Starting in 1994 on the East Coast, Justin Duerr did, and wondered what it meant.
Toynbee tiles kansas city movie#
It's sincere in what it's trying to convey.Imagine coming across a homemade tile on a city street or sidewalk bearing the enigmatic, four-line message of TOYNBEE IDEA IN MOVIE 2001 RESURRECT DEAD ON PLANET JUPITER. Now imagine coming across dozens of such tiles. "But it's not something put down with the idea this person is thinking they'll be in art gallery, or try to make money off it. They've even been spotted in the breakdown lane of a busy interstate.Īt this point, Duerr thinks he does have a pretty good guess about who the original tiler was. Dozens of new tiles have appeared in and around Philadelphia, a few in just the last month. There are slight, but telling, differences: For example, instead of saying "resurrect dead," the new tiles say "raise dead." Whoever it is, the current tiler has clearly been busy. Then, about four years ago, Justin Duerr started seeing new ones.ĭuerr and other experts think the new tiles are the work of a copycat. And once you see them, you start noticing them everywhere."īy the late 1990s, many of the older tiles had been paved over. "It's rife with paranoia, everything these tiles say, and yet they're so bizarre," DeLeon says. A few tiles refer to Knight as a "Helion Jew" and even a Soviet Spy. Knight, founder of the Knight Ridder newspaper chain that used to own the Inquirer. DeLeon says the tiler seems to have a special vendetta against John S. A few carry instructions such as "you must make and glue tiles" and "you as media is". In some cases, the Toynbee tiles branch out beyond their core message about Jupiter. Morasco died several years ago, and his widow insists he didn't have anything to do with the tiles. The caller said his name was James Morasco, and there was a Philadelphia social worker by that name. I believe my headline on it was, 'You wanna run that by me again?'"
Mamet says he made the caller up but in 1983, a real caller identifying himself as a city social worker rang Clark DeLeon at The Philadelphia Inquirer.ĭeLeon, who was writing a daily column for the Inquirer at the time, recalls: "He had this idea about people living, or being resurrected from the planet Jupiter. Mamet's play centers on a radio host and a strange caller who wants to talk about his plan to - yes, resurrect the dead on Jupiter. Toynbee tiles first appeared in the early 1980s, around the same time playwright David Mamet published the one-act play 4 AM. "Because that's something Toynbee talks about." "Resurrecting the dead could potentially mean resurrecting a dead civilization, or a dead idea, or concept," Duerr says. Toynbee, while Kubrick of course refers to Stanley Kubrick and his film 2001: A Space Odyssey. He theorizes that the messages refer to late British historian Arnold J. The tiles seem to originate in Philadelphia, where artist Justin Duerr is working on a documentary film about them. They seem to be made of linoleum, presumably stuck to the street in the middle of the night. The cement-bound messages take on various forms, but usually bear some variation of the following text: "Toynbee Idea: In Kubrick's 2001, Resurrect Dead on Planet Jupiter." But no one is certain what the messages mean, or who may have planted them.
Toynbee tiles kansas city license#
Tending to be about the size of license plates, the tiles are embedded in the streets of various cities, including New York, Washington, Chicago - even Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires. but he's not revealing it.Īs an urban mystery, the Toynbee tiles have fascinated fans of street art for more than 25 years. Justin Duerr, who is making a documentary about the tiles, says he has a good guess who the original artist is.
0 kommentar(er)
