" ... is the new ..."

LesiureArts

Origin: Static Issue 03
Content: Graphic image

In 2005, LeisureArts documented every single instance of the phrase “is the new” that they encountered. In the diagram that they produced out of this painstaking (but no doubt fun) job of collection and cartography, each arrow indicates an instance of the phrase. Hence “gin vodka” represents “gin is the new vodka.” If, like me, you've ever relied on such phrases to help map your way through the cluttered landscape of contemporary consumerist life, with its proliferation of here-today-gone-tomorrow trends, LeisureArts are here to tell you that an empirical approach to the problem doesn't make it easier – it just makes it more confusing. After viewing their hilarious (and slightly disturbing) diagram, you may just feel like you need a stiff drink. But is it to be gin or is it to be vodka?

-- Eu Jin Chua 

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Contributors:

Randall Szott is the founder of LeisureArts, an infra-institutional practice engaged with various forms of ephemeral, convivial and quotidian cultural production; and the director of placekraft, an interdisciplinary research module devoted to generating and studying tactical urbanism, speculative cartography, ephemeral/vernacular architecture and itinerant practices.

Eu Jin Chua is a doctoral candidate researching film and film theory at the London Consortium.

Associated Links:

http://leisurearts.blogspot.com

http://placekraft.blogspot.com

http://www.myspace.com/concept_trucking