Dienstag, 17. Mai 2011

Architecture for children













































The sun is shining, take the kids to a playground - a modernist playground! Gabriela Burkhalter's Website Architektur für Kinder (architecture for children) is a wonderful ressource for playground projects by artists and architects between 1945 and 1975. Often with radically new concepts, they were not only modern in shape, but also mirroring modernist reform pedagogy with their combination of strict modernism and abstraction, playfulness, openness and variability (emphasis on creativity) and a sense for adventure.

From top to bottom:
1. from the magazine article: 400 terrains de jeux, vus et commentés par Jacques Simon
Aménagement des espaces libres, fascicule 4, in: revue Espaces verts (revue d'aménagement de l'espace rural et de loisirs), saint-michel-sur-orge, France, 1975
2. Michael Grossert's playground for the Aumatten schoolyard in Reinach, Switzerland (1967)
3. Group Ludic, Paris
4. Cover of the book: Alfred Ledermann, Alfred Trachsel: Spielplatz und Gemeinschaftszentrum (2nd edition 1968), Switzerland/Germany

Donnerstag, 12. Mai 2011

Good night TV ident month





I decided that the extended TV ident month is over. TV idents might be a part of the regular programme here on the dispokino channel in the future, but for now we say goodnight with the ident for the kid's bed-time-story programme from Swiss TV (1970ies) and the melancholic French closing ident of Antenne 2 (1975-83), drawings by Folon, Music by Michel Colombier.

Montag, 2. Mai 2011

TV ident month: Aleksandra Domanović's Yugoslavian news idents project



In her project 19:30, Yugoslavian born artist Aleksandra Domanović explores the history of the TV news of the geographic region of ex-Yugoslavia. It includes an anthology of ident music, remixes, a video and a series of parties.
Aleksandra Domanović, who grew up in Slovenia, draws on her experience of wartime Yugoslavia when everyone throughout the entire country would gather at 19.30 in front of the TV to watch the main news and check out the latest developments. The music that once announced the news today triggers memories of that period. Following the dissolution of Yugoslavia, the former regional channels became the national channels of the new nation states. Their signature tunes often contain martial or nationalist elements.
In the aftermath of war, techno parties offered people a chance to dance and leave nationalism behind them. In remixes, parties and a video, Domanović mixes and explores these connotations of TV news  and post-war Techno culture.

Here are some of my favorites from her collection:

1980's Zrcalo Tedna (Bosnia and Herzegovina)

 undated Intro (Serbia)

1975 or 1978 (Macedonia)


And my own remix of Macedonia's clock music from 1982:

Pre-news lullaby for the children of Skopje (modernist part) by And Me

Sonntag, 1. Mai 2011

TV ident month extended



Time is running, the official "TV ident month" April is over. But I have some more stuff for you. Stay tuned.