Tag: in real life
S P A C E | Kuala Lumpur
S P A C E | Saigon, ‘Miniparty’
LET’S TALK ABOUT learning. How we discover, find, and make new connections. Ideas, shapes of thinking and the input that comes from places that might not be the ‘usual’ ones. No more boring meetings: What are the containers that make great conversations *happen*? Conversations that lead to better collaboration and better work? Those are important. Let’s not waste time. Let’s make things better, together.
Better and more enjoyable: that’s the key.
How do we design the S P A C E that lets fresh thinking flow?
Let’s consider. Let’s discuss.
‘Strange Geometries’ is our first invite-only salon on this topic. Min 2. Max 6.
WHAT YOU’LL GET. DK will share very short introductions to design and lateral thinking methods, including:
- Grice’s ‘Maxims of Conversation’
- Six Thinking Hats, a method of opening dialogue.
- The Open Space Technologies how-to.
- A copy of the s eBook, Nostalgia Ca Phe (Kismuth Books)
This mini-conversation will be hosted by DK’s Dipika Kohli. She has delivered seminars at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill on the topic of Design Thinking, a series caled SELF as a 9-week experiential program at Stanford University, and for an architects circle in Seattle DK was invited to present, ‘Just Be You.’
Protected: Writing in my head
Protected: Jaisalmer, 1999
S P A C E | Hanoi, ‘Miniparty’
Discovering and designing a new zine: ‘S P A C E | Rīga, ‘Lūdzu’
WHOLE LOT OF STUFF inspired this issue of our Latvia series of zines in S P A C E.
This one is called ‘S P A C E | Rīga, ‘Lūdzu’.
I think it’s the best one.
I always say that about the most-recently published.
A good sign, no?
The issues are in our online store. In real life, there will be a launch party in Rīga on 29 May. All the new works will be available to read.
Launch party in Rīga
29 MAY | S P A C E | Rīga. This Wednesday, DK will be sharing the printed copies of this issue (and the three that precede it, all made while here in Latvia. in the last six weeks). We have been getting to know the scene by wandering around in the city, looking at buildings, picking some spots that have a feeling about them that resonates with us, staying a while, revising, meeting people, meeting them again, getting deeper into the conversations, selecting themes, writing poetry, writing plays, writing and photographing, co-creating with people we have met, discovering the feeling that the place gives us, and wrapping them up in this set of issues. But, as we always do before we close out a stay in a new city, we will gather those whom we have built some kind of genuine connexion with. In a party setting. Just once. For the journeys to be described too much would be to offend them: the unexpected is what we are expecting, at this gathering. Those who inspired the stories. This who shared. Those who welcomed DK. Those who gave time, and cared, and shared with us. Are invited. I’m excited about this, and will look forward to seeing M, I, S, and T, at least, and a handful of others who might decide to RSVP with us. Very limited seats. Advance bookings only. For those who want to experience this, I invite you to RSVP by getting a ticket. Tickets are 12 euro.
How we made S P A C E in Latvia
WORKING OUT OF cafes, borrowed living rooms, and kitchen tables since April 16, 2019, DK and friends are making S P A C E stories in photo essay, illustration, collage, and creative nonfiction. There will be four issues of our international zine collection that will be set right here in Rīga.
They are in our online shop.
- S P A C E | Rīga, ‘Sunny Side of the Street”
- S P A C E | Rīga, ‘Drift’
- S P A C E | Rīga, ‘The Weather Report’
- S P A C E | Rīga, ‘Lūdzu’
For this collection, the works were created by a unique international team: Dipika Kohli, A. Spaice, Zafar Imran, Alexis Jokela, and BOSS. Special thanks for creative consultation with: Nils Don Sihvola (ig) and S P A C E contributing editor, Mike Dynamo. Big thanks also to Zina Olehnoviča for co-hosting ‘Art of Conversation’ with DK in real life at her shop Tortik Time, and to Samir Shukla for commissioning new writing from us, writing about Latvia, for our ongoing column for Saathee Magazine. Also to D, north side of town, like, way, for showing me around and telling it like it is. Don’t know if you’ll see this and know this ‘D’ is you, but wow, you really helped me get going on this project. Couldn’t have made this without your frank comments, dark humor, and other flat and honest sideways observations.
Order the zine, S P A C E | Rīga, ‘Lūdzu’…
Meantime, here is where you can order S P A C E | Rīga, ‘Lūdzu’…
Atelier S P A C E | Riga
Make a ‘zine’ with DK. Get to know more about the DIY-style of publishing a mini-magazine. Techniques, templates, samples and demonstrations are all part of this short, sweet creative workshop that has been traveling Southeast Asia and N. Europe since 2017.
Discover S P A C E, the conversations and the zines. Make, take, converse, and enjoy. Learn more about DK’s Atelier S P A C E and couture zines at instagram.
Workshop fee: €15, includes workshop materials + 1 coffee or tea.
Max 8.
Kismuth in 2019
HERE IS THE LATEST story that was published in Saathee Magazine, as part of DK’s monthly column, ‘Kismuth and the Way.’ It’s called ‘New Currents’.
I had written ‘Just Being Honest’ for a year or so for Saathee when I had first gotten going on the road, in 2013, then took a break to write Breakfast in Cambodia which came out of those columns and another one, ‘The Village Report,’ that ran for two years under different editors at Seattle’s Northwest Asian Weekly. Subsequently, I got the idea in my head to do other things like conversation salons that led to things and people and smart, cool moments that reminded me the poetry of writing isn’t in the shaping of words and sentences, but in the connexion that comes of the spontaneous interactions that come up out of nowhere when you just make yourself open to receive them.
Such thinking opens worlds of doors. And luckily, I got to examine a few of them.
That made me do the next thing. Work with a very small team of people who helped me understand this better, clarify it, (thank you!), and then conceptualize the making of our mini-mag, S P A C E. Couldn’t have done this without the new inputs from people I have met since leaving the United States, and discovered on the road, but also, in Cambodia, and learned to be a part of conversations that are longitudinal, carry more weight with the history and time that gives and gives, reminding us that we are not alone but a part of something bigger, after all, even if the struggle to define that exactly becomes unwieldy and eventually falls into a thing that I now understand is ‘post post modernism,’ ie the tossing of definitions themselves, altogether. This is coming into focus for me, in yet another new place, another new country: Latvia. More about that for the next column, of course.
POLITICS x ART. I was going to write more here about how there are political events that are happening right now that are disturbing and upsetting, especially in countries that don’t even care about human rights (including my own country of birth). But I realize that I’m not informed enough to be able to comment on those things. Still, the state of the world and the oppression of voices of illuminating people who could be the ones who bring humanity towards a better, more equal place is upsetting to me, as it might be to many others who are, at heart, poets. I’m writing from a wild, wacky place right now in Latvia that’s fancy and has ‘Poet’ in its title, like for real. Where, there is one very chatty person who has been asking me a torrent of questions about why I write, how I decided to be a poet (does one decide?), whether I believe in knowledge (nope), what I think about my home country (which is where, again?) and what I might do to sell my books (‘I don’t sell’). Ask me about the boiled egg. It’s too funny.
Funny things are going on, around me, left and right, and reminding me of the absurd that I clung to for so long in my writing, and comics-making, at some point, during the late 2000s when I wanted to try my hand at ‘visual artist’ as, say, a job title. That was short-lived, soon as I found out that the reception for the art show, where people met one another in real life because there I was hosting the show and people were there because of the show, but for me, what I found out, for example at the reception for Today I Love You (2012, was it?) and later, the launch party for Breakfast in Cambodia (2016), it was the mix that was most intriguing to me. Real life. The stage of being there,e together, in a framed moment… a box, kind of, a box of ‘where’ and ‘when’…
Which was how I hit on the idea of framing the moments, altogether discarding the art show, the books, etc. Let’s have parties. Let’s call them S P A C E.
Hosting one tonight, in Latvia.
Whodathunk.
Well, well.
Here we go.
Off to the new chapters, discovering and running into the next.
War, climate, politics, fear mongering… these things are there. News is bad, people don’t care about each other, the modern world is one of disparity and ennui and disruption of the harmony that can come when we are able to enjoy each other’s differences, instead of parrying one another for no reason other than to fill a void, internally, that could have been prevented if we had had better parenting. Societies begin there, right? Good parenting. And here I am, opining. I don’t mean to do this, really.
But really. I can go on and on and on…
But I’ll spare you.
To the work of making art, which is the only thing, I think, that a poetically inclined person can do in this era to stay sane…
Atelier S P A C E | Tokyo
Atelier S P A C E is a two-year roving popup zinemaking atelier. It’s a project of the boutique studio, Design Kompany (started in 2004 in Seattle – presently based in Phnom Penh). On the road since Sept. 2017 from: Battambang, Cambodia, Atelier S P A C E co-creates a weekly zine. This is done with people DK discovers on the spot, in the locations where the popup zinemaking workshops go. DK invite others to co-create the zines. So far, some of the places we’ve been to make zines with others in this way are: Sheffield, Helsinki, Hanoi, Berlin, Seattle, Kuala Lumpur, and Phnom Penh. Stop by. See what’s up. Be a part of the experience at Atelier S P A C E, where some of us will be on hand to write, print, collage and sew with some of you a fresh zine, to be made on the spot: S P A C E | Tokyo, ‘Osananajimi’. Learn more about DK’s Atelier S P A C E and couture zines at instagram.
S P A C E | Tokyo will be a ‘yomikai’ get-together for those who want to read what we create, together, at Atelier S P A C E | Tokyo.
Request more info about either event…
S P A C E | Huế
Order the zine…
14 March | ‘The Resistance’
Let’s talk about ‘The Resistance.’ A conversation party and zine reading. DK and friends in Hanoi invite you to be a part of this very limited-edition popup, S P A C E | Hanoi. Save the date for 14 March. Hosted by A. Spaice, who was last in Hanoi to make ‘N’ Hanoi: NARRATIVE.
For S P A C E | Hanoi, ‘The Resistance,’ taking place on 14 March, the time and place will be shared *only* with guests who RSVP. This helps us keep the conversations small in scale and limits it to those who are interested, only. We’re excited to be back in the city after such a long time, and to connect and reconnect, but even better, to interconnect, new and different others whose paths might not have crossed. As per usual: in S P A C E.
To RSVP, go here.
How we’re making S P A C E on the road
Best part of making S P A C E is the chance encounters, stories-in-the-field, and finding out of things that happen when you simply create a bounded box of ‘where’, and ‘when.’ To show up. And see. What the things that are there (and also within, and so many more things to say about this), can tell you. ‘See what making S P A C E can reveal to you about… you.’ That’s what I had once written and shared on a website page that existed far away from this one, in another time, another moment, when I still believed that most people want to do the hard work of reflection. And trust me to help them do that. But what I found is it’s far too hard to do this, let alone subscribe to someone else’s method, and when all that happens, you also have these moments of deep metaphysical questioning, and sometimes that gets a little tricky because we have a lot of things to bring up and some of the time it’s not comfortable.
‘Bigtalk’
Talking about business and talking about ‘tasks’ and talking about ‘things to do in order to reach success’ are more often toted into the public spaces of conversation. (Which I find terribly boring.) Rather, what if we could make more S P A C E for connexion, on a different level. Talking about ‘purpose,’ for example. ‘Values,’ and ‘drive.’ Where this picture was taken is where for a little more than two weeks Design Kompany designed, hosted, dialogued about, and conversed deeply about things related to these latter. Who we are and why things matter most to us, in these instances of sharing in the bounded box of time and space, for the Atelier S P A C E that invites us to look at things but also to let go of the looking, and just engage and enjoy whatever falls into the space, too…
Quieting, stillness
This one was really good. I’m going to write about the things we uncovered in a future zine, set in the town where this picture was taken, and made in this very space. Writing. Designing. Editing. And most importantly, thrashing ideas about. But then, letting go of them, too, and feeling the way towards the rightness of the things to share. Sharing.
More is awaiting. In the ateliers to come. And in the conversations shaping up through the online zine S P A C E, and its attendant small circles of communities too. To the journeys, then. The near, the now, the next.
S P A C E | Rovaniemi, ‘Arctic Circle’
Today, in S P A C E, we share S P A C E | Rovaniemi, ‘Arctic Circle.’ Discovery. Connexion. Recommencements. And starts. But most importantly: showing up for the I-don’t-even-know-what-it-is-yet.
‘I’m listening’
‘Arctic Circle’ is heavily inspired by a conversation that had begun in a southeast Asian locale, in autumn of 2016, and moved around in cyberspace before recommencing in the north of Finland almost exactly, if my calculations are accurate (and they’re only perfectly accurate 4.85% of the time) two years thence. A very important thread, for me,
I’ll refrain here from too much wordage, as is my unwieldy, cumbersome and ‘getting murky with communicating, DK’ habit. That’s why for this issue, I made a fresh commission. This one, a photo essay. ‘Arctic Circle’ is a set of images that are interpretations of what I had shared with BOSS.
Including, but not limited to: zines, bits of leaf, some twigs, a large wooden button, thin strips of the trunk of a birch, Queen Anne’s lace (pressed, flattened), black tissue paper, words, glyphs, and… um. Moss. (I was worried they wouldn’t let me pass through immigration with this last.) His photos turned out to be more than I could have put together in any kind of series myself: owing to the fact that the new and different emerged. Fresh eyes. Listening.
Read more about the way this story came into shape, in the first place, or get a copy of the issue, S P A C E | Rovaniemi, ‘Arctic Circle’ at either of these links at the end of this post.
Acknowledgements
Special thanks to Sanna Upola at Kärsämäki Library for challenging DK to make this set of writings from Finland more interesting than it could have possibly been without your input. Atelier S P A C E | Finland benefitted greatly from our conversations, for sure.
After, I met more helpful people briefly at an intriguing section of art books at Korundi Art Museum, and amidst all the great natural lighting flooding insets where I could probably have stayed for years, quietly writing and reading and musing about Art and Design and Architecture, at the Rovaniemi City Library.
Wow, the famous Finnish architect Alvar Aalto‘s design has exquisite sunken insets and exciting natural lighting. No wonder a handful of architecture students whom I asked about what they were doing observing and making notes and documenting strangers with photos were up to, at first a little skeptically, then more convivially, chatting them all up and asking not to be photographed while also inquiring about natural ventilation. They’d come all the way from Japan, made the trip, specially, to study it. Thanks also to Arktikum for press passes to help DK research and find context to make Atelier S P A C E | Rovaniemi.
And speaking of putting a thing together after contemplating it, here’s how to get the issue itself… ‘Arctic Circle…’ It’s free for collaborators and current members of S P A C E. Also available as a single issue download (USD $7). Click this pic to below to order it at our online store. Delivers instantly.
Single issue | Subscribe to S P A C E
S P A C E | The State of Publishing
JOIN DK and friends in HANOI for this unique conversation salon on the state of publishing.
LAST SEEN IN DURHAM, NC, when DK and bloggers, editors, photographers, and writers had gathered at Mercury Studio for a short, packed, nonlinear and very frank conversation about the state of publishing. Some of the outtakes informed how DK evolved into the zinemaking atelier that we are today. It’s remarkable to note that we still have the honest, real, and relevant conversation notes: they still hold, today. I’ve been going through this right now, as we look at our archives and get rid of most things that are no longer part of what we are doing here at this studio, but wow. The conversation salon, ‘The State of Publishing,’ was, by far, one of my favorites.
Maybe because I worked in newspapers before DK.
Or because I love community publishing.
Lately, reading and learning about how to design for the aesthetic moment. More ahead, if you are part of this online conversation that we are getting going now, in small circles, in our eZine and its attendant forums, S P A C E. More here.
Inspired by the things that are popping up now as we review our past works in salon making and the outcomes that came from those, I’m interested in convening more people gain for a conversation about publishing today. This time it’s 2019. This time it’s not Durham NC but Phnom Penh. I’m looking for people to co-host this with. Are you curious? Get in touch. This is the beginning. Let’s converse. Let’s play. I’ll personally be there to host this event. Ask me anything about vector art and image trace: I’m lately getting super into these things. Design. Zines. DIY-style publishing.
Who else finds this intriguing? Let’s find out.
S P A C E M A K I N G
It’s become clearer to me that my job is to continue to do this: to make space (ie S P A C E) for a conversation that stretched across the different disciplines, and even connected some people who never had met but who had lived in Raleigh, Durham, or Chapel Hill for decades, was great. I want to thank some of the people who were there, that night: Laura Ritchie, a curator, who was one of the most supportive of DK’s projects in Raleigh-Durham NC; Michael Faber, a designer who also came out to many of our meet ups to see what we were doing and share what he was up as well; Clarion Content’s editor Aaron Mandel, who gave us shout-outs sometimes when we least expected them, theIndependent Weekly‘s then editor Lisa Sorg for showing and and lending the voice of that paper; and Paul Deblinger for telling me to go and read R. Pirsig’s ZAMM (and insisting, and that, in the end, led to the things that came from there: journeying, the road, adventures, the rest).
Disparate voices convening in the forerunner of what’s now S P A C E: that was the point of it. That was the goal. Getting together to learn from one another. Be inspired. Share. The actual learnings, in real life, where it’s not packaged into things that go out as blips into social media feeds. Instead, it’s a conversation. Lately, reading and learning about how to design for the aesthetic moment. More ahead, if you are part of this online conversation that we are getting going now, in small circles, in our eZine and its attendant forums, S P A C E. More here.
Inspired by the things that are popping up now as we review our past works in salon making and the outcomes that came from those, I’m interested in convening more people gain for a conversation about publishing today. This time it’s 2019. This time it’s not Durham NC but Phnom Penh. I’m looking for people to co-host this with. Are you curious? Get in touch. This is the beginning. Let’s converse. Let’s play.
–DK
RSVP…
RSVP to make sure you have a spot. Limited seats. Advance bookings only.
YOUR HOST…
DK’s Dipika Kohli will host this event. ‘Ask me anything about vector art and image trace: I’m lately getting super into these things. Design. Zines. DIY-style publishing. Is this of interest? Let’s find out.’
LEARN MORE ABOUT DK’S SALONS…
Processed Identity | GOOD | ThisBigCity
#innovation #design #designthinking
Photo: Design Kompany
S P A C E | Brussels, ‘The Work of Art’
Philosophy is sometimes described as the conscious examination of life, so we humans can be aware enough of what surrounds us in order that we may make qualified decisions. By so doing, we can choose to exclude or include certain experiences (or design our societies). Yes: design them, in other words, so we can all live more pleasurably.
In this issue, new photography from Brussels, taken by S P A C E art director Jānis Žguts, is paired with the line artwork of DK’s Dipika Kohli. It’s a collaboration that began in 2016, at the conversation salon, ‘Rooftop Philosophy,’ held in Phnom Penh, and has continued from what began as a simple question: ‘Who wants to talk about this with me?
‘Richness and complexity’ are one of the things we design for in S P A C E (ask me for my 7-point checklist if you are a member?), so it makes sense that from there, a journey of conversation and discovery about the things that philosophy invites us to mull over continued in both short bursts of extended query, or over monthslong quiet spaces where the team could reflect, both separately and with others, too.
Such conversation spacemaking is exactly what this zine is designed to invite. I
In fact, this zine is part of a series of art books, photozines, and creative nonfiction works by international, collaborating teams at DK. Just underway since December 2018, the project will continue as long as people are engaged, curious, and joining our subscription list to say ‘yes, tell me more.’
Get to know us and others in S P A C E. You can learn more about S P A C E and how to be part of these online and real life conversation salons, as well as read the digital zines we are sharing every Tuesday, at our crowdfunding page.
Protected: S P A C E | The Book of New Things
S P A C E | ‘6N’
DK ARE QUIETLY in the conversations that always happen at the start of our ‘N’ salons: online, indefinitely and tentatively, and with a whole lot of gumption. If we manage to get 16 strangers to convene in a city, around a topic that starts with an ‘N’, what might happen? What magic could we make? It might look like this. But what about redesigning? After ‘N’ Helsinki: NEUROSIS, the program which we are currently writing a short story about for the zine S P A C E | Helsinki, ‘Coat Check,’ there’s a lot of scope for making it… simpler.
Hard, the original design. Which involve this… Writing to the internet blindly and seeing if people will respond to the query, ‘Do you want to meet new people? In your city which has an ‘N’ in it, right? At a venue that starts with an ‘N’? It costs, by the way, and we’ll choose a date together amongst only those who’ve registered.’ It’s a miracle we managed to do this 4 times.
Whose job is it to create quality public spaces, or active the ones that are there but being used in boring ways like people doing digital nomad stuff that really means they’re staring at their laptops and not actively connecting with the ambient wisdom of the right-around-me-right-here-right-now? Okay, I’m editorializing, but I think you know what I mean. We all know what it feels like when the conversation moves, is great, and people are smiling and enjoying themselves and even learning something at the same time. Had a few small glimmers into the future, while beginning the hard slog of querying total strangers about doing the next one, the next ‘N’, with DK. In S P A C E. A work in progress. As all great pieces truly are.
Special thanks to Khiang Hei yesterday for co-hosting with DK the small salon-party, ‘S P A C E | Phnom Penh.’ Was really good to reconnect after several years and talk shop, talk art, talk art circles, talk failing art circles and exodus of the people who make things, talk about the opportunities and critique and politics and documentary photography and his upcoming show at Rutger’s University, and what it means to be an artist, and the work of work (well, that didn’t get totally discussed at that space but we did bring that party on into the late late evening with F. at, um, a bar. I try to stay away from these places on Friday nights, but you know. Sometimes you gotta see what else is happening in the world besides your own little forays into internet composition and discovery and all that jazzy jazz. Speaking of jazz: this is a topic I love to write about, but, like ‘N’ and things at DK, in general, am finding it’s a very select group that actually also loves free and bebop jazzification of musics. Erm.)
F., if you see this, this is what I was talking about…
[Renownked comic artist] Hal Foster warned in the mid-1990s, ‘the institution may overshadow the work that it otherwise highlights: it becomes the spectacle, it collects the cultural capital, and the director-curator becomes the star.’ More about relational art.
Comments are open, for a bit.
Reality and trust
Update: S P A C E members are invited to weigh in at this page.
TWO PEOPLE will know what the title of this post is about. Two. Just two. I met them yesterday. A and T. The question I posed to elicit these answers is a private one, something I won’t share outside of my innermost circles. (That’s just a handful of people, around the world, with whom I connect deeply and talk about ideas with regularly, over time. For progression and depth. More about that in a second. But together, we call this journey, a foray into S P A C E). For now, I need to say thanks. To A and T.
Thank you both for being there, on the rootftop, for sharing with me and admiring as we, who are tenderhearted and questing, the view of the half-moon beneath the clouded, darkened, past-dusk, and past-nine polluted skies and the redness of that lunar orb: vague and yet, alluring.
For the last few years, I’ve been focusing so much on how to ‘design’ for these kinds of moments. So much, that I forgot how to just let the universe lead me straight into them. Which, of course, is how I first started. Running into this: the magic. The art. Oi, but it’s getting big. Already. That’s okay. That’s where the good stuff is.
Acquaintanceship
INTRIGUE. There was the mystery of it that drew me to that exact spot, to contemplate it for a bit. But also: stopping. Standing still, for a moment. Atop the world, there, or, at least, atop Phnom Penh. I’m not much of a going-out type of person, but I’ve made a pact with myself to ‘try new things’ more often, especially in the town that’s been where I’ve been lucky enough to stop for a while and take stock of the things that, for me, have been sieved out to be the clear, wide understandings that say, together, ‘This counts.’
Like I said, there was another moment, in another bar, on another roof, in the same town, on the same topic that you and I, A and T, together, explored. Because I’m a sort of nerd about relational art, I have to bring it up: I have to think about how that thing that was rests next to this thing that is. (Is this reality?) More about that another day, maybe when we all get better acquainted.
Continue reading “Reality and trust”
Hitting ‘print’ on ‘Janteloven’
… And I’m excited, too, to finish the next issue already, today is the launch of S P A C E member Aske Pedersen‘s ‘Janteloven.’ Really great to work on this, I’m feeling excited to share it with our community, soon. Today we’re just gonna stare it internally, in DK’s very small, most inner circle of S P A C E: editors and friends, who’ve been talking with us, teaching us new ways of trying things, experimenting, exploring, traveling, discovering, and most importantly, writing and making, with us, these past 2+ years, around the world. But I do have a public page, too. Find it here.