Yoko Ono is Back in Plastic

By: Arsalan Mohammad for Interview

Over green tea, biscuits and strawberries at Reykjavik's Nordica Hotel, Yoko Ono took time out from promoting her Peace Tower project–the annual light sculpture that shoots up high into the Icelandic night each fall, between the dates of John Lennon's birthday (October 9) and the anniversary of his death (December 8)–to talk up her latest album, Between My Head And The Sky. Backed by a band directed by son Sean and featuring the best and brightest of Japanese avant-pop, the album sees 76-year-old Ono returning to the Plastic Ono Band, and sliding yet again ahead of the art-electro pack, for whom she remains the questioned godmother. http://www.interviewmagazine.com/blogs/music/2009-10-27/yoko-ono/

Next to MoMA, a Tower Will Reach for the Stars

By: NICOLAI OUROUSSOFF

Cass Gilbert’s Woolworth Building, William Van Alen’s Chrysler Building, Mies van der Rohe’s Seagram Building.

If New Yorkers once saw their skyline as the great citadel of capitalism, who could blame them? We had the best toys of all.

But for the last few decades or so, that honor has shifted to places like Singapore, Beijing and Dubai, while Manhattan settled for the predictable.

Perhaps that’s about to change.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/15/arts/design/15arch.html

Welcome to Neuva York

By: Alex Taylor for the New York Obverver

"Nexus New York: Latin / American Artists in the Modern Metropolis,” the inaugural exhibition at the recently refurbished El Museo del Barrio in East Harlem, takes on a set of artists apart from the familiar high-modernist view of New York. (Imagine Broadway Boogie Woogie scored to the mambo.) That no such show has been attempted before tell us something, of course.

One sees about a dozen big names—the great Mexican muralists of the 1930s, Rivera, Orozco and Siqueiros; the singular Frida Kahlo; and Yanquis modernists like Jackson Pollock and Robert Motherwell—but twice as many unknowns. The best thing about this intensely enjoyable show is its reach into minor figures and archival material, giving a wide introduction to lesser-known chapters in the city’s complicated life as an art capital. http://www.observer.com/2009/culture/welcome-neuva-york

Joaquin Torres-Garcia 's 14th Street 1920

Shipping Container Health Clinics for Developing Countries

By Bridget Meinhold for Inhabitat
Good design has the potential to provide better education, access to safe water and improved health care. Take for instance our very own Emily Pilloton of Project H Design, whose design projects are bringing vast improvements to their surrounding communities. Along the same line, a new non-profit initiative called Containers 2 Clinics is creating modular health care clinics for developing countries. To do so, they are rescuing shipping containers and then outfitting them with all the necessary equipment to treat women and children. Not only is this company delving into the fascinating world of shipping container architecture, but they are developing a much needed service for humanitarian aid. http://www.inhabitat.com/2009/10/30/shipping-container-health-clinics-for-developing-countires/

Accumulation

By Marjorie Welish

The New York School has done more than provide the art world with blue-chip art; its gestural aesthetics continue to sustain considerations of what painting is and what it isn’t when, as now is the case, a few exhibitions revisit the era, or restage works, or react to its significant paradigm.


A test of Abstract Expressionism has been how an artist can sustain an authentic painting practice long after his reputation is secure. After all, productivity in art is not the same as fecundity, as it often yields a recycling of skill and taste to formulaic styling. It is an open secret that the productivity weighing against greatness in the career of Abstract Expressionist Sam Francis makes it imperative to judge his work on a painting-by-painting basis.

http://www.observer.com/2009/culture/accumulation

Wise Warriors, Artfully Attired

By Roberta Smith/New York Times

For the Japanese samurai, dying well was the best revenge. This elite warrior class began to play a central role in Japan’s history and culture around the eighth century and in time evolved into the country’s ruling caste. Highly cultivated in arts like poetry, monochrome ink painting and the tea ceremony, this class adhered to a strict code of honor built around loyalty, self-discipline, obligation and the shame of failure. Its most unbending principle was that a samurai’s death should bring honor to his family and descendants and to the emperor or clan he served.

Fighting heroically to the end while looking good was what it was all about...

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/23/arts/design/23samurai.html?_r=1

Global ZIRA

For the managerial application or executive office, create a work environment that meets your work surface needs and storage requirements. Then go ahead and personalize it!

Select from the following: hundreds of components for any size or shape office, storage components that can tower to 84" high, 17 laminate finishes, 5 edge options, 9 handle options in silver, black, nickel or brass finishes, 4 glazing options on doors and modesty panels, and lastly, work surface grommets and power blocks for your electrical needs. Zira is your most functional solution to work environment efficiency and organization. http://www.globaltotaloffice.com/global_industries/index.html

MAD

10/29 'The Adventures of Prince Achmed'

With a live piano performance and original score by Donald SosinThursday October 29, 6:30 PM $10/$7 for members.Members, please call 212-299-7740 to claim your discount.

The Adventures of Prince Achmed tells the story of an evil sorcerer who tricks Prince Achmed into riding a magical flying horse that sends the prince off on a flight to his death. Yet the prince foils the magician’s plan and soars headlong into a series of wondrous exciting adventures. Prince Achmed joins forces with Aladdin and the Witch of the Fiery Mountains, fights the sorcerer's army of monsters and demons, and falls in love with the beautiful Princess Peri Banu. Since its smashing premier in 1926, this rare film has been successfully shown in nearly every country around the globe.
https://thestore.madmuseum.org/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=TMOADOS&Product_Code=GC_EVNT_2&Category_Code=EVENTS

ReNu Modular iPhone Charger Makes Solar Power Sleek

The problem with most built-in solar gadget chargers is that it just doesn’t make sense to stick your pricey phone in the sun for the whole day while you wait for it to charge. But the Regen ReNu modular solar panel takes care of that issue–the combination solar panel and battery pack attaches to the back of an iPod/iPhone dock or USB device for easy access to solar power. When you want to charge the panel, just remove it and place it near sunlight!

http://www.inhabitat.com/2009/10/26/renu-modular-iphone-charger-makes-solar-power-sleek/

Rewrite by GamFratesi

Copenhagen designers GamFratesi have designed a prototype desk with a cave-like shield on top to create an intimate working environment.

Called Rewrite, the desk is presented at GamFratesi’s solo show at The Danish Museum of Art and Design.

http://www.dezeen.com/2009/10/25/rewrite-by-gamfratesi/#more-47215

This is HUGE

HUGE Architects a Shanghai, China based design firm has recently completed the Source Flagship store in Beijing China.
Source is a street fashion retailer and was established in Shanghai in 2006. This one-stop fashion centre of street culture sells the hottest street fashion brands from the USA, Italy, the Netherlands, UK, Australia and Japan.
For their new Flagship Store in Beijing, they required that the entire store have maximum flexibility of displaying products and a warehouse-like and industrial atmosphere. The store features a 9 meter high Shoe Tower – based on a concept of stacked shoeboxes – which functions as the main display feature as well as a staircase connecting the two floors of the store. http://coolboom.net/interior-design/source-flagship-store/#more-7501

Don't Feed the Animals!

ShowCase: SEA: Seeing Eye Architecture

ShowCase is an on-going feature series on Archinect, presenting exciting new work from designers representing all creative fields and all geographies.We are always accepting nominations for upcoming ShowCase features - if you would like to suggest a project, please send us a message.

Like seeing eye dogs, miniature service horses, assisting chimps and parrots, Architecture Service Animals are not merely to be looked at; they are to be looked with. They are structural organizations bred for the apperception of space and matter. http://archinect.com/features/article.php?id=92499_0_23_0_M

For City Opera Costumes, Lofty New Roles

By RANDY KENNEDY
Published: October 20, 2009
NORTH BERGEN, N.J. — In deepest urban New Jersey, just off the hellish Routes 1 and 9, past the Lincoln Tunnel Motel and the Hoboken cemetery, sits an unlikely place that might be thought of as opera heaven. Or maybe opera purgatory, a cavernous building where hundreds of pieces of faux-ormolu-encrusted furniture, brass goblets, rubber plants and costumes — rack after elegant rack — end up when not in use in productions by New York City Opera, awaiting their next night on the stage. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/21/arts/design/21costumes.html?_r=1

Student Works: Evolver

And all I built in college was a dorm room loft and a few beer can pyramids...
Evolver is an architectural artefact intervening on the panorama surrounding Zermatt. It was designed and executed by a team of 2nd year students from the ALICE Studio at Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland. In an effort to take full advantage of the site's extensive and astounding views, the project sits strategically next to the lake Stelli at an altitude of 2,536 m (8,320 feet).Evolver's structure mainly consists of a succession of 24 rotating frames supporting an enclosed space that visitors are encouraged to enter. As he or she progresses through the space, a concealed but uninterrupted 720° movement is unraveling along a transformed panorama. http://archinect.com/features/article.php?id=92648_0_23_0_M

Parking Outside the Box

By: Val Moses
The parking garage is the Rodney Dangerfield of building types, the troubled snag in the urban fabric, the Gordian Knot of design. But for all the ugly-red-haired-stepchild car parks of the world and the many generic, bunker-like auto warehouses, there are also stunning examples of man-and-machine triumph that incorporate both function and aesthetics. And they are about to be celebrated in an exhibition that opens tomorrow at the National Building Museum, in Washington, D.C. http://www.metropolismag.com/pov/20091016/parking-outside-the-box

Parking Outside the Box

By: Val Moses

The parking garage is the Rodney Dangerfield of building types, the troubled snag in the urban fabric, the Gordian Knot of design. But for all the ugly-red-haired-stepchild car parks of the world and the many generic, bunker-like auto warehouses, there are also stunning examples of man-and-machine triumph that incorporate both function and aesthetics. And they are about to be celebrated in an exhibition that opens tomorrow at the National Building Museum, in Washington, D.C. http://www.metropolismag.com/pov/20091016/parking-outside-the-box

Biooctanic

By: Bridgette Meinhold

Based on the research of UPI 2M, the Biooctanic biofuel production towers would use algae and bamboo as feedstocks. UPI 2M’s research led them to the conclusion that algae and bamboo would result in the best production results (maximum amount of biofuels per unit of building surface area). They also took into consideration the cost of technologies required for cultivation and processing, growth rate, and the annual input-to-yield ratio.
While originally envisioned for cities in Croatia, this concept could be applied in any urban setting. The benefits of biofuel generation at the site of sale and distribution include reduced transportation costs, reduced emissions, greater efficiency and, much like vertical farming, urban biofuel generation that does not take up arable land that could otherwise be used for farming.

http://www.inhabitat.com/2009/10/22/biooctanic-giant-cactus-shaped-biofuel-crop-production-towers/#more-68010

Island Boy

Some of Melanie Ford Wilson's work presents a fairytale vision of land and sea, all lush greens and rich blues. Water and the night play a large part in the settings of this painter's work, along with characters who move quietly, as though in a dream. An island boy amasses treasure while looking out to sea; a mermaid glides through underwater castles of narrative; and a dark lady cloaked by her hair keeps guard over the lighthouse.

http://mocoloco.com/art/archives/012083.php

Yee-Haw!

Artist Kevin Bradley first came to my attention while I was enjoying the Castleberry Hill Art Stroll in Atlanta last month. At first glance the prints exhibited by Gallery Stokes reminded me of the now iconic Grand Old Opry posters produced by Nashville's historic Hatch Show Print for artists like Johnny Cash, Patsy Cline, and Bill Monroe. Bradley uses similar techniques with wooden typeface blocks to create a more accidental aesthetic with what are known as make-ready prints. These prints are typically used to assure proper alignment before printing other editions, but Bradley is far from typical. "The make-ready print serves a purpose to the printmaker in that the accident can be incorporated into editions and still keep the vitality of surprise that the process tries to kill" says Bradley of his creative process. Enjoy more of Kevin Bradley's work at the web site for his Knoxville shop: http://www.yeehawindustries.com/home.html

Hedgehog Concert Pavilion Makes Traffic Cones Beautiful
by Ariel Schwartz,
Traffic cones often signal some sort of disaster or messy construction zone, but NYC architecture firm EFGH has managed to upcycle the orange cones into something beautiful with this 15×15′ Hedgehog concert pavilion. The whole thing can be constructed in just six hours, and by using already-manufactured traffic cones the architecture firm saved considerable costs on materials.
http://www.inhabitat.com/2009/10/19/hedgehog-concert-pavilion-makes-traffic-cones-beautiful/#more-66533

The Portrait Unbound
January 23, 2010-April 4, 2010
High Museum of Art, Atlanta

This exhibition of new work by California-based photographer Robert Weingarten will consist of twenty large-scale digitally-created portraits of American icons, and represents a bold departure from traditional camera portraiture.

Among the most influential designers of our time, Ron Arad (Israeli, b. 1951) stands out for his daredevil curiosity about technology and materials and for the versatile nature of his work. Trained at the Jerusalem Academy of Art and at London's Architectural Association, Arad has produced an outstanding array of innovative objects over the past twenty-five years, from almost unlimited series of objects to carbon fiber armchairs and polyurethane bottle racks. He has also designed memorable spaces, some plastic and tactile, others ethereal and digital. This exhibition will be the first major retrospective of Arad's design work in the United States. http://www.moma.org/interactives/exhibitions/2009/ronarad/#/1/0

Mario Cucinella's completed building for Nottingham University sets the standard for sustainable energy research
The main function Cucinella's newly opened building is to provide a specialist research laboratory for staff and postgraduate students within the new Centre for Sustainable Energy Technologies. The tower incorporates a research studio / teaching room and resource room, as well as offices, meeting rooms and a permanent display space. The exhibition space will provide a platform for communicating the latest developments in sustainable energy and construction technologies, both regionally in China and internationally. http://www.worldarchitecturenews.com/index.php?fuseaction=wanappln.projectview&upload_id=11076

Rael's research examines the convergence of digital, industrial, and non-industrial approaches to making architecture. He was the recipient of a Graham Foundation Grant for "Constructed Topographies: Earth Architecture in the Landscape of Modernity"; winner of the Architectural League of New York's Deborah Norden Competition for "Wadi Hadramut: Cities of Earth"; and is author of Earth Architecture (Princeton Architectural Press, 2008), which examines the contemporary history of the oldest and most widely used building material on the planet—dirt.

Singapore designers Ministry of Design have completed an office interior for an advertising agency that features a drawing of the company’s founder spread across the walls and floor, wielding a scaled-up model of a pencil.

Designed for advertising agency Leo Burnett and located in Singapore, the project is divided into three parts.

For this story in its entirety please visit:

http://www.dezeen.com/2009/10/18/leo-burnett-office-by-ministry-of-design/#more-45710

by: Rose Etherington

Molten Color: Glassmaking in Antiquity

October 8, 2009 Getty Villa

Over 180 ancient glass objects from the collection of Erwin Oppenländer are featured in this exhibition.The Oppenländer collection, which the Getty acquired in 2003, is remarkable for its cultural and chronological breadth. It includes works made in Mesopotamia, Egypt, the Greek world, and the Roman Empire, and spans the entire period of ancient glass production, from its origins in Mesopotamia in about 2500 B.C. to Byzantine and Islamic glass of the eleventh century A.D. http://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/molten_color/

Bilbao Jardin Garden

A wonderful addition to the International Urban Garden Competition “Bilbao Jardín 2009”, by Diana Balmori of New York-based Balmori Associates and a design that literally 'climbs the stairs' with a undulating vegetated strip and cor-ten walls splaying out in a wider planter at the lowest landing.

Some of the designers explanatory text, via Bustler: "The garden climbs the stairs, running in undulating lines of different textures and colors. Envisioned as a dynamic urban space; it moves in time and with the seasons. Its lush planting cascades down as though the garden was flowing or melting, bleeding the colors into each other. In one gesture, it narrates a story of landscape taking over and expanding over the Public Space and Architecture, therefore transforming the way that the stairs and the space is perceived and read by the user. It is a garden of contrasts: the contrast between native and exotic plants, between the red flowers and the green grass, between the green grass and the grey paving. In form, the garden engages the horizontal plaza with the rising vertical plane of the steps and the upright gesture of Eduardo Chillida’s sculpture. Like the famous Spanish Steps in Rome, the garden is not only designed for visitors to ascend and descend, but for them to linger, and just be." http://landscapeandurbanism.blogspot.com/2009/10/bilbao-jardin-garden.html

Toward the Sentient City

Toward the Sentient City is made possible with support from the J. Clawson Mills Fund of the Architectural League and the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts. Additional support has been provided by the University at Buffalo.
A major exhibition of five newly commissioned projects and installations by teams of architects, artists and technologists that imagine alternative trajectories for how various mobile, embedded, networked, and distributed forms of communication systems might inform the architecture of urban space and/or influence our behavior within it. http://archleague.org/2009/09/toward-the-sentient-city/

White House Art

While Jacqueline Kennedy was known for her love of Cézanne and Hillary Rodham Clinton for living with paintings by Kandinsky and de Kooning as well as glass by Dale Chihuly, the Obamas have made a wider selection. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/07/arts/design/07borrow.html?_r=1

Voronoi Touch Screen by Seeper

At Tent Digital Seeper presented Voronoi, an interactive MultiTouch Sphere that allows visitors to change the face of the sphere by dragging their hands across it. The inflatable, spherical touch screen is just begging to be touched; the combination of projector, computer, infra-red light and people's hands creates unique fluids, colours and dynamics. Also at Tent Digital was Flynn Talbot with Horizon, an interactive light wall installation that shows the patterns of the sky when visitors modify the effects and choose the colour combinations on a touch screen.

http://mocoloco.com/

SLASH

Slash: Paper Under the Knife takes the pulse of the international art world's renewed interest in paper as a creative medium and source of artistic inspiration, examining the remarkably diverse use of paper in a range of art forms. Slash is the third exhibition in MAD's Materials and Process series, which examines the renaissance of traditional handcraft materials and techniques in contemporary art and design. The exhibition surveys unusual paper treatments, including works that are burned, torn, cut by lasers, and shredded. A section of the exhibition will focus on artists who modify books to transform them into sculpture, while another will highlight the use of cut paper for film and video animations.

http://collections.madmuseum.org/html/exhibitions/485.html

41 Cooper Square by Morphosis

Architectural photographer Roland Halbe has sent us his photographs of the recently-completed academic building for The Cooper Union in New York, designed by Thom Mayne of American practice Morphosis.

http://www.dezeen.com/2009/10/11/41-cooper-square-by-morphosis/#more-44010