A Colossus by Chuckmatrix Clip dominates the PiRats Gallery

It seems the shocks to the SL art world never stop, and the latest is the news that the venerable PiRats Art Sims will be soon closing, probably at month’s end, only days away. The reason, as usual, the high tier prices Linden Labs charges, undoubtedly combined with the poor state of the economy, both SL and RL. Pirats is, by its own definition, “a french non-profit organization founded by Merlina rokocoko & Newbab Zsigmond for RL and SL Art and creation promotion”. According to a group notice sent out by Newbab yesterday (and please note that it was written by someone who is not a native English speaker), “Nathalie (Merlina) and Jean-Marc (Newbab) spent more than $4,000 personal money in three years that Pirats continues to help around 250 artists to show their work in 159 exhibitions, visited 168 682 times by 20 054 persons. Today we can no longer afford.” Afford to continue to pay tier, that is. Newbab’s note quotes in detail the negotiations conducted over the last eleven months, with no replies from LL since this past August. To quote Newbab further, “We believe that our work has brought to Linden Lab more money than they ask us to pay now, and yet we pay for what we produced without even a conversation, without even a straight answer to our questions.
We are now in a situation that leaves us no choice, Pirats Art Network will close.” You can’t get more final than that. (If you wish to read the entire notecard with the IMs to and from various representatives of LL, you can still join the PiRats group to get it. Several other SL art groups like Open This End and Art & Artist Network also sent it out, or you can IM me inworld and I will send you a copy.)
But a campaign to petition LL to save PiRats has been launched by SL artist Asmita Duranjaya. I am reproducing the entire notecard here so that you can, if you wish, copy it, sign it with your own avatar name, and forward it as a new notecard to Asmita so she can collect all the names for a petition to LL>
“Manifest
We, all the signing artists, who had the pleasure to show our work in one of the PiRats galleries, confirm hereby, that PiRats is one of the best organized and well structured art network in Second Life, that we would not like to miss in the future. We apply all, to allocate one LEA sim for PiRats, to ensure the continuity of Nathalie’s (Merlina) and Jean-Marc’s (Newbab) work for more than 250 artists in Second Life and more than 1400 group members as well as those, who will join in the future. Please sign this manifest with your name and give it to every artist and art aficionado in Second Life and everybody should send it back to me with his signature until 1st of February.
Asmita Duranjaya (independent artist)”
If Bryn Oh’s experience with LL in trying to save her Immersiva sim is any indication, I fear this effort may also fall on deaf ears and prove futile. But it is worth a try and no one who fails to at least take the time to sign their name on a notecard should ever complain about the sad state of SL or SL art in the future. Silence is surrender. I know I would much rather write about art galleries and sims that are thriving, an not those closing or threatening to close.
In the meantime, you should visit PiRats while you still can and donate as many lindens as you can afford. Even if the petition fails and PiRats goes under, it is one way to say thank you for all the great art.

UPDATE! You can sign an on-line petition to save PiRats here, and donate real money (not lindens) through a crowd funding page here.

More photos after the fold…

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As many of you know, Bryn Oh’s Immersiva sim, one of the oldest, most famous and most, well, most immersive art sims in Second Life suddenly disappeared off the grid in the middle of December last. I won’t rehash the details here, as you can find them on Bryn’s blog, but suffice to say, Linden Lab nixed Bryn’s suggestion that they offer her and MadPeas (who were also rendered homeless, as they had the same patron) a new sim gratis where she could complete her work. Undeterred, Bryn has started a crowd funder that has already exceeded the target goal, but don’t let that stop you from donating if you can because the target amount was chosen because it would allow Bryn to continue a new Immersiva sim for only a year and a half. Bryn’s many fans would like to see her stay inworld for much longer than that. You can read more about it here, and donate here. You can also view Bryn’s machinima videos on YouTube if you don’t know Bryn’s work or why it is important.

STOP SOPA AND PIPA! – The proposed bills in the US Congress known as SOPA and PIPA threaten the freedom of the internet. If they pass they will kill Second Life as we know it. Live music, DJs, RL art in SL, costumes and avatars based on pop culture, etc. , will become impossible to perform or create. Go here to send an email of protest to your congress person: http://www.fightforthefuture.org/pipa.  See SL artist Miso Susanowa’s weblog for more information: http://netpolitiks.blogspot.com/ 

Many sites, including Wikipedia, and this one here, are honoring an internet blackout as a day of protest. This is what the internet will look like if you do nothing today. Head on over to Inspire Space Park (also blacked out today) now to learn more, and pick up one of the signs seen in the photo above and wear it throughout the day in SL!

The works of many SL artists bring a smile to my face, but the works of Scottius Polke make me laugh, giggle or outright rofl. Despite the obvious amount of effort that Scottius puts into his art, I feel that somehow calling them “works” does not do them justice. “Plays” may be a better term, for his art displays that innocent joy in creation and childlike wonder at just how odd the everyday really is that most of us had ironed out of us by that irksome thing called Real Life many years ago. Significantly, Scottius chooses to present himself in SL as a Tiny otter, that most playful of small, furry mammals, and when I first met him a while back, he was floating in the cyber air dressed as an astronaut. I once before described Scottius’ graphic style as akin to van Gogh drawing cartoons on psychedelics, although a marine themed build “The Docks” struck me as being more like Spongebob Squarepants as directed by Tim Burton. In fact, Scottius’ most recent fun build continues the underwater theme. Located at the Nordan Art Gallery, it’s called Starfish Command and seems to be the opening salvo in an attempted echinoderm conquest of the world, or at least SL.
Shaped like a huge perfume atomizer atop a star-shaped base, the Starfish Command is in actuality a high powered cannon that you can manipulate (sit on one of the two chairs on either side of the cannon itself) to launch kamikaze starfish commandos at the unprotected gallery, or the even more unprotected ocean. The starfish fall far short of even those nearby targets, but seem to enjoy the ride immensely, whooping in delight as they explode from the barrel with enthusiastic battle cries, including the one that serves as the title for this post. Not much of an onslaught, maybe, but it’s a start, although I don’t think we have anything to worry about just yet. If you are of a more pacific nature, you can lounge on one of the starfish shaped cushions at the base of the cannon, but be careful how you sit because, as the cushion themselves will admonish you, “Don’t squish the Starfish!“
Scottius has another current exhibit, this one a bit less dangerous, called “Animals in the Scribbled Wild”, at the Flying Eye Art Museum on the Looking Glass sim. It features the animal art of Scottius’ RL avatar Scott Rolfe. These paintings are all featured on a calendar you can buy off Scott in RL (why not an inworld version, Scottius?) from his website, Rusty Crocodiles. Also, on his blog check out his assemblages, reminiscent of Joseph Cornell’s boxes, which show how discarded junk can be transformed into art provided it is seen through the eye of imagination. As should come as no surprise, many of these assemblages display the same whimsical humor as his SL art.
The Gallery is a work of art in itself, created by Marcus Inkpen (how do you keep the floors so shiny, Marcus?). He is also a RL artist, J. Matthew Root, who specializes in fantasy art, some of it appearing in Heavy Metal magazine. He has also co-created a work of art with Sharni Azalee at Looking Glass, and if you have the time, you should explore the entire sim, one of the most realistic ones I have seen in SL. Many of the builds you come across are also for sale here.
These shows have been on for a while, I am sorry to say that I got to them late. Starfish Command will be running until January 23, and ScribbledWild till the end of  January. I would still visit them as soon as possible. You should also visit Scottius’ other builds: The Docks, Lunamaruna, mushROOM, and his own gallery at Avalon Town. Have fun and keep ‘em flying! (The starfish, that is…)

UPDATE: Read a new interview with Scottius Polke conducted by Flora Nordenskiold, owner and curator of the Nordan Art gallery.

CECI Dover the Diva from Argentina

WEDNESDAY 1/18 – CECI DOVER Hot Latin jazz and cool R&B sung by the Diva from Argentina! 5-6 PM SLT
THURSDAY 1/19 – TRIVIA Queen CLANCY HUCKLEBERRY will provide a potpourri of 28 Questions at L$25 each plus one bonus Q at L$100 for a total of $L800 in prizes! Clancy will be joined by DJ SPARROW LETOV-MEREDITH and the best barkeep in SL, FRITTER ENZYME! 5.30-7 PM SLT
FRIDAY 1/20 – DILAH HALOSTAR The Lons Star Diva sings the blues, jazz, and quality standards in her own unique style! 5-6 PM SLT

As those who have been reading this blog know, I seem to be often lamenting the closing of various sims in Second Life, such as the Lost Gardens of Apollo. Sim closings especially this past summer seemed to have come swiftly upon the heels of one another, culminating recently in the completely unexpected and mysterious disappearance of Bryn Oh’s Immersiva, perhaps the quintessential SL art sim.
But today I bear tidings of joy, for almost as unexpectedly as Immersiva vanished from the SL grid, one of the most famous of SL sims, Chouchou, has returned after an absence of something like two years! Chouchou, for those who don’t know, is “a Japanese music group formed in a virtual world, Second Life to search for new possibilities of music”, and is composed of Juliet Heberle on vocals and Arabesque Choche on instruments, mostly piano. Their music is ethereal but not truly ambient, as Juliet’s fragile vocals add an innocent, romantic warmth that keeps their otherworldly music from floating entirely out of the stratosphere. Although their music is available from iTunes, they perform as a duo only in Second Life. (In fact, you can also purchase their music inworld at the Chouchou music store, look for access to it on the teleport menu.)
The Chouchou sim features three main regions: Chouchou proper, a surreal archipelago; above it, Islamey, Chouchou’s live venue, which used to be a sort of grotto in the sky but is now a Japanese garden in the sky; Momento Mori, an awe-inspiring cathedral in the clouds, and The Bebel, a stark black and white plane which they describe as the “sound lab where our music comes from” and which contains interactive art.
I visited the revived Chouchou the same day I learned it was back online and found it quite crowded with Chouchouholics,  as their fans call themselves, wandering around, playing the piano by the huge shade tree, or simply sitting on the strand, in pairs or alone, perhaps conversing in IMs or merely relaxing to the music of Chouchou. Just like before.
Chouchou was one of the first places in SL I visited, and visited often. Along with Aerobreeze (the first place in SL I rezzed, and similar in many ways to Chouchou), Chakryn Forest, the Lost Gardens of Apollo, Support for Healing island and a few other sims some now gone or forgotten, it was one of my favorite places to just be in SL as opposed to doing. (I had other favorite sims for doing.) I spent a lot of time in the reborn Chouhou taking pictures with various windlight settings, some of which I am posting here, along with some taken back in my noob days at the original Chouchou sim. When I was finished I found a spot in the sand and sat down and meditated, listening to the crystalline magic sounds of Chouchou. I invite you to do the same.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Chouchou/180/163/21

More Chouchou photos after the break…

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THURSDAY – 1/12 – TRIVIA- L$800 total prizes with hostess CLANCY HUCKLEBERRY, DJ SPARROW LETOV-MEREDITH  and barkeep FRITTER ENZYME!  5.30-7 PM  SLT
FRIDAY – 1/13 – WALTKEYS FAITH – Jazz keyboard virtuoso 7-8 PM SLT
SATURDAY – 1/14 – MOSHANG ZHAO –  the Chill Master! 7-9 PM SLT
DJ SPARROW LETOV-MEREDITH – Jazz ‘n’ stuff! 9-? pm SLT

SUNDAY – 1/15 – LUVVIE STARSIDER – the Tiny toubador serves up an (p)ossum hour of gentle acoustic song! 12 PM SLT

We’re having some fun events to ring in te New Year at Graine’s Riverside Cafe and Hangout!

WEDNESDAY- 12/28 – THUNDERFOOT LOREFIELD – acoustic folk – 7-9 PM SLT
THURSDAY – 12/29 – TRIVIA- L$800 total prizes with hostess CLANCY HUCKLEBERRY, DJ SPARROW LETOV-MEREDITH  and barkeep FRITTER ENZYME!
SATURDAY – 13/31 – MOSHANG ZHAO – Ring in the New Year with the Chill Master – 7-9 PM SLT

We hope you will drop in and join us!

And while we are on the subject, here are some photos from the events we held during the pre-Christmas week, featuring more old friends! Zen Revnik, DJ’s Sparrow Letov-Meredith and Misty Ashland, Ichie Kamachi, Tip Corbett and Elizabeth Malloy all honored us with their performances, and most of the usual crowd was their to enjoy it! (Sorry, Tip, I was so busy dream dancing to your Christmas music variations that I forgot to take a picture of you!)

Thunderfoot Lorefield

Zen Revnik

Fritter Enzyme, Lorac Cleanslate and Whitestag Gothly

Ichie Kamachi

Luvvie Starsider

Elizabeth Malloy

Last year at this time I was celebrating Christmas at the Azure Jazz Club and Art Gallery. This year I celebrate it at Gallery Graine and Graine’s Riverside Cafe and Hangout. The first one was a night club with art gallery attached. The new one is an art gallery with a club attached (although I prefer to think of it as a cafe, even more a hangout) In between was a long stretch of recovering from the Azure and exploring things that running the Azure prevented me from developing: my SL photography, learning building, making prim sculpture and trying to make machinima. I am warning you all now! But before I get bogged down in all that, the point of this post is to wish you all a Happy Holdays, whether you celebrate Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa, Yule, Solstice or whatever holiday that reminds us the winter does not kill the light. Be safe, healthy and well in these last few days of the year and let’s make the next one better for all in both SL and FL!

Yesterday, December 17, 2011, Occupy Second Life hosted the 24 hour Occupy the Earth Music Festival benefit concert in support of OccupySupply, Firedoglake‘s ongoing project to provide Real Life Occupiers with cold weather gear. A full slate of poets, disc jockeys, singers, musicians and comedians (well, one comedian) performed hour by hour for the entertainment and edification of a crowd of dedicated supporters, some of whom stayed all or most of the day at the beautiful Ground Zero Music and Art sim. One estimate places the total attendance figure at close to 400 avatars, which I have not been able to verify but I was at the event almost non-stop from 6 AM- 3 PM SLT, and again from 4-6 PM SLT, and I counted an average attendance figure per hour of anywhere between 21-33 avis, some of whom were present all day or close to it. Even more importantly, we managed to raise (by my count) L$11,0995.00, which roughly equals U$D 440.00. (I tallied the amount by counting the donations in all the fire-in-a-trash-can tip jars we placed around the stage. I await an exact count and any corrections from our official OccupyDonations avi.) This amount has been estimated to provide “enough funding to keep over 200 hands warm this winter at Occupy Wall Streets all over America and the World”. In any case, it was much more than I had hoped to raise, and I was thrilled to realize we could make such a crucial difference for such an important cause. I realize that many Occupy camps have been evicted and torn down, and many more continue to be targeted for demolition, but I trust the movement will still need cold weather gear in the coming months even as it changes tactics and focal points of the struggle.
One thing that made me extremely happy was the relative ease with which the event proceeded. For such a huge endeavor involving so many people in Second Life, it came close to coming off without the proverbial hitch. We did have two no-shows, due to miscommunication, and the occasional technical sound glitch, and I crashed once, but only once. (And for a full sim on a SL Saturday, that was close to a miracle!) In fact, at one point I wondered if things weren’t going a little too well, and not long after, it was hardly coincidental that we were assaulted by a griefer or griefers who first let loose with sound gestures of screams and angry male voices threatening rape. This all came about during Scottish musician POL Arida’s set, one of the most crowded of the day. It just so happened that two of the attendees were dragging around “life-size” standees of the Mad Pepper Sprayer himself, Lt. Pike, and leaving yellow clouds of gas in their wake. At first I thought the offensive gestures went with them, but soon as I cammed through the crowd, that the source was coming from somewhere I couldn’t identify. As I was vainly searching for the culprit, we were hit by a rain of Mario the Plumber icons that soon were followed by a rain of Hitlers, and accompanying sounds that drowned POL out at one point. I made no attempt to IM the other hosts as I was too busy trying to locate the griefer. When I was finally able to determine who the culprit was using Radar and the Nearby Speaker’s List, he suddenly TPed out and the circus ended. There was no major griefing after that episode, but I did boot a suspicious looking and acting avi who would not get off the stage or respond to my IMs during Luvvie Starsider’s show.
But other than that, it was a wonderful time and a stirring endorsement of the power of dedicated collaboration and solidarity. And now for the roll call of honor!

99 THANKS TO:
GMetal Svartur and Theadee Resident, owners of Ground Zero Music and Art sim, who kindly allowed us to hold OEMF on their land for 24 hours and run it as we saw fit. And also to Stirred Diesel, partner and manager of Strum Diesel, who recommended GZ to us

Velazquez Bonito, well known SL artist and builder, who designed and built an awesome stage setting for us at the last minute that really captured the essence of the event.
Widget Whiteberry, of Commonwealth and Virtually Speaking fame, who created and deployed an amazing OWS slide show for us.

Jamie Parkin, Virtual Live Band manager, who used his connections to promote OEMF  through various SL channels.
Scout Kestrel who documented OEMF for posterity in a machinima. (Can’t wait to see it!)

Mysty Mellison who wrote a wonderful story “The Fire” and produced a YouTube video series to illustrate it. Taking place during the French Revolution, it has parallels to the Occupy Wall Street movement. Is history repeating itself?  Mysty notes that “the Fire” is about the greedy banks stealing from the peasants. Nothing ever changes, it seems, unless we make sure it does! Watch and listen to “The Fire” for an effective antidote to pro-Wall Street propaganda!

The Performers! (in order of their appearance):
Serene Bechir poet
Kookie Hax DJ
magoo68 DJ
Klannex Northmead poet
Dirran Skytower poet
Billy Bob Neck comedian
Bai Putzo DJ
Stosh Quartz poet
Eifachfilm Vacirca DJ
NTopy Sellers DJ
Baxter Aubin DJ
Keeba Tammas Live music
POL Arida live music
Luvvie Starsider live music
Thunderfoot Lorefield live music
Virtual Live Band live music
Sparrow Letov-Meredith DJ
Senjata Witt live music
Allison Widdershins DJ
Paradox Messmer DJ
Aleksei Khrushchev DJ
Solange Simondsen DJ
Lolotehe Menoptra DJ
Kookie Hax (again) DJ
Special mention to Strum Diesel, who was scheduled to play but who had to cancel due to a RL injury. Get well soon, Strum!

The OSL organizers and hosts:
Merriam Galaxy
Baxter Aubin
Merry Arun
NTropy Sellers
ByrneDarkly Cazalet
Eliza Cabassoun

Beragon Betts
Temba
Eifachfilm Vacirca
Carl Solutionary

any1 Gynoid
ZenBeatz Resident
Graine Macbain (that’s me, of course)
If I forgot anyone, please let me know!

And last but not least:

All of you who came to the event and danced, wooted, chatted, LOLed, commented, cheered, jeered, TPed in friends, got the word out and donated to feed the fire, mic check: THANK YOU SO MUCH! WE ARE THE 99%!

More information here:

any1 Gynoid’s CNN.com iReport account of OEMF
http://occupywallst.org/
http://ampedstatus.com/
http://www.occupytogether.org/
http://firedoglake.com/
http://shop.occupy-supply.com/storefront.aspx

More photos after the break…

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