By Mike, on May 22nd, 2011 "I want it all" – Marian Bantjes
If you get a chance you must head to the Onsite gallery at OCADU and catch the Marian Bantjes exhibit. Marian recently published, “I Wonder,” a beautifully printed and design “illuminated manuscript” (as design guru Steven Heller has described it). She is definitely one of Canada’s hottest [...]
By Mike, on April 12th, 2011
10 Ruble Russian Coin featuring cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin (Photo by Mike)
Today is “Day of the Soviet Space Program (Cosmonautics)” for Russians – a day to remember the cosmonaut and national hero Yuri Gagarin, who on April 12, fifty years ago, was blasted into orbit from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
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By Mike, on January 25th, 2011 Mike has been an earnest student of film since he studied the “History of Cinema” and “Italian Cinema” at university. Mike is an aspiring filmmaker with a few short videos under his belt. Currently he is working on “City Symphony” – a hybrid documentary / music video that includes music by his alter-ego “Mikooshka.”
Here [...]
By Mike, on September 29th, 2010 This could be the zeitgeist moment of Facebook – when the little social network that could really become an all-encompassing behemoth. Already writers and thinkers in the tech world compare its scope and power with Google. It is an incredible phenomenon: it quite reminds me of the game changing killer app that was Napster at [...]
By Mike, on September 17th, 2010 < Photo of Maracatu Nunca Antes, Toronto-based Brazilian music group, by Yvonne Bambrick
Kensington Market is a colorful, lively place chock full of quaint shops and colorful characters. On the last Sunday of every month they hold an innovative, car-free, pedestrian-only street festival.
My pal Grey Coyote is the President of the Kensington Market Action Committee [...]
By Mike, on September 17th, 2010 I picked up the September 2010 issue of Wired Magazine and was struck by the amazing cover story and (design!). It boldly declares that the “Web is Dead!”
For those of you who would like my take and synopsis, please read on. (Link at end of this blog post).
The basic premise of the article [...]
By Mike, on September 9th, 2010 Two art show / exhibitions open this Friday that explore the geography of Ontario, one focusing on the man-made spit at the foot of Leslie St. in Toronto, and the other on the remote wilds of northern Ontario, north of Thunder Bay by and reached via Highway 11.
I don’t really frequent art openings and [...]
By Mike, on July 30th, 2010 I am a huge proponent of the multiculture. It informs my design and my world outlook. I also teach English and through my teaching have met students from literally every corner of the globe. In my artistic life, as Mikooshka (my musical alter-ego), I craft music which crosses over from genres like reggae, rock and [...]
By Mike, on June 14th, 2010 I’m a teacher and designer offering a free online course for people interested in developing skills in areas like Graphic Design and Marketing. I’m offering the course to people who are not artists, but who have “artistic” or “artsy” tendencies and would like to develop some materials to promote themselves, their business or their organization.
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By Mike, on June 11th, 2010 The opening ceremony of the 2010 World Cup is taking place right now, and it’s reminiscent of the large-scale ceremonies I remember from the Vancouver and Beijing games. The stadium is ginormous and hundreds of Africans, primarily women, are performing synchronized dancing as performers do songs blended together in medleys.
I just saw the singer [...]
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Mike Simpson is a teacher, writer, musician and designer from Toronto, Canada. He is a new media enthusiast and has been "strongandfree" since 1996.
Mike is working on a hybrid music and video project called "City Symphony" and teaching at George Brown College.
Check out Strong+Free for his Design and Media work.
Contact him:
mike @ strongandfree.ca
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