sketch

click to enlarge

update

I've been chipping away at various projects but not showing or saying too much about them too soon because the projects are bigger than myself alone.

I enjoyed going back out to the Lasserre building at UBC this week on two occasions.  First, to present a talk for Annabel Vaughn's 'node' studio - she kindly asked me show the students a few of the projects I have done over the past few years which have been situated in the public realm.  I showed: 'turf skirts,' 'fact/fiction worlds series,' 'ludo in soho,' 'egg + dart,' 'concrete pillow bench,' 'verb tests,' 'shelf project,' 'seed balls hung from viaduct,' 'floor project,' 'moving space diorama,' and then finished with some background info on one of the projects I am currently developing.

My second trip out to Lasserre this week was to take part in a studio crit for the first years - they did localized string installations based on some gathered drawing data about a specific part of an iconic building.  There's a buzz in the air these days about string installations!  Or maybe I am all of a sudden more aware of this type of activity based on our own string installation earlier this summer...

David and I are settling in to our new studio.  Below is a photo of the first thing I made there (after taking down our string installation and moving all our stuff in).

viaduct curtain progress

click to enlarge - this is the most recent rendering. 

entry tunnel

Earlier this Spring I was helping out on a restaurant project called Fat Dragon at work (Bricault Design).  The entry tunnel was my bit:

found infrastructure

It's still early days

on this viaduct curtain collaboration.

curtain 1

I was asked to help make a very big curtain for a party a few years ago. And by 'a few' I actually mean six. (Wow, so much has happened since then.)

Made in partnership with Phillipe Lew and Space Agency.

underside of cambie bridge

unfinished painting, currently rolled up and in the corner.

viaducts fantasy

it's a gathering of small rental workshops and independent cafes/shops underneath the Dunsmuir and Georgia viaducts, with a cycling & pedestrian concourse sculpture park above. you could call it an 'infrastructural symbiosis,' or as i also like to call it, 'viaducts fantasy.' ideas in collaboration with Chris Forrest. not entered into the recent competition.

this is what it's like there now:

colouring book update

Copies of 'Colouring Under The Vancouver Viaducts' are available at Vancouver Special.

Under Cambie Bridge : page 5 inspiration.

moving space diorama

I was able to install the moving space diorama

just the other day, after a couple of months of planning.

Before:

This public art work by Jill Anholt (Moving Pictures, 2005) was vandalized last year and the exposed metal interiors were attracting garbage. It was such a great little pair of spaces, but they were in a bad way and I wanted to try to make them better somehow. I came up with a bunch of ideas and the one with the concentric circles stuck - I made a maquette with cardboard (as shown in earlier posts) and was able to do some tests at 1:1 scale. I tried a number of materials and realized that hanging would be best structurally and that whatever it was, it should be weatherproof and easy enough to install and remove. I contacted Jill and explained where I was coming from, and asked her permission for doing this installation. She explained how it was taking a long time for the City to get around to fixing her piece, and she graciously agreed to let me do it.

After:

It was a straightforward installation. We swept up broken glass and cigarette butts and burnt bits of paper (one of the interiors is charred from a fire), and removed bent bolts from holding up the original 'lens' pieces. The layers of pink pleather that we put up are just scored, bent, and stuck to the 'ceiling' using double-sided tape.

We've been back at different times of day to see how it looks. It's interesting to see how the daylight changes the effect of the layers.

If you'd like a copy of the 'announcement' pdf document for this piece, send an email to spacemakeplace@gmail.com

Ken Lum map sightings

In the winter I had a commission to design the conceptual map that went along with the Ken Lum exhibit at the Vancouver Art Gallery. It was a great job and people seemed to be pretty happy with the results. The Gallery has had to order another 10K because the first batch of maps were all taken - the show has been very popular. I happened to have my camera with me the other evening when I saw a girl on Robson Street holding her copy!

It made me think of other 'sightings' the map has had. Lisa Parker was at the gallery on opening night and took this photo, which she then posted on her flickr site:

The map has been indexed on the Canadian Design Resource:

And it has also made its way onto Wallace Koopman's artlog where he shows a nice composition of lunch and map in the gallery cafe:

Well isn't that sweet. Thanks folks.

colouring books

two hours worth

6pm

8pm

6pm

8pm

a few spring sketches

drawn with cold hands!

Burrard Bridge north side

Main Street Viaduct north side

Main Street Viaduct south side

Cambie Bridge west side

this week at the studio

westend carpark 'verb' series

The idea was that a simple amendment to a space may dramatically alter the active experience of it, enhancing a volume's 'verb' qualities.

floor update!

Today was a beautiful day. I went for a bike ride and decided on my way to check out how my floor is doing. Turns out it is doing well! - enjoying some sunny rays.

Some joggers passed through while I was there.

Some time in the last week or so someone has decided to add their own paste-ups to one of the side walls. I like how they are random and organic and kind of weird.

seed balls hung from viaduct

A project I did a couple of years ago. The idea was to hang seed balls from the viaduct, over a grassy patch.

The seed balls were made out of compost (from our kitchen worm bin), a bit of powdered clay (had to get a new blade for the blender afterwards), some wildflower seeds, and a bit of water. They were hung with bright orange yarn that was leftover from my M.Arch thesis project. More photos are on my website under the dark green button. The Main St viaduct is still my favourite one in the city.

more floor pics

Thanks so much to unurth for posting photos of my floor project on his blog over the weekend!