In Defense of Browsing An Essay by Leanne Shapton www.curbed.com The feeling of fortuitous gratitude at coming across unexpected information is something most of us who’ve done any research, have experienced — that kismet of finding the perfect book, one spine away from the one that was sought. In the field of art and image research, this sparking of transmission, of sequence and connection, happens on a subconscious level. …Why is the vernacular image still being dismissed as ephemera? Why is its study not being prioritized? All languages are alive, but visual language is galactic. Keywords are not eyeballs, and creating rutted pathways to follow is the antithesis of study. A century of visual language, knowledge, and connectivity is marching toward a narrow, parsimonious basement of nomenclature. The NYPL takes a step backward if it models its shelves and research on a search engine. Spontaneity is learning. Browsing is research. The art of finding what you didn’t know you were looking forMarginalia Search connectionresearchlanguageserendipitychance
The quality without a name There is a central quality which is the root criterion of life and spirit in a man, a town, a building, or a wilderness. This quality is objective and precise, but it cannot be named. There are words we use to describe this quality: alive whole comfortable free exact egoless eternal But in spite of every effort to give this quality a name, there is no single name which captures it. Christopher Alexander, The Timeless Way of Building No words to describeThis language without words beautylifemeaningspirit