Art (design) imitates life OR Biomimicry

Have you seen the new TV series called Touch?  It's a great show about the interconnectedness of the universe.  I highly recommend it.

However, this post isn't about the series, just the opening credits.  I can't figure out how to embed them, but you can watch them on vimeo here.

The credits showcase some pretty stunning examples of awesome design in nature, and a few of how we as humans have manipulated our environment through art and architecture to imitate this design.  It's called "biomimicry," and I'm fascinated!

Reduction is relative

So... my efforts to simplify my re-entry into American culture have led me to... Bombay?

No kidding.  After three months of Walden, I've moved back to India, this time temporarily, to help my parents get settled into a new life.  It was hard enough to make the decision to leave the first time, and the tides of fate have just pulled me right back into my adoptive home.  You can't make this stuff up

Though the country is the same, there are a lot of differences this time around.  For one, despite my efforts to simplify my life, I am now living in a 8,000 square foot super posh flat overlooking the heart of what I affectionately call Bombay's West Village.  I also come with renewed purpose in life.  I have started my Masters in Sustainable Design (two courses taken online, but it's a start), and I'm working with the Indian School of Business on a solar policy research project that I helped them design last year.

The refrain keeps beating in my head... "simplify, simplify, simplify" but it seems at odds with my current surroundings.  On Friday I met Mukesh Ambani, the world's 9th richest man.  His idea of a simple family home is Antilla, the world's most expensive single family home, clocking in at a mere $2 billion.  

At least that makes our 8,000 sqft home look humble by comparison!

The Hand of God

I was very lucky to go to school in New York, and even luckier to be brought up to enjoy art and culture.  As a junior undergrad, I visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art and discoverd Rodin's "The Hand of God."

I fell in love.  For the second time in as many months.



I can't explain why this sculpture moved me, and it seems incomplete to have only one view, because this scupture is meant to be seen from all sides.  The two lovers are gently held in the palm of a hand.  In one swoop it confirmed my beliefs about God, sex, and French sculpture.

Then, this week, from Slate's Political Gabfest, I heard about BBC 4's "A History of the World in 100 Objects" from the British Museum.

And I found this -- the Ain Sakhri figure, found in Khareitoun, modern day Sudan, in 9000 BC. 

 

It was then that I realized, that it wasn't the cultural anthropomological aspects that I was tuned into at the Met.  It was the same instincts that have ruled and propegated civilization since the beginning of time :)

But please check out the British Museum's Podcast

And Rodin's statuary -- he did "The Thinker," too.