An assemblage | calligraphy: the stroke, the word, the world.
Presentation wall, with calligraphic drawings and educational references, photographic brand boards, working tools, broadsides and flow examples. Yesterday, exploring the hand drawing of letterforms, with a team from Girvin, Inc., and it was about finding motion, gesture, the curve, the light and the dark, what is seen and stroked, and what is left blank -- untouched. I've been teaching calligraphy, once again. For now, it's a cadre of Girvin designers. During that same day, I had a...
the arc of heaven
the arc of heaven one spring stroke, that great, arcing curve of beauty, a bow to heaven which is the doubl'd arrow-slinger that celebrates that dawn, that just now closes -- revealing the pearl, she hanging in the sky like one luminous pendant -- launching the day a pendant of splendor. She goes -- and the day remains. in beauty, ever cycled. TSG | decatur island On Mar 27, 2010, at 10:52 AM, Gregory Furman wrote: spring storm...
BRANDFIRE
BRANDFIRE As a designer, presuming strategic intention, the practice is never about what's on the surface alone, but more to what lies beneath. The legacy of any design decision lies in historical experience -- it is about the story of what has been, what story might be told now, and how that story could extend to the future. For each of us, exploring the idea of design might be to the link of the signature -- the "signing" of a solution in the original use of the word. For every design might...
(My) F A R M E R ‘ S W I S D O M
-- F O R -- -- G E O R G E G I R V I N -- actually, when I found this, and redrafted it, I'd thought: dedicated to my ol' farmer pop, too. love you, daddo. T H E A D V I C E O F A N O L D F A R M E R ---------- --------------------------------------------------------- Your fences need to be horse-high, pig-tight and bull-strong. Keep skunks and bankers at a distance. Life is simpler when you plow around the stumps. A bumble bee is considerably faster than a...
Ravening | A love of the Crow’s Family
Those of us that have been around...crows, rooks, ravens, jays, magpies and jackdaws. Have known and loved the raven, and family, in all manifestations for years. Why now, would there be such renewed and continuing enthusiasm about the crow -- which, familial to the smartest bird group in the world -- is essentially a black bird. For me, it's a continuing saga that goes way back, so a love of this family is nothing even remotely new. But the saga of the raven -- literally, the legend -- is...
Calligraphy on the wind
Notes on installations, surprise and the awakening of beauty, discovered. I've written about the idea of poetry on the wind, words that gesture to an impression, that tied to a string, written on handmade paper or the stock of recycled paper bags, flutter and turn in the breeze. For me, that fluttering bespeaks leaves, that are turning; and in the etymology of the word, liber -- the foundational character of the library, tells, from circa 1374, from Anglo-French, going back in time: librarie,...
Crows, seeing people; people seeing crows
The recollection of a face, reflections on corvid recognition. I'd offer this: these days, there's more interest in the corvid population than ever before. Why? Because we've all learned about the degree of intelligence that is connected with the family. And somehow, there's some disconnection from an earlier proposition that perhaps the corvid clan of birds are inherently linked to evil. Now, there's a positioning that actually the "renegade raiders" are something that are more interesting,...
D R E A M I N G
I was taking a rest, after a long week -- a contemplation: and things came to mind that recalled the journeys that have been, and what new emergences shall be. And those dreams were deepening, in the meaning -- the meditation on making -- and the creative spirit that can be unbound, in reflection. ..... D R E A M I N G Sometimes, in the work of the week you stretch back to the weekend which might not be the end. there will be more. It might be the beginning of more work, to find the right full...
What I wonder about: personal brands, icons and totems
Why does Tim Girvin love crows and ravens? Some people have equated the raven as being something inextricably linked to me -- my personal brand. That is, when people see something on the raven, or the crow, they presume that I know about it, or should. And they tell me about them, of course. And yes, out there, I know there are others that are captivated by the raven'd compulsion, endlessly fascinating they are. "Say, did you hear that story about the Raven starting up a bulldozer and driving...
Roxy Paine | Steel Arborist | Maelstrom Maker
Librado Romero/The New York Times I love trees. That's obvious, given at that I have written dozens of blogs that have something to do with the spirit of trees. And I've written about Roxy Paine, too. But, being a designer, my love of trees is really about the extraordinary character of how they work. I won't get into a long-winded overview of that. But I do marvel at how they seem to be designed to organically fill the space -- like a rhythmically expanded vortex, they flow out to fill...