A video posted by autistic woman titled "In My Language" has sparked lively online debates on personhood, the essence of language, and the nature of her condition (some claim that someone who expresses herself so clearly can't be autistic). While these debates interest me, they weren't the questions that came to my mind on seeing the video. Instead I was fascinated by purity of experience it portrayed, a kind of purity most often seen in children, and which artists are always talking about trying to reclaim: a state of elemental awareness, an almost painful sensitivity to the world...

Last weekend 60 minutes profiled Daniel Tammet, a savant who was able to recite pi to 22,514 digits (it took him 5 hours), and was able to learn conversational Icelandic within a week. Unlike most other known savants, he can interact fairly normally with other people in everyday social situations. And unlike most other savants he can narrate his mental process. Numbers for him aren't abstract things, but objects with mental geographies, "Every number up to 10,000, I can visualize.... [each] has it's own color, has it's own shape, has it's own texture," he explained in the interview. He spoke of the beauty (and ugliness) of numbers and illustrates their forms as landscape-like paintings.

I believe savants are not much different that the woman in the first video, it's just that the focus of their intense gaze happen to to have practical application in our world—descriptions of numbers versus descriptions of water or some other more ineffable obsession. The cerebral wiring that allows this focus, limits human interaction. Daniel Tammet for all his startling abilities can't remember faces a few hours after meeting a person, instead he memorizes the number of buttons on a coat, or the count of stripes on a shirt, but even so Tammet is unusual amongst autistics. He can have human relationships. Most severely autistic people have trouble relating to anyone. What "In my Language" was saying, I thought, was that this was ok. The author wanted no pity. Her life is not empty, her gestures are not randomness, or madness as is often supposed by outside viewers, just the opposite, it is a life emotionally overfull- her brain is saturated with dense thought much of it beyond our comprehension.

Most anyone who has dabbled in the arts, I think, can relate to these inward impulses. We become immersed in the clarity of a particular interaction, in the love of the word, in an idea, in a particular emotion, or in a fleeting vision and the artistic instinct is to fix time telegraphing the moment so it can be remembered. We live for those moments of heady transparency when the mundane veneer of our lives is peeled back to reveal something extraordinary. But of course usually we fail even at holding on to the thing for ourselves. It is the rare individual who can marry impulse, idea, and technique to produce something that allows us to peek into that hidden world of extravagant beauty surrounding us... Despite our clumsy fumblings the important thing I think is to try. Because in trying we build bridges between the worlds and we become more adept at living in them both.

Related: Tammet on Wikipedia (contains many other links)

That's the first line of Michael Pollen's article Unhappy Meals in yesterday's Times magazine on the food industry. Odds are if you are reading this blog you've already read the article, but just in case, there's the link served up for you. We're big Michael Pollen fans in this house and happen to be in the middle of reading The Omnivore's Dilemma which is excellent (Jenn is further through it than I am and keeps hitting me with corn facts... read the book and you'll understand). The Botany of Desire is another must read book we push on all our friends. If you love food and incisive writing, these books are for you.

A friend of mentioned I might like the photography of Linn Schröder and indeed I do.
Making Room did an interview with her a while back and features a gallery of her series "Sind Sie ein echter Frosch". The image above is from a series titled A Play (sometimes translated "A Piece"). One or two more shots from this series can be found on a page called The Art of Being German which is chock full of interesting photography.

If you have ever tried to make photographs in the New York City subway system, you know what a difficult task it is. The lighting is terrible. People are wary. It's hard to get a clear shot because of the crowds. Etcetera. And yet Travis Ruse has managed to take countless beautiful candid shots in the subway, day after day, year after year.

Tonight a show of his subway photos will open at 6:30 at Redux Gallery (116 E. 16th St. 12th Flr). I happened to see several freshly printed images over at Gabe Greenberg's studio and they look spectacular, so much more alive than any image on a screen could ever be, can't wait to see them on the wall. The show runs through March 9th.

Related: Bruce Davidson's Subway

Last night I finally hunkered down and ported this blog from blogger to Movable Type. Nothing exciting design-wise, just a more functional (I hope) layout with some long overdue new features (categories, search, custom feeds, tags, etc).

I've only tested on Safari and Firefox, so if there's any wonkiness in Internet Explorer (or just in general) let me know. There is still quite a bit of fine tuning to be done and a few features I want to add. I also need to get busy tagging/categorizing old entries.

Jenn hates the new design (or lack of design) by the way ("is it finished?" she asks).... Ultimately I don't think the design matters much as the vast majority of you read this site via RSS.

Continue reading "New Digs" →

For the past couple of years Photo Eye has been my favorite photo magazine/photobook source with consistently smart editorial choices and thoughtful reviews. Tonight I gave their website a spin for the first time in a very long time and discovered they host online galleries with scores of artists. Unlike many similar sites these gallery feature decent sized images (on each artist click the small thumbmnail, then the medium sized one, to get a pop out window with large images). Many photographers also have prints available. Navigation of the galleries is clumsy, and artist selection is somewhat tame, but suffering bad HI is a small price to pay to be able to check out so many excellent photographers in one place.

We were on the grass looking at the sky and you asked, "What if we had never met?"

And I said, "Hey that cloud looks like a Japanese castle."

And you said, "I've never seen a Japanese castle, but if they look like that cloud, I can imagine them."

And when I finally turned to answer your question, you had fallen asleep.

-July 12, 1986

Like everyone else, I'm pretty exited about the iphone. But I won't be head over heels excited until I find out if 3rd parties can develop apps for it, because a slick phone would be neat, but a real version of OS X with 3rd party apps would be like cherries every day. This list of "I want" apps came to mind almost immediately. What's on your list?

1. I want to be able to find photographs on the net geotagged to my current location with a scroller that goes back chronologically. Imagine standing at a particular spot, and instantly be able to see what happened there last week, last month, last year. (idea originally from Jakob Lodwick)

2. I want fingerpainting. (allowing you to choose between watercolors, gouache, oils, etc... and with paint running down the screen based on the phone's orientation)

3. I want an intruder alert. In other words you lock your phone with a special code, and if someone picks up your phone it starts taking pictures, recording sound and sending you an email with photos and the recording. Also it should have a siren.

4. I want an alarm clock set to one of my itunes playlists.

5. I want Netnewswire.

6. I want a portable antfarm with virtual ants.

Continue reading "My iphone "i want" list" →

If you've ever wandered the streets of Tokyo you've no doubt wondered what was going through the minds of all those Japanese salarymen in their identical suits... Click through to the world of Yamasaki, a salaryman with a camera to find out...

All day long you look into their mouths
Teeth unflossed.
Tartar-laden.
Gums receding.

You hate candy.
You hate garlic.
You hate their hot breath on your hands.

This pain you inflict,
The pain they feel—
It's their own fault.
You have no remorse.
You think, "Go ahead curl your toes in agony,
I'm helping you."

You live with knowledge
This woe is preventable.
If they would just listen.

And yet
If they do listen.
If they really listen
And change their ways.
You're out of a job.

One of my favorite radio stations, WFMU, is hosting the 2007 365 Days Project featuring a new set of outsider recordings in friendly MP3 format each and every day of 2007. The original 365 Days Project from 2003 is revered by my sound obsessed friends both for it's impossible to find recordings and well researched scholarship. This year's edition promises to be equally relevatory.

Last week I noticed my two year old son staring out the window with his face pressed against the glass. I came over and he pointed out to the curb. "Tree," he said.

I had worried about this. The night before we had undecorated the Christmas tree while he was sleeping. Now it was 6:30 in the morning and it was the first thing he noticed.

He had been pretty excited about the tree. The night we put it up he kept disappearing and reappearing from the living room as we arranged the lights. We thought he wasn't interested and was getting cars or something. He was actually hauling his pillows and blankets into the room so he could go to sleep in view of the tree. For the month it was up, turning on the Christmas lights was the first order of the day.

And now the tree was out on the street with the garbage. He insisted on an inspection, so we went outside. There it was on the curb wet from rain and with a single ornament dangling from it's lower branch. He immediately ran over and began a valiant attempt to drag the 7 foot tree back to the house. He's less than 3 feet tall. I explained the tree had spent a long time with us making us happy but now it was time for it to go away to be with the other trees. I pointed out the many trees scattered on the curb up and down the block. He paused, considered the explanation, and solemnly waved goodbye to the tree. We removed the ornament. Then, grabbing my hand he led me down the street and with real gravitas said goodbye to each and every tree.

Other than my own dim memories I knew nothing of the world of toddlers until I had one of my own, but I've come to believe that our early years are the ones in which we are the truest versions of ourselves. In those years we are without the accumulated layers of knowledge, the cruft of life, that gives our world boundaries. The truth was I was sad too and at that moment it felt unfair we couldn't keep trees in the house all year long. I almost believed my own white lie about the trees returning to the forest. Comforting. And of course that's how it starts, one day you realize the trees are just going to mulched and sent to the dump and you wonder why your father lied to you. You don't realize until much later that this is the lie he had heard from his father.

Afterwards we returned home and my son searched through the house until he found his Christmas book featuring a tree. Again, he said "bye bye," and then, satisfied, he threw the book aside and bounded upstairs ready for the next thing.