March 2010 – Callithump!

Coming soon: Callithump! Broadside. A broadside, also known as a broadsheet, is a page 17″ X 22″. It’s the standard size for newspapers in the US, or at least it was before the cheesy 11″X17″ tabloid format started taking over. We’ll be screenprinting broadsides with special guests while we have them over for dinner in upcoming weeks.

We’d been wanting to do something in this format in homage to Robert Piser’s Daily Palette, the first publicly available art vending machine (that we know of). Once we started exploring, we discovered an interesting fact: Broadsheets were initially the domain of poets, artists and political activists. They became popular for newspapers in the early 1700s as a way to get around a newspaper tax that taxed papers based on the number of pages.

It’s time to take the format back! The time is ripe, since newspapers are abandoning the broadsheet in favor of the tabloid or the web.

It’s fun to work in a large format after being confined to capsules for so long! An advantage to newsprint is the the local paper gives us rolls of the stuff for free. This means our production costs are almost nothing, so we’ll be able to give Callithump! Broadsides away for free!

We’ve got a fun approach to creating these as well. It’s a variation on the Exquisite Corpse. We’re doing prints with multiple screens. The screens are done by different people who we’ve invited over for dinner, while we prepare dinner, eat, drink and make merry. The catch is, we don’t discuss the content of the prints beforehand, only the size limitations. The final result might blend nicely, or it might be a sticky mess. It’s gauranteed to be interesting!

The Callithump! Broadside beta, three screens into the process.

If this sounds like fun to you, drop us a line and we’ll have you over for dinner! You are cordially invited!

If you live too far away from Brunswick, Maine to come join us, please try it on your own. Give your local newspaper a call and see if they give away remnants. We use silk screens, but really, any way to make a mark on paper will do. Let us know how it goes!

Small in Japan: Japanese Vending Machine Culture

From what I can tell, vending machines play a very different role in Japanese culture than they do in the US. In the US vending machines are on the fringe, even though they’re in the most public of places. For instance, they sell toys to distract children while the grownups shop. Or they sell items beyond the purview of the establishment where they reside, such as condoms & sanitary napkins in the bathroom of a bar, junkfood and soda in an office building. They’re there to fill a need, but the contents are usually overpriced and/or poor quality. You only go to them when you have no other choice.

In Japan, on the other hand, vending machines have a much more seamless integration with the rest of the culture. They’re everywhere, targeting all age groups. The contents are much higher quality than what we get in the States (outside of Callithump! machines, of course). I’ve been fascinated by Japanese vending machine culture for a while and whenever I know of anyone traveling to Japan, I always ask them to bring me back something! Here are a few:

tiger thing — It's a hampster disguised as a tiger, designed to be attached to a cell phone.

Happy New Year! — I guess it's supposed to be a chick, or maybe a ghost, desguised as a chick, or vice versa? Again, to hang on a cell phone

This is a Rei Ayanami keychain. It's got a big button and, when pressed, Rei Ayanami's voice comes out of it. It's pretty neat that 15 years after Neon Gen first aired, it still has enough of a presence in Japanese culture that this sort of product is still viable. I can't think of anything similar in the US.

Co-ed Alien — A Koedalien Key Cover, apparently.

Koedalien Kloseup — Detail of the Koedalien pamphlet, inluded with the keychain

For reasons I can't explain, minature replicas of food are very trendy in Japan right now. This is a Mr. Donut Frank Pie cellphone fob.

More minature food. This time, a Mos Burger keychain, complete with separate patty, tomatoe slice, and bun!

A nigh infinite variety of things get vended from vending machines in Japan, from air to used schoolgirl panties, although these pictures are all of keychains, keychain covers, and cell phone fobs. But just look at the astonishing variety of things in that tiny subset!

If anyone out there can tell me more about vending machines in Japan, I’d love to hear from you! And if you’re in Japan or traveling there and can hook me up with vending machine schwag, I’ll reward you handsomely!