May – 2012 – mammoth // building nothing out of something

Monthly Archives: May 2012

May 29, 2012 – 7:00 pm

cryptoforestry in the homogenocene

Wilfried Hou Je Bek, author of the Cryptoforestry blog, has a nice article in the first issue of new journal The State on his particular topic of expertise, defining cryptoforestry, describing the place of cryptoforests within cities, and discussing the pleasure to be found in seeking out and treking through cryptoforests — a pleasure which […]

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May 24, 2012 – 8:20 pm

shift: process

SHIFT, North Carolina State University’s student-produced, professionally-reviewed journal on landscape architecture, is seeking submissions for its second issue, “SHIFT: Process”, which will “focus on new ways of thinking about the design process” that better engage “the designer, the community, and ecology”. More details can be found at the SHIFT website.

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May 24, 2012 – 7:00 pm

withdrawal and rise

[Detail from a map of groundwater wells in Jackson County, Texas, drawn by the U.S.G.S. in cooperation with the Texas Water Development Board and Jackson County; satellite studies of groundwater levels — which use small changes in the Earth’s gravitational field to detect fluctuations in groundwater reserves — have indicated extreme depletion in Texas as […]

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May 24, 2012 – 6:00 am

shiptracks

[Ship tracks — “narrow clouds… form[ed] when water vapor condenses around tiny particles of pollution that ships either emit directly as exhaust or that form as a result of gases within the exhaust” — in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California, captured photographically by a NASA satellite; the atmospheric trace of the seaborne transfer […]

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May 22, 2012 – 7:00 pm

comments

In an attempt to stem the flow of comment spam, we’ve adjusted the comment policy to increase the scenarios under which comments are held for moderation and we’ve turned off comments on old posts.  If you’d like to contact us about an older post or you’ve posted a comment and it seems to be stuck […]

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May 21, 2012 – 6:00 am

voices going viral

[mammoth is among the blogs included in the “Voices Going Viral” exhibition accompanying “Going Viral”, an event tonight at the New York Center for Architecture: Going Viral explores the impact that social media, technology and device culture are having on ourdesign process, and ultimately the way we practice. How do we shape a global conversation? […]

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May 16, 2012 – 6:00 am

“brute force architecture”

We highly recommend checking out Bryan Boyer’s latest post, “Brute Force Architecture and its Discontents”, which is a fascinating take on OMA and its uinque impact on the operational models of other architecture firms around the globe: OMA is famous for two things: its astounding output, and the extent to which its operations chew through […]

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May 15, 2012 – 7:30 pm

dredge research collaborative: live interview @ studio-x

[The Dredge Research Collaborative — Stephen, Tim Maly, and myself, with fourth member Brett Milligan present in spirit but not body — in live conversation back in January at Studio-X NYC about the dredge cycle, artificial islands, geotubes, sensate geotextiles coating aqueous terrain, the scale of human influence over sediment, the New York Bight’s “Mud […]

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May 7, 2012 – 9:00 pm

“google/arctic/mars” at studio-x nyc

If I were in New York City tomorrow night, I’d be at Studio-X for what sounds like a really great evening: first, a live interview with Michael Gerrard on “drowning nations” and climate change law, and, second, a roundtable on “sovereignty, governance, and the nation-state itself in a range of geographic and spatial scenarios, from […]

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May 3, 2012 – 7:00 pm

glitch jam

[The Placer County Courthouse, in Auburn, California — imagine it swarmed by a glitch jam.] NPR reported this morning on a traffic jam in California caused by an algorithmic glitch “accidentally summon[ing] 1,200 people to jury duty on the same morning”. An excellent reminder of the tendency of algorithmic dysfunction to manifest as physical dysfunction, […]

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