Elsewhat

As I touched on in my post about Henry Dreyfuss’ Symbol Sourcebook, Buckminster Fuller, the designer of the above-pictured Expo 67 American Pavilion here in Montréal, was a big character. I recently ran into the following passages about him in a thrifted book This Was Expo, about Montréal’s Expo 67:

He once had an idea for an apartment building that would be put in its place by a dirigible. The building would be made of lightweight alloys and the floors of it would be hung from a great mast. A dirigible would pick up the whole building and take it to where it was needed. First the dirigible would drop a bomb – that’s right, a bomb – which would create a hole in the ground for the mast. Then the dirigible would put the building in place and fly away. A ground crew would pour concrete around the mast to secure it. And everybody’s housing problem would be solved.

This is someone who does not shy away from big ideas. It continues later:

On this day he was talking, as usual, about his ideas and about the future of mankind. “Because I’m in research,” he was saying, “I’m on the frontiers of man.” He looked around at the fair outside, through the transparent walls of the dome. “We are all going into world man,” he said. And for a moment, under the spell of his genial intensity, Expo seemed an important moment in world history and “world man” indeed a possibility. But then perhaps all moments seem important to those in Bucky Fuller’s company.

In a 1972 interview, Bucky allegedly said:

Something hit me very hard once, thinking about what one little man could do. Think of the Queen Elizabeth again: The whole ship goes by and then comes the rudder. And there’s a tiny thing on the edge of the rudder called a trim tab. It’s a miniature rudder. Just moving that little trim tab builds a low pressure that pulls the rudder around. It takes almost no effort at all. So I said that the individual can be a trim tab. Society thinks it’s going right by you, that it’s left you altogether. But if you’re doing dynamic things mentally, the fact is that you can just put your foot out like that and the whole ship of state is going to turn around. So I said, ‘Call me Trim Tab.’

And he believed in this small idea of leverage enough that he put it on his tombstone.

From the small weekend diversion department: the above window sign was put up for an upcoming grocery store near my house. It roughly translates to “New grocery store coming. For everyone. Opening Soon.”

Nothing weird so far, until I got close enough to view the prices from the (presumably) stock photo they used. All the prices are in thousands of dollars for basic produce. Very 2023.

Alley piece by Chado.

I spotted some random streaks of colour from the end of the loading dock. I had to walk down a long ramp with dog in tow to see what it actually was. I’m not sure if this is an accident or the work of an artist, but I like it a lot.

Spanish artist Isaac Cordal, previously mentioned here, has a wonderful little show at C.O.A. Gallery in Montréal until July 15. The show is quick and sweet, and can be done in 15 or so minutes.

As part of the Mural festival, Cordal has hidden upwards of 20 pieces of street sculpture along Montréal’s St-Laurent Boulevard, including this one in the gallery’s own sign:

Show Details Here →

It’s the time of year where the sun sets very close to “Montréal North”, which is actually North-West, and so shines perfectly down many streets and even narrow alleys.

French artist Tristan Blondeau makes these wonderful little Petit Prince-esque planet sculptures for what he calls his ‘Planetarium’ series.

See them all here →

Found in Montréal’s Mile Ex.

Friend of Elsewhat Sean Michaels has a piece up in The New Yorker this week about the intersection of AI and the music industry. It touches on tech, music sharing, sampling, and lots more.

Meanwhile, the pace of A.I. research has recalled the work of West Yorkshire rhubarb farmers, whose stalks grow so fast that they can hear the sound of them stretching. Tools with names like So-Vits-SVC, which has been used to generate A.I. facsimiles of Drake’s, Eminem’s, and Jay-Z’s voices, are introducing a new set of challenges to an industry that has barely recovered from covid-era concert restrictions. Musical artists, confronted by Big Tech’s tempo, influence, and affluence, have shown an understandable willingness to line up behind Big Media. Given a very real fear that generative tools will further erode, or permanently cripple, the already precarious economics of artists’ lives, why not allow globe-straddling labels, studios, and publishers to stand on their behalf?

Read it here →

This stunning piece was done by Moroccan artist Tima for the Montréal Mural Festival.