IZO

New titles for familiar paintings (stanis-sadal, in Russian).

Current humour:

What's an American University? A place where Russian professors teach Chinese students.

Reminds me of this Soviet-era joke:

What is cultural exchange between USSR and USA? We send to USA our geniuses from Odessa. And USA send to us - their geniuses from Odessa.

Russian humour

  

Viktor Puzo and guest in parody of TV personality Katya Gordon.

Brezhnev Kiss (via LJ dmitrivrubel).

Sovietized gadgets (Gizmodo). Below, by Paul Vasco.

Just sayin'...

Alphonse Allais was a French journalist, writer and humorist, born October 20, 1854 in Honfleur (Calvados) and died October 28, 1905 in Paris. Famous in the Belle Epoque, known for his acerbic pen and absurd humor, he is the misunderstood author of the first abstract paintings: his monochromes Harvesting Tomatoes at the Side of the Red Sea by Apoplectic Cardinals etc. were submitted to the Salon of Incoherent Arts a generation before the White Square on White Background of Kazimir Malevich, generally considered the first example of this.

The above from French-language Wikipedia (Wikipedia). Below, his Battle of the Negroes in a Deep Cave in Darkest Night-time (1893) (via i.ua, in Russian).

An oldie (well, it's a week old!) but a goodie (thanks, NI).

Photoshopped Yuliya Timoshenkos; below from archiverba (tema).

 

New Year's vidz:

Medvedev and Putin, chastushki (rhyming ditties).


Evgeni Chichvarkin in London.


Demis Roussos in Moscow.

Einstein joke, translated from Hebrew by Google:

Professor Einstein and his wife went out for a few days camping. His tent and sat to eat.  After a hearty meal and a bottle of good wine wished each other good night and retired to sleep.  

A few hours later Mrs. Einstein experiencing elbow the professor observes.

- "My dear husband, look to the sky and tell me what you see?"  

- "Millions of stars," replied the distinguished professor.  

- "What does that tell you?"  

Einstein thought for a moment effort to impress his wife said:  "In astronomy it means that there are galaxies and potentially millions - billions of planets.  Chronologically I suppose we approach the hour 3:15 AM,  Theologically I see that God is omnipotent and we are tiny creatures no matter,  Meteorological perspective I guess tomorrow is for us a wonderful day beautiful sunshine! And what does that tell you my dear wife? "  

Waited and said:  

- "My dear husband, every day you become more and more idiot - stole our tent!"

The late TV presenter Roman Trakhtenberg.

Meaning of the artwork, так сказать (thanks A3).

Russian Boy I.


Russian Boy II.


Russian Boy III.

Art world's Top 20 Most Powerless People (Hyperallergic) (thanks, MK). Oddly enough, I'm not on the list; must lobby harder.

New Wave: parody of original by DJ Smash.

Subversive poster campaign in Moscow. None of the posters survived a day (stanis-sadal). Below: 

Have you built a successful business from scratch? Hurry! Tickets to London from £823.

Say hello to Yakov Smirnoff, Soviet comic (Google) (thanks, MK):

You gotta be very selective, very careful what jokes you say. If you say, like, take my wife please, you get home, she's gone.

New Year's greeting from the President of Georgia.

How often will this clip be the launch-pad for satire? When the Russians banned Skype (via dolboeb).

Art Exhibition.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Yuliya Timoshenko says the end of the Crisis is nigh, the grivna is rising, and Ukrainians should get rid of their dollars (forpost, in Russian). Ukrainian joke:

- Моня, ты слышал доллар упал ?! 

- Шоб у тебя так стоял как он упал !

In Krasnoyarsk, someone managed to rename Lenin Street: it's now Lennon Street (SAN, in Russian, with video).

Russian Roulette Balloon Gun (Gizmodo) (thanks, MK).

Worldwide Swine Flu Goose Fuckery update (segal, in Russian).

Plight of the Blyam-blyamchiks.

Ben Lewis's Hammer & Tickle, a documentary about humour under Communism, is on Youtube (Youtube) (thanks, MK). Part I below.

I'm not sure if this is really a "drunk Russian on the beach", performance art, or a fake (thanks, MK).

Russian Lolcats/Rolcats (LA Times) (thanks, MK). The Russian site is here (Kotomatrix, in Russian). An English-language translation-site, whose translations have nothing whatsoever to do with the Russian originals, is here (rolcats.com). And here's some useful commentary on memes, recursive humour etc. (Ethan Zuckermann).

I Told You So (irena_bezrylova).

Preved Medved meme conquers broadcast media: Ukraine is to blame (tsn.ua, in Ukrainian, video).

Igudesman and Joo. Alexei Igudesman was born in Leningrad; ok he didn't study in Russia but he still has sweet Russian accent (via thatcageygirl).

Funny version of LOTR (in Russian) (thanks, MK).

Crisis humour (Grigory Pasko/Robert Amsterdam) (thanks, MK).

The entire ru_marazm archive (bsk.kpgs.ru).

Blame it on the Bear: anti-Russian cartoons inspired by the Russia-Ukraine gas payment crisis (Alex Log).

Photoshopping the Crisis (ibigdan, in Russian).

President Medvedev has requested that all entertainment programmes be banished from TV today because it's the day of Aleksi II's funeral (for this reason the Kandinsky Prize ceremony has been delayed). A quick survey of the blogosphere reveals that not everyone is happy with this policy. Designer Artemy Lebedev, for example, states that the ban on fun is an insult to his atheism; he has caused perturbation with his reproduction of a got-up poster-style image, below, the caption to which reads The Boss Summoned Him Suddenly (33 pages of comments on this at time of writing) (tema, in Russian). Anton Nosik has the result of a survey, in which about 60% of respondents agree with Lebedev (dolboeb, in Russian).

Bon mot: according to multiple media reports from Miami, Larry Gagosian is learning Russian "one ruble at a time". PLUS ONE BON MOT EXTRA FREE: a reader asks, is he acquiring Russian clients "one rube at a time"?

From Art Lebedev's brilliant Idioteka (artlebedev.ru).

Cool Russian Actor (IZO, earlier), is back.

From Marat Guelman's blog:

лучшее про кризис


чье не знаю

English Humour (thanks, RA).

Re "socially-aware net translator" (IZO, earlier today): a reader writes:

This reminds me of the 2005 Moscow Biennial when Slava Mogutin's exhibition "Wigger" was translated in the biennial program as "белый негр," [white negro] and back-translated in the program's English version as "White African-American." But I think that was all done by humans.

Not safe for Russian work: new adventures of Shurik (thanks, NM):

A collection of Putin cartoons (Cartoonist Group) (thanks, MK).

Some random "Russian plot" links:

- Putin Plot To Return As President (Yahoo).

- Details of Russian plot to annex Crimea (Video Novosti, video, in Russian).

- Yushchenko's pock-marked face not result of a Russian plot (RIA Novosti).

- At 6:23 p.m., flight logs at O'Hare International Airport confirmed that two passengers, a male carrying two silver briefcases and dressed in a perfectly tailored Brioni tuxedo, and an African-American female wearing a fur coat and speaking in a thick Russian accent, were seen boarding a private plane. (The Onion).

Stalin.

 

Borat has had the effect of increasing tourism to Kazakhstan, says Kazakh tourism minister (MIGnews, in Russian).

Rhymes for Plutser-Sarno (rezoner, in Russian).