Culture Kings: July 2010

Saturday, July 31, 2010

Friday, July 30, 2010

Thursday, July 29, 2010

taken

Rest In Peace
Jonathan "Ynot" Corso
July 28th, 1989 - July 28th, 2010

This by-far, is the hardest post I've ever had to write. This is probably filled with spelling and grammatical errors but please bear with me. My head is still spinning and in disbelief of the fact that I will never see my homie again. I know that everyone in time, passes but having someone taken at such an early age is not something I can deal with right now. I guess I should start when I first met Jonathan Corso when he was just 14 years of age. It was my friend Dose who brought him around when we had crew meetings or get togethers, and he would introduce him as his little brother, sometimes even as his adopted son. And just like Dose had, we would eventually adopt him as one of our own.

"Who is this little delinquent?" I thought the first time I met him. He reminded me so much of myself at that age... showing a crazy amount of potential in art. He had street smarts, a rebellious attitude, general hatred for authority, and even though he was only 14, had a heavy drug addiction. Dose was a recovering drug addict himself. He had been sober for a few years at that point and took Jonathan, who was now becoming known as "Ynot", under his wing which helped Jonathan; who we'll now refer to as Ynot from here on out, kick his addiction by introducing him to graffiti. See, that's what people don't get, graffiti prevents troubled kids from turning into hard criminals by giving them a creative outlet.

Both Ynot and Dose used graffiti as a way to get over their addictions, and without drugs to hold them back, they hit the streets hard. In the next few years Dose and Ynot would get up (do graffiti) more than any other writers in South Florida. It got to a point where one couldn't travel anywhere in Palm Beach to the Keys without seeing their names a hundred times. The duo would reach "King" status over that period. Those graffiti writers that are prolific enough to achieve King status, usually do later in life, after a long graffiti career, but Ynot would attain that same status while he was still a teenager. Through graffiti Ynot would inspire a whole new generation of graffiti writers when the culture was starting to die out breathing new life into the South Florida graffiti scene.

However, graffiti wouldn't be the last artistic outlet for young Ynot. He soon would find a way to make money and art at the same time. This art was permanent though, unlike graffiti which is constantly being painted over and erased causing a short shelf life. Just like his older homies before him, Ynot would start tattoo apprenticing under senior members of the crew who were also tattoo artists.

Ynot quickly picked up tattooing just as he did graffiti. It was even more apparent now that the kid was ridiculously artistically inclined. He became well known in the Fort Lauderdale area for being a rising star in the tattoo world. His love for tattoos often was the cause of misunderstanding in society. His hands, neck, and face was tattooed. And along with a head of dread locks, he was commonly thought of as a thug or scum by those ignorant enough to cast judgement solely upon illogical and bigoted preconceptions on appearance. It was this sentiment that would ultimately lead to his death.

On Wednesday morning, July 28th, Ynot was celebrating his 21 birthday at Club Eden, a popular strip club in the Fort Lauderdale area. He was standing outside at 4am waiting for some friends when a group of men approached him and began to ridicule and taunt him. Each person in that group outsized Ynot and they only began to taunt him because they thought he was alone. Little did they know that our friends were just around the corner and were quickly coming to the aid of there little homie. A scuffle broke out and the group of guys, according to witnesses had obviously lost the fight. Instead of admitting defeat one of the men jumped into a white Cadillac Escalade and ran Ynot over then reversed direction to hit my friend Pucho. Pucho flew back 15 ft. before hitting the ground and blacking out while Ynot lay on the ground motionless. The driver, high on cocaine and alcohol then proceeded to circle around and intentionally run over Ynot's motionless body again...

None of the homies fighting alongside Ynot knew how badly injured he was until it was too late. The rest of the details are a bit hazy... Ynot was still breathing when the cops arrived. Quake, who had been fighting alongside Ynot stopped beating on the guy who he was fighting to attend to him and began to perform CPR. Everyone except Ynot was taken to the Police Station for questioning, unknown to his friends who were being held by authorities, Ynot was pronounced dead upon arrival at Broward General Hospital. He had just turned 21 years old, his newborn son Maximilion had just turned 5 months, and his last facebook update read "It's my birfday!" - R.I.P Ynot

a note to Ynot:

"I miss you bruh. The whole crew is fucked up right now. Quake and Pucho keep blaming themselves, and Dose is a wreck. The homie Whie got word from Econ in the pen and went crazy when he got word, I heard 10 COs had to hold him down... Don't worry about your seed, the crew is going to make sure he's straight. I know you're catching tags and raising hell up in heaven, put me up cause Lord knows I'll never make it to up there. At least you're with good company now up there with Beno, Sege, and Nes. Tell them homies I said what up!

I'm sorry I wasn't there that night. I'm sorry I was never able to take you out clubbing on the beach now that you were of legal age. I'm sorry cause we'll never be able to paint that burner like we talked about... I'm should have been there, things might be different."

missing you,
Evils MSG

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

field of dreams

by FriendsWithYou on the Fubon Financial building Taipei

The wonderful people at the Fubon Art Foundation commissioned FriendsWithYou to create a massive art piece to cover the façade of the Fubon Financial building in Taipei, Taiwan. As part of the Very Fun Park 2010 exhibition “Field of Dreams” became the focal point of the project and was created as a visual representation of this year's theme “looking up.” As the brilliantly multicolored flowers and bright colors appear on the horizon people are forced to look upwards, to discover that the cloud is smiling and asks you to rediscover the beauty of life. “Field of Dreams” will be on exhibit through July 2011.

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

hello my name is Macho

Drawings by Team Macho

duel

Dancing Pigeons - Ritalin

streamlined

1930 Custom Art Deco Henderson

The motorcycling world loves a ‘barn find’—an old, obscure machine wheeled out of the woodwork for the first time. And this is one of the biggest revelations of recent months. It’s a 1930 Henderson that was customized before WW2 by a fellow called O. Ray Courtney and fitted with ‘streamliner’ bodywork.

The art deco influence is obvious; legendary automotive designer Harley Earl could have drawn those curves. It’s all the more unusual because the mechanicals are hidden: even at the height of the Art Deco movement, most motorcycles were a triumph of form over function, with exposed cooling fins, brake drums and suspension springs.

The bike is owned by collector Frank Westfall of Syracuse. It caused a stir in June 2010 when it appeared at the Rhinebeck Grand National Meet, a motorcycle show held a couple of hours drive north of NYC. Grail Mortillaro (of the chopper blogKnucklebusterinc) had a camera to hand, so we have him to thank for these images.

Henderson was a Chicago brand and one of the American ‘Big Three’ (with Harley-Davidson and Indian) until the onset of the Great Depression. It went bust in 1931. But you can see the influence of the ‘streamliner’ style on another contemporary North American brand—Victory. If there’s a spiritual successor to this Henderson custom, it’s the Victory Vision Tour, a gargantuan cruiser with completely enclosed bodywork and not a leather tassle or saddlebag in sight.—Chris Hunter of motorcyle design website - Bike EXIF.

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1939 Rolls Royce Phantom III

In a world of plastic cars with hybrid heartbeats, the joy of driving is a dying art. This 1939 Rolls-Royce Phantom III “Vutotal” Cabriolet by Labourdette recalls an era when driving was always an artful experience. Yet this is not your standard Rolls Royce Phantom III, this is the result of a complete rebuild by the Parisian designer Henri Labourdette. Labourdette tore the Phantom III down to the bones, adorning its body with gold plating and brass fixtures on a shape that stretched sensually from bumper to bumper. The “vutotal” term comes from that heavy slice of glass that rests above the instrument panel, a sharply-squared windshield that sits in a welcome contrast to the curves below. As we said of the 1948 Buick Streamliner, curves like these inspire poetry… [fairfield concours d'elegance via ab]