Photographer Bharat Sikka finds the still moments in the storm where new dust is just beginning to settle over old dust. Hardly recognizable as India — without the celebrated warm saturated hues of oranges, magentas and ambers — Sikka shows this side of the world in the bluest of grays. In his previous PLANET contribution, Seeing in Between, he gave us slowly calculated views of the changing physical terrain of India that comes along with economic development. Deeper down this road, Matter is articulated in somewhat quicker gestures as a record of calm in chaos. From an ominous still life of crinkled plastic to a portrait of a face silhouetted by hair, we see that Sikka’s connection to the looming changes is emotional. Matter will be up until March 19th at Nature Morte Gallery in Berlin. Sikka will continue to add images to the site mattershow.com throughout the year.
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Hunting for rambunctious music that honors the bygone big-band era can quickly transform into a wild goose chase. This is not the case for DC-area collective Chopteeth. As a twelve-piece Afrobeat band combining nationalities and genres, Chopteeth captures its vivacious performances at local landmark venues such as the Black Cat, 9:30 Club, and the Rock & Roll Hotel on Chopteeth Live. To a generation hooked on Vampire Weekend’s brand of Afropop and the Fela Kuti revival, this is more than a live recording. “Didjeridoo” kick-starts the celebration as a rollicking tribute to Duke Ellington; “Gagne Perdu” is a tropical whirlwind of keys and a brassy breeze. The runaway rhythm and catchy chanting on Ghanaian track “Eyi Su Ngaangaa” is a swift call to the dancefloor. Whether the influence derives from Congo or Senegal, Fela Kuti himself, or the band members’ own experiences in fields such as ethnomusicology or playing in other area bands, the layers beneath each track signals a meticulous attention to detail and an intense devotion to funk. In a city with a celebrated funk scene and distinct go-go tradition, Chopteeth’s brand of Afrofunk is the pulse of the city.

Buy this at iTunes. After the jump, check out a performance of “Eyi Su Ngaangaa”.
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Sometimes great documentaries have spectacular launches then fizzle and die, while a select few take off and not only reach a mass audience but deliver on the promise of its power to change. The Mexican documentary Presunto Culpable (“Presumed Guilty”) is flying at a heady altitude. After blazing trails and winning prizes at dozens of film festivals in 2009, being picked up for broadcast by the likes of UK’s Channel 4 and US public television network PBS in 2010, the film – remarkably for a home-grown documentary – secured theatrical distribution in Mexico, the place where it most needs to be seen, opening on February 18th 2011. Then, after two weeks in 200 cinemas nationwide, when it broke the box office record for a documentary with over 300,000 tickets sold (the proceeds of which will be donated to a foundation), a federal judge issued an order blocking further exhibition. It seems like the rotten legal system the film exposes, that presumes suspects guilty until proven innocent, is rearing its ugly head in response to the filmmaker’s barbs.
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“I’m your prostitute/You gonna get some”, sings Lykke Li on the provocative single, “Get Some”. Gone are the fractured rhythms and coy coo that pervaded Li’s 2008 debut Youth Novels. In their place, we encounter more confident, almost brazen, vocals, tribal beats, and a Spector-esque wall of sound, courtesy of Bjorn Yttling (of Peter, Bjorn, and John), who serves as producer on Wounded Rhymes. The meek singing on earlier hits, such as “Little Bit”, has given way to anthemic girl-group harmonies of “Sadness Is a Blessing” and opener “Youth Knows No Pain” — whose title could even be construed as a rebuff of Youth Novels. Add in the grinding guitars and eerie organs of “Rich Kids Blues” and we may have found a successor to PJ Harvey as the next generation’s resident siren, serving up an irresistible mix of sultry and scary sounds. With Wounded Rhymes, the Swedish singer sheds the nymph-like aura of her debut with a sophomore set that showcases a maturing artist with an ever-developing style that may only get better with age.

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Buy this at iTunes. After the jump, check out the new video for “I Follow Rivers”. And be sure to read our interview with Li from a few years ago here.
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New York has always been a photographer’s city. The dynamic skyscrapers, the green spaces, the vibrant hustle of immigrant communities thrown together, has inspired a wide variety of photographers over the centuries. Some have been interested in the city as a focal point for social unease (Jacob Riis, Eugene Richards); others have been more concerned with capturing its beauty (Alfred Stieglitz, Berenice Abbott).
     Visit any bookstore in the city, and you’re likely to find more than a few photography books on New York. There are books on specific subcultures, like Full Bleed: New York City Skateboard Photography, and beautiful historical survey photography books, like Reuel Golden’s New York: Portrait of a City. Until now, though, there hasn’t been a significant anthology of contemporary art photographers’ views of the city. That omission is addressed in New York A Photographer’s City (Rizzoli), a hefty coffee table book that features work by over 100 photographers.
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Now that the holidays are a distant memory, the “charm” of winter has long worn off, and you just can’t stomach the idea of a late-season snowstorm, tis the season to head south for a winter vacation. One of my favorite places to get away is the natural wonderland that is Central America, with its Pacific and Caribbean coasts in close proximity, lush rainforests, and crisp, clear mountain highlands. On a recent trip to Costa Rica and Nicaragua, I came across a few choice spots worth mentioning. The region, like nearly everywhere, has obviously undergone dramatic change and growth in recent years and it’s become harder to find places that exude a tasteful charm (instead of a developer’s fantasy). But that’s what I keep an eye out for.
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If I could assign fashion a “$64,000 question”, it would probably revolve around the age-old debate of whether to share the excitement of a new discovery with everyone in your contacts list–or keep it safely tucked under your hat for as long as humanly possible. In no area does this temptation to “plead the Fifth” seem greater than accessories– where the quest to find a statement-making bag that will keep its cool long after the latest “it” bag has said its goodbyes is still considered a challenge.

Lucky for us, Ria and Yiouri Augousti, the husband-and-wife team better known as R&Y Augousti, are up for the task. If the label doesn’t ring a fashion bell, that’s because the line’s focus has been rooted in small furniture and home accessories design since launching in Paris in 1990. Influenced heavily by their love of the Art Deco era–a period known for taking creative carte blanche in using rare and extravagant materials–the couple adopted a similar sensibility, using exotic skins and shells to create striking pieces with a distinctly “modern vintage” flavor, as they call it.
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On February 26, A.R. Rahman could make history. On that night, he could be the first Indian-born composer to win four Oscars, having been nominated for Best Original Score and Best Original Song (”If I Rise”, featuring Dido) for the film 127 Hours. Then again, such boundary-breaking does not seem to faze this veteran, who’s worked on over 110 films and who already made history with his two Academy Awards for Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire in 2008. Also directed by Boyle, 127 Hours depicts the harrowing fight for survival of mountain-climber Aron Ralston (played by James Franco). The film follows Ralston for the titular five days, after his arm was trapped by a boulder and he resorts to unthinkable measures to free himself. Dialogue is minimal in 127 Hours, meaning music holds a more significant role in driving this otherwise one-man show. Rahman spoke to us from his home in Chennai about such challenges, not to mention his charitable work, for which he recently earned the Crystal Award from the World Economic Forum.

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Like some kind of demented artistic genius with a sick sense of humor, Canada continues to confound in the best possible way. Opening February 25th, the wily gallery plays gleeful host to OHWOW’s second installment of Dadarhea, a collaborative, bourgeois-denouncing video work (and paintings) by a select group of equally demented artists. Animation, musical performance, green screen, and improv unite in what promises to be the most heinous, and illogically good time you’ve had all year. Many of last year’s artists have returned for round two: Devin Flynn, Jim Drain, Melissa Brown, Brian Belott, Fran Spiegel, Takeshi Murata, Joe Grillo, Marie Lorenz, Laura Grant, Naomi Fischer, Ara Peterson, Michael Williams, Jessie Gold, Billy Grant and Alison Kuo are all repeat Dadarhea offenders. According to Canada’s website, the collective group of artists are joined in a pact to “explore, laugh, splat, maximize, question, flap, drop, trough, dangle and generally go too far in the name of curiosity without actually killing a cat.”

Dadarhea runs from February 25-March 20 at Canada in New York.
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Following the awards season success of environmentally themed non-fiction films like 2006’s An Inconvenient Truth and last year’s Oscar winner The Cove, it would appear as though we’re seeing the establishment of an entire new division of documentary films – one focused on the health of the planet and the people inhabiting it. That’s certainly the impression given by this year’s list of Academy Award nominees, with two feature-length and two short-form films that can boast green credentials among the ten documentaries being recognized this Sunday. Let’s coin this new genre Cinema Verde.

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