3.22.2009
Our Mountain House... in Detroit??
Tyree Guyton’s Heidelberg Project? $100 houses? Matthew Barney’s “Ancient Evenings” project? Crazy artists taking over slums abandoned by corporate American waste and greed?
What do all the above words have in common? Detroit, i tell you. Where a house can be had for $100 these days (i'm still skeptical about that). Where the nations artists are flocking to make their way, make a statement, and live cheaply and in a new way.
I just read THIS op-ed piece in the NYT from a couple of weeks ago about it all. Seriously Steven, maybe we should buy a mountain house in a Detroit crack hood? Or, at least go for a visit and see what it's really like. You think there are entire streets covered with stuffed animals like this?
What do all the above words have in common? Detroit, i tell you. Where a house can be had for $100 these days (i'm still skeptical about that). Where the nations artists are flocking to make their way, make a statement, and live cheaply and in a new way.
I just read THIS op-ed piece in the NYT from a couple of weeks ago about it all. Seriously Steven, maybe we should buy a mountain house in a Detroit crack hood? Or, at least go for a visit and see what it's really like. You think there are entire streets covered with stuffed animals like this?
Get Up in your Right Pit, and Blast It!
OMG. Double Pits to Chesty?? Is THIS homoerotic as hell or what?? Rev it up.
Groovy Chandelier
We got this for scarcely more than the price of lunch--lunch at Ikea mind you--back in December. I haven't wired it up yet, but it is hanging on our back porch over the table. Love the bluish glow. I wish i could put it on our deck when we do it.
3.21.2009
Food and Work. The Usual.
We've been eating lots and lots of good food lately... and taking lots of pictures, but i'm too lazy to get them off the camera. One thing i love about my notebook is that i can take pictures with it, and voila, there's the pic. No wires, no camera, no hassle. Someday soon i suppose some next generation bluetooth thingy will just beam photos from the camera to the computer. That will be nice.
Tonight I cooked; Steven spent a bunch of time in the garden getting all his sprouting babies some tlc. Still a few more weeks until all the plants in the house and greenhouse can emerge back into the front and back gardens. We had a nice Porterhouse steak, some simple broiled asparagus, and totally sinful potatoes: boiled and then tossed with scallion, butter, SNOWVILLE CREAMERY cream cheese, and some wonderful chicken stock paste we've been buying at Trader Joes.
In other news, I went to Sioux City for my project there (the eighth trip now?) and got to survey an old, trashed Eisenhower-Interstate-System-era concrete road paver. This baby is going to be restored (by the gentleman standing next to me, who owns it, and is donating it to the museum that is my client) and placed in the visitor experience. All told, with it's 1957 Mack Diamond T dump truck in the front, dumping raw material into the skip, the drum and mixer, and the boom with the traveling bucket, it is nearly 90 feet long. So, as the designer, actually placing it is going to be a really fun challenge.
Along with a couple of airplanes, a 1902 Oldsmobile (think mahogany Chris Craft: mostly made out of wood!), numerous buckboards, broughams, carriages and buggies, several other 20s and 30s era vehicles, many industrial and stockyard and meatpacking fragments, hundreds of pieces of terra cotta and other architectural fragments, gobs of furniture and household material culture, and thousands of other smaller artifacts, the road paver above is being arranged into a coherent story of Sioux City history. Coherent sentences be damned.
The giant artifacts are really fascinating and have many stories to tell; but the most exciting parts i'm working on involve audio-visual environments that work in conjunction with the collection. A burned out building recreation will house giant projections of Sioux City disasters (fires, floods, explosions, the crash of United 232, etc.). Another environment is Sioux City's Attic, and will celebrate the bizarre, cryptic, and often surreal connections between what a museum collects, the stories of the people involved, and the networks out into the rest of the world that result. Many of the artifacts demonstrate an essential irony: here, in the city history museum, one finds pieces that really have nothing to do with Sioux City... well, except for the fact that a Sioux City native collected them. The gallery will have lots of a/v tricks: mirrors that dissolve into ghost stories, televisions and music boxes that mysteriously come to life, furniture that flies and rugs that pull out from under one's feet. Another theatrical space will recreate a portion of a Corn Palace from SC history; a show-controlled theatrical presentation with object reveals and dramatic overviews of this place that--with all the exuberance and hucksterism of the 1880s--once tried to market itself as Chicago's rival.
I think i'm going to walk (waddle?) across the street now for a little tub of ice cream.
Tonight I cooked; Steven spent a bunch of time in the garden getting all his sprouting babies some tlc. Still a few more weeks until all the plants in the house and greenhouse can emerge back into the front and back gardens. We had a nice Porterhouse steak, some simple broiled asparagus, and totally sinful potatoes: boiled and then tossed with scallion, butter, SNOWVILLE CREAMERY cream cheese, and some wonderful chicken stock paste we've been buying at Trader Joes.
In other news, I went to Sioux City for my project there (the eighth trip now?) and got to survey an old, trashed Eisenhower-Interstate-System-era concrete road paver. This baby is going to be restored (by the gentleman standing next to me, who owns it, and is donating it to the museum that is my client) and placed in the visitor experience. All told, with it's 1957 Mack Diamond T dump truck in the front, dumping raw material into the skip, the drum and mixer, and the boom with the traveling bucket, it is nearly 90 feet long. So, as the designer, actually placing it is going to be a really fun challenge.
Along with a couple of airplanes, a 1902 Oldsmobile (think mahogany Chris Craft: mostly made out of wood!), numerous buckboards, broughams, carriages and buggies, several other 20s and 30s era vehicles, many industrial and stockyard and meatpacking fragments, hundreds of pieces of terra cotta and other architectural fragments, gobs of furniture and household material culture, and thousands of other smaller artifacts, the road paver above is being arranged into a coherent story of Sioux City history. Coherent sentences be damned.
The giant artifacts are really fascinating and have many stories to tell; but the most exciting parts i'm working on involve audio-visual environments that work in conjunction with the collection. A burned out building recreation will house giant projections of Sioux City disasters (fires, floods, explosions, the crash of United 232, etc.). Another environment is Sioux City's Attic, and will celebrate the bizarre, cryptic, and often surreal connections between what a museum collects, the stories of the people involved, and the networks out into the rest of the world that result. Many of the artifacts demonstrate an essential irony: here, in the city history museum, one finds pieces that really have nothing to do with Sioux City... well, except for the fact that a Sioux City native collected them. The gallery will have lots of a/v tricks: mirrors that dissolve into ghost stories, televisions and music boxes that mysteriously come to life, furniture that flies and rugs that pull out from under one's feet. Another theatrical space will recreate a portion of a Corn Palace from SC history; a show-controlled theatrical presentation with object reveals and dramatic overviews of this place that--with all the exuberance and hucksterism of the 1880s--once tried to market itself as Chicago's rival.
I think i'm going to walk (waddle?) across the street now for a little tub of ice cream.
3.15.2009
Newsclipping of the Day :: Time to burn down Wall Street
I know this is old news, but i had a rough week and am just now catching up with the week's news. Thank you, for speaking the truth John Stewart. Thanks for saying what every fake news anchor or investigative journalist won't say. For those of you who may not have seen it already:
3.07.2009
2003 :: Panther Creek
I am so ready to go on weekend backpacking trips. This weekend would've been PERFECT, if only Steven hadn't had to be on call. Supposed to have rained, and so far it has not materialized. I bet it will be here in the morning.
Panther Creek was the nearest, best and favorite place to go for a weekend hike from Atlanta. A couple hours drive to the north, into the Appalachians, with a beautiful trail that parallels the stream, sometimes high above it, often right next, sometimes crisscrossing. We went there so many times with Trotsky. One time we watched him chasing something, slip into the stream, and tumble down a long waterfall. Another time i slipped and had a freak accident that frightened us both (I still have a strange hole in my left leg muscle from that). One time one of Trotter's friends Petey came along with us and committed terrible dog transgressions. Often we would practice Tai Chi on big rocks in the center of the stream... wish we'd taken more photos of that!
Panther Creek was the nearest, best and favorite place to go for a weekend hike from Atlanta. A couple hours drive to the north, into the Appalachians, with a beautiful trail that parallels the stream, sometimes high above it, often right next, sometimes crisscrossing. We went there so many times with Trotsky. One time we watched him chasing something, slip into the stream, and tumble down a long waterfall. Another time i slipped and had a freak accident that frightened us both (I still have a strange hole in my left leg muscle from that). One time one of Trotter's friends Petey came along with us and committed terrible dog transgressions. Often we would practice Tai Chi on big rocks in the center of the stream... wish we'd taken more photos of that!
Our Groovy Little Cinema
Wow, look at Chris! He's like Roger Ebert! Where's Ruth?? She sends me emails every week to let me know what's coming up... and she ALWAYS gives me my club soda for free. I seriously heart this place.
3.02.2009
Remember That Tart
From the other day? I think it's the best tart i've ever made. I think what made it the best was the cognac with the apples and sugar. And the pastry cream. Well, and the shortbread crust didn't hurt either. And the whipped cream on top was great too. The whole thing was very subtle and nice and chilled.
I wish i could make it for Ina Garten. I'm sure she'd have some advice for me about how to make it better. We just had the last of it.
I wish i could make it for Ina Garten. I'm sure she'd have some advice for me about how to make it better. We just had the last of it.
War on Entrenched Interests
If any of you are NOT getting enough of Obama these days (last week's unofficial, brilliant State of the Union Address notwithstanding), you might enjoy going HERE to enjoy his weekly radio addresses. In last Saturday's he basically declared war on the entrenched special interests in Washington and told them: no more business as usual. I'm so glad we have this guy. Just consider this choice quote as a teaser:
"I realize that passing this budget won’t be easy. Because it represents real and dramatic change, it also represents a threat to the status quo in Washington. I know that the insurance industry won’t like the idea that they’ll have to bid competitively to continue offering Medicare coverage, but that’s how we’ll help preserve and protect Medicare and lower health care costs for American families. I know that banks and big student lenders won’t like the idea that we’re ending their huge taxpayer subsidies, but that’s how we’ll save taxpayers nearly $50 billion and make college more affordable. I know that oil and gas companies won’t like us ending nearly $30 billion in tax breaks, but that’s how we’ll help fund a renewable energy economy that will create new jobs and new industries. I know these steps won’t sit well with the special interests and lobbyists who are invested in the old way of doing business, and I know they’re gearing up for a fight as we speak. My message to them is this:
"So am I."
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