Scotland Photos

Sunrise in Glasgow

Biker Group, Glasgow

The Tall Ship, Glasgow

[I forgot to find out the name or author of this work of art], Glasgow

Sunset in Glasgow

Sunset in Glasgow II

Statue and Cliffs, Edinburgh

Arthur's Peak and the Ocean

Edinburgh Castle, Edinburgh

Sunset in Edinburgh

Sunset in Edinburgh II

Some Guy

“Wait, you don’t work with Nelson? You’re just some guy?”

I could barely believe it either. I’d been in Glasgow less than twelve hours and had already found my way into a party in someone’s apartment. Most of the party was made up of a group of friends, with an assortment of significant others and coworkers. This last designation constituted the pretense of my entrance to the party.

I’d met Nelson on the street. I’d been walking to a bar the Guardian had said was cheap and cool when the group of drunks ahead of me paused to take a picture. Nelson was the photographer and used his artistic license to demand that I join the photo, which of course I did. I like imagining them looking through the night’s photos and seeing me but not knowing who I am.

I hadn’t expected to be engaged in conversation following the photo, or to be invited to a party with these people as a result. Nelson made me promise to tell the other guests I was a new coworker of his, the old ones being the group with whom I’d just been photographed. We rehearsed my role while shepherding the rest of our office (they’d been drinking since 3 pm; it was nearly 10) to the apartment where the party was to be held.

We were greeted by a line of huggers – most of the people at the party had known each other since college and were good friends. (The fact that I would even be able to start a sentence with ‘we’ on the first of five nights traveling alone in Scotland was a luxury I’d not anticipated.) When I reached each new person in the line there was a pause, as I was of course a new face. I mostly stuck to handshakes so as not to be strange but got a few hugs anyway.

The ruse lasted about an hour and a half. In their friendly inquisitions, Nelson’s friends forced me to make up a background for myself. Apparently I was in Glasgow as a social worker as my first clinical experience for credit in my graduate program back in the US. My school had set up an exchange program because there was greater need in Glasgow than locally, and I was enjoying it so far, having only lived here for a few weeks. My flat was on the east side, and no I hadn’t seen any crime there yet, but I’d be sure to keep my wits about me. I hadn’t been in the office long enough to witness any tension between the psychologists and the social workers (apparently this was a complaint of Nelson’s) and would attempt to stay clear of it should I encounter any.

In an eventual lull in conversation between Nelson and myself and one of his closest friends, he leaned in close and gave me a conspiratorial look.

“Todd, you know Dan here, he told you he’s a social worker?”

“Yeah, told me all about it. Says he likes it so far.”

“See, funny thing is, he’s not. I met him on my way here.”

I was enough of a fixture at that point that they let me stick around, having proven myself friendly and unthreatening (are there people who agree to come to parties on such terms who aren’t?). It was a “bad holiday jumper” party, and having not dressed for it I was without one until one of the hostesses leant me an extra one. I was introduced to of the guys who’d been in the other room, and I asked if he’d been told anything about me, to which he responded, “Oh yeah, I heard. You’re the talk of the party.”

It was 3am by the time I left. In their hospitality they’d ensured that I was drunk, and as such I was inspired to wander back to the hostel, which was about a 45-minute walk. I went to the bathroom to consider my exit, and through a combination of not wanting to make a scene or an imposition (God forbid, right?) and hoping to preserve an air of mystery about my presence that night decided to slip out without saying goodbye or thank you. 

Ambivalism

I've been assigned several manifestos to read this week for my Architectural History & Theory:

- "The Manifesto of Futurist Architecture", Antonio Sant'Elia (1914)
- "Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture", Robert Venturi (1965)
- "Junkspace", Rem Koolhaas (2002, republished in the aforementioned Content)

Upon reading and analyzing these the notion of writing a manifesto seems rather quaint, despite the date that the last one was published. Even this is something of an anti-manifesto, a diatribe against the "fallout" from Modernism that never goes so far as to prescribe an alternative. Indeed, both Koolhaas and Venturi are directly responding to the unrealized utopia promised by the era immediately following Sant'Elia's writing.

What I've been observing in this class (and in another on 20th century art) is that this period, roughly 1920-1945, was the last gasp of Movements, and that the full sum of creative work that followed it falls under the vague and enormous umbrella of postmodernism. Broad though that statement is, I think I'm standing on fairly firm ground in making it.

Which leaves us ... where? Here, I guess. Which is everywhere, apparently.

A reading from the art-based class (specifically about painting, but it seems relevant) names the appropriation and combination of various styles Pluralism, and while the author seems to regard this approach as ahistorical and uncritical and its practitioners as dilettantes, to me it seems rather appropriate.

Media today functions like a limitless museum- I'm equally in reach of information about Warhol as I am about Michelangelo. Does the opportunity of Pluralism negate critical engagement? Or is it incumbent upon critics to navigate the field of references laid out by a mixing of styles? Or should I leave my apartment more?

Readings, Watchings, Listenings

I've been taking a lot in recently, largely not for class (sorry, Roger). I'd like someday to distill all this that I've been devouring into something new and stubbornly mine, but until such time as I know how I'll leave a list here.

 - The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway, 1926

 - Superman Comes to the Supermarket, Norman Mailer in Esquire, 1960

 - Annie Hall, Woody Allen, 1977 (movie)

 - Ta-Nehisi Coates' blog on The Atlantic

 - this short story by Tao Lin, 2007

 - Content, Rem Koolhaas, 2004

 - Reflektor, Arcade Fire, 2013 (album)

 - this article about Jonathan Lethem's Chronic City

 - a chapter on Gerhard Richter from Briony Fer's The Infinite Line, 2004

Photos from the Early Goings

Boat Cafe

Street Performer at Tate Modern

Young Girl at Tate Modern

Big Ben, from Trafalgar Square

Regent's Park, Early

The Real Mickey Mouse

Frank and a Stranger

Showtime

The Walkie Talkie

Early Bird Special

Frank on the Thames

SOAS, Brutalism

Two Couples and a Fountain

HMS Belfast and Clouds

Three Surfaces and a Couple Trees

London Skyline from Canary Wharf

Sunset from St. Paul's

Naptime

Murphy's Law

We've had lovely weather here for the past week (at least). I mean real lovely, not just London lovely.

Last night, after a lengthy and stimulating life catch-up with my good friend Jill Brandwein I decided I wanted to catch a London sunrise. I went immediately to bed and set my alarm for 6 am. I got up, narrowly avoided getting drenched, and made it to Primrose Hill just a few minutes after the sun was supposed to. Only it was still dark. It has been all day- the clouds have returned.

Oh well.

Got this photo, which isn't awful. Someday I'll manage to beat the weather.

New Things

Tonight is my last night in the hostel. I'm looking forward to moving into my new digs tomorrow- just in time, in fact, to have a pint (or several) with my predecessor Cassie Ballert. She's in London for the weekend and it'll be good to have an infusion of Michigan into my European adventures.

In other news I've also got a preliminary class schedule going. It's looking like I'll be in the following classes.

Fall:
 - London's Times of Destruction and (Re)Construction
 - The Chapel in Italy, c. 1300-1500: Form, Function, and Decoration
 - Green Futures (taken in The Bartlett School of Planning)
 - History & Theory of Architecture (taken in The Bartlett School of Architecture)

Spring:
 - Skin and Bones: Medeival Bodies in London Museums and Galleries
 - Methodologies of Art History
 - American Geographies: Figuring the West, 1848-1914
 - Modernity Through the Lens: the European Avant-Garde, Utopia, Technology, and Mass Culture

In the interest of full disclosure, I tried to sneak an Architecture studio course in there despite it not being a Humanities course, but I wasn't allowed by UCL. I am, however, very excited to take my Planning and Architecture courses. The latter will focus on a favorite architect of mine, Rem Koolhaas, pictured below with my brother and sister.

Note: Rem Koolhaas is not a member of the Connors family.

In less navel-gazey news, I've been getting a better sense of the interface between America and Europe (or at least their respective sensibilites). American issues with obesity are pretty well known here, well enough at least for a guy I met in a design gallery to inform me that Herman Miller was now making a wider version of the iconic Eames Lounge (have I mentioned that the London Design Festival is this week?) for American markets.

He also told me that upon his visits to US cities he was surprised by how close "posh" (upscale) areas were to more depressed ones. Given this set of charts I saw this week, it's a rather astute observation; it seems that segregation is alive and well in the US, it's just not institutionalized. Obviously race and economics are their own issues, but the wealth gap (chasm?) in the US does often align itself along racial lines. Not that the UK is without its own socioeconomic challenges, but so far it seems that the level of diversity here is much higher (of course, neither Boston nor U of M are known for being terribly diverse- how much of this is culture shock I'm unsure).

Less depressingly, he mentioned that a common trip to the US for Europeans included flying to the east coast and driving to California or Las Vegas. It's interesting, not only because it throws into focus how spacious and geographically varied our country is, but also because this is a trip not many Americans get to do (at least as far as I've been able to observe). Every person to whom I've mentioned driving cross-country has either told me that it was one of the best things they ever did or that it was something they'd always wanted to do. It makes me want to rent a car and drive out into the country here, just for contrast. I don't know if that's legal. More on this later. I should also recommend James Reeves' excellent The Road to Somewhere: an American Memoir here for anyone interested in reading about the nooks and crannies of the US you find when you just get out and drive. After all, isn't that the American dream?