a natural excursion

loké - the journal of making - understanding, 2019

tourists swimming through chum

as the boat entered the bay, slowing its engines, the tour guide announced that the sightseers were in for a surprise. their tanned bodies, glistening with sunblock under the hot mexican sun, looked out towards the water, trying to assess what surprise might possibly await them now that they had coasted so far from civilization at the terminus of a two hour boat ride.

from across the bay two small boats launched in unison from a small dock. the first slowly maneuvered towards the ship while a second plied towards a dark patch of ocean closer to the shoreline. as this dance occurred around the sightseeing vessel, its crew began to tear up the cushions from the prow. they assured their captive audience that they were in for a real treat. the type of experience they wouldn't have access to back home in canada, or in the american midwest.

after a few more minutes of waiting, a dark creature waddled clumsily from the first boat onto the deck. it was a very large and aged sea lion. leashed and with a bloody gash on its nose, the animal was paraded in front of the assembled day-trippers while its handler coaxed the animal to carry out a series of party favors in exchange for treats. the tourists were then asked if anyone was interested in giving albert a hug. one by one the assembled audience raised their hands to volunteer to hug and kiss the enslaved mammal while nearby guides snapped selfies for them to post on their social media accounts to elicit the envy of their friends and family back home. as a young woman approached to get their picture taken, the handler effused that with pretty ladies albert liked to ‘french’ kiss. on this prompt the sea lion extended its long dry tongue and licked the young woman's face, as the assembled crowd applauded and jeered.

while the attention of the day trippers was focused on albert, the crew of the second small boat took advantage of the distraction to draw fish to the nearby snorkeling cove. dumping large buckets of chum into the clear waters, fish of all shapes and sizes soon materialized from below the surface to feast on the slurry.

wrapping up their photo shoot, the crew transported albert back to shore while the vacationers donned their life jackets and snorkeling masks. pulling up to the chum filled portion of the bay, the sightseers were dropped one by one into the soupy waters. brushing chunks of meat aside as they paddled along the surface, their gazes focused down towards the sea floor and its tropical wildlife.

while nature abounds in the wilds of mexico, there is also a synthetic nature that has been fabricated to fulfill the tourism economy. while the fish and the sea lions are real, they have been inserted into a rigid economy and schedule. they have been sexualized to provide an element of family eroticism to visitors from abroad. they have been drawn from the depths of the ocean to perform, with the promise of simple rewards.

extending practice beyond object form

free: architecture on the loose, bi publications, 2013

in keller easterling’s first two major publications, organization space and enduring innocence, they present readers with an exhaustive body of evidence cataloging dynamic spatial products, or what they terms active forms—‘resorts, information technology campuses, retail chains, golf courses, ports and other enclave formations’.[1] these are products that are not merely objects in the landscape, buildings in the traditional sense of bricks and mortar, or what keller terms object forms, but are also plugged into and influence larger political, economic and cultural systems. they are architecture as information. while the rich, and often times mythical, narratives that surround these spatial products implicate the built environment, keller rightly acknowledges that ‘architects often treat them as banal or unresponsive to recognized systems of architectural language’.[2] while ‘rogue nations, cults, diplomats and other impresarios’[3] have up until now been the protagonists within these active form narratives, keller, in their upcoming publication, extrastatecraft: the powers of matrix space, aims to gift this role to the professionals that already know so much about space: architects.

towards this end, keller would like to extend the powers of architects beyond object form and into the register of active form, essentially freeing them from the accepted limits of contemporary practice. but what is the qualitative distinction between object form and active form? in the action is the form: victor hugo’s ted talk, keller distinguishes between these two types of practice through the analogy of the stone in the water: ‘if architects are often making a stone in the water while the world makes the water, the stone is an object form while the water is what might be called the active form’.[4] while architects are very well versed at using all of the tools of architecture— geometric manipulation, volume, materiality—to shape the stone, they are less adept at getting that stone to part the water, to control its flow or to alter its currents. keller would like architects to get better at this.

what are some of the difficulties in communicating the concepts of object form and active form?

recently i gave the first two lectures for a course called globalization space, at yale, and they seemed to go well. the idea that there is some kind of matrix space —an infrastructural matrix of spatial products—was well understood by all kinds of students from different parts of the university.

the social and political sciences are now looking to spatial studies—to the special knowledge of architecture and urbanism. i usually present a long strobe through all of the spaces that we are swimming in—things like turning radii, parking spaces, skyscrapers, malls, suburbs or resorts. that soupy space of repeatable details is our test bed.

still, just a few days after these lectures, i went to croatia to give a talk at a conference hosted by some very cool architects that are producing complex digital formalism. their work is beautiful and sophisticated and they are interesting people. they also want to make these forms reach out to the political. so they put on a conference about global politics. i have been to so many of these conferences where the people who focus on politics scold the formalists saying, ‘you don’t know anything about politics or human rights or whatever and what you’re doing is disengaged’. i really can’t stand that divide. it’s not fair and it’s not productive. so i thought i had the perfect solution, by saying that this sort of soupy-matrix space is good news. it’s actually a kind of magical and powerful space that we can use, but in order to do so we need to be able to extend the powers of object form with active form. the minute i said that, some people walked out of the lecture hall, because what it seemed to them was that i had questioned the validity of object form when i was really building a bridge. i was trying to eliminate the binary opposition between object form and active form. active form does not struggle against or duel with object form. it partners with object form. pretty tricky.

you do seem to avoid the binary relationship even in the naming of these terms. active form is described in relation to object form, rather than to inactive form.

that’s right. what i am trying to say in the action is the form: victor hugo's ted talk is that these forms are on a continuum, that one becomes the other, and that we might learn how to extend some of the powers of object form. in the analogy of the stone in the water, sometimes we are just making the stone—an object form— without any intention of diverting the water. that is a completely reasonable artistic choice. i am obsessed with object form as any architect would be, but i am also curious about the water—something very powerful that we might also engage. we don’t think that our training has anything to do with the water. we consider it as the artless world of monetized spaces that has nothing to do with us. but i see a way that we might engage it artistically.

can you give some examples of what active forms might be?

in my lectures at yale, i’m trying now to figure out how to broach these theoretical topics. i think the best thing is not to­ make such a big deal out of it. it is better to say that this idea is pretty simple and we already know how to make active forms. i often show an image of a levittown-like suburb, a mass-produced community of suburban houses, and say that we already know about the active forms within its landscape. for example, there are multipliers,[5] such as the repeated houses in this example, which extend beyond a single object form. if you were going to operate on this landscape, rather than fixing up a single house, you might design an intervention that would multiply within that field. the object form is one approach, but an active form approach might extend your powers. you would use that landscape as a carrier.

to give some other examples of what active forms might be: they could be switches. they could be remotes. they could be governors that establish a relationship between interdependent spatial variables—a means to generate not only a single object but also a flow of objects.

you describe the modification of a single house in levittown as an exercise in object form. is it possible to institute change at the scale of the neighborhood, or suburb, or even larger, by attacking the problem from its minutia? that something as basic as a material choice, at the micro level, could have a profound effect on houses, neighborhoods, or cities at a macro level when multiplied within these larger landscapes?

yes. take for instance the example of materials. in that levittown landscape they were using sheet goods—four by eight foot sheet goods. you could have stacked three of them horizontally to achieve a twelve foot ceiling, but they were turned vertically to make eight foot ceilings. that one move formats millions of spaces and millions of acres of square footage. the power of that small decision as a multiplier is incredible. these kinds of choices, made by all kinds of practitioners, might be made by architects. we, who know something about volume and space and domesticity and all of the rest of it. we know things that impact on those multipliers.

does an architect lose their standing if they enter the realm of the multiplier, versus devoting themselves to object form?

i don’t know why one doesn’t just do both. i have been testing this question for a few years now. in a course at yale about architectural entrepreneurialism, we have been looking at a kind of unorthodox form of practice that shifts authority in our hierarchical discipline. some of my former students are pursuing these kinds of practices—practices calling on all of our abilities to design an object, as well as the way that object will play in culture. it means designing not only the shape of the game piece, but also how the game piece moves. i want my students to be good at that because there is so much rigor, so much creativity, so much maturity and muscle in what architectural students make, and yet this intelligence is often neglected. so thinking like an entrepreneur, you are not just designing a product. that is secondary. you are designing the way it’s going to catch on in the world, why it’s going to be contagious. you are designing its epidemiology and we just need to get better at that. i want us to get better at that.

as an educator, how does one test ideas about active form inside of a studio environment that is shut off from the rest of the world?

it is an important question. i have done a couple of studios at yale where the intention is to rehearse our abilities to cultivate active form. i always think that if it were drama school you would take classes where you would learn to perform hamlet’s soliloquy, and then you would take some classes where you would learn improvisation. the kinds of studios that i am teaching are ones in which you learn improvisation. so rehearsing your reactivity as well as your ability to make a masterpiece building or to do a single soliloquy. i’ve done a couple studios where you start your project, and then you get an envelope—a message announcing new circumstances and forks in the road.

part of the invention is also about what kinds of documents are necessary to talk about these ideas. in typical studios, we work from the master plan down to the detail. in these experimental studios we have started with the detail, which is then proliferated or multiplied in different master plans, or scenarios. so the details are quite explicit and drawn using all of our conventional tools, but they are also multipliers. they act as a germ in several different landscapes and scenarios.

this year i really want to focus on object form as well. in particular what i am interested in right now is our lack of artistry with volume and space. we are connoisseurs of the containers of space, but we are not really connoisseurs of volume. we don’t speak to each other in terms of cubage. we don’t even know the cubage of some of the most iconic volumes like grand central station.

are those the type of things you think we once knew as a profession and have now lost track of?

i think so. perhaps understanding volume was one of those things that architects used to be so good at. we might be like an enologist with wine or ‘the nose’ in perfume design that is able to talk about nuanced differences.

why do you want us to get better at active form? or is it inherently good for a form to be active versus inactive?

while it is not a matter of what is good or bad, to rehearse some of these ideas probably enhances our powers for dealing with the world. let’s say you want to design a table. all of your powers of geometric manipulation, shape and measure, understanding of body and domesticity and practices of dining, all of your knowledge of the object goes into that table. the advent of that object in the world—the way that object enters and travels through the world—is also important to the object. active form is often a partner, the thing that propels the object in culture. there is much more to the story of active form, but that is one point of entry.

so it almost gives the designed object a sort of darwinian evolutionary advantage?

who knows why something succeeds, as it is often out of your hands. you could make something like bilbao. reasons why it was loved and was politically instrumental were completely undeclared and unintended, and yet there it is. so you never know. people think i work on politics and things that come with moral overtones, but for me the artistic pleasures surround ingenuity and the chance to be effective.

it’s interesting that you bring up the example of bilbao.

it’s a stone in the water.

it’s a stone in water but it’s also very active in the way that it influenced the global cultural tourism industry.

somebody once asked me about this great movie, the man who never was, starring clifton webb and gloria graham. it’s a story about how the allied forces planted a decoy—a body with some maps and stuff—as a false lead for a plan that they were not going to deploy. there is an example of a dead thing, a still, dead, static body, that was nevertheless completely active, disruptive and able to part the waters. almost all object forms have some kind of activity but recognizing what it is and being able to manipulate those extra valences is a power.

do you think that as architects we understand active form as it implicates attributes such as beauty, as in the gehry example, and already use that to our advantage?

maybe. i think we also certainly understand the active forms of careerism. we spend a lot of time thinking about how the hero got popular, who is on top, or which starchitect is here and there. so all the entrepreneurial energy that we might be putting into other things are often expended on the construction of hierarchy. in this way, some of the people that you think of as the least interested in something like active form are masters at it—masters of entrepreneurialism, and of how to spin things in the world.

do you think that these sorts of endeavors are a productive use of active form?

the kind of active form i am talking about can go a lot further. for instance, i think architects would be quite good at establishing global protocols for certain kinds of development conundrums in the world. i just came back from the ecuadorian amazon where the problem is not how to make more object form but how to actually shrink the object. so you have a lot of people from mckinsey or the world bank, you have finance people, you have people who are experts in the carbon market, and they are all trying to make a difference. but we are the ones trained to make space. we are the ones that have been driving the development machine forward, and there is a chance that we know how to put it in reverse. so then what kind of training will you need if you have only been trained to make the object? what skills do you need to acquire to not only add but also subtract architecture? what skills could be useful?

in a site like this an active form might be something more like a valve, governor, switch or cosine x—a tool to establish interdependencies between properties. with a kind of ratchet effect it could be used to densify in one place and subtract in another. dial them one way or the other, to get them to leverage or offset. and that is something the political world could borrow from us. right now they have development formulas related to econometrics. they are all pretty abstract. attaching risks and rewards to visible, tangible space could be really useful. we can say ‘that piece of forest is worth this much on the carbon market and will be traded somewhere in geneva’. but what if it was a little bit more immediate and tangible? you look at mcmansion suburbia and try to understand that the house that you bought so long ago is attached to abstract (and imploding) global financial networks, but you just can’t see it. what if we developed a portfolio of spatial variables rather than abstract financial or other abstract variables?

is there a point at which there are too many variables for this type of strategy to be effective?

well you can figure out a few things. regardless of the complexity usually you start just by trying to understand the rules. i think it’s better when rules are simple, but repeated. even if you think about levittown, a condition that is as dumb as it gets, repeated, or multiplied, it is incredibly powerful. it is just finding things that ride that landscape and get amplified by it.

two examples of places where local governments have just established simple offsets are dubai and the amazon rainforest. in dubai, if you want to do business in oil and gas, there are a couple of simple rules. you have to start in another industry that the state needs, and you have to make a uae national the ceo. that is the rule, and it could not be simpler. in the amazon, the yasuni itt protocol says ‘we will preserve an especially biodiverse portion of the rainforest that is sitting on a huge oil field, if you compensate us for the lost revenues in oil’. so they are selling certificates to keep the oil underground. it’s a leveraging offset.

you often present your readers with information in a stylized or poetic way. rather than simply defining terms, you utilize storytelling as a way of communicating incredibly complex relationships.

maybe i am a writer before being an architect. i did theater before i did architecture, and i write things that aren’t about architecture. there is a kind of writing that i want to do but rarely get to do. maybe i just got so impatient with not being able to do it and with the academic necessities that limit it. maybe i decided that i was going to write for architecture while exercising some of the same narrative structures that interest me. in enduring innocence, but also in this book that i just finished, extrastatecraft, it’s very clear to me that while there are important rationalizing formulas running in the background, the irrational and the fictional are running the world. the evidence in enduring innocence was incredibly satisfying for me because i was able to write something like footnoted fiction. the narrative sequenced the information to tell a story. i hoped that the often quite dry research would read like fiction.

can you tell us a bit more about your upcoming book, extrastatecraft?

extrastatecraft is not a hyperbolic story like enduring innocence. in response to enduring innocence people often said, ‘you are giving us all this evidence but you haven’t told us what to do with it’. somehow an architect was expected to have answers or, at least, techniques. i was also asked to be more explicit about ‘my politics’ as if politics was only a declared label. this book delivers some techniques for form making and activism that are effective in the matrix space of global infrastructure. one section of the book looks at the development of free zones around the world. if the book has a one-liner, it would probably be that any zone incentives now typically located in exurban enclaves, should be mapped onto the city. it is a very simple, almost obvious idea. all the enclaves outside of nairobi and quito and moscow or lahore, if mapped back on to the city, would have an enormous effect, especially if the idea was contagious within a population of zones. if i had been smart, i would have written a popular book that was just about the zone. a book in 40,000 words or less, with a big one liner: here is the problem and here is what you might do. that might have been a really popular book.

extrastatecraft exists as a project online at www.extrastatecraft.net, and also as an upcoming book, extrastatecraft: the power of matrix space, to be published by verso in 2013.

[1] keller easterling, enduring innocence - global architecture and its political masquerades (cambridge: mit press, 2005), 1.

[2] easterling, enduring innocence, 1.

[3] easterling, enduring innocence, 1.

[4] keller easterling, the action is the form: victor hugo’s ted talk (moscow: strelka press, 2012).

[5] a multiplier is an agent that is repeated, or multiplied. in the example of levittown, houses were mass-produced from a few basic plans, and then propagated across the landscape. they were not treated as singular objects, but as a repeatable formula.

past

www.thebiblog.net, past, september 9, 2012

the eroded cliffs of kauai

to travel across the islands of hawaii in sequence from east to west _ hawaii, maui, oahu, kauai _ is to travel backwards in geological time. the islands, born of molten lava, formed in a linear sequence as the pacific plate slowly shifted across a stationary hotspot in the earth’s mantle. as the islands distanced themselves from this hotspot, a few inches per year, their fiery volcanic growth eventually halted, and the cooling of their masses along with the harsh winds and water of the pacific gradually tugged at their loose ends, pulling the islands back into the dark depths of the ocean. while the life cycle of the hawaiian islands is diagrammed on cartographic maps, as the islands decrease in size from southeast to northwest, it is also readily apparent visually from the silhouettes of the islands’ mountain chains. the 400,000 year old big island, which is soft and conical in mass, contrasts sharply with the 5 million year old island of kauai with its jagged gravity defying cliffs and canyons. these aesthetics have translated to the islands specializations. in stephen spielberg’s 1993 adaptation of jurassic park, they relied on the eroded mountains of kauai to convincingly transport their audience into an ancient land of dinosaurs (despite the island having technically formed millions of years after the extinction of dinosaurs). the island has hosted a number of other film shoots that have used the visual allure of these decayed mountains to project an otherworldly aesthetic. in contrast, hawaii, the newest and therefore largest and tallest of the islands, has become a center for astronomical research, with observatories perched along its elevated peaks. Its streamlined silhouette the perfect backdrop to its space-age pursuits.

controversial

www.thebiblog.net, controversial, july 8, 2012

melrose place explosion

dr. kimberly shaw mancini: well, that makes bomb number three. don't you love the smell of sulfur in the afternoon, sydney? 

[bound and gagged sydney only grunts and groans] 

dr. kimberly shaw mancini: what's that? no? well, I don't think hell is going to smell a whole lot better, but since that's where you're going to spend the rest of eternity, you better start getting used to it. 

in 1992, beverly hills, 90210, the prototypical teen drama documenting the hardships of america’s wealthiest teenagers, had attained the peak of its popularity, reaching an estimated 18.1 million viewers per episode. in an effort to capitalize on its immense following, its producers spun off melrose place, a 90210 for a slightly more seasoned crowd. the series, which followed the lives of 30 somethings trying to reinvent themselves in a los angeles courtyard complex, received criticism, and poor ratings, in its first season, for being too timid. to remedy these perceived failings, melrose place’s writers concocted increasingly scandalous and controversial story lines in an effort to increase viewership. love trysts, betrayals and workplace firings, which were commonplace in the first and second seasons, were replaced by catastrophe’s such as car crashes, murders and even the walking dead, in later seasons. to amplify the suffering of their fictional characters even further, the writers ultimately turned against architecture. in the first episode of season 4, in a revenge plot not so dissimilar in psychology from those carried out by al qaeda in september of 2001, kimberly shaw annihilated 4616 melrose place, along with all of its residents. at the press of a button, and with the visual muscle of a roland emmerich blockbuster, actors were launched into the air like rag dolls, while the very bounds of their fictional world came crashing down around them.

geneva garvin is unreal

sadie magazine, 2012

geneva garvin is unreal. long live the real geneva garvin.

geneva jacuzzi, born geneva garvin, is a musician, performer, writer and artist based out of los angeles, california. at least, this is the conventional fiction. beyond the myth of the flesh and blood human exists a hundred other unconventional fictions, including the grecian goddess, the mime, the moon, the sun, the idiot dancer and the zygote, to name a few. placing equal weight on the real and unreal, geneva’s music, performances and identity often fluctuate between mundane and fantastical states, resulting in real/unreal hybrid outcomes (this interview is no exception). in the world of geneva jacuzzi, songs about a mess of clothes on the bed sit comfortably next to ballads describing the lives of zombie sharks. through these charming juxtapositions, it becomes increasingly difficult for the audience to determine which fiction is more fantastical _ that which we think is real, or that which we know is not real.

ok, so i’m just going to jump into the questions. first off, am i communicating with geneva jacuzzi or geneva garvin?

garvin silly! 

where did geneva garvin grow up?

just a couple hours south of la. it was a trailer in the trailer shark, but a nice one. double-wide.

so how did geneva garvin end up in la?

who knows? it just happened one day. oh, i think i may have gotten kicked out of my parents house or something.

you think you may have gotten kicked out?

my parents didn’t want to make me leave. they had to. there was madness in the shark church. neon madness. blue-finned zombies with haunted hairdos. talking snakes and lakes of fire. but it was a controlled madness. trauma-induced fantasy. i was unaware of being assimilated . . . assimilation not a success. i was a mutant who was allergic to most of the food at the church picnics. it had strange effects on me, like, extra sensory vision and rampant acts of promiscuity. spies would see these things and report back to the old men. there was a meeting held and the decision was made for me to be cast out.

and so you were then exiled to the city of los angeles?

typical big city story. eighteen, broke, roach closet apartment, street sweeping. my only friend was an older woman that i met at a job.

old as in ancient?

yes, she was an old pum-pum from the tutu tribe. she was cool. we would drink coffee and then go power walking.

that sounds so luxurious.

luxurious? coffee’s cheaper than crack.

so, you shared your apartment with her as lovers?

no, i lived alone. but she moved eventually and left me with a big yamaha. she stole the keyboard from a bumba clot. it was my first keyboard. things got weird after that.

how did things get weird? and how weird did things get?

i was in limbo. an adult retard who came late in life to the concept of mortality. trapped in a coffin with imaginary mirrors and a melting tv. the talking keyboard would ramble on about mystery religions and creation myths but none of it made any sense. i tried to record it but the stories would change every time i played it back. very frustrating. 

collage seems embedded in every format that you tackle, both aesthetically and technically. from your stage name, to the aesthetic references that populate your lyrics— pyramids colliding with greek mythology and zombie sharks—to the music itself and its layering of synth and drum beats and eight-track production, to the album artwork which could be described as literal collage, to your music videos which make reference to ’80s production techniques while also mashing together aesthetics from the past and future. can you elaborate on the use of collage in your process?

all of those things aren’t exactly what they appear to be. geneva jacuzzi is a biomorphic entity from the future/past. she’s also encoded into all of the geneva jacuzzi art/media. the code uses the feedback loop of all things non-existing as a vehicle that manufactures its own destination in order to create itself, by uncreating . . . itself. there are certain vortices created in the rewinding and fast-forwarding wheels of the analog tape recorder where [this] can be witnessed.

this is a perfect example. you just implanted the “collage theory” into the feedback loop. now the past demands more collages in order to complete itself. 

would you describe your work then as a sort of echo of the unreal?

i guess you could say that but i don’t claim to be an expert on what’s real and what’s not real.

in lamaze, there are certain quadrants of the unreal that you emphasize more than others—i am thinking of the mythological aspects specifically. was this consistency intentional, or merely the result of there being so much unreality inside the feedback loop? can we expect a geneva jacuzzi song about andy griffith in the future, or should we put all expectation to rest and just enjoy?

mythologies were ancient even in the ancient times. why did freud’s love caboose transform into a reality? a castrating gorgon at the knowledge college? game theory at the pentagon? unreality is the new reality, or so it seems. who really knows anyway? my intentions could just be more illusions created by crazy art entities with wild transdimensional sex drives. if that’s the case, lamaze was the birth of whatever fertile things were doing it at the time of its creation. i’m just rambling now. anyway, andy griffith? uh, sure why not?

star

www.thebiblog.net, star, may 20, 2011

“bridge of the starship enterprise”, star trek, 1966-69

i was raised on star trek. spending every summer isolated deep in the canadian countryside, it was often the only show available on our rabbit ears. as a grouchy ten year old i generally resented the formulaic plots. captain kirk lands on seemingly abandoned planet. captain kirk angers natives. captain kirk escapes to the starship enterprise. even more disappointing than the stale plot, however, was the terrible aesthetics. while future earth certainly spared no money on the mechanics of the uss enterprise, they definitely tightened the purse strings when it came to hiring the designers. with awkward proportions, cramped quarters, dismal lighting, cheap materials and ugly furniture, the enterprise looked more like a labyrinthine suburban rec room than a sophisticated trans-galactic spaceship. the mundane interior might have been redeemed by the most intriguing aspect of space travel, zero gravity, except that artificial gravity had already been mastered in star trek's future timeline. star trek's banal future visions would haunt me for the next twenty years of my life, the series constantly refreshing casts and space ships, but maintaining its living room feel.

while i ultimately abhorred star trek as entertainment for not straying far enough away from what i already knew, if i were ever to actually be jettisoned into space, i can think of no better model living space than the home that i currently reside in here on earth. a plush couch along one wall of my space pod, an antique television in the corner playing reruns of golden girls, a uniform of sweatpants and a t-shirt, a bowl full of kraft dinner, and instead of the sun out my window, a vortex of speeding stars.

conspiracy

www.thebiblog.net, conspiracy, january 12, 2011

inverted pyramid at the louvre, designed by i. m. pei, paris, 1989

in dan brown's the da vinci code, the author attaches special importance to i. m. pei's 1989 addition to the louvre in paris, which they conclude is the burial site of the holy grail. what is curious about brown's hypothesis is that it assumes a complicit architectural profession _ and in so doing tilts our understanding of modernism on its head. while pei's work is often viewed as an exploration into the volumetric potential of basic geometries, brown interprets it as an infatuation with symbology. while pei has argued that the pyramid was "most compatible with the architecture of the louvre, especially with the faceted planes of its roofs" and that his pyramids were in no way representative of the great pyramids in egypt, according to brown, pei's pyramids are foremost wayfinders for members of the priory of sion. the pyramids represent a v, feminine vessel (vagina), or holy grail. pei's architecture thus leapfrogs modernism altogether and has more in common with the other modern symbologists, post-modernists, such as robert venturi (whose last name coincidentally begins with the letter v). through brown's eyes the pyramids at the louvre are architectural ducks, erected inside of a courtyard made up of some of the most lavishly decorated sheds in the world.

pei's life long devotion to the priory of sion has resulted in a laundry list of pyramidal sionic signposts:

• the east wing, national gallery, washington, 1978

• javits convention center, new york, 1979 (pyramidal space frame)

• ibm office building complex, somers, ny, 1989

• bank of china tower, hong kong, 1990 (stacked pyramids)

• one canada square, London, 1991

• guggenheim pavilion, new york, 1992

• rock and roll hall of fame, cleveland, 1998

coming to america

clog - bjarke ingels group, 2011

coming to america movie poster, 1988

in the 1988 film coming to america, prince akeem, played by eddie murphy, travels to america after failing to find a suitable queen in his kingdom of zumanda. akeem's celebrity is so pronounced within his, fictional, homeland that the native women can't help but become enchanted in his presence, transforming into literal bitches, "ruff, ruff", before his eyes. what he wants more than anything in the world is a woman that will appreciate him for his person and not his fame and fortune. it is therefore a quest for anonymity that leads akeem not just to america, but to its largest city, new york, and ultimately to the borough of queens, for "what better place to find a queen than the city of queens?". and while akeem does eventually locate his queen, a new yorker with some natural beauty, smarts, and ambition, it is clear to the audience that her best quality is that for a brief moment she has unburdened akeem of his decoration.

in 2007, with a nod to eddie murphy, victoria beckham released "victoria beckham: coming to america", a documentary showcasing her displacement from london to los angeles after her husband david beckham joined the los angeles galaxy. "when we get to america, it's going to be great. we're going to pick up our bags at the airport, and we're just going to walk through. no one's going to notice us. because people don't know who we are there." while victoria gets mobbed at the airport in one of the first scenes, she does ultimately achieve anonymity as she pulls up to her "giant dusty ice cube" modernist palace in the hollywood hills, its characterless facade indistinguishable from any of the other nearby mansions. penetrating the celebrity masses, victoria becomes but another minor, therefore anonymous, hollywood starlet.

following in the footsteps of princes and starlets, bjarke ingels experienced his own "coming to america" in 2010. while his migration, officially, stemmed from the opportunities bestowed by durst fetner, the allure of anonymity cannot be denied. from a tiny european nation where the name bjarke is now synonymous with architecture, the girth of the american continent allows ingels, for a brief moment, to forgo his lofty civic and social responsibilities and to focus on practice. of course, like prince akeem before him, there is the added benefit of being able to frequent the bars of manhattan without fear of the local women transforming into subserviant dogs.

haunted

www.thebiblog.net, haunted, october 31, 2010

tim burton’s beetlejuice house after it has gone through its post-modern transformation

horror film scripts often implicate architects in hauntings. either a house is constructed on top of a native american burial ground, as in the poltergeist films, or else the architect designed the building using black magic, as in ghostbusters. in the film beetlejuice, a haunting occurs in spite of design. after the maitland's, a young couple, die in a horrible car crash, they return to their recently purchased rustic gothic revival home to find that it has been taken over by an obnoxious married couple from new york city, the deetz's. if that weren’t bad enough, the deetz's have brought their interior designer in tow, who through the progression of the film unsympathetically transforms the polite mansion into a post-modern funhouse. in order to halt the house's transformation, the phantasmic maitland's spend the remainder of the film attempting to scare away the intruders, which eventually requires the help of the poltergeist betelgueuse who resides in a scale model of the home located in the attic. by the end of the film, it is unclear to the audience which is more horrific, the undead, or post-modern architecture.

while burton has never used their films to explicitly critique modern architecture, they often contrast gothic and modern aesthetics to create a binary between normal, human, characters and places in their films, and their fantastical counterparts. defying horror movie tropes, burton’s aesthetically scary monsters are more altruistic in their actions than the humans that populate their worlds. monsters and gothic architecture may look old, decayed, and scary, but at their hearts they are good. subsequently, the humans, and modernism, in burton’s films are ill tempered, destructive and rotten. for burton, looks are deceiving.

the message is ironic, given that the format of burton’s art relies on overt fictions, utilizing special effects and puppetry to create the illusions that make up their worlds. the beetlejuice house did not exist prior to filming. exterior shots relied on a full scale pressurized mock up of the house that contained four walls and a canvas roof, making it no more authentic or substantial than the scale model of the home that resided in the maitland's attic. the post-modernism that is derided in the film is ultimately as unreal as the demonic betelgueuse.

date

www.thebiblog.net, date, september 15, 2010

a community dance studio, the perfect venue for a blind date

i have an unhealthy obsession with dating shows _ i mean the trashy reality kind. this obsession inevitably led me to apply to appear on dating television. i was contestant #3 on u8tv the lofters first gay themed dating episode. luckily for me, the episode only ever appeared online. in the show i was pitted against a boy from scarborough and my ex-boyfriend (a strange coincidence) in a battle for the heart of a cowboy from calgary. when the calgarian made their appearance and was nearly twice my age, i threw the game. my ex did the same, so that the scarberian was deemed victor, with an awkward date as their prize.

i sometimes wonder what happened on the date. not just the how, but also the where. my fascination with dating shows has as much to do with the infrastructure of dates as the drama that takes place within this infrastructure. the dating show presents us with an almost unending menu of date activities that take place across the urban landscape, from center to fringes, in community gyms, bowling alleys, equestrian facilities, restaurants, and a plethora of other places that exist mainly to satisfy the date. did the noise of the bowling alley or chill of the equestrian facility distract enough to make the calgarian attractive in eyes of the scarberian? did the calgarian find their date more attractive in the dim lighting of the french bistro? were they at any point inebriated enough to make these first two points moot?

if their date had followed the format of my favorite early 2000’s dating show, "blind date", it might have played out as follows:

scarberian picks up calgarian from hotel downtown. skip to scene of the couple driving to a strip mall in the suburbs. calgarian has surprised scarberian with square dancing lessons at a community dance studio with a flashy logo. calgarian and scarberian hold each others waists and giggle at square dance instructions demonstrated by a tall, good humored, 60 year old woman wearing a cowboy hat and overalls. skip to scene of couple driving to a historic building near the city center. scarberian has surprised calgarian with acting lessons at a local drama workshop. calgarian and scarberian exercise their voices by sputtering saliva, followed by acting out a portion of script from the film adaptation of "the color purple". calgarian refuses to act on stage due to stage fright. tension mounts. skip to scene of the couple driving to a mauve colored restaurant with outdoor seating. scarberian lectures calgarian on not taking enough risks. calgarian has one too many drinks. date ends outside restaurant with awkward hug. skip to interview of contestants.

gay

www.thebiblog.net, gay, march 2, 2010

re-envisioned gay yale art and architecture building façade, image by author, 2007

despite the prevalence of homosexuals in the field of architecture—i can attest to their high numbers as a member of this group—i cannot say that i have ever come across an architecture that is distinctly homosexual in appearance. it is not surprising given that the architects of past generations operated from within the closet. while paul rudolph's work is often cited as overtly homosexual—the corduroy banding of their yale art and architecture building is said to be a vision of frolicking boys in trousers—i am genuinely left unconvinced.

for susan sontag, the most homosexual of aesthetics is camp, an umbrella term for everything that we homosexuals hold dear: rainbows, lady gaga, the view, mushrooms, mugs, us weekly, lamps (of all sorts), googly eyes, martini's, les misérables, penises, gold spray paint, xena warrior princess, bright colors, androgyny, oprah, rhinestones, cupcakes, textiles, pyramids, dolly parton, to name just a few. camp and architecture, however, lead exclusive lives.

due to the enforced seriousness of the discipline, gay architects have denied themselves their playful inclinations (their propensity for camp), and have insisted on carrying the aesthetic burdens of their heterosexual colleagues and clients in order to prove their capacity for high design - a design discipline version of passing. to this effect, there is no greater insult for the queer, educated architect, than being mistaken for the gay decorator. but, while the homosexual architect operates in the realm of understated polite (boring and outmoded) taste, the gay decorator is playful, loud, garish, silly, humorous, sexy, spontaneous, innovative, absurd, ridiculous, happy, but above all, through their propensity for camp, remains relevant to contemporary practice. it is my sense that in coming out of the closet as homosexuals, collectively as architects, we have left this gay decorator behind. it is about time that they were released to work their magic.

diagram

www.thebiblog.net, diagram, february 23, 2010

kirby mood board

in the wider world, the diagram is a two-dimensional image that is used to explain complicated or abstract ideas. this results in the ubiquitous flow chart of board meetings, the color coded subway maps that are recognizable in cities around the world, or the depiction of the veins beneath our skin that hang in doctors examination rooms. in architecture, however, the relationship between the diagram and the diagrammed is often reversed. architects realized that the very diagrams that were useful in describing complex spatial projects, could be reverse engineered: by determining the most efficient diagram first, and then folding the building design into it. entire firms rely on this process, and it is critically well received—perhaps because the buildings which are conceived as diagrams are so easily understood. the danger lies in accepting that easily understood architecture makes for good architecture. in a field that has always had one foot planted firmly in the arts, and the other in the sciences, diagrams tip the scales further towards the scientific (though at times the diagrams themselves can be beautiful). the diagram typically does not speak to the experiential aspects of design such as the richness of materiality, the play of light and shadow, or the beauty that is achievable through thoughtful detailing. if we are to balance the scales, perhaps an equal emphasis should be placed on whimsy during the early stages of design: for every diagram, an image depicting mood or atmosphere.

west coast

www.thebiblog.net, west coast, february 19, 2010

burning man thunderdome, nevada, 2009

while the mad max trilogy was filmed almost entirely in australia (and launched mel gibson’s career - also an australian), its visual language was thereafter adopted by the anarchist and gangster rap sub-cultures of america's west coast. the films, released in the early eighties relied on a dystopian punk aesthetic: dust, grease, blood and engine parts. these visual cues parralleled a storyline depicting a world without rules: anarchy.

the burning man festival, staged yearly in the desert in nevada, is perhaps the most overt celebration of the post apocalyptic anarchistic aesthetic of the films(although firearms and motor vehicles are prohibited at the event). just as in barterville from mad max beyond thunderdome, the burning man organization claims that "there are no rules about how one must behave or express oneself" at the festival _ a version of lawlessness. In addition, one of the central features of the festival is a full sized re-creation of the thunderdome erected by the death guild, a san francisco punk music label, where nightly death matches are held (foam batons are used instead of weapons and no one has actually died). in recent years, pranksters replaced the thunderdome signage with a banner reading "hot topic", the name of a suburban chain store selling goth merchandise to bored teenagers _  a critique of the death guild's ode to capitalism, and a movie that grossed $36,000,000 for warner brothers in 1985.

the anarchist community was not the only californian sub-culture to adopt the mad max aesthetic. the themes of anarchy and lawlessness were equally relevant to the west coast gangster rap scene of the 90's. the video for tupac shakur's california love is said to have been filmed on the original set of mad max beyond the thunderdome, and generally parallels the themes of the movie. appropriately, this was 2pacs first single after serving eleven months in prison on sexual assault charges. his problematic and rebellious lifestyle would eventually lead to his death in 1996, from gunshot wounds_ a final perverse nod to the violent themes of the film.

border

www.thebiblog.net, border, february 18, 2010

satellite dish skyline

demarcations between nations have traditionally been drawn in the sand, at times, irrespective of the populations that lie within their boundaries. the partitioning of the ottoman empire by western powers led to the modern day borders of much of the middle east, including iraq, lebanon and israel. these artificial boundaries cut across ethnic boundaries: kurdistan is divided between turkey, iraq and iran despite an ethnically united population. while the middle east remains fractured to this day, advancements in communications technologies are effectively joining these disparate communities back together again. the most pronounced example is the popularity of the satellite tv station al jazeera, which is broadcast across the middle east by satellite. since its launch in 1996, the percentage of homes with satellite and cable access in the middle east has skyrocketed: from 38% to 80% in algeria, and from 8% to 43% in lebanon. an advantage of satellite communication over traditional means of dissemination is that it is economically burdensome to block the signals _in 1999, the algerian government cut off power to entire cities in an effort to stop its citizens from viewing an al jazeera piece on the atrocities of the algerian army. the broadcasting footprint is also many times greater than what would be achievable over the air. with a viewing audience that is 96% muslim, al jazeera is creating a new form of phantom nationhood that puts an emphasis on shared beliefs rather than on shared currencies, laws and governmental apparatus.

trip

www.thebiblog.net, controversial, february 15, 2010

view out of the car window of the nevada landscape

in the summer of 2010 i drove across country, from new york city, to los angeles. a close friend was starting life anew, re-birthing, and my task was to guide them through the amniotic fluid of america with the aid of a gps, a road map, and a copy of "hamburgers across america". the view driving across the goethals bridge, from staten island into new jersey, provided our last glimpse of the atlantic ocean. we had technically left the east coast, and it was only a half hour into our journey. that afternoon we stopped for lunch, and consumed our first hamburger of the trip, at a mcdonald's at the side of the highway.

for the remainder of the trip, all 5 days, we searched for hints that we were getting closer to the west. we started to place bets on when we'd see the first sunflower, the first mountain, the first cactus. while the changes were subtle at first, slowly the scenery shifted: hilly green pastures in kansas, dry open expanses in collorado, and fiery orange mountains in arizona. It wasn't until we became completely disoriented by the sights that surrounded us, that we realized that we had at last reached the west. but reaching the west, we wanted nothing more than the familiarity of the east. we stopped for lunch at burger king, kept our radio tuned to npr, and slept at the same hilton garden Inn's that we had frequented in kansas city and columbus.

as we entered las vegas we got braver with our surroundings, taking time in the desert heat to admire the fountains at the bellagio, rising and falling to celine dion's power ballad "my heart will go on". we abandoned our familiar eastern fast food burger haunts for an all you can eat vegas buffet. having driven across nothing but desert for two days straight, their sights were now more familiar to us than the verdant landscapes back east. as we approached los angeles, our west coast transition was almost complete. pulling off the highway in hesperia california, we stopped for our final road trip meal: an in-n-out burger, animal style.

ugly

www.thebiblog.net, ugly, february 4, 2010

bryce 2.0 island

as a child growing up, there was a mantra passed on to me by my older brother mykola: imperfection is perfection. a design family, at a young age, our parents bought us a mac se(exotic at the time) to spark our creativity. we spent all of our subsequent free time, into adulthood and beyond, making 2 dimensional animations, later graduating to what constituted 3-d in those days. what quickly became apparent, even to our young eyes, was that the 2-d pixel and 3-d primitive geometries, the then standard tools of design, made everything we created a little too perfect. whereas in reality even the most polished surface contained scratches and dimples, our swivel 3d cubes and cylinders had no flaws to speak of. for hours on end, time which would have been better spent playing outdoors, we would sit next to each other at the computer screen attempting to fabricate the imperfect. this played out in dirtied texture and bump maps, and relying heavily on post processing in photoshop. we were not alone in our awkward relationship with the ultra perfect. freud developed the theory of the uncanny in the 1900's, which documents a general discomfort with objects that are familiar and foreign at the same time. in film, the term uncanny valley is used to describe the repulsion that is felt when observing digital actors whose movement falls just short of natural _ this accounts for the unease you might have experienced when watching the final fantasy movie for the first time, or more recently avatar(though the latter is more successful at tricking our perception). while i am not certain that there are any conclusions to be drawn from this post, i will state that, to this day, i am disturbed by my rhino viewfinder.

iconic

www.thebiblog.net, icon, february 3, 2010

the new york new york hotel & casino in las vegas

at a recent point in the long history of art and architecture, collectively we decided to turn a blind eye to the true meaning of the word icon and to bestow this term instead upon our most provocative and celebrated buildings. in the broadest sense an icon is a facsimile, or representation of something else. a small portrait of a religious being stands in for a real flesh and blood (or ghostly) saint, just as an image of a piece of paper on our digital desktops stands in for a real document coded in binary on our hard drives. what is apparent in both of these examples is that while the source materials are greatly simplified and abstracted they remain recognizable in the copy. by this definition, the guggenheim in bilbao and the jewish museum in berlin, two of the most touted architectural icons of the past ten years, are in actuality two of the least iconic buildings of the last century. they are too original to be confused for copies, hardly recognizable as buildings at all when they were first constructed. at the other end of the spectrum, replicas of buildings such as the reconstructed parthenon in nashville fail as icons because as copies they are too exact. true iconic architecture sits somewhere in between. it is a failed attempt at replication that arrives at something both recognizable and new. this is the architecture of the early colonists that attempted to recreate the grand architecture of europe without the materials or the means. it is the architecture of the new york new york hotel & casino in las vegas, which attempts to stuff the chrysler building and empire state into a hotel envelope. more recently, it is the architecture of dubai, the world replicated in sand off of its shores.

a musician without boundaries

sadie magazine, 2008

heidi mortenson is no fan of boundaries. at the forefront of the experimental electronic pop scene in berlin, heidi has forged a successful musical career by shunning the rules and stereotypes of the music industry and, above all, by insisting on being themselves. musically, this plays out in their love of experimentation and found sounds, vestiges of growing up with asperger’s. their compositions are collages of beat box, ringtones, conversations, tiger growls, modem bleeps, static, and digital chimes. accompanied by their powerful voice and lyrics, the results are remarkably catchy despite their surprising origins. professionally heidi has taken every facet of their career into their own hands, ensuring complete creative freedom over their work. heidi is a musician, a writer, a performer, a dj, a producer, and even owns their own label, wired records. heidi’s insistence on staying true to themselves has also lead to a critique of gender and sexuality in the music industry. while queer and female identifying, heidi refuses to describe their band in these terms. their aversions to boy/girl labels has also lead to their dynamic stage shows, which confront the audience with an ambiguous version of themselves. in costume, it is difficult to distinguish whether heidi is male or female, gay or straight. heidi stresses that ultimately these labels shouldn't matter, as what is of true importance is the music.

what was your childhood like growing up in denmark?

i wasn’t a very social kid and was rather shy growing up. but even though i stuck to the sidelines, i really enjoyed being around happy people. i remember playing outdoors, listening a lot, thinking a lot, live music, and birthday parties. when i started school, however, i was taken out of kindergarten, because i was not integrating with the other children. instead, i was homeschooled by my aunt, who would take care of me during the day, along with my cousin of the same age, until my mum got off work.

when did you first start experimenting with sound?

when i was a kid i would borrow my father’s microphone and record things around the house. i would record sounds off of the radio or my father and grandfather when we would play the accordion together. most of my recordings were of people unaware that they were being recorded. i used to lie behind the screen that separated our living room from the kitchen and record my mum as they spoke on the telephone. i felt that this was the most valuable material since people would shut up or act unnaturally when they knew that they were being recorded.

what about your first attempts at music?

i first started modulating music when i was twelve, right when the film la bamba came out. i would play the soundtrack on my tape recorder and play around with the equalizer and pitch knobs to modify the sound.

living in denmark, how were you first exposed to electronic music?

when i was eighteen, i lived in copenhagen and attended a dance academy. one night while going out, i discovered a club called x-ray that played electronic music, and i thought to myself, this is what ny must look like! the club had me ‘zoomed in’ from the first night. it felt so much more natural and right for me to freestyle to this electronic music, spun by djs, than it did to be in the dance studio doing ‘1, 2, 3, and 4’ routines in contemporary dance. the academic dance lessons were too disciplined and structured for my liking. i wanted to partake in wild, real, spontaneous expressions of music. at the academy i discovered laurie anderson, and at the club i discovered josh wink’s ‘don’t laugh’

you left home when you were still a teenager?

i left home at nineteen, alone, and without anything except for my plane ticket and a suitcase. i first headed off to italy, where i stayed for three months, and then moved to barcelona where i spent the next seven and a half years of my life.

what precipitated the move?

i left because i wanted to get away from a boring gray denmark, where life was a safe bubble. the town i grew up in was quite small, and i wanted to really taste life, meet other open-minded people, and experience the types of things that i'd only ever seen on television. i also wanted a big dose of electronic music, and i wanted to dance.

how did television contrast with your small town reality?

when i was a teenager, my hometown was quite small and narrow-minded. everything in it, from concerts to hangouts, was mainstream. it was rare for anything to really happen at all. in contrast the people i saw on tv were always on adventures and their lives were always changing. there was also the soundtrack music that really captured my imagination and that allowed me to interpret what was happening on-screen in intriguing ways. my own reality seemed to be heading in a straight line, in a single direction. i would finish school and eventually become a grown-up. unsatisfied with these prospects, i couldn’t wait to go and discover for myself what was out in the world outside of my hometown.

was there a breaking point at which you decided that this is what you wanted to do?

the breaking point, the moment at which i decided i wanted to be a musician, was in barcelona after playing my first concert ever, which took place at the lem festival in 2002. after my performance ended i headed backstage, feeling really uplifted, so much so that i had to force myself to sit down to really take it all in. i remember at that moment thinking this is what i want to do. it was at that very concert that i won the title of ‘resident artist of lem 2002’, awarded to the most talented act of each year’s festival. while the point of the distinction was to help the resident artists promote their acts, and set up gigs over the span of a year, i ended up getting most of my breaks through people that had attended my performance. one of these breaks was meeting up with solu, a visual artist, who asked me to join them on a european tour.

were your parents supportive of your music, or did it alienate them?

my parents were not so thrilled at first. my mum tried to act interested, but my dad was alienated by the electronic nature of my music, and they found it very challenging to listen to. They’re a very sensitive person, and music affects their mood on the spot. nowadays, however, they are very supportive of my career path. they know that this is my passion, my job, my life, and i’ve been at it long enough that they no longer doubt my commitment to it. they respect what i’ve been able to accomplish in my music, and they also respect me for taking risks and straying from the lifestyle they have chosen for themselves.

in some of your interviews you describe gender as a sort of clothing, and of having the capacity to feel like a boy one day, and a girl the next. what would you say characterizes each of these moods beyond their outward portrayal?

the question of gender is funny for me, as i have fluid gender identities. recently i have found that my notions of gender have woven themselves together, that they are fluid and shifting. i imagine gender like two paint colors on a palette that are mixed together with a paintbrush and water. at the edges, the paint still retains its original pigment, whereas at the center of the mixture, the part that is the largest in area, the colors fuse into a single new pigment. where i am on this palette changes each day, or week, but mostly i move within these fused colors.

do you think that there needs to be a clear distinction between the two?

i’m happy to be a female bodied person, but i don’t feel that i have to restrict myself to the stereotype of a female bodied person—clothes-wise, job-wise, partner-wise, nor any other-wise. the flexibility to move across the terrain of gender is natural for me. i like to make electronic music and beat box; i like tools and other gear, and i don’t care what gender these activities or items are associated with. the definitions of what it means to be a boy or a girl are very much determined by societal traditions, by our upbringing, by our roots, by history. these traditions have created what one could call boy territories and girl territories. i refuse to view these two classifications as separate territories, and for me it’s all one big field. while boys and girls are different, you should be able to pursue and enjoy whatever suits you personally without paying attention to these territorial boundaries. i feel that the media takes advantage of these gender territories and solidifies their borders in order to facilitate the marketing of their products towards distinct targets. it gets tiring because they only ever represent the same old stereotype and disregard the possibility of bridging the two territories entirely. when i describe territories, i am suggesting the stereotypes that describe “boy-things” and “girl-things”.

do you find sexuality to be as ambiguous as gender?

i don’t like to put my sexuality in a box. i also don’t want to rule out any future romantic possibilities. this is why i like the word queer. it allows me to be any gender at any time, and also breaks away from the strict labels of lesbian, straight, gay.

do you think distinctions between queer, lesbian, and gay are ever useful?

some of my friends feel the need to label themselves in these categories, and it’s all good to me. whatever definition, i feel that it’s up to each of us to decide independently.

do you have any advice for female bodied people that might identify as queer, but are having difficulty expressing this to other people?

i never came out of the closet via an official act. i never felt the need to, and i was also living very far away from my family, and so it didn’t seem necessary. being queer is very natural to me and never seemed like an abnormality that needed to be announced. i love who i love. heterosexuals don’t announce that they are straight, because they are the majority. most of my life i have belonged to a minority by choosing an alternative lifestyle, and it is in the minority that i feel comfortable and at-home. some of my friends have felt the need to make the announcement in an effort to make people understand, but i believe it’s up to each of us to make this decision. i don't, however, agree with hiding your sexual partner or sexuality from your friends and family. it's ultimately satisfying to be yourself.

what do you think of the term, "queer music"?

i define myself as queer, despite the fact that i feel the term is pretty loaded in the context of the music industry. for this reason i don’t describe myself as a queer band, or as a queer artist. i also refuse to describe myself as a female band or female artist. i don’t believe that queer or female are genres of music, and so i simply describe myself as a band, or as an artist. i feel that any other sort of label is limiting to me. i make music, and i play music, and if people are interested in it, they are welcome to listen. i find that the term “queer music” often represents trashy, un-clever and boring performances. dildos, food resembling genitalia being destroyed in front of the audience, shouting, and an emphasis on the theatrics versus the actual music. i find that these types of performances have more in common with stage productions than they do with the production of music. i also don’t believe that the shock effect works in 2008. naked people, dildos, food throwing, we’ve seen it all before. i find that challenging gender is relevant when expressing yourself outside of the boundaries of traditional roles, but it's nothing new - marlene dietrich was doing this in the 1930’s. i think it’s worthwhile to put thought into your art, be it provocative or funny. audiences these days are smart, and they won’t be won over or shocked by nudity. in contrast to these tactics, i applaud artists that really hone their skills and bring something personal and unique to the stage.

how has your questioning of gender and sexuality been received by your family?

my parents are fine with it and wish me every happiness. my mum doesn’t like to look at photos of me where i’m photoshopped as a boy, as they don’t realize that it’s all done through software, and they interpret it as reality. They hide the cover of my latest album don’t lonely me, because it portrays my head collaged over an athletic male body. They are embarrassed about family or friends seeing it. Their reaction makes me laugh. when i confront them about it, they don’t want to admit that they’re hiding it, which makes it even more hilarious. it’s okay though, because i know that they are very proud of me and love me regardless, and they’ll come around one day i’m sure. as for my dad, they are fine with me dressing up a bit like them. i used to wear their long underwear on stage and they found it amusing. i still wear them every winter, as they are very comfortable. we are very much alike when it comes to clothing. we appreciate practical clothes, and we don’t mind if they have a few holes in them, or if they’re not the latest style. my dad has a saying that goes, “if they’re not modern now, they probably will be in some years.” my father and i share another similarity, which is that we are both on the autism spectrum (previously termed asperger’s).

did you eventually grow out of the most severe symptoms, or do you still have a hard time in social situations?

i never regarded my asperger’s symptoms as being terribly severe, and for the most part attributed it to my character. i still stick by this belief, and generally don’t regard asperger's as having had a negative impact on me. i definitely don’t view it as a sickness. asperger’s can, however, be irritating and disturbing at times. it makes me dread huge crowds, which i find claustrophobic, something a musician is confronted with on an ongoing basis. when i lived in spain for eight years, my asperger’s resulted in me being shy and added a dark mellowness to my personality. i was only finally able to overcome this shyness when i moved to berlin and decided to take myself more seriously as a musician. this resulted in founding my record label, networking, setting up gigs in berlin in conjunction with other performers, and generally becoming responsible for the success of my professional career. i now find that my asperger’s is actually advantageous in some respects, as it creates two opposing versions of myself. it results in the immature teenager, the silly, nerdy, trifling, trickster side of me that i feel provokes me to express myself, and the serious responsible side of me that allows me to succeed in business. i also appreciate my asperger’s, because i have traced it to my father who i love and admire. i also find that it rules out so many other mental disorders, and sicknesses. it has also led me to mentor other people facing similar challenges.

do you think that the asperger’s part of your brain plays out in your music?

asperger’s definitely plays out in my music as an obsession. i am constantly aware of sound and rarely travel without my stereo, pocket recorder, and ipod. i am constantly collecting records. i visit wikipedia daily to advance my musical intellect. in my spare time i read autobiographies and watch documentaries on historical musicians. i don't read the manuals to any of my equipment, because i love to experiment with sound, welcoming mistakes and chaotic compositions, learning from them, and arriving at new combinations.

in your song, "girl since i met you", you speak of the distraction that comes from lust, which seems both at odds with asperger’s, but also completely in line with its obsessive nature. do you have any thoughts on this?

i don’t find myself obsessive when it comes to love. i’m definitely not a jealous type. when i’m in a relationship, there's you, me, and "us". i'm independent by nature, which i think is healthy. i also think it's important to love and respect each other’s differences, as this makes for a more dynamic "us".

can you enlighten us as to the current music scene in berlin?

berlin is currently a mecca for musicians. artists from all over the world come to berlin in the hopes of meeting like-minded people and being able to express themselves with the expectation that they can earn enough money doing what they love to afford the cheap rents in the city. a lot of new music has sprung from here as a result, with artists from different nationalities congregating, talking, and sharing ideas.

it seems like berlin has given birth to a lot of independent female artists that are carving out a niche in experimental/electronic pop. i'm thinking of artists like peaches, who moved to berlin from toronto, or kevin blechdom from san francisco. all of these acts strongly question female identity and sexuality. would you say that there is a dialog between these artists?

we see each other perform, and we each have our own style of music, and our own personal goals as musicians. some of our goals are the same or similar in part because we are all contemporary women who feel the need to bring attention to the forces that work against us. the music industry is a field dominated by men, which puts women artists in a peculiar position. as a result many of us utilize our music to bring attention to our malfunctioning patriarchal society and its manipulative media. this results in our need to question gender and sexuality in the context of the musical discipline.

can you name some of your favorite up-and-coming berlin artists that we might not have heard of in america?

there are a few up-and-coming berlin artists that i am excited about right now. mosh mosh are fun and original, and their lyrics are weird, catchy, and quite genius. watch out for their album release on wired records. i am producing some of the songs. miss le bomb produces great catchy and humorous electro songs. she’s always on to new projects and traveling the world performing and producing artwork. my own band the uncontrollables are being resurrected. we’re starting practice sessions in my garage at the end of august. at this point all we know for sure is that there will be an organ, handclaps, harmonies, tape delay, reverb, inventive, and alternative recording techniques, tricks, and full-live-band concerts.

sounds amazing.