City of Craft

day 1, -4 below zero. no feeling in my toes and fingers. gangrene a possibility.

Kiyoshi AWAZU (1929-2009)

These are some pretty amazing drawings from Kiyoshi AWAZU, a Japanese artist/designer. Equally fascinating is his writing about his vision.

On the Thinking Eye he says, "The Meaning of Seeing I think that creating is seeing. Sometimes seeing is harder than creating. The difficulty that we face in creation equals the difficulty we face when we are not able to see things. Seeing, becomingable to see and seeing through things are the mind processes used when we try to create. Criticism relies on seeing as does creation..."

Mama, don't let your babies grow up to be...

I am picking up the ending but it is worth a visit to BLDGBLOG for the beginning to read an interesting discussion of a Times article...Who would want to be an architect?

I'll end this simply by citing some provocative statements made in the article's comments thread—provocative not because I agree with them but because they're well-positioned to spark debate. I'll quote these here, unedited, and let people discuss this for themselves.

—The Bartlett "seem to want to be an architecture school and a school of alternate visual media culture at the same time. More often than not these agendas work against each other... They should make a choice and be clear about it. Are you training students to be architects or something else that has to do with architecture? What should a student expect to learn when they finish school? What are you being prepared for. If bartlett graduates go on to become film-makers, and video game designers, and such, maybe its a good idea to say it is not an architecture school and say it is a school of visual media. Then you will attract students with that goal in mind."

—From the same commenter: "Consider, if a school opens up and starts teaching alternative medicine (acupuncture, aromatherapy, Atkins diet, chiropractic medicine, herbalism, breathing meditation, yoga,etc), gives its graduates medical degrees and sent them off to hospitals and emergency rooms to perform surgery, a lot of people would have a problem with that. This is, in effect, what the architectural profession is doing when it allows schools like the Bartlett to give architecture degrees."

—"architectural education is still a leftover of that idea of the businessman/artiste producing unusual shapes for art critics"

—"The profession does not work. It’s economically non viable. Our work is pure iteration. Far too time consuming, and as a result, it’s impossible to charge anyone for the work we have actually done."

And on we go...

love hurts!

via free people

artist stephen powers grew up in west philadelphia, where walls and rooftops were a blank canvas for the former graffiti artist. now, with the help of the philadelphia mural arts program, he has put a spin on the traditional notions of graffiti with love letter. the project is literally his love letter to the city where he grew up, that can also be read as a love letter from one person to another or from the residents of west philadelphia to their neighborhood.

more...

A Letter for One with Meaning for All

The City of Philadelphia Mural Arts Program and Philadelphia native, New York-based artist Stephen Powers have collaborated to create Love Letter, a public art project consisting of a series of 50 rooftop murals from 45th to 63rd streets along the Market Street corridor. The murals, which are best viewed from the Market-Frankford elevated transit line, collectively express a love letter from a guy to a girl, from an artist to his hometown, and from local residents to their West Philadelphia neighborhood. Love Letter, which will be documented in two books, a film, and a gallery exhibition, speaks to all those who have loved and for those who long for a way to express that love to the world around them.

download the map for your next trip to Philadelphia! Stephen Powers site.

via BLDGBLOG


[This is so interesting to me! I just hope I make it to NYC before the show closes. The 7 used to be my studio train from Manhattan to LIC and this would be so much fun to take the 7 and listen to a podcast...]

...What strange irony of the California landscape would lead butterflies to follow a major highway on their seasonal migrations—or what triumph of bad planning would result in that highway being built in perfect alignment with a preexisting animal geography?

Of course, the landscape itself might all but guarantee such an overlap, as California's central valley offers both Caltrans and Painted Lady butterflies an effective and easy route to from north to south. But what other examples might there be of human transportation infrastructure coexisting with biological routes of passage?

What paths for animals could we thus build through our cities? Birds following WiFi signals along parallel geographies through the urban canyons our buildings now frame...

Exploring all of these questions, and more, is a cool new exhibition called the Safari 7 Reading Room, which opened last night at New York's Studio-X. Nicola Twilley, of Edible Geography, and I got to take a tour of the exhibition before it opened with Studio-X's Gavin Browning.

more...

Orange Solar Moment at Simone Interiors...

“Drawing teaches us to observe and if we were more visually aware in this country, our environment would not be in such a mess. And possibly there might be less crime and violence if we could notice and enjoy what we see."

Letter published in The Guardian, November 1995

I want to engage the physical properties of space and architecture with works that explore form and content (or, form versus content) using a mundane, mass-produced material—sign vinyl. The slow and labor-intensive process of hand-cutting the vinyl and carefully applying it to a wall or window subverts the commercial nature of the material.

For Simone, I created an abstract work that is a reflection—a moment—of the street in the luminosity of the sun. I hope that this unexpected work will interrupt and challenge viewers' visual routines for a second to notice the nooks and crannies of our city.

Day One Installation...

and a few more...

A few more small cuts.

Kalla Design Blog Inspiration

Japanese designer Hitomi Kimura says in her blog: "Finding a "right" (to me!) colour combination is the true joy for me. I am planning to apply my multi-coloured pattern onto paper in the near future."

Painted Buildings in Russia

via Free People...

This makes me so happy!




see more at sturman

A few small cuts.

Calling Ganesh

measure, measure, measure

Orange Solar Moment at Simone Interiors

Which one will I choose?

Collection of Moments

Barnstormers!

Yeah, so cool....The Barnstormers are an Tokyo-NYC artist collective that stormed Cameron, North Carolina and lit up their barns, tractors, shacks, and farm equiptment. WOW!

We need some of these!

If you've visited Philly, or live here, you may already be familiar with the City of Philadelphia Mural Arts Program, which is responsible for helping Philly be the city with the most murals in the USA - we have more than 2,700!
The festive trucks shown above are part of one of the Mural Arts Program's latest projects. Partnering with Philadelphia University's Design Center, together they wrapped 10 of the city's garbage & recycling trucks in these funky all-over prints! They've been doing the rounds with the rest of the trucks since Earth Day, and the other day I saw one on my street! It sounds silly but I was excited! I think next they should wrap all the rest of the trucks...

For a little more...

via...freepeople