Category Archives: The Playing Field

“The Future is a Quickening of What Now Is”

 “Art celebrates with peculiar intensity the moments in which the past reinforces the present and which the future is a quickening of what now is.” At work, we’re working with a fantastic group of artists to develop a new exhibition. I’m very grateful to be working with such a wonderfully playful group. Simultaneously, I’m re-readingContinue reading ““The Future is a Quickening of What Now Is””

The Scared is Scared

Young director Bianca Giaever finished the Scared is Scared a few weeks before she graduated from Middlebury College. The film’s direction and main narrative comes from a conversation Bianca had with a six-year-old named Asa Baker-Rouse, who walked Bianca through a storyline ostensibly “about” a mouse and a bear. Bianca took that conversation, meshed it with her ownContinue reading “The Scared is Scared”

The Happy Museum Project

Try this experiment: Toss a paper towel roll down a long hallway in a museum gallery. Step back. Watch as a school group passes through the hallway. At the Manchester Museum, you would see children walking the unfurled roll as if it were a tightrope. When the perforations began to break, the towels became skates. KidsContinue reading “The Happy Museum Project”

Learning to Code

What I love about this video, from http://www.code.org, is the enthusiasm the interviewees remember feeling for the act of just figuring stuff out. I saw great glimmers of this during Programmable Park, our 2012 summer collaboration with Amon Millner and Modkit. It makes me want to learn more about coding and to create more opportunitiesContinue reading “Learning to Code”

Social Seating

Winter Storm Nemo just blew through Boston, leaving about five feet of snow on yards, driveways, and, well, everywhere. The shared nuisance of digging out cars and sidewalks creates a social environment that’s somewhat unparalleled; neighbors talk to each other, smile at each other, help each other. Snow– a common nemesis– becomes a social medium.Continue reading “Social Seating”