.

I can’t help but agree… 

.

A simple decision flow-chart… (link to source no longer works).

(Not trying to rob therapists here… just saying).

(from ‘New at Pentagram’)

Privately commissioned to create a gift for an architect, Daniel Weil created a one-of-a-kind clock that is both simple and complex. Reducing objects to their component parts has long fascinated Weil… this clock is the latest demonstration of his interest in investigating not just how objects look, but how they work.

Constructed in ash and nickel-plated brass and silver, the clock is built of five separate elements. The numbers, both hours and minutes, are inscribed on the face and interior of a 9 3/4-inches diameter ring. The mechanism for setting the time connects with the central mechanism with visible rubber belts. A single AA battery provides power to the clock through visible power strips that are recessed in the assembly’s base. And, befitting the object’s recipient, the housing for the central mechanism takes the form of, literally, a house.

“Objects like clocks are both prosaic and profound,” says Weil. “Prosaic because of their ubiquity in everyday life, profound because of the mysterious nature of time itself. Time can be reduced to hours, minutes and seconds, just as a clock can be reduced to its component parts. This doesn’t explain time, but in a way simply exposes its mysterious essence.”

[ I like clocks. ]

Winnipeg, Canada

I’m dumbfounded every year at this time when I see hordes of crazed consumers out shopping for unneeded things they can’t afford. I’m convinced that a focus on material things causes easily-avoidable stress and dampens the creative spirit within a culture—and we well know the devastating effect that over-consumption is having on our planet.

Save some shoppers. Save the planet. Give some folks a hearty hug. Who cares if you know them or not… think of it as an intervention of sorts. (While you consider your hug-deployment strategy, here’s a nice tune by Joel Kroeker to put you in the mood).

Image: one of a bunch of poster designs I’ve contributed over the years to Buy Nothing Christmas, an initiative started by Aiden Enns (former managing editor at Adbusters and founder of Geez magazine).

Toronto, Canada

I’ve been asked to give a talk at FITC Toronto 2011 (my 4th time with FITC in hogtown I believe… also enjoyed previously contributing in Chicago, Amsterdam, and Winnipeg). This is Sean Pucknell’s/FITC’s 10th anniversary event, and it promises to be “a busload of thrills.” Early-bird pricing for event attendance closes on 11 December. My presentation is entitled Cause an Effect. The blurb reads as follows:

Our globalized society is morphing rapidly from an information era into the age of ideas—at the same time our fragile planet accelerates towards the edge of survival. Those of us involved in creative pursuits (such as data manipulation, visualization and ideation, media-making, image creation, and content delivery) find ourselves thrust suddenly into the leading role of change drivers. Though equipped with previously unimaginable power, the influence we now wield outstrips our own understanding.

This presentation will explore “why” we do what we do, and “to what end.” Expect humor, passion, pithy insights, astute maxims, and a personal existential narrative wrapped in a big-picture exposition on the power of design to shape culture and influence our tomorrows.

Taipei, Taiwan

As I write this, I’m sitting in the shadow of Taipei 101 (until earlier this year, the world’s tallest building). I’ve been staying at the Grand Hyatt Taipei directly at the base of this colossus for the past few nights, with full days spent in consultative sessions with the organizers of next year’s 2011 IDA Congress Taipei / design at the edges event, as well as jury duty for the Taiwan International Design Competition (multidisciplinary) and the 2010 Golden Pin Design Award (product design recognition scheme).

Thanks go to my kind hosts and the local organizers, and thanks as well to friends Alice Chen and Enrica Hsiao who met up with me for a lovely sashimi lunch yesterday… now it’s off to the airport and back to winter.

Montreal, Quebec

Submissions have been coming in nicely from around the globe to INDIGO’s Mother Tongue project. There’s still time to submit, anyone can participate… submission deadline is 1 December 2010.

Shown above: three recent submissions, from Belgium, Australia, and Italy. 

Montreal, Canada

Just a reminder that the submission deadline for INDIGO’s Mother Tongue exhibition is two weeks from now—1 December 2010.

(from Facebook—who knew?)

Today I chanced across a lovely collection of Vintage Advertising and Poster Art, here. Much, much, more along the lines of the thumbnails above at the site… enjoy.

Jinan, China

Best “61st” wishes to longtime friend and former Icograda president Guy Schockaert. Thanks to another longtime friend and former Icograda board colleague Ahn Sang-Soo for the photo of Guy, taken this past weekend… sooo apropos.