visual resistance

visual resistance blog i'm trying to keep a running record of these things particularly ones that involve 3-D work.

AIA diversity

the other day i sat for a 45 minute phone interview with a firm who is conducting a survey for the national AIA on the profound diversity issue within the profession. the woman conducting the interview was particularly stricken by the 1% of licensed african-american architects which has not changed in 30-40 years...also by the number of women in architecture school (usually 50/50) and the # of licensed women architects which also has a huge discrepancy. there were numerous questions but the final one was this: what are the major inhibitors/barriers to people of color (african-american in particular since she was focusing on my experiece and perspective) students/practioners in architecture and what can be done to resolve this issue.

my answer: major money and energy needs to be put into: early exposure to architecture in secondary and presecondary education to cultivate the interest and love of architecture, funding for students of color in the post secondary education process and MENTORSHIP like nobody's business.

a) exposure:

given the percentages of architects of color, you are less likely to come in contact with an architect of color as a young person of color. your uncle, grandmother, cousin is not likely to be an architect. schools don't neccessarily promote architecture as a profession to pursue. for most people the main professions youth know about are: doctor, lawyer...maybe engineer. then there's teachers, law enforcement etc. etc.

b) funding/support:

this is expensive! usually, if there are any, the grants, fellowships, scholarhips, assistantships are few and far between....let alone support in particular for the retention students of color. many students of color (and other students with financially challenging backgrounds) have to work and go to school. architecture isn't really something that can be done part time...and working and going to architecture school is brutal. i'm not saying some people can't make it work...i know many who do but its one more factor that makes it hard.

c) mentorship:

the architectural education process is long and arduous. if you don't have someone rooting for you and pushing you it can be easy to give up. how many faculty of color are there? are professionals reaching out to students? as professionals are seasoned professionals reaching back to the newer generation?

d) payoff:
the education, internship and licensure process in general is long as hell. and the resulting salaries are crazy LOW compared to the other "professions". for many people of color picking a career path usually is without the priveledge of "doing something you love"...conversely it is directly related to transcending financial struggle. those who don't have that financial struggle i think still are looking for a certain level of prestige that architecture doesn't offer.

what do you think? is my answer simplistic? is there more or less to it? thoughts? she said most people had similar answers.

"bitch i made it"

-that's what it says on the dumpster right out front of my new residence. if i weren't having problems using the newish picture function in blogger i'd post it b/c you know i took a picture. those random eloquent sharpie scrawled non sequitur's always make me smile. i should probably be offended or annoyed that people are writing stupid shit on private property but i'm not =). what was that person thinking?

anyway yes, i actually AM alive. in the past solid 2 weeks since i last posted, i've been packing and moving. i have finally moved and and perpetually trying to find stuff. i have a lot to post...i guess. this is just something to stall...but coming, frontespieces and thoughts on individual lamps from ruskin's seven lamps of architecture around which my theory class is oriented. sketches and pics of mock up for furniture...bought wood yesterday. perhaps i'll get to that tomorrow morning. my DSL connection got lost in the move...

my friend liz has a blog about her participatory design studio in taiwan this summer...check it out =).

venting: architecture and children

i ran across this discussion thread on archinect over the weekend and i was deeply annoyed by the negative anti-child/career responses.

anyone who knows me knows that i'm all about the choice to choose when and whether to procreate. i've never deemed it a selfish decision not to have children. but what i do think is selfish is for people on either side to insult eachother or for that choice and choose to limit their perception of people based on their status as a parent. in my opinion, this is just as bad as limiting your perception of people because of race, ability or sexuality. i think as a parent, it grates against my very being to hear parents referred to as "breeders", boring people that only know how to talk about soccer practice...and children referred to as "gross" and as "extra mouthfuls". its like people don't value their own parents and the fact that they were once children.

i have my moments when its really hard but, just so i'm on record, my venting about being a parent and trying to pursue architecture has more to do with how the 'system' is set up than any limits that having children inherently place on you. I HATE that people choose see children only as a limitation. maybe its the buddhist upbringing...but i really believe that you create your own destiny and reality. if people only relied on how things had been done in the past and the constructed societal "limits"...where would we be as a society? i wouldnt have done a lot of the things that i've done if i'd chosen to embrace those ideas. when i wanted to go to an ivy league school and my advisor told me they didn't except mediocre students...i pursued it anyway so what i wasn't a straight a student, my portfolio kicked ass and i volunteered like crazy and was politically active and that multi-dimensionality (i think i just made that word up) was an asset.

children can make you happier than any loving bond you've ever experienced...if you want them. here's a shout out to my son, for his contribution to my life. making it a life full and enriched in ways i could never imagine. he's my best design project yet. we get to shape him and mold him with all the hopes that we have for humanity and watch him develop his own identity and contributions to this world.

surprise

one of my professors emailed today about the blogs. he read this one for just about the entire year its been in existence. more than just flattering, i was very excited about this for educational reasons. he surely has many other important things to do with his time...than sit there and read about the random things i deem important enough to post about. i don't know if any other prof.s have looked at it but i think this is a testament to his character if not many of the prof.s here. for the most part, we don't have the sterotypically, crazy out there aloof architecture teachers who are so self absorbed they don't know your name. taking it a step further to take an interest in and dialogue about student interests beyond the classroom is really special. or maybe i'm just corny....and sleepy as usual =)...but he did get the lionel pries excellence in teaching award multiple years so i think i'm on point w/this.

some items of interest

philly murals

The site uses GIS and features statements by artists, images, and is searchable in a number of ways, including by mural subject suchas African American history, social concerns, and more--great teaching tool. If you move a bit further through the website you can explore other databases that are interesting, too--by neighborhoods, for example.

public art network

Americans for the Arts' Public Art Network (PAN) develops professional services for the broad array of individuals and organizations engaged in the expanding field of public art. More than 300 public art programs exist in the United States at the state, local and national level. PAN connects the field by stimulating dialogue, discussing critical issues, developing public art products and services, and providing information through the website and the PAN Listserv.

big ideas in small packages

congratulations to Dave Sarti, (a former coworker from last summer's job at environmental works) on finishing his house! what an exciting and inspiring notion...maybe when i grow up i will design and build my own house too!...

...

on another note, i just picked up my studio evaluation from last quarter somehow i managed to not only survive but get one of the better evaluations i've gotten in my time here. mind-boggling i tell you. a running theme in all of these evaluations "yamani seems less confident than her design work suggest she be" i'm not sure what to do about that except keep practicing. orcas was kewl...i'm a nerd because going to the top of mount consitution was by far my favorite part...besides seeing family of course. meanwhile, furniture design has begun...whoa nelly. the ass-kicking has commenced. models due on the first day of class and everyday thereafter for the next 2 days? dude. WTF. i haven't even had time to process comments from each day. particularly with trying to work...yeah 2 jobs now one quite flexible, architecture related and both fun and frustrating b/c i don't know what i'm doing and one non architecture related but involves community assistance out in my student/family residential community and getting free rent! (in other words i'm LOCO) to sum up, i'm doing the same thing i always do, not taking a break, not allowing any time for rest and taking on WAY too much. i was at this point a few months ago when my body shut down and unleashed that $1400.00 tonsil situation...so on august 20th i just might collapse and sleep for the entire 6 weeks until fall starts. my tuesday night theory class with JenDee looks quite promising...

studio 804

this seems to be a really exciting design build program in kansas. i read about this while reading john hill's article in ten by ten about dan rockhill. not that i would want to be in lawrence kansas but i really wish i had researched this design build thing a little more thoroughly a few years ago. there seem to be a lot of exciting design build programs at schools around the country. too bad UW seems to have really started to marginalize this part of their curriculum. it seems steve badanes who's amazing but also close to retirement (i'd add a link to his bio on the UW architecture website but that website is so atrocious and dated that i refuse to direct people to it) is like the lone soldier pioneering this cause. which really sucks. a lot of students come here specifically for that experience but it seems to whiddled away and there's not much of an effort to rebuild. but that's just my little opinion...obviously they are doing a lot with this Yakima design build thing which which is a collaboration with folks in landscape and the revered pyatok.

Extreme Home Makeover UW style (build a house in 10 weekends)

This upcoming weekend 6.25-27.05, UW Architecture students (and anyone else who wants to help out!) will commence the building process of the single family residence for a family in Yakima Valley. some of the people working their butts off on this all quarter are close friends. i think its awesome work to design and build a place for a family that really needs it. i plan to get out there at least weekend a month to help out...i'll try to post the schedule...in case you want to too!

tollbooth gallery

in my inbox this morning:

The Tollbooth Gallery will be putting together some ex-stallation projects involving architecture students or recent graduates. This project we hope, will dialog the merging between architecture and contemporary art. Additionally, it would be a great opportunity for experimentation of forms and concepts. Selected participants would build off of the Tollbooth structure in conjunction with videos and paper works from well-know artists.

Tollbooth Gallery seeks architects / designers interested in creating ex-stallations. Works should be in response to the Tollbooth structure, as well as any ongoing exhibitions. The Tollbooth Gallery is the worlds smallest gallery dedicated to experimental video and wheat pasted paper fine arts. Interested applicants please contact karen@artrod.org. No Deadline.

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm......fun maybe i can come up with something.

Community | Architexts

Yay! they FINALLY got a website! i interned with them for a like a month or so 5-6 yrs ago...working on the early stages of this project. they are definitely one of my examples of the kind of work i could see myself doing. i was younger, and even less clear than i am now about where i was going with this interdisciplinary thing so i don't think it turned out to be a mutually beneficial experience but i have kept them on my radar...and wished it had been more or that i could somehow get back involved.

anyway, i'm contemplating coming up with an echoing green application to start a public art/architecture/service/advocacy org like some of the ones i've mentioned in previous posts but with a 'twist'....but there's always the dilemma, what's the best use of your energy? do you start something new, or join the efforts of something existing.

2 chicago related posts in one day. my roots must me calling me...

CHAOS

i've seen this on two different blogs now. being a native chicagoan, i can't emphasize enough the IMMENSE satisfaction i get from seeing this organized widespread appropriation of exisiting Chicago Housing Authority ads to counter and criticize the their plans for "transformation" which is the bigges euphemism i've ever heard. those not from chicago or not up on public housing history...should know that there was about 30 straight blocks of public housing approaching downtown from the black, i mean, south side of chicago about half of which was high-rises. in 1997 when i was doing public allies, and working in the grand boulevard/bronzeville area in stateway gardens community doing youth development, organizer training at centers for new horizons , small business development training through mid-south planning and development and WSEP and supposedly doing public health education as a part of our team 'service project' i came to love this community and this issue struck me deeply. it was really heating up even back then. we were trying to figure out how to extend the scope of our "public health" project to include housing voucher education and tenant advocacy. right before i left 2 years ago 90% of these buildings were completely razed. i've been back about 4 times since 2003 and everytime, i'm speechless and damn near brought to tears when i see the vast expanses of vacant land and all the corny ass supposed "less dense" 'mixed-income' development planned. WHERE ARE THE PEOPLE??? where did they go? i would get freaked out back then when i would run into a family in one of the eleven homeless shelters i was working in that i had just met at Stateway weeks or months before...now i can't imagine where all of them are. this is pure Chaos indeed. my experiences in homeless shelters and public housing were a large impetus in my interests in architecture...wanting to design truly affordable well designed housing for the people who need it most. but i'm getting to the end of architecture school and it sometimes just seems plain frivolous. advocacy and organizing seem to be more of a vehicle to solving this problem than architecture. there are so many emergency housing needs that architects are doing nothing en mass to address. there's no doubt, that having such concentrated spanses of public housing and the condition that it was in was extremely problematic but just whole scale destruction of people's homes, history...lives...that is just wrong.

architecture + cobbling=cydwoq

this is what happens when architects design shoes =). these are my recent frivolous preoccupation. if only my level of employment sustained this level of shopping...but ebay is really a beautiful thing. a couple months ago i found a new, never worn pair for like a third of the $.

2more days till freedom (from finals,19 credits and a quarter from hell) and perhaps a more regular posting schedule.

4 more days till beaux arts ball.

and next week? catch me on orcas island baby!

heavy trash

my class mate presented a "artivism" case study on this group today. i hope i can interview someone from their group for thesis.

Heavy Trash is an anonymous arts organization of architects, artists, and urban planners. Heavy Trash creates large, disposable art objects that draw community and media attention to specific urban issues. By explaining a particular urban problem and suggesting a solution, Heavy Trash seeks to provoke dialogue among citizens.

check out their manifesto and all the comments pro/con heavy trash and pro/con gated communities...which isn't the only issue they "act on" but...its amazing how intense people get with anonymous comments. clearly people love it or HATE it...

pocket property

i'm fast at work on the case study i'm doing for my architecture and the landscape course...we could either analyze our studio project...or an 'architectural' project which addresses some of the issues we have discussed in class about the "transgression and fluidity of architecture and landscape" (those are jeff hou's words). i chose to look at one of these "is it architecture?/or is it art?" type projects that i'm obsessed with. so, i'm analyzing Andrea Zittel's "pocket property" c.2000 which is essentially a building and a land mass which she builds and inhabits as social commentary. on her site she writes:

The A-Z Pocket Property was in part a result of a true desire to create my own personal “intimate universe”. But it is also a dark humored commentary on the way in which our culture constructs and then capitalizes on a human desire for freedom, autonomy, and isolation. Living in American suburbs makes one aware of how land is "packaged" as a consumable product and sold off like products on a supermarket shelf. Likewise, in some futuristic manifestation, the Pocket Property is foreseeable as a product, which could be mass-produced to satisfy peoples craving to be in control of their own intimate universes.

strange bungalow indeed.

ruby osorio

i just read the new issue of art papers and i'm feelin this girl. i think i'll add her to my side bar next to Ghada.

she appropriates "girliness" and stereotypical ideas of femininity to communicate a sort of "every thing is not as it seems" sense of reality. if you look closer at the images. the article talked about how she teeters on the "outsider art" realm and the more "high art" scene. which is a concept i have yet to fully comprehend...but...


i like seeing work like this and reading about artists like this because it gives me some inspiration that interdisciplinary interests can be reconciled and communicated in a creative means...thats the thing about art...it can be personal...yet relevant to other people's experience.

i don't know if architecture is "personal"...i mean, it is subjective in the sense that we bring our personal and culturally derived aesthetics to the design...but ultimately its for other people. whereas art you can make for yourself and care less what other people think...not that i wouldn't b/c i just care too much in general. but the expectation is that architecture has to be "responsible" to the public. not that i want to 'disregard' the public...i'm all about the public!

anyway, i digress. ruby is hot. i 'm feelin ruby. lately, i've been thinking that an academic career could give me the kind of hybridity and freedom i'm looking for. i could be disillusioned...but perhaps a ph.d. is next. in what though? so far i have my eye on these two: CUNY environmental psychology and i'm kinda digging this Ed.D. program at Columbia in art & art education because it is equally art practice as in actually creating real tangible work be it built or whateva....but the thing is, i would be coming from more of a public art for public education/consciousness raising standpoint not really the k-12 thing so i have to figure out if that fits.

black people love us

oh really? i'm in btw. classes so i don't have time to comment on this but i thought i would throw it up here for reactions in the meantime.

internet art? does the identity of the author matter? offensive insanity or creative satirical commentary? on what exactly? does it matter?

my gut reaction=W.R.O.N.G. i will count the ways for you, um...later....

take two, a little more:

there's a link to a NYT article here
( i can't find the original article.) i guess this circulated a while ago. again, i'm late and obvlivious. but the authors described this project as social activism. the italian and jewish siblings with a black step-mom argue, "There is a mistake that people have made about the division of labor, It's like racism is something only people of color can think about. Feminism is something only women can think about. But it's important for white people to get involved in the critique too."

i agree that the conversations should not be onesided and should be holistic but...a lot of things have to be considered also, the medium, the audience etc...
on another note, i guess black people love us is along the lines of damali ayo's rent-a-negro.com. damn artists. always stirrin shit up =). i think its interesting how this stuff gets integrated into the lives general public...does it go over as just another random forward in somebody's inbox...for instance what's the conversation between me my grandma when it shows up in her inbox. these guys also did that rejection line thing. i know people who use it and have no idea that its tongue in cheek, or art, or commentary on the "democratic potential of the internet" or anything.

paretti started or is involved in this rather compelling organization eyebeam

fuzzytank

someone i know showed me his city noise log (for lack of a better term?) today. its kinda cool surfing thru the images...i love looking at the city through other people's eyes...

budapest october! i'm there dude.

re-activism

got this in my inbox this morning from liz. i'm all over it! well...i might not make it to budapest. but... the "jujitsu architecture" workshop in particular...man, i wish i could. maybe i could come up with some kind of paper worthy of becoming a panelist...so i could get some expenses paid! i'd be happy just to attend though. i should at least contact them...maybe i could get some interviews for my thesis.