world webcam distribution map.

images saved from 1600 webcams every ten minutes then placed on a geographical world map and animated over time. via infosthetics.

new poem in the works, warning it's rather schizophrenic :o)

check it before you wreck it :0)

after school special.

for a moment
i was floating
thrown from the decks
of the SOA in zetaville
and wading the thick ether
of placelessness.
and then i landed
upon the humming
freshly oiled chassis
of the "architecture machine"
growing buildings in the
garden i once despised.

it's time to be Frank again!

all of you

where are you?

I wish to open up the 'self-education' blog again

I am writing up the texts from the 'Stamp Out Architecture'
seminar and am hoping to turn this into a small book

I would like new, reflected comments on the seminar and
the whole self-education/ de-schooling issue

can you respond to me by email so that I know you/we
are out there somewhere

thanks, more soon
and greetings to you all
(let me know about New Orleans! and what you think)

frank heron

What's Worth Knowing 1

(Newsletter from the Hotel Architecture, 7.3.2004)
Hello
It's been a week since arrival on the big bird from Atlanta, tight spaces, sitting next to a computer game fanatic who was returning from meeting his 'girlfriend' - fellow 'quest?' gaming member - in Oklahoma. Colder than usual here in the Hotel Architecture, so the open log fire has been in use, outside it has even snowed and the winds come down from Siberia, eastwards across Scandinavia. The writing goes well, the new book is called 'Architecture or Life' (what a choice huh?) and I must complete an initial draft/ outline scheme for the publishers by first week April, ready to work on it in Autumn for publication next spring 2006. In the meantime I have been looking around at all the books here in the cottage and thinking of something Esther said about the notion of a 'lost' or partial education.
What exactly do we mean by this?
Why are some names, references appearing now and how have they (suddenly) gained currency at SOA? Is it the introduction through new faculty? Is it a representation of what has happened eslewhere and the 'tickle down effect' as it comes into the SOA? Why, if modern/conemporary philosophy is more talked about, should we attend to this? And how would we attend to it? By a reading list, by a chance route, by intense investment in things we at first do not understand, or by attempting to understanding for example Robert Smithson's work? Do you sometimes feel you have to graduate to realise we wish no longer to question or engage deeply with knowledge as experience but accept learning as 'example' (and become professionals: remember the US army recruiting slogan - learn, lead, succeed!!)? Or do you graduate to realise you only just begin engaging with knowledge and experience when you begin questioning it?
Which are you? And is it either-or?
I think not; the world is both-and, and the difficulty is oscillating and sailing between the two. How many of us are comfortable with uncertainty? A good friend of mine, the architect Volker Giencke, teaches in Innsbruck and believes that architecture students, first year, must also begin with a course on art...not Renaissance art or Greek Art, but art today, art tomorrow in all its messiness and 'incomprehension'. He believes the first grapple with 'incoherence' and 'incongruities' becomes the first step into the potential world in architecture that has not been scripted, not already existing. And the references the artists use are those very same that you have suddenly found appearing in your various seminars and studios!! What is your take on this? Is it a 'lost education' or a late-education? Take a look at the following: "An Ideal Syllabus" (Artists, Critics & Curators choose the books we need to read) edited by Jerry Saltz, Frieze, London 1998.
Early morning greetings from the Hotel Architecture.
Frank.

everyday self-ed, numero 3

[then]:
[1] the dancing lights in dad's rear view mirror
[2] going through the encyclopedia with grandpa (often to answer a single, simple question)
[3] wondering how the sucky tube at the drive through bank worked
[4] wondering why mcdonald's didn't have a sucky tube
[5] observing my teachers and then going home and trying to reteach my siblings
[6] drawing fake checks and then filling them in
[7] my favorite quilted afghan was a cape, a fortress wall, a sail, a tentacle, a snake, an ocean surface
[8] climbing trees for the sake of seeing my house from above
[9] 'i believe'
[10] playing war games, board games, video games, imagination games, and life games

[now]:
i see my own eyes in the rearview mirror
the encyclopedia is too slow
i use the atm
teachers want you to teach them too
i love my debit card
my computer is a phone, a typewriter, an easel, an instrument, and an
information source
i'm still climbing
'i make-believe'
life games are the only games
:::mg:::

everyday self-education #2

talking to strangers
intoxication
hallucigenics
anything girlfriend
long hours of anything
silent time, any form
fighting or wrestling
--mm

everyday self-education #1

[ [ everyday self-education, a series ] ]
Please make a list describing some activities that you find you learn the most from. Photos welcome. entry #1 from tresaresa:

Recent, like the past few days:
1. I read some Shakespeare.
“…Her collars, of the moonshine’s watery beams;/Her whip, of cricket’s bone; the lash, of film;/… Not half so big as a round little worm/Pricked from the lazy finger of a maid…/And sometime comes she with a tithe pig’s tail/Tickling a parson’s nose as ‘a lies asleep,/Then he dreams of another benefice...” --Romeo and Juliet
2. I go take pictures of mcdonald’s playground equipment.

3. I make a storyboard of a website.
4. check Wooster, Myspace, and theory blogs
5. having “discourse” with my class mates

6. have a small anxiety attack

Like from my whole life, highly memorable
1. Doing tai chi with some older Chinese people.
2. Giving and receiving testimony (one time in the produce section).
3. Reading all types of novels.
4. Staying up all night and executing an idea.
5. Singing in a choir.
6. Listening to my high school English teacher recite poetry. (Cliché, but listening to people in general.)
7. Getting my parents to tell me stories about before I was born.
8. Sleepovers (about 3rd-12th grade)
9. Arguing with people or hearing other people’s fights.

Robert Smithson at the DMA through April 3, $5 for students
Hours Tuesday and Wednesday: 11:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m., Thursday: 11:00 a.m.–9:00 p.m., Friday, Saturday, and Sunday: 11:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m., Closed Mondays