In the corner of the page containing a pattern for cutting out a jointed paper doll.

1. Enlarge or reduce template to desired size.
2. Cut out.
3. Embellish and attach pieces together.

I think these may be the lost directions for life.

There’s an magazine called Antenna, that showcases “street wear” Something that, as a middle aged white lady, I know little or nothing about. However, the magazine is a treasure trove of images of things (shoes, sweatshirts, toothbrushes(?)) laid out against a white background.

Each issue has several pages of — shoes.

Some of which were cut out and attached to a model of an accordion fold booklet with a pocket turn-up on the bottom that had then had a bunch of triangle pop-up supports folded in.

If manipulated carefully the shoes kick in and out. I feel another book coming into focus. Though perhaps without the hot pink background. Or maybe…

Back in the day (newly married) the DH and I used to watch a lot of the discovery channel. One of the most charming shows was The Secret Life of Machines.

Everyday items like vacuum cleaners, washing machines, and quartz watches explained by deconstruction and wacky little animations. A little like the David Macaulay books.

The full 18 episodes of the Secret Life of Machines is now available online at The Secret Life of Machines website. Also be sure to follow the link to Other Hunkin Sites for more cartoony goodness from the creator.

BTW: there’s a cool site for the David Macaulay’s The Way Things Work book as well. Love those mastodons!

We spent Saturday with our friend Demetrio Bautista Lazo the weaver. In addition to eating too much. (Gracias, Maribel por la comida muy delicioso!) We went walking around the town of Teotitlan.

That’s Demetrio showing me a tree of life rug that he’s working on.

This the dome of the local church..

As was common when constructing colonial churches the walls were built using the stone from the existing Zapotec buildings. Some parts of the plaster of the new walls has been removed and the designs on the old stones are visible.

I’ve fooled around with trying to complete some of the geometric designs. There’s usually not enough of the pattern to be certain of how the whole was put together. Though as I collect more examples I think I will find enough fragments to reconstruct some of the linear designs. (Click on the thumbnails for larger versions.)

These two seem similar and may be related enough to make a larger pattern out of:

Two wavy pattern that remind me of the snail pattern used in some of the rugs.

This section of the wall contains several small bits of pattern and the image of a birdlike creature. The diamond pattern in the lower center is very common in rugs. I’ll have to ask Demetrio if he knows who the bird is.

A final picture of several very small fragments. I am suspicious of the flowery vine chunk in the upper left. It’s too naturalistic to be Zaptotec, perhaps it is a bit of some earlier church or chapel., or bit of this church reused in making repairs.

edited 25.june.2008 to correct image links