29 April 2010
On reading and rereading and rerereading
If people had cared about such things back in the 80s, when I was little—and if my parents believed in them—I probably would have been diagnosed with a learning disability. Whether or not it would have been an accurate diagnosis, I can’t really say. What I do know is that, for all the books I pick up, I rarely finish any of them in a timely manner (if at all), because a new idea always seizes my attention. And every idea has to be explored.
To say it happens a lot would be an understatement. (Consequently, I read at an agonizingly slow pace. For me, 20 pages per hour is borderline miraculous. Realistically, it’s closer to ten.) I realize that, in 100 words, I have managed to destroy the pseudo-intellectual image I have spent two decades constructing. Hopefully, those I’ve duped into thinking my mind is in any way normal will not bother to read this.
So, yes, maybe I have been working on Swann’s Way since 2006, but my hyperactive synapses are not entirely an unrelenting hindrance—at least, I don’t think they are. The Indie Handbook was an idea I had whilst reading Thom Reynolds’ I Hate Myself and Want to Die, and that seems to be working out ok.
Last night, I was reading the new issue of Lula Magazine—well, I say “reading”, I spent 90 minutes on the same two-page interview I’ve attempted every night for a week. Lula is probably the single most inspiring periodical I have ever encountered, and though Issue Ten hasn’t quite knocked me senseless the way Nine (the phenomenal tribute to redheads) did, but it gave me an idea. I don’t know if it’s an Indie Handbook caliber idea, but it could prove interesting.
I am starting a magazine.
If you’ve got 20 minutes, I would encourage you to watch this video. It’s the TED equivalent of Lula Nine and it is pertinent to the topic at hand.
24 April 2010
Enter. Absorb.
Wexner Center for the Arts
I love the Wexner Center. Architecturally, artistically, conceptually, it is by far my favorite place in the city of Columbus. If any entity in Columbus has the right to be a bit pretentious, it is the Wex—and yet, it is the only art or performance venue in this town that does not make me nervous. So, I can honestly say that any criticism I offer is levied out of love with genuine hope of improvement.
Yesterday, this new Wexner Center ad campaign was posted on Twitter (@wexarts). I am 100% behind the visual aesthetic represented here. The design concept is consistent with other Wex campaigns and promotional materials I have seen in the past, down to the arrows (pointing up and to the right) reflecting the Next@Wex aesthetic. It’s the text that gives me trouble.
“Enter. Absorb. Blog. Retweet.” It is a narrative—the story of the spreading of an idea—and as a narrative, it makes perfect sense. When spoken, however, the contradiction is unavoidable. The first two words, enter; absorb, serve their purpose perfectly, propelling the narrative (as both thought and speech) forward. The difficulty arises with the subtle harshness of the word blog. All the momentum of “Enter. Absorb.”first stumbles on the repeated B before colliding with the G and collapsing onto the period, breaking the rhythm and forcing undue emphasis on the full stop. This can be used to great poetic effect. Take, for instance, the opening lines of The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock:
“Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherised upon a table;”
In the case of Eliot, the disrupted rhythm with emphasis on the pause mirrors the stagnancy of the evening being depicted. For the Wex ad, however, a hitch in the narrative is detrimental to the overall effect. The word retweet is passable, though it does result in its own share of textural awkwardness.
The campaign’s overarching theme of progression and the passing-on of ideas, is, I think, still perceptible (though I cannot help but wonder if, had the conflict between rhythm and narrative been avoided, the implication of movement might have been even more apparent).
An Indie Handbook Annex 