Craft Your Creativity With This Trio of Online Classes Celebrating National Craft Month

Its always a good time to get crafty. But if there had to be a perfect part of the year, its March during National Craft Month. This annual celebration honors the art of crafting in its many forms, and My Modern Met Academy is getting in on the fun with a special bundle of our online craft classes. From now until March 31, 2023, purchase the Craft Month Bundle and enjoy three craft classes for $90. Its a $25 savings if you were to buy them all individually.

The classes in the Craft Month Bundle include a crochet course and two embroidery classes that are guaranteed to take your stitching to the next level.

The crochet course is great for beginners. Called Crochet Crash Course: Fiesta Fringe Bag, craft expert Khara Plicanic will show you how to read a pattern and perform all the stitches and other techniques youll need to successfully create a fashionable fringy bag.

The embroidery courses both feature stitching plus another element. One of our newest classes is Mixed Media Thread Painting: Learn to Embroider Your Travel Memories with artist Maria Zamyatina. In the comprehensive course, she shows you how to combine watercolor painting with thread to create a spectacular piece that reflects a fabulous trip or place you love.

The other course in our bundle is Intermediate Embroidery: Getting Creative with Printed Fabrics taught by Floor Giebels. Y...

The internet is full of jokes, and lets be honest not all of them are great.

If youre looking for a sure-fire giggle today, though, we think weve found 14 jokes that just cant miss!

14. If you get the vibes you gotta get out.

Listen to your gut.

i be lying to uber drivers saying right here is perfect knowing damn well i aint never been to this location nor do i know where the hell i am at

ZAY GUCCII (@relatableisaiah) January 4, 2023

13. Now I cant unsee it.

Thats exactly what it should be.

who tf is bo burnham i thought he was that animated depressed horse

(@capstellium) January 14, 2023

12. The way to go.

You can commune with nature.

me high as fuck at the botanical gardens pic.twitter.com/EoQPLsgNqj

nate (@naterichx) January 3, 2023

11. Ill show you deep

How about the deep end of the pool?

That we spend much, if not most, of our lives working is, in itself, not necessarily a bad thing unless, that is, were bored doing it. In the Big Think video above, London Business School Professor of Organizational Behavior Dan Cable cites Gallup polls showing that about 70 percent of people are not engaged in what they do all day long, and about eighteen percent of people are repulsed. This may sound normal enough, but Cable calls these perceptions of work as a thing that we have to get through on the way to the weekend a humanistic sickness: a bad condition for people, of course, but also for the organizations who get lackluster performance.

Cable traces the civilizational roots of this at-work boredom back to the decades after the Industrial Revolution. In the mid-nineteenth century, a shoe-shopper would go to the local cobbler. Each of the people in the store would watch the customer walk in, and then theyd make a shoe for that customer. But toward the end of the century, we got this different idea, as a species, where we should not sell two pairs of shoes each day, but two million.

In 2018, Hirokazu Kore-edas Shoplifters won the Palme dOr at Cannes. The award itself came as less of a surprise than did the fact that Shoplifters was the first of Kore-edas films to win it, given how long hed been the most widely acclaimed Japanese filmmaker alive. And though it had been more than twenty years since the Palme last went to a Japanese movie Shomei Imamuras The Eel, in 1997 Japan had long since established itself at Cannes as the Asian country to beat. Imamuras The Ballad of Narayama had won the Palme in 1983, Akira Kurosawas Kagemusha in 1980, and Teinosuke Kinugasas Gate of Hell in 1954, when Western cinephiles were only just starting to appreciate Japanese cinema.

Why has that appreciation proven so enduring? This is one question investigated by The Essential Japanese Cinema, a video essay from The Cinema Cartography. Narrator Luiza Liz Bond emphasized the heightened aesthetic sensibility of Japanese filmmakers, on display in the tender observation of Ozus Tokyo Story, the poetic rhapsody of Kurosawas Dreams, the harrowing feminine gaze of Videophobia. But one can find examples just as rich and even more various in lesser-known films from Japan such as Shji Terayamas engag experimental drama Throw Away Your Books, Rally in the Streets, Kaiz Hayashis oneiric silent-film pastiche To Sleep as to Dream, and Gakury Ishiis subtly psychedelic and science-fictional coming-of-age tale August in the Water.

As we all know, things get extremely complicated when it comes to planning a wedding.

There are so many details to work out that it can drive a wedge between couples and it can get ugly.

And a woman asked the readers on Reddits Am I the A**hole? page if shes wrong for wanting her daughter to make the cake for her upcoming wedding.

Read on to see whats going on here.

AITA for wanting my daughter to make my wedding cake although my future husband is refusing?

I (F-36) have a daughter (F-16) who loves baking, and shes incredibly good at it. Its her passion since she was 3 and I encourage her to follow it and discover more ways to become better at it. I even enrolled her in few classes in academy to learn more.

I met my fiance (M-41) 2 and a half years ago. Were getting married soon. And for the wedding cake I had an idea whichs to have my daughter bake the cake and decorate it for us. My daughter agreed and was so excited to do it.

My fiance glanced at me when he heard about it then when we were alone he snapped and said I cant believe youre being serious about this I told him why not, its not like were having a huge formal wedding with many guests. Just a small party with our family and loved ones.

He said this was a f**king joke and that he will not let a child bake our wedding cake while there are tons of professional bakers out there who can make a much more decent looking/tasting one. I said I didnt understand the problem because I thought he loved her baking. He responded I do love what she bakes but lets just stick to the muffins and brownies.

I told him he was being unreaso...

The National Public Housing Museum, the only cultural institution dedicated to telling stories of public housing in the US, announces Tiff Beatty as the new Associate Director and three new leadership team hires: Samantha Wallace as Director of Advancement and Membership, Colleen McGaughey as Director of Development, and Emily Breidenbach as Director of Communications and Community Engagement.

The museum was founded in the late 1990s by public housing residents to preserve their voices, memories, and histories, and was incorporated in 2007. This past October, the museum raised $14.5 million and broke ground on its physical home, an adaptive reuse of the former Jane Addams Homes on Chicagos West Side.

Tiff Beatty, the newly appointed Associate Director, has a breadth of innovative programming and community organizing expertise a...

The Wild Bird Fund recently found a domestic king pigeon that had been dyed pink and released into the wild. The poor guy was named Flamingo, and his story is an important reminder not to dye birds (or any animal) and the danger of releasing domestic creatures into the wild.

Photo Credit: IFLScience

The rescue group believes Flamingo was rinsed with hair dye to turn him pink, prompting some to suggest he was used as a prop for a gender reveal party. Despite the teams best efforts, Flamingo died, likely from inhaling toxic fumes. The strong ingredients in hair dye make it especially hazardous for birds with highly sensitive respiratory systems, and while preening, its possible the poor pigeon also ingested the toxins.

...

The streaming giant Netflix recently posted guidelines for a trial in Chile to end password-sharing, but accidentally went live on its FAQ page, visible to other countries, including the U.S. So, what happened, and what is in store for all Netflix consumers?

Photo Credit: Pexels

Netflix currently allows sharing between individuals living in the same household, but it has been looking at ways to police non-account holders who use a friend or family members login. One way is to monitor device location and prompt users to log in whenever using Netflix on a device away from their home Wi-Fi connection.

The popular streaming service once Tweeted that love was sharing a password, contradicting the rules they accidentally published. For a brief time yesterday, a help center article containing information that is only applicable to Chile, Costa Rica, and Peru went live in other countries. We have since updated it, it said in a statement.

Love is sharing a password.

Netflix (@netflix)...

By no means do we live in a golden age for the artist-mother, but with the recent publication of Hettie Judahs book-length manifesto How Not to Exclude Artist Mothers (and Other Parents), podcasts like the Artist/Mother Podcast, support groups (the Art Mamas Alliance comes to mind), and the Mother Art Prize, the artist who is also a mother has been, at the very least, acknowledged to exist. 

The artist who continues to endure silently, between doctors appointments and large medical bills, however, is one sandwiched between motherhood and retirement: She is the artist-daughter. It wont shock that...

In honor of International Womens Day, a week-long online auction curated by Pussy Riot creator Nadya Tolokonnikova will be sending a portion of its proceeds to the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. My Body, My Business, hosted by Sothebys, includes 32 works from a diverse group of women whose traditional and digital practices explore...

Tate Liverpool will shutter on October 16 ahead of a planned 29.7 million ($35.1 million) restoration of its Royal Albert Dock home. The refresh of the converted warehouse is being partially paid for

Though its origins are somewhat disputed, a popular maxim holds that writing about music is like dancing about architecture which is a sideswipe at music criticism, specifically, but might also be more broadly interpreted to mean that certain expressive media cannot be effectively used to convey a sense of others. In this spirit, it might be argued that it is very difficult to knit about dance, but fiber artist Katie Shulman would likely disagree.

I have a structured process, and I like to use materials like elastic bra strapping that behaves with its own will, Shulman told Hyperallergic during a studio visit, and because I am making such specific decisions, theres an intermediary period that is pretty intuitive. Im pushing and pulling and making connections based on weight and tension.

An exhibition at the Lewis-Clark State Colleges Center for Arts and History in Lewiston, Idaho, became a hotbed of controversy after six abortion-related artworks were removed mid-install. The school cited the...

Travel Down to the Tallest Underground Cave Waterfall in a High-Speed Glass Elevator

Nature can be generous and bless a community with two wonders in the same place. Ruby Falls near Chattanooga, Tennessee, is the tallest and deepest underground waterfall in the U.S. It's located inside the scenic Lookout Mountain, making this one of the top destinations for nature lovers and thrill-seekers alike.

Ruby Falls is 1,120 feet below the surface and is surrounded by smaller caves and myriad stalactites and stalagmites. To reach a prime viewing spot, a glass-front elevator was built. It travels down 260 feet, and the large glass interior doors allow guests to see the rockface whether they are coming or going. A one-way trip down this high-speed elevator takes half a minute, traveling at a speed of 600 ft/min.

So, how was Ruby Falls discovered? It was by accident; in the early 20th century, the construction of the neighboring railroad led to the closure of the Lookout Mountain Cave. In 1928, local cave explorer Leo Lambert put together a team of excavators and set to build an elevator from the surface that would lower visitors into the cave. During the process, a team member drilled into an 18-inch opening that led to a previously unknown cave. Marveled by the sight, Lambert named the waterfall and cave after his wife, Ruby.

During construction, the team removed an estimated five million pounds of stone from the shaft, which were later used to build the historic Ruby Falls Castle and Lookout Mountain Tower that greet visitors at the surface level. The original car sling, as Lambert envisioned it, welcomed visitors for over 90 years until it went through its biggest upgrade to date in January 2023.

Ruby Falls offers a series of tours, which range from a slow and gentle walk to an exciting lantern-lit adventure around the falls. Given the intricacies of the location, all tours are guided. As for the mountain that houses Ruby Falls, it rises 2,000 feet above sea level and offers majestic views of the Cumberland Plateau and the Tennessee River.

Ruby Falls is the tallest and deepest underground waterfall in the U.S.

LONDON In 201617, the R...

Couple Discovers a Trove of 2,000 Vintage Cameras in Abandoned Storage Unit

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When a Massachusetts couple was asked to clear out a storage unit, they never could have guessed what they'd find inside. Kristen, a young mother of two who works part-time at a tanning salon, was asked a favor by her boss in December. Aside from the tanning salon, he also owns a storage unit rental company and needed to clear out a unit left behind by a renter. Kristen and her boyfriend Fridrik agreed to clean it out on the condition that they could keep what they found. They'd been told by Kristen's boss that some cameras were inside, but nothing prepared them for what they saw when they opened up the unit.

Inside the unit was a veritable museum of photography. It was filled with approximately 2,000 vintage cameras and lenses. For Kristen, who studied film photography in high school and loved it, the discovery has been overwhelming but illuminating. Not only has her apartment been overtaken with camera equipment, but she's also invested a lot of time in organizing the collection and learning about the cameras.

The vast majority of the collection is Miranda and Minolta, she shared. Theres also a good amount of FEDs, Voigtlander, Zorkis, Zenits, Fujicas, Yashicas, Pentaxs, Prakticas, Mamiya Sekors, Exaktas, Olympuss, Exas, Petris, Konicas, and some TLRs and other brands I cant think of at the moment.

The Bruce Museum in Greenwich, Connecticut, will open the doors to its striking new building on April 2 during a grand reopening ceremony thats free to the public from 125pm (ET).

Designed by the New Orleans-based firm of EskewDumezRipple, the structure features a striated facade of cast stone and glass inspired by the surfaces of Connecticuts rock quarries. The new addition features the Steven and Alexandra Cohen Education Wing; the contemporary William L. Richter Art Wing, which includes four leading-edge galleries that provide vastly expanded accommodations for changing art exhibitions; and, for the first time, significant space to show the museums permanent art collection.

The entire ground floor is free and open to the public during museum hours. It includes a new museum store; an inviting caf with indoor/outdoor seating; a state-of-the-art auditorium; and meeting spaces for special event use by local community groups, families, and businesses.

Qiang Zhang, Golden Snub-nosed Monkey. Foping National Nature Reserve, China. Status: Endangered. All images the photographers, from The New Big 5 by Graeme Green, published by Earth Aware Editions, shared with permission

In the Victorian era, big game hunting saw a meteoric rise in popularity, coinciding with Britains colonization of numerous regions in the so-called Scramble for Africa and the advent of more accurate firearms that galvanized a fashion for amassing exotic trophies. Sometimes intended for museums, specimens were often bound for private collections, and creatures that roamed the vast African continent were considered particularly attractive prizes.

Known as the Big Five, the lion, leopard,...

Italian artist Piero Gilardi, whose Tappeti-Natura, or Nature-Carpets, brought the wilderness into the gallery, died March 5 in Turin at the age of eighty. His death was confirmed by his gallery,

Scientists Reveal a Hidden Corridor in Great Pyramid of Giza Not Seen for Thousands of Years

(Photo: Nina via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0)

The Egyptian Great Pyramid of Giza is one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Despite being 4,500 years old, the magnificent structure never ceases to amaze us. Scientists have recently discovered a hidden corridor in the pyramid, a passage that has not been seen by humans in thousands of years. The released news of a deep stone passagewayannounced in both Nature Communications and by the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquitiessuggests more may be discovered using advanced technology.

There are many passages inside the pyramid, but the recently discovered one was by scientists from Scan Pyramids in 2016. They used a non-invasive imaging technology called muography. A muon is a sub-atomic particle that moves at almost the speed of light and can be produced and used to penetrate stone. Where the particle did not fully get absorbed indicated an empty space just behind the northern face of the pyramid. On the outside of the pyramid, a stone chevron structure is nearby. The team followed up with radar and ultrasound.

Eventually, an endoscope (a thin, tube-like scope often used in medicine) 0.24 inches thick was inserted through the stones of the external chevron design. The camera sent back a live feed of a stone corridor with a vaulted ceiling that has lain unseen for thousands of years...

Tentacle Earplugs Make It Look Like an Octopus Is Wiggling From Your Head

Earplugs are typically functional tools rather than fashion accessories. But thanks to Japanese designer Genki Hirano, they are both. The glass artist crafted limited edition tentacle earplugs that, when placed inside the ear, make it look like a sea creature is crawling out. The effect is as surreal as it is whimsical.

Although these pieces were meant to be limited edition items for a design festival, Hirano was requested to make a line of tentacle earplugs for toymaker Ikimon due to their outstanding popularity. However, they still retain a sheen that makes it look as though they were crafted from handblown glass.

Each set of earplugs comes with three different-sized buds so that it offers a more comfortable fit inside the ear. Hirano even made other versions of the tentacle earbud in colors like white and yellow as well as models inspired by other sea creatures including a squid tentacle.

You can purchase these earbuds at a gashapon, or toy vending machine, for 400 yen at various locations in Japan.

Japanese designer Genki Hirano has created earbuds that resemble realistic tentacles.

Artificial intelligence (AI) technology can produce eerily realistic photos of people who dont exist enjoying parties that never happened. But if zoom in on these images, eerie may be too generous to describe what you see.

Photo Credit: Pexels

Sure, its fun to prank your friends with fake celebrity wedding photos or immortalize your dog playing the electric guitar. But recently, a user of Midjourney, an independent research lab that produces an artificial intelligence program based on text prompts, shared pictures of parties that never happened. And it turns out, the technology still has a few creepy kinks to work out.

I had to be specific in order to get male-looking AI peopleand even then, variation is a challenge. It definitely defaults to white people when you ask for people. pic.t...

Ikebana VII (The Arrangement) (2023), oil on canvas, 18 x 18 inches. All images Toni Hamel, shared with permission

It may be human to err, but Toni Hamels characters take mistakes and futility to irrational conclusions. The artist (previously) is known for her keen wit and observations of contemporary life, which she translates into oil paintings that place folly at the center: a woman paints red stripes onto a tulips petals, a man gestures toward a celestial Amazon logo, and a team numbers clouds suspended in the sky.

Many of Hamels works comment on inadequate responses to major issues like the climate crisis and social inequities, and she often paints scenes with figures undertaking unhelpful and unrelated actions to remedy the problem. Her Activist paintings, for example, depict a melting arctic and figures attempting to stop the loss of life and landscape through words alone. Laced with humor and satire, Hamel considers her work a form of protest and a reflection of my general preoccupations as an artist.

Currently living and working in Kingston, Ontario, Hamel will have many of the pieces shown here at CK Contemporary in San Francisco in the coming weeks. You can find an archive of her works on her site and Instagram.

Charming Chalk Characters Come Alive by Cleverly Interacting With the Environment

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If you're ever walking through Ann Arbor, Michigan, keep an eye on the groundyou may just find something delightfully unexpected. Artist David Zinn uses his creative talents to add charming chalk drawings to sidewalks, staircases, and other niche corners of the city. Each of these cartoonish characters playfully interacts with the environment in such a way that will bring a smile to your face.

Zinn's art is easy to spot for its distinct style. He renders a range of animal and mythological characters including foxes, dragons, dogs, and creatures straight from his imagination. Despite their stylized appearance, many of these illustrations appear to have three-dimensional depth, which Zinn achieves through the use of perspective and shading. In this way, these artworks look as though they are standing or placed underneath the surface rather than drawn on top.

Some of the clever places that Zinn places his original creations include a crack in the sidewalk where a green weed becomes the body of a verdant doglike creature. Another piece of chalk art imagines a wooden staircase acting as a couch for a sleepy squirrel. Because each of these pieces is made using chalk, they are, by nature, ephemeral and will wash away with the elements. This vulnerability, however, makes the artwork a precious find; you know that Zinn made a special effort to bring life to a small part of the city, even if its lifespan is only for a couple of days.

If youd like to learn how to draw like Zinn, he has a book called Chalk Art Handbook that contains all of his tricks and secrets. Its now available through Bookshop. To purchase more from Zinn, be sure to check out his ...

Cheerleading Squads Music Is Cut Off During Routine So Supportive Crowd Steps in To Help

Photo: Screenshot from YouTube

Cheerleaders spend months perfecting their choreography, but anything can happen during a performance. The Cheer Athletic Panthers were in the middle of their routine at the NCA All-Star Cheer Competition in Dallas, Texas, when their music suddenly cut out. But rather than succumbing to the pressure, the whole team stayed focused on what they needed to do. Fortunately, the supportive crowd carried them through the remaining minute by chanting along.

The entire scene was captured in a TikTok video that has now accumulated over two million views. After the Panthers were nearly halfway through their routine, the music suddenly cut out, and the crowd was quick to jump in. One, three, five, seven, was repeated to help the athletes time the rest of their performance. Some people in the comments mentioned that it was a long time for the music to disappear, and even if that's the case, the Panthers pushed through the unexpected curveball in stride.

Moments like thiswhere the audience steps in to support mishapsare a common occurrence in the cheer sport, which depends a lot on the cheer community. We may be biased but #NCAnationals has the best sportsmanship in the game, NCA Cheer wrote on its official Instagram.

Watch the video below. It's safe to say that the Cheer Athletic Panthers stunned with both their skills and resilience.

After the music cut out at the NCA All-Star Cheer Competition, the crowd helped out the team by filling in with their chant...

All Natural, Erika Ranees first solo exhibition with this gallery, presents seven abstract paintings that address the artists life between two types of environments: New York City, where she currently

In his latest stop-motion animation, Alexander Unger, who works as Guldies (previously), presents an idiosyncratic tale set in a nighttime forest. MITOSIS follows the transformation of a pine cone into an anthropomorphized log, which in turn morphs into timber, crates, and an idyllic cabin in the woods. Yet an eccentric presence lurks amongst the trees that, frustrated by the changes, confronts their new neighbor and inadvertently prompt the entire cycle to begin again.

MITOSIS takes inspiration from the biological process by which a cell produces two identical nuclei in preparation for cell division. It took Unger one year to complete the work, which incorporates 4,425 individual photos. Find more of Guldiess work on Instagram and YouTube.

All images Guldies

...

Stock Your Home Library With Books and Decor for Creative Folks of All Kinds

One of the best ways to spend less time staring at screens is by returning to the dependable book. Even if you're not a big reader, there are many options available that will spark your imagination. My Modern Met Store recently restocked some of our favorite resources for drawing, outdoor activities, and even outer spaceeach of which makes a perfect addition to your shelf.

For instance, if sketching was on your New Year's resolutions list, then the 642 Things to Draw is an ideal companion to keep with you throughout the months. It includes hundreds of prompts that will help you practice your skills across a range of different subjects. Staying within the art genre, there is also a must-have book resource for anyone interested in color theory that's titled Color Problems by Emily Noyes Vanderpoel. Originally published over a century ago, it analyzes the proportions of color from actual objects.

We offer books that will make you want to spend more time outdoors, such as How to Be a Wildflower by Katie Daisy. This flora and fauna field guide is full of everything from fun prompts and pressed flower projects to motivational quotes and much-needed meditations.

While you're updating your library, there are also creative ways to display your newest additions. Artori Design, for example, crafts playful bookshelves that are dabbled in humor. Both the Wondershelf and...

I dont know about you, but my mind tends to wander on long interstate road trips. What is there to do besides stare out the window and see what there is to see, right?

One of the things you cant help but see in fact, youre probably watching for them are the numbered signs telling you what interstate youre on and which ones are going to be coming up just down the road.