Sam Bloomfield, 58, grew up poor on Tonga but arrived here in 1976 and says he has tried to show his gratitude ever since, according to a July 4 profile in his hometown Herald of Everett, Wash. He has tattooed "God Bless America" under his left eye, "Land of the Free" under his right eye and a large "USA" across his forehead, and last year underwent another 15 painful hours with the needle to cover the rest of his face with stars and stripes resembling an American flag so that he can toast his beloved country in the mirror every morning.
Justice Run Amok
Extreme Behavior
The days of the ceramics trade here are numbered, lamented Francisco Figueriredo, 68, and the specific ceramics trade of his region (Portugal's Caldas da Rainha) happens to be ornamental penises. For more than 30 years, Figueriredo and his wife have been two of a small number of craftspeople who have shaped and molded various models for export (e.g., mugs with penis extensions, penis-shaped bottles, ceramic soccer figures with penises peeking out from under flags). A July Reuters dispatch attributed the decline to a general loss in the provocativeness of public sexual displays.
Artist Michael Fernandes' exhibit in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in June caused a commotion because it was merely a banana on a gallery's window sill, and Fernandes had it priced at $2,500 (Cdn) (down from his original thought, $15,000). Actually, Fernandes changed bananas every day (eating the old one), placing progressively greener ones out to demonstrate the banana's transitoriness. "We (humans) are also temporal, but we live as if we are not," he wrote. Despite the steep price, two collectors placed holds on the "work," requiring the gallery's co-owner, Victoria Page, to get assurance from callers. "It's a banana; you understand that it's a banana?"
Police, including SWAT officers, were called to an apartment in Mesa, Ariz., in June after neighbors reported a fight between a man and woman that included yelling and breaking things inside. When they arrived, they found only a 21-year-old man, conducting the fight by himself, alternating a high-pitched voice with a low-pitched one. He was referred for a medical exam.
Artist Martin Creed won Britain's 2001 Turner Prize for his highly acclaimed installation of a lightbulb going off and on indefinitely in an otherwise-empty room. His latest exhibition ("Work No. 850"), at the Tate Britain in July, consists of a runner sprinting through one of the galleries every 30 seconds. The museum's director described Work No. 850 as a "compelling," "lyrical" piece that "upsets any preconceived ideas" of moving through an art space. News of the Weird's most recent encounter with Creed came in 1996 when he released his "Sick Film," consisting only of shots of people vomiting on camera, and at the time, he said he was considering a similar s-word film, to consist only of people performing an even less tasteful bodily function on camera.
In June, a 20-year-old window cleaner on Australia's Gold Coast survived a nine-story plunge, suffering only a broken arm and, from falling on his harness, a super wedgie.
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Operation Repo
The Smoking Gun Presents: World's Dumbest
Inside American Jail
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