PLAY – ORGANIZED AND ORDERLY

Play is practice. 

Play is simulation. 

It aptly activates children's brains, 

but it is not innocent.

 
Games, toys and children's equipment are designed to incorporate and promote certain skills. The little girl nurtures her piece of plastic and dresses it in pink, while the child in blue is caught up in a simulation of war or the act of driving his 3-inch metal car.
 
Fortunately, gender-neutral modes of play do exist, too. The outdoor playground, with its jungle gyms and monkey bars, originates from Germany and is in use worldwide today. The playground is, ultimately, a version of the man-made park: nature reconstructed in city space, tamed, shrunk and adapted to the needs of us humans. It is safe and restricted, usually fenced and physically differentiated from other public spaces. In all its ostensible freedom and good-willed simulations of nature, it is still a venue of control.

When childhood is understood as a passing chapter in life, it is appropriate to shove this short, mental play phase into physical areas of acting out needs and developments necessary for leading a successful life. Let us cage and control the conformist little monkeys! Let's program them to learn how to climb an aluminium igloo in the city centre, to try rock climbing on an apathetic mini mountain made of small square stones. Most importantly, let us Keep An Eye On Them.

”City streets are unsatisfactory playgrounds for children because of the danger, because most good games are against the law, because they are too hot in summer, and because in crowded sections of the city they are apt to be schools of crime.” (Theodore Roosevelt, 1907.)

Play, isolated and categorized like this, is sadly separated from adulthood and from inspiring public spaces not designed exclusively for it. Thus, play is accidentally deprived of important forms of freedom and healthy anarchy. It begins to lack life. 

Amsterdam 2011

Amsterdam 2011

Helsinki 2011

Amsterdam 2011

THE STORY OF JARHEAD BEAR – part 6 of 6

This is the sixth and final part of
the story. If you are joining us now,
you can read the previous parts starting here. 

 

Passing days bring along more long hours of exhausting examination of others, who are seemingly
living a better life. An unclear, incoherent viewpoint. One angle, no escape. Turning its head hurts as the jar's plastic edge rubs the bear's skinny neck.

Jarhead Bear realizes a new threat, which replaces the now dead mosquito as its main point of hallucinatory focus. A couple of vertical, two legged, oddly moving huntsmen appear to be chasing it, they are trying to disorientate mother, trying to catch the whole crew. Strangely enough, they are not shooting, just appearing in sight every now and then.

Could they help?

But Jarhead Bear knows no other way than to stay in the only world it has come to recognize in the past weeks – the foggy, reeking jar. It will continue to run away from its possible rescue and follow the leader, even without an ounce of genuine will to do so.

This story was inspired by experiences

of office work and the true story of 'jarhead' bear. 

THE END

THE STORY OF JARHEAD BEAR – part 5 of 6

This is the fifth part of
the story. If you are joining us now,
you can read the previous parts starting here. 

Jarhead Bear, desperate and unbearably thirsty, has now been trapped in its plastic prison for a dozen days. If only it were able drink the raindrops that draw a dotted sheet on the wrong side of the jar. Since there are no more recognizable smells of food, the cub's sense of hunger is beginning to wear off at the same pace as its last bits of energy. The jar only inhabits a reek of the bear's own, quiet breath, elevating from the depths of its empty stomach.

When things seem so unfortunate that they cannot get any worse, Jarhead Bear gets an unwelcome visitor. A demonic mosquito, complaining at the top of its tiny yet intolerable voice, finds its way into the cub's container home. This new, uncomfortably lively friend troubles its tired ears and eyes all day and night.

Wandering far behind its crew, the travels of our distressed bear have become agonizing. From its jar filled with the most horrible of sounds, Jarhead Bear stares at the blurry image of its mother, teaching the other cub to find and eat berries, those treasures of the green ground so unreachable from behind the stinky obstacle of life which once was the greatest pleasure of all.

Continue to the final part...

THE STORY OF JARHEAD BEAR – part 4 of 6

This is the fourth part of 

the story. If you are joining us now,

you can read the first parts starting here.

 

Raindrops do not tickle the cub's nose like they used to. Jarhead Bear perceives the moist air as a faint fog on the jar's outer surface but cannot reach it with its tongue. The drips and drops sound hollow; they are close but not quite here. The rain leaves sad, watery trails on the jar, thus hiding mother's footprints, which are essential for survival. Every now and then, the cub shakes its head in a fierce attempt to free itself, but nothing happens. 

When Jarhead Bear breathes and gets out of breath, the jar grows steamy and throws the cub ever farther from its sleuth. It cannot feel the wind on its ears, it cannot hear the crackles of the forest, it cannot scratch or clean its head. It is practically impossible to stay behind mother's dark, distant figure, drawing away inevitably.

Continue to part 5...

THE STORY OF JARHEAD BEAR – part 3 of 6

This is the third part of the
story. If you are joining us now,
you can read the previous parts starting here.

 

One August night, a particularly strong smell of trash hovers into the woods. The death-like reek is a reminder of the garbage truck, now probably visiting the house closest to the forest. Usually a trip to a freshly emptied trash shed is not worthwhile, but the dry weather has transformed the territory into an empty and cruel area. It is almost autumn, ­ time to start preparing for hibernation. Food must be found, weight must be gained.

Mother does not hear or see danger, so it directs her cubs to the shed. The hungry group climbs over the sharp edges of the bins and begins devouring the delicacies left behind by the truck, whose driver must have been in a hurry to catch an evening coffee since a lot is still there.

In the back corner, at the very end of the wooden shed, a lonely, see through jar sits at the bottom of a green bin. The jar, a visually extremely ordinary individual, has a scent of exceptional, irresistible bliss. It is already dark when the cub shoves its snout deep into the jar. It drools, licks and lets its furry tummy fill up with the pleasure of old milk. It cleans it as precisely as possible, and is pleased, so pleased. It has found Something. Life is good.

But our tale is a tragedy. Jarhead Bear's bearhead is stuck deep and tight in the plastic jar.

Continue to part 4...

THE STORY OF JARHEAD BEAR – part 2 of 6

This is the second part of 
the story. If you are joining us now,
you can read the first part here.

High points of life in the forest, now painted in shades of slowly fading green, include playing with sticks and branches and the comforting reek of carcasses, which brings along a knowledge of food somewhere nearby. The cub's sense of smell is subjected to a pleasure even better, a sweeter stink, once mother takes it from the forest to better waters: the overflowing trash cans of the human species.

Mother knows how to avoid some of the leftovers, those brown vegetables and fruits thrown out because of the soft mould they grow. But for the little bear, the trash is a feast where everything can be consumed. The greedy cub operates like its mother, but without consideration. It has just grasped the idea of rummaging through anthills and beehives, and it now dashes into the rubbish bins in this frenzy of its never-ending hunger. Tins and cans, ice-cream packets, crumbs of potato chips, candy wraps and frozen berries. Everything is there and must be eaten at once.

Continue to part 3...

THE STORY OF JARHEAD BEAR – part 1 of 6

We are happy to begin 
the production of Content 
with the six part story of Jarhead Bear. 

 

Our antihero has the thick claws of a beast and a dense coat lightly dusted by summer. It has a large, robust mother, who demonstrates how only some of the green treasures found in the homestead forest are edible. Rowan and birch leaves are safe, as are buzzing insects, their sweet honey and certain divine berries later on in the cooling summer. 

It is essential to keep up behind mother's wide bottom and accurately mimic her actions. The little brown bear, together with its brother, loyally follows and observantly learns the best tricks and gimmicks, the precious hidden trails and caves; the ways to survive in the woods.

Continue to part 2...