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Juli McKenna Kearns

@idyllopus.bsky.social
612 followers 549 following 2.7K posts

No Ai. Author/artist/playwright (twas)/cinema analyses. Dem Socialist. She/her. Spouse-Martin is a musician/engineer/producer. Child-Aaron is a filmmaker/artist. Atlanta GA. Plutonium-enriched childhood in WA. My website: idyllopuspress.com

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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 21h
Series ased on my memory of watching a Euripides (probably) play on PBS when I was a young teen, on spare sets, which greatly impressed me, the distancing effect created by the distorted quality of the video on television. The feeling had was of watching an ancient transmission of an event.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 21h
Televised Dinner Theater of Mortals and Gods Series - Flavian Woman, 2015 Digital painting collage with a photo I took in 2006 of a sculpture of a Flavian woman on loan at the Fernbank Museum of Natural History.
Sculpture of Flavian woman on the right, looking toward a simple black box which could be interpreted as a window, a lot of grain and light distortion.
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Seth Cotlar @sethcotlar.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
I was unaware that as someone born in America I inherited Athens. So does that mean I’m eligible for Greek citizenship?
U.S. Department of St... • • Follow
... X
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7h •
The United States has made its choice.
We choose the unapologetic pursuit of national power.
"Nationalism" became a dirty word,
, so we
tore down our monuments, condemned our own history, and taught children to be ashamed of the countries they would inherit.
MARCO RUBIO
Secretary of State
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Well, I suppose SI is fine for generative AI if it means Stolen Information.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
In the movie, when she transforms she has the face of a wasp and the body of a woman, which they inverted for the poster. Czechoslovakia would have been able to handle it, Hollywood not so much.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
...a young teen, on spare sets, which greatly impressed me, the distancing effect created by the distorted quality of the video on television., which gave the feeling of watching an ancient transmission of an event which the television had picked up.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Televised Dinner Theater of Mortals and Gods Series - Nero, 2015 Digital painting collage with a photo I took in 2006 of Nero sculpture on loan at the Fernbank Museum of Natural History. The series of several images was based on my memory of watching a Euripides (probably) play on PBS when I was...
Head of Nero in lower right, against black, with clouds in the background from a personal photo.
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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 06/10/2026
This is a good illustration of how so much of AI theft isn't indirect (ie, data sucked into a model to train the chatbot) - it's actually **direct** copying, but *enabled* by GenAI. Of course it is: chatbots absolutely suck at creating good, new stuff.
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Brian Goldstone @brian-goldstone.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Atlanta had over 142,000 eviction filings in the past year. More than 10,000 in a single month. Absolutely staggering.
wabe.org
Metro Atlanta leads US in highest eviction rates with over 142,000 filings
Metro Atlanta is leading the nation for the highest eviction rates in the United States, with over 142,000 filings as of June 2026, according to new data by The Eviction Lab, a Princeton University-ba...
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
Clearly have the wealth to not worry about their hose tearing.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
A series of several images based on my memory of watching a Euripides (probably) play on PBS when I was a young teen, on spare sets, which greatly impressed me, the distancing effect created by the distorted quality of the video on television, the feeling was of an ancient transmission of an event.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
Televised Dinner Theater of Mortals and Gods Series - Janus, 2015 Digital painting collage with a photo I took in 2006 of Janus sculpture on loan at the Fernbank Museum of Natural History.
Black and white image, grainy, with the face of the Janus sculpture facing forward on the left, a greenish-tone to it, against black, gray boxes on the left to give a sense of theatrical depth. The image is askew and has inconsistent tones, light bleeding in around the left.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
This is so incredibly painful. azluminaria.org/2026/10/05/f...
azluminaria.org
Final “grandmother” cottonwood toppled, protesters arrested in Lochiel - AZ Luminaria
Armed Border Patrol agents raided a protest camp in Lochiel, in southeast Arizona, making way for contractors to cut down the last standing cottonwood tree Monday morning for a double border wall, aft...
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
...my memory of watching a Euripides play on PBS when I was a young teen, on spare sets, which greatly impressed me, the distancing effect created by the distorted quality of the video on television., which gave the feeling of the television receiving an ancient transmission of an event.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
Ttelevised Dinner Theater of Mortals and Gods Series - Lucius Verus and Window, 2015 This is a digital painting with a photo collaged in that I took in 2006 of a Lucius Verus sculpture on loan at Fernbank from the Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Florence. The series of several images was based on...
Profile of statue of bearded man against a black background with a bisection of black and gray to the side, with heavy grain.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
I was 5 and it was Jim Danforth's stop-motion dragon in the 1962 "The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm". I knew that dragon was Hollywood but up on the Seattle big screen in all its CINERAMA glory I was awed. I wasn't terrified but I was frightened and I was more awed than frightened.
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Matt Novak @paleofuture.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
We murdered four more people in a boat today
U.S. southern Command: On October 4, under the direction of #SOUTHCOM, Joint Task Force Western Hemisphere executed a lethal, kinetic strike on a go-fast vessel operating along established narco-trafficking routes in the Caribbean. Confirmed intelligence revealed the vessel's active involvement in narco-trafficking. The operation killed four narco-terrorists. @DeptofWar
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
This is so tame for Luis...
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Dustin A. Chacón @lingdustin.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
I've heard people make claims that AI would lead to a new Renaissance, but I didn't imagine it'd happen like this:
Screenshot of a Tweet from Pope Leo XIV. It reads: 

"In this era of artificial intelligence, it is becoming urgen to distinguish human art from what machines produce. There is an ontological difference, even before an aesthetic one, between art and what a machine can generate through statistical calculation based on millions of images created by others. Algorithms lack the spark of humanity. For this reason, the Church wishes to renew an alliance with artists and cultural institutions to safeguard our humanity."
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Parkscope Joe @parkscopejoe.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
This is insane.
Christopher Hale w @ChristopherHale
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NEW: According to a bombshell report in the New York Times, Anthropic co-founder Chris Olah threatened to walk out of Pope Leo XIV's Al encyclical launch in May because the pope rejected the idea that machines can be conscious.
Olah's team then privately lobbied the pope's advisers "to take the possibility of model consciousness seriously." Pope Leo XIV held firm.
For months, Anthropic has wined and dined theologians and religious scholars under nondisclosure agreements, hoping they would bless the idea that Claude has moral standing.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Roadside America #3, 2007, redone 2026 Southwest Seekers Series Digital painting 16.6 by 25 inches Model reference: Intergalactic at Deviant Art. Photo reference for background taken by artist/me.
A young woman in a purple dress stands in the foreground in a dessert landscape, staring up at a black space in the sky.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
The acting. The acting was great. Stellar, deep performances, gut-wrenching. It took me a few years before I'd watch it because I was expecting TV-movie schlock.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Little America Penguins, 2007 Southwest Seekers Series Digital painting 18.6 by 30 inches Model reference: Akai Hinoiri. Photo reference for background taken by artist/me.
A girl/young woman stands in the foreground, looking at the camera, caught in mid-movement, her medium-length blond hair flowing to the side. She stands before the outdoor display of a Christmas tree with lights surrounded by short penguin-panels. X-mas lights also decorate the trunks of neighboring pine trees. A parking lot is beyond, and beyond that an interstate ramp, and beyond that a glimpse of the upper floors of a building that is likely a hotel. A desert hill is also seen beyond the interstate.
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Claire Willett @clairewillett.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
I mean yeah, a decade of no one holding Trump accountable for his much more obvious crimes, combined with both Nazi and Confederate rehabilitation projects on the right, was always going to lead to “actually we’ve never done ANYTHING wrong and you guys owe us apologies for every check on our power”
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Hegseth quotes more scripture. Through the (American) patriots it was "the lord" who fought against the red coats. "The lord" who fought the communists. "The lord" who fought the Islamists. The Ivy League schools don't get it--but "they're jealous". So, fuck separation of church and state.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Hegseth's going all the way here. "Putting on the full armor of god..." he says. Because the real "battle is spiritual. God is good, evil is not." And the military must "understand the difference". Hegseth adds, "The lord is on my side." Sigh.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Each school will be distinguished as a Designated Military College. Producing patriots and officers. But the most essential component? (Here it comes.) Faith. Religious community. Sacred duty to god. Secular humanism is on its way out. A new Office of Religious Affairs. Psalm 32:12 quoted.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Not just any cadet will do (tainted by woke universities), so they're partnering with Louisiana State University, Liberty University (y'know Jerry Falwell's), Tuskegee U, MSU and Hillsdale College (private conservative Baptist) for supply via the brand new program, America's Corps of Cadets.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
To lead our nation into the future of warfare, our nation's "best minds...Elon Musk, Palmer Luckey, and Newt Gingrich" heading Project Meridian. Those are the best mind-lights. Huh. Hegseth says there will be no creative restrictions or limitations. Huh. He adds they will be "ruthless..." (Vomit)
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
"Super"intelligence warfare run by stupid criminals. What could go wrong? Hegseth announces "Autonomous Warfare Command", "...built to scale autonomous and robotic capabilities across the joint force...drone warfare super-charged by SI-enabled targeting..." www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZdp...
youtube.com
Secretary Hegseth delivers State of the Force address
YouTube video by ABC News
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wileyquixote25.bsky.social @wileyquixote25.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
JFC....
newrepublic.com
Hegseth Announces Elon Musk and Newt Gingrich Will Help Lead Military
Pete Hegseth revealed that the men will help direct a project to determine the future of the military.
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Don Curren 🇨🇦🇺🇦 @dbcurren.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
“The primary distinction of the #artist is that he must actively cultivate that state which most men, necessarily, must avoid: the state of being #alone.” - #JamesBaldwin
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Damn, that’s effective. Been years since I watched it.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
The Very Large Array, New Mexico, 2006, processed 2025 The wind was strong and unrelenting. There were hares everywhere. Take a step and a hare went bounding. We hauled ass to try to get there before dusk, which fell quickly, and just made it. #black-and-white-photography
Facing east with the setting sun behind throwing long shadows toward the white dishes of the Very Large Array in the New Mexico desert.
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Katie Phang @katiephang.bsky.social · 22/01/2026
Special Counsel Jack Smith in his Opening Remarks:
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
It's just insane.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Watched "Backrooms". Modern rubbish (which most of it is) commercial and residential architecture is psychotic and soulless. As is the furniture constructed to fill it. Maybe that's not what the film was supposed to be about but the set design was the strength of the film and wins.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Watching "10 Years with Hayao Miyazaki". I'm talking myself out of spending the few dollars to rent "Cobra Woman". I have watched so many bad films lately, but "Cobra Woman" is such a sequined spectacle of bad. The fact it stars Maria Montez just makes me want to watch "Lola Montez" again.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Prep time before a day of filming "Intravenus". 2025. At the Little 5 Points Community Center. Joshua Haire.
Actor Joshua Haire in makeup.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Prep time before a day of filming "Intravenus". 2025. At the Little 5 Points Community Center. With Rachel Walker and Joshua Haire.
In an old school room with a high ceiling and a wall of closets at the rear. A table with a white cloth is in the center of the room. Behind it sit the actress, Rachel Walker, and actor, Joshua Haire.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Prep time before a day of filming "Intravenus" at the Little Five Community Center. 2025. With (l to r) Chandler Balli, Brice Heller, Aaron, and Rachel Walker.
Sepia-tone of an old school room with a table, covered in a white cloth, in the center. Actors in costume to the left are Chandler Balli and Brice Heller. At the center is Aaron, the director. To the right, at the table, is actress Rachel Walker.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Prep time before a day of filming "Intravenus". 2025. With Rachel Walker and Joshua Haire.
Black-and-white of an old school room, a table with a cloth over it in the center and various props on it. Rachel sits behind, leaning her head on her arm on a chair. Joshua sits to the screen right.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Blue Sunset at Yellowhorse, 2007 Southwest Seekers Series Digital painting with photo by me as reference for background. Model reference is Phoeebstock at Deviantart. 20 by 30 inches
A woman in a blue dress, eyes closed, a serene expression on her face, arms extended out to the sides, stands before buildings at the Yellowhorse Trading Post at the Arizona and New Mexico border. The sky is varying grades of blue, light to dark at the top, with several clouds floating in the background.
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David Sirota @davidsirota.com · 29/09/2026
it seems we're facing the prospect of oligarchs’ robots mass murdering every human being on Earth, not because we don't know how to stop the robots, but simply because our government is too corrupt to even try to stop them
levernews.com
AI Regulation Was Coming. Then Trump Killed It.
After a flood of tech industry cash, President Donald Trump killed a requirement that AI giants disclose their riskiest experiments to national security officials. Now lawmakers are scrambling to catc...
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Continuing with my "Southwest Seekers" series from 2007. Roadside America #2, 2007 Southwest Seekers Series Digital painting 15.9 by 24 inches Model reference: Intergalactic at Deviant Art. Photo reference for background taken by me.
Close-up of the face of a young woman with long blond hair who stands in the foreground of a landscape scene showing a stretch of interstate beyond reaching into desert hill country.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
An Optigan commercial. Comments at Youtube inform Devo sampled the Optigan's banjo disk for "it's a beautiful world". www.youtube.com/watch?v=MY4h...
youtube.com
Optigan TV Commercial
YouTube video by Jared Rainer
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Trying to comprehend the Optigan! www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rg1D...
youtube.com
Optigan: This 1970s Toy Organ Plays Optical Film Discs!
YouTube video by Vintage Keys Studio
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
After watching, I also appreciated the availability of a photo-book by the director on the making of the film, because it established the boundaries of the film--the director's or the subject's.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Good film. Deals with mortality and preservation of one's work.
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Juli McKenna Kearns @idyllopus.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
A documentary on David Rumsey and his map collection. He's a person for whom maps are as poems. He had the money to follow this passion and has made his map collection available for all to view. I know I've benefited by their availability many times. www.davidrumsey.com/about/a-stra...
davidrumsey.com
David Rumsey Historical Map Collection | A Stranger Quest Film
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