Members of Jeudi Noir

More than 8% of the houses in Paris (data of the city administration) stand empty. Supposably the real number is much higher. On the other hand even sharing a flat costs at least 400 Euros. This is a big problem for a city that is connected with terms like art and creativityWhat will the future be like if a city cannot offer space to live and work for upcoming younger talents that do not belong to the group of top earners? It’s of course possible that the mayor of Paris does not know about the importance of the creative industries and if he one day will know it might take years till a dull city administration will react on the issue.

The group Jeudi Noir did not want to wait so long. Their approach is to occupy houses that are empty and unused. Last “project” is a splendid villa on the Place de Vosges no. 1b. On one of the most demanded addresses in Paris the “Squatteurs” occupied a 1,300 square metre house that is degenerating since 45 years.

Spaces out of real estate perfection and capital are rare our cities. But it is exactly those places that creativity needs to grow and evolve. Assumed that the squatters treat the building at least better than its owners or even better start renovating the objects, it is the best strategy for the ghost buildings. “Eigentum verpflichtet” (property obligates) – and if the owner is not interested in caring for it, why not let creative people do the job that really have a motivation for it?

More information in English, French or German (including video).

Written at Cafe Kislev in the centre of Cologne, an enjoyable place with WLAN in the Zülpicher quarter.

In a country where the government wants to stay in control of its citizens, it is hard to find private or secret space. The only way to disappear from the eyes of big brother is to hide yourself. Artist Liu Bolin found a way to do so – respectively without photoshop or other manipulations. He just paints himself away. Found via reddit.

An interesting development comes from the company Greenhouse Energy and is called Microfueller (EFuel100).  It is a private filling station that allows to turn organic waste into ethanol fuel. Now – it is not that you can throw your old salad into the machine and the next day you drive 100 kilometres from that. The company itself will provide the feedstock for you. Greenhouse made contracts with companies that need to get rid of e. g. beverages that have date-expired and otherwise have to pay a high price to have those products hauled away for disposal.

Interesting and ground-breaking idea. Hopefully something like this does not lead to an increasing overproduction of things. It’s always a chain of systems that interacts with each. In the beginning it also seemed that using corn to produce fuel would be the most sustainable solution. Then it happened that the prices for corn rose worldwide – making it too expensive for people in poorer countries that are depending on it as a food.

However decentralized energy production is the most promising idea for the future. For example, the German bio-energy supplier Lichtblick is planning to install 100.000 gas power stations (“ZuhauseKraftwerk”) in private homes that supply heat for the building itself and energy for the public net. This huge swarm system with a capacity of 2,000 megawatts is equivalent to the power of two nuclear power plants.

More about the “Microfueller” project in an article published in The Economist. More about the Lichtblick idea soon to come here on ROGER LiVE – subscribe to my newsletter to stay up to date.

Jer Thorp, an artist and educator from Vancouver/Canada who runs the blog blprnt.blg, did this data visualization to display government spending on arts funding. The government of British Columbia seems to be one of the few regions that did not realize that the creative industries are beneficial for the economy but even more important for the cultural life and the satisfaction of its citizens. The liberal government cut its spendings from 47.8 to about 23 million $. This may have severe outcomes for the creatives in British Columbia.

Yesterday, on Sept. 9th 2009, members and supporters of the arts community gathered at the Vancouver Art Gallery to protest against the funding cuts. Image: Carlito Pablo

It’s just a test of a 3D software. But it’s impressing enough to show. Thanks for the tip, Howard Rheingold.

street tests from Najork on Vimeo.

The Golden Institute for Energy in Colorado was the premier research and development facility for energy technologies in an alternate reality where Jimmy Carter had defeated Ronald Reagan in the US election of 1981. Equipped with virtually unlimited funding to make the United States the most energy-rich nation on the planet, its scientific and technical advancements were rapid and often groundbreaking.

Its scope ranged from planetary engineering to the enabling of individual participation and profit from the creation of electricity. Notable projects include the development of the state of Nevada into a weather experimentation zone and the new gold rush in the form of lightning-harvesters that followed, or major modifications made to the national infrastructure in an attempt to use freeways as a power plants. The institute’s vision continues to inform the American consciousness to this day. In relation to energy preservation and harnessing, but also in terms of man’s relationship to the forces of nature.

Sascha Pohflepp – The Golden Institute from Plugimi on Vimeo.

With a series of pictures about poverty amongst students, two students from the Strasbourg School of Decorative Arts (École Supérieur des Arts Décoratifs Strasbourg) won Paris Match’s (a french weekly magazine) annual prize for student photojournalism. The intersting point and the problem (at least for the jury of Paris Match) was that those pictures were not documentary reality but purposely posed – a mocumentary.

The cheque with the prize money was blocked after the two creators, Guillaume Chauvin and Rémi Hubert, read out their statement, that “they had wanted to make a powerful artistic gesture attacking the voyeurism and gullibility of parts of the press.” (The Independent)

.

Making people wonder is probably the only way to get them out of their daily grind for some seconds. However getting this done is really hard as mainstream advertising’s daily business is to break rules and cross even the most delicate borders.

A very intensive way is to do a performance on the streets as face-to-face human-to-human is the most emotional approach. But this takes a lot of time and energy. Mark Jenkins found a way – he did not put himself on the street to get the message across, but employed dummies to this job for him. Out came some really disturbing stuff.

The installations of Mark Jenkins evoke a different perspective and transport the viewer into a different reality. A reality where anyone can be Mark Jenkins.

This one’s dedicated to all the students working on their final thesis or senior project. It shows the suffering on deadlines, doubts and dreads that artists and designers have to fight against while trying to finish their work.

Bang-yao Liu, a student from the Savannah College of Art and Design made it subject to his senior project. For him post-it notes were the real enemies in his work.

This is my senior project at Savannah College of Art and Design. Where my idea comes from is that every time when I am busy, I feel that I am not fighting with my works, I am fighting with those post-it notes and deadline. I manipulating the post-it notes to do pixel-like stop motion and there are some interactions between real actor and post-its.

So if you are suffering too much make it topic of your thesis to deal with your psychological creativity blocades before you enter real life. Interesting is also the making-of movie.
Found via Wooster Collective.

On April 25th, 2009, Jordan Seiler and PublicAdCampaign.com organized a massive takeover of billboards called NYSAT (New York Street Advertising Takeover): 126 billboards throughout the city were white washed by dozens of volunteers. Then, over 80 artists transformed the advertising space into their personal pieces of art. Here’s the work of Ji Lee.