via [ Andrew Sullivan ]
Why are we discussing Food Taxes and Federal Subsidies for Food Production? Because
the federal government already has a tax policy affecting what we eat, and it dramatically distorts the price of our food … and the size of our waists.
via [ Cool Infographics ] from the [ NewScientist ] The Writing on the Cave Wall By Kate Ravilious
This article addresses the geography of the earliest forms of Human mark making. I’ve recently posted several similar issues on Human Geography.
[ Theaster Gates ]
I need to get out of my cave more often.
I had a brief chance encounter with Theaster Gates today. I found myself sitting in the University of Chicago Booth Business School cafeteria this morning working on the Graphic for the previous post. While working I overheard pieces of a conversation behind me. I thought I heard the gentleman talk about issues he was grappling with between being an Artist and an Urban Planner. Oh, this caught my attention, and I couldn’t help but interrupt his conversation and introduce myself. It turned out to be Theaster Gates. For some reason I couldn’t remember his name, until later when I realized that I was recently looking at his work at the 2010 Whitney Biennial and did a post about the “Newly Revitalized” Whitney Biennial.
via [ Fast Company ]
Not too long ago, we were bemoaning the fact that the president still lectures at his State of the Union–rather than illustrating his points, like any good communicator, with some handy infographics. And we pointed out that infographics could sway politics mightly, given their unsurpassed power to convey messages that people remember.
Obama’s coming around: He’s just appointed the father of modern data visualization, Edward Tufte, to the Recovery Independent Advisory Panel. Thats the group of people that confer with the White House about the $787 Billion stimulus fund.
Presumably, Tufte will be using his expertise to find charts that illustrate how the stimulus is being used, and what effect its having on the economy. Thats brilliant news, for anyone overwhelmed by the blather surrounding political debates.
And its not just a token appointment. Tufte says that hell be going to Washington several days a month, and teleworking regularly.
via [ The National Academies Press ] “Understanding Climate’s Influence on Human Evolution”
I have always been fascinated by a spatial understanding of “who we are” and “what we know.” In my mind there is an innately spatial component to both “Climate” and “Evolution”
[ Correlation Between Genetic and Geographic Structure in Europe ]
Description:
The hominin fossil record documents a history of critical evolutionary events that have ultimately shaped and defined what it means to be human, including the origins of bipedalism; the emergence of our genus Homo; the first use of stone tools; increases in brain size; and the emergence of Homo sapiens, tools, and culture. The geological record suggests that some of these evolutionary events were coincident with substantial changes in African and Eurasian climate, raising the intriguing possibility that key junctures in human evolution and behavioral development may have been affected or controlled by the environmental characteristics of the areas where hominins evolved. However, with both a sparse hominin fossil record and an incomplete understanding of past climates, the particular effect of the environment on hominin evolution remains speculative. This presents an opportunity for exciting and fundamental scientific research to improve our understanding of how climate may have helped to shape our species, and thereby to shed light on the evolutionary forces that made us distinctively human
I will be participating in Paul Sargent’s “Precious Cargo” show in Buffalo this month.
Precious Cargo
March 18 – May 15, 2010
University at Buffalo Art Gallery
Opening Reception: March 18, 5 – 7pm
Screening Event: May 14, 2010
Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center
Precious Cargo is an exhibition of contemporary art and design projects addressing the flow of goods and services in an interdependent post-global world. Organized by multidisciplinary artist Paul Lloyd Sargent, works in this exhibition critique and complicate such binary oppositions as: inter/national vs. regional/local transport, [interdependent] global trade vs. [self-sufficient] local trade, supply chain vs. disposal chain, resource exhaustion vs. sustainable culture, consumption vs. reuse, resource vs. commodity, and more. This is the second exhibition in an annual Artist in Residence program in which artists are invited to transform the gallery space over the duration of the exhibition run, providing audiences an opportunity to engage the artist-at-work and witness the transformation of the gallery over time. Sargent will be working in the gallery on March 20, 30 & 31 and April 1, 6, 7 & 8 constructing “Not To Scale,” a working relief map of the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Seaway made entirely from found objects illustrating the lock system, canals, and waterways necessary for travel from the Atlantic Ocean to ports along each of the Great Lakes.
Contributing works in the UB Art Gallery will be:
The Center for Land Use Interpretation(CLUI)
The Center for Urban Pedagogy(CUP)
Compass Group working in the MRCC
Thomas Frank
Chris Jordan
Stella Marrs
Mary Mattingly
Lize Mogel
Stephanie Rothenberg
Sam Sebren
The Waterpod®
Alex Young
Based on NOAA predicts
2006 NOAA Prediction
USGS image
Series of images from the USGS
[ THE WHITNEY BIENNIAL ] February 25–May 30, 2010
Tides and Bodies of Water:
BoingBoing draws attention to Amy Greenfield’s video work and the controversy of Youtube’s censure of her work. The work below comes from Amy Greenfield’s solo exhibition Untitled Nude curated by Lynn del Sol at {CTS} creative thriftshop in conjunction with Dam, Stuhltrager Gallery. Her show just closed this February 12th.
TIDES HD from Amy Greenfield on Vimeo.
Throughout Greenfield’s films she focuses on the innate dignity of the human body. The themes of identity and meaning emerge in our common movements. Walking, falling, embracing, rolling, running, lifting, sliding are what she and her performers do in her films. For Greenfield the body, moving with, and against, the close up camera, can be the concrete image of inner human nature, an instrument for its expression, and a vessel containing images and actions that crystalize the meaning and mysteries of experience: memory and movement, the past and the present moment.1
The French poet, Paul Valery, noted that “The nude is for the artist what love is for the poet”
- PR packet {CTS} creative thriftshop
via [ OpenGov Tracker ]
In an effort to encourage a participatory government and satisfy the Open Government Directive agencies are soliciting your ideas on how to make them more transparent, participatory, collaborative and innovative. OpenGov Tracker is quantifying these efforts visually.
via [ AlterNet ] “Cities Shortening Yellow Traffic Lights for Deadly Profit” By Scott Thill
Some cities have been shortening yellow lights to nab drivers with a ticket. But studies show that theyre raking in the bucks at the expense of public safety.
Cities Shortening Yellow Traffic Lights for Deadly Profit | Civil Liberties | AlterNet.
In the Production of Space
via [ Next Nature ] “Correlation Between Genetic and Geographic Structure in Europe”
The map on the right is a geo-political map based on capitals as landmarked locators. The map on the left shows the genetic relationship between these 23 populations. The area assigned to each population represents the amount of genetic variation in it.
A team of scientists tested almost 2,500 people to compile a geospatial genetic map. The map was published in the August 2008 issue of the scientific journal Current Biology in the article Correlation between Genetic and Geographic Structure.
Western …
Has a long History locating first principles, origins, truth, author and identity. Now we are looking for whom to blame.
Perhaps the most important lesson from this dialogue is were it is occurring.
Update - Friendship Confirmed (Feb. 18 2:54 pm): I’ve been given entry to this gated community.
