El Bulli: The Golden Ticket →

When one cooks creatively, your relationship with your mother’s kitchen is very different. When someone reproduces they reference their memories, they reference their mother’s cooking — the omelettes, the rice. In our case there’s almost nothing to reference because what we do is so different.

What does remain is my mother’s sentiment.

1. nowness.com

Fools’ Interface →

…one infrequently violated but nevertheless important law of good user interface design: don’t force the user to look like a fool.

1. subtraction.com

In Japan, Living Large In Really Tiny Houses →

In my father’s words, “Getting good at living in small spaces is getting good at living.”

“People tend to think of homes simply in terms of floor space. We architects think in 3-D,” Yamashita says. “Using all three dimensions, we can make a space look larger, and more functional. It becomes easier to devise ways of bringing in more light and air.”

“It’s kind of a psychological jujitsu,” Brown says. “That changes your sense of perception from the things that would make you feel claustrophobic perhaps, and rather focusing on the life and the people that you’re with.”

1. npr.org

Seeing Things for the First Time →

One of the most intriguing aspects of photography as an art form is the inherent impact of technology—there’s a fundamental conversation between the photographer, the subject, and the way in which that subject is being captured. What defines photography is not just the perspective and viewpoint of the photographer, but also the medium itself. And as we look back on generations past, it’s often hard to transcend that layer of technology and experience those images in any way other than in the monochromatic tones of the particular film technology that was available at that time.

I think about this often — most recently yesterday when discussing phone apps that add various retro effects to photographs. Polaroid borders, for example, often seem contrived, overused and a bit disingenuous. The best work is honest to its medium.

On the other hand, take black-and-white photography. Originally this was a constraint of technology, but nobody now would argue that black-and-white photography no longer has a place in the photographer’s vocabulary. We may never shoot photographs that technically lack color again, but black-and-white photographs will continue to be made.

Where’s the middle, then? It moves constantly, but is always determined by moderation, appropriateness, and good taste.

Often overlooked and very importantly, if you take photos that look current now they will be indelibly (and hopefully beautifully) timestamped as being from Today in the eyes of future audiences.

And from Brian Eno, 1995:

Whatever you now find weird, ugly, uncomfortable and nasty about a new medium will surely become its signature. CD distortion, the jitteriness of digital video, the crap sound of 8-bit — all these will be cherished and emulated as soon as they can be avoided.

1. Jon Crawford-Phillips, imprint.printmag.com
2. notes.caseyagollan.com

Why I Stopped Snapping Photographs →

August Heffner:

A few years ago, I stopped bringing a camera on vacation. It has been an amazing experiment and I haven’t regretted it once.

Taking a photograph of the Eiffel Tower, for example, seems ridiculous. There are millions of photos of the Eiffel tower…

I know this sounds heavy-handed but I encourage everyone to try it on their vacations. I’ve substituted photograph making (like a smoker would use chewing gum) with a notebook and pens. Every time I feel the urge to take a photograph, I pull out my notebook and draw the scene. I’ve learned a lot more about the places I’ve been and, in every country I’ve traveled to, this method usually created a mob of children around us in any public park. These interactions have been some of the best cultural travel experiences I’ve had, beating any and all museums in the world.

You don’t need Eiffel Tower photos. Or sunsets, or kids (other people’s). But what about the unique moments? And drawing them, too, just for good measure.

Bruce Davidson offers a reason to reconsider leaving that camera home though:

What’s great about looking at your work is the emotion comes back. The emotion comes back. The rhythm of what you were photographing comes back. It’s almost like a musical score. You can see where I may have quit too soon, or stayed too long. Or was bored and took a lot of pictures of nothing because I wanted to put film through the camera. All kinds of things are working when you’re looking at the contact sheet. Also, you see old girlfriends and friends and your children going up and my hairline receding.

1. imprint.printmag.com
2. Casey Gollan