Bits: 03.30.11

Raphaël Dallaporta, B-40, from the series "Antipersonnel"

• In "Antipersonnel," Raphaël Dallaporta photographs antipersonnel landmines "in the way an advertising photographer might render a shampoo bottle," including the B-40 blast mine above, which is presented with this caption: "The B-40 antipersonnel mine is a Vietnamese adaptation of the BLU-24/B US-made cluster bomb. When activated, the homemade mine contains enough explosive and fragmenting pieces to blow off a leg. Despite the destruction of 4 million mines and 8 million items of unexploded ordnance (UXO) since 1975, it is estimated that 16.478 million square meters of land in Vietname is still contaminated by mines and UXO."

• Wired's Raw File blog looks at an "oddly peaceful" yet weaponry-laden scene in the Middle East, the International Defence Exhibition and Conference in Abu Dhabi, as photographed by Spencer Murphy in 2007. “Countries from all around the globe are present and offer everything from pepper spray to tanks and aircraft,” Murphy says. “I do not want to make an intentional moral statement but merely present to the viewer a world that most of us don’t get to see.”

• Mother Jones hosts a selection of work from the exhibition Artists Against the War, presented in January 2008 at the Society of Illustrators gallery in New York.

• As the Louis Vuitton/Nadia Plesner copyright infringment lawsuit gets its first hearing in The Hague today, here's a far less incendiary use of the luxury brand's logo: needlepointed bananas by Kazuki Guzmán. [Update: Plesner's hearing has been rescheduled for Apr. 20.]

• Speaking of Plesner, the art-and-law blog Art and Artifice notes two "fascinating aspects" of Vuitton's ex parte application: "Firstly, LV suggests that Plesner may have a defence under freedom of expression but immediately dismisses this argument on the basis that it 'holds no water' and that 'there is no necessity to use the intellectual property rights of Louis Vuitton [as] There are numerous other means to get this message across.' Secondly, the reliance on design right as opposed to copyright, particularly as there is no fair dealing defence to design right infringement." I've emailed Plesner in hopes of hearing the outcome of today's hearing.

• Vuitton collaborator Takashi Murakami is now selling "New Day" t-shirts, and he'll donate 100% of proceeds to the victims of the tsunami and earthquake in Japan on Mar. 11.

• New York exhibition: Keep Out You Thieving Bastards -- featuring Minnesota artists Aaron Spangler, Alec Soth, Angela Strassheim, Cameron Gainer, Chris Larson, David Rathman, Justin Newhall, Paul Shambroom, Rob Fischer, Ross Knight, Santiago Cucullu, Sara Woster, Shannon Kennedy, Tetsuya Yamada, and Chris Osgood and Chuck Statler -- on view through May 8 at Hendershot Gallery.

• A bike-mounted robotic graffiti rainbow sprayer by Akay.

• Photographer Brian Ulrich gives a nod at a potential future project on Facebook when he asks friends for old store charge cards like this one. One reader notes that an array of such cards are offered for sale, in all their weird-vintage-design glory, on Ebay.

• 3eanuts: "Charles Schulz's Peanuts comics often conceal the existential despair of their world with a closing joke at the characters' expense. With the last panel omitted, despair pervades all."