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Saturday, December 25, 2004

Dada

Precurser to the surrealist period
that produced Dali, Ernst, Python
and lesser talents, this early
twentieth-century bizarro art movement
translates loosely as 'hobby-horse'.

Happy playground of the exquisite corpse.

Salvador Dali

Whatever his medium - ink, paint, scultpure, film -
this profane and intensely talented enigma proved the
past century's premiere artisan of the collective unconscious.

We shall surely never enjoy his like again.

Joseph Darby

Abu Ghraib whistleblower

Darts

The gentlemanly pub-crawler's game of choice,
this ancient European sport has long proved
the perfect compliment to a pleasant evening
of traditional Drum and Bass.

Leonardo Da Vinci

The original renaissance man,
this Italian artist, sculptor,
inventor, scientist and alleged
sodomite continues to serve as
something of a role-model for
like-minded imaginations across
cultures and continents.

Okay, save perhaps for the sodomy.

Edgar Degas

Perhaps best known for his paintings, drawings and bronzes of ballerinas,
this French impressionist always seemed to prefer pastels over other media
and the female form above anything else.

Oo-la-la!

De La Soul

This trio of black bohemians retooled late-80s hip-hop culture
by sampling the likes of Steely Dan, Johnny Cash and Hall & Oates
whilst simultaneously turning a cold shoulder to the pervasive
gangsta culture that was (and remains) the genre's chief source
of popularity and revenue (and resultant bling).

Cross-cutlural ambassadors of an oft-misunderstood art form.

Johnny Depp

Florida-bred film actor extraordinaire,
Depp continues to amaze with a knack
for cherry-picking unusual roles and
bringing out the best in a variety of
hit-or-miss projects ranging from
Edward Scissorhands, What's Eating Gilbert Grape
and Don Juan DeMarco to Ed Wood,
Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas and Pirates of the Carribean.

A class act, despite the tatoos and Tiger Beat roots.

Jacques Derrida

Algerian-born, Frech-based philospher and literary theorist
whose pioneering, visionary and controversial concept of
deconstruction opened all manner of human communication to a
seemingly endless array of fluid and subjective interpretations
by allowing a consumer the freedom to substitute or negate
one man's definition with his own.

And chew thought double meant twins.

Descendents