Photography Lyndsy Welgos
Art Direction Eric Wrenn
Styling Alice Newell-Hanson
Casting Preston Chaunsumlit
Post-Production Soña Z

Models Monika at Wilhelmina, Louis Mayhew at RED, Satoshi at New York Model Management, Anthony #Nodel, Salieu at RED, Paula Lorenzato at Wilhelmina, Maksim at New York Model Management

Special Thanks Chen Chen and Kai Williams, Mike Eckhaus and Zoe Latta

Credits
2. Monika wears top by Champion, necklace by Telfar
3. Salieu wears fleece by Patagonia, trousers by Proper Gang
5. Louis wears shirt by Eckhaus Latta
6. Satoshi wears suit by Patrik Ervell, polo shirt by Proper Gang
7. Monika wears top by Champion, drinking S/S13 Energy by Eckhaus Latta
9. Anthony wears shirt by Dior Homme
10. Paula wears polo shirt by Proper Gang, hat by Telfar
11. Maksim wears jacket and shorts by Issey Miyake, shirt by Uniqlo

Credits

Emerging Artist is on view at ProBio curated by Josh Kline at EXPO 1: New York, MoMA PS1.

Direction DIS
Post-Production Director Ruy Sanchez-Blanco, Blank Motion
Director of Photography Brendan Stumpf
Editor Sam Maliszewski, Blank Motion
Gaffer Andrew Smith
Steadicam Operator John Kelley
Camera Assistant Kyler Dennis
Hair and Makeup Brandy McDonald
Voiceover Artist Wavy Spice
Production Assistant Joyce Ng

Special thanks to New Galerie, Blank Motion, Sarah Lookofsky, Kevin McGarry, Nick Weiss, and Felix Burrichter.

It’s a good thing one no longer has to preface a short interview with the proprietor of an online motorcycle-parts store with a brief history of photography, the avant-garde and the supposed end-game of conceptualism.

For a generation raised on and foreclosed by an increasingly immaterial capitalism, dematerialization offers little excitement.

It appears from here that the 20th century’s all-out war on the signifiers of authorship—mastery, intent, originality—paradoxically preserved authorship alone as the sole survivor and index distinguishing the work of art.

Today even this seems unclear. As the Frieze art fair comes to a close, and the Venice Biennale begins, it seems unavoidable, if unsettling, that the only concrete remaining distinctions may lie only in the point of purchase.

For his part, Babe-Not-Included—who wishes to remain anonymous—sells motorcycle parts on eBay.

BABAK RADBOY
So — I’m a big fan of your store. I just clicked through something like a thousand pictures. I love the photography, but is it working in terms of sales?

BABE-NOT-INCLUDED
Oh I think so. I’ve taken things that are up for sale for a year, and I literally sold within a day once I put a girl on it, without changing the price or the description. We’ve also done things when we had two of the same bike and I put up the same description and same price—everything identical except for the picture. Not only did it help sell it faster, but I got a lot more views, which turned into more potential customers. They were looking at other things I had, so they are buying multiple items from me. They were going and looking at my other stuff because I had models—buying 2-3 things…

BABAK
Right. As I said I think I just viewed a thousand “things.”

BNI
Yeah, they check it out and they get into it, and you know “Oh yeah I need this, I need that.” And then they start buying other things. I get all kinds of guys, guys who don’t even have bikes, but they think it’s cool and buy stuff.

BABAK
Honestly I considered buying a part. Your image came up randomly in a search and I mistook them for art.

BNI
Right. Yeah. Kind of cool.

BABAK
I mean, I don’t know anything about motorcycles; I was just asking myself Why is this woman in a bikini holding a plastic ameba? When you do your edit, do you go for a certain level of ambiguity? Because that wtf moment I think definitely draws people in.

BNI
Um a little bit, yeah. The girl is usually going in a circle. We usually do the front, the side, the back, and then the other side. Or if it’s something very small. Usually its something around her chest area because it’s going to be more cropped in. If it’s showing her whole body and it’s something that’s the size of a quarter, you wouldn’t be able to tell. You’ll have to zoom in more. It depends on the item. When I am selecting 1 of the 4, I choose the one that really pops and really looks like a good display of the product.

BABAK
I get it. It’s interesting because as a contemporary artist (which I’m not), you almost have to invent the kinds of constraints and determining logics that come “naturally” to your eBay store.

BNI
Well… the main constraint is time. It’s all about time. I need to get through certain amount of parts in a certain amount of time to make it cost effective. Otherwise it’s gonna cost me too much money. We go through 100 parts in two hours or something. And it’s hard to keep it unique because as of now, we don’t do any face photos. It’s very hard to only show a torso, and you can only change up the outfit, or if they have tattoos or different skin complexions. It’s not the most exciting thing to do, especially when you’re not even smiling.

BABAK
I find the cropping of the faces really strong. I’ve seen whole babes used to sell whole bikes, but the fact that you show partial babes to sell parts of bikes is striking.

BNI
Exactly. That’s the whole point. It creates a little bit of the mysteriousness and funness to it. I mean it’s not neccasary to have a whole person; even with clothing retail there is always better sales even with a figure, a mannequin, even a torso. But it just started as a time thing; we started out with full-body shots, but it was very hard to incorporate the hair and makeup, facial expressions, smiling and blinking. And I have thousands of parts, and for me to get through it and you know, trying to make everyone look good, was just taking way too much time. In the end the girls are there for the parts.

BABAK
I definitely see that. I noticed in your work certain patterns develop; certain bike parts appear with certain body parts. The bike is anatomized to the body.

BNI
Yeah, there are certain things. Like if it’s a headlight, it’s almost always breasts. If it’s a tail light or something from the back of the bike, it’s always the butt picture. And there are certain things that just look good with the girls and a female figure, too. We had a set of forks, and they were long—two of them—and they run and sometimes they criss-cross; they’re feminine or something. You know, it just goes very well with the girls’ figures.

BABAK
When you think of a biker’s relationship to his bike, do you think the bike has a feminine character the way, say, a ship does?

BNI
Oh yeah. I definitely think, just by polishing them, you would find them attractive and sexy and things like that. And that’s why a lot of guys are into customizing, because you’re just making them more appealing. Guys really get attached to their motorcycles, too. It’s like a relationship when you own a motorcycle. You put a lot of money into them. You ride them all the time…

BABAK
So the bikes are definitely female?

BNI
Yeah, yeah. I cheat on my fiancée; I call my bike my girlfriend.

BABAK
I was reading a message post where someone suggested you grant equal opportunity for gay shoppers and do a gay version of the site since there are a lot of gay men who are into bikes.

BNI
Really? I don’t remember that, but possibly. I have gotten a couple of questions; sometimes they might be serious but sometimes they’re just joking around. I haven’t really pursued that… haha, um.

BABAK
I don’t know if you have many gay friends who are into bikes. Do you think they see their bikes as male or female?

BNI
Ha! I don’t know, I definitely do not… But I wouldn’t see why not. If that’s what they find attractive and curvy and sexy… I guess it’s whatever your mind is into. I guess I’m an open-minded. I have friends who are gay. So whatever floats your boat. A babe could be, if we all want to go down that road, a guy.

BABAK
Who styles these pictures? The clothes are awesome.

BNI
My fiancé and I are both shopaholics when it comes to clothes. I have big bins full. One is just tops. One’s bottoms. One’s shoes and different things. We’re always out and about looking for and come up with ideas, modifying stuff — we’ve cut tank tops, we just try to change it up. I’m really into fashion. Actually that’s kind of part of the deal, that they get to keep whatever they wear, which helps me eliminate a lot of repeats.

BABAK
Do you get many complaints about the site?

BNI
To be honest, I’ve gotten three. And I thought it was actually going to be worse. Hopefully you don’t put anything in the article too much about that. I don’t want to make it trashy. For example, I stopped for the most part shooting girls with really dirty used bike parts. I’d taken photography classes in high school, and I’ve always been interested in it, but I am not a professional photographer. I am learning more; I try to make the look of everything more professional.

BABAK
I find the effect is weirdly more objective than objectifying.

BNI
Umm yeah, totally.

BABAK
I mean it occurs to me: if you are simply using the image of a female body as a way to draw eyes to an image of a part you want to sell, why not just do a diptych or just Photoshop an existing babe pic behind the part?

BNI
Yeah, I’ve been asked if they’re Photoshopped or if they’re real. I always try to get them to either put their hands in front of it or be touching the items or somehow incorporating them to make it look more three-dimensional, because I was realizing that they were just working as a backdrop, which to me is kind of cheating. I use a white bench a lot of times or different tables to prop things up. I’m trying to make it realistic and make it like an experience.

BABAK
I think it comes across. You’ve developed a practice through experimentation; you have certain constraints, but you are getting some kind of creative fulfillment out of it.

BNI
Yeah, absolutely. I’m glad, because I do know that people see it that way. I don’t want to come off awfully disrespectful to females or anything. I think art is art. I’m into all kinds of motorcycles, and for me they are like art. I have one just hanging on the wall because it is cool looking. I figured there’s nothing wrong with using a female, only if it’s done in a tasteful way. It’s fun and attractive, and it’s a brand now. It’s something people enjoy and support.

BABAK
What kind of creative inspirations do you have, as far as artists and photographers? Is that stuff you’re into?

BNI
Not right now. I’m just fascinated by images. Especially with what people can capture with photography. You know, a film camera, that to me is true photography. I always have a real appreciation for people who pick up a regular 35mm or any film camera and produce a really cool image.

When I was younger I did a lot of 35mm black and white photography. I’ve been so busy in my life with working and everything. I didn’t have a lot of hobbies. It’s kind of fun now to incorporate what I do at work and my hobby. It’s definitely got me into taking more pictures generally.

I used to draw a lot, and loved playing on the computer with graphic design. I haven’t done it at a higher level in years. I started get back on Photoshop and relearning all the stuff I used to do. That’s why I like motorcycles. I can customise, just change things and use your imagination.

BABAK
There’s one model I’m interested in. She’s got a tattoo of an Latin motto on her chest, “Odi et Amo.” Is she a friend of yours or did she come from an agency?

BNI
I don’t use agencies; I just use Model Mayhem. She’s one of the original girls who come shoot with me. She’s got all kinds of tattoos; they all got meanings and stories of why she got them.

BABAK
That one works really well. You see it in a photo, it almost looks like a caption: Here’s a pair of breasts, here’s a fiberglass cowl, and the caption is “I hate and I love.”

BNI
Hahahaha yeah, it really messes with your mind, eh?

Credits

Special Thanks Babe Not Included

Photo Editor Avena Gallagher

Credits

2 Killed, 9 Wounded Near Empire State Building

Enlightened

K-CorealNC.K by Ryan Trecartin

1/21

Stock Fantasy Ventures will serve a global market of cutting edge communicators in advertising, business, art, and journalism with high quality, pre-trend stock photo and video clips.

When we set out to create this investment proposal, we wanted to provide information to enable your investment decision.

You just viewed samples from the first stock image production of Stock Fantasy Ventures: Moping drunk CEO on a thick fur rug wearing unbuttoned Theory dress slacks and wrapped in a KLM airplane blanket receives a call from HSBC Bank and gradually begins to sob while taking their automated customer satisfaction survey. It cost our first investor, the Netherlands-based Impakt, about $1000 to produce, and we project a 600% return on investment within its first year on both the art market and the stock imagery market through sites such as Pond5 and Getty Images.

Current offerings of stock imagery through those marketplaces typically present a limited scope of activity, situations, and identity stereotypes. Stock Fantasy Ventures seeks to create alternative representations of finance and business. Recurring themes are financial uncertainty and discontent, disgruntled workers and consumers, and absurdity.

We aren’t just launching a startup, we’re starting a movement. Global communicators spanning the fields of business, art, and journalism are increasingly turning to cost-cutting stock imagery due to the ease with which high quality files can circulate online. These communicators will use our products to entertain, sell, inform, and inspire. Our products are more true to our contemporary moment than current offerings of stock media, filling both a gap in the market and a need in our society.

In 2008, “turmoil” was tenth in the top 10 searches of the Merriam-Webster Online dictionary. “Precipice” came in seventh. But the most searched-for word in 2008 was “bailout.” The word is defined in simple terms as “a rescue from financial distress,” but that simple definition falls far short when describing the social, political and economic impact of “bailout.”

Early in 2008, when Getty Images launched their Financial Services paper, there were already signs that businesses in the financial sector were shifting their messages and visual language to reflect an emerging downturn. While positive escapism may be a real trend in other sectors, financial services have recognized they can no longer credibly sell daydreams. They feel they need to be in touch with the challenging reality their customers face. Gone are the depictions of aspiration and conspicuous wealth as financial services brands try to re-establish trust with their customers.

But “money” and “finance” aren’t actually making sense to people. Just a few years ago, people thought banks had plenty of it, and we’re now discovering that they didn’t, and don’t.

In many instances, financial marketers aren’t hitting the right note. Those that say ‘believe in us’ or ‘we have all the answers’ without the data explaining why isn’t credible given all the wreckage. Others feel it’s comforting for consumers to be treated candidly: “We’re in uncharted waters. We’re doing our best. We want to hear your questions. We’re here to help you.” They feel this adds credibility.

But credibility is dwindling. Economic Confidence in general is net negative in almost all European countries. Germany is the only European country that improved from a negative score in 2009 to a positive score in 2012.

According to a Gallup poll from last year, Americans’ confidence in U.S. banks is now at a record-low 21%. The percentage of Americans saying they have a ‘great deal’ or ‘quite a lot’ of confidence in U.S. banks is now about half the pre-recession level of 41%, recorded in June 2007.

The outbreak of a consistent series of economic crises from the 1970s to today has demonstrated the extreme unreliability of credit and speculation capital. Credit and speculation capital grow at uncontrollable rates because of electronic transactions-digitally automated-and, as a result, create virtually instantaneous financial bubbles, always ready to burst.

This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us to visually explore a meaningful new relationship with these markets. It’s hard to be reassuring when nobody knows how it’s going to pan out. We believe that another future isn’t just possible; it’s inevitable. And that future will be informed by the images we produce and consume. We need different ways of understanding our world, which cannot be abstracted from price information analyzed by computers. We are engaged in an existential struggle for the quality of our dreams.

Stock Fantasy Ventures is poised to change the conversation about our economy. We aim to take themes of uncertainty, discontent, even absurdity from the realm of fringe critical discussion of the economy and place them squarely into the mainstream, institutional discussion of what our financial lives look and feel like. By using the existing stock imagery market, Stock Fantasy Ventures allows, for example, the financial services industry to interface with clients through a set of images that is market driven, reflecting the realities of their industry that are truly resonating with their consumers. This then allows them to drive the market in their favor, creating a new relationship with their clients based on dialogue, trust, and self-reflexivity.

Stock Fantasy Venture’s central disruption comes from Marx’s observation that capital posits every limit as a barrier to be forcibly overcome. The limit here–that no one is trusting banks and finance–is placed at the center of a potential rebranding of the financial industry as a responsive entity that understands consumer’s uncertainty and the uncertainty inherent within it. This wins consumer trust by being real with consumers, and in 2013 being real is the only way to do real business.

Whether they know it or not, our competitors are shaping the future – but within a limited scope. Our direct competition uploads media to those aforementioned stock media marketplaces – Pond 5, Getty Images, etc. Our indirect competitors are people hired to make video and photography for their clients. But what neither type of competitor offers is imagery that occupies a dual status as commercially viable images and works of art – they’re more than just stock images because they’re art, and they’re more than just art because they’re also stock images.

A disorientation of goals and disruption of reference points can lead to fits of rage, where the most clear target becomes one’s employer. This theme has been on the rise in popular culture, art, and current events in recent years.

The gradual decline in job security since the 1970s, as well as the lack of the purchase that people can have on their social environment has produced a fading of the belief in the future as a vanishing point which can orientate action and therefore make meaning out of the present.

Now, you may be wondering what is meant by the ‘modes’ listed at the bottom of these slides…

Yojimbo by Akira Kurosawa. 1961. Situated in the mid-19th century collapse of the Japanese feudal system in which a transition from a production to consumption-and speculation-based economy is taking place. The film opens with Sanjuro, a lone samurai, who encounters a town ruled by two rival warlords.

Sanjuro sells his labor to the evil warlords as a means of manipulating and disrupting the established balance of power. At this moment in the film, Sanjuro double crosses his warlord masters by freeing a kidnapped couple, murdering six guards, destroying the building in which they were held, and blaming it on the opposing warlord, effectively pitting them against each other. The samurai, a figure traditionally celebrated as loyal, is found in a new historical context where both existing powers are distrusted and destroyed rather than honored.

Our video concept contributes an update to this image, in which the transition from a production to speculation-based economy is complete. We see an ethnically ambiguous transgender freelancer, presumably having sold herself for provisional work with a financial services company. The freedoms of the freelancer are shared around the globe – freedom from social bonds, freedom from solidarity, freedom from certainty or predictability, freedom from property. She sells her intellectual property to this corporation, it becomes their property, and this then generates capital through which they purchase additional property – partially in the form of office space and furniture. The freelancer recognizes that these concrete manifestations of the corporation’s capital – are just like her – cheap, disposable, interchangeable, unattached.

The Bitter Tears of Petra Von Kant by Rainer Weiner Fassbinder. 1972. The film has an all-female cast and is set in the home of the protagonist, a prominent fashion designer named Petra von Kant. It follows the changing dynamics in her relationships with the other women. Petra falls in love with a woman named Karin, and Karin begins to model for her. But Karin quickly abandons Petra and decides to return to her husband, after arming herself with the professional contacts and experience she’s gained as a model. Yet Petra is not without fault. Having spurned her husband for trying to assert economic control over her, Petra has simply repeated the process with Karin through her materialist concept of love.

In this scene we find Petra, post-abandonment, in her bedroom – a great wilderness of white shag carpet in which she flounders in an alcohol-pickled rage, hopelessly awaiting a call from Karin.

As you saw, a well-bred woman in designer clothing anxiously awaits a call, and receives one, but from a female automaton – requesting her to engage in a customer satisfaction survey. The woman reflects on her extremely negative customer service experience and begins to sob. Themes of manipulation, physical and emotional alienation, and materialism remain, but the failed relationship in Fassbinder’s film is shifted through our video from a love interest to a retail bank, from fantasy in the flesh to an abstract electronic voice representing a corporation. Our protagonist is surrounded by and clothed in new materials, machined surfaces, and abstraction in the service of pure design.

A single stock image concept yields a variety of products on the marketplace. We have a moping drunk CEO, a moping drunk CEO taking a call with a bluetooth earpiece, a moping drunk CEO sobbing, a moping drunk CEO in crisis on her carpet, a CEO applying makeup, and so on. But she could also be a gallerist, a PR firm director, a journalist, an actress…

An investment in a stock image concept generates 5 video clips, 5 print-quality photos, and 5 online-quality photos. For each clip or photo sold through a stock media marketplace, the investor will have a 50% return. We expect 3 of each image type to sell within its first year on the stock media market.

On the art market the video clips will be sold as a package for $5,000 and framed prints will sell for $8,000 each. For each clip package or photo sold on the art market (through a gallery or dealer), the investor will have a 25% return. We expect 1 video clip package and 3 framed prints of each image type to sell within it’s first year on the art market. Based on that the above chart summarizes net profit for investors in the first year for each stock image concept:

Remember, Stock Fantasy Ventures isn’t just a startup. It’s the start of a movement.

To find out more, download our executive summary here.

info@stockfantasyventures.com

www.andrewnormanwilson.com

Credits

Hiram Powers, The Greek Slave, 1851 | Christian Friedrich Tieck, Clemens Brentano, 1794 | Jacopo Ligozzi, Macabre Still Life, c. 1600-1605

David Hammons, In the Hood, 1993

Philip Post for DERTBAG

Hiram Powers, California 1, 1858

Luis de Morales, El Divino Ecce Homo, c. 1570

Adelaide Labille Guiard, Portrait of Maximilien Robespierre, 1786

Andrea di Bartolo, dit SOLARIO, La Tete de Saint Jean Baptiste, 1507

Alex Israel, Box of Hands, 2012

Henry Fuseli, Lady Macbeth Seizing the Daggers, 1812

Prins Preben, Hood Pose

Jan Davidsz de Heem, Still Life with Lobster, 1643

Cum Rag, barebackrt.com

Wildt Adolfo, Vir Temporis Acti, c. 1911

Francisco De Zurbaran, The Sudarium of St Veronica, 1658-61

Credits

Made possible by BOFFO Art Camp, Fire Island, NY

Photography by DIS
Artwork selected by Bjarne Melgaard with David Rimanelli

Credits

Credits

Credits

Act 1: Living a lie.

Scene 1

INT. CRAMPED APARTMENT -EARLY MORNING

A young woman is lying naked in bed. Her body is exposed to the cold light coming in from a low window next to the bed. An alarm sounds from nowhere and the young woman swats the alarm. She does not hit anything except for the bed. The alarm stops.

The young woman opens one eye and looks straight into the camera. Her eye is clear and awake. The camera slowly zooms into her eye as the narration begins.

The camera zooms out from the eye to the naked body. The woman has been replaced with another actress of the same age and likeness. The young woman gets out of bed, stands up, walks over to a closet and picks out a hanger. The hanger has no real clothes on it, but the young woman pretends to put on a slip. She does this without hesitation and without checking any details. She walks to the door and steps out straight on to the busy street of a big city. The young woman walks among the other people and has a runway walk, distinct from the other people on the street. No one notices anything different about her though. The narration continues as the camera follows the woman walking down the busy street.

Scene 2

INT. LUXURY PENTHOUSE IN A BIG CITY -NIGHT TIME

The penthouse is Sleek and expensive. The young woman has been replaced by another actress. Similar in appearance. The young woman is sitting down in a black leather seat and stares intently into the camera as the narrator continues. The camera stays static.

Act 2

This curse

INT. UPSCALE ART GALLERY -EVENING

The camera pans across details of the gallery. The entry way, the desk, the walls, the floor, without focusing on a work of art. The narrator speaks as the camera pans slowly across the interior.

The camera focuses on the young woman in the gallery space. She has yet again been replaced by another similar actress and is still naked. She proceeds to take of her imaginary slip and tosses it to the ground and stands on top of it. The camera pans over her body as the narrator continues.

Act 3

Transgressive editions

INT. EMPTY ROOM WITH NO WINDOWS.

All the actresses who have portrayed the work of art as a young woman are standing clothed with products from the DISOWN project in an empty room. The room is akin to a storage room and is dimly lit. The camera only shoots the women in a group, never a one woman on her own.

END.

HOT MIC by Francis Carlow. Available at DISown.

Credits

Ryan Trecartin presents a two-dimensional side project where the set cues are propositional, not determinant.

“I’m looking at the body as a pet, giving life to ideas about the body itself, and forming a sense of companionship with it.” — Ryan Trecartin

Credits

Small Works

Matthew Simmons writes about the open heart of a user known as Beebee.

You can do big work on the internet. You can try to teach people things—you can post on a blog or a video about a large and important topic and you can hope that you reach people. You can create an experience on the internet. You can make art. You can make people angry. You can ask everyone to rally around a cause: save children, save animals, save themselves.

You can also do small work on the internet. You can record yourself saying hello. You can tweet about your commute. You can like a Facebook status update or a picture of a cat on Instagram.

The internet is full of noise. It’s a sustained drone of voices. The big work fights hard to yell over the drone—it maximizes and optimizes so that it can be found. It learns which buttons to push on people to get them to pay attention. One sits and strategizes their way to find more eyes on the internet. One plots to keep those eyes on her or himself for as long as possible. People write books on the subject. Companies hire consultants. Everyone tries. Most people fail. The doers of the big work work like hell.

Mostly, the small work doesn’t stand a chance. Mostly.

On the internet, you might come across Brian. On Twitter, he’s @beebee880. On Youtube, he’s beebee890. On Instagram, he’s BEEBEE890. On Vine, he’s Brian.
(Note the switch from 880 to 890. I regret that I cannot tell you why the switch happened. Checking “beebee890” on Twitter, one finds only a suspended account. Did Brian once have that account, get it suspended, and then return by subtracting 10? When he set up his Twitter account, did he mistype it? Maybe someday I’ll tweet at him and ask.)

He has about 12,200 or so followers on Twitter, but in defiance of high followers-to-following ratio of many noteworthy Twitter users, he follows over 13,000.

He has 7,300 or so followers on YouTube, and his video archive goes back to 2007. (The first video mentions more videos that have been accidentally erased.)
In many of his YouTube videos, he crushes soda and tea cans above his head ceremoniously, dedicating each to a notable person.

SquidWillis

Beebee I’m been your fan through thick and thin I please have a can crush it would mean the world to me

He has 2400 or so followers on Instagram, and likes to take photos of food, buses, and himself.

sircorn

#looksprettygoodbeebee

Brian has neurofibromatosis, a genetic disorder of the nervous system. He has a prominent bump on his forehead called a neuroma. It’s a tumor of nerve tissue. He has brief blackouts, and takes buses because of them. He talks openly and honestly about his disability. In small ways:

Brian films himself opening a can of soda with his right hand. His left is nearby shaking.

Brian films his mom sweeping the kitchen floor for him. He suggests that he could try it to show viewers his disability.

And his small work gets heard like a shout over the din.

scroll right

from @beebee880

Brian is good-humored and odd and expressive. This unassuming, natural charisma, combined with his generous responsiveness, has contributed to his amplification. And though some of the people who interact with Brian, or use his many social media accounts to observe him, do so to mock him, it is just as clear that his own generosity has created around him a little pocket of mutual kindness. Which, it must be said, is sort of remarkable in the cesspool of anonymous carping, insult, and cruelty that the internet can be. He renders the negative responses invisible by occasionally acknowledging them dismissively, and by simply continuing to be him.

Brian is a hub of kindness.

One of the best ways to observe this in action is to follow him on Vine.

It’s as if Vine was made for Brian. A perusal of his YouTube archive reveals that his impulse to record a message to the world often stopped in under a minute. His shortest videos are as brief as seven seconds. So the six-second constraint of a Vine video is just about right for him.

Brian has 16,000 Vine followers, but follows 30,000.

Brian has two kinds of Vines: He says hello to the world or he does something to amuse himself and asks others to do it, also. Often he puts something on his head.

His script for the videos is often the same:

“Hello Vine/everybody. I have a [object] on my head/in my glasses. Please ReVine and do the same. Okay? Bye.”

Or:

“Hello Vine/Everybody. I’m going to bed. Okay? Bye.”

He will sometimes add the time. He will wish people good night. He will ask for a follow. And then: Okay? Bye.

The Okay is often drawn out at the vowels. The Bye is quick and matter-of-fact. Brian’s voice has a little croak, a little vocal fry.

He is a prolific reviner. And more often than not the vines he revines are imitations of his own vines. Most appear to be teenagers, but none seem to be mocking or mean-spirited. They are getting in on the game. They are infected by the singularity of him. And the copies beget copies. They speak to Brian, and Brian sees them. And he revines them—multiples of copies.

Scrolling through Brian’s Vine feed is like watching the conveyor belt at the exit of an industrial stamping machine, as it embosses patterns or logos on a long sheet of metal. It’s an endless parade of “Oooookay? Bye”s. Brian is the pattern. His revined content is the Brians he has stamped on follower after follower.

“Hello, Brian. I have an inflatable guitar on my head. Please revine and do the same. Ooooookay? Bye.”

“Hello, Brian. It’s 10:30pm and we’re going to bed. Oooooookay? Bye.”

“Hello Brian, we made a cookie for you. Oooooookay? Bye.”

The vines are at home or on buses. They are at fast-food joints. They are alone or with a small group of friends. They tag him or put his name in a hashtag to get his attention. And if he sees the Vine and approves, he revines it to his followers. Around and around it goes.

It’s disarmingly sweet—a rare and important thing in a tense, all-too-serious world. In a world of sophisticated attempts to co-opt memes for personal aggrandizement or monetary gain, Vine Brian simply is a meme, a style of behavior capable of spreading from person to person. He’s not selling Brian. He just is Brian. You can be Brian, too. Okay? Bye.

This is how I connected to Brian: Through the poet Patricia Lockwood, I discovered a loose affiliation of surrealist jokesters that is sometimes called—much to the chagrin of the affiliated—Weird Twitter. And around that time, they lost a notable voice. Jackson Lusk, whose Twitter handle was @tree_bro, had resigned from the site a bit earlier. But he still had friends there, and when he passed away they shared the news.

And in the sharing of news and retweeting of sentiments about the news, there was @beebee880 and a link to a YouTube video by user beebee890 of a genial, round-faced young man with glasses and a prominent bump on his forehead, sharing the news of the passing of @tree_bro, mentioning that he had appreciated how @tree_bro had stuck up for him when someone had said something cruel to him. “You told that one person off for me. I remember that. I don’t know if they got the message, but I did,” Brian said.

In his honor, Brian crushed a Pepsi can, which he held over his head in a formal and solemn way. A simple, small thing, direct and emotional. It was Brian doing the small work. It was so loud you couldn’t miss it.

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Two Weird Tricks

Body by Body asks, is there anything else to say about selfies?

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