A Fuller Lifestyle

From March 31 through July 29, 2012, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) will present The Utopian Impulse: Buckminster Fuller and the Bay Area, the first exhibition to consider Fuller’s local design legacy. The presentation will feature some 65 works, including prints, drawings, photographs, documentary video, books and models representing some of Fuller’s most iconic projects alongside those by Bay Area designers inspired by his body of work.

The Utopian Impulse opens by introducing Fuller, primarily with prints from Inventions: Twelve Around One portfolio (1981), as well as several key works on loan from the R. Buckminster Fuller Archive at Stanford University. Pairing the Fuller’s own drawings of projects dating from the late 1920s through the mid-1970s with iconic imagery of built work, the exhibition  commemorates his most well-known ideas, such as the 4D House (1928), a hexagonal autonomous dwelling meant to be optimally resource efficient and mass producible from factory-made kits that could be easily shipped anywhere and quickly assembled on site.

The exhibition also presents several of Fuller’s big-picture ideas, including his World Game (1969–71) project, a data-visualization system intended to facilitate global approaches in solving the world’s problems—or, in Fuller’s own words, to “make the world work, for 100 percent of humanity, in the shortest possible time, through spontaneous cooperation, without ecological offense or the disadvantage of anyone.”

Here at K2 we have been hugely inspired by Fuller’s thinking and can’t wait to see an amazing exhibition that celebrates his Bay Area endeavors.

Thanks to the SFMOMA for the heads up on this amazing show.

Blek Future

Here at K2 we appreciate art, good art that is in all forms—whether high brow or low, street art or fine, if there is soul and passion behind it, so are we. That’s why Saturday November 19th we will be heading to Nine Four One Gallery in San Francisco for the Godfather of stencil art, Blek le Rat’s opening. His biggest show to date is entitled 60/30 and is being called “one of the most historically significant the street art community has seen” by the gallery as well as marking the 60th birthday of the artist and the 30th anniversary of the birth of his art.

Nine Four One Gallery explains: “Thirty years ago, when Blek le Rat first started to paint his local streets, this was certainly not the case. Unaware of the eventual prominence his style would gain and motivated by the idea of using art to spread ideas of social consciousness, Blek’s first major move was the flooding of Paris with his signature piece, the silhouette of a rat. These vermin spread from the subways of the Périphérique to alleyways of Montmartre and could be seen all throughout the city and soon thereafter, in surrounding cities as well. The traveling plague was a warning and also a call to awareness- rats are one of the last wild animals that thrive in the city, and even though they may not be seen, rest assured, the city is filled with them. ‘It is about uprising, a signal of rebellion. It’s our revolution,” Blek once explained in an interview.

Stencils are now a widely used form of art and expression made increasingly popular by UK artist Banksy and others but if you want to see where it all started we suggest you check out this show going through January 7, 2012.

If You Leave

In 2009 photographer Laurence Von Thomas started the blog If You Leave with a simple mission, to be a place where photographers can submit their work that focuses on images with a single impact. The blog grew quickly in size and became a place where stunning photography mostly centered on the ideas of peace, solitude and loneliness (as they tend to pack the biggest punch visually) were displayed. In 2010 Laurence released a book featuring the moving visuals on his site, which was immediately snatched up. Today he releases his second book and Dazed Digital has a great interview with him. Here’s the scoop.

Adeline Mai

Tara Violet Niami