Notes from attending 'Attention Lab 1' at the School of Radical Attention in Brooklyn. The event included two guided exercise and a few guided discussions between groups of two, four, half or all of the 40 odd participants. Introductory conversations while waiting for the lab to begin covered themes around the question of why each... Continue Reading →
Notes from the AIA Brooklyn General Meeting 11/20/2024 and panel discussion. Convening two weeks after the 2024 election, the subject of labor, collectivism and the architectural profession felt timely, poignant, and very distant. The three panelists were: Dr. Benjamin Shepard City Tech Professor of Human Services. He is the author/editor of over ten books including White... Continue Reading →
dedicated to my father Dr. Ahmed Achrati In my recent review and documentation of photos from past trips to Algeria, I've come across a number of visits to prehistoric carvings and etchings in the areas surrounding El Bayadh. These day trips were a part of a broad effort on the part of my father to... Continue Reading →
dedicated to the memory of Dr. Cheikh Achrati, this post is part 5 of a series covering travels in Algeria In 2019 I went on a pilgrimage of sorts from El Bayadh to visit Aïn Sefra in western Algeria. The day trip was arranged to offer detours through the Ksour Mountains, rock art carvings, and... Continue Reading →
This past weekend I had the privilege to help install a chuppah for a marriage ceremony for close family. This chuppah (or huppah) holds a great deal of sentimental value to me, as it is the same one I designed for my own wedding six years ago. The wood pieces have held up pretty well... Continue Reading →
this post is part 4 of a series covering my trip to Algeria this past February South of Brezina, in the Algerian province of El Bayadh, lies a series of mesas marking the start of the Sahara. I've visited the area on three occasions, the first of which was during a sandstorm in December 2017.... Continue Reading →
this post is part 3 of a series covering my trip to Algeria this past February These photographs from Algeria show the geography and geology of the Saharan Atlas mountains between El Bayadh and Brezina, a small oasis marking the start of the desert. All photos taken by the author, from the front seat of... Continue Reading →
this post is part 2 of a series covering my trip to Algeria this past February The previous post reviewed photographs taken from a flight from Algiers to El Bayadh in February, comparing the bird's eye view from the plane to the God's eye view of satellite imagery. As the flight approached El Bayadh we... Continue Reading →
part 1 of a series covering my trip to Algeria this past February The documentary L'Algerie Vue du Ciel is a beautiful portrait of Algeria with slow motion sweeping panoramas of many cities and regions. The ever present voice-over commentary keep the feeling closer to a travelogue or nature documentary than an experimental documentary like... Continue Reading →
There is a famous location in Brooklyn, on Washington Street in DUMBO, where the Manhattan Bridge tower frames the Empire States Building. It isn't quite Leaning Tower of Pisa, but there are enough tourists posing for photographs to slow car traffic and produce a curious scene when viewed from above: The view of skyscraper framed... Continue Reading →
Adam Achrati 