We went to the hospital today. I am going to have my brain-waves measured next week which is terribly exciting. I hope I do emit brain-waves and that they'll be interesting enough to result in a diagnosis. Right, let's move on to something a bit more interesting: + Fun Facts about the QWERTY Keyboard + The QWERTY keyboard and how it was adapted in Russia/The Soviet Union + Why the QWERTY keyboard got its layout + The QWERTY Myth
Public Writing
One of my current preoccupation is the idea of public writing - that is, writing/lettering/typography found in public places and spaces. I take photos whenever I see somebody doing something interesting - whether they be commissioned or non-commissioned pieces. I have even tentatively put together a small Flickr-set of some of my photos. One of my favourite examples stem from my erstwhile hometown of Copenhagen, Denmark. I was walking along a wall when I noticed the street name elaborately carved into the bricks. Above the carved brick you had the traditional blue-white street sign with the same name. Two centuries of labelling streets in one go. I was excited by the juxtapositions: permanence vs. easily replaced and serif vs sans-serif. I was also excited by how the contemporary street sign had been placed higher than the carved brick as if to exercise its dominance, its importance.
One of my Scottish friends, Fi, works as a curator and we recently spoke about the concept of public lettering and writing. Fi mentioned that the first thing was sprung to her mind was the Scottish Parliament's Canongate Wall. It is absolutely fascinating: various stones with quotes on Scottish identity and history are inserted into an outer wall, so anybody walking along the street will be asked to reflect upon Scotland, art and identity. Even the pavement has slates engraved with sentences. And, as I agreed with Fi, that is really a great example of public space and writing being combined to great effect.
And then you have non-commissioned stuff like graffiti and posters and random notes put up in windows..