Typography Book Projects: Psychogeographical Mapping, Cooking & Typography

Outlining some ideas for my typography class at Parson’s, for our book making projects.

For class, we will be creating 2 projects, which will turn into books. One is a psychogeographical map and the other is a little cooking memoir. I need to come up with idea for each.

The cooking book is to teach us about book binding and selecting type options for recipes, which can have many options. We need to pick a somewhat personal story/recipe. I think I will write about both my hatred of pot pies, as well as my love of Gordon Ramsay’s shepherd’s pie recipe, which I first made during Hurricane Sandy. This was also the week I adopted my cats, only kittens at the time, only 8-10 weeks old. At the time, the subways had been shut down, so I couldn’t go anywhere for a week. Luckily, because I was living so far north in Manhattan, there was no flooding and basically we didn’t lose any power. (In the East Village, it was another story.) I think there’s enough there to write a good story.

For the Psychogeographical Mapping…I’m drawing a blank. Some ideas:

  • dog runs
  • pet stores
  • Japanese grocery stores
  • Walking down the street listening to Rhapsody In Blue and taking note of what’s around me. (If you haven’t done this, while taking a walk in NYC, you’re really missing out.)
  • Mapping the Central Park Conservatory Garden, a good place to read. Maybe the benches.

Maybe some better ideas:

  • Map movie theaters in NYC that aren’t chains, up to 96th St. Meaning no Regal, AMC, or Imax theaters. City Cinemas is OK.
  • Map Goodwill Donation stores. I do go to Goodwill and the Salvation Army a lot.

I’m leaning towards the theater idea. Now to do some write-ups.

Cities that shape

Last Friday I saw the movie Tokyo!, directed by Michel Gondry, Leos Carax, and Bong Joon-Ho. It asks the question, do we define our cities, or do they define us?

Today, while checking my RSS feeds, I eventually saw something related to this idea. “Theory of the Dérive”, by Guy Debord:

One of the basic situationist practices is the dérive [literally: “driftingî], a technique of rapid passage through varied ambiances. Dérives involve playful-constructive behavior and awareness of psychogeographical effects, and are thus quite different from the classic notions of journey or stroll.

He also writes:

In his study Paris et líagglomération parisienne (BibliothËque de Sociologie Contemporaine, P.U.F., 1952) Chombart de Lauwe notes that “an urban neighborhood is determined not only by geographical and economic factors, but also by the image that its inhabitants and those of other neighborhoods have of it.î In the same work, in order to illustrate “the narrowness of the real Paris in which each individual lives . . . within a geographical area whose radius is extremely small,î he diagrams all the movements made in the space of one year by a student living in the 16th Arrondissement. Her itinerary forms a small triangle with no significant deviations, the three apexes of which are the School of Political Sciences, her residence and that of her piano teacher.

It’s basically mapping someone’s movements over a course of time, and displaying this information graphically. I disagree with the quote on MoonRiver’s blog describing “the narrowness of the real Paris in which each individual lives and which, according to Debord, ought to provoke outrage at the fact that anyone’s life can be so pathetically limited.”

Pathetic seems unfair. This is just a map of someone’s movements for a year. It’s not a determination of the quality of those movements and interactions. Let’s not forget, the map is of Paris; I’m sure there are many who would have loved to trade places with this student for that year. I guess perhaps it depends on what de Lauwe means by “image”, above. To be less serious, here’s another example from a dad mapping the movements of himself, his 2 kids, and their cat for 1 hour in front of the TV, on Flickr. Interesting stuff.

To answer the question, do our cities shape us, or us them, I think it’s a little of both, but perhaps as much as we make it so. In any case, the movie was quite entertaining and quirky to say the least.

Tokyo! is playing at the Landmark Sunshine Theaters, in NYC.