https://field-works.org Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art Thu, 09 Jan 2025 04:42:26 +0000 https://field-works.org en https://field-works.org/Featured-Work-1 Tue, 15 Oct 2024 20:58:48 +0000 Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art https://field-works.org/Featured-Work-1 Field Works <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/523fc52cc6ac82c8423d9acc135cebd7f75d5a8ddd0059fab70d6456b555b0df/Sunset_Tearoom_render-2.png" data-mid="219809263" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/523fc52cc6ac82c8423d9acc135cebd7f75d5a8ddd0059fab70d6456b555b0df/Sunset_Tearoom_render-2.png" /> <img width="2000" height="1125" width_o="2000" height_o="1125" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/d3515adc8c6e9c347ca182763fb3d2bbf6a6d3da18f161e1ae9abacbec63863e/pink-lights_render_night_improved-1.png" data-mid="219809261" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/d3515adc8c6e9c347ca182763fb3d2bbf6a6d3da18f161e1ae9abacbec63863e/pink-lights_render_night_improved-1.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/f337db12c7bbc2ca504c1d9f4b17f12c7a4912592d52329f377baa7d0c10dfa4/DERLAN_FINAL-REVIEW_PDF_Page_33.png" data-mid="219809262" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/f337db12c7bbc2ca504c1d9f4b17f12c7a4912592d52329f377baa7d0c10dfa4/DERLAN_FINAL-REVIEW_PDF_Page_33.png" /> A Mental Health and Community Center for New Haven, CT Fall 2021Architectural Design (Unbuilt) <img width="3000" height="1688" width_o="3000" height_o="1688" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/a4f4db932ac970db282ffc58439a46b572007573bba9f321f4741e97cba4f0cd/two-people-ver-2-1.png" data-mid="219809585" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/a4f4db932ac970db282ffc58439a46b572007573bba9f321f4741e97cba4f0cd/two-people-ver-2-1.png" /> <img width="3000" height="1688" width_o="3000" height_o="1688" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/7395708ce3784d2d17c4dc7d3b7a082cd721126766a2ae8707423a93fa7e2cfb/REFERINGHAUSEN_Page_08.jpg" data-mid="219809584" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/7395708ce3784d2d17c4dc7d3b7a082cd721126766a2ae8707423a93fa7e2cfb/REFERINGHAUSEN_Page_08.jpg" /> <img width="3840" height="2160" width_o="3840" height_o="2160" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/a933fb1018a6d43fae4bb85796e251647b9ddace7fee0d533e9e4df20ee0ae1a/REFERINGHAUSEN_Page_02.jpg" data-mid="219809676" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/a933fb1018a6d43fae4bb85796e251647b9ddace7fee0d533e9e4df20ee0ae1a/REFERINGHAUSEN_Page_02.jpg" /> <img width="3000" height="1688" width_o="3000" height_o="1688" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/b0b3663ff3b4937e09169e5448398f4d2dc3f73abe5b8b2a39ef996cdc41d671/REFERINGHAUSEN_Page_20.jpg" data-mid="219809582" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/b0b3663ff3b4937e09169e5448398f4d2dc3f73abe5b8b2a39ef996cdc41d671/REFERINGHAUSEN_Page_20.jpg" /> A Tool Library for Referinghausen, DE&nbsp; Winter 2022 Architectural Design (Unbuilt) <img width="1089" height="722" width_o="1089" height_o="722" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/4b108a6aa81c65ea46f2b72bab6bce0e41ff7ac966b061936210308f78365188/89F05020-080E-4834-8B49-5AB239355F6A_1_105_c-1.jpeg" data-mid="219809992" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/4b108a6aa81c65ea46f2b72bab6bce0e41ff7ac966b061936210308f78365188/89F05020-080E-4834-8B49-5AB239355F6A_1_105_c-1.jpeg" /> <img width="1089" height="722" width_o="1089" height_o="722" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/e1510825566c93652876669d3eab228fb8f697c5a58e73310ed7224bdd0e0dcc/B6413A7F-E43D-44AC-BBF3-258628BFF006_1_105_c.jpeg" data-mid="219809991" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/e1510825566c93652876669d3eab228fb8f697c5a58e73310ed7224bdd0e0dcc/B6413A7F-E43D-44AC-BBF3-258628BFF006_1_105_c.jpeg" /> <img width="1089" height="722" width_o="1089" height_o="722" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/4f7c3d2defe3357b5ed7fa04d99bd31c31310d2fe18199c27fafa64c584fc6c3/1E29D029-DA9F-463E-B584-231A2F31D899_1_105_c.jpeg" data-mid="219809989" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/4f7c3d2defe3357b5ed7fa04d99bd31c31310d2fe18199c27fafa64c584fc6c3/1E29D029-DA9F-463E-B584-231A2F31D899_1_105_c.jpeg" /> <img width="479" height="722" width_o="479" height_o="722" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/a715404c92ea85f7c1a722fc25ea8ad880c218a9e0704c5da190de72d3a25650/7915FDD3-26F6-489C-8115-DDAC0D8C88AE_1_105_c.jpeg" data-mid="219809988" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/479/i/a715404c92ea85f7c1a722fc25ea8ad880c218a9e0704c5da190de72d3a25650/7915FDD3-26F6-489C-8115-DDAC0D8C88AE_1_105_c.jpeg" /> <img width="1089" height="722" width_o="1089" height_o="722" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/309052f8ffa2ec4fd185e09392b992c872ab0d5480f90e2e7c3bc253e91b8ad1/8200D8B2-A3A1-4B42-9117-38EFB0393CAE_1_105_c.jpeg" data-mid="219809990" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/309052f8ffa2ec4fd185e09392b992c872ab0d5480f90e2e7c3bc253e91b8ad1/8200D8B2-A3A1-4B42-9117-38EFB0393CAE_1_105_c.jpeg" /> <img width="1089" height="722" width_o="1089" height_o="722" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/018318a0e75932ec4030229fb55e59a79b30ea918328047c04b3cae1707e7b0e/769C67C7-90DC-41E4-ABEE-B6E54472890F_1_105_c.jpeg" data-mid="219809984" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/018318a0e75932ec4030229fb55e59a79b30ea918328047c04b3cae1707e7b0e/769C67C7-90DC-41E4-ABEE-B6E54472890F_1_105_c.jpeg" /> <img width="1089" height="722" width_o="1089" height_o="722" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/eb5484071cf91160a0391a8405dbfcf49ba4b5727976fc9d2553c2df8e8334b4/586844E2-D3D4-4DDC-9E18-1FD454AB6DA4_1_105_c.jpeg" data-mid="219809983" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/eb5484071cf91160a0391a8405dbfcf49ba4b5727976fc9d2553c2df8e8334b4/586844E2-D3D4-4DDC-9E18-1FD454AB6DA4_1_105_c.jpeg" /> <img width="1089" height="722" width_o="1089" height_o="722" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/679e18fde57e39b626bdefde3a03e74cf2ecc2a2b08f9dfd55b3ff0afd1d01a6/3DAE87AE-D835-4192-A2CC-8787691A6018_1_105_c.jpeg" data-mid="219809985" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/679e18fde57e39b626bdefde3a03e74cf2ecc2a2b08f9dfd55b3ff0afd1d01a6/3DAE87AE-D835-4192-A2CC-8787691A6018_1_105_c.jpeg" /> <img width="1827" height="1205" width_o="1827" height_o="1205" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/d9f996b849db388bdefded3bdfbc924a0267c6be4ef352bb719269dc7d13c8a8/Screenshot-2023-12-07-161332.png" data-mid="219809982" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/d9f996b849db388bdefded3bdfbc924a0267c6be4ef352bb719269dc7d13c8a8/Screenshot-2023-12-07-161332.png" /> <img width="1089" height="722" width_o="1089" height_o="722" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/679e18fde57e39b626bdefde3a03e74cf2ecc2a2b08f9dfd55b3ff0afd1d01a6/3DAE87AE-D835-4192-A2CC-8787691A6018_1_105_c.jpeg" data-mid="219809985" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/679e18fde57e39b626bdefde3a03e74cf2ecc2a2b08f9dfd55b3ff0afd1d01a6/3DAE87AE-D835-4192-A2CC-8787691A6018_1_105_c.jpeg" /> <img width="1647" height="1154" width_o="1647" height_o="1154" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/78d98ad40dea179a4e98e29aada7b412caa23758c755583baf0af4b26615047d/Screenshot-2023-12-07-161248.png" data-mid="219809986" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/78d98ad40dea179a4e98e29aada7b412caa23758c755583baf0af4b26615047d/Screenshot-2023-12-07-161248.png" /> The Eternal Fountains of the Eternal City for Mold Magazine Summer 2022 Photos &amp; Writing <img width="1500" height="844" width_o="1500" height_o="844" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/a973d0a09eddd9b6429bd0a7d0d76a7d734720dacd7bfb0747e1eb6f28f0b66a/Black-Stone_1-1.png" data-mid="219809589" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/a973d0a09eddd9b6429bd0a7d0d76a7d734720dacd7bfb0747e1eb6f28f0b66a/Black-Stone_1-1.png" /> <img width="2000" height="1333" width_o="2000" height_o="1333" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/60468d3a9a063acf2a76d6279813ca69e0e3b1bb08a1ef2a0cffc0d220b9cd21/16.png" data-mid="219809587" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/60468d3a9a063acf2a76d6279813ca69e0e3b1bb08a1ef2a0cffc0d220b9cd21/16.png" /> <img width="1526" height="1017" width_o="1526" height_o="1017" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/2b8bb95edda877f4b3cf1a5e0ee637d7e631059da564be1be43bb4e72e9be1df/11.png" data-mid="219809588" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/2b8bb95edda877f4b3cf1a5e0ee637d7e631059da564be1be43bb4e72e9be1df/11.png" /> A Water Tower for La Ciudad De México Spring 2023 Architectural Design (Unbuilt) <img width="1500" height="2250" width_o="1500" height_o="2250" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/da5cecf77b3fefa7cc2313b6d3635687fef6f9d456dda4a46e6c97e95e07edd0/IMG_1256.jpg" data-mid="219809672" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/da5cecf77b3fefa7cc2313b6d3635687fef6f9d456dda4a46e6c97e95e07edd0/IMG_1256.jpg" /> A Body Clock for the IN-SYNC, DE-SYNC, RE-SYNC Exhibition at the Yale Architecture Gallery Fall 2021&nbsp;Art Installation&nbsp; (Built) ◬ https://field-works.org/About-1-1 Thu, 17 Oct 2024 14:13:42 +0000 Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art https://field-works.org/About-1-1 Field Works All things Built Environment, Verified in the Field Contact us about your design project: ︎ &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp; 240 727 8327︎ &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;ben@field-works.org What we do Architectural designGarden/landscape design-buildFurniture design-buildUrban designPlace-based researchCommunity engagementSocial practice art/ public artGraphic designStorytelling (through writing, photography, and film) https://field-works.org/Fieldnotes-About Thu, 07 Sep 2023 00:43:50 +0000 Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art https://field-works.org/Fieldnotes-About fieldnotes A sporadic report on poetic observations. An email newsletter loosely focused on our radically changing ecosystems and the built environment. Lots of rambling, both in the walking sense &amp; the talking sense. Sign up Here.&nbsp; ◬ https://field-works.org/04_fieldnotes Thu, 09 Jan 2025 04:42:26 +0000 Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art https://field-works.org/04_fieldnotes 004 A VIEW OF THE WORLD FROM THE LOWER 9TH WARD 01 07 2025 <img width="2924" height="1948" width_o="2924" height_o="1948" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/d46e11143413fe3d6c8ba559687baac55be55d037950061c2e1bf6635f06e1d5/unnamed-1.png" data-mid="224421083" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/d46e11143413fe3d6c8ba559687baac55be55d037950061c2e1bf6635f06e1d5/unnamed-1.png" /> A view from the abandoned pier on my daily walk along the levee in my new neighborhood of the Lower 9th Ward, New Orleans, LA. The “Central Business District (CBD)” of New Orleans can be seen beyond the Mississippi. 09.07.2024 &nbsp; FIELD REPORT A VIEW OF THE WORLD FROM THE LOWER NINTH WARD Its one of those purgatory mornings, gray, even light making everything flat, crisp, melancholy. Wisps of fog cling to the low inland slope of the levee, the crunch of gravel underfoot the only sound other than the occasional sloshing of the waves on the banks, wakes from the passing barges on the Mississippi. Sometimes the city skyline over there across the river looks sort of heroic, grand even, like a bygone, adolescent New York viewed from some longshoreman’s boat out in the Meadowlands of New Jersey (one imagines). But today it looks sort of pathetic, frail, small, not a “real” downtown— and wholly inappropriate on this flat, wet, horizon. I’m grateful to live here, in the part of the lower 9th that borders the river; one of the few places in the city you can maybe forge a real connection with the water, get a glimpse, a ghost image, really, of what the delta might have been like in its early days. Because I am downriver from the port, and because of the proximity to the Industrial Canal that connects the River to Lake Pontchartrain (and cuts me off from the rest of the city) I am ensured regular traffic of staggeringly large boats. This, too, feels like a view rarely given which I feel lucky to receive; a peek behind the curtain of the constant churn of global petrocapital trade. Seeing these whales of boats, like whole cities crushing towards you, blotting out the sky, materializes just how much damn stuff we collectively consume daily. Sometimes men are fishing off the abandoned pier, their coolers full of fat, long, possibly-polluted catfish. I worry about the pollution, heavy metals and the like (what with this being a long-industrialized waterway and at the end of a massive watershed, the collection of half of America’s waste water and runoff), especially because I assume I’ve eaten these catfish in my poboys already. In spite of, or perhaps because of, this paranoia I think I’ll get my fishing pole set up (Thanks again, Jonathan!) and join them one morning as I pass. Again, to materialize the reality of consumption, of eating fish. This is something new for me, following nine years of vegetarianism, and I want to catch and prepare some with my own hands. Today the pier is silent, wind-swept, with only faint bloodstains marking where the fisherman usually stand. The horrors of our post-ecological world: to fear the very river which gives me my drinking water, to see fresh fish not as bounty but as potential poison. And not just here, but everywhere: everything is both vital to life and a hidden, slow death. You cannot avoid the plastics. A biological rejection at the cellular level of our way of life. And so we joke about it. <img width="2086" height="1392" width_o="2086" height_o="1392" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/6839ac0061f4108364811fee834b99952cf7035e4c3641e94712441b370e5661/unnamed-2.png" data-mid="224421082" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/6839ac0061f4108364811fee834b99952cf7035e4c3641e94712441b370e5661/unnamed-2.png" /> One of the pair of “Steamboat Houses” found along the banks of the Mississippi in my new neighborhood, also known as Holy Cross. 09.07.2024 On that topic (i.e. jokes about the horrors of contemporary life) I’ve been thinking maybe I should re-read White Noise. Some enterprising romantic has hung a nice, sturdy swing from the Channel marker, a large, two-story metal structure with a bright orange triangular sign offering the number 2 for the passing boats. It is perfectly oriented for sunset, plus the buildings of the CBD offer protection from the harsh red ball of sun, so you can enjoy the changing gradients of the firmament without harm to your eyes (as much). Here is another instance of beauty and the unknown ills of the world—like a moth to the flame. I remember that from White Noise; the potent symbolism of these otherworldly sunsets after “”The Airborne Toxic Event,” which is why maybe I was thinking of it as I walk to this, my new sunset spot. It deals with invisible perils. I direct my attention, most of the time, not to the modern mass of buildings but to the subtle hint of the French Quarter, the spires of St. Louis Cathedral visible if you focus, and pretend I’m standing here before all this; before the channelization of the Mississippi, before the tall buildings, before the 1,770+ active oil platforms and web of associated pipelines out in the Gulf. This sort of intentional myopia is fun (and certainly vital for tourism in New Orleans), but the ugly truths of the region have their own insidious draw, aesthetically, and are a significant part of the reason I moved here. And so much of my exploration of this place since moving four months ago has been informed by this pendulum swing between massive infrastructures and quotidian beauty: the sublime power of the Surge Barrier on Lake Borgne, the mystery and humanness of finding some sort of spiritual offering left on the levee on my walk. I believe that New Orleans is a place in which vital questions about the future of architecture, ecology, and governance might be asked, and with humility, attempted to answer. It is a place of both singularity— an urban island amid fecund bayous and ghost cypress stands— and incredible diversity; a roiling pot of long-held cultural traditions, emergent cultures, changing demographics. New Orleans is a city of contradictions, like a myth from Invisible Cities. It is terra firma where none should exist; a modern city in an alluvial delta constantly battling to remain (as anyone familiar with its potholes will attest). It is both a backwater town and an international destination. A place of shared cultures yet intense segregation. Its built environment ranges from quaint shotguns and Creole cottages to massive infrastructures like levees and surge barriers. It is simultaneously not recognizably American and quintessentially so. Engaging with the built environment here means engaging with obvious challenges—flood resilience, hurricane preparedness, historical context—but also envisioning how to live differently in the face of climate change and how our lives will evolve accordingly. I could go on about why I chose to move here, and why I am grateful to call it my home, but I’ll just say this: Amid increasingly homogenized global cities, New Orleans remains distinctly its own. And so these two thick chains and a plank wood, a simple gift to the neighborhood, warms my heart each time, childlike, I launch into the air. The swing reminds me of the joy I found on my first visit to New Orleans, some 6 years ago, and reminds me why I am here today: beyond all this positioning, I just love it here. ­ RECOMMENDED ENCOUNTER WATCHING FLOATING PLANTS <img width="1014" height="1006" width_o="1014" height_o="1006" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/708ac701675ccef70ccea4986ec109ff2da39bd8a8c7d59b5c835e14319d66f3/unnamed-4.png" data-mid="224421079" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/708ac701675ccef70ccea4986ec109ff2da39bd8a8c7d59b5c835e14319d66f3/unnamed-4.png" /> Location marked by a star is the very end of the former Dump at the end of Florida Ave. where I found the ruins of an old dock and hang-out/ hunting camp and sat and watched floating plants for a while. Earth is a place where you can still lose things. But its becoming increasingly less likely, and that is something I am concerned about. I’ve been revisiting James C. Scott’s Seeing Like a State. The nutshell summary is that statecraft is integrally tied to the knowability of people, and thereby taxation and control of them, which historically has been achieved through sedentary lifestyles. Basically, Scott argues that farmers are easier to tax than nomadic peoples. Seems simple, but when you apply the logic to more complex societies like our own you see it everywhere. What I’m trying to get at, I guess, is that I fear this same “knowability” mapped onto the physical surface of the Earth. How fantastic and strange that we can see an entire image of the world, and zoom in to any part of it, with a few clicks on our phone or laptop. Google Earth/ Google Maps has radically changed our perception of the world, I’d argue, and will only continue to do so with advances in things like LiDAR scanning and AI analysis of satellite imagery. Sedentarianism will no longer be this vital force of state power. Indeed, this is kind of the whole premise behind Starlink and recent trends in “Digital Nomadism”: to have a fully connected world. Which sounds radical, freeing. But in practice, at least for me, results in further destabilization of community producing a further radically individualized (and thereby capitalistically efficient and profitable) existence. To be able to live a neoliberal capitalist lifestyle anywhere on Earth’s surface isn’t freedom, its destruction through homogeny. This is actually one thread in a larger question about how we perceive the Earth which I am currently trying to write a book about. So, I’d love to discuss more if anyone has thoughts on all this. (I told myself I’d write a book before I turn 30, which happens on May the 19th, giving me exactly 132 days. Hold me to it!) <img width="1045" height="1098" width_o="1045" height_o="1098" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/03e44c14b19e8b64a467a7c604af9d7ec4d492dae1c2cf397dde075f1508e8a6/Screenshot-2025-01-08-225253.png" data-mid="224421127" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/03e44c14b19e8b64a467a7c604af9d7ec4d492dae1c2cf397dde075f1508e8a6/Screenshot-2025-01-08-225253.png" /> All to say, I was thinking about movement and how it relates to governance and our understanding of the world when I was sitting at the edge of a former city dump, a huge, abandoned peninsula of land sticking out into what remains of Bayou Bienvenue, and I noticed these clumps of water hyacinths (Pontederia crassipes). Brought to North America from their native South America as an ornamental, it is now a particularly competitive invasive, notoriously hard to remove and fast to reproduce via cloning through runners. A la Anna Tsing, what might this tenacious plant teach us about nomadism and fecundity? I sat for a long time, risking walking back in the dark with the wild pigs (I saw many rooting spots on the walk out), watching and photographing these moving plants, which, through their movement, evade some level of qualification. <img width="749" height="498" width_o="749" height_o="498" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/8ed5394ba085419e948058fc9f571b9674d3024b04dd9a28cf4afef9cef85253/unnamed-6.png" data-mid="224421077" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/749/i/8ed5394ba085419e948058fc9f571b9674d3024b04dd9a28cf4afef9cef85253/unnamed-6.png" /> Mapping fails when applied to even just a few minutes of this floating plants passing by. There are too many of them, their movements too constant. They travel in packs. &nbsp; WORKS IN PROGRESS ADMINISTRATION ST. JEROME AND THE QUEST FOR HABITABLE FURNITURE <img width="1096" height="1099" width_o="1096" height_o="1099" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/3c56a6e2f98c670fb2426086b1467605765de52342d1bf4823ec61d3fc96a401/unnamed-2.jpg" data-mid="224421076" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/3c56a6e2f98c670fb2426086b1467605765de52342d1bf4823ec61d3fc96a401/unnamed-2.jpg" /> I’m looking to make myself a desk. Obviously, this is an overcomplicated undertaking for a designer. I’ve been looking at paintings of St. Jerome lately for inspiration. Part of the canonical representation of this particularly studious saint, besides a lion, is a book-strewn desk. I think it must have been a seductive subject for artists of the Renaissance. It gives a moment for them, still within the framework of religious iconography in which many were required to operate, to reflect on their very practice as artists. An atelier, a study, a desk, a studio, a room of one’s own. I love to compare different versions and imagine the artists approaching it as an exercise in creating the Platonian desk, their own perfect setup. The Barbie Dream House of a desk. I’m already running longwinded, here, so I won’t muse further on it. I’ll just share some of my favs: <img width="1446" height="1866" width_o="1446" height_o="1866" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/f545063ddbb0640d4a6c6fd432da12765934e87fb4abec06a683d947f583286e/unnamed-3.jpg" data-mid="224421075" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/f545063ddbb0640d4a6c6fd432da12765934e87fb4abec06a683d947f583286e/unnamed-3.jpg" /> Durer, 1514 <img width="961" height="1200" width_o="961" height_o="1200" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/531f74421d2adda0d999001d7f84cc440f197b62173acf6f2b10d0017a49af68/unnamed-4.jpg" data-mid="224421074" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/961/i/531f74421d2adda0d999001d7f84cc440f197b62173acf6f2b10d0017a49af68/unnamed-4.jpg" /> DHendrik van Steenwijck the Younger, 1624 <img width="1024" height="1299" width_o="1024" height_o="1299" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/985bf659203dae3e59dde489015ea529c89df2313861762d19686aa078649c8d/unnamed-5.jpg" data-mid="224421073" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/985bf659203dae3e59dde489015ea529c89df2313861762d19686aa078649c8d/unnamed-5.jpg" /> Antonello da Messina, 1474 I’ll also ask that if any of this sort of “part-room, part desk” sort of furniture comes to mind I’d be so grateful for recommendations. I’m trying to share W.I.P. work and early thoughts more in this newsletter because I think its fruitful ground for collaboration! There’s definitely some sort of project brewing, here. Commission me to build you an authentic replica of the desk portrayed in Antonello da Messina’s version of the painting! This would be like my dream design-build job rn lol. I’ve already started 3d modeling a speculative version of it (WIP below). <img width="1165" height="1167" width_o="1165" height_o="1167" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/d73eac20318091103cbd234defa68d390abd290a1540e73ea0fb4ec6fd3179b4/unnamed-7.png" data-mid="224421072" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/d73eac20318091103cbd234defa68d390abd290a1540e73ea0fb4ec6fd3179b4/unnamed-7.png" /> &nbsp; POETS ANONYMOUS A COLLABORATIVE POEM by C.A., H.T., M.M., and Anon The heady scent of flowers too ephemeral to name, the mess I left for someone else, the tiny, sweaty forehead nestled in the crook of my arm balanced so delicately that I can’t reach my room temperature, mediocre coffee tapping nerves, low humming beats, the bumps on the road heading north I-5 an oncoming storm, rain falling, the wood pecker in my brain, Squinting and turning to face the breeze and sunbeams, the manta rays breech for joy, obviously. The above being the collaborative poem, submitted in parts by readers from my call in the last issue of fieldnotes. That you all so much; it was lovely to hear from each of you and catch a glimmer of your life. Perhaps we should do another one? I am interested in how our seemingly disparate lives can find cohesive rhythms side by side like this. And a big part of the reason I started an e-newsletter was to connect with friends in a more intimate, real way than social media typically offers, so making (potentially bad) poems together seems perfect. Perhaps this time it could be that anyone interested submits a self-contained (rhyming or not) couplet (i.e. two lines of verse)? Which would then assemble, as feels most fitting, into a longer collective poem. Here’s a link to submit if you feel moved to. &nbsp; ENDORSEMENTS READING, EATING, LISTENING Reading I am currently re-reading To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf. When I first read it, I was 23, and I recall the beauty of the writing coming through, but feeling ambivalent about the broader themes of the book. I feel like what I picked up on was the 19th century gentle society and read it in a sort of straight-ahead (boring) way. But it is really quite an experimental work musing on society, feminism, and existential issues; honestly blowing my mind right now. I think age has brought me to a place I can really value the book’s themes— time, the unknowability of others, the inner-narratives, our own peculiar distortions of time and space which guide us all. There’s a section I remember in which time’s degradation on a long-shuttered house is described and mused upon which I’m really looking forward to revisiting (as you know, architecture and all, I think a lot about the poetics of the built environment). On deck is Ulysses, another book published in the 1920s which is particularly attuned to time. I’ve been telling myself I’d read this (and moving with a chunky copy) for years. If you’re at all interested in reading along as shared accountability, give a shout. Eating Those not local to New Orleans may be surprised to hear that, alongside the multitude of Cajun classics, the city has fantastic Vietnamese food. After the Vietnam War, many of the United States’ South Vietnamese allies immigrated to the U.S. and a large number found a new home, and new market for french bread, in New Orleans. (In part thanks to Catholic Charities and the shared french-tinged, Catholic heritage of both Vietnam and Louisiana. So much to reflect on here in terms of shared and divergent cultural identity, colonialism, globalism…) Dong Phuong Bakery is the most famous of the many Vietnamese restaurants in the area, in particular for their version of King Cake. I tried it (not the King Cake, though it is now of the season!) for the first time a couple days ago after a visit to Bayou Savage. They have a vegetarian “beef bulgogi” Bánh mì that was so damn good, and for $6.50 no less! Also really enjoyed trying the “Yuca Silkworms” which were like gummy worms but really soft and mild tasting, and made of mung beans and Yuca powder. Listening Been playing the album “Send Flowers” by State Champion a good bit this week. Really great lyrics, delivered in like a channeling of David Berman (Silver Jews) from the spirit realm. Also, I finally got around to listening to my housemate Duncan’s first record and I’m so upset I waited! Really fantastic: funky, complex, fun. His favorite artist is Prince, which definitely comes through in a great way. The production rocks, lots of cool 80s synth sounds, funky guitar pops, even a smooth sax solo. It is called “Accelerator” by The Convenience. &nbsp; PHOTOLOG NEW ORLEANS &amp; MARYLAND AUG ‘24 - JAN ‘25 <img width="1581" height="1047" width_o="1581" height_o="1047" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/3382374b43a9d7b9e8430017fb559b14573becb77561d2bfd1ecd4ad7d288211/unnamed-8.png" data-mid="224421071" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/3382374b43a9d7b9e8430017fb559b14573becb77561d2bfd1ecd4ad7d288211/unnamed-8.png" /> Most photos I will feature in this section are from walks, but this first one is out my car window on my drive from Los Angeles to New Orleans back in August. A first glimpse of some cypress swamps in Texas. I’m looking at getting a sea kayak, which will allow me to really put in some nautical miles exploring this ecosystem and take overnight kayak camping trips. <img width="2078" height="1386" width_o="2078" height_o="1386" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/41d590d504ebaa80102af989bd166b53ec782d9591911ef2985b20bc0ba006d0/unnamed-9.png" data-mid="224421070" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/41d590d504ebaa80102af989bd166b53ec782d9591911ef2985b20bc0ba006d0/unnamed-9.png" /> This ladder out on the stark landscape of the former city dump felt like a perfect readymade found sculpture, especially at this angle <img width="933" height="1386" width_o="933" height_o="1386" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/c3f359358ae75527eff2939696a33d08e782595bf6f0d17244277d55005b78c0/unnamed-10.png" data-mid="224421069" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/933/i/c3f359358ae75527eff2939696a33d08e782595bf6f0d17244277d55005b78c0/unnamed-10.png" /> Chris shucks an Oyster while Jonathan goes for a piece of fried Red Drum that he had caught in the Chesapeake earlier this year. Four of us put down nearly a bushel of Chesapeake and Chincoteague oysters on Thanksgiving eve. Felt really restoring and revitalized my connection with the Tidewater, which I miss dearly. <img width="2088" height="1394" width_o="2088" height_o="1394" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/510046ed14bc9ef2e6b6001673a050d5213c084f8727886172da63ba79334dd8/unnamed-11.png" data-mid="224421068" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/510046ed14bc9ef2e6b6001673a050d5213c084f8727886172da63ba79334dd8/unnamed-11.png" /> When I was back in Cumberland I tagged along with Casey and Gabe to their duckpin bowling league. This place doesn’t have machines to reset the pins so “Pin Boys” have to hop down and do it by hand (!) <img width="2088" height="1393" width_o="2088" height_o="1393" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/cad23abe274f5da6bcf70759e2c4d02fb03b25faa00343d3326f1eb27217cc48/unnamed-12.png" data-mid="224421067" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/cad23abe274f5da6bcf70759e2c4d02fb03b25faa00343d3326f1eb27217cc48/unnamed-12.png" /> A portrait of my Great Aunt Mary, now 92 years old. <img width="2075" height="1374" width_o="2075" height_o="1374" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/dd1f04418e9de32d473c46ec6a684a6be31bbbbdbe044ef0369813668d63ff5f/unnamed-13.png" data-mid="224421066" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/dd1f04418e9de32d473c46ec6a684a6be31bbbbdbe044ef0369813668d63ff5f/unnamed-13.png" /> I love the feeling of walking up the crest of the levee to reveal the sunset and I feel like this photo really gets at the feeling, which is sort of hard to describe. <img width="3396" height="2263" width_o="3396" height_o="2263" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/2278f6362b2f5e65454c75943e6531268aa99cf414fee5f95e530f4be1052196/unnamed-6.jpg" data-mid="224421065" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/2278f6362b2f5e65454c75943e6531268aa99cf414fee5f95e530f4be1052196/unnamed-6.jpg" /> A visitor wearing a Saints jersey to St. Louis Cemetery No. 2 carries an uprooted weed after cleaning a grave as a couple arrives with fresh flowers on All Saints’ Day. I liked this dichotomy (old/ new, dealth/ life) which is further accentuated by the surrounds of the cemetery itself. Ever present is the drone of the I-10 highway overhead, and general urban bricolage creates a jarring backdrop for the historic tombs. (e.g. a billboard for the Mega Millions can be seen in the background). <img width="688" height="1035" width_o="688" height_o="1035" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/93bc57c8fb85e8afd3d87b5a5105e5283440e745bd4b6a440b5901fd3c985806/unnamed-14.png" data-mid="224421064" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/688/i/93bc57c8fb85e8afd3d87b5a5105e5283440e745bd4b6a440b5901fd3c985806/unnamed-14.png" /> One of the more overgrown tombs in St. Louis No. 2 on All Saints’ Day. <img width="1250" height="1252" width_o="1250" height_o="1252" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/98ff6d596ea46147e3a7efc42ea90138e8564bda14115f91279df8edd637d10e/unnamed-15.png" data-mid="224421063" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/98ff6d596ea46147e3a7efc42ea90138e8564bda14115f91279df8edd637d10e/unnamed-15.png" /> Speaking of the Liturgical calendar, last night kicked off Carnival, being the start of the Epiphany, or 12th night. This is celebrated in New Orleans with a parade dedicated to Joan of Arc, a charming and wholesome walking parade with lots of Gothic French grab that I attended with my housemates Maggie and Sam and their friend Steven. <img width="2214" height="2214" width_o="2214" height_o="2214" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/de8af25fd2171e7b7c298d1b4b1ac70b6c132a053adea3c02501f6c7aec8395f/unnamed-7.jpg" data-mid="224421062" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/de8af25fd2171e7b7c298d1b4b1ac70b6c132a053adea3c02501f6c7aec8395f/unnamed-7.jpg" /> My first New Orleans parade, though, was a Second Line which went through my neighborhood a few weeks back! <img width="2081" height="1393" width_o="2081" height_o="1393" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/624272be4fa0871b464892cf67d082c4449b9dee036419f82d9dec5bfaa90c39/unnamed-16.png" data-mid="224421061" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/624272be4fa0871b464892cf67d082c4449b9dee036419f82d9dec5bfaa90c39/unnamed-16.png" /> One more from the Joan of Arc parade last night: this woman was just a spectator but really went all out with her Golden Church Head. I’ve got to start planning my costume for Marti Gras because this city goes all out. <img width="2064" height="1379" width_o="2064" height_o="1379" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/647cebb41cc17301cb9baf3d23a1858650f6a8ec2d329dc833ed407b4983da56/unnamed-17.png" data-mid="224421060" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/647cebb41cc17301cb9baf3d23a1858650f6a8ec2d329dc833ed407b4983da56/unnamed-17.png" /> Not much to say here, I just really liked how round this puddle was! Sorry I rambled so much, yet again. Until next time, friends. Stay in touch :) May the Sun Shine Upon You! ◬ https://field-works.org/003_fieldnotes Sat, 11 May 2024 20:12:08 +0000 Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art https://field-works.org/003_fieldnotes 003 LOCATING LOS ANGELES05 18 2024 <img width="1840" height="1229" width_o="1840" height_o="1229" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/6d855285c4f26624ccc8c93a450f77f018fdc8ae40f0e462c13c230c759b1986/Screenshot-2024-05-11-232146.png" data-mid="211199867" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/6d855285c4f26624ccc8c93a450f77f018fdc8ae40f0e462c13c230c759b1986/Screenshot-2024-05-11-232146.png" /> An interactive guidepost (photo left) near the crest of Mt. Lowe in Angeles National Forest acting as a view finder to assist in locating downtown Los Angeles (photo right). 02/10/2024 I last wrote in October, in New Mexico. Since then it has been the crossing of Arizona, nights in truck stops, nights in the quiet of a pull off on a dirt road in the lightless desert, some passing friends and a few naked plunges in the Colorado at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. Some crying at the wheel, and screaming. Reminiscences of my time on the Pacific Crest Trail as I coddled my transmission through Cajon Pass. Stopping to crush some sagebrush in my hands and rub it on my body. Thinking about The Grapes of Wrath and unironically blasting “California” by Phantom Planet two times in a row as I made my way down to the greener pastures of coastal Southern California. <img width="2070" height="1376" width_o="2070" height_o="1376" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/42ba19d027068d5738d274440aa924e913a94a3c6b80e9184e87ed3fd6a04c6d/Screenshot-2024-05-11-233934.png" data-mid="211199868" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/42ba19d027068d5738d274440aa924e913a94a3c6b80e9184e87ed3fd6a04c6d/Screenshot-2024-05-11-233934.png" /> A train crossing the Colorado at the border between Arizona and California The past 6 months, somehow, have been Los Angeles. The joy of discovery, mania, perplexity, and then malaise. An impossibility of capturing, or locating, the place, other than perhaps in the occasional picturesque diner or donut shop, the shadow of a palm tree, the streetlights of Western Ave stretching ad infinitum to the sunset-scorched horizon as viewed from up on high at Griffith Observatory. A fog of hot days and job applications and nowhere to be. Sweating by a weedy patch of the LA river writing bad songs on guitar leaning on the hood of my van. Drinking far too much, too often alone. Also some ups; great live music and the hint of a future community, discovering the unironic joy of the very nerdy sport of disc golf with my friend Mike, some writing for the LA special issue from the New York Review of Architecture. Then a new apartment (a room in a large artist loft space within a former Pabst brewery and only accessible by not one, but two ladders) and finally, spurred by being nearly completely broke, a new job (construction manager). Mediocre dates, some better ones. Nice solemn walks scented by jasmine. Eavesdropping on conversations in Spanish, not understanding, but appreciating the cadence, the texture, of a new language. Nice, quiet beer over a book at one or the other of the two pseudo-European hip cafes I like. (In America, we use European as adjective for the rare bar where there's actually good, affordable wine and you can sit outside. As we all know a shockingly high bar). Smoking more cigarettes to fuel nights spent attempting to make friends in this new place. At some point, Death Valley. <img width="2408" height="1599" width_o="2408" height_o="1599" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/8af071d9598d3b4a1a2877a5c231a5ca1037fc3dd1100049d1b916817072d794/Screenshot-2024-05-11-235139.png" data-mid="211199873" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/8af071d9598d3b4a1a2877a5c231a5ca1037fc3dd1100049d1b916817072d794/Screenshot-2024-05-11-235139.png" /> A family wandering in the “Devil’s Golf Course” of Death Valley <img width="2083" height="1393" width_o="2083" height_o="1393" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/725166ac0ac0b6f15cae286f1b6df2492c9f2952ff05476275db6016ccd1506a/Screenshot-2024-05-17-214355.png" data-mid="211199903" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/725166ac0ac0b6f15cae286f1b6df2492c9f2952ff05476275db6016ccd1506a/Screenshot-2024-05-17-214355.png" /> Joseph and Charlie smelling the chaparral ( Larrea tridentata, aka&nbsp;creosote bush) in Grapevine Canyon in southern Nevada And sweet friendsgiving Thanksgiving in Nevada with my college windsurfing buddies ft. my first wobbly attempt at windsurfing in like 7 years. A Christmas drive across country (2500 miles in two nights, an audiobook of Whithering Heights, three red bulls). One Taco Bell after another. Back West for the rest of winter, fiddling with my keyboard, my banjo, my guitar, “I’m going to really try to make music.” etc etc. A couple weeks where I was trying to write short stories. Then I bought sign-painting brushes. Too many commitments I will fail to uphold, and a real reckoning with my own failures. An astonishing amount of TV as neural numbing agent. A week where almost all I listened to was “These Days” by Nico (and written by Jackson Browne) on repeat. These days I'll sit on corner stonesAnd count the time in quarter tones to ten, my friendDon't confront me with my failuresI had not forgotten them <img width="1296" height="1941" width_o="1296" height_o="1941" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/8154f829767ee6ba9b27301dc753ce39be896968b377c5b9a0f96673bf65ab81/Screenshot-2024-05-12-002621.png" data-mid="211199881" border="0" data-scale="74" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/8154f829767ee6ba9b27301dc753ce39be896968b377c5b9a0f96673bf65ab81/Screenshot-2024-05-12-002621.png" /> My new home visible across from the neighboring railyard, the smokestack acting as landmark for the former brewery complex turned artist live-work space dubbed "The Brewery" <img width="1399" height="970" width_o="1399" height_o="970" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/f2ceafd8104af49a92ed6a62ecd2b5f506bfa6e8b95cc7c79dd107ddc71836c9/Screenshot-2024-05-12-003415.png" data-mid="211199886" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/f2ceafd8104af49a92ed6a62ecd2b5f506bfa6e8b95cc7c79dd107ddc71836c9/Screenshot-2024-05-12-003415.png" /> An shot of the factory floor in its heyday, shown to me by my roommate Jacob. We can see our loft in it, that tile floor is our floor, the distinctive light fixtures our light fixtures. No remnant smell of the ghost of beer, though, and probably for the best. <img width="1331" height="1670" width_o="1331" height_o="1670" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/84e48c74c49e4802827582e1163a71520e98f59223f2f1c70b22bd9b4600a003/Screenshot-2024-05-12-002742.png" data-mid="211199882" border="0" data-scale="76" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/84e48c74c49e4802827582e1163a71520e98f59223f2f1c70b22bd9b4600a003/Screenshot-2024-05-12-002742.png" />my current home, my room being the one at the top of the tower of rooms built by Jacob. More of too, too many beers alone. The beers had the company of nostalgic TV programs (X Files). Anything to not be myself for a while. The undoing of my mind, undersleeping, then oversleeping, all fluctuations within the base chemical cycling of alcohol to coffee with nicotine as bridge. I blame it on the 9-5, or this excessive drinking, my mind coming apart. But it's really something more fundamental and damning. It came on slow, then ramped up. My thoughts were erratic, strange, and alarming. The prolonged self-induced numbing turned into a fracturing, a disintegration. It ended with me checking myself into the ER, convinced I was losing my mind. I was told I was fine, with a 500 dollar bill to show for it. Not that this really calmed me. Desperate, I quit drinking, quit cigarettes, quit coffee, quit Instagram, quit everything, basically. I left my phone in a drawer and drove to the desert. <img width="1212" height="1509" width_o="1212" height_o="1509" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/858eeddb8f6a86937cc723f5f60504a8745fccee6cfdeb270f4fae8208309d74/Screenshot-2024-05-12-003043.png" data-mid="211199884" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/858eeddb8f6a86937cc723f5f60504a8745fccee6cfdeb270f4fae8208309d74/Screenshot-2024-05-12-003043.png" /> The arm of your friendly neighborhood hypochondriac as he awaited a complete and permanent mental dissociation which never fully arrived. In Joshua Tree, getting baked by the sun, filming the light on the rocks and myself moving around, jumping, yelping. Eadweard Muybridge’s “The Human Figure in Motion” (1887). Or something like Bruce Nauman, simple existence as creation. Reading The Goodby People by Gavin Lambert (second I’ve read of his about various characters of LA, the first, Slide Area, set in the 50s and this second one, in the early 70s, both great, and part of my self-made series of reading fiction set in my new home of Los Angeles) in one sitting, on a large, sandpapery-yet-comfortable rock. Slowly, a returning to a more stable condition thanks to the sun locating me. It and the rock, my anchors. <img width="3024" height="2268" width_o="3024" height_o="2268" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/c4b2463f90d491c673ff84de89393515b72dc307a5817634d2d4c52e78d960f4/IMG_4805-1.jpg" data-mid="211199972" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/c4b2463f90d491c673ff84de89393515b72dc307a5817634d2d4c52e78d960f4/IMG_4805-1.jpg" /> Stomping around the desert A sunset walk, reading an information plaque about deep time and the evolution of desert flora somehow making me uncontrollably weep. This was followed by an unbelievable feeling of peace, of acceptance, and of love for everyone I saw, a deep empathy for the world. &nbsp;No way to write about this without sounding "woo woo" but it was real. I've been slowly improving since this intense awakening. I’ve been trying to hold onto it as long as I can. I've been doing this, i.e. holding onto reality, by avoiding my phone. I am seeing that though alcohol certainly played a large role in my unease, the damn phone is probably just as bad. When not looking at my phone or the internet, I've: Read Speedboat by Renata Adler and liked it. It didn't move me, perse, but was well written and had some real hitters in terms of interpretations of interpersonal relationships in the modern age. Also, just a fascinating capsule of the life of a (tired) extremely cosmopolitan New Yorker in a different age and specifically capturing a sort of removed mental state achieved through a sort of cynical gaze from ones' own life which may feel familiar to some of us. Spent time in the sauna. The things which have most helped me, been most relieving and life affirming, are physical ties back to the body; laying in the sun, stretching, meditative body scans (I’ve been listening to this one a lot.) The sauna particularly has been my savior. It is simultaneously social and reverent, quiet and intense, profoundly of the body and yet brings about a sharp mental alertness. It also makes me feel my humanity in a deep time sort of way, soaking in heat being such a time-honored social practice: badstu, onsen, banya, sweat lodge, temascal. Gone to the movies alone (a really wholesome, lovely and treasured activity for me which is a perfect blend of nostalgic childish joy and bygone ripened bachelorism. Think The Moviegoer). Most recently, Civil War. I thought Ex Machina was an extremely well crafted, thought provoking, and entertaining movie. I distinctly remember being excited to see what else the director would do. Somehow I’ve missed two of Alex Garland’s since then (but by the reviews, might not have missed much). I finally saw Civil War last night, and I’d describe it exactly the same. Just a really good movie, the first I’ve seen in theaters in maybe a year that's really delivered. Listened to, and attempted to write, music. This week I've really been loving Colour Green by Sibylle Baier. A collection of bare, haunting songs, discovered by the son of an unknown 1970s folk singer, which were burned to CD by him as gifts to family members. According to Wikipedia lore, he gave one to J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr. who encouraged the Orange Twin record label to release it, which they did thankfully. The first track, "Tonight," is particularly great. Apologies for this fairly monotonous listing, but it has been helpful rambling away here as a reminder of good things to be had off the screen. Its pull is strong. I've been playing online chess on my phone which I justify as a less toxic activity than doomscrolling but which still fuels the insidious power of the device. Just the object of the phone, checking it, holding it, has a sort of addictive magnetism which disturbs me. Right now, though, I am feeling light and hopeful. I just got back from Galco's Old World Grocery in Highland Park. An old, linoleum-floored store full of special sodas and bygone candy bars, I come here for a feeling of wholesome comfort. The check out girl carries kind eyes in a humble, self-possessed sort of way, and the last time I was in the older gentleman who probably owns the place talked to me about red peach jam, and how the red peaches are grown in France with grapes intertwined into the trees because they are a late season fruit and can be harvested at the same time. But they don’t keep well, which is why they are made into jam. All of this with Danny and the Juniors' "At the Hop" (1958) playing from the crinkly loudspeakers. What’s a better cure for depression than chatting with the kindly and idiosyncratic elderly? Plus, you can try fun treats like the “Idaho Spud.” <img width="958" height="1201" width_o="958" height_o="1201" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/e94159ea327ed0384b54c14b1f3823dbc5b57426b0a9af26428c36bab0400d9c/Screenshot-2024-05-12-002847.png" data-mid="211199883" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/958/i/e94159ea327ed0384b54c14b1f3823dbc5b57426b0a9af26428c36bab0400d9c/Screenshot-2024-05-12-002847.png" /> !!READER PARTICIPATION!! A COLLABORATIVE LIST POEM In wrapping up this ramble, I thought it’d be fun to ask you, my dear reader(s), to participate in fieldnotes. I’ve been making list poems every day of notable events, memories, feelings, of the day. I thought it might be fun to make a collaborative one! If you feel so moved, email me a single line (could even be a single word) of something notable in your recent flow of experience. For example, a few days ago I woke up to an absurdly loud crowd of parrots. So I might write: The screeching din of parrots on a cool Altadena morning These various moments will be strung together as a list. For example: pine needles, the drone of a nearby lawnmower, the smell of a vaguely familiar perfume, sun spots beneath closed lids, a turmeric-stained wooden spoon, Please feel encouraged to submit multiple entries to the list, if you feel so moved! And send along if you’d like me to include your first name, initials, or retain anonymity in the byline. Speaking of collaboration, for those of you in the Los Angeles area, I am contemplating putting together a little rambling club for those of us who love nothing better than ambling about aimlessly exploring. Like the rambling clubs of 20th century Britian, I'd imagine it to be of a socialist bent, perhaps as a semi-curated platform to discuss the politics of space. In short Book Club + Walking Group + Art Project. Would you join the L.A. County Ramblers? Space Walks? The Space Walkers? More soon! SOME PHOTOS OF LOS ANGELES AND SURROUNDS In the past I've really felt color photography was far superior to grayscale, but I am coming back to it as you can see. I've been feeling so over-saturated lately, is part of it I think. I think it is also because I read Rings of Saturn by W.G. Sebald and was really taken by it and its sparing use of low-quality photos from his long fugue-like walk through European history. I usually end these emails with an apology for, yet again, rambling in a diaristic and self-indulgent way about nothing in particular vs. presenting a few interesting tidbits I've come across with brevity (and levity) which I think is my ultimate goal. But I think this is just what my fieldnotes are, typically, if I am being honest. Why am I subjecting others to them? Exhibitionism? A sounding board? Juvenile ego-fueled self-aggrandizement? I think, primarily, accountability...To try to write a bit, such that eventually these might not be embarrassing anymore because they actually WILL have a clear structure. And to risk the embarrassment of candid over-sharing as an in-road to real connection with others. And that I might have some external record of time passing for myself, which feels extra important in the timeless summer here in LA. Anyway, I will part ways with a poorly curated smattering of photos I made on recent walks around LA. Until next time, my friend!&nbsp; ◬ <img width="1089" height="1628" width_o="1089" height_o="1628" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/043e4ecbcf1710244dbf2d8d04914fbd2894142057acf0da229f8ceb2af38901/Screenshot-2024-05-11-234520.png" data-mid="211199870" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/043e4ecbcf1710244dbf2d8d04914fbd2894142057acf0da229f8ceb2af38901/Screenshot-2024-05-11-234520.png" /> <img width="2424" height="1605" width_o="2424" height_o="1605" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/501637d3ba55c6f4c3532f3cdd0d051711cc7f11f1a342f551dc2c86c74234b7/Screenshot-2024-05-11-235504.png" data-mid="211199874" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/501637d3ba55c6f4c3532f3cdd0d051711cc7f11f1a342f551dc2c86c74234b7/Screenshot-2024-05-11-235504.png" /> <img width="2919" height="1941" width_o="2919" height_o="1941" 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data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/73a349499d63ad09503232e64af9c11fd73c400bd2d6098684a3a59c2a2a2448/Screenshot-2024-05-11-234630.png" data-mid="211199871" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/73a349499d63ad09503232e64af9c11fd73c400bd2d6098684a3a59c2a2a2448/Screenshot-2024-05-11-234630.png" /> <img width="2090" height="1392" width_o="2090" height_o="1392" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/5926b9ee7f5e54bdce1f4cde8cb0fa2372da40d104d6d72a18e829c9f2ddaa65/Screenshot-2024-05-17-213918.png" data-mid="211199888" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/5926b9ee7f5e54bdce1f4cde8cb0fa2372da40d104d6d72a18e829c9f2ddaa65/Screenshot-2024-05-17-213918.png" /> <img width="2081" height="1397" width_o="2081" height_o="1397" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/55f0f6d6ad166e41016e8bb599e8b0eacc02b47195217ef995f2778cd0ff391b/Screenshot-2024-05-17-214153.png" data-mid="211199897" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/55f0f6d6ad166e41016e8bb599e8b0eacc02b47195217ef995f2778cd0ff391b/Screenshot-2024-05-17-214153.png" /> MAY THE SUN SMILE UPON YOU!&nbsp; https://field-works.org/002_fieldnotes Tue, 05 Dec 2023 08:17:37 +0000 Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art https://field-works.org/002_fieldnotes 002 NARRATIVES ON NARRATIVE FORM: TRAVEL RESEARCH &amp; DON QUIXOTE&nbsp; 10-14-2023 <img width="624" height="416" src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/YoGPipc5O8WqPDTBy2Go-jLITQ_x-p8jVAy7chy-p3jxBBuQuB5Ing6qdT7Ejebdk7SfcC0NkaEkPXIVR_Sw1e0nwSu7cNoubvPfARGwwOWKqVmkMY9XipM1bDiBWwEKSCF8YF0N95-IimTqyXDXm28"> AN ALGAE COVERED POND AMID FIELDS AND A STAND OF TREES OVERTAKEN BY KUDZU IN MISSISSIPPI. It’s a cool day in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and I am taking the day to rest and reflect. As of yesterday, I’ve been traveling across the country for a full month. As you’re probably aware, I’m attempting to make a documentary loosely about water and the built environment; how we live with water. I’ve been putting my trust in spontaneity; my “research” has been guided by what I stumble into as I travel. And In many ways I’ve been rewarded for this non-method; strange and beautiful conversations with people I’ve met by luck, arriving to landscapes, events, neighborhoods, always at what feels like just the right time, beauty and wonder each day, everything like kismet. To dislodge oneself from the internet in some ways aids magical thinking and the feeling of always being in the right place at the right time (vs. my default mode of obsessive research) and I’ve been luxuriating in this feeling, embracing unfiltered reality. I think perhaps its because I’ve just got out of academia, where most of my research was of the “remote sensing” variety—learning through other people’s writing, through observations on the internet (Google Earth vs. actual site visit), absent from the physical world— that I am particularly motivated to sacrifice these ways of knowing in favor of unguided wandering. A dérive across America, a materialist method (of the marxist variety) of research to the extremes, one might try to justify. But I haven’t been justifying. In fact I’ve been trying to avoid any explanation of my work. I’ve been absolutely allergic to any sort of plan, method, any hypothesis. God forbid an Artist Statement. Perhaps to my detriment. When someone asks me what my documentary is about I tense up, admit my absolute lack of direction with an embarrassed shrug. The good thing about water is that its such a broad topic and so approachable that usually people are excited to share their perspective and offer encouragement (with the sole exception of a painter, an MFA student, who really gave it to me at one of my favorite dive bars in New Orleans in the wee hours of the morning for not having any real perspective, a “lazy” and “extractive” approach to making work). She has a point re: extraction, especially. All art and knowledge production requires some sort of extraction, though we might loathe to acknowledge this fact. Which is the very reason I’ve been so hesitant to claim any specific ground (or in this instance, waters). I want to be like an earnest and unknowing child, observing without prior judgements, open to new stories and paths of experience which might take form along the way, taking nothing with me but my own learnings and lots of footage to cut into some coherent narrative later on. Of course, even my existence in any of the places I’ve been traveling and observing has been reliant on significant extraction of a different type: destruction in the form of tanks of gasoline…another topic entirely but I’ve been imagining this as my last Great American road trip, each one of these tanks of gas hopefully in the the twilight of my reliance on automobiles. What would be reasonable? 100 more tanks in my lifetime? 1000? I’ve been loosely planning to live in LA for a while as the end point of my cross-country trip, which might complicate this goal, it being the apotheosis, in megalopolis form, of U.S. car culture (yes?) Narrative, then, has been a primary question haunting me as I drive. The narrative of this project. The narrative of my life. My “career.” Legibility. Sense of place, of time. I try to write songs. I try to write nonfiction prose. I try to make photos, sketch. A documentary film. I look back on my design work from the past three years with a removed and apathetic gaze. Maybe it is okay to go through life without a hypothesis if you have a method. (i.e. a songwriter doesn’t necessarily need to have a uniting theme to their songs, say). Or its okay to switch mediums if you have a hypothesis (an artist interested in a specific topic might make photos, paintings, essays, diverse mediums as tools to approach a singular goal). I’ve never stayed long enough with either subject OR medium for either to grow into a discipline. (a telling word, discipline). It feels telling, too, that for the first time in my life that I’ve had real funding to support my work I find myself wandering aimlessly without a clear goal or outcome and unable to articulate the project, if there even is one. <img width="624" height="417" src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/9RyDK4zV75HsYmUQr_2hv3bN63PU-Zw1YbcelmnaP82Mxxmuc_DoYQtwyHypmqQ7Zn9MrMun8JjPW0HKcEE1pNcsHE0C8RaukHL0FHIF6UXHLPRmpGwy66eRNX_YE2DT-wIZhdKwATSxZ9S9QEhXf6s"> A COTTON FIELD AND IRRIGATION DITCH ALONG THE ROAD OUTSIDE CLARKSDALE, MS. EACH FIELD FELT SO CHARGED WITH SOMBER HISTORY AND MEANING, A MILLION BRIGHT POINTS LIKE A HORACE PIPPIN PAINTING.Don Quixote, what many herald as the first modern novel, is a story about a man who goes mad by reading stories. A man with an average, novelistically illegible life chooses to live under a self-delusion to bring to his life a sense of purpose, a projection of an invented reality onto the world around him, often in direct confrontation with the “real.” Doesn’t any narrative, any story, require this same form of magical thinking? Rather than having ““swept the world's admiration for the mediaeval chivalry-silliness out of existence” as Mark Twain (another self-dubbed name, another fiction more real than the reality of Samuel Clemens) put it, I see Cervantes as having hit on a much deeper, existential problem, a problem both central to literature and extending beyond it to all of cultural meaning. I read Don Quixote as a brilliant critique of the human condition, a nihilism with a chuckle at self-invented meaning as both futile and our only hope in a fractured, morally subjective world. I can’t decide if it is tragic or hopeful. What does it mean that on his deathbed, Don Quixote renounces his false name, even his lady love, the unseen Dulcinea del Toboso, again becoming Alonso Quixano, the simple hidalgo who kept a library of chivalric romances and dying alone as his “true” self? Don’t we all wish, like his faithful squire, Sancho Panza, that our protagonist might meet his Maker as the great “Don Quixote”, even if he no longer believes, or maybe never truly did, in the fictional world he created? I used to think our obsession with “titles” had some thanks to the career-mindedness and increased specialization under industrial capitalism, and of a post-cinematic world. Scientist, Artist, Entrepreneur. Actor, Conservationist, Writer. Petroleum Engineer. Gluten Free Specialty Bakery. Chief Executive Officer. Post-Hardcore Sludge Metal. Multidisciplinary Designer. Content Creator. But here we have a story from the early 1600s. By reinventing himself as the protagonist of his own life, isn’t Don Quixote doing what all of us do constantly? We are absolutely saturated by stories– cinema, photos, branding, biographies, resumes, social media; now it feels that to build some sort of artistic (or otherwise) legibility, you must choose your narrative wisely. If Don Quixote chooses to be a knight errant, what am I choosing to become? And does it matter if he knew he was pretending or not? I think of other great spinners of self-myth, populist leaders; Ronald Reagan, Donald Trump, Adolf Hitler, etc etc. Perhaps dramatic examples, but demagogues point to the insincerity of self-image, identity, of stories. This is the thing I have been resisting, I think. To declare any “title” feels at best like a collapsing of my self into a narrow and flattening simulacra, and at worse an ego-driven self-serving tool which might erode the few core beliefs and symbols I still maintain as my “truth” or “true self” through a gross simplification which consumes the complexity of reality. A house of mirrors. But by resisting a legible (both internally and externally) self identity is a dangerous game— in attempts to avoid being typecast by the world I might loose any hope at the very authenticity I’m chasing. Instead of simply writing about my trip, my work, I am now writing about writing about my work: always I am removed. These are not “fieldnotes” as I had planned ( a nice paragraph about the Gila Wilderness here, a diagram of a slot canyon there, say) but further tantrums of a lost soul, further neurotic, inherently self-indulgent and pathetic ramblings. <img width="624" height="425" src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/xLKkIRD7uDaoNCsj1fZ4FsoTnosttlNow8ib269zUhhZtCwrfh18DXhiQao14iYw_Izf1IcENM2df4ocIbrCynbdqiTatQwkUABGGOMmBYWQ1VqptfMi5JnU5jBnDf1Ay6DzWN31OZu6zUSTcoZuYXI"> A CONVERSATION AMONG STRANGERS ABOUT A HORSE IN DOWNTOWN CHATTANOOGA.I’ve also been thinking a lot about the narrative structure of a quest. In short, it is the pursuit, across space and time, of an object. Its quite the popular, perhaps the eternal, narrative device. We love the simplicity maybe, the panacea, the silver bullet. Related to the quest: I’ve often felt similar feelings to those outlined by Agnes Callard in the recent New Yorker piece, “The case against travel.” Travel, in the fully commodified experience it so often has become, is repulsive, at its worst, and horrifically boring at its best. I, and many of my ilk, might try to avoid these “consumer” experiences abroad in favor of some “authentic” reality. Even this instinct, though we might trace to concepts of the “exotic” and the colonial origins of tourism from within the British Empire. And, then, even people who drive the horrid homogenization of the world through their obsession with “comfort” or “security” still desire a “safe” version of “authenticity.” (Perhaps you are staying in the more "authentic" Mérida and trying to learn some Spanish phrases and looking down on those tourists walled in the all-inclusive resorts of Cancún. Yet you both arrive, searching for something, to Chichén Itzá). And so I think maybe the answer is to travel with a purpose. The pursuit of knowledge. To learn ways of conserving water, say, to help us as we approach a fatalistic tipping point in global climate change. Or some other fabricated narrative. <img width="624" height="416" src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/9e1KZApb8t65QaakH3u0ICZrpoCPv4UIbUiZXovBcOhleXcl6F-SF0gAFENHQ8sF3nQS0_xh61pKMcF1_Q1dSMnU91bWaCRQXq7CXBBqBI5yWgytTaEAENKjP024GhqzlRJTu1AOYulTKaOG0tzpXRE"> A DRAINAGE DITCH BEHIND SOME HOUSES IN JACKSON, MSA quest, then. But what is my object? And how could any travel research possibly be non-extractive? Missionaries had a purpose. As did the conquistadors. Even my tentative new name for my practice “Field Works” harkens back to the “golden age” of exploration, the bookish adventurer I so idolized as a child: Alexander von Humboldt scribbling notes on some inhospitable and impossibly remote peak in the Andes, fighting the wind for his sheet of parchment, Darwin waking in his cabin on the HMS Beagle, uncharted islands on the horizon rippling into a kaleidoscopic green in the crown glass letting in the pale morning light onto the worn wood floors where hand-scrawled maps and notes lie spread out from a late night of work, Indiana Jones packing his gun and his whip and donning his hat after giving another well-attended lecture to his star-struck students. So what drives an adventure, without a grave to rob, or new lands to chart? (I hope you read the irony, here.) For some, its found in the collection of other things– aging blues artists for music ethnologists like Alan Lomax in the 1960s, say. Or its the photographs– for the professional photographer and Instagram influencer alike, typically the more rare and difficult to attain the better. What was Thoreau, really, but the first cottage-core influencer? (again, irony, yes. But I also remember an artwork at the National Gallery which put reproductions of Thoreau's cabin and the Unabomber's cabin side by side...Googled quickly, I believe it may have been James Benning's Two Cabins, but not positive). For the academic, it is to do “research." Are any of these ethical imperatives? How much good must come of synthesized knowledge to be worth the costs? How do we make work without becoming the bullshit we've long criticized in the salad days of one's creative practice? <img width="624" height="420" src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/8MO66sonHk-3j_rhMzT1bO6YMQE5mwbbPKz15GMcipcS4AvOPKFIisKCpgPceVLXzns2HguwxcA3kpUgjZtBmH6u85NiVAbTWCbLM-qxIpmwK-9ew9WMYXPsC1VZiwBO42ZVZNHxzcXo9Nv9PLUdIu0"> TWO YOUNG MEN STANDING IN A BOAT CLOSE TO SHORE IN THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER IN VICKSBURG, MS <img width="624" height="415" src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/OKbpwVLf34PwULJPRzyqOU-_sZinopcfN3l1KDHPtUbMReE3K4FSGnfxKS9UQYmsyfrX5JVXItPcvDczWu_AaKLATs0AGY36O-EeBOsAAu0VnKgeYtKK79G0ZTXEwiGmRq4QLvm9Eb7_qGYiNl0zzHc"> A RESTROOM AT A TRAILHEAD IN BIG BEND STATE PARK, NEAR THE BORDER BETWEEN TEXAS AND MEXICOAll of us are driven, to varying degrees, by a desire for more, a hunger…it is this blind, embarrassing and undirected ambition fueling me across the limbo of the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways in search of MORE: more purpose, more community, a better place to call home. I’m trying to embody the experience, at the very least: To really be, fully, the ethical gray that is a roadtrip across the United States in the time of extreme global precarity, to admit to myself that my own placeless and Sisyphean ego drama is rooted in the same cosmopolitan bourgeoisie artist identity I frequently scorn, to accept that any chance at escape from this identity crisis might not require either a Quixotic leap into the deranged world of ambition-Capitalism (LA is a good place for this, I hear) or further decent into a rejection of prevailing norms (give away my phone, go WOOF at an organic farm in Oregon) which becomes, like Thoreau or Kaczynski, its own form of White man ego-yelp and self-delusion, but instead could, like a seedling, grow from a slow and steady building of community, of empathy, of hope. Perhaps its not this impossible choice of a) join a community of fellow Quixotes in a lifelong playdate of agrarian anarchism, or b) learn to accept and even cherish the violence of our world, drive a big truck, and buy stock options. It is simply to try to be a little better each day. To try to make friends. To share, earnestly, to practice kindness. To try to buy less plastic (but not beat yourself up when you eat an entire pack of Corn Nuts, a bag of Zapp's Voodoo chips, a Heath bar, and a Coke in one 100 mile stretch crossing West Texas). To be able to hold and inhabit both worlds— the fictions we need to make to participate in our current world (i.e. a legible "career," a sense of self not founded upon self-flagellation, even, dare I say it, a Roth IRA) and the truths which might build a better one (that our daily life relies on unimaginable suffering worldwide and is ushering in the 6th mass extinction on Earth), is maybe all I can do "authentically" at the moment. I drive my car many miles each day and see things of beauty. I don't know have a clear narrative for my life and I know I want to make something beautiful and try to end or abate some small sufferings with my short time left here. I wouldn't wish this writing I've just scrawled on anyone and yet I will send this email anyway. I fear the power of stories and feel a strong urge to capture them. I might paint Rocinante on the side of my van, even knowing that I'll later regret it.&nbsp; ◬ https://field-works.org/001_fieldnotes Thu, 07 Sep 2023 00:43:12 +0000 Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art https://field-works.org/001_fieldnotes 001INTRODUCING FIELDNOTES09-14-2023 Hello, friends. I hope you’re well and feeling centered and engaged with the world. I’m writing, primarily, to share some news (hm…a “newsletter?"): This email is the last thing I am doing before I start on the road for my travel research! As in, I leave today! First stop is the mining areas of West Virginia where mountaintop removal mining has radically altered the landscape, with, of course, significant and dramatic implications for the built environment and water resources. Then to Asheville, NC, then Raleigh, then Charleston, SC, (all to visit friends, primarily) then further afield, in the generally Southern direction. Currently deciding if I go all the way down to Miami (for obvious city-water related connections) or pivot West before the Florida panhandle. (Thoughts? And again, if you live somewhere in between Maryland and Florida, or between Florida and Los Angeles for that matter, reach out! I’d love to see you. And, truly, probably intended to reach out but have been above-averagely avoidant in planning this trip.) If you haven’t heard about my travel research project: I was awarded a generous travel fellowship upon graduation, and pitched in the application to study water infrastructure and water scarcity’s impact on urbanism/ city life. Then, in a hubristic and potentially regrettable bolt of inspiration, I bought a camcorder from the web and decided I would make a documentary (despite my complete lack of filmmaking experience and slim knowledge of water resource management). I am tentatively calling it WATERWORKS. You can read a bit more here. And the name change. In short, I’ve decided to hang out my shingle! I am pleased to introduce Field Works, an experimental design and research company of which I am sole proprietor. The past month, I’ve been thinking a lot (constantly) about the type of work I’d like to do, and how one might practice design and design research both full-time (i.e. make money) and ethically. I still don’t have the answer, but I know one thing: I care about studying and improving how we live and make our way through the space around us, and I want to try to keep doing it as long as I’m able. On the name (in a small nutshell): I see a disjunction between how we study and design our living infrastructure, in the “studio”(i.e. inside, separated) and the material reality of the world we live in. Whatever the scale, from a piece of furniture to an urban plan, good design work begins and ends with observation and exploration outside the studio— in the field. I’ll be doing a lot of “field work” on this road trip, and I hope to continue making such observations wherever I next land. And so this newsletter, formerly Broken Fences Almanac, will now be fieldnotes, the newsletter of Field Works. Is Field Works a proper design practice? A form of conceptual/ social-practice art? A way for me to cosplay my childhood dreams of being an adventurer/explorer/ scientist? I suppose the answers to these questions are in its reception (i.e. if I get any clients). Really, it's just a way for me to construct legibility in my own life, a structure in which to concentrate my diffused and disparate passions (history, research, writing, photography, building things, design) into a shorthand which I can use to explain what I am doing with my life and not sound crazy (maybe?) And, an even slimmer maybe, get paid for it? fieldnotes is a change in name only. This newsletter will retain much of the same form (sporadic, rambling) as Broken Fences Almanac, just hopefully with a bit more legibility, and over the next few months, will serve as a log of my travels and discoveries along the way. A (fledgling) website for the practice can be found at www.field-works.org I’ve also, against my better judgement, made an Instagram @field__works Finally, I've got a new email: ben@field-works.org I’ll go ahead and sign off here. Thank you, so much, for reading this little bulletin. Writing them certainly helps me to get my head around things, and it means so much when some of you reply that you enjoyed reading. A more fun one should be coming soon that isn’t just life updates, and I promise from here on out they will feature more fun/ fascinating/ hopeful observations and tidbits and less existential neurosis! ◬ https://field-works.org/006_Broken-Fences-Almanac Tue, 12 Dec 2023 23:27:09 +0000 Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art https://field-works.org/006_Broken-Fences-Almanac Broken Fences Almanac 006Broken Fences Almanac_00607-11-2023 BROKEN FENCES ALMANAC_006 WANING CRECENT MOON JULY, 11, 2023<img width="4160" height="2774" width_o="4160" height_o="2774" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/704f95f668cb4445fe76fb9412bd2ea36ca074c5d43e42247b85606cd0b4718a/unnamed.jpg" data-mid="199246993" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/704f95f668cb4445fe76fb9412bd2ea36ca074c5d43e42247b85606cd0b4718a/unnamed.jpg" /> The face of West Rock after a cool rain in April. I haven't written you, the generous signer-uppers for this newsletter, since October. I apologize, if anything to myself, for I really hoped this might be a regular practice, one oriented towards fostering consistent connection in what feels like an increasingly fragmented world. Fragmented, at least, for me. I recently, on a late night research spiral, came across the Wikipedia entry on Schizotypal Personality Disorder. (Is there a word for hypochondria but specifically for psychological conditions? Just googled: Phrenophobia?). Alongside the characteristic difficulty maintaining close social ties (hmm…), the entry listed another telltale symptom of SPD as &nbsp;“the preoccupation with seeing themselves and/or the world as strange/ odd.” But the world is strange, I thought. Not that I think I have a personality disorder per se, (or, not this one, at least) but my feelings of recognition with the obsession with strangeness did give me pause. Is it possible that our current milieu of social media, texting, the infinite scroll (what we might collectively call “internet brain”), the 9 hours a day I spend in a hermetically sealed, air-conditioned office, the absurd quantity of cars, of consumer goods, of trash, is strange, yes, but not quite as strange or unbearable as I experience it? One has to wonder what mental distortions one is peering out of. “No!” I think, “It is equally strange as it is terrible.” (Convince me it’s not, please?) Thus: It’s Not All Bad. This has been a sort of mantra I’ve been saying to myself lately. My negative thinking has gotten to a place where even a hike in the woods won’t bring me peace— all I can see are the various invasives covering the forest floor, hear the drone of the highway nearby, remember that this is all second growth, a weed patch, really, in comparison to the ecosystem richness of the Chestnut old growth forests prior to the European invasion of North America. A tiny weed patch where the remaining fireflies, songbirds, and deer must cling, the only oasis in the fecund mat of human development that stretches from here, in D.C., without a break all the way to Hartford, Ct. But a handful of wineberries, glowing like little lanterns (the Italian for raspberry, not coincidentally, is lampone) in the sunlight: It’s not all bad. &nbsp; <img width="4160" height="2774" width_o="4160" height_o="2774" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/7e2e20491e570353d780b3c6c53ab3cb2c083ccefc0b5137b765a940ee6b716a/unnamed-1.jpg" data-mid="199246992" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/7e2e20491e570353d780b3c6c53ab3cb2c083ccefc0b5137b765a940ee6b716a/unnamed-1.jpg" /> Quality Moss in Woodbridge, CT RECOMMENDED ENCOUNTER: FAR-LOOKING<img width="640" height="447" width_o="640" height_o="447" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/7dba7fddca3c4015ecb12034adb7223037e77eedb3fcd09265608aaa2f0e005d/unnamed.png" data-mid="199246990" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/640/i/7dba7fddca3c4015ecb12034adb7223037e77eedb3fcd09265608aaa2f0e005d/unnamed.png" />Last month I was on a walk in New Haven (before graduation and my move to D.C, to name the least of my recent life-altering experiences). Something caught my eye, some flash of movement. It was not close at hand but far up the street, at least at the end of the block. I didn’t clock whatever it was, but I found myself scanning the deep center of the picture plane that is what my eyes see, and became aware of this sensation in real time. With this came a sort of epiphany. It may sound stupidly obvious, but I felt I was seeing this spatial dimension for the first time. Far sight. For the rest of my walk, I focused my attention on the far distance— the block, one which I’d walked countless times over and which, if I am being honest, had become fairly banal and tiresome, was born anew. About a week after this moment of clarity, I went for an eye exam. Before going, I went on a research spiral around how optometrists work, and how often they might wrongly prescribe someone’s corrective vision— I’ve been taken aback by their casual and happy-go-lucky demeanor on past visits. (I wonder how many times "Optometrist" and "Happy-Go-Lucky" have shared a sentence). Over-prescription is quite common, actually. Worse, it encourages our eyes, those of us who are myopic, to further extend, in order to meet the sharpness of the image projected onto our retina, resulting in something ominously termed, and I might be misremembering it here, “Ocular Creep.” At the actual exam, I got confirmation of this by the doc. She was asking the age-old question “Which is better, 1…or 2?” To which I replied the requisite answer: I couldn’t tell. She opted for the lower dose, citing the same concerns of over-prescription. Day to day, I now realize how CLOSE I am looking all the time. The computer screen. The phone screen. The desk in front of me, the people walking in the opposite direction on the street, the facades of buildings I pass. My attention is claimed by a sphere of 20 or so feet around my head. Probably closer to 3 feet. &nbsp;All of us office-bound, vision-conscious workers are familiar with the “20-20-20 rule”. But what about beyond 20 feet, or beyond even the “far looking” I’ve been doing in the city? How rarely I gaze at truly FAR vistas, at the stars. Is this a great shrinking of our environment? As our “information” increases exponentially and into smaller and smaller “bits”, becoming further and further abstracted, does our physical body follow suit? An abstract human body, shaped by not physical environment but evanescent information... This physiological change, the lengthening of our eyeballs, feels connected to others driven by “modern life”: our increasing overbites, our crowded teeth, our shrinking jaws. Our collapsing nasal cavities, our habitual and deathly mouth-breathing. I’ve been an obsessive nose-breather for months now, yet I still revert to the mouth if I am not careful. Again, information: breathing through our mouths must be tied to all our talking, no? To come to an end of my rambling: I recommend you try far-looking and looking long in your daily life, if not to challenge our increasing “close” sphere, then for the increased range of poetry and aesthetics one can experience in experientially tired spaces: to find new joys in old places. BROKEN FENCE: ROBIDA COLLECTIVE <img width="780" height="1024" width_o="780" height_o="1024" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/448076a5faba177b89fe8283401ab0c76dc3fb918212a44e4d95ac472a2aeb39/unnamed-2.jpg" data-mid="199246989" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/780/i/448076a5faba177b89fe8283401ab0c76dc3fb918212a44e4d95ac472a2aeb39/unnamed-2.jpg" />Illustration by Vanilla Chi for Mold Magazine If Robida Collective sounds familiar, its because I mentioned them in my last newsletter. Since then, I sat down with them over Zoom for an interview for a piece on their practice for Mold, which I procrastinated on finishing for, I kid you not, 6 months. It is now, finally, published, so I am including it below, follow the jump to Mold for the rest :) INHABITING THE MARGINS WITH ROBIDA COLLECTIVE:THE YOUNG DESIGNERS BUILDING COMMUNITY IN A RURAL VILLAGE ON THE SLOVENE-ITALIAN BORDERIn the mountains of the Natisone River Valley, nearly on the border between Slovenia and Italy, lies the small village of Topolò. That’s its Italian name, anyway. In Slovene the village is called Topolove. To Robida Collective, a group of primarily young academics and architects who call the village home, the two names matter. As one member, Dora Ciccone explains, “Topolò is very related to the Slovenian border community, which is a minority in Italy, so we have a special care for culture, for languages.” Most of the group met in Slovene-speaking Ljubljana, two hours by car from Topolò, but now live together, some full time, others for parts of the year, in the village in this bilingual region of Italy. The identity and space of borderlands being so central to their practice, it is no surprise then that their annual publication, Robida Magazine, features pieces in English, Italian, and Slovene, among others (so far, the magazine counts 9 languages published across their 8 issues, with a 9th issue, titled Soil, on the way). From this annual magazine, to hosting a “Summer School” of collective learning with lecturers and participants from across Europe, to their internet radio station, Robida Collective is exploring, challenging, and remaking the relationship between the small, isolated, rural village they call home and the rest of the world. This connection—between the rural and the global—has long been a preoccupation of my work and is why I sat down with Robida Collective last month to ask them how they understand their village in relation to the urban and the rural, the global and the local, and what relevancy places like Topolò might have for the future. CONTINUE READING SEEKING ADVICE: WATER WORKS, A DOCUMENTARY Finally, just an ever so brief update here that I'm the recipient of a generous travel award, which I plan to use to make a short, experimental format documentary on water infrastructure, water use, and future water scarcity in the U.S., tentatively called WATER WORKS. More to come soon, but if you see any interesting water stories, news tid bits, etc. I'd be so grateful if you sent 'em my way! I made this video project, developed as a panoramic immersive video installation (hence the weird long format), to question how we might experience the ghost of an ecosystem, specifically the Lago Di Texcoco under present-day Mexico City. It's not great, but was foundational to my current thinking on water relationships in cities and water scarcity and how it relates to design. <img width="636" height="123" width_o="636" height_o="123" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/0abd0904485c5b1ed842635d1384d089e587244cd786f32f0420ab3050526720/unnamed-1.png" data-mid="199246994" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/636/i/0abd0904485c5b1ed842635d1384d089e587244cd786f32f0420ab3050526720/unnamed-1.png" /> Screenshot from “Ghost Lake” (2023) the short “film” I made in architecture school last semester. https://field-works.org/005_Broken-Fences-Almanac Tue, 12 Dec 2023 23:31:37 +0000 Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art https://field-works.org/005_Broken-Fences-Almanac Broken Fences Almanac 00510-09-2022 ◯FULL MOON TONIGHT October 9th, 2022 <img width="2394" height="1588" width_o="2394" height_o="1588" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/7edeb2e6dd6c6bae91ebb21f50e27b0993a5cf62b5958123b61f0f4db43ca028/Screen-Shot-2022-10-09-at-5.51.47-PM.png" data-mid="199247125" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/7edeb2e6dd6c6bae91ebb21f50e27b0993a5cf62b5958123b61f0f4db43ca028/Screen-Shot-2022-10-09-at-5.51.47-PM.png" />A clear autumn day at the sprawling Bishop’s Orchards in Guilford, CT. When I named this newsletter the Broken Fences Almanac, I was interested in exploring that form— the Almanac. The almanac, at its core, is a publication connected to the passing of time and time's measure; by sharing moon phases and solar events and other such phenomena, it connects the abstract Gregorian calendar to our real earthly existence. An admirable goal, and one vital for the livelihood of farmers and with larger implications (immense value, I think) for our overall existential well-being. The almanac also attempts to forecast: from weather and planting dates for farmers to tidal information for sailors, to horoscopes. This too, we need now more than ever. How can we forecast our future on earth as our climate is changing rapidly and like never before in history? And how can we center ourselves, and connect to the real, the material within this changed Earth? And how can we connect to earthly food systems and ecosystems amid a world increasingly, nearly completely, privatized. What this newsletter has been so far is more of a “what I've been up to and thinking about” sort of thing. So, in an effort to get back to these central interests, this month, and perhaps months following, I will include: a Recommended Encounter: An action that has helped me to connect to our earthly existence. It might be a walk in the woods, or a bath in ice water, or a book, or album, recipe etc.A “Broken Fence”: To try and spatialize the act of commoning, I imagine a broken fence as an apt symbol for the process of moving beyond private property. Hoping to share each week a spatial project (architecture, urbanism, art, landscape, activist group, etc.) which feels to me to be doing some small part to move us towards a more interconnected and commonly-cared-for world.A longer piece of writing: Full disclosure this is just to force myself to write more, and have a place to think though stuff not completely in an echo-chamber. This month from my series on Rural-urban systems for MOLD.RECOMMENDED ENCOUNTER­Anton Chekhov's short stories <img width="531" height="400" width_o="531" height_o="400" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/28432a0d963b5dd3ffa78d76eb28367c6c6cacd7d9d2e71b8f2eeafdc248b90f/Chekhov_ht.jpeg" data-mid="199247128" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/531/i/28432a0d963b5dd3ffa78d76eb28367c6c6cacd7d9d2e71b8f2eeafdc248b90f/Chekhov_ht.jpeg" />Chekhov in 1893 I brought a Chekhov reader (that had been following me around for probably a year now) on my flight to Germany last month. I had grabbed it from a used book store initially because of the singing endorsement of him and fellow Russian short-storyists &nbsp;by George Saunders, in his unique book-as-writing-class A Swim in a Pond in the Rain. (also highly recommend this book if you like fiction. And doubly highly-recommend if you write, or try to write, oh so secretly, like me, fiction sometimes.) Also, more than thrilled that George Saunders has a new collection of his own short stories out! I'll let George Saunders tell us what makes Chekhov, and his compatriots of late 19th century Russian fiction, so great: “These stories…were written to challenge and antagonize and outrage. And, in a complicated way, to console…The resistance in these stories is quiet, at a slant, and comes from perhaps the most radical idea of all: that every human being is worthy of attention and that the origins of every good and evil capability of the universe may be found in observing a single, even very humble, person and the turnings of his or her mind.…[These writers] seemed to regard fiction not as something decorative but as a vital moral-ethical tool. They changed you when you read them, made the world seem to be telling a different, more interesting story, a story in which you might play a meaningful part, and in which you had responsibilities." I couldn't agree more. These stories are so simple, and about what seems to be apolitical and quotidian things, but dig into some big existential questions, and are moving, at the overwhelming-love-and-pain-of-recognizing-the-universals-of-humanity scale. Anyway, here are some of my favorite Chekhov stories so far: “About Love”"In the Cart"“Gooseberries”“The Privy Councilor” Also very good: "The Darling”“At the Mill”“Vanka”“The Man in a Shell”You can find most of them for free in this PDF (translations vary of course… I'm not so into his work yet to know or have opinion on the differences in quality among them). Interestingly enough, I also watched Drive My Car, the 2021 film by Ryusuke Hamaguchi, based on a Murakami story, of which the plot has a lot to do with Chekhov's play Uncle Vanya (next on my reading list). The movie itself must surely draw inspiration from Chekhov's ability to approach big ethical/ moral ideas through the lens of everyday life and I'd recommend it &nbsp;(a warning though, 3 hours long...) as a nice pairing with reading Chekhov. BROKEN FENCERobida Collective <img width="1500" height="1000" width_o="1500" height_o="1000" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/17baeeb863fd19a5c332fea12ca6684ece4e9611ae70e6c48c25f4c38c4ce653/academyofmargins.png" data-mid="199247127" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/17baeeb863fd19a5c332fea12ca6684ece4e9611ae70e6c48c25f4c38c4ce653/academyofmargins.png" />My studio this semester was able to chat briefly with this group via Zoom, who based in an extremely small village in Northern Italy, nearly on top of the border with Slovenia, called Topolò (Topolove in Slovene). They are a collective of artists who live and work in the old village, which has been largely abandoned, approaching the village “as a house” and with a feminist theory of care. Like many artists occupying affordable places, they are grappling with issues of potential gentrification, and what their presence, which is bringing more people to the village, means for the village's collectivization and future. Their approach and framework seems genuinely caring, and I think the problems they are grappling with and the questions they are asking will prove vital to understanding occupation of “the margins" or “periphery," as they call it, especially as we can stay connected from rural areas, -potentially de-centralizing the city as a place for cultural production. Find their Website here to follow along and tune in to their radio programs or check out their magazine. <img width="800" height="600" width_o="800" height_o="600" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/2d46c3784d48242f07b50a2ffe532f75523cd39b9e16529b3fb852d72284ab63/topolo-800x600.jpeg" data-mid="199247126" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/800/i/2d46c3784d48242f07b50a2ffe532f75523cd39b9e16529b3fb852d72284ab63/topolo-800x600.jpeg" /> RURAL-URBAN SYSTEMSEternal fountains of the Eternal City <img width="1950" height="2560" width_o="1950" height_o="2560" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/679ec503b070918aefea38bdfc2dffc10a895d5f55a3ee172bb38df602046aa2/MOLD-Magazine-Rural-Urban-Systems-09262022-scaled.jpeg" data-mid="199247124" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/679ec503b070918aefea38bdfc2dffc10a895d5f55a3ee172bb38df602046aa2/MOLD-Magazine-Rural-Urban-Systems-09262022-scaled.jpeg" /> Illustration for the piece by Vanilla Chi for MOLD.Originally published by MOLD on 9.29.2022 In Tivoli, Italy—around an hour and a half bus ride from the Centro Storico of Rome—lies one of the most dramatic celebrations of water in the world: the fountain garden of the Villa D’Este. Built in the 1500s by the wealthy Cardinal Ippolito II d'Este, the Villa’s expansive grounds contain hundreds of fountains. Taking outlandish forms—from grotesque faces and moss-covered dragons, to a boat with an obelisk for a mast–the fountains are powered by gravity alone and spurt water throughout a lush landscape of planted beds, reflection pools, waterfalls, artificial grottos, and flumes. Standing along the “Viale delle Cento Fontane,” or the “Avenue of 100 Fountains'' (actually composed of 300 fountains), you can gaze out across the countryside of Lazio below, and somewhere on the haze of the horizon, to Rome. The Villa D’Este highlights an important feature of the hills around Tivoli, prized since ancient times: the rich spring water of the Aniene Valley. Nearby, abandoned villas where this water no longer flows reveal the essential, place-making impact of the springs. There may be no greater counterpoint to the Villa D’este than the city-scale ruins of the Roman emperor Hadrian’s villa, which can be seen in the valley below from the gardens. In the height of summer, it is dry, and hot, the wreckage of grand fountains flickering in the heat waves of the midday sun. The Mediterranean climate, famed for its mildness, can be brutal without a secure water source. How does the city of Rome, with nearly three million residents, survive? The hills surrounding Tivoli are where the story of Rome’s drinking water begins.The water that feeds Villa D’Este comes from groundwater, a large standing aquifer within Karst formations—a geologic feature characterized by many passages and holes dissolved from rock, which allows for high water inundation. This same water is what the ancient Romans tapped as early as 140 BCE as source for their aqueducts supplying the city-state’s water. Of the eleven ancient aqueducts, four begin in the Aniene valley, stretching roughly forty miles to the city center. In modern Rome, not much has changed. Ninety-seven percent of Rome’s water is provided by springs. In some cases, it is still brought to the city using ancient infrastructure: the famous Trevi Fountain, for example, gets its water through remaining underground segments of the Aqua Virgo. I was fortunate enough to spend close to a month in the Eternal City this summer, studying the landscape and architecture structuring the urban fabric through long days of walking, and periodically taking refuge from the heat in the dark and cool interiors of churches. The drama of chiaroscuro—the sharp shadows on the undulating baroque facades, the bright-bleached walls outside to the dark and cool inside—is an apt metaphor for how a city walker relates to water in the city. I would walk &nbsp;near-empty handed, only a small sketchbook in my pocket, accepting and enjoying the sweltering sun. When feeling too sun-soaked, or more bluntly, dehydrated, I would shift my attention to the streetscape, peering down alleys and into squares. Before long, I was sure to encounter a fountain, bubbling with some of the coolest, clearest water I'd ever tasted. That I could walk out my door in the morning—my Nalgene abandoned on my desk—with confidence that free, clean water could be found whenever I might need it, and practically anywhere in the city, seemed the stuff of utopian urbanist dreams. The Nasoni, or “big noses”—named from their spouts, which protrude out like a nose from a head—number some 3,223 across the city. Azienda Comunale Elettricità e Acque (ACEA), the water management company for the region, counts a total of 6,044 in the entire service area of Lazio. In the center, where most tourists, like myself, spend the bulk of their time, one can be found without too much trouble—seemingly stumbled upon at just the right moment. The crowds, the sun, the dry sharp relief of ancient stone, beyond time, can be exhausting. The fountains feel, truly, like an oasis. And what an oasis they must be now. As heat waves tear across all of Europe, Italy is experiencing its worst drought in 70 years. The Po River, the country’s longest, is reduced to critically low levels exposing wide swathes of its sandy bed. Rice paddies are drying up, leaving whole fields of ruined crop, while tomato growers, olive groves, and vineyards are threatened with the same fate. What of this makes its way to the day-to-day lives of a city dweller in the nation’s capital? Food shortages perhaps, and of course the heat—suffered by all—but soon enough, water rationing across Italy will be likely. Water access in the city has a history of contention and political pressure. After the fall of imperial Rome, and with it many of the original aqueducts and fountains that characterized the ancient empire’s wealth, the city population collapsed, in no small part due to a lack of available fresh water. As such, bringing clean water back to the city became the principal project of the city’s rulers– the various popes which, from the 8th century to the 19th, were the primary government of the Italian peninsula. Elaborate fountains acted as billboards to announce the grand re-entry of fresh spring water into parts of the city, and the power of the papacy. &nbsp; This trend is exemplified in Baroque masterpieces such as the Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi (by Bernini for Pope Innocent X) in Piazza Navona, and of course the Trevi (Nicola Salvi for Pope Clement XII). In 1870, Rome was captured from papal rule, and the Risorgimento came to a close: the Italian peninsula finally became a fully united nation-state under King Vittorio Emanuelle II. Water, again, announces the new sovereignty: The Nasoni were a way for the new united government to celebrate “modernizing” the country, supplying hygienic water to the growing capital. We might ask what a similar celebration might look like in our contemporary cities. How would a city’s leadership celebrate the return of public space to the city? Of ecosystems resilience? Of resilience to climate change and water security? Municipalities of the United States could do well to mull on these questions: the current water crisis in Jackson, Mississippi is only the most recent instance of municipal neglect of water supplies in majority Black cities. From Flint, to Milwaukee, to Baltimore, Black communities have to disproportionately deal with contamination, flood events, and aging infrastructure due to decades of disinvestment. 44 million Americans are drinking water from service providers that have recent Safe Drinking Water Act violations, and are disproportionately likely to be Black. Thinking of the water not as a “service”, but as a shared, city-wide commons, about which we might all have decision-making agency, is a necessary step to answering some of these questions, and achieving a more equitable and sustainable future. For now the public drinking fountains stay on in Rome, but this access is not guaranteed. In 2017, the last time of serious drought for Rome, the mayor ordered some of the Nasoni be shut off, at the rate of roughly 30 a day. Protests came from nonprofits and residents who argued that the fountains are vital for the lives of people experiencing homelessness in the city. They’re also critical to the nonhuman inhabitants of Rome—a small basin at the bottom of each fountain, specifically designed for dogs, some say, allows all sorts of animals, wild and domesticated, to take a drink. It has also been pointed out that leaking pipes in the city’s vast and aging plumbing system are to blame for far more water waste—some cite a loss of roughly 50 percent of the city’s water—compared to less than 1 percent lost from the Nasoni. Others argue that the Nasoni are actually necessary to the system, relieving pressure like a release valve, to keep the water flowing and the pipes clean. Yet the drought brings to light that, as delicious and seemingly inexhaustible as it is, the groundwater that feeds the city with water is not, in fact, eternal. In order to be replenished, an aquifer must be slowly “recharged” by rainfall. The measurement for groundwater recharge rates is in the millimeters per year, and so is by definition a slow and steady process. The ACEA is aware of this challenge, and recently inaugurated a man-made recharging system to pump water back down into the aquifers. The recharging of groundwater is just one of hundreds of water-related problems cities will face in the coming decades: problems that seem particularly pressing for Italy’s capital. Climatic projections expect that drought days could make up more than 50 percent of the dry season in the mediterranean region by 2065, if greenhouse gas emissions aren’t radically reduced. The greater Po Basin (where a third of all Italians live) hit record low water levels this year. Estimates say 30 percent of the rice crops of the region will die, affecting the economy of Europe and beyond. (Italy provides the EU with 50 percent of its rice). This July, record high temperatures in Italy’s north destabilized a glacier, causing an avalanche in the Dolomiti (the Italian Alps), leaving seven people dead. A recent toxic smoke cloud hovering over Rome’s skyline in late July seemed an omen of the potential strife to come. Today, the Nasoni are a model of what urban water access might look like: a free resource that encourages occupation of the public realm, supports the health of all, and renders commodification efforts (i.e. the plastic water bottle) obsolete. Rome has a real, visual and physical connection to its water source, to its hinterland, thanks to them: the Nasoni flow day in and day out, each one like their own mini-river. Their soothing trickle, perhaps lulling you to sleep through an open bedroom window, the cool air around them deepening your breath: le fontanelle bring the hinterland into the daily life of the city—a constant reminder of the life giving force of water. Perhaps this is when Rome’s moniker as the “Eternal City” rings most true: water flowing from the fountains like a river, the sun sharp and timeless on the travertine, and the scraggly permanence of the stone pines, their shadows stretching out across the surface of the Tiber. https://field-works.org/004_Broken-Fences-Almanac Tue, 12 Dec 2023 23:33:37 +0000 Field Works | Architectural Design & Public Art https://field-works.org/004_Broken-Fences-Almanac Broken Fences Almanac 00407-13-2022 ◯FULL MOON TONIGHT (CLOSEST TO EARTH THIS YEAR)July 13, 2022 <img width="1318" height="874" width_o="1318" height_o="874" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/db3804069195752bce6a216740f00038fd7e93d828d05cc9b05c33d07c95cc67/unnamed.png" data-mid="199247178" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/db3804069195752bce6a216740f00038fd7e93d828d05cc9b05c33d07c95cc67/unnamed.png" />Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus altissima) by my house. I saw them in Rome, too. Despite their global reach, they feel synonymous with Atlantic coast summers to me.I've been back in the U.S. for almost three weeks now, somehow, after spending a stupendous 40 days in Italia. I've got a lot I'd like to share from this trip, but as I am somehow still just getting my footing (a lot has happened since been back, too: One of my best friends got MARRIED in one of the funnest, heart-warmingest weddings ever, I visited my family in Cumberland, visited Baltimore, visited a friend in Concord and took a midnight dip in Walden Pond, hosted some friends on a crazy roadtrip to their new home in Seattle, and started a new job at the Yale Urban Design Workshop…to name a few!), Iso &nbsp;am using the excuse that I am still waiting on film to be developed to put down some of my thoughts on Italy next newsletter. Still, I've got something else I am equally excited to share! I am writing a 6 part series for the esteemed MOLD Magazine! If you aren't familiar, MOLD is a print and online magazine focused on the intersection of food and design. (So, pretty up my alley). Thrilled to be working with them. Below is the introduction to my series as well as the first installment, an interview I did a few months back with my professor about the urbanism and food systems of the ancient cities of the Americas. Hope you enjoy, and talk more next month! ­New Series for MOLD Magazine: Rural-Urban SystemsOriginally published by MOLD on 6.8.2022The past month I’ve been receiving a box delivery of groceries each week to my apartment, each pre-packaged into several “meal kits” with accompanying recipes. A service I would normally abhor (the amount of packaging is truly disturbing, I pride myself on my abilities in the kitchen, etc.), I was enticed by a referral for a free trial. Even more estranged from its origins than in the supermarket, it is a complete mystery as to where this food comes from before arriving at my door. Sometimes in unpacking the box, a red pepper or some fruit cradled in my hand, I try to picture the farmland where these vegetables were grown– perhaps in Mexico, maybe even further afield. Some imagined, rural landscape, tethered to my city apartment by the thousands of miles this little pepper has traveled. But most of the time, I don’t think about it at all. For many of us, food production is understood to be a non-urban phenomenon– urban areas consume what rural areas produce, and the interaction between the two is limited primarily to this dynamic. We don’t see our food until it is on our plate or in our fridge. Our cities are anesthetized, severed from the terrain surrounding them which allows them to live. The other day, my girlfriend almost walked into an upscale salad shop, thinking it was a bank, so devoid it was of signs of real food. Cities weren’t always so sanitized. In the late 1800s, cows roamed in Harlem. Roosters at a poultry supplier were waking Bob Dylan in Greenwich Village in 1963. As both an architectural designer and sometime farmer, I look for alternatives to our current model, and speculate on how we might design more holistic systems of city-building. What I continue to find in my research is that the prevailing theories of urbanism come up short. The globalized city is too often observed as standing alone– the glimmering metropolis on the horizon– humming with its self-created energy of life and movement. Rarely is the city transparent in its reliance on a vast web of externalized systems in the lands beyond its borders– systems that span the globe. As such, urbanism engages in a myopia, valuing the physical space of the city at the expense of the processes that are required to keep the city alive. This has led me to try to approach these questions, not from the standpoint of the city, but from the rural. As Rem Koolhaus said ahead of his (questionably-vague, overambitious, and overwrought) exhibition and book, Countryside: “the countryside is where the radical changes are.” In my own work, I hope to explore the spaces beyond, but inexorably linked to, the city– the rural-urban fringe, exurbs, desakota, outskirts, hinterland, umland, the peri-urban, the countryside– to better understand the systems necessary for urban life, but from the outside looking in, so to speak, in the hopes of avoiding some of the pitfalls of contemporary urbanism. In this six part series for MOLD, I will profile systems– food, waste, and everything between– which bridge the urban, the periurban, and the rural, from farming practices in pre-colonial America to present day composting, to complicate our understanding of the geography of our cities. And as we explore moments where the urban-rural divide is proven a false dichotomy, we might catch glimpses of a future city where ecology, agriculture, and habitation reach a symbiosis.­­“Territorial Cities of Pre-Columbian America: AN INTERVIEW WITH ARCHITECT AND URBAN HISTORIAN ANA MARÍA DURÁN CALISTO” ­<img width="1560" height="2048" width_o="1560" height_o="2048" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/54c355fe0ddf88dd3dbd10ef59b8f499c9db667e2a90848bc5e864065878264c/unnamed.jpeg" data-mid="199247179" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/54c355fe0ddf88dd3dbd10ef59b8f499c9db667e2a90848bc5e864065878264c/unnamed.jpeg" />Illustration for the piece by Vanilla Chi for MOLD Magazine. Originally published by MOLD on 6.8.2022“Next morning, we came to a broad causeway and continued our march towards Iztapalapa. And when we saw all those cities and villages built in the water, and other great towns on dry land, and that straight and level causeway leading to Mexico, we were astounded. It was all so wonderful that I do not know how to describe this first glimpse of things never heard of, seen or dreamed of before…large canoes could come into the garden from the lake through a channel they had cut, and their crews did not have to disembark. Everything was shining with lime and decorated with different kinds of stonework and paintings which were a marvel to gaze on…But today all that I then saw is overthrown and destroyed; nothing is left standing.” &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; -Bernal Diaz del CastilloReading descriptions by &nbsp;Bernal Diaz del Castillo, a conquistador in Cortés’ army who participated in the Spanish conquest of Tenochtitlán and later documented his experiences1, it is impossible not to long for a glimpse of this dreamlike world that rivaled ancient Rome and Constantinople– and to mourn its destruction. Chasing this glimpse is, in part, the work of Ana María Durán Calisto’s Yale School of Architecture research course “Territorial Cities of Pre Columbian America.” Over the course of this semester, my classmates and I are attempting to visualize our research on one Native American city, leveraging our skills as designers to produce maps, plans, and diagrams. Durán Calisto is an architect by trade, and her work centers around the history of urbanization in the Amazon basin. The intention of the seminar is to both build a more robust architectural accounting of pre-colonial urbanism in the Americas and for design students to learn from these urban ecologies as we seek to reestablish a sustainable relationship between human settlement and environment. As I investigate rural-urban systems for MOLD over the coming months, a conversation with Durán Calisto about these profound (and prescient) American cities seemed like a fitting place to start. Below is our conversation, edited for length and clarity, in which we discuss her work, the course, and the design ingenuity within indigenous cities of the Americas. Ben Derlan: In this 6 part series, I am attempting to trace the systems which connect our cities to the hinterland, urban to rural. I feel this tie is captured in the title of the class “territorial cities.” How do you understand the territory in relation to the city? Ana María Durán Calisto: The relationship between the city and its hinterland is absolutely fundamental; there’s no city without the hinterland. To see what has happened with globalization is very disturbing. The natural relationship, if you wish, between the city and the hinterland that feeds it, that provides water, that provides fresh air, that provides so many resources for the well-being of the city has been disrupted. What happens now is that the hinterland of our cities is an ocean away, kilometers away, it is disjointed from the city. How can you take care of an American city’s hinterland if it’s in Indonesia, or the Amazon? It is very difficult. So that is one of the outcomes of globalization we are really going to have to tackle. How can you take care of that hinterland that is taking care of you? BD: In our course, we’ve spent the first few weeks studying the ontology of the city– how do we define a city. Perhaps to reaffirm that these pre-columbian cities were in fact, cities. Where does this doubt come from? AMDC: There’s always this doubt, which I have found fascinating because I have encountered it over and over again. Why is it that for the western ontology of the urban, these cities somehow don’t fully qualify, don’t fully fit the definition and expectations of what a city should be? That’s why we’re investigating (in class) how the west has defined terms like urbs, civitas, polis, communitas, and questioning the narrative of evolutionary, linear urban formation that we inherited from the Enlightenment and social darwinism. An assumption which, in a way, stagnated archeology in places like Amazonia for decades. The prevailing narrative, since V.G. Childe, an archeologist writing in the early 1900s, stated that intensive agriculture precedes the emergence of cities. In Amazonia soils are very poor and very acidic. So Betty Meggers and the other archeologists first studying the region believed, if soils here are very poor, and incapable of supporting intensive agriculture, cities couldn’t have existed in the region. But this condition was based on a specific understanding of agriculture in the European or Mesopotamian style, not in terms of forest agriculture, polyculture or agro-ecological forest: the multi-species, highly biodiverse agricultural systems of Amazonia. So Amazonia has been sunken underneath all sorts of preconceptions about what agriculture is and how it looks and what urbanism is and how it looks. The widespread existence of terra preta and terra morena, fertile and anthropogenic soils, brought this hypothesis under scrutiny.An important Amazonian archaeologist we spoke with last semester for this course, Clark Erickson, told us that “wherever you start carving the ground in Amazonia, you find ceramic shards.” It makes you wonder about the myth of the “pristine forest." He said that he still has yet to find it, because every site he had visited personally had delivered some sign of human occupation. Continue reading the interview at MOLD Magazine.