Fish Sculpture Progress

1/4 scale, schematic model of the Vermillion Rockfish, carved from pine and redwood Between meetings for new wowhaus projects over the past week, I’ve completed two 1/4 scale models of our mosaic fish sculptures for the Ortega Branch of the San Francisco Public Library, commissioned by the San Francisco Arts Commission. I’ve borrowed a few […]

Interview with Jim Christensen

photo: Todd Hido My interview with Brooklyn-based artist and woodworker Jim Christensen is the latest in an ongoing series of interviews and studio visits with other makers/artisans/crafters. You may read these by clicking here. If you would like to introduce yourself and your work to a growing Deep Craft network, I invite you to visit […]

Revive the WPA?

display of WPA-initiated crafts (public domain image) What became of the Obama meme-machine? How could the campaign that so vigorously appropriated the viral marketing strategies of such mainstays of youth culture as social networking and graffiti graphics get it so wrong when selling actual policy? Where’s the poetry? “Public option“..!? “Single payer“..!? How about starting […]

Giant Fish Sculptures Commence

‘feeder fish’, like these anchovies abound this time of year (public domain image) I’ve begun making the scale models for our giant, mosaic fish sculptures that will live permanently outside the new building for the Ocean View branch of the San Francisco Public Library. Funded by the San Francisco Arts Commission, the project is the […]

Entropy Schmentropy

I doubt the rancher who owns this tiny roadside outbuilding shares my enthusiasm for the patterns of blistered paint on its corrugated walls. He’d probably agree that it needs repainting and was a poorly executed job to begin with, or that the galvanized steel was best left exposed to the elements without any paint at […]

Collaborative Agitprop

Scoping a site for Watershed Field Research in Fruitvale One of the most rewarding aspects of a collaborative working relationship is that both the relationship and the work it produces tend to improve over time. Whenever Ene and I (aka wowhaus) perform field research for one of our public projects, we pay as close attention […]

Watershed Morphology Workshop

representations of water from across time and cultures How do we indicate water, let alone its increasing significance in maintaining the fabric of a healthy urban watershed? As we prepare a final design for the City of Oakland’s system of Watershed Markers, Ene and I will spend the weekend at farmer’s markets and major pedestrian […]