Case-Shiller Index Expected to Show New Low in House Prices - NYTimes.com
Quotes from the article:
- After every giddy boom comes the hangover, they acknowledge, but that deep-rooted desire for a castle of one’s own quickly reasserts itself.
- No one ever renovated the kitchen or redid a room for the kids in a rental...
Reminds me of our recent visit to Dresden. On a tour of the city, our tour guide mentioned that when the wall fell, her parents bought their home and did renovations. She explained that few people did renovations, especially outside of their homes, when they were state-owned.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Architecture + Art at UCSD
Kyong Park. 24620. Ongoing.
24620, a Kyong Park project, is an abandoned house from Detroit in search of a new home. The house was cut up so that it could be moved and re-assembled anywhere in the world. It is a 'fugitive house,' running from the city of Detroit, which has destroyed or burned more than two hundred thousand homes in the last fifty years.
24620 desperately extends its existence by travelling. Its first journey was made in April, 2001, when it crossed the Atlantic Ocean, and was re-constructed and presented in the 3rd annual Archilab exhibition in Orléans, France. Since then, it has been to five other European cities, and continues on.
With its pieces misplaced and their incisions permanent, the house, when re-assembled, replicates the condition of a dysfunctional city in the violence of dismembered spaces. Wherever it may go, the house takes the ideals and failures of modernism with it, creating discourses on the cultural state and destiny of each community.
Architecture folks affiliated with my alma mater, UCSD. Important work. Hurrah.
Teddy Cruz
Kyong Park
James Enos
Sam Kronic
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Paradise Valley, Arizona
Paradise Valley, Arizona - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
In contrast to the Frankfurt Kitchen:
"It has expensive real estate, with a median home price at $1.74 million, with many exceeding $10 million and some over $40 million."
Frankfurt Kitchen at MAK Vienna
Frankfurter Kitchen, Wikipedia entry
M A K o n l i n e
This last fall, I received a DAAD Research Grant to look at 20th Century German compact housing and the use of color to lighten the country's mode during difficult economic times. The Frankfurt Kitchen was one example of designs that met these goals.
From MAK Online:
The cost savings resulting from the reduced size of the kitchen remained significant, however, so that the Frankfurt Kitchen offered the double advantage of lower construction costs and less work for the occupants. Only by arguing in these terms, was it possible to persuade the Frankfurt city council to agree to the installation of the kitchens, with all their sophisticated work-saving features. The result was that, from 1926 to 1930, no municipal apartment could be built without the Frankfurt Kitchen.
In this period around 10,000 apartments were built with the Frankfurt Kitchen.
Frankfurter Kitchen, MAK Vienna
Gretchen Morgenson: The 'Reckless' Origins Of The Financial Meltdown : NPR
Gretchen Morgenson: The 'Reckless' Origins Of The Financial Meltdown : NPR
In the interview, Morgenson kept mentioning characters in the housing crisis who were wrapped up in "the American flag of home ownership." It's the unsustainable model imploding in my recent artwork, especially a period when Wall Street players bet against the model's success. Arranging numbers. Repackaging and selling loans.
In the interview, Morgenson kept mentioning characters in the housing crisis who were wrapped up in "the American flag of home ownership." It's the unsustainable model imploding in my recent artwork, especially a period when Wall Street players bet against the model's success. Arranging numbers. Repackaging and selling loans.
How To Create a Job | This American Life
How To Create a Job | This American Life
Attracted to jobs overseas, my muse, the female expatriate, is constantly chasing a rainbow. Although more on domestic job creation, this episode from This American Life spells out how jobs get shuffled from state to state. Fascinating overview of how priorities warp through carefully crafted lenses like reduced regulation and people are encouraged to move away from traditional support structures.
Attracted to jobs overseas, my muse, the female expatriate, is constantly chasing a rainbow. Although more on domestic job creation, this episode from This American Life spells out how jobs get shuffled from state to state. Fascinating overview of how priorities warp through carefully crafted lenses like reduced regulation and people are encouraged to move away from traditional support structures.
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Horst Ademeit at Hamburger Bahnhof
Hamburger Bahnhof - Berlin: "HORST ADEMEIT"
I'm still haunted by this exhibition last week. I'm currently working on an exhibition called The Excess of Memory that goes hand and hand with an expat's tendency to live many lives and mix those memories. My occasional obsession with journal writing attempts to sort out people and places from past lives. Horst's incessant journals and photo-taking (8500 polaroids in the exhibition!) reminded me of this tendency...
Friday, May 20, 2011
Summer Reading
Form+Code in Design, Art, and Architecture by Casey Reas, Chandler McWilliams, and LUST (Princeton Architectural Press). 2010.
http://formandcode.com/
Related lectures by Casey from 2008
- http://vimeo.com/3847606
- http://vimeo.com/3864524
Saturday, May 14, 2011
On The Media: Transcript of "Two Cautionary Data Tales" (May 13, 2011)
On The Media: Transcript of "Two Cautionary Data Tales" (May 13, 2011): "Two Cautionary Data Tales
May 13, 2011
Data doesn’t always expose and explain; it can also lead us astray. OTM producer Jamie York looks at two times in the recent past when an overreliance on data has had disastrous consequences. Joe Flood, author of The Fires and Dennis Smith, author and veteran firefighter, tell the story of the RAND Corporation and the fires in the Bronx in the 1970s. Scott Patterson, author of The Quants and Michael Lewis, author of The Big Short, explain how math and science whiz kids nearly destroyed Wall Street."
Why I'm using code in these housing images. Data patterns gone unexpected directions, out of our perceived control.
May 13, 2011
Data doesn’t always expose and explain; it can also lead us astray. OTM producer Jamie York looks at two times in the recent past when an overreliance on data has had disastrous consequences. Joe Flood, author of The Fires and Dennis Smith, author and veteran firefighter, tell the story of the RAND Corporation and the fires in the Bronx in the 1970s. Scott Patterson, author of The Quants and Michael Lewis, author of The Big Short, explain how math and science whiz kids nearly destroyed Wall Street."
Why I'm using code in these housing images. Data patterns gone unexpected directions, out of our perceived control.
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Friday, May 06, 2011
New Book from ExpatWomen.com
For all the ladies interested in living overseas, ExpatWomen.com just put their first book. Having been impressed by their website, I'm curious...
Link to the book on Amazon.
Owen Mundy, Art Opening May 7, 19:00, Bauer&Ewald, Berlin
Owen Mundy, A Single Composite, May 7–June 24, Bauer&Ewald, Berlin
My husband's art opening at 7 pm in Berlin tomorrow, May 7. Hurrah!
Bauer&Ewald
Lenaustraße 20
12047 Neukölln-Berlin
u8 schönleinstraße, u7/u8 hermannplatz
My husband's art opening at 7 pm in Berlin tomorrow, May 7. Hurrah!
Bauer&Ewald
Lenaustraße 20
12047 Neukölln-Berlin
u8 schönleinstraße, u7/u8 hermannplatz
Sunday, May 01, 2011
Metastadt
I'm working a new series of images related to my Sherwin Series, but inspired by domestic space, especially public housing in or near to Berlin. I'm especially fascinated by a project called Metastadt constructed Wulfen, 30 minutes west of the Bauhaus' second home, Dessau. The best description of the project is on this site about flexible housing at http://www.afewthoughts.co.uk/flexiblehousing/
I love the flexibility of the structure, and its tragic end, despite its utopian beginnings.
Influences on my drawing style these days:
1) Artists like David Shrigley
2) The repeated drawing of the Brandenburg Gate on the windows of the U1 trains here in Berlin
