M1

I found these precedent scans while going through some old work. How fun Japanese playgrounds are! The alien, yet bizarrely natural landscapes and objects evoke a sense of uncertainty, exploration and independence. I'm reminded of the playground spots I used to habit as a child, but none come even close to the kind of imagination that these images provoke. But I have not left the playground since then. The idea of a "playground" emerges in every day life. Nodal points, landscape elements, fluid organization of people, etc. The cities and landscapes around us form a mega-playground in which we can abstract into a series of systematic points of interest, paths and permanent topographic elements that we conform and move through. We are constantly navigating our surroundings, and adapting to wavering conditions in weather, temperature and light. How we choose to understand our environments depends on our understanding of them, and I think playgrounds like these almost subvert our traditional idea of traversing, and causes one to think completely outside of the box.  Children are "geniuses" when it comes to abstraction and divergent thinking, but maybe mostly because they have not yet learned to control their imagination, allowing them to interpret questions with answers that have such a high capacity for creativity. And I believe this kind of creativity is what drives us to be who we are. 

My third year in school was probably the best one -- a year of discovery, experimentation and and work. The option studio with Andrew Levitt allowed me to focus on a body of work that centred around this idea of taking a part of the Toronto Islands and transforming it into a place for journey and self-discovery.  

An abstract:

There are two types of travellers in this world - the earthly and the spiritual.

As we embark on our separate journeys towards a far-off telos, we find our relations and resemblances to the earth in the least likely place, where experiences like the curvature of a cup, the formation of morning dew, or the stillness in Polaris move us in ways we never realized. In these occurrences we find an intangible sense of place, and it is the distance between departure and arrival that holds key to understanding the how and nature of things to our bodily spirits.

The island embodies our greatest hopes and fears, and mediates between the spiritual realm of our unconsciousness and our conscious minds. This pilgrimage, or odyssey, through the landscape leads us to create a connection between both worlds by provoking individual responses from each traveler to the meeting places of the built and wild. Speculation arises from the subversion of expectations on the symbolic and mythological qualities of space and how one typically would experience it.

Marking this journey are a series of paths, many leading to unexpected destinations, and others leading to places of seemingly little significance. The path symbolizes the evolution of self-knowledge gained through experience, and provides and opportunity for introspection and confrontation. How you navigate your landscape becomes a true meditative task. As the dislocation from the built urban world puts one at a vulnerable state, we must reply on our senses to become our primary navigators of the wilderness. While the forest and darkness threatens our security and evokes our greatest fears, it is here in this journey into the unknown and unfamiliar where we are finally able to find our place.

Each return to the island brings a new perspective, outlook and path, enriching the site with lore, magic and history. The island continues to grow as more people come, and this symbiotic relationship of growth and self-growth evolves to greater levels of depth, forever rooting the island to the history of the people and necessarily back to the city.

The island is home.

I'm not sure I've been able to match the power and intensity I felt through the creation of a place like this. I sometimes think the reason why I am so drawn to Hawai'i is not only for its purity, but for it's sublime nature. I haven't travelled nearly enough to see other equally powerful places, but my affinity for landscapes that drive my own ambition isn't something I'm able to control. Toronto has a charm to it that can't be replicated anywhere else, but now that I've had a taste of more, it's hard to hold back ;)

In Hawai'i on Saturday!!!!!!