Everyday Utopia

Here's some pics from the Everyday Utopia exhibition that lovely Marina Fokidis curated, just opened at Think21 in Brussels, featuring Angelo Plessas, Miltos Manetas and yours truly. Seems like I took all the photos in a rush between Champaign and Vodka and more, but better pics are coming soo
Plessas' Future is Fake Neon and MeLookingAtYou walldrawing
classic Manetas painting
more Plessas
I showed paper models with notes, arranged in a Sandbox configuration
Dolmen House
Soft Ruin

Idea and Menir

Charles can explain everything...

SP. Random sky

SP. Random today

Good Morning SP

Last week in Istanbul II

Startech Elektronik
rainbow window by Galata tower
great Dali drawing
lovely Sylvia Rodeo Kouvali posing in the rain

before passing by a haunted jungle ruin in Bebek

Naxos Observations

We missed all the caves in Naxos, but we saw a huge ancient door

that when you pass through,
you find yourself where you were

up on a mountain there were some runaway rocks
a building made of plastic and tires
a marble explosion
whose scale we only realized when we got closer
(look for the trucks)
some funny formations
Aristides' Pink and Silver tower
a Hellenistic Round tower
which was hollow insideand sometimes dangerous

Subterranean Holiday II : Irakleia

We had to walk (and climb!) for an hour and a half in the blistering heat to get to the super-spooky Irakleia cave,
apparently the largest cave in the Aegean...

when we asked the locals how big the cave is, they said they dont now, because nobody has reached the end
or maybe nobody came back?
there were spots to light candles, and as we walked we lit them to find our way back
all you could see was darkness
I had to keep taking pictures with flash to see where we were going
finally it was too spooky and we went back out

Subterranean Holiday I : Antiparos

We had been to Antiparos a few times, and had passed by a sign indicating the way to the"cave", though we always passed it by. This time we decided to visit

when you enter the stalagmites and stalactites look great,
and everything is lit with a quasi yellow light..
then the cave looks like it continues forever
(the stainless steel railing is unfortunately very Dubai airport)
and suddenly opens up to huge vertigenous underground halls

and you pass these great caves and the path continues further down

and you realize that you are in an incredible underground masterpiece


Sylvia posedthen everybody posed
(Sylvia, Mari, Angelo, me, Ilias)
ancient graffiti

the scale of the place is hard to describe
the rooms are endless
Angelo thought he was seeing ghosts everywhere

when we went back up,
I though I heard screams and went back to check

Hydra highlights

Ueda, Plessas

fuzzy island

fuzzy drinks and underwater paradise

cat and lemon

wood construction

funny facade

fish scale silver blue

the doors to whatever

Mai hiding behind Madeleine hiding behind Turbo-X

Bevilacqua Ueda Melas

The Aphitheater House

this past weekend we stayed in the Amphitheater House at Hydra, designed by our good friend (and great architect) Aristide Antonas


the house is basically a 9m high space with an aphitheater for perfect projections.

the house redefines an island aesthetic with its unreal proportions, almost like a house turned insideout.check the Flickr set on the house here

The Temenos Report

Last weekend we went to see the rare screenings of Gregory J. Marcopoulos at the Temenos in Arcadia. They happen every few years and command a sect-like cult following.

on the way there we passed pyramid mountains
and religious hideaways
made new friends
we arrived just as the sun was settingWe learned that architect Christos Papoulias has designed the screen and surroundings: In typical Papoulias way, the place looks metaphysicaly undesigned, as if everything fell into perfect place in the most natural way. As if Temenos was always there.



We could only stay for one night of intensive Marcopoulos minimalism
on the way back, sadness
burned mountains

but the rain was evaporating from the hot asphalt, up in the magical Mainalos mountain
Konstandinos, Stuart and Angelo
passed a rainbow church
a curious control building
just when the meter hit 44444 kilometers

Learning from Beijing

Beijing must be the ultimate fake experience, the Las Vegas of the Far East. Instead of casinos imagine semi upscale worker housing, endless groups of identical boring skyscrapers, and shopping malls full of contraband stuff you wouldn't want even if it was original. What you see has been choreographed by the government, every poor neighborhood hidden behind brand new stone walls with hanging flower pots, happily undulating next to patches of perfect gardens, hiding the stinking hell of living without running water, stinking sewer streets and life as it was before the Olympics. Even the highway to the Great China Wall is lined with a thick wall of trees so you think China is a beautiful forest when instead its all factories that make made in china garbage. Still a fascinating place to visit.
Along the way we passed Marble Gates
(In The Temple of Heaven Park or something like that)
and rainbow gates

that glow at nightand tree gatesand Pagoda skyscrapers
with VIP hotlines
and slightly 80's rooftops
and neoclassical shopping-mall absurdities

we said hi to the Great Wall of Chinaand slid down slides

we passed fruitbowl sculptures

and poor neighborhoods covered-up
with "will be pretty" posters


they didnt let you look inside, where its dirty and stinkybecause the future is poster perfect
Sterling Ruby at Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, 798 Art Area

Amazing Bia Davou drawings at the Transexperiences exhibition by EMST, 798 Space

The Arab Guggenheim Museum by Nikos Charalambidis

great drawing by Katerina Christidi

stone grotto staircase in the Forbidden City

Steven Holl's Looped Hybrid

could never resist Koolhaas' CCTV, the most impressive and sinister building I saw recently

from every possible angle

looming over unsuspecting China
Herzog & de Meuron's Bird Nest also quite nice

some samurai skyscrapers

Yellow and Blue neighbors
with Eiffel Tower topping

R2D2 Siamese twins

More Pagoda Post Modernism
with lightbulb outlines pretending everything is all right

Funny Tricycle Ride in Beijing

Diner in Princes' Garden

Had a great diner last night, at a place called Princes' garden or something like that. It is just the most amazing Chinese restaurant, in a vast garden with private rooms for dining,
ponds and caves and paths with outdoor patios and blue plants and Chinese Geishas (or whatever they are called in Chinese).
The garden is so complex that once I lost my group it took me at least 20 minutes in day-glo-neon lilly pond heaven to relocate them.
Then we proceeded to the flower salads...

Eternal Sameness of the Spotless Nothing

Beijing is being renovated and developed so fast
that there is almost no more Beijing in Beijing.
Just endless rows of same skyscraper after skyscraper
after highway after shopping mall after billboard after ever after.

except of course from
the awesomeness of the CCTV Headquarters
by OMA Rem Koolhaas

The Stockholm Underground

Stockholms' tunnelbana are lovingly dressed up as faux natural caves.
starting off from the airport with a simple grey cave
with the occasional screen of course
moving on to Stadshuset, getting all theatrical with abandoned bombs
and faux structures emerging thru the faux rock
yellow mysteriesRadhuset with white faux cracks
and ending up in Fridhemsplan,
a white-grey rock with Jackson Pollock-esque paint splatters
plus the prerequisite inexplicable object
and a wooden seagull (why?) flying through clouds of green spray paint.

Limassol Sunday (with Christodoulos)

This past weekend in Limassol we passed the gates of orange juiceto soda-bottle Parthenons
enchanted forests in hotel lobbiesDorothy's white brick road to bunker 80's beach resorts whose logos resemble castles or letterswe looked at sea platforms
and more resortsand white wallsand minarets that always look like rockets

Östersund

I was up at Östersund with Jan Aman and the Fargfabriken team
to look at the space for the upcoming FF Nord
It was -16 degrees and very productivethe space was great, 1200 sqm and not a single columnthere was a light on the snow
then we left for Stockholm