Georgie Boy: Fallen Queen of Broadway by Mister Jellyfish

[Mister Jellyfish Mister]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7oApQgl-SI[/youtube]

[Snow]

WOW fucking LOVE the Motel Rats, FUCKING LOVE THEM!!! BRAVO!!!!! Maaaaaagnificent addition.

Thats it, I'm coming over and drinking your beer, getting in the way and telling you how you're doing it all wrong.

[Foxfur]

Brilliant! I can't wait to see it in real (?) life.

And thank you Mr. Jellyfish, for putting up the custom motel sign pic on your FB page.
Hours o' fun.
Signpost scrabble without worries of arrest.

Ff

[theCryptofishist]

I just wonder about how much you have to give to Kickstarter to get one of those rats after the event...

[Foxfur]

I just wonder about how much you have to give to Kickstarter to get one of those rats after the event...

I have two kidneys. I will consider donating one for a rat.
I wish I'd gotten in on the ground floor on this one. Out of all of the KS project pages I've seen, Georgie had not only the best schwag, but the most schwag for your philanthropic dollar. Think about it. Who gives away remote controls for their artwork? Nobody... Who gives away the Uber Finger of God remote control so that YOU may appear to the uninformed as THE artist? Nobody...
I believe the trancendental remote breakout was at $250.
I've seen others where you get a lousy fucking t-shirt and a handwritten thank you note for a $1,000 donation... Man, I'm not expecting the world, but for $1,000? I'm expecting a warm, moist orifice that I can use or sublease for at least a few hours.
For a quarter of that I'd have obtained a remote and would have been able to procure the aforementioned orifice on my own.

I can't wait to see 2012...

Ff

[Foxfur]

Brilliant! I can't wait to see it in real (?) life.

And thank you Mr. Jellyfish, for putting up the custom motel sign pic on your FB page.
Hours o' fun.
Signpost scrabble without worries of arrest.

Ff

Forgot to add the pic...


Have fun kids.

[Mister Jellyfish Mister]

Here's an example of what will play from time to time in Georgie Boy's motel TV:

Liza Minelli Interviewed About Georige Boy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dE9WVkj9OA

Will likely chop it down for time. Video and writing by Dave Cherry. Voice over by Ashley.

Thanks to you too, Foxfur. After much of our casting and molding projects were destroyed in a house fire, we've started another fundraiser on a different platform called IndieGogo with the same rewards:

http://www.indiegogo.com/Georgie-Boy-Fa ... g-Man-2011

[Mister Jellyfish Mister]

Georgie Boy Sings!:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z80Cxgln0b4

[Sic Pup]

Fahbulous! Simply fahbulous!

What a duo, the dog has a Boo-Boo sensibility about him.

[Mister Jellyfish Mister]

Fahbulous! Simply fahbulous!

What a duo, the dog has a Boo-Boo sensibility about him.

Ha! I can hear that! Pic-a-nic baskets!

[Mister Jellyfish Mister]

As I explained in a previous post, we are hoping to replace the project materials and components that were destroyed in the house fire of one of our volunteers. Please click the link and contribute what you can and/or forward it out to your burner friends:

http://www.indiegogo.com/Georgie-Boy-Fa ... 935&i=addr

With gratitude,

-Jellyfish.

[Foxfur]

If Mister Jellyfish has failed to get it through to you, perhaps this will change your mind:
http://foxfuramused.com/2011/07/20/please-help-georgie-boy/
Georgie sent me a beautiful letter today!
All I had to do was give him a small sum in compensation for his company.
Yeah, I paid for his time but it is so going to be worth it.
Do it for the rats!
Totally smitten,
Foxfur

[Mister Jellyfish Mister]

Preview/audio tour for the project is up at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wig9S_KisEA

It's "George-ous"!

[Mister Jellyfish Mister]

Hiya Burner friends. It's been a pretty rough ride since our return from the playa, and I wanted to share with you some of the stuff that transpired during the event as it relates to the project. Please forgive me in advance for such a long post. Here goes, and thanks for your interest...

In the opinions of myself and many of our volunteer crew members, the installation was a complete success. The primary objectives were for the most part satisfied or exceeded, with over 90% of the systems installed by deadline and fully operational at any given time during the event as long as electrical power from the grid was not interrupted. Reviews of the piece are prevalent on the internet so I won’t toot my own horn here. I would like to express how pleased I am that the gay community seemed to get the joke in profound ways, which was one of my concerns from the outset due to the controversial nature of the humorous content and how far I was pushing it. The placement was absolutely perfect, combining with other camps including the Popcorn Palace and Bad Idea Theater in transforming the 3:00 plaza into somewhat of an all-night “theater district”.

Biggest Challenge:

I was approached during the event by about a half dozen participants who were camped in the 3:00 plaza itself that complained about the constant “repetitive” sounds emanating from the piece and how it was interfering with their personal expectations of sleeping hours accompanied with requests for me to shut down the installation during certain hours or reduce the volume. I did my best to be a good listener, respectfully repeating their concerns back to them so they felt heard and appreciated-- asking if there was anything else about the art that offended them and they all answered “no”. I then explained my philosophy of the audio being a vital component to the art, and that I was watching the body language of the crowds of participants surrounding it and adjusting the volume so it physically drew them in but did not push them back. I apologized to many, but did not yield my position. The more they wanted to talk about it, the more I listened and attempted to explain, including pointing out that the sound system was running well beneath the 300 watt maximum (for camp areas) with all speakers facing The Esplanade as well as it being a 24 hour honorarium installation in a busy plaza in which they asked to be placed themselves, and that many may be making a pilgrimage to experience the piece after following the project online for many months or contributing to it in one of the many fundraisers. One woman persisted with me to a point of insistence, so I felt compelled to make a gesture toward her camp and say “Less red”. As she did not understand I explained my parody of her complaint: “Your camp has too much of the color red showing. I have an expectation of less red at Burning Man. It is interfering with my enjoyment of the event I want you to reduce the amount of red in your camp—for me. I am also allergic to the color red”. It got me nowhere with her but it felt like a good Burning Man interaction afterward. There were others there, even campmates of the woman I mentioned, who completely supported and “got” what we were doing saying things like “Don’t fight the flame, you only make it stronger” (Thanks, Nick!). We laughed and celebrated with them as they used a bullhorn to implore with participants not to push Georgie Boy’s button—their making art out of frustration was glorious. I am happy to have been able to predict the complaints due mostly to the repetitive nature of the audio content and talk about them with members of the Honorarium Grant Committee early on, and I’m proud of the way I handled them in ways that they never escalated to needing a Black Rock Ranger or ARTery staff member to mediate them. During the last half of the week, just about every morning was met with a discovery of our electrical power plugs being pulled out of the sockets in front of the 3:00 plaza camp they were trenched to (steel cage around the box next time?), There were also two occasions of vandalism, one in which the large interactive control button was torn out of the pulpit to which it was mounted. It was very cool that Kevin, the owner of an electronic supply company, donated several backup buttons for just such an event, yet the installation ran all day every day and most all of every night.

Biggest Success:

Peddling back from the breathtaking Temple Of Transition burn, I chanced upon a couple in the 3:00 keyhole who told me that they had just that moment proposed and agreed to be married. I asked them if I was the first person on the planet to know it-- which they confirmed. I told them I had a gift for them to mark the occasion and walked them just a few paces over to my art installation where I announced their good news to the participants there, opened the control room door and interrupted the game-play to start the animatronic sequence that included the song “You and I” by the rock group, Queen. The moment was absolutely precious for many as Georgie Boy, his dog, rats, and masks serenaded the couple and onlookers. It hit me hard in that moment as to how grateful I was to be in a place where happenstance, serendipity, and my ability to give all came together in such profoundly moving ways. Whilst hiking behind my house a couple of months before the event, that same song came to me on random when I was feeling like I was running out of steam on the project and it somehow carried me through only to be delivered in such a remarkable way in the end.


Looking back:

I was clearly fooling myself by saying this was not a large project. Sure, it was physically smaller than last year’s Ein Hammer, but the technical involvement and attention to detail blasted away any expectation of working “every other Sunday” that I encouraged our volunteer crew members to have.

It is with a heart full of love and light that I thank you and Burning Man again and again for the opportunities of self expression that this and the four previous honorarium grants and countless personal contributions have afforded me and my work. So now it’s time for a break, eh? It feels really good sharing with you the fact that I will not be applying for honorarium funding in 2012. I am rather excited about the idea of not entertaining yet being entertained, and becoming a true participant at Burning Man from the other side of the velvet ropes instead of another "work vacation". So when I’m out there next year and someone’s art piece blows stars through my mind as it would want to do, I can lock arms with you as we simply revel in its grace... together.

Be well and do strange things,

-Mister Jellyfish.

[junglesmacks]

I ask this in honestly a non-snarky light and am truly curious:

Your definition of outstanding, glowing success of your art piece includes the knowledge that you pissed so many people off to the point of having your plug pulled, being surprised that BRC Rangers weren't called in to your interactions and having displeasure threads started on eplaya?

Just asking.

[jkisha]

TOO MUCH RED!

[HandJamMasterC]

I loved GB !! My wife is convinced you used our friend Jeff as a model for Georgie - had to shoot some video of Georgie so we could compare them !!

For all the whiners - ask for 3 and H next year.

[Foxfur]

As I lay in my trailer each night, at 3:15 & A, I could clearly hear the sound fo the wheel spinning. Even with the windows and roof vent shut tightly. It never failed to make me smile. It became an integral part of my burn experience. It was the yin to the yang af the techno-pumping mutant vehicles.
Thank you, and your incredible crew, for Georgie Boy. He was wonderful.
And a special shout out to HOTSHOT! Fucking amazing!

[bigbluedoggy]

I could clearly hear GB from our camp at 3:00 and A all night... no problem for me. I was truly amazed at your ingenuity and execution! So happy to call you a friend, even if it is just a casual acquaintance. You have brought some very incredible installations to the playa and you absolutely deserve a break next year. Regarding whether pissing folks off was a good thing or a bad thing, the flip side to your placement is this: if you had been placed out in deep playa, I am guessing the vandalism would have been much, much worse to the extent you would have been forced to give up after a few days. Having it in such a well trafficked area probably was the key factor to it continuing to work all week. It's the quirkiness of installations that make them unique and that always stand out in people's minds after its all over. Thanks, again, MJM!!

[Tiahaar]

I admit it...I pushed the button! Great job Jellyfish!