A Man Named Knight

There once was a man naméd "Knight"
Who fell once a day every night
He enduréd the angst
But alas he but canst
T'was the last of the man we called "Knight"

There once was a poet unrivaled
In poems he wrote named "Untitled"
He peppered his "dark"s
And drew acrid remarks
For his poems on love unrequited.

Hold your horses!

Someday I'll fly away!!!
Ah, it's good to be online after three days of absence from the net. Anyway, Bensen, why are we three the only ones posting on this blog? Nevermind.
I think you mean "hardest to translate" don't you? That was what I got from the article (or maybe I'm dazed now, kindly direct me to your source[s]).
Is kitsch art? Then again, philosophically speaking, what is art? That aside, can we consider kitsch art? Or is it mere degredation of art - derivatives, maybe?
Also, I think that kitsch arises from subculture phenomenon - that's where all the goth, fangirls/boys, fanfics come from, and that's how all these subcultures become kitsch - or at least, things associated with them are viewed as kitschy. What say you?
Then again, as Ms Johnson has pointed out, that kitsch, most of the time, is anachronistic. I have inclinations to think that it may not have to have been fashionable... Or does it necessarily?

Kitsch Definition

Ok, we have been working on defining Kitsch. It is difficult. This is what we have so far. One day, it will develop into a wonderful essay.


Why kitsch? But before we can answer that question, another one presents itself. What is kitsch? This seldom-encountered word with its simple one-syllable structure and too-many-consonants. Just like its namesake, kitsch is something that most people do not exactly understand, and yet also something that we have all encountered deep in our subconscious. An innate feeling that we recognize easily, but have difficulty expressing. It has been defined as “the absolute denial of shit”. This definition is very concise, but does not give us any deeper understanding. Indeed, 'kitsch' is a word that is very difficult to describe in words. It has been voted as one of the 'hardest words to define'. But let us strive to define it anyway, or at least die in the attempt.
The first criteria of kitsch is that it has to be done in bad taste. The second would be that it has to be an imitation of something that was once fashionable. So what can we consider as kitsch? Design, poetry, prose, fashion, culture, etc. can all be kitsch. But what about other things that are not art-based? For example, can a concept be kitsch?

Damn you, Sweden!

Kitsch is usually era-based, so something like this might classify as kitsch.

Also people who try to be cute are usually kitsch also. (Last link contains implied pornography, but all the pornography is fake.) And who could refuse some extra oomph?

Ciaozz~

P.S. Goth Night howw??? Good job Bensen.

GOTH KNIGHT

GOTH NIGHT!
POETRY 101!
ACHTUNG BABY!

UPDATE!

SHAWN CHUA! PLEASE BLOG AND UPDATE US ABOUT THE MEETING ON FRIDAY!

So many links,

So little time.

Sample Blog Titles

We have been assigned the task to do l33t blogsurfing! First area to investigate - blog URLs and blog titles! I have uncovered the following. Apologies to anyone I offend, Bensen/Cheng/Shawn/Ryan may be less liberal in doling out apologies though.

Revelations. / goodbye / everyday should be like this / winds of change / random thoughts / Iron Sharpeneth Iron / Thoughts on life... / stop pretending nothing is wrong / my ramblings / exquisitee (sic) phenomenon / Bohemian Garden / ~Welcome to my world~ / The Lost Memories / For A While... / Consciously Dreaming / Welcome To My Life / one last / pages / vague/rant / An (sic) Secret Place / The Ambiguity in Me / Taste The Rainbow / inside my mind

Okay, I've had enough, I'm feeling nauseous.

Obvious Emasculations.

Lo childs.
Our first assignment of the year is thus to:

1. Write some miasmic poetry. Please try and insert some sort of general idea into your poems, such that it is actually dramatis-able.
2. Go blogsurfing and identify all the bloggers who write miasmic poetry. For those who don't know what miasmic poetry is, try this. If you can, try and adapt their poetry, or, better yet, invite them to our Goth Night, which is to be held very very soon.

Could we have a night of sheer communist propaganda too? Another look at communist merchandise. Lovely people at wellcoolstuff. My favourite:

At least we tried.

Today (fine, yesterday) we had our first and only unofficial RE meeting one! All hail! Anyway, we were trying to come up with definitions for kitsch, and raised some issues.
Anyway, our initial definitions included
- "[T]he absolute denial of shit" as said by Milan Kundera and
- Art produced and reproduced (relentlessly?) in bad taste
We tried to challenge this, to no avail because we were distracted, though we came up with two questions?
- Does cliche not equal kitsch?
- Does tradition not equal kitsch?
Comments?

powerdei

Hey all, i noticed that zy hasnt given u guys the powerdei link. hahaha. the truth shall set u free! See it for yourself!

http://www.gluck.net/jesus/

Indeed. Be amazed. Be surprised. Be shocked. Be indignant.
Or Be a-little-indifferent-and-a-little-uninterested-but-mostly-bored.

on a side note, i have submitted the koskterclub website to losers.org We hope to secure a place on their wonderful website. Wish us luck!

Then again.

I'm retracting what I said about 5 minutes ago of how Hippies Wav tops the chart for most kitsch webpage today. If you'd get your browser to load Mew's Webpage (I found this on Losers.org) you'd realise that words do not describe just how awfully horrible this page is.

Cyberkitsch - it's a start

Bensen has been doing research on cyberkitsch, but is too lazy to blog, so I'm helping him blog.
As we all know, our journey of cyberkitsch started at our discovery of this page at Walled City expounding on the grotesqueries of cyberkitsch, which brought up the all too familiar cursed sites (see the page for details) by pre-1998 netizens.
Bensen's first find was something religiously unnerving, practically blasphemous, and totally scary, I shall not post it here. Ask him for the link to see the (I quote him) "wonders of american faith".
design. rants about the bad, the worse and the ugly of web-design. Though not awfully pleasing to the eye, the site's a good read, so take a look.
Next he uncovered this site on (surprise, surprise) kangraoos. Kitschy, indeed - the standard websafe, gaudy colours adorn the page, but this one mercifully scrimps on the animated GIFs.
Next was Monkey Kung Fu, the name enough to make you shiver. Two fonts on the page was bad enough, colours in 16-bit, and an awful marquee. Enough said, I didn't scroll through half the page before I left for my bath.
When I returned to the conversation, Bensen discovered that we were not the first to explore this - though I figured that a while ago - and neither would we be the last! Losers.org - Losers on the Internet, has this section on design. Nicely done, they rate 'em losers on a scale of 1L to 5L, though the site is a bit liberal in it's dosage of capitals. Find some really bad web-design here, they have other sections for other groups of losers - groupies, goths, wannabes and so on.
This page topped the charts today. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Anyway, that's all for now, until I/we can be bothered to search some more, you'll have to survive, or at least try to, with what I leave with you now.

Boring Admin Stuff

Hi All.
1) I'm gonna change the blog layout soon, and it's going to be orange. If anyone has violent disagreements with orange, please tell me and I'll change it to blue instead.
2) I'm thinking of licensing this blog under Creative Commons, specifically, under this licence. So far, Shawn, Ryan and Chengyi have agreed. I need Bensen's agreement so tell me on MSN.
3) And I think we need to meet up soon (Friday?) to actually get our project started proper. How thinks?
4) Do we need a tagboard?
Oh of course, a happy Lunar New Year to all.

Non-update.

This Monday's RE was eventful - about as eventful as a balloon filled with helium. First up, Bensen was at Farrer Park, at some tennis match (at least they won), and Ryan was sick (bless him). So only Shawn and I were left during RE, though Ms. Johnson was strangely absent. ^^

No way d00ds

d00ds, d!$ l4y0U+ iZ soOo n0+ K!+ScH. liK3, iT n33ds sUm+h!nG uB3R l33tz. f0R X4mPL3, leets sp34kz oR www.koksterclub.blogspot.com

Agenda.

1. Organise Dark Evening of Miasmic Poetry.
a) Write Miasmic Poetry
b) Get Costumes
c) Send Invitations
e) Let's have it very soon.
2. Get some proof of Chinese New Kitsch.
a) ph3wlzz. We have 1 day to do this, if we're doing this at all.
3. Use this blog as an RE log too. Rampant Liaison Cheng. Hmmmm.

Hello World!

Filth ridden dreams haunt my tormented mind.
Tears of blood stream down the restless ravages of my soul.
In your sweet, sweet embrace.

Okay, Goth and bad Blogger layouts aside, welcome to our brand-spanking new RE blog! Kitsch, as you might not have known, is the art of making art so bad that people actually think it's good. More suitably phrased, it, in the words of Milan Kundera, "is the absolute denial of shit".