This is an exploration of the last several years of my life. Each Little Blank Book is a short examination, and together they form a collection of where I am today. Blank, they can only be read through digital interaction, exposing my affinity for the relationship between digital and physical media with the user.
Decided to get a design job, worked at a magazine, learned what "bitch work" really meant. Lost interest in print. Learned about code. Decided to tutor, taught kids how to Flash and semiotics. Got a job at Wunderman. Had a blast, enjoyed the frequency my boss swore and they got drunk. Left to concentrate on schooling. Graduated after the shit hit the fan, Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, AIG, you remember.
Started out not being able to sit still. Found an outlet: drawing. Was moved by sculpture, ended up falling in love with the smell of fixer and film. Made some moves, kissed some girls. Decided to get some schooling and try to grow up. Learned about design, loved, lost. Worked with some great artists.
There are a lot of cities on this little planet, and a lot of people I hope to meet. For now I'm leaving you with an email and a phone number. You can bet on both to be a bit more concrete than my location. At least for now.
cellular phone: 734.812.4006
electronic mail: jim@yellowskyscraper.com
A very tall building of many stories, constructed over periods of time, built on a transient foundation. Constantly under renovation and continuously under construction. Able to move with time, allowing for inevitable growth and change.
In most cases these days it is far more efficient and cost effective to solve a problem without really solving the problem at all. If patching a hole is more cost effective than figuring out how the hole got there in the first place, why not just patch the hole? We build more roadways to accommodate our ever growing commuter culture, but how far must it go? With the ever increasing time we spend on the road, especially in traffic jams, when will the time come when we stop building more roads and try to understand this phenomenon for what it is and what is behind it? This micro site is a catalyst for discussion on the topic at hand, how do we address this problem? Do we really need to expand our concrete landscape even farther? When will it cease?
Have you ever stopped and thought about how many things you own, I mean really, every single thing in your everyday space and why you have them. I find that within my clutter many things go predominantly unused or even forgotten. Why do we keep so much that we don't really use or need? What compels us to hang on to the clutter? Perhaps it's more about our emotional relationship with the object than its physical attributes. These relationships can be as simple as utility or a fascination, or as complex as a memory or sentiment. Whether large or small, utilitarian or emotional, this relationship seems to prevail over the tangible object.
So, through a detailed inventory of my personal work space, I bring myself to you. This is the documentation of the relationships I have with the things I own. This is my Jimventory.
Love is transient, intense, and most of the time, unattainable. I'm not sure about its relationship with me just yet. But I do know that without it, I might not have accomplished what I have to date. I might not have become a designer. I wouldn't be here, at the end of my college career, and you wouldn't be there reading about it. Do I have faith in it? Perhaps, although I'm not sold on the idea that I entirely understand it yet.
Loss, the one thing I can truly attribute to CCS. I went in with half an idea, and exited with a quarter. I developed an unhealthy addiction to caffeine and Taco Bell, which led to a bout with colitis and a rouge set of kidney stones, that were, to say the least, surprising. I can no longer just make something with out questioning myself throughout every step of the process. I experienced insomnia for several months, and lost footing mentally. Despite the all the hardship and privation, I enjoyed myself, and wouldn't trade any of the past four and a half years for a damn thing.
I was lucky enough to experience a few throughout my stay at CCS. It was pure happenstance that I managed to get stuck with this group of extremely talented and critical individuals, minus a few stragglers of course. To my fellow designers, but more importantly to my friends.
To all the interactive power moves, catch phrases, and mind blowing methodologies. To the type pairs, the reappearing doilies, the oversized type, and the crazy patterns. To the silk screened sarcasm, and the reputation for tardiness. To the face scans, and all the boxes of coffee. To all the things that helped make me a better person and a stronger designer. Cheers.
I tend to be shy, so shy that I freeze up in front of large crowds, small crowds and sometimes when I'm alone. I'm indecisive. I chase windmills. I'm an alcoholic with standards, as if being a snob somehow justifies drinking too much. I dislike that twenty or so minutes it takes to fall asleep. I usually bring up the two things you shouldn't in mixed company. I'm often caught arguing about something. I physically can not converse with the opposite sex despite repeated attempts, I'm just not that charming. My humor is usually misdirected and awkward, resulting in confusion and/or long silences. I sometimes mumble. Oh yeah, and I can't spell or properly structure sentences for the life of me.
Ambivalence: having mixed feelings or contradictory ideas about something or someone. In most cases you need only look to the nearest fence, cause I'll be on it.
Curiosity: a strong desire to know or learn something. There isn't a thing that isn't worth exploring, no matter how apparently dangerous it may be.
Indecision: the inability to make a decision quickly. There has to be adequate time to process all of the variables, situations worth taking time must be allowed it.
Anxiety: a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome. What isn't there to be afraid of these days? Walking out your door is a risky endeavor.
A degree in Design offers many things, an official title and set of skills. I can tell someone what I am, what it is that I do, and expect that certain assumptions will be made as a result. It fits nicely on a resume, it implies an aptitude, and it tells others that I can perform a certain job with some proficiency.
I, on the other hand, am rather uncertain of what graphic design is. I'm uncertain about where or what graphic design is to me and what form I'll take from it. It's this uncertainty that drives me to design and create. It's the question, the wonder, it's the uncertainty that fuels my ambition.
Graduation: the successful completion of a course of study or training, having been awarded an undergraduate academic degree.
I learned about design, right in the middle of one of the best examples of old industrial decline and what that means to a community. I learned about criticism, what it means to have thick skin, a process, and well... to learn. I learned to throw push pins into walls. I learned what design was, next to the reality of failure and our mass justification of the situation. I became cynical of Design's purpose and function. I learned that letterheads and micro-sites aren't the answer for me. But most importantly, I learned that finding the answers is in my own hands, and Design gave me what I need to find them.
Metal fabrication. I have always been sculpturally minded, plus nothing is more bad ass than working with metal. New Media, I intend to find out exactly what this is. Oh yeah, most importantly, paying off those ungodly student loans that came with this education. Or, perhaps, death in absentia, after a bit more research and legal consultation of course.
The freeways in Detroit are great; they offer the commuters a way into the center of the city, expediting them past all of the emptiness and decay. Some say the freeway fostered this modern urban shrinkage, Detroit being the first to have a freeway is exemplary of this paradigm.
There is a story in everyone, in every place. Each person that crosses your path has the potential to affect you. Positively or negatively you shape your surroundings with every action, with every move. You can't expect to change the story of the world, but you can affect the stories around you.
Design can be very dirty, especially when coupled with marketing or advertising. Design isn't created through comity, Design isn't coercion, Design isn't the cone vacuum. It's expression, it's information, it's education. The status quo is something to wash your hands from, maybe not to make a better world, but perhaps to make things a bit more interesting again. Design wasn't meant to sell socks, design was meant to inform, to educate, to elevate social health.
So here I am, at the end of that chapter everyone keeps talking about, I'm at the end and beginning of my experience with Design. I find that it can sometimes be difficult to focus on what's happening right in front of me, while staring into the uncertain. It's a bit frightening, to be unsure of the steps you should or shouldn't take, what direction to go in, or how many directions to go in.
The last day of school isn't that different from your first. All the emotion and uncertainty of being on your own, or at least you can't help thinking that you are. You're left there with a bunch of strange kids, without your mom or dad to comfort you. It can be a terribly uneasy feeling, or maybe an exciting one. After seventeen and some odd years of organized learning, you're left in the same place, the same situation, an even bigger world than the one you left behind.