Final Layout

Cartier Commercial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=yaBNjTtCxd4

This is just way too cool!

The Nature and Aesthetics of Design

David Pye argues that what culture has come to see as  ‘good’ and ‘better’ is in truth  the opposite of their definitions. What we find good, is actually cheap. We are a culture of consumers, and institutions such as a Wal-Mart, and Costco have only ingrained this sense of buying big ,buying in bulk, buying for cheap, as good. In truth, the opposite of cheap is often better. The more expensive something is the more likely it is to last, to be durable, and to have worth later in life.

Similarly, it is this same twisted sense of’ better’ which leads us to many of our innovations. Pye states that our happiness cannot be bought, but it can be formed. This phenomenon is due the fact that creature comforts mean the same thing to everyone.  People want to spend less time doing housework? Then create rugs that don’t get dirty or self-propelled vacuums. Make things so they can “be redesigned so as to be cheaper, easier to make, easier to wash…” and continue to feed our cultures need for what is ‘better’.

Black Walnut Box Photos

Not much time to write, got stuck making Easter dinner while the Fam is out golfing, but I've got the time to post some photos. So here you go.

Inspiration 2/22

I have always been a fan of the Art neveau movement, and one of my all-time favorite artists is Alphons Mucha. I love the way he depicts women, fabric, and backgrounds. I hope with enough practice I can be as talented as him.

Final chair pictures

Some photos of my final chair.

Duality

In truth I do not feel that I can accurately state that I ever met my grandfather. He met me of course, but at two weeks old I can hardly say I was in a state to carry on a civil conversation, or to put it more realistically, to even remember him. This however does not stop the fact that I feel that I know him. Eighteen years of stories, some continuously retold, others gained during late night discussions over coffee or even the last few bites of turkey after a holiday dinner. You get to know a person, or at least, get to know what a person was. My grandfather was a father, a husband, a golfer, a waiter, a football player, a soldier. But for me, he is a mixture of stories. A key player in the events of some of my father’s childhood memories, often involving a golf course, or Marrettis, the Italian restaurant he was a waiter for, which still leaks out a story or two of him whenever we go back to my dad’s home town to visit my grandma. Or more often than not, the hero of the war stories my dad begged from his as a child. War stories that always turned out ok in the end because Grandpa didn’t want to talk about the war. But then again, who could argue with a man who turned an entire German army into coleslaw, or went AWOL to have doughnuts with his brother.

My grandfather has become something of a living legend over the years, made interesting by the fact I never knew him, and yet feel as if I know something of what made the man. I suppose it is a case of ‘you always want what you can’t have’ but then again it may be more than that. It may be that every person deserves to be remembered for what made them them, and not be allowed to sink into the miasma of those who went before them.