGO), Lawrence Liang (IND), Miguel López (PE), Sri Louise (USA), Matteo Lucchetti (I), Lucifer / Church of Kopimism (NL), Make (RUS), Mapa Teatro (CO), Oliver Marchart (A), Leónidas Martín / Enmedio Collective (ES), Masala Brass Kollektiv (A), Joana Mazza / Observatório de Favelas (BR), Tomislav Medak (HR), Kerstin Meyer (D), Antanas Mockus (CO), Moddi (N), Maryam Mohammadi (IR/A), Mao Mollona (GB), monochrom (A), Carlos Motta (CO/USA), Chantal Mouffe (GB/B), Rabih Mroué (LB), Michal Murin (SK), Marina Naprushkina (BY), Alexander Nikolic / Boem* (A), Mary Ocher (D/RUS), Jens Ohlig (D), Sofia Olascoaga (MEX), Nikolay Oleynikov and Dmitry Vilensky / Chto Delat (RUS), Giulia Palladini (I),  Lia Perjovschi (RO), Sibylle Peters (D), Nenad Duda Petrović (SRB), Claus Philipp (A), The Pinky Show (USA), The Piracy Project (GB), Michelangelo Pistoletto (I), Lisl Ponger (A), Srđa Popović / CANVAS (SRB), Precarious Workers Brigade (GB), Goran Sergej Pristaš (HR), Public Movement (IL), Radio Helsinki (A), Tzortzis Rallis / Occupy London Times (GB/GR), Judith Raum (D), raumlaborberlin (D), Gerald Raunig (A), Oliver Ressler (A), Reverend Billy & The Church of Stop Shopping (USA), Richard Reynolds (GB), Ultra-red (GB/USA), Scott Rigby / Basekamp (USA), Irit Rogoff (GB), Lina Saneh (LB), Imanuel Schipper (CH), Florian Schneider (D), Thomas M. Schnölzer / VolXküche feat. die Pastinaken (A), Judith Schwentner (A), Marco Scotini / Disobedience Archive (I), Ruti Sela (IL), Salma Shamel / Mosireen (ET), Urok Shirhan Alsaedy (IRQ), Gregory Sholette (USA), Stevphen Shukaitis / Minor Compositions (USA), Amund Sjølie Sveen (N), Anders Smebye (N), Joost Smiers (NL), Laila Soliman (ET), Petr Šourek / CorruptTour (CZ), Janek Sowa / Free Slow University Warsaw (PL), Jonas Staal (NL), Ana Džokić & Marc Neelen / STEALTH.unlimited (NL/SRB), Nora Sternfeld (A), Kuba Szreder (PL), Xu Tan (RC), Theater im Bahnhof (A), Bert Theis (I/L), Slaven Tolj (HR), Aseem Trivedi (IND), Don Tshibanda (CGO), Klumzy Tung (GB), the vacuum cleaner (GB), Wolfgang Vacarescu (A), Nicoline van Harskamp (NL), Marina Vishmidt (GB), Voina (RUS), W.A.G.E. (USA), Klaus Walter (D), Joanna Warsza (PL), Dave Watts (GB), Hans Winkler (D), WochenKlausur (A), Michael Wrentschur (A), Stephen Wright (CAN), Salam Yousry (ET), Stephen Zepke (A/NZ), Michael Zinganel (A), Federico Zukerfeld / Etcétera... (AR) and more.

Sounds pretty crazy. Anyway, Pinky and I will be making a presentation titled Unpleasant Cat Stories for Learning on Saturday September 22 at the Black Cube at 1pm - please come if you are in or nearby Austria. The rest of the week, I'm guessing Pinky and I will just use the time to talk and learn with everybody else, our favorite thing to do.

Oh, by the way, isn't the cover of program the best cover you've ever seen? I wonder who could have crocheted such a fabulous work of art? (Hint: It's me. Project background info here.)

To download the program, click here. (pdf, 12 pages, 1.8mb)

See you in Graz!

~Bunny.

Wheelchair Lady is now in a nursing home

Posted by Bunny.

If I recall correctly, Pinky decided to take in Wheelchair Lady in 2010, and since then taking care of her has been Pinky's #1 priority. The Pinky Show has had to take a back seat to caregiving - which happens to be 24/7 work because Alzheimer's + Parkinson's disease + strokes is no joke - and I'm sure many of you have noticed that our output has really dropped off the past couple years.

However, to make a long story short, since Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases are degenerative in nature, the caregiving was getting more and more intense and complicated. Pinky started to realize that she actually wasn’t taking proper care of WL (Don't look at me - I’m NOT the caregiving type), and some of the drugs that she needs aren’t the kind of stuff that ordinary people can administer at home. Anyway, after a lot of soul searching and research, Pinky finally decided to move WL to a nearby nursing home. It's a really nice nursing home with lots of trees and stuff, and Pinky will be visiting her every day. It's a big change though, and Pinky's still feeling very sad.

Me, though, I just think this a good decision. Wheelchair Lady will get the higher level of care she needs, and Pinky will be able to return to working on Pinky Show stuff. Which is what I think Pinky's real contribution in this lifetime is supposed to be.

~Bunny.

U.S. to UN: Noooo!!!

Posted by Bunny.

There's a front page story on The Guardian (UK) website about how the United Nations will conduct an inquiry into the U.S.'s treatment of Native Americans. The inquiry will be lead by the UN special rapporteur on indigenous peoples James Anaya:

"I will examine the situation of the American Indian/Native American, Alaska Native and Hawaiian peoples against the background of the United States' endorsement of the UN declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples."

Anaya will be travelling to various places in the U.S. to meet and talk with Native Americans and present a summary of his findings at a press conference on May 4, and also to the UN Human Rights Council at its next session. Here's a picture of the front page. Big photo, bright orange header - hard to miss, isn't it?

View fullsize

​click to see a larger version

I searched the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, San Francisco Chronicle, Washington Post, etc. etc. - and guess what? No mention at all of the inquiry or forthcoming report. Hmmmmmm...

HMM!

Mainstream media-style censorship aside, The Guardian story contains this statement: "The UN mission is potentially contentious, with some US conservatives likely to object to international interference in domestic matters..." This is interesting for at least a couple of reasons:

1) The U.S. has never had a problem with the UN poking its nose into the 'domestic matters' of other nations, as long as the U.S. stands to gain something from this kind of 'interference'. This is just hypocrisy.

2) It's silly to say that such an inquiry would raise objections from U.S. conservatives. Why single them out? In fact, state violence and genocide against Native Americans has just been the most consistent and obvious thing conservatives and so-called liberals tend to agree on; in fact they've been together on this throughout all of U.S. history! The real division would better be characterized as indigenous vs. settler, since it's really all settlers who benefit from violence against Native Americans.

~Bunny.

LINKS......................................................

The above-mentioned Guardian story.

UN website: UN adopts UNDRIP. (The U.S. eventually signed on - late - in 2010.)

UN website: The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in pdf form.

Bigger PINKY SHOW

Posted by Bunny.

Guess what? We are slowly making our way through our archive of past videos, converting them to a bigger size. I will be swapping out the old videos on our website with the newer, bigger versions and when I'm done mostly everything will be a lot bigger and nicer to look at. How much bigger? FOUR TIMES BIGGER. And of course everything will still be free, so we'll essentially be giving away 4 times more free stuff than before, if you count pixels as stuff. You're welcome!

First up - our Fabulous Imperialism video is now big. It was our first 'real' video - if you've never seen it before, go see it now. I hadn't watched it in years actually, it was fun to watch it again. I still think it rules. After watching it again I went and pat Pinky on the head because she really has improved a lot as a narrator these past few years. (She sucks in this video.)

~Bunny.

PS in new Art Education book

Posted by Bunny.

There's a new book out titled Art and Social Justice Education: Culture as Commons. If you're into not sucking as a teacher you should probably go read it. I haven't read it myself but if we're in this book it must be a good book. Skimming the index, I see the Pinky Show is on pages 99, 104-106, and 190.

Therese Quinn, art education professor at The Art Institute of Chicago and one of the editors of the book, was the person who contacted us about being included in the project. She was super nice to work with, keeping us informed about the book's progress and even sending us a complimentary copy of the book when it was completed. It's always fun for me to see our work in print. But I'm disappointed that it's actually a pretty expensive book - right now I see it at Amazon.com for $45 (list price is $50) - so if you can't afford to buy a copy hopefully you can check it out at a library, assuming the one near where you live hasn't already been shut down due to "budget cuts" or whatever. The book does have a lot of pictures in it though, some in color, so I guess that probably adds to the cost of printing. It's 200 pages thick and does have a lot of examples of artists and projects that I'm sure you will like (assuming you aren't at our website by accident). I haven't read eveything but I did look at all the pictures already; they're good.

Click on the picture on make it big, then you can read the words.

Good-bye for now. ~Bunny.

Happy New Year

Posted by Bunny.

Pinky and I wish everybody reading this a very good new year.

Personally I'm very glad to have a brand new year to get started with. With a few exceptions, I thought last year sucked.

Pinky spent probably 90% of her waking hours taking care of abandoned wheelchair lady we found down by the highway. After a lot of nerve-wracking ups and downs - including a couple of times where we really thought she was about to die - her health finally seems to be improving a little. She's strong enough now that last week we were finally able to start taking her to a Level II adult daycare facility near here so that she can have some interaction with other humans, and also give Pinky and me some time to get back to doing Pinky Show work together.

What did I do last year? Well, changing adult diapers and giving sponge baths is not my thing. So I spent most of last year working on our Pinky Show book project and in my spare time building an 8-foot tall media analysis robot. I named her Mittens. She should be ready for unveiling in about a week. I'm doing final testing now.

We just got our new 4TB CalDigit RAID in the mail yesterday. This is to replace our old WiebeTech work drive that finally died after several years of very intense use. Thank you to everyone who sent us donations over the past year. Your donations helped keep the Pinky Show website online, pay our electricity and food bills, pay for the replacement harddrive as well as all the other small project expenses that began piling up during the past year. Now with wheelchair lady at daycare several days a week Pinky and I will finally have a chance to wrap up some old, unfinished work and also start some new stuff. I have a feeling this is going to be a very complicated, tumultuous, tiring, and exciting year. I feel good and ready for work.

See you soon,
Bunny

New Stuff announcement

Posted by Bunny.

Hello friends. We have new stuff:

1. New video: The Desert is Quiet. What’s it about? It’s so short, you might as well just watch it!

2. Companion animated GIF to the above-mentioned video. It’s called Despite All Appearances Every Moment is Unique.

3. Seven Scenes from Work and Life, a small e-booklet with pictures and explanatory notes.

We hope you find this stuff useful or interesting. If you have any comments please send us a note.

I’ll end with some good advice Pinky & I have been trying to think about very seriously lately:

"The desire to sacrifice an entire lifetime to the noblest of ideals serves no purpose if one works alone."

I'm not sure if our ideals are so noble but I think it's definitely important for us to work more with others, something cats are not particularly known for. Anyway, if you’re curious about the original context of this quote it's here.

Okay, good-bye for now.

Bunny

Pinky Show in Karlsruhe, Germany & Zurich, Switzerland

Posted by Pinky.

We just got back from Germany and Switzerland, where we worked a lot but also ate some tasty European food. We especially liked Turkish imbiss, all the delicious breads, and we even got to try some fancy “one-day” chocolate in Zurich. (Everything in Zurich was crazy expensive - riding the bus cost around $6 (so we walked!) and a cup of coffee is also around $6+ so we had to get out of there really fast...) Bunny ate several sausages.

We were there to attend the opening to an art exhibition in which included some of our work, The Global Contemporary. Art Worlds After 1989 at ZKM Center for Media and Art Karlsruhe (Germany), and also to do some workshops with the ZKM Education Department. Here is a short interview we did for the ZKM blog while we were there: [ to the ZKM blog ]

The workshops went very well I think, especially the very intense three-day workshop we had with museum education and curator-people. That was fun. Also we did a very short workshop with high school art students that was not-so-intense; basically we just showed some examples of how you can put audio recordings with pictures or animation to make different forms of story-telling and stuff like that. For example:

.

Bunny and I want to send a special thank you to Henrike Plegge at ZKM for organizing the workshops and all her hard work in making sure our trip to Germany was comfortable, work-efficient, and fun. We learned a lot from everybody we met, especially Uta, Peter, & Ella who let us stay at their apartment the whole time and told us so many wonderful stories that we will never forget. Thank you.

Now some pictures!​

Bunny in front of the ZKM, on her way to the Karlsruhe Zoo.

Ella next to the bread slicing machine.

Swans and ducks floating on Lake Zurich.

walking in the woods on the banks of the Rhine river near Karlsruhe.

New war poster, image macros, and button art in the PS archives.

Posted by Pinky.

Hi everybody! It's the end of the week - yay! I hope your week has been filled with many victories against the forces of evil!

I just finished posting some stuff in the Pinky Show archives. The thing that I'm guessing will interest the most people is the poster Bunny and I made a couple of weeks ago. It's called Figure 1: War Deaths, Traumas, and Other Miscellaneous Injuries. We made it primarily for classroom teachers and other educators, to help students think and talk more about the wide range of suffering violent conflicts like wars and "interventions" produce - suffering that for the most part is never covered by TV news broadcasts. We made two versions - please note that version two contains images that may be unsettling to some viewers.

Oh, speaking of TV news, for those of you who are into media studies, journalism, and whatnot, we also have two new image macros that takes TV news as its subject matter so you might be interested in that… Also, I finally added in some of our button-work (buttons are a means of communication too!) to the archive. Hmm, only took me 6 months to get around to posting it...​

Whenever possible we always try to have a digital version of our work available for free on our website. We have students and educators downloading our materials from almost every corner of this planet, including some places where money is unbelievably hard to come by. For those of you who have the means, please help keep this project floating!

And, as always, if you are handy with Facebook and stuff like that please transmit this info far and wide. Bunny and I've kinda given up on the social media thing. We kind of understand how Twitter works but Facebook seems too confusing.

Okay, I will sign off now. It is already very late and I still haven't cooked supper!

Thank you and a big hug to all Pinky Show friends!

~p.

Buttons to help the Japanese cats (and dogs too)

Posted by Pinky.

It's been over a month since the giant earthquake, tsunami, & nuclear plant disaster struck Japan and the situation remains dire - not only for human beings but also for the environment and millions of animals. In my March 19 blog entry I included links to organizations that are working very hard to take care of thousands of suffering cats and dogs. Some of the people working for these organizations are even risking their own health by going into areas contaminated by radiation to try to find hungry, lost, injured, and traumatized cats. Our hearts go out to these dedicated and kind people.

Bunny and I are trying to use our Pinky Show-resources to raise as much money as possible so that we can send it to Japan Earthquake Animal Rescue and Support, World Society for the Protection of Animals, and World Vets. This morning we made buttons:

The buttons say, "Please Help the Japanese Cats." Anyone who makes a $10 donation to The Pinky Show will receive five buttons. Please share them with your friends, help us get the word out. Just write "Japanese Cats fundraiser" or something similar in the message field of our donation form and we will send 100% of all proceeds collected to the above-mentioned organizations so they can keep doing their work. Of course if you can afford to send more than $10, please do so. It's difficult, tiring, and potentially very dangerous work and these people need support.

Sincerely yours,
pinky

P.S. Thank you to Reiko Cat for volunteering to model for our button.​

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April 19 evening update! Tonight we collected $68.25 at a nearby fighting school (!?) and gave away lots of buttons! I'm sure that'll pay for several bags of cat food. We will keep you posted as to how much progress we make with this fundraiser. ~ p.

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Another blog to watch: Japanese Cat Network
Posted by Bunny.

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April 22 update! So far in-person donations are trouncing donations from the internet. We've collected around $170 just by talking to people and about $45 came from online donations. This weekend Pinky and I will knocking on some doors and also visiting a hospital and a shopping mall or something. We'll keep at it. Posted by Bunny.

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April 24 update! We have collected a total of $474.25. Our sincerest thank you to everyone who has made donations. We will be fundraising for another week - if you have not yet sent in a donation, please do. Earthquake, tsunami, radiation - it's difficult to imagine a worse disaster, right? If it happened here, I'm sure we all would be praying that others would come to help us with food, medicine, soap, and shelter. Please think about it. Thank you, Bunny.

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May 1 update! The total collected is now almost $700. We've been walking around talking to people about the situation in Japan and handing out little slips of paper with links to rescue and support organizations. I hope at least some of those people made donations on their own. The largest donation we received so far from an individual was $100, smallest 25 cents (yes, they got a button too). We are going to wrap up this collection at the end of this week so we can hurry up and send the money. Our most sincere thank you to everybody who made a donation. Posted by Bunny.

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May 8 update! Final total: $857.

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May 18 update! Wow, just received another late donation! Final FINAL total: $870.

Here comes Patrick Wolfe... "soon".

Posted by Bunny.

We are editing our 2009 interview with historian Patrick Wolfe. Actually this is the second time we are editing it. The first time we edited it we thought we wanted to combine excerpts from Dr. Wolfe's interview with interview footage from other scholars all talking about settler colonialism. But, with a little push from our friend Giordano who very correctly pointed out to us that there isn't enough Patrick Wolfe stuff on the internet, we are re-editing it to present a large portion of the interview as a stand-alone video. I guess we can always interview other people about settler colonialism later, then we'll just have lots of stuff on our website about settler colonialism. Which would be a good thing. The video will also an introduction by Pinky.

Yes, we are slow. If you simply can't wait to get your PS PW fix, you can read (parts of) his great book Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology: The Politics and Poetry of an Ethnographic Event here.

~Bunny.​