hi Cheryl. happened to go to the Friends bookstore and they
had a half-off sale and got the following works today...
1) which way out, arthur m. young (cosmology)
2) philosophies and philosophers (milton hunnex)
- diagrammatic/map/reference work of concepts
3) the tai chi workbook *
4) towards one science,
the convergence of traditions - paul snyder
5) the lovers quotation book, helen handley
6) the new archaeology, how new and revolutionary
scientific techiniques are transforming our
study of the past - david wilson (i.e. electromagnetism)
(about #4, a comment on torqued architecture. i have had
severe balance issues and as a result have not gone to
see the new Walker Art Museum as it is a lot of angles
that are distorting perspectives and unbalanced in terms
of the horizon, etc. enough that, for a person without
balance, a walking stick would be necessary if there is
no railing nearby to grab onto. then i wondered about
this type of design in relation to elders and elderly
persons (or persons with vertigo, etc). the effect is
novel, possibly, yet does it limit who can go to the
museum (a certain age ground) due to human physiology
at a certain point ('health' of eyes/legs/inner ear).
makes me wonder about the ethics and also the wisdom
of such architectural design choices & decision making.)
--
i went back into the book by Paul Sheapherd, Artificial
Love, today and finally hit some of what i felt was up
to now missing in the text (a conceptual synopsis and
sense of clarity and purpose for all the considerations).
approximately it is this:
* technology is the human condition, it is made by humanity
and thus (as no one is humanity itself, only a small part)
technology acts/behaves as a force of nature.
* architecture is landscape, building, machine, sculpture.
it is the very rearranging of material for human purposes.
* four frontiers/progressions contextualize architecture:
universe, life, tribe (humanity), self (human).
right now, as i read this i think there are major flaws
in thinking ('human purposes' versus the view of serving
technology/machines as with Ellul/Mumford's megamachine).
and a little too simple a simplicity, too fast and loose
yet maybe that is the downside of being poetic at times.
a lot of it seems contrived, too, it does not read as if
characters are outside the author but only constructs to
put this view into form, they do not stand on their own,
only to add detail to this argument which has distortion.
--
choregographing the earth in performances such solstice river as you mentioned is such an zen organic expression of connections. Hardenbergh's works with site specific performance seem closely related to christo and jeanne-claude, especially in the amount of governmental interface needed to construct? also use of machines seems an integration as yinyang but i question it somehow, not that it doesn't seem natural to the spirit of the performance, but that it elevates machine to organics? maybe its further illuminating a humbling and positive direction? as lyrically described and envisioned, the audio simulcast seems a positive addition and audience participation in the event gives it such a more visceral spirit. mississippi as source of source of source. were you able to latch onto the blue fabric and wave it over the bridge?
her works apparently are site-specific and so the ones that
used bulldozers was one performance, cherry-pickers, another.
i think such performances are very architectural, they add
something to the environment, a human bridge between land
and buildings, animate interpretive audiovisual formations.
yes, organic and yet also artificial, like a dance where a
person may be a bird and a human, mimicry of each the other.
a person, a building, a building a person, a dance a river,
a river a dance. it was an interesting idea executed as well
as can be expected yet the scale is overwhelming and a built
infrastructure that supports such events would be necessary
to go further with it. i have been looking to collaborate
with a choreagrapher on a dance of the big bang to the inter-
net, a short story interpreted with music and movements. for
instance, the radiation and particles of the early universe,
their movements, in relation to the rise of artifice and the
machine age, and the digital flurry and fury of the present,
in clothing, in staccato movements and sounds, emotions.
comment on blogs-i rarely visit them. its so nice to just open email and have ideas flow in, without having to open another site. the riverstream is more organic, easy. does anyone on this list want to recommend a blog or two that would offer something similar?
i don't know. i visit some but something about them i dislike
as a concept and maybe it has to do more with the client/server
architecture of the internet and going to places to read dead
'i see' scrolls, and then the limits of points of view which,
eventually gets old as it is not more anonymous, institutional
where many can function as one and expand something beyond a
certain limit. instead, it solidifies the idiocy of slang, of
celebrity culture, and hierarchies, popularity contests, and
the embedded stupidities of the reigning cultural consumption.
i have tried to read the internet but cannot keep up with it.
and would like to log off altogether for a few months sometime.
e-mail is nice but writing/exchanges/conversing is very time-
consuming/energy intensive, and after a certain point it is
hard to continue after saying things, in general, once around,
and maybe three times or more until a No Exit moment arrives.
--
must say i saw an exhibit today Contemporary Chinese Art-
the collection of Pat Hui, at the Katherene Nash gallery
at the University of Minnesota (west bank) and it was a
stunning display of 2d art from China. if you live in the
twin cities it is a must-see exhibit. some works were of
brilliant colors with Chinese characters/ideographs atop
them as if landscapes- the entire exhibit was as if all
landscape paintings/drawing in a merging of words/symbols
and colors which held great power and beauty to behold.
it was reinvigorating, the staleness of .US aesthetics
(aesthetic commerce) was inverted by life, living and
breathing colors, bright, in love, offerings of hope.
only one other exhibit here in the last years was of
similar interest (at the old walker) and it was also
of Chinese conceptual artists whose work astounded me.
no images online. http://artdept.umn.edu/art_dept/nash.html
brian