Unusually Long Exposure Photographs by Michael Wesely

For more than a decade, German photography artist Michael Wesely has been inventing and refining techniques for making photographs with unusually long exposures - some as long as three years. In 1997, armed with a self-built pinhole camera, he began using this unique approach to photography to explore major urban construction projects around Berlin.

In 2001, when the Museum of Modern Art in New York under went a three year renovation and expansion, they invited Michael Wesely to bring his unique vision to this significant change. Wesely setup his custom made cameras in four locations around the museum construction site and photographed the destruction and re-building of the MoMa until 2004 - leaving the shutter open for up to 34 months! The demolition and construction over the course of Wesely's long exposures gives the pictures a ghostlike appearance. The streaks of white bands in the background is the sun tracing the sky hundreds of times over the period.

The incredible thing about these pictures is that you can actually see the passing of time in a single shot. The older parts of the building that were exposed the longest appear darker and clearer. While the newer parts seem more ghost like. It took Michael more than 2 years to create this incredible time incapsulation at the Potsdamer Platz in Berlin (below).

The photo taken at the Leipziger Platz in Berlin (below) had an exposure time of 16 months.

Here is another image he created. It is an 18 month exposure of Palast der Republik, Berlin.

A 2 year 3 month exposure of the construction of Allianz Arena football stadium in Munich, Germany.

The exposure time of these flowers are not known. Could be a few weeks.

PETA’s Bloody Protest in New York

PETA’s (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) demonstrations areamusing, to say the least. In the latest stunt put up by the animal rights activists, demonstrators stripped down in New York City's Times Square, wrapped themselves up in cellophane and doused themselves with fake blood so they looked like meat on sale at a supermarket. The message PETA wants to send out is that buying a steak from a grocery store is no different from buying a corpse.

How to Display a Retired Space Shuttle

NASA has stated that it intends to put up its three space shuttle orbiters -- Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour -- on museums for public display after the fleet is retired. The agency requested interested museums submit statements of interest, including details for how they plan to meet the requirement of exhibiting an orbiter in an environmentally-controlled, enclosed display.

NASA has reserved Discovery for the Smithsonian but the fates of Atlantis and Endeavour, as well as the prototype Enterprise have yet to be decided. In the interim, some of the 20 organizations vying for an orbiter have released concepts for how they plan to exhibit a retired shuttle, should they receive one.

Space shuttle Enterprise, on display since 2003 at the Smithsonian's Stephen F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Va., will be replaced on exhibit by Discovery, according to National Air and Space Museum curators. (Credit: Dane Penland/NASM)

According to sources, the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex would seek to modify one of NASA's Orbiter Processing Facilities to at least temporarily house and display a retired shuttle, removing some of the support scaffolding to allow a better view. (Credit: NASA)

The new 53,000-square-foot space shuttle exhibit at Space Center Houston, the official visitor center for NASA's Johnson Space Center in Texas, will focus on the human side of shuttle operations, including astronaut activities. (Credit: Space Center Houston)

The National Museum of the U.S. Air Force in Dayton, Ohio, had existing plans to ad a new hangar to its facility, with an area set aside as a "Space Gallery." The museum has cited the USAF's role in the shuttle program as why it merits an orbiter. (Credit: USAF)

The Air Force Museum's "Space Gallery" display would also include Mercury, Gemini and Apollo spacecraft. (Credit: USAF)

Stills taken from an animated tour of the U.S. Space & Rocket Center's proposed display of an orbiter. The Huntsville, Alabama museum acquired the Orbiter Protective Enclosure built to protect and shield an orbiter from prying eyes if it was ever forced to land outside the U.S. while carrying classified cargo, which could be an appropriate home for a retired orbiter. (Credit: U.S. Space & Rocket Center)

New York City's Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum would display the orbiter inside an enclosed hangar located along Hudson River Park Pier 86 where the aircraft carrier is berthed, just blocks away from Times Square. (Credit: Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum)

The Museum of Flight's glass-enclosed "Human Spaceflight Gallery," which the Seattle, Washington museum pledged $12 million and broken ground in June 2010 to build, even before knowing if they will receive an orbiter. (Credit: Museum of Flight)

 

The Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum in McMinnville, Oregon is no stranger to displaying large craft: they already house the Hughes H-4 Hercules Spruce Goose. Here, an artist shows how an orbiter would fit among their displays. (Credit: Evergreen)

Tulsa, Oklahoma may not come to mind when thinking about space, but it is where the space shuttle's payload doors were assembled. The Tulsa Air and Space Museum plans to show off those doors by displaying the orbiter vertically. (Credit: TASM)

Kay Petal’s Needle Felted Celebrity Wool Sculptures

Kay Petal is a sculptural needle felt artist from Alaska who specializes in soft-sculpted lifelike dolls with a focus on celebrity caricatures.

Kay Petal discovered needle felting in 2007 when she was recovering from cancer. After surviving from a rare cancer Petal became keenly aware of the need to stop giving in to the mundane things in life and find that thing she is truly passionate about. When she purchased a book by a pioneer of needle felting, Birgitte Krag Hansen, she discovered what she really wanted to do.

Kay Petal’s Felt Alive dolls are fully jointed, solid felted wool and require no sewing, no stuffing, no painting, no knitting or crocheting, no patterns and no wire armatures. Her work has been featured in numerous magazines and has been getting accolades in the blogosphere.

Jay Leno

Bono

Elton John

Marilyn Monroe

Johnny Cash

Jackie Chan

Mr. T

Ellen DeGeneres

Donald Trump

Lyle Lovett

Spock

Bruce Springsteen with Bono

Sarah Palin

Beatles

Conan O'Brien

Willie Nelson

Sculptures for Giants by Robert Therrien

Robert Therrien recreates everyday objects true to their original material and colour, but on an enlarged scale. In a recent exhibition held at Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh, Scotland he featured oversized objects such as chairs and tables.

Robert Therrien was born in Chicago in 1947 and currently lives and works in Los Angeles. His work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Gagosian Gallery, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Museum Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, among other venues.