I found this interesting feature when I recently uploaded videos to Youtube. It is called "insight", and it let's the uploader view complete statistics and diagrams showing who has been viewing your videos. I found this interesting to see that most of the people viewing the videos I uploaded of the student ACSG meeting were Alumni's between the age of 55 to 65. Very interesting that they care so much for the school still.

Making grocery stores fun again- the Mexican way

This is a photo I took at a mexican market in my home town of Paramount called Northgate. It used to be a Von's market, and Im not sure why it left. This market caters to the local overwhelming hispanic population. I had to go grab something while visiting my mother, and I was so shocked when I passed a whole group of mariachis playing while people were shopping. How cool was this? It's so much more colorful than your garden variety Pavilion's or even Whole Foods for that matter. And it's cheaper of course!

Taking what works into the future

The latest Muji design competition has just been announced, and I thought it was a great project brief. Take a piece of tried and true design, something that you might have taken for granted, or something that was an obvious and great solution to a problem that is local to where you are from, and update it for today's use in the Muji fashion. It will be great just to see what objects come back into the public domain that may have been lost in obscurity or just not seen in developed countries that can have greater uses.

Art Center's EIR presentation and Propaganda

I posted this on Nathan Cooke's blog a couple of days ago,and thought I should add it here:

I attended the community coalition meeting today entitled “building our future”.
The main concern for this meeting was to inform the community in general about the coming conclusion of the environmental impact report that was submitted for review to the general public. Apparently this was not the first of such meetings, just the last as a way to communicate with the public and potential or current donors to the project. The meeting was hosted by Iris Gelt , with a presentation by the technology advisor Michael Berman and a tour of the architectural model by Patricia Oliver. They were looking to have people show more support for the hillside master plan by having people write in to the department of planning. There has been a lot of the local community that have been opposed to the new building on Art Center’s plot of land. Only 4% of land is being used that Art Center owns on the hill, and they are not planning on expanding on what is considered “developed land”.
Michael Berman gave a powerpoint presentation about what a “library” means to Art Center. It showed the current uses the students have for it. Of course it showed how we use it for everything but a library at times. It seemed he tried to sum it up by saying we are calling it a library but it is just a place to acquire knowledge. When I asked what the reasons for the semantics were, Ms. Oliver interjected that it was because no one knew what they were talking about when they tried to call it a media center or other labels. So, for their purposes they are calling it a library.
What was the surprising point to me was that they emphatically stated that none of the student’s tuition will be used for any of the new building projects. I was relieved to hear that. What I was not thrilled to hear, was that plans for the new “library” start with the building of the library first, and then a parking structure second. Ms. Oliver explained that no one will give money to build a parking structure. When asked by a thoughtful faculty member how the parking would be paid for, they hmmd and hawed until they revealed that there was a company that would build it for us, and then it would be paid back to said company by charging for parking. Lovely.
The new library would also include a technical skills center, meeting areas for students in particular for trans disciplinary uses, and what they are calling a “beta site”, where companies can show off and have Art Center students utilize and test anything from their new software to new materials and technologies. The technical skills center would accommodate more new machinery like cnc machines and other rapid prototyping technologies. They are expecting the new building to bring in a prospective 400 more students. They are planning to replace the overflow parking that is lost in the sculpture garden where the library is to be placed by having the ravine take its place. I asked about the number of spaces in comparison, and Ms. Oliver explained it would be equivalent to what is there already. Ms Oliver also explained that the buildings would be “sustainable” , using primarily concrete (also that new translucent concrete) and solar embedded glass. They also plan to move power and infrastructure for the buildings away from the campus, utilizing the roof of the current building for solar panel arrays. Another point of interest (and sorry for the laundry list, Im not much of a writer)was that the extension that was put on the ellwood building in the 70’s(?) was going to be cut off from the rest of the ellwood building and be given a second floor addition. It was weird to see a 3rd of the building chopped off. And their be a walkway in the middle between where the department chairs are and the shop facilities.
Other pieces of information of note, the annex must come down by November of 2009, the plan for all of the building is anticipated to take place over 25 years, the library is planned to be 50,000 square feet, and there is a separate commission of 75,000 dollars given by Getty for an assessment of the existing campus for much needed repairs and renovations. Those studies have recently concluded.
The only questions that were not answered that I had, pertained to how the department was funded to do all the work that has come this far in terms of the models, planning and of course design on campus. This was tactfully avoided and I would love to find out more about that.
If anyone has any further questions regarding the proceedings at the meeting please feel free to contact me at Robert.quintero@gmail.com.
I also have some photos of the proposed buildings if anyone cares to see them. I was informed however that these designs were merely place holders that met the specific build envelope. I really wonder how much of our money was spent for getting this project this far and how much money they still need to raise to build it (before they can begin they need half in cash and half in pledges).
Hope this is helpful to some, I was one of two students who were able to attend apparently.

Art Center Unites! (or, trying to keep my diploma from becoming worthless)

I attended the ACSG meeting today. It was very gratifying to see the turnout of people coming to show their support, voice their concerns, and find out what is going on at school. I think this is especially wonderful because as a student at art center, you are so focused on your work-its difficult to take your head out fo the sand to see what is going on around you that is not involved with your projects. I was surprised to find out when the proceedings got under way- for a number of reasons. It seems that the student government was under the impression that everyone was keeping up with this blog and had read every post-and was coming to the meeting to voice their particular concerns. I was a bit concerned about this-but it soon became evident to everyone that students were there to be told what was going on and to find out what facts were generally known. This was a bit frustratingly handled by the student government representatives, who were very adamant about only wanting to hear the students complaints and nothing more. This point even became a bit muddled at times-and unfortunately it seemed to be in part to a lack of communication and understanding within the student government itself, with the vice president tagging along the phrase "only about Nate Young's resignation" to everyone's questions about what will be presented to Mr Koshalek at the scheduled meeting between ACSG and Mr Koshalek. This confused many about whether ACSG will only be presenting our questions about why Nate Young resigned or whether they would be presenting other grievances aired. This was only a symptom of what was breeding contempt for the members, as some of the ACSG at times seemed combative and to be talking down to some people in response to their questions. It might have been a bit brash of the members to expect people to leave what I will call a bit of "passion" out of their remarks, after all-that is what they are for-to be a sounding board that can refine what the general students say into a format appropriate for consumption for our president. All in all, I was very happy that most of the students were able to present their problems in a mature and appropriate manner that was very productive. In the end, I mention this aspect of the meeting to remind the council that we respect them, support them, and would like them to make sure they know who they are representing and have an adequate representation of that passion when they make their voices heard for us to the president. I would humbly ask that they bring their "A" game to the table this Friday. The rest of the meeting held some great moments, especially when Nate Young's former secretary rose to speak. With a voice which sounded on the verge of tears, she bravely proceeded to tell everyone why Nate resigned from Art Center. I could feel a collective breath being held as someone was finally going to tell us some bit of truth. Let us all hope that she will not face any consequences for sharing that information with us.
We are on the verge of some important milestones in this conversation-Mr. Koshalek's contract renewal and a meeting with him this Friday. With all of the passion wrapped up in this issue, it might be easy to lose sight of some things as we move along. Richard Koshalek was hired to do what he is doing now-raise money. The board of trustees wants him to do what he is doing. To really affect what is going on, we have to address what Art Center's business model is now and should be to the people who really control that vision-the board of trustees. Right now, we are controlled like a business model-a business that does not realize that its product it is marketing is suffering. You can do all the advertising, but if what you are selling is tarnished and in disrepair-people will stop buying. Making Mr Koshalek into a monster is an easy way to go to make us feel better-Im sure he is definitely not without fault. I am also sure everyone else within the ruling class at Art Center has things we can blame them for. We need to address the structure of Art Center before we can address which one of the parts within it arent working properly and need to be replaced.
One thing we can all fault Mr. Koshalek for however, is a complete lack of transparency and availability. Where was he today? I think we all need to make sure we have a say in where he will be after 2009.
I was able to film the proceeding of the meeting in its entirety and without editing. I apologize for it being cut into so many pieces, but I couldnt get it onto youtube any other way. As of now, this is just half of the meeting, the second half will follow shortly.
http://youtube.com/user/robatokintaro

Welcome to flavor country

Hi, welcome to my blog. I always resisted starting a blog because I didn't think that my thoughts or observations were any more important than anyone else's. I still don't think so, but I figure this would
be a great way for family and friends who I'm no longer around to share in my life. I hope that I can
share with you things you will value as much as I do. If anything, maybe you can have a cheap laugh from time to time.