UN official holds rich nations accountable for food shortages.

People waiting for emergency food rations distributed by the World Food Program in Sudan.
(Tim McKulka, UNMIS via Reuters)

ROME: Resolving the global food crisis could cost as much as $30 billion a year, and wealthier nations are doing little to help developing nations face the problem, United Nations officials said here on Tuesday.

Jacques Diouf, director general of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, convened a three-day summit meeting attended by dozens of world leaders. He sharply criticized wealthy nations who he said were cutting spending on agriculture programs for the world's poor and ignoring the loss of rain forests while spending billions on carbon markets, subsidies for their own farmers and biofuel production. - International Herald Tribune

"Bogotá : Building A Sustainable City"

PBS documentary, narration by Brad Pitt, about Bogota's transformation and a model for sustainable growth.

Getting ready for 2010

Parts 1 & 2
2 x 23 minutes

Being the first African country to host the FIFA World Cup™ puts a heavy responsibility on South Africa to get it right. The tournament will put a spotlight on the continent as a whole and will provide South Africa with an opportunity to showcase its post-apartheid success on an international stage. This documentary looks at how the billions of dollars allocated to making sure the 2010 World Cup™ is a success are being spent, and crucially, whether the new stadiums and roads will be ready in time.



More info at:
totalsoccer2007.blogspot.com

Malanie Smith

Spiral City I
2002

Adrian Paci

Home to Go, 2002

Lawrence LaBianca

Tool for Seeing
Redwood, Glass, and Steel - 16" x 18" x 18"

President Bush promised to expand American biofuel production, but the result has been worse than nothing. Corn is a poor source for energy, but growing it and other staples as fuel has caused food prices worldwide to explode - even as the scarcity of flex-fuel vehicles means no significant increase in U.S. biofuel use.

Now the U.N. is worried about rising food costs, while environmentalists see entire regions torn up to grow fuel crops.

From LinkTV.org

S.C.U.M Manifesto

Back by popular demand! We've gotten so many requests to put the full text back on the site - we did it. Frankly, it is now all over the web, just do a search on SCUM Manifesto. Many of the other sites that have this text exploit it for anti-feminist ends.

Follow the link; you can read her biography and watch the film "I Shot Andy Warhol."

Elite Squad

The director of the acclaimed documentary Bus 174- Brazil’s Jose Padilha- premiered his recent film titled Elite Squad.

Elite Squad, which Padilha wrote with former Rio police officer Rodrigo Pimentel, follows two young Rio de Janeiro police officers as their fantasy of implementing law and order disintegrates into bloodshed and corruption.

It details night raids through the makeshift homes of the city's hillside slums known as favelas, as well as the stark class differences that feed an appetite for riches among many of its poor residents.

Padilha, 39, said he had originally hoped to use the information he received from Pimentel for a documentary but quickly realized that it would not be feasible.

"How would I do this, go to corrupt cops with cameras?" he asks. "If I tried to make this film as a documentary, it would probably get me killed."

TonyLabat.com

Tony Labat
Wax Museum (Interventions)

Tony Labat was born in Cuba and came to the United Stated at the age of 15 in 1966. He received his BFA (1978) and his MFA (1980) from the San Francisco Art Institute where he’s being teaching since 1985 and is currently Chair of the New Genres Department. He has exhibited internationally over the last 25 years. Mr. Labat has received numerous awards and grants and his work is in many private and public collections. Labat has developed a body of work in Performance, Video, Sculpture and Installation. His work has dealt with and continues his investigations with the body, popular culture, identity, urban relations, politics, and the media. In 2005 Labat had a survey exhibition of his work in conjunction with the publication of "Trust Me." From tonylabat.com

Check out Tony Labat's work at tonylabat.com

Rigo23 at the Luggage Store

May 11 - June 16, 2007

Backtracking 199485
new work by Rigo 23

large-scale mixed media drawings on canvas

Opening
Friday May 11, 6-8pm
@ the luggage store
1007 Market Street (nr 6th), San Francisco

Lecture/Discussion
Saturday, May 12, 3-6pm
with Rigo 23, Keith McHenry, Garth Ferguson, and other guests to be announced.

Gallery Hours
Wednesday-Saturday, 12-5pm and by appt.

It is with great pleasure and honor that we present “Backtracking 199485,” a solo exhibition by Rigo 23: new large scale mixed media drawings with text on canvas with handmade zines accompanying each new work. Rigo’s graphic imagery borrows stylistically from signage, advertising, cartoons, logos and newsprint photography.

San Francisco has always been regarded as a “safe haven” for social experimentation; and as a place where differences enriched rather than divided the socio-political landscape. San Francisco was a sanctuary town, which welcomed individuals fleeing from war and hunger. San Francisco welcomed people moving towards freedom of expression -- sexually, politically, socially, artistically and spiritually; and as Rigo says, who “…at least walked towards a better and more humane collective future.”

Posada Carriles's Predicted Impunity

On the 8th of May a U.S. federal court dropped the immigration charges against Posada Carriles. Jury selection was supposed to begin on Friday in the trial against the suspected bomber, but U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone blasted the prosecution for "fraud, deceit, and trickery" in the way it ran the case.

So far, Fidel has been publicly mum over the court’s decision. However, an article in official newspaper Granma bemoaned the “predicted impunity” of the court’s decision, and an official at the Cuban Interests Section in Washington accused the Bush administration of protecting Posada Carriles.

Amores Pesos

MACO (México Arte Contemporáneo), the new international contemporary art fair in Mexico City, took up residence last weekend in the fancy district of Lomas de Chapultepec, although no one seems to know why the site used for the fair’s first three incarnations was not chosen again. One rumor is that the original neighborhood was too poor and too close to the centro historico: Potential Mexican clients, who are, by default, rich and paranoid, were reportedly worried about their safety and felt ill at ease in the old location.

A Global Conversation in Art

World Factory: Shotgun Review

Mario Rizzi, Murat and Ismail, 2005. DVCAM film, Dolby stereo sound

In recent years, San Francisco has experienced an influx of internationally-respected curators, whose work here challenges the often-criticized provincialism of our city. Most palpably, the healthy rivalry between SFAI and CCA to bring in top names in the field has had a galvanizing effect on the Bay Area scene, as newcomers and locals alike compete to heighten our awareness of global issues and artists. Hou Hanru—famous for exhibitions such as Z.O.U.—Zone of Urgency at the 2003 Venice Biennale and the touring exhibition Cities on the Move, and now SFAI’s Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs—launched an ante-upping volley this spring with his epic three-part exhibition World Factory.

"We are again a city to be reckoned with, our local politicians promoting environmentalism and diplomacy on the national and international stages. So should we encourage a global conversation in art, which neither prioritizes nor excludes our own." - Anuradha Vikram.

Dialogues

SFAI announces the launch of Dialogues, an ongoing series of podcasts featuring some of our distinguished visiting artists and scholars. The podcasts can be played in a browser window and are also available for free in the iTunes store, where you can subscribe to the series. Available now are Carlos Basualdo, Paul Chan, Laura Hoptman, Alfredo Jaar, William Kentridge, Rem Koolhaas, and Chris Kraus.




Alfredo Jaar
The Eyes of Gutete Emerita, 1996
Two quad vision light boxes with six b/w text transparencies and two colour transparencies

Private Desire Vs. Public Virture in Architecture

KQED Forum:

Explores the intersection between public and private spheres in the world of architecture.
Host: Michael Krasny

Guests:
Didier Faustino, artist and architect

Donald MacDonald , architect

Hou Hanru, director of exhibitions and public programs at the San Francisco Art Institute

Sandra Vivanco, architect

Castro fears biofuel plans will hurt world's poor

HAVANA, Cuba (AP) -- Ailing Cuban leader Fidel Castro returned again to public debate -- if not view -- on Wednesday with a newspaper column denouncing U.S. promotion of using food crops for biofuels.

For the second time in less than a week, Castro chided the Bush administration for its support of ethanol production for automobiles, a move that the 80-year-old revolutionary said would leave the world's poor hungry.

"From where and who will they supply the more than 500 million tons of corn and other cereals that United States, Europe and the rich countries are going to need to produce the quantity of gallons of ethanol that the big companies of the United States and other countries demand in return for their many investments?" he asked.

Ortega Government Shows Some Response to Civil Society Demands

While nothing is certain about the direction of this new government, it merits attention that within the first week of taking office, the Ortega administration announced the end of the IMF-pushed school autonomy policy, the launch of a program to revitalize small-scale farming, and the appointments of an anti-privatization activist to head the public water utility and a labor rights activist to lead the Labor Ministry. At the same time, these policy shifts are not the brainchild of any one politician or political party. They are the result of a growing civil-society consensus, backed by mounting public pressure, that the U.S.-promoted neoliberal model has only further impoverished Nicaragua.

China's Power Erodes Free-Trade Support in Developing Nations

China's emergence as a world trade powerhouse, blamed in the U.S. and Western Europe for the loss of thousands of factory jobs, is having an even more severe impact on developing nations. Support for free trade is dwindling as industry groups in countries around the globe lobby for protection against Chinese competition.

New Mexico Governor Moves Toward White House Bid. 2008

WASHINGTON - Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico took the first step Sunday toward an expected White House run in 2008, a high-profile state chief who promoted his extensive experience in Washington and the world stage as he seeks to become the first Hispanic president.

Richardson joins a crowded and historically diverse field of contenders in a fast-developing campaign. On Saturday, New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton said she wanted to be the first female president. Last week, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois jumped in, a formidable contender who would be the first black commander in chief.

Lament of the Images - Alfredo Jaar (2002

In 2006 Cristián Warken spoke with Alfredo Jaar about "Lament of the Images," First shown at Documenta 11, it exhibits a newfound respect for the documentary image's capacity to promote and preserve historical memory.

A Convesation with Alfredo Jaar

Cristián Warken speaks to Alfredo Jaar about "the Society of the Spectacle." 2006 (Video: Spanish)

A Nation's Right to Survive

Nicaragua: A Nation's Right to Suvive.
Documentary Film by John Pilger

In 1979, the Sandinistas won a popular revolution in Nicaragua, putting an end to decades of the corrupt US-backed Somoza dictatorship. They based their reformist ideology on that of the English Co-operative Movement, but was to prove too ‘radical’ for the Reagan administration.In this film, Pilger describes the achievements of the Sandinistas and their "threat of a good example". (Runtime 52 Minutes)