amy caterina: this used to be real estate...

yesterday (after the earthquake) i visited the grand central art center project room in santa ana to see amy caterina's installation: "this used to be real estate, now it's only fields and trees." the entire environment is knitted, including the ground, in shades of nature... and there is a projected cloud-scape sky with an ocassional bird flying through. there are sounds of nature chirping through-out. i love how her concept brought nature into an unnatural setting. her web site is freerangeknitting.com for more information. below are some pics...



viewers are allowed to walk in the environment after putting on surgical shoe coverings.








freerangeknitting.com

ralph caplan: thank you for not smoking

i stumbled upon this interestingly funny article about signage.


"When CBS headquarters in New York was being built, design director Lou Dorfsman’s what-to-do-in-case-of-a-fire sign was rejected by the Fire Commission because the type was too small to meet specifications. Dorfsman retaliated by designing a sign that did satisfy all the Commission’s criteria for height and width, but that he had shrewdly rendered illegible—his point being that Gradgrindian measurements did not in themselves guarantee the desired result."

check it out here.

look mom, i'm in grad school.

the 'redefining the call box' project (lookforsigns.org) is coming along well. when i return from hawaii in a couple weeks, i will have a month of summer left to tackle 2 more projects: olympictograms.com (coming soon: hopefully right around the olympics 8/8/08), and a proposal for the 'relax' project. and before i know it, fall 2008 will be here. stick around...

politics are hot.

even in the design world. steven heller proposed, "Since Mr. Obama promotes himself as the candidate of change, maybe he should start wearing a different kind of lapel pin that signals his patriotism as well as other values he wants to communicate. To provide him with options, I asked some illustrators and designers to suggest alternatives..."

check out some responses...
{click - nytimes.com}

LOOKFORSIGNS.ORG

see what happens when i get a weekend of relaxation and no homework. i start devising strange plans and creating artist organizations. kristy and i had this idea running as we drove the mountain roads last weekend. i think it's a pretty cool concept, i just don't know where it will go. i'm getting into it more and more each day and i'm beginning to believe i can think this entire project all the way through.

stay posted at http://www.lookforsigns.org and watch the ideas unfold... if the call box idea doesn't fly, i know i have more "sign" related concepts up my sleeve. but, i feel the Redefined Call Box is a pretty sweet start.



don't miss it.

pull.

in light of the design for the world proposal, i stumbled upon this last weekend outside the cabin we rented in lake arrowhead. (prev. post)

things like this make me happy.

(to see the previous post regarding the proposal, click here.)

480T final. summer school has ended.

our final presentation was on Wed, Jul 2 and it went extremely well. i didn't sleep the three days leading to it, but in the end, i'm very pleased with the outcome. i have to give it up for the awesome group that i was in. and all the hours were paid for with a little r&r last weekend in lake arrowhead.

along with the final presentation on Mary Kelly, i also had my final paper due. it too, was on Mary Kelly, titled, "Influences: A Choice or Not. Thoughts after a thirty-day study of Mary Kelly." the pdf is attached here.

i'll somehow try to configure the final presentation to upload onto youtube so i can share it here. it's approximately 30 mins. i did all the music for it and jessica ku created the animated flash for it. it takes a peek into some of Mary Kelly's most famous works.

and now the real summer is here — until august 25, when the fall semester begins. in the meantime, i have a couple extra-curricular projects going on that i will keep updated on this blog.