Design Angles on Art

This weekend, my gallery column in the National Post considers three shows from a perspective of design--something I'm hoping is timely given the Interior Design Show and related conferences coming to Toronto this week. Here's an excerpt:

Terreform One and Mitchell Joachim at Eric Arthur Gallery 230 College St.

Praised by CNBC, Wired and Rolling Stone, Brooklyn architect Mitchell Joachim is a provocative poster boy for eco-aware city design. Currently a visiting chair at the University of Toronto's school of architecture, Joachim offers a peek at his increasingly influential ideas (and those of his non-profit organization Terreform One) in this exhibition at Eric Arthur. The funny (and slightly unexpected) thing about the show is just how much Joachim's highly speculative, sci-fi-flavoured proposals seem to resemble whimsical conceptual art rather than pragmatic, user-friendly design. Sure, everything in here -- six panels, three models and one video -- looks plenty slick, speaking the graphic patois of design lingo in spades. But the imagery and ideas behind the slickness -- like colonial houses attached to robot legs so they can exist permanently in transit on highways (or "homeways") -- can seem way-out wacky. Jellyfish-shaped "blimp buses" and soft-sided "sneaker cars" are also pretty wild. However, the show does convincingly suggest that the real-world problems Joachim is reacting to (like the fact that New York City generates one Statue of Liberty's worth of waste every hour) are jaw-droppingly dramatic in their own right. Unfortunately, as in many design shows, the works here seem more like props for a presentation than a presentation in itself. But if edgy projections like these can make preventative carbon cap-and-trade seem mainstream, perhaps it's all for the best. To Feb. 20.

Image of one of Terreform One's lamb cars from Inhabitat