Thursday, July 21, 2005

Staten Island Chinese Scholar Garden

The Chinese Scholar's Garden in Staten Island is not a very obvious place to consider when thinking of what to do in NYC, but it is a quiet space away from the smog, people and various annoyances of the city in the summertime. There are different botanical gardens throughout the site as well as a structure with various windows that look out into different parts of the garden. It is very peaceful and was more elaborate than I expected.

These are some pictures I took with my camera phone:

Picture(31) Picture(24)
The lady in the right picture was explaining that the tiled emblem was made with broken heineken bottles.

The windows that looked into other windows is something I would love to recreate in my own home...
there were a lot of windows that looked through other windowsmy favorite window at the Chinese Scholar's Garden
Right image is the Banana Leaf window

There was a pond in the middle of the Scholar House that had Koi fish and Lilypads.
pond

Apparently there is also a mini labyrinth that you can walk through at Connie Gretz's Secret Garden. Unfortunately it was closed when we went, so we did not get to see it. I know its not a full size labyrinth, so i am not too thrilled about it, but its a nice attempt.

To get to the Scholar's Garden, you can take the Staten Island Ferry for free and see their snazzy new terminal with a big LCD panel that streams HAVE A NICE DAY and the time intermittently. Taking the Staten Island Ferry is a method of getting a free boat ride and a creative approach to cooling off in the middle of summer. Once you get to the Staten Island Ferry Terminal, you take a bus that goes to Snug Harbor, which is where the Scholar's Garden is located. The bus stop to go to the garden is across the street from the site, and the bus stop to go back to the Ferry Terminal is right in front of the site.


Staten Island Ferry Terminal
Originally uploaded by tangentialism.

Thursday, July 14, 2005

Artbook at Visionaire

I had a friend who used to work for
Visionaire, and he said that they were closing or had closed, but apparently not.

This is happening at their Mercer Street Space:

From nyc.flavorpill.net
Artbook at Visionaire

when: Now through Thur 9.8 (Mon-Sat: 1-6pm)
where: Visionaire Gallery (11 Mercer St, 212.274.8959)

Advancing of the union between two culture-publishing powerhouses, Distributed Art Publishers takes up summer residence at Visionaire's Soho gallery. Together, they present over 400 titles, including limited edition collaborations edited by fashion gurus Karl Lagerfeld and Tom Ford, as well as a racy photographic Bible featuring Nan Goldin's Mary Magdalene and Wolfgang Tillmans' Crucifixion. The budget-friendly North Drive Press No. 2 is editor Matt Keegan's awesome box of multiples and interviews, while a set of prints by blue-chip artist Thomas Schütte caters to deeper pockets. As part of the superstar lineup, nude-model maven Vanessa Beecroft drops by the gallery to sign books on Thur 7.14. (CEK)

Note: The Artbook at Visionaire book-signing series continues with Richard Prince (TBA) and Alex Katz (Tue 8.9).

All Visionaire's design books have a specific theme for each issue. I own a book about Movement, which contains photographs and drawings of various transparencies. The transparent images create these concise systematic layers which change with each turn of a page. The current issue comes with figures that were co-designed by Kid Robot and various designers like Karl Lagerfeld and Marc Jacobs. If you visit Visionaire's site, there is a great Flash animation of the figures, which starts off with the figure designed by Karl Lagerfeld.

Tuesday, July 05, 2005

A very intriguing project addressing issues of preservation in sexual worth via bioart.

hymNextTM: "

The Designer Hymen Project was a concept product in 2004. Hymen prototypes were grown in a petri dish from rat smooth muscle tissues and blotting membranes. The hymens could theoretically be marketed as a hymen replacement but were to be distributed as soft sculptures only. Thus they were not intended for human application at that time.



HymNext[1].jpg



In may culture, the value of a female is dependent on this thin piece of mebrane. The absence of one can be devastating to her reputation and family which may lead to social rejection or even death to her. The one-time, sacred breakage of the hymen also represents the surrendering of the female as property and of sexual loyalty to the masculine counterpart during ritual consummation.



...



Treating the hymen as a replaceable object and creating a piece that may imply repeated events of defloration may be aborrhent to some but celebratory to others.



A project by Julia Reodica at vivoLabs.



Via a NYT article on bioart (also seen on Fleshbot )


href='http://www.we-make-money-not-art.com/archives/004611.php'>DIY artificial insimination, Extra Ear 1/4 Scale, Victimless leather jacket, Hairy cactus, Manipulated tattoo, Your Kidney Supermarket, Skin Gun, etc.

"



(Via sexblo.gs.)