CocoCommodore video art by Tarek Chemaly

Yesterday I promsied you the story of Coco, the parrot from the Commodore hotel, and today, I share it with you in video art format. Enjoy.

By the way, yes, the video is silent, I felt at this stage all the sounds were already inserted in other videos, and wanted viewers to insert their own soundtracks instead.

Coco, the Commodore hotel parrot lives again.

Photo credit: Nick Waite

Photo credit: Nick Waite

Photo credit Eli Reed

Photo credit: Eli Reed

Do you know the story of Coco? Coco was a grey African parrot owned by the BBC correspondent Chris Drake and which sat in the lobby of the Commodore Hotel in Beirut. Coco was able to whistle the Marseillaise, the opening bars of Beethoven's 5th symphony but his specialty was imitating the incoming sound of shells (a trick every newbie journalist at the Commodore would fall for). In Feburary 1987, the hotel was raided and looted by mitiliamen and Coco was abducted in the process. Chris Drake put a reward of 10,000 LBP at the time for anyone who could bring back Coco, but to no avail.

Soon, I shall be telling the story of Coco in video art format. Stay tuned.

Below are two different accounts of Coco's vanishing for your pleasure:

Crystal Clear Brooks - Roger Waters' Gaza Poem

Artwork from "The (Com)Promised Land" series by Tarek Chemaly

Below is a poem by Roger Waters inspired by Gaza sourced here.



Crystal clear brooks – Roger Waters



Crystal clear brooks

When the time comes

And the last day dawns

And the air of the piper warms

The high crags of the old country

When the holy writ blows

Like burned paper away

And wise men concede

That there’s more than one way

More than one path

More than one book

More than one fisherman

More than one hook

When the cats have been skinned

And the fish have been hooked

When the masters of war

Are our masters no more

When old friends take their whiskey

Outside on the porch

We will have done well

If we’re able to say

As the sun settles down

On that final day

That we never gave in

That we did all we could

So the kids could go fishing

In crystal clear brooks.

Bayan Bibi's "Gaza in my heart" products

It's good to know someone is doing something apart from throwing ice buckets on themselves for no apparent reason. Bayan Bibi, ever the maverick and the activist, has launched a line of products in support of Gaza. Drawing from the Palestinian visual heritage of the Koufiye she applied the motif to a panoply of products (from the mini bandana to the pin or fridge magent). Please visit here to know where the points of sale are and what you can do yourself to support this campaign.

"The journey is the destination" a new series by Tarek Chemaly

Artwork by Tarek Chemaly

Artwork by Tarek Chemaly

It is rare for me to have unfinished projects sitting idle (I have an obsessive-compulsive streak), so to know that this project was first initiated in 2009 and was left unfisnished is a rarity itself. It is based on a children's sticker book which provides kids with heads and feet to be matched with the correct color-it-yourself image (baker, fire fighter, ballerina). What started in my mind as a gender-bias study ended up after finding the sentence "the road is beautiful, where does the bus go?" (in a children's summer vacation copybook) as a project about anticipated growing up when childhood is optional for some.

Why I will NEVER win the lottery

Artwork by Tarek Chemaly

So I got around to admitting it: I will never win the lottery. Never.

Sure, as the saying goes "to win the lottery you need to buy a ticket" something which I have done a grand total of 2 times in my life - at the suggestion of two different people who saw me being "lucky" on those two occasions. The world is full of people whose life was ruined by winning the lottery.

Some people are pragmatic about it, an Amercian friend - the US being a country where nouveau riche and excessive display of wealth is not frowned upon - told me he wouldn't buy a lottery ticket because if he won he didn't want his children to squabble over the money and people to start befriending him out of nowhere.

This reminds me of a recent exchange over social media with former Minister Nicolas Sehnaoui who was prompting people to come read my blog, sheepishly I admitted that - apart from this making sort of shy, I also did not recognize him when we met the first time in February 30 cafe in Hamra. His reply was something to the effect of that this is how real relationships grow, out of lack of expectations. And people approaching him out of "expectations" is something he knows only too well.

Actually, I once read that the common denominator between lottery winners is that they all feel they are lucky, so does this mean I don't feel I am? Assuming so would be would be taking a pessimisitic view of events. Rationally, you might be thinking "He will never win the lottery because he doesn't buy tickets, he doesn't buy tickets because he doesn't feel he is lucky, he doesn't feel lucky because he thinks the odds are too far against him, he feels the odds are against him because he doesn't believe in happiness".

How about this expalanation: he will never win the lottery because he already won it.

And whereas I do not subscribe to simplistic notions of happiness as sold in pop psychology, I will end with this gem in the words of House M.D.: "Miserable stays miserable, happy doesn't buy lottery in the first place".

USA: Of "American Exceptionalism" and tarnished brands.

Artwork by Tarek Chemaly

The above artwork was done in the spirit of the Obama "Hope" poster by Shepard Fairey (which itself was subject to litigation by the way), and depicts current Texas Governor Rick Perry in his mugshot. On the one hand, this can be seen as a "democratic act" a la "no-one-is-above-the-law", but Perry was supposed to be one of the candidates for the 2016 elections in the US, and this in itself bodes well badly as to what kind of politicians are running there and what kind of governance this will enduce (the "oops" moment in question goes back to his failed presidential bid of 2012 when he forgot during one of the debates with fellow Republican contenders the name of the third government agency he would shut down if elected).
But the above pales in comparison to what is happening in Furgeson, Missouri, with protests, chaos, and riots which followed the killing of an unarmed (and reportedly with hands up in the air) Michael Brown by a police officer.
The notion of "American Exceptionalism" - an unwavering faith in the country, a "USA! USA!" shouted during every Olympics when other nations would try to snatch the gold medal from the rightfully-deserving American team, the "America the beautiful", the "land of the free, home of the brave" - were put to the forefront by Ronald Reagan to an America trying to get over the (Nixon) Watergate scandal and the Vietnam war blunders.
And should you think this notion has gone out of style, look no further than Hillary Clinton (supposedly the front runner of the Democratic Party for the 2016 elections) who still parroted that notion on CBS very recently only to repeat the notion in her interview with the Atlantic saying "we don’t even tell our own story very well these days” which makes it look as if - with the right narrative (think pre-emptive attack on Iraq with fake evidence of Weapons of Mass Destruction) - the whole thing would be fine and dandy again.
Of course it's all pretending that the Snowden NSA revelations did not happen, or Julian Assange never existed, or that the US sided with every wrong side in recent history, or how powerless they are in all international conflicts to impose their view (including the oh-so-loved-ally Israel whose PM Benjamin Netanyahu said to the US "don't ever second guess me on Hamas again").
However it is sobering to see US enemies having fun at their expense publicly, such as Russia's Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin who tweeted the following photo:

Source The Guardian

Even Egypt is lecturing the US as to how it ought to handle the crisis in Furgeson (crowd control is a kind of a speciality for Egypt perhaps), and there's a general feeling of glee and hand-rubbing. All such acts of international schadenfreude would have been unthinkable a few years back.
The bully of the neighborhood is still delusional about his grandeurs, but to everyone else he is a down-on-his-luck slob living in times gone-by.

"How to succeed in blogging without really trying" Auditions now open.

Auditions for "how to succeed in blogging without really trying" now open. #freebies on the way out for everyone. No previous experience necessary.

Supporting wine and Lebanese religious contradictions

"From the harvest of our grapes, the joy in our wine" - such is the new campaign from the Ministry of Agriculture dubbing itself "the national campaign for the support of Lebanese wine". Never did one visual encapsulate all Lebanese contradictions in one go - let me explain: this campaign is supported by the taxpayers' money, a respectable chunk of whom is Moslem, and assuming that a solid proportion of which is against alchohol consumption due to religious reasons (notice I am measuring my words very carefully, using abstract and generic terms due to absence of any statistics or reliable surveys), then we deduce that the money these people put went to promote an industry they vehemently oppose. Go figure! All this at a time when one of Lebanon's big cities (Tripoli) took it upon themselves to ban beer ads over there. 

Fenicia bank, continuity via Chinese whispers.

Fenicia Bank (formerly known as Bank of Kuwait and the Arab World) is emphasizing its heritage with a cheesy ad. I think though not sure that the client is actually old and the "client service" people (just look at the name card in case you did not get it) are young to emphasize continuity? The line is "lifelong relationship" - for a more confusing take, check this on their own homepage. Under the line of "there are things you'd rather not inherit". Only to come to the visual above with "some things you'd want to inherit".

Of course what the bank did not bet on is that when you open the page the images start scrolling randomly which makes it difficult to understand the visuals being displayed. Frankly, if you did not want your clients or potential clients confused, maybe you should not have changed your name in the first place instead of emphasizing on heritage and continuity.

The other issue is that in Arab society, it is very taboo to speak of "inheritence" especially when related to a bank, because of the view of life and not wishing-ill on anyone (especially not your rich fat uncle as he appears in the ad). Hence the words "be3d el char" (may evil be averted), or "Allah ytawwil bi 3omrak" (may God give you a long life) etc.... whenever unintentionally a death reference is uttered.

Funnily enough, the game "Chinese whispers" (or telephone cassé) is also commonly known as "telephone Arabe" in France. So this might explain it then!

Picon fails on all counts

Picon, the popular spread cheese, is reintroducing the large portion. Actually, this is the shape we have always known Picon in until a smaller portion was introduced (sorry, not able to pin back the date). And so now Picon is going back to a larger shape with a drastically silly campaign.

My first question is - who are they talking to? The visuals (the cut cucumber to make it a "balance" and in another visual cut in the shape of a boy showing his "muscles" made of cucumbers) are silly even to kids by today's standards. If they are adressing mothers (or parents at large) it's also a fiasco. And - if - as they did with the Picon melting blocks - they are adressing hipsters in rock bands (with girl groupies preparing cheese sandwiches - yeah right), then...

OK, and the visuals suck too.

So what's left?

Beautiful graffiti vanishes in Hamra

Hamra mural before (1)

Hamra mural after (1)

Hamra mural before (2)

Hamra mural after (2)

My most preferred piece of graffiti in Beirut has been painted over "warning from the ministry of heath, thinking can lead to dangerous and deadly diseases" - now it's been painted over as "Parking". The other graffiti which was done by Yazan Halwani (adorning the parking's ticket booth) and which was already defaced (I think by the same nutso who was defacing all graffiti in town with Christian religious stuff written with his handwriting next to them) is now gone. Fayrouz, our national diva which was on the original is now back though, albeit on a while background.

Farah Samman's great design for Julia's album

Let's face it, Arab singers have horrible designers working for them - it is so very rare for the albums to be well designed and what's worse are the concert promotions which are usually horrendous collages of photos of several people badly cropped and intermingled mish-mashed together. Sure, you will now accuse me of being biased considering the new album by Julia Boutros has been designed by Farah Samman - someone with whom I have collaborated frequently in the past. Actually, it's the other way around it's because I was so impressed with her work that we started collaborating. So there, the design of Julia's new album and concert promotions are stunning! Everything from the typo to the choice of images, to the overall feel and positioning of the artist (if I am not mistaken the images are by Mokhtar Beirut - actually, if the choice was mine I'd have put the image of Julia in that majestic Tom Ford gown on the cover of the album).

Failing to find the original here's a snapshot of the photo in question from Julia's website

In other words it's a very refershing change to have an artist in the Arab world who cares enough to give a distinguished package - not just a singing product.

Satrbucks is lost in (Arabic) translation

"Yes to an all-time favourite" is according to Starbucks "The drink of choice for all times" in the Arabic version - notice the subtle but drastic difference? "all-time" becomes "all times". Still don't get it? An "all-time favourite" is a "classic" or something that has been enjoyed for a long time, "all times" refers to the hour of the day of consumption, or the occasion in which it was being enjoyed.

So basically, the Mocha Cookie Crumble Frappucino is not to about enjoying it whenever one desires, it is more that so many people enjoyed it in the past it is now a classic drink. Now, can I have one please? (I'll skip lunch to compensate the calories). 

Of blue vintage cars in Beirut.

Ford

Oldsmobile

Citroen

Porsche

Alfa Romeo

Buick

Fiat

Peugeot

Renault

I did the yellow series a while back, now I am covering from my archives the blue vintage cars all over Beirut. In various shades, from flashy to tame, from glossy to matte, from perfect condition to just scarping by. Another carcheology post!

Pop art invades the city via Roy Lichtenstein

Khoury Home as inpired by Roy Lichtenstein

Khoury Home as inpired by Roy Lichtenstein

Pop art is invading town. Between BLC and Khoury Home we can sense its presence big time all over the city. And just in case you want to file this under copycat, the answer is no - since the use of pop art (specifically Lichtenstein and his benday dots) has been quite common in advertising. Between the two ads, BLC has a more solid concept (using the O to indicate 0%).

And just for artistic reference, here's a work called "Explosion" by Lichtenstein.

Explosion - Roy Lichtenstein

Beirut Beer redeems itself in English.

Research credit: D.P.

Now that established that the Arabic version of Beirut Beer was close in spirit and expression to Pepsi, it seems they redeemed themselves with the English version which is more Whisky worthy (no direct corelation but reminds me of Chivas "live with chivalry" and Ballentine's "some things are worth doing" in terms of positioning and upscale tone of voice). "We've got what it takes" which is a better English adaptation for the Arabic line "ne7na adda". So apparently this is the silver lining of the campaign and a redeeming effort.

Aizone has a hit on their hands.

I heard several comments on this ad already, "ugly" is one of them. However I tend to really like this one - the punk rock edgyness to it is undeniable. The over-the-top ambaiance, the in your-face-attitude all combine to make it very much the Aizone spirit (sure, you'd be shelling a lot of dough to appear as if you were a "rebel" and fighting the system, but then the concept of high fashion masquarading as street clothing is all about that).

I think ever since Sagmeister and Walsh took over the reigns of the Aishti/Aizone account, the resuts were very consistent - strange-odd-incomprehensible for Aishiti, pop-rebellion influenced-stricking for Aizone. Maybe the fact the Sagmeister and Walsh do not know the Aishti consumer per se is what makes them go in these directions (on the economic level it is indeed the same people who shop at Barney's or Saks but on the socioeconomic level the equation becomes very different). Naturally, all those strange and pointless ads never stopped anyone from purchasing from Aishti, which perhaps goes to show that good or bad advertising the brand is now so established it is immune to such pitfalls.

Milton Glaser: I ♥ Earth

Milton Glaser

He gave us 'I ♥ NY', now Milton Glaser is putting his touch on a logo for global-warming movement, according to glaser the logo is " "symbolically, the disappearance of light" in addition he sees it as "(e)ither Earth is dying or it's beginning to grow again. My preference would be that it was beginning to grow again, but for the moment I have no evidence of that." The logo is available in a set of 5 pins (for $5) the proceeds of which go to print more pins so that the maximum amount of people who would be wearing to sensibilize "the masters of the universe" (according to Glaser) to take action.

Do note that the United States has a significant portion of its citizens who deny that human actions have anything to do with climate change mostly calling it a "liberal hoax" and other such terms. So simply acknowledging the fact that global warming is happening is a big thing in itself. Not everyone however is seeing the campaign positively from a media angle and the way the website is presented does not help much with a hashtag like #itsnotwarming unfortunately a lot of people won't understand that the rest of the message is that "it's dying" and might stop there in their interpetation of the campaign which could seriously backfire.

Actually, technically and scientifically the slogan is misleading - earth will be fine, it's the species on it that will disappear.

"Light at the end of the tunnel (and it wasn't the train)" video art by Tarek Chemaly

This is a new video art composed of 61 hand-animated frames on a digital platform. The joke goes “I saw the light at the end of the tunnel,
and it was the train” – so after several years of trials and tribulations, I am
hoping I now see the light at the end of the tunnel, and that it’s not the
train.

Still from "Light at the end of the tunnel (but it wasn't the train)" by Tarek Chemaly

Why Anthony Rahayel should decline Deek Duke prize

Source: Facebook

If I am writing this, it's both - to congratulate Anthony Rahayel (our fellow blogger at the excellent No Garlic No Onions) for his Milan trip win in the Deek Duke lottery - and to invite him to decline to accept the prize. Let me stress that Deek Duke says that it did the draw under the supervision of the Lebanese Lottery Association, so I am in no way doubting the fair and square results. But frankly, Anthony has built a solid reputation of not being close to brands which has made his blog credible and very trustworthy. By accepting the prize, there would be too much bantering as to how much his future reviews will be influenced by it, and should they be positive people like me would be thinking "hmmmm, this is a kickback" and should they be negative, we would be thinking "hmm, he's trying to distance himself to remain credible".

No Garlic No Onions is one of the rare blogs I comment on - and frequently - everything from my opinion on the piece to typo mistakes etc... Which is why, to keep the credibility, I humbly ask Anthony to decline the prize.

Otherwise, mabrouk! 

Aishti goes all Carmen Miranda

Composite image - Aishti ad and Carmen Miranda

Good news for Aishti, their site is now up, bad news for Aishti they've gone all Carmen Miranda. Upscale Carmen Miranda but Carmen Miranda nonetheless, and no, it's not comparing apples to oranges at all - pardon the pun, or it could be that Sagmeister and Walsh went bananas on this one, or whomever approved of this from the client side is a fruit cake... OK, fine, I am pushing it, the ad is OK - neither good nor bad, just... irrelevant perhaps.

Carmen Miranda was famous for feisty style and fruit hats, my introduction to her came from an episode of Quantum Leap where Scott Bakula lept into the south during a beauty pageant and this was his talent segment (singing Cuanto la gusta by Carmen Miranda). To save the day.... he ends up signing Great Balls of Fire (and thereby promoting Darlene from third place to winner).

Fun fact, singer Carole Samaha, who now pretends to speak bad English on twitter, while we were shooting a movie together in 1996 (a graduation project for a friend) picked up a fruit bowl, put it over her head and said "I'm Carmen Miranda" (and that's of course, before dumbing herself down for the purposes of the masses).

Destroyed MEA planes as art inspiration

Soon there will an auction in Doha which which include interesting Middle Eastern art, Ayman Baalbaki will feature among the lot with a work entitled Al Sharq Al Awsat (which means "Middle East" - but also refers to our national carrier Middle East Airlines).

Here is the work in question courtesy of Sotheby's:

Ayman Baalbaki, Al Sharq Al Awsat

As soon as I saw the work I remembered it was based on an actual photo, from the 1982 destruction of the Beirut International Airport. Sadly I have no credit for the photo as to who took it but here it is nonetheless:

And just in case you are interested, here's a different view of a plane that suffered the same fate (from the same era and time):

The same infamous photo appeared as an inspiration to the airport scene in Waltz With Bashir (director Ari Folman)

Still from Waltz with Bashir (Ari Folman)

 It is good to know that destroyed planes actually ended up being an inspiration to artistic works.