More Solid Reading Around the Web, Old and New

Danziger Projects: Alejandra Llaviada
I’ve been coming across one too many really great pieces of writing not to share. Here’s a short list for you if you’re looking for some good stuff to read while bored at work this week…
“I Am the Unicorn,” by Nicolle Elizabeth, over at the Rumpus. Beautiful, deeply human, well executed and heavy. Nothing like a seemingly far-reaching tangent in an essay that then gets neatly folded back into the fabric of the piece. (more…)
Great Reading Around the Web, Old and New

Shark Kid Halloween Costume
An interview with designer Martin Baas by Brian Fichtner over at Cool Hunting. Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore discovers more about his young idol/hero Patti Smith in this Bomb magazine interview. The Future of Art in an Age of Crisis — Part 1 by David Walsh explores its own title, over at the World Socialist Web Site. A Sociobiological take on “The Subtle Art of Exclusion” in an article by Robert Weissberg entitled Stuff White People Like, on the site Taki’s Magazine. Not Death of Newspapers, But Death of Advertising article by James Fallows in the Atlantic, available online. Probing seminal article on controversy Dash Snow begs the questions, what is art, who is art, can life be art, is this just the boring artworld getting too high on itself, in New York Magazine. Interview with me, Matty Byloos on Don’t Smell the Floss, conducted by Henry Baum, editor of Self Publishing Review: an online resource for writers. Andrei Codrescu interview: Exquisite Corpse Editor, author of Wakefield converses with Robert Birnbaum on Identity Theory.com. The New Republic features a piece by Jed Perl on the museum collected art in Los Angeles.
Great Reading Around the Web, Old and New

Bunny Boys
Dan Baum tweets a lengthy story about his time and eventual release from the tenured reporting ranks of the New Yorker, wherein he learns of institutional cultures and exactly how he didn’t fit in. David Ng, for Culture Monster, one of the LA Times blogs, addresses Erased James Franco by the artist Carter, and tries to break down the process. The Fanzine invites in some heavy weights, including author Gary Shteyngart, to discuss irrational fears in the most recent episode of Talk Show (Talk Show 25 also with Brian Evenson, Lev Grossman, Elizabeth McCracken, Karen Shepard, from 5.20.09). A quick post enumerating the future of Green Warfare and tree bombs over at BLDG BLOG, which is strangely poetic and beautiful. Jonah Lehrer on his Science Blog: The Frontal Cortex posts a few answers to questions on Self Control, originally from the New Yorker online. Island of Bad Blood by Ian Thomson discusses the complexity of racial issues in Jamaica over at the British online magazine: Standpoint. In Defense of Distraction by Sam Anderson in NY Magazine covers the revolution in fractured attention sponsored by “Twitter, Adderall, lifehacking, mindful jogging, power browsing, Obama’s BlackBerry, and the benefits of overstimulation.”