Found a Amazon (Alexa) Dot from the trash bin. The box was unopened. I’ve set it up in my studio (I have no need for it). Also found various cases of screws/nails, a power drill and an very good-looking router (took screws/nails but left the rest). The other day there was a +60inch flatscreen tv and xbox 360 with wireless controllers and a bag full of games. Found an Alesis Micron synth too, it’s pretty banged up but I’ll try to get it working (Dorian Concept has a video on it). The trash in New York is filthy rich. Also.. Any environmentally conscious decision and act I can imagine is counteracted by living glory of present day mega-cities. The collapse is upon us – Being alive is out of fashion.
20180828
Got on a trail ride at the Bronx Equestrian Center, Inc. yesterday. I was guided by Susie, who rode her horse Storm. My white horse was called Mystic the Percheron, who has also starred in The Greatest Showman. The trail took us around the Thomas Pell Wildlife Sanctuary, following the border of a golf course. The forest felt like a jungle, vines covered the trees, the phragmites were sky hight and we saw deer while passing a creek. Reaching the stables was the hardest part, the ride went smoothly and after the trip I got to wash a few sweaty horses.
How Should a Museum Be? (2018) Stefan Kalmár. An honest plea to make museums more vital. Unfortunately I don’t think that museums have ever been made with good intents.
[…] in the 21st century, ideology and power manifest themselves primarily in the realm of the visual, rather than the textual. Hence, the removal of arts education is tantamount to an institutionalized programme of (visual) illiteracy.
What would it look like if a major museum engaged in the development of self-sustainable, well-designed, social housing projects rather than lend its name to a tower of luxury penthouses – as with New York’s Museum of Modern Art and the lavish 53W53 building? Our economic set-up today is geared to look to where the money is, not to where it isn’t.
20180826
Saw a eye-opening graffiti from the window of the G-train.
IN AN ECONOMY THAT YIELDS PROFITS FROM PEOPLE’S LOW SELF ESTEEM; FEELING GOOD ABOUT YOURSELF IS A REBELLIOUS ACT.
I was taught that critical art is “participating in discussions in order to show how unjust particular discussion are”. I was taught to welcome the hurt – So that the audience could witness how unfair and evil the world is. This still makes sense to me… But I know it shouldn’t.
Kassutronic is designing neat eurorack modules.
Why a leading political theorist thinks civilization is overrated (2018) Sean Illing. Interview of James Scott, author of In Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States (2017). They talk about de-development!
JS: […] the standard narrative is that once we had domesticated plants, then we immediately shifted to an agricultural society so that we could stay in the same place […] But that’s not quite right. Four thousand years passed between the first firm evidence of domesticated plants, cereals, and the beginning of truly agrarian communities that are living largely by agriculture.
[…] hunters and gatherers spend only about 50 percent of their time producing or searching for what they needed to survive. The idea that hunters and gatherers and foragers were living hand to mouth and one day away from starvation is nonsense […]
20180823
Schematics and a guide on muffwiggler.com and doepfer.de for nifty 5v gate -> S-trigger converter, which might work on the Boss RC-30 tap tempo (and any other Boss pedal with a tap-tempo). I’m tempted to try this even tough I’m not using my RC-30 as much. Here is a better plan Slacker’s midi clock metronome PLUS tap trigger (S-trigger is not for switch toggle action!). After a furious night of internet search I learned of the Thomas Henry Trigger-to-Switch Project, which uses a 5 VDC dpdt dip relay relay to convert a +5v (5ms) into a switch toggle action. Also considering making a Panasonic/Lumix camera remote using these schematics. Bought a new cheep multimeter.
20180822
Visited Somewhere I’ve Never Been book-reading/NYC-launch event organised by Pool publishing and Steph Kretowicz at the Commend space. Kretowicz talked warmly of her collaboration with Kaino (on a podcast series based to the book which I mentioned earlier). The event was relaxed but the atmosphere was not cosy. This unfortunately made the text feel introverted and nostalgic. Kretowicz’s interesting idea of using global public-pop-music-performances as a tool for illustrating, the degree by which personal identity building processes differ across the globe; was not explored in detail.
Renewed my monthly membership to Frenchie’s Gym (at 306 Broadway). The place is a gorgeous antique-bodybuilding facility. Majority of the weights and devices are from the seventies and the atmosphere is welcoming (in an edgy way). I haven’t had the stamina to visit the place often but as the weather cools I’ll have more energy for exercise. A blogger by the name of MissfitFinland has made a post about the place in 2014.
It’s not allowed to take photographs at the gym so, at some point I’ll have to spend some time writing about the feel of the place. The gym is on the second floor of a worn brick building, at the level of the M & J train rails, which run over Broadway. The passing trains shove a breeze of air from the windows and their sound cuts trough the constant salsa muzak playing from the radio. People on the train platform peek trough the open windows but it’s dark inside and I doubt that they see us sweating inside. There is no air conditioning.