From Swoon:

“so,
what’s inspiring me lately is this idea of city builders, though not in the
literal or ordinary sense, i am thinking of the utopias that never get built but
that inform our sense of what a city could be, and the failures that teach us
something about our collective desires, and of course of the people who build
out little niches of the city that they want to live in for themselves, with
their own two hands, from graffiti artists, to kids putting up illegal skate-
parks, to mad scientists doing hydrogen fuel cell research in their back yards
because they are trying to liberate every modern urbanite from dependence upon
the grid. this train of though started this summer in philly,

i was
doing a show with change agent and my good friend orien mcneill (whom i had
almost forgotten is a complete genius), was drawing the crazy cities he keeps
inside his head onto the wall of the gallery.

/>it got me thinking about something but i wasn’t sure what. then i went to
sweden for the ‘outside in’ conference
and i met up with akim and zasd who had brought 20 graffiti writers from berlin
to build the ‘city of names’ in an open field by some housing projects.

/>

/>

/>it was a simple idea, what would happen if the graffiti writers built the
city? by the time i arrived the kids had stopped tearing it down and were
playing in it. freaks gallery was there from copenhagen and told me about a one
week restaurant that he created with href="http://www.akayism.org/streetart/projects.html">akay and adams in
zurich, it was called the scrap yard, they broke into an abandoned building,
brought in found furniture and served dumpstered food, the restaurant fed about
300 people in a week for free. jocko weyland was there talking about
skateboarding, amy francesi was talking about guerilla gardening and hydrogen
fuel cells, michael
rackowitz was showing his homeless shelters that parasite onto the ventilation
shafts of buildings, keep you warm for the night and can be built for $5.
lights were going on in my head like coney island at night. since i’ve been back
i have been working on installing tiny peepholes around the city that let you
peer into another world.

/>i have been looking at href="http://www.cmoa.org/exhibitions/upcoming.asp">the drawings of lebbeus
woods, sketches
of arcosanti, and wondering how to bring these builders of cities here to
new york all in one space to play…. thanks for asking that, really helps to
ask yourself that from time to time.”... href="http://www.wearechangeagent.com/swoon/">swoon

From
Influenza:

“the digital octopus: total governmental control
on our daily lives, ongoing and the unstoppable change to police states while we
speak, build on media-engined fear culture supported by a hermetic government
controlled entertainment industry and the maximum lack of independent critic.
mazzeltov and happy holidays”... influenska
/>
From Dalek:

“i have been drawing my
inspiration from the morning news. channel 4. maurice
dubois. i think that
is his name.”... Dalek

/>

From Anthony Skirvin:

“What’s
currently inspiring me? ‘That art, in this case photography, has the power to
bring about change. In 1908, the NCLC(The National Child Labor Committee)
provided Lewis
Hine with a monthly salary and assigned Hine to photograph child labor
practices. For the next several years, Hine traveled extensively, photographing
children in mines, factories, canneries, textile mills, street trades and
assorted agricultural industries.

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/>Hine’s photographs alerted the public to the fact that child labor deprived
children of childhood, health, education and a chance of a future. His work on
this project was the driving force behind changing the publics attitude and was
instrumental in the fight for stricter child labor laws’.... href="http://www.anthonyskirvin.com/">Anthony

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