"our practice is to hire an architect and get on with it, not to waste time and money on design competitions for what are essentially utilitarian buildings"
thank you councilor gord hunter. you are the perfect embodiment of political ignorance, and the reason why so much of ottawa looks like shit.

twan gets a little upset, does a little twirl.
skip ahead to 0:50.

science museum porn (as art).

In 1942, Andre Breton organised a retrospective exhibition of Surrealist art in New York: First Papers of Surrealism. For the vernissage Marcel Duchamp created this installation – a gigantic web – called the Mile of String. He and Breton furthermore arranged for a number of children to ball in the room thereby making it very difficult for the guests to see the paintings.
The gallery space, such a predetermined expectation. And Duchamp stays as the first to play on expecatations and challenge every inch of them. From then on what we see are replays of what his first attempt produced.
text + image via

the ego has landed.

newswipe.

dance, dance.

mixtape sunday:

dillmatic.

wu vs the beatles.
these are both much better than you would expect.

daniel day lewis mastery.

20 Tufteisms from The Visual Display of Quantitative Information

1. Graphical excellence is the well-designed presentation of interesting data – a matter of substance, of statistics, and of design.
2. Graphical excellence consists of complex ideas communicated with clarity, precision, and efficiency.
3. Graphical excellence is that which gives to the viewer the greatest number of ideas in the shortest time with the least ink in the smallest space.
4. Graphical excellence is nearly always multivariate.
5. Graphical excellence requires telling the truth about the data.
6. The representation of numbers, as physically measured on the surface of the graphic itself, should be directly proportional to the numerical quantities represented.
7. Clear, detailed, and thorough labeling should be used to defeat graphical distortion and ambiguity.
8. Write out explanations of the data on the graphic itself. Label important events in the data.
9. Show data variation, not design variation.
10. In time-series displays of money, deflated and standardized units of monetary measurement are nearly always better than nominal units.
11. The number of information-carrying (variable) dimensions depicted should not exceed the number of dimensions in the data.
12. Graphics must not quote data out of context.
13. Above all else, show the data.
14. Maximize the data-ink ratio.
15. Erase non-data-ink.
16. Erase redundant data-ink.
17. Revise and edit.
18. Forgo chartjunk
19. If the nature of the data suggests the shape of the graphic, follow that suggestion. Otherwise, move toward horizontal graphics about 50 percent wider than tall.
20. The revelation of the complex.

i react against the majority of these. this is this. what a boring world mere representation brings. interpret.

* this is this.
text via.

wangechi mutu.

baster.nl

“the art of indulgence is a threatened species. god preserve us from all those reasonable architects, those cool manners, those careful buildings. go look elsewhere for that – there’s plenty of it around.”
_ sir peter cook

watching you watching me.
laptop reflections.

what is that supposed to be, harris; you eating cinnabun?

skip ahead to 5:25.
them teeth.

you are electric.

mano a mano.
maple leaf gardens, toronto.

dear GIS: you and me, we're finished.

?uestlove on fela & michael.

anton gerasimenko.

pink noise is why you like what you like.

mies in toronto.

buckminster fuller in toronto.
proposed design for the future site of the skydome + cn tower.

yonge + dundas square.
1987 (pre-dundas square).

hello again, summer.

thanks for listening, mescudi.

skin fruit.
Koons’s recourse to an air of collegiality and aesthetic assault is dictated by a distinct vulnerability in his position. His career and the plutocratic culture that it has adorned represent an epoch-making collusion of mega-collectors and leading artists, which has overridden the former gatekeeping roles of critics and curators and sidelined the traditional gallerists who work with artists on a long-term basis of mutual loyalty. With numbing regularity, newly hot artists have abandoned such nurture for gaudy, precarious deals with corporate-style dealers like Larry Gagosian, Pace-Wildenstein, and David Zwirner. In the boom era, buzz about the opportunistic exhibitions of such dealers and the latest sales figures from art fairs and auction houses were what passed for critical discourse. The situation mesmerized newcomers, by flashing promises of ascension to the starry feeding trough. Now that such promises can no longer be made, the posturing of “Skin Fruit”—roughly, noblesse oblige, laced with a left-libertarian raciness—cannot long deflect the mounting potency of class resentment. People are going to notice that the defensive elements, in this particular scrimmage of sensibilities, are members of the putatively vanguard aristocracy of wealth and social clout. The future of art, and the corresponding character of cultured society, seem bound to be determined by some smart, talented, as yet unidentified parties among the howling sansculottes.
via the new yorker

coke sells k'naan through the world cup.

lost toronto.

old yonge street.

he looked, straight. watching.
always watching.

get your shirts pressed; it costs $2.
it is worth it.

and, also, shine your shoes.

CCGS Labrador was a wind-class icebreaker.

between the earth and sky.

The day before Sunday’s health care vote, President Obama gave an unscripted talk to House Democrats. Near the end, he spoke about why his party should pass reform: “Every once in a while a moment comes where you have a chance to vindicate all those best hopes that you had about yourself, about this country, where you have a chance to make good on those promises that you made ... And this is the time to make true on that promise. We are not bound to win, but we are bound to be true. We are not bound to succeed, but we are bound to let whatever light we have shine.”
And on the other side, here’s what Newt Gingrich, the Republican former speaker of the House — a man celebrated by many in his party as an intellectual leader — had to say: If Democrats pass health reform, “They will have destroyed their party much as Lyndon Johnson shattered the Democratic Party for 40 years” by passing civil rights legislation.
krugman at the times.

three frames.

us too.

donald trump's son.

hello, carlo.

sebastian errazuriz.
one of the simplest, most powerful memorials.
in the stadium where pinochet massacred so many.

1993 can last forever.

nas had it right.

these people are just ruining the internet.

ottawa had streetcars?

look at the crowd in this. about 80% are filming the concert on their phones or cameras. we can't justify experiencing anything anymore without documenting our presence.

belly loves nas.

teal and orange.

your easter horizon.

lookit AIG and the bailout; gotta step on the fish to help the whale out.
cannot wait for this album.