Feed aggregator
LECTURES - PHOENIX PUBLIC LIBRARY
Last Thursday, February 2. 2012, Arcosanti Planning Interns mounted the exhibition of Arcosanti/Cosanti images, that Planning Coordinator Nadia Begin put together at the downtown Phoenix Public Library (Bruder Building).
On Thursday, Feb 9, Nadia and Jeff Stein have a public presentation/conversation there at 6:30-8PM with William Eaton, guitarist and instrument maker about THE ARCHITECTURAL INSTRUMENT.
[text: Jeff Stein]
[photos: Planning interns Yasaman Esmaili and Nick Klever are placing the last photos of the wall display for the exhibit on the second floor of the Burton Barr Phoenix Public Library].
The event is part of
PHOENIX RISING: The next 100 years
Color+Art in Contemporary Architecture
The Desert Environment Series presents "conversations" with educators, architects, musicians and visual artists every Thursday during the month of February alongside a month long exhibition in the Second Floor of the Burton Barr Library to celebrate the Arizona Centennial.
February 2nd,
5:30pm -6:30pm
Desert Environment Series Opening
Exhibit will be on display from Feb. 2- 29th on the second floor of the Burton Barr Library.
[photo & text: Nadia Begin]
[photo: Planning Coordinator Nadia Begin is giving final touches to the display].
February 2nd (Opening Night)
6:30pm- 8:00pm
Desert Sights & Sound and Simple Shelter
Rob Resetar - Videographer/Composer,
Teresa Rosano & Luis Ibarra - Architects.
February 9th,
6:30pm- 8:00pm
The Instrument Maker and the Architectural Instrument William Eaton - Musician.
Jeff Stein & Nadia Begin - Cosanti Foundation.
[photo & text: Nadia Begin]
[photo: The finished display that will be exhibited until the end of the month of February].
February 16th,
6:30pm- 8:00pm
The Education of an Architect
Victor Sidy - Dean at the Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture.
Joslyn Hicks - Adolescent Program Director for Mission Montessori.
February 23rd,
6:30pm-8:00pm
Color in Hospital Architecture & the Grand Canyon Sergio Mejia - Architect from Mexico City.
Bruce Aiken - Painter.
The desert environment series started in 2008 by Alumni Alex Barragan as a Forum to discuss ideas on Engineering, Architecture, Industrial Design, Education and the Arts as they influence Arizona's Most Spectacular Environment.
The concept behind this month long event is:
*To ENCOURAGE the study of the great disciplines of Engineering, Architecture, Industrial Design, Education and the Arts.
*To EXPLORE new ideas, re-sharpen our imaginative skills and find ways to develop hidden talent.
*To REORGANIZE our studios, our business, or to take our projects to the next level.
*To APPRENTICE with the experts in the field of your interest.
[photo & text: Nadia Begin]
On Thursday, Feb 9, Nadia and Jeff Stein have a public presentation/conversation there at 6:30-8PM with William Eaton, guitarist and instrument maker about THE ARCHITECTURAL INSTRUMENT.
[text: Jeff Stein]
[photos: Planning interns Yasaman Esmaili and Nick Klever are placing the last photos of the wall display for the exhibit on the second floor of the Burton Barr Phoenix Public Library].
The event is part of
PHOENIX RISING: The next 100 years
Color+Art in Contemporary Architecture
The Desert Environment Series presents "conversations" with educators, architects, musicians and visual artists every Thursday during the month of February alongside a month long exhibition in the Second Floor of the Burton Barr Library to celebrate the Arizona Centennial.
February 2nd,
5:30pm -6:30pm
Desert Environment Series Opening
Exhibit will be on display from Feb. 2- 29th on the second floor of the Burton Barr Library.
[photo & text: Nadia Begin]
[photo: Planning Coordinator Nadia Begin is giving final touches to the display].
February 2nd (Opening Night)
6:30pm- 8:00pm
Desert Sights & Sound and Simple Shelter
Rob Resetar - Videographer/Composer,
Teresa Rosano & Luis Ibarra - Architects.
February 9th,
6:30pm- 8:00pm
The Instrument Maker and the Architectural Instrument William Eaton - Musician.
Jeff Stein & Nadia Begin - Cosanti Foundation.
[photo & text: Nadia Begin]
[photo: The finished display that will be exhibited until the end of the month of February].
February 16th,
6:30pm- 8:00pm
The Education of an Architect
Victor Sidy - Dean at the Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture.
Joslyn Hicks - Adolescent Program Director for Mission Montessori.
February 23rd,
6:30pm-8:00pm
Color in Hospital Architecture & the Grand Canyon Sergio Mejia - Architect from Mexico City.
Bruce Aiken - Painter.
The desert environment series started in 2008 by Alumni Alex Barragan as a Forum to discuss ideas on Engineering, Architecture, Industrial Design, Education and the Arts as they influence Arizona's Most Spectacular Environment.
The concept behind this month long event is:
*To ENCOURAGE the study of the great disciplines of Engineering, Architecture, Industrial Design, Education and the Arts.
*To EXPLORE new ideas, re-sharpen our imaginative skills and find ways to develop hidden talent.
*To REORGANIZE our studios, our business, or to take our projects to the next level.
*To APPRENTICE with the experts in the field of your interest.
[photo & text: Nadia Begin]
VISIT - BOSTON ARCHITECTURAL COLLEGE
Cosanti President Jeff Stein in Boston this week presented a copy of the new book from Cosanti Press, LEAN LINEAR CITY: ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY to Susan Lewis, Library Director of the Boston Architectural College. The BAC’s architecture library, one of America’s real treasures, hosted a reception several years ago for Paolo Soleri when he was named Cascieri Lecturer at the BAC. The library’s collection includes several of Soleri’s earlier books.
Photo: Jeff Stein and Susan Lewis
[photo & text: Jeff Stein]
Photo: Jeff Stein and Susan Lewis
[photo & text: Jeff Stein]
COSANTI - ANNUAL BIKE RIDE
This year Cosanti was one of the pit stops for the United Blood Services "Tour de Hero" annual bike ride, which took place last Saturday, January 28. 2012.
[photos & text: Aimee Madsen]
Many in the valley of sun grabbed their bikes to help United Blood Services save lives in honor of National Volunteer Blood Donor Month, created to help raise awareness and recruit donors for the Arizona community blood program.
[photos & text: Aimee Madsen]
Seeing many on bikes buzz by Cosanti, seemed fitting on a couple different levels; Paolo Soleri being pro-citizen involvement and an avid bicyclist himself.
[photos & text: Aimee Madsen]
[photos & text: Aimee Madsen]
Many in the valley of sun grabbed their bikes to help United Blood Services save lives in honor of National Volunteer Blood Donor Month, created to help raise awareness and recruit donors for the Arizona community blood program.
[photos & text: Aimee Madsen]
Seeing many on bikes buzz by Cosanti, seemed fitting on a couple different levels; Paolo Soleri being pro-citizen involvement and an avid bicyclist himself.
[photos & text: Aimee Madsen]
MEETING - FIBER ARTISANS
The first "Meet & Greet Fiber Retreat" for Fiber Artisans - spinners, weavers, knitters, took place this past Saturday Jan. 28, from 9 am - 3 pm in the Arcosanti cafe.
[photo & text: Sue]
The meeting was a great success. Over 30 artisans came to share their work and expertise.
[photo & text: Sue]
There was quite a variety of finished items, lots of unusual yarn.
The general public was able to visit and peruse lots of handmade crafts, felted hats and bags, knitted items, wonderful scarfs and gorgeous yarns.
[photo & text: Sue]
[photo & text: Sue]
The meeting was a great success. Over 30 artisans came to share their work and expertise.
[photo & text: Sue]
There was quite a variety of finished items, lots of unusual yarn.
The general public was able to visit and peruse lots of handmade crafts, felted hats and bags, knitted items, wonderful scarfs and gorgeous yarns.
[photo & text: Sue]
VISIT - TO ESD ENERGY SYSTEMS DESIGN
Arcosanti Habitat Coordinator Scott Riley and Cosanti President Jeff Stein met Monday morning with engineers Halleh Landon and Ali Ardebili of ESD/Energy Systems Design in Scottsdale. ESD is an electrical and mechanical engineering firm at the cutting edge of sustainable design, recommended to us by Arcosanti alum and City of Scottsdale Sustainability Director Anthony Floyd.
Scott and Jeff are seeking proposals for heating and cooling Arcosanti’s bakery upgrade/renovation on the third floor mezzanine of the Crafts III building. Solutions for this small but complex space will be a test for larger systems (including how to use greenhouse air) throughout Arcosanti.
The work is meant to continue to support the reason we are here: BECAUSE of our location in central Arizona, not in spite of it. ESD will research ways to meet codes and comfort requirements while still allowing folks at Arcosanti to feel connected to sun and seasons and place.
ESD’s own LEED-certified offices overlook the Soleri pedestrian bridge and plaza and themselves take advantage of serious and elegant (as in ‘mathematically elegant’) energy-saving mechanical and electrical designs/devices. More to come…
[photos: Halleh Landon and Ali Ardebili,engineers at ESD, Scott Riley at EDS with low-flow A/C vents as wainscote]
[photos & text: Jeff Stein]
Scott and Jeff are seeking proposals for heating and cooling Arcosanti’s bakery upgrade/renovation on the third floor mezzanine of the Crafts III building. Solutions for this small but complex space will be a test for larger systems (including how to use greenhouse air) throughout Arcosanti.
The work is meant to continue to support the reason we are here: BECAUSE of our location in central Arizona, not in spite of it. ESD will research ways to meet codes and comfort requirements while still allowing folks at Arcosanti to feel connected to sun and seasons and place.
ESD’s own LEED-certified offices overlook the Soleri pedestrian bridge and plaza and themselves take advantage of serious and elegant (as in ‘mathematically elegant’) energy-saving mechanical and electrical designs/devices. More to come…
[photos: Halleh Landon and Ali Ardebili,engineers at ESD, Scott Riley at EDS with low-flow A/C vents as wainscote]
[photos & text: Jeff Stein]
CONFERENCE - ST. FE INSTITUTE
ARCOSANTI IN SANTA FE.
Cosanti Foundation President Jeff Stein has returned from a speaking trip to the Santa Fe Institute, America's center for theoretical physics and research into complex adaptive systems. (Santa Fe, of course, is also home to one of Paolo Soleri’s first large architectural commissions, the Paolo Soleri Amphitheatre, still standing.) Invited there for research collaboration by Institute Distinguished Professor Geoffrey West, Stein’s presentation described the following:
“Abstract: Cities, and over half the world’s population living in and around them, are now clearly an integral part of earth’s ecology. Arcosanti, the urban experiment founded 40 years ago by architect Paolo Soleri in the Arizona desert, would place cities at the very center of that ecology, at the very center of the web of life on earth.
[photo: the seminar room at SFI]
[photo & text: Jeff Stein]
“While those who can afford it continue to trade nature for buildings and their energy needs, Soleri and his Cosanti Foundation have been investigating something very different for more than a generation. That exploration – and its accompanying construction work – continues to promote and develop an urban form (Arcology: Architecture and Ecology) that could foster interdependence and social and ecological well-being through density, frugality and a profound awareness of place. Meant to embody a holistic understanding of the city as a scalable organism, Arcosanti’s intent is to focus the twin evolutionary forces of miniaturization and complexity on the problem of urban design.”
At the Santa Fe Institute Stein engaged in discussions with SFI President Jerry Sabloff, spent time with West’s team of post-doctoral fellows working on the physics of the growth of cities – “Cities, Scaling, and Sustainability” - and spoke with Nobel Laureate Murray Gell-mann, discoverer of the Quark, who participated in the Arcosanti Minds for History conference back in 1989.
Several architects from the Santa Fe area also attended Stein’s seminar, including Ed Mazria, executive director of Architecture 2030, the global organization working toward reducing fossil fuel use in new buildings to carbon neutrality by 2030.
[photos: Murray Gell-Mann's famous book and Jeff Stein]
[photo & text: Jeff Stein]
Cosanti Foundation President Jeff Stein has returned from a speaking trip to the Santa Fe Institute, America's center for theoretical physics and research into complex adaptive systems. (Santa Fe, of course, is also home to one of Paolo Soleri’s first large architectural commissions, the Paolo Soleri Amphitheatre, still standing.) Invited there for research collaboration by Institute Distinguished Professor Geoffrey West, Stein’s presentation described the following:
“Abstract: Cities, and over half the world’s population living in and around them, are now clearly an integral part of earth’s ecology. Arcosanti, the urban experiment founded 40 years ago by architect Paolo Soleri in the Arizona desert, would place cities at the very center of that ecology, at the very center of the web of life on earth.
[photo: the seminar room at SFI]
[photo & text: Jeff Stein]
“While those who can afford it continue to trade nature for buildings and their energy needs, Soleri and his Cosanti Foundation have been investigating something very different for more than a generation. That exploration – and its accompanying construction work – continues to promote and develop an urban form (Arcology: Architecture and Ecology) that could foster interdependence and social and ecological well-being through density, frugality and a profound awareness of place. Meant to embody a holistic understanding of the city as a scalable organism, Arcosanti’s intent is to focus the twin evolutionary forces of miniaturization and complexity on the problem of urban design.”
At the Santa Fe Institute Stein engaged in discussions with SFI President Jerry Sabloff, spent time with West’s team of post-doctoral fellows working on the physics of the growth of cities – “Cities, Scaling, and Sustainability” - and spoke with Nobel Laureate Murray Gell-mann, discoverer of the Quark, who participated in the Arcosanti Minds for History conference back in 1989.
Several architects from the Santa Fe area also attended Stein’s seminar, including Ed Mazria, executive director of Architecture 2030, the global organization working toward reducing fossil fuel use in new buildings to carbon neutrality by 2030.
[photos: Murray Gell-Mann's famous book and Jeff Stein]
[photo & text: Jeff Stein]
BOOKS - LEAN LINEAR CITY
We are delighted to announce the Cosanti Press publication of LEAN LINEAR CITY: ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY.
This compact book (7" x 7", 196 pages, fully illustrated in color) is the first full-length publication to present architect Paolo Soleri’s Lean Linear City concept, a “traveling” city that aims to optimize logistics to the extent feasible, in part by being fully integrated with its vital transportation corridor. Soleri, who is known for his theory of “arcology” (architecture + ecology), proposes this “arterial” arcology on analogy with how arteries support the essential life-functions in an organism.
The book can be purchased on our website with the following link LEAN LINEAR CITY: ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY.
[image: YoungSoo Kim, Tomiaki Tamura & text: Lissa McCullough]
Lean Linear City features pedestrian-based communities oriented around linear local and regional transportation systems, fostering quality of life through urban mobility and access, while minimizing consumption of land and material resources of all kinds, including energy resources.
Lean Linear City: Arterial Arcology outlines Soleri’s comprehensive approach to defining and controlling growth patterns of existing and future cities to produce more sustainable, equitable, and robust urban forms. The book graphically illustrates how Lean Linear’s logistics are designed to cohere, enhancing the urban experience, minimizing waste, taking advantage of passive energy opportunities, and defining “smart” boundaries in relation to surrounding agricultural and natural lands.
As urban planners face the key issues of the twenty-first century—ever expanding populations, rapid urbanization, limited global resources, increased demand for food production, and protection of a fragile environment—Soleri proposes that logistically defined “arterial” cities may prove to be a viable option for sustainable urban development. [image: YoungSoo Kim & text: Lissa McCullough]
[from introduction in the book]
Welcome to an important exploration of architectural and cultural thinking and design. Based on the pioneering work of Paolo Soleri, what you are about to read unfolds a collaborative new investigation of Soleri's idea for a Lean Linear City. In these pages architecture and ecology confront the vastness of the North American continent to create a complex and immanent solution for the future of the city. And this book, besides examining the design and methodology for creating an event of such enormous complexity, also describes why we must do it.
Humans want to connect: to each other, to goods, services, ideas. It is why most of us alive on the planet now live in cities: the city is the best instrument we have devised to make these connections. But we also want need to connect to nature, to the earth itself and to that bit of the earth‚s ecology we do not control. And we need to design ways to do that without overwhelming what remains of the earth‚s natural systems, habitats and landscapes.
[image: YoungSoo Kim & text: Jeff Stein]
This book describes a new parameter for design: leanness. It is based on a clear understanding of how life on earth functions. As the authors point out, because of our population numbers, because of the attitude we have taken until now about how to design and grow our cities, we are in some difficulty as a species. And we have placed every other species on the earth into some difficulty, too. A reformulated, lean design, the kind described in these pages, could very well be how we get out of it.
Architecture historian Christian Norburg Schulz points out that humans are wanderers by nature, always on the way. On the other hand, when we do settle and identify with a certain place, the result is architecture. ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY shows how we can reconcile this dichotomy of human life on earth, the dialectic of departure and return ˆ path and goal ˆ that describes our place in the world. While our current urban culture has been able to provide the civilizing comforts of buildings, possessions and literacy, it has yet to integrate these static comforts with the nomad in us, the part that is in love with movement.
To relate architecture and cities to their citizens, to an audience in motion, designers must make architecture work harder, designing buildings ˆ and cities - to be leaner, more like living things, integral parts of a living landscape, able to engage human senses beyond the mere visual. This emphasis on lean urban performance while carrying forth a new understanding of urban form characterizes the work of ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY.
This book comes to us at a watershed moment, when the very basis of culture and economy, and thus our relationship with each other and the cosmos, is being re-thought and requires re-thinking. A Japanese term for this is Hashi: the end of one thing and beginning of another. Hashi can be a bridge, chopsticks, or a book like this.
ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY, in this Hashi moment, presents some of the most important designs yet made for understanding the coming relationship of people, place and planet. I hope its publication will spark action among its readers, so that we can take our rightful place as humans on the earth, a species among many others, truly extra-ordinary in what we are becoming.
Welcome to the real work of the next generation, and to the lean, linear blueprint for how we can go about that work.
Jeff Stein AIA,
President, Cosanti Foundation
[image: YoungSoo Kim and Adam Nordfors, text: Jeff Stein]
This compact book (7" x 7", 196 pages, fully illustrated in color) is the first full-length publication to present architect Paolo Soleri’s Lean Linear City concept, a “traveling” city that aims to optimize logistics to the extent feasible, in part by being fully integrated with its vital transportation corridor. Soleri, who is known for his theory of “arcology” (architecture + ecology), proposes this “arterial” arcology on analogy with how arteries support the essential life-functions in an organism.
The book can be purchased on our website with the following link LEAN LINEAR CITY: ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY.
[image: YoungSoo Kim, Tomiaki Tamura & text: Lissa McCullough]
Lean Linear City features pedestrian-based communities oriented around linear local and regional transportation systems, fostering quality of life through urban mobility and access, while minimizing consumption of land and material resources of all kinds, including energy resources.
Lean Linear City: Arterial Arcology outlines Soleri’s comprehensive approach to defining and controlling growth patterns of existing and future cities to produce more sustainable, equitable, and robust urban forms. The book graphically illustrates how Lean Linear’s logistics are designed to cohere, enhancing the urban experience, minimizing waste, taking advantage of passive energy opportunities, and defining “smart” boundaries in relation to surrounding agricultural and natural lands.
As urban planners face the key issues of the twenty-first century—ever expanding populations, rapid urbanization, limited global resources, increased demand for food production, and protection of a fragile environment—Soleri proposes that logistically defined “arterial” cities may prove to be a viable option for sustainable urban development. [image: YoungSoo Kim & text: Lissa McCullough]
[from introduction in the book]
Welcome to an important exploration of architectural and cultural thinking and design. Based on the pioneering work of Paolo Soleri, what you are about to read unfolds a collaborative new investigation of Soleri's idea for a Lean Linear City. In these pages architecture and ecology confront the vastness of the North American continent to create a complex and immanent solution for the future of the city. And this book, besides examining the design and methodology for creating an event of such enormous complexity, also describes why we must do it.
Humans want to connect: to each other, to goods, services, ideas. It is why most of us alive on the planet now live in cities: the city is the best instrument we have devised to make these connections. But we also want need to connect to nature, to the earth itself and to that bit of the earth‚s ecology we do not control. And we need to design ways to do that without overwhelming what remains of the earth‚s natural systems, habitats and landscapes.
[image: YoungSoo Kim & text: Jeff Stein]
This book describes a new parameter for design: leanness. It is based on a clear understanding of how life on earth functions. As the authors point out, because of our population numbers, because of the attitude we have taken until now about how to design and grow our cities, we are in some difficulty as a species. And we have placed every other species on the earth into some difficulty, too. A reformulated, lean design, the kind described in these pages, could very well be how we get out of it.
Architecture historian Christian Norburg Schulz points out that humans are wanderers by nature, always on the way. On the other hand, when we do settle and identify with a certain place, the result is architecture. ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY shows how we can reconcile this dichotomy of human life on earth, the dialectic of departure and return ˆ path and goal ˆ that describes our place in the world. While our current urban culture has been able to provide the civilizing comforts of buildings, possessions and literacy, it has yet to integrate these static comforts with the nomad in us, the part that is in love with movement.
To relate architecture and cities to their citizens, to an audience in motion, designers must make architecture work harder, designing buildings ˆ and cities - to be leaner, more like living things, integral parts of a living landscape, able to engage human senses beyond the mere visual. This emphasis on lean urban performance while carrying forth a new understanding of urban form characterizes the work of ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY.
This book comes to us at a watershed moment, when the very basis of culture and economy, and thus our relationship with each other and the cosmos, is being re-thought and requires re-thinking. A Japanese term for this is Hashi: the end of one thing and beginning of another. Hashi can be a bridge, chopsticks, or a book like this.
ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY, in this Hashi moment, presents some of the most important designs yet made for understanding the coming relationship of people, place and planet. I hope its publication will spark action among its readers, so that we can take our rightful place as humans on the earth, a species among many others, truly extra-ordinary in what we are becoming.
Welcome to the real work of the next generation, and to the lean, linear blueprint for how we can go about that work.
Jeff Stein AIA,
President, Cosanti Foundation
[image: YoungSoo Kim and Adam Nordfors, text: Jeff Stein]
VISIT - ASU ARCHITECTURE STUDENTS
On Friday, January 13. 2012, I met with John Meunier's 6th year ASU architecture students at Cosanti foundation to introduce that place to them in terms of architectural "intricacy".
[photo: Prof. John Meunier, ASU & text: Cosanti Foundation President Jeff Stein]
[photo: Prof. John Meunier, ASU & text: Cosanti Foundation President Jeff Stein]
KANSAS CITY ART INSTITUTE
The photos were taken during a photographic field workshop with students from Kansas City Art Institute in the west fork of Oak Creek Canyon, Sedona Arizona, Jan. 10, 2012.
The students are visiting Arcosanti for a two week intensive program in art and science.
[photo & text: Roger Tomalty]
Charles Ferguson, a field geologist with USGS gave spontaneous lectures on the Geology of the Canyon.
[photo & text: Roger Tomalty]
The exercise was to take no more than 36 photographs (equivalent of one roll of film- prior to the digital era).
Aimee Madsen, photographer and film maker at Cosanti, put together the idea for this field photo exercise in Oak Creek Canyon.
[photo & text: Roger Tomalty]
Each photo was to be carefully selected and framed, paying special attention to the changing and often challenging lighting conditions.
Alumnus Russel Ferguson, now Director of School of the Foundation Year at KCAI, KANSAS CITY ART INSTITUTE.
[photo & text: Roger Tomalty]
The students are visiting Arcosanti for a two week intensive program in art and science.
[photo & text: Roger Tomalty]
Charles Ferguson, a field geologist with USGS gave spontaneous lectures on the Geology of the Canyon.
[photo & text: Roger Tomalty]
The exercise was to take no more than 36 photographs (equivalent of one roll of film- prior to the digital era).
Aimee Madsen, photographer and film maker at Cosanti, put together the idea for this field photo exercise in Oak Creek Canyon.
[photo & text: Roger Tomalty]
Each photo was to be carefully selected and framed, paying special attention to the changing and often challenging lighting conditions.
Alumnus Russel Ferguson, now Director of School of the Foundation Year at KCAI, KANSAS CITY ART INSTITUTE.
[photo & text: Roger Tomalty]
CORDES JUNCTION INTERCHANGE
We return to our report from 1/13/12 about road construction at the Cordes Junction Interchange.
[photo & text: Sue]
Paolo Soleri returned to the site of one of his designs on the first bridge support. The bridge is being constructed little over a mile from the Arcosanti site.
This meeting took place on a very cold morning on Thursday, 1/12/12.
[photo & text: Sue]
ADOT landscape project manager Joel Salazar and Paolo Soleri looked at specific color swatches to make a final decision on the actual color shades.
[photo & text: Sue]
[photo & text: Sue]
Paolo Soleri returned to the site of one of his designs on the first bridge support. The bridge is being constructed little over a mile from the Arcosanti site.
This meeting took place on a very cold morning on Thursday, 1/12/12.
[photo & text: Sue]
ADOT landscape project manager Joel Salazar and Paolo Soleri looked at specific color swatches to make a final decision on the actual color shades.
[photo & text: Sue]
CORDES JUNCTION INTERCHANGE
We last reported on road construction at the Cordes Junction Interchange on 8/12, 8/15, 9/26 and 10/10/2011.
The following photos were taken last Friday, October 21. 2011.
We can just see the red roof of the old Papa's Place Restaurant on our right.
[photo & text: Sue]
[photo & text: Sue]
[photo & text: Sue]
[photo & text: Sue]
The following photos were taken last Friday, October 21. 2011.
We can just see the red roof of the old Papa's Place Restaurant on our right.
[photo & text: Sue]
[photo & text: Sue]
[photo & text: Sue]
[photo & text: Sue]
CORDES JUNCTION INTERCHANGE
We last reported on road construction at the Cordes Junction Interchange on 8/12, 8/15, 9/26, 10/10 and 10/24, 11/30 and a segment of Paolo Soleri's visit with ADOT, posted on November 4. 2011.
During that visit Paolo Soleri viewed a full size mock-up of one of his designs for the abutments of a new bridge over Highway 17, very close to the Arcosanti site.
The photos were taken last Thursday, January 5. 2012.
[photo & text: Sue]
Paolo Soleri was invited by ADOT and the joint-venture highway construction company VASTCO-SUNDT to view one of his designs on the first massive bridge support.
This relief is still missing intended coloration.
[photo & text: Sue]
It was a somewhat festive event with an entourage of photographers and reporters, as well as ADOT representatives and heads of the road construction company.
[photo & text: Sue]
ADOT landscape project manager Joel Salazar shows selected colors to Paolo Soleri. In the background is Cosanti Foundation president Jeff Stein.
Another visit was scheduled for January 12. 2012 to decide on the actual shade of colors for the design. We will report on that visit on Monday, Martin Luther Kings holiday, January 16. 2012.
A lot of work is happening on Highway 17, the sides of the freeway and the median. Photo updates coming soon.
[photo & text: Sue]
During that visit Paolo Soleri viewed a full size mock-up of one of his designs for the abutments of a new bridge over Highway 17, very close to the Arcosanti site.
The photos were taken last Thursday, January 5. 2012.
[photo & text: Sue]
Paolo Soleri was invited by ADOT and the joint-venture highway construction company VASTCO-SUNDT to view one of his designs on the first massive bridge support.
This relief is still missing intended coloration.
[photo & text: Sue]
It was a somewhat festive event with an entourage of photographers and reporters, as well as ADOT representatives and heads of the road construction company.
[photo & text: Sue]
ADOT landscape project manager Joel Salazar shows selected colors to Paolo Soleri. In the background is Cosanti Foundation president Jeff Stein.
Another visit was scheduled for January 12. 2012 to decide on the actual shade of colors for the design. We will report on that visit on Monday, Martin Luther Kings holiday, January 16. 2012.
A lot of work is happening on Highway 17, the sides of the freeway and the median. Photo updates coming soon.
[photo & text: Sue]
KANSAS CITY ART INSTITUTE
This continues our report from 1/6/12 about a group of students from KCAI, KANSAS CITY ART INSTITUTE, visiting Arcosanti for a two week intensive program in art and science.
[photo & text: Sue]
The group is lead by Professor Russel Ferguson, who is an Arcosanti alumnus and now Director of School of the Foundation Year at KCAI, KANSAS CITY ART INSTITUTE.
Participants are:
Sandra Bojanic, Illustration junior;
Oliver Clark, Sculpture sophomore;
Trent Coffin, Animation junior;
Maylynda Eshleman, Photography senior;
Kendell Harbin, Printmaking senior;
Mavet Miller, Ceramics junior;
Andrew Ordonez, Painting junior;
Andrew Ozier, Illustration junior;
Joey Watson, Ceramics sophomore;
Issey Howe, Sculpture sophomore;
Max Newman, Sculpture sophomore;
Molly Ryan, Ceramics sophomore;
Kahil Irving, Ceramics sophomore;
Frederick Voder Bruegge, Painting junior;
Shane Lutsk, Ceramics sophomore;
Will Meipu, Painting junior;
Jules Itzoff, Illustration junior.
[photo: Sue & text: Russel Ferguson, Sue]
The two-week visit is packed with lectures, work sessions and tours.
Activities include:
Daily work sessions, drawing the Ceramics Apse, the Vaults, the East Crescent complex and the Foundry.
'History of siltcasting and construction at Arcosanti from 1970 until 1974' with Cosanti Foundation instructor Roger Tomalty.
Riparian tour of the Agua Fria riverbed with Roger Tomalty.
[photo: Jeff Stein, Sue & text: Russel Ferguson, Sue]
Also included are:
Three sessions in the Soleri Archives to view original materials and scroll drawings. Here is the group with Soleri Archive photographer David DeGomez, who is explaining his set-up and method.
'Greenhouse research' presentation with Roger Tomalty.
A day trip to Oak Creek Canyon.
Several meetings with Paolo Soleri.
Participation in an Erosion Control workshop.
A talk with new Cosanti Foundation President Jeff Stein.
Tour and supper and a lecture at Taliesin West.
Tour of the Dome House.
Visit to Cosanti.
This report continues.
[photo: Sue & text: Russel Ferguson, Sue]
[photo & text: Sue]
The group is lead by Professor Russel Ferguson, who is an Arcosanti alumnus and now Director of School of the Foundation Year at KCAI, KANSAS CITY ART INSTITUTE.
Participants are:
Sandra Bojanic, Illustration junior;
Oliver Clark, Sculpture sophomore;
Trent Coffin, Animation junior;
Maylynda Eshleman, Photography senior;
Kendell Harbin, Printmaking senior;
Mavet Miller, Ceramics junior;
Andrew Ordonez, Painting junior;
Andrew Ozier, Illustration junior;
Joey Watson, Ceramics sophomore;
Issey Howe, Sculpture sophomore;
Max Newman, Sculpture sophomore;
Molly Ryan, Ceramics sophomore;
Kahil Irving, Ceramics sophomore;
Frederick Voder Bruegge, Painting junior;
Shane Lutsk, Ceramics sophomore;
Will Meipu, Painting junior;
Jules Itzoff, Illustration junior.
[photo: Sue & text: Russel Ferguson, Sue]
The two-week visit is packed with lectures, work sessions and tours.
Activities include:
Daily work sessions, drawing the Ceramics Apse, the Vaults, the East Crescent complex and the Foundry.
'History of siltcasting and construction at Arcosanti from 1970 until 1974' with Cosanti Foundation instructor Roger Tomalty.
Riparian tour of the Agua Fria riverbed with Roger Tomalty.
[photo: Jeff Stein, Sue & text: Russel Ferguson, Sue]
Also included are:
Three sessions in the Soleri Archives to view original materials and scroll drawings. Here is the group with Soleri Archive photographer David DeGomez, who is explaining his set-up and method.
'Greenhouse research' presentation with Roger Tomalty.
A day trip to Oak Creek Canyon.
Several meetings with Paolo Soleri.
Participation in an Erosion Control workshop.
A talk with new Cosanti Foundation President Jeff Stein.
Tour and supper and a lecture at Taliesin West.
Tour of the Dome House.
Visit to Cosanti.
This report continues.
[photo: Sue & text: Russel Ferguson, Sue]
WORKSHOP - EROSION CONTROL
AGUA FRIA WATERSHED EROSION CONTROL WORKSHOP
Free hands-on training along the Agua Fria River at Arcosanti
Friday, January 13, 2012
9 am to 1 pm
with lunch provided
Arcosanti, Arizona
The Cosanti Foundation and the Arcosanti Project, supported by an ADEQ Water Quality Improvement Grant, are hosting this educational “hands on” training in low cost, effective, best management practices to reduce erosion. Learn techniques like rock dams and rock and brush structures to deal with head cuts, stream bank stabilization and other run-off issues.
Protect your property and reduce sediment to streams and rivers. Partners include the Upper Agua Fria Watershed Partnership, Friends of the Agua Fria National Monument, Sonoran Audubon and National Audubon’s Together Green Grant, NRCS.
Technical support is provided by Natural Channel Design of Flagstaff.
For more information and to reserve a spot contact: Mary Hoadley, 928-632-6212 or maryhoadley@arcosanti.org
[photo: Tomiaki Tamura & text: Mary Hoadley]
Free hands-on training along the Agua Fria River at Arcosanti
Friday, January 13, 2012
9 am to 1 pm
with lunch provided
Arcosanti, Arizona
The Cosanti Foundation and the Arcosanti Project, supported by an ADEQ Water Quality Improvement Grant, are hosting this educational “hands on” training in low cost, effective, best management practices to reduce erosion. Learn techniques like rock dams and rock and brush structures to deal with head cuts, stream bank stabilization and other run-off issues.
Protect your property and reduce sediment to streams and rivers. Partners include the Upper Agua Fria Watershed Partnership, Friends of the Agua Fria National Monument, Sonoran Audubon and National Audubon’s Together Green Grant, NRCS.
Technical support is provided by Natural Channel Design of Flagstaff.
For more information and to reserve a spot contact: Mary Hoadley, 928-632-6212 or maryhoadley@arcosanti.org
[photo: Tomiaki Tamura & text: Mary Hoadley]
KANSAS CITY ART INSTITUTE
Alumnus Russel Ferguson, now Director of School of the Foundation Year at KCAI, KANSAS CITY ART INSTITUTE, arrived at the beginning of the week with a group of 17 students.
[photo & text: sue]
The students will spend two weeks of intensive sessions in art and science.
[photo & text: sue]
Yesterday was the first meeting with Paolo Soleri, here at the weekly School of Thought.
We will continue this report with more of the students activities.
[photo & text: sue]
[photo & text: sue]
The students will spend two weeks of intensive sessions in art and science.
[photo & text: sue]
Yesterday was the first meeting with Paolo Soleri, here at the weekly School of Thought.
We will continue this report with more of the students activities.
[photo & text: sue]
BOOKS - CONVERSATION WITH PS
We are happy to announce a new book about Paolo Soleri, to be available at the beginning of April, published by
PRINCETON ARCHITECTURAL PRESS
publishing Fine Books since 1981
CONVERSATIONS WITH PAOLO SOLERI
by Lissa McCullough
ISBN 9781616890551
Publication date 4/12/2012
5.5 x 8 inches (14.0 x 20.3 cm), Paperback
96 pages, 30 b/w illustrations
Not Yet Published, order now for first shipment on or about 4/6/2012
$19.95 Pre-order this title
(no credit card charge until the book ships)
Conversations with Paolo Soleri, the newest volume in our popular Conversations series, offers timely thinking in response to our global environmental crisis.
Drawn from the visionary architect's personal notebooks and sketchbooks, Soleri's most recently (2004-2009) documented ideas respond to contemporary issues such as climate change, oil dependence, suburban sprawl, and overconsumption.
Soleri outlines a detailed proposal for urban reformulation and renewal, appealing to architects, urban planners, environmentalists, urban historians, philosophers, ethicists, and anthropologists.
Two essays and a new interview covering the breadth of Soleri's career round out this accessible introduction, making Soleri's work available for the first time.
[image & text: Princeton Architectural Press, Sue]
This publication was put together by Lissa McCullough, Paolo Soleri' editor.
Here is Lissa with Soleri in November 2011.
The book joins a series that include:
Rem Koolhaas,
Ian McHarg,
Le Corbusier Talks with Students,
A Conversation with Frei Otto,
and Paul Rand.
[photo & text: Sue]
PRINCETON ARCHITECTURAL PRESS
publishing Fine Books since 1981
CONVERSATIONS WITH PAOLO SOLERI
by Lissa McCullough
ISBN 9781616890551
Publication date 4/12/2012
5.5 x 8 inches (14.0 x 20.3 cm), Paperback
96 pages, 30 b/w illustrations
Not Yet Published, order now for first shipment on or about 4/6/2012
$19.95 Pre-order this title
(no credit card charge until the book ships)
Conversations with Paolo Soleri, the newest volume in our popular Conversations series, offers timely thinking in response to our global environmental crisis.
Drawn from the visionary architect's personal notebooks and sketchbooks, Soleri's most recently (2004-2009) documented ideas respond to contemporary issues such as climate change, oil dependence, suburban sprawl, and overconsumption.
Soleri outlines a detailed proposal for urban reformulation and renewal, appealing to architects, urban planners, environmentalists, urban historians, philosophers, ethicists, and anthropologists.
Two essays and a new interview covering the breadth of Soleri's career round out this accessible introduction, making Soleri's work available for the first time.
[image & text: Princeton Architectural Press, Sue]
This publication was put together by Lissa McCullough, Paolo Soleri' editor.
Here is Lissa with Soleri in November 2011.
The book joins a series that include:
Rem Koolhaas,
Ian McHarg,
Le Corbusier Talks with Students,
A Conversation with Frei Otto,
and Paul Rand.
[photo & text: Sue]
HAPPY NEW YEAR 2012!
HAPPY NEW YEAR everyone!
This is an Aerial view of Arcosanti in 1972.
The South Vault was the first structure built. West of the Vault we can see the scaffolding for the shell of the Ceramics Apse, below that are the footings for the Foundry Apse.
[photo: Ivan Pintar & text: Sue]
This is an Aerial view of Arcosanti in 1972.
The South Vault was the first structure built. West of the Vault we can see the scaffolding for the shell of the Ceramics Apse, below that are the footings for the Foundry Apse.
[photo: Ivan Pintar & text: Sue]
DOCUMENTARY - BEFORE FORM
In-house film maker Aimee Madsen has been at work for several years on footage for a documentary about Paolo Soleri.
Now she hopes to raise funds to continue and complete this very important project.
The documentary is filmed mostly at Cosanti in Paradise Valley, AZ, and centers on Soleri's work as an artist and a sculptor.
With the following link you can access a teaser clip with commentary by Sonny Fox.
BEFORE FORM: The Creative World of Paolo Soleri.
Here you can learn more about Aimee Madsen.
We thank everyone for their continued support during the last year and wish for a Peaceful, Healthy and Productive 2012 for all of us. We will continue our reports in the New Year.
[image: Aimee Madsen & text: from kickstarter, Sue]
Now she hopes to raise funds to continue and complete this very important project.
The documentary is filmed mostly at Cosanti in Paradise Valley, AZ, and centers on Soleri's work as an artist and a sculptor.
With the following link you can access a teaser clip with commentary by Sonny Fox.
BEFORE FORM: The Creative World of Paolo Soleri.
Here you can learn more about Aimee Madsen.
We thank everyone for their continued support during the last year and wish for a Peaceful, Healthy and Productive 2012 for all of us. We will continue our reports in the New Year.
[image: Aimee Madsen & text: from kickstarter, Sue]
JEFF STEIN TO ALUMNI
On December 12. 2011, new Cosanti Foundation President Jeff Stein held a first Strategic Planning Retreat with ALT, the Arcosanti Leadership Team and some of the department managers.
From left, Ron Chandler, manager of Landscaping; David Tollas, project manager; Nadia Begin, manager of the planning department; Mary Hoadley, Cosanti Foundation director and treasurer; Roger Tomalty, agriculture manager at Arcosanti and manager of Soleri Scuptures; new President Jeff Stein; maintenance manager Randall Schultz; utilities manager Scott Riley; manager of HR, workshop coordination and the Italian Project, Matteo Di Michele; Cosanti Foundation director and director of the Soleri Archives, as well as director of Design, Tomiaki Tamura; and taking the photo is Sue Kirsch, manager of the Soleri Archives.
Jeff Stein sent the following address to the Arcosanti Alumni:
13 December 11
Dear Fellow Arcosanti Alum:
Best wishes!
It’s Jeff Stein sending you a note from Arcosanti. As I write this, the sun is shining, the air is crisp and buildings you helped construct continue to be occupied and more relevant than ever.
Those of us at the site want to take this moment before the start of a new year to thank you for taking a chance on an Arcosanti Workshop years ago, for having had the foresight to come here to contribute your strength and energy to build this place where we live and work today. You have helped to shift some of the discussion worldwide from maximized cars to miniaturized cities. The dialogue, of course, is still ongoing; but you should know the importance of this desert place is greater than it was when I was a workshopper thirty-five years ago. We have regular calls from journalists - New York Times, Wall Street Journal, new international publications – and educators. This past month, a documentary film director showed up to tell us he needed to revise his shooting script about the future of housing in America to show visual evidence at Arcosanti, because architects he was interviewing around the US suggested relevant dialogue on green/ sustainable architecture BEGINS here.
The news this month is of University of Michigan studies about the effect of nature on enhanced brain function. The studies claim that memory, attention span, creativity…all are enhanced by time spent in - or even just a view of - unspoiled nature. Arcosanti, standing and functioning in the midst of a vast nature preserve, is a living example of this enhanced ability to evolve.
We are thankful for the continuing support of alumni. Geoff Bruce has funded the Geoffrey Bruce Workshop Scholarship for the coming year; Russell Ferguson returns for his annual month-long visit with 16 students from Kansas City Art Institute in January; Anthony Floyd, pioneering the new International Green Construction Code, is at Arcosanti lecturing about it, keeping us up to date. And we appreciate all of you for visiting with family and guests, buying bells, sending workshoppers. As an Arcosanti alum, please do consider supporting a workshop scholarship; or find a way to support our exhibition and publication schedule. We need donations to both these projects, and welcome your participation in them.
Thank you for all you have done so far to make Arcosanti a reality in the world. There’s much more to do, and we look forward to your help.
Cheers.
Jeff Stein
On behalf of the Arcosanti Community
Jeff Stein AIA
President, Cosanti Foundation
Arcosanti HC74 Box 4136
Mayer AZ 86333
T: 617-435-9909
E: jeffstein@arcosanti.org
W: www.arcosanti.org
JUST A NOTE: The following is a partial list of what we are up to just recently at Arcosanti. Again, it is your support that continues to make all this possible.
Books:
*Our new book ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY: Lean Linear City, put together by Arcosanti staffer YoungSoo Kim, is at the printer; Princeton Architectural Press brings out a new CONVERSATIONS WITH PAOLO SOLERI this spring; and new additions to the QUADERNI series will be arriving by summer.
[more about these new books will be posted in the early part of the New Year].
Films:
*Five separate documentary films are being prepared about Arcosanti and Paolo Soleri’s work, including projects by Geoffrey Madeja, Eric Bricker, Michael Peterson / Blue Dot Films, Lisa Scafuro / Mona Lisa Films , and Aimee Madsen / Eye Am Films. This last Eye Am film is an in-house project at Cosanti .
[We will post a report about Aimee Madsens project on Friday, December 30. 2011].
Lectures:
While Paolo Soleri (age 92!) no longer makes public appearances, several of us continue to represent the work in venues across the US: Matteo DiMichele and YoungSoo Kim presented at the University of Nevada; Roger Tomalty in Boston, Jeff Stein at NAU, TECHONOMY, and the Santa Fe Institute.
Exhibitions:
We are preparing two exhibitions during the coming year: a major retrospective of the work of Paolo Soleri, with comprehensive catalogue at the NAU Art Museum in Flagstaff; and an equally significant exhibit at SMOCA / Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, part of a series of installations in conjunction with ASU.
Roads:
*Not that one, just yet, but it’s a start: a new Cordes Junction interchange ($50 million!) is under construction with a special ramp to Arcosanti; Paolo Soleri was design consultant for all the concrete bridge (5 new bridges) abutments and landscape walls.
Workshops:
The construction workshop / experiential education remains at the core of our educational mission. 2012 workshops begin on February 5, and we look forward to a larger group of diverse students undertaking more projects on-site than during the past few years. We have added special events to this year’s workshops: side trips, foreign language study, and a special tuition discount for children of alumni.
Institutions:
*We are developing new educational / research relationships with Northern Arizona University and with the Santa Fe Institute; and closer ties, project-based, with Arizona State University and Taliesin West/the Frank Lloyd Wright School.
Planning:
*Strategic planning is ongoing with Board and Staff and Community, sharpening our focus as a lean institution and working through the possibilities to accomplish our mission. We will welcome new thoughts for consideration in the coming months.
Construction:
*We know what must be done, and pretty much how to do it: the East Crescent needs completing; expanded greenhouse agriculture is ready to happen; site utilities need expanding; archival storage is in the works; Cosanti in Scottsdale requires restoration work.
Colly Soleri Music Center
*The annual series of performing arts events at Arcosanti continues in the coming year – April to October – with returning guests as well as new artists ready to produce some extraordinary moments in the East Crescent amphitheater. We hope you can join us for one or more of these.
President:
*Of course Paolo’s retirement from day-to-day management decisions made this happen at the end of the past summer; I have left Boston and the Deanship of Boston Architectural College to do this work; the board and staff at Cosanti and Arcosanti, and Paolo himself, have been extremely generous in helping to insure our success here as we move forward to the future.
Again, I thank all of you for your continued support of this place and of each other. I hope to see you out here. Jeff
[photo: Sue & text: Jeff Stein, Sue]
From left, Ron Chandler, manager of Landscaping; David Tollas, project manager; Nadia Begin, manager of the planning department; Mary Hoadley, Cosanti Foundation director and treasurer; Roger Tomalty, agriculture manager at Arcosanti and manager of Soleri Scuptures; new President Jeff Stein; maintenance manager Randall Schultz; utilities manager Scott Riley; manager of HR, workshop coordination and the Italian Project, Matteo Di Michele; Cosanti Foundation director and director of the Soleri Archives, as well as director of Design, Tomiaki Tamura; and taking the photo is Sue Kirsch, manager of the Soleri Archives.
Jeff Stein sent the following address to the Arcosanti Alumni:
13 December 11
Dear Fellow Arcosanti Alum:
Best wishes!
It’s Jeff Stein sending you a note from Arcosanti. As I write this, the sun is shining, the air is crisp and buildings you helped construct continue to be occupied and more relevant than ever.
Those of us at the site want to take this moment before the start of a new year to thank you for taking a chance on an Arcosanti Workshop years ago, for having had the foresight to come here to contribute your strength and energy to build this place where we live and work today. You have helped to shift some of the discussion worldwide from maximized cars to miniaturized cities. The dialogue, of course, is still ongoing; but you should know the importance of this desert place is greater than it was when I was a workshopper thirty-five years ago. We have regular calls from journalists - New York Times, Wall Street Journal, new international publications – and educators. This past month, a documentary film director showed up to tell us he needed to revise his shooting script about the future of housing in America to show visual evidence at Arcosanti, because architects he was interviewing around the US suggested relevant dialogue on green/ sustainable architecture BEGINS here.
The news this month is of University of Michigan studies about the effect of nature on enhanced brain function. The studies claim that memory, attention span, creativity…all are enhanced by time spent in - or even just a view of - unspoiled nature. Arcosanti, standing and functioning in the midst of a vast nature preserve, is a living example of this enhanced ability to evolve.
We are thankful for the continuing support of alumni. Geoff Bruce has funded the Geoffrey Bruce Workshop Scholarship for the coming year; Russell Ferguson returns for his annual month-long visit with 16 students from Kansas City Art Institute in January; Anthony Floyd, pioneering the new International Green Construction Code, is at Arcosanti lecturing about it, keeping us up to date. And we appreciate all of you for visiting with family and guests, buying bells, sending workshoppers. As an Arcosanti alum, please do consider supporting a workshop scholarship; or find a way to support our exhibition and publication schedule. We need donations to both these projects, and welcome your participation in them.
Thank you for all you have done so far to make Arcosanti a reality in the world. There’s much more to do, and we look forward to your help.
Cheers.
Jeff Stein
On behalf of the Arcosanti Community
Jeff Stein AIA
President, Cosanti Foundation
Arcosanti HC74 Box 4136
Mayer AZ 86333
T: 617-435-9909
E: jeffstein@arcosanti.org
W: www.arcosanti.org
JUST A NOTE: The following is a partial list of what we are up to just recently at Arcosanti. Again, it is your support that continues to make all this possible.
Books:
*Our new book ARTERIAL ARCOLOGY: Lean Linear City, put together by Arcosanti staffer YoungSoo Kim, is at the printer; Princeton Architectural Press brings out a new CONVERSATIONS WITH PAOLO SOLERI this spring; and new additions to the QUADERNI series will be arriving by summer.
[more about these new books will be posted in the early part of the New Year].
Films:
*Five separate documentary films are being prepared about Arcosanti and Paolo Soleri’s work, including projects by Geoffrey Madeja, Eric Bricker, Michael Peterson / Blue Dot Films, Lisa Scafuro / Mona Lisa Films , and Aimee Madsen / Eye Am Films. This last Eye Am film is an in-house project at Cosanti .
[We will post a report about Aimee Madsens project on Friday, December 30. 2011].
Lectures:
While Paolo Soleri (age 92!) no longer makes public appearances, several of us continue to represent the work in venues across the US: Matteo DiMichele and YoungSoo Kim presented at the University of Nevada; Roger Tomalty in Boston, Jeff Stein at NAU, TECHONOMY, and the Santa Fe Institute.
Exhibitions:
We are preparing two exhibitions during the coming year: a major retrospective of the work of Paolo Soleri, with comprehensive catalogue at the NAU Art Museum in Flagstaff; and an equally significant exhibit at SMOCA / Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, part of a series of installations in conjunction with ASU.
Roads:
*Not that one, just yet, but it’s a start: a new Cordes Junction interchange ($50 million!) is under construction with a special ramp to Arcosanti; Paolo Soleri was design consultant for all the concrete bridge (5 new bridges) abutments and landscape walls.
Workshops:
The construction workshop / experiential education remains at the core of our educational mission. 2012 workshops begin on February 5, and we look forward to a larger group of diverse students undertaking more projects on-site than during the past few years. We have added special events to this year’s workshops: side trips, foreign language study, and a special tuition discount for children of alumni.
Institutions:
*We are developing new educational / research relationships with Northern Arizona University and with the Santa Fe Institute; and closer ties, project-based, with Arizona State University and Taliesin West/the Frank Lloyd Wright School.
Planning:
*Strategic planning is ongoing with Board and Staff and Community, sharpening our focus as a lean institution and working through the possibilities to accomplish our mission. We will welcome new thoughts for consideration in the coming months.
Construction:
*We know what must be done, and pretty much how to do it: the East Crescent needs completing; expanded greenhouse agriculture is ready to happen; site utilities need expanding; archival storage is in the works; Cosanti in Scottsdale requires restoration work.
Colly Soleri Music Center
*The annual series of performing arts events at Arcosanti continues in the coming year – April to October – with returning guests as well as new artists ready to produce some extraordinary moments in the East Crescent amphitheater. We hope you can join us for one or more of these.
President:
*Of course Paolo’s retirement from day-to-day management decisions made this happen at the end of the past summer; I have left Boston and the Deanship of Boston Architectural College to do this work; the board and staff at Cosanti and Arcosanti, and Paolo himself, have been extremely generous in helping to insure our success here as we move forward to the future.
Again, I thank all of you for your continued support of this place and of each other. I hope to see you out here. Jeff
[photo: Sue & text: Jeff Stein, Sue]
HAPPY HOLIDAYS 2011
MERRY CHRISTMAS and HAPPY HOLIDAYS to family and friends near and far.
[photo: sunrise viewed from the third floor of the East Crescent]
[photo & text: Sue]
[photo: sunrise viewed from the third floor of the East Crescent]
[photo & text: Sue]
