SELECTIVE AFFINITIES VOL.1

Selective Affinities

THE UNDERGROUND PRESS, TAIF CITY, SAUDI ARABIA

Narciso Simeon

Selective Affinities…

(And other insignificant interests)

Copyright page 2016 Narciso Simeon All rights reserved. No part of this journal may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the publisher.

THE UNDERGROUND PRESS books may be purchased at special quantity discounts for business or sales promotional use.

For information , please e-mail narcisosimeon@ymail.com or write to Special Sales Department, The Underground Press, 76 Pagal, San Carlos City, Pangasinan, Philippines 2420 This journal was mostly set in Adobe Gothic Std B by the Underground Press. Printed and bound in Saudi Arabia.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Simeon, Narciso.

Selective Affinities (Things I Learned Out of School) / by Narciso Simeon.

ISBN- 00: 000-0-000-00000-0 (hard copy: paper) 1. Fine Art -- Study and Teaching. 2. Drawing – Study and Teaching 3. Humanities – Study and Teaching I. Title. II. Title Selective Affinities (Things I Learned Out of School).

XX2000.XX00 2016 000 – nov23 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

To Mai, for pushing me hard and making this endeavor possible…

I love those moments when you tell me to shut up because I am already thinking too much…

Author’s Note This JOURNAL aims to strengthen the foundation of the creative life by providing starting points upon which the thinking process may thrive.

The following lessons in “ideology”, creativity, concepts, and presentation first came to me in the summer of 1987, when I was but an amateur observer and participant of the “charmed life” circle.

Narciso Simeon Winter 2017

Acknowledgments Many thanks to Richard Valerio; Butch Balantac; Fernan Bukid; Rommel Reyes; Isagani Camacho; Norman Caguioa; Gigi Cayanan; Robert Bautista for giving me daily doses of inspiration and sometimes criticisms…

To my older sisters ate Elena, Ric, Margie, Prescy and Euly for teaching me how to read and write at an early age, and their countless instructions in life and love; To my nieces Mary, May-ann and Abi for pushing me to my limits thereby achieving higher grounds; To my teachers Leila, Dolly, Jovy for telling me to believe in myself; To my beloved Tess for ever being patient at my side in my eccentricities and To my mother who sowed in my dark soul the value of compassion and self-sacrifice, this work is for you.

Selective Affinities…

(And other insignificant interests…)

MASSING SPHERES HATCHING CROSS-HATCHING SCRIBBLING STIPPLING LINES POINTS DOTS…

Actually the first object I learned to draw is the coconut tree near our house…and then the bananas, and then the bamboos, eventually practicing my new-found hobby even up to my early high school days…

HOW TO DRAW A LINE Draw two points . Connect them together.

End point

Bamboo Grove 2010 oil on canvas 50cms x 70 cms This page is the background…the image is the foreground…the figure of the bamboo grove is painted on a white canvas…the bamboo is the foreground, the shadow is the background… it never ends…I call it the strands of continuity…

The grove One weekday afternoon a fine summer day after school.

Those times when consciousness is not relevant.

I took long walks toward the river South.

I passed through the bamboo groves green, dark.

I passed through.

Found my father’s path Toward the rushing river

South.

Freehand Drawing • • • • • • • • • •

Despite rapid advances in digital imaging technology, drawing with a Free hand holding a pen or pencil remains the most intuitive means we Have for graphically recording observations, thoughts, and experiences.

The tactile, kinesthetic nature of freehand drawing in direct response to Sensory phenomena sharpens our awareness in the present and enables Us to collect visual memories of the past. Freehand drawing also enables Us to initiate and freely work through the ideas of a possible future that we magine in the minds eye. During the design process itself, the freehand Drawing of diagrams allows us to further explore these ideas and Develop them into workable concepts.

Excerpt from Francis D.K.Ching’s Architectural Graphics, 2003 4th Edition

Check these figures…

Things when seen are said to be visible. Things against a background are said to be on the forefront…things which are removed from a background are said to be implied. We can see them though we can’t see them. In reality, they’re invisible. Any which way we look at things, each person have their own perceptions. Either way we see or not see, there is the reality that sometimes we perceive while others do not.

Just try to see things as simply as we can with what we can perceive with…the eyes, primarily, the senses secondarily.

Buy a stretched canvas, if it is primed, the better. Carry the canvas as well as the easel. Mount the canvas, steady the easel, start painting . On summer days, you are lucky to see the world around you. Colors. Figures. Shapes. I sometimes hate winters.

Write something here…

OPEN AND INTERACT WITH MY BOOK ON SKETCHING…

Schematic house plan…

Start painting and learn these matters in colorful actions… good luck!

You need to see nature and copy it as much as possible…first steps in painting..of course

THE THEORY OF PLUS AND MINUS

my kitchen plan

This scene gives you the inspiration to go out and live life…not wasting every single moment on trivial things…

Human aspiration to live life fully and not wanting to die ever…

The “happiness” feeling of seeing living people…walking, playing, interacting…the daily grind of activities which affirm inside you that living Is an awesome thing …and it feels good to be part of this mass of humanity…

Breathing, moving, even dreaming…

Medieval city

Modern city

This is a modern day residential area…

COUNTRY HOUSES BRING NOSTALGIA…

Try to look longer on the picture…feel the place

URBAN BUILDINGS ANIMATE MY SENSES…

Study of a monument concept…

Space can be manipulated …

(VIETNAM VETERANS WAR MEMORIAL)

Maya Ying Lin (born October 5, 1959) is an American designer and artist who is known for her work in sculpture and land art. She first came to fame at the age of 21 as the designer of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington,

More or less.. memory of place

• That feeling of excitement or nostalgia when you arrive at a certain place and you think you will be affected upon arriving or even upon departing.

As if the place itself is alive and breathing and it has the power to move you and your emotions…unexplainable in daily conversation or language, rather you know that the place itself will surely leave an imprint in your memory…

PHOTOGRAPHS AND MEMORIES…by Jim Croce

• Draw the route here

Leonard Wood Road • Start from the Y.M.C.A. then pass by the Happy Glen loop then to Brent School and through the long walk to the Teachers’ Camp and nature then the pine trees and through the botanical garden finally you would want the sunny side so instead of going up through that junction, you leave that option on a rainy day, you continue to the Wright Park and have a cold drink from one of those kiosks and appreciate the cold air in your lungs…and you think this is the life that you’ve been born into…to travel

MOST PEOPLE LOVE TO SIT IN A PUBLIC PLACE WHERE PEOPLE CIRCULATE ON A CLEAN , WELL-LIGHTED FOYER AS A MEANS OF RELAXATION OR STRESS REMOVER…

Hyatt Terraces • Summer of 1981

• Place photo here

The shadow of the trees Those shadows…

They induce the feeling of longing…

For the things or experiences that you once have gone through…

There is a calming effect on your tired being…

A recharging of your spirit…and again

That longing for the things or experiences…

And it comes back again…in your evasive memory

Your failures…

Continue the reminiscing…

The long and winding road…

Try curbing your emotions and walk along a winding path that will lead to a lesser known destination.

Then get inspired…

Feel the air…

Guggenheim Museum Frank Lloyd Wright, Architect

Architecture In 1943, Frank Lloyd Wright was commissioned to design a building to house the Museum of Non-Objective Painting, which had been established by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation in 1939. In a letter dated June 1, 1943, Hilla Rebay, the curator of the foundation and director of the museum, instructed Wright, “I want a temple of spirit, a monument!”

Wright’s inverted-ziggurat design was not built until 1959. Numerous factors contributed to this 16-year delay: modifications to the design (all told, the architect produced 6 separate sets of plans and 749 drawings), the acquisition of additional property, and the rising costs of building materials following World War II. The death of the museum’s benefactor, Solomon R. Guggenheim, in 1949 further delayed the project. It was not until 1956 that construction of the museum, renamed in Guggenheim’s memory, finally began.

Wright’s masterpiece opened to the public on October 21, 1959, six months after his death, and was immediately recognized as an architectural icon. The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum is arguably the most important building of Wright’s late career. A monument to modernism, the unique architecture of the space, with its spiral ramp riding to a domed skylight, continues to thrill visitors and provide a unique forum for the presentation of contemporary art. In the words of critic Paul Goldberger, “Wright’s building made it socially and culturally acceptable for an architect to design a highly expressive, intensely personal museum. In this sense almost every museum of our time is a child of the Guggenheim.”

Wright’s original plans for the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum called for a ten-story tower behind the smaller rotunda, to house galleries, offices, workrooms, storage, and private studio apartments. Largely for financial reasons, Wright’s proposed tower went unrealized. In 1990, Gwathmey Siegel & Associates Architects revived the plan with its eight-story tower, which incorporates the foundation and framing of a smaller 1968 annex designed by Frank Lloyd Wright’s son-in-law, William Wesley Peters.

In 1992, after a major interior renovation, the museum reopened with the entire original Wright building now devoted to exhibition space and completely open to the public for the first time. The tower contains 4,750 square meters of new and renovated gallery space, 130 square meters of new office space, a restored restaurant, and retrofitted support and storage spaces. The tower’s simple facade and grid pattern highlight Wright’s unique spiral design and serves as a backdrop to the rising urban landscape behind the museum.

In 2008, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum was designated a National Historic Landmark; in 2015, along with nine other buildings designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, the building was nominated by the United States to be included in the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage List.

So long…FLW…

Architectural design ideas and concepts are always fascinating…

Vicente L. Roque

•

Once I began thinking that designing a house will require a specific person or resident or user to be placed into that enclosure…then, at the onset, it will be easier to just give that person some set of standard needs, areas, that is, we box in the target occupant with spaces that we thought is needed…those are the thinking you would like to practice…make a plan, detail it, present it to the client , make money, enjoy life…

Where ideas come to life…

Industrial plan…

The box …

Designing is the organizing and arranging of things for useful purposes and functions.. mostly human of course…

Creativity and design is part of humanity’s innate behavior…

Greener places…

Box houses..

Good ventilation…

Active life in the city…

How about a community without automobiles…

Or landscaping the city…

From matchbox…

TO BATHROOMS…

TO AIRPORTS…

A PERFECT IDEA OR CONCEPT FROM THE HUMAN MIND IS NEITHER ATTAINABLE NOR ACHIEVABLE…ONE WAY OR ANOTHER, ANYTHING CONCEIVED MAY OR MAY NOT BE SUSTAINED IN REALITY. IT IS ALWAYS COMING AND GOING…THE CONCEPT OF PERFECTION IS A FUTILE EFFORT…WE ALWAYS LONG FOR THE IDEAL…ALWAYS…

Birth of the Guard Room and other shelters…

The central idea of a building is actually the need of the user..

Consider this thought process: I am sitting in a room. The clouds are gathering outside the room. It could rain.

Most probably the temperature drops. To an uncomfortable level. Then I am Aware of my location and my condition. Now. Afterwards I go out into the pouring rain and for a while I could appreciate nature’s condition. It rains sometimes.

But while I am outside in the rain, I remember my prior location and my condition.

In a room, sheltered, comfortable to a degree, maybe safe. So I begin to think Of going to a room, shelter, protection from the rain, wind, cold. And I develop and appreciate the idea of being comfortable in a room.

And so begin the long journey of building a room, several rooms, areas, where I can remain static and feel and experience comfort for a certain period of time.

In my prime of life…thus the concept of building a shelter where it could meet My requirements…started from being in a location of relative comfort and a sense of belonging to that place of comfort at least for a certain period of time…

Draw a guard room here…

My guardroom house…

Expandable on three sides…

WHEN SOMEONE OR SOMEBODY NOTICES OR DEVELOPED CURIOSITY IN YOUR IDEAS…

Thus begin the interactive relationship between client and designer…

A USEFUL IDEA DERIVES FROM KNOWING THAT THERE IS A NEED FOR THE IDEA TO BE CONCEIVED AND DEVELOPED INTO FUNCTIONAL REALITY. THE IMMATERIAL TO MATERIAL OR PHYSICAL. THE ETHEREAL TO THE TANGIBLE…

THE MORE SPECIFIC A CONCEPT IS, THE GREATER APPEAL IT WILL BE FOR THE INTENDED USER OR DEVELOPER…

Writing table and lamp…

Any decision to pursue an idea and develop it into a working concept should be justified in one’s way or another’s…

Draw from sketchy to harder lines. From preliminaries to schematic. Then gradually progressing to more details…

THESE ARE REAL PEOPLE TRYING TO FINISH THE ARGUMENT…

Should we include this detail?

Engineers are more concerned with material things.

Architects are more inclined to the metaphysical matters in relation to the material world.

THE CLIENT IS SATISFIED…

CONCEPT WILL BE JUSTIFIED AND IMPLEMENTED…

An artist knows something in general…an engineer knows something special…a scientist wants to know about all things…

OR WE CAN BE PLAYING ALL THE ROLES…

LETTERING ADVICES …

Place original page or scanned copy here

The tree story…

ONE CAN CHOOSE A SUBJECTIVE OR AN OBJECTIVE APPROACH IN FACING REALITY…

Even in art and music…

Reality perceived through the senses…

You see, you hear, you feel, you smell, you Discern (meta-reality)…

Here’s a sample of meta-reality…you know that the rider is present but you can not perceive his or her presence…

Science is concerned with perceived reality…art is more concerned with the less perceptible thereby the more spiritual…

Tribute to stairs…

Concentrate and focus on the original concept that came to mind at the onset…as one man said…”first impressions are usually best”…

Practice concentration and focus and try to have slight variations on your thought processes…then filter the most important for the record or retention…

Sometimes you have to do nothing in order to accomplish something…

Good thinkers are not necessarily geniuses…but most of the time, they are fast paced…

Not this…

Workhorse…

The beginning of creativity also begins with fascination of drawing tools…

In 2010 I began oil painting…

And I found out it can be fun…

But the process is long and tedious…the room becomes messy…you accumulate garbage, trashes, unnecessary things sometimes…

A true artist is not afraid to abandon a current project…specially when inspiration runs out for the moment…

Remember Leonardo…it took him several years to complete the Mona Lisa…or is it really complete?

It’s raining outside…again

After going out into the rain…

Write your journal…your musings…pour out your heart…

Sometimes you’ll discover that you are not a Loser after all…or you could be deceiving Yourself…

In the process of painting, I discovered that the act of painting itself can be inspiring…not just because of the colors or the subjects but because one is induced into a form of concentration and it acts as a catalyst for developing or hatching new ideas or thoughts…ideas beget new ideas…

• Louis Sullivan

Once again, my fascination with architectural ideas and the people behind them…

Richard Meier

Philip Johnson

Architecture does not have to be perfected…it just have to be functional at the needed moment thereby becoming beautiful and aesthetically pleasing as it stands and endure the passage of time…

Tadao Ando

Get out of that box…

Place the profile picture here…the one in a pensive mood..

And do the exponential lay-out ..i.e. thinking about the thinking

While thinking on how to solve a problem…you become aware of your activity or creative energy and it leads to evaluating yourself and the reason why you are thinking in the first place, knowing that this activity or process might or might not help in solving the problem after all…

Or put it this way…

Now you become self-aware…

If one wants to demonstrate or impart good quality in any endeavor or product, be it big or small, the idea itself should really have that good quality or possessing an inherent beauty or goodness…

Ever tried making letterings with their corresponding characteristics? aharoni

Adobe Gothic Std B ALGERIAN Bauhaus 93 Bernard MT Condensed Broadway Brush Script Std

Does it matter to me?

Florence, Italy

Frame the view, frame the picture, frame the painting…experience the enhancement of beauty…

Once I found a good view, background landscape, or a beautiful setting, I commit it to memory and turn my back from it, knowing that I am only a passing figure in the vast magnificence of this creation… I almost discovered God.

Gertrude Stein

Shades and shadows render drama to life…they’re all around us.

See the effect of shadows…

And the difference of lines…

Still life with a key

By Pablo Picasso 1920

Lines, shades, shadows…they can be composed and imply harmony…

Any contrast on any issue or concept will be greatly noticed by anyone not because of its (the contrast) intrinsic value but because it uplifts the concept that we tend to always look at irregularities or differences on any area of our lives or endeavors…in simple terms: contrast enlivens enthusiasm.

When faced with different directions…just follow the arrows

In points of uncertainty, always choose first the most meaningful destination in going thru a decision…

Solid compositions massed properly will give the feeling of stability, security and strength…

Fluid compositions imply mobility, energy, movement, dynamism, activity.

Model of Griffin Square and Tower with I. M. Pei City Hall in foreground.

Pratt, Box and Henderson.

Dallas, Texas, Unbuilt, 1961.

To balance a composition, place opposing concepts or meanings…

Counterpoints are created by combining vertical, diagonal and horizontal lines…

To each his own…pursue your calling whatever it is…

For every endeavor and skill, the rule still applied is the same: practice could lead to perfection…

University of Wisconsin , Milwaukee Master Plan

Color theory is a theory…we can better understand the meaning and behavior of colors by observing nature or the seasons…

We can orient children or beginners in color theory by letting them play or organize blocks of colors…try LEGO…

We aspire to gain knowledge about the world around us and discover how complex it is. In our younger days, curiosity dominates our quests, but as we grow older, we tend to seek the more simple things in life but end up choosing the more simplified complexities of things…

Abstract monument

Site plan scale model

Cubist painting

By Miguel Angel Belinchon

We are always fascinated by minimalism and yet live our lives and aspirations in unnecessary complexities and abstractions…

Poker Face

By Thomas Fedro

From Minimalist architecture…

Still Life Roy Lichtenstein

Harlequin Musician Pablo Picasso

Man with Guitar Narciso Simeon

To Cubist paintings

Organizing complex things can be time-consuming and next to impossible, difficult and can end up producing a more complex problem than a simplified solution…

Illustration…

If you can deliver a message in five minutes, then you can also deliver the same message in one hour…choose either to be simple or choose to be complicated.

Daylight properly captured or effected can be enlivening to the soul…

Caroline Place Amin Taha Architects

Rem Koolhaas Fondazione Prada, Milano

Light reflected can also enliven the scene…

From the street view, windows can render depth and mystery…

Jeep Wrangler

Sports car…

Crossover

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