Designs For Different Futures at The Walker Art Center - Anything Is Possible

My two favorite social distancing activities are nature and art, and luckily, there are ample opportunities to partake in both here in The Twin Cities, where I have been riding out the pandemic. The Walker Art Center has put up a new exhibition called Designs For Different Futures, that is an especially great show for these times, as we have to figure out new solutions for going forward in this world. Have. To.

The artists at The Walker are full of good design ideas, so many that I dared to start having a little bit of hope for the future again. There was a disembodied female voice from future narrating things in the background, lending it all a bit of a 2001: A Space Odyssey vibe. In fact, the first piece we saw even looked like a little spaceship (there were little projections inside).

In these Covid times, it makes a lot of sense to have a graphic on the floor instructing one how to assess the risk of a handshake. Comical, but also deadly serious - especially when there's a jackass president who lies about the risks. K, moving on ... 

I was very excited to see the Svalbard Global Seed Vault model on display, as I've been following this project since its inception in 2008. Designed by Architect, Peter W. Soderman, the Svalbard Seed Vault houses seeds from around the world deep in a massive, futuristic space deep within a fjord. 

The vault is like a giant seed library, with countries sending inn their native seeds in the event that a natural or man-made disaster would render a crop extinct ... they've now got backup here in Norway. (Of course, they thought it was invincible, but the vault has already been breached due to the ongoing Climage Crisis. Please CARE!!!) It's all pretty smart. Pretty cool.

One of the things I LOVED, but that you can't really see is the Future Library, 2014-2114 by Katie Paterson. Norway has a lot of cool things going on, because Paterson's library is there too. She planted 1,000 spruce saplings outside of Oslo. In 100 years, they will be felled to make paper to print books that are being written for the library, one per year by 100 different authors ... and most of us will not be around to read them (Frankly, I'll be surprised if anyone is around due to the Climate Crisis that we're really doing nothing of consequence about, very sadly). The first new book is by Margaret Atwood, of The Handmaid's Tale fame, sending her manuscript off into the future. I'm madly in love with this idea ... and trying to figure out how to read any of them!

 

Perspire, 2018 by Alice Potts shows ballet slippers soaked in human sweat that has crystallized and been dyed with red cabbage. Crazy. This is an attempt to show how in the future our accessories and clothing will be highly personalized ... or something like that. It looked cool. 

Looking even cooler was my favorite part of this exhibit, which was a series of dresses made from either 3D Printing or seaweed ... all materials that will definitely be in play going forward in our world, as our current fashion practices are simply not sustainable. My very favorite piece in the entire show (that opens this story above) was the show-stopping Syntopia Finale Dress, 2018 by Iris van Herpen. Vogue described van Herpen as "Fashion's chief scientist and perhaps also its leading futurist," and that surely shows in this jaw-dropping creation. It says that she based the pattern for the laser-cute stainless steel and black silk dress on the soundwaves of birds in flight, and that's all I had to hear. LOVE IT WITH MY WHOLE HEART. And want to wear it so bad. To something. Anything. Cheers to you, Iris van Herpen! 

Also spectacular, though much more earthy, is the Kombukamui Dress, 2018 by Julie Lohmann - made from seaweed and rattan! She liked how seaweed gets big and leathery when wet, and a totally different character when it dries ... and sees seaweed as a ton of design possibilities for the future. 

 

 

There was a really cool piece called In Plain Sight, 2018 that tracked the use of electricity around the world ... and how inequality around the globe affects peoples' access to it. The number one thing people need more of today is empathy. All the bad things happening now would be so much better if people could only find their empathy. This screen really drove that home to me yet again. 

 

There was an enormous bulbous sphere in that same room called Another Generosity, 2018 that changed colors and kind of seemed to breathe. It's filled with water and air (the main - highly endangered - elements of life on Earth, that reacts to tiny changes in its environment - much like our real Earth does, and why we need to be so  much more gentle with it. Please. 

I can't remember what this went with or who did it, but I agree with pretty much every statement within:

             

There was a Republic of Estonia e-Residency Kit, 2014 by the Republic of Estonia. In 2014, the little country introduced the concept of e-Residency, offering anyone the opportunity to be an e-resident. It doesn't grant tax residency or citizenship, but it does let you conduct business and use their public services, etc. Borders fall away (all man-made anyway, so I don't really believe in them), enabling a free flow of ideas and resources. Pretty cool. 

Similarly, Infinite Passports, 2014-2017 by Giuditta Vendrame and Fiona du Mesnildot proposes a system where members could exchange passports temporarily, as well as their geopolitical status. This would allow people to migrate about freely without permission from any government. I'm down with that.

  

The Handmaid's Tale red gown featured prominently in the middle of the gallery suggested an eerie future - especially if this joke of a Supreme Court nominee gets confirmed. It's about design for the future ... but I don't want any part of that kind of future - and it's up to all of us to prevent it. I feel sick just thinking about it  ... 

There was an area devoted to accessibility in the future, featuring the PhoeniX Exoskeleton, 2011-2017 by Homayoon Kazerooni. It's designed to give people with mobility disabilities and spinal cord injuries the ability to walk on their own. Activist Ace Ratcliff was quoted about it, saying, "A utopia is not a world where disability is a problem that's been solved; rather, it's an inevitable expression of genetic variance, and disabled humans are not just welcomed, but fully included." Now ... that's a great statement, but the irony was that my Mom and I got stuck in the tiny closet of a handicapped lift that brings you to this level, for like 15 long minutes, as the staff scrambled to get us out. It was broken, and we couldn't get out, so had to go back up to get out there (Thank God). Mom was therefore unable to access this level of the museum and was never able to see these works that were really interesting for her, having lost her leg and being disabled herself. I'm thinking the Walker should maybe invite her back for free now ... because she didn't get to see this cool prosthetic leg of the future! 

Stance, 2016 by Leslie Speer, Anthony Ta, Brendan Ngo, and Darren Manuel was made from saddle leather, fiberglass, skateboard deck (!), maple veneer, and silicon. It can be adapted to the growth of its user over time (COOL - because we just came from another leg fitting for Mom and it's a major hassle!). It uses regional materials, so its parts can be customized and assembled locally for less than $40! That would also be cool as Mom's new one will be upwards of $1,800 - that insurance will not pay. UNBELIEVABLE still how bad our country's healthcare system is, It really is, and must be reformed. Moving on ... 

 

... to Stranger Visions, 2012-2013 by Heather Dewey-Hagborg. This work addresses genetic surveillance and the ethics of accessing another person's genetic information without their knowledge. Dewey-Hagborg collected chewed up chewing gum from around New York City, and worked with a lab to extract the DNA. In a process called "Phenotyping", she took their genetic information to make portraits of what the person who chewed the gum most likely looked like. TRIPPY. It was very Game Of Thrones Man with No Face-y. 

There was so much to see, and you'll want to see it, as I've included very little of the entire show here. There are other great exhibits happening at The Walker now as well, like Don't Let This Be Easy, celebrating the work of women artists and feminism (The Walker does a great job of being socially timely). All of the works were great, but I was really struck by this file cabinet with shirts in it, saying things like, "One of the ways people hurt me is ...". Please just trust me that you want to see this whole room for yourself. 

You have to love the Selection from Don't Look Back, 1999 by Fiona Banner from the permanent collection. Banner has screenprinted transcripts from the classic Bob Dylan documentary, and it's great as a whole ... 

... and then fun to zoom in on to remember that part of the movie and how cool it was. Is. Again, there is SO much to see and our time was running out, so I urge you to go and explore for yourselves, as it's a really good social distancing activity, as we crossed paths with very few other people in the galleries. 

Racing by a few walls from the permanent collection, I was delighted to see a piece (I Got A Job To Do, 2003) from our Venice, California friend (and Cali Loco!) Llyn Foulkes! That made my heart happy, as I've been missing Venice SO much, and it's nice to see a little part of it even here in the North. 

There is also an exhibit of Jasper Johns prints from 1960-2018. Our favorite from An Art Of Changes was his Flags, 1965. It had one of those optical illusion games, where you stare at the white dot on the flag for 15 seconds and then look at the plain gray panel and you can still see the flag there in your tripping out retinas. 

That coolness was a great finale for our wonderful day at The Walker. It gave us a lot to think about as we go forward in this world, and it was a little reassuring that there are such smart, creative, talented people hard at work around the globe making designs for all of the different future possibilities we may face.

I've said it many times before, but art that makes you stop and think about ways to make our current world better is the very best kind. And this show is full of that. Please go, please think, and please enjoy! 

Walker Art Center 

Designs For Different Futures

September 12, 2020 - April 11, 2021 

Fiore Designs - Your Local Venice Flower Purveyor

"If someone loves a flower, of which just one single blossom grows, in all the millions of stars, it is enough to make him happy just to look at the stars ..." That has always been one of my favorite quotes from The Little Prince, and one that I think of each time I go to Fiore Designs, often to get a single blossom to love. There's something so nice about having a beautiful flower in a bud vase to look at whenever you need some beauty in your life. Which is pretty much always.

Fiore Designs is a Venice flower shop, founded and operated by Venice ladies, Jennifer Juhos and Nicole Renna. We've all been friends for ages, so it makes me so happy to see them realizing their dreams, right here in our own neighborhood - and beyond.

Juhos is an L.A. girl, born and raised, and as it's warm here most all year round (besides this week!), she was always surrounded by flowers. She loved flowers. She worked at flower shops, learning how to make gorgeous arrangements under their designers, and after graduating from USC, she started her own flower business out of her Dad's garage. The business grew fast, and soon Juhos had her Fiore Designs own real store in Studio City.

After 12 years of beautifying Studio City, Juhos met her husband, Colin (not him pictured above. That's my brother, Paul, cutting up), who lived in Venice. Which meant that she soon lived in Venice, and opened the new Fiore shop on Abbot Kinney Boulevard in 2010 (before it got as nuts as it is now). That darling little cottage was almost directly across the street from me, so I'd pop in there often, both to see my friends and to get myself a flower, or a party stopping bouquet to bring to a shindig. It was a great addition to the block, and friend-owned!

As Fiore became a full-scale operation, growing well beyond just bouquets, and on up into corporate events, creating large scale environments for events like conventions, weddings, Bar/Bat Mitzvahs, building sets for photo shoots, productions, storefronts, company gifting, and all the things in life that need flowers and greenery and lovely decor ... Juhos soon realized she needed someone to help her visions come to life. Maybe someone with a background in big productions. Maybe someone that already loved accompanying her downtown to the Flower Mart whenever she was in town. Maybe dear friend Renna, who was in the midst of changing careers and coasts - from film production in New York, to she didn't know what in Venice, just that it had to be Venice again. The timing was perfect for her to make the leap and join her friend as her partner in Fiore. And all this happened shortly after she told another friend how, "I just want to have like a flower shop in Venice or something." Bam. Stars aligned.

Soon thereafter, they expanded to the Pacific Palisades, which really brought both the ladies, and the business together. The Palisades location was relatively short-lived, as let's face it, it's not Venice, and they grew tired of running all over town to be everywhere at once, and got bought out to focus on all the events and the Venice shop. The Venice shop that would soon move to it's new, current location on Pacific Avenue and Brooks.

Abbot Kinney was going crazy (as we all know), and as locals don't even really go there anymore if we can help it (besides to the token few favorites remaining), the writing was on the wall, and the Fiore gals decided to cut out early and build their home base over on Pacific, even closer to the beach that they both love. Sharing the adorable block with the surf shop, General Admission, Fiore Designs opened in the new location last December, with an extra-fun mulled wine and champagne party that was so fun we almost forgot we were in a place of business ... except for all the exquisite floral arrangements that we partied amongst.

The new space has more of a Brooklyn or European vibe, with its exposed brick walls and high ceilings. The shelves are lined with wonderful gifts (including books, bath, candles, CHOCOLATE...) that Juhos and Renna curated from gift shows in Paris and London, gaining inspiration all along their trips from store windows to street signs. They carry products that they made sure were not available anywhere else in the United States, so that Fiore can be a truly unique destination (even online).

"Venice is our home. We want Fiore to grow here," explained Juhos, adding that they hear customers come in all day long from their office loft above the shop, all saying, "It's so nice to be in a real flower shop, right around the corner!" It feels cozy. It feels neighborhoody. It's right up the street from the beach, so you can smell the salty air and feel the sunshine as you walk home carrying your bundle of floral joy, and probably wave at a friend that you pass by. Because this place is part of a community, that as far as Juhos and Renna are concerned, still very much exists.

"When you go out to parties, restaurants, coffee shops, you still see people you know everywhere you go. People support each other and their businesses here, and no matter what, it's still an AMAZING community," Renna insisted, truthfully. Juhos added, "L.A. is so big, but this is still the one place left that still feels like a neighborhood." She explained that she and her husband's favorite thing to do on a day off is just get on their bikes and see where the day takes you ... the bike path, mimosas, bump into a friend, stop by their place, grab people for food, bike to the sunset ... those kind of perfect Venice days where anything can happen. I knew exactly what she meant (mainly because we've all been together on those kinds of days!).

The local businesses they support by patronizing, support them back by ordering flowers. Tasting Kitchen, Hourglass, James Beach ... all places they love, loving them back. That's how Community works. When we talked about longtime, beloved businesses and friends getting priced out of Venice, we all agreed that it's sad and wrong, but you can't give up on Venice. "What I love is the essence of Venice. It's not just one place ... my backyard is one of my favorite places, because you can feel that essence just in the air," Juhos told me. And she's right. You can also feel the love in the air, as the attention to detail and sheer beauty of the things they create can only be done with love. Just in time for Valentine's Day (for which the ladies are more than happy to assist you sometimes clueless gentlemen!)

You for sure get that Venice essence - and love - within the almost Boardwalk-adjacent Fiore at No. 907 Pacific ... where Renna invited everyone to "Come in! Visit! Feel the vibes! Smell the flowers! You are WELCOME."  Juhos added, "We put a little Venice pixie dust in everything we do." And you can feel it.

Fiore Designs
No. 907 Pacific Ave.
Venice
310.230.5007
Fioredesigns.com
Instagram: @Fioredesigns


*PS - When telling the ladies about my series of stories about taking cool classes in Venice, they said they can do flower arranging classes/workshops for groups (like you and your friend's birthday party), with wine, and cheese, and flowers, and skills. Yes! Contact Fiore to arrange.