Author: moleitau

Walking City: 21st Century Mirrorworlds remix

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Walking_remix_1

^ Comparison of YRM/Tom Carden’s  ‘Destinations’ (Detail) with Ron Herron/Archigram’s ‘Walking City’ (reversed out-of-black by me)

Congratulations to Tom Carden on getting a piece selected for the architecture section of The Royal Academy’s prestigious Summer Exhibition this past year. It’s called ‘Destinations’ and is a beautiful simulation of passenger movements through an airport terminal over a day. 

Many things notable about this: that an artifact that is a simulation of flow through architecture is included in a celebration of the aesthetics of architecture, that these complex simulations of ‘people weather’ are not only working tools of large-scale architectural practice, but also now boundary objects that communicate to wider audiences, and that as David Gelertner put in his mid-90’s book MirrorWorlds, that now we have the power to make magic mirrors of what might be, how does that inform our actions – as architects, designers and citizens.

I was fortunate to sit down and have a chat with Tom this week in London, where we talked about simulation, visualisation, cities and agency and if those sorts of fields fascinate you, too, I recommend subscribing to his blog, Random Etc.

The other thing that struck me about Tom’s image was it’s superficial resemblence to Ron Herron’s iconic Walking City – appealing, as it’s an image of that peculiar 21st century transient city: the airport and it’s inhabitants – walking…

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See also: Rodcorp’s "life in the walking city" [via Anne G. to whom I apologise for the non-ironic utopian, technological, democratic discourses I hope she keeps reading 😉 ]

Design Engaged 2004

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At Design Engaged in Amsterdam.

Had a very good morning… I’ve still to finish writing my presentation, but here’s a sneak preview of it’s lowbrow take on ubiquitous computing and embodied interaction; with apologies to Frans Hals, Paul Dourish and Richard Marks.

Rene_and_eyetoy_sml

Dan Hill is about to speak about “self-centred design”

Update: My presentation, about embodied interaction, touch-technology, RFID, NFC and semiotics: “Being in the world: the long-now of RFID” is here

Rip, Mix, Melvyn!!!: “In Our Time”, in MP3

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Dan told me that my favourite radio programme, Melvyn Bragg’s “In Our Time” is now available in MP3 format direct from the BBC. Ironically perhaps the first mp3’d programme discusses the discovery of electricity!

This is extremely good news… and great that the BBC are putting out high-quality original programming that they own the rights to, in flexible, non-DRM’d formats.

Now Dan, you just need to convince Melv and his merry band of academics to wrap their MP3’d thoughts in one of the newly launched UK CC licences, so that thousands of school multimedia projects around the country can resound with their honeyed tones…

I think I’m going to write him an email…

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UPDATE:
Just looked at the licence text on the download page, which says:

“You may not download, edit, or use this file for the purpose of promoting, advertising, endorsing or implying a connection with you (or any third party) and the BBC”

Does that mean that editing or using the file for something, like a school project, say is perfectly fine?

Plus la Massive Change…

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Massive Change: registering opinion
Originally uploaded by blackbeltjones.

… the more stuffy galleries stay the same…

I wasn’t expecting to be impressed by the Bruce Mau instigated and designed “Massive Change” exhibition, and the densely-set, impenetrable and prententious prose that decorated the first room just reinforced my preconception.

But then, pretty quickly it hit it’s stride with innovative displays of process and prototype models for Dean Kamen’s Segway and his kerb-climbing wheelchairs; and input tools for computer system of the last 30 years. Other rooms like one focussed on types of scientific imaging, and another on visualisations of the Earth were dramatically staged and rich with content.

However, the exhibition’s stated goal is that it is not about “the world of design, but the design of the world” (something touched-on here before now) – it’s job is to infect visitors with possibility and have them carry that out into the world. It is also a show that relies heaviliy on visual evidence, often densely-overlayed and spectacularly staged visual evidence, that might require some reflection from the visitor before the ideas could be taken on board.

Why is it then that Vancouver Art Museum doesn’t allow anyone to take photos of this visual evidence? I asked and was given a standard policy line.

Liz Goodman and myself then just resorted to a kind of cameraphone cat-and-mouse with the gallery attendents and trying to look like we were texting with our phones when they circled by. We were timing their passes and whispering “cover-me” by the end of our visit, like we were near completion of some imaginary “Metal-Gear Gallery” stealth-imaging game.

If the goal of the show is to instill massive change, why restrict the spread of the ideas contained within the show to within the walls of the museum?

Mau would do well to revise the next staging to allow some kodak moments for aspiring design activists.

They Misrule

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Halloween samba band in a highschool
Originally uploaded by blackbeltjones.

Just got back to Finland from a really fantastic few days in Vancouver, where we co-hosted with LudiCorp a small little gathering to examine ‘play’ and all it’s many facets.

Lots of diverse views and lots to digest, but for now I’ll point you to Greg Costikyan’s excellent essay “Games: The Cultural Elaboration of Play” (permalink not working, sorry), which he expounded upon at the event.

This of course coincided with Halloween, and so my favourite type of play, i.e. misrule!

We saw an event run by a Vancouver organisation “Public Dreams” called The Parade of Lost Souls which was a fantastic experience of Sutton-Smith‘s “Play as communal identity” as well as a giant riot of fireworks and fun, followed by an excellent samba / big-band in the local high-school gym, where I’ll hand the reporting over to Justin.