Designism and Afterthesemessages.com

What a great visit to New York City this Christmas. When I first got to Greenteam they had been invited by the Art Directors Club of New York to discuss the problem of Designism and how there are so many people that wanted to become part of this movement when there is no one to pick up the torch. They are of course ready to do so and answer those questions in the next few months. In the mean time the students here at VCU are going to push forward our efforts to educate students on the power of design toward social change. I am also proud to announce that Afterthesemessages.com is going to help our efforts in getting this out to the student bodies here in Virginia and around the country.

What is designism?

I don't know what Designism is but I do know that a small group of students got together tonight to talk about how we can change the world. We started the night with An Inconvenient Truth the Al Gore movie about global warming. This went really good we had people show up late and by the time we started talking about our plan of action we had about 30 students. We talked about all the different things we could do to help change things in the Richmond area. We kinda got out of hand at times but we want to start small so we can build off of what we know. The first attack is going to be mostly internal to get people in the Adcenter thinking differently. The task for us is to do this and stay in the bounds of environmental design. We just heard from Brian Hurewitz with Greenteam and he was talking about the difficulty of keeping the standards that they have set for themselves. I am just now understanding how hard it really it is as we are trying to keep those same standards with no money. My hat goes off to them and what they are able to do and still stay to their standards.

Alisha has been learning the ropes of the bike and I think she is on the way to some thing big. In using the bike we are reducing fuel use. We are able to get around the Richmond area and the bike is also made of strong recycled plastic that is lightweight making the bike faster. Little things can be done to help the earth and Alisha and I want to be part of that solution.

The Poem

Sock puppets pushing beer

The work goes on as are group worked the other night till 5:30 a.m. to get the best shots. I was kinda out of it toward the end of the shooting I would just lie on the floor. This forced me to take a minute to reflect on how we were using puppets to sell beer and how hard it was to find any real merit to what I was doing. But, to be honest I was having fun. I think that is how I was able to smile that morning as I dropped everyone off. We need to find something in everything we do to be able to make it to the projects that really do. That is the only way to keep your head above the water.I am not sure if I can do it, but I am going to try.

More on Oscar

Oscar the Pug

The crazy things we do.

When the weather channel is outside your house you know some thing is going down.

This the first of many reports from the new location in Richmond, Virginia. We have moved in to a great new apartment in the downtown area near wear I have classes. The summer has been pretty hot! It is a lot more hotter than it is in Ohio. I have not started class yet but I am working for VCU ging the whole graphic design deal. Well, Hope to show more later.