A very inspiring and resourceful new issue of the bimonthly art paper ‘HTV de IJsberg’ is out now. This 79th issue is called ‘Mental architecture/former utopian building’ and is guest-edited by artist/curator/scenographer/culture gourmand Jean Bernard Koeman. The magazine collects (three) personal statements and (hidden) work of several artists like HAP, Geert Goiris, Thomas Hirschhorn, Jan De Cock, on how they are inspired by the utopians and architectural achievements of the 1950’s and the modernist era. It is a magazine full of pictures and personal thoughts on why these buildings or structures are important, funny or fantastic. A wonderful extra region to feed your mental map.

Example of (a part of) HAP’s contribution, read on here.

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The thumb with mindmap is made by Jean Bernard Koeman.

Note on mental architecture. Mental architecture is one of the guiding assumptions of evolutionary psychology: that the human mind is composed of semi-independent modules (left and right brain being the most common ones). Interaction with the environment, but also internal processes like meditation, can alter our mental architecture, or the way our neurons are linked and grouped. Conceptually seen, you can also use the term ‘mental architecture’ for mapping out how you see the world, and on which thoughts, concepts, experiences, and images your map is based. Mental architecture is the building in ourselves (Jean Bernard Koeman)!

A year ago, I got a very stirring present in my PO box. The little treasure is called ‘Cabinet‘, a magazine on art and culture I haven’t seen anywhere before. In their words: “Cabinet is as interested in the margins of culture as its center. Presenting wide-ranging, multi-disciplinary content through columns, essays, interviews, and special artist projects. Visually engaging, in-depth exploring, playful and serious, exuberant and committed.”

What I like about Cabinet, is its omnivorous appetite for understanding the world in a non pretentious way, which makes the magazine a very inspiring and valuable sourcebook of ideas. My cup of tea with milk.

Some impressions..

Tears of Laughter (Issue 17 Spring 2005) Between the expressions of laughter and weeping there is no difference in the motion of the features, Leonardo da Vinci wrote in his posthumously published Treatise on Painting, either in the eyes, mouth or cheeks. With the difference between the physical expression of emotions so subtle, artists had a challenge on their hands: How to differentially depict, in the words of Sir Joshua Reynolds, the frantic joy of a Bacchante and the grief of a Mary Magdalena? (…)

The Origins of Cybex Space (Issue 29 Spring 2008) The Swedish physician Gustav Zanderâ’s institute in Stockholm, founded in the late nineteenth century and stocked with these custom-built machines, was the first “gym” in the sense that we know the word today (…)

Skateable Reverse Engineering (Issue 8 Fall 2002) Skateboarding’s evolutionary leap from flat ground to the vertical walls of Southern California’s empty swimming pools in the mid-70s was the starting point for an inspired re-appropriation of familiar sites. This was followed by a construction boom in commercial skateparks, almost all of which had gone bankrupt and been bulldozed by 1985. The subsequent dry period made skateboarders a breed of connoisseurs unique to the building arts: they possessed an instinct for evaluating every type of manmade object from the sole standpoint of whether or not it was skateable (…)