Santiago Calatrava talks about his vision for the transit hub he’s designing for the World Trade Center site. I’m a fan, although there doesn’t seem to be a lot of design meat here.
And the New Yorker‘s Jane Kramer gets Berlin artists/memorial designers Renata Stih and Frieder Schnock to talk about a memorial for the World Trade Center. Their comments seem well suited to the discourse of a year or so ago, when entertaining the world of possibilities didn’t feel so escapist as it does now.
In fact, last year, I was very impressed by their proposed Holocaust memorial.
Author: greg
More Olafur Eliasson Pix
The Weather Project, 2003, Olafur Eliasson, at the Tate Modern
The top one’s shot in the mirrored ceiling.
I’m working on it, but right now, I got nothing that’ll top this.
American Ordealism
Is it a coincidence that The Cremaster Cycle, the filmic ordeal-in-a-black-box, is playing in London at the same time as David Blaine, the Brooklyn ordeal-in-a-clear-box?
Read Peter Bradshaw’s Guardian review as if you’re seeing the movies for the first time.
And read about David Blaine getting out of his box as if you thought you’d already heard the last of him.
Late Saturday night, after a party for Doug Aitken at the Wapping Project, an artspace, the gridlock surrounding David Blaine’s impending egress was blamed for the complete absence of cabs that left 20 of us (including Doug and Thomas Demand) stranded in B.F. East London. Result: a group of us walked back to our hotel in Westminster, along the Thames, for about two hours. Ordealism.
tate update: sun worshippers
the british public treats it as the real sun, laying out on their backs as if at the beach.
[10/21 update: like I said…]
london lunch rec (via mobile):
Chicken cutlet curry at Tokyo Diner off Leicester Square (just west, I think)
Olafur Eliasson: The Weather Project at Tate Modern
Just got back from the preview and party for The Weather Project, Olafur Eliasson’s absolutely breathtaking installation at the Tate Modern in London. The Turbine Hall is something like 500 feet long, the full length and height of the building.
I can tell you that Olafur created a giant sun out of yellow sodium streetlamps, but that doesn’t begin to describe the experience of seeing it and being in the space. It is this awareness of one’s own perception which is at the heart of his work. Not only does he use and transform this unwieldy cavern, he intensifies the viewer’s sight and sense of being in the space.
And as always, Olafur lays bare the mechanisms that create the unavoidably sublime experience, which in this case include, literally, smoke and mirrors. You can see exactly how you’re being
[update: the Guardian‘s Fiachra Gibbons likes it, too.]
Goin’ to London
Your Sun Machine, Olafur Eliasson, 1997
Marc Foxx Gallery. Image:Sao Paulo Bienal
I’m heading to London for a few days.
Going to one friend’s exhibition opening and another friend’s art fair. I’ll be doing a little reporting, even though I’m not sure where to find the “Internet” over there.
I have a great idea; at a moment to be appointed (but it has to be today, in time for my trip), everyone goes outside and marks up the outside of their building with their wi-fi network information. Then, a few minutes later, we all disperse into the crowd.
Forward this message to all your friends.
From the Dept. of WTF
“It’s Nike Ground! This revolutionary project is transforming and updating your urban space. Nike is introducing its legendary brand into squares, streets, parks and boulevards: Nikesquare, Nikestreet, Piazzanike, Plazanike or Nikestrasse will appear in major world capitals over the coming years…”
And where does this new and friendly revolution begin? Oh, where so many of western civ’s not-so-great-after-all ideas heil from: Austria. “Starting from 1 January 2004 Karlsplatz (in Vienna) is going to be called Nikeplatz.”
! indeed.
[via Archinect]
[update: this turns out to be art by 0100101110101101.org, which released it’s press release Oct. 10, four days after Nike denied its involvement, and a full three days before Archinect or I posted it. Don’t let the facts get in the way of a good conclusion, I guess.]
[update 2: and to answer reader Chris’s question, no, all of Austria’s not all that bad after all. Schwarzenegger’s our problem now, anyway.]
Seeing Lost In Translation on the Upper East Side
Context isn’t everything, but it counts. We just got back from seeing Lost In Translation with a multi-generational crowd, in the movie theater around the corner from Holly Golightly’s brownstone. As they say, it’s the little differences:
Chia-Church
The artists Heather Ackroyd and Dan Harvey and their team of 15 people plastered the walls of a church in South London with clay and grass seed. Read their diary at the Guardian and watch it grow to Graeme Miller’s soundtrack.
Related: visiting information from the London International Festival of Theatre
More info on Ackroyd & Harvey and Miller on Artsadmin
I Report, You Decide: Speaking with a former WTC juror
Friday, I met an architecture professional who was on the LMDC jury last summer to select the architects for the World Trade Center site design study. We spoke about the Memorial Competition, details of which were familiar to this person.
The juror was deliberately cagey, but said the Memorial jury was down to ten proposals: “And when it gets down to ten, the lines start to sharpen.” Asked about the timeline, this person said, “very soon,” but when I bounced the rumored names of finalists, the response I got was, “you know more than I do, then.” (Which is so clearly not the case, it’s almost embarassing.)
about making films, really.
I’ve been very quiet about my actual filmmaking activities of late, mostly because they’ve been pretty sparse. My efforts to re-edit Souvenir November 2001 have been stymied by Final Cut Pro for a while, and I’m coming to grips with the idea of re-building it from scratch. Well, from a late-stage EDL (Edit Directions List), actually, which is the cut-by-cut source code of the film. That’d mean dumping all 80Gb of my media, so it’s an irrevocable decision, which I’ve been avoiding making.
But this week, I’ve been invited to show and talk about my work in November (More details to come.), so it’s about time to pull the trigger. Of course, movement on that will also impel movement on the re-scoring effort, too. Sometimes a deadline can be a very helpful thing.
Beyond this non-working on film, I’ve been researching and began negotiating for the film rights of a novel. It took a while to trace the rightsholder (the book had been out of print in English for many years and was recently reissued.) and to fill in the backstory of the book’s creation. The writer’s estate is represented by a small but very sharp agency in Europe, so my very early mornings have been full of iterations on the contract points, a lot of phone calls, etc. Makes me feel productive, but exhausted. It’s very interesting and exciting, but not something I can really post about in realtime detail, you understand. As soon as it closes, you’ll be among the first to know.
But enough about me. (Heh. As if.) POV points to a new (to me) filmmaker weblog, Nyurotic, which is quite engaging. Ang Mito is a documentarian, whose film screened in the Work In Progress section of this year’s IFP Market to very positive reaction. Mito posts her rollercoaster experiences at the Market. Definitely check it out.
Discussing Mystic River
The first rule of Mystic River, on the other hand, is don’t discuss Midnight in the Garden of Good & Evil.
The director of both films, Clint Eastwood, talks largely of the former with Michael Parkinson in the Guardian.
Not at all related: my examination of the unexamined similarities between Midnight and Spike Jonze’s Adaptation. [Buy Adaptation on DVD. Whatever you do, don’t buy Midnight. Rent it if you insist, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.]
Discussing the WTC Memorial
The first rule of the World Trade Center Memorial Competition is don’t discuss the World Trade Center Memorial Competition. OK, technically, it’s the second rule, and it actually applies to publicly identifying your own design proposal, but whatever.
Many entrants and many more followers of the Competition are discussing it, though, on multiple venues online. Most voices are earnest; some are a bit weary or cynical. Some are pained, or painfully critical; some are self-aggrandizing to a disturbing degree. For my part, I try to stay engaged but circumspect (except for an occasional lash out at the hearts-and-minds-numbing involvement of a shill like Peter Max).
Here are some sources for unfiltered WTC Site Memorial Competition reading:
A recurring theme across all the boards: exuberant comments by one William Stratas, a web developer/Competition entrant from Toronto. For undiluted, effusive Stratas, check out his site, Planetcast.