Anyway, while I've been working on a few "wordy" posts that I hope to have in a bloggable state soon, I figured I'd do another perception/picture post tonight, as I spent most of today in San Francisco at the Exploratorium. Aside from it being a bit noisy in that echo-y way that reminds me disconcertingly of the school gymnasiums of my youth, the Exploratorium is one of the coolest environments there is -- not only is there science everywhere, there are also a ton of purely visual delights, including many Things That Spin. :D
The photos below are just a few of the images that caught my eye today.
A panel on the wall made of numerous tiny curved mirrors:
A neat spinny disc-shaped thing in the wall:
A portion of the inside architecture of the Exploratorium. Not an exhibit -- just a collection of lines, angles, and surfaces I found really cool:
Matt (my SO) and me inside a giant kaleidoscope (basically 3 mirrors held together at the edges in a triangle shape):
(As always, I would absolutely love to see images -- drawings, photographs, etc. -- from others, so feel free to comment with links to things you feel are representative of how you see the world.)
4 comments:
Wow, those are some pretty awesome architectural designs (I like the kaleidescope ^^) Have you ever been to Quebec, Canada? There are a lot of interesting designs there, especially in restaurants and Museums that you might enjoy. Just thought I'd throw that idea out. :)
I like picking up interesting rocks, and sea glass from the shore of a lake or by the ocean, I've got a rather interesting collection by now ^^
Visual perception is a beautiful thing, but I've always favored the tactile sense... in a new space or place I love noticing the way it makes my skin feel (most museums are cold, dry, goose-pimply), what textures are offered or can be found.
I too love rocks, stones: the beautiful bones of the earth. I love the way they look, but also their texture, their smell, the way they taste. As a child growing up on geological and archaeological field schools, I put a LOT of stones and bones in my mouth. Taste buds and fingertips tell me a lot that my eyes just don't understand. I can look at a stone and know that it spent a good chunk of geological time in a river, but I can touch it, and feel akin to a couple thousand years of running water.
Speaking of rocks and spinning things, here's a picture I took a while ago in the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History: http://tinyurl.com/5wv7s5. I can appreciate it as a photo; I love the warm ISO shots more than those I took with a flash--the curves and the color balance are much more profound. It also reminds me of how I wanted nothing more than to climb over the ropes and run my hands over that lovely rock, feel the graininess and grit, smell it, taste it. When I got back home I dug out a small concretion I was given and ran it through my fingers for a while. I also remember the feeling of people jostling behind me to see a cold cut gem behind glass (also spinning, and shiny), largely ignoring the slowly turning sensuous majesty of the sandstone.
Also: CANNOT WAIT UNTIL THE ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OPENS!!! AHHH SEPTEMBER!!!
I just stumbled across your blog. You rock (er--no pun intended).
kakalina: No, I've never been to Quebec - in fact, I've never been outside the USA, not even to Mexico or any part of Canada. I'll have to remedy that one of these days, as there are some places (England, Japan, Australia) I've wanted to see for a while now.
Neither I nor Matt really likes traveling, is the problem -- I like being in interesting places, but the process of planning to go, getting there, and dealing with all the logistics makes my brain feel like partially digested silly putty. :P But someday perhaps I will end up in Canada, and if I do, you can bet I will be on the lookout for interesting buildings and such to photograph.
Miriam: Thanks for stopping by!
I am extremely visually-oriented myself, but there are definitely neat things about multi-sensory and tactile experiences as you describe. As a kid (and even now, when I have reason to do so) I would often touch and/or put my lips on any shiny objects I came across because I knew that some shiny things were only painted to look like metal when they were actually plastic. You can usually tell by temperature and a kind of hardness/density thing whether something is actually metal or plastic, and I was fascinated by how, for instance, I could detect those things more readily with my lips than with my fingers, and more readily with my fingers than with my eyes. Very interesting stuff. And I had a rock collection as well as a kid that I mounted on a sheet of cardboard. :)
One thing I did yesterday as well at the Exploratorium was go through something called the Tactile Dome -- basically, it's a geodesic structure filled with all kinds of carpeted ramps, slides, tunnels, and cushions that you navigate through in total darkness.
There's also a lot of weird stuff stuck to the walls and ceilings of the place; I remember one part where it felt like bubble wrap, and another part where these weird fuzzy things hung down like a curtain from the ceiling and you had to push through them to get past. Definitely worth going through at least once, though in my case I really didn't have any desire to go through it a second time -- it was fairly warm inside, the air wasn't of great quality, and it smelled kind of funny. If it had been cooler and better ventilated (I'm sure part of the smell was due to the fact that people have to take their shoes off to go inside, and just thinking about that was grossing me out a bit), I would have gotten more out of the experience, but it was still fascinating to have to rely wholly on touch and hearing if only for a short while.
Also, the Exploratorium itself has a really interesting feel/smell to it that I like - only the Tactile Dome has any hint of foot-smell; the rest of it smells sort of metallic and vaguely chlorine-y (there are some water-oriented exhibits which I guess use chlorinated water as a disinfectant; makes sense considering all the kids sticking their hands in it all day). It's a very comfortable smell that reminds me of playground bars (the kind you swing on, not anything to do with alcohol) and sturdy wooden play structures.
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