Manifesting Futures monument

Introduction- This proposal for an improbable monument will called the Manifesting Futures monument, and will have a tall column with a pedestal that displays a three dimensional holograph of Lady Justice. It will not be a static monument because the public will be able to choose what they want to periodically display instead. My intent was to rethink the entire notion of a traditional monument as a public marker of memory.

Background- A few ideas led me to this improbable monument: values and ideals, the concept of time, and the holographic model of the universe.

I came upon the subject of values and ideals, from researching the concept of monuments; monuments typically embody an ideal—oftentimes, from an historical moment that was meant to be remembered. The Dewey monument in San Francisco’s Union Square personally conjured a negative reaction. Replacing the current monument was at first, an emotional response—an attempt to ‘fix’ my American history. Personally, I think the Dewey monument has an implicitly justified arrogance that once was considered the “spirit” of the country.  (Remember Manifest Destiny?) Having such a monument in the center of Union Square, the heart of the radical city of San Francisco, seems insensible. The values and ideals the Dewey monument exemplifies, not only are pas en vogue, but also, I think, proven to be of the wrong essence. We’ve come so far in the decolonization of the minds of minorities. To keep this present monument as a part of San Francisco’s current culture is a physical representation that fosters the same spirit of Arizona’s animosity toward Mexican immigrants and what allowed the internment of legitimate Japanese American citizens. I don’t see why it must remain a part of San Francisco’s current culture.  

The next concept I’ve incorporated into my improbable monument is that of time. The Occidental way of thinking, time is linear; the Oriental way of thinking sees time as circular or cyclical.  What divides time into past, present and future? According to the Growing Universe theory, more commonly known as Growing Block Universe, the past and present are real but the future is merely potential. Manifesting Futures is based on this theory: though the future is indeterminate, we have our present to help shape the future.

In relation, I’ve read Michael Talbot’s book, The Holographic Universe, which was instrumental in shaping how I perceive reality. His book begins with this quote from Karl Pribram’s interview in Psychology Today,

“It isn’t that the world of appearances is wrong; it isn’t that there aren’t objects out there, at one levels of reality. It’s that if you penetrate through and look at the universe with a holographic system, you arrive at a different view, a different reality. And that other reality can explain things that have hitherto remained inexplicable scientifically: paranormal phenomena, synchronicities, [and] the apparently meaningful coincidence of events.”

Talbot's book The Holographic Universe suggests that the universe is a hologram. After examining the work of physicist David Bohm and neurophysiologist Karl Pribram, both of whom independently arrived at holographic models of the universe, the book argues that a holographic model could possibly explain supersymmetry and also various paranormal and anomalous phenomena and is the basis for mystical experience Superstring theory as the basis for the use of holographic display. 

The pursuit of advances in technology is an earmark of the future. Instead of looking back at the past through this monument, the monument is designed to be representative of the future’s potential.  We keep looking back into the past when we really should be using the present to shape the future.

Project Description-

Detailed description: a 3D holographic display will be featured on top of a column.

What it represents, signifies, commemorates- the future, technology, everyone’s values

Why it is important- creates a truly public space

Where it is located and why chosen this particular- It will be located in the center of San Francisco’s Union Square because it is considered the heart of one of the most radical cities in the world.

How it works, what it does, what it looks like, what its made of, what the size is, etc.

How people view it and or interact with it- The computer and servers that create the display will be located in the underground parking garage beneath Union Square; it will be accessible to the public to change the display and to look through display archives. Also, a website will allow people to create and upload 3d models of what they want displayed.

Why it is improbable, how it challenges conventional monuments- the concepts behind the monument, such as looking to the future instead of commemorating the past makes it improbable. Also, the removal of the current Dewey monument is highly improbable. Lastly, the cost, and availability (outside of military use) of the technology needed for this monument makes it very difficult to be realistic.

Total Projected Cost- $2,282,721.00

Breakdown: 

• Equipment: $753,721.00 (9X HD6400 Video Server, Video Wall and installation, Optoma PK201 Projectors, Tripod Heads, Bell Computers, Firewire 800 cables, HDMI Cables, 8.5 mm C-mount lens, Custom lenticular material, Aluminum Framing Materials, Firewire Cameras, and Point Grey FirePro PCI Express Card- Dual Bus)
• Employment: $904,000.00 (Seven board members @ 65,000/annual, five engineers @ $50,000/annual, six construction workers 960 hrs. @ $25/hr, two administrative assistants @ $30,000/annual)
• Maintenance: 625,000.00 ($25,000/25 years)

 Timeline

1. Create Manifesting Futures Monument Board of Trustees
2. Begin grant writing process for funding and subsequent endowment
3. Finalize monument proposal with Board
4. Submit monument proposal to the San Francisco Arts Commission and San Francisco Planning Department
5. Subsequent approval from aforementioned
6. Acquire necessary permits
7. Hiring of staff: administrative assistants, engineers & construction company
8. Community meetings for San Francisco residents’ input regarding Dewey monument
9. Removal of Dewey monument and its’ relocation, destruction or reappropriation
10. Breaking ground ceremony and construction
11. Soft opening for important guests
12. Opening for the public

  

Manifesting futures

View more presentations from Frances Ting.

improbable monument proposal

My proposal is to replace the Washington monument in Washington D.C. with a giant bullet to represent how the U.S. brings our culture, ideologies, commerce to other places by force.

Another idea is to replace the victory statue at Union Square with a holographic version of justice, with a blindfold. It will only be available to view at night, and in the day time, the tall column pedestal will be empty.

artists working with a (significant) monument and public memory

At Yerba Buena Gardens, right behind the Metreon in San Francisco, is the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial. The memorial is an art installation, situated behind a "majestic waterfall fifty feet high by twenty feet wide which cascades over Sierra granite." (1) It can be entered through an East or West entrance. From the East entrance, Dr. King's following quote from a speech he made in 1956 in San Francisco is etched into the granite and painted in gold, "I believe that a day will come when all God's children from bass black to treble white will be significant on the constitution's keyboard." This is tied in with the twelve subsequent glass panels in the walkway, each having carefully selected quotes from Dr. King's speeches and writings. These signify "the 'call and response' and the twelve bars of the traditional blues form." (2) After the quote, there is a large illuminated photograph taken by Amelia Ashley-Ward of the San Francisco civil rights activists commemorating the 20th anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington. Each quote is translated into one of San Francisco's nine sister cities' languages, as well as African and Arabic. The translations are not explicitly tagged with the language they are in, but with the help of the internet, I figured it out. The following are the twelve quotes:

1. These are revolutionary times. All over the globe men are revolting against old systems of exploitation and oppression; and out of the wombs of a frail world, new systems of justice and equality are being born. The shirtless and barefoot people of the land are raising up as never before. (Translated into Tagalog)
2. I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits. I believe that what self-centered men have torn down men other-centered can build up. (Translated into Japanese)
3. An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity. (Translated into Chinese)
4. We must rapidly begin to shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered. (Translated into Korean)
5. Through our scientific genius, we have made the world a neighborhood; now, through our moral and spiritual development, we must make of it a brotherhood. In a real sense, we must learn to live together as brothers, or we will perish together as fools. (Translated into African Zulu)
6. There is nothing in all the world greater than freedom. It is worth paying for; It is worth going to jail for. I would rather die in abject poverty with my convictions than live in inordinate riches with the lack of self-respect. (Translated into Hebrew)
7. As the movement took hold, a revival of social awareness spread across campuses from Cambridge to California. It spilled over the boundaries of the single issue of desegregation and encompassed questions of peace, civil liberties, capital punishment and others. (Translated into Arabic)
8. I refuse to accept the cynical notion that nation after nation must spiral down a militaristic stairway into the hall of thermonuclear destruction. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. (Trasnslated into Greek)
9. Men for years have been talking about war and peace. But now, no longer can they just talk about it. It is no longer the choice between violence and non-violence in this world. It's non-violence or non-existence. (Translated into Italian)
10. The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. (Translated into Irish/Gaelic)
11. When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city. we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro Spiritual, 'Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!' (Translated into African Ivory-coast)
12. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will and he's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over and I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you; but I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land. (Translated into Spanish)

The first panel begins with Dr. King acknowledging the time oppressed people were rising up during the 1950's and 60's. The following four panels reflect his philosophies regarding equality, humanity, dignity and brotherhood. The next five panels then progress into his firm belief in freedom for all, the struggle for it through non-violent means and that the ultimate measure of men are the challenges and controversies encountered. The eleventh panel is a repetitious call to let freedom ring, similar to Dr. King's renown oratorical style. The twelfth panel was from Dr. King's last eerily foreshadowing speech before his assassination in which he alludes to Moses talking to the Israelites. There is another illuminated photograph, this one taken by Bob Adelman of Martin Luther King, Jr. delivering his "I have a Dream" speech at the 1963 March on Washington. It ends with a quote from the "I have a Dream" speech, similarly etched into the granite and painted gold: "No. No, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until 'justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.'" This is tied in with the waterfall feature, assisting in drowning out the city's noise and lulling an individual to focus on the words of Dr. King. The water is a deliberate element use for its' "cathartic, purifying, transformative, and regenerative capacities" according to artist Bill Viola.(3) Sculptor Houston Conwill, his sister Poet Estella Conwill Majozo, and architect Joseph De Pace were commissioned to create the memorial. The artists have also collaborated and down other memorials/monuments in major cities across the United States, which have African-American, African-American leaders, or civil rights themes.

Bibliography:
(1) Yerba Buena Gardens. 2004. MJM Management Group. 25 Feb 2009. <http://www.yerbabuenagardens.com/features/gardens.html#3>.
(2) "Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial." Travel Spots USA. 25 Feb 2007. 25 Feb 2009. <http://www.magazineusa.com/us/cityguide/show.aspx?state=ca&unit=sanfrancisco&doc=70,0003&dsc=Martin_Luther_King_Memorial>.
(3) Getlein, Mark. Living With Art. 8th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2008. 57.

monuments, memory and public space

This blog post has been way overdue. The reading (see Paula Levine's The Past in Present Tense) was really meaty so it required a lot of my brain power to process. Now that I've had time to digest the information, let me relay how I used Levine's text to examine a monument of personal significance in San Francisco's Union Square...

Levine wrote, "Monuments and public commemoratives can, when they work well, reeducate us to the events and people before us as a way to pay respect and reactivate daily life. They can be the vectors of memory, waypoints that mark the events, people, sites, and moments of significance that the culture, nation, town and city value."

In relation to the monument in San Francisco's Union Square, it was erected in 1903 to commemorate Dewey's victory in the Battle of Manila Bay during the Spanish-American War. It was for the U.S. people, specifically the people of San Francisco--to remind them that U.S. involvement in war is justifiable, so long as the "good guys" win in the end.

Levine continued, "...However, those same commemoratives can also close down, delimit, and reduce complexities of history, cultural memory, events, ideas and lives, and appear as objects "for nostalgia or consumption."

U.S. citizens believed the military was doing "good" by being in the Philippines-- a completely narrow, one-sided affair. The fact that news of Spanish-American War was being filtered, skewed and downright withheld was unknown to them. What historians tend to leave out was that the U.S. became interested in acquiring the Philippines and actually purchased their "victory" from the Spanish. The Pilipinos were already in the midst of fighting for their own freedom, coming to a head in kicking out the Conquistadors themselves. With American involvement, the U.S. government tried to portray themselves as the liberators of their "small monkey-like brothers." The government and media made the U.S. people believe the war lasted until 1898 was a technicality-- the Philippine-American War went from the subsequent year, 1899 until 1913. The following war, the Philippine-American War which was actually just a continuation from the Spanish-American War, was minimally referred to in the media at the time and was said to have been won in 1902, though this is now contrary to what we know now.

Additional flags beneath U.S. flag are: peace, lands for the people, public improvements, education, and prosperity.

         
In Levine's The Past in Present Tense, monuments may embed a physical mnemonic-device to instill certain ideas and yet may dilute truth. (12) I see this monument attest to this unfortunately, which is still smack-dab in the middle of a bustling international city. Paradoxically, presently, not many people know the significance of the Dewey monument in Union Square. But the fact that it still stands prominently in such a liberal, radical place that its' citizens take pride in, shows the power that lie in monuments.

starbucks logo heist

                                                                                                                         

Saudi Arabian Starbucks Cafes

Finally, I got a chance to put my kids to bed early so I could work on my logo during the first few days of spring break. The image above is the finished result. It's not as exact as I'd like, but I was working with a deadline and given this was my first go at Illustrator, I don't really feel like being so hard on myself. I  committed early on to heisting the Starbucks logo and as I sat in the lab the first day, I came up blank. I had no idea what I was going to do with it. I was doing some very casual research on anything Starbucks-related and came upon an image of an alternate logo used in the Middle East, namely in Saudi Arabia. The siren is omitted altogether, leaving stars within the circle, floating on water.

 

cutting them out

      

   

a stack of 32 finished stickers

It got me thinking about cultural differences, how figures are not depicted in Islamic cultures, a longstanding tradition which has led them to become masters at calligraphy instead. Anyway, I thought, why not keep the siren and clothe her? And that's when I knew I should cloak her in a burqa! With all the scantily clad female figures found in American media, this was definitely a statement.

 My logo features a figure fully clothed, allowing only a glimpse of the figure's eyes. Instead of a five pointed star, I used an eight pointed star, which is associated with Islam, though Islam does not have any official symbols.  On what used to be the siren's two fins alongside her, I typed in the words, "Allah says: This is Art." Originally I wanted the text to be clear enough to read, but I couldn't figure out how to do that, while retaining the shape of the original fins. I looked through tutorials and did not find anything pertinent. I took this as a sign that the text might be too controversial, maybe sacrilegious. This might be a better version, with the words distorted.

  

I remembered a video my brother (political activist, community leader, hip-hop artist... you know the type) posted on his Facebook a couple years back. The video featured Princess Hijab, a French culture jammer who altered subway ads by covering figures with niqabs (face coverings). She claims that niqabs are not culturally or religiously affliated with any one group. In fact, she doesn't really say what's behind her art, only that it IS art. My logo heist project is dedicated to her. Her gumption is admirable and inspirational. I am striving to be more bold.

My best friend Cherryl, an SF State Art History grad student, was very gung ho about helping me with the actual application of the stickers at a local Starbucks. I knew she'd be into it; she's always been a rebellious, subversive type. I went about sticking them in the store and she went right in after me and began taking pictures.

There were a lot of people around, since it was the weekend but they just looked on quietly in awe.  Good for us, they understood Rule #1-- NO SNITCHING. (That's a Boondocks reference, in case you didn't know.) I stuck a few in the bathroom (on the seat cover dispenser, the garbage can and the paper towel dispenser). Then I put stickers on some coffee bean package displays. Finally, I idly stood by the area where finished drinks are placed for customers to pick them up and I stuck them on random people's drinks by pretending they were mine, turning them around and then pretending like I was mistaken. The process was exhilarating, intense, scary and... it made me feel a bit guilty (mostly for the stickers in the bathroom. I'm sure someone's going to have to remove them once they're found.)

This project was all kinds of fun--I enjoyed every step of the process. I'm seriously considering doing this again.

 

culture jamming

To start off our next project, Culture Jamming, we were assigned to read Mark Dery's article, "Culture Jamming: Hacking, Slashing, and Sniping in the Empire of Signs." (A bit long winded but I love the title-- don't you?)  

Here is the anticipated question (questions, in my case...) that I need to post to incite a class discussion: Do you agree with Dery that even with the so-called "information explosion," society has been regressing into ignorance like never before? Do you see yourself as a part of this ignorant population? If not, what has made you/your situation different from everyone who is included in this group?

Long before we were assigned this Culture Jamming project, I watched a documentary on the culture jammer Ron English called Popaganda: The Life and Crimes of Ron English. It didn't necessarily open my eyes to anything new, as I am non-white and from a lower class background, but it was a great validating feeling to see subversive stuff going on... especially by guys like Ron English who aren't afraid to go to jail--just as long as they get to do their thing. I think it's quite noble. That's a lot more than I can say for myself. Sometimes I have very leftist ideas about corporations, culture, the economy... then when I am confronted by actually doing something about it, I fear that what I have will be taken from me. Kind of a cop out, I know. But I'm sure I'm very American in that way...

s

 

And since I go here a lot... I thought I would do my project on the Starbucks logo. Starbucks is on the fence about being about free trade, being hip, targeted at youth and culture. Then again, they have consistent products, a strong corporate identity, great customer service... and their cafes are usually fairly clean, relaxing places to hang out with a friend, read a book or do some homework. Here is how the company designed their logo concept:

Below are the different changes to the Starbucks logo over the years:

 

This is the Starbucks logo I am going to rework somehow:

amy tan on the creative process

i'm watching this right now-- i LOVE amy tan!

amy tan on the creative process - TEDtalks