I took some stills of one of my favourite music videos, Red Hot Chili Peppers's 'The Zephyr Song', directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris (who had also directed videos for R.E.M, Oasis and Beastie Boys).

See the stills here.

Check the video here.

A new tumblr find. Nicole Bell, better known by her artistic name Nicole Dollanganger, makes the most disturbing music I have ever heard. Songs like 'Coma Baby', 'Blood Brothers' and 'Dog Teeth' are tragic lullabies, obscure stories sang with the softest voice. Raw, cruel, but beautiful and delicate. Brutally honest. And a great alternative if you are already done  with cool people repeating the word 'swag' or 'pussy' in their lyrics until your ears bleed. Grab a box of tissues and enjoy her first album, Curdled Milk, that you can either listen for free or buy from her bandcamp (http://nicoledollanganger.bandcamp.com/).

While Tumblr now seems to be packed with misinterpreted quotations, skinny girls and cats, if you are careful enough you will be able to find one or two things that make all the time spent online worth every second. This is how I met Peter De Potter, from Antwerp, whose work comprises a different range of photography, both found imaginary and self-made, divided in series, each with its own tumblr page. So far De Potter has created http://angelic-starts.tumblr.com (2010), http://routine-routine.tumblr.com (2011), http://i-am-an-image-machine.tumblr.com(2011) and most recently http://badges-for-honorable-lovers.tumblr.com. By using these sites all his work has been transported into a digital platform, with an occasional physical twin of the online  pieces aside from a few minor alterations regarding its printed format. Apart from these series, last year, the Belgium artist participated with an entry at the Avant/Garde diaries in Berlin, curated by Raf Simons, with whom he has collaborated since 2001.

PdP's art has caught my eye in a very powerful way. Firstly because the obvious magnificence of his work; his ability to conjoin ideas to create a greater concept in just one collage is remarkable and definitely one of a kind, even if it almost every tumblr blogger would state they do the same thing, De Potter sensibility is transmitted by each piece into a larger vision that might not be perceived by some.
While some individuals would aim their criticism to his way of re-using other artist's work, De Potter defends his pieces noting where the importance of his art lies: "The question of lifting images from their original sources is not new in the art world yet there has never been a definite answer or definition about it. To me, my work is very much about the questions 'what is an image', 'what is a collage', 'why do we fall in love - in the physical sense - with an image', 'why are we touched by an image' than anything else." Even more than that, there is something so romantic in his vision, and that is his use of both found imaginary and his own to create something new. Sort of bringing back to life forgotten thoughts one once had- shared and then disappeared. De Potter transforms images, a process which feels almost like recycling, and comes up with collages that feel fresh and honest.

The Internet has been for a while the strongest way of diffusing art and the fastest way ever to receive a real feedback from the viewers. And yet there is people who still reject platforms like Tumblr or Instagram, regarding them as an 'irrelevant' form of entertainment. Now Peter De Potter proves otherwise and reaches his public in the most exciting and modern way and possibly, the highest number of audience. If it seems like everything has been done before, why not trying something new?

I recently discovered the artist Shinichi Maruyama (b. 1968 Nagano, Japan. Now based in New York). What I loved about his work is, given the ephemeral nature of his sculptures, they can only exist through a photographic or film media support. Check out his 'Water Sculpture', just brilliant.

http://shinichimaruyama.com/