The Road To Refresh...

Tonight's the night!

The work is in place ...and we're set to have a great time tonight!

The event is @ 424 Findlay Street (above Carl Solway Gallery) 8p Until ...all are welcome!

Showing tonight are:

Antonio Adams, Mary Bahr Rhodes, Keith Banner, Tanner Brown, Stevene Childress, Curtis, Demone, Tony Dotson, Anita Douthat, Mark Flanigan, Chris Hoeting, Billy Holodnak, Dale Jackson, Jamie Payne, Bill Renschler, Jared Rosenacker, Bill Ross, Jonathan Sears, Tom Towhey ...and more!

And 1...

Day until the:

Celebration @ 424 Findlay Street

8p Until...

Only two...

...days left until our New Years Eve Celebration @ 424 Findlay Street (Suite 2B).

The Countdown begins with:

New years with parProjects

If you still don't have plans for New Years Eve and/or would like to have an affordable good time with a group of like minded artists, you're welcome to come join our celebration!

In a bit of impromptu fashion, we've decided to team up with Mary Barr Rhodes and help host a nice and simple New Years Eve show/party ...and all are invited. We'll be hanging work of local artists (the finalized list is coming soon) and bringing in the year with style. Light refreshments will be provided, but of course you're more than welcome to bring your own party favors.

The festivities will be starting around 8p and taking place at 424 Findlay Street, Cincy, OH 45214 Suite 2B (above the Carl Solway Gallery) ...and there will be no admission to join the party as we're all artists (or art appreciators) and know how things are in these tough times.

So come see some art and join the party if you're FREE.

Cheers!
parProjects

A nice studio space

Courtesy of the good folks over at JetsonGreen.com, we'd like to highlight one one the components of our dream project -- custom built artist studios.

A vintage motorcycle builder named Alan Stulberg has created a rather nice container studio for himself. Down in Austin, his single-cell space has quite the nice look. Stocked with couches, video screens, a huge sliding door and a lot of large windows, this space is more than most artists could wish for ...and did I mention, it's in his backyard!

Acording to JetsOnGreen, "Stulberg used plasma cutters for the openings and finished the space with soy-based foam insulation, sanded plywood, Homasote recycled paper, and a ductless mini-split air conditioner and heater. Like the door, Stulberg built the box lights himself which take low-output halogens." In another words, recycling was definitely at the forefront of his efforts.

So with that, we'd like to send a simple "Great job!" to Alan. This is one of the more impressive single-person-built studio spaces we've stumbled upon. Hopefully his hard work is paying off for him right about now.

Also, as an FYI: We're officially following Alan's blog-posts about his space over at http://shippingcontainerstudio.blogspot.com/ and encourage you to do the same if you find this interesting. Plus, he considers himself a "Fashionista," so he may have a lot more to offer than this space shows.

Cheers,
parProjects

Christmas is good.

We hope you had a wonderful day!

See you soon,
parProjects

Shipping Container Homes by Container City

Please enjoy this video from the History Channel's Modern Marvels.

Featuring Container City in London:

Happy Holidays,

parProjects

Revisiting the Heidelberg Project

The Heidelberg Project is leading the way for change and activism in the community of Detroit. The project is moving from an artist creation into an organization with ideas of development and sustainability in mind.

This open-air environment resides in the heart of Detroit’s east side, which is where the projects founder Tyree Guyton grew up. The project is inspirational in many ways. It truly has a clear mission to open artistic expression and creativity to many that would not otherwise be engaged. The project primarily is a neighborhood that has been transformed into a collection of art installations and assemblages, not to mention painting and many other uses of media.

The next step for the project is to strengthen the organization by building several structures that will serve as a home for many programs. The project is broken up between the Cultural Village and PlayHouse/Amphitheater.

Cultural Village

(The design of the HTMS Center is headed by University of Michigan Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture, Beth Diamond.)

The first is a model for the HP House That Makes Sense Center (HTMS), a headquarters and multi-purpose space including an exhibition space, artist-in-residence space, children’s workshop, Heidelberg store and more.

PlayHouse/Amphitheater

(PlayHouse Concept by Detroit Collaborative Design Center)

The second component of the Cultural Village is the Heidelberg Project PlayHouse / Amphitheater, designed by Dan Pitera, Associate Professor and Director, Detroit Collaborative Design Center, University of Detroit Mercy (see Playhouse/Amphitheater section for more detail).The HTMS will serve as a flagship arts center for the CV. It provides space to introduce visitors to the HP and to create and celebrate art. Using simple but powerful sustainable techniques such as natural ventilation, passive solar, and reused materials creates a smart building without relying on expensive technologies.

The project also highlights interesting ideas for a more sustainable design. Ideas include creative and inventive ways to use recycled materials in the design.

http://www.heidelberg.org/

Thanks,

parProjects

Every Once In A While...

From time to time, we like to focus our posts on what others around us are doing. Here's an example of just that. This particular article isn't necessarily about any one/thing in particular though. It's more about ideas of community as a whole ...and what's out there for people to stumble on.

http://cincinnati.com/blogs/listapalooza/2010/12/21/12-local-arts-highlights-in-2010/8/

The above link is what's currently (by the Cincinnati Enquirer) being considered the city's top 12 local art highlights of 2010 ...so we thought you may enjoy seeing what you may have missed.

Personally, parProjects was involved in #7 -- a large scale, community "paint-the-street" project. And while this event has gained both positive and negative attention, the fact that it brought hundreds (if not thousands) of people together to do something creative (and awesome) should NOT be ignored or discredited. I know I had a blast mingling and painting a (half-mile) public street like many others ...of all ages, genders, races and creeds!

Which leads to the age-old question: Without community, what do we really have?

Thanks again,
parProjects

An Outstanding Resource

Container Technology A-Z
Compiled by: ISBU Association

A mobile update

This post is (mainly) for our daily followers.
Per usual, the holidays have us on the road ...and this post is actually happening via cell phone. Still today has been a good day. Our project architect & our structural engineer officially met via Email.

All parties are officially on the same page, so we're looking forward to sharing their hard work with you ...in the approaching months.

Aside from that, we're looking forward to sharing our pledge-drive-posters with you. Four unique prints will be available to you, our dedicated followers, around the first week of January!

We'll see you soon.

Kaohsiung International Container Arts Festival

The Kaohsiung International Container Arts Festival is held every 2 years
in Taiwan.

Since 2001, this biennial cultural event in the second biggest city of Taiwan, Kaohsiung, has invited talented artists in the world to express their ideas on urban ecology, and join the search of possible solutions to modern life predicaments.

"Container is not just a Steel Box,
we encourage the spirit to Think out of the Box!"

Kaohsiung International Container Art Festival (facebook)
Festival Homepage

Thanks,
parProjects

Simple & Elegant Observation

Name: OceanScope
Location: Songdo New City, Incheon, South Korea
Function: To give the public remarkable, daily views of the sunset.

Oceanscope / AnL studio from ArchDaily on Vimeo.

More on this, and other green projects, can be found at:
http://www.greendiary.com/entry/oceanscope-observatory-made-from-shipping-containers/

See you soon,
parProjects

Thank You Again

Our meeting with Bloomfield/Schon + Partners went as well as we could have hoped. They, again, were receptive to our ideas. But most importantly, they gave us alternative options on where we can land our project ...within the grounds of their American Can Building project.

In approaching the meeting, we were unsure of how the discussion would play out ...mainly since the city of Cincinnati still (officially) owns the land of our primary location (1a). But Bloomfield/Schon + Partners have not only agreed to help us approach the right people within the city, but they've also given us at least one premium location (that they own) where we'll be able to land phase 1 of our arts/community center (1b).

To say the least we're excited to enter the holiday season on this high note. Northside, Cincinnati has come through for us again.

We thank you.
parProjects

Location Location Location

Tonight, we're keeping things light as we continue working on artwork for our approaching pledge drive.

Still, tomorrow holds and important meeting with the Cincinnati-based architecture and design firm Bloomfield/Schon + Partners. This will be our second meeting with the group ...as they hold the key to the entire project ...Location.

The firm has been refreshingly receptive to our ideas, so tomorrow we'll be continuing the conversation of our proposed land-lease agreement & development planning. We're looking forward to meeting with the group as they seem to be extremely interested in working with us (and other organizations) to build strong community projects.

Winding...

As the year winds down, we've been meeting with & introducing ourselves to a lot of people/groups that we're interested in working with in the future. Yesterday's travels brought us to the Camp Washington region of Cincinnati to a Hive 13 (hacker space) meeting.

Interesting enough, the group of engineers/artisans were hosting a lock-picking presentation by "Locksport" pioneer Schuyler Towne. To say the least the presentation was exciting ...plus Chris was able to pick a few before the night's end.

That being said, we hope to create innovative programming and a welcoming atmosphere in similar ways to Hive 13. We're also interested in seeing if the group (or select members) will come up with something innovative for our upcoming kinetics show.

In the pick below, we're being walked through a fascinating interactive video piece that involves the use of an XBOX 360 motion system.

At any rate check them out if you have a moment. They can be found at:

http://www.Hive13.org

Thanks again,
parProjects

Street Level Views

In preparation for a series of prints that parProjects is creating, we have collected several street level views of the model's current design.

Our fundraising efforts will (hopefully) kick off around the start of the year on http://www.kickstarter.com/ and will feature the finished editions.

Thanks,

parProjects

Quickly...

Here's a link to a simple site ClimateCrisis.

http://climatecrisis.net/

As you may assume, it addresses the future of our globe's climate.

Also worth noting: The site is from the closing credits of Al Gore's film "An Inconvenient Truth".

Today's post is meant to not only encourage you to peruse the site, and see how YOU can easily make a difference; but it also is meant to encourage you to watch the film "An Inconvenient Truth," if you haven't before. (It's rather easy to find via Netfix or a simple Google search.) The parProjects team just completed this task, and we agree this film has only added more fuel to our drive.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8847562857479496579#

The road continues...

parProjects