a recent trip to the art institute reawakened thoughts of environments constructed to facilitate some vague notion of cultural and personal fulfillment. what are people doing in museums? what does a stroll 'round the gallery do for them? and do we need to see the tangible *public* benefits of this visit in order for it to be rendered valuable to our culture as a whole?
i suppose i could devise all sorts of reasons people were at the art institute yesterday based on my observation of the patrons:
-- it is a stopping point on a tour of the city
-- it is simply pleasing to enter a space most wouldn't call their every-day environment. so, to gain new experience
-- to take a view of history (although it should be understood that history is constructed in a very specific way here)
-- to study art, especially painting, which is the dominant medium present at the art institute
-- to get inside from the cold outdoors
-- to practice drawing in a quiet controlled space (to study old masters)
-- to sit and think, and to be alone
-- to people-watch (my favorite experience)
-- to view new and interesting exhibits
-- to revisit our favorite works, take pleasure in them
-- to learn something from any one of these exhibits
i don't know if the value of museums in general is obvious enough to be articulated on some kind of universal level, and i highly doubt we can even make a hypothesis on the use of museums in chicago or any other region. i chose the photograph above to illustrate these notes because i still can't understand why the french impressionist galleries at the art institute are, hands-down the most popular at any given time (as are most of the modern european painting exhibits), because to me museums are truly successful when they achieve a specific function. to me, exhibits should at the very least bring to light something about the world the viewer does not already know.
this immediately brings to mind one of the most compelling ideas about museums i've come across, by mieke bal, paraphrased: one cannot see what one has not already learned to see. this is detrimental to the educative funciton of museums. but, i ask, does this cycle need to always be broken? is it just enough the people *come* to see the art, therefore preventing its obscurity? this is a question i have to wrestle with quite a bit more.
but here, people unwaveringly go to this exhibit which, in my opinion, can not speak directly to the experiences people have in their own lives. nor can most people look beyond the "prettiness" of french impressionism to see some kind of aesthetic revolution happening on the 19th century canvas.
Sunday, December 30, 2007
museology revisited
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
index/content
i started my "volunteer book" as a little black and red notebook to keep track of my schedule for the craziness volunteering introduces into my life. i had neatly listed 'Chicago Freedom School: Communiversity' and 'Chicago Humanities Festival' under the "Guide to book contents" in the crisp black and gray lines provided for me. And now it occurs to me that those indices I created -- those categorical items prescribed before the signified items came into existence -- are beginning to take on completely new meanings as i start to delve into their actual content: my participation.
conceptually speaking i would describe the chicago freedom school as a community-based human rights education organization designed to provide people (particularly high school students) a forum to learn about, discuss and do something about various human rights issues. i would describe the humanities festival as a citywide series of lectures, performances, panels, participatory exhibits, and films based on one theme: environmental awareness. i would go on to say how environmental awareness is not just about ecological concern (although it is to a large degree) but to be able to have enough presence of your own surroundings to really be able to see what's around you.
but what happens when the content of the book begins to change? the indexical signifiers prematurely imposed on the hopes for the little black and read notebook start to change meaning. the label "Chicago Freedom School", which as described above has not too much to do with me suddenly becomes relevant in my thoughts about what i should do with my time. it also reminds me of the intense amount of energy i've recently found to pursue something new, interesting, and useful.
the idea of the Chicago Humanities Festival had -- despite (or perhaps because of) my intensive academic training in the Humanities -- appeared in my mind as a great and honorable endeavor designed only for 'certain' audiences. as guilty as i feel saying that, it was hard to see how something like a Humanities Festival could really incite the real social action of people who are otherwise 'interested but don't really want to do anything about it'. i had failed to make the connection that the kind of education you get from hearing experts on a situation get together to publicly discuss the issue at hand, whatever that might be.
there's education, and then there's action. how could they ever be mutually exclusive? i'll let that one be for now.
but now to close for tonight... my "volunteer book" contains notes from two chf panels i attended this past week, and nothing i had expected when i prescripted their contents on the book's first page:
After Katrina / Emergency Preparedness and Environmental Justice
dr. iva e carruthers, constance pope, eric klinenberg, roderick hawkins, cheryl s taylor
"Technocracy transforms the hierarchical structure of information."
"When communication breaks down [reporters] can only report on what they think they see."
"Without collaboration or understanding, emergency preparedness is lip service."
"There are no pieces being put together [after Katrina]. The consequence of not addressing what happens is that the world fails to learn."
"[Each disaster] is an event. When it's processed like this, it seems that there's a beginning and an end to it."
"The problem is the numbness you get when you become a spectator to an event is that you get a false sense of security. When the event is over, when is needed is more engagement on the national and international level."
"[Directly after Katrina the whole nation wanted to know what happened]. Now, the rhetoric of reobservation [of Katrina] now sounds antiquated."
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"Disasters represent the breakdown in the normal order of things and expose injustices we otherwise ignore. They are teaching moments where we can think seriously about these conditions... It is difficult to take a critical stance..."
"Katrina is part of the grander pattern of subjecting citizens of color to hazardous conditions. ... The EPA would say the environment was ok to live in but clearly it wasn't."
"Based on the perception that African Americans are less environmentally aware and therefore less likely to respond, [a medical waste management company] chose a poor African American community to place their incinerator."
"How can we think about catastrophic events as instances that help us see those injustices? ... [After Chicago's 1995 heat wave] the city refused to hold hearings and process what went wrong. This did not become a teachable moment."
===========================
===========================
Creative Reuse in Design
sarah black, cat chow, kevin henry, lane relya, julia cosgrove
"People piece together material as information. The program is created and everything under it is just database. You don't create things with tubes of paint anymore but you program things."
"The observation that viewers bring their subjectivity to the work [when historicizing DIY culture in terms of Conceptual Art movements] is retroactively applied in an art historical context. An author can never fully determine meaning. But in DIY [what we could call] 'the viewer' participates."
"Participatory architectures on the web ("Web 2.0") are less viewer/object related than they are economies of use and sharing."
"Art/object no longer calls for a viewer. You look at operations: programming/reprogramming."
"YouTube, etc. as a virtual space is still part of the DIY culture because you still subvert the existing culture. You can chose the media you consume rather than having it handed to you."
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"Youth culture is attuned to things they can't articulate. Now, they're surrounded by stuff..."
"Now there's a kind of nostalgia for things made by hand. So the 'vintage' tshirts you find at Urban Outfitters were made in China and made vintage for you."
"A large part of our material culture is junk."
"We build too much capacity in our artifactural environment."
"One problem for reuse as a political act is that it's not sustainable because of the time it takes to collect and make materials. A new economy must emerge."
"Our next step should be to think about whether we do, in fact, need the things we use. 'Creative reuse' will become 'Creative use'"
conceptually speaking i would describe the chicago freedom school as a community-based human rights education organization designed to provide people (particularly high school students) a forum to learn about, discuss and do something about various human rights issues. i would describe the humanities festival as a citywide series of lectures, performances, panels, participatory exhibits, and films based on one theme: environmental awareness. i would go on to say how environmental awareness is not just about ecological concern (although it is to a large degree) but to be able to have enough presence of your own surroundings to really be able to see what's around you.
but what happens when the content of the book begins to change? the indexical signifiers prematurely imposed on the hopes for the little black and read notebook start to change meaning. the label "Chicago Freedom School", which as described above has not too much to do with me suddenly becomes relevant in my thoughts about what i should do with my time. it also reminds me of the intense amount of energy i've recently found to pursue something new, interesting, and useful.
the idea of the Chicago Humanities Festival had -- despite (or perhaps because of) my intensive academic training in the Humanities -- appeared in my mind as a great and honorable endeavor designed only for 'certain' audiences. as guilty as i feel saying that, it was hard to see how something like a Humanities Festival could really incite the real social action of people who are otherwise 'interested but don't really want to do anything about it'. i had failed to make the connection that the kind of education you get from hearing experts on a situation get together to publicly discuss the issue at hand, whatever that might be.
there's education, and then there's action. how could they ever be mutually exclusive? i'll let that one be for now.
but now to close for tonight... my "volunteer book" contains notes from two chf panels i attended this past week, and nothing i had expected when i prescripted their contents on the book's first page:
After Katrina / Emergency Preparedness and Environmental Justice
dr. iva e carruthers, constance pope, eric klinenberg, roderick hawkins, cheryl s taylor
"Technocracy transforms the hierarchical structure of information."
"When communication breaks down [reporters] can only report on what they think they see."
"Without collaboration or understanding, emergency preparedness is lip service."
"There are no pieces being put together [after Katrina]. The consequence of not addressing what happens is that the world fails to learn."
"[Each disaster] is an event. When it's processed like this, it seems that there's a beginning and an end to it."
"The problem is the numbness you get when you become a spectator to an event is that you get a false sense of security. When the event is over, when is needed is more engagement on the national and international level."
"[Directly after Katrina the whole nation wanted to know what happened]. Now, the rhetoric of reobservation [of Katrina] now sounds antiquated."
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"Disasters represent the breakdown in the normal order of things and expose injustices we otherwise ignore. They are teaching moments where we can think seriously about these conditions... It is difficult to take a critical stance..."
"Katrina is part of the grander pattern of subjecting citizens of color to hazardous conditions. ... The EPA would say the environment was ok to live in but clearly it wasn't."
"Based on the perception that African Americans are less environmentally aware and therefore less likely to respond, [a medical waste management company] chose a poor African American community to place their incinerator."
"How can we think about catastrophic events as instances that help us see those injustices? ... [After Chicago's 1995 heat wave] the city refused to hold hearings and process what went wrong. This did not become a teachable moment."
===========================
===========================
Creative Reuse in Design
sarah black, cat chow, kevin henry, lane relya, julia cosgrove
"People piece together material as information. The program is created and everything under it is just database. You don't create things with tubes of paint anymore but you program things."
"The observation that viewers bring their subjectivity to the work [when historicizing DIY culture in terms of Conceptual Art movements] is retroactively applied in an art historical context. An author can never fully determine meaning. But in DIY [what we could call] 'the viewer' participates."
"Participatory architectures on the web ("Web 2.0") are less viewer/object related than they are economies of use and sharing."
"Art/object no longer calls for a viewer. You look at operations: programming/reprogramming."
"YouTube, etc. as a virtual space is still part of the DIY culture because you still subvert the existing culture. You can chose the media you consume rather than having it handed to you."
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"Youth culture is attuned to things they can't articulate. Now, they're surrounded by stuff..."
"Now there's a kind of nostalgia for things made by hand. So the 'vintage' tshirts you find at Urban Outfitters were made in China and made vintage for you."
"A large part of our material culture is junk."
"We build too much capacity in our artifactural environment."
"One problem for reuse as a political act is that it's not sustainable because of the time it takes to collect and make materials. A new economy must emerge."
"Our next step should be to think about whether we do, in fact, need the things we use. 'Creative reuse' will become 'Creative use'"
Sunday, September 23, 2007
RE: Hey! Get on gchat, you!
i've been doing a lot of thinking lately. all this thinking has been done on my bike, as i zig zag up and down neighborhood streets from point a to point b. today i had a particularly great zig zag from roger's park all the way down to my place. as i pass through the streets i start to get a sense of all the different places that compose this city. there certainly is what you might call a "chicago character" throughout, but the differences are astounding. community centers (schools, churches, shops, cafes, parks and other such places where people congregate) are all so different. some have been transformed from one thing into another. many of the gorgeous churches in pilsen were german at their foundation and now are used for the same purpose by mexicans but i imagine in different ways. what are all the ways churches make their presence in their communities? i would ask the same question about any of the other venues i mention above, and more.
speaking of which, i'm fascinated by the total transformation of buildings. in chicago (not especially in chicago, but still, here) there are hundreds of buildings whose concrete has been stamped with dates and names. i suppose my incorrect use of "whose" would indicate that yes, in fact buildings lead fascinating lives. so even a small church that lies on the side of the highway at around 14th street south Halsted can be grossly misappropriated (in a really fantastic way) as a really awesome and intimate concert venue called the south union arts center, complete with a green and pink neon jesus (if i recall correctly) hovering above the altar/stage.
the maintenance of old traditions can be seen in certain churches. weeks ago graham and i were poking around the orthodox cathedrals in the ukranian village, when one of the old ladies who attended the church approached us, assuming we knew russian. some of the congregation filed out and we could only hear russian (or ukranian?) spoken.
ok, so here's the email i just wrote that inspired this blog entry, which contains my latest project idea. i'm endlessly inspired to do this (and have been for a very long time) so anybody who wants to participate in any way is totally welcome. note, in amazement, that tiffany did not prompt me to respond in any way. i guess i just really needed to write it somewhere... :)
here it is, thoughtlessly written:
----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: tiffunk
Date: Sep 23, 2007 8:30 PM
I'm on gchat... where are you?!
From: jodiremix
Date Sep 23, 2007 9:45 PM
haha i was watching family guy. they had a 1 hour star wars version but it was pretty lame. oh well. fg is kind of hit or miss anyway, most of the time.
i just tried to make a new myspace account for a new project i'm starting... the chicago neighborhood project! :) i've been wanting so badly to go around the city and take photos of different neighborhoods, and to do some research on their histories and how they've changed. but i'll start with the photos. i biked to humboldt park yesterday and then biked all the way up to roger's park and stayed at margeaux's. today it only took me 1 hr 15 minutes to ride all the way back from ropa (roger's park hehe). anyway as i've been riding around the city more i'm seeing all kinds of amazing buildings and other things. eventually i want to go out and interview people in the neighborhoods (how cool would it be to interview a street vendor in pilsen. really!)... i have an idea of a website: based on the map of chicago... i mean, the map would be interactive. but i don't know anything about making that kind of thing right now so i just want to get started by making a myspace page for the project and asking people to submit things like pictures of their neighborhoods or cool things they see. also, maybe people could submit "testimonials", saying something about their neighborhoods or neighborhoods they've lived in. it would also be great to have a realtime map of people's routes through the city. if you didn't read my blog entry on maps of the city, it explains what a realtime maps is (i think that's what it's called. eh.)
ok i think that's what chuck would call "diarrhea of the mouth" but in this case it would be "diarrhea of the typing fingers". ok now i just grossed myself out. talk to you soon.
love
jodi
speaking of which, i'm fascinated by the total transformation of buildings. in chicago (not especially in chicago, but still, here) there are hundreds of buildings whose concrete has been stamped with dates and names. i suppose my incorrect use of "whose" would indicate that yes, in fact buildings lead fascinating lives. so even a small church that lies on the side of the highway at around 14th street south Halsted can be grossly misappropriated (in a really fantastic way) as a really awesome and intimate concert venue called the south union arts center, complete with a green and pink neon jesus (if i recall correctly) hovering above the altar/stage.
the maintenance of old traditions can be seen in certain churches. weeks ago graham and i were poking around the orthodox cathedrals in the ukranian village, when one of the old ladies who attended the church approached us, assuming we knew russian. some of the congregation filed out and we could only hear russian (or ukranian?) spoken.
ok, so here's the email i just wrote that inspired this blog entry, which contains my latest project idea. i'm endlessly inspired to do this (and have been for a very long time) so anybody who wants to participate in any way is totally welcome. note, in amazement, that tiffany did not prompt me to respond in any way. i guess i just really needed to write it somewhere... :)
here it is, thoughtlessly written:
----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: tiffunk
Date: Sep 23, 2007 8:30 PM
I'm on gchat... where are you?!
From: jodiremix
Date Sep 23, 2007 9:45 PM
haha i was watching family guy. they had a 1 hour star wars version but it was pretty lame. oh well. fg is kind of hit or miss anyway, most of the time.
i just tried to make a new myspace account for a new project i'm starting... the chicago neighborhood project! :) i've been wanting so badly to go around the city and take photos of different neighborhoods, and to do some research on their histories and how they've changed. but i'll start with the photos. i biked to humboldt park yesterday and then biked all the way up to roger's park and stayed at margeaux's. today it only took me 1 hr 15 minutes to ride all the way back from ropa (roger's park hehe). anyway as i've been riding around the city more i'm seeing all kinds of amazing buildings and other things. eventually i want to go out and interview people in the neighborhoods (how cool would it be to interview a street vendor in pilsen. really!)... i have an idea of a website: based on the map of chicago... i mean, the map would be interactive. but i don't know anything about making that kind of thing right now so i just want to get started by making a myspace page for the project and asking people to submit things like pictures of their neighborhoods or cool things they see. also, maybe people could submit "testimonials", saying something about their neighborhoods or neighborhoods they've lived in. it would also be great to have a realtime map of people's routes through the city. if you didn't read my blog entry on maps of the city, it explains what a realtime maps is (i think that's what it's called. eh.)
ok i think that's what chuck would call "diarrhea of the mouth" but in this case it would be "diarrhea of the typing fingers". ok now i just grossed myself out. talk to you soon.
love
jodi
Sunday, September 9, 2007
project #0909
i found this amazing interactive map of baghdad on the nyt website today! this is somewhat refreshing since google earth only contains pretty tourist photos of the city.
project idea: make a similar map of chicago. considering my obsession with neighborhood churches and community art centers (soon to branch to schools) it would be interesting to trace the effect (historically and presently) those places have had on different neighborhoods.
it would be a huge undertaking. maybe i can start with sacred blood in my neighborhood or those fantastic german churches nestled everywhere in pilsen.
project idea: make a similar map of chicago. considering my obsession with neighborhood churches and community art centers (soon to branch to schools) it would be interesting to trace the effect (historically and presently) those places have had on different neighborhoods.
it would be a huge undertaking. maybe i can start with sacred blood in my neighborhood or those fantastic german churches nestled everywhere in pilsen.
Monday, August 27, 2007
Saturday, August 25, 2007
alternative routes
ever since i found out that you can customize your google maps, i have been wanting to make albums and albums full of maps. this is a quick and easy way to start to figure out my own pattern of movement through the city. if i'm smart i'll also remember to include modes of the purpose of the trip, transportation, who i'm with, and -most important- things i saw along the way (ideally pictures of them) and what i thought about them.
i just figured out which is the most-used electric outlet in my apartment by plugging my phone in to charge and recalling how often my room mate and i crouch down to that space to unplug something, plug something else in.
that might not seem relevant, but if we realize the our geographical patterns, that is, how we normally interact with our spaces, we can identify and solve problems hidden by routine. so the problem with the electrical outlet might go like this: in order to prevent the cluttering of space and the possible demise of this (and therefore the other) outlet(s), we could start using other outlets. this might, in some small way, improve our quality of life by preventing a future shortage. this could also make us think about all the ways we use our electricity, how to conserve, save money, etc.
a larger quality of life issue comes up when i start to think about mapping (and changing) the routes i take through the city. last night i went to meet tiffany for a show at the empty bottle. on the way up i rode my (new!) bike, taking the direct route up western ave. for those of you who don't live in chicago, western is a major north/south street on the west side of the city. it runs from 147th street on the south side and comes to a dead-end on howard street at the northern-most edge of chicago. i have traveled up and down western every day, on my way to work, to friends' houses, etc. countless times in the 14 months i've lived in my current apartment. city buses, semis, and cars pass by creating a constant stream of traffic noise. the sidewalks are at times covered with shattered glass (near schools, churches, and the alderman's office). people shout at you from their porches and cars. bushes of weeds creep out from their empty lots.
so i rode up western at about 10 pm last night. when i returned later, i rode east one block and turning right onto oakley, i came upon a totally different environment. an affirmation that i had made a good decision was the 4 bikers in view along the tree-lined street. i rode past residential houses on a somewhat quieter street, relieved from the western avenue traffic. i felt that for the time being the pollution in my life could be mitigated or ignored. heading southward, i became even more pleased. i passed an evangelical church, with its sculpture of the virgin, hands upward and dramatically lit. i passed what i figured to be a russian orthodox church and smiled to myself because it hadn't even occurred to me there would be one in the city. i love to appreciate the material facts of religion much as many appreciate art.
as i passed under a bridge and into the warehouse district, oakley ave lost its quiet vitality. a dark-colored car with tinted windows crept northbound about a block away, and my sense of caution heightened. i kept the driver's side of the car in my sights, cleared any danger from the car, and headed toward the intersection. i decided to turn back out to western when i came to a stop light next to another car, completely stopped in the middle of the northbound lane and surrounded by six or seven men.
back on western i passed the new low-income housing on the north side of the highway; the same guy who shouted to me on the way up shouted to me on the way back. i arrived home, wondering if there was a better way to get between my neighborhood and the northwest side of chicago.
maps are made by surveyors and city planners. these are comprehensive, birds-eye views designed to improve the infrastructure of the city. maps made for the chicago cultural center chart points of interest for any kind of tourism in the city (graveyards of chicago, public art, millennium and grant parks). some of the most exciting maps were made by cartographers as they crossed new territory.
but the best maps of all tell something about how people traverse their spaces. a project called amsterdam realtime sent citizens of amsterdam, equipped with tracking devices, to practice their everyday life in the city. the tracking devices recorded their movements. londoner christian nold's biomapping project records people's emotional responses to their surroundings in different neighborhoods all over the world. more on these later.
unfortunately google is still testing something called "My Maps" or I just need to spend more time figuring it out. so i'll have to wait to make such wonderfully complicated maps. fortunately google can provide links to maps i make. here's an added bonus, before i stop. two very long walks this week:
graham and i walked from his friend's house in the south loop to my house early this morning after a party. he had his bike, i really didn't want to take the train. we walked through the uic campus and all the way down taylor street, which reminded me of when i was a student there. i told him many stories. he told me i should be a tour guide.
on the day chicago was almost demolished by tornadoes trees and lamp-posts fell across the blue line, and i had to figure out a different way home from work. after going around the block from the train, i headed southward to harrison, then west to halsted, where i caught the harrison bus home. i watched the traffic as i walked through the slight rain without an umbrella.
footnote (1) : as i was searching frantically for the amsterdam realtime project (which was challenging because i forgot the name of the project!) i found two websites worth taking a second look at: gapminder and mapping worlds. for future review.
footnote (2) : an article about the amsterdam mapping project appeared on the website of the paris-based project interdisciplines
i just figured out which is the most-used electric outlet in my apartment by plugging my phone in to charge and recalling how often my room mate and i crouch down to that space to unplug something, plug something else in.
that might not seem relevant, but if we realize the our geographical patterns, that is, how we normally interact with our spaces, we can identify and solve problems hidden by routine. so the problem with the electrical outlet might go like this: in order to prevent the cluttering of space and the possible demise of this (and therefore the other) outlet(s), we could start using other outlets. this might, in some small way, improve our quality of life by preventing a future shortage. this could also make us think about all the ways we use our electricity, how to conserve, save money, etc.
a larger quality of life issue comes up when i start to think about mapping (and changing) the routes i take through the city. last night i went to meet tiffany for a show at the empty bottle. on the way up i rode my (new!) bike, taking the direct route up western ave. for those of you who don't live in chicago, western is a major north/south street on the west side of the city. it runs from 147th street on the south side and comes to a dead-end on howard street at the northern-most edge of chicago. i have traveled up and down western every day, on my way to work, to friends' houses, etc. countless times in the 14 months i've lived in my current apartment. city buses, semis, and cars pass by creating a constant stream of traffic noise. the sidewalks are at times covered with shattered glass (near schools, churches, and the alderman's office). people shout at you from their porches and cars. bushes of weeds creep out from their empty lots.
so i rode up western at about 10 pm last night. when i returned later, i rode east one block and turning right onto oakley, i came upon a totally different environment. an affirmation that i had made a good decision was the 4 bikers in view along the tree-lined street. i rode past residential houses on a somewhat quieter street, relieved from the western avenue traffic. i felt that for the time being the pollution in my life could be mitigated or ignored. heading southward, i became even more pleased. i passed an evangelical church, with its sculpture of the virgin, hands upward and dramatically lit. i passed what i figured to be a russian orthodox church and smiled to myself because it hadn't even occurred to me there would be one in the city. i love to appreciate the material facts of religion much as many appreciate art.
as i passed under a bridge and into the warehouse district, oakley ave lost its quiet vitality. a dark-colored car with tinted windows crept northbound about a block away, and my sense of caution heightened. i kept the driver's side of the car in my sights, cleared any danger from the car, and headed toward the intersection. i decided to turn back out to western when i came to a stop light next to another car, completely stopped in the middle of the northbound lane and surrounded by six or seven men.
back on western i passed the new low-income housing on the north side of the highway; the same guy who shouted to me on the way up shouted to me on the way back. i arrived home, wondering if there was a better way to get between my neighborhood and the northwest side of chicago.
maps are made by surveyors and city planners. these are comprehensive, birds-eye views designed to improve the infrastructure of the city. maps made for the chicago cultural center chart points of interest for any kind of tourism in the city (graveyards of chicago, public art, millennium and grant parks). some of the most exciting maps were made by cartographers as they crossed new territory.
but the best maps of all tell something about how people traverse their spaces. a project called amsterdam realtime sent citizens of amsterdam, equipped with tracking devices, to practice their everyday life in the city. the tracking devices recorded their movements. londoner christian nold's biomapping project records people's emotional responses to their surroundings in different neighborhoods all over the world. more on these later.
unfortunately google is still testing something called "My Maps" or I just need to spend more time figuring it out. so i'll have to wait to make such wonderfully complicated maps. fortunately google can provide links to maps i make. here's an added bonus, before i stop. two very long walks this week:
graham and i walked from his friend's house in the south loop to my house early this morning after a party. he had his bike, i really didn't want to take the train. we walked through the uic campus and all the way down taylor street, which reminded me of when i was a student there. i told him many stories. he told me i should be a tour guide.
on the day chicago was almost demolished by tornadoes trees and lamp-posts fell across the blue line, and i had to figure out a different way home from work. after going around the block from the train, i headed southward to harrison, then west to halsted, where i caught the harrison bus home. i watched the traffic as i walked through the slight rain without an umbrella.
footnote (1) : as i was searching frantically for the amsterdam realtime project (which was challenging because i forgot the name of the project!) i found two websites worth taking a second look at: gapminder and mapping worlds. for future review.
footnote (2) : an article about the amsterdam mapping project appeared on the website of the paris-based project interdisciplines
Saturday, August 18, 2007
lists of lists
i've been making a list of the lists i want to make
would you call that meta-listmaking?
am i simply a project creator rather than a project executor?
tiffany and mckenzie -- please tell me, was it borges or proust who made those long sensuous inventories of things?
here's the challenge: the napkin images won't behave. i'm having some photoshop genius girls come over now and help me. well i guess i should say they happen to be coming over and then can help me. they will be caught unaware. perfect.
would you call that meta-listmaking?
am i simply a project creator rather than a project executor?
- the last 10 songs i've listened to and what i was doing when i listened to them (also associations)
- a historical ethnography of western ave
- the western bus - convincing chuck that it's not full of weirdos
- places i dream of going and what i think they would be like
- journals from traveling to those places and how they turned out
- my favorite pubs in the city, ranking order, and why
- the lives of my friends (a bit tricky - privacy issues)
- poems about them
- printmaking projects
- which are linked to my desire to make architectural photographs of unlikely buildings in chicago
- something that would reflect my approach to meaningful work (projects, service, academics, etc)
- things i wish i would have done before turning 18, 21, and 25
- my dad's obsession with family genealogy
- i'm not quite as determined as i'd like to be to research the genealogy of my mother's family
- taking oral histories of my family and friends
- putting together an archive of them
- but the archive
- would live
- and not gather dust
tiffany and mckenzie -- please tell me, was it borges or proust who made those long sensuous inventories of things?
here's the challenge: the napkin images won't behave. i'm having some photoshop genius girls come over now and help me. well i guess i should say they happen to be coming over and then can help me. they will be caught unaware. perfect.
Sunday, August 12, 2007
artefacts of myself, or bar napkins
moving back into my parent's house in the middle of my college career one summer in 2002 wasn't too difficult. i had tried, struggled, and failed for two years to make an adult life for myself, moving between st. louis and chicago more times than i'd like to admit, and i was ready for a break. i had just turned twenty and settled in to complete the last two years of college. however, i couldn't resume the life i left at eighteen.
the problem: my bedroom. i had occupied it since i was twelve. the small room at the back of the house, permanently lit by a light post in the neighboring back yard, where i had spent five years transforming from a strange and shy child into an even stranger, defiant teenager, was a crypt of those years; during the two years of my absence from that childhood address on Lakehurst Street a thick layer of dust had settled on half-finished scrapbooks, Beatles CDs and posters, reports written in 10th grade, photographs printed and obsessed over in 12th grade, seashells brought from my former North Carolina home, and all the et ceteras produced from those years. i could never manage to discard any of those items save for those two or three moments of insanity where i spent a day or two going through my closet and drawers reminiscing over those things i made myself throw away. the pink curtains and sea-shell themed desk i reluctantly accepted from my mother at a younger and less confident age remained. journals abandoned after ten pages remained. the 3x5 notecard box in which i hid cigarette butts remained.
i returned to my parents' home at twenty, made a feeble attempt at reconstituting the room for myself and resigned to sleep for the next two years on the couch in the basement (which subsequently became a site of turf wars between my high-school-aged brother and i). i trumped my mother's talent for procrastination, and despite all our good intentions nothing was ever done; i could never bear (and never had the time) to file through all the stuff of my former life to choose what was worth keeping. when i moved away for graduate school my mother eventually hired a friend to tackle the room. it was strange to return on christmas vacation one year to find all of my stuff (my life, at one time) relegated to large blue tupperware tubs, and labeled jars, such as one, filled with coins and a two dollar bill labeled "her life savings?"
that which i had saved in my life thus far was taken care of ... to make way for a guest room. i am usually the guest staying in that room two or three times per year.
are my pack-rat days over? my obsession with preserving the artifacts of my past lives, picking and choosing what might some day elicit far-gone memories of my former selves comes into conflict with the space i presently wish to occupy. i learned, the year i moved to hyde park for graduate school, that i couldn't simply cart all those treatises on existentialism, those unread novels and books of poetry around with me the rest of my life. those books remained on a shelf in my small oddly-shaped room unread as the books purchased by the command of the syllabus and of my thesis research piled up on the floor, displaced by my desire to remain with past desires to know jean-paul sartre, t.s. eliot, and simone du beauvior.
i've learned that those acts of creation, those collections, those ephemera that result from my experiences can no longer be carried, in physical form, from apartment to apartment every one to two years. let's face it: since 2004 i have lived in chicago; but i have moved four times and i don't have that library i have always wished for (ah, what i would do to live alone in a two bedroom apartment!)
so i suppose, unless i become a wealthy and narcissistic archivist of myself i must learn to stop collecting. this prospect is quite frankly depressing. it doesn't deserve a second thought. i am, naturally, a collector, a cataloger, an archivist. so i create this space where i hope to store those things i value, such as the bar napkins either written on in the midst of events, moments, or conversations. i value those things as momentos.
during the past few days i have been carrying these bar napkins around with me. they will disintegrate in my purse, rattled around with everyday contact, but posted here they have the chance to become reflective pieces... whether they be lists of favorite dinosaurs, all the 50 (or 51!) United States darryl and i can try to remember, or momentos of the night when margeaux excitedly (and then reluctantly) judged a poetry slam contest. here i hope they will live and become part of a complex archive of my present. enjoy.
the problem: my bedroom. i had occupied it since i was twelve. the small room at the back of the house, permanently lit by a light post in the neighboring back yard, where i had spent five years transforming from a strange and shy child into an even stranger, defiant teenager, was a crypt of those years; during the two years of my absence from that childhood address on Lakehurst Street a thick layer of dust had settled on half-finished scrapbooks, Beatles CDs and posters, reports written in 10th grade, photographs printed and obsessed over in 12th grade, seashells brought from my former North Carolina home, and all the et ceteras produced from those years. i could never manage to discard any of those items save for those two or three moments of insanity where i spent a day or two going through my closet and drawers reminiscing over those things i made myself throw away. the pink curtains and sea-shell themed desk i reluctantly accepted from my mother at a younger and less confident age remained. journals abandoned after ten pages remained. the 3x5 notecard box in which i hid cigarette butts remained.
i returned to my parents' home at twenty, made a feeble attempt at reconstituting the room for myself and resigned to sleep for the next two years on the couch in the basement (which subsequently became a site of turf wars between my high-school-aged brother and i). i trumped my mother's talent for procrastination, and despite all our good intentions nothing was ever done; i could never bear (and never had the time) to file through all the stuff of my former life to choose what was worth keeping. when i moved away for graduate school my mother eventually hired a friend to tackle the room. it was strange to return on christmas vacation one year to find all of my stuff (my life, at one time) relegated to large blue tupperware tubs, and labeled jars, such as one, filled with coins and a two dollar bill labeled "her life savings?"
that which i had saved in my life thus far was taken care of ... to make way for a guest room. i am usually the guest staying in that room two or three times per year.
are my pack-rat days over? my obsession with preserving the artifacts of my past lives, picking and choosing what might some day elicit far-gone memories of my former selves comes into conflict with the space i presently wish to occupy. i learned, the year i moved to hyde park for graduate school, that i couldn't simply cart all those treatises on existentialism, those unread novels and books of poetry around with me the rest of my life. those books remained on a shelf in my small oddly-shaped room unread as the books purchased by the command of the syllabus and of my thesis research piled up on the floor, displaced by my desire to remain with past desires to know jean-paul sartre, t.s. eliot, and simone du beauvior.
i've learned that those acts of creation, those collections, those ephemera that result from my experiences can no longer be carried, in physical form, from apartment to apartment every one to two years. let's face it: since 2004 i have lived in chicago; but i have moved four times and i don't have that library i have always wished for (ah, what i would do to live alone in a two bedroom apartment!)
so i suppose, unless i become a wealthy and narcissistic archivist of myself i must learn to stop collecting. this prospect is quite frankly depressing. it doesn't deserve a second thought. i am, naturally, a collector, a cataloger, an archivist. so i create this space where i hope to store those things i value, such as the bar napkins either written on in the midst of events, moments, or conversations. i value those things as momentos.
during the past few days i have been carrying these bar napkins around with me. they will disintegrate in my purse, rattled around with everyday contact, but posted here they have the chance to become reflective pieces... whether they be lists of favorite dinosaurs, all the 50 (or 51!) United States darryl and i can try to remember, or momentos of the night when margeaux excitedly (and then reluctantly) judged a poetry slam contest. here i hope they will live and become part of a complex archive of my present. enjoy.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
