life as practice
Last week, Dawn surprised me with a trip to MOCA to see the Art in The Streets exhibit. MOCA really went all out on this, from the bus parked out front completely painted, to the entire side of the building painted with a mural, the multiple installations by Space Invader (a favorite of mine), work by Banksy (another favorite), and an area dedicated to Fab 5 Freddy. Fantastic!
If you are in the Los Angeles area, I highly recommend going. I’ll likely go at least once more before it end.
In Dwell Magazine’s unending supply of great things, they included a small article on Ubu Web. A massive collection of, well, things. I feel it’s best you just go see for yourself rather than explain what is there.
One thing I did happen upon is ‘Ten Commandments for Gilbert & George 1995’:
Ten Commandments for Gilbert and George
Thou shalt fight conformism
Thou shalt be the messenger of freedoms
Thou shalt make use of sex
Thou shalt reinvent life
Thou shalt create artificial art
Thou shalt have a sense of purpose
Thou shalt not know exactly what thou dost, but thou shalt do it
Thou shalt give thy love
Thou shalt grab the soul
Thou shalt give something back
Watch it. This is brilliant. I especially enjoy ‘Thou shalt give something back’ because yes, you should.
Took a picture of Little Man at the Star Wars exhibit we went to this weekend (I’ll try to post more on that later) and submitted it to Threadless. We were both wearing our ‘Dark Side of the Garden’ shirts and he tried on the Darth Vader mask. Had to get a picture.
Here’s the link on Threadless.com
…and yes, we match sometimes. Hey — I have to get away with that as much as I can now. I’m sure the day he tells me I’m a nerd and he doesn’t think it’s cool to match it coming soon enough.
On Wednesday, Ethan and I went to MOCA’s SKIN + BONES: PARALLEL PRACTICES IN FASHION AND ARCHITECTURE exhibit, which was hosted by Dwell Magazine. Arriving at 7:05, there were not a heck of a lot of people there yet, though that would change quickly. Though they were serving hors d’oeuvres and wine, we skipped it and went directly into the exhibit. (I don’t drink anyways, precepts and all 😉 )
The way it flowed was very well planned out. Starting off with a room devoted to a fashion designers ‘layering’ exhibit, it really began your experience with an easy and direct understanding of how fashion and architecture were, in fact, related. I believe the name was even shelter, but don’t completely remember. Around the corner came what turned out to be Ethan’s favorite piece of the exhibit; a somewhat deconstruction of men’s dress shirts — each folded and pieced together uniquely. The next piece that really sticks in my mind was a section of this building commissioned by 19 Arabs countries. The display explained that one side had a very traditional arab look, then the opposite side was to be the ‘western translation’ of it. They had a section of the wall of this translation. Imagine an entire wall of separate sections constructed of steel; each section having many large camera-like apertures that would react to light via sensors therefore changing the amount of light allowed into the building. Brilliant. One of the other pieces that both of us were impressed with was actually a dress.
the picture does not do it justice, and though I couldn’t imagine a woman wearing it would find it comfortable or even livable, looking at it in person was interesting. Your eyes could not focus on the majority of the dress! Likely due to what it was made from, and how it was constructed, but none-the-less strange. As we continued on through the exhibit the fashion became less, and the architecture took over. Frank Gehry’s working models of the Walt Disney Concert Hall were great to see, especially since that is where we parked (across the street from MOCA) and walked from. I was really hoping to see more of the Curtain Wall House
but no such luck. Oh well. The final part of the exhibit was devoted to a ‘mist house’ that was created during a Swiss expo. The structure was created in a lake, then the ‘building’ itself had walls constructed of 400+ mist sprays sourced from the lake. People then wore computer controlled raincoats to visit the building and as they walked through, they would light up with colors when another person matched, therefore promoting conversation. This sounded like it would have been a great experience to be part of; quite interesting.
Ethan and I really enjoyed the exhibit.
So I am FINALLY going to see the Skin+Bones Parallel Practices in Fashion and Architecture exhibit at MOCA next Wednesday. Tricia and I had planned to go during her last visit but got a late start and were unable to get there in time. Now, one of my favorite magazines Dwell is having a private viewing for their readers. Ethan and I plan to go — I’m quite looking forward to it.