Reference Page: March 2007

Poetry in Motion
Beware, Jason Bruges’s work is mesmerizing. On a recent visit to his Web site, www.jasonbruges.com, we found ourselves robbed of precious minutes working our way through his entire portfolio. Though the pictures of his light installations are magnificent in their own right, the best way to see his work, if not in person, is on video. Under the entry for the Leicester Lights project, the second to last photo includes an embedded moving picture showing the traffic pole’s lights changing in sync with the current of passing cars. There’s also a video of Bruges’s installation at the Victoria & Albert Museum available at www.grouper.com/video (search for Jason Bruges in the queue). If you’re in New York, you can check out his exhibit at the AIA New York’s Gerald D. Hines Gallery through March 10. See www.aiany.org/centerforarchitecture for more information.

Hitting the Road
Remember when mobile living used to be the norm? Women would set up tent while men hunted and gathered, and just when things were really coming together, a local bandit tribe would pillage the village, forcing inhabitants to move on. It appears as though history has repeated itself, though this time it’s yuppie-hippies decking out sustainable RVs with Eames chairs and hitting the road. If you’re intrigued by the New Age nomadism suggested by BARK’s All Terrain Cabin and happen to be in Scotland in the near future, be sure to visit Living in Motion, a traveling exhibit from the Vitra Design Museum, on display at Edinburgh’s City Arts Center until October: www.cac.org.uk. Stay abreast of prefab technology and news at www.fabprefab.com; the links on the left direct visitors to a wealth of information, including places around the world where shipping containers can be purchased.

Robert Moses Lives
If all the good press surrounding the Robert Moses extravaganza hasn’t been enough to get you to drag yourself out to the Queens Museum of Art, www.queensmuseum.org, you can also visit the Unisphere from the 1964–65 World’s Fair, as well as the museum’s famous New York Panorama: www.queensmuseum.org/panorama/pictures.htm. Of course, it doesn’t hurt to prepare intel-lectually for such a vast exhibit; your best weapon is Robert Caro’s scintillating Moses biography, The Power Broker (Vintage, 1975). Never one to let criticism go unanswered, Moses wrote a response to the book, all 23 pages of which are available at www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com/detritus/moses. It’s full of contempt!

Good Malls and Bad Cities
Although malls were our favorite adolescent hangouts, now they are the bane of our overly consumerist existence. And so we can understand why “compulsive shopping disorder” may soon be making it into the Diagnostic and Statistic Manual of Mental Disorders as a valid mental illness: pn.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/41/20/22. But if, like columnist Philip Nobel, you choose to give in to the rays of love shining out of that Gap storefront and see the mall as valid ground for fostering good community vibes, check out mallsofamerica.blogspot.com, dedicated to posting vintage photos of malls of previous decades. Herman Krieger’s photo essay “Mall-aise,” at www.efn.org/~hkrieger/mallaise.htm, brings back mall bile in full force, however, with a series of images depicting the dark underbelly of malldom. Maybe the two new shopping-center “communities” featured in this month’s “Far Corner” are different, but before you lease a town house in Santana Row, www.santanarow.com, consider whether you’d feel safe walking home at night amid rows of shady mannequins.

Going Overground
Culture jammers take notice. Trendy downtown ad agencies and their designer-jean-clad, cocaine-snorting, 30-something art directors are stealing the “guerrilla communication” techniques you so lovingly pioneered. But can you really blame them? With TV shows quickly going straight to DVD and print media losing to online competition, ad execs need to adapt—or gain a conscience and change careers. For commentary on the state of advertising, check out www.adbusters.org or pick up the bimonthly magazine. On the book front, Gavin Lucas and Michael Dorrian’s Guerrilla Advertising: Unconventional Brand Communica-tion (Laurence King, 2006) visually documents the most successful, as well as the most controversial, campaigns. To see the whole thing in action, go to thatgirlemily.blogspot.com, a fake blog created to accompany a viral marketing campaign for the reality show Parco P.I. on Court TV.

The Magic Lantern
Who knew that the architect Steven Holl was so philosophical? Questions of Perception: Phenomenology of Architecture (Stout, 2007)—a reprint of his 1994 essay published as a special issue of A+U—has the architect ruminating on the metaphysics of architecture. But esoteric philosophy aside, Holl and his eponymous studio are raking in some of the world’s most coveted commissions. In 2001 he was named the most important architect of his generation by Time magazine, but with his University of Iowa School of Art & Art History winning a 2007 AIA Institute Honor Award, his 2005 renovation of Higgins Hall for Pratt Institute and recently completed New Residence at the Swiss Embassy, in Washington, D.C., both receiving 2007 National Honor Awards, and the spectacular Bloch Building set to open in June, it’s more than likely that his best work is yet to come. For a complete list of projects go to www.stevenholl.com or pop by MoMA’s Architecture and Design gallery to view sketches and models of the architect’s early projects.

Bodies & Space
Even a multimillion-dollar renovation with construction workers lurking around couldn’t keep the doors closed at the School of American Ballet. Throughout the entire project the svelt dancers didn’t miss a beat, pirouetting and chasséing across the dusty studio floors. Well, dedication pays off and will be showcased at the school’s annual Workshop Perform-ances, on June 2 and 4, where hard-bodied dancers compete to get noticed by scouts from dance companies around the world. Visit www.sab.org/workshop for details. With the studio complete, Diller Scofidio + Renfro can concentrate on the numerous renovations the firm is spearheading for Lincoln Center and other clients. Some of its most hotly anticipated commissions include the High Line, a 1.5-mile park on an abandoned elevated train track on New York’s west side, and the expansion of Juilliard and Alice Tully Hall. To celebrate all this success, in early 2008, Skira will publish a lengthy monograph on the firm’s work—a sure sign that the once mainly conceptual trio is on the right path.

A Civic Act
Those who like a healthy dose of philosophy with their architecture will appreciate the “Words and Ideas” section Daniel Libeskind offers on his Web site: www.daniel-libeskind.com. In various essays Libeskind expounds on the meaning of architecture and the symbolism he employs in his own work. If your gag reflex goes off upon reading titles like “Proof of Things Invisible,” we suggest you skip the text and go straight to the buildings: the Denver Art Museum provides an entire site dedicated to the new Libeskind addition at expansion.denverartmuseum.org. There you can sop up Libeskind’s verbose explanation of the inspiration behind the building, this time via video, by clicking a link on the main page. The site allows you to glimpse what Dan Kohl, the museum’s director of design, has done with the interior spaces: first select “Realization,” then “Inside the Building,” and lastly “Full View,” which will bring up an interactive graphic of the building. From there you can click on each wing to see a corresponding photo of the interior area.