Cultivating Meaning and Space

I almost forgot about research methods research pseudo-paper which actually came due before the structures class.  The topic I chose/ended up with suited me well.  At first it started out as a discovery mission to find out how landscape architecture is addressing more than just the visual.  In the end, I used a series of articles published in Landscape Journal about gardens and meaning to look at 4 different types of work, how these all potentially create meaning through a variety of purpose and medium.

The research itself was good for me as it reminded me to look at works as more than just pretty pictures, that there are levels of success and that there are many different approaches to landscape architecture.  I think I actually came to some sort of epiphany when I forced myself to define “landscape,” realizing that landscape architecture is more about people than nature; it is about the relationship between people and space and to each other.  One of my favorite quotes from the research was this from Lucy Lippard:

“each time we enter a new place, we become one of the ingredients of an existing hybridity…  By entering that hybrid, we change it; and in each situation we may play a different role.”

One of my main purposes in this was to really think about how landscape design can be more than just icing, how we can create spaces that become a sort of poetry.  From the intro pages…

“In the Anthropology of Senses and Sensations, Jack Goody says that the five basic senses are our window on the world.  Through senses we acquire information and our experience of the world is mediated by the senses.  As we know from physics, the world from which we obtain sensory information is very different from the world as we experience it.  The “picture” our brain creates is limited by the range of stimuli to which our senses are attuned.  Unlike language, landscapes can be designed to appeal to all five senses.  A user must interpret these sensations and depending on the stimuli we are attuned, the meaning or significance varies.” 

 

The four works I looked at were Nancy Holt’s Sun Tunnels, Nadim Karam’s Urban Toys, Latz and Partner’s Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord, and Kathryn Gustafson and Leni Schwendinger’s Dreaming in Color at McCaw Hall.

“The four works have little in common, but they all utilize sensory input to convey meaning between users and designers.  Each can be read at multiple levels, ranging from very simple to the more complex which is fed by interrelated action of the senses and previous experience.  These works offer opportunities to negotiate and renegotiate human relationships and communicate these relationships.”

 

 

And yet again another project that only gets about half way finished.  I guess that was the purpose of this class though… to set up the potential for something to do later.  Procrastinator’s unite! …tomorrow.

 

 

 

 

 

Structures: The Wandering Wall

After the studio project was completed (which means that we actually still have a book to complete – of course, I say “we” as if anyone else is actually even thinking about it), the next thing that came up was the structures final project.  I have to say that this project was fun and after the trials of the studio project – very welcomed.  It’s really too bad that we couldn’t devote more time to it (it was only a lowly undergrad class) as thinking about materials, how to get them to work for what you’re trying to accomplish and the various ways they can be used is just stimulating.

Anyway, so the wall was a continuation of the balloon project from previous.  It was made out of around 200 mylar balloons filled with helium (a few with plain air).  It was 80 ft long and 6ish feet tall.  It moved, it waved, it danced… it flew.  Awesome.

 

Procrastination by Reassessment

http://crippledcowstudio.wordpress.com/

The studio project…  well, it’s finished.  That’s at least something.  I think that it was successful in its purpose, which was more about process than about the actual event.  Off the top of my head, things that could/should have been done differently:

1.  altars should have been lit…  without them as a visual aid, the flow wasn’t right.  it would have provided additional interest in another place on the site.

2.  the project should have been set up entirely at least 2 days beforehand to allow for adjustments.  This was difficult for sure since we not only had to contend with site conditions such as dew and rain, but also the routines between the buidlings which have to occur for the students who work there.  We tried to get things set up, but it seems there wasn’t enough push to get people motivated.  I really don’t know how to address this other than the hope that experience will demand consideration for any future project.

3.  Diagrams and sketches.  Even though we had a lot, they needed to be updated and used during the setup.  If they had been available for people, then perhaps things could have been set up better, faster, without as much questioning?? 

4.  The circulation needed to be adjusted/addressed better – perhaps a simple change of time on the invitation would have done the trick.

5.  Because the visual and auditory are linked, the sound has to be set up with the visuals – therefore the visuals have to be set up then the sounds adjusted around them to fit.  This goes back to number 2 which said that the whole thing needed to be set up way ahead of time.

To be perfectly honest, I feel as though I learned quite a bit but I’m not sure how much the class did.  It feels at times that most people were just in it to get it over with and that they could care less about thinking about any future project that it might relate to.  The prospect of having to do another project like this or even any group work at all is daunting and exhausting.  I would actually prefer to see it fail miserably next time than to take the role of cat herder again.

So on to other things… 

Research presentation, structures final, wall final, STW presentation, plants presentation, hybrids presentation….  sleep.

Interference Principle and Carnatic Music

Using pieces of the antipodal mapping and thinking about how we are going to be transforming the site through projections, sound and story, I decided to use the idea of carnatic music and the interference principle to explore how to create a surrealist space.  To mention some things that have influenced my thoughts, I’ve been reading Urban Toys which is a book put out by Nadim Karam about his sculptural works which create these back stories and also been looking at the video work of Diana Thater, Krzyszstof Wodiczko, Janet Biggs and Dawn Dedeaux.  These have all had considerable influence on the development of my thought processes.

Surrealism – stressing the subconscious or nonrational significance of imagery arrived at by automatism or exploitation of chance effects, unexpected juxtapositions.

Our backstory of the site (which for super secret reasons I cannot post here) is based upon this idea of a real history, an imagined past set of events and present conditions culminating into this new space.  It is about layering these elements to create something that is a little skewed, a little wild.  Drawing upon this, I thought that the interference principle was a nice term to use where the addition of 2 or more elements creates a new waveform – the butterfly effect.  It is this “interference” that we are highlighting and using to create the space.

   

Carnatic music is one of the oldest (if not the oldest) forms of music in existence.  There are a few different takes on the etymology of the word which is now used solely as a location description of the area in Southern India.  Karnataka – Kanatak – Karnatik – Carnatic:  karna = ear, atati = he pleases  “that which pleases the ear” or kar = black, nadu = country or land “black soil” or karu = elevated, nadu = land “elevated (divine) land”.  The latin spelling from carnaticus = “pertaining to the flesh”.  It is said that carnatic music is of divine origin with connection to and immitation of sounds made by animals and birds.  The main emphasis is on vocalization and when instruments are incorporated they are meant to be played in a singing style.  Carnatic singers keep the beat by moving their hands up and down in a specified pattern, using their fingers to keep time.  It is notated by tonic solfa, kind of like Western music however the seven swaras (notes) correspond to chakras, animal spirits and the cycle of life and death.  There are two basic elements:  raga, or melodic formulae, and tala, or rhythmic cycles.

I have to make clear as well that, since I have reformatted my machine, my video editing software is acting up so these are all very rudimentary – windows movie maker at its finest!  They’re basically just sketches anyway, so enh.

 

Having previously documented the various sounds around the site, I took these into some ideas about how they can be reinterpretted through visuals and composition.  I also looked at the hand mudras associated with carnatic music, developing them into a more symbolic look which when cycled through kind of give this impression of motion and look a bit like animal representations.

To bring it all together, I have used this idea of rhythm, cycling and connection.  The rhythm and cycling are based on the carnatic music explorations obviously, but also from the initial sound explorations.  The connection part comes first from my documentation of physical “connectors” and then from this idea that we are layering these realities, histories into some sort of new interpretation.

After the “pin up” today, I am pretty excited that our ideas are really forming this nice whole.  No matter what KBen’s interpretation of whatever he chooses to listen to, our story is solid and the plans are coming together nicely.  The most immediate questions (other than how the hell are we going to do this in a month?)  are how to script the journey through the site without making the audience feel railroaded into some sort of museum tour and how to create participation elements, interactive spaces?  How do we navigate this sort of treacherous site?  How many yards of fabric are we going to need?

One thing I need to remember is that as a group project we are all playing roles – we don’t each have to do everything.  And I think I’m an idea person, a stimulus, the “ground-breaker” as the birthday book calls me.

Oh, and the lemur project…  heh.

Tribute to Messy Ecosystems

Thought I would put a pic up of the model for Frank’s class.  I don’t know why, but my models for his classes always come out very nice.  Fairly normal, but nice.  We’re working on designs for the new courtyard area at hilltop.  We’re in the modernist phase, so I was working toward a cubist design after my favorite Kandinsky.  I used one of his paintings to think about program and spatial areas.  And I used one of his markings based on Lotte Jacobi’s dance pictures (no credit given in the book, thank you very much) for the circulation.  I would like the design to mimic the dance…  using echoes of the elements and sweeping motions.  I’m using a mixture of prairie grasses – swishing and blowing in the breeze – to fill out the plant palette.  I think that the design will be pretty decent in the end.  I really like this class and it actually feels like we’re learning something. 

 

And a veggie burger stain, reinterpretted…  I may use this for rendering inspiration.

Hopefully I will get a lot accomplished on the swamp situation over the next week.  Who knows… maybe I’ll even clean my computer!

Overintense fantasy

 

I think I just got into the studio project.  First I decided to watch the Pervert’s Guide to Cinema (which is part of class, not some random thing I picked out) while working on my planting design.  It was actually pretty good and I stopped it before it was over so I can take it home and really watch it.

Some quotes that I think I should remember…

“events on the screen threaten to overthrow and grab us, the spectator.  The fantasy space gets too intense and reaches out toward us so that we lose ourself.”

“is it the brutal real that disturbs us or is it our fantasy?”

“we escape into a dream to avoid a dead look into our real life but then what we encounter in the dream is even more horrible so at the end we escape from the dream back into reality.”

“[it begins] dreams are for those who are not strong enough, who cannot endure reality and ends with reality is for those who are not strong enough to endure, to confront their dreams.”

the uncanny = where the fantasy space is already disintegrating but we are not yet back to reality

“Flowers should be forbidden from children.”

“The male fantasy can never catch up to the female fantasy.”

That was a lot, but I’m sure there are more when I’m actually paying attention.

Second bit of ah-ha space.  I figured I should try to do some of the digging about the site and after quite a bit of tangled research by using antipodal mapping (is that what it’s called?) I found that our site is actually linked to Atlantis.  Wow.  It doesn’t sound as good when I say it like that…  let’s try again.  Our site, located at 30d24′40.29″N 91d10′48.16″W is directly antipodal to 30d24′40.29″S 88d49′11.84″E which is right at the convergence of the African, Indian and Antarctic crustal plates on the mid oceanic ridge.  This is also said to be where “Kumari Kandam” or “Lemuria”, ancient land of paradise, sunk into the seas…  I believe that Nicole’s psychic abilities were active when she put up her comic last year…  “we’re lemurs!  LEMURS!”

 

In other news, I’m looking into Night Gardens for plant design and I’m really excited about the new shampoo I splurged on today.  No word on the rest of that list…  I’ll try again tomorrow.

Whirlwind week

Whew.  Glad this week is over. Actually I think it may have been two weeks, but who’s counting?  Let’s see here… what’s been happening?  I’ll go backwards.

Yesterday was the studio exhibition.  I have to say that it was awesome.  Finally a group project that seemed to just work.  There was not much fighting which I contribute to our excellent class of head-strong yet pensive peeps.  Everything looked beautiful and we even had a visit from the dean…  I don’t really know about the response to the projects, whether they were understandable or not.  Honestly, I just wasn’t into mine that much – more interested in the hybrids class.  But I was really glad to see that some people in our class, who haven’t been really excited about projects recently, get into this one.  In my opinion, it was their energy that made this project shine.  I’ll post more pics at a later time – took video of it with the hybrids contraption, so that should be fun.

Hybrids…  crazy vids coming out of that class.  I suppose I need to go shopping for a rolly device to put the camera on.  Animation is due on Thursday and I might pull out my hair.  (Hopefully tugging on it will just make it longer, not fall out.)  See the hybrids page http://hybrids4504.wordpress.com/ for more weirdness.

Plant design…

I really need to find a style of rep that I like.  I’ve been using watercolor on my layouts and, while I like some of it, I think I would benefit from lifting some ideas from others.

Research methods…  that class is the bane of my existence.  I have a bibliography that is 8 pages long, but I can’t write a damn thesis statement to save my life.  This is what happens when your brain just refuses to think.  Until I get some serious down time, I fear that this class will continue to suck the life right out of me.

Structures / Construction class, whatever it is.

Ah, the balloon madness.  Very very cool stuff. 

The launch…

And a slide show from the booklet…

So, onwards and upwards I guess.  Why are weekends only 2 days long?  When is the US going to adopt the 4 day work week?

Smoke and Mirrors

Hmmm… studio…  a device that reads something about the landscape (garden, shoe, whatever) and gives a readable output which can be used to map the space.  The stranger the better, it seems.  The device doesn’t really have to work, we just have to make up a story that could be plausible at some point.  My device…  combo of sound meter and gaze tracker.  Reads the glance…  creates a map of distraction.  It sounds fine, but it’s been a struggle to create anything.  Some pics below of a piece of the device, some little study models I made of the “output” and a diagram that I made about what’s supposed to be happening.  I have a vid of my eye, but I need to edit it before I can post cuz it appears that I can’t stay awake for more than a minute and my eye surely shows it.
      

 

Some little sketches from Plant Design class…

   

Hybrids…

Having a struggle with trying to make an armature for my camera that has mirrors on it.  I have a base put together, but the mirrors are proving difficult.  I think I will need 5 – behind, ceiling, floor, peripheral right and peripheral left.  I think they need to be adjustable which is part of the problem right now.  What this is going to prove, I’m not sure… I’m starting to waiver on the idea a bit.  Kind of liked the auditory approach that Allen suggested (Brad hinted at it before that too…)  Distortion…  kind of fun.

So I have distraction and distortion…  kind of fitting.

The jumble that is spring 2008 semester

Hybrids:

Structures (or whatever that class is called):

Studio that was:

 more lines… much prettier this time

Studio that is:

   

And I call it… “String on the Wall”

Project termination jubilation

The presentation went better than I anticipated.  I think things came together better than I thought they would. 

The biggest problem that I encountered was the one that plagued me through the whole project and that was trying to figure out the water over time thing.  What I needed:  some sort of measurement of water output and the effects it would have whether flowing or perculating or contained.  The challenge of finding that information was difficult.  I could find information about the geothermal plants in California, but all of that information never garnered me actual data on the excess water produced.  I’m sure that info is out there somewhere, but since the plants are more concerned with how much energy is output the data on the water is less available.  Not to mention the whole residual salt thing that I was not even about to add into that equation.

It’s funny that this project, concentrated around more hands-on type of stuff, has really made me excited about the possibilities and potential with digital rep.  I mean, how cool is it that the possibility exists of actually creating this crazy device, situating it in a landscape and adding animation to it to see what happens as time passes? 

On a separate note, KD convinced me to hang up those lousy little pencil-marked thumbnail pics and I am so glad she did.  I was really happy with how they turned out, even if they were just a footnote.  In all of that mess, I think they might have been my favorite pieces.  So for next project, perhaps I will try something new…  and small…  and complete.  (yeah right)

On to other things…