Observed | January 15
Scientists haven’t tamed volcanoes but it’s wild and fun
to watch them try. [BV]
Visualizing the astonishing effects of the longest government shutdown in history in 8 charts. [BV]
Observed | January 14
I almost missed
this lovely explainer by Estelle Caswell on how Coltrane constructed “Giant Steps” on the circle of fifths to create “the most feared song in jazz” (feat. a cameo appearance by L. Bernstein from his 1972 Norton Lectures at Harvard) [MB]
Observed | January 11
British artist Clive Head captures the often dizzying urban environment in his
multilayered oil paintings that visualize movements through space and time. [BV]
A year of United States weather. (via
James I. Bowie) [BV]
Observed | January 10
#TBT: Separate areas with sofas, vanities, and even writing tables used to put the “rest” in women’s restrooms.
Why were these spaces built, and why did they vanish? [BV]
#TBT:
The foods of provincial New Jersey in vintage postcards. [BV]
Observed | January 09
Whose peace of mind benefits when we
meditate at the art museum? [BV]
This artist is making massive mosaics from to anatomical medical illustrations, stone by stone. [BV]
Observed | January 08
Already dreaming of your next vacation? From Massachusetts to Tunisia,
eight famous artists‘ favorite vacation spots. [BV]
Congo Tales: A new book and collaboration that offers an opportunity to grapple with what an ethical approach to storytelling might look like. [BV]
Shipping this month:
A fanzine that visualizes the history of Fugazi through their own data, created by Carni Klirs. [BV]
Observed | January 07
The periodic table is 150 – but
it could have looked very different. (via Blake Eskin) [BV]
Bunkitsu: the new bookstore in Tokyo that has a cover charge (h/t Joe Freedman) [BV]
Observed | January 03
#TBT: A gallery of
posters designed for Braniff airlines. [BV]
Observed | December 27
#TBT: Videographer Guy Jones edited Lumière brother’s
film footage from 1890’s Paris to explore some of the everyday thrills of late 19th-century life. [BV]
Observed | December 26
WOSU’s All Sides Weekend’s Clare Roth discusses art as self-expression and curative made during and after the Holocaust;
Arthur Szyk with Steven Heller. [BV]
Ah, the shimmer of
aluminum metalized polyethylene terephthalate (aka glitter). [BV]
Observed | December 20
The Shanghai Soup Dumpling Index is a scientific investigation into the quality of soup dumplings in Shanghai. It applies a quantitative framework to the existing qualitative descriptors of the Shanghai soup dumpling: thin skin, plentiful soup, abundant filling, fresh meat. (via Blake Eskin) [BV]
A Christmas #TBT:
aluminum Christmas trees in mid-century photographs! (via
John Foster) [BV]
Observed | December 19
News you can use:
Nose-breathing boosts memory, study finds. So stop and smell the roses. [BV]
A household is a miniature ecosystem with inputs, outputs and flows: one that can, and should, be designed. [BV]
Observed | December 18
Check out these rather ordinary looking portraits. They’re all fake. They weren‘t Photoshopped, but rather completely generated by artificial intelligence. None of these people actually exist. (via Steven Heller) [BV]
The Portland Trail Blazers commission local artists to
design posters for each of the team’s home games. (via
James I. Bowie) [BV]
Observed | December 17
The Lake Victoria Challenge wants to transform mobility in Africa’s Lake Victoria region using innovative drone design to connect 30 million people. [BV]
Observed | December 14
In 1976 John Foster bought fiberboard art boards for an art class he taught in a school in St. Louis. In 2018 he returned to the school to find the art boards still in use—
a visual palimpsest of 40+ years of aspiring artists.
[BV]
Observed | December 13
The third edition of
In Our Time: A Year of Architecture in a Day, The Met‘s take on the best architecture, art, technology, photography and design projects of the year will take place on 19th January, 2019. [BV]
#TBT:
Spot the ashtray in these groovy pics of mid-sixties interior décor [BV]
Observed | December 12
“
Gossip,” the newest issue of AIGA Eye on Design magazine, gives us the inside scoop on all the need-to-know design deets of the past year—designer feuds, workplace woes, and more—and it’s out now. [LS]
On fifteen years of reading Design Observer and helping Michael Bierut and Jessica Helfand
make a new book. [BV]
