'My brain made me do it.'
Lecture about the 'environmental effects of ill-considered philosophy'.
1. There is a popular model that free-will depends upon indeterminism. That is, freedom of choice depends upon 'a miracle'. An event that cannot possibly be predicted.
Suppose we get our free will from a machine for generating quantum randomness. We're going on a trip and the machine isn't allowed on the plane. So, prior to the trip you use the machine to generate a list of the randomly generated numbers and you take these on the trip. Whenever you make a decision you check the list. Why is that different to the machine?
The feeling is that if if there is determinism it takes away opportunities. But:
If determinism is true then you can't change the future
If determinism is false then you can't change the future
Both are true because the future is what will happen. This can't be changed.
2. Agents:
eg chess playing program.
Two programs A and B.
A is a better player = better at producing possible futures and choosing the most advantageous.
Let's pick a game where A wins.
B COULD have won if it had castled. But it didn't because its evaluation routine isn't as good as A's.
If B's random-decision routine (using a pseudo-random number generator) was replaced by a real random number generator (quantum) would that improve B's chess competency. No. Randomness is irrelevant. Over-spec.
David Wiggins - 'cosmic unfairness of determinism'. But indeterminism is also unfair. We can never control everything.
3. Does neuroscience show there is no free will?
Core experiment is Benjamin Libet. Study in voluntary actions.
a. Move your fingertip at a random point. (spontaneous whim)
b. Notice on the clock when you made the decision.
Result is the 'Libet gap' of 350ms (about a quarter of a second) between the electrode firing for the message that makes your finger move and the clock position. The claim therefore is that the decision is prior to the conscious awareness. (Slightly complicated because there is also a smaller 'veto window' where you can override the electrical message.)
But surely there are also relevant events that could be measured prior to the 350ms gap. (and the veto, for tha matter.)
DD says all this is only relevant if we assume the Cartesian Theatre (the homunculus). (1. Not physically true 2. Gets into an infinite regression)
a counter example is
Model of Libet is:
1. Neural Event 2. Conscious intent 3. Action
Counterexample:
1. Political Event 2. Senate Debate 3. Law
Number 1 might happen first, but it is still the Senate that creates the law.
4. Responsibility of Agents
1. If not other agent is responsible for your actions then you are
2. Presumption of competence. (Needed for trade, contracts, promises, agreements)
If 1 and 2 hold, then the agent can be punished
Computers etc have shown that you can have 'competence without comprehension'
What was new for me, in my view of Dennett, was the ethical dimension of his work that he was hinting at during the lecture. Of course, in a way it is obvious there is an ethical dimension - as LW pointed out, you won't solve any problem of philosophy until all problems of philosophy have been solved.
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Friday, January 29, 2010
Nicolas Hodges. Piano. Thurs 28 Jan 2010. Queens Hall Edinburgh. ECAT
Programme
Pascal Dusapin: 7 Etudes
Michael Finnissy: Piano Concerto No 7
Georges Aperghis: Dans le mur, for piano and tape
Nicolas Hodges, in the flesh, didn't look anywhere near so Pinter-like as the programme image suggested.
Pascal Dusapin: 7 Etudes
Michael Finnissy: Piano Concerto No 7
Georges Aperghis: Dans le mur, for piano and tape
Nicolas Hodges, in the flesh, didn't look anywhere near so Pinter-like as the programme image suggested.
Friday, June 19, 2009
Royal Society of Edinburgh Politics and Science. Friday 24th April 2009
IInteresting things:
From Frayn
After Copenhagen play was written two letters were uncovered.
Bohr's letter to Heisenberg. Because of the controversy caused by the play, Bohr's letter was released early by the family. (It had been stored under conditions not to be released until 2012). This shows that Heisenberg ADMITTED to Bohr that he was working on a nuclear bomb programme -- so H admitted this to a known opponent of Germany, and he knew that B would report this activity to the allies. So H was clearly more sympathetic to the Allies than would appear.
A little later Heisenberg's letter to his wife was uncovered. H had written this while IN Copenhagen so this account is the least clouded by memory. He didn't post the letter (too dangerous) it but delivered it to his wife when he returned. It shows H went to dinner at Bohr's house as soon as he arrived AND on the day after the visit to the Institute (when they had the argument) AND on the day the after! H records that on the third visit they had a great time with H playing Mozart and Bohr reading aloud. So the only thing that both H and B agreed about -- that the meeting on the evening of the visit to the Institute ruined their friendship -- wasn't true! They had both misremembered this after the event.
Recently, the German historian (Karish??) has uncovered that there was also a secret Nazi Hydrogen (fusion) bomb programme! (Heisenberg was working on fission). His competitor on the fission programme was also secretly involved with the fusion programme, as was another character who was kept at Farm Hall. Neither of them ever gave any indication to the other scientists that they were involved on that project. The fusion prog ran a test in the Baltic and another in Germany (at Ordrift??). The last one probably went wrong and there were many deaths from radiation burns and poisoning. The fusion prog did well enough that the SS took it under their wing. In the last weeks of the war the SS moved papers and command out of Berlin. The plan was to go to a stronghold set up in the Alps. Instead they were heading to Ordrift(?) -- a last ditch attempt to hole up with the fusion programme? Speculation that one of the reasons the Nazi's didn't surrender when they had plainly lost was because they thought there was a chance of creating a Hydrogen bomb?
Frayn had been in correspondence with Jeremy Bernstein (editor of the American edition of the Farm Hall transcripts) and so has found himself on the coat tails of a an email distribution list of distinguished scientists including Freeman Dyson.
The RSE event itself was full of about 40 clones of Jackie and Richard from Oxford. Considering we were in Edinburgh even the accents were the same.
A highlight of the dramatised reading of the Farm Hall transcripts was that, after the reading the British report explaining that the rooms were bugged and so the British could 'read the Germans' minds', the opening bit of dialogue went:
'Do you think they have hidden microphones?'
Heisenberg: 'Naw. The the British are too old fashioned.'
One of the best characters was a bloke called Otto Hahn. He really was shuffling between guilt and being an party animal. He was the guy who actually discovered the principle of fusion in 1939 and so wondered if he should have committed suicide rather than tell anyone. He also resigned from his post in protest at Jews being sacked. After the news of Hiroshima he was inconsolable with grief until given loads of drink which the major reckoned put him on a more even keel. While at Farm Hall he was awarded the Nobel Prize and there was speculation about going Sweden to collect it if he promised not to tell anyone where he was being kept. Trouble is, he had friends in Sweden with very good cellars and he couldn't promise not to let things slip once things got social with the wine. Turns out the guy who was was reading this part was Friedrich Hirzebruch -- founding Director of the Max Black Institute for Mathematics.
Other readers:
-- Sir Michael Atiyah who, when he was President of the Royal Society, was the chap who got the Farm Hall papers declassified.
- John Finney (emeritus prof at UCL) who is Chairman of British Pugwash. In the discussion after the reading he mentioned that at Los Alamos, none of the scientists working on the Manhattan project (with the exception of Rotblat) thought for a moment about the real implications about what they were doing. It only hit them when the first test explosion was held -- such it is that our moral imagination always lags behind novelty.
Anyway, what I call a good Friday night out.
Pre-show talk with Michael Frayn: Thu 23 Apr at 6pm
AA few stories from Frayn's talk on the Thursday night.
Frayn's success in the theatre.
1. His first stage appearance was in a Gogol play in Russian (he was a student of Russian at Cambridge). He had a minor non-speaking part, but on exiting the stage he couldn't get the door to open. After minutes of trying he was so desperately pulling the door that he almost pulled the set down. It was only then that he could work out what they were shouting to him from behind the stage, which was 'push!'.
He never acted again.
2. It was a real big thing for the Cambridge Footlights to get picked up for a transfer to London -- potentially career making -- and it always happened. The yearFrayn wrote the revue they were NOT selected. He gave up on theatre and as a columnist always took the mickey out out plays and theatre as revenge.
3. He went to Germany to see the first production of Copenhagen in Germany -- a big event because it was going to tour around the country. It was performed as a circus act -- with Bohr literally doing backflips, Heisenberg walking a tightrope, and Margarete banging away loudly on a typewriter whenever there was boring physics talk. He told his agent there was no way he was going to have dinner with the cast after the show. But it was a one horse town and there was only one restaurant. It was eat with the cast or have no dinner. After wrestling with his conscience and his stomach, Frayn had dinner with the cast and pretended he'd enjoyed the production.
See trailer
See discussion in Bohr, Hesienberg
Copyright and the Emperor's Clothes - Simulacra, Baudrillard and the End of Intellectual Property. Lecture by Prof. Dr. Thomas Hoeren. Munster Univ.
At the Faculty of Advocates, Edinburgh. Wed 17th June, 2009
Not being a legal bod, let me at least see if I can get the pieces in order...
There is no copyright on ideas.
1. British (and therefore US) Copyright law is to protect the investor.
2. EU tradition is copyright law is to protect the 'real creator'. The 'originator'.
How does EU law reconcile the two approaches?
First attempt was the UK approach to software development -- which gives the legal right for all the developers be listed.
Second attempt was in the area of databases. (The person who developed this law is now banned from the US.) The directive on legal protection of databases tries to combine approaches 1 and 2. Where the db is treated as a literary work and needs to be original content. And the concept of a 'maker' was introduced to protect the investor (employer.)
The directive also introduced the concept of 'reciprocity'. That is, USA databases only get legal protection rights if they accept the law of the directive for EU databases.
Case 1. The British Horse Racing Board (/Agency) -- First application of the Directive in practice by the European Court of Justice.
The cost of running the BHRB database is £4m per year. But William Hill bookies are using it without making any contribution. Protection is for the investment of gathering the data, not creating it. Extraction and re-utilisation of the data has to be for a 'substantial part' (undefined) of the db. As William Hill only use the winners they were in the clear.
Case 2: German Anthology of German Poetry.
A prof though of the idea of getting someone to compare three collections of german poetry to determine which were the most popular German poems between 1700 and 1900. This research was funded by the University of Freiberg.
Then Direct Media made their own collection of the most popular poems between 1700 and 1900 on a CD. The collection was slightly different to the Univ db but they admitted referring to the db as one of the sources while compiling their list.
The Prof AND the university sued Direct Media.
The court decided that the prof was a copyright holder because it was his idea. (Descpite the fact that ideas are not protect by copyright law!). But if data is stored on the internet there is an explicit aknowledgement that the information is being made freely available.
First time ever a German Univ has sued for copyright. (Traditionally in Europe, Univ don't get copyright protection.) But this was protection of the investment.
Direct Media argued they had not 'extracted' the data but simply referred to it. The European Court of Justice Advocate General ruled that the broadest interpretation possible should be given to protect databases. So 'extraction' is not cut and paste. Extraction protection is greater than copyright holder protection. (Which is not the 'broadest possible interpretation.) Plus, the univ has rights to the work even if the Prof (who has the copyright) wanted to give the data away.
The way out is to have an Information Law, of which copyright is subsidiary. The EU db directive was intended to encourage economic activity. In a study of EU database companies the conclusion was the law had NO economic benefit. However it was considered 'too expensive' to remove the directive!
Over wine:
1.Brussels has no Law Library. So if an individual wants to bring attention to something he has to pay out of his own pocket to send the books to each individual. (Guess what the lobby companies do!)
2. There is no record kept of the revisions of the legislation. So you cannot track what was changed after which meeting with X lobbyist. (The lobbyist are usually faxed the first draft of the legislation.)
Afterthought:
The advantage of law by precedent.
In the case of EU law such as this directive there is no mechanism to trigger to changing or clarifying it.
Reference: Congress
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
George Steiner, Edinburgh Book Festival 17-Aug-2008
I have been very lazy and have not posted up any notes of the events I have attended for some time. However, my reaction to the Steiner event has been so strong I really have to record it somewhere.
The event itself left me feeling intangibly deflated. It was only afterwards that I was able to analyse what had actually been going on.
What's the big deal?
George Steiner appeared at the Edinburgh Book Festival to talk about his audaciously named collection of essays ‘My Unwritten Books’.
The event itself left me feeling intangibly deflated. It was only afterwards that I was able to analyse what had actually been going on.
What's the big deal?
The session started off with Steiner giving a rousing state-of-the-world speech that covered:
- The increasing intellectual laziness of the world
- Our declining standards in rigour of thought
- Our collective callousness. After what we have seen from WW2, the most powerful nations still avoid benevolent intervention .Yes, we intervened in Kosovo, but we only intervene when it suits the interests of traditional 'great power' manoeuvrings.
- The un-inspiring leaders we have
- The country’s obsession with money
Now, I was into this as much as the next man and was quite carried away by the tidal wave of misty idealism in the room and the almost hysterical respect in which Steiner was regarded.
The came the questions -- each one prefaced with a good 3 minutes of praise for Steiner's wit, wisdom, learning, intelligence, insight, and blah-di-blah.
Some typical questions and answers follow (these are typical examples).
Q. Why have you not publicly attacked George Bush?
A. Because he gave me $12,000
Q. Rather than confine your message to the few (people like us), why have you not used the mass media in the manner of Bronowski and Clarke?
A. I was offered a series by Huw Weldon of the BBC but I didn't want the hassle of being recognised in the street or the discomforts of travel. And I was concerned that I would lose my reputation with my academic peers.
The answer to some question about teaching, involved the statement that teachers are not paid enough. Apparently, the great thing Stalin did was to pay secondary teachers as much as university professors. (Though presumably the real thinkers in the Gulag didn’t receive such beneficence.)
So much for feeling enough solidarity with our fellow humans to do something to improve the world. So much for the critique of the modern obsession with money.
It seems that the old saw still very much applies: 'Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach.'
Now, you may think I'm being a bit harsh picking on some 80 year old bloke. But he was selling his book, and I was charged a ticket price. And there is an important lesson to be learned in the hysteria of admiration. At the time, I doubt that any person in the room formulated any criticism of what was being said. I didn't: I only came to my senses afterwards. It is saddening to see such sloppy and blinkered standards passing for our intellectual life. Especially in a room full of people who ought to know better.
In short: intellectually lazy, manipulative, lacking rigour, money mad, and helpful to fellow men -- as long as no person inconvenience is involved. Rather un-inspiring.
Sunday, October 07, 2007
The Winter's Tale. Lyceum Theatre. Edinburgh. 29-Sept-07
Let's be honest. If you cut out the temptation to bardology, The Winter's Tale is pretty much un-producable. There is almost zero drama - Leontes goes mad - there is no fight within himself to stop what he is doing - nobody can stop him - so there is only 'spectacle'. Areas that could be used for drama aren't: there is a tiny bit of suspense about the notion that the shepherd's won't get chance to reveal Perdita's identity but nothing is made of this; there would be the big scene of Perdita's identity proved and Florizel's reconciliation with Polixones which the play avoids staging ect etc.
It has to be said, the Lyceum production made a really good fist of making the thing work. The daft - statue come to life scene - they got it to work. And the impossible part of Leonties was actually carried off (especially in the first part of the play) by the actor. It really was a terrific performance by Liam Brennan who delivered the lines with a Scottish accent.
It is such a luxury to be able to actors like Brennan just 10 minutes away from the doorstep. he really does dominate the imagination when he has played a character. I have seen a few Iago's but the brilliant performance he gave at the Lyceum three years ago was so electric it has made any other Iago's I have seen feel either beside the point or only skin deep.
It has to be said, the Lyceum production made a really good fist of making the thing work. The daft - statue come to life scene - they got it to work. And the impossible part of Leonties was actually carried off (especially in the first part of the play) by the actor. It really was a terrific performance by Liam Brennan who delivered the lines with a Scottish accent.
It is such a luxury to be able to actors like Brennan just 10 minutes away from the doorstep. he really does dominate the imagination when he has played a character. I have seen a few Iago's but the brilliant performance he gave at the Lyceum three years ago was so electric it has made any other Iago's I have seen feel either beside the point or only skin deep.
Sunday, August 12, 2007
Poppea: After Claudio Monteverdi, Vienna Schauspielhaus, Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh International Festival
Sat 11 August. In German with English Supertitles.
I’m not sure the audience were prepared for what they were going to get. This family group certainly wasn’t.
The stage opens to a performance of Cole Porter’s ‘Love For Sale’. Was it some sort of introduction before the opera starts? But no, it set the tone, and was the first of several Porter songs. This appearance of the mischief-making Amor was followed by our introduction to Ottone and then the darkest of dark love affairs between Nero and Poppea.
There were two turning points for us the audience, I think.
Near the end of the first scene with Nero and Poppea when the audience realise it is OK to laugh: it is meant to be funny.
The almost-round of applause at the end of Ottavia’s aria. From now on, the audience knew they could enjoy the singing as they would an opera or musical.
Once we knew the rules we could sit back and enjoy a carnival of Cole Porter performed as opera, recitative performed as pop song, soliloquies performed as music hall, death plots performed as 50s musical, love scenes performed as cabaret, existential nightmares performed as madrigals.
For an Australian director (Barry Kosky), producing an adaptation from an Italian composer of the sixteenth century, the work combined the best German ingredients: Expressionism, Caberet, cynicism and wry, wry wit.
Sure it is stylisted. Sure, sooner or later we get the expected buggery scene. Sure, the director goes for any novelty he can think of (this was the first time I have seen a duet where one of the couple performs in Sign - it was a good thing we had the supertitles!) but that doesn't mean the show lacks content. There's a tragic flavour to Poppea (and Nero). You know what is going to be Poppea’s ultimate fate from the opening scene when Nero takes his leave by singing ‘Every time we say goodbye I die a little’ while absent-mindedly almost strangling her to death. (Suetonius reports her eventual cause of death was Nero kicking her in the abdomen while she was pregnant.)
There is also a sadness in Nero's betrayal of Seneca. There is a real friendship with Seneca (displayed in a suitably Nero-ic way of wanking Seneca off in the bath while threatening him with death) so there is a looney sadness in his lament after Seneca’s execution.
I also liked the almost subterranean elements of the 16th centory Ur-text: the actress playing Poppea makes it clear that she knows what she is signing up for, but she is driven by insane ambition; Amor, of course, shafts everybody; Drusilla and Ottone, although banished and penniless, will (might) live with true love in pastoral contentment; finally crowned, Poppea will get the just deserts of ambition – having achieved his object, Nero is already bored.
The singing was uniformly astounding from all the cast (frequently while performing the most energetic dancing, knifing, lovemaking, torture etc). On the night I was there, I think the audience was most taken with Beatrice Frey as Ottavia, whose almost-but-not-not-quite-contained mania suited the production's most operatic pieces, which she performed with surety. She has a rare skill at singing while sobbing, laughing and making the less easy to name sounds of mental breakdown.
However, I have to mention the range of singing and acting from Martin Neidermair as Ottone and cannot leave out Kyrre Kvam as Nero – who managed to pull off the trick of being barking mad, bloody frightening, sexually perverted, emotionally tender, childlike, sympathetic and even wise, within the space of two and a bit hours.
The musicality of arrangement and performance was awesome, the delivery of any one song frequently requiring segues through the styles of matinee-idol, rebirth trauma, cabaret, music hall parody, rock, aria and degenerate expressionism.
The director of the production led the small orchestra and played the piano with passion - piano being the instrument played constantly through the entire length of the performance. Another noticeable feat of endurance was the astounding amount of time Ruth Brauer-Kvam (Drusilla) was able to spend on her tiptoes.
And I must mention that Poppea has the most fantastic mouth-bling outwith New York.
A diverting evening: urbane, musical, skillfull, funny, spectacular. The cast and the director seemed gratified to get three curtain calls on the opening night. It is going to be a sell out.
I’m not sure the audience were prepared for what they were going to get. This family group certainly wasn’t.
The stage opens to a performance of Cole Porter’s ‘Love For Sale’. Was it some sort of introduction before the opera starts? But no, it set the tone, and was the first of several Porter songs. This appearance of the mischief-making Amor was followed by our introduction to Ottone and then the darkest of dark love affairs between Nero and Poppea.
There were two turning points for us the audience, I think.
Near the end of the first scene with Nero and Poppea when the audience realise it is OK to laugh: it is meant to be funny.
The almost-round of applause at the end of Ottavia’s aria. From now on, the audience knew they could enjoy the singing as they would an opera or musical.
Once we knew the rules we could sit back and enjoy a carnival of Cole Porter performed as opera, recitative performed as pop song, soliloquies performed as music hall, death plots performed as 50s musical, love scenes performed as cabaret, existential nightmares performed as madrigals.
For an Australian director (Barry Kosky), producing an adaptation from an Italian composer of the sixteenth century, the work combined the best German ingredients: Expressionism, Caberet, cynicism and wry, wry wit.
Sure it is stylisted. Sure, sooner or later we get the expected buggery scene. Sure, the director goes for any novelty he can think of (this was the first time I have seen a duet where one of the couple performs in Sign - it was a good thing we had the supertitles!) but that doesn't mean the show lacks content. There's a tragic flavour to Poppea (and Nero). You know what is going to be Poppea’s ultimate fate from the opening scene when Nero takes his leave by singing ‘Every time we say goodbye I die a little’ while absent-mindedly almost strangling her to death. (Suetonius reports her eventual cause of death was Nero kicking her in the abdomen while she was pregnant.)
There is also a sadness in Nero's betrayal of Seneca. There is a real friendship with Seneca (displayed in a suitably Nero-ic way of wanking Seneca off in the bath while threatening him with death) so there is a looney sadness in his lament after Seneca’s execution.
I also liked the almost subterranean elements of the 16th centory Ur-text: the actress playing Poppea makes it clear that she knows what she is signing up for, but she is driven by insane ambition; Amor, of course, shafts everybody; Drusilla and Ottone, although banished and penniless, will (might) live with true love in pastoral contentment; finally crowned, Poppea will get the just deserts of ambition – having achieved his object, Nero is already bored.
The singing was uniformly astounding from all the cast (frequently while performing the most energetic dancing, knifing, lovemaking, torture etc). On the night I was there, I think the audience was most taken with Beatrice Frey as Ottavia, whose almost-but-not-not-quite-contained mania suited the production's most operatic pieces, which she performed with surety. She has a rare skill at singing while sobbing, laughing and making the less easy to name sounds of mental breakdown.
However, I have to mention the range of singing and acting from Martin Neidermair as Ottone and cannot leave out Kyrre Kvam as Nero – who managed to pull off the trick of being barking mad, bloody frightening, sexually perverted, emotionally tender, childlike, sympathetic and even wise, within the space of two and a bit hours.
The musicality of arrangement and performance was awesome, the delivery of any one song frequently requiring segues through the styles of matinee-idol, rebirth trauma, cabaret, music hall parody, rock, aria and degenerate expressionism.
The director of the production led the small orchestra and played the piano with passion - piano being the instrument played constantly through the entire length of the performance. Another noticeable feat of endurance was the astounding amount of time Ruth Brauer-Kvam (Drusilla) was able to spend on her tiptoes.
And I must mention that Poppea has the most fantastic mouth-bling outwith New York.
A diverting evening: urbane, musical, skillfull, funny, spectacular. The cast and the director seemed gratified to get three curtain calls on the opening night. It is going to be a sell out.
Sunday, March 18, 2007
Nick Crowe. CCA Glasgow. 17 March-07
I went around the exhibition prior to the artist's discussion of the work.
Operation Telic. (2005) Are engravings on glass, lit by a light at the edge of the glass pane, which illuminates the etching in green. A fantastic exercise in High Sarcasm. The etchings are all based on genuine images from the MOD website documenting the Iraq war. Some of them take irony to exquisite levels - the etchings of British soldiers teaching Iraqi toddlers how to use rifles is just mind-boggling. Making them etchings made them more effective than simply posting up the photos. The etchings make the images simpler, reduced of clutter, more iconic, and in the simplicity of the the line drawings, more iconic.
The Beheaded. 68 figures - about 10 inches long - in dichroic glass. Each of these represent someone Nick Crowe was able to identify via the web. Where details were vague a figure was not added. The cut-outs hang from string on a revolving wheel.
The first impression is how pretty the piece is. The figures themselves are pretty, but the strong lighting projects the colours onto the background wall. If you stand underneath the piece and look at the different walls, you see the images and colours flowing around the room like:
Tinkerbell lights reflected from chandelier drops
A child's rotating bedroom lamps (my son once had one with sheep that would parade around the room)
High Sarcasm again.
The reflection also reminded me of ghosts.
Three Cynical Objects - Nasdaq FTSE, DOW (2001) Again, beautiful objects. Three sculptures that at first look like skyscrapers. On white maple wooden stands, so that they do indeed look like salesman awards, lit from the below on the edge so that they glow green like a graph on an old green-screen terminal.
They are the graphs of the financial indexes of the year of the dot.com crash. I enjoyed these a lot. Though I would dearly have liked to know which sculpture was which index. Some conflicting thoughts:
I can imagine a stock market actually purchasing these. Partly for for fun, partly cos even some businessmen would enjoy the sarcasm of celebrating a disaster, partly as a warning, partly as a lesson - if these things are managed proerly, does it matter to the larger economy in the long run? - I am not denying that individuals were hit (including my fund for my son's education) and some individuals had worked hard to see things go up in smoke.
I also wondered about this (probably state-funded-academic) taking pot-shots at the people that fund his activities.
Great piece of work.
It will be more economical to include other stuff via the artist's talk below.
Artist's Talk
Nick Crowe:
If you saw his on a train you would assume either:
academic
artist
Very clear, friendly, thoughtful speaker. I was especially impressed at the depth of thought on answering the questions as these ranged over various topics. A lot of thought has gone into his work. (He referred to himself several times as talking like a 'geek'. Usually a sign that someone has properly explored a topic.)
Proposal for the World Wide Web
A copy (in etching) of Tim Berners-Lee's original proposal to get research backing. I saw this as a celebration, a memorial to a significant event. NC loved the crappy computer graphics that dated the piece, and the misspelling of 'refers'. I am often envious of the way fine artists can celebrate things this way. It doesn't seem to be allowed in written media.
Similar with Management Commmitee of the World Wide Web Consortium which I hadn't been too impressed with. (I remember wondering what the people portrayed might think of being made to look so ugly.) NC explained that the portraits were the way they were because they had been drawn from small images from their web site. Which somehow puts a completely different slant on it. Modest. NC pointed out the anonymity of these guys, plus their power. Stuff I should have known but didn't - there used to be a tag called 'blinking tags' which worked on early browsers. Now if you go to a site that uses them they don't blink. Because since them the Committee have ruled them out of the standards. (There is a terrific piece of work about this story to be created.) NC referred to them as 'good guys'. And indeed they are. Heroes really.
The Family Tree of Zainab Duranthrrial Sadik Llthnnnzstil, the First Martian Martyr. (2004)
The programme had got stuff about 'a sense of revulsion for a future we do not know or understand' but I didn't really get that. Martyrdom is a clear enough concept. I spent some time trying to figure out the alien family tree - it looked like the Martians married their children but I couldn't make out much more. I asked NC what it was about. The tree shows that the Martians marry their children, but also take sometimes 3 or more partners to produce a child, and siblings breed - and there is one example of parthenogenesis!
A dilemma with this sort of think - if you explain too much (thereby humanise) it looses it's weirdness. If you don't explain: people miss what it is about.
The piece was commissioned for 'Biennial for the 24th Century'.
The Beheaded (2007)
The wires used to hold up the figures are made of Kevlar! The motor to drive the wheel is a mirror-ball motor. NC talked about the fact that the 68 is a part of the total beheaded in the first 5 years if the 21st Century. The named individuals are a memorial to the 'unknown beheaded. ' NC mentioned the piece reminded him of memorials to the unknown soldiers in cathedrals. Which in my mind related the piece to stained glass.
The pieces were cut out with water jet cutters. They were cut out whole and NC cut off the heads himself. Doing this gave a rough edge to the neck so you get the sparkles of the imperfection (which I had noticed) and makes each one unique. NC talked about technology of violence - partly the reason for the high tech materials.
The glass is described by the manufacturers as 'transmitting' one colour and 'reflecting' another. (Makes sense - one colour is embedded in the glass, another is presumably layered on the surface as a reflective.)
Three Cynical Objects - Nasdaq FTSE, DOW (2001)
NC talked very morally about the stock exchanges. (Personally I can't quite see what is so immoral about the exchanges per se. They make money but then so do lots of people, including some very wealthy artists. Fortunately the work carries the best of NC's thought and leaves behind any simplicities)
What was amusing was NC pointed out that despite the other exchanges crashing and burning the FTSE actually went up again in Feb just before the complete collapse in March! The triumph of hope/ greed/ wishful thinking. (Easy to say with hindsight.)
Operation Telic.
'Telic' means 'objective'. So Operation Telic = Operation Objective. Which NC saw as demonstrating that they had no objective cos they couldn't name it.
NC pointed out very interesting things:
At the start of the war 'liberation of women' was one of its aims (Hence the photos of soldiers with women.) Course the opposite has happened. Not an aim referred to much now.
The pieces were intended to be displayed in a rough and ready unplanned manner (to mirror the war itself). Personally, this aspect completely escaped me when I looked at the piece. Would anyone get this without being primed by the catalogue?
Anyway, because the wires under the shelves were not covered in two pieces of plastic they contravened UK H&S so a white line had to be placed on the floor which the viewer was not allowed to cross. This regulation is not applied in any of the other countries where it has been exhibited.
NC pointed out the exhibition is about the death of 1000s due a war that was less than ill-thought out, illegal and immoral - at least in execution - but UK Govt won't let you go within a metre of the exhibit just in case you go mad and grad a wire, and somehow pierce the plastic and somehow manage to get enough of a shock to hurt yourself.
Some of the early MOD photos of the soldiers in Iraq were in soft focus!
The Campaign for Rural England (2006)
A bus shelter made of English Oak rather than steel. The toughened windows have been shattered in such a way that the outer layers have fractured but the inside is still complete and holds the others in place. The pattern if the broken glass was rather beautiful.
NC explained:
The type of bus shelter is one not provided free by the advertising company because there is no point in advertising in these areas.
In Manchester the broken glass is called 'Preston Diamonds.'
The glass is specially manufactured to break in this manner for safety reasons. So although the act is destructive it is bringing out the design of the glass. (In an Aristotelian manner of showing the object's purpose (my gloss).)
In Berlin, the glass used on the phone boxes have a plastic laminate inside, so the vandals have learned how to break the glass and curl them into classical scrolls.
That awkward thing where he didn't want to defend vandalism (need of laws) but on the other hand one has to admire the signs of life in the transgressors.
I asked about copyright. Mainly prompted by 27 Damaged Windscreens where the images were collected via Google. I thought he put it well:
It is not that copyright law is wrong - it is just unsophisticated
Copyright law was brought in to protest individual creators, but now it is only used by big business in a spirit contrary to the original intention
With the new media it has to be accepted that an object/ image has a life outside of the original context of copyright law.
If I don't want someone to use an image I wouldn't put it on the web
If someone were to complain about an image I would remove it and just use something else.
NC On political works. The most successful political work leaves room to negotiate. Operation Telic shouts the message at you. The Beheaded sort of negotiates.
NC was a bit narked that the lighting for the Common Occurances had moved since he was there last so you couldn't actually see the etchings.
*
What I liked about the show was that unlike some conception art the pieces themselves had interest even if you didn't know the full context. (esp Operation Telic, Beheaded, Cynical Objects etc. ) I know you can't expect an artist to point to all the references within the work itself. - And part of the fun is finding extra depths but having something there that will grab 'the chap who happens to be walking by' is obviously an advantage. Hence I thought less of Campaign for Rural England, which I thought was bound up in knowing the type of bus shelter it was. (Information which I am a bit light on.)
But this is a bit of a whinge about a really powerful exhibition.
http://www.nickcrowe.net/
Operation Telic. (2005) Are engravings on glass, lit by a light at the edge of the glass pane, which illuminates the etching in green. A fantastic exercise in High Sarcasm. The etchings are all based on genuine images from the MOD website documenting the Iraq war. Some of them take irony to exquisite levels - the etchings of British soldiers teaching Iraqi toddlers how to use rifles is just mind-boggling. Making them etchings made them more effective than simply posting up the photos. The etchings make the images simpler, reduced of clutter, more iconic, and in the simplicity of the the line drawings, more iconic.
The Beheaded. 68 figures - about 10 inches long - in dichroic glass. Each of these represent someone Nick Crowe was able to identify via the web. Where details were vague a figure was not added. The cut-outs hang from string on a revolving wheel.
The first impression is how pretty the piece is. The figures themselves are pretty, but the strong lighting projects the colours onto the background wall. If you stand underneath the piece and look at the different walls, you see the images and colours flowing around the room like:
Tinkerbell lights reflected from chandelier drops
A child's rotating bedroom lamps (my son once had one with sheep that would parade around the room)
High Sarcasm again.
The reflection also reminded me of ghosts.
Three Cynical Objects - Nasdaq FTSE, DOW (2001) Again, beautiful objects. Three sculptures that at first look like skyscrapers. On white maple wooden stands, so that they do indeed look like salesman awards, lit from the below on the edge so that they glow green like a graph on an old green-screen terminal.
They are the graphs of the financial indexes of the year of the dot.com crash. I enjoyed these a lot. Though I would dearly have liked to know which sculpture was which index. Some conflicting thoughts:
I can imagine a stock market actually purchasing these. Partly for for fun, partly cos even some businessmen would enjoy the sarcasm of celebrating a disaster, partly as a warning, partly as a lesson - if these things are managed proerly, does it matter to the larger economy in the long run? - I am not denying that individuals were hit (including my fund for my son's education) and some individuals had worked hard to see things go up in smoke.
I also wondered about this (probably state-funded-academic) taking pot-shots at the people that fund his activities.
Great piece of work.
It will be more economical to include other stuff via the artist's talk below.
Artist's Talk
Nick Crowe:
If you saw his on a train you would assume either:
academic
artist
Very clear, friendly, thoughtful speaker. I was especially impressed at the depth of thought on answering the questions as these ranged over various topics. A lot of thought has gone into his work. (He referred to himself several times as talking like a 'geek'. Usually a sign that someone has properly explored a topic.)
Proposal for the World Wide Web
A copy (in etching) of Tim Berners-Lee's original proposal to get research backing. I saw this as a celebration, a memorial to a significant event. NC loved the crappy computer graphics that dated the piece, and the misspelling of 'refers'. I am often envious of the way fine artists can celebrate things this way. It doesn't seem to be allowed in written media.
Similar with Management Commmitee of the World Wide Web Consortium which I hadn't been too impressed with. (I remember wondering what the people portrayed might think of being made to look so ugly.) NC explained that the portraits were the way they were because they had been drawn from small images from their web site. Which somehow puts a completely different slant on it. Modest. NC pointed out the anonymity of these guys, plus their power. Stuff I should have known but didn't - there used to be a tag called 'blinking tags' which worked on early browsers. Now if you go to a site that uses them they don't blink. Because since them the Committee have ruled them out of the standards. (There is a terrific piece of work about this story to be created.) NC referred to them as 'good guys'. And indeed they are. Heroes really.
The Family Tree of Zainab Duranthrrial Sadik Llthnnnzstil, the First Martian Martyr. (2004)
The programme had got stuff about 'a sense of revulsion for a future we do not know or understand' but I didn't really get that. Martyrdom is a clear enough concept. I spent some time trying to figure out the alien family tree - it looked like the Martians married their children but I couldn't make out much more. I asked NC what it was about. The tree shows that the Martians marry their children, but also take sometimes 3 or more partners to produce a child, and siblings breed - and there is one example of parthenogenesis!
A dilemma with this sort of think - if you explain too much (thereby humanise) it looses it's weirdness. If you don't explain: people miss what it is about.
The piece was commissioned for 'Biennial for the 24th Century'.
The Beheaded (2007)
The wires used to hold up the figures are made of Kevlar! The motor to drive the wheel is a mirror-ball motor. NC talked about the fact that the 68 is a part of the total beheaded in the first 5 years if the 21st Century. The named individuals are a memorial to the 'unknown beheaded. ' NC mentioned the piece reminded him of memorials to the unknown soldiers in cathedrals. Which in my mind related the piece to stained glass.
The pieces were cut out with water jet cutters. They were cut out whole and NC cut off the heads himself. Doing this gave a rough edge to the neck so you get the sparkles of the imperfection (which I had noticed) and makes each one unique. NC talked about technology of violence - partly the reason for the high tech materials.
The glass is described by the manufacturers as 'transmitting' one colour and 'reflecting' another. (Makes sense - one colour is embedded in the glass, another is presumably layered on the surface as a reflective.)
Three Cynical Objects - Nasdaq FTSE, DOW (2001)
NC talked very morally about the stock exchanges. (Personally I can't quite see what is so immoral about the exchanges per se. They make money but then so do lots of people, including some very wealthy artists. Fortunately the work carries the best of NC's thought and leaves behind any simplicities)
What was amusing was NC pointed out that despite the other exchanges crashing and burning the FTSE actually went up again in Feb just before the complete collapse in March! The triumph of hope/ greed/ wishful thinking. (Easy to say with hindsight.)
Operation Telic.
'Telic' means 'objective'. So Operation Telic = Operation Objective. Which NC saw as demonstrating that they had no objective cos they couldn't name it.
NC pointed out very interesting things:
At the start of the war 'liberation of women' was one of its aims (Hence the photos of soldiers with women.) Course the opposite has happened. Not an aim referred to much now.
The pieces were intended to be displayed in a rough and ready unplanned manner (to mirror the war itself). Personally, this aspect completely escaped me when I looked at the piece. Would anyone get this without being primed by the catalogue?
Anyway, because the wires under the shelves were not covered in two pieces of plastic they contravened UK H&S so a white line had to be placed on the floor which the viewer was not allowed to cross. This regulation is not applied in any of the other countries where it has been exhibited.
NC pointed out the exhibition is about the death of 1000s due a war that was less than ill-thought out, illegal and immoral - at least in execution - but UK Govt won't let you go within a metre of the exhibit just in case you go mad and grad a wire, and somehow pierce the plastic and somehow manage to get enough of a shock to hurt yourself.
Some of the early MOD photos of the soldiers in Iraq were in soft focus!
The Campaign for Rural England (2006)
A bus shelter made of English Oak rather than steel. The toughened windows have been shattered in such a way that the outer layers have fractured but the inside is still complete and holds the others in place. The pattern if the broken glass was rather beautiful.
NC explained:
The type of bus shelter is one not provided free by the advertising company because there is no point in advertising in these areas.
In Manchester the broken glass is called 'Preston Diamonds.'
The glass is specially manufactured to break in this manner for safety reasons. So although the act is destructive it is bringing out the design of the glass. (In an Aristotelian manner of showing the object's purpose (my gloss).)
In Berlin, the glass used on the phone boxes have a plastic laminate inside, so the vandals have learned how to break the glass and curl them into classical scrolls.
That awkward thing where he didn't want to defend vandalism (need of laws) but on the other hand one has to admire the signs of life in the transgressors.
I asked about copyright. Mainly prompted by 27 Damaged Windscreens where the images were collected via Google. I thought he put it well:
It is not that copyright law is wrong - it is just unsophisticated
Copyright law was brought in to protest individual creators, but now it is only used by big business in a spirit contrary to the original intention
With the new media it has to be accepted that an object/ image has a life outside of the original context of copyright law.
If I don't want someone to use an image I wouldn't put it on the web
If someone were to complain about an image I would remove it and just use something else.
NC On political works. The most successful political work leaves room to negotiate. Operation Telic shouts the message at you. The Beheaded sort of negotiates.
NC was a bit narked that the lighting for the Common Occurances had moved since he was there last so you couldn't actually see the etchings.
*
What I liked about the show was that unlike some conception art the pieces themselves had interest even if you didn't know the full context. (esp Operation Telic, Beheaded, Cynical Objects etc. ) I know you can't expect an artist to point to all the references within the work itself. - And part of the fun is finding extra depths but having something there that will grab 'the chap who happens to be walking by' is obviously an advantage. Hence I thought less of Campaign for Rural England, which I thought was bound up in knowing the type of bus shelter it was. (Information which I am a bit light on.)
But this is a bit of a whinge about a really powerful exhibition.
http://www.nickcrowe.net/
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
Steampunk Magazine
Great new magazine. Better to have the printed version of course but I can make do with the free pdf download for now.
Fascinating articles on the Pyrophone and Armonica. Interesting primer on Anarchism as well (a much maligned group).
Really outstanding story: 'Mother of the Dispossessed' by Anon. Great to have some politically aware stuff, something that actually digs a response. Something to make you uncomfortable. A blessed relief from nostalgia. And very entertaining. I really liked the bizarre moral coda which ignores all the proceeding horror and savagery to derive something suitable for the audience of Last of the Summer Wine or All Creatures Great and Small.
I haven't been so excited about a short story since the last time - no - a poor joke. This is definitely something special.
Steampunk Magazine
Fascinating articles on the Pyrophone and Armonica. Interesting primer on Anarchism as well (a much maligned group).
Really outstanding story: 'Mother of the Dispossessed' by Anon. Great to have some politically aware stuff, something that actually digs a response. Something to make you uncomfortable. A blessed relief from nostalgia. And very entertaining. I really liked the bizarre moral coda which ignores all the proceeding horror and savagery to derive something suitable for the audience of Last of the Summer Wine or All Creatures Great and Small.
I haven't been so excited about a short story since the last time - no - a poor joke. This is definitely something special.
Steampunk Magazine
Sunday, February 25, 2007
Farthing. #5. 25-Feb-2007
Always a treat when Farthing is delivered.
The knock-out story was of course, 'After the Reformation: Interviews with the Grammarians' by Helen Keeble.
This is a story about what it is like to be a word in a book. Exactly the sort of idea that I get excited about. I enjoyed the definitions of terminology. What was clever is the the way the human situation emerged and became explained as the story progressed. Personally, I think I might have preferred it if it hadn't been explained. But I know I'm minority taste with these things.
This is her first published work. I can't wait to see what follows.
Excellent Drabble (#19) from Michael Stone too.
The knock-out story was of course, 'After the Reformation: Interviews with the Grammarians' by Helen Keeble.
This is a story about what it is like to be a word in a book. Exactly the sort of idea that I get excited about. I enjoyed the definitions of terminology. What was clever is the the way the human situation emerged and became explained as the story progressed. Personally, I think I might have preferred it if it hadn't been explained. But I know I'm minority taste with these things.
This is her first published work. I can't wait to see what follows.
Excellent Drabble (#19) from Michael Stone too.
Mrs Warren's Profession. Lyceum. Edinburgh. 25-Feb-2007
A read a good GBS story once in an academic tome. GBS was taking a curtain call to huge cheering. In the silence before he came to speak, one man booed. Shaw replied: ‘I agree, sir, but who are we two against so many.’ The implication taken by the academic was that GBS knew that his popularity – his wit – was stopping him producing work of greater depth. Bollocks obviously – but then again you know what he means. Occasionally the twists and paradoxes seem to be there for their own sake rather than to illuminate theme or character.
This complaint does not apply however, to Mrs Warren’s Profession, staged in a blindingly good production at the Lyceum..
This play was written for love not money. (It was Shaw’s third play and he always knew the subject matter was so extreme no one would ever be able to stage the play.)
And there is never one hint of false paradox. The daughter’s reaction when she learns he mother used to be a prostitute is not acceptance and admiration to make a point. It is the genuine reaction of a clear-eyed, intelligent, cant-dismissing emotionally mature woman.
How sad that 114 years later there are so few women’s roles with this level of clear-eyed challenge. Instead we get these wanky middle-aged fantasies (many of which we are supposed to accept as products of ‘serious’ writers).
And yet, when we look at the relationship between the young lovers Frank and Vivie, it is childish, playground, sexless. Was this GBS setting the stage that their eventual separation is not a tragedy? Is it a challenge to our ‘romantic’ thinking about marriage? Does it say something about Shaw’s relationship to women? As to these questions I suppose I should read Ellman, but within the context of the play itself, compare the scenes with Viv with the sexy scene between Frank and Mrs W. A). Frank is definitely not playing the child here, B) Frank seems to be serious about pursuing some unconstrained activities here.
A lucky escape for Vivie.
I very much enjoyed Vivie’s speeches, with their inarguable critique of the WAG and vacuous celebrity world - just as a sideline. And the reality, thank God, is that BB celebrity porn is recognised as fantasy. Young women know this is fantasy. (But how much might they be tempted to think it true?)
Excellent cast. The Rector, Gardner (Richard Addison) might have been a bit weak but I suspect it was the part. Compare Sir George Crofts (Douglas Lee) which also seemed weak until Shaw gave him a meaty scene to play to.
Frank was played with brilliance (Anthony Eden). I don’t see how you could have got more from that part.
Mrs Warren (Paola Dionisotti) was spot on. The way she played the registers between her accents was fantastic. You could do that in a modern play but it would just show ‘working-class’ roots - whatever that means now. On the date the play was written it would have represented something more like the distance from a Morlock to an Eloi.
I thought Vivie (Emma Stansfield) was hampered by stupid costumes. The bustles and mutton-shop sleeves simply made her look like a fat man. In the play, men are throwing themselves at Vivie, partly because of her character and brain - but not only. She should have been shown to be her Mother’s daughter a bit more.
This complaint does not apply however, to Mrs Warren’s Profession, staged in a blindingly good production at the Lyceum..
This play was written for love not money. (It was Shaw’s third play and he always knew the subject matter was so extreme no one would ever be able to stage the play.)
And there is never one hint of false paradox. The daughter’s reaction when she learns he mother used to be a prostitute is not acceptance and admiration to make a point. It is the genuine reaction of a clear-eyed, intelligent, cant-dismissing emotionally mature woman.
How sad that 114 years later there are so few women’s roles with this level of clear-eyed challenge. Instead we get these wanky middle-aged fantasies (many of which we are supposed to accept as products of ‘serious’ writers).
And yet, when we look at the relationship between the young lovers Frank and Vivie, it is childish, playground, sexless. Was this GBS setting the stage that their eventual separation is not a tragedy? Is it a challenge to our ‘romantic’ thinking about marriage? Does it say something about Shaw’s relationship to women? As to these questions I suppose I should read Ellman, but within the context of the play itself, compare the scenes with Viv with the sexy scene between Frank and Mrs W. A). Frank is definitely not playing the child here, B) Frank seems to be serious about pursuing some unconstrained activities here.
A lucky escape for Vivie.
I very much enjoyed Vivie’s speeches, with their inarguable critique of the WAG and vacuous celebrity world - just as a sideline. And the reality, thank God, is that BB celebrity porn is recognised as fantasy. Young women know this is fantasy. (But how much might they be tempted to think it true?)
Excellent cast. The Rector, Gardner (Richard Addison) might have been a bit weak but I suspect it was the part. Compare Sir George Crofts (Douglas Lee) which also seemed weak until Shaw gave him a meaty scene to play to.
Frank was played with brilliance (Anthony Eden). I don’t see how you could have got more from that part.
Mrs Warren (Paola Dionisotti) was spot on. The way she played the registers between her accents was fantastic. You could do that in a modern play but it would just show ‘working-class’ roots - whatever that means now. On the date the play was written it would have represented something more like the distance from a Morlock to an Eloi.
I thought Vivie (Emma Stansfield) was hampered by stupid costumes. The bustles and mutton-shop sleeves simply made her look like a fat man. In the play, men are throwing themselves at Vivie, partly because of her character and brain - but not only. She should have been shown to be her Mother’s daughter a bit more.
Sunday, February 18, 2007
Zahir. issue 12. Spring 2007. 18-Feb-2007
A beautifully produced magazine. B5-ish. Perfect bound. Lovely cover design and good quality paper.
Interesting stats. (To sound like a cricket commentator)
9 contributors.
1*MFA
1*PHD in sciences
1*ex-Clarion
1*planning to go on an MFA programme
1*PHD in Classics
1*teaches fiction
1*ex-military
High number of - what I considered - stand out stories.
3. Julia Perceiving in Binary: A futuristic romance. Nicole Grieco.
2. The Rocket Seamstress. Gray Rinehart.
1. My Piece of Sky. Debra Goldberg (teaches fiction)
1. My Piece of Sky. Debra Goldberg
My puritanism makes me ambiguous towards fantasy. I have a tendency to think fantasy has to justify itself: tell you something. Nothing more fantastic than a piece of sky deciding to come down to earth. No clever parallels, no conceits for something else. Did I care? Not a jot! Brio wins! Like a teetotaler taking a drink.
2. The Rocket Seamstress. Gray Rinehart.
I liked this story because of the unusual setting (Russian space race) and because of the way it mixes tech and spells, and industry and the human, and generation gaps.
Interestingly, as a European (I think the Brits are 'European' in this regard) I found the strong Russian patriotism a bit wierd. If I had written the story I would not have thought to make the patriotism real as opposed to 'lip-service' or ironic.
The story was written by an ex- US Air Force Officer.
Was he being extremely fair-minded in showing Russian patriotism/ achievements? Does he know Russia and is simply being truthful? Or - and now I start hiking of into possible bollocks - does it take one patriotic superpower to understand another? Or is the patriotism a reflection of his own. (Maybe a false reflection?) Be interesting to know.
Interesting stats. (To sound like a cricket commentator)
9 contributors.
1*MFA
1*PHD in sciences
1*ex-Clarion
1*planning to go on an MFA programme
1*PHD in Classics
1*teaches fiction
1*ex-military
High number of - what I considered - stand out stories.
3. Julia Perceiving in Binary: A futuristic romance. Nicole Grieco.
2. The Rocket Seamstress. Gray Rinehart.
1. My Piece of Sky. Debra Goldberg (teaches fiction)
1. My Piece of Sky. Debra Goldberg
My puritanism makes me ambiguous towards fantasy. I have a tendency to think fantasy has to justify itself: tell you something. Nothing more fantastic than a piece of sky deciding to come down to earth. No clever parallels, no conceits for something else. Did I care? Not a jot! Brio wins! Like a teetotaler taking a drink.
2. The Rocket Seamstress. Gray Rinehart.
I liked this story because of the unusual setting (Russian space race) and because of the way it mixes tech and spells, and industry and the human, and generation gaps.
Interestingly, as a European (I think the Brits are 'European' in this regard) I found the strong Russian patriotism a bit wierd. If I had written the story I would not have thought to make the patriotism real as opposed to 'lip-service' or ironic.
The story was written by an ex- US Air Force Officer.
Was he being extremely fair-minded in showing Russian patriotism/ achievements? Does he know Russia and is simply being truthful? Or - and now I start hiking of into possible bollocks - does it take one patriotic superpower to understand another? Or is the patriotism a reflection of his own. (Maybe a false reflection?) Be interesting to know.
Friday, February 16, 2007
Sunday, February 04, 2007
Goya: Monsters And Matadors. National Gallery Of Scotland 3-Feb-07
What excuse do I have for my ignorance of the Goya prints?
Well, mainly the bullshit the press puts out, that reduces the whole output to a simple message: 'life is shit' and 'Goya is a gloomy bloke.'
Hardly seems worth going out of your way for.
No surprise that the reality is different.
Series: The Tauromaquia
I had seen a print in the newspaper. Plate 21 'The dreadful events' which gives the impression the whole series is just about people or various animals being gored. But the series is much more interesting than that. It is actually about the history and techniques of bullfighting, from the early days of gangs of blokes just ganging up on a bull, the Moors bringing in the use of horses (and much of the techniques that were later incorporated) to the more modern bullring and bullfight which incorporates a range of the older and newer spectacles.
What do the prints show:
The glamour
The daring
The carnival crazy publicity stunt atmosphere of Daren Brown, Evel Knievel, David Blaine with one of his less boring stunts.
The danger and pain
The sense of history
Plate 14 is called 'The very skillful student of Falces.'
(Falces is where the bullfighter Don Bernando Alcade y Merino had studied for the priesthood.)
It shows a figure shrouded in a cape and huge hat, exactly like a modern comic book hero (Alam Moore tradition) BUT it was a real person.
There is 'Martincho' going to leap over a bull while he wears anckle chains.
Another swings across the bull on a pole.
Reminiscent, rightly I think, of the bull dancers of ancient Crete.
Great bullfighter 'Pepe' was seriously wounded 13 times in his career before his death in the ring. (The death shown in Goya's print.)
Series: The Disasters of War
Interesting how big a part women played in the war. Eg, the print 'What courage!' - with Augustina climbing over the dead soldiers to fire the canon. And the fact that -at least to a certain extent - Spanish women fought beside the men.
Many of the more grusome prints very famous of course. I was always a little unsure if the things drawn would actually look like that. But after the documentory feel of the bullfighters series you know war images are accurate.
Goya isn't on a one message track through. He is a documentor of everything. Even the glamour.
Series: The Proverbios
Not much to say about these. Partly because they were all familiar to me. Only you could imagine a Goya fantasy comic book.
It was good that the exhibition was on the bottom floor. It made me go down and see the Scottish Collection again. This visit struck by the Traquair. Quiller Orchardson's breathtaking 'Master baby' (a Pinter play image if there ever was one.) Joseph Noel Paton's Midsummer Night's Dream paintings.
What a pleasure to have these on my doorstep!
Well, mainly the bullshit the press puts out, that reduces the whole output to a simple message: 'life is shit' and 'Goya is a gloomy bloke.'
Hardly seems worth going out of your way for.
No surprise that the reality is different.
Series: The Tauromaquia
I had seen a print in the newspaper. Plate 21 'The dreadful events' which gives the impression the whole series is just about people or various animals being gored. But the series is much more interesting than that. It is actually about the history and techniques of bullfighting, from the early days of gangs of blokes just ganging up on a bull, the Moors bringing in the use of horses (and much of the techniques that were later incorporated) to the more modern bullring and bullfight which incorporates a range of the older and newer spectacles.
What do the prints show:
The glamour
The daring
The carnival crazy publicity stunt atmosphere of Daren Brown, Evel Knievel, David Blaine with one of his less boring stunts.
The danger and pain
The sense of history
Plate 14 is called 'The very skillful student of Falces.'
(Falces is where the bullfighter Don Bernando Alcade y Merino had studied for the priesthood.)
It shows a figure shrouded in a cape and huge hat, exactly like a modern comic book hero (Alam Moore tradition) BUT it was a real person.
There is 'Martincho' going to leap over a bull while he wears anckle chains.
Another swings across the bull on a pole.
Reminiscent, rightly I think, of the bull dancers of ancient Crete.
Great bullfighter 'Pepe' was seriously wounded 13 times in his career before his death in the ring. (The death shown in Goya's print.)
Series: The Disasters of War
Interesting how big a part women played in the war. Eg, the print 'What courage!' - with Augustina climbing over the dead soldiers to fire the canon. And the fact that -at least to a certain extent - Spanish women fought beside the men.
Many of the more grusome prints very famous of course. I was always a little unsure if the things drawn would actually look like that. But after the documentory feel of the bullfighters series you know war images are accurate.
Goya isn't on a one message track through. He is a documentor of everything. Even the glamour.
Series: The Proverbios
Not much to say about these. Partly because they were all familiar to me. Only you could imagine a Goya fantasy comic book.
It was good that the exhibition was on the bottom floor. It made me go down and see the Scottish Collection again. This visit struck by the Traquair. Quiller Orchardson's breathtaking 'Master baby' (a Pinter play image if there ever was one.) Joseph Noel Paton's Midsummer Night's Dream paintings.
What a pleasure to have these on my doorstep!
Monday, January 22, 2007
Sunday, January 14, 2007
Gallery of Modern Art .'Off The Wall'. Edinburgh. 14-Jan-07
14/01/07
Jim Lambie. Bed-head.
A standard mattress used in bedsits. Covered in multi-coloured/ types of buttons.
Alas, you need to read the curator's notes but when you do, the work mattress becomes very poetic and beautiful. Each button represents every dream he had on the mattress.
I misread it slightly to think of it as every dream every person who had ever used a particular bedsit mattress had very had.
Jim Lambie. Zobop floor. Everyone smiles when they walk on it. Filling up a room without putting anything in it.
I also like the way the pattern makes 3D architectural shapes.
What would it be like if you also covered the walls & ceiling?
Christine Borland. Spirit Collection: Hippocrates.
A treat to see this again.
What I thought of this time is that every leaf is like its own world. Maybes not as dramatic as other things but this surely will come to be seen as a great work of modern sculpture.
David Mach. Dying for it. Hypocrisy in a way. (Exploiting a woman's form to complain about the expoitation of woman's form. - Of course I am being guided by the curator notes here.) I There is something in the idea of the St Andrew's cross really being a human figure but why pick on the Saltire/ Scotland in particluarl as the culprits of sexism? Although I would not make too much of this... Why not make a pretty picture of the pretty Saltire?. I love the 3d sculpture of the woman.
Nathan Coley. The lamp of sacrifice.
Again. In the exhibition space it felt really squashed up. Not very exciting. Though I liked the fresh cardboard smell. (Which I remember as the biggest impact first time I saw it.)
On the wall was a yellow pages list of churches. These had been numbered to serve as an index. This felt very Wittgensteinian (picture theory.)
The Great War. Prints commission by the Ministry of Information 1917.
Nevinson's 'Banking at 4000 feet' Really gives a physical sense of the plane's height and the stomach churn as it banks. (The bloke gripping the side of the fuselage. The tiny cockpit looks like a bath.)
As you look more at these prints they become overwhelming. A visceral & emotional impact that is just not trendy now. (Or not honestly justifiable for soft citizens of the West such as myself?)
Otto Dix (not one of the Min of Inf commissions) has a detachment / clarity that makes the surprise rather than be a cliché. Cardplayers. - The cripples from the war. Soldiers killed by gas. Craterfield near Dontrien lit by flares. In the last, even the mud seems to be made of corpses.
(He served in the war.)
Percy Smith. The Dance of Death.
Seven scenes of Death (who is a shrouded skeleton) in the trenches. This should be rubbish. It is so Edwardian. At first I had a guilty pleasure in enjoying the Gothic shrouded Death.
But this is a case where the intention and skill overcome the form.
The commulative effect make you stop and take it seriously. After a couple of runs through the set, the print Death Awed says it all.
Jim Lambie. Bed-head.
A standard mattress used in bedsits. Covered in multi-coloured/ types of buttons.
Alas, you need to read the curator's notes but when you do, the work mattress becomes very poetic and beautiful. Each button represents every dream he had on the mattress.
I misread it slightly to think of it as every dream every person who had ever used a particular bedsit mattress had very had.
Jim Lambie. Zobop floor. Everyone smiles when they walk on it. Filling up a room without putting anything in it.
I also like the way the pattern makes 3D architectural shapes.
What would it be like if you also covered the walls & ceiling?
Christine Borland. Spirit Collection: Hippocrates.
A treat to see this again.
What I thought of this time is that every leaf is like its own world. Maybes not as dramatic as other things but this surely will come to be seen as a great work of modern sculpture.
David Mach. Dying for it. Hypocrisy in a way. (Exploiting a woman's form to complain about the expoitation of woman's form. - Of course I am being guided by the curator notes here.) I There is something in the idea of the St Andrew's cross really being a human figure but why pick on the Saltire/ Scotland in particluarl as the culprits of sexism? Although I would not make too much of this... Why not make a pretty picture of the pretty Saltire?. I love the 3d sculpture of the woman.
Nathan Coley. The lamp of sacrifice.
Again. In the exhibition space it felt really squashed up. Not very exciting. Though I liked the fresh cardboard smell. (Which I remember as the biggest impact first time I saw it.)
On the wall was a yellow pages list of churches. These had been numbered to serve as an index. This felt very Wittgensteinian (picture theory.)
The Great War. Prints commission by the Ministry of Information 1917.
Nevinson's 'Banking at 4000 feet' Really gives a physical sense of the plane's height and the stomach churn as it banks. (The bloke gripping the side of the fuselage. The tiny cockpit looks like a bath.)
As you look more at these prints they become overwhelming. A visceral & emotional impact that is just not trendy now. (Or not honestly justifiable for soft citizens of the West such as myself?)
Otto Dix (not one of the Min of Inf commissions) has a detachment / clarity that makes the surprise rather than be a cliché. Cardplayers. - The cripples from the war. Soldiers killed by gas. Craterfield near Dontrien lit by flares. In the last, even the mud seems to be made of corpses.
(He served in the war.)
Percy Smith. The Dance of Death.
Seven scenes of Death (who is a shrouded skeleton) in the trenches. This should be rubbish. It is so Edwardian. At first I had a guilty pleasure in enjoying the Gothic shrouded Death.
But this is a case where the intention and skill overcome the form.
The commulative effect make you stop and take it seriously. After a couple of runs through the set, the print Death Awed says it all.
Saturday Guardian 13-Jan-07
I have decided to start commenting on books etc as well. As I get more gaga I suspect my memory does not serve as well.
Superb article by Zadie Smith. 'Fail Better'. On what makes a good writer. Blindingly obvious that the character of the writer is so important. Not in terms of liking cheese etc but in terms of having the Virtues needed to produce good stuff. Obvious but ignored in the usual chatter. The press' voracious demand for the easy.
Superb article by Zadie Smith. 'Fail Better'. On what makes a good writer. Blindingly obvious that the character of the writer is so important. Not in terms of liking cheese etc but in terms of having the Virtues needed to produce good stuff. Obvious but ignored in the usual chatter. The press' voracious demand for the easy.
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen Rotterdam 12-Dec-2006
Fantastic range of Magritte's. I had always thought that the trouble with Magritte was that he just turned out stuff in one style. Not so. This exhibition showed that he experimented in several different styles. Very good too I thought. Trouble is, the critics and the buyers didn't like them. There you go. Ahead of his time I expect.
Gallery Link
Gallery Link
Mary Stuart. Lyric Theatre Edinburgh. 4-Nov-2006
I know this sounds miserablist of me but I kept getting distracted by the bald patch in Mary Stuart's hair. It reminded me of the Doris Lessing story where two actors are complaining that there was a lipstick smear on a pillow. As she says, they we right to do so.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
28/10/06. White Cube Hoxton
Carroll Dunham - downstairs.
My thought was that it is rare to see a woman artist obsessed with penisis. (Or perhaps I'm out of touch).
I read the leaflets and it turns out She is a He. (Perhaps I am out of touch.)
Gabriel Orozco - upstairs
Strangely more of the same. Identical themes and images: Cowboy hats and graffiti penisis - but with the addition of arse holes. I think it fair to say with Gabriel it is about fuckin. With Carroll it is about being fucked. (I wrote that before I found out Carroll was a man.) Perhaps Gabriel will turn out to be a woman...
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Achin Vanaik. George Monbiot. Radical Book Fair. Edinburgh. 14-Oct-2006
http://www.word-power.co.uk/book_fair
Achin Vanaik.
What a brain!
Approaches to the global warming crisis:
Market
Or
Technology
Or
Turn away from endless growth.
'To believe in endless growth either a fool or an economist.'
16% of world power is nuclear. NP is in decline in West. Growth areas for NP are non-West.
Decommission costs make NP uneconomic. NP always needs massive subsidy.
About 25 million people globally have suffered radiation effects. (Though it would be interesting to see the calculations behind this.)
In India nuclear weapons are supported by the scientists because they have made such a mess of the NP programme. (Costs, delays, poor safety record.)
Storage still not solved.
Good quality Uranium will run out in 60 yrs. Then have to use low grade ores. This mining pushes up overall Carbon use. (Carbon cost of digging the stuff out and transporting it.)
India is after high grade ores for NP. Can use indigenous poor grade ores for weapons.
Non Prolif Treaty - has contradiction built in - by helping with power, this gives the means to build weapons. So now US also worried about nuc energy. - Leading onto the current Iran issuea.
It is Israel that has always stopped a pact in mid East to be a nuclear weapons free zone.
N Korea is after normalisation to grow economy with Japan etc.
http://www.tni.org/fellows/vanaik.htm
Monbiot.
Due to coming water shortage the World with have a net food shortage.
Once we get to 2 degrees above pre-Industry then we hit positive feedback effects.
Plasma TV uses 5 times more energy than CRT.
Industry has re-graded fridges to hide the fact that they are not efficient. (It is not currently possible to buy the best grade fridges in the UK.)
A big issue is electricity transmission. (Which can be solved by going to DC apparently.)
The green-hyperconsumer. (Agas etc.)
California proposals to reduce by 80% by 2050 - will reduce down to current Europe!
Achin Vanaik.
What a brain!
Approaches to the global warming crisis:
Market
Or
Technology
Or
Turn away from endless growth.
'To believe in endless growth either a fool or an economist.'
16% of world power is nuclear. NP is in decline in West. Growth areas for NP are non-West.
Decommission costs make NP uneconomic. NP always needs massive subsidy.
About 25 million people globally have suffered radiation effects. (Though it would be interesting to see the calculations behind this.)
In India nuclear weapons are supported by the scientists because they have made such a mess of the NP programme. (Costs, delays, poor safety record.)
Storage still not solved.
Good quality Uranium will run out in 60 yrs. Then have to use low grade ores. This mining pushes up overall Carbon use. (Carbon cost of digging the stuff out and transporting it.)
India is after high grade ores for NP. Can use indigenous poor grade ores for weapons.
Non Prolif Treaty - has contradiction built in - by helping with power, this gives the means to build weapons. So now US also worried about nuc energy. - Leading onto the current Iran issuea.
It is Israel that has always stopped a pact in mid East to be a nuclear weapons free zone.
N Korea is after normalisation to grow economy with Japan etc.
http://www.tni.org/fellows/vanaik.htm
Monbiot.
Due to coming water shortage the World with have a net food shortage.
Once we get to 2 degrees above pre-Industry then we hit positive feedback effects.
Plasma TV uses 5 times more energy than CRT.
Industry has re-graded fridges to hide the fact that they are not efficient. (It is not currently possible to buy the best grade fridges in the UK.)
A big issue is electricity transmission. (Which can be solved by going to DC apparently.)
The green-hyperconsumer. (Agas etc.)
California proposals to reduce by 80% by 2050 - will reduce down to current Europe!
History Boys. Bennet. Kings. Edinburgh. 21-Oct-2006
The fact that it won all those awards in the US shows they must have had a dearth of good plays that year. Of course to say it is a bit middlebrow and a bit populist (songs) and a bit snobbish doesn't mean that I am not jealous at how brilliantly the thing is put together and how funny it is. (Made even worse by the fact this is not his best work.) What I thought was good was that all the characters were real and both good and bad. Lots of greys, no black and whites.
Contrast the theatre version of Tutti Frutti where the transfer from TV had not worked. In History Boys they had film breaks during the scene changes. During this they showed the dolly bird secretary of the Headmaster. If she had actually appeared on stage it would have been too much of a distraction, sex currents would have been too strong and it would have broken the spell. But having her on film in a theatre (distanced) was just right. Skill.
Contrast the theatre version of Tutti Frutti where the transfer from TV had not worked. In History Boys they had film breaks during the scene changes. During this they showed the dolly bird secretary of the Headmaster. If she had actually appeared on stage it would have been too much of a distraction, sex currents would have been too strong and it would have broken the spell. But having her on film in a theatre (distanced) was just right. Skill.
Merchant of Venice. Lyceum. Edinburgh. 14-Oct-2006
To my shame this was is not a play I knew. The programme carried the predictable apologia from the local English Prof.
I am strongly opposed to censorship, and it is fine studying the text for scholarly purposes, but on grounds of good taste I don't see how the play can be shown as entertainment.
It is OK the prof arguing that WS is showing the attitudes of his time and that he makes Shylock a real man 'who can bleed'. Fact is, the end result of the play is the barbaric treatment of Shylock. This is not questioned by one character in the play. I am not criticising WS for this. But it is dated. (Like slavery and woman as chattel). If one thinks of the way this play must have been used over the years as a support for antisemitism and theft from the Jews (not to mention worse) then I think the relativist excuse that it 'has to be seen in context' loses its strength. It may be historically interesting but it is still distasteful. Pretending otherwise is bad faith.
If it was purposely distasteful (like The Jew of Malta) I would be more included to defend it.
I am strongly opposed to censorship, and it is fine studying the text for scholarly purposes, but on grounds of good taste I don't see how the play can be shown as entertainment.
It is OK the prof arguing that WS is showing the attitudes of his time and that he makes Shylock a real man 'who can bleed'. Fact is, the end result of the play is the barbaric treatment of Shylock. This is not questioned by one character in the play. I am not criticising WS for this. But it is dated. (Like slavery and woman as chattel). If one thinks of the way this play must have been used over the years as a support for antisemitism and theft from the Jews (not to mention worse) then I think the relativist excuse that it 'has to be seen in context' loses its strength. It may be historically interesting but it is still distasteful. Pretending otherwise is bad faith.
If it was purposely distasteful (like The Jew of Malta) I would be more included to defend it.
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Calum Innes Fruitmarket. 07/10/06
Fabulous names: Dioxazine Violet
I preferred the plain black and white dribble paitings to the coloured ones.
Shellac on linen. It is actually the aged linen that has done most of the work. I suppose it will change more given long enough.
The ones on the top floor were the most striking for me. The Famous Identified Forms should be trite dribbles but are somehow much more: organic shapes, plants, space ships, people, light in the dark, stains, age, decay.
I thought standout was Untitled 2002. The markings really draw you in: moonscape, mountains, people, soot, desert or just marks. Why don't I dismiss these pieces as simply random marks? Why is he picked up and exhibited in prestiguous spaces as opposed to other abstract painters?
Interestingly, Formed Painting 2 is very colourful and simply looks like a textile design .
http://fruitmarket.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12&Itemid=82
I preferred the plain black and white dribble paitings to the coloured ones.
Shellac on linen. It is actually the aged linen that has done most of the work. I suppose it will change more given long enough.
The ones on the top floor were the most striking for me. The Famous Identified Forms should be trite dribbles but are somehow much more: organic shapes, plants, space ships, people, light in the dark, stains, age, decay.
I thought standout was Untitled 2002. The markings really draw you in: moonscape, mountains, people, soot, desert or just marks. Why don't I dismiss these pieces as simply random marks? Why is he picked up and exhibited in prestiguous spaces as opposed to other abstract painters?
Interestingly, Formed Painting 2 is very colourful and simply looks like a textile design .
http://fruitmarket.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12&Itemid=82
Outside the Ron Mueck exhibition. 07/10/06
For the last day of the extended run they are keeping the exhibition open until midnight. The queue to get in at about 4pm ran outside the Scottish Academy and along Princes Street.
My highlights: Spooning Couple. Because they are smaller than scale but appear so real it maked you feel like God looking down on the poor humans.
The baby of course - a monster, but you feel parental. And the frightned giant who should be intimidating but you feel sorry for him. Human weakness on a monolothic scale.
There's talk of Scotland buying the small figure in the boat. I hope so. It felt to me like an updated sort of faery story.
http://www.nationalgalleries.org/mueck/highlights.html
My highlights: Spooning Couple. Because they are smaller than scale but appear so real it maked you feel like God looking down on the poor humans.
The baby of course - a monster, but you feel parental. And the frightned giant who should be intimidating but you feel sorry for him. Human weakness on a monolothic scale.
There's talk of Scotland buying the small figure in the boat. I hope so. It felt to me like an updated sort of faery story.
http://www.nationalgalleries.org/mueck/highlights.html
4. Director Ilya Khrjanovksy.
4
http://www.rusfilm.pitt.edu/2005/pn/4.htm
One of the best film openings ever? Then, the whole meeting of the 3 characters and the barman in the early hours. A combination of Tom Stoppard and Harold Pinter. (And they said it couldn't be done!)
From here on in there is not ever the slightest pretence of pulling the different themes together - or even making sense of some of the strands. Does it matter? Not a bit.
It's the village of women that gets to me. Some of them remind me of my Granny. (Though she was more or less teetotal. This lot are on on vodka from breakfast to supper. ) The disturbing thing is that it all feels sooo authentic. (There are rumours of whole villages drunk outside the cities but is place is so extreme in their whole economy.) And it doesn't feel like fantasy. The lone man is so pathetic - trying to pursuade parents at the railway station if he can borrow their child with his bag-full of small coins as his hire-price.
Can't wait for 5.
http://www.rusfilm.pitt.edu/2005/pn/4.htm
One of the best film openings ever? Then, the whole meeting of the 3 characters and the barman in the early hours. A combination of Tom Stoppard and Harold Pinter. (And they said it couldn't be done!)
From here on in there is not ever the slightest pretence of pulling the different themes together - or even making sense of some of the strands. Does it matter? Not a bit.
It's the village of women that gets to me. Some of them remind me of my Granny. (Though she was more or less teetotal. This lot are on on vodka from breakfast to supper. ) The disturbing thing is that it all feels sooo authentic. (There are rumours of whole villages drunk outside the cities but is place is so extreme in their whole economy.) And it doesn't feel like fantasy. The lone man is so pathetic - trying to pursuade parents at the railway station if he can borrow their child with his bag-full of small coins as his hire-price.
Can't wait for 5.
Sunday, October 08, 2006
Albert Watson Edinburgh City Art Gallery 30/09/06
Some of the photos (eg Orkney Standing Stones work just cos their bloody big.
The car photos are fantastic - big 50s American cars in peopleless settings. One in a car park is more the film 'crash' than 'crash'. Another has raindrops on the glass. Outside a Motel. You know it dominates some human story. There is a photo of a dashboard that tells you more about humans & the smell of the world than all the fashion plates opposite.
Celebs: Dull. Except for the cut ups of Jack Nicholson & Michael Jackson. Jack N always seems to get photographers rapping. The Michael Jackson is brilliant at giving a sense of his movement. Of course the photo is better than anything I've seen Michael Jackson produce himself. Fearsome back view of Mike Tyson.
Breaunna in the LA Hilton. The Catwoman is fantastic - comics for boys. The superhero vs her scared vulnerable expression.
A mock Christ Trilogy thing I though lazy & confused.
The showstoppers were the American landscapes. Great Motels. Pathetic/ phallic like sex sometimes. But the missing people hint at all sorts of lives.
I loved the roadsign for God. And the stunning sunset, improved by the Resort road adverts stretching into the distance.
And electric pylons like ship masts. Just for a second - at the top of the picture - the desert is like a ship.
A lot of the fashion ones are just sub-surreal cheap contrasts.
Monkeys with Mask is just a joy.
As is Dirt Road. Brings you back to the world with your eyes open.
Fashion: There's a boot on a cooker & its supposed to be surreal (?)
Also upstairs. The Ichthys font by Colin Reid. Unlike all the other media, Glass must have reached it's peak in history in the modern age.
The car photos are fantastic - big 50s American cars in peopleless settings. One in a car park is more the film 'crash' than 'crash'. Another has raindrops on the glass. Outside a Motel. You know it dominates some human story. There is a photo of a dashboard that tells you more about humans & the smell of the world than all the fashion plates opposite.
Celebs: Dull. Except for the cut ups of Jack Nicholson & Michael Jackson. Jack N always seems to get photographers rapping. The Michael Jackson is brilliant at giving a sense of his movement. Of course the photo is better than anything I've seen Michael Jackson produce himself. Fearsome back view of Mike Tyson.
Breaunna in the LA Hilton. The Catwoman is fantastic - comics for boys. The superhero vs her scared vulnerable expression.
A mock Christ Trilogy thing I though lazy & confused.
The showstoppers were the American landscapes. Great Motels. Pathetic/ phallic like sex sometimes. But the missing people hint at all sorts of lives.
I loved the roadsign for God. And the stunning sunset, improved by the Resort road adverts stretching into the distance.
And electric pylons like ship masts. Just for a second - at the top of the picture - the desert is like a ship.
A lot of the fashion ones are just sub-surreal cheap contrasts.
Monkeys with Mask is just a joy.
As is Dirt Road. Brings you back to the world with your eyes open.
Fashion: There's a boot on a cooker & its supposed to be surreal (?)
Also upstairs. The Ichthys font by Colin Reid. Unlike all the other media, Glass must have reached it's peak in history in the modern age.
Friday, October 06, 2006
Mapplethorpe Scottish National Gallery Of Modern Art/ Philip Townsend 21/08/06
Mapplethorpe:
What a parade of flatulent egos!
The only human characteristic on show is vanity.
How embarrasing to be one of the subjects...
The photo notes had lots of talk about composition - but surely the easiest part of photography. Especially in a studio!
Philip Townsend:
Compare and contrast the Philip Townsend exhibition round the corner.
Fun, joyful, sexy - and shows why these people were cool.
(To be fair, there was an interesting point in the Mapplethorpe about why the series on women seemed less offensively vain. Answers on a postcard please. Then again, why should I be fair?)
What a parade of flatulent egos!
The only human characteristic on show is vanity.
How embarrasing to be one of the subjects...
The photo notes had lots of talk about composition - but surely the easiest part of photography. Especially in a studio!
Philip Townsend:
Compare and contrast the Philip Townsend exhibition round the corner.
Fun, joyful, sexy - and shows why these people were cool.
(To be fair, there was an interesting point in the Mapplethorpe about why the series on women seemed less offensively vain. Answers on a postcard please. Then again, why should I be fair?)
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
Dada's Boys. Fruitmarket Gallery 18/06/06
V dull except for the more recent stuff.
Sarah Lucas value for money of course. (The photo of Sarah Lucas with a skull really looks like Barrie Humphries.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Lucas
Matthew Barney is out on his own, but I didn't spend too much time there as I have seen his stuff. (I don't know if it is just me but I would prefer one artist as a time rather than these group exhibitions.) http://unit.bjork.com/specials/dr9/
I liked Keith Farquhar who was new to me. The rules of attraction. About courting / sex. It is an installation of pretty mirrors with Calvin Kelin y-fronts and huge glasses of mock white wine. I always think galleries are sexy places anyway. And this put an exhibition party into a different league. It was like a giant game (of 'get laid'). Funny. Is that all there is to the attraction business?
Sunday, October 01, 2006
Edinburgh. Lecture on Titan: Huygens Probe. Winter 2005.
Prof John Zarnecki
Notes:
17 yrs designing & building probe.
ESA /Bae 25% of Hubble
Then Giotto to Haley's Comet
Titan round Saturn.
1.5 billion Klicks
Only satelite with substantial atmosphere (mass 10x earth )
Surface pressure 1.5 x earth
Temperature -180C
Mostly water ice. Cover in ice.
All for 3 mins of data. Actually got 72mins.
Liquid methane rain. (Violently)
Grav. 0.15 of earth.
Cost of project to UK population = £1.50 each over 15yrs
Notes:
17 yrs designing & building probe.
ESA /Bae 25% of Hubble
Then Giotto to Haley's Comet
Titan round Saturn.
1.5 billion Klicks
Only satelite with substantial atmosphere (mass 10x earth )
Surface pressure 1.5 x earth
Temperature -180C
Mostly water ice. Cover in ice.
All for 3 mins of data. Actually got 72mins.
Liquid methane rain. (Violently)
Grav. 0.15 of earth.
Cost of project to UK population = £1.50 each over 15yrs
Sarah Angliss. Sonic Cabaret. Winter 2005.
Hoover the talking seal
Nokia the starling
I remember she showed file of a machine that was an articulated robot arm with two mikes that followed sound. V spooky how it follwoed people around as if alive. At night, they found it curled up on itself - so that it could listen to its own engine.
Used to have organs specially to accompany birds.
Bulfinch Seronet (starved bulfinch so it thought it was winter)
Vocoder uses voice to control the sound the machine makes (into synth).
Sample voice. Faurier transfer.
Audacity free software
Untold secret of modern popsingers is the Entares autotune.
(Robbie Williams was asked about it and he likened it to a spell checker.)
(However dispute if some could not manage at all with the voice correction.)
Puredata & Processing Free software
Brighton Festival show
Proximity Effect with mikes = crooners.
Mains hum = 50 hert & Barry White
Below 20h we don't hear it.
The Godstop. Organ pipe below hearing.
Tried them at concerts.
Before electronic used candles to detect Infrasound. (Ghost story connection.)
The lecture included a sample godstop pipe. You didn't feel anything until you touched it, but then it was definately creepy.
http://www.spacedog.biz/biography.htm
Nokia the starling
I remember she showed file of a machine that was an articulated robot arm with two mikes that followed sound. V spooky how it follwoed people around as if alive. At night, they found it curled up on itself - so that it could listen to its own engine.
Used to have organs specially to accompany birds.
Bulfinch Seronet (starved bulfinch so it thought it was winter)
Vocoder uses voice to control the sound the machine makes (into synth).
Sample voice. Faurier transfer.
Audacity free software
Untold secret of modern popsingers is the Entares autotune.
(Robbie Williams was asked about it and he likened it to a spell checker.)
(However dispute if some could not manage at all with the voice correction.)
Puredata & Processing Free software
Brighton Festival show
Proximity Effect with mikes = crooners.
Mains hum = 50 hert & Barry White
Below 20h we don't hear it.
The Godstop. Organ pipe below hearing.
Tried them at concerts.
Before electronic used candles to detect Infrasound. (Ghost story connection.)
The lecture included a sample godstop pipe. You didn't feel anything until you touched it, but then it was definately creepy.
http://www.spacedog.biz/biography.htm
December Sky in Edinburgh. 2005
Notes:
Dec - darkest month. 14 hrs dark
Civil nautical and astronomical twilight
sunspots -> aurora borealis. Can ruin electronics on satelites. Last Thurs broad band in the sky from E to W. How can you tell not a lit up cloud? Stars shine as bright.
Mars. Viking 1977.
4 missions currently. Japan one damaged from solar flare. (Nazomi)
Mars Express. Beagle 2. Lands Xmas day. US Rover probes. Mars is red because rusty.
Venus. Visible in twilight. Bright because of reflective clouds. Very Prominent next Spring.
Saturn v bright at moment all night. Cassini probe to Titan to land Heugans. No one knows surface.
Jupiter early morning. '94 comet hit.
Meteorides. Mid 13/14 Dec will get 1 meteor a minute. From Gemini. Saturn close to it.
Fireball meteors can create moving shadows.
Comet Enki close at moment. SW. By Aquila.
Int Space Station 3 minutes to cross. Bright as Mars. By Mars. By square of Pegasus.
Dec 2. US launch secret satellites. 3 together.
Cappela almost overhead.
Gemini is above Orion.
Dec - darkest month. 14 hrs dark
Civil nautical and astronomical twilight
sunspots -> aurora borealis. Can ruin electronics on satelites. Last Thurs broad band in the sky from E to W. How can you tell not a lit up cloud? Stars shine as bright.
Mars. Viking 1977.
4 missions currently. Japan one damaged from solar flare. (Nazomi)
Mars Express. Beagle 2. Lands Xmas day. US Rover probes. Mars is red because rusty.
Venus. Visible in twilight. Bright because of reflective clouds. Very Prominent next Spring.
Saturn v bright at moment all night. Cassini probe to Titan to land Heugans. No one knows surface.
Jupiter early morning. '94 comet hit.
Meteorides. Mid 13/14 Dec will get 1 meteor a minute. From Gemini. Saturn close to it.
Fireball meteors can create moving shadows.
Comet Enki close at moment. SW. By Aquila.
Int Space Station 3 minutes to cross. Bright as Mars. By Mars. By square of Pegasus.
Dec 2. US launch secret satellites. 3 together.
Cappela almost overhead.
Gemini is above Orion.
Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence 05/11/05
Directed by Mamoru Oshii.
Like many films the winner for me was the opening sequence. I this case the construction/ growth of a female android. (Vaguely Hans Belmer but beautiful/ sacred.) The plot turned out be a load of balderdash about souls but you can't have everything.
Like many films the winner for me was the opening sequence. I this case the construction/ growth of a female android. (Vaguely Hans Belmer but beautiful/ sacred.) The plot turned out be a load of balderdash about souls but you can't have everything.
SuperComputer Lecture. 2005
Weather readings taken every 6 hrs over a 12km grid which is 70 levels high
= 2*10 to 15 calcs.
Would take 3 months on PC.
So process in parallel.
Climate modeling much larger 100km. Usually over 100yrs.
Physics /Chem model individual particles.
Eg 10 billion particles! .5 million light yr grid.
Wires in chips down to 5 atoms wide.
= 2*10 to 15 calcs.
Would take 3 months on PC.
So process in parallel.
Climate modeling much larger 100km. Usually over 100yrs.
Physics /Chem model individual particles.
Eg 10 billion particles! .5 million light yr grid.
Wires in chips down to 5 atoms wide.
Edinburgh. Summer 2005.Theodore Zeldin.
Theodore Zeldin.
I was impressed at the time. Things from my memory:
2 people cause change. Provides real equality.
Fear is biggest block to progress.
Muses. The Muse.
Trying to set up an MA over everything rather than specialising.
Flaw of English is they think everyone will be rational.
Rights should be based on needs. Not wants.
But as time has gone by and I looked at An Intimate History of Humanity I'm not sure if he isn't full of hot air.
I was impressed at the time. Things from my memory:
2 people cause change. Provides real equality.
Fear is biggest block to progress.
Muses. The Muse.
Trying to set up an MA over everything rather than specialising.
Flaw of English is they think everyone will be rational.
Rights should be based on needs. Not wants.
But as time has gone by and I looked at An Intimate History of Humanity I'm not sure if he isn't full of hot air.
Royal Colledge of Surgeons. Edinburgh. 06/10/05
Prof Arnold Moran lecturing on the voice. (He is a surgeon on the larynx etc.)
Notes:
Used Colin Watson software for analysis.
Birds have 2 voiceboxes! - one per lung.
300 songs for Nightingale.
Lyrinx is primarily to protect the lungs. Epiglotis Stops food falling down lungs.
Human mouth is small (no smell vs snouts) so can be controlled.
100s muscles used for speech - all controlled by brain.
So Drunk impacts muscle actions.
When chords touch you get sound.
200 cycles per sec - female
100 cycles per sec - male
Length impacts pitch.
Clicks of vibrations makes continuous sound.
Main definer of sound is muscle weight. Heavy = low.
Russian & Slavic genetic feature = a fluid in larynx so heavier. Females get this in west with age. (not men.)
Church split male/female for choires.
Boy trebles. Castration so less muscles but stronger than women. Bigger lung volume. Women don't have same power in lower register.
97 percent of music records have voice.
Some people hard to hear.
Some have' laser' voice due to harmonics.
Due to projection. 3KHz is easier to hear. Top end of piano. Some people
Pavaroti top C is 0.5 A soprano is 1. But the harmonics make them audible.
Sound wave has sharp dips cos larynx closes rapidly cos chords are held closer via training.
Harmonics sound louder. (Using cave of mouth. Each person does it differently!
Energy of non singer is wasted on lower KHz.
Passagio = moving point from one register to the other.
Opera singers get fat because lonely. Can't stop or drink cos damages voice.
Pop - mike allows voice chance to relax. Best are Ella & Frank. Could have been Opera singers.
Current fashion is voice is just another instrument.
Musicals audition for next while performing current.
Belting (Ethel Merman) = safe.
Twanging (Dolly Parton) (Les Mis)
Crooning
Falsetto (of pop) v high & unnatural.
Muscle injuries.
Nerves.
Real lesions.
Lump on chord - cist or nodule if diagnosed wrong will scar chord.
Voice messages turned to accent for region.
100 muscles in vocal - only n muscles used at one time.
Classical singers develop regular swopping = vibrato.
So classical singers can't do Cole Porter. (Vibrato spoils it.)
Notes:
Used Colin Watson software for analysis.
Birds have 2 voiceboxes! - one per lung.
300 songs for Nightingale.
Lyrinx is primarily to protect the lungs. Epiglotis Stops food falling down lungs.
Human mouth is small (no smell vs snouts) so can be controlled.
100s muscles used for speech - all controlled by brain.
So Drunk impacts muscle actions.
When chords touch you get sound.
200 cycles per sec - female
100 cycles per sec - male
Length impacts pitch.
Clicks of vibrations makes continuous sound.
Main definer of sound is muscle weight. Heavy = low.
Russian & Slavic genetic feature = a fluid in larynx so heavier. Females get this in west with age. (not men.)
Church split male/female for choires.
Boy trebles. Castration so less muscles but stronger than women. Bigger lung volume. Women don't have same power in lower register.
97 percent of music records have voice.
Some people hard to hear.
Some have' laser' voice due to harmonics.
Due to projection. 3KHz is easier to hear. Top end of piano. Some people
Pavaroti top C is 0.5 A soprano is 1. But the harmonics make them audible.
Sound wave has sharp dips cos larynx closes rapidly cos chords are held closer via training.
Harmonics sound louder. (Using cave of mouth. Each person does it differently!
Energy of non singer is wasted on lower KHz.
Passagio = moving point from one register to the other.
Opera singers get fat because lonely. Can't stop or drink cos damages voice.
Pop - mike allows voice chance to relax. Best are Ella & Frank. Could have been Opera singers.
Current fashion is voice is just another instrument.
Musicals audition for next while performing current.
Belting (Ethel Merman) = safe.
Twanging (Dolly Parton) (Les Mis)
Crooning
Falsetto (of pop) v high & unnatural.
Muscle injuries.
Nerves.
Real lesions.
Lump on chord - cist or nodule if diagnosed wrong will scar chord.
Voice messages turned to accent for region.
100 muscles in vocal - only n muscles used at one time.
Classical singers develop regular swopping = vibrato.
So classical singers can't do Cole Porter. (Vibrato spoils it.)
Ingelby Gallery. Edinburgh. Garry Fabian Miller. 24/09/05
Garry Fabian Miller.
Red Light.
The images on the url don't give a good impression. They were absolutely beautiful. Here the medium is the message. The fact that they are, in effect, natural phenomenon gave then extra depth. God must see like this.
http://www.inglebygallery.com/artistsDetail.php?id=20
Red Light.
The images on the url don't give a good impression. They were absolutely beautiful. Here the medium is the message. The fact that they are, in effect, natural phenomenon gave then extra depth. God must see like this.
http://www.inglebygallery.com/artistsDetail.php?id=20
Edinburgh University. Carlos Fuentes. 08/06/05
How small minded the British mainstream scene is.
CF's thesis was that the novel is all about deceit, invention and the confusion between reality and fantasy. And that is why it is inherently subversive.
It was really peculiar having a glass of wine afterwards in the same room as CF. He is just not the sort of person you expect to meet.
CF's thesis was that the novel is all about deceit, invention and the confusion between reality and fantasy. And that is why it is inherently subversive.
It was really peculiar having a glass of wine afterwards in the same room as CF. He is just not the sort of person you expect to meet.
Modern Art Gallery 27/06/05
Francis Bacon. Can't remember the event. After Martin Hammer's lecture it was stiking how much Three Figures at the base of a crucifiction is just like an earlier Sutherland.
Saatchi Gallery. London. June 2005.
When still housed in the old GLC building. (Before they Saatchi and the landlords fell out.)
I got it. Who wouldn't want to do this? Basically, just go round all the art college shows and just buy the best ones.
This is the sort of thing The Prince of Wales used to do in. (Though it is hard to imagine any of the current crop doing anything as useful.)
Light Perpetual 1 - Conrad Shawcross
http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artists/conrad_shawcross.htm
What I remember was it's noise. And it was rather frightening as if you could get caught up in it. And the shadows cast were like things in a horror-dream. It also seemed so effective for something so apparently (it was probabaly a horror-dream to make) simple.
Naomi V Jelish by Jamie Shovlin (basically a student purchase)
http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artists/jamie_shovlin.htm
I confess I didn't find it moving but I loved the concept of the project.
Richard Wilson - 20:50 (oil room)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/turnerprize/history/wilsonr.htm
What the blurb doesn't explain is the effect from the relfections of the surrounding room - doors etc. AND the SMELL.
Brood - Kate MccGwire (wishbones) (student)
http://www.axisweb.org/grCVFU.aspx?SELECTIONID=15357
Don't know how long this site will last. WHY ISN'T IT ON THE SAATCHI SITE?
Made from 20000 chicken wishbones. Can you beat that? Good luck?! (For the chickens.) A beautific delicate slaughterhouse.
Vermin Death Star - David Falconer (rats)
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/gallery/image/0,8543,-11104640115,00.html
The memory of this still gives me the shivers. (And why is that fun?)
100s of freeze-dried rats used to make the metal castings for the sculpture. Was it really cast-metal? Even the process of making it makes your stomach turn. Or? Maybe there are whole reserves of frozen rats out there? What a great name for an sf book. Or pulp film. Can't stand to look at it but it is certainly art.
http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/
I got it. Who wouldn't want to do this? Basically, just go round all the art college shows and just buy the best ones.
This is the sort of thing The Prince of Wales used to do in. (Though it is hard to imagine any of the current crop doing anything as useful.)
Light Perpetual 1 - Conrad Shawcross
http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artists/conrad_shawcross.htm
What I remember was it's noise. And it was rather frightening as if you could get caught up in it. And the shadows cast were like things in a horror-dream. It also seemed so effective for something so apparently (it was probabaly a horror-dream to make) simple.
Naomi V Jelish by Jamie Shovlin (basically a student purchase)
http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artists/jamie_shovlin.htm
I confess I didn't find it moving but I loved the concept of the project.
Richard Wilson - 20:50 (oil room)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/turnerprize/history/wilsonr.htm
What the blurb doesn't explain is the effect from the relfections of the surrounding room - doors etc. AND the SMELL.
Brood - Kate MccGwire (wishbones) (student)
http://www.axisweb.org/grCVFU.aspx?SELECTIONID=15357
Don't know how long this site will last. WHY ISN'T IT ON THE SAATCHI SITE?
Made from 20000 chicken wishbones. Can you beat that? Good luck?! (For the chickens.) A beautific delicate slaughterhouse.
Vermin Death Star - David Falconer (rats)
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/gallery/image/0,8543,-11104640115,00.html
The memory of this still gives me the shivers. (And why is that fun?)
100s of freeze-dried rats used to make the metal castings for the sculpture. Was it really cast-metal? Even the process of making it makes your stomach turn. Or? Maybe there are whole reserves of frozen rats out there? What a great name for an sf book. Or pulp film. Can't stand to look at it but it is certainly art.
http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/
Ketelbey 08/08/05
One of those pieces of music that everyone (in the UK of a certain age) has heard but does not know the name of.
Albert W Ketèlbey (1875-1959) was an English composer whose early music won the praise of Elgar and gained first place over Holst. From ages 16 to 20, he was a church organist as well as a piano soloist. After 1912, Ketèlbey became a music editor for Chappell and music director of the Columbia Gramophone Co. This piece was the first of many short tone poems with exotic titles (In a Persian Market, In the Mystic Land of Egypt, In a Chinese Temple Garden) that he composed with elaborate orchestrations over the next 15 years. His positions helped to get these atmospheric pieces published and recorded. Theatre organists such as Reginald Foort, Reginald Dixon, and Quentin Maclean have performed and recorded them.
Huntarian Glasgow. 23/05/05
A selection from the University collection.
What great stuff!
Things I remember are the Chardin paintings.
Konstanze Mozart painted by her brother (not WAM)
Paintings by Beatrix Whistler. (The wife. She should get more attention.)
A portrait of Anne of Austria. Wife of Phillip II spain. 1570-71.
http://www.huntsearch.gla.ac.uk/index.html
What great stuff!
Things I remember are the Chardin paintings.
Konstanze Mozart painted by her brother (not WAM)
Paintings by Beatrix Whistler. (The wife. She should get more attention.)
A portrait of Anne of Austria. Wife of Phillip II spain. 1570-71.
http://www.huntsearch.gla.ac.uk/index.html
Fruitmarket. 21/05/05
An Aside. Selected by Tacita Dean
Kurt Schwitters painted stones. 1945-7
Roni Horn Brink of Infinity. 1995. Sea breaking over rocks. Photo or painting? HAUNTING.
Rodney Graham. 2003 Rheinmetat. I thought this was a STANDOUT. A film of snow falling on a vintage German typwriter. Black v white. Metal vs snowflake. Cold and cold. Nature vs machine. Monumental vs transient. I hate the British obession with WW2, but it did also seem to be about ingenuity and brilliance and the perversion of.
Othar Baumgarten Mosquitos. Which was a bunch of bread rolls with feathers. 1969. A joke's as good as a rest.
Joseph Beuys goden coloured portrait bust bronze of a girl 1947. Surprisingly naturalistic and skilful. A type of artifice he decided to move awat from.
Yvan Salomone. Watercolours of Waste-scapes. The sort of mournful industrial landscapes I always enjoy.
http://www.fruitmarket.co.uk/archive-AA.html
Kurt Schwitters painted stones. 1945-7
Roni Horn Brink of Infinity. 1995. Sea breaking over rocks. Photo or painting? HAUNTING.
Rodney Graham. 2003 Rheinmetat. I thought this was a STANDOUT. A film of snow falling on a vintage German typwriter. Black v white. Metal vs snowflake. Cold and cold. Nature vs machine. Monumental vs transient. I hate the British obession with WW2, but it did also seem to be about ingenuity and brilliance and the perversion of.
Othar Baumgarten Mosquitos. Which was a bunch of bread rolls with feathers. 1969. A joke's as good as a rest.
Joseph Beuys goden coloured portrait bust bronze of a girl 1947. Surprisingly naturalistic and skilful. A type of artifice he decided to move awat from.
Yvan Salomone. Watercolours of Waste-scapes. The sort of mournful industrial landscapes I always enjoy.
http://www.fruitmarket.co.uk/archive-AA.html
Usher Hall. Edinburgh. 19/04/05
Organ Wedding MusicJohn Kitchen & Alexandra Stevenson.
Not as enjoyable as the previous recital I had seen because we didn't have the real organ anorachs (= life enhancing enthusiasts) that we had last time. For an ognoramus like me though it was an education to hear some of the range of Wedding Music.
Not as enjoyable as the previous recital I had seen because we didn't have the real organ anorachs (= life enhancing enthusiasts) that we had last time. For an ognoramus like me though it was an education to hear some of the range of Wedding Music.
Simon Patterson. High Noon. Fruitmarket. 16/03/05
The Great Bear is deservedly famous. Not bowled over by General Assembly or Ur. But Escape Routine was highly entertaining. Shows what good you can do when you push a pun far enough. (Air stewards and stewardess explain escape routines of chains and ropes.) Gets in bondage, absurdity, comedy, surealism and escapology all in one go.
http://www.fruitmarket.co.uk/Archive%20Simon%20Patterson.html
Paris Musée d'Orsay 19/02/05
Jean Delville 'L'Ecole de Platon' (School of Plato) - talk about kinky!
Ellen Gallagher Fruitmarket 02/01/05
The stuff I thought most powerful were the coloured and generally messed about film sequences. One was a jazzed up version of a 50s horror film that was really twisted into other directions.
Nathan Coley 'The lamp-of-sacrifice' 22/01/05
'The lamp-of-sacrifice'Carboard modles of all the 286 places of worship in Edinburgh.
3 months to make with assistant Tony Nolan. Lyndsay Mann took the photos of the churches they usedf to make the models from. Very strong smell of cardboard & maybe glue. The exhibition fills a huge fills room. Apparently it has been purchased for Scotland. I have to admit my thought was where will they keep it?
Ghazi Hussein 30/01/05
Shore Poets. Edinburgh
Ghazi Hussein - Palestinian poet in arabic. English read by Tessa Ramsford.
Suspicious as I am of anything from the acedemico/Arts Council insititutions I thought this poetry was a jolt of energy.
Middle Eastern tropes. Rhythm, pattern, passion. Something to say.
http://www.scottisharts.org.uk/1/artsinscotland/artsandcommunities/diversity/features/archive/profileghazihussein.aspx
Ghazi Hussein - Palestinian poet in arabic. English read by Tessa Ramsford.
Suspicious as I am of anything from the acedemico/Arts Council insititutions I thought this poetry was a jolt of energy.
Middle Eastern tropes. Rhythm, pattern, passion. Something to say.
http://www.scottisharts.org.uk/1/artsinscotland/artsandcommunities/diversity/features/archive/profileghazihussein.aspx
National Gallery. 01/05/05
My usual first port of call. Botticelli's Venus and Mars. (She is always so sad to have made him weak.)
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.nationalgallery.co.uk/shop/productimages/040306.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.nationalgallery.co.uk/shop/product_display.asp%3FSiteLanguage%3DENG%26ProductID%3D040306&h=170&w=190&sz=8&hl=en&sig2=PJah0UYqzll5lN-vpzvy9g&start=1&tbnid=4pbxlV5zAalP2M:&tbnh=92&tbnw=103&ei=6eYfRbOJKLDIJPD93LUM&prev=/images%3Fq%3D%2Bsite:www.nationalgallery.co.uk%2Bbotticelli%2Bmars%2Band%2Bvenus%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D
This time I was struck by the colours on Virgin with Iris. School of Durer. The Orange dress with the Scarlet Cloak.(Can't seem to get any images from the web.)
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.nationalgallery.co.uk/shop/productimages/040306.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.nationalgallery.co.uk/shop/product_display.asp%3FSiteLanguage%3DENG%26ProductID%3D040306&h=170&w=190&sz=8&hl=en&sig2=PJah0UYqzll5lN-vpzvy9g&start=1&tbnid=4pbxlV5zAalP2M:&tbnh=92&tbnw=103&ei=6eYfRbOJKLDIJPD93LUM&prev=/images%3Fq%3D%2Bsite:www.nationalgallery.co.uk%2Bbotticelli%2Bmars%2Band%2Bvenus%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D
This time I was struck by the colours on Virgin with Iris. School of Durer. The Orange dress with the Scarlet Cloak.(Can't seem to get any images from the web.)
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