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Second Sight #37 – PLAYFULNESS & LIGHTNESS

Second Sight — Mon, 26 May 2014 22:00:24 +0000

Play, games, fun and gamification – that’s what this issue is about. In our 2014 and beyond issue, both Tessa van Asselt from TrendsActive Utrecht and Joanna Feeley from Trendbible London mentioned the trend toward playing and playfulness. We see it in art, fashion, popculture, even in education and branding – gamification, 3D techniques or science fiction themes as in Starwars: it seems we can’t get enough of them. In 2015 they‘re back in the cinema. So we’ve delved this time into the phenomenon to understand the deeper meaning of playfulness and lightness.

Pharell Williams’ toys, the moving image culture, fun and mechanical birds, but also cigarettes and literature, new materials and innovation – this issue goes beyond playing, it is about real experiences, deeper senses and enlightenment, even about engagement. Playfulness and lightness is interesting now, from so many perspectives!

“… to the most primal creative energies of childhood” – page 15

“… it’s not just theory” – page 23

ORDER SECOND SIGHT # 37 – PLAYFULNESS & LIGHTNESS

Order the books at ABC, printed via de Espresso Book Machine.

Letter from Laser 3.14

Second Sight — Thu, 15 May 2014 21:13:31 +0000

Yesterday at the Second Sight street trend event, we shared a letter of Laser 3.14 – hereby his words about street culture…

“Hello. I’m laser 3.14 and I was asked to write a letter of introduction. I don’t know if you know me or my work but I am a street artist and a poet. I’ve been part of street culture for almost three decades now and I have seen the city in a couple of different forms and shapes. To be honest, I have a love and hate relationship with this city.

I love it because of what I have learned from it by being a street cat and seeing great parts and elements of it.

I hate it because it has accepted being hammered and subdued into a clean-cut conformist state, which is the total opposite of what it was and what it should be. The city has turned into a shadow of its former ultra dynamic and electric self. To me this kills any chance of some real radical creative thinking and forming of ideas that, as history taught us, can truly elevates people’s lives. But my love for it is the one that’s paramount and gives me energy to go out at night and do my art.

Growing up in the streets of Amsterdam, I have naturally become a part of real street culture, and when I say natural, I mean, going out, meeting up with my friends, doing our aerosol art on the streets, rooftops, subway tunnels, squatter buildings and in many other places a lot of people might not know even exist, living and breathing the graffiti art and the electrified sky, while meeting people from all walks of life. People from the seedy harsh street realism (criminals, dopers, freaks, artists, poets, hippies you name it) to the safety and sometimes conformity of the posh, I saw, firsthand the street trends and the subcultures emerge from the very early stages and in my days the masses always figured it out very late. Unknowingly we were ahead of the curve because we just did what we did, because we loved what we were doing, not because it was something that was demanded of us. There was just this raw love and pure passion for the things we did.

It took almost three decades for the masses to figure out street culture. (damn talk about lingering on and on behind the curve) When we were kids if you wore the kind of sneakers and the clothes we wore, spoke the way we spoke etc. you were looked down upon. You were deemed a pariah or a dangerous person. We did not mind too much because we did not cause harm to anyone.

Tattoos, piercings etc everything that has now become ‘accepted’ by the masses, at first caused discomfort and scared the living daylights out of people. Which was a good thing. Now that these elements are omnipresent in a big realm of fakery, they have lost their power and magic. In my eyes, some trends can kill the power of certain things.

We now need more than ever, people who dare to discomfort by being true to themselves – not carbon copies of the guy-girl next door. We need iconoclasts. I always believed that outside the box is where the magic happens. When you step into a box, you must never forget how to step out again. And to step out, one must be ahead of the curve. That’s why I love being present through my art on the streets.

For me the streets scream poetry. If you open yourself to them you can hear the music they make. Poetry is in every crack, in every corner and can be found in all walks of life, and it’s this knowledge that gives one the strength to get out of bed each and every day, and believe me when I say that there are a million reasons in this screwed up world to pull the blanket over ones eyes and to stay in bed.

When you want to see something real always pay attention to what’s happening at the fringes of society. The places that might harbour discomfort, the most interesting and daring ideas. Never be afraid to look them up and dive into it. I did and always will. ”

Written by Laser 3.14 – May 14th ’14 Amsterdam

TWOTY 2014

Second Sight — Tue, 01 Apr 2014 20:37:30 +0000

The TWOTY Awards 2014 are going to be held on September, 12th this year. The best stories and ideas about the future – as well the future further away as the nearby future – will be showcased. Who are the visionairies, trendwatchers, forecasters and futurists behind this stories this year?

The future matters, that’s what we believe! The mission of the TWOTY Awards is to showcase more, better and broader insights and ideas from various foresight experts – trendwatchers, trend forecasters, futurists and other foresight professionals.

Please, share your idea about the future. If you have thought about the future, please blow our minds!

Four prizes will be awarded:

Submission for the TWOTY Awards is open. Everyone who is a professional foresight expert can submit. That means that you can be either a trendwatcher, forecaster, futurist or you work with trends and futures daily. As foresight manager or as other porfessional. We accept entries from the Netherlands and from abroad.

Please, deliver open work – not done for a client and without restrictions or other limitations set by clients. Read more about the jury process and jury’s.

TO SUBMIT….

Are you a trendwatcher, forecaster, futurist, general visionary? Do you have a vision on the future or do you work with futures?
Do you want to share your story about the future with the public?

If you can say ‘yes’ to both questions – send us your submission before June, 1st!

- What’s your name?
– What’s the name of the company you are working for?
- Can you tell us more about your work?
– Your background…
- And please don’t forget to mention for what prize you want to compete for? Trendwatching, Forecasting or Futurism?

Please send us your story in 1000+ words*** (together with more information about yourself , some background info and working experience)

SUBMIT BEFORE JUNE 1ST

* Read more about the submission process…
** This means that you will give the organisation of the TWOTY Awards permission to publish and distribute the story (of course, with your credits)
*** Each story must contain a minimum 1000 words and must be sent to us in English.

Please, share your idea about the future. Don’t hesitate. The Future will matter!

Sketch above made by Dik & Stijlloos

Artwork TWOTY made by Petra Hart

Sponsors:

Masquerade

Tozama Dyantyi — Tue, 04 Mar 2014 14:44:25 +0000

Yet again in a Mask, Kanye West portrays a metal man on the cover of Interview Magazine Feb 2014.

The Mask trend continues since the Maison Martin Margiella collection in 2012, with West playing a split faced, shrewd shaman in one show, a furry feathered mental patient from Star Wars in another, then a corporate-caped street monger in Paris. Now he sets a sort of ‘anti -trend’ against face recognition surveillance technology. Because his fans know him and how he looks, his personal expression with masks can be seen as a provocative statement to be anonymous. The toothy, armoured masks look aggressive. Not only does he show a desire for anonymity, he seeks total detachment from everybody else. In public he wants to be free from the paparazzi’s prying eyes, but on stage now he also uses the mask to play out different kinds of personalities. And the choice of these personalities is somewhat questionable.

Like many other celebrities nowadays, he sells the idea of multiplicity, and also transhumanism. The look of higher performance.
The on stage alter personality of Beyoncé, Sasha Fierce, is the opposite of her innocent, shy self. Nicki Minaj’s body of personalities includes an angry boy, his English mother and a living doll. Lady Gaga is cross dressing, and wears a huge ufo as a hat/mask. Music video’s and Fashion magazines are full of cross-dressed and -engineered behaviour. This message of interchangeable persons, genders and body parts, is undoubtably a huge campaign for transhumanism and robotics. Pharell Williams’ new collaboration with Daft Punk is another example of this. He even caused, how oddly convenient, a whole following of fellow artists to sell the same one idea.

Pharell Williams, from http://hypetrak.com/tag/daft-punk

Pitbull from http://poponandon.com

Sam Sprro, from http://indiecurrent.com

Superhero Ego by Daft Punk

‘Branding global dissent‘ – Occupy Rio de Janeiro, 2013.

Pussy Riot from Dutch Newspaper AD 23-5-2013

Prince Charles of Wales and his wife, à la Eyes wide shut, attend a charity party.

Anonymity brings safety. And it shows unity. On the one hand. On the other hand it destroys the fundament of accountability.
And it silences, hides, covers up, blurs lines.

Listen to remixes of Pharell Williams Get Lucky track!

About Respect, Poetry and New Virtues

Andreia Rocha — Thu, 27 Feb 2014 16:13:24 +0000

How are we going to shape this century? What do and what don’t we approve? It seems that, we have so many questions now to ask ourselves and others. Two years ago, at Second Sight, we organized a gathering about the importance of forecasting, at that time we had a discussion…..

This article is published in the book Second Sight #36 Rethinking Ethics.

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