in my room what sometimes feels like a jail cell
It’s nearing 4:00am and I’m not tired. I think it’s because of that two-hour nap I took earlier today yesterday. It was actually meant to be a half-hour nap.
Currently listening to Metro Station, one of my guilty pleasures. Shhh.
The list:
1) Question from objectifiedfilm.com: “How many manufactured objects did you touch this morning, between waking up and leaving your house?”
Gary Hustwit, director of the documentary Helvetica (which I thought was amazing), is coming out with Objectified, which will look at this question, and many others.
What’s Objectified about?
“Objectified is a documentary about industrial design; it’s about the manufactured objects we surround ourselves with, and the people who make them. On an average day, each of us uses hundreds of objects. (Don’t believe it? Start counting: alarm clock, light switch, faucet, shampoo bottle, toothbrush, razor…) Who makes all these things, and why do they look and feel the way they do? All of these objects are ‘designed,’ but how can good design make them, and our lives, better?” (from kottke.org)
The film comes out soon (in April or May) and I can’t wait to see it!
Oh, and the poster design for the film is pretty cool. See below.
Did anyone else notice that “Objectified” isn’t set in Helvetica? Would that have been corny?
And props to anyone who can identify all the objects in the poster. What’s the second item in row four?
2) Postsecret: (The following description is from amazon.com)
The project that captured a nation’s imagination.
The instructions were simple, but the results were extraordinary. “You are invited to anonymously contribute a secret to a group art project. Your secret can be a regret, fear, betrayal, desire, confession, or childhood humiliation. Reveal anything — as long as it is true and you have never shared it with anyone before. Be brief. Be legible. Be creative.”
It all began with an idea Frank Warren had for a community art project. He began handing out postcards to strangers and leaving them in public places — asking people to write down a secret they had never told anyone and mail it to him, anonymously.
The response was overwhelming. The secrets were both provocative and profound, and the cards themselves were works of art — carefully and creatively constructed by hand. Addictively compelling, the cards reveal our deepest fears, desires, regrets, and obsessions. Frank calls them “graphic haiku,” beautiful, elegant, and small in structure but powerfully emotional.
As Frank began posting the cards on his website, PostSecret took on a life of its own, becoming much more than a simple art project. It has grown into a global phenomenon, exposing our individual aspirations, fantasies, and frailties — our common humanity.
Every day dozens of postcards still make their way to Frank, with postmarks from around the world, touching on every aspect of human experience. This extraordinary collection brings together the most powerful, personal, and beautifully intimate secrets Frank Warren has received — and brilliantly illuminates that human emotions can be unique and universal at the same time.
Frank Warren has compiled a number of PostSecret books, and I bought the first one, PostSecret: Extraordinary Confessions from Ordinary Lives, when I was in high school. I went through a roller coaster of emotions as I read the book and passed the book along to a friend as a White Elephant gift a couple of years ago. I hope she enjoyed it as much as I did.
To view secrets, visit postsecret.com. New secrets are posted every Sunday. I visit postsecret.com every week!
I’ve sent in two secrets to Frank Warren. You should send your secrets in too.
