In September of 2002 the editors of Cabinet magazine sat down for an editorial review for an upcoming issue of the publication devoted to Real Estate and Property. During this conversation Jeffrey Kastner, Sina Najafi and Frances Richard discussed the idea of Gordon Matta-Clark's Fake Estates project and its relevance to the issue. What transpired from this conversation was a two-year research project which culminated in concurrent exhibitions entitled Odd Lots: Revisiting Gordon Matta-Clark's Fake Estates at

La Flor Bakery


Yimei Bakery


Here are Mierle Laderman Ukeles comments on the La Flor segment:

I invited Vikko, the owner and creator of La Flor, an island of Mexico deliciousness sprung right under the El in Queens, to participate with me in creating QUEENS QOOKIES / SWEET SPLITS. I asked him to come up with some kind of baked goods that have the shape of ODD LOT #3. We talked a lot. I showed him pictures of #3. We walked over to ODD LOT #3 together under the El, so noisy. We looked at #3 and ended up in a long conversation about property, possessions, about dreams and ambition; and then more philosophically about having and losing. He talked about his dream, to leave baking with his mother since childhood in his simple village in southern Mexico to chase his dreams in the big city, and got here, and needing a job, ended up back in the kitchen, baking. Only this time, he created an oasis, and built a wonderful cafe, and now owns another and perhaps more to come. All this, while we stood on a Queens street, looking at a mysterious shape floating somewhere down a driveway between buildings, then walking back to the cafe.

He had suggested making the shape of #3 in stencils with powder sugar on brownies with Mexican chocolate. Seized with this idea, I and my two assistants figured out the ratio of the whacky dimensions of #3 in relation to standard cookie sheets sizes -- which is pretty complicated, and then made many models and drawings and stencil patterns using this shape now fit into the size of the cookie sheet. When we returned to show it to him, he was so touched that we had run with his idea so hard, that he said he'd bake for nothing! Nothing doing, I said, we had to do this in a business-like way. They were beautiful!