of course, denial is always an option
go read @ brandavenue
26.9.08
high windows
_ _ _ _ _ _
i leave you with a little poetry for the weekend. i first heard this poem when i was 19, out of a teacher that smoked a pack of non-filter cigarettes per class, making his voice deep and scruffy. i had a mad crush on him and every time i read this i get jittery and a bit ruttish. ejem.
_ _ _ _ _ _
High Windows
When I see a couple of kids
And guess he's fucking her and she's
Taking pills or wearing a diaphragm,
I know this is paradise
Everyone old has dreamed of all their lives--
Bonds and gestures pushed to one side
Like an outdated combine harvester,
And everyone young going down the long slide
To happiness, endlessly. I wonder if
Anyone looked at me, forty years back,
And thought, That'll be the life;
No God any more, or sweating in the dark
About hell and that, or having to hide
What you think of the priest. He
And his lot will all go down the long slide
Like free bloody birds. And immediately
Rather than words comes the thought of high windows:
The sun-comprehending glass,
And beyond it, the deep blue air, that shows
Nothing, and is nowhere, and is endless.
Philip Larkin (1974)
i leave you with a little poetry for the weekend. i first heard this poem when i was 19, out of a teacher that smoked a pack of non-filter cigarettes per class, making his voice deep and scruffy. i had a mad crush on him and every time i read this i get jittery and a bit ruttish. ejem.
_ _ _ _ _ _
High Windows
When I see a couple of kids
And guess he's fucking her and she's
Taking pills or wearing a diaphragm,
I know this is paradise
Everyone old has dreamed of all their lives--
Bonds and gestures pushed to one side
Like an outdated combine harvester,
And everyone young going down the long slide
To happiness, endlessly. I wonder if
Anyone looked at me, forty years back,
And thought, That'll be the life;
No God any more, or sweating in the dark
About hell and that, or having to hide
What you think of the priest. He
And his lot will all go down the long slide
Like free bloody birds. And immediately
Rather than words comes the thought of high windows:
The sun-comprehending glass,
And beyond it, the deep blue air, that shows
Nothing, and is nowhere, and is endless.
Philip Larkin (1974)
25.9.08
this is the end
_ _ _ _ _ _
1. this is the end of architecture for me. it is somehow tied to my growing out of puberty.
2. with the passing of years and events, my love of architecture has waned and i've overcome my childhood reverie of becoming an architect, for good.
3. as a kid i didn't really know what architecture was about. i just liked to build dinosaur skeletons on this really ancient 2-d computer program i had, and constantly drew megapalaces and encased cities and flying walkways and underwater capsules in notebooks. when i was like 9 or 10, i thought i had it figured out: i wanted to be an "architect by computer." computers were pretty rare in the tropics back then, and people would ask me: –what the hell is that? and i would just answer –well, i'm going to build buildings, but by computer.
4. on of the things i hate most about architecture today is the fixation on renderings; second only to future-of-architecture review boards:
5. i don't see how we can become enthralled and jolted by architecture anymore. i think architectural ideas and concepts might still hold some sort of power, but architectural practice right now seems just about as promising as investment banking.
6. architectural remains, on the contrary, will be more significant than ever, particularly as we move away from physical and visual concerns, into the abstract yet predominantly material domains of program, process and hidden meaning.
23.9.08
19.9.08
receptacle
_ _ _ _ _ _ _
this morning i woke up. i rose and shone. i put on a pair of flannel pants. i went to the kitchen and made scottish breakfeast tea. i poured the tea and drank it. i took a shower. the drain was clogged. a gooey velvety whiteness remained. i dried myself well, especially between the legs and between the toes. i rubbed my armpits with an unscented deodorant stick. i sprayed my wrists with man perfume, rubbed them against my arms and neck. i put on a pair of underwear, baggy black pants and a gray t-shirt with skinny horizontal yellow stripes running across it. i chose a pair of sneakers. i brushed my teeth with tooth-whitening paste, proceeded to floss and mouthwash. i called my boyfriend and caught him lying. i pulled the laundry off the rack and threw it into a pile somewhere. i locked the door and took the elevator. i said hi to the doorman and walked the usual fifteen minutes to the metro, spotting the usual construction workers swallowing their usual foot-long subs wrapped in tinfoil for breakfast. i smoked two cigarettes and listened to country music on the way. i thought about the beautiful persons that died over the weekend, and about the downfall of the american empire and about mexico burning with narco-anxiety attacks. everything was terribly familiar, and yet terribly different. i realized how cities are the perfect imperfect receptacle.
this morning i woke up. i rose and shone. i put on a pair of flannel pants. i went to the kitchen and made scottish breakfeast tea. i poured the tea and drank it. i took a shower. the drain was clogged. a gooey velvety whiteness remained. i dried myself well, especially between the legs and between the toes. i rubbed my armpits with an unscented deodorant stick. i sprayed my wrists with man perfume, rubbed them against my arms and neck. i put on a pair of underwear, baggy black pants and a gray t-shirt with skinny horizontal yellow stripes running across it. i chose a pair of sneakers. i brushed my teeth with tooth-whitening paste, proceeded to floss and mouthwash. i called my boyfriend and caught him lying. i pulled the laundry off the rack and threw it into a pile somewhere. i locked the door and took the elevator. i said hi to the doorman and walked the usual fifteen minutes to the metro, spotting the usual construction workers swallowing their usual foot-long subs wrapped in tinfoil for breakfast. i smoked two cigarettes and listened to country music on the way. i thought about the beautiful persons that died over the weekend, and about the downfall of the american empire and about mexico burning with narco-anxiety attacks. everything was terribly familiar, and yet terribly different. i realized how cities are the perfect imperfect receptacle.
18.9.08
we *heart* crisis
– – – – – – – – –
1. the party is over. take a look at all those little downward charts in the newspapers
2. a crisis is a threshold
3. architecture—like any other productive enterprise sustained and fed by the long lost boom—is near the low, quiet breaking point between the tipsiness of the last of the few-too-many and the start of a brutal hangover
4. hopefully we won't have to look at those tawdry glowing renderings everywhere anymore
1. the party is over. take a look at all those little downward charts in the newspapers
2. a crisis is a threshold
3. architecture—like any other productive enterprise sustained and fed by the long lost boom—is near the low, quiet breaking point between the tipsiness of the last of the few-too-many and the start of a brutal hangover
4. hopefully we won't have to look at those tawdry glowing renderings everywhere anymore
12.9.08
piles
cities as piles, composed of:
abetments
abstractions
addresses
altars
aspirations
backdoors
backlots
bad metaphors
binaries
brandings
breakouts
breaks
burning sensations
calls
categories
carcinogens
characters
climates
conflicts
crusts
days
degradations
deprivations
deviations
diapers
doubts
drivers
drives
duties
empty containers
encounters
epicenters
episodes
erotic transfer
erosions
exchanges
expansions
failures
falsifications
fetishes
frames of reference
generations
gradients
group dynamics
half-finished structures
hidden alternatives
hierarchies
hues
inflections
inequalities
inscriptions
itineraries
latencies
layers
lingerings
malfunctions
(processed) materials
(raw) materials
names
networks
parasites
peaks and valleys
pointless systematizations
power struggles
procedures
products
(chinese) products
questions
radiofrequencies
reactions
rebirths
refractions
regressions
regurgitations
reproductions
sadness
scars
scenes
scores
searches
secretions
smells
songs
squares
strategies
symbolisms
things dead
things living
things we’ve lost
things we’ve forgotten
threads
threats
totems
trials
variations on themes
visual impressions
wants
waste
plus whatever else you might want to add.
10.9.08
babylon
dash snow, untitled ("dead man"), 2006.
one of my personal highlights from the babylon: myth and truth show at the pergamon museum in berlin, along with a tiny engraving of louis XVI as the whore of babylon, blake's nebuchadnezzar, the posters from d.w. griffith's intolerance, and the early modernist portrayals of the metropolis as babel, was the dash snow series of cum-stained, glittered tabloid portratis of saddam hussein.
the show in general was hot and unorthodox, like anything you would expect from berlin.
5.9.08
wasilla
much has been said about barack obama's globalized upbringing and his sousing in chicago city politics. but what about his contender? no, i don't mean mccain. think more moose-hunting, gun-loving, hockey-mom-cum-vicepresidential-candidate. slate treats us to a lovely journey through dame sarah palin's hometown (and even sheds light on the great architectural feats of her term as mayor there). not to be missed.
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