July 2009 Archives

The other day I dreamt of grass coffins and had to do one.

I would like to have grass growing from the back of my feet. Inside anthuriums making use of the the two thirds of water in my body, eventually taking it over. I imagine mobile beings which reflect their own anatomy and in the process don't require mirrors.

These will soon become sculptures in resin, water and life.

My current big project plays with the visceral reality of territory.

We all invest in land, in boxes to inhabit, nations go to war as they dispute territory. Land equals wealth. The property market goes down the whole economy follows. We use maps to navigate this neatly organized world of possession. Public space and Private space.

Maps get me from a to b, they point out landmarks, even give me traffic information. But there are many types of maps, of cartographing reality and the one I'm most interested in exploring and helping create is a new visceral territorial map. Tribocracy.

A layer on top of the cartographic maps we know so well. A map that informs me of who is claiming what territories. A map aimed at an younger audience, that allows them to pinpoint their dwelling, project their desires onto it: it only takes 3 points to claim an area, but you have to physically be in that area. I can claim the tower of london, if only i can encircle it... 

A map that is both physical and virtual where I can see who dwells in my newly claimed territory. A map that allows me to escape this political reality we are bound to and generate a new layer of meaning. Tribocracy.

Conversation is now everywhere as more and more people become 'users' of some technical device which allows them to converse, to formulate opinions, to project their desires onto the digital realm. Everyone's carrying a little mirror.

If you cross-section it, you will find a wonderful layer, painted twitter blue. Busy, loads of users opinionating, writing about going to the loo, about whatever takes their fancy. A layer of noise where sometimes one can discern some melodies. Necessary noise, just like the noise our bodies produce with the flowing of blood, or the crackling of joints.

Some users within this layer, depending on social status or historical behaviour, become social broadcasters and their opinions are followed by even more people.

Conversation can be filtered, it can be localised. Conversations surface issues and issues are then dealt with by a secondary layer: a political layer.
What if the conversation layer was already empowered by tools that turn opinions into real actions? We probably would not need to look at a reality of layers.

A few years back I started painting this thought process using a vertical class system metaphor. The reality however, is not vertical, but a 2D mesh of people with mirrors. The political layer (in green) needs to be part of the mesh.

In my latest pieces i have been tinkering with a giant digestive system. Stemming from Novak's liquid architecture where the 'user' creates the space simply by moving his body. Using the same line of thought, i have become fascinated by this idea of how food meanders through our bodies giving us shape and structure. What architecture have we provided food with, in order to get as much nourishment out of it as possible?...