Thoughts on Architecture

Thoughts on Architecture

Berlin is up near the top on the list of my favorite cities in Europe. There is such a great sense of history surrounding the city and you can feel the weight of it as soon as you arrive. It is a city that is slowly discovering it's post-WWII and post-Cold War identity and that is very clearly seen in the architecture. Weight is a key word when describing the architecture of the city. The traditional architecture of Berlin's past is very grand and imposing. Hundreds of years of history, both good and bad interpreted through the architecture. The past is a heavy burden to the city of Berlin.

The residents of Berlin have seen the worst of the wars in Europe in the 20th century. It was almost completely destroyed in World War II and literally split in half during the Cold War. The city was only whole again in 1989 when the wall came down which makes modern-day Berlin relatively young. Everybody knows the legacy of Germany after World War II but because of that current residents of Berlin are very open-minded and progressive. Nobody wants to make the same mistakes of the past and the architecture today tells that story.

Modern-day Berlin is a city who's scars have been patched up by progressive architecture. You can never forget the past but you can use it as a foundation to build a better future. The Reichstag (Parliament) building is a perfect example of this. Like most buildings in Berlin, it has a heavy past to carry. An arson attack on the Reichstag in 1933 can be seen as an important event in the creation of Nazi Germany. In the aftermath, the Reichstags Fire Decree was passed into law at the request of Hitler which suspended most civil liberties in Germany. Today, the Reichstag is a symbol of Germany's democracy and it's views on modern architecture. The picture above was taken inside of the glass dome which was built on top of the building in 1999 by acclaimed architect Norman Foster. It represents a reunited Berlin but more than that it shows how architecture projects the mentality of the population around it. Based on this, the future is good.

Every time I go back to Kuala Lumpur, it changes. I only get to fly back there maybe once a year in the summer and never for more than two or three weeks. No matter where I end up in this world, I always will know that Malaysia is ultimately my home. It is where I'm from. Though every time I go back there, I can't help but to feel like a tourist. Kuala Lumpur is a city that is constantly evolving, always moving. I can barely tell where it starts or ends. There is an endless stream of construction and new buildings seem to pop up every day. Once again, the architecture of where the city's place in history is.

Malaysia is a relatively young country, only gaining her independence from the British in 1957. It is a multi-cultural nation made up of various ethnic groups and religions. It is also difficult to ignore the influence that the British had on our culture. Western values are mixed in with our Asian heritage. Kuala Lumpur, the capital, represents these ideals clearly. It's a city in which you can see an ultra-modern shopping mall built literally around a Hindu temple. Old mosques and churches stand side by side under the shadows of towering office buildings. Small and mobile stands sprout open every morning on the street to serve food next to expensive French restaurants. It's a city of contrasts and contradictions. It is my city.

The first time I saw the Petronas Towers, once the tallest buildings in the world, I couldn't believe how huge it was. It almost seems impossible when you are standing at the bottom looking up. Designed by Argentine-American architect Cesar Pelli, it represented our financial strength at a time when most of our neighbors were feeling the burden of recession. Despite being a foreign architect, Pelli took great care to incorporate aspects of our culture within the design. The form of the building, a 12-vertex star, is a prominent image in Islamic art. Of course, there are taller buildings today but I have yet to see one that represents the culture of the city that surrounds it better than the Petronas Towers. It will always be my favorite skyscraper because in many ways, it represents me and everybody that comes from Malaysia. It is our architecture.

Business Card Design

Business Card Design

I had said in a previous post that "Simplicity is good" and that's exactly the thought I had in my head when I designed my business card. Nothing fancy, it follows the design of the blog and gives out all the relevant information. I like it.

One Week

One Week

Just one more week until the summer. This time last year, I made this video while living in London. Things can change pretty quickly.

America (So far) - Part II

America (So far) - Part II

More short stories to go with photos of my time in America.

I once saw Victoria Falls with my parents in Zimbabwe, the world's largest waterfall. We walked down a badly marked path through a forest, you could hear a faint rumbling in the distance. People walking the opposite direction were carrying umbrellas or wearing rain coats and we wondered why. It was a perfectly sunny day. Ten minutes later we were soaked. The spray of the falls felt like heavy rain even under the shelter of the trees. The faint rumbling turned into a roar of sound. You could feel the falls before you even saw it. We marched on, alone in the forest. It felt like we were discovering a new continent. Suddenly, the forest parted and the Victoria Falls stood right in front of us, ancient and ever-changing. In the noise, we were all speechless. 

I had not seen anything else that made me feel that way until I saw the Grand Canyon. Nothing you say can take away from how amazing the Grand Canyon is. It is impossible to oversell. Ranney and I were driving in from a 16-hour stay in Vegas that left us a little worse for the wear during the road trip I mentioned in my previous post. It was close to sunset when we drove up to the rim. We walked through a well marked path, past what seemed like a thousand tourists. It had taken us forever to find a place to park the car and I was ready to be disappointed. Then I walked to the edge and saw the canyon. It takes a minute for your head to comprehend what you are looking at. It's such a vast space that it almost looks flat. It's a picture that's impossible to capture. All noise seems to disappear into the canyon. I stood there silent and watched the sunset, it was not a time for words. 

I clearly remember the moment I flew into America for the first time. It was the summer of 2007 and I was flying into New York City. I looked out the airplane window at the edges of the city and thought "This could be anywhere". Just another urban sprawl. We started to descend when I noticed something strange. Green diamonds littered the ground. There were baseball fields everywhere. That's when I knew I was in America. 

It was not a sport that I could ever imagine myself watching and I'm a big sports fan. Give me an excuse to watch a sport and I'll do it. That's why the Olympics are so great because you can watch something like curling and not seem like too much of a weirdo. It's the Olympics! I only get this every four years, give me a break! Baseball bored me to death. I just didn't get it. That is until I moved here. It was impossible not to get excited about baseball when the Giants did so well and especially when you live only a couple of blocks away from the ballpark. I bought a Giants hat, I watched the World Series and I started to understand why it's great. This season, I went to my first baseball game - Giants against the Dodgers - and I completely fell over the edge. I found myself cheering as loudly as everyone else and I couldn't take my eyes off the game. Well, at least when I wasn't looking for more beer and hot dogs. It came down to the last inning, the Giants won 5-4 and that was it. I'm hooked. 

Everyone has a place in nature where they feel most at ease. It could be in the middle of the forest or on top of mountains or floating on a lake. Mine is right by the ocean. Sometimes things are so simple they barely need an explanation. My girlfriend and I decided to go to Ocean Beach at sunset to remind ourselves that we actually live by the sea. 

Simplicity is good. 

America (So far) - Part I

America (So far) - Part I

Short stories to go with photos of my time in America.

Trips born out of spontaneity are the best trips. In the summer of 2009, my good friend Ranney and I talked casually about maybe taking a road trip through the American South-west. We wanted to see strange roadside attractions and visit friends on the way. We wanted to get lost in the middle of the desert and drive on empty, straight roads to nowhere. He was going to be back home in San Diego that summer and I really had no plans at all in London. There were no concrete plans though until I got a message from Ranney sometime in mid-June. It simply read - "We got a car, let's go".

A week later I was flying into San Diego for a two week road trip (which included me sneaking into Mexico without a visa from El Paso, Texas). The funny thing about that trip was that a last minute change of plans forced us to fly into San Francisco to pick up the car the next morning from a family friend. We were only in the city for a couple of hours, I was jet lagged and had almost no sleep from the past two days. But I clearly remember thinking that I'd want to come back here. Now I live here. It's funny how things work.

For my first Spring break in America, I thought I had the obligation to do something trashy and over-the-top. Something that screams Spring break. I needed to go somewhere where I'm surrounded by people I might not even want to be around, where there are bright lights and a million college kids who won't remember much of the trip. So naturally, my girlfriend and I booked a flight to Vegas.

I had read somewhere that the trend of Las Vegas in the eyes of the developers at the moment is to move away from themed hotels, to make it classier. I hope they never do this. The main attraction of Las Vegas, at least through the eyes of the foreign, is the sheer absurdity of the city. It's amazing and you can't help but to fall in love with it. We want to walk down the street and see a fake Eiffel Tower and a giant Pyramid and a recreation of Venice. It is a symbol of everything excessive, tacky but most importantly fun. That's the beauty of America. The message is, "Who needs to go anywhere when we have it all right here? Plus you can drink, smoke and gamble everywhere!" It might not be sustainable and Vegas might have seen better times but I hope it never changes.

I'm not a fan of long flights, something I should have probably thought of before I decided to move out to San Francisco. To make up for this, I decided to stop by on the East coast on the way back to Brussels for the winter break to visit friends. Of course this turned out to be a road trip and over the course of five days, I managed to see four states (New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island).

This was a trip about food, about visiting new places but most importantly it was a trip about seeing the people I used to live with and seeing where they grew up. I'm used to moving and I've had to say goodbye to friends many times before. It's easier now because the world is a lot smaller but you always end up thinking about "the good old days". One thing I have learned though is that no matter how many times you leave, you'll always end up home again even for just a little while. It was nice to see life in the homes of my good friends on the East coast. I had always thought that I would end up going to school somewhere out here but the road trip I went on with Ranney which started this thought will now end this thought. There was something I couldn't let go of when I flew out from California. I could not stop thinking about the things I had seen.

And for now, this is my home.

Critiquing

Critiquing

The critique is an important part of the experience of being in an art school. We are here not only to learn from our teachers but also from our fellow students. Though no matter how good you think your work is, being part of a "crit" will always make you a little anxious. Nobody ever likes to hear their work being criticized and it's never fun to criticized other people's work.  But if you follow a few simple guidelines, which we learned in class a few weeks ago, then more can be gained from the experience.

One of our blogging assignments is to critique a piece that was done by a second-semester fashion illustration student at the Academy titled "Death Dance". We are also told that this composition was created in just an hour. Here's the piece.

My initial reaction is very positive. I'm impressed with the fact that such a well balanced composition can be created in an hour. It's not something that I could have done. The piece works because of the dynamic nature of the characters in it. There's a great sense of movement which was created with the different poses of the models. The splatter of paint and the quick brush strokes add to this feeling. On a personal note, I've always connected the color red with speed probably because I think sport cars look better in red.

As for negative points, the composition of the figures could use some work. The two figures on the far left seem to overlap each other and it ruins the sense of depth which was created with the central figure being larger than the others. The artist did a good job in creating a sense of how the dresses might look or feel like but I would think that more detail would be needed in order to actually make the dress.

Overall, it is a good piece when you consider how little time it took. I would like to see more detailed sketches of the dresses from the artist and I would also ask him how he came up with the title.

We are never going to escape this process of the critique, not in art school and not in the professional world. We must realize that the point of the process is not to bring you down but to offer you another point of view. Of course, not everyone will give you fresh or helpful insight but it's worth it even if you only learn one thing that will improve you work.

De Young

De Young

Last Tuesday was our field trip day to the De Young museum. I had been to Golden Gate park many times and I've visited the California Academy of Sciences which is just across the road but I had never been to the De Young so I was looking forward to the trip. It was good to get out of the classroom for a day even though we had to take what seemed like the bumpiest bus ride in the world to get there. 

The first thing that I noticed when we pulled up to the museum was the design of the building. It had a quality of being from out of this world, hiding in a thick fog surrounded by the greenery of the park. It's almost camouflaged into the background, it's sharp curves dissolving into the trees. At the rear of the building, a mysterious tower shoots up through the low clouds of the morning. It is definitely a cool structure. 

Though that should be no surprise as it was designed by Herzog & de Meuron, a very accomplished Swiss architecture firm with a history of museum design. They had designed the Tate Modern Museum in London as well as the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. More recently, they designed the Beijing National Stadium which was the centerpiece of the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics. The de Young was made with its surroundings in mind. The exterior of the building is covered with a copper skin which will eventually oxidize and change the color of the building to a more greenish tone. 

The inside of the museum is just as impressive as the outside. The layout is very well designed and there's a great flow to the building. You can start at any point and be sure that you will eventually cover most of the exhibits without having to constantly consult a map. I had always thought that the de Young houses mostly classical fine art pieces but was pleased to see that there was a good mix of contemporary art and sculpture as well as classical pieces. 

There was a very interesting section of the museum devoted to African and Pacific art. I'll just let the photos I took do the talking here.

Of course, we were still on class time so our assignment for the day was to pick a piece that caught your eye and blog about it. I picked a piece by English sculpture Cornelia Parker named "Anti-Mass". If you were at the museum, it's almost impossible to miss this piece. It looked like a giant cube that was made out of pieces of wood that seemed to float in the air in the middle of the room. If you looked closely, you would realize that the wood was being held up with almost invisible wires and that the wood was burned. 

The wood that was used in this piece was taken from the charred remains of an African American Baptist Church in Alabama that was burned down by Arsonists. The title is a play on words as Parker used the word "mass" to signify the elemental substance as well as the sacramental ritual in the Christian religion. This piece unites science and religion as a monument of the power of belief and creativity over the negative force of intolerance. 

I picked this piece because it is something that I immediately noticed when I walked into that room. There is a very strong contrast within the piece even at first glance. The lightness of the floating structure seems to contradict what the piece is actually made of. When you find out the history of the structure, then the contrasts are even greater. Another aspect of it that works is the sense of order within chaos. A cube is shaped out of several pieces of charred wood, all in different shapes and sizes. It is the perfect vessel for the message which the artist is trying to convey, that true spiritual belief cannot be destroyed and that creativity will transcend intolerance.