Now That is an Excellent Question.

 Ai Wei Wei's show opened in Berlin last night without him.
 Any thoughts on that, China?

Hit Me Baby One More Time

      Hooray!
      One of my architecture projects from UCLA is now featured on suckerPUNCH !

Not only does this make me happy, but also beckons me to channel my inner Britney Spears.
Since we all know we secretly or not so secretly have a soft spot for this song,
let's all take a synchronized 3.5 minute dance break...
C'mon, it'll be good for you!

Delicious Poems

Partly inspired by Austin Kleon and his awesome Blackout Poems made by blacking out newspaper pages and continuing on from my older post about how much beat poetry you can find in your Delicious Bookmark Tags, I will now present some of my favorite new beat wisdom generated from my ever-growing virtual word cloud:

      My current word cloud...

    
    And some of the new jazzy stuff I've found in it lately...

    what else can you find?

    And just for fun, here is my Blackout Poem I submitted to Mr. Kleon...
    Since I've been running low on any English  based printed text over here,
    I made this one from a letter my dad wrote to help me get my Freelance
    Artist's visa (Don't worry, I made a copy first).

     

Happy Easter from Deutschland

    

    Filosofia wishes you and yours a very happy Easter!

   
    and to add to the enjoyment of your day
    here is a photo still from a short film of a cactus getting a haircut.

    Happy Day!

We Can Work it Splice by Splice

    There is some really great work up
    at the Hamburger Bahnhof Museum right now.
    One of the best things I saw today was a video recreating one of
    Glenn Gould's most important recordings by splicing together thousands
    of samples from amateur performance videos uploaded on YouTube and
    projecting them on two enormous screens, side by side.

    Not only did this cacophonous installation offer some extremely compelling
    glimpses and juxtapositions of people, animals, instruments,
    and vintage equipment...

                                           But it sounded great too!

Well done, Cory Arcangel, that was a lot of work!

Rainy Day Facism

   

    I am secretly, or perhaps not so secretly,

    in love with this very massive Berlinese building.

    Isn't it so star ship enterprise?

    Doesn't it make you want to put on a uniform and salute it?

    And how hot are all of those filleted edges?

   

    What can I say

    other than that I'm a sucker for good piece of fascism on a rainy day!

    Oh, and also that if all the employees at this place were to spontaneously
    break out into song and dance, I'd imagine it would probably look like this:

Upside Down and Inside Out

 
     Right in the heart of Berlin at Postdamer Platz's Sony Center
     you can find a real life section cut through a preserved Berlinese interior.
 
     Channeling the essence of Gordon Matta-Clark, this inverted interior offers
     an array of intricate design details including this impressively ornate
     mirror and wall relief.

   
    While what makes this slice through the past so compelling and disorienting
    has a fair amount to do with its juxtaposition against its more contemporary
    architectural neighbors, the most effective aspect of this peculiar
    preservation move is the fact that you can be outside and inside
    simultaneously.

 
             So in honor of this wonderfully inverted architectural specimen, 
             let's all take a minute to enjoy Diana Ross singing "Upside Down"
             with Michael Jackson at the LA Forum.
 

                  
  

Logo a Go-Go

     I have been in the process of revamping my portfolio website
     sofia-borges.com
     and deciding on a logo is not easy.

     I began with something a bit heavy and perhaps overly bland.

 

     But that is gray scale.

     And I like color so much that maybe we should make it green instead.

     And that seemed good enough for a while...
     But then my boyfriend started making his website
     and after his first attempt at a logo, I found myself feeling a little jealous.

    By the time he got to his second iteration
    I found myself suffering from a serious logo complex.

    So I experimented.

    This was certainly an improvement from the the first but...
    Maybe it's too cute? Maybe it looks too much like a flying peacock?

    So I tried again.

    Hmmm, better!
    But given the layout of the rest of the website still not really working.

     Having a narrower header makes sense given my more
     consolidated border for my images
     but isn't it kind of weird to have the image bleed into the name?
     Shouldn't it be the opposite?

     Ok that's more like it.
     But now my links don't fit anywhere. So let's try moving my name up a bit.

      Very good!

      Uh, oh, but now Kaitlin just said it looks too girly! What's to be done?

      Should I desaturate?

     Should I change the hue?

     I'm tired!! How about we just compromise.

     So this is where I'm leaving it for now. Which one would you pick?

The Geometry in Your Dessert

    Have you ever noticed how much geometric inspiration
    can be found in your dessert?

    It's entirely possible that all of the baumkuchen I've been eating lately
    is to blame for this post but...

    don't you see it??

    whether it's that perfect rectangle of flan

    or that tantalizing triangle of torte

    or that still-warm square of beignet

    One of the best places to look for form and design inspiration
    is right there in your pastry

   This last one-
   (my one-day-old-half-eaten-chocolate-chip-bagel-birthday-cake-stand-in)
   probably doesn't count but will still hopefully provide you with some
   amusement/ food for thought.

    the moral of this story: don't skip dessert!