Ferris Wheels

I have been inactive for the holidays, but since most of the people that read this are around Fresno for the holidays as well, I guess it doesn't matter too much.

A side note for Carly, one of the first things I saw when I got to Fresno was a big ferris wheel. Honestly, its part of a big holiday thing at a new little league sports complex. Fresno is everything you hoped!

This American Life

I heard a facinating story on

This American Life

this morning. They devoted the entire program to it, which is rare. It was about an evangelical pastor, Reverend Carlton Pearson, who has basically been labeled a heritic because he is preaching that Hell does not exist. Or rather he is preaching that Hell is not the ultimate destination of those who are not born again.

there were some things that he said that I found troubling, mostly concerning the pitfalls of the megachurch, but overall I found the story well presented and enthralling. I highly recomend everyone give it a listen. The program is about an hour long, and will be available on the website soon.

This American Life

Megachurch Architecture

I just heard an update on NPR about the controversy of megachurches that are cancelling Christmas day services. I think Ed already mentioned the irony of the evangelical whinning about the shift to Happy Holidays, etc.

So I thought I would post a link to an article at Slate magazine about

megachurch architecture

It has a slide show as well. At some point I would really like to spend more time thinking about church architecture. Look for an article withing the next five years. By the way I should say that my goal over the next five years is to publish several articles on a variety of topics in a variety of publications. This is partly to start building my Phd application, but more about starting my career as an academic taking part in architectural debate. To date I have had one article pblished in the department journal, and edited the same journal the following year. Sure it's just a department journal, but you have to start somewhere.

This is the title of a book against imersion baptism

I found this while doing a search in the UW library database for "anabaptist."

Young, Samuel, fl. 1684-1700

The duckers duck'd, and duck'd, and duck'd again,
head, and ears, and all over; for plunging, scolding,
and defaming : Occasioned by a message
brought me by an Anabaptist. Thus if you stop not the
press, four men will swear sodomy against you. Humbly
offered to the consideration of learned, pious
Anabaptists; who confess I have given their cause of
plunging a dreadful blow. With friendly address to Mr.
Philosensus, whose mistake in thus joyning this Greek
and Latin word together, helps me to a thought against
plunging. That it not only tends to, but actually doth
deprive some men, but especially women, (on their own
confession) of their senses when baptized, (as they
call it) and therefore is not, cannot be an ordinance
of Christ, but a human, or rather diabolical
invention. With more arguments against plunging. By
Trepidantium Malleus

Thesis update

I am in the process of restating my thesis topic. As expected it continues to evolve, and fluctuate between levels of specificity. As one of my advisors said, you should not expect your thesis to solve the worlds problems, and should view it as the beginning of a larger project. Actually he said that about dissertations, which in my mind means it applies even more to a masters thesis. This provides some relief, because I am beginning to realize that I may not reach any conclusion, or at least that I will not have a well formulated answer to the question I anticipate, "So what is and is not ethical ornament."

I'm offering up the latest draft of my blurb for comment.

The goal of this thesis is to clarify relevant ethical concepts as they relate to architectural ornamentation and demonstrate how misunderstanding and misapplication of ethical concepts have influenced architectural theory and practice past and present.

It is vague, I know. The rough outline is that within ethics there was a separation of telos, the idea of an end goal, from the Aristotelian idea of "things as they were-things as they are-things as they should be." In architecture this translated to a focus on truth and authenticity of things as they are, namely materials. Ruskin talked about "The Lamp of Truth" which paved the way for Loos' rejection of ornament as immoral and the celebration of materials and structural expressionism. The idea of materials and forms having meaning was denied by post-war modernists in favor of form and program. While they had socialist/utopian goals, they attempted to achieve those goals by drawing on the spirit of the age, celebrating the machine age and mass production. They were simutaneously arguing that 'things as they are' (the state of design at the turn of the century) needed to change to reflect 'things as they are' (the spirit of the machine age). In essence they were determining 'things as they should be' according to 'things as they are'. The rationale for rejecting ornament was based less on morality and more on expression of the zeitgeist. With Venturi we see how the idea of meaning was acknowledged by post-modernism, but without aknowledging the ethical implications of meaning. Venturi argues that while rejecting ornament modern architecture ironically became ornament.

In the present the legacy of the rejection of ornament is a tacit acknowledgement of meaning but a denial of ethical implications, or rather a reluctance to discuss meaning in terms of ethics. This is really the area that I need to understand better. What exactly is the legacy of the moral rejection of ornament, and the subsequent rejection of morality. While in practice buildings are designed to reflect the techniques and materials of architecture (in the same way that abstract expressionism focused on expression of the paint and canvas) by doing so they have inadvertently become ornaments imbued with meaning. Meanwhile in architectural theory ornament is still condemned. What we are left with is a hodgepodge of bits and pieces divorced from the ideas that created them.

It is a mess that I do not fully understand, which I'm sure is clear from my rambling attempts to communicate it. Maybe that explains why my earlier statement is so vague.

Jose

In the spirit of the holidays my mom sent me a cookie reciepe.

Jose Cuervo Christmas Cookies

1 cup of water
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup of sugar
1 tsp salt
1 cup of brown sugar
4 large eggs
1 cup nuts
2 cups of dried fruit
1 bottle Jose Cuervo Tequila

Sample the Cuervo to check quality. Take a large bowl, check the Cuervo again, to be sure it is of the highest quality, pour one level cup and drink.

Turn on the electric mixer... Beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl.

Add one teaspoon of sugar. Beat again. At this point it's best to make sure the Cuervo is still OK, try another cup..just in case.

Turn off the mixerer thingy. Break 2 leggs and add
to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit,
Pick the frigging fruit off the floor.

Mix on the turner. If the fried druit gets stuck in
the beaterers just pry it loose with a drewscriver.
Sample the Cuervo to check for tonsisticity.

Next, sift two cups of salt, or something. Who
giveshz a sheet. Check the Jose Cuervo. Now shift
the lemon juice and strain your nuts. Add one table.
Add a spoon of sugar, or somefink. Whatever you can
find. Greash the oven.

Turn the cake tin 360 degrees and try not to fall over. Don't forget to beat off the turner. Finally,
throw the bowl through the window, finish the Cose
Juervo and make sure to put the stove in the dishwasher.

Cherry Mistmas

As promised

I promised that I would post a picture of the Turducken, so here it is. Notice the lovely steam. It took about 9 hours to bake. The duck is barely visible at the bottom, because this picture was taken early in the carving.




I've also been lax in discussing anything related to architecture or my thesis. I wil continue to not discuss my thesis because I'm lost at the moment. As a stand in here are a couple pictures of Alvar Aalto's architecture. These are from my trip to Finland summer 04. The first is the Paimio Sanitorium, and the second in Villa Mairea.

Apple Rocks

I picked up my computer on Wednesday. It was a one week turnaround including the Holiday. They replaced the top case (the part your palms rest on) the screen, the DVD, and a bunch of cables. All that for just over $300 dollars. So know I will cathc up on the posts. I realize I haven't said anything about my thesis or architecture in a while, so I will post something soon.