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Friday, November 17, 2006

Caged Rocks - Beyond Controversy

Plate 1: NMIT LLC

In the last decade of 20th Century, caged rocks were a prominent feature of more than a few educational establishment in the South Island of New Zealand. (Plate 1: Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology Library Learning Centre.) These structures, with no apparent function, were designed by blokes, as it is evident the effects of gravity over time were never considered.

Ben heard these are allegedly someone's sculpture/outdoor art. Yeah, right.

20 Mates:

prash said...

caged rocks!.... hmmm....thats interesting .....generally anything caged will have a strong urge/intention to get out of the cage.... but with rocks (being nonliving) , i thought that urge/intention would be absent .....but well.... it isn't ....gravity is helping the rocks to make an effort to get released .....hehe

jazzy said...

we've got something similar, i've heard they're much stronger than the normal wall, i don't know if i should believe it.
looks cool to me.

Anonymous said...

I like the look of them.

Anonymous said...

I like the look of them. I think they are called gabiens,normally used to reinforce river embankments.

Meg Nakagawa said...

Thanks for stopping by, everybody. To me, it's too much like, "Students, do not drive straight into the library" looking - the type of things you see around embassies.

Robert, ever since they did this to the library, I've been seeing it all over the place, and as you say, mostly in river banks and river floors (is that what you call the bottom?)

Anonymous said...

Caged rocks are being put in on the Bruce Road at Mt Ruapehu to hold back slips. I don't know how long they will last either.

Meg Nakagawa said...

Geez, Louise, (I wanted to say that for so long....), caged rocks against a volcano? Chamber Pot on the Auckland waterfront? I'm starting to get a little worried...

Anonymous said...

Hello Meg,
A diversity of arts is nowadays really a reality :)
Also this is some kind of art - humorous one!
http://joensuudailyphoto.blogspot.com/2006/09/
sit-down-please.html
My post today is from rugs, if you are interested.
Pleasant day for you!

Meg Nakagawa said...

Mimmu, I agree with you, but I don't like it. To me, these are construction or engineering, not art, and not architecture. But then a lot of people would say weaving is not art, but just craft...

Loved your rugs, though. Especially the second one.

Irredento Urbanita said...

Sometimes when I see a column of stones like those I think it's dangerous. Served discussion.

Anonymous said...

i wonder why they didnt bond it with cement or something? however, I do like them, perhaps at another location

Anonymous said...

Usually, we only see these wire netting around stones which are menacing to fall down on mountain roads...Is it the same in NZ?

tr3nta said...

hey Meg....
I guess u didnt got the sense of the the blog so i transalate it for u...

A travel... ¿In what sense a travel?... ¡such a small word with such an imense meaning!... ¿were do we want to be carried by our destiny?... ¡with an one-way ticket!... ¡togheter!... ¡from birth to dead!... ¡all eternity!... A travel... to travel... to leave... to travel... ¿would you like to come with me?...

Love your 2 last photos... beautiful the dinamic mailbox...

Meg Nakagawa said...

Thanks for visiting, people!!!

Irredento, Alice, for construction/engineering purpose, I don't think these are stable enough; at least these ones started to sag in six months. We have seen them securing the sides of the roads!

Kris, or even stick a bit of dirt and plant grass or something, (I do realise this won't work after the first heavy rain, but, but, but...)

Tr3nta, thank you for the translation. I was a bit unnerved... "I did get the "to travel... to leave... to travel..." but I thought possibly you were talking about a morbid kind of a travel.

phlegmfatale said...

I like the caged rocks - it's rustic and stylized all at the same time. Nice texture, too. You should to a B&W of rocks & wire close up.

Meg Nakagawa said...

Wow, Phlegmy, I could, couldn't I? Didn't think of that. I might even play around with exaggerating the contrast, too. Great idea, thanks!

Anonymous said...

Ha ha, you always come up with such humorous captions!

Meg Nakagawa said...

Well, dear Nathalie, who is to say these rocks aren't struggling to get out?!

StarByte said...

Okay so while we were driving back to DC on Saturday we passed a bunch of piles of rocks. Sitting in the middle of the rocks was a sign "Fresh Vegetables" Ian pointed it out and laughed and wondered what the "heck were those green things you've been feeding me all those years, mum?"

Meg Nakagawa said...

He caught you, then. Kids get harder to fool as they get older - how what are you going to tell them about Santa this year?