Posted on

20170703

I made my own pants. The hardest part was figuring out how to make strong seems. The model is based on a pair of Thai fisherman pants I was gifted years back. I used black cotton leftover fabric (from an exhibition) and a very strong cotton/polyester sewing thread. I added buttons which can be used to turn the pants into shorts and to tightened pant legs (useful when cycling and they look cool). I’ve been wearing them for a month (even visited Brussels with them) and they work great. I’ve added waist pockets (with leather inlines) to carry my phone, loose change and keys.

If someone wants a pair of pants I’m more then happy to make them a pair or better yet help them make a pair for themselves. The model is unisex and one size fits all. They feel great and the buttons & waist pockets are optional accessories. 

Unfortunately people are afraid that wearing bespoken or self-made pants would make them look foolish. People are horrified of crafts. Without the guidance of a specialist they have to assume responsibility for their look. The process would make their class and/or skills visible. It’s weird that people like eating out and preparing dinners for their friends but they don’t like making their own clothing.

Posted on

20170629

The buffering icon here represents my hopes for the many ways that my social media feeds can satisfy my longings at any given moment. They rarely do, though I believe that we are half in love with the buffering icon here because it represents the promise of intimacy or excitement across the distances that separate us.

Jason Farman writes about the act of waiting concerning our relationship with technology in Fidget Spinners (2017). An artwork which runs in sync with the text.

Posted on

20170626

Dyslexia is the biological equivalent of poststructuralist thinking – It is proof that nature can be creative. Dyslexia is an asset when you want to read a text or phenomenon rhizomatically.

  • Dicktator and Tractor can read the same. They are grouped together by their length, the height of letters and the timbre of the words.
  • Bourgeois can be spelled in pretty much any way (Examples: Bouswar, Bourwarg, Bosourward, Bourghraigh). The spelling process ends when the computer proofreading program quits nagging.
  • Relationships to technologies are not limited by a proper (humanistic) reading or predeterminations on how the technology should work. Relationships to technologies are personal.
  • The names and numbers of months don’t connect. ToDo -lists replace chronology, everything is ad hoc.
  • Anything that opens a lock is a key.
  • Similar structures and relations within networks can be identified without allowing binary/etc. categorizations to hinder the reading. Instead of focusing on words (nodes), a dyslexic reader focuses on context (relations). This enables them to spot similarities in categorically different fields of knowledge.
  • You are constantly reminded of the oppression of the status quo. Any utterance can be called to question by bystanders, various proofreading technologies and design.
  • Every time you feel you are understood by someone, you fall in love with them. Because relations are more important than words, meaningful relationships with the non-human world emerge unannounced.
  • When you manage to read something and to understand it you change as a human being.
  • Names are irrelevant, familiar faces and tools are recognized. Signifiers constantly re-emerge, introductions are made by announcing relations (Let me introduce you to a great colleague, whom I met in… , Try to pry it open with that shiny metal thing…)
  • Each reading changes the content of the text. There is constant doubt of categories and reasoning which is validated by logic. The font and screen resolution change the message.
  • Writing is fluid because it is speaking through text. Writing is an act. Every word is a prosthetic.