finding out more

Soo, I'm being lazy and I'm just going to post an email I sent about the fashion project because I don't feel like rewording it.... it seems like every time I write/ think about this project it becomes more clear to me what I'm looking for, but I'm held up trying to find a link between the two subjects.


Hiii,


  Thank you for being patient with me, this week has been kind of hectic. I did a little research last night and found some really interesting fashion designers - "Klavers van Engelen" and "Iris van Herpen" - they are Dutch and look at fashion design and form in unique ways. I think tonight I will research some architecture that is made with attention to surface/ texture details. Also, the one main thing I am missing right now is some one person who is a link between fashion and architecture - I can't find someone who does both. If you find someone who designs clothing and architecture, that would be very helpful! Thank you : )


- c


Oh, also I think these are my main points for the presentation:
- relating fashion and architecture through:  the use of space, form, material, movement, and the body

what is my project about?

What is my Titus project about? I know I have disparate ideas I can link together, but I'm not sure they really "fit" the criteria... it sounded like he wanted the name of a person who acts as a link between some field of art and architecture. I can't find anything like that connecting architecture and fashion designers. The two fields seem to have great deal of respect for one another, but not much understanding or overlap. They are definitely separate spheres of people.

I know what I want to talk about. I'd like to bring up the spatial and texture ideas that are similar and viewed differently for architects and fashion designers. Also, maybe touch on structural ideas and how they relate to form. The body concept will also be weighted heavily in the discussion. The way we use and understand the body are completely different. The architect is designing for space far outside of the body, and yet we are concerned a great deal about what goes on in people's inner dialogues - how do we create safe spaces? welcoming spaces? usable spaces? Whereas the fashion designer is designing close to the body - literally on the surface that links the outer human to the inner dialogues, and yet they are so focused on the movement and volume of each piece... and maybe miss the human as a whole? I'd also like to explore the concept of idea turnover time in architecture and fashion, how in fashion ideas can turnover in a matter of days, whereas architecture ideas progress very slowly. How then, can we look back on the fashions of the time - in both attire and architecture - and be able to pinpoint them to specific time periods? Both fashion and architecture are expressed in similar, overall idea turnovers and yet fashion can run through many more ideas than architecture.

I guess this is a good start to a discussion on these two topics... I just hope it will sound intelligent and interesting to the class/ Titus and not arbitrary and superfluous. Ahh, well I mostly just hope to get through this week...

- c

procrastination nation

I CAN'T GET ANYTHING DONE!


Here's a cool project:

by Boyd Cody Architects - Dublin, Ireland

Some research:

The final two are really dynamic and awesome, but I want my design for the next project to be linked to its site a bit more - even more so than my last project... just not sure how to do this yet.


In other news, still researching fashion, sculpture, and architecture for Titus's class. I think my focii are:
- spatial aspects
- idea turnover [time]
- relation to the form of the body
- relation to life [we live in these things]
- texture, focus on tactile-visual sense
- complexities and use of space [especially with respects to the void, folding, use of space]

Questions still need to answer:
- how does fashion inform itself?
- what are questions fashion can only ask of itself and not with external references?
- what are the main constraints?
[plumage - for how it informs itself - like the feathers and showing-off aspects of birds and animals... also deals with size/scale of what one is wearing... fit... etc]
[also the "putting onto" of fashion, versus the quickly "growing out and away from" of architecture]
- same for sculpture: what are the constraints? how do sculptures inform one another? etc.


Ohhhhkay, better get back to it then. Still have to get everything ready for Grimshaw by Monday, there's two presentations this week, an Ecology exam... ahhh! My vacation is somehow coming to a closee.

- c

fashion research

I like theeese trends!

- c

comment

So, I have a comment about my "Hating RPI" rant... somehow this doesn't include working here, because the summer program I participated in last summer, as well as my incoming time as a freshman [all the first-year stuff]... THAT was all great. It's just surviving as a student here that sucks. Trying to figure out who you are in such a competitive, cold environment... I think it's even worse being a girl [in some respects], and at least in architecture - we have to fight to be taken seriously. Ahh, okay that's all I needed to comment on for now, I couldn't just post about hating RPI without expressing the truth about how it is here during the summer - maybe that's all it is... escaping the typical Troy weather makes everything much, much better.

- c

newest submission for anthropology

Here's the question I thought of for this week, it sort of combines what I'm learning in sensory culture and anthropology all-together... the two classes are beginning to converge very quickly...


Why is it so difficult to describe spatial phenomena? I was recently reading about synesthesia and it was cited that those people experiencing seeing/feeling objects in conjunction with another sense were the most difficult to analyze. The scientists said this was because of the subjective nature of viewing and describing objects.


Also, it seems like languages emphasize time, space [as a dimension outside of the body], and relationships among things [obviously with different ideas about time continuum and what an "object" is comprised of]. But why is it so difficult to understand objects and shapes that do not adhere to pure geometrical form? In addition, it is amazing that we can create things so far beyond our individual mental capacities - we have created the internet, but we don't know or can't point out "where" it exists - and yet we describe it as though it takes up space.


- c

I hate RPI

RPI sucks. I know I'm not the first person to say this, nor will I be the last. This place is like a deep, black pit. They make us work like we are entering the engineering/ architecture military, they aren't understanding, no one really has time to care about anyone else. Time spent not doing work, we all feel guilty that we aren't working our butts off, and the time we devote to work [most of it] is miserable. In this place I've lost more of my dreams than gained any. I've lost a happy part of my personality for a practical one, I feel like a shade of the person I once was. I have never hated myself so much, or thought of myself as so incompetent as I do now, and for some reason I have no confidence whatsoever and suck at talking to people - all of this when I was once the smart, nerdy, helpful Key Club president. I used to help people with Chem homework, and make study guides for all the Latin exams. I was an A student [well except for a couple B's in math.. but really, who's couting?]. And where did it all go wrong? Was it in high school when I decided taking computer programming classes and stocking up on AP's was going to get me somewhere in life... when I did all of this and choose to leave my art classes. Looking back I could have saved myself a lot of stress and time if I had just stayed doing the things I loved in art and just forgot about being a productive scientist. I don't know why I chose to go that way - maybe it was my group of friends... Minority Row... most of them geniuses in their own right. I got caught up in the boys' desires to be the "best" and to excel at all "their" things - math and physics - I guess back then I was sort of competitive - well not competitive, I just wanted to keep pace with everyone around me. And now... I don't care anymore. Architecture is infinitely interesting, it can be exciting to study projects, read into them, decipher them, but is it really fun to sit in front of a computer all day and redo surfaces? redo lines? lineweights? hatches? Ahhh, I wish I knew what to do with my life. I don't know where to go from here... I have no desire to get a job with a firm... the one I'm at makes me want to fall asleep everyday, it makes realllly want to not grow up. But I have no idea what to get a Master's in... this is so depressing. And why does it seem like so many people around me are in this same position? What led us all to be here? Why do we all feel this way? I really wish it would change.

- c

"designer's statement"

So, the last piece of the puzzle in this extraordinarily long portfolio ordeal is my "design statement". As if it wasn't difficult enough to put together a hodge-podge of projects that I'll never be happy with... now I have to commit myself to some "intelligent" comment about all of this work I've done. I'm not sure what I have to say about myself, about these projects... when I look back on my time spent as a student I really 1] don't remember very much from all the all-nighters and 2] am so jaded by the workload, the opinions, the competition, that it's hard to say what my unique vision is for my "style" or whatever it may be that I have at this point in my studies of architecture...

Well, seeing as I can't write this thing myself I did what any good RPI'er would do... "research" the thing.. and I found this awesome statement:


Designer's Statement
Britt Whitaker


I had a hard time trying to to write an “artist statement” and I couldn’t figure out why. I didn’t know how to write about my work or why I do what I do, I don’t have some underlying theme and I feel pretentious writing about how it might impact anyone else.
I’ve read a hundred artist statements, so I tried to copy some fluffy bullshit. Something about being the next up and coming artist trying to better the world with my work. That was some bullshit. It took about 15 minutes of contrived emotion for me to realize that there was some inherent flaw I took offense to at the idea of me writing an “artist statement”. It stemmed from the realization that I’m not some kind of artist. To describe myself as an artist or say why I do what I do only shows I understand the traits and characteristics, or what society considers to be the definition of an artist, and in and of itself that kind of destroys the whole point. So if I actually had the capacity with words to give my own definition I suppose that would be an acceptable replacement. But seeing as I can’t, I can only say what I’m not. And I’m not an artist. I’m a designer. There’s some inherent difference there that permeates anything and everything that surrounds us. It slips unseen into our eyes, and the realization rarely crosses our lips.
Art is selfish. But before anyone decides to deconstruct that idea, design is too. The difference is in it’s assimilation into the world. Who understands it, who judges it, and who assigns its monetary value is more or less irrelevant. I love art, but it’s appreciated by those who choose to appreciate it. Design is everywhere and everything. It’s the pauper of the art world. It doesn’t ask to be understood, it doesn’t ask to be ordained as anything. It exists in and of itself and every piece of every design exists only to support the structure that it forms. My work is everywhere and everything, and because of that, it is invisible.
I design because I know no better way of communicating my thoughts and emotions, and in theory that’s a philosophy. As far as I know it’s not reflected in anything I do, but that’s kind of the point.




^ Love that one.

Ahh, what are my designs about? Well, my good ones are all about experimentation... trying something new and seeing where it goes... but that kind of makes for a number of throw-away projects I have... I guess I design my architecture akin to fashion or music. They reflect the trends that are going on in my mind, and my surroundings at the time I'm working on them. I guess that's interesting...? I'm not sure there are some deep philosophical meanings behind my work.. I am very interested in experiential spaces, you know... a lot of that transcendental bullshit that the French would looove. I also love Christian Nordberg-Scultz, so I guess some of it was inspired by his awesome writing... I mean, really. What does someone expect from an architecture student? I rebel against my professors ideas now that I'm older... maybe that could be a good point to put out there... hahaha I really have nooo idea. I saved a whole page for this writing, too... maybe that wsa a bad idea - I think it would be much better to just be short and sweet about the whole thing, okay maybe a little sour, too, we archies love to have a bad side [we are notorious for weearing black anyway...]. Okay, I got try writing this stuff down on paper... I won't get anywhere trying to write something on the computer...

- c

all about class

I love all of these!

- c

spring "break"

There is soo much to do on this break! And what am I doing? ... filling up my time avoiding what needs to get done - of course! Let's just delve into the list of things I need to accomplish:

- 3 annotations for Anthropology
- 1 sensory culture essay
- finish portfolio [for real this time!]
- Studio site research
- horseback lesson before Thursday
- send student "books" to Demetrios
- apply to jobs [?]
- figure out topics for Ecology and Analogical Models
     - do research on these topics

Well, I think this is it... but that's sort of a lot considering I'm leaving Wed/ or Thurs for Boston, not to get back until late Friday [at the earliest]. Ahhh, I need to get to work!

- c

minangkabau

curved roofs of the Minangkabau. 

something i'm learning

Every semester there comes time for a new lesson. I think it's finally come time that I've discovered my lesson for this part of my life. I think this semester is teaching me to take my time and not rush things for the sake of getting something out there. It's okay to let an idea meld in my mind for a while, to continually throw out bad, or stale ideas in search of something good. I'm learning this in Sensory Culture tonight, where I don't want to produce something mindless and unintelligent - in fear of both what Kreuger might think, as well as my fellow classmates - many of whom are a bit more well-read than me, and who are much better at at least remembering what they have previously read [seeing as I tend to remember themes and situations, but completely eradicate authors and titles from my memory]. I guess I'm also learning this lesson back on the horses again, too. I find myself not just "going for it" anymore, but collecting myself and my horse before trying to get something accomplished. Maybe this is my new "older" outlook on life - at least for my mid-life... who knows what this outlook will seem like when I'm thirty or forty. This outlook is also sort of souring my Studio experience - well maybe not souring for me... but probably for DBell who can hardly have a conversation with any of us unmotivated bags of sand. Maybe it's a result of DD, to "rush slowly"? To keep a concept rather than throw out huge chunks of it, and to develop something for what it is... whether I like it or not [that's probably the biggest lesson I took away from DD]. I know with this new project it's not entirely what I want it to be, but I like the general basis behind it and the potential for where it could go - I guess this keeps me from rushing things - I don't want to break the fragile basis from which it was conceived and I don't want to jump on ahead to new things without fully considering their implications first. Even though this is a very procrastinating view on life, I think it's a positive one. Everything is way too rushed in our lives these days, no one has time to wait anymore, but I have learned to appreciate and look forward to waiting. I love taking a shower, waiting for an idea to come to me as I waste time standing by myself. These are some of the best instances in my life, not times when I'm rushing around mindlessly on the web... hoping something will pop-out at me that's inspiring... not times spent blindly wandering around clothing stores hoping to find something that'll uplift me, change my mood, and transform all of my thoughts... none of these things work as well as stripping things down to the bare essentials [no awkward pun intended] and thinking things through at a pace appropriate to ourselves. Well, this is actually an uplifting post, and hopefully one I can return to again when I go into panic mode during the course of the week as this final approaches, or probably more likely when I'll need it during thesis.

- c