Janet Reno dances for no man!

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Indecision 2004 - Dance Party
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With the upcoming presidential campaign all over the news, I've enjoyed watching completely non relevant political satrire from 2004. Watching the Indecision 2004 DVD never gets old. Highlights include Steven Colbert interviews at the conventions before anyone knew who he was and Rob Cordry's hometown tour of Boston.

Take Note

Since giving up designing couture in Paris, Christian Lacroix is apparently moving into the world of notebook design. This is great news for those of us who love his design but only have the budget for $12 purchases rather than $12,000.

Ronchamp Redux

 Renzo Piano's convent for the Poor Clares. Photo by Michel Denance    

La Chapelle de Notre Dame du Haut Ronchamp by Le Corbusier. Photograph: Alamy

An interesting read about the addition of a convent and visitors center to the hill where Le Corbusier's famous chapel sits in Ronchamp.

His and Hers

Trevor Tondro for The New York Times

I love this slideshow of two brightly painted cottages. It makes me long for a nice warm summer day.

Don't hold your breath

The Weather Project at the Tate Modern (Photo by Slynnal)

Sad to discover that the London Olympic organizing committee has rejected the proposal by Olafur Eliasson. The summer before my second year of grad school Cameron and I drove up to San Francisco to see a retrospective of his work at the SFMOMA. The show was amazing and it sounds cheesy but it got me excited about making art again after the lazy days of the summer.

Homespun religion

House at Sutton Coldfield by Ernest Newton. Before 1899

"Belief in the sacredness of home-life is still left to us, and is itself a religion, pure and easy to believe. It requires no elaborate creeds, its worship is the simplest, its discipline the gentlest and its rewards are peace and contentment."
-Ernest Newton, 1891

I found this quote while reading FLW's biography and it gave me pause. While I agree with the sentiment, ideally home life should be one of peace and contentment, it was most certainly written by a man who has never done laundry or scrubbed a floor in his life, hence his belief that this peace comes about simply and gently.

Words of Wisdom

Reading the quote from Nan Goldin in my previous post reminded me of some interesting advice Jeffrey Vallance gave to me and my fellow UCSB MFA students during class one day. Someone asked him a question along the lines of "How do you make it as an artist financially?" He replied in all thoughtful seriousness that we would simply have to get a lot of credit cards and max them out. I remember sitting there stunned to be hearing such a suggestion. Anywho one google search later and I discover that Jeffery was on Letterman and also hosted a show on MTV in the 80's, bizzaro.

Thanks Nan

Nan Goldin's 'Top Tip' for aspiring photographers:

Don't do it. There are way too many photographers. Try to draw or get politically involved in something that matters. And unless you need to make art to stay alive, you shouldn't be making art.

Mr. Conductor

Everyone's favorite vice president of programming and microwave oven technology at the sheinhardt wig company has a side gig as a radio talk show host, who knew? I just listened to his interview with Lorne Michaels which was pretty interesting. All I knew of Lorne were from his brief appearances on SNL as the stern boss in various sketches, so it was interesting to see how unbosslike he seemed in the interview.

It means business

Here's a post to shake things up a bit. I tend to blog about my love of architecture, art, food, clothes, etc. however I've also developed into a huge fan of Bloomberg Businessweek, bizarre no? Cameron started getting the magazine about a year ago for free with some extra airline miles and I was always really impressed with the cover art each month and eventually I cracked one open and had a read. I know basically nothing about business but I found the articles really engaging, concise and also fairly balanced in their analysis (a nice contrast to the Atlantic which always seems like it has a major ax to grind).

Mr Qiang

Cameron at MassMOCA

The sign of a true friend, someone who is willing to let you do this to them 30 times.

 I saw Cai Guo-Qiang's work for the first time at MassMOCA and was really awed by his representation of narratives unfolding in three dimensions. Seeing his show was the genesis for a project of mine where I created a cast of the wonderful Sarah Hilton everyday for one month and then displayed the molds in a calendar format.  I also had the interesting experience of calling Mr. Qiang's workshop to inquire about pricing for his work. I was taking a museum studies course and our final project involved selecting a work under $5000 and creating a proposal for the museum to purchase it. My first thought was to see if there were any small gun powder drawings in that price range. The woman I spoke to in his studio was very kind, though she made it quite clear that his work was well out of the $5000 range and I felt a little silly for not realizing this to begin with.

Cai Guo-Qiang: Sky Ladder on Nowness.com.

Just put on your sneaker and go

I ran four miles this morning in the snow (when will it end!) and I felt great for the whole run which really took me by surprise. Watching this video makes me want to actually try and keep running (not that I have an delusions about becoming fast mind you) beyond the point where I loose the baby weight and have tended to settle back into a no exercise routine.

Señor Macho Solo

In honor of Jack White's upcoming solo album here is an interview with him from a few years ago. I found out about the White Stripes in probably the most uncool way possible, by listening to NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross. Gross was interviewing Loretta Lynn about her album Van Leer Rose, which Jack produced and sang on. I went out and bought the album, my first country album i believe, and I really loved it.  Anywho I was intrigued about why the lead singer of a Detroit rock band would go produce an album for an older country singer, so I bought my first White Stripes album, Elephant and have been a fan ever since. And as a final random aside I just found out that the female motocross championship is called the Loretta Lynn and is held on a track on her property, pretty awesome.

Safer Art

To begin I'm typing this as I sit here writhing in pain because I decided to reward myself with a cookie after a run and my stomach isn't thrilled with the choice, so I'll make this short and sweet. Here's a 60 minutes segment from Art Basel, which highlights art sales to the 1%. Alas we are strictly in the 99% here in Spokane (why Russian billionaires don't vacation here is beyond me) and the art market remains soft to say the least.

Night of many quotes

My favorite quote from church today came from Henry Eyring's talk about facing tragedy, I was really moved when he said that we never need to feel alone or unloved when we are in the Lord's service (ie serving our fellow men) because we never are.

And on a totally different note I love this quote from a talk that Dries Van Noten gave at the French Institute Alliance Française last night.  He said, “I’m more inspired by things which I don’t like ... nothing is so boring as something beautiful. I prefer ugly things, I prefer things which are surprising ... You force yourself to ask yourself questions. Quite often I make a collection and I say, ‘Here’s a color I really don’t like.’ ... My assistants will say 'Okay, you don’t like lilac,' [that means] this season will be lilac. It’s like you see a color, and you think, Why don’t I like this color? Maybe the composition is wrong, maybe the lighting is wrong — it would be beautiful in silk, but not the synthetic fabric ... That for me is the fun."

Girl walks into a highschool

My favorite adolescent male from Freaks and Geeks

Last night at 11pm while muffling my laughs as I read Rachel Dratch's new book I was reminded of several priceless moments of adolescent embarrassment at good ol' Provo High School so I thought I'd share. Rachel told a funny/sad story of how she rudely blew off a really great guy in high school and has regretted it ever since. I could completely relate to her plight of not understanding the male species as a teenager. Being raised by a single mom who shared my love of BBC dramas, all I knew of men took place in old castles, Italian countrysides (ah, I can hear the Puccini now!) and scenes of dashing young men on horseback, all of this unfortunately had zero relevance to striking up a conversation with a teenage boy in Provo, UT. Thus I basically avoided talking to boys for most of my high school life, even when I accompanied them to dances I still managed to say next to nothing, quite a feat!
Some really cherished memories that came back to me last night include the time I saw a guy who was a few years older than I and one of the 'popular' kids come up to me after a volleyball game with his hand up for a high five. I was shocked and flattered so I reached up and intercepted a high five between him and my older much cuter volleyball teammate, awesome. Also the time I walked down the empty hall between classes and seeing another popular older guy (why was it always these guys!) walking toward me I began having that internal panic trying to decide if I should I say hello and act like a normal person or just avoid eye contact and hope he doesn't notice that I exist. Well that nice young man actually did say hi to me and I proceeded to croak out some bizarre sound in response as I apparently hadn't spoken in a while and had a frog in my throat, and he laughed the whole way down the hall, good times.
I'm actually thankful for my awkwardness in retrospect as it kept me from the dramas of the teenage dating scene (I'm praying all my teenagers experience similar teenage awkwardness so I can avoid it as a parent as well) and has provided me with a good laugh ten years later.

Dream Houzz

modern kids design by new york architect CWB Architects

Looking to waste hours of your day compiling images of beautiful homes that will never be yours? Me too! Start scrolling through images at the Houzz website and time will magically float away. Be sure to refine your search based on your style preferences because some of the stuff on the main photo page was definitely not my taste. It was also interesting to see what interior designers interpret as 'modern' design. I loved the simplicity of the kids room above, with great light and small details like the square window to look out from the bed.

August Photos

Secretary at West German Radio in Cologne, 1931 

While reading an article about the photographer Gillian Wearing, I found a link to this great slide show of images from August Sander's series People of the 20th Century.

Nice Legs

My wire mesh leg project photographed by Erin Brown.

I'll always have a soft spot for art involving women's legs, as that was the subject of my first non assignment based art project in college. Thus I enjoyed reading an article about Larry River's mixed media piece titled 'Legs' and the problems that can arise when you place art outside and your neighbors don't like it.

could you be serious

My mom has been in town and I've been entertained to the point where I haven't spent hours staring at the computer screen each day which is great for me but bad for the blog. I'm always in need of a good laugh, especially after reading the nytimes (I feel ill whenever I read about the Trayvon Martin case), so it's off to Hulu for a nice five minute clip of SNL. The only lady on SNL that you hear about lately is Kristen Wigg, but in my opinion Nasim Pedrad is hilarious in most every skit she's in. Enjoy this Arianna Huffington impression and stick it out to the end for a great joke about Newt.

L Studio

I stumbled upon this website where they have short interviews with artists and other random content (an interview show with Diablo Cody set in her trailer?). The website is sponsored by Lexus who is clearly trying to make us believe they are innovative by association, but since I can't afford a Lexus I don't find the blatant marketing efforts too distracting. Anywho here's a short and sweet interview with one of my favorite architects Shigeru Ban.

Who are the best

Last night Cameron and I finally finished Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who on Netflix. The documentary  had great interviews with Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend. I thought it was interesting to see the evolution of the band, how these rock stars dealt with aging and what they did when their best work was behind them. I was also amazed at how many famous songs Pete wrote which are now such a part of pop culture from their use in movies and commercials. And finally the footage of Keith Moon is crazy, including pastimes such as dressing up like a pirate and running down the beach in Malibu.

Art of Letters

Nobody is a Critic

I'd even take a nice talk with Sister Wendy.

I was reading an article in the guardian about Damien Hirst's upcoming show at the Tate and it referred to another review succinctly titled, "Are Hirst's paintings any good? No, they're not worth looking at". Reading this  bit of scathing artistic criticism made me long for some critical dialogue about my work. I certainly don't want to be told my work is that of an unpromising first year art student, but I miss having a group of artists around to bounce ideas off of. Luckily I've had Emily to discuss things with from time to time, she has been such a great friend and collaborator and will be greatly missed when I head back east this summer.

Ciao Ragazzi

A quick shout out to my favorite architecture professor Filippo, who had a feature in Dwell magazine this month. He renovated this beautiful old farm house in northern Italy. The home is such an impressively seamless blend of the past and present.

illuminated manuscript

My wonderful friend Emily had me over for a birthday dinner last week and gave me the newest edition of Michael Pollen's Food Rules book. This edition was a collaboration with the painter maira kalman and it was such a pleasure to read that it led me to wonder why more authors don't collaborate with artists.

The House that Lawrence Built

I just had a look at this slideshow of photographs from the home of conceptual artist Lawrence Weiner. Seeing his photograph brought me back to my senior year at Wellesley, where Mr. Weiner came to campus for week as a visiting artist. Before he gave the standard artist lecture he had agreed to meet up for coffee with one of the 300 level art classes that I was taking at the time. It was one of the most awkward half hours of my life. There were about four of us sitting around a table with him and I don't remember any of us asking him a single question. Truthfully I didn't have any idea who he was and it hadn't occurred to me to google him or actually check out a book from the art library. As painful as it was at the time, I kind of like looking back and always having that memory of the odd 30 minutes I spent with Lawrence Weiner.

Crazy Pants

After sitting alone in the living room and watching 2 hours of 30 Rock my mind became hazy and I bought these pants online. 

 The idea was that I'd somehow look a little cooler like this lady for example.

 But my nagging suspicion is that wearing these pants and lugging around my kids will make me look like this lady, someone who decided to wear my funky pajama pants out for the day because I'm too exhausted to care.

Color Coated

I love the colors at the Stella McCartney show. Brown tweed looks so youthful with bright pink pants and the combination of blue, black and white looks vibrant and strong. Also I love that she showed pants and coats in this collection that have a nice unassuming, casual quality to them.

The Art You Cannot Avoid

The most random of the pictures Cameron took of me for my written masters thesis, which focused on the analysis of architecture and the human scale in my artwork.

I just read this great opinion article in the nytimes about the need for architectural criticism. The author highlights the indecipherability of much of the academic architectural criticism. Reading this brought me back to my days of trying to plow through the reading for grad school architectural history courses and feeling that I was comprehending about a tenth of what was written. The author also discusses the importance of being able to truly express the experience of being in a space, with all its subtly and nuance in writing about architecture. This took me to happier memories of one architectural design course which required sitting in a piazza for hours on end to analyze the flow of traffic and see how people interacted with the space, or my first design class at MIT where the professor took us to the engineering library and had us knocking on the walls to gain a better understanding of the tactile nature of the building materials. Alrighty enough nostaliga for now, long story short, the article is worth a read.

Blank File

In the late 90's there was a little show called 'Fashion File' on the style network, hosted by Tim Blanks (randomly google has informed me that it was a big hit in Canada). I remember the network had the oddest programming and seemed to basically just run a lot of reruns of shows from other networks. Fashion File was definitely the diamond in the ruff. It was on at the oddest hours so I was always overjoyed when I was able to catch an episode. So much of television's coverage of fashion is celebrity based and super cheesy, with Fashion File being the notable exception (and Style with Elsa Klensch on CNN). Tim Blanks is a great journalist and just happens to report on fashion. Today while I was browsing Hulu after putting the boys to bed I stumbled upon a great series of designer documentary's produced by the Fashion File team about 10 years ago. The interview with Alexander McQueen was so interesting to see in light of how his style evolved over the next ten years and his untimely death. Definitely worth a watch.

el sistema

It's amazing to watch these young kids play.

Simply Cool

 

I like the simplicity of the silhouette in these Dries Van Noten dresses contrasted with the use of the prints. The prints have a cut and paste feel to them that seems perfectly contemporary even thought the prints themselves have specific historical or cultural references.

Sze Venice

Sarah Sze, Still Life with Landscape (Model for a Habitat), 2011, stainless steel, wood, overall dimensions: 9 x 22 x 21 ft

I can't wait to see what Sarah Sze comes up with for this years Venice Biennale. The experience of walking through that city is so much about discovery. I visited Venice three times during my semester in Italy and since I was constantly getting lost in the city, there was always something new around every corner. I love the intricacy and fragility of Sarah Sze's work, it's a perfect fit for the city of Venice.

The Classic Shoe

In junior high I thought I was quite the style maven because I had a pair of black and white brogues from the Delia's catalog (nothing beats getting a catalog in the mail when you're thirteen). It was during the period of the nineties when there were all those retro zoot suit wearing bands and schools had swing dancing clubs. Well today I discovered the much cooler (and richer) older sister to my Delia's shoes, Church's Burwood Leather Brogues, which look like the classiest shoe around. Since so few people dress up these days (myself included) it also feels a bit rebellious to wear such formal looking shoes in your day to day life.

Special K

Mary Katrantzou's designs remind me of three dimensional op art. The level of detailing in her prints is really impressive and the prints all relate to the body in such interesting ways. I also love the surprises that arise upon closer inspection, who knew spoons could look so chic. Basically I love them all and am willing to date a Russian oligarch on the side if that will get me one of these beautiful dresses.

Ah, Mortality

I happened to read an article about caring for aging parents last week in the Atlantic, and this week I picked up Loosing Mum and Pup, Christopher Buckley's memoir about his parents in their last years of life. In the article, the author's relationship with her father was extremely conflicting. In some respects she was harsh,  as she made it clear she considered him to be a large expensive burden and couldn't wait until he passed away, yet she was also an enabler and seemed to acquiesce to his every bizarre whim and financial request.
Christopher Buckley's memoir was a much more interesting read as his  parents were more fully fleshed out in the book and his relationship with them thought complicated was ultimately one of love and admiration. It was interesting to read about the shifts in the parent child relationship through the years, culminating in the child's responsibility for deciding the final resting place of the parent. Taking care of an aging parent isn't something I'd given much thought to prior to reading these so I found myself examining my own parental relationships and thinking about how I might act in similar situations.

Mr Lucas

Halibut Jackson

I've been so dismayed by the lack of decent books for young children. About fifty percent of the books we find for the boys at the library have lame illustrations, text or both. Because of this I'm always overjoyed when we find a book that is engaging for the boys and not maddening for me to read.
I really love David Lucas's illustrations. We got his book 'Halibut Jackson' at the library sale and I thought it must have been about 40 years old since the illustrations reminded me of Andy Warhols early drawings from when he was a fashion illustrator. As it turns out the book was published eight years ago and he has about a dozen other books that I'd love to check out for the boys.

Cindy Sherman Work Out

Here's an excerpt that I liked from the NYTimes article about Cindy Sherman and her upcoming retrospective at MOMA. 
"She works alone in her commodious floor-through studio that houses her costumes, props and equipment. Women’s wigs dot window sills, and there are shelves of wax doll’s heads and body parts from medical mannequins. It is here that she becomes the subject, the photographer, the director, the makeup artist and the costume stylist. “Whenever I tried to hire people or use friends or family, even if I paid them, I felt like I had to entertain them,” she said. “When I’m working alone, I can push myself. And I don’t complain.”

Light and Dark

I just read Lillian Bassmans obit and looked through this slideshow of her photography. I love the way she highlights the shapes of the clothes using high contrasts.

"joy is not necessarily stupid"

 Here is a great little interview with museum architect extraordinaire Renzo Piano. He just finished up the addition to the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston and I can't wait to check it out myself someday. While studying architecture during my junior year abroad in Florence I discovered Mr. Piano's work and was completely enthralled. His designs encompass everything I loved about the architecture in Italy. They flawlessly connect to the past while being completely contemporary, the experience of being in the space is so thoughtfully considered and beauty is completely tied to functionality.

Here is his recent addition to the LACMA which during my visit I found much more compelling than  some of the art inside. 

Italian Envy

John Cuneo

It's official, everything is better in Italy. The architecture, the cheese, the clothes and now the Big Mac. I've never eaten a Big Mac, the thought of eating some secret sauce is troubling to me, what are they trying to hide. But after reading this article in the Atlantic I may give the Vivace Big Mac a try the next time I'm in Rome.

The Pitt

THAN HTAY MAUNG 
My Offering, 2011

It looks like we'll be moving out to PA this summer for school. Should we end up in Pittsburgh I can't wait to check out The Mattress Factory. An entire museum devoted to installation art, I'm in heaven just thinking about it.

Style File

Look 3

Look 11

Look 16

In honor of the start of New York fashion week, here are a few outfits that I loved from the Celine 2012 Resort collection. Each of these have a great bold minimalist feel with unexpected details. The long shirt peaking out from the slit in the 3rd look and the tucked in double breasted shirt from the 11th look. And finally I love the coat from the 16th look, since it reminds me of an Anni Albers textile.

 I used to feel a little weird looking at Style.com every week since everything in my closet definitely falls into the functional category (I'm talking to you maternity jeans). But I've decided it's just like looking at things in an art gallery, since no one actually buys things from galleries, right? Well at least not any I've shown work in. So I can just appreciate these images comfortable in the knowledge that I will never cross paths with the twenty people who actually have these rarefied  items in their homes.