Building Bicycles for Two

I went to see the Starn Brothers' bamboo installation at Tallix yesterday (Big Bambu). Some of the really old, huge stalks of bamboo look like elephant legs. The artwork was okay, but what it really did was make me even more obsessed with the idea of doing the bamboo bike workshop in Brooklyn. I want a bamboo bike (and to provide one for someone who really needs transportation!!

leaving the body

As a kid, I was obsessed with Lois Duncan novels and the concept of astral projection—willing your spirit to travel free of your body. [There was the thrilling story about Navajo twins separated at birth, one good, one plotting vengeance for her unhappy life. When the lonely girl's body dies her baaad spirit shows up and takes residence in the body of the happy one while her spirit is out running around. What could be more exciting for a pre-teen?]

And, the unruly winter weather has me admiring snowshoes for runners that have springs in them, turning otherwise boring ground-bound humans into snow kangaroos.

But neither of these examples are the body leaving I refer to: Rather than worrying after my soul, I'm pondering where the old bod will go when I die. Cremation seems like a waste of resources. Burial is good, but chemicals and makeup and expensive coffins are yuck, and not what we ought to be planting in the earth. In other countries you can be same-day buried without all the chemical pollutant fuss, but in the U.S., that's still rare. There are new eco-cemeteries, but somehow I expect they find ways to charge you an arm and a leg. I'm into the idea of simple home burial. Plant me with my cats in the side yard.

This is the best thing I got out of Six Feet Under. [Some slack here, please: I was sick delirious dying, and the gfriend rented full seasons to distract from the agony.] Annoying funeral director Nate buries annoying vegan chef Lisa au naturale, no box, in the woods. No rows, no markers, no mowing or plastic flowers. The idea seemed so lovely, and so illegal.

Heard the rumor that Tennessee is the only state where you can bury your human loved-ones in your yard. Go to town with deceased cats, dogs, snakes, rats, rabbits, groundhogs, squirrels, deer, and birds, but it's gonna cost you to lose your humans.

I thought of leaving my body to the faeries at Short Mountain. They'd get some good compost, and would likely have a ritual involving drumming, which would make my hovering spirit happy. Mom fiddled with the fantasy by bringing up the difficulties of legally transporting a human body across state lines. I guess I'll have to get old on communal lesbian land in TN, and, if at all sick or feeble, will have to be restricted within state lines. (Turns out Ohio and Vermont will work, too.) Preferably, I will expel my last breath within dragging distance of a good-sized compost heap.

Or, the gov could chill and let us have our dead in every state.

Note to swimmers: Ocean dumping is legal!

The beautiful GONER tag is by Jonathan Berger, from his Founder, GONER, Seer series of shows in 2007.

signs of change

1. Beautiful posters from Exit Art's Signs of Change show, curated by Dara Greenwald and Josh MacPhee.
2. Brooklyn scaffolding used as an "ad" for a JustSeeds art show, from f.trainer.

radish sculpture

Several years ago, I carved radishes as holiday ornaments. It just made sense, with the beautiful red and white and the nice smell. They shriveled after about 10 days, but were lovely while they lasted. Well, I've been outdone. Check out Noche de Rabanos in Oaxaca!

Photo thanks to Skull a Day and Planeta.

touched

We've talked botanigrams before (moss graffiti, guerilla gardening and the like), billboard alteration, and wheatpasting, but here is another version, clean tagging or reverse graffiti. This version, by Paul Curtis, is paid for by advertising agencies, and riffs off those who've been writing messages in dirt for years. Using graffiti styles as advertising isn't new, unfortunately, but creative types are happy to steal back methods that have been lifted from street artists.

Using cleaning brushes (or in some instances, power washers and stencils), tagging or drawing into grime does have the allure of things that have been touched or used a zillion times. Picture the worn and darkened wood of your grandma's trowel handle. It can be that beautiful.

But it doesn't mean I have to give up spray paint!

new takes on igloos

All images are from The Snow Show. Doesn't it make you want to build one?

winter planting planning

Though it's 18 degrees outside, winter has barely started, and already my mailbox is filled with seed catalogs. They do know how to prey on us...planting is on my mind. Today I'm re-appreciating the work of Agnes Denes, who, back in the eighties, took urban gardening to another level by planting (and harvesting) a wheat field on a landfill in Manhattan. I'd seen images of that work before, but didn't know she'd gotten in early on tree planting mania, by reforesting areas in Australia and Finland. This is installation art of the best kind.