Life as it should be?

Today a friend emailed me this:

My Next Life

I want to live my next life backwards!

You start out dead and get that out of the way
right off the bat.

Then, you wake up in a nursing home feeling better
every day.

When you are kicked out of the home for being too
healthy, you spend several years enjoying your
retirement and collecting benefit checks.

When you start work, you get a gold watch on your
first day.

You work 40 years or so, getting younger every day
until pretty soon you're too young to work.

So then, you go to high school: play sports, date,
drink, and party.

As you get even younger, you become a kid again.

You go to elementary school, play, and have no
responsibilities.

In a few years, you become a baby and everyone
runs themselves ragged keeping you happy.

You spend your last 9 months floating peacefully
in luxury, spa-like conditions: central heating,
room service on tap.

Until finally... you finish off as an orgasm.

I rest my case.

A visitor

Today a cute little thing paid a visit.

Café Piu Piu, São Paulo

Just got back from a 10 day stay in São Paulo. What a great city. I always used to complain about how ugly it was. How could such an interesting people build such a horrible city? But this time around I got São Paulo. It's fascinating, beautiful in it's own way, in it's scale. And my audience is in São Paulo. I look forward to showing my work A LOT there in 2008 and beyond.
I went to a great café/bar called Café Piu Piu in the Bexiga quarter. And I saw a great choir perform there called Juke. Check out http://www.juke.com.br They sing jingles and intros to old TV shows like Hawaii 5-0 and Speed Racer. They are hysterical and charming at the same time.

Peter Greenaway craps on Paulista

Peter Greenaway showed a 50 film called "The Tulse Luper Suitcases" on Avenida Paulista two nights ago. I, along with what seemed to be a large portion of São Paulo's hipsters, crowded the streets to watch. Greenaway began by asking the audience if we agreed with him that cinema was dead. The crowd mumbled a yes showing some resistence to his opinion. He told us that we were about to witness a 50 minutes of a new language of non-linear cinema that would be exciting and entertaining. He sat before a giant touch flat touch screen monitor and dragged, by hand, a series of looping images to the top portion of the screen which appeared on 4 huge projection screens on a building. After 3 minutes I realized what we were getting ourselves into: a 50 minute display of your typical VJ loopings and samplings. It went on and on. No change in texture. This could have been a video display at an MTV after-party. I tried to start a boo-ing but I could tell that everyone was going to applaud just another piece of contemporary video crap of multiple sceens showing non-communicative looping imagery. At the end body-guards escorted him into the Itau building. As he walked by me I just yelled "Looping is not Innovation".

My First Crush (cute animation)

Another 9/11

Six years on and here we are again. Another 9/11. I still perform Airplanes & Skyscrapers, a performance I premiered in Belgium on the first anniversary of the attacks. This past weekend and last month I performed this piece twice in the State of São Paulo; in Araraquara and São José do Rio Preto. I still haven't performed it in the United States. Americans who have watched the performance don't understand how I haven't shown it in the States yet and I just tell them that I still haven't found the right agent. This piece has been shown in France, Scotland, Holland, Belgium and Brazil.

This year, as my little nine-eleven tribute, I post an illustration I made back in May of 2004. A dragonfly in SoHo observing construction of the new towers at the World Trade Center site off in the distance.

I hope to be back blogging now. I was away for a while because I got tired of my old computer. I just bought a new kick-ass MacBook Pro 17 inch high definition screen. Will be interesting to see how this machine influences my web-presence and art work. kisses to all.

New 7 Wonders of the World

Three hours before the vote closed I decided to cast my vote for:
The Great Wall of China
Angkor, Cambodia
Petra, Jordan
Taj Mahal, India
Eiffel Tower, France
Christ Redeemer, Brazil

The result:
The Great Wall of China
Petra, Jordan
Christ Redeemer, Brazil
The Roman Colosseum, Italy
Machu Picchu, Peru
Chichén Itzá, Mexico
Taj Mahal, India

Cat Spanking / Gato Apanhando

Complexo do Alemão

A polícia matou ontem 19 no Complexo do Alemão. A polícia descobriu paiós e esconderijos. E agora? A minha curiosidade é que se simplesmente saem da favela e deixam o tráfico tomar conta de novo. Não parece existir uma tática a longo prazo para a re-estruturação da favela (e favelas). Ora, já que conseguiram entrar, que fiquem. Aproveitem a ocupação para entrar com a Força Nacional (que já está no Rio) para garantir uma paz para que a "abertura urbanística" seja feita... ou seja... implantar uma malha urbana descente... ou seja abrir ruas, avenidas, calçadas e praças. As pessoas que moram no caminho desta abertura seriam removidas para prédios de relocação perto e dentro da favela para depois voltarem para prédios descentes perto de onde moravam. A violência contra o tráfico não pode ser a única manchete nos jornais. A revolução arquitetônica das favelas tem que ser também manchete.
Sempre digo: Metade do problema da favela é arquitetônica e não social. Favela tem que abrir, abrir, abrir... como Georges-Eugène Haussmann fez com Paris no século 19. Focos urbanos ingovernaveis e acessiveis por apenas traficantes não é só um problema de polícia. É uma questão de soberania nacional.

Tenho Orkut!

Agora virei brasileiro de verdade. É só me procurar... Ricky Seabra.

Yoga & the Kitty

Vox Nostra Resonet

This is a beautiful women´s choir for you to click on singing medieval music:
go to http://www.amazon.ca/Miracles-Sant-Iago-Ambrosian-Chant/dp/B0000007F1 scroll down a bit and click "listen" on song number 3 (Vox nostra resonet). It´s just a one minute sample but worth it.

Thomas Pasley

Does anyone out there know the whereabouts of Thomas Pasley, actor? I knew him in NYC back in 1993. Please email me with news or contact information at yo@rickyseabra.com

YouTube of the Day: Lejo DJ

This is adorable!

A Pedra do Reino

Um Belo Desastre. Tanta espectativa pra entender bulhufas. A cenografia é linda. Os atores do mais alto nível. os figurinos fantásticos. O roteiro. Uma bosta. Todo mundo com quem conversei disse a mesma coisa no dia seguinte.
- Não entendi nada.
Como é que alguém faz uma obra de arte pra ninguém entender? Esta é a praga da arte contemporânea. Os artistas deste gênero distorcem a forma até o ponto onde a compreensão está a beira de não existir... ou deixa de existir mesmo. Aí pronto. É arte. Wow!
Não assisti ao segundo episódio de a Pedra do Reino. Estava com muito sono e sem forças pra assistir ao jogo do Grêmio. Será que o diretor sossegou com a sua linguagem errática de edição, cortes bruscos, berros e atores babando? Vou tentar assistir hoje.
Isso demonstra que não basta ter grana, cenografia, figurino e atores maravilhosos. O mais importante é roteiro. O Suassuna, coitado, deve ter boiado e muito.

YouTube of the Day: Spiders on Drugs

CA Rio CA

Yesterday I almost got mugged on a bus here in Rio. Back from the tour and Rio is already behaving like Rio. Three muggers boarded the bus. One through the rear door and two through the front door. They didn´t pay. The driver was probably threatened but we didn´t notice. One woman took the initiative and started to pull the bell asking to get off the bus. The driver stopped and a bunch of people got off and I followed. The people who got off told me that the muggers were probably going to "hijack" the bus a few blocks down by the beach where it would be easier for them to run away.
I still love this city but there is definitely something wrong with the word Carioca, the term used to describe it´s natives. If you´re born in Rio you are Carioca. Think about it. Carioca is Rio surrounded by caca.

Back in Rio / De volta ao Rio

The Isadora.Orb tour is over and we are back in Rio. Exhausted! Tour was great. Got to see southern Brazil. Feels like a whole other country. It´s not tropical. The south is Brazil´s Alaska. Exotically cold.

Email working

My emai is working again. Only use yo@rickyseabra.com from now on. Thanks. I have this rickyseabra@gmail.com only as a back up.

Email down

My email has been down for the past 4 days. If you´ve tried to email me your emails are probably bouncing back to you. I hope this gets fixed asap.

Porto Alegre

So. I´m in Porto Alegre now. Extreme south of Brazil. Show was difficult last night. My microphone was giving to much feedback in the theater. But we survived and people loved the performance. The theater organized a talk between the artists (andrea and I) and the audience. Everyone stayed to participate. Great fun.
Afterwards we went to dinner with the production and two artists from a group called Companhia do Giro. At one point during the dinner I had to ask Daniella, "Is it my impression or is Porto Alegre really ugly?". She answered, "Don´t worry. It´s ugly." I´m quite shocked actually. The city doesn´t have a postcard. When you think of Porto Alegre you can pinpoint a monument, a famous building, an obelisk, nothing. That´s one thing they have to work on. But the people are kind. Really kind. I hope to come back. We had a great audience that was really into the piece. So Curitiba and Porto Alegre are cities we really have to come back to to do some audience building.

Curitiba

Last night was our last performance of Isadora.Orb at the SESC da Esquina Theater. The Curitiba audience was by far the funnest audience we´ve had. A lot of university students. They really got the performance. I always used to think that it Isadora.Orb was more for a sixties generation audience but this younger generation, born in the early 80´s really enjoyed it. I hope to come back to this city to perform Isadora more. I think we´d have a good word of mouth here.
So... today we visit Oscar Niemeyer´s Eye. More on that later. kisses

YouTube of the Day: Apache

Yes, folks. This is for real.

Me in dressing room

Fabulous Theater

The Calil Haddad Theater of Maringá is the most beautiful theater in which I have performed.

100 kms of corn

Between Ponta Grossa and Maringá, a lonely tree.

Theater Cine Opera Ponta Grossa

Here's a bad picture of the art decó theater of Ponta Grossa in which we performed.

Campo Mourão

I´m in the small town of Campo Mourão, a two hour drive from the Paraguaian border. Since we had a day off yesterday we took the time to redesign the lighting. Tonight we go on stage with Isadora.Orb. We spent the day trying to figure out the lighting of the piece. Up till now we had only had time to set up and perform and not take the time to insure the quality of the projections. But we figured it out and tonights show should be beautiful.

Campo Mourão is by no means an attractive city. Not like Maringá. That was truly an oasis of urban planning. The last Maringá show, however, didn´t go so well. We were suffering from "second night syndrome". We let our guard down after opening night and everything started to go wrong. I skipped a text. My camera was on the wrong settings and had to do the readjustments during the performance. Andrea had a huge grasshopper land on her lap while she was adjusting volumes and when my return speaker blew out I just relaxed and thought; come what may! Actually, nobody in the audience noticed. But it was one of those nights in which I was just wishing the play would end.

Life is completely different here in rural Brazil. My skin misses the beach. But there is a tranquility of the mind that has set in making me miss my days in Brasilia and even Amsterdam.

Maringá

I´m in Maringá, Paraná. Last night we performed in the most beautiful theater I have ever performed in. I´ll post pics soon. The city is small, 200,000, 60 years old, and very clean with lots of trees. It´snice to come to places like this because you get a sense that Rio is not the center of the universe (or Brazil) and that Brazil doesn´t have to be pessimistic like the cariocas are. There is a Rio-centrism that newspapers and TV networks like Globo like to put out... that the country is corruptand inefficient and that Brazilians are essentially bad. This "realidade brasileira" (Brazilian reality) which these networks like to sell does not apply to the entire country
At night this city is covered with grasshoppers. They cling to every wall and store front.

YouTube of the Day: Anthem Spoof

Here´s a pretty funny spoof on how R&B Pop Diva´s have been rendering the Star Spangled Banner since Whitney. (Whitney was the best, of course).

Ponta Grossa

So I´m in Ponta Grossa, an adorable art decó city in the State of Paraná, Brazil. 400,00 inhabitants. We´ll be showing Isadora.Orb tomorrow. This morning we tried to visit a national park with some fabulous rock formations but nobody here could give us the proper directions. We´ll try again next week when we are in Curitiba. We will be performing in a wonderful art decó theater. Will post pics asap.

Tour begins!

Tomorrow morning Andrea Jabor and I will go on tour through southern Brazil with our performance Isadora.Orb, The Final Metaphor.

YouTube of the Day: Jazz Dispute

YouTube of the Day: Machine Show

The Gorgeous Tiny Chicken Machine Show. I´m not sure this is a continuing series. It should be. Trés PeeWeeHermanesque.

YouTube of the Day: Annie as Minnie

I´m back to sharing my YouTubes of the Day. This one is one from Annie Lennox´s album Medusa in which Annie plays Minnie Mouse Waiting in Vain for Mickey to show up and pop the question.

Think in Reverse.

Think in reverse.
Sustainability will no longer save us.
Have only one child. Or don’t have children at all.
Adopt one off the streets of the world.
Give your car back to your dealer.
Ride a bike everywhere.
That silly gift, that inflatable Edward Munch Scream, that head massager, give it back to the friend that gave it to you.
Tell them to give it back to the store.
Tell the store to send it back to the distributor, then manufacturer. Tell the manufacturer to undo everything it did until it disappears into the ether.
Send your air conditioner in to be melted and recycled.
If your too hot you´re probably too fat.
Eat less. You live off of 1/4 of what you eat.
Your doctor lives off the other 3/4.
The bastard.
Buy a smaller fridge.
Eat local fruit and vegetables.
Car companies: SHUT DOWN YOUR ASSEMBLY LINES NOW.
Not tomorrow.
NOW.
Figure out cleaner engines.
Not tomorrow.
NOW.
Put up solar panels on your houses today for both water AND electricity.
Pay your last electricity bill and tell them you’ll use their power when it’s produced by wind or solar energy.
Governments; stop being such wimps and do the same.
Stop mining coal EVERYWHERE.
Hunt cattle in the Amazon.
Hunt cattle where ever there was a forest.
Give all your soy products back to the supermarkets.
Tell them soy didn’t cure world hunger and that cash crops are evil.
Find out where your shit goes.
If you discover it goes untreated to the sea
go shit on your mayor’s doorstep until he/she does something about it.
Stop all construction. Plant ivy over them.
Knock down one room in your house.
Plant 2 trees in its place.
Tear up one street in your neighborhood.
Plant 100 trees in its place.
Cancel your next ten business trips.
Use skype or messenger instead.
Visit your grandparents in a zepplin or by train.
Demand that trains be solar powered.
Don’t ride them until they are.
If there is not enough sunshine to power trains in winter
don’t go to your parents for Christmas.
Who told you to live so far from them anyway?
If there is no longer coal to heat your house and you are hungry through the cold
wait for the Indians to come around with food.
Give thanks.
And this time mean it.

- April 2007 – Ricky Seabra, Rio de Janeiro

Back with Blogspot

Hi everyone. I´ve been away from my blog because I´ve been having html code problems. To make a long and uninteresting story short and uninteresting my Dreamweaver program (with which I build my blog) seems to have a bug and it was erasing some of my entries. So I have changed to Blogspot. Let´s see how this goes. kisses to all.