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This little girl, done in bronze and sort of “smuggled” into position overnight (with a city permit allowing them) either says a lot about the future of business on Wall Street, or doesn’t say anything, depending on who you read and talk to.  The statue, Fearless Girl, was dropped deliberately in front of another famous statue, Charging Bull, as a sort of symbol.  She is supposed to represent future women standing up to Wall Street and corporations who have almost no female representation in board rooms and executive suites, demanding that this change, and soon.

Admirers think this is great.  There’s a lot of detractors as well, though, pointing out that the statue was commissioned by an investment house that sells a branded package of stocks from companies with women on their board — and the plaque at Fearless Girl‘s feet is nothing more than advertising the package, complete with brand.  It’s also pointed out that less than a third of the company’s own board is female, so shouldn’t they be putting their money where their mouth supposedly is?

Harper and I see this as a beginning, not an ending.  Less than 30% representation certainly isn’t equal, but it’s a beginning.  Societal mentality changes slowly — as slow as a glacier at times — but it changes.  While as much progress as women have made in the corporate area in 45 years is about as slow as that glacier, remember that those big ice cubes have ground down mountains over time.  It’s time to start improving corporate performance, yes.  But it will come, one way or another.

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Jem visited an LEA exhibit called Light Thoughts 2 back in March.  I took a pass through there this past week, and found that it had been added to considerably since then, so I shot some fresh photos:

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This is a heads-up for long-time readers, participants, bloggers and designers: the nominees for the coming Academy Awards will be announced on January 14.

That means that it’s time to start planning your entries and booking studio time (or finding locations) for the 7th Annual Oscar Fashion Photo Contest. The Flickr contest group will open on January 8, sometime in the real-life AM. You’ll have until 12:01 SLT following the end of the Oscar ceremonies (on February 28) to get in your entry. For reasons unknown to me (can’t say why they didn’t consult me on the matter, but there it is), the Academy has decided to keep a tighter voting period this year, which is why I’m again offering an advance warning before the contest actually opens up.

The prize fund is now under consideration. I can promise that it won’t be any less than last year’s guaranteed pool of $28,500, but it may go up this year, depending on how I slice the rent. (Grin) Here’s a link to last year’s rules, but don’t count these as completely gospel for now, as there are often tweaks made. This year’s rules will be published officially on January 8. It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway: read them in full and carefully.

For designers:  I’ll be putting together, as soon as possible, a sign box that you can display at the information point in your stores.  This should dispense a notecard with the press announcement and a link to the rules article.  If you would like a vendor at your store, please contact me by IM or notecard.

For other bloggers:  a press release will be available on January 8, containing the link to the rules article for 2016.  This will be for immediate release.  All publicity is appreciated!

For participants:  have fun with the contest, and let’s see what you can make of it!

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Here are the past winners’ announcements. Remember, the Flickr group will open on January 8!

• 2010 Winners
• 2011 Winners
• 2012 Winners
• 2013 Winners
• 2014 Winners
• 2015 Winners

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Harper’s Fine Art has moved into a larger store on the other end of the mall I was already in!  The move gives me more prims to work with, which means I can have more of my collection out.  It also gives me room for a second floor, which will have lots of stained glass as soon as I can build it — I’m already in the process on that — and a larger Secret (Public) Photo Studio, now with a changing room!  With as much room as I now have on the (effective) 4th floor, I am willing to offer temporary rental space to anyone who wants to build a more elaborate set for their own photos, limited to one-day setups if over my maximum of about 125 prims.

Along with the move comes a more unified look to my signage, including what will be a species of actual logo for Harper’s Art (though if someone can do me an original piece of artwork at a good price, I’ll be quite willing to consider it).  What hasn’t changed is my commitment to offer the finest in both reproduction and original art at affordable prices, along with occasional sideline items that may tickle your fancy.

Come “join me in Desire.”  I think you’ll find something you like!

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Contact Sheet is an irregular column of selected photographs and portraits from Residents of Second Life and other virtual worlds. All rights to featured images are reserved to the artists under appropriate copyright laws. Click on the links as necessary to go to the required blog, Flickr or Koinup page. Please go to these artists’ pages in any case to leave comments, (as well as comments here), if you have an account on the appropriate service.

Suggestions are appreciated; please send descriptions and links to me by in-world IM, notecard, E-mail to harper.ganesvoort@gmail.com, or leave a comment below.

NOTICE: Some of the photos/links may contain nudity. Viewer discretion advised.

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Longtime readers of this blog will probably know of my love for the work of Andrew Wyeth.  This modern realist painter first came to my attention in the 1980s, with the publicity furor over his Helga series of paintings; I was intrigued enough to track down every book on Wyeth that my library had, and discovered the power of his work, running back to the days of the famous Christina’s World (1948).

Copyright 2012 by podenga; all rights reserved.

It’s a pleasure to find a piece that is reminiscent of his work, which was practically a fountainhead for an entire school of modern realism.  I know nothing for sure about “podenga,” except that I follow his/her stream regularly.  This one leaped out at me today as I was checking through the previous day’s new works on Flickr.  I’d urge you to click through and take a better look in a larger size!

(If you’re curious at all about Wyeth’s work, I encourage you to explore it, both online and at your own local library.  Remember, though, Andy was only one of a family of creative masters, beginning with his father, Newell Convers (N. C.) Wyeth, and coming down through every branch of the family to the present day.  You can see a very brief overview of their work at a site for what looks like a family gallery.)

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Teleport to Leroy region.

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Botgirl Questi announced  that a new virtual art exhibit, the Caerleon Museum of Identity, will be opening on Saturday, October 2, at 12:00.  (Her press release was not specific, but I would assume that this is SLT.)  The announcement included a video clip:

You can read the full text of the press release at Botgirl’s blog.  With 18 artists represented in the exhibit, which will run through October, it promises to be a thought-provoking museum.

I say this because this exhibit goes to the point of one of the things that provokes discussion among people “living” and working in virtual worlds:  when we’re looking at an avatar, is that someone’s real identity there?  The anonymity of an avatar gives people wonderful flexibility — with this creation of bytes and pixels, we can be who we want to be, not what we really are.  For some, it’s wonderfully liberating; for others, it allows them to conceal aspects of themselves they’d prefer not to show.  But for all of us, we have to confront the question at least once:  is this what the person behind the other computer is really like?

Most of us play various roles in our RL day as it is, usually linked to our interactions with those around us.  We have one face for the customer in our store; another, a presumably looser version, for the co-workers when we’re in a private moment on the floor or in the back room.  Friends outside of work may see yet another, at a sports game or club-hopping.  Even our interaction with some family and relations, if not all of them, can be a form of role-play; we have favorite grandparents we love to visit, or abysmal aunts we wish would never stop by, and we either display our feelings, or conceal them as deeply as we can out of politeness’ sake.

But what happens when all of the cues built by society and the knowledge base of personal, direct interaction in a meeting are made invisible and irrelevant?

In Second Life, we only have what the person is showing us with words on a screen, or perhaps a voice; and, of course, the appearance they choose to build for themselves out of pixels and prims.  For all we know, the rampaging extrovert with chopped, grungy hair, greasy leather clothes and piercings in places never dreamed of, might be in RL a dramatically shy wallflower with clean, tied-back hair, an ultraconservative wardrobe, and never even piercings for earrings.  Indeed, they might not even be the sex they’re portraying themselves as.  And then,of course, there are the furries, dragons, fae and aliens teleporting all over the place.  One of my favorite avatars from my days at the Blarney Stone was a blue fox.  That surely wasn’t what the person was in real life!

You may want to check out this exhibit while it’s open.  Hang around for a while and meditate on the studies; see what these artists’ thoughts evoke in you.  I haven’t seen this yet, though I may attend the bloggers’ preview on Friday.  But my experience and training tell me that the best art make you think, opens up your senses to a new reality, or a new take on reality.  This virtual world we love and deal in is a reality in itself that needs new thoughts, new philosophers to work out its parameters.  Perhaps the Caerleon Museum may begin the walk toward such an exploration.

Teleport to the exhibit.

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Where now the columns that lifted
Their snowy tops to the sacred Moon?
Where now the walls, writ over with
Runes of power and virtue?
Where now the altars, cunningly carved,
Which smoked with incense and sacrifices?
Where now the priestesses and their chants,
Singing songs of praise to the holy Selene?

Her Brother, Bright Phoebus, has traversed the sky
Day after untold day.
The countless leaves have fallen to the forest floor
And turned to dust and mold,
And blown through the sanctified doors,
Till all that remains is broken stone and whispering ghosts.
Lonely are the ancient spirits, crying their pious lament:
We have ne’er forgot Thee, Huntress Maid!

• — Harper Ganesvoort

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Contact Sheet is an irregular column of selected photographs and portraits from Residents of Second Life and other virtual worlds. Images used in this article are used under permission of the owners via their participation in the Creative Commons license; otherwise, all rights are reserved. Click on the links as necessary to go to the required blog, Flickr, Koinup or Snapzilla page. Please go to these artists’ pages in any case to leave comments, (as well as comments here), if you have an account on the appropriate service.

Suggestions are appreciated; please send descriptions and links to me by in-world IM, notecard, E-mail to harper.ganesvoort@gmail.com, or leave a comment below. I can also be reached on Twitter (Harper_G) or Plurk (Harper G. — include the period!), but the message may get lost in the luminiferous æther.

NOTICE: Some of the photos/links may contain nudity. Viewer discretion advised.

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I was planning on putting an article or two on something other than art/photography between columns of “Contact Sheet,” but the in-world news isn’t cooperating with me (grin).  So here we go again.

Incidentally, I’ve set up groups on both Flickr and Koinup for collecting all those artists whom I feature in these columns.  If you’d like to see the entire “gallery” at one stroke (or as much of it as the owners are willing to add), click on the links.

Another thing:  in going back through the old columns to invite artists from Flickr, I discovered that I used to link to their profile, either on Flickr or Second Life.  It seems like a good custom to revive, and so I’ll try to do that where possible.  In Koinup, that means basically the person’s home page, since they don’t seem to have another place to say anything about themselves in detail.

In order to get the Koinup group rolling, this column will be purely from that service.  Most, if not all, of the artists whose work you’ll be seeing today will be new to “Contact Sheet.”  Welcome to them, and I hope to see more good work in future!

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Costumes —

phaylen works in Second Life, and appears to do both commercial photography as well as artistic and personal shots.  In the first shot, a trio of ladies are channeling the days of Marie Antoinette and her court, possibly in the replica of the chateau at Versailles, and they do an excellent job of it.  The second is titled Witches of Avalon — possibly Avilion, in this case — but the first thing that came to mind for me was The Witches of Eastwick.  It’s not an inappropriate comparison, actually, although the book and film were set in modern times.  Here, the costumes are definitely mediaval in character, and the ladies look ready to weave a spell or two in this woodland setting.

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Next, Eves Rodenberger gives us Hunting Chicks.  This does not look to be part of a series (yet), though the title is surely referring to the model, not the quarry.  The fantasial heroic female is becoming more popular, especially since Mercedes Lackey’s Velgarth novels.  I’m most familiar with those, and so the character that comes to mind is Tarma shena Tale’sedrin, though the resemblance doesn’t truly occur here.

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Mermaids are popular avatars in Second Life.  bark Aabye combines this with smashing costume pieces by Tekeli-li, and gives us this view, one of a series.  The model is Kyota Spitteler.  You’ll be seeing much more from bark in future, as she’s done a batch of monochrome images I intend to offer samples of.

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World of Warcraft makes its debut in “Contact Sheet” and Around the Grid, with this image from Maiyya called vrykul Ice Maiden.  I have no idea of the ways WoW works, so I don’t know what powers this warrior has.  Some sort of cold effect is implied here, however.  The aurora in the background only emphasizes the concept.

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This WoW avatar is called Azzurra, and the appelation is appropriate.  Arowhena shows her in a throne room or place of ritual; judging by the glow in the subject’s eyes, this must be a place of Meaning to her.

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Closing out the collection for this column, Magggg gives us our first image from The Sims, entitled Ruled by Darkness.  This subject shows that, no matter how beautiful the package, imbalance in the soul has its consequences.

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That’s all for tonight.  Please remember to leave comments on the artists’ works if you have an account on Koinup — and comments are welcome here, too!  Also, if you know of anyone whose work I should take a look at, Plurk me at “Harper G.”, send me a tweet on Twitter at “Harper_G”, or send E-mail to harper.ganesvoort@gmail.com.

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I’m running out of group slots, so I haven’t joined the newsgroup for patrons of Zaara Kohime, the owner and designer of Zaara, and therefore didn’t know that she has moved.

In case, poor fashion-driven soul, you haven’t heard of this place, ’tis truly bizarre of you, for Zaara is becoming one of the finest designers in Second Life.  In case you haven’t tired of me crowing about this woman’s work, her dresses are supremely elegant, her textures and colors mouth-watering delicious, her saris the most versatile I’ve seen so far — I’ve yet to wear one to Frank’s Place, but I think it would fit right in with the formal scene there [1] –and her ghagra skirts wonderful to move in!

Zaara kept store in the Tesla sector for a time; but she’s moved and opened up her own island just yesterday (Monday, January 12).  I’m not here to talk about the clothes, though, but about that new island; Zaara worked on it herself, and it’s as much of a gem as her clothes are.  Click on the thumbnails starting on the next page, and follow.