rrread

design | plants | memoirs | photography | branding | entrepreneurship

[robynrockread]

140 / Perks of being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky (1999) 224 pg

Read the cult-favorite coming of age story that takes a sometimes heartbreaking, often hysterical, and always honest look at high school in all its glory. Also a major motion picture starring Logan Lerman and Emma Watson, The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a funny, touching, and haunting modern classic. The critically acclaimed debut novel from Stephen Chbosky, Perks follows observant “wallflower” Charlie as he charts a course through the strange world between adolescence and adulthood. First dates, family drama, and new friends. Sex, drugs, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Devastating loss, young love, and life on the fringes. Caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it, Charlie must learn to navigate those wild and poignant roller-coaster days known as growing up.

[robynrockread]

139 / Hold Up by Keith Godard and Emmett Williams (1980) 184 pg

This is very witty book that uses the most significant part of your body when you hold a book, a pair of thumbs.One of the founders of concrete poetry and Fluxus, Emmett Williams along with Keith Godard the well known graphic designer conceived of the idea of the voyeur's thumbs that hold up the book are visited by many other thumbs to which surprises occur.

[robynrockread]

138 / Succulents Simplified by Debra Lee Baldwin (2013) 272 pg

Succulents are hot. And Debra Lee Baldwin, the bestselling author of Designing with Succulents and Succulent Container Gardens, is the ideal guide for gardeners, crafters, and DIYers looking for an introduction to these trendy, low-maintenance, drought-tolerant plants. Along with gorgeous photos packed with design ideas, Debra offers her top 100 plant picks and explains how to grow and care for succulents no matter where you live. Step-by-step projects, including a cake stand centerpiece, special occasion bouquets, a vertical garden, and a succulent topiary sphere, will inspire you to express your individual style. Whether you’re a novice or veteran, have an acre to fill or a few pots, live in Calexico or Canada, Succulents Simplified is a dazzling primer for success with succulents wherever you live!

[robynrockread]

136 /How to See by George Nelson (2017) 248 pg

A new edition of George Nelson's classic guide to visual appreciation, released on the fortieth anniversary of its original publication

Originally published in 1977 by iconic American furniture manufacturer Herman Miller, George Nelson's critically acclaimed manifesto on how to recognize, evaluate, and understand the objects and landscape of the man-made world has influenced generations of design professionals, students, and aficionados. Forty years later, this cult book has been brought back to life with a fresh, new look and feel. At a time when our collective fascination with design has gone global, by one of the 20th century's most important design thinkers and will continue to educate and inspire readers everywhere.

[robynrockread]

135 / Eyes on the Street: The Life of Jane Jacobs by Robert Kanigel (2016) 496 pg

The first major biography of the irrepressible woman who changed the way we view and live in cities, and whose influence can still be felt in any discussion of urban planning to this day.

Eyes on the Street is a revelation of the phenomenal woman who raised three children, wrote seven groundbreaking books, saved neighborhoods, stopped expressways, was arrested twice, and engaged at home and on the streets in thousands of debates - all of which she won. Here is the child who challenged her third-grade teacher; the high school poet; the journalist who honed her writing skills at Iron Age, Architectural Forum, Fortune, and other outlets while amassing the knowledge she would draw upon to write her most famous book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Here, too, is the activist who helped lead an ultimately successful protest against Robert Moses' proposed expressway through her beloved Greenwich Village and who, in order to keep her sons out of the Vietnam War, moved to Canada, where she became as well known and admired as she was in the United States.

[robynrockread]

134 / Greenterior: Plant-loving creatives and their homes by Bart Kiggen, Magali Elali (2015) 240 pg

Showcases interior features on twenty creatives from Antwerp to New York, who all have one thing common - a passion for plants

Plants in combinations with interior design is a hot topic

Bart Kiggen and Magali Elali visited florist Mark Colle, interior photographer Martyn Thompson and fashion designer Christian Wijnants among many others. During their visits, the duo photographed these people's homes, focusing specifically on the presence of plants. The residents discuss their passion for plants, flowers and greenery in the fascinating accompanying text.

The book also contains a handy index listing all the plants featured in the photographs, including their specific characteristics.

[robynrockread]

133 / Christo and Jeanne-Claude: The Gates by Christo, Jeanne-Claude, Wolfgang Volz  (2003) 100 pg

On January 22, 2003 Michael R. Bloomberg, Mayor of New York City, announced that the city had given permission to New York artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude to realize their temporary work of art: "The Gates, Central Park, New York, 1979-2005."

Christo is world-famous for his major artistic projects, including "Valley Curtain", "Running Fence", "Surrounded Islands", "The Wrapped Pont Neuf", "The Umbrellas", and "Wrapped Reichstag". For the past 24 years, he and his wife, Jeanne-Claude, also an artist, have been working on a magnificent project for New York City's Central Park, "The Gates". "The Gates" will involve the entire topography of Central Park, spanning approximately 23 miles. 7,500 glorious gates--each of which is 16 feet high with a free hanging, saffron colored, fabric panel suspended from the top--will create an undulating golden ceiling above those who walk along the park's paths. "The Gates" will not only reflect and enhance the park's beauty, they will make art a free and accessible experience to be shared by all.

The Gates is the artists' firsthand account of their monumental endeavor and a testimony to their dedication and perseverence. Through photographs and text, this book allows the reader to follow each step of the project--measuring the park, drawing plans to welding the 900 pound steel bases of the gates, life-size testing of the gates, meeting with lawyers, politicians, and city boards, and the final approval. Complete with maps, photographs, architectural designs, and Christo's own drawings and collages, The Gates provides the most comprehensive view of the scope and importance of this project.

Wolfgang Volz has been the exclusive photographer and technical director for Christo and Jeanne-Claude since 1971. He has been represented in more than 300 gallery and museum exhibitions around the world.

Accompanying Volz's photographs is Jeanne-Claude's engaging and informative text.

[robynrockread]

132 / Jonas Wood: Interiors by Michael Ned Holte and Ana Vejzovic Sharp (2011) 184 pg

In this book, Los Angeles–based painter Jonas Wood (born 1977) explores his longstanding fascination with intimate interiors, such as his childhood home, his studio and other spaces in his everyday life. Wood renders these interiors with a disorienting combination of scrupulous exactitude and absolute flatness.

[robynrockread]

131 /The Complete Medicine Cabinets: Damien Hirst by Arthur Danto, James Frey, Damien Hirst (2011) 184 pg

Published on the occasion of Damien Hirst's exhibition at L&M Gallery, New York, October 2010, the first ever medicine cabinets book is contextualised by the artist's following of the punk movement. The first twelve sculptures in the book are named after the title tracks on the Sex Pistols' Never Mind the Bollocks album. The front page newspaper spreads punctuating the book from the album's release year (1977) and the year of the cabinets' completion (1989) provide a context for reading James Frey's story poem, Fuck This and Fuck That, which describes the listless protest of a teenage waster. The song titles and cabinet names - No Feelings, Liar and Seventeen - resound with the frustrations of Thatcherite Britain and the violence borne out in daily uprest and anarchy, as depicted in the news: IRA MEN HELD IN BIG SWOOP; RIOT SHIELDS OUT AGAIN and DOCKS JOBS-FOR-LIFE TO BE AXED BY AUTUMN. Hirst's medicine cabinets have long been described as temples of medicinal hierarchies providing nothing more than a short-term cure in the face of death. Viewing the pervasive successes and exploitations of the pharmaceutical industry as a belief system in itself is evidence of our dependency and a form of escapism. Hirst has commented: 'I've always seen medicine cabinets as bodies, but also like a cityscape or civilization, with some sort of hierarchy within it. It's also like a contemporary museum of the Middle Ages. In a hundred years' time this will look like an old apothecary. A museum of something that's around today.'The publication features a radio broadcast interview between Damien Hirst and Steve Jones, the Sex Pistols' guitarist, covering music, girls, money, drugs, drinks and smokes. Thebook's index lists every medicine cabinet ever made and the exhibition itself will include original Sex Pistols memorabilia including album sleeves and t-shirts.

[robynrockread]

130 /The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion (2005) 240 pg

The book recounts Didion's experiences of grief after Dunne's 2003 death. Days before his death, their daughter Quintana Roo Dunne Michael was hospitalized in New York with pneumonia which developed into septic shock; she was still unconscious when her father died. During 2004 Quintana was again hospitalized after a collapse and bleeding in her brain.

The narrative structure of the book follows Didion's re-living and re-analysis of her husband's death throughout the year following it, in addition to caring for Quintana. With each replay of the event, the focus on certain emotional and physical aspects of the experience shifts. Didion also incorporates medical and psychological research on grief and illness into the book.

The title of the book refers to magical thinking in the anthropological sense, thinking that if a person hopes for something enough or performs the right actions that an unavoidable event can be averted. Didion reports many instances of her own magical thinking, particularly the story in which she cannot give away Dunne's shoes, as he would need them when he returned.[4] The experience of insanity or derangement that is part of grief is a major theme, about which Didion was unable to find a great deal of existing literature.[5]

Didion applies the iconic reportorial detachment for which she is known to her own experience of grieving; there are few expressions of raw emotion. Through observation and analysis of changes in her own behavior and abilities, she indirectly expresses the toll her grief is taking. She is haunted by questions concerning the medical details of her husband's death, the possibility that he sensed it in advance, and how she might have made his remaining time more meaningful. Fleeting memories of events and persistent snippets of past conversations with John take on a new significance. Her daughter's continuing health problems and hospitalizations further compound and interrupt the natural course of grief.

[robynrockread]

129 /Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec: Work by Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec (2012) 303 pg

Ronan (born 1971) and Erwan Bouroullec (born 1976) are both brothers and designers based in Paris. They have been working together for fifteen years by their distinct personalities. Their studio is based in Paris and their team numbers around six people. In 1997, they were spotted by Cappellini, giving them their first industrial design projects. They started working with the Kreo Gallery in 2000 and had their first solo show there in 2001. Issey Miyake then hired them to design the new house "A-Poc". They are then Rolf Felhbaum, President of Vitra, and worked on a new office system entitled "Joyn". Since then they have gone to work with Artek, Alessi, Axor Hansgrohe, Cappellini, Established & Sons, Flos, Hay, Kettal, Kvadrat, Kartell, Glas Italia, Ligne Roset, Magis, Iittala, Mattiazzi, Mutina, Nani Marquina, Samsung and Vitra. Their work has covered many of the fields of architecture, from craftsmanship to industrial scale, from drawings to videos and photography. The designers also maintain an experimental activity with Gallery kreo, which is also essential to the development of their work. The Museum of Modern Art - Pompidou Center and the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Design Museum in London, and the Museum Boijmans van Beuningen in Rotterdam. Several monographs have been devoted to their work: "Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec" at the Design Museum, London (2002) and "Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec" at the Museum of Contemporary Art Vitra Design Museum (2012) and "Bivouac" at the Center Pompidou Metz (2011) and then at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago (2012-2013). In 2013, the Arts Décoratifs, Paris presented "Momentané" and more recently they presented "17 Screens" at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art (2015). In 2016, the city of Rennes shows their latest researches in 4 exhibitions in three different places (Frac Brittany, Champs Libres and the Parliament of Brittany). A special website has been conceived for the occasion: www.bouroullec.com/press Until January 22, The Vitra Design Museum showcased the exhibition Reveries Urbaines. A comprehensive monograph was released in 2012, Works, Phaidon Press. In 2013, under the art direction of Cornel Windlin, JRP Ringier published a 864-page paperback book called Drawing that collects more than 850 drawings that Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec made between 2005 and 2012. In the past two monographs have been published: Ronan And Erwan Bouroullec, published by Phaidon Press (2003) and Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec - Catalog of Reason (Paris: Modern Images / kreo, 2002). 

[robynrockread]

128 /The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl by Issa Rae (2016) 224 pg

In this universally accessible New York Times bestseller named for her wildly popular web series, Issa Rae—“a singular voice with the verve and vivacity of uncorked champagne” (Kirkus Reviews)—waxes humorously on what it’s like to be unabashedly awkward in a world that regards introverts as hapless misfits and black as cool. I’m awkward—and black. Someone once told me those were the two worst things anyone could be. That someone was right. Where do I start? Being an introvert (as well as “funny,” according to the Los Angeles Times) in a world that glorifies cool isn’t easy. But when Issa Rae, the creator of the Shorty Award-winning hit series The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl, is that introvert—whether she’s navigating love, the workplace, friendships, or “rapping”—it sure is entertaining. Now, in this New York Times bestselling debut collection written in her witty and self-deprecating voice, Rae covers everything from cybersexing in the early days of the Internet to deflecting unsolicited comments on weight gain, from navigating the perils of eating out alone and public displays of affection to learning to accept yourself—natural hair and all. The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl is a book no one—awkward or cool, black, white, or other—will want to miss.

[robynrockread]

127 /Do What you Love and Other Lies about Success and Happiness by Mya Tokumitsu (2015) 192 pg

This mantra is so often repeated that it has become part of the American ethos. Find a career that you’re passionate about. Work hard and maintain a good attitude, be persistent, and all good things will come to you: wealth (or at least material comfort), job satisfaction, a sense of self-worth, and the happiness that comes from achieving success in a profession that you have chosen and find fulfilling. Except, as this penetrating, fact-filled book reveals, most of these ideas are lies, and have been co-opted by corporate interests as a way to pay their employees as little as possible, and to strip away the hard-won benefits and protections that wage earners used to enjoy. After all, if you truly love what you do, pedestrian concerns about salary, health care, and retirement savings can take a back seat. Passion and devotion are what matter. Therefore, unpaid internships abound (they’re opportunities!), full-time positions are being replaced by freelance and contract work (it’s flexible!), and the amount of debt that one has to incur even to get in the game can be crippling. Both a rallying cry for a disempowered workforce to reclaim its footing on the economic ladder, and an eye-opening exposé of the ways that “doing what you love” can actually make your goals less achievable, this compact, insightful, and brilliantly argued call-to-arms might just spark a much-needed workplace revolution.

[robynrockread]

126 /There Are More Beautiful Things than Beyonce by Morgan Parker (2017) 80 pg

There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyoncé uses political and pop-cultural references as a framework to explore 21st century black American womanhood and its complexities: performance, depression, isolation, exoticism, racism, femininity, and politics. The poems weave between personal narrative and pop-cultural criticism, examining and confronting modern media, consumption, feminism, and Blackness. This collection explores femininity and race in the contemporary American political climate, folding in references from jazz standards, visual art, personal family history, and Hip Hop. The voice of this book is a multifarious one: writing and rewriting bodies, stories, and histories of the past, as well as uttering and bearing witness to the truth of the present, and actively probing toward a new self, an actualized self. This is a book at the intersections of mythology and sorrow, of vulnerability and posturing, of desire and disgust, of tragedy and excellence.

[robynrockread]

125 /Mashup: The Birth of Modern Culture by Bruce Grenville, Daina Augaitis, Stephanie Rebick, Vancouver Art Gallery (2016) 368 pg

MashUp: The Birth of Modern Culture traces the inexorable rise of collage, montage, sampling and the cut-up. Tracing its roots from the multiple-perspectives, montages and readymades of Marcel Duchamp, Kurt Schwitters and Hannah Hoch, to the present with its postmodern network culture, where remixing and co-production are the norm and the New Aesthetic seeks to harmonise the now-everyday crossover of the digital and the actual. The book addresses the development of détournement and deconstruction in art, architecture, music and society. Each chapter is a detailed, inclusive look at a cross-section of the main artists and thinkers that have embraced and developed all forms of 'mashup' culture, since its inception in the late nineteenth century with Braque and Picasso's experiments into perspective. MashUp: The Birth of Modern Culture finds parallels between the works of luminaries such as Jean-Luc Godard, Joseph Cornell, Elizabeth Price, Joyce Wieland and Jeff Wall, tracing the lasting impact of such seemingly disparate cultural phenomena as voguing, hacking and the use of audio and film as a kind of a globally available, open source language in vidding, hip hop and dub, and in art that deals with the mass proliferation and dissemination of images and knowledge brought on by digital technologies. MashUp: The Birth of Modern Culture situates the work of Andy Warhol, Richard Hamilton and Guy Debord alongside the likes of Rem Koolhaas and Bruce Mau, Superstudio, Brian Eno and Cory Arcangel, and more generally within a culture where the new is necessarily re-made and re-modelled, and quotation and re-appropriation are an integral part of the way we talk about it. Published in collaboration with the Vancouver Art Gallery.

[robynrockread]

124 /Botanical Art: From the Golden Age of Scientific Discovery by Anna Laurent (2016) 224 pg

Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, wall charts were a familiar classroom component, displaying scientific images at a large scale, in full color. But it's only now that they've been superseded as a teaching tool that we have begun to realize something their ubiquity hid: they are stunning examples of botanical art at its finest. This beautifully illustrated oversized book gives the humble wall chart its due, reproducing more than two hundred of them in dazzling full color. Each wall chart is accompanied by captions that offer accessible information about the species featured, the scientists and botanical illustrators who created it, and any particularly interesting or innovative features the chart displays. And gardeners will be pleased to discover useful information about plant anatomy and morphology and species differences. We see lilies and tulips, gourds, aquatic plants, legumes, poisonous plants, and carnivorous plants, all presented in exquisite, larger-than-life detail. A unique fusion of art, science, and education, the wall charts gathered here offer a glimpse into a wonderful scientific heritage and are sure to thrill naturalists, gardeners, and artists alike.

[robynrockread]

123 /In the Company of Women: Inspiration and Advice from over 100 Makers, Artists, and Entrepreneurs by Grace Bonney (2016) 360 pg

Across the globe, women are embracing the entrepreneurial spirit and starting creative businesses. In the Company of Women profiles over 100 of these influential and creative women from all ages, races, backgrounds, and industries. Chock-full of practical, inspirational advice for those looking to forge their own paths, these interviews detail the keys to success (for example, going with your gut; maintaining meaningful and lasting relationships), highlight the importance of everyday rituals (meditating; creating a daily to-do list), and dispense advice for the next generation of women entrepreneurs and makers (stay true to what you believe in; have patience). The book is rounded out with hundreds of lush, original photographs of the women in their work spaces.