Saturday, November 05, 2005




This pattern tends to come up.
I've often thanked the Noble Cauliflower for the reminder.
Found here.

mathpuzzle



Ok. Ever since I came across a stack of old Recreational Mathematics magazines AND became reacquainted with the workbooks of yore...I've been in thrall to the visuals of these puzzles. This one posted is the tame teaser.
Anyone interested in visual poetics will gladly spend hours at mathpuzzle.
Of course, with the ubiquity of the home computer and its corollary design tools, the older aesthetic is being lost, replaced by full-colour, gaudy versions of the b&w on newsprint or mimeographed 'originals'.

Wednesday, November 02, 2005

Various Reasons




Beauty being one.
I also like this kind of thing because I can fantasize about knowing what it means.

It's from here.
The dream always started in the dark, wet, organic murk. A number line emerges horizontally, moving towards the right. I count along it, faster and faster.
The dream ends on the light-soaked diamond shaped roof of an incredibly high tower, surrounded by clouds. I have finished counting.
I find myself back in the murk. I realize I have to count all over again. I wake up screaming and convulsing.
I haven't figured out when or how the horizontal line 'turned the corner' to become the vertical tower. I don't remember any crossroad.

Tuesday, November 01, 2005



I've always had a thing for Venn diagrams.
Swan Bill Markings



Swan Sanctuary

Number Lines



These things that we studied in early elementary school seem to have triggered early Night Terrors in me regarding infinity.
Between the ages of 5 and 7, I had a recurring dream that involved fast counting towards infinity, completing the impossible task and then realizing that I was at the beginning and would have to count to infinity all over again. At this point I would wake up sweating and chattering and screaming in delirium.
Having an ally in childhood, no matter how imaginary, is of untold value.
Everywhere I 'went', I 'went' accompanied by a force to be reckoned with.
This wakeful, conscious allegiance slowly faded and I remember coming to many years later with a deep shame that I had neglected this friend, this companion of mine that got me through so many tight spots.
It may be more accurate to say that my ally and I merged beyond the recognition of difference.
No need for shame.

Sunday, October 30, 2005



Painting by John C. Dawson.
Copyright the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County

Origins

In grade four (I went to Morison School in Ville St-Laurent in Montreal) I developed my first real crush.
She was new to the school and after fourth grade I never saw her again though I still remember her name. Not telling.
Well, I also had a crush on the teacher, Missis Walker. Missis Walker had a burgundy brown Corvette and a Jimmy truck of the same colour. Looking back, she must have had some financial help.
Anyway, my little crush was the catalyst for a fantasy world that spun open and out of control, growing for years and becoming more and more elaborate.
She was the first person whom, in my imagination, I set up to be threatened by some otherworldly monster and subsequently rescued. All using what I later found out to be Jungian cliches. Not telling.
Anyway this kid, that I hardly interacted with but was super cute to my 10 year old eyes, inadvertently spawned a world in my brain , a world that I visited with slavish devotion every evening and every morning, sometimes for hours at a time before I eventually fell asleep and actually dreamed.
This world was soon peopled with various villains and allies, air and spacecraft of various shapes and capabilities, kustum kars, domed houses of incredible design, incredible powers, etc..
Of course there was the period years later when I thought perhaps that she, being my first muse, was also my true love.
That period is thankfully over, though I still credit this person with jumpstarting my imagination.
If I was to meet this person today, pushing forty, I'd have to bring it up.
Don't anyone worry, I'd do it in such a way as to not creep her out.
The condition of having little or nothing to say.
The reason behind finding and linking to interesting visuals.
Not yet having turned this new practice into an art.
Struggling with motives and meaning.

I started with some meager autobio.
Then shared my basic aesthetic.
This is the feedback loop portion of our evening.
I would like a scanner now.