marthames-blog

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In today’s news, a scientific breakthrough has emerged: the first ever image of a black hole. These gaping, lifeless holes have been known and debated since Einstein’s time, but only now, with the use of a telescope as large as earth itself do we actually have a visual look into these mysterious, terrifying gaps of space and time.

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Notes on Packer’s 5 Rules

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In a world where college admissions seem to get more competitive each year, it has been reported that wealthy parents bribed different school officials and used “side doors” to get their kids to into prestigious colleges, including Yale, Stanford and USC, among others. In some cases, parents even depicted their children as student athletes in an effort to get them onto college teams when their children didn’t even play a sport. There is now currently a federal investigation to asses those who were involved in this scheme. 

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Typed notes from MoMA’s Mar. 3 free Friday night event.

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Flash Draft on event

Lede 1: The sun has set, the streets are coming to life, pedestrians rush in and out of cabs and businesspeople are finally trading in their briefcases and portfolios for wallets and purses. It’s a Friday night in Manhattan.

Lede 2: Amidst the construction and chaos, on 53rd street between 5th and 6th avenue, one of Manhattan’s best known art museums stands. With names like Van Gogh, Duchamp, and Picasso hanging on the walls, people from all over the world gather inside to get a glimpse at the museum’s world renowned collection.

Lede 3: Manhattan’s museums are known for being expensive. Unless a patron lives in the state of New York, they can pay upwards of 20 dollars or more for admission to just one museum, regardless of how many exhibitions they are seeing or how many hours they plan to spend there.

Sponsored by the clothing company UNIQLO, the Museum of Modern Art, located on 11 W 53rd St., offers free admission on Friday nights from 4-8 p.m. As MoMA Senior Deputy Director of External Affairs Todd Bishop explained on UNIQLO’s website, “Making art accessible to everyone is at the heart of MoMA’s mission, and our partnership with UNIQLO plays a key role in introducing our collection to new audiences.” In exchange for sponsoring free admission, as is explained on the UNIQLO site, UNIQLO has the right to design and sell clothing that is inspired by artwork from MoMA’s extensive collection.

On free Friday nights, just like on any other museum day, patrons first enter the museum and have the option to check their coat at the complimentary coat check. They then get in line to claim a ticket from a MoMA staff member at the ticket desk. Given how crowded the free Friday’s can be, the wait in line can be longer than on normal days and MoMA recommends that visitors come after 6 p.m.

Friday, Mar. 3, was no exception to the busy, lively nature of MoMA’s Friday nights. With a buzzing energy throughout the museum’s five floors, people from all over gathered to see one of the world’s best known collections.

Before grabbing their free ticket, many stopped on the ground floor to take a picture in front of Sol Lewitt’s colorful and almost in-motion painting titled Wall Drawing #1144, Broken Bands of Colors in Four Directions.

As viewers made their way through security with tickets in hand up to the second floor, they could see Ballet Society rehearsal of The Four Temperaments (from nov 26, 1946) by an “unknown filmmaker” play in an open, relaxed seating area. While some intently watched, others took the chance to check their phones and rest their legs from standing as they explored the museum’s collection.

For those that didn’t pause at the ballet film, they hopped on the packed escalator to the third floor where they had the chance to see one of the museum’s newest and more crowded exhibitions: The Value of Good Design. Among the many objects, viewers could see that all the items on display shared a common theme: good design, obviously, but also the quality of functional, human centered design. From uniquely crafted seating arrangements to an almost chaotically colorful coat hanger, the exhibition housed a variance of “good design”.

On the fourth floor of the museum, the least crowded portion of the evening, a more immersive experience could be found in Joan Jonas’s Reanimation. In the digital presentation, a buzzing, almost static piano noise played as people walked through the shimmering lights created by circular sculptures.

Right when it seemed there was a lull in the crowd, the escalator to the fifth floor was packed with no room to move. The fifth floor, Collection Galleries 1880s-1950s, was by far the most populated of the evening. As patrons passed through the various halls of the collection, they saw works from Van Gogh, Henri Matisse and as one person even shouted, “Oh, there’s the Monet!”. Of all the artworks, Van Gogh’s Starry Night was especially crowded with eager selfie takers and a security guard trying to manage the growing crowd. As he watched over the viewers, the guard shared a fact about the incomplete edges of the painting, “  . . . So it’s [Starry Night] technically incomplete. And the reason the museum framed it like this is so people can see the difference between a replica and the original. Replicas are fully filled out canvas end to canvas end. It’s too right there’s no contrast and texture. The original you can literally count every brushstroke”.

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In class notes on nut grafs

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In class notes on ledes

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Nut Graf example from a NYT article:

“I thought I was strong, but felt powerless,” Ms. McSally said during a Senate Armed Services subcommittee hearing on sexual assault in the military. “The perpetrators abused their position of power in profound ways.”In sharing her experience — pride in her historic military service, betrayal over the assault and determination to help find a solution — the junior senator from Arizona offered one of the most powerful testimonies to date in the growing and heated debate on Capitol Hill over how to adjudicate claims of sexual assault in the military.

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3 Data and Human Questions

3 Data Questions:

1. What determined the 20 most popular jean brands?

2. What data was used to determine the average hand size of men and women?

3. Why were red and yellow used for the pocket colors? I understand the red because it’s showcasing how objects don’t fit into women’s pockets, but not necessarily the yellow.

3 Human Questions:

1. So it’s been addressed that women’s pockets are clearly smaller, but why? There is some historical significance, but why hasn’t it changed now?

2. Since it’s an obvious issue are there discussions among designers about making pockets bigger? 

3. Is there any way for us to actually know how many women are genuinely concerned about the size of their pockets? Do stores or brands keep some kind of log on satisfaction among customers on different features of the pants (a pocket being just one example)? -- maybe this is more of a data question ? 

4. What do designers base the size of their objects, such as a front wallet, off of? 

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Event Reporting

On Friday night, I went to MoMA’s free Friday nights event which is sponsored by Uniqlo. Below are my notes. 

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This morning, I received a text from a friend of mine asking if I had heard about “Momo” on Youtube which she described to me as, “It’s this face that some guy has put in kids shows that stream on YouTube and it tells the kids to kill themselves and to turn the stove on while the family is asleep and shit.” Having never heard of this, I immediately researched it and after reading a few articles found that it is likely yet another internet hoax or meme that seem to be common in our current digital age. However, according to an article from CBS (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/momo-challenge-nearly-deadly-for-family-california-mother-says/), the “Momo Challenge” has apparently caused near harm to a daughter in California, as the figure encouraged the young daughter to perform dangerous acts. She even described Momo to her mother as “It was Momo making bad videos. It was bad.” While internet schemes like this seem to gain increasing attention and are so easily shared on social media, what seems to be a common thread among articles on this specific instance is that figures like “Momo” raise the real question of what parents should actually protect their children from on the internet.

From my own perspective, while I understand the threat that schemes like Momo can pose, I think we need to be better skeptics and question what we see on the internet more often. While children are obviously more susceptible to what’s on the internet than someone my age, why are we (we more so directed at people my age and older) spending more time talking about this than other, genuine threats that exist both on and off the internet? When my friend texted me this morning, I obviously wanted to know what this was and what potential threat(s) it posed, but when as soon as she told me Kim Kardashian posted a warning about it on her Instagram, I became even more skeptical. If people my age are relying on news from figures like the Kardashians, that, in my opinion, poses a larger threat than yet another internet hoax.

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Radical Revision of Flash Draft

Word count: 756              Beyond Flipping Burgers, A Cafeteria Worker’s Life 

Michael Brown never intended to work in a college cafeteria. 

As he flips burgers and scrapes grease off the griddle during his shifts, the 56-year-old cook interacts with different customers every day. Scribbling to get  orders down, he often only talks to customers, who are most often students, for a few seconds. Sometimes, students will flash him a smile or even offer a quick “hello”, but few know him outside of the school cafeteria setting.

The New School cafeteria, located in the school’s University Center at 63 Fifth Ave., is where Brown spends his Monday’s, Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s as a cook at the grill.  Despite having no prior experience in a cafeteria, he is certainly no stranger to working in the food industry. “I cooked for the Knicks and the Rangers for 13 years. Parco Moretti hotel. Museum of Modern Art. And then I took a break. So I said ‘ok let me go back to the union and see if they find me somewhere to go again’. So they send me here” he explained. 

Prior to starting at The New School, Brown spent some of his time off fishing. Even from a young age, he has been drawn to the sport and often uses it as a way to relax. “Pops took me when I was four and I was hooked” he laughed, realizing he made an unintentional pun. 

Reminiscing on the first time he fished, Brown recalled that this was around the same time he came to New York. Originally from Manchester, Jamaica, Brown spent a majority of his childhood in different parts of New York and has been here ever since.  Despite not recalling much from his early years in Manchester, he has gone back to visit a few times and recently moved his father to New York, who didn’t come to America when he was a child, for health reasons. “Every once in a while [I go back to Jamaica] - it got kinda rough there. So my father, he’s sick, so we had to bring him from there here because the doctors here are better so he’s in a nursing home here” he explained. 

Alongside his father, Brown also has six sisters, four brothers, 14 nieces and nephews, a 33-year-old daughter and a 2-year-old granddaughter in New York. Out of state, he has a 26-year-old son that plays football at Florida State College. His mother currently resides in Newton County, GA, and when he didn’t spend his time fishing before coming to work at The New School, he was traveling between Georgia and New York to take care of her.

Brown has not only been responsible for helping to take care of his parents as they age, but when he split with his children’s mother, he took on the responsibility of raising them on his own.  “ . . . It was rough because I felt that I needed the mother - a father can only do so much. Especially for the daughter. So all her personal, private stuff all that I had to learn all that and oh god, she love me to death right now for that. But she used to send me to the store and I ain’t tell you what for but I used to go because that’s for my baby. You know?” he said.

Aside from his parents, now that his children are much older, Brown’s favorite person to take care of and spend time with is his granddaughter. “She just turned two and oh my god. Two years old. A terror. But I love her to death tho.  . .  . I get [her] Thursday’s and Friday’s. And I be ready to give her back in 15 minutes prior to the time I got her. Trust me. Cause she just tears up everything. And then when I get mad she be like ‘Papa, Papa’ and I’m like ‘get out of here’ then she hug me and it all over and then she right back again” he said.

Even though Brown’s family life and work life are separate, one of the best parts about his job is that because he treats the students at the cafeteria much like he treats his own family,  he feels like he has his own family at work.

“. . . The way I treat them is the way I treat these kids. If I see them doing something wrong, I’m gonna talk to them about it. They come to me when they need help or wanna ask me a question, try to help them as best as I can” he said.

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Daily News Update ---

This morning, on my walk to school, I listened to The Daily by the NYT (as I almost always do) and was especially struck by this morning’s episode. In all honesty, I probably don’t pay as much attention to pop culture, movies, music and other things of that nature as I should, but this episode brought up the issue of white people’s moral journeys as they build interracial relationships within movies. As a white person, I’ve watched plenty of movies that have fulfilled this narrative and have to an extent questioned their motives, but  never necessarily called out or fully comprehended the flaw within them as I should have because, one, I’m ignorant (especially toward movies and pop culture in general), and two, with movies like “Green Book”, “The Help” and “Driving Miss Daisy”  time after time again winning at the Oscars, I’m rarely exposed to people around me questioning what these movies imply in terms of interracial relationships. Neither of these reasons excuse my perspective, but I’m pointing them out nonetheless. Listening to the podcast this morning, especially as the film critic for the Times presented his opinion, I felt that an important narrative was being told and just how toxic these movies, even if they don’t intend to be toxic. can be if they aren’t critically talked about. 

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Example of bad design

Nearly every day, I use this door at the making center and I almost always open it the wrong way.

Since it’s a steep staircase and you walk right down to the door, you would have to turn your head up just to see the hinge on the top, which I never can see and only noticed when I took these for this post. 

I always open it as if it will open on the right hand side (and door knobs are typically on the right hand side of doors, I believe) but this door actually opens on the left hand side. Maybe it’s user error (I mean it definitely is), but it’s confusing. 

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Flash draft on Michael Brown

Word count: 747

As he flips burgers and scrapes grease off the griddle at the lunch bar,  56-year-old Michael Brown interacts with different customers every day. Working as a cook at The New School cafeteria, he primarily interacts with students as they rush between classes. While he scribbles down their orders, they only interact for a few seconds. Sometimes, students will flash him a smile, offer a quick “hello” or, every once in a while, even ask him for advice.

“. . .One kid last season he had a report to do. And he didn’t have a clue on how to do it. So I told him, ‘This is gonna be real simple. Come out here to the cafeteria and just look around. Think about what you see. Go outside. Look at the people walking back and forth, the cars goin’ up and down the block. Just look around you.’ So he did that and he came back and I seen him a week later and he told me he got a A+ and he thanked me. He said ‘what you said wasn’t you know a whole lot, but I took what you said and just did somethin’ with it’” he shared.

The New School cafeteria, located in the University Center at 63 Fifth Ave., is where Brown spends his Monday’s, Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s as a cook at the lunch bar. While this is his first cafeteria job, Brown is certainly no stranger to working in the restaurant business.

“I cooked for the Knicks and the Rangers for 13 years. Parco Moretti hotel. Museum of Modern Art” he said.

Brown, however, never anticipated working at the cafeteria.

“And then I took a break. So I said ‘ok let me go back to the union and see if they find me somewhere to go again’. So they send me here” he explained.

During his time off, Brown travelled between New York and Georgia to take care of his mother who lives in Newton County, GA. When he wasn’t caring for her, he spent his time fishing.

“...anywhere any time I have time basically we is fishin’. . . “Pops took me when I was four and I was hooked” he laughed.

Alongside Brown, his father now lives in New York. Originally from Manchester, Jamaica, Brown moved to NY when he was four, whereas his dad has come more recently.

“Every once in a while [I go back to Jamaica] - it got kinda rough there. So my father, he’s sick, so we had to bring him from there here because the doctors here are better so he’s in a nursing home here” he explained.

Alongside his father, Brown also has six sisters, four brothers, 14 nieces and nephews and a 33-year-old daughter in New York. In Florida, he has a 26-year-old son that plays football at Florida State College.

“Me and her mother, we broke up. So I took up the responsibility of raising them. My son and my daughter. It was rough because I felt that I needed the mother - a father can only do so much. Especially for the daughter. So all her personal, private stuff all that I had to learn all that and oh god she love me to death right now for that. But she used to send me to the store and I ain’t tell you what for but I used to go because that’s for my baby. You know?” he said.

Outside of his children, one of Brown’s fondest familial relationships is with his daugther’s two-year-old daughter.

“She just turned two and oh my god. Two years old. A terror. But I love her to death tho.  . .  .I get [her] Thursday’s and Friday’s. And I be ready to give her back in 15 minutes prior to the time I got her. Trust me. Cause she just tears up everything. And then when I get mad she be like ‘Papa, Papa’ and I’m like ‘get out of here’ then she hug me and it all over and then she right back again” he said.

While Brown leads two separate lives between his family and his job, he treats the students he interacts with much like he treats his own family and in that sense feels as if he is working with them.

“If I see them doing something wrong, I’m gonna talk to them about it. They come to me they need help or wanna ask me a question, try to help them as best as I can” he said.

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As Trump has declared a “national emergency” over what he calls an “immigration crisis” 16 states have sued him in response and are likely going to question, in court, whether there actually is cause to declare a national emergency or not. The states that have entered this lawsuit are California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon and Virginia.

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Daily News Update - As the government has the potential for another shut down tomorrow, Congress is quickly moving to attempt to pass a border security deal that will not provide Trump with the funds to build his wall.