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Fresh Stuff From Alexandros Vasmoulakis in Shenzhen, China
Posted on September 5th, 2010 • Filed under mediarosa • No Comments
More from Alexandros here.
Read the original post on Wooster Collective
From the Chronicle Kitchen Heirloom Beans
Posted on September 2nd, 2010 • Filed under mediarosa • 1 Comment
This week’s post comes to us courtesy of Steve Sando, proprietor of the company with the greatest and most desired beans available in the USA, Rancho Gordo New World Specialty Food.
Let us know what you think of this recipe by posting a comment. And, by commenting, you’re entered to win a copy of Heirloom Beans!
I always say “I hate health food” but in reality I do try and find ways to eat better. I don’t think I’d enjoy fat free cupcakes or pretend bacon, but if there are effortless little tricks I can use to lighten things up, I’m all for it.
Pureeing beans for a spread or dip isn’t news or revolutionary but when a friend gave me a purple cauliflower, I knew it was time to play in the kitchen. You can use any bean and any type of cauliflower, keeping in mind the textures will vary.
Black Calypso and Cauliflower Spread on Toasted Bread
One of the best aspects of working at farmers’ markets is the trading that vendors do among themselves after the market ends. I normally come home with quite a bounty—often including ingredients I would never consider buying on my own. One farmer gave me a purple cauliflower, and the result is this spread. The purple cauliflower mixed with the dark beans is less than attractive, but the cauliflower and bean combination is really good.
Serves 8 to 10
1 pound cauliflower, cut into florets
1 cup drained, cooked black calypso beans
1 tablespoon capers with juice
1 oil-packed anchovy fillet (optional)
Salt and freshly ground pepper
1/2-inch-thick slices crusty artisan bread (1 per person if loaf is fat or round, 2 if loaf is smaller)
Extra-virgin olive oil for brushing
Chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley for garnishing
Preheat the oven to 400°F.
Place a steamer rack over (but not touching) water in a large saucepan. Add the cauliflower, bring to a boil, and cook until soft, about 6 minutes. Remove the cauliflower from the pan, reserving some of the water, and let the cauliflower cool slightly.
Put the cauliflower, beans, capers, anchovy (if using), and a pinch each of salt and pepper in a blender. Blend until smooth. You may need to stir the mixture with a rubber spatula to get the blades going, but try to avoid adding more liquid. If you need more liquid, use the reserved steaming water. Transfer to a bowl. You will have about 2 cups. Taste and adjust the seasonings.
Brush the bread slices with olive oil. Arrange the slices on a baking sheet and toast in the oven until crisp but still tender inside, about 7 minutes.
Spread the bean mixture on the toasted bread. Sprinkle with parsley and then drizzle with olive oil. Serve on a large platter.
Substitution Note: Any of the cranberry or runner beans make a fantastic spread for bread, and all will pair well with the flavors here.
Purchase Heirloom Beans.
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Read the original post on Chronicle Books Blog
Postopolis DF – notes from day 5 (first part)
Posted on August 19th, 2010 • Filed under mediarosa • No Comments
The last time i blogged about Postopolis was two months ago. The idea of getting to grips with a report that had to chronicle a criminally long day was a bit intimidating. The fifth day of our blogathon in Mexico DF started at noon and ended at 10 pm. We were braced for the worst but the whole day was over in no time, thanks to some brilliant presentations and a friendly weather. No time to yawn nor complain. Since the schedule ran without a pause, we either came with picnics or ran down the street between two presentations to grab snacks and drinks.
Street market…
at the other side of the street….
of Museo El Eco where Postopolis was taking place
I’ll kick off the report with Julio Cou Cámara who gave what turned out to be everybody’s favourite presentation. Cámara is part of an emergency team that regularly dives into the liquid garbage of Mexico City.
Photo: AP
He is one of the two men who dive into the sewer system to clear blockages, repair pumps, take out debris and ensure that contaminated waters don’t overflow and inundate city streets, subway tunnels, or people’s homes.
Once he has entered the stinking sewage, Cámara can’t see anything. The water is so black and thick with all sorts of garbage, excrement, even corpses of murdered people, dead animals, car parts that any light would be useless, its beam can’t go through.
(Image by Tomo)
At the request of Nicola Twilley who had invited him to Postopolis, Cámara brought his equipment with him. The diver has to wear a suit thick enough to protect him from any sharp object (syringe, bits of glass, etc) that might cut through the garment, harm and infect him as well as a heavy-looking helmet embedded with a microphone and headphones to allow him to receive instruction from the surface.
Photo: AP
Photo: AP
Photo: AP
Photo: AP
Nicola at Edible Geography has a much better write-up of Julio Cou Cámara’s presentation. And if you’d rather read the text in spanish, Tomo has translated it for you.
Postopolis brought also a fascinating talk by architect and researcher María Moreno Carranco about Santa Fe or City Santa Fe, one of Mexico City’s major business districts. Built some 20 years ago on the site of a garbage dump, Santa Fe consists mainly of highrise buildings surrounding a large shopping mall. The district also includes a residential area built like fortresses, luxury condominium towers and college campuses, among other facilities.
(image)
Although some would say that Santa Fe is a resounding success, more critical voices raise their concerns over the streets devoid of passersby and other activities, the inadequate public transportation network, insufficient public spaces, street lightning and pedestrian areas, problems with water infrastructure not solved. Santa Fee seems to be a dysfunctional island, its glass and steel corporate towers of the new Santa Fe are surrounded by modest neighborhoods of cinder block apartments.
Image by Rodrigo Díaz
Ethel and Cesar from dpr-barcelona had invited Rodrigo Díaz, an architect originally from Chile and expert in urban planning, to tell us about his experience as a militant pedestrian in Mexico DF.
Image Rodrigo Díaz. The text says “Beware! Don’t park your car. Passage for pedestrians. Thank you”
Díaz has never owned a car and he argued quite convincingly that living the pedestrian life in Mexico DF might be much easier than most drivers think. Especially with a network of buses and metro that keeps getting more efficient. Although Mexico is presented as a metropolis asphyxiated by traffic and car exhaust where some people spend up to 4 hours per day stuck in their car on their way to and from work, only 1 in 4 people actually owns a car. Yet Mexico was built for the motorized minority, the city lacks sidewalks and infrastructures for pedestrians. There isn’t either any governmental measure inviting people to use their car only when it’s wiser to do so. As the architect explained in one of his posts, a higher percentage of the population in countries such as Denmark or The Netherlands own a car but people would rather bike or walk to move over short distances. Or use public transports at peak traffic hours.
Previous Postopolis stories.
Read the original post on we make money not art
Things I Learned from Writing a Book and Blogging about Unnecessary Quotation Marks
Posted on August 11th, 2010 • Filed under mediarosa • No Comments
After years of blogging about quotation marks, and months of working on a book on the topic, you might expect me to have learned some weird and interesting things. That expectation would not be misplaced.
As a communication scholar, I’m fascinated by the technological aspects of running a popular blog. I am convinced my blog would not be possible without broadband internet and the cameraphone. These two technologies make it easy to take pictures when you weren’t expecting a Kodak moment, and to read and produce frivolous blogs and load them quickly. I’ve also seen the way one link on a popular website can lead to: a big spike in page views for a day or two, subsequent links, and sometimes a sustained increase in readership.
I’ve also learned some fairly useless things about people who submit quotation marks images. There are particular places where if something turns up, I’ll get several shots of it. Basically anything along a well-traveled highway gets sent to me regularly, especially around travel times like summer and holidays. Perhaps because NYC is so dense, I’ll always get repeat submissions of things there, often within days or minutes of each other. I also found that some people find exponentially more things more frequently than others. I’m not sure if these people visit more different places and have more opportunities, or if they are just more alert than the rest of us. I myself find examples rarely, maybe two or three a year. Once, to my chagrin, I ran to pick up lunch from my office and found myself right in front of a perfect example without a camera or phone! (I believe the place did “not” have any fried green tomatoes left). Actually, a friend of mine went back later and got the shot for me!
When I started emailing people for permission to use their images in print (something included in my disclaimer, but perhaps not the submitters expectation) I also learned some things about the unnecessary quotation marks community. I was blown away by the speed and generosity of responses to my emails. Even when I was emailing people on weekend evenings (the life of a blogger/writer/grad student is very exciting) I often heard back within a few hours. Come to think of it, this may be an effect of the new ubiquity of smart phones.
Another thing I learned is that some people are really intense about grammar rules. I often get emails from people asking that I start a similar blog about their personal grammar peeve. The most frequent offender seems to be apostrophe (at least two fine blogs already exist collecting apostrophe errors). I’ve also been berated for developing a somewhat idiosyncratic style on the issue of end punctuation and quotation marks used in a manner other than marking a quotation. I insist that my style is defensible, consistent and makes sense, but that doesn’t keep the occasional commenter from expressing the law with multiple exclamation points.
Most obviously, I learned a lot about the different ways quotation marks appear in everyday life. And let me tell you, it’s crazy. But you can read the book for more about that.
Bethany Keeley
Read the original post on Chronicle Books Blog
Fresh Stuff From Vhils in London
Posted on August 6th, 2010 • Filed under mediarosa • No Comments
(Thanks, Ben)
Read the original post on Wooster Collective
Scrapbook from the ongoing FILE festival
Posted on August 1st, 2010 • Filed under mediarosa • No Comments
Previously: Feeding the Tardigotchi.
Fast, furious and merry images from Sao Paulo and the 11th edition of the FILE Electronic Language International Festival, i think the report will have to wait till i’m back in Europe.
Sao Paulo. Exotic plants, skyscrapers and where did i leave that picture showing helicopter landing pads on top of said skyscrapers?
City of much admired street art.
Quirky fashion shops.
El Cabriton y amigos
…and shoezz! Cult plastic sandals, high heels and pumps from Melissa Galeria.
I’m fairly enthusiastic about them. Here’s the booty (so far):
Dear Sao Paulo, please please never get rid of your generous trash ‘bins’.
The FILE Festival is remarkably popular with the public
In the morning the queues to play with games or interactive works are still reasonable so keep the lie in for another day.
Infinito Ao Cubo by Rejane Cantoni & Leonardo Crescenti. Part of the interactive public art section of FILE
The Machinima section in the early morning
Detail from 2x[Power of Two] by Jorge Luis Crowe
Superfluidity by Electronic Shadow
Every evening ends with some fantastic performances.
Performance by Minusbaby (Richard Alexander Caraballo) during Hypersonica
FILE is open until August 29, 2010.
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Proletarian posters from 1930s Japan
Posted on July 10th, 2010 • Filed under mediarosa • 8 Comments
In the 1930s, a new style of poster emerged that reflected the growing significance of the masses in Japanese society. These artistic posters borrowed elements from Western design and often incorporated bold slogans with political, economic and educational themes. Here are a few examples.
Health Exercises for the People (Bureau of Postal Insurance, 1930)
Tohoku Area Famine Relief (Federation of Tokyo Area Proletarian Organizations, 1931)
The 2nd Proletarian Art Grand Exhibition (Japan Proletarian Artists Federation, 1929)
Workers and Farmers Russian Art Exhibit (Japan Proletarian Art League, 1927)
Listen! Workers of All Nations! (1931)
Safety Leads to Efficiency (Labor Welfare Association, 1932)
Proletarian Art Institute (1930)
Poster for The Proletarian Graph Magazine (Proletarian News Company, 1929)
Indulging in Alcohol Ruins Your Health (Labor Welfare Association, 1932)
Harufusa Ohashi (Election Poster for Labor-Farmer Party, 1928)
Come, the Dawn of Mankind is Breaking (Farmers’ Theater Performance, 1928)
National Bonds for the Sino-Japanese War (Ministry of Finance, 1937)
The Grand National Exhibition of Advancing Japan (City of Gifu, 1936)
Records of a Victory (Leftist Theater’s 20th Performance, 1931)
A Town With No Sun (Leftist Theater’s 14th Performance, 1930)
A Happy Worker Makes a Happy Home (Labor Welfare Association, 1932)
Rise, All Japanese Citizens (Imperial Rule Assistance Association, 1940)
The Key to Harmony Is the Spirit of Mutual Help (Ehime Factory Improvement Committee, 1929)
To Manchuria! (Ministry of Overseas Affairs, 1927)
Poster for Taishu [The Masses] Magazine (Taishusha, 1929)
Kusunoki Masashige Festival (Kenkoku Kai, 1931)
Mobilizing All Citizens and Organizations for the Nation (Industrial Guilds Central Committee, 1937)
Pay a Living Wage (Japan Textile Workers’ Union, 1930)
Prevent Tuberculosis (Ministry of Home Affairs – Social Affairs Bureau, 1930)
Clean Up Before Make Up (Labor Welfare Association, 1932)
[Source: "Japanese Posters and Handbills in the 1930s - Communication in Mass Society," published by National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, 2001]
Read the original post on Pink Tentacle
06.19.10: Report from the Heartland
Posted on June 27th, 2010 • Filed under mediarosa • No Comments
Midtown Market/Exchange — the former Sears headquarters in Minneapolis. A tornado warning had been lifted a couple of hours earlier. There’s great Mexican food in here, and the famous Holy Land lunch and grocery, home of the jalapeño hummus, is here as well. A few years ago it was a derelict, empty shell. The upper floors house a medical facility, not a hospital.
Minneapolis just got voted best biking city in the US by Bicycling Magazine, beating out Portland and New York City. The US Census rated the city #2.
Last Thursday they instituted a bike share program called Nice Ride — an obvious sexual innuendo that was never mentioned. I was in town for one of my bikes and cities and the future of getting around panels, so I tried the system out — twice. Here’s how it works.
There are bike stations all over a large section of town, covering downtown, and areas known as midtown and uptown (which are actually south and southwest of downtown). Each station has a map showing where the other stations are, so you know where to head for — most are within a few blocks of typical destinations.
Obviously you can also go to their website, where there’s a physical map showing the station locations as well. You slide in a credit card (debit cards are no good — pin code entry is an issue) and decide how many bikes you want. You get the first 30 minutes totally free — your card isn’t charged. After those 30 minutes are up, the fees kick in, ramping up the longer you hold onto the bike. You have unlimited 30 minute chunks available to you within a 24-hour period of your rental — all at no charge. The idea is to encourage short trips, not long, leisurely day trips. You don’t have to return the bikes to the station where you got them… you typically abandon your bike at a station near your destination. When you’ve done your business there and want to return home, or to your hotel in my case, you go back to the station, re-insert your credit card and are issued a release code number. You can repeat this process as many times as you like in the 24-hour period and not be charged. I made one trip to Dero, a company that makes bike racks, and then later to the Uptown Theater, where the event was.
You can also get a yearly unlimited pass, which comes in the form of a stick you can attach to your keychain. When inserted into a slot at the stations it releases a bike instantly.
How are the bikes? Pretty good. They’re made by Bixi in Montreal, where one of these systems is already in place. The Minneapolis bikes look nicer and are easy to spot, as they’re electric green. They’re super sturdy, of course, and have only three gears — which is plenty for a flat city like Minneapolis (or New York, or Melbourne, Australia, which is initializing their own system in a couple of weeks). There is a carrier contraption in front with non-removable bungee cords, which worked fine for me to attach my laptop bag. There are front and rear lights powered by hidden dynamos — so no batteries to replace. Mud and chain guards mean you can wear normal or office clothes and not worry about getting grease stains or puddle splatters. They’re not lightweight — this isn’t a sports bike by any means — but in a flat town like this it’s no problem.
Luckily, my destinations were located in opposite directions reachable by the midtown greenway, a beautiful bike and pedestrian avenue that goes all the way across town — from the lakes to the Mississippi. It was a former rail line and for years had been abandoned — a gully filled with abandoned shopping carts and the detritus of the homeless. A few years ago it was cleaned up, and more recently the two-way bike and ped lanes were put in. There were lots of folks using it — it was gorgeous on a sunny day like today.
It’s like an expressway — you exit via ramps. The next step is to tie in the local businesses along the way a little more.
In the early afternoon, I went to the local public radio station, where a few years ago they instituted a station with a new format called The Current, that plays more music than the usual talk and current affairs programming of most public radio. They feature local music and various kinds of alternative or indie music. Needless to say, it’s hugely popular. A guy from the station would be a moderator at the bikes and cities event later.
Then I went to visit Dero, a company that manufactures bike racks to serve various, mostly practical, specific needs: cluster racks for colleges around the country, lightweight ones that can be dropped into position for temporary events, standard U-shaped ones, and I saw a prototype for a sheltered double-decker system. The upper level rail slides down so you don’t have to hoist your bike up.
They’re busy fulfilling lots of orders. We’re in discussion about some custom-designed racks for specific cities in the near future, but have to get through some red tape first.
Outside their warehouse is a sensor powered by some solar cells.
Employees can attach a little electronic thingie to their spokes, which causes the sensor to beep when they ride by.
They are then rewarded by the company for riding to work, and receive a financial credit. New York has a similar law that employees can get tax credits or financial rewards for riding — though having an automated system makes it a no-brainer.
The panel in Minneapolis was typical of these events; the makeup was a city person, an advocate, a historian/planner and myself. On this one we were joined by Mayor R.T. Rybak, who has been instrumental in getting these programs pushed through. He’s so popular that no one wanted to run against him in the last election. This event was under the umbrella of “Policy and a Pint,” a series of gatherings organized by the same local NPR radio station, in which they encourage having a beer while discussing policy. At the Uptown the excellent local beers were dispersed in the theater lobby, which slowed down the seating considerably, but allowed everyone to loosen up a little.
I got lots of laughs during my slide talk, which was satisfying. I guess it’s turned into a PowerPoint standup routine, with a bit of advocacy in there as well. I’ve adjusted my own presentation since I started doing these about a year ago — now I end on a more optimistic note, mentioning programs that are being instigated in lots of cities. It’s not just about bikes either — they’re merely part of a larger movement to make our cities more livable. There’s a groundswell in many US cities to make them more pleasant, to improve the quality of life. Many of these changes involve giving cars less priority. Even car-centric cities like LA and Dallas are building park-like things that cover over parts of their freeways; high-speed bus lanes are being installed; and pedestrian zones are being expanded.
As usual, most of the questions during the Q&A after our talks were directed to the city person — in this case, the mayor. Big cheers… as he responded to some of the queries affirmatively, announcing plans for expansion and additions to current projects. The event was becoming less a presentation and more a rally and celebration.
We had to wrap up by nine, as the Uptown Theater was screening the Joan Rivers documentary.
On to Chicago. Nice show of H. C. Westermann’s series of prints “See America First” at the Art Institute. He became known in the late ’50s and ’60s, but was maybe a little too unclassifiable to really become super well-known. He was a big inspiration for a lot of others, though.
[Source]
The big show there was of a particular era (1913-17) when Matisse got a bit “experimental.” Needless to say it is a popular show, but for my money it’s a little bloated — there are maybe half a dozen super amazing and surprising paintings, and the rest is context and backstory.
To some these might look unfinished — but he worked long and hard on them, though they don’t betray a lot of that time and effort. One wall text mentioned that WWI was quite a disturbing and disruptive event at that time — which is sort of an understatement, but it seems it had some shakeup effect on Henri. These were quite a bit different than his earlier work.
Later in the afternoon there was a freak storm — windows blew out on the Sears (now Willis) tower, a McDonald’s drive thru sign got blown away, and the skylight of the Goose Island brewery, one of the bike event sponsors, got sucked out of their ceiling. Over 200,000 folks lost power. Earlier that day I was told that the “windy city” moniker is deceptive — that Chicago is not really all that windy…
“Sean Maloney was on the 68th floor of the [Willis] building Friday afternoon when he said he felt the building begin to sway. Open doors started slamming shut. A colleague suddenly slid across the floor in his chair. Looking out toward the west, Maloney could see a dark wall of clouds bearing down on the city.
Blocks of concrete fell from the Aon Center.”
[Source]
I think they’d better stick with Windy City.
The bike event was at the Cultural Center, which used to be a fancy downtown public library. Here is the ceiling of a room with a Tiffany glass skylight — unaffected by the storm. There was a wedding reception about to begin there, so I was shooed out.
The bikes and cities event was not as exciting as the storm, though Chicago is expanding their network of bike lanes and is going to initiate some high-speed bus routes soon too. It’s cold here in the winter, but there are folks who bike to work all year round, so there.
Read the original post on David Byrne’s Journal
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