21st invites.

well, i've done them, i just cant seem to upload them! aaaah i want you to se them...

numb

what does this say about lcp? i'm not really sure what to think.
[sorry, that was a post which i put up before i realsied workshop makes up some of our studies mark.. sorry soumitri]

sorry lawrence

maybe some way to gauge the way we've changed after the corp game is how we address future problems. and also how we reflect on solutions to problems of projects past. perhaps we are a new kind of design snob - rejecting products, form and colour, while replacing them with the need for an understnading of how a chair will change the social structure of a nation, and if it doesnt and if all it does is looks cool, then tis redundant, thats a worse knid of snob if you ask me.
anyway, what i was intending to say - remember when lawrence brought in his solution to the first project first semester. i dont even remember what the project was about, but ti was to do with sustainibility and there were a few pathways we could explore. i remember lawrence looked at alternatives for lighting in houses, and he came up with 2 solutions, with many great sketches and diagrams. his first was to refect light from a large mirror at the top of the house and reflect it through mirrors to light to house naturally, arguing that it wasnt that hard ot do anyway. the second idea was to have a network of fire flies buzzing aorund tubes and lighting the house naturally.
i think a lot of us thought these ideas were stupid and could never work, but perhaps by going through the corp game and also playgroup we have begun to let these ideas sink in a little more.
anyway, just a though i guess...

sydney

sydney is cold.
its a bit rainy too. i had brekky down at bronte beach where it wasnt quite as windy or cold, i had a nice brekky, but i hate these cafes where everrthing is new. we sat across from ben, thet guy who won big brother the first time. his mate was giving the business partners they were having brunch with a little spiel about bens achievements, and how they were moving into this new venture and i assume they wanted this couples assistance. ben was so... smarmy. jesus man, you won a reality tv show.
we walked back in teh rain, took us about 20 mins and now i'm pretty wet. mum and dad are heading into town to see the pissaro exhibition, i just cant be bothered, so i'm heading down to my favourite cafe to buy a book and sit and read and relax. maybe its somehting i've been looking forward to.
i miss melbourne a bit, and alice as well, but i'll be back next year, if not a bit this year.

interesting

i remember back to the start of last year, when i went to melbourne for my interview (i remember it was with guy and malte). i took this little laptop bag which is pretty swish, its on wheels, and ironically dad got it for free at some conference. and i remember wondering what i could wear for this interview because turning up in jeans and a warner brothers movie world t-shirt with sauce stains down the front woudlnt have been too impressive.
so i must ahve thought - what do designers wear? black, all black. so thats what i wore, black shirt and pinstripe pants and black school shoes. how interesting that i thought thats what i designer was, joseph would be proud.

feedback

The sort of things we'd like to know include your ideas about a) what happened that was different to other studios you may have studied in, the corporation game allowed us to follow a path towards or own interests, while guiding our thinking in a new, exciting and liberated fashion. While other studios gave a problem and accepted a definitive outcome, the corporation game lived by the motto it taught – ‘the process should be privileged, not the product’, and in this way, our ‘product’ was the techniques for problem solving. Our initial scepticism and unfamiliarity of such an unorthodox learning method (combined with LCP) was eventually relieved once we began to let go of our preconceptions of thinking and design, and also to trust Soumitri. This process of trust is something which I haven’t experienced in other studios, purely because the content did not require it. b) what you learnt (particularly now that you've had some time to reflect since you completed the studio),Interestingly, a failure in the CG is that there is no real measurement of what you have learnt. I’m sure I think differently now, with more liberation. I express myself better and can communicate, and juggle subjects with the other team members. Some of my weaker points areas within team work have been strengthened, for instance my listening has improved, with further assistance from the playgroup.From a realistic viewpoint, I don’t believe I have learnt as much as I think I have. I am familiar with alternative thinking techniques, and I have encountered divergent and convergent thinking; but I don’t believe we have learnt as much as Problem Kya Hai, for instance. I think the students in that studio pushed themselves harder than we have. From interactions through that group, mainly through playgroup; I know they have been taught more in-depth and interesting thinking techniques, and I wish we had been given the opportunity to do so.
when putting together ‘first issue’ (http://corporationmagazine.blogspot.com/) we tried to list the things we had learnt, and came to the conclusion that we found it to hard to categorise what was important, and what was just a jumble of stuff.The greatest tell as to how much we learnt will be the future outcomes of our designs. If Soumitri really has equipped us with the best tools for difficult problem solving, then shouldn’t we produce the best products (or at least the best process?) Otherwise, most of what we’ve been taught is relatively bullshit. If we can’t apply it to future problems then perhaps the application of the course is flawed (oops, I just read (d)). c) what you highly valued from the experience, andif education is meant to excite, then the CG was very good education. i left many classes bewildered and drained, but inspired and urging to get out and try the things I had learnt. I valued the teamwork, and I enjoyed how the course was aimed personally at us, and allowed us to bring our own problems to the group. d) any suggestions for improvement I slacked off towards the end because I was involved in other things. And that was fine with Soumitri, he is very understanding most of the time. I know it is impossible for educators to push the right buttons, but I couldn’t help thinking that he could have pushed us harder, he said it himself -The Studio is a 24 Credit course. So what?
1. You are doing only three courses this semester: Comm, Studies and studio.
2. The other two courses are 12 credits each!!!!!!!!!!!
3. So What??
4. Basically the studio is worth the combined weight of the two other courses.
5. Which means that is the amount of effort you need to be putting into it.
6. But its only one day, jusst 5 hrs. Ah! Wecome to learner centred eduCATION.Interestingly, I feel we could have been pushed harder with deadlines etc, but that would also be not in the spirit and ethos of the course – where process is privileged. Aside from that, the only suggestions are that there be some sort of record at the end of the course, that if we are not allowed to take notes then we be encouraged (or forced by a cat-o-nine tails) to have a weekly blog entry ‘what I have learnt this week’ or something like that, and that the blogs be pushed more initially. Otherwise it has been an interesting, challenging, rewarding and frustrating course; thanks Soumitri

friends/corporations

"Money is a thing that will be there when asked for. A good person is not so easily found." Yamamoto Tsunetomo

thought

"I never came upon any of my discoveries through the process of rational thinking."- Albert Einstein

gosh

whatever i want to - as a pumpkin

dinolove

loving at last

evandead

In my bare feet
I rocked him to sleep.
With the saw of my blade
We’ll drink lemonade.
In the sun, I’d rest my drink on his back
And exclaim ‘how sweet’.

here

here

new comp

thinking of entering linden postcard comp - costs $45 including subscription.