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Lets create a new post and it shall be called...

I'll come back to that, not sure why I'm writing but I'm suspended somewhere in those weekly four hour gaps between the Critical Studies lecture and the critical studies seminar so thought I'd have a go cause I think I'm hard enough.. Or summit.

Summit, like the summit of a mountain? or something... yes

i am thoroughly bored. but i have accomplished lots today. i have done lots of measurements of stairs for my research for my Complaint brief:

"It is a physical impossibility to walk down the stairs to the lecture theatre without looking and feeling like a fool."

Audience: Students of an non Vis Comm persuasion.

and i have started my research into people etc.

*I am now force listening to Sonic Youth, ooo music like... his voice sounds like placebo but not quite as irritating - das be gutt*

I have decided to do my "people" research using the people i live with, i live in a block of flats (about 40+ people) of all art students that go to this college and do a variety of courses and also know which steps I am on about so i figured it would be less difficult than asking random people who i don't know who will probably look at me weirdly and i'll get scared and run away to hide. so yes, home research will be good.

i am bored of writing now, i am going to go and measure more measurements and write more writing and then it will be the end of my time in suspense and i will watch presentations and then go home and measure more peoples measurements and make more notes on note type subjects..


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This is Home

This photo was taken last summer in a field just above my house in the Isle of Man where i'm considered by friends etc to live "in the middle of nowhere" - 10 mins drive to the nearest village and 25-30 mins to the main town of Douglas where i spend most of my time. I'm feeling kinda homesick at the minute and this picture just makes me smile so i thought i'd share it with you all...

Critical Diary Report 1 - The Art of Looking Sideways

The Art of Looking Sideways - Alan Fletcher,
Publisher – Phiadon 2001

I found this book a few weeks after my 18th birthday, after caring but slightly old fashion grandparents gave me book tokens to entertain myself with and enhance my future “career” prospects. So a few weeks later I wandered on down to Ottakars, bought a coffee and built a stack of books around myself and spent the afternoon thumbing through random design books, the usual – you know – Graphic Design, Website design and other examples of people work, book after book after book. Through the mist of boredom and coffee swam “the Art of Looking Sideways” hidden on the bottom shelf squashed between other regular design books. I picked it up and ever since that moment it has become my bible.

The way my mind works I find I am inspired by words more than imagery and if not then at least by clever concepts and ideas that make me think “out side the box” as they say. This book is perfect for me when ever I become stuck with a design problem I pick it up, thumb through at random and forget what it was I was meant to be focusing on in the first place, and then it comes back to me, I become inspired and stimulated. I don’t think I’ve worked on a single project since then that this book hasn’t helped me in one way or another.

It is full of random quotes, thoughts, memories, views, questions; basically it is full of EVERYTHING and anything you could ever hope to wonder about. One of my favourite quotes from it is “has anyone ever published how nice is it is write with a ball point pen on an eraser?” which I would show you but of course I can’t find at the minute in the vast depths of its pages.

There are 73 chapters in total, spread across a huge 1058 pages, which cover a huge range of topics such as “taste” “meaning” “reflections” “culture” “brain”. Each chapter is started by a quote from a famous person such as the “colour” chapter with the quote “Colour is the place where out brain and the universe meet” by Paul Klee, or the “Places” chapter “It is always better to be looked over than over looked” By Mae West.

Not only is the book a wealth of information it is also beautifully made, each page is thoughtfully laid out with various textured pages which mean that whatever page you open it on you’ll find something you’ve not seen before. Even now as I flick through it and having looked through it many, many times before I haven’t seen half of the pages the book holds, although believe me I’ll keep trying.

I have just opened it at random and found a quote directly from the author – “This book is about everything – well almost everything – I was never taught” it makes me smile, I almost get the feeling it knows what I’m looking for and makes sure it falls open at that page, if not it’s just full of useless information cleverly disguised as useful information wrapped in a cover and spine that will influence your thoughts. ahh the cover, well that reads:

"words and pictures on how to make twinkles in the eye and colours agree in the dark. Thoughts on mindscaping, moonlighting and daydreams. Have you seen a purple cow? When less can be more than enough. The art of looking sideways. To gaze is to think. Are you left-eyed? Living out loud. Buy junk, sell antiques. The Golden Mean. Standing ideas on their heads. To look is to listen. Insights on the mind's eye. Every status has its symbol. "Do androids dream of elecrtic sheep?" Why feel blue? Triumphs od imagination such as the person you love is 72.8% water. Do not adjust your mind, there's a fault in reality. Teach yourself ignorence. The belly-button problem. Visual Charades. What had an ox to do with the letter A? The art of looking sideways. How to turn knots into bows. When does 1 and 1 add up to 3? Why sit with your back to the view? Notes on the Blue Tit Syndrome, letterplay and visual puns. Patterns of chaos. Kissin' cousins to camp. Half a word is enough for a quick ear. Some people think computers can't. Civilisation is chaos taking a rest. Too far east is west. Writing is the geometry of the soul. Why look at things upside down? Squaring the circle. "If you want the rainbow you gotta put up with the rain." Never wait for yourself. A word in your eye. The art of looking sideways. Beauty is a flavour of quark. Crerbral acrobatics. By the way, what's is it like living with a paper bag over your head? Not referring to you of course - the uncommon exception to universal bondage."... Just incase you wondered

Read about it at > http://www.designmuseum.org/design/index.php?id=102

Buy it at > http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0714834491/qid=1136844316/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl/202-5299087-2101436

I love it so much and would recommend it to anyone, and if you don’t like it, it would make a good, if quite expensive, door stop…