Category: visual

“‘Two weeks ago we blogged about a visualization tool designed to help us understand how neural networks work and what each layer has learned,’ Google writes. ‘In addition to gaining some insight on how these networks carry out classification tasks, we found that this process also generated some beautiful art.'”

Omar Victor Diop: “I wanted to bring these rich historical characters into the current conversation about the African diaspora and contemporary issues around immigration, integration and acceptance.”

“Soto said he’s pleased to bring the focus back to art: ‘I felt like the best thing was to give them autonomy and see what it is they wanted to do in their space.'”

“In an economy where content is king, where digital marketplaces like Amazon promote writing (especially user-generated criticism, that holy grail of free content that instils value in a product without the company needing to pay or take responsibility for it), the role of criticism—to respond to the work—also includes responding to its marketplace and the way the market regulates what viewers are exposed to, even online.”

“Major public cultural institutions in Greece are on the point of collapse, say leading Greek art professionals, as concerns mount that the country faces insolvency after 61% of the population rejected bailout proposals earlier this week made by international creditors.”

“Take a crowd of Canada’s top architects, put them in a room and ask them to design a dense city neighbourhood – working with a 1,000-page book of rules and requirements. This was how the Canary District in Toronto, which will be the athletes’ village for the Pan Am/Parapan Am Games this summer, was created.”

“In January this year, the ministry of culture announced an international competition to find energetic new manager-directors for 20 of the country’s most important state museums … For the first time ever, foreign candidates have been invited to apply, and fluency in business management, rather than Italian, is the main requirement.”

“A project to restore 14 historic mausoleums destroyed in Timbuktu three years ago by hardline Islamists is due to finish at the end of July. … Extremist groups targeted the tombs of Muslim saints as well as the city’s vast libraries when rebels occupied northern Mali following a military coup in March 2012.”

“A surge in demand has pushed the art market into uncharted territory. Chinese collectors are increasingly formidable, with Wang Zhongjun (a new addition to the Top 200) picking up a Picasso for $30 million and Wang Jianlin (also on the list) buying a Monet for $20.4 million. But there are also plenty of new players coming in from all over the world, many of whom prefer to remain anonymous.”