DOUG AITKEN: MIRAGE
With April quickly turning into the craziest month of the year thus far, I suppose I can only be grateful that I was able to get to even a part of Desert X. But with Doug Aitken's Mirage house so close to us, it would have been a tragedy not to make it.
This incredible piece of artwork touched me in a personal way, bringing together some themes that have been running rampant in my life over the last few years. Our intense focus on real estate, renovations and building has been closely in tune with the landscape around us. One that is wild and seemingly untamable in many ways. Doug Aitken's Mirage really highlighted the stark contrast between the wild natural world and the rigid, developed one we create for ourselves, as well as the delicate relationship between the two - our endless search for the untouched, and our desire to interact with it.
It reminded me of what Nikko's philosophy when it comes to building - to work with nature in a symbiotic way, to allow it its place and to work with it, as opposed to an attempt to dominate or control beyond a reasonable means. Because too much interference means destroying and therefore losing that which drew us to it in the first place.
xx,
Tienlyn
Photos by Raelyn Jacobson
