Latest news with #JacksonPollock
The Star
20 hours ago
- Automotive
- The Star
Smooth rides start here
Muhammad Rusyduddin says there is a steady demand for good quality bike care products to cater to cyclists of all calibers. OUT on the trail or weaving through city streets, the bicycle chain is the unsung hero of every ride. Strip it away and the bike becomes little more than a fancy sculpture. But give it some care and it will return the favour with smooth and efficient rides for years to come. The trick here is to keep it clean after each adventure; whether a muddy off-road romp or a sweaty urban sprint, give the bike a quick rinse. Focus on the chain; that is where the grime builds up. Use a proper chain cleaner and a decent degreasing solution, as this matters when it comes to gunk-fighting power. Applying dry lubricant to the chain after a clean-up. A good chain brush will help scrub off oil, mud and whatever else the road throws at you. The bristles snake between the links, hitting every greasy crevice. For those who live for the details, there's a mechanical chain cleaner, a nifty device that clamps onto your chain. Just crank the pedals and let the machine work its magic. A humble old toothbrush does the job just fine if you're trying to watch your budget. Once the muck is gone, let the chain dry out to be lubricated. There are two types of lubricants: wax-based and oil-based. Wax lube is cleaner. It sheds dirt naturally once it dries. Oil lube, while effective, can turn your calves into a Jackson Pollock painting if you go overboard. For the gearheads and meticulous riders, there's a growing ecosystem of chain-care products. 'You can get chain lubricants to complete care kits for between RM59 and RM499. 'The most basic lube should last you four to six months, depending on how often you ride,' said USJ Cycles Lifestyle Boutique's assistant manager, Muhammad Rusyduddin Rosli. A clean, well-lubricated chain doesn't just run better – it lasts longer. Muhammad Rusyduddin notes that chains typically need replacing every 2,000km, depending on terrain and usage. A reputable chain can cost anywhere between RM35 and RM170, depending on the brand, material and the number of gears your drivetrain supports. So next time, after your next ride, don't just lean the bike against the wall and call it a day. Give the chain a little TLC. It's a small habit that guarantees a big return, especially when you're halfway up a hill, the sun is setting and everything's working like clockwork.
The Guardian
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Leonardo Drew review – are these towers of debris the ruins of America?
This place looks like a storm hit it. The winds have ripped up houses, shops, factories and art studios, whirled the pieces in a mighty twister and smashed them to earth in pulverised fragments. Now they scatter South London Gallery, towering over you in two random heaps, with other pieces gathered in clusters, floating on the walls, thrown all over the floor. Crunch, crunch – you can walk on broken bits of wood carpeting the ground, negotiating your way around bigger debris, as you inspect the ruins of America – and, sadly, of American art. Seven decades ago, Jackson Pollock put America at the forefront of abstract art with looping and spiralling vortices of energy that he created by pouring and flicking paint on to a horizontal canvas. Leonardo Drew grew up in a housing project in Bridgeport, Connecticut, in the 60s and is consciously influenced by Pollock, whose work he first saw in a book at his local library. Where Pollock threw paint, Drew scatters splintered wood, yet his sculpture can also be seen as painting, since before breaking up many of the boards and planks in this show, he painted them. The entire installation can be seen as a huge action painting in 3D. Drew even numbers his works like Pollock did: the alternative title of Ubiquity II is Number 436. But if action painting in the 50s was a freewheeling image of the improvisational American spirit, this is the debris of a shattered American dream. You get a sense, contemplating Drew's crafted rubble, of surveying the aftermath of a cataclysmic weather event or walking the streets of a US town obliterated by the latest freak hurricane or tornado. This is painfully resonant given the Trump administration's policy of active climate crisis denial, including the withdrawal of government funding for research. And, as the eerie silence of this world in smithereens, broken only by the wood cracking under your feet, reminds you, some of the most traumatic indicators of climate emergency, from storms to fires, have hit the US itself. Drew doesn't claim his art is political in any direct way: it is abstract. I'm reading Trump into it. But although I could go on like this, identifying artistic echoes and urgent themes, it's forced. This artwork is disappointing. On paper, and in photographs, Drew's work seemed spectacular, yet as soon as I walked into the gallery my heart sank. There's a lumpen, flat, unthreatening feeling to this show. It's as depressing as a destroyed town but without the danger or horror. In fact, it's hard to feel anything at all about an assemblage that fails to suggest motion, energy or life. When you enter the long, tall white space, the first disappointment is the way wooden items are stuck around the walls. They don't look like flying fragments propelled through space, but decorations on a bedroom wall. Some resemble cricket bats. One looks like a gun. Whatever they are meant to be, they are as radical as wrapping paper. The second blow to anyone seeking artistic fun is the sight of the two tottering heaps with a valley between them through which you can pass. 'Tottering' is inaccurate, for they are clearly not about to fall. You can see the scaffolding on which the artist has built his Towers of Babel. Everything is safely, staidly stuck in place. I'm not saying it should fall, but where is the dramatic tension? The only hint of danger or dynamism is in the starbursts around the floor. One looks like a fist of rapidly expanding matter. It makes you think of the exploding enemy plane in Roy Lichtenstein's painting Whaam! – which is itself an ironic homage to Pollock's action art. Maybe the contrast is deliberate, for Drew says his art is a meditation on entropy. So the energetic, propulsive assemblages may be newborn stars or fragments of the big bang. But the sagging heaps of crap are the universe approaching its death, Earth under an avalanche of garbage, America at the end of its time. Maybe so. But it's dreary to look at. It's not just at the macro scale that the installation appears inert. Every small chunk you look at, in the heaps, on the walls, has an arbitrary wanness up close. Nothing seems to mean much, or matter much. Perhaps Drew is simply crushed by these times. But it seems to me this work, with its conscious echoes of Pollock that fail to recapture the excitement or surprise of America's modern art glory days, is a symptom of a nation in cultural as well as political decline. Trump's America is a shell of what it once was. Americans were creatively brilliant not so long ago, pumping out the best art, novels, music. But this exhausted art looks to me like the product of a decaying country. South London Gallery from 30 May to 7 December
Yahoo
27-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
50 People Who Spent A Tooooooon Of Money On Their Dream Home And Pretty Much Immediately Regretted It
person who might to be more careful in choosing their home's location next time: person whose pool just became an infinity pool at no cost: person who juuuuust might have a bee problem: person who should've just stayed put: person who miiight have wanted to measure those stairs one last time before putting them in: person who had the worst kind of surprise: person whose basement just got a brand new indoor pool: person whose Good Samaritan power lines saved the day: Shoutout to power lines. Always keeping us going. person who must ford this river Oregon Trail-style to get back to their home: person who got paint EVERYWHERE: person who lived their dream: person who's about to make three new friends: person who has a slight leak in their home: person who straight up fell through a suburban trap door: person whose toilet Zeus must have mistaken for frickin' Cronus: SERIOUSLY! person whose neighbors never let the party die: Related: 26 People Who Had Overwhelming Gut Instincts They Couldn't Were Right person whose oven spontaneously combusted at the worst possible moment: person whose roofer was kind enough to say hello: person who must immediately vacate the premises: person who just got a brand-new below ground pool installed: person who might just want to paper over that hole: person who has their couch riiiiight where they want it: person whose trash committed some, frankly, trash behavior: person whose kitchen said NO: person who was kind enough to let the world peak into their house: Related: 51 People Who Quickly Discovered Why Their Hilariously Clueless Partner Was Single Before Meeting Them person whose neighbor pulled this wildly perplexing yet frustrating move: person whose stairs just got a visit from the ghost of Jackson Pollock: person who has clearly learned the value of a good pivot: person who turned their garage into a winter wonderland: person whose bathroom is completely frozen solid: person who gave their carpet a very cool, modern makeover: person with a very delicious floor: person who had this Looney Toons-esque series of events happen to them: person who will never whack weeds so haphazardly ever again: person whose toilet was kind enough to make them a new indoor pool: person who angered the wrong Norse god: person whose iron is currently burning a hole to the center of the Earth: person whose beanbag chair went absolutely nuclear: person who picked the absolute worst place to park that day: person who was betrayed by the very fish tank they loved so: person who was betrayed by the porch they love the most: person who should never have investigated that sound: person whose oven is doubled over in pain: person who just made a friend for life: person whose house got the Nosferatu stake-through-the-heart treatment: person who went Kool Aid Man-mode on their door: person who airmailed their neighbors a very special gift: person whose fan fell ferociously from up high: person whose railing blew way up: the person whose home is apparently being attacked by a 14th-century king: Folks, I'm serious! Also in Internet Finds: 15 Facebook Marketplace Items You'll Wish, From The Depths Of Your Soul, You Could Unsee Also in Internet Finds: People Are Confessing Their Absolute Pettiest "Revenge Served Cold" Stories, And It's Deliciously Entertaining Also in Internet Finds: 19 Things Society Glorifies That Are Actually Straight-Up Terrible, And We Need To Stop Pretending Otherwise
Buzz Feed
27-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Buzz Feed
50 People Who Spent A Tooooooon Of Money On Their Dream Home And Pretty Much Immediately Regretted It
The person who might to be more careful in choosing their home's location next time: The person whose pool just became an infinity pool at no cost: The person who juuuuust might have a bee problem: The person who should've just stayed put: The person who miiight have wanted to measure those stairs one last time before putting them in: The person who had the worst kind of surprise: The person whose basement just got a brand new indoor pool: The person whose Good Samaritan power lines saved the day: Shoutout to power lines. Always keeping us going. The person who must ford this river Oregon Trail-style to get back to their home: The person who got paint EVERYWHERE: The person who lived their dream: The person who's about to make three new friends: The person who has a slight leak in their home: The person who straight up fell through a suburban trap door: The person whose toilet Zeus must have mistaken for frickin' Cronus: SERIOUSLY! The person whose neighbors never let the party die: The person whose oven spontaneously combusted at the worst possible moment: The person whose roofer was kind enough to say hello: The person who must immediately vacate the premises: The person who just got a brand-new below ground pool installed: The person who might just want to paper over that hole: The person who has their couch riiiiight where they want it: The person whose trash committed some, frankly, trash behavior: The person whose kitchen said NO: The person who was kind enough to let the world peak into their house: The person whose neighbor pulled this wildly perplexing yet frustrating move: The person whose stairs just got a visit from the ghost of Jackson Pollock: The person who has clearly learned the value of a good pivot: The person who turned their garage into a winter wonderland: The person whose bathroom is completely frozen solid: The person who gave their carpet a very cool, modern makeover: The person with a very delicious floor: The person who had this Looney Toons-esque series of events happen to them: The person who will never whack weeds so haphazardly ever again: The person whose toilet was kind enough to make them a new indoor pool: The person who angered the wrong Norse god: The person whose iron is currently burning a hole to the center of the Earth: The person whose beanbag chair went absolutely nuclear: The person who picked the absolute worst place to park that day: The person who was betrayed by the very fish tank they loved so: The person who was betrayed by the porch they love the most: The person who should never have investigated that sound: The person whose oven is doubled over in pain: The person who just made a friend for life: The person whose house got the Nosferatu stake-through-the-heart treatment: The person who went Kool Aid Man-mode on their door: The person who airmailed their neighbors a very special gift: The person whose fan fell ferociously from up high: The person whose railing blew way up: And the person whose home is apparently being attacked by a 14th-century king: Folks, I'm serious!
The Age
06-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
How a seminal American artwork divided Australians
ART Blue Poles: Jackson Pollock, Gough Whitlam and the Painting that changed Australia Tom McIlroy Hachette $34.99 My parents did not think highly of Blue Poles. When Gough Whitlam agreed in 1973 to spend $1.4 million dollars on Jackson Pollock's enormous painting, they suddenly found a focus for their rancour about everything that was wrong with the world. Such malarkey was a decadent waste of money and any of their children could have done better. Indeed, if their children had done anything like this, they would have been in trouble for making a mess. They were not alone. One of the many pleasures of Tom McIlroy's superb account of the Blue Poles phenomenon is hearing the Australian public in uproar about a painting. Fifty years later, cultural debate in Australian has not matured much. Still plenty of name-calling. Not much listening. Ten years after it arrived, I saw Blue Poles for the first time and have returned regularly since. People come to Australia just to see it. Blue Poles packs a punch, different to almost any other work I have experienced. Yet it is not easy to describe quite how or why it does so. McIlroy quotes Jackson Pollock (1912-1956) as saying that if you look at a bed of flowers, you can appreciate their beauty without needing to know what those flowers mean or represent. Pollock was committed to art that was not figurative in any way. We all know that flowers are an essential part of nature and the fertility of Earth. They are useful. What about Blue Poles? Its power is that you simply can't articulate why it is so powerful. It creates a spiritual space in the same way as other wonderful forms of exuberant uselessness such as the Taj Mahal. McIlroy is a gifted writer who finds clear lines of storytelling as he unpacks an intricate story. He is dealing with pivotal moments in two cultures: mid-century USA and 1970s Australia. He begins with Pollock himself, the alcoholic son of an alcoholic father who died driving a car while he was drunk, killing one woman and injuring his love interest of the time. Nothing in his bloodline was arty or pretentious. He was lucky to find a rock in the artist Lee Krasner, his wife. She endured a difficult relationship, to say the least. One of her own fine works, Cool White, hangs alongside Blue Poles. Blue Poles was completed in 1952 and took 20 years to reach our shores, thanks to the inaugural director of the national Gallery, James Mollison. McIlroy's portrait of Mollison is riveting, as is his portrayal of the business of art which Mollison negotiated
