More books about buildings and bikes: David Byrne talks cycling at the Paramount
Pace Wildenstein
Animals think they're pretty smart. Shit on the ground, secure bicycles: Byrne and friends
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After dropping out of the Rhode Island School Of Design, David Byrne found a city, found himself a city to live in called New York. But while subsequent years found the former Talking Head weaving himself into the fabric of The Big Apple by collaborating on stage productions with Twyla Tharp or turning a Manhattan ferry terminal into a musical instrument, his restless mind has never stopped thinking about the world's other municipalities. Byrne's latest book, Bicycle Diaries, looks at the modern city as seen from the seat of his preferred mode of transportation: the folding bicycles he's been riding sine the 1980s. "This point of view—faster than a walk, slower than a train, often slightly higher than a person—became my panoramic window on much of the world over the last thirty years—and it still is," Byrne writes in an excerpt published on Pop Candy. "It's a big window and it looks out on a mainly urban landscape. (I'm not a racer or sports cyclist.) Through this window I catch glimpses of the mind of my fellow man, as expressed in the cities he lives in. Cities, it occurred to me, are physical manifestations of our deepest beliefs and our often unconscious thoughts, not so much as individuals, but as the social animals we are."
Austin isn't one of the physical manifestations beliefs and thoughts covered within the book (although Sweetwater gets four pages of loving description), but Byrne will visit the city as part of the promo tour for Bicycle Diaries, participating in a panel on biking in Austin with League of Bicycling Voters president Rob D'Amico, City of Austin bicycle pedestrian coordinator Annick Beaudet, and urban planner Jana McCann. The discussion takes place Sept. 27 at the Paramount Theatre; admission is free. Byrne's recent series of unorthodox bike racks will undoubtedly come up in the discussion, along with questions about making American cities more bike and pedestrian-friendly, and that most important query of all: Well, how did we get here?
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