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Rock

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    Experts call for regulation after latest botched art restoration in Spain

    in Politics and World Events

    Posted

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/nov/10/spanish-statue-bodge-up-is-a-new-rival-to-borjas-monkey-christ

    And here we go again...

    Spanish statue bodge-up is a new rival to Borja's Monkey Christ

    Trump-like visage grafted on to a carving in Palencia recalls earlier inept restoration

    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/0ba3ca42eec7934c0c0155914636cd99ef4453bc/0_0_2560_1536/master/2560.jpg?width=620&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=8d5c979a64035d91ed8532d82f4d1664
    The statue in Palencia, Spain is on an ornate, early 20th-century building. Photograph: Facebook/Twitter

    In the footsteps of the unintentionally iconic Monkey Christ, the Tintin St George, the near-fluorescent Virgin and Child– not to mention the less than sinlessly executed Immaculate Conception – comes … well, it’s hard to say.

    The latest Spanish restoration effort to provoke anguished headlines and much social media snarking is, or rather, was, a carved figure adorning an ornate, early 20th-century building in the north-western city of Palencia.

    What was once the smiling face of a woman next to some livestock has been replaced with a crude countenance that bears a passing resemblance to the incumbent US president, Donald Trump. Or one of the Sand People from Star Wars. Or something from a cheese-induced nightmare. Or, to be honest, pretty much anything you wish to project on to it.

    The bodged restoration came to light after an artist placed pictures of the offending visage on Facebook on Saturday.

    “The pictures are a bit blurry, but you can see the prank perfectly well,” said Antonio Guzmán Capel. “It looks like the head of a cartoon character.”

    https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/16b0280444fe412cd9cd17115390b06cc6db7ee1/0_191_2120_1272/master/2120.jpg?width=620&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=ad99392f8dff7e79247d65fd16be3961
    The 20th-century Ecce Homo-style fresco of Christ, in Borja, Spain before and after an amateur restoration. Photograph: Centro de estudios Borjanos/AP

    Palencia, he added ruefully, now had an attraction to rival the Monkey Christ that propelled the town of Borja to global fame eight years ago after a devout parishioner took it upon herself to restore Elías García Martínez’s Ecce Homo before it flaked and faded into oblivion.

    “I’m sure whoever did it got paid for it,” said Guzmán. “But the bigger crime was committed by the person who commissioned it and then tried to carry on as though nothing was wrong.”

    Palencia’s reaction may be one of shock and anger for now, but the authorities in Borja managed to find a way to turn the great Monkey Christ fiasco of 2012 to their advantage.

    That year, almost 50,000 people visited the small church where the Ecce Homo is displayed behind a protective screen. Thousands still visit the church every year and a small museum has sprung up where people can buy Ecce Homo key rings, T-shirts, teddy bears and mugs. As well as employing two caretakers, the church-museum also yields revenue that is used to help fund places at Borja’s care home for the elderly.

    But for restoration experts in Spain, the latest bodged job is another example of the need for proper training, protection and investment.

    “THIS #IsNotARestoration,” Spain’s Professional Association of Restorers and Conservators said in a tweet, adding, perhaps a little unnecessarily: “It’s NOT a professional intervention.”

    The original sculpture was removed after being damaged during restoration work on the buildingThe restored sculpture bears little resemblance to the original, which was replaced after being damaged during restoration work on the building

    Madonna + Maluma slay Billboard Awards - watch Medellín performance!

    in ARCHIVE - The MADAME X Forum

    Posted

    https://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/tech/immersive-technology-whos-that-girl/5142442.article

    Immersive technology: Who’s that girl?

    2 September 2019


    Madonna’s performance at the 2019 Billboard Music Awards, where she danced alongside four avatars of herself, demonstrated the potential of immersive technology in live events. Jake Bickerton meets the London-based studio that created the spectacular sequence

    Madonna’s eye-catching performance at the 2019 Billboard Music Awards was, even by the Queen of Pop’s lofty standards, an attention-grabbing showpiece, with the star dancing alongside four different versions of herself.

    It would have been difficult to tell which one was the real Madonna, if not for a sprinkling of VFX fairy dust that welcomed each digital Madonna onto the stage.

    The photo-real illusion was created using digital avatars made by immersive studio Dimension. The company creates highly realistic virtual human avatars inside a circular volumetric stage with 106 cameras, split between 4K video and infrared.

    The subject is surrounded by the cameras, which are mounted on a circular grid forming the framework of the stage.

    The combination of video and infrared cameras makes it possible to capture depth information. A wireframe of the subject is first created, then a volumetric mesh is added to give the model a degree of realism. Finally, a photo-real texture is applied to the mesh to create the lifelike 3D avatar.

    You can move a virtual or physical camera 360 degrees around this virtual human to show whatever angle you like, but the avatar will only perform the moves captured and can’t be reanimated.

    The companies behind Dimension are immersive media firm Hammerhead, digital technology innovation centre Digital Catapult and Microsoft.

    Dimension joint managing director Simon Windsor says: “The Madonna shoot all came together at the eleventh hour. She came to our volumetric studio in Wimbledon over two evenings, staying from 7pm to 2am each time, and we created four different personas for her.

    “There was a lot of pre-production time working with Madonna’s choreography team and dancers to ensure what we were filming would work flawlessly with the physical camera moves on the night.

    “We made sure they understood the way the tech works, the dos and don’ts of interacting with the avatars. We also offered advice on Madonna’s wardrobe and what items of clothing would resolve better than others. To make sure the holograms would look convincing and slot in seamlessly alongside the real Madonna and her dancers, we planned the routine with pre-viz and storyboards.

    1309100_m1_338824.jpeg

    “Madonna was fantastic to work with,” he continues. “She’s a big advocate of using tech in live performances. It’s a world first having holograms perform on stage in this way and introduces lots of different creative possibilities around how the physical stage translates into virtual worlds. It’s a watershed moment for believable holograms.”

    Jeremy Silver, chief executive of Digital Catapult, says: “Madonna’s performance at the Billboard Music Awards provided just a taste of the unprecedented levels of visualization and storytelling made possible by immersive technologies.

    “Such performances are critical moments for the UK immersive sector, demonstrating the vast potential of these technologies and the UK-based studios championing them. It is only a matter of time before we see their wider adoption within the music industry and the broader creative sector.”

    Amazon Fire

    in Politics and World Events

    Posted

    28 minutes ago, VogueMusic said:

    Horrific. Enraging. Depressing.

    And the only place it seems to be talked about is social media.

    13 minutes ago, Jazzy Jan said:

    This is devastating and should be the first story on news reports. The lungs of the earth is burning.  Horrific and frightening. 

    That's strange; I thought that the Amazon fire was the first story on news everywhere. At least in Portugal it has been.

     

    "Ciao Bella" Thread

    in ARCHIVE - The MADAME X Forum

    Posted

    Quote

    "Bella ciao" ("Goodbye beautiful") is an Italian folk song that was adopted as an anthem of the anti-fascist resistance. It was used by the Italian partisans between 1943 and 1945 during the Italian Resistance, or the resistance of Italian partisans against the Nazi German forces occupying Italy, and during the Italian Civil War, or the Italian partisan struggle against the fascist Italian Social Republic and its Nazi German allies. "Bella ciao" is used worldwide as an anti-fascist hymn of freedom and resistance. The song has much older origins though in the hardships of the mondina women, the paddy field workers in the late 19th century who sang it as a protest against harsh working conditions in the paddy fields in North Italy.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bella_ciao

    Is Madonna's Bella Ciao a throwback to this resistance anthem? Her family is Italian so she probably knows the song since ever and the current political state of the world (USA) reminds the fascism of the past, so it kinda makes sense. Agree?

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