dean terry

You are not supposed to pay attention to the parking structures that sit next
to (rather than under) suburban office buildings such as this one in Addison
Texas. These structures built for automobiles are supposed to be invisible, not
part of the official design of the primary structure. Sometimes it’s hard to
figure out which one is uglier.

While I was interviewing him in Addison
Circle, Andres Duany looked
at these structures and said “it couldn’t have taken more than 15 minutes
to design the whole facade.”

Pretty generous of him, I thought.

Memory Bench

Benches and chairs have become decorative. They are like vestigial relics of a time when people really did sit in front of their houses.

OK this is funny. I played a part in Bubble 1.0 and if we are in a Bubble 2.0 – there certainly is a frenzy over social software – then this image may have it down pat. One thing that was lacking in Bubble 1.0 was irony, not to mention doubt. We were all caught in this mass hallucination that looked something like the cover of The Robb Report, except younger and with email.

After the sales of myspace and flickr, a lot of people raised their heads from their gmail and went “hmmmm. So people really do want to connect with other people?” Well of course they do – at least via the mediation of a screen. Most of the built environment precludes opportunities for interrelations. We all get to have our stuff, our houses, and our cars, all of which keeps us at increasing distances from one another. And a good deal of recent technology is itself to blame for the spiral of disconnectedness.

As I finish my film Subdivided I am continually reminded how no matter how violently some societal forces push
us away from one another, we always find ways to connect, even if it’s just recreational
groping in Second Life

A Little Tree on a Concrete Island

This is a sad little tree behind a new shopping center in Frisco, Texas. We can thank thoughtful zoning rules for this lovely scene. Everything was scraped away, paved and cemented, and then they made a little island for this lonely, pathetic tree.

Still image from the documentary film “Subdivided” – to be released this year.