Registry of Aesthetic Impressions photo gallery
by Micromanager
Photos by Ulises Rangel and Matt Stone.
The Society of Smallness
Underachieving since 2012
July 1, 2019
Nature’s Notaries
by Micromanager
For Nature’s Notaries, Documents Bureau marshals a team of pencil pushers to the grassy expanse of the Burnham Wildlife Corridor. Three events will take place over the summer months at Caracol gathering space which is located along the Corridor near 25th street. Nature’s Notaries was produced in partnership with Night Out In The Parks and Northerly Island Park.
June 24, 2019
SoS Summer Happenings
by Micromanager
There’s plenty going on this summer. Come log in some office hours with Documents Bureau or take the soapbox at Bughouse Square in July.
Documents Bureau Presents: Nature’s Notaries
Caracol in the Burnham Wildlife Corridor
Saturdays June 29, July 20 August 24, September 28
All events from 11am-2pm
Documents Bureau Presents: The Registry of Aesthetic Impressions
The Art Institute of Chicago’s Block Party
Sunday, July 21, 12:00-4:30pm
The Society of Smallness at Annual Bughouse Square Debates
Saturday, July 27, 1-4pm
Detailed info about these events:
Nature’s Notaries — Office clerks can be found in a natural setting at Caracol Gathering Space on the Burnham Wildlife Corridor where, as always, they will provide permits, certificates, or affidavits that express your love of the great outdoors and put it in official language. Learn more about Caracol here.
Registry of Aesthetic Impressions — A special production of Documents Bureau will appear at the annual Art Institute Block Party. (Yes, THAT Art Institute.) At this esteemed institution we will hold our bureaucratic court underneath a stairway in Griffin Court. Enjoy the art at a discounted entry fee and then testify to your aesthetic experience with us.
The Annual Bughouse Square Debates — The Best Summer Spot to Spout off. In a tradition as old as hobos and tramps, the Newberry Library’s Bughouse Square Debates celebrates Chicago’s past as host to “the finest soapbox culture in U.S. history.” The humble and portable soapbox stage offers just the right amount of space, time, and distance from which to practice minor acts of disruption. It takes place in Washington Square Park in Chicago’s Streeterville neighborhood.
June 19, 2019
The poetry of bureaucracy
by societyofsmallness
The offices of the Central Social Institution of Prague, Czechoslovakia had the largest vertical letter file in the world. Electrically operated elevator desks rose, fell and moved left or right at the push of a button. Date: 26th April 1937, Photo Credit: UPPA/Photoshot
Good poetry leads right into the heart of the subject — makeup-free, wrinkles and hairs all exposed. Diving into this deep well reveals truth that is beautiful in its brutality.
Dolor
By Theodore Roethke
I have known the inexorable sadness of pencils,
Neat in their boxes, dolor of pad and paper weight,
All the misery of manilla folders and mucilage,
Desolation in immaculate public places,
Lonely reception room, lavatory, switchboard,
The unalterable pathos of basin and pitcher,
Ritual of multigraph, paper-clip, comma,
Endless duplication of lives and objects.
And I have seen dust from the walls of institutions,
Finer than flour, alive, more dangerous than silica,
Sift, almost invisible, through long afternoons of tedium,
Dropping a fine film on nails and delicate eyebrows,
Glazing the pale hair, the duplicate grey standard faces.
Theodore Roethke, Michigan native and Pulitzer Prize winner who spent his childhood in a greenhouse.
January 28, 2019
For the Love of Bacteria
by societyofsmallness
Some scientists are working overtime to ensure that tiny bacteria can be preserved and then be brought back to life intact in 500 years. And that begs the question: why are bacteria so damn important? While it’s common knowledge that bacteria can ravage our bodies (e.g. cause pus oozing boils and rotting flesh) not as much attention is given to the beneficial role that bacteria play in maintaining the balance of life. Without bacteria, the cycle of life would come to a screeching halt as the carbon trapped in organic matter would not be broken down and made available again as food for the living.
Bacteria may be small, but they are not to be trifled with. Not only are bacteria some of the oldest organisms that ever appeared on earth (a testament to their resilience), they are also EVERYWHERE: in soil, water, those romantic hot springs where you spent your honeymoon, and even in radioactive waste. Bacteria live in symbiotic relationship with humans and animals residing in almost every tissue of the body, such as the skin, where they feed off sweat and oils, and our guts, where they help break down dietary fiber for absorption and aid in the synthesis of vitamins. Bacteria claim second place next to plants in the total biomass of the planet. A study published this past week by scientists from the Weizmann Institute of Science, in Israel estimates the total weight of bacteria at 73 Gt C (gigatons of Carbon), that is 1,166 times larger than humans at 2.5 Gt C.
So what’s the dealio? Are these bugs rulers of the world? And why has it taken us so long to figure it out? It turns out that bacteria are mindbogglingly diverse but until very recently, it was difficult to grow them in labs for study. Today, scientists have at their disposal powerful imaging technology that they are able to take with them out in the field. Breakthroughs in genetics have made possible the manipulation of DNA to not only study mutations but also modify and program genes in bacteria and therefore to use them for beneficial purposes, such as cleaning up big oil spills. Add to that developments in super computing that allow scientists to design models and make predictions at unprecedented scale and we could call our time the Gold Rush era of bacterial studies.
We have much to learn about the role of bacteria in our planet and we stand to gain great insights about our own survival by studying bacteria’s unsurpassed talent to mutate, specialize, and resist eradication. So, next time you are reaching for the hand sanitizer, consider what you’re up against: 73 billion metric tons of germs that have been around since the dawn of time and will possibly be here long after we’re gone. Proceed to wash with soap and sanitize, if you must, but not before humbling yourself before the mighty rulers of the living world.
December 28, 2018
Odysseus in a barrel
by societyofsmallness
Jean-Jacques Savin aboard his barrel.
On December 26, Jean-Jacques Savin, a 71-year old French adventurer, set off on a three-month transatlantic voyage aboard a plywood barrel that is just big enough for him, a tiny kitchen, a sleeping cot, and a carefully selected stash of supplies. He follows in the wake of mariners of yore, mythical and real.
Odysseus’s voyage lasted ten years and was fraught with danger, but at least he had a fleet of twelve ships. Savin has opted for a tiny craft partly inspired by the voyage of an earlier seafarer, compatriot Alain Bombard, a biologist, physician, and politician who in 1952 sailed across the Atlantic in a small, inflatable boat measuring a mere 15 feet. Bombard took only a sextant and a few provisions on his voyage. He lived on fish and saltwater for three months.
Savin’s equipment and provisions are more extensive. On his website, he lists safety, technical, and miscellaneous categories that include a fire extinguisher, a raft, a GPS reader, and a manual water making machine. Among the extras, “bonbonnes de gaz,” which we’d like to think are scientifically designed vapor pellets that turn into saltwater taffy when they come in contact with the surface of the ocean, or maybe they are canned farts so Savin can amuse himself on those lonely days at sea. But no, these bonbonnes are strictly functional, they are fuel canisters presumably for cooking his “nourriture lyophilisée,” or freeze-dried food. According to CNN, Savin also brought along “a bottle of Sauternes white wine and a block of foie gras for New Year’s Eve, as well as a bottle of Saint-Émilion red for his birthday in January.”
Savin has a fascinating past as a military paratrooper, a private pilot, and a ranger at a national park in Central Africa. A consummate sportsman, Savin has sailed across the Atlantic four times, swam across the Bay of Arcachon, and climbed Mont Blanc in 2015. But his voyage in a barrel is the most audacious feat by far for it entails, as Savin explains, a “crossing during which man isn’t captain of his ship, but a passenger of the ocean.”
Godspeed, Jean-Jacques Savin! We are inspired by your odyssey and will continue to follow your progress as you float across the ocean in your tiny capsule.
Learn more about Jean-Jacques’s journey on Facebook.
Update: Since this post was published, Jean-Jacques Savin attempted another transatlantic crossing, this time in a canoe. Unfortunately, he encountered rough conditions, his boat was overturned and he was lost at sea. RIP, Jean-Jaques. You lived fully and courageously.
December 27, 2018
“Unseen Things are Still There”
by societyofsmallness
Hare and Dandelion by Kubo Shunman (Japanese, 1757–1820). The Met.
We take pride in being underachievers, but as 2018 comes to a close, we’re committed to turning over a new leaf. We embark on our New Year’s resolution with Stars and Dandelions, a beautiful poem whose simple style nonetheless tackles a scale of cosmic proportions.
Stars and Dandelions is one of over 500 poems that Kaneko Misuzu wrote during her brief lifetime. Born in the fishing village of Senzaki in the early 1900s, Misuzu blossomed into a curious and voracious reader and continued her education at a time when Japanese girls completed only up to sixth grade. In her early twenties, Misuzu worked in a small bookstore owned by her mother. It was there that one day, leafing through a stack of magazines aimed at young readers, Misuzu saw a call for poetry and prose and she decided to send in five of her poems. Hence began her short-lived, but prolific writing career. Tragically, Misuzu took her life in 1930 to escape a miserable life next to an abominable husband who cheated on her, infected her with venereal disease, and forbade her from writing.
Misuzu’s poems were forgotten in the turmoil and aftermath of World War II. In the 1960s, Setsuo Yazaki, an aspiring young poet, discovered a poem by Misuzu in a rare book. Yazaki would spend over fifteen years tracking down additional information about Misuzu and her ouvre. It wasn’t until 1982 that Yazaki found Misuzu’s younger brother—already in his late 70s—and through him, Misuzu’s diaries and poems.
Stars and Dandelions
by Kaneko Misuzu
Deep in the blue sky,
like pebbles at the bottom of the sea,
lie the stars unseen in daylight
until night comes.
You can’t see them, but they are there.
Unseen things are still there.
The withered, seedless dandelions
hidden in the cracks of the roof tile
wait silently for spring,
their strong roots unseen.
You can’t see them, but they are there.
Unseen things are still there.
The Society of Smallness 