Neuronville. Think Build Talk

futureleisurist:

Oh my yes!

Wow.

Quite an adventure today.

Carlos, Jen and I went to see the student housing made from shipping containers (I’ll post a photo later, when I’ve had my film (!) developed).

Tragically, Carlos lost his keys and, as we were wanting to head home, this was a major source of consternation to all involved. 

We spent half an hour retracing steps and checking pockets, bags and camera-bags to no avail.

I eventually went on ahead to get a replacement lock key for the bikes which were chained together, but by the time I headed back, they were on a different path back… so I ended up on some sort of very long park cum pathway-along-the-river which was choc full of boaters and swimmers, lovers and hikers. And the weather was gorgeous, so despite my incessant pedaling, I didn’t mind too much when I had to give up and retrace my steps to get home.

The temperature was somewhere near 80F, but the cool breeze made it so lovely it’s hard to describe.

On the way I realized, thanks to Karen (our fearless leader’s right-hand), that I would have to go and get replacement keys made at the various lock-smiths as tomorrow is Sunday and the day after is another national holiday.

So my little sojourn to see the sights turned into a four hour odyssey. Alas, when I got home I had all the keys remade but one and Carlos was napping, which was also close to time for Andres to celebrate his 23rd birthday.

Needless to say, not much more schoolwork was achieved in this latter part of the day.

I’m excited to see the photos developed though. It’s not everyday one gets a mature sheep in the foreground and 21st century buildings in the far background with a magnificent expanse of green in-between.

And now…Trying to find my lovely bride some [fabulous and cheap] accommodations for her impending visit, but must sign off for some important sleep as, despite the sun only being down for about an hour, it is now almost midnight. Yes. It’s sunny until 9:30pm here. Last light is around 10:15pm if not later.

And the sun rises before the roosters… around 5:30am. 

Studio Maaken

Attended a lecture at the Bouwekunst where we watched a woman+artist+performance artist perform a song while laying and removing pieces of laminate, paper and plastic bits and pieces onto the glass of an overhead projector. She was amazing and I know Andres (who was also there representing the American Sector) and I both looked at each other and thought “Card assignment redo!” She sang in Dutch but her voice was brilliant and the story was wonderful to see as it unfolded, even if much of the meaning was lost.

After her, her colleague talked to us about the work her firm does as Architects and Industrial Designers. Topics included 

Rotation-molding (more on this after I research it; apparently you can even do this at home if you’re so inclined), 

Some really neat items made from sheet tin, where an industrial car-making machine stamps out a design in tin which is then ‘blown-up’/epanded so that it gains inherent strength,

The use of the blue-print process applied to 3-dimensional objects such as vases,

A Dress made out of a sheet of wood.

More time on the bike of course. It was another very warm day here. Shorts, t-shirt and even flip-flops while riding the bike. Not advised as an occasional shin-scrape is almost guaranteed. 

Now researching scale of the barges that are omnipresent in the canals and how a home can be carved out of a space that floats, remaining tied to a concrete wall. And where and how one finds that space.

Out for dinner for the first time since landing. Andres, Brian, Greg and Mark P. all ended up with us.

We went to the Taco Shop which has among other things, rather mysteriously, printed on the window, “Pacific Coast Highway” and some other presumed Americanisms. The owner was away and the kitchen was in utter dissarray. 35 minutes to get our food, but it was basically pretty good American-style burrito fare. Which is to say reminiscent of home, but at €13, stupid expensive. Some were thrilled with it becase of they’re a little homesick. I was disappointed with myself that I hadn’t gone for something a little more Dutch. When in Rome and all that.

When out to ‘s-Hertogenbosch AKA ‘Den Bosch’, via an hour-long train ride to see some 13th century style architecture and town-planning/layout. This is your basic medieval village+fortifications wall in the middle of a polder town. What’s really amazing is how well the central square still operates in 2012. The 9ft wide ‘sidewalk’ is only different from the rest of the cobbled square by virtue of a different size block set into the ground as a delineator. People walk, cars drive (slowly), motorcycles scoot, delivery trucks rumble, and all essentially without regard to a roadway. And it works. Apparently, if you don’t have a road, you have to be cautious. When everyone is cautious and slow, these different entities can coexist without much worry.

We saw an Archimedes screw in action. This is the technique for lifting water out of the polders used by many of the old windmills. Today an electric pump does the work, but when attached to a windmill, if the wind blows, the screw lifts water with need for little else. Using windmills to make use of an even older technology is still… amazing.

The Van Gogh museum today. Amazing that a person can decide at 31 to become a painter and end up being one of the most regarded artists ever. Tortured soul or not, his work is amazing.

Spent much of the three hours sketching from paintings/drawings of his. There is not better way to understand a painting or such than to stand and attempt to duplicate it in some tiny way. This I discoverd just today. I’ve seen others do it in museum before and suspected they might just be nuts. Now I get it.

I learned that Van Gogh had a paucity of linework that is almost thrilling to copy. He would drag out a few lines and drop a blob of colour here or there that I would have spent 5 minutes on, just to model the light. His technique models in 3 strokes. I am a better at what I do for this lesson.

In one picture in particular, the time spent staring at the details made me see things I hadn’t even noticed when I began. In ‘Night’ [After Millet], painted in 1889, there appear to be musical sounds depicted, drifting outward from the man’s guitar and toward the sleeping baby. Just as is used today in a comic/graphic novel. 1889! I wonder if he was the first to depict sounds in paint? Wow.

Sketch of Van Gogh’s “Peasant Family at the Table”, 1882

Sketch of Van Gogh’s Night [after Millet] 1889

Sketch of Vang Gogh’s “Binding Sheaves” 1889

Sketches from my sketchbook during our Design II “Corner” project. The whole drawing is on white sketch-paper with the back edges and floor structure overlaid with trace-paper (“bumwad” to architecture students).