the looker

Yellowstone 2

2012-01-22T16:20:00.001-08:00

Yellowstone 2011

2012-01-22T16:18:00.001-08:00

India3 2011

2012-01-13T07:03:00.000-08:00

India2 2011

2012-01-13T07:01:00.000-08:00

India1 2011

2012-01-13T06:59:00.000-08:00

Milan2 2011

2012-01-13T06:57:00.000-08:00

Milan 2011

2012-01-13T06:54:00.000-08:00

St. Joseph 2010

2012-01-13T06:28:00.000-08:00

Dallas 2007

2012-01-13T06:27:00.000-08:00

Michigan 2010

2012-01-12T07:16:00.000-08:00

St. Louis 2008

2012-01-12T07:03:00.000-08:00

San Francisco 2006

2012-01-06T13:15:00.000-08:00

Chicago 2004

2012-01-06T13:00:00.000-08:00

The Art Of Numbers

2009-09-03T05:41:00.000-07:00

The Art Of Numbers

We as a generation have become so desensitized by numbers and statistics thrown at us that large numbers fail to find impact and we remain largely bored by the gigantic amount of data available to us in the modern world. Careless consumerism and its unseen, unaccounted for aftermath are finally getting some attention in the major information forums, however it remains difficult to engage the masses in a meaningful discussion for lack of a visceral response among the general population. I have recently stumbled upon the work of an artist who tackles this with great ingenuity.

“Finding meaning in global mass phenomena can be difficult because the phenomena themselves are invisible, spread across the earth in millions of separate places. There is no Mount Everest of waste that we can make a pilgrimage to and behold the sobering aggregate of our discarded stuff, seeing and feeling it viscerally with our senses. Instead, we are stuck with trying to comprehend the gravity of these phenomena through the anaesthetizing and emotionally barren language of statistics.”
-Chris Jordan

In an urgent battle to help us find our sensible shoes Chris Jordan displays a great understanding of the senses and how they work. He uses the power of numbers to illuminate numbers, using artistically arranged compilations of human squanderings making one a little less likely to turn away from its illustration. In a world where many people surprisingly still continue to equate green-thinking with elitist capriciousness or at worst, propaganda, Jordan finds a way to engage the emotional and awaken the rational.

It is a mistake to imagine Jordan’s work limited to ecological ideals for it is firmly rooted in the social and global context of which ecological issues are only one of the more pressing. Alluding to crime, political motives and an inherent lack of consumer curiosity regarding the full result of every purchase he tessellates our collective decisions into beautiful images of decay and consequence.

Where the Trash Cans go Moo

2008-08-15T16:04:00.000-07:00

One advantage of being born in a "developing" nation and moving to a "developed" one is the viewpoint it gives me on both worlds. Often, this sensibility cannot be defined by a "logical" analysis alone. I have seen a curious and often comical pattern in some of my American and European friends’ attitudes about India.

A frequent topic of amusement is the issue of street cows on Indian roads. We often engage in discussions about this urban Indian curiosity. "So why DO you have cows on the roads?" they ask, followed by an incredulous look. It’s easy to use the defensive religious stance, mentioning the Hindu masses of India to whom this is a sacred animal, who often engage in the worship of the cow and demonstrate an elaborate tolerance towards the bovines. But then again, it’s probably my attempt to logically explain the functioning chaos that India is.

Last year, on a Delhi winter morning during my annual trip there, I found myself sitting at one of the roadside dhaba (street vendors) having a cup of masala chai tea when it all came to me. Outside of all the animal rights, health care and traffic safety agendas, one can't help notice a simple, base-level sustainable mechanism at work on the streets of India -- a symbiotic collaboration between the street vendors and the cows. For years, the Indian government has tried to control the free roaming cows in urban areas, but their efforts have been in vain. Are there vested interests at play here or are the slow moving bovines creatures stealthily dodging the hands of the law?

Yes, the animals’ owners obviously benefit from the cows’ free range because it saves them the overhead of traditional husbandry, but it begs the question-- why don’t the urban citizens object? It may well be the religious sentiment surrounding their existence which allows them special status, or it may be that the creatures have developed a symbiotic relationship with the people who interface with them the most – the street vendors.

I slurped up my masala chai served in the terracotta cup and crushed it into the dirt on the side of the street for the winds and earth to claim. I then moved to a chat (savory fast foods) vendor. I couldn’t help but notice a huge, mellow cow standing patiently a few yards away. Vendors crowd the streets in Urban India – there is never a shortage of options in the land of the hungry and poor. To quote Anthony Bourdain, Chef and host of Travel Channel TV series ‘No Reservations,’ “To judge the level of entrepreneurship in a country one just needs to count the number of vendors at any street corner in any urban setting”. Some of the major street corners of urban India host up to 10- 20 street vendors. If India is poor, lacking the food to feed its masses -- then how does it manage to feed all those cows on the streets which are obviously thriving?

I noticed the venders serving their mostly vegetarian food on plates made of Sal and Siali leaves- commonly used in low income economies. Once used, the plates are discarded in a heap behind the vendor. This provides the cow with a constant supply of fodder with the particular flavoring of the vendor it chooses. Not only does the cow remove leftovers of the vendor at the end of the day, it also prevents the vendor from reusing them to save a penny. No detergent, no water, no washing.

Once the plates are digested they are recycled into another valued resource. The hot, dry Indian climate converts cow dung into dried cow dung cakes in a matter of one afternoon. These cakes are then collected by the poor people who move from villages to urban slums in hope of finding daily wage work. So the dung cakes are scooped up for use in chullahs (a primitive cooking stove), which run fantastically well on the sun-dried, dung cake fuel.

Does one view these mechanisms which have evolved to balance inefficiencies of bio waste disposable as “broken infrastructure?” Or design and install trash cans which remove the cow’s better ergonomics from the cycle, and create two new streams of pollution where none existed before?

Or does one study this evolutionary infrastructure of sustainability in minute detail and design NEW systems leveraging what it has to teach us, rather than imposing a business model fit for another context and another world?

Here’s my curious perspective: often the “developing world” has solutions that may look like mistakes, but are actually clever and quite complex holistic adaptations.

Even if it does involve a moo-ing trash receptacle.

Raza's Universe

2007-08-19T11:47:00.000-07:00

“Painting is something alive as human beings in its different manifestations… it is a vital process of becoming. Just imagine how fascinating it is that the seed contains the total inherent forces of a plant, of animal life, and so on and so forth. And that could be the same process in Form too!”

Raza's Universe

If art is a language that transcends the physical then no one speaks it more coherently than Raza through his work. Observing Raza is like being audience to a deaf and mute couple interacting through sign language and sharing emotion , you have evidence of communication but you are far from deciphering it. Watching how Raza uses simple form and colors to create intricate masterful artifacts seems like he holds back a secret, a secret to the universe which is unknown to most. There seems to be an inherent order and theme in the communication which is palpable but not decipherable. The canvases look like torn pieces from a vastly larger fabric of a parallel limitless universe.

Raza calls his work a result of two parallel enquiries aimed at a 'pure plastic order' and 'the theme of nature' respectively. Both converge into a single point and become inseparable - the Bindu. In the late 70s, he focused on pure geometrical forms; his images were improvisations on an essential theme: that of the mapping out of a metaphorical space in the mind. To quote Raza, "As far as my work is concerned, I am coming to crystallization of a potent symbolism in its simplicity and elasticity. The process is continual and through elimination, my means are getting more and more economical and I am looking at my destination without the superfluous
and the unnecessary."

I Found.

2007-08-13T17:37:00.001-07:00

I Found.

There’s a Chinese saying that the best way to understand a person is to go through his trash? Or maybe it’s from the FBI rule book.

I moved from India to United States to pursue higher studies at the Institute of Design which entailed a heavy dose of ethnography and user research. ID differentiated from other colleges by the mantra “User Centric Design Approach”. During my two years there I learnt various methodologies and frameworks to understand the “user”. But they all seem very “intellectual” and conditioned. The whole act involved an ensemble of tools like camera, notebook, questionnaire, etc which made the research very staged and left the user highly conscious of my motives. I graduated with a Masters degree and all the tools in my bag but little knowledge of the inherent idiosyncrasies of the culture that thrived around me. The concoction of cultures that constitutes America puzzled me. I was so preoccupied with the courses and lectures that I missed out on experiencing the true squeaks and smells of the masses. I wanted to meet the everyday American, know what he does, what he thinks. Almost wished I could dress up in a black robe and have a bunch of people confess to me their deepest desires, dreams, fears, perceptions, aspirations. The stuff that makes people tick, and get out of bed ever morning. I needed something that could make me catch up all those lost years of growing up with them and empathize with this culture at its deepest crudest level.

I came across this magazine called FOUND. I was amazed to find all my answers there. I laughed at some and was shocked by others. An of course there was also the dirty found. In all as I flipped through pages I was going through what people call cultural sensitization. The book was a collection of found stuff: love letters, birthday cards, kids' homework, to-do lists, ticket stubs, poetry on napkins, doodles-- anything that gives a glimpse into someone else's life. Anything goes. Here was a bundle of information, a lens to look through. Information people generated when they were least conscious of their surrounding many in their most honest hour.

Does user ethnography start with digging through the consumer trash or simply collecting found pieces? Objects and artifacts that people create tell stories. Many, many stories.

Distorted Scale

2007-08-13T15:35:00.000-07:00

Distorted Scale
When the physical attributes of an object are scaled does that new scale affects the physiological impact the object has on the onlooker? We all know bigger is better but is bigger really big or is it small in its conclusion. The conclusion being what the mind retains after the experience is long over. This question has troubled me for years before I chanced about these series of sculptures by Don Mueck. Does the sculpture of the couple look more insecure because they are smaller or if they were actual scale. Does the scaled up boy squatting look more lost in a small space or less? Does scale distort or amplify or shrink the emotive message behind the object. What in Don Mueck’S sculptures makes them haunting and unforgettable? Is it the copious amounts of plastic used in their manufacturing, the keenness to detail in replication or amplification of emotion
through distortion of scale?

Coolness in avoidance of coolness.

2007-08-12T19:22:00.000-07:00

Coolness in avoidance of coolness.

The manifesto that MUJI carries stating “because there is elegance in plainness”, “depth in the minimal” has a resonance in my mind the echo of which can be traced to my college days. I remember as an architecture student during “my days of experimenting with truth” understanding the concept of Gandhism and the simplest approach I could seek at that point in time was to investigate and scale down this concept and ideology to the persona of the man who invented it, Mr. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. Like a sleuth with my rustic camera bag slung on my shoulders and my old Bata sandals I visited the Sabarmati ashram, Gandhi’s (place of) residence during India’s freedom struggle. As an 18 year old half way intoxicated into the world of consumerism, the absence of “STUFF” in that little shack rattled my state of sobriety. For a persona as big as Gandhi it was hard for me to define him through his set of belongings which I could count on my figures. There was this pair of spectacles which had an uncanny resemblance to the ones that inspired John Lennon’s in later days, a diary, an ink pot, a fountain ink pen and few other forgettable articles of necessity. In an age where people define themselves and clutter their lives by things it was hard to imagine all this man could attribute to his greatness was his simple thought. As a designer what intrigued me most was the banality of design of these few articles. There was nothing unnecessary or meaningless in the gestalt of these objects, a simple honesty and functionality where the occasional wear and tear of time added embellishment and detail. The objects screamed of silence in a way only understood by its owner. It almost felt as if each of those could only be deciphered, owned, and deserved by someone who understood and practiced simplicity and minimalism in every facet of life.

When I see Muji products it gives me that similar sense of leaving some of my attributes onto these objects rather than them defining me and my life. http://www.muji.net/eng/