Your Daily Insight as told by Rosabeth Moss Kanter

A vision is not just a picture of what could be; it is an appeal to our better selves, a call to become something more.

Final Days: The Interstellar Interactivity of Tom Sachs at Park Avenue Armory

Those of you feeling dulled by the cold, ashen greys and dead stares floating through New York's galleries, we officially have your antidote--and, naturally, it comes in the form of a homemade space station.  But you'll need to act fast as your remedy's days are numbered...

Sunday, June 17th will be your final day to immerse yourself in installation artist Tom Sachs' gonzo and intimidatingly inventive Space Program: Mars.  Happening at Park Avenue Armory and co-presented by Creative Time, Sachs' has transformed 55,000 square feet into a full-blown, extraterrestial environment. 

Yes, a bizarre undertaking, but to hear it from Park Ave. Armory:

Space Station: Mars is deemed "a demonstration of all that is necessary for survival, scientific exploration, and colonization in extraterrestrial environs: from food delivery systems and entertainment to agriculture and human waste disposal," with "a conceptual underpinning that addresses serious and profound issues—namely the commodification of abstract concepts such as originality, shock, newness, and mystery—expressing them in the personal and physical terms of production and process."

So we implore you: Muster up the $12 for a ticket and find an hour or two within the week to explore Sachs' otherworld, it's an installation event that's simply all too rare.

Here's the strange, predictably esoteric trailer:

Space Program Mars: Trailer from Tom Sachs on Vimeo.

And a couple choice shots (though we'll save the others for your own eyeballs):

Your Daily Insight as told by Nikos Kazantzakis

By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it. The non-existent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired.

Brooklyn's Henry Hargreaves Takes Technology Into His Own Hands (and Deep Fries It)

Now: We understand that some of you may look at the above image and recoil, gasping in horror over the sheer "how could he?!"-ness of it all.

Let's just take a second and breathe. Yes, we benefit from our technologies. Yes, we have become inextricably linked. No, they do not have personalities, or a heart, or brain--and as much as we may enjoy anthropomorphizing our iPads, they do. not. care. about. us.

So who cares? Let's just deep fry them, pour some powdered sugar on and ingest our gidgets and gadgets once and for all? That's what Brooklyn-based artist Henry Hargreaves might be suggesting with his aptly-named series, Deepfried Gadgets.

Or maybe, Hargreaves just wanted to provoke a reaction, showing us that our myriad technologies can't actually serve our very basic survival needs.

Or maybe, Hargreaves just wanted to put some things in a deep fryer and see if they made it out in one piece.

Either way, as deceptively (or as literally) low-brow as this work might appear, we're on board.

Take a glimpse at a few more--to some, horrific--shots and now tell us that smart phone sitting to the left of your laptop, the one to the right of your Kindle, doesn't look potentially tasty.

All Images Courtesy: henryhargreaves.com

Your Daily Insight as told by Abraham Maslow

The key question isn't 'What fosters creativity?' But it is why in God's name isn't everyone creative? Where was the human potential lost? How was it crippled? I think therefore a good question might be not why do people create, but why do people not create?

This Friday: See 7 Award Winning Short Films at The New York Japan CineFest

'Together: Dancing with Spinner Dolphins.' (Dolphin Dance Project)

Whether you're seeking inspiration for work in one of our filmmaking classes or just looking for a great way to kick off your weekend, Friday's New York Japan CineFest program at the Asia Society is an excellence opportunity to catch seven acclaimed short films, and maybe even meet their directors, who will also be in attendance.

One of the program's most decorated films is Justin Ambrosino's The 8th Samurai, which imagines the fate of an additional actor cut from Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai. The "wildly humorous" tribute even toured with Kurosawa's films for his 100th anniversary back in 2010. Equally acclaimed is Ken Ochiai's Frog in the Well, which follows a man's "meditative and transformative" trek across Japan to scatter his mother's ashes.

Kosuke Furukawa's Uguisu portrays a waitress who "comes across two mysterious customers" while working at a Brooklyn diner, which you might recognize as Williamsburg's Cafe de la Esquina (previously home to the Wythe Diner). We're also quite intrigued by Chisa Hidaka's Together: Dancing with Spinner Dolphins, in which "a human dancer and wild Spinner dolphins forge a tender relationship through the language of dance."

Rounding out the lineup are Yasu Suzuki's Radius Squared Times Heart, which snagged Best Comedic Short Film at the Manhattan Film Festival, Haruhito Naka's Into The New World, in which a woman's search for her missing boyfriend leads her into an "unexpectedly hallucinatory world," and Yoriko Murakami's Corazon en Fuego / Heart on Fire, a stop-motion animation about a lonely woman who is "visited by an unexpected guest who will change her life forever."

Sounds like there's something for everyone! Watch the New York Japan CineFest trailer below and grab your tickets for Friday's program here.

-- John Ruscher

Your Daily Insight as told by Ken Kesey

You don't lead by pointing and telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case.

Live Schedule for Core 77's 2012 Design Awards Announced

One of 2011's Winners: Thomas Hurd's Renewable Polytope FurnitureRemember when we implored you to summon your inner design genius and enter Core 77's 2012 Design Awards? We're assuming you heeded our words, submitted your brilliant concepts and are already on the path to glory.

Either way, the Design Awards roll on--and Core 77's 2nd annual award show is shaping up to be a wildly ambitious, transcontinental event. Kicking off July 8th and running the course of nine days, winners will be announced via live broadcast from panels of jurors seated across the globe. With seventeen design categories, running the gamut from Transportation to Social Impact to Food Design, inspiration seems extractable for just about anyone watching.

In no way will we try and replicate the entire schedule, so head here now and make sure you've got that thing bookmarked. However, we will tell you that New York has not one but two jury panels this year--Manhattan repping on July 9th and Brooklyn on July 14th.

Meanwhile, we've assembled a handful of some of our favorite winners from 2011 (check the captions for what it is you're looking at.) If these are any indicator of what may transpire at this year's awards, our world is simply poised to be a better place.

Ethan Frier & Jonathan Ota's "Project Aura": For safer night-time urban bikingBruce Mau's Identity Branding for OCAD UniversityPUMA's Recyclable Cardboard Bag & Box Combo, "Clever Little Bag"Motonium Design's "Mission R" Fuel Efficient, Electric Street Racing BikeBespoke Fairings: Specialized Prosthetic CoveringsAdam Harvey's "CV Dazzle" Digital Camouflage (For all your digital privacy needs)

Your Daily Insight as told by Gertrude Stein

You have to know what you want. And if it seems to take you off the track, don't hold back, because perhaps that is instinctively where you want to be. And if you hold back and try to be always where you have been before, you will go dry.

Call For Entries: Submission Deadline for the Crest Hardware Art Show Now Extended Through Friday

The 11th Crest Hardware Art Show is less than a month away, but you still have time to submit your hardware-themed artwork for this time-honored showcase. The deadline for submissions has been extended through this Friday, June 8, and the show will kick off on June 30 with the always fun Crest Fest.

If you're in need of some inspiration, you might peruse some work the show has featured in previous years on We Heart New York, L Magazine and Craft or on the show's Flickr page. Personally, we'd love to see something inspired by Crest's resident animals: Franklin, a pot-bellied pig who's been featured in the New York Times and has his own Facebook page, and Finlay, an African Grey parrot who's been known to play tricks on cell phone-weilding customers.

For more check out our previous post about the show and the full guidelines and entry form. Following the June 30 opening, where you'll be able to enjoy music art, food and more, the show will remain on display through August 31.

We'll leave you with a brief video of "Running Man," an amazing zoetrope by Greg Barsamian that was featured in the show back in 2008:

-- John Ruscher