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Tomorrow, World Fair Trade Day 2008 is being celebrated in over 70 countries, with free food, lectures, concerts, fashion shows and art exhibits. Surrounding WFT Day is the first-annual Fair Trade Fortnight, which is running through May 18. For this inaugural Fortnight, the theme is environmental justice.

For example, Trade Aid New Zealand is going all-out with their “Junk 2 Green Funk” contest, in which participants re-fashion trash into art. The aim is to to heighten awareness of conservation and the role of the artisan in fair-trade craftsmanship.

So what do you get out of World Fair Trade Day?
Retailers all over the country are going to be handing out free fair trade coffee, chocolate and other samples. And we’re not talking just any caffeinated swill here — this is quality stuff. Great art and film events abound, too.

What do the fair-trade craftsmen and farmers get out of it?
Where to start? Living wages; safe working environments; ecologically sound production methods; long-term working relationships between producers and retailers.

Of course, just because Mother’s Day comes only once a year (you didn’t forget, did you?), doesn’t mean you should ignore your mom for the other 364 days. So it goes without saying that it’s important to support fair-trade producers whenever you can. At zipiZape Artisans, we celebrate Fair Trade Day every day, offering handmade crafts from artisans from all over the world — Mexico, Nepal, South Africa and Peru, to name just a few of the countries our producers hail from, as well as Navajo and Zuni art from right here in the US.

Back to WFT Day: There are fair-trade throwdowns going on all over the country this weekend. These 6 listings should give you a little taste of what’s going on in our neck of the woods (New England), including trunk shows, free coffee and chocolate, film screenings and wine samplings:

Worlds Biggest Coffee Break
Saturday, May 10 | 3pm-4pm

Description: “Aiming to set a world record for the biggest ever coffee break, Amherst Fair Trade Partnership (AFTP) will stage a ‘Fair Trade Coffee Break’ on May 10, World Fair Trade Day. It will be one of hundred’s of Fair Trade coffee breaks held simultaneously around the world, and will focus on the benefits of Fair Trade for farmers, consumers, and the environment. AFTP will distribute Free Fair Trade coffee, chocolate and flowers at various businesses throughout Amherst at 3pm. Live music will be at some locations. AFTP will also distribute a guide to all the places that carry Fair Trade products in town. In order to set the world record, the events will have to draw over 5,000 people throughout the U.S. participating at the same time.”

Participating venues: Black Sheep Deli/Cafe, Loose Goose Deli, Henions Bakery, Wheatberry Bakery, Bart’s Ice Cream, Collective Copies, Tabella Restaurant

[Amherst, MA (downtown). 413.687.1434. amherstfairtrade@earthlink.net]

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Fair Trade Film Screening: “Chocolate Country”
Saturday, May 10 | 2pm

Description: “This 30 minute film won Best Short Documentary at the Seattle International Film Festival and is an exciting, positive story set to local Dominican folk music. It will take you into another world and culture and show you where chocolate comes from, how it’s grown and prepared, and how you can support a better life for the farmers who grow it. You can read about it and see the trailer at ChocolateCountryFilm.com. The director, Robin Blotnick, and the producers, Northampton locals Jill Higgins and Joe Blotnick, will be there to present and discuss the film. Chocolate Country came into being while Jill and Joe were Peace Corps volunteers in the Dominican Republic working with the cacao farmers’ cooperative and their film maker son came to visit.” Admission is $3, and apparently comes with free Pierce Brothers coffee and Divine chocolate.

View trailer (click here if you’re having trouble viewing the embedded video below):

[Amherst Cinema, Amherst Cinema Arts Center, 28 Amity St., Amherst, MA. 413.687.1434. $3. amherstcinema.org, chocolatecountryfilm.com. amherstfairtrade@earthlink.net]

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Shredded couch armrests, severed chipmunk tails … Sometimes our cats leave us a few clues about their daily activities, but most of their seekrit feline goings-on remain a mystery. Until now. German workshop tinkerer and cat fancier Juergen Perthold whipped up the CatCam — a tiny $20 digital keychain camera rigged to take a shot every 2.5 minutes — and attached it to the collar of his kitty, Mr. Lee. The result? A slightly surreal glimpse into the kitty’s trek through woods, fields, tunnels and garages.

Check out the rest of Mr. Lee’s day, as well as the exploits of a handful of other feline Ansel Adamses. Want to build your own CatCam? Perthold shows you how! (And for only $31, you can order a CatCam kit from Juergen himself.)

From a similar vein comes “Stranger Photos Have Happened.” For this experiment, Jay Carlson (the founder of online ‘zine The Plug) left a disposable camera tied to a bench, accompanied by this note:

Good afternoon,
I attached this camera to the bench so you could take pictures. Seriously. So have fun. I’ll be back later this evening to pick it up.
Love, Jay / The Plug

And lo, the passers-by obliged, begetting much cheesy mugging unto the camera — enough to fill up the whole roll.

See the rest here: http://theplug.net/28/strangerphotos.htm [via Make]

^{[image courtesy christopherdale]}

Fee fi fo fum, I smell a bloody good photographer. Flickr user christopherdale snapped this eerie shot of “The Awakening,” a 100-foot sculpture of a panicked giant struggling to to free himself from the sod of Washington, DC (or thereabouts). His long-exposure technique gives the whole scene an otherworldly feel. Here’s a nice detail of the giant’s gaping yap, complete with gnashy choppers.

^{[image courtesy christopherdale]}

Some people are purists, for whom the hard way is the best way. We’re talking about the folks who rub two sticks together to start a fire, spin their own dental floss, or thump cream in a churner just so they can butter their bagels. This ethos might not be commonplace, but you can find it in just about any sphere — including animation. (Perhaps I should say “especially animation,” come to think of it.)

Enter Javan Ivey.

^{[images courtesy Javan Ivey]}

Inspired by the mind-blowingly intricate strata-cut stop-motion technique used in some claymation, Ivey uses an approach he dubs “stratastencil,” in which each frame of the film is a layer of cut paper. The results are eerily beautiful, as the motion flows like a river of time. Link [via Make]

Bonus video (discovered while doing research for this post):

Here’s “Buzz Box,” the epileptic opus of strata-cut master David Daniels. This film demonstrates the slice-and-shoot process pretty clearly — maybe not terribly pleasant to watch (and YouTube’s pixelation is brutal), but it’s quite a marvel nonetheless. (For beautiful high-res videos by Daniels, go to BentImageLab.com and click on “New Scientists.”)

In case you’re having trouble viewing the embedded video, here’s a direct link.

Every morning, I peruse the Universal Hub photo stream, and this entry stopped me dead in my tracks. It depicts a Central Square alleyway — a sight I’ve seen many times, but never in such a beautiful light. Amazing work, sushiesque!

^{[image courtesy sushiesque]}

In the spirit of April Fool’s Day, we’re bringing you the best trompe-l’oeil the tubes have to offer. Here are 8 jaw-dropping examples of artists transcending the limits of two dimensions.

Bored Night has three great 2-D illusions on their site (definitely check out that lurking pool mosquito), but this creepy humanoid is my favorite.

[images courtesy Bored Night]

I can’t even fathom the kind of logistics needed to execute this decorative trickery.

[image courtesy 2Loop]

With this painting (a comment on the the California Water Wars), I spent a good 15 minutes trying to figure out where the art ends and reality begins. Ceci n’est pas une pipe?

[image courtesy John Pugh]

Blue Sky’s “Tunnelvision” mural gives me chills for some reason. (It’s something about the colors — it’s like a tunnel through time.)

[image courtesy Blue Sky]

Behold: Trompe-l’oeil at its most freakout-inducing.

[image courtesy Hemmy.net]

This handpainted eagle ruffles a few feathers … IN MY BRAIN. (Click here for loads more.)

[image courtesy yoke.cc]

A bit of Banksy for you.

[image courtesy canonsnapper]

And of course, no post on modern-day trompe-l’oeil would be complete without Sidewalk Chalk Guy.

[image courtesy gprime.net]

Did we miss any of your favorites? Let us know in the comments!

Now that spring has sprung, the grass has riz (almost) and all that good stuff, it’s time to emerge from our down-comforter-filled caverns and start doing things outside again! If you’re looking for a new outdoor project, here’s a cheap, easy and awfully weird one: Wacky Archives shows you how to make your own ethereal apparition. No ectoplasm required — just chicken wire and a slightly twisted sense of whimsy. [Via Make]

^{[photo courtesy Wacky Archives]}

Actually, this reminds me of Nightshirts, one of the installations in the Forest Hill Cemetery. (New Englanders, if you haven’t already, I highly recommend you check this place out. Makes for superb picknicking.)

*Title of this post inspired my favorite IMDB find of all time.

Belly up to the Kunstbar, a cozy little watering hole where the White Russians are Chagall and Kandinsky. The brainchild of animation collective The Petrie Lounge, this short is a surreal(ist) love letter to Art History 101. [Via Neatorama]

Sorry for the lack of posts/erratic site behavior — we’ve run into a few technical difficulties this week. (Looks like I’m well on my way to filling out my “newbie blogger” bingo card!) Anyway, thanks for your patience, folks; things should be getting back to normal very soon now.

At this point, everyone knows what a powerful tool Google can be if you’re looking to dig up information on other people. Well, recently, I stumbled across a couple websites that allow you to use Google to spy on pretty much the entire world, all at once. But not in the way you’d expect.

I’m referring to two flashy mashups of Google Maps and Flickr: Flickrvision and Earth Album.

Earth Album harvests Flickr’s most interesting photos, then displays the results for a given country when you click on the map.

Flickrvision is something a little more startling: It shows you a satellite’s-eye view of photos being uploaded in real time, sending that little digital globe spinning with every new submission. (For an extra dose of voyeurism, you can also check out Twittervision — although in this case, I think a picture really is worth a thousand words.)

Happy gawking!

Other nifty map-related sites:
breathingearth.net | Watch the population rise and fall in real time! See the carbon emissions of countries around the world! This is how the planet “breathes.”
opentopia.com/sunlightmaprect.html | Shows what parts of the earth are currently goth-friendly, and which parts are subjected to the sun’s burny rays (or, if you live in Seattle, coated in a light gray drizzlemist).
google.com/sky | No longer do you have to download Google Earth to mess around with the digital heavens — you can do it right in your browser!

Now, I know I’m barely scratching the surface of this topic here (and intentionally so, since I could easily spend the rest of my life researching this). Got your own favorite map sites? We’d love to hear about them!

^{[photo courtesy Spanish-Living.com]}

Meet L’Hemisfèric, one of the five attractions that make up the dazzling, ultramodern City of Arts and Sciences (known as Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciències in Catalan, or Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias in Spanish) in Valencia, Spain. This “city,” completed in 2004 by renowned Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, includes an opera house, a garden, a science museum and an oceanographic park. The cherry on top of this sensory overload sundae is, of course, L’Hemisfèric: an entertainment complex boasting the trifecta of IMAX theater, laserium and planetarium. And if you’re into creepy nicknames, feel free to call it the “Eye of Knowledge.” (According to Spanish-Living.com, “The eye even blinks with the aid of a steel and glass shutter operated by hydraulic lifts.”)

^{[photos courtesy Hipocondriaca, . Bambo]}

As it turns out, right now would be an excellent time to make a trip to Valencia, as the whole town is gearing up for Las Fallas. Held on March 15-19, this annual celebration welcomes spring in the very best way: with FIRE and NOISE. During the festivities, celebrants construct enormous firecracker-stuffed puppets (called ninots), usually grotesque or satirical figures, which get paraded around the streets and placed in tableaus (fallas). Every day at 2pm, pyrotechnicians try to out-muscle each other in La Mascletá, a fireworks competition that focuses on sheer bone-rattling percussive power instead of sparkly lights. (They refer to the finale as the terremoto, meaning “earthquake.”) As you might expect, the whole thing culminates in an epic conflagration: Nit del Foc (”The Night of Fire”). According to Valencia City Guide:

All Fallas burn all over the city the following night (including the winner of the competition) in a tremendous spectacle of fire and joy. Valencia is at that moment like Nero’s Rome, a city in flames.

And indeed, so it would seem:

^{[photos courtesy vanguardista, Fabio Gava]}

For more dazzling Las Fallas snapshots from Flickr, go here. [Thanks to Neatorama for inspiring for this post!]