Louis Kornitzer's book, Gem Trader, is partly autobiographical and partly woven round the lore of pearls. It's educational + explains the distribution chain of gems, as they pass from hand to hand, from miner to cutter, from merchant to millionaire, from courtesan to receiver of stolen goods, shaping human lives as they go + the unique characters in the industry.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
Anyone can peddle shoelaces, but it will be obvious to any layman that there must be considerable amount of cash in hand before one can hope to be a diamond merchant. On the face of it it looks like one of those mysterious occupations that you cannot work up to. There are no correspondence courses for learning to be a president or a diamond merchant, and no ‘assisted passages’.
Nevertheless, you do not need much money, despite appearances, to be a diamond merchant—provided you have the necessary credit. Ever since the first struggling days when I first established myself I have enjoyed two vital things: good health and good credit. Nevertheless, it was not through any effort on my part that I first handled diamonds. It was in the days when I was still handling amethysts, peridots, opals, sapphires, anything, in fact, that came along, but was already deep in my lifelong attachment to pearls. A man named Brodnik came to see me.
I knew him by name. He was a dabbler in many things, considered a well-to-do man. This would-be diamond merchant was a short stocky figure with waxed moustache and a fund of good stories. He said to me at once: ‘I have watched you for a long time. I believe you are the man for me. Money talks. I am prepared to trust you. I want you to buy diamonds with my money and split profits fifty-fifty.’
Well, it was not all quite so simple as all that, but in the end I agreed to some such arrangement. I wanted the money put into my own bank, but he insisted on a bank in the City where he had certain discounting facilities. After all, it was his money, I thought, and so what he said went. Unfortunately, after I had bought a few parcels of diamonds and sold them at a good profit, and was beginning to think that the word ‘diamond’ had a musical sound, the unforseen happened.
One day Brodnik turned up at the office looking worried. ‘Trouble for you,’ he said sadly.
‘What trouble?’ said I.
‘Your bank has closed its doors this morning.’ He mentioned the establishment where he had deposited my diamond working capital.
‘Your bank, you mean,’ I corrected him.
‘Not mine,’ he said even more sadly. ‘My account there don’t matter a peapod. I’m overdrawn at that bank for forty pounds. Don’t you worry about me. Well, what are you going to do about it? I’m looking to you for my money.’
Brodnik was my old man of the sea for some time, until I was lucky enough to get out of his clutches. I did not touch diamond again for years.
My second venture into the brilliants market came when I was associated with a prominent French pearl dealer for the purpose of tapping new sources of pearl supplies in the South Seas. Wherever I went on that trip I was asked whether I had anything to offer in diamonds. I accordingly and optimistically drew my Paris associate’s attention to the possibilities of increasing our profit, and asked him to ship some diamonds of the right sort.
He had a first class brain, had my friend Jacques. Nevertheless, he envisaged my South Seas customers as a series of native rajahs and dusky chiefs, and he shipped to me as his first consignment a golden elephant with turquoise eyes and diamond-spattered trunk. The next week he sent me an ivory cane carved at the top into the semblance of an Indian god with diamonds set in eyes, nostrils and ears. There was no third consignment, or he might have sent me a meerschaum studded with brilliants or something even more hopeless than he did send. I gave diamonds a wide berth for another eight years.
Then one day in New York I was introduced to a prominent Antwerp diamond cutter who had risen from poverty to possession of the biggest diamond factory in Belgium and had unlimited credit. This man again broached diamonds to me. ‘I’m surprised that you should be content with pearls when you could, with your connections, build up a diamond business in the Far East second to none.’
I told him dryly of my first two experiences with diamonds. He laughed. ‘Third time lucky,’ he said. ‘This time you are going to hit the sky.’ But that is a story I must reserve for a later chapter.
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
The Invention Of Oil Painting
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
4
Tradition relates that Quinten Massys, the ‘smith of Antwerp’ became a painter only because his sweetheart would not marry a smith. The swinging brushwork and broad handling which he substituted for the small detailed touches of the earlier painters well accord with the vigor demanded by the work of a smithy. His handling of color is also new, for instead of placing unbroken blues, reds, yellows, etc., in immediate juxtaposition, he marshals his hues into a uniform color scheme. Disliking smallness in all things, he painted figures almost life-size; and when the size of his picture forbade the full length, he contended himself with half figures rather than reduce his scale to miniature proportions. ‘The Banker and his Wife’ at Louvre is a fine example of this innovation.
With the death of Quinten Massys in 1530 the first period of Flemish painting comes to an end. The next generation of Flemings either practised their art in Italy or, like Jan Gossart, called Mabuse (c. 1472-1535), imported Italian fashions in painting.
Mabuse, who took his name from the town of Maubeuge, where he was born about 1472, was a Fleming before he naturalized his art. This we may see by studying the magnificent example of his first manner at the National Gallery. ‘The Adoration of the Magi’, bought for the nation from the Countess of Carlisle in 1911, was painted by Mabuse before he visited Italy. In the architectural background we get a hint of the influence of Roger van der Weyden; the thirty figures in their rather pompous costumes are stolid and almost stony in comparison with the grace of his later works.
Some ten years later Mabuse visited Italy in the train of the Duke of Burgundy, and in Florence Mabuse came under the influence of Leonardo da Vinci. That his first contact with the new naturalism did not have altogether happy results we know by the commonplace realism of his ‘Adam and Eve’ at Hampton Court. Soon, however, the warm air of Italy won him to gentleness, and in his Italianised works it is as a portrait-painter that Mabuse excels. Of his many portraits of ‘Margaret Tudor’ (the elder sister of Henry VIII), which now hangs in the Scottish National Gallery at Edinburgh.
4
Tradition relates that Quinten Massys, the ‘smith of Antwerp’ became a painter only because his sweetheart would not marry a smith. The swinging brushwork and broad handling which he substituted for the small detailed touches of the earlier painters well accord with the vigor demanded by the work of a smithy. His handling of color is also new, for instead of placing unbroken blues, reds, yellows, etc., in immediate juxtaposition, he marshals his hues into a uniform color scheme. Disliking smallness in all things, he painted figures almost life-size; and when the size of his picture forbade the full length, he contended himself with half figures rather than reduce his scale to miniature proportions. ‘The Banker and his Wife’ at Louvre is a fine example of this innovation.
With the death of Quinten Massys in 1530 the first period of Flemish painting comes to an end. The next generation of Flemings either practised their art in Italy or, like Jan Gossart, called Mabuse (c. 1472-1535), imported Italian fashions in painting.
Mabuse, who took his name from the town of Maubeuge, where he was born about 1472, was a Fleming before he naturalized his art. This we may see by studying the magnificent example of his first manner at the National Gallery. ‘The Adoration of the Magi’, bought for the nation from the Countess of Carlisle in 1911, was painted by Mabuse before he visited Italy. In the architectural background we get a hint of the influence of Roger van der Weyden; the thirty figures in their rather pompous costumes are stolid and almost stony in comparison with the grace of his later works.
Some ten years later Mabuse visited Italy in the train of the Duke of Burgundy, and in Florence Mabuse came under the influence of Leonardo da Vinci. That his first contact with the new naturalism did not have altogether happy results we know by the commonplace realism of his ‘Adam and Eve’ at Hampton Court. Soon, however, the warm air of Italy won him to gentleness, and in his Italianised works it is as a portrait-painter that Mabuse excels. Of his many portraits of ‘Margaret Tudor’ (the elder sister of Henry VIII), which now hangs in the Scottish National Gallery at Edinburgh.
Monday, November 26, 2007
Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Here is a fact sheet on irradiated gemstones via NRC’s 'Fact Sheets & Brochures' page.
More info @ U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
More info @ U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Why Are We Repeatedly Misled By Market Forecasts That Are Consistently Wrong?
I think we are brought up to be insecure, and we look to others for the sources and solutions to our problems, rather than looking to ourselves.
The Awful Truth
The Awful Truth (1937)
Directed by: Leo McCarey
Screenplay: Viña Delmar, Arthur Richman (play)
Cast: Irene Dunne, Cary Grant, Ralph Bellamy
(via YouTube): The Awful Truth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kooj5oyujd4
A unique romantic comedy for all seasons + I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Leo McCarey
Screenplay: Viña Delmar, Arthur Richman (play)
Cast: Irene Dunne, Cary Grant, Ralph Bellamy
(via YouTube): The Awful Truth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kooj5oyujd4
A unique romantic comedy for all seasons + I enjoyed it.
Charitable Magic
Economist writes about Harry Potter and the hugely profitable sketches by J.K.Rowling + other viewpoints @ http://www.economist.com/daily/columns/marketview/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10170822
Where Rube Goldberg Meets Kafka
Robin Cembalest writes about Havana Bienal + the curious mix of capitalism and communism + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnews.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=862
The Invention Of Oil Painting
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
3
The first great figure in Flemish painting who appears to owe little to either of the Van Eycks is Hans Memlinc (c. 1430-94), who probably studied at Cologne before he settled in Bruges about 1467. His paintings in the Hospital of St. John’s at Bruges are world famous, and round them has been woven a pretty legend.
Young Memlinc, the story goes, while fighting as a soldier of Charles the Bold, was desperately wounded and dragged himself to the Hospital of St. John at Bruges, where he was kindly received and his wounds tended. When cured, out of gratitude for no fee, he painted the picture still to be seen in the Hospital.
Unfortunately, historical research has demolished the legend and reveals Memlinc as no soldier of fortune but a prosperous citizen and house-owner in Bruges. Yet the legend well accords with the character of Memlinc’s paintings, which have been likened to ‘the visions of a sick man in convalescence’.
Just as the name of Michael Angelo is indissolubly linked to the Sistine Chapel in Rome, so is that of Memlinc to the Hospital of St. John at Bruges. But while we are awed by the heroic figures and magnitude of the Italian’s paintings at Rome, in Bruges we are fascinated and bewitched by the bijou qualities of the Fleming’s art. Memlinc’s large triptych in the Hospital, ‘The Virgin and Child Enthroned’ with panels on either side of ‘St. John the Baptist’ and of ‘St. John the Evangelist at Patmos,’ is not the work that takes our breath away: it is the ‘Shrine of St. Ursula,’ a wonderfully painted casket—made to hold relics of the saint. Though only 3 feet long and less than 3 feet high, this casket is covered with eight panel paintings, and six medallions on the roof slopes.
Looking at these poetical pictures of a romantic story, it seems ungracious to recall that the legend of St. Ursula, according to modern science, rests on no surer foundation than the discovery in medieval times of an old Roman burial ground. From these unknown remains, it is now said, the tale of Ursula and her 11000 virgins was constructed. Many versions of the legend are in existence; but none nearer than five or six centuries to the date when the events were supposed to have happened. This is the version followed by Memlinc.
Ursula, daughter of a King of Brittany or Cornwall, either to delay marriage with a pagan prince, or alternately to escape the persecution of the British Emperor Maximian, was enjoined to go on a pilgrimage and make 11000 virgins her companion. The company sailed up the Rhine via Cologne to Basle, and thence went by foot to Rome, where they were received by the Pope with every honor and attention. Returning, they sailed up the Rhine from Basle, with papal benedictions, but on arriving at Cologne, they were slaughtered by the Huns. After the martyrdom, their relics were piously collected and buried.
That is the story, and it will be noted that Memlinc, to show how absolutely the Pope was in sympathy with St. Ursula, actually makes him embark with her at the start of the return journey. Incidentally these miniature paintings show that Memlinc knew Cologne well, for in all the scenes which take place in the city he was effectively introduced the Cathedral and other of its principal buildings.
The spirituality of Memlic’s portraiture, his power to paint the soul as well as the surface, is beautifully exemplified in ‘The Duke of Cleves’. His romanticism, a new note which Memlinc definitely contributed to painting, is bewitchingly exhaled from his ‘Betrothal of St. Catherine’ and the ‘Legend of St. Ursula,’ both of which are touching in their simplicity, their freshness, and miniature daintiness.
Already the city, so wealthy in the days of the Van Eycks, had become in the time of Memlinc Bruges-la-Morte. Something of its sad poetic solitude pervades his pictures. The great house of the Medici had collapsed, the rich merchants had gone elsewhere, and the next great Flemish painter, Quinten Massys (1466-1530), was domiciled in Antwerp.
3
The first great figure in Flemish painting who appears to owe little to either of the Van Eycks is Hans Memlinc (c. 1430-94), who probably studied at Cologne before he settled in Bruges about 1467. His paintings in the Hospital of St. John’s at Bruges are world famous, and round them has been woven a pretty legend.
Young Memlinc, the story goes, while fighting as a soldier of Charles the Bold, was desperately wounded and dragged himself to the Hospital of St. John at Bruges, where he was kindly received and his wounds tended. When cured, out of gratitude for no fee, he painted the picture still to be seen in the Hospital.
Unfortunately, historical research has demolished the legend and reveals Memlinc as no soldier of fortune but a prosperous citizen and house-owner in Bruges. Yet the legend well accords with the character of Memlinc’s paintings, which have been likened to ‘the visions of a sick man in convalescence’.
Just as the name of Michael Angelo is indissolubly linked to the Sistine Chapel in Rome, so is that of Memlinc to the Hospital of St. John at Bruges. But while we are awed by the heroic figures and magnitude of the Italian’s paintings at Rome, in Bruges we are fascinated and bewitched by the bijou qualities of the Fleming’s art. Memlinc’s large triptych in the Hospital, ‘The Virgin and Child Enthroned’ with panels on either side of ‘St. John the Baptist’ and of ‘St. John the Evangelist at Patmos,’ is not the work that takes our breath away: it is the ‘Shrine of St. Ursula,’ a wonderfully painted casket—made to hold relics of the saint. Though only 3 feet long and less than 3 feet high, this casket is covered with eight panel paintings, and six medallions on the roof slopes.
Looking at these poetical pictures of a romantic story, it seems ungracious to recall that the legend of St. Ursula, according to modern science, rests on no surer foundation than the discovery in medieval times of an old Roman burial ground. From these unknown remains, it is now said, the tale of Ursula and her 11000 virgins was constructed. Many versions of the legend are in existence; but none nearer than five or six centuries to the date when the events were supposed to have happened. This is the version followed by Memlinc.
Ursula, daughter of a King of Brittany or Cornwall, either to delay marriage with a pagan prince, or alternately to escape the persecution of the British Emperor Maximian, was enjoined to go on a pilgrimage and make 11000 virgins her companion. The company sailed up the Rhine via Cologne to Basle, and thence went by foot to Rome, where they were received by the Pope with every honor and attention. Returning, they sailed up the Rhine from Basle, with papal benedictions, but on arriving at Cologne, they were slaughtered by the Huns. After the martyrdom, their relics were piously collected and buried.
That is the story, and it will be noted that Memlinc, to show how absolutely the Pope was in sympathy with St. Ursula, actually makes him embark with her at the start of the return journey. Incidentally these miniature paintings show that Memlinc knew Cologne well, for in all the scenes which take place in the city he was effectively introduced the Cathedral and other of its principal buildings.
The spirituality of Memlic’s portraiture, his power to paint the soul as well as the surface, is beautifully exemplified in ‘The Duke of Cleves’. His romanticism, a new note which Memlinc definitely contributed to painting, is bewitchingly exhaled from his ‘Betrothal of St. Catherine’ and the ‘Legend of St. Ursula,’ both of which are touching in their simplicity, their freshness, and miniature daintiness.
Already the city, so wealthy in the days of the Van Eycks, had become in the time of Memlinc Bruges-la-Morte. Something of its sad poetic solitude pervades his pictures. The great house of the Medici had collapsed, the rich merchants had gone elsewhere, and the next great Flemish painter, Quinten Massys (1466-1530), was domiciled in Antwerp.
Blue Diamond
A 6.04 carat, internally flawless, emerald-cut (square in shape) fancy vivid blue diamond, set in a ring was sold by Sotheyby’s (Hong Kong) on October 8, 2007 to Alisa Moussaieff (Moussaieff Jewellers) for US$7,981,835 (US$1,321,590/carat + buyer’s premium).
Design For All
Good designs:(via The New Yorker) I liked the designs. It's simple + functional.
- Sonia Kashuk
‘Beauty is in the eye of the beholder’ takes on a new meaning with Sonia Kashuk’s ergonomic makeup brushes. Designed for perfect finger placement, they’re made to handle hours of making up, or a quick kiss of color.
- Sustainability
It’s hard not to get hung up on the state of the environment. By designing an innovative reuse system for hangers, Target keeps millions out of landfills, putting them back on racks and refashioning broken ones into other plastic goods.
- LED Tealight
Does a candle without fire burn any less brightly? GE’s battery-powered LED tealights glow and even blow out just like a real candle. And best of all, your batteries may burn low but you’ll never get burned.
- Thomas O’Brien
Designer Thomas O’Brien likes to shed light on classic design elements. Take his lamp that brings modern embellishments to a tried-and-true-silhouette, uniting the best of old and new design.
- Method Floor Mop
From the ergonomic pole to the compostable corn-based cloths, Method is, well, methodical about smart, sustainable design. It’s nontoxic and naturally derived to protect your home sweet home (and everyone in it).
- Universal
A great idea that works for everyone, that’s what great design is all about. It’s in little things that help us every day, like easy-to-install energy-saving lightbulbs that fit every home, every hand and everyone’s lifestyle. 15 W.
- Natural
Parabens, pesticides, artificial colorings, SLS’s...that’s no way to start. So Erba Organics created a line of safe, clean and environmentally friendly products for Baby and Mom that take care of you, and the planet.
- Violight
Great design is good for your health. Just take the toothbrush sanitizing Violight for example. It’s sleek, modern exterior (designed by Philippe Starck) hides powerful germ-killing UV technology.
- Wine
Sometimes going against the grain, or the grape, is the right design solution. It worked for the Wine Cube, whose innovative pouring system keeps wine safe from oxygen, and great tasting for weeks after opening. 3L.
- PŪR
Clean drinking water isn’t just a healthy issue, it’s a matter of design. With sleek aesthetics and a space-saving shape, PŪR filters eliminate 99.99% of tap water’s impurities. That’s fresh design to the very last drop.
- Clear RX
It was one life-changing error in her grandparent’s prescriptions that led Deborah Adler to create CleaRx, a pharmacy system that makes taking (and tracking) medications easier, safer and smarter, thanks to design.
- Q-Tips
Inspired by his wife’s toothpick-swaddling ingenuity, Leo Gerstenzang invented ready-to-use cotton swabs in 1923 creating a ‘tipping’ point for portable and hygienic tools that’s still a tip-top design today.
- Yo-Yo
Two equally sized and weighted discs, an axle that joins them and a piece of string. A toy that’s swept every continent and mesmerized children of all ages. Sometimes design is that simple. And that great.
- Dyson
A bagless vacuum that never loses suction? Skeptics scoffed, by Dyson’s intuitive design and patented Root Cyclone technology revolutionized domestic life with a vacuum that expels super-clean air.
- Victoria Hagan
The Victoria Hagan Perfect Pieces end table makes a statement without saying a word. It’s just the right size, height and proportion, and its extra touches ensure that it looks right at home in any room.
- Ergonomic
An intelligent shape can make all the difference. Like a basket designed to curve around the human form—not bump against it, and handles that make your load, well, that much easier to handle.
- Isaac Mizrahi
Thanks to design details by Isaac Mizrahi, the little black dress has been raised from wardrobe option to necessity. Flattering and finessing on any occasion—that’s the look of great design.
- Sonia Kashuk
‘Beauty is in the eye of the beholder’ takes on a new meaning with Sonia Kashuk’s ergonomic makeup brushes. Designed for perfect finger placement, they’re made to handle hours of making up, or a quick kiss of color.
- Sustainability
It’s hard not to get hung up on the state of the environment. By designing an innovative reuse system for hangers, Target keeps millions out of landfills, putting them back on racks and refashioning broken ones into other plastic goods.
- LED Tealight
Does a candle without fire burn any less brightly? GE’s battery-powered LED tealights glow and even blow out just like a real candle. And best of all, your batteries may burn low but you’ll never get burned.
- Thomas O’Brien
Designer Thomas O’Brien likes to shed light on classic design elements. Take his lamp that brings modern embellishments to a tried-and-true-silhouette, uniting the best of old and new design.
- Method Floor Mop
From the ergonomic pole to the compostable corn-based cloths, Method is, well, methodical about smart, sustainable design. It’s nontoxic and naturally derived to protect your home sweet home (and everyone in it).
- Universal
A great idea that works for everyone, that’s what great design is all about. It’s in little things that help us every day, like easy-to-install energy-saving lightbulbs that fit every home, every hand and everyone’s lifestyle. 15 W.
- Natural
Parabens, pesticides, artificial colorings, SLS’s...that’s no way to start. So Erba Organics created a line of safe, clean and environmentally friendly products for Baby and Mom that take care of you, and the planet.
- Violight
Great design is good for your health. Just take the toothbrush sanitizing Violight for example. It’s sleek, modern exterior (designed by Philippe Starck) hides powerful germ-killing UV technology.
- Wine
Sometimes going against the grain, or the grape, is the right design solution. It worked for the Wine Cube, whose innovative pouring system keeps wine safe from oxygen, and great tasting for weeks after opening. 3L.
- PŪR
Clean drinking water isn’t just a healthy issue, it’s a matter of design. With sleek aesthetics and a space-saving shape, PŪR filters eliminate 99.99% of tap water’s impurities. That’s fresh design to the very last drop.
- Clear RX
It was one life-changing error in her grandparent’s prescriptions that led Deborah Adler to create CleaRx, a pharmacy system that makes taking (and tracking) medications easier, safer and smarter, thanks to design.
- Q-Tips
Inspired by his wife’s toothpick-swaddling ingenuity, Leo Gerstenzang invented ready-to-use cotton swabs in 1923 creating a ‘tipping’ point for portable and hygienic tools that’s still a tip-top design today.
- Yo-Yo
Two equally sized and weighted discs, an axle that joins them and a piece of string. A toy that’s swept every continent and mesmerized children of all ages. Sometimes design is that simple. And that great.
- Dyson
A bagless vacuum that never loses suction? Skeptics scoffed, by Dyson’s intuitive design and patented Root Cyclone technology revolutionized domestic life with a vacuum that expels super-clean air.
- Victoria Hagan
The Victoria Hagan Perfect Pieces end table makes a statement without saying a word. It’s just the right size, height and proportion, and its extra touches ensure that it looks right at home in any room.
- Ergonomic
An intelligent shape can make all the difference. Like a basket designed to curve around the human form—not bump against it, and handles that make your load, well, that much easier to handle.
- Isaac Mizrahi
Thanks to design details by Isaac Mizrahi, the little black dress has been raised from wardrobe option to necessity. Flattering and finessing on any occasion—that’s the look of great design.
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Namak Mandi
Namak Mandi (translates as Salk Market) is situated in Peshawar in the North-Wesk Frontier Province of Pakistan + it’s a major gemstone market in the region. The 1980 political crisis in Afghanistan brought in refugees + gems to the area + gradually Namak Mandi developed as a gem market. Because of its unique location + convenience, Namak Mandi is becoming one of the largest rough gemstone markets for stones from Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Iran, China, and Kashmir (Pakistan).
The more frequently encountered gemstones in Peshawar include Actinolite, Aquamarine, Axinite, Brookite, Emeralds, Epidote, Feldspar/moonstone, Garnet/red + green varieties, Idocrase, Pargasite, Peridot, Quartz, Corundum/ruby + sapphires, Spinel/red + blue, Topaz, Tourmaline, Turquoise, Zircon + Synthetics/Imitations.
The more frequently encountered gemstones in Peshawar include Actinolite, Aquamarine, Axinite, Brookite, Emeralds, Epidote, Feldspar/moonstone, Garnet/red + green varieties, Idocrase, Pargasite, Peridot, Quartz, Corundum/ruby + sapphires, Spinel/red + blue, Topaz, Tourmaline, Turquoise, Zircon + Synthetics/Imitations.
Thanksgiving Feast Under A Microscope
Tom Conlon writes about a typical Turkey Day meal under magnification via Mike Davidson, a biologist and expert photomicrographer at Florida State University's National High Magnetic Field Lab @ http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/15-11/st_thanksgiving
In my view the images looked very familiar--like the inclusions in mainstream colored gemstones. I enjoyed it.
In my view the images looked very familiar--like the inclusions in mainstream colored gemstones. I enjoyed it.
Bande à part
Bande à part (1964)
Directed by: Jean-Luc Godard
Screenplay: Jean-Luc Godard
Cast: Anna Karina, Danièle Girard
(via YouTube): Nouvelle vague "dance with me" from bande a part
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekQZPozjCX8
Jean-Luc Godard / Bande à part (Band of Outsiders) / Trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_K3oHzokvs
It was natural + entertaining.
Directed by: Jean-Luc Godard
Screenplay: Jean-Luc Godard
Cast: Anna Karina, Danièle Girard
(via YouTube): Nouvelle vague "dance with me" from bande a part
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekQZPozjCX8
Jean-Luc Godard / Bande à part (Band of Outsiders) / Trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_K3oHzokvs
It was natural + entertaining.
'Secret' Artwork Goes Up For Sale
BBC writes about The Royal College of Art's Secret Postcard event where art lovers are being given the chance to take home an original Tracey Emin or Damien Hirst for just £40 at a sale + other viewpoints @ http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/7110679.stm
The Roaches That Came In From The Cold
Blake Eskin writes about Catherine Chalmers + her larger-than-life color photographs of animals doing interesting things + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnews.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=859
The Invention Of Oil Painting
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
2
If little is known about the Van Eycks, still less is known concerning their successors. Patient research among municipal records in Flanders, however, has greatly increased our knowledge during recent years. Twenty years ago the very name of the painter of a fine altar-piece in the Abbey of Flemalle, near Liege, was uncertain; he was alluded to vaguely as ‘The Master of Flemalle’. Today it has been established that he was a painter of Tournai, called Robert Campin, who was born about 1375 and lived till 1444. There are two good examples of his art in the National Gallery, and he is important, not only for his own work, but as being the master of Roger van der Weyden.
Among the religious painters Roger van der Weyden (c.1400-64), who was born at Tournai and settled in Brussels, had a considerable influence. Beside the calm solemnity of Hubert van Eyck, his pictures appear exaggerated in their dramatic intensity and fervor. He was essentially a tragic artist, dwelling on the sufferings of the Savior and peopling his pictures with wailing figures, whose emaciated faces stream with tears, whose hands are convulsively clutched in agony or outstretched to heaven. In 1450 he visited Rome and is thought to have had some influence on Ferrarese imbibed something of a new spirit, for towards the end of his life his sentiment became more gentle and refined. Van der Weyden is seen at his best in ‘The Bewailing of the Body of Christ’ in the Berlin Gallery, and in this picture his affinity with the school of Van Eyck is shown in the delicate and gently detailed landscape background.
Roger’s fellow pupil Jacques Daret, who died in 1466, is softer and more conciliatory in his religious themes, and his paintings are peculiarly sweet both in color and temper.
The tragic painting of Van der Weyden was continued by Hugo van der Goes (c.1435-82) of Ghent and Bruges, who is reputed to have begun life as a wild pleasure-lover. Suddenly he withdrew to a monastery near Brussels, and conscious-stricken at his own dissipation he henceforward devoted his talent to sacred subjects, usually accentuating the sorrows of Christ, but always avoiding the wailing and excessive gesticulation which marked the pictures of Van der Weyden. His art is deeper and more quiet, but is certainly not less expressive. The alter-piece with ‘The Adoration of Jesus’ which, under the orders of Portinari, agent for the Medici in Bruges, he painted for Santa Maria Nuova in Florence, is generally accepted as the supreme masterpiece of Hugo van der Goes. We see the continuation of the Van Eyck tradition in the glimpse of landscape, in which light-green branches are boldly contrasted with the deep-blue sky, in the naturalism of the fire-red lily in the foreground, and in the realism of the rough, weatherbeaten shepherds who on one side balance the sturdy figure of St Joseph, who stands praying, on the other. When this picture arrived in Florence, it created a great sensation, and it has been thought that many famous Italian artists, among them Pierro di Cosimo, Ghirlandaio, Piero Pollaiuolo, were influenced to the extent of changing their style after they had seen this masterpiece by Hugo van der Goes.
2
If little is known about the Van Eycks, still less is known concerning their successors. Patient research among municipal records in Flanders, however, has greatly increased our knowledge during recent years. Twenty years ago the very name of the painter of a fine altar-piece in the Abbey of Flemalle, near Liege, was uncertain; he was alluded to vaguely as ‘The Master of Flemalle’. Today it has been established that he was a painter of Tournai, called Robert Campin, who was born about 1375 and lived till 1444. There are two good examples of his art in the National Gallery, and he is important, not only for his own work, but as being the master of Roger van der Weyden.
Among the religious painters Roger van der Weyden (c.1400-64), who was born at Tournai and settled in Brussels, had a considerable influence. Beside the calm solemnity of Hubert van Eyck, his pictures appear exaggerated in their dramatic intensity and fervor. He was essentially a tragic artist, dwelling on the sufferings of the Savior and peopling his pictures with wailing figures, whose emaciated faces stream with tears, whose hands are convulsively clutched in agony or outstretched to heaven. In 1450 he visited Rome and is thought to have had some influence on Ferrarese imbibed something of a new spirit, for towards the end of his life his sentiment became more gentle and refined. Van der Weyden is seen at his best in ‘The Bewailing of the Body of Christ’ in the Berlin Gallery, and in this picture his affinity with the school of Van Eyck is shown in the delicate and gently detailed landscape background.
Roger’s fellow pupil Jacques Daret, who died in 1466, is softer and more conciliatory in his religious themes, and his paintings are peculiarly sweet both in color and temper.
The tragic painting of Van der Weyden was continued by Hugo van der Goes (c.1435-82) of Ghent and Bruges, who is reputed to have begun life as a wild pleasure-lover. Suddenly he withdrew to a monastery near Brussels, and conscious-stricken at his own dissipation he henceforward devoted his talent to sacred subjects, usually accentuating the sorrows of Christ, but always avoiding the wailing and excessive gesticulation which marked the pictures of Van der Weyden. His art is deeper and more quiet, but is certainly not less expressive. The alter-piece with ‘The Adoration of Jesus’ which, under the orders of Portinari, agent for the Medici in Bruges, he painted for Santa Maria Nuova in Florence, is generally accepted as the supreme masterpiece of Hugo van der Goes. We see the continuation of the Van Eyck tradition in the glimpse of landscape, in which light-green branches are boldly contrasted with the deep-blue sky, in the naturalism of the fire-red lily in the foreground, and in the realism of the rough, weatherbeaten shepherds who on one side balance the sturdy figure of St Joseph, who stands praying, on the other. When this picture arrived in Florence, it created a great sensation, and it has been thought that many famous Italian artists, among them Pierro di Cosimo, Ghirlandaio, Piero Pollaiuolo, were influenced to the extent of changing their style after they had seen this masterpiece by Hugo van der Goes.
Design For All
Good designs:(via The New Yorker) I liked the designs. It's simple + functional.
- Bialetti
Italian Alfonso Bialetti proved the power of design with his creation of the first stovetop espresso maker. Compact and stylish, it delivers coffeehouse-style espresso without the pressure of leaving home.
- C9 By Champion
We go to great lengths to sweat, contort and brave elements, and great design keeps pace. From watches that measure heart rates to Duo Dry fabrics designed to wick sweat away and to keep you cool.
- Firefly
Who says smart design is lost on the little ones? Firefly's day-glo 'no adults allowed' phone is pint-sized (even the buttons) for small hands and keeps dialing options basic like Mom, Dad, and 911 assistance.
- Graves
People love walking up with Michael Graves Design. Starting with a hot cup of tea is one thing, having it announced by a cheery chirp and poured from a designed-to-feel-good-in-the-hand kettle is another.
- Joy
Does your fork make you happy? Life may be serious, but design can instill a sense of personality and humor in the most unexpected places. Think whimsical corkscrews or pink, kitty-shaped humidifiers.
- Radio
Forget the fancy knobs and complicated devices. Tivoli's legendary designer, Henry Kloss proved that less is more with a clean, simple interface and crystal-clear sound that picks up even the faintest signal.
Design For All (continued)
- Bialetti
Italian Alfonso Bialetti proved the power of design with his creation of the first stovetop espresso maker. Compact and stylish, it delivers coffeehouse-style espresso without the pressure of leaving home.
- C9 By Champion
We go to great lengths to sweat, contort and brave elements, and great design keeps pace. From watches that measure heart rates to Duo Dry fabrics designed to wick sweat away and to keep you cool.
- Firefly
Who says smart design is lost on the little ones? Firefly's day-glo 'no adults allowed' phone is pint-sized (even the buttons) for small hands and keeps dialing options basic like Mom, Dad, and 911 assistance.
- Graves
People love walking up with Michael Graves Design. Starting with a hot cup of tea is one thing, having it announced by a cheery chirp and poured from a designed-to-feel-good-in-the-hand kettle is another.
- Joy
Does your fork make you happy? Life may be serious, but design can instill a sense of personality and humor in the most unexpected places. Think whimsical corkscrews or pink, kitty-shaped humidifiers.
- Radio
Forget the fancy knobs and complicated devices. Tivoli's legendary designer, Henry Kloss proved that less is more with a clean, simple interface and crystal-clear sound that picks up even the faintest signal.
Design For All (continued)
Saturday, November 24, 2007
Three Inclusions
I think I have identified three inclusions that sell best to the masses:
- Envy
- Greed
- Fear
And it works.
- Envy
- Greed
- Fear
And it works.
Polonius’ Advice To Laertes
I think gem and jewelry merchants + art dealers/analysts should read Polonius’ Advice to Laertes, Divided into Pieces of Advice
It's educational.
It's educational.
Within Spitting Distance
New Business Models: Economist writes about personalised genetic analysis concept (s) + the impact + other viewpoints @
http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10166427
http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10166427
The Apu Trilogy
The Apu trilogy is a series of three films directed by Satyajit Ray. These films are Pather Panchali (Song Of The Little Road), Aparajito (The Unvanquished) and Apur Sansar (The World of Apu). The films were based on the works of the Bengali author Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay.
(via YouTube) Pather Panchali (1955) - The Train scene
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGaIAWn2PJo
Apur Sansar Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8iiv5lt52U
A real gem + this trilogy is perceived as one of the greatest achievements of Indian film.
(via YouTube) Pather Panchali (1955) - The Train scene
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGaIAWn2PJo
Apur Sansar Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8iiv5lt52U
A real gem + this trilogy is perceived as one of the greatest achievements of Indian film.
Chocolate Lorry Goes To Timbuktu
BBC writes about two British adventurers journey across Europe to West Africa with 2,000 litres (454 gallons) of bio-diesel made from 4,000kg (8,818lb) of chocolate misshapes, the equivalent of 80,000 chocolate bars + to raise awareness of the benefits of bio-diesel + the concept of carbon negative + other viewpoints @ http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/dorset/7109085.stm
Vanity Fair Portraits
(via The Guardian) Charlotte Higgins writes about portraits of the great by the great + the concept of personality portraiture + other viewpoints @ http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/photography/story/0,,2213818,00.html
The Online Art Market: Hit Or Miss?
Kelly Devine Thomas writes about the Internet art economy + the impact + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnews.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=842
Is De Beers Running Scared?
Chaim Even-Zohar writes about the in-house problems faced by the Diamond Trading Company (DTC) + De Beers + the De Beers Jewellery joint venture with LVMH + the failure in enforcing Best Practice Principles (BPP) + compliance failures/credibility issues + sightholder dilema/issues + other viewpoints @ http://www.idexonline.com/portal_FullEditorial.asp
The Invention Of Oil Painting
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
Now Hubert van Eyck was born about 1365 near Maestricht, which is no great distance from Cologne. Most probably he studied in the Rhineland capital before he migrated to Flanders and, with his brother Jan, settled in Ghent. The increasing commercial prosperity of Bruges and Ghent attracted artists from the banks of the Rhine, and the School of Cologne declined as the Early Flemish School arose.
Since the time of Vasari, the brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck have generally received credit for having discovered oil as a medium for painting. Before their time artists had mixed their colors either with water (frescoes) or with yolk of egg (tempera paintings), and though modern scholarship is inclined to doubt whether the Van Eycks were actually the first to make use of oil, they were beyond question the pioneers of the new medium.
Tradition says that Jan, having one day ‘devoted the utmost pains’ in finishing a picture with great care, varnished it and as usual put it in the sun to dry. But the heat was excessive and split the wooden panel which he had painted. Grieving at the destruction of his handiwork, Jan ‘determined to find a means whereby he should be spared such an annoyance in the future’. After various experiments he discovered that linseed oil and oil from nuts dried more quickly than any which he had tried, and that colors mixed these oils were more brilliant, proof against water, and blended far better than the tempera. Thus was oil painting invented.
‘The Adoration of the Lamb’ at Ghent, executed by the two brothers, is not only the earliest monument of the art of oil painting but it is the most splendid masterpiece produced by any Northern artist before the seventeenth century. Not till Rubens was born, some 200 years later, did Flanders produce the equal of the Van Eycks, and from this fact alone we may deduce the extraordinary mastery of their art.
‘The Adoration of the Lamb’, an elaborate polyptych, is not one picture but a whole collection of pictures. Originally it consisted of the long central panel showing ‘The Adoration of the Lamb’ and above this three panels of ‘The Virgin,’ ‘God the Father’, and ‘St. John’; on the left of the ‘Lamb’ panel—which measures 7½ feet long by 4½ feet high—were two panels of ‘The Just Judges’ and ‘Christ’s Warriors’ showing ‘The Holy Hermits’ and ‘The Holy Pilgrims’ on the right. On the upper tier the three central figures were flanked by two double-panelled shutters, the painted subjects on one side being ‘Angels Singing’, ‘”Angles Making Music’, and, at the extreme ends, ‘Adam’ and ‘Eve’; on the reverse of the shutters are ‘St. John the Baptist’, ‘St. John the Evangelist’ ‘Jodoc Vydt’—the donor of the altar piece—and ‘Wife of Jodoc Vydt.’
The complete altar-piece therefore consisted of twelve panels, four painted on both sides, making sixteen pictures in all. The whole painted surface of this composite picture, or polyptych, amounts to over a thousand feet. Six of these panels were formerly in the Berlin Museum, but having been surrendered to Belgium under the Terms of the Treaty of Versailles, they have now been added to the central panels together with the panels of ‘Adam’ and ‘Eve’, formerly at Brussels, so that the whole altar-piece is now seen in its original completeness in the Cathedral of Ghent.
The whole altar-piece was undoubtedly planned and begun by Hubert, who certainly painted the three tremendous central figures and the panel of ‘Angels Making Music’. After Hubert’s death in 1426 Jan van Eyck completed the altar-piece, and probably did not adhere altogether strictly to his brother’s original designs. The difference between the work of the two brothers is one not so much of skill as of temperament. Hubert possessed a solemn spirituality and serious thoughtfulness which was not shared by his more worldly younger brother.
Jan van Eyck, born about 1385, is a more popular and no less eminent figure than his elder brother. He lived on in Ghent and Bruges till 1441 and his works are comparatively numerous, whereas few paintings by Hubert are extant. Shortly before completing the Ghent altar-piece, Jan entered the service of Philip of Burgundy, for whom he undertook several diplomatic missions. In this way he saw Portugal and other foreign countries, and his later paintings betray his affectionate remembrance of the country he had seen in southern climes. Jan was essentially a realist, with his keen gaze ever fixed on the beautiful earth and on human beings rather than on religious doctrines. His real bent is shown in many of his panels for ‘The Adoration of the Lamb’. In the panel of ‘The Annunciation’ his delight in the still-life, in the washbasin and other furniture of the room, in the street view seen through the window, reveals him to be the true father of genre painting. His portraits of Jodoc Vydt and his wife, shows without flattery as a dull but prosperous Flemish burgher and his wife, prove him to be the father of modern portraiture. Both these qualities, his capacity for realistic portraiture and his infinite exactitude in rendering the detail of an interior, are magnificently displayed in ‘Jan Arnolfini and his Wife’, one of the most precious things in the National Gallery.
While Hubert belongs to the austere company of monumental or architectural painters, Jan is a pioneer of domestic painting and one of the first producers of what we now know as a ‘picture’. In this development Jan van Eyck was, doubtless unconsciously, meeting the demand of his time and place.
In Northern churches and cathedrals, which need more light than the Southern, the place occupied by wall paintings was gradually given over to stained-glass windows, which are marked features in the Gothic architecture of Northern Europe. Wall-paintings, which still led the way in Italy, became secondary in Flanders do the decorative panels introduced into wooden screenwork. This much accomplished, it was a short step to meet the demands of a prosperous commercial community by (metaphorically) detaching a panel from his ecclesiastical frame and adapting its subject and style to a private dwelling house.
Thus, while Italy remains the home of the religious picture, Flanders and the Netherlands become more and more the home of secular art. Though he painted other religious subjects beside ‘The Adoration of the Lamb’ and the miniature ‘Altar piece’ which the Emperor Charles V took with him on his travels, the most famous of the other paintings by Jan van Eyck are portraits. In his portraiture he is uncompromising in his endeavor to state the whole truth; such details as warts and wrinkles, furrows and stubbly beards, he renders with passionate delight and exactitude. A splendid example of Jan’s rugged realism may be seen from portrait in the Berlin Museum, known as ‘The Man with the pinks’. Precisely drawn, true to every wart and wrinkle, the face is so full of life and character that we almost listen for speech to come from the slightly parted lips. Who this man was has never been discovered, but from his costume and the handsome ring on his finger we may deduce that he was a person of position.
Now Hubert van Eyck was born about 1365 near Maestricht, which is no great distance from Cologne. Most probably he studied in the Rhineland capital before he migrated to Flanders and, with his brother Jan, settled in Ghent. The increasing commercial prosperity of Bruges and Ghent attracted artists from the banks of the Rhine, and the School of Cologne declined as the Early Flemish School arose.
Since the time of Vasari, the brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck have generally received credit for having discovered oil as a medium for painting. Before their time artists had mixed their colors either with water (frescoes) or with yolk of egg (tempera paintings), and though modern scholarship is inclined to doubt whether the Van Eycks were actually the first to make use of oil, they were beyond question the pioneers of the new medium.
Tradition says that Jan, having one day ‘devoted the utmost pains’ in finishing a picture with great care, varnished it and as usual put it in the sun to dry. But the heat was excessive and split the wooden panel which he had painted. Grieving at the destruction of his handiwork, Jan ‘determined to find a means whereby he should be spared such an annoyance in the future’. After various experiments he discovered that linseed oil and oil from nuts dried more quickly than any which he had tried, and that colors mixed these oils were more brilliant, proof against water, and blended far better than the tempera. Thus was oil painting invented.
‘The Adoration of the Lamb’ at Ghent, executed by the two brothers, is not only the earliest monument of the art of oil painting but it is the most splendid masterpiece produced by any Northern artist before the seventeenth century. Not till Rubens was born, some 200 years later, did Flanders produce the equal of the Van Eycks, and from this fact alone we may deduce the extraordinary mastery of their art.
‘The Adoration of the Lamb’, an elaborate polyptych, is not one picture but a whole collection of pictures. Originally it consisted of the long central panel showing ‘The Adoration of the Lamb’ and above this three panels of ‘The Virgin,’ ‘God the Father’, and ‘St. John’; on the left of the ‘Lamb’ panel—which measures 7½ feet long by 4½ feet high—were two panels of ‘The Just Judges’ and ‘Christ’s Warriors’ showing ‘The Holy Hermits’ and ‘The Holy Pilgrims’ on the right. On the upper tier the three central figures were flanked by two double-panelled shutters, the painted subjects on one side being ‘Angels Singing’, ‘”Angles Making Music’, and, at the extreme ends, ‘Adam’ and ‘Eve’; on the reverse of the shutters are ‘St. John the Baptist’, ‘St. John the Evangelist’ ‘Jodoc Vydt’—the donor of the altar piece—and ‘Wife of Jodoc Vydt.’
The complete altar-piece therefore consisted of twelve panels, four painted on both sides, making sixteen pictures in all. The whole painted surface of this composite picture, or polyptych, amounts to over a thousand feet. Six of these panels were formerly in the Berlin Museum, but having been surrendered to Belgium under the Terms of the Treaty of Versailles, they have now been added to the central panels together with the panels of ‘Adam’ and ‘Eve’, formerly at Brussels, so that the whole altar-piece is now seen in its original completeness in the Cathedral of Ghent.
The whole altar-piece was undoubtedly planned and begun by Hubert, who certainly painted the three tremendous central figures and the panel of ‘Angels Making Music’. After Hubert’s death in 1426 Jan van Eyck completed the altar-piece, and probably did not adhere altogether strictly to his brother’s original designs. The difference between the work of the two brothers is one not so much of skill as of temperament. Hubert possessed a solemn spirituality and serious thoughtfulness which was not shared by his more worldly younger brother.
Jan van Eyck, born about 1385, is a more popular and no less eminent figure than his elder brother. He lived on in Ghent and Bruges till 1441 and his works are comparatively numerous, whereas few paintings by Hubert are extant. Shortly before completing the Ghent altar-piece, Jan entered the service of Philip of Burgundy, for whom he undertook several diplomatic missions. In this way he saw Portugal and other foreign countries, and his later paintings betray his affectionate remembrance of the country he had seen in southern climes. Jan was essentially a realist, with his keen gaze ever fixed on the beautiful earth and on human beings rather than on religious doctrines. His real bent is shown in many of his panels for ‘The Adoration of the Lamb’. In the panel of ‘The Annunciation’ his delight in the still-life, in the washbasin and other furniture of the room, in the street view seen through the window, reveals him to be the true father of genre painting. His portraits of Jodoc Vydt and his wife, shows without flattery as a dull but prosperous Flemish burgher and his wife, prove him to be the father of modern portraiture. Both these qualities, his capacity for realistic portraiture and his infinite exactitude in rendering the detail of an interior, are magnificently displayed in ‘Jan Arnolfini and his Wife’, one of the most precious things in the National Gallery.
While Hubert belongs to the austere company of monumental or architectural painters, Jan is a pioneer of domestic painting and one of the first producers of what we now know as a ‘picture’. In this development Jan van Eyck was, doubtless unconsciously, meeting the demand of his time and place.
In Northern churches and cathedrals, which need more light than the Southern, the place occupied by wall paintings was gradually given over to stained-glass windows, which are marked features in the Gothic architecture of Northern Europe. Wall-paintings, which still led the way in Italy, became secondary in Flanders do the decorative panels introduced into wooden screenwork. This much accomplished, it was a short step to meet the demands of a prosperous commercial community by (metaphorically) detaching a panel from his ecclesiastical frame and adapting its subject and style to a private dwelling house.
Thus, while Italy remains the home of the religious picture, Flanders and the Netherlands become more and more the home of secular art. Though he painted other religious subjects beside ‘The Adoration of the Lamb’ and the miniature ‘Altar piece’ which the Emperor Charles V took with him on his travels, the most famous of the other paintings by Jan van Eyck are portraits. In his portraiture he is uncompromising in his endeavor to state the whole truth; such details as warts and wrinkles, furrows and stubbly beards, he renders with passionate delight and exactitude. A splendid example of Jan’s rugged realism may be seen from portrait in the Berlin Museum, known as ‘The Man with the pinks’. Precisely drawn, true to every wart and wrinkle, the face is so full of life and character that we almost listen for speech to come from the slightly parted lips. Who this man was has never been discovered, but from his costume and the handsome ring on his finger we may deduce that he was a person of position.
Friday, November 23, 2007
Appalachain Spring
Aaron Copland was an American composer of concert + film music + an accomplished pianist + he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in composition for Appalachian Spring + his scores for Of Mice and Men (1939), Our Town (1940), and The North Star (1943), all received Academy Award nominations + the Heiress won best music in 1949.
(via YouTube): Appalachian Spring - Aaron Copland
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26cmyrtcTNk
Part One: See and hear Aaron Copland, July 1980
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33uW-4ruKR0&feature=related
Appalachian Spring, pt. 1 Blake Richardson, Conductor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jUzobQcq0M
Appalchian Spring, pt. 2 Blake Richardson, Conductor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBL2sld2sPw&feature=related
Blake Richardson conducts Appalachian Spring (3 of 3)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qy8wjuXwOE&feature=related
A true American classic + simply beautiful.
(via YouTube): Appalachian Spring - Aaron Copland
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26cmyrtcTNk
Part One: See and hear Aaron Copland, July 1980
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33uW-4ruKR0&feature=related
Appalachian Spring, pt. 1 Blake Richardson, Conductor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jUzobQcq0M
Appalchian Spring, pt. 2 Blake Richardson, Conductor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBL2sld2sPw&feature=related
Blake Richardson conducts Appalachian Spring (3 of 3)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qy8wjuXwOE&feature=related
A true American classic + simply beautiful.
What I Am Going To Do When I Have Mega Millions?
Actually I found the answer via Larry Doyle (New Yorker, August 27, 2007). I suppose I'll have to hire a lawyer to start preemptively suing people who claim that I owe them money or fathered them or blinded them in a bar fight. And I'll need bodyguards with double-O clearance, for insurance purposes. And another lawyer to sue the first lawyer. But, beyond that, my life is going to stay pretty much the way it is, only with the Mega Millions.
That's it for now.
That's it for now.
Weaker-Dollar Fallout
Kelli B Grant writes about the present status of US dollar + impact on big-ticket imported items such as cars, jewelry, wine when the dollar weakens + other viewpoints @ http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119533955120197040.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
Diamonds Still An Investor's Best Friend As Art Fades
Douwe Miedema writes about the trend among the world's richest to invest in large diamonds + the perception that art is a more speculative investment than precious stones + the concept of fashion fad vs. simple price correction + other viewpoints @ http://www.guardian.co.uk/feedarticle?id=7087633
Clifford Elphick
Andrew Davidson writes about Clifford Elphick, CEO, Gem Diamonds + his way of doing diamond business + knowledge/luck factor + other viewpoints @ http://www.thetimes.co.za/PrintEdition/BusinessTimes/Article.aspx?id=615129
The Stone-age Auteur
(via The Guardian) Adrian Searle writes about William Kentridge, South Africa's most famous artist + his charcoal animations + other viewpoints @ http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/visualart/story/0,,2213950,00.html
The Invention Of Oil Painting
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
The Art of the Van Eycks, Memlinc, and the early Flemish masters
1
In the whole history of painting there are no more remarkable figures than the two brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck. Never before or since has Art made so mighty a stride in the space of one generation. We get some idea of what they achieved if we compare any King or Queen in a pack of playing cards with a modern photograph of a living monarch.
Just as Moliere’s ‘Bourgeois Gentilhomme’ was astounded to find he had been talking prose all his life without knowing it, so some readers may be surprised to learn that they are perfectly familiar with medieval Gothic art, for examples of of it may be found in every pack of playing cards, in which the court cards are survivals of medieval Gothic portraiture.
To obtain the best possible insight into the birth of Gothic art one ought to visit the Cathedral of Brunswick. Here we may see what are probably the best preserved examples of medieval wall paintings. In the choir is a series of pictures, painted about the beginning of the thirteenth century, and one of the best of these represents ‘Herod’s Birthday Feast’. It is perfectly childish, of course, but it is childish in a totally different way from that in which the pictures of Giotto and Angelico are childish. Neither the Italian nor the Brunswick pictures show any sense of perspective or give any real effect of space and distance; but the treatment of the figures greatly differs. In the Italian paintings there is still a faint trace of Greek draughtsmanship distorted by Byzantine dogma, but the Brunswick paintings show quite a new conception of the human body which has nothing to do with Greece or Rome; it is pure Gothic. In these Brunswick paintings the people pictured look like nothing so much as a row of court cards. Herod himself looks as much like a real human being as the King of Hearts look like H.M.King George V.
Now we are in a position to appreciate the art of the brothers Van Eyck. To realize the advance they made we must not compare their figures with the portraits of today or modern photographs, but with the Queen of Spades and the Jack of Diamonds. And we must remember that little over a hundred years separates the style of court card portraiture from the realistic forms of Hubert’s mighty figures surmounting ‘The Adoration of the Lamb’ and Jan van Eyck’s ‘The Man with the Pinks’.
It is a great misfortune that we know so little about the lives of these amazing men. Many interesting details about the early Italian artists have been preserved to us because Giorgio Vasari, himself an early sixteenth-century Florentine painter, wrote the lives of the preceding and contemporary Italian artists with a fullness and vivacity which make his accounts still fascinating and readable. But there was no biographer of the early Flemish artists, and the few meagre facts we know about them have slowly been unearthed by patient scholarship toiling amid the archives of the cities in which these artists lived.
Therefore it is by the pictures which remain, rather than by any written record, that we must endeavor to reconstruct the flowering of art in Flanders and Northern Europe. But if we do study those works, then it is positively electrifying to behold the mysterious and rapid quickening of the artistic spirit in Flanders.
Of what came between the paintings of Brunswick Cathedral and the art of the Van Eycks, little is known and nothing certain. The very names of the painters of some undoubtedly early pictures are unknown, and all we can say with certainty is that from about the end of the fourteenth century to the middle of the fifteenth century a group of painters flourished on the lower Rhine and became known as the School of Cologne. Several of its members are merely legendary, but the Bimburg Chronicle of 1380 contains an authoritative entry:
‘In this time there was a painter in Cologne of the name of Wilhelm; he was considered the best master in all German Land; he paints every man, of whatever form, as if he were alive.’ This master has been identified as William of Herle (or Cologne), who died about 1378, and though he evidently impressed his contemporaries by his pioneer realism the work of his school is esteemed in our own time for its spiritual calm and peaceful purity. ‘St Veronica’ in the National Gallery is probably painted by William of Cologne or by one of his pupils.
The Art of the Van Eycks, Memlinc, and the early Flemish masters
1
In the whole history of painting there are no more remarkable figures than the two brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck. Never before or since has Art made so mighty a stride in the space of one generation. We get some idea of what they achieved if we compare any King or Queen in a pack of playing cards with a modern photograph of a living monarch.
Just as Moliere’s ‘Bourgeois Gentilhomme’ was astounded to find he had been talking prose all his life without knowing it, so some readers may be surprised to learn that they are perfectly familiar with medieval Gothic art, for examples of of it may be found in every pack of playing cards, in which the court cards are survivals of medieval Gothic portraiture.
To obtain the best possible insight into the birth of Gothic art one ought to visit the Cathedral of Brunswick. Here we may see what are probably the best preserved examples of medieval wall paintings. In the choir is a series of pictures, painted about the beginning of the thirteenth century, and one of the best of these represents ‘Herod’s Birthday Feast’. It is perfectly childish, of course, but it is childish in a totally different way from that in which the pictures of Giotto and Angelico are childish. Neither the Italian nor the Brunswick pictures show any sense of perspective or give any real effect of space and distance; but the treatment of the figures greatly differs. In the Italian paintings there is still a faint trace of Greek draughtsmanship distorted by Byzantine dogma, but the Brunswick paintings show quite a new conception of the human body which has nothing to do with Greece or Rome; it is pure Gothic. In these Brunswick paintings the people pictured look like nothing so much as a row of court cards. Herod himself looks as much like a real human being as the King of Hearts look like H.M.King George V.
Now we are in a position to appreciate the art of the brothers Van Eyck. To realize the advance they made we must not compare their figures with the portraits of today or modern photographs, but with the Queen of Spades and the Jack of Diamonds. And we must remember that little over a hundred years separates the style of court card portraiture from the realistic forms of Hubert’s mighty figures surmounting ‘The Adoration of the Lamb’ and Jan van Eyck’s ‘The Man with the Pinks’.
It is a great misfortune that we know so little about the lives of these amazing men. Many interesting details about the early Italian artists have been preserved to us because Giorgio Vasari, himself an early sixteenth-century Florentine painter, wrote the lives of the preceding and contemporary Italian artists with a fullness and vivacity which make his accounts still fascinating and readable. But there was no biographer of the early Flemish artists, and the few meagre facts we know about them have slowly been unearthed by patient scholarship toiling amid the archives of the cities in which these artists lived.
Therefore it is by the pictures which remain, rather than by any written record, that we must endeavor to reconstruct the flowering of art in Flanders and Northern Europe. But if we do study those works, then it is positively electrifying to behold the mysterious and rapid quickening of the artistic spirit in Flanders.
Of what came between the paintings of Brunswick Cathedral and the art of the Van Eycks, little is known and nothing certain. The very names of the painters of some undoubtedly early pictures are unknown, and all we can say with certainty is that from about the end of the fourteenth century to the middle of the fifteenth century a group of painters flourished on the lower Rhine and became known as the School of Cologne. Several of its members are merely legendary, but the Bimburg Chronicle of 1380 contains an authoritative entry:
‘In this time there was a painter in Cologne of the name of Wilhelm; he was considered the best master in all German Land; he paints every man, of whatever form, as if he were alive.’ This master has been identified as William of Herle (or Cologne), who died about 1378, and though he evidently impressed his contemporaries by his pioneer realism the work of his school is esteemed in our own time for its spiritual calm and peaceful purity. ‘St Veronica’ in the National Gallery is probably painted by William of Cologne or by one of his pupils.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Daniel Terdiman
New Business Models: Bryan Gardiner writes about Daniel Terdiman + his new book The Entrepreneur's Guide to Second Life: Making Money in the Metaverse + Second Life entrepreneurism + other viewpoints @ http://www.wired.com/print/techbiz/people/news/2007/11/terdiman
Léolo
Léolo (1992)
Directed by: Jean-Claude Lauzon
Screenplay: Jean-Claude Lauzon
Cast: Gilbert Sicotte, Maxime Collin
(via YouTube): Leolo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OqC7ELoRrM
An extravagant fantasy + magical realism + hilarious.
Directed by: Jean-Claude Lauzon
Screenplay: Jean-Claude Lauzon
Cast: Gilbert Sicotte, Maxime Collin
(via YouTube): Leolo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OqC7ELoRrM
An extravagant fantasy + magical realism + hilarious.
People Are More Dangerous Than HIV
A few weeks ago, in a movie theatre, a person felt something poking from her seat When she got up to see what it was, she found a needle sticking out of the seat with a note attached saying
"You have just been infected by HIV".
The Disease Control Center (in Paris ) reports many similar events in many other cities recently. All tested needles were HIV Positive. The Center also reports that needles have been found in cash dispensers at public banking machines.
We ask everyone to use extreme caution when faced with this kind of situation. All public chairs/seats should be inspected with vigilance and caution before use. A careful visual inspection should be enough. In addition, they ask that each of you pass this message along to all members of your family and your friends of the potential danger.
Recently, one doctor has narrated a somewhat similar instance that happened to one of his patients at the Priya Cinema in Delhi. A young girl, engaged and about to be married in a couple of months, was pricked while the movie was going on. The tag with the needle had the message "Welcome to the World of HIV family".
Though the doctors told her family that it takes about 6 months before the virus grows strong enough to start damaging the system and a healthy victim could survive about 5-6 years, the girl died in 4 months, perhaps more because of the "Shock thought".
We all have to be careful at public places, rest God help!
"You have just been infected by HIV".
The Disease Control Center (in Paris ) reports many similar events in many other cities recently. All tested needles were HIV Positive. The Center also reports that needles have been found in cash dispensers at public banking machines.
We ask everyone to use extreme caution when faced with this kind of situation. All public chairs/seats should be inspected with vigilance and caution before use. A careful visual inspection should be enough. In addition, they ask that each of you pass this message along to all members of your family and your friends of the potential danger.
Recently, one doctor has narrated a somewhat similar instance that happened to one of his patients at the Priya Cinema in Delhi. A young girl, engaged and about to be married in a couple of months, was pricked while the movie was going on. The tag with the needle had the message "Welcome to the World of HIV family".
Though the doctors told her family that it takes about 6 months before the virus grows strong enough to start damaging the system and a healthy victim could survive about 5-6 years, the girl died in 4 months, perhaps more because of the "Shock thought".
We all have to be careful at public places, rest God help!
A Date With The Chapmans
(via The Guardian) Absolutely free. Exclusive online art work by Jake and Dinos Chapman @ http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/visualart/page/0,,2212423,00.html
Art Rocks
Barbara Pollack writes about a new generation of artists that combine music, flamboyant costumes, video projections + a new wave of contemporary artists whose projects blur the distinction between popular music and fine art + other viewpoints @ http://artnews.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=1228
Single Or Plain Pointed Star Cuts
(via Diamond Cuts in Historic Jewelry:1381-1910) Herbert Tillander writes:
Only in portraits have I ever come across Pointed Star Cuts without girdle facets, but very few portrait painters have ever known enough about jewelry to reproduce gems with any degree of accuracy. Even J.H von Hefner-Alteneck, Professor of Design and Superintendent of the Bayerrisches Nationalmuseum, made a serious but very typical mistake. In his illustrated work on sixteenth-century jewelry, published in 1890, he reproduced a perfect drawing by Mielich but turned the regular Double Rosettes into groups of plain, three-facet Rose cuts—the design which, at the time he was writing, most closely resembled the earlier cut. With his background and training he should certainly have known better. But if someone of the calibre of Hefner-Alteneck was capable of making so glaring an error, how can one rely on details of jewelry by even the greatest portrait painters?
Certainly in Elizabethan portraits, Star Cuts, particularly those of exceptional size, may have been simply combinations of eight triangular diamonds, not unlike the eight-petalled Rosettes of the period. They were clearly inspired by the Pointed Star Cut, but had been created for show, following royal command. However, artists may also have been instructed to exaggerate the splendor of the jewels, as Holbein often did in his portraits of English royalty.
The accession of Elizabeth I to the English throne in 1558 was significant in the world of fashion. Magnificent jewelry, hitherto worn mainly by men, was now used more and more by women. In fact, from now on, opulent jewels gradually became the prerogative of queens. Although in her portrait (The Phoenix Portrait of Elizabeth 1 by Nicholas Hilliard, c. 1575—National Portrait Gallery, London), pearls appear to overshadow Elizabeth’s other jewels, the three large Pointed Star Cut diamonds are the most important gems. I do not believe that any of the Star Cuts could have been sapphires, as is sometimes maintained. Portrait painters frequently painted diamonds with a bluish tinge. Certainly such diamond cuts existed and were favored, particularly by royalty, throughout the sixteenth century.
The diamonds in the brooch (A Gonzaga Princess by Frans Pourbus the Younger, c. 1605—Museo degli Argenti, Palazzo Pitti, Florence) are all pointed. The square and lozenge-shaped gems are of the Standard type, with four large facets in both crown and pavilion. The rectangular stones are normal Hogbacks. The eight round ones are Star Cuts. Four of the diamonds—assuming that they are correctly reproduced by the artist—were already out of date; their facets meet in a ridge, like basically faceted half-moons. All the gems appear to be pavilion-based and must surely have displayed attractive light effects.
Only in portraits have I ever come across Pointed Star Cuts without girdle facets, but very few portrait painters have ever known enough about jewelry to reproduce gems with any degree of accuracy. Even J.H von Hefner-Alteneck, Professor of Design and Superintendent of the Bayerrisches Nationalmuseum, made a serious but very typical mistake. In his illustrated work on sixteenth-century jewelry, published in 1890, he reproduced a perfect drawing by Mielich but turned the regular Double Rosettes into groups of plain, three-facet Rose cuts—the design which, at the time he was writing, most closely resembled the earlier cut. With his background and training he should certainly have known better. But if someone of the calibre of Hefner-Alteneck was capable of making so glaring an error, how can one rely on details of jewelry by even the greatest portrait painters?
Certainly in Elizabethan portraits, Star Cuts, particularly those of exceptional size, may have been simply combinations of eight triangular diamonds, not unlike the eight-petalled Rosettes of the period. They were clearly inspired by the Pointed Star Cut, but had been created for show, following royal command. However, artists may also have been instructed to exaggerate the splendor of the jewels, as Holbein often did in his portraits of English royalty.
The accession of Elizabeth I to the English throne in 1558 was significant in the world of fashion. Magnificent jewelry, hitherto worn mainly by men, was now used more and more by women. In fact, from now on, opulent jewels gradually became the prerogative of queens. Although in her portrait (The Phoenix Portrait of Elizabeth 1 by Nicholas Hilliard, c. 1575—National Portrait Gallery, London), pearls appear to overshadow Elizabeth’s other jewels, the three large Pointed Star Cut diamonds are the most important gems. I do not believe that any of the Star Cuts could have been sapphires, as is sometimes maintained. Portrait painters frequently painted diamonds with a bluish tinge. Certainly such diamond cuts existed and were favored, particularly by royalty, throughout the sixteenth century.
The diamonds in the brooch (A Gonzaga Princess by Frans Pourbus the Younger, c. 1605—Museo degli Argenti, Palazzo Pitti, Florence) are all pointed. The square and lozenge-shaped gems are of the Standard type, with four large facets in both crown and pavilion. The rectangular stones are normal Hogbacks. The eight round ones are Star Cuts. Four of the diamonds—assuming that they are correctly reproduced by the artist—were already out of date; their facets meet in a ridge, like basically faceted half-moons. All the gems appear to be pavilion-based and must surely have displayed attractive light effects.
The Birth Of Modern Painting
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
5
Romantic mysticism, which budded with Fra Angelico, passed by Lippi to flower with all sweetness and beauty in the art of his pupil, Alessandro Filipepi, famed as Botticelli. Sandro Botticelli was born in Florence about 1447, and was first apprenticed to a goldsmith. To the end of his life he was a jeweler in colors, but owes little beside the name of Botticelli, by which we known him, to his goldsmith master, whom he soon left, to devote himself thenceforth entirely to painting. The thing that differentiates the art of Botticelli from that of all his predecessors is the intensely personal, even egotistical note that he strikes in all his work. The exquisite, delicate melancholy which pervades the expression, both of Christian saints and Pagan gods, in all his pictures, is his own, not theirs, as though he were sorry for them for being saints and gods, and so, by their very nature, deprived of all those ecstasies alike of faith and of doubt, of conviction and speculation, which are the compensating privileges of human imperfection.
The Italy of Botticelli was not the Italy of Fra Angelico. Beauty was no longer the handmaid of religion. The Church was no longer the only patron of art, nor were church walls the only outlet for artists. Cosimo de Medici and Lorenzo the Magnificent did not worry their painters with theological restrictions; it was beauty that they wanted. It was not till his master Lippi left Florence in 1467 to undertake a commission at Spoleto, that Botticelli began to develop his own individuality. Pictures before that date, as ‘The Adoration of the Magi’ in the National Gallery, reflect the art of Lippi. But as soon as the young painter was left alone in Florence, he mixed with other artists like the Pollaiuoli, who had greater knowledge of anatomy than Lippi, and his art made rapid progress. On another page is shown one of the most beautiful of these early works, ‘Judith with the Head of Holophernes’. Muscular action is finely expressed in the swinging stride of the maid who follows bearing the head of of the slain tyrant, while the heroine herself is depicted with all the fresh girlish charm of one of the young Florentine maids who frequented the artist’s studio. In the distance the great army of invasion is seen retreating in confusion through a spacious landscape.
Botticelli’s chief patron in Florence was not Lorenzo the Magnificent, but a distant kinsman of the Duke with the same name. For the villa at Castello, belonging to this younger Lorenzo de Medici, Botticelli painted a number of pictures, among them, about 1477, the famous ‘Primavera’. No more beautiful allegory of the coming of Spring has ever been painted than this picture. In the center Venus, the Goddess of Love, awaits Spring’s coming, with Cupid hovering over her. On her right are the Three Graces, with Mercury, the Messenger of the Gods; on her left gaily-decked Spring advances, gently pushed forward by Flora, the goddess of flowers, and by Zephyr, who personifies the mild west wind. Where’er she treads the flowers spring to life. Beautiful as an interpretation of old Greek legends, which make a human story out of all the phenomena of Nature, this picture is also an expression of the revived pagan delight in physical form which was typical of fifteenth century Florence.
The fame of this and other pictures by Botticelli spread to Rome, whither in 1481 he was summoned by the Pope to assist in the decoration of the Sistine Chapel, where three great frescoes, the ‘History of Moses’, ‘Destruction of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram,’ and ‘Temptation of Christ’, remain to this day as a monument of his skill, his energy, and his sense of drama and beauty. After two years in Rome, Botticelli returned to Florence, where, in 1483, he painted the most exquisite of all his Madonnas, ‘The Magnificat’. But the happy days of the painter were drawing to an end. After the death of Lorenzo in 1492 and the accession of his worthless son Piero, Florence was agitated by political troubles; and to that city, tired of pleasure and weary of knowledge, came Girolamo Savonarola, the great reformer priest.
When the Medici were expelled from Florence, the young Lorenzo went with them, and Botticelli lost his best patron. During these tumultuous years Botticelli devoted much of his time to executing a wonder series of illustrations to Dante, the originals of which are still preserved in Vatican Library and the Berlin Museum. These drawings reveal not only an intimate knowledge of the great poem, but also a profound sympathy with the feelings of the poet. Savonarola preached and Botticelli listened, though happily he did not follow the example of some of his contemporaries, and burn his earlier pictures of pagan subjects. Though his brother Simone, who lived with him in these later years, was a fanatical disciple of Savanarola, Sandro himself does not appear to have been wholly converted till the great preacher in turn became the victim of the fury of a fickle populace.
In the same year (1498) in which Savanarola was burned at the stake in the Piazza della Signoria, Botticelli painted his great picture, ‘The Calumny of Apelles’. This work, had a double purpose. Nominally it was an attempt to reproduce a famous lost picture, Calumny, by the ancient Greek painter Apelles, from the description of it given by the Greek writer Lucian. But we can have little doubt that the inward and spiritual meaning of this picture, which shows black-robed Calumny (or according to another interpretation, Remorse) slinking from the radiant presence of the naked Truth, was directed against the calumniators of the martyred friar. Among all Botticelli’s pictures this painting is distinguished by its exquisite finish and richness of detail, and we may regard it as the last great expression of his powers both as a classic and a humanist. Distressed both by the disturbed state of his native city and by the tragic end of Savanoralo, Botticelli fretted himself into melancholia during his last years. The few religious pictures of this period which remain—many of them probably finished by pupils after the master’s death—contain a strange exaggeration of gesture and facial expression, and an almost theatrical vehemence of action, which are entirely foreign to the poetical fantasies of his earlier manner. As an example of the high-strung emotions of his last years, ‘The Mourning of Christ’ may be compared in these pages with the serene tranquility of Botticelli’s early and middle-period work. The happiest painting of his last period is the little ‘Nativity’ in the National Gallery.
5
Romantic mysticism, which budded with Fra Angelico, passed by Lippi to flower with all sweetness and beauty in the art of his pupil, Alessandro Filipepi, famed as Botticelli. Sandro Botticelli was born in Florence about 1447, and was first apprenticed to a goldsmith. To the end of his life he was a jeweler in colors, but owes little beside the name of Botticelli, by which we known him, to his goldsmith master, whom he soon left, to devote himself thenceforth entirely to painting. The thing that differentiates the art of Botticelli from that of all his predecessors is the intensely personal, even egotistical note that he strikes in all his work. The exquisite, delicate melancholy which pervades the expression, both of Christian saints and Pagan gods, in all his pictures, is his own, not theirs, as though he were sorry for them for being saints and gods, and so, by their very nature, deprived of all those ecstasies alike of faith and of doubt, of conviction and speculation, which are the compensating privileges of human imperfection.
The Italy of Botticelli was not the Italy of Fra Angelico. Beauty was no longer the handmaid of religion. The Church was no longer the only patron of art, nor were church walls the only outlet for artists. Cosimo de Medici and Lorenzo the Magnificent did not worry their painters with theological restrictions; it was beauty that they wanted. It was not till his master Lippi left Florence in 1467 to undertake a commission at Spoleto, that Botticelli began to develop his own individuality. Pictures before that date, as ‘The Adoration of the Magi’ in the National Gallery, reflect the art of Lippi. But as soon as the young painter was left alone in Florence, he mixed with other artists like the Pollaiuoli, who had greater knowledge of anatomy than Lippi, and his art made rapid progress. On another page is shown one of the most beautiful of these early works, ‘Judith with the Head of Holophernes’. Muscular action is finely expressed in the swinging stride of the maid who follows bearing the head of of the slain tyrant, while the heroine herself is depicted with all the fresh girlish charm of one of the young Florentine maids who frequented the artist’s studio. In the distance the great army of invasion is seen retreating in confusion through a spacious landscape.
Botticelli’s chief patron in Florence was not Lorenzo the Magnificent, but a distant kinsman of the Duke with the same name. For the villa at Castello, belonging to this younger Lorenzo de Medici, Botticelli painted a number of pictures, among them, about 1477, the famous ‘Primavera’. No more beautiful allegory of the coming of Spring has ever been painted than this picture. In the center Venus, the Goddess of Love, awaits Spring’s coming, with Cupid hovering over her. On her right are the Three Graces, with Mercury, the Messenger of the Gods; on her left gaily-decked Spring advances, gently pushed forward by Flora, the goddess of flowers, and by Zephyr, who personifies the mild west wind. Where’er she treads the flowers spring to life. Beautiful as an interpretation of old Greek legends, which make a human story out of all the phenomena of Nature, this picture is also an expression of the revived pagan delight in physical form which was typical of fifteenth century Florence.
The fame of this and other pictures by Botticelli spread to Rome, whither in 1481 he was summoned by the Pope to assist in the decoration of the Sistine Chapel, where three great frescoes, the ‘History of Moses’, ‘Destruction of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram,’ and ‘Temptation of Christ’, remain to this day as a monument of his skill, his energy, and his sense of drama and beauty. After two years in Rome, Botticelli returned to Florence, where, in 1483, he painted the most exquisite of all his Madonnas, ‘The Magnificat’. But the happy days of the painter were drawing to an end. After the death of Lorenzo in 1492 and the accession of his worthless son Piero, Florence was agitated by political troubles; and to that city, tired of pleasure and weary of knowledge, came Girolamo Savonarola, the great reformer priest.
When the Medici were expelled from Florence, the young Lorenzo went with them, and Botticelli lost his best patron. During these tumultuous years Botticelli devoted much of his time to executing a wonder series of illustrations to Dante, the originals of which are still preserved in Vatican Library and the Berlin Museum. These drawings reveal not only an intimate knowledge of the great poem, but also a profound sympathy with the feelings of the poet. Savonarola preached and Botticelli listened, though happily he did not follow the example of some of his contemporaries, and burn his earlier pictures of pagan subjects. Though his brother Simone, who lived with him in these later years, was a fanatical disciple of Savanarola, Sandro himself does not appear to have been wholly converted till the great preacher in turn became the victim of the fury of a fickle populace.
In the same year (1498) in which Savanarola was burned at the stake in the Piazza della Signoria, Botticelli painted his great picture, ‘The Calumny of Apelles’. This work, had a double purpose. Nominally it was an attempt to reproduce a famous lost picture, Calumny, by the ancient Greek painter Apelles, from the description of it given by the Greek writer Lucian. But we can have little doubt that the inward and spiritual meaning of this picture, which shows black-robed Calumny (or according to another interpretation, Remorse) slinking from the radiant presence of the naked Truth, was directed against the calumniators of the martyred friar. Among all Botticelli’s pictures this painting is distinguished by its exquisite finish and richness of detail, and we may regard it as the last great expression of his powers both as a classic and a humanist. Distressed both by the disturbed state of his native city and by the tragic end of Savanoralo, Botticelli fretted himself into melancholia during his last years. The few religious pictures of this period which remain—many of them probably finished by pupils after the master’s death—contain a strange exaggeration of gesture and facial expression, and an almost theatrical vehemence of action, which are entirely foreign to the poetical fantasies of his earlier manner. As an example of the high-strung emotions of his last years, ‘The Mourning of Christ’ may be compared in these pages with the serene tranquility of Botticelli’s early and middle-period work. The happiest painting of his last period is the little ‘Nativity’ in the National Gallery.
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
How Basic Are Behavioral Biases? Evidence From Capuchin Monkey Trading Behavior
A recent study published by a group of researchers at Yale University, titled, 'How Basic Are Behavioral Biases? Evidence From Capuchin Monkey Trading Behavior' is interesting + educational. Jewelers/gem dealers/gemologists/art dealers may want to read the report @
http://www.som.yale.edu/Faculty/keith.chen/papers/Final_JPE06.pdf
http://www.som.yale.edu/Faculty/keith.chen/papers/Final_JPE06.pdf
Hollywood Takes Action Hero Jesus To India
(via The Guardian) Randeep Ramesh writes about the Aquarian Gospel + a $20m movie, which portrays Jesus as a holy man and teacher inspired by a myriad of eastern religions in India + a fantasy action adventure account of Jesus's life with the three wise men as his mentors + commercial and spiritual gains from the concept + other viewpoints @ http://film.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2213087,00.html
Net Gains
Carly Berwick writes about interactive, computer-based artworks + a general acceptance of the genre + other viewpoints @ http://artnews.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=1226
A Swashbuckling Tale Of 10th-century Adventure
Ishaan Tharoor writes about 'The Adventures of Amir Hamza' + its Persian/Arabian roots + the blending of Sufi Islam and the mythological repertoire of the older strains of Hinduism + the religious element + other viewpoints @ http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1684204,00.html
Mon Oncle d'Amérique
Mon Oncle d'Amérique (1980)
Directed by: Alain Resnais
Screenplay: Jean Gruault
Cast: Gérard Depardieu, Nicole Garcia
(via YouTube): Mon oncle d'Amerique
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7AfY-ux7Ds
It's entertaining + illustrative + experimental + a form of movie fun.
Directed by: Alain Resnais
Screenplay: Jean Gruault
Cast: Gérard Depardieu, Nicole Garcia
(via YouTube): Mon oncle d'Amerique
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7AfY-ux7Ds
It's entertaining + illustrative + experimental + a form of movie fun.
Ancient Jade Study Sheds Light On Sea Trade
Tan Ee Lyn writes about ancient jade artifacts in museums across southeast Asia + the sea trade patterns dating back 5,000 years + analytical studies via X-ray spectrometers + other viewpoints @ http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071119/sc_nm/jade_asia_dc
Nay Win Tun: Burma's Gem Stone Tycoon
Wai Moe writes about Nay Win Tun, the CEO of Ruby Dragon Jade & Gems Co Ltd, a young businessman in his early 40s, who controls Burma’s largest gem trading business + other viewpoints @ http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=9164
A Rare Red Diamond
According to the Christie's, a rare purplish-red diamond ring has sold (British jeweler, Laurence Graff, bought the ring) for 2.97 million Swiss francs ($2.6 million), setting a world record for a red diamond. For photo and details see Christie’s and Reuters.
The Birth Of Modern Painting
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
4
In the expression of feeling, the most famous follower of Fra Angelico was Fra Filippo Lippi, but if unable to attain the etheral spirituality of Angelico his art was full of humanity and delicacy. His Madonnas belong to Florence rather than to heaven and reveal the painter’s fine feeling for feminine beauty more obviously than his piety. He was a genial painter, and in his comfortable satisfaction with the things of this life he shared with Angelico a love of flowers. ‘No one draws such lilies or such daisies as Lippi,’ wrote Ruskin. ‘Botticelli beat him afterwards in roses, but never in lilies.’
Lippi’s geniality is very evident in his ‘Annunciation’. The figures are human, the scene is homely, characteristics generally suggestive of the Dutch painters of a much later generation.
Fra Angelico and Fra Lippi stand for the imaginative development that followed the death of Giotto. In the other direction, the first great advance in the rendering of physical nature is found in the painting of Paolo Uccello, who first introduced perspective into pictures. Uccello was far more interested in the technical problems of foreshortening and perspective than in anything else. Uccello represents the scientific spirit in the air of the Florence of Cosmo de Medici, where not only artists, but mathematicians, anatomists, and great scholars were congregated. Among his achievements must be reckoned the recommencement of profane painting by his invention of the battle picture, a subject in which he had no predecessor and no successor till a century later. His early battle piece, the ‘Sant Egidio’, amuses us by the rocking horse appearance of the horses. In his absorption with technique, Uccello was indifferent then to realistic accuracy. Truths of color did not interest him—he painted horses red. The third dimension in space, which Giotto could only suggest experimentally and symbolically, was conquered by Uccello, who clearly separated the planes in which his figures move and have their being. Roses, oranges, and hedges were drawn with botanical precision, and no pains were spared to draw branches and even leaves in correct perspective. The splendid realism to which Uccello ultimately attained is best represented by the intensely alive animal and its rider. Uccello’s equestrian portrait of the English mercenary John Hawkwood in the cathedral of Florence is a milestone in the history of art.
The Birth Of Modern Painting (continued)
4
In the expression of feeling, the most famous follower of Fra Angelico was Fra Filippo Lippi, but if unable to attain the etheral spirituality of Angelico his art was full of humanity and delicacy. His Madonnas belong to Florence rather than to heaven and reveal the painter’s fine feeling for feminine beauty more obviously than his piety. He was a genial painter, and in his comfortable satisfaction with the things of this life he shared with Angelico a love of flowers. ‘No one draws such lilies or such daisies as Lippi,’ wrote Ruskin. ‘Botticelli beat him afterwards in roses, but never in lilies.’
Lippi’s geniality is very evident in his ‘Annunciation’. The figures are human, the scene is homely, characteristics generally suggestive of the Dutch painters of a much later generation.
Fra Angelico and Fra Lippi stand for the imaginative development that followed the death of Giotto. In the other direction, the first great advance in the rendering of physical nature is found in the painting of Paolo Uccello, who first introduced perspective into pictures. Uccello was far more interested in the technical problems of foreshortening and perspective than in anything else. Uccello represents the scientific spirit in the air of the Florence of Cosmo de Medici, where not only artists, but mathematicians, anatomists, and great scholars were congregated. Among his achievements must be reckoned the recommencement of profane painting by his invention of the battle picture, a subject in which he had no predecessor and no successor till a century later. His early battle piece, the ‘Sant Egidio’, amuses us by the rocking horse appearance of the horses. In his absorption with technique, Uccello was indifferent then to realistic accuracy. Truths of color did not interest him—he painted horses red. The third dimension in space, which Giotto could only suggest experimentally and symbolically, was conquered by Uccello, who clearly separated the planes in which his figures move and have their being. Roses, oranges, and hedges were drawn with botanical precision, and no pains were spared to draw branches and even leaves in correct perspective. The splendid realism to which Uccello ultimately attained is best represented by the intensely alive animal and its rider. Uccello’s equestrian portrait of the English mercenary John Hawkwood in the cathedral of Florence is a milestone in the history of art.
The Birth Of Modern Painting (continued)
Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India
Rule for ascertaining the proper price of a diamond of whatsover weight it may be, from 3 up to and above 100 carats
(via Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India / V Ball / Edited by William Crooke)
I do not mention diamonds below 3 carats, their price being sufficiently well known. It is first necessary to ascertain the weight of the diamond, and next to see it is perfect, whether it is a thick stone, square-shaped, and having all its angles perfect; whether it is of a beautiful white water, and bright, without points, and without flaws. It if is a stone cut into facettes, which is ordinarily called ‘a rose’, it is necessary to observe whether the form is truly round or oval; whether the stone is well-spread, and whether it is not a lumpy stone; and, moreover, whether it is of uniform water, and is without points and flaws, as I described the thick stone.
A stone of this quality, weighing 1 carat, is worth 150 livres or more, and supposing it is required to know the value of a stone of 12 carats of the same degree of perfection, this is how it is to be ascertained: square the 12, this amounts to 144; next multiply 144 by 150, i.e the price of 1 carat, and it amounts to 21,6000 livres—12 x 12 x 150 = 21600. This is the price of a diamond of 12 carats.
But it is not enough to know the price of only perfect diamonds, one must know also the price of those which are not so; this is ascertained by the same rule, and on the basis of the price of a stone of 1 carat. This is an example: suppose a diamond of 15 carats which is not perfect, the water being not good, or the stone badly shaped, or full of spots or flaws. A diamond of the same nature, of the weight of 1 carat, would not be worth more than 60 or 80 or 100 livres at the most, according to the beauty of the diamond. You must then square the weight of the diamond, i.e 15 carats, and next multiply the product 125 by the value of the stone of 1 carat, which may for example be 80 livres, and the product, which is 10000 livres, is the price of the diamond of 15 carats.
It is easy to see from this the great difference in value between a perfect stone and one which is not so. For if this stone of 15 carats had been perfect, the second multiplication would be by 150, which is the price of a perfect stone of 1 carat, and then it would amount not to 10000 livres, but to 33750 livres, i.e. to 23750 livres more than an imperfect diamond of the same weight.
According to this rule, the following is the value of the two largest among the cut stones in the world—one of them in Asia belong to the Great Mogul, the other in Europe belonging to the Grand Duke of Tuscany—as will be seen by the subjoined figures.
The Great Mogul’s diamond weighs 278 9/16 carats, is of perfect water, good form, and has only a small flaw which is in the edge of the basal circumference of the stone. Except for this flaw the first carat would be placed at 160 livres, but on that account I do not estimate it at more than 150, and so calculated according to the above given rule it reaches the sum of 11,723,278 livres, 14 sols, and 3 liards. If this diamond only weighed 279 carats, it would have been worth 11,679,150 livres only, and thus these 9/16ths are worth 47,128 livres, 14 sols, 3 liards.
The Grand Duke of Tuscany’s diamond weighs 139½ carats, is clear, and of good form, cut on all sides into facettes, and as the water tends somewhat to a citron color, I estimate the first carat at only 135 livres, from which the value of the diamond ought to be 2.608,335 livres.
In concluding the remarks which I have made in this chapter, I should say that in the language of the miners the diamond is called iri; that in Turkish, Persian, and Arabic it is called almas, and that in all the languages of Europe it has no other name than diamond.
This, then, in a few words is all that I have been able to discover with my own eyes in regard to this subject during the several journeys which I made to the mines; and if by chance some other has written or spoken of them before me, it can only have been from the reports which I have made of them.
(via Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India / V Ball / Edited by William Crooke)
I do not mention diamonds below 3 carats, their price being sufficiently well known. It is first necessary to ascertain the weight of the diamond, and next to see it is perfect, whether it is a thick stone, square-shaped, and having all its angles perfect; whether it is of a beautiful white water, and bright, without points, and without flaws. It if is a stone cut into facettes, which is ordinarily called ‘a rose’, it is necessary to observe whether the form is truly round or oval; whether the stone is well-spread, and whether it is not a lumpy stone; and, moreover, whether it is of uniform water, and is without points and flaws, as I described the thick stone.
A stone of this quality, weighing 1 carat, is worth 150 livres or more, and supposing it is required to know the value of a stone of 12 carats of the same degree of perfection, this is how it is to be ascertained: square the 12, this amounts to 144; next multiply 144 by 150, i.e the price of 1 carat, and it amounts to 21,6000 livres—12 x 12 x 150 = 21600. This is the price of a diamond of 12 carats.
But it is not enough to know the price of only perfect diamonds, one must know also the price of those which are not so; this is ascertained by the same rule, and on the basis of the price of a stone of 1 carat. This is an example: suppose a diamond of 15 carats which is not perfect, the water being not good, or the stone badly shaped, or full of spots or flaws. A diamond of the same nature, of the weight of 1 carat, would not be worth more than 60 or 80 or 100 livres at the most, according to the beauty of the diamond. You must then square the weight of the diamond, i.e 15 carats, and next multiply the product 125 by the value of the stone of 1 carat, which may for example be 80 livres, and the product, which is 10000 livres, is the price of the diamond of 15 carats.
It is easy to see from this the great difference in value between a perfect stone and one which is not so. For if this stone of 15 carats had been perfect, the second multiplication would be by 150, which is the price of a perfect stone of 1 carat, and then it would amount not to 10000 livres, but to 33750 livres, i.e. to 23750 livres more than an imperfect diamond of the same weight.
According to this rule, the following is the value of the two largest among the cut stones in the world—one of them in Asia belong to the Great Mogul, the other in Europe belonging to the Grand Duke of Tuscany—as will be seen by the subjoined figures.
The Great Mogul’s diamond weighs 278 9/16 carats, is of perfect water, good form, and has only a small flaw which is in the edge of the basal circumference of the stone. Except for this flaw the first carat would be placed at 160 livres, but on that account I do not estimate it at more than 150, and so calculated according to the above given rule it reaches the sum of 11,723,278 livres, 14 sols, and 3 liards. If this diamond only weighed 279 carats, it would have been worth 11,679,150 livres only, and thus these 9/16ths are worth 47,128 livres, 14 sols, 3 liards.
The Grand Duke of Tuscany’s diamond weighs 139½ carats, is clear, and of good form, cut on all sides into facettes, and as the water tends somewhat to a citron color, I estimate the first carat at only 135 livres, from which the value of the diamond ought to be 2.608,335 livres.
In concluding the remarks which I have made in this chapter, I should say that in the language of the miners the diamond is called iri; that in Turkish, Persian, and Arabic it is called almas, and that in all the languages of Europe it has no other name than diamond.
This, then, in a few words is all that I have been able to discover with my own eyes in regard to this subject during the several journeys which I made to the mines; and if by chance some other has written or spoken of them before me, it can only have been from the reports which I have made of them.
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
What Do I Want From A Gemstone?
I want surprises in my gemstones. A beginning and end. I don't want clarity. I like peaks and valleys. Good gemstones, bad gemstones, the perfect and flawed. Every gemstone is a story.
Bag Lady
Megha Bahree writes about Anita Ahuja, the creator of Conserve, a Delhi nonprofit organization + other viewpoints @ http://members.forbes.com/global/2007/1126/029.html
Dizzy In Boomtown
The Economist writes about the boom in emerging economies and their stockmarkets + pros and cons + the alarming memories of the early 1990s + other viewpoints @ http://www.economist.com/finance/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10136509
I think the analysis should be a wake-up call for emerging markets like India and China. Vast capital inflows can harm economies in several ways. Not only can they inflate asset bubbles and spur excessive borrowing, but they can also cause a steep rise in the exchange rate, damaging the competitiveness of export sectors.
I think the analysis should be a wake-up call for emerging markets like India and China. Vast capital inflows can harm economies in several ways. Not only can they inflate asset bubbles and spur excessive borrowing, but they can also cause a steep rise in the exchange rate, damaging the competitiveness of export sectors.
Persona
Persona (1966)
Directed by: Ingmar Bergman
Screenplay: Ingmar Bergman
Cast: Bibi Andersson, Liv Ullmann, Margaretha Krook, Gunnar Björnstrand
(via YouTube): Persona - Ingmar Bergman
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MeehCG9oF4c
A Bergman masterpiece. A great scene.
Directed by: Ingmar Bergman
Screenplay: Ingmar Bergman
Cast: Bibi Andersson, Liv Ullmann, Margaretha Krook, Gunnar Björnstrand
(via YouTube): Persona - Ingmar Bergman
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MeehCG9oF4c
A Bergman masterpiece. A great scene.
Tutankhamun's Treasures
(via The Guardian): Egyptologist Zahi Hawass introduces the new Tutankhamun exhibition at London's O2 @ http://arts.guardian.co.uk/video/2007/nov/14/tutankhamun.arts
How Our Critics Spoke
(via ARTnews correspondents): Different viewpoints @ http://artnews.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=1215
Madagascar's Sapphire Rush
Jonny Hogg writes about the town of Ilakaka in Madagascar + it's reputation for being one of the most dangerous places in the country because of sapphires + other viewpoints @ http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7098213.stm
Raising Awareness And Helping The Coral
(via Bangkok Post, November 18, 2007) Corals are now like plants: cuttings can be grown in a nursery, then transplanted elsewhere. Transplanting coral is exactly what conservation-minded people will be doing at Phi Phi Lae on December 3 as part of the celebrations to mark the 80th birthday of His Majesty the King. Organized by the Phuket Marine Biological Center, the celebrations also include an exhibition on marine conservation, reef cleanup and rubbish collecting on the beach at Phi Phi Don, the only populated island in the Phi Phi group, off Krabi.
‘Coral reefs at Phi Phi Lae were among the worst hit by tsunami in 2004,’ Dr Nalinee Thongtham, who heads PNBC’s coral reef rehabilation programmes, said. ‘We grew tiny coral fragments in floating nurseries off Phi Phi Lae and now they are big enough to be transplanted. Volunteer divers from local diving companies will help us transplant them on December 3.
‘The advantage of growing coral fragments in nurseries and transplanting them on natural substrate is that you don’t introduce a lot of foreign matter to the sea floor. What’s more, taking small fragments causes little effect on donor colonies.’
Phi Phi Lae is a small, uninhabited island, popular with tourists because of its clear blue waters and coral reefs. ‘It’s not the first time that we are planting coral in the area to replace that destroyed by the tsunami,’ Nalinee said. ‘In October last year we transplanted 1200 fragments at Phi Phi Lae, again with help from local diving companies as well as volunteer divers from Bangkok and elsewhere.
‘Growing coral fragments in floating nurseries is part of a research programme we started two years ago. The transplanted coral that was part of that research programme is now thriving. Organizing the activities at Phi Phi Lae and Phi Phi Do n on December 3 is one way of getting the public involved in coral and reef conservation, and increasing environmental awareness.’
The PNBC will also transplant coral grown in nurseries at Panwa Bay at a later date. ‘It will be a pioneer project using a coral species that can better tolerate turbid waters and sediments,’ Nalinee said.
‘Coral reefs at Phi Phi Lae were among the worst hit by tsunami in 2004,’ Dr Nalinee Thongtham, who heads PNBC’s coral reef rehabilation programmes, said. ‘We grew tiny coral fragments in floating nurseries off Phi Phi Lae and now they are big enough to be transplanted. Volunteer divers from local diving companies will help us transplant them on December 3.
‘The advantage of growing coral fragments in nurseries and transplanting them on natural substrate is that you don’t introduce a lot of foreign matter to the sea floor. What’s more, taking small fragments causes little effect on donor colonies.’
Phi Phi Lae is a small, uninhabited island, popular with tourists because of its clear blue waters and coral reefs. ‘It’s not the first time that we are planting coral in the area to replace that destroyed by the tsunami,’ Nalinee said. ‘In October last year we transplanted 1200 fragments at Phi Phi Lae, again with help from local diving companies as well as volunteer divers from Bangkok and elsewhere.
‘Growing coral fragments in floating nurseries is part of a research programme we started two years ago. The transplanted coral that was part of that research programme is now thriving. Organizing the activities at Phi Phi Lae and Phi Phi Do n on December 3 is one way of getting the public involved in coral and reef conservation, and increasing environmental awareness.’
The PNBC will also transplant coral grown in nurseries at Panwa Bay at a later date. ‘It will be a pioneer project using a coral species that can better tolerate turbid waters and sediments,’ Nalinee said.
The Birth Of Modern Painting
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
3
The most considerable figure in Florence after Orcagna was the Dominican monk Fra Giovanni da Fiesole, known as Fra Angelico (1387-1455), who belonged essentially to the psychic or spiritual school, and only approached the physical in his loving observation of nature. Here he was an innovator, for his eye dwells on gentle aspects, and in his landscape backgrounds he introduces pleasing forms of mountains and verdant meadows multicolored with the budding flowers of spring. Indeed, all his paintings is flower-like, but this delicate naturalism does not determine its character. It is the soulful quality of his work which gives it supreme distinction. The unworldliness of his art is explained partly by his cloistered existence and the fact that he lived until his fiftieth year in the little hill towns of Cortona and Fiesole. He led a holy and retired life, and like St. Francis, was a little brother to the poor.
If Fra Angelico had his excellencies, he also had his limitations. His angels are so beautiful that, as Vasari wrote, ‘they appear to be truly beings of Paradise’. But his devils inspire us with no terror; they are too harmless and self-evidently ashamed of their profession to be anything but ludicrous. His frescoes in San Marco at Florence and in the Vatican at Rome remain the most enchanting visions of the heavenly world, a world he decked with bright joyful colors culled from the flower gardens of earth.
The Birth Of Modern Painting (continued)
3
The most considerable figure in Florence after Orcagna was the Dominican monk Fra Giovanni da Fiesole, known as Fra Angelico (1387-1455), who belonged essentially to the psychic or spiritual school, and only approached the physical in his loving observation of nature. Here he was an innovator, for his eye dwells on gentle aspects, and in his landscape backgrounds he introduces pleasing forms of mountains and verdant meadows multicolored with the budding flowers of spring. Indeed, all his paintings is flower-like, but this delicate naturalism does not determine its character. It is the soulful quality of his work which gives it supreme distinction. The unworldliness of his art is explained partly by his cloistered existence and the fact that he lived until his fiftieth year in the little hill towns of Cortona and Fiesole. He led a holy and retired life, and like St. Francis, was a little brother to the poor.
If Fra Angelico had his excellencies, he also had his limitations. His angels are so beautiful that, as Vasari wrote, ‘they appear to be truly beings of Paradise’. But his devils inspire us with no terror; they are too harmless and self-evidently ashamed of their profession to be anything but ludicrous. His frescoes in San Marco at Florence and in the Vatican at Rome remain the most enchanting visions of the heavenly world, a world he decked with bright joyful colors culled from the flower gardens of earth.
The Birth Of Modern Painting (continued)
Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India
The different kinds of weights for weighing diamonds at the mines; the kinds of gold and silver in circulation; the routes by which one is able to travel; and the rule in use for the estimation of the prices of diamonds
(via Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India / V Ball / Edited by William Crooke)
I come now to some details as to the traffic in diamonds, and in order that reader may understand this easily—believing that no one has previously written of this matter I shall speak in the first instance of the different kinds of weights which are in use, both at the mines and in other places in Asia.
At the mine of Rammalakota they weigh by mangelins, and the mangelin is equal to 1¾ carats, that is to say, 7 grains. At the mine of Gani or Kollur the same weights are used. At the mine of Soumelpour in Bengal they weigh by ratis, and the rati is 7/8ths of a carat, or 3½ grains. This last weight is used throughout the whole of the Empire of the Great Mogul. In the Kingdoms of Golkonda and Bijapur mangelins are also used, but the mangelin in these places is only 13/8 carats. The Portuguese use the same weight name in Goa, but it is then equal to only 5 grains.
I come now to the kinds of money with which diamonds are purchased in India. Firstly, in the Kingdom of Bengal, in the territories of the Raja of whom I have spoken, as they are included in the dominion of the Great Mogul, payment is made in rupees. At the two mines in the Kingdom of Bijapur, in the neighborhood of Rammalakota, payment is made in the new pagodas which the King, being entirely independent of the Great Moghul, coins in his own name. The new pagoda does not always bear the same value, for sometimes it is valued at 3½ rupees, sometimes more and sometimes less, according as it is raised or lowered by the state of trade, and according as the moneychangers arrange matters with the Princes and Governors. At the mine of Kollur or Gani, which belongs to the King of Golkonda, payment is made in new pagodas of equal value with those of the King of Bijapur. But one has to buy them sometimes at from 1 to 4 percent premium, because they are of better gold, and because the merchants do not accept others at this mine.
These pagodas are made by the English and Dutch, who have obtained from the King, either by agreement or by force, permission to manufacture them, each in their own fortress. And those of the Dutch cost 1 or 2 percent more than those of the English, because they are of better quality, and the miners also much prefer them. But as the majority of the merchants are influenced by the false reports that the people at the mine are unsophisticated and almost savages, and that, moreover, the routes from Golkonda to the mines are very dangerous, they generally remain at Golkonda, where those who work the mines have their correspondents to whom they send the diamonds. Payments are made there with old pagodas, well worn, and coined many centuries ago by different Princes, who reigned in India before the Musalmans gained a footing in the country. These old pagodas are worth 4½ rupees, i.e. 1 rupee more than the new, although they do not contain more gold, and consequently do not weigh more; this will be a cause of astonishment if I do not explain the reason. It is that the Shroffs of Changers, in order to induce the King not to have them recoined, pay him annually a large sum, because they themselves thereby derive a considerable profit; for the merchants never receive these pagodas without the aid of one of these Changers to examine them, some being defaced, others of low standard, others of short weight, so that if one accepted them without this examination he would lose much, and would have the trouble to return them, or perhaps lose from 1 to even 5 or 6 percent, in addition to which he must pay the Shroffs 1/4th per cent for their trouble. When you pay the miners, they will also receive these pagodas only in presence of the Changer, who points out to them the good and bad, and again takes his 1/4th percent. But to save time, when you desire to make a payment of 1000 or 2000 pagodas, the Changer, when receiving his dues, encloses them in a little bag, on which he places his seal, and when you wish to pay a merchant for his diamonds you take him, with the bag, to the Changer, who, seeing his own seal intact, assures him that he has examined all the coins, and will be responsible if any do not prove good.
As for rupees, the miners take indifferently those of the Great Mogul and those of the King of Golkonda, because those coined by this King would have been the coinage of the Great Mogul if these monarchs had remained on good terms.
The natives of India have more intelligence and subtlety than one thinks. As the pagodas are small, thick pieces of gold of the size of the nail on the little finger, and as it is impossible to clip them without it being apparent, they bore small holes in them all round, found whence they extract 3 or 4 sols value of gold dust, and they close them with such skill that there is no appearance of the coins having been touched. Moreover, if you buy anything in a village, or if when you cross a river you give the boatmen a rupee, they immediately kindle a fire and throw the rupee into it, from whence if it comes out white they accept it, but if black they return it; for all the silver in India is of the highest quality, and that which is brought from Europe has to be taken to the mint to be recoined. I say also that those are very much deceived (as merchant tried to make me believe on my first journey) who imagine that is answers to take to the mines spices, tobacco, mirrors, and other trifles of that kind to barter for diamonds; for I have fully proved the contrary, and am able to assert that the merchants at the mine who sell the diamonds require good gold, and the best too.
Now let us say something as to the routes to be followed to the mines. Some modern rather fabulous accounts represent them to be, as I have said, dangerous and difficult, and frequented by tigers, lions and barbarous people; but I have found them altogether different from what they were represented to be—without wild beasts, and the people full of good will and courtesy to strangers.
As for Golkonda, one need know but little of the map to be aware of its position; but from Golkonda to Rammalakota, where the principal mine is, the route is less known, and this is the one which I followed. The measure of distance in this country is the gos, and a gos is equal to 4 French leagues.
From Golkonda to Canapour, 1 gos; Canapour to Parquel, 2½; Parquel to Cakenol, 1; Cakenol to Canol—Candanor, 3; Canol—Candanor to Setapour, 1; Setapour to the river, 2. This river is the boundary between the Kingdoms of Golkonda and Bijapur.
From the river to Alpour, ¾ gos; Alpour to Canol, ¾; Canol to Raolconda, where the mine is, 2½. Thus in all it is 17 gos, or 68 French leagues from Golkonda to the mine. From Golkonda to the mine of Coulour, or Gani, it is 13¾ gos, which amounts to 55 of our leagues. From Golkonda to Almaspinde, 3½ gos; Almaspinde to Kaper, 2; Kaper to Montecour, 2½; Montecour to Nazelpar, 2; Sarvaron to Mellaserou, 1; Mellaserou to Ponocour, 1¾. Between Ponocour and Coulour or Gani (Kollur) there is only the river to cross. I come now to an important subject which is little understood in Europe.
Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels India (continued)
(via Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India / V Ball / Edited by William Crooke)
I come now to some details as to the traffic in diamonds, and in order that reader may understand this easily—believing that no one has previously written of this matter I shall speak in the first instance of the different kinds of weights which are in use, both at the mines and in other places in Asia.
At the mine of Rammalakota they weigh by mangelins, and the mangelin is equal to 1¾ carats, that is to say, 7 grains. At the mine of Gani or Kollur the same weights are used. At the mine of Soumelpour in Bengal they weigh by ratis, and the rati is 7/8ths of a carat, or 3½ grains. This last weight is used throughout the whole of the Empire of the Great Mogul. In the Kingdoms of Golkonda and Bijapur mangelins are also used, but the mangelin in these places is only 13/8 carats. The Portuguese use the same weight name in Goa, but it is then equal to only 5 grains.
I come now to the kinds of money with which diamonds are purchased in India. Firstly, in the Kingdom of Bengal, in the territories of the Raja of whom I have spoken, as they are included in the dominion of the Great Mogul, payment is made in rupees. At the two mines in the Kingdom of Bijapur, in the neighborhood of Rammalakota, payment is made in the new pagodas which the King, being entirely independent of the Great Moghul, coins in his own name. The new pagoda does not always bear the same value, for sometimes it is valued at 3½ rupees, sometimes more and sometimes less, according as it is raised or lowered by the state of trade, and according as the moneychangers arrange matters with the Princes and Governors. At the mine of Kollur or Gani, which belongs to the King of Golkonda, payment is made in new pagodas of equal value with those of the King of Bijapur. But one has to buy them sometimes at from 1 to 4 percent premium, because they are of better gold, and because the merchants do not accept others at this mine.
These pagodas are made by the English and Dutch, who have obtained from the King, either by agreement or by force, permission to manufacture them, each in their own fortress. And those of the Dutch cost 1 or 2 percent more than those of the English, because they are of better quality, and the miners also much prefer them. But as the majority of the merchants are influenced by the false reports that the people at the mine are unsophisticated and almost savages, and that, moreover, the routes from Golkonda to the mines are very dangerous, they generally remain at Golkonda, where those who work the mines have their correspondents to whom they send the diamonds. Payments are made there with old pagodas, well worn, and coined many centuries ago by different Princes, who reigned in India before the Musalmans gained a footing in the country. These old pagodas are worth 4½ rupees, i.e. 1 rupee more than the new, although they do not contain more gold, and consequently do not weigh more; this will be a cause of astonishment if I do not explain the reason. It is that the Shroffs of Changers, in order to induce the King not to have them recoined, pay him annually a large sum, because they themselves thereby derive a considerable profit; for the merchants never receive these pagodas without the aid of one of these Changers to examine them, some being defaced, others of low standard, others of short weight, so that if one accepted them without this examination he would lose much, and would have the trouble to return them, or perhaps lose from 1 to even 5 or 6 percent, in addition to which he must pay the Shroffs 1/4th per cent for their trouble. When you pay the miners, they will also receive these pagodas only in presence of the Changer, who points out to them the good and bad, and again takes his 1/4th percent. But to save time, when you desire to make a payment of 1000 or 2000 pagodas, the Changer, when receiving his dues, encloses them in a little bag, on which he places his seal, and when you wish to pay a merchant for his diamonds you take him, with the bag, to the Changer, who, seeing his own seal intact, assures him that he has examined all the coins, and will be responsible if any do not prove good.
As for rupees, the miners take indifferently those of the Great Mogul and those of the King of Golkonda, because those coined by this King would have been the coinage of the Great Mogul if these monarchs had remained on good terms.
The natives of India have more intelligence and subtlety than one thinks. As the pagodas are small, thick pieces of gold of the size of the nail on the little finger, and as it is impossible to clip them without it being apparent, they bore small holes in them all round, found whence they extract 3 or 4 sols value of gold dust, and they close them with such skill that there is no appearance of the coins having been touched. Moreover, if you buy anything in a village, or if when you cross a river you give the boatmen a rupee, they immediately kindle a fire and throw the rupee into it, from whence if it comes out white they accept it, but if black they return it; for all the silver in India is of the highest quality, and that which is brought from Europe has to be taken to the mint to be recoined. I say also that those are very much deceived (as merchant tried to make me believe on my first journey) who imagine that is answers to take to the mines spices, tobacco, mirrors, and other trifles of that kind to barter for diamonds; for I have fully proved the contrary, and am able to assert that the merchants at the mine who sell the diamonds require good gold, and the best too.
Now let us say something as to the routes to be followed to the mines. Some modern rather fabulous accounts represent them to be, as I have said, dangerous and difficult, and frequented by tigers, lions and barbarous people; but I have found them altogether different from what they were represented to be—without wild beasts, and the people full of good will and courtesy to strangers.
As for Golkonda, one need know but little of the map to be aware of its position; but from Golkonda to Rammalakota, where the principal mine is, the route is less known, and this is the one which I followed. The measure of distance in this country is the gos, and a gos is equal to 4 French leagues.
From Golkonda to Canapour, 1 gos; Canapour to Parquel, 2½; Parquel to Cakenol, 1; Cakenol to Canol—Candanor, 3; Canol—Candanor to Setapour, 1; Setapour to the river, 2. This river is the boundary between the Kingdoms of Golkonda and Bijapur.
From the river to Alpour, ¾ gos; Alpour to Canol, ¾; Canol to Raolconda, where the mine is, 2½. Thus in all it is 17 gos, or 68 French leagues from Golkonda to the mine. From Golkonda to the mine of Coulour, or Gani, it is 13¾ gos, which amounts to 55 of our leagues. From Golkonda to Almaspinde, 3½ gos; Almaspinde to Kaper, 2; Kaper to Montecour, 2½; Montecour to Nazelpar, 2; Sarvaron to Mellaserou, 1; Mellaserou to Ponocour, 1¾. Between Ponocour and Coulour or Gani (Kollur) there is only the river to cross. I come now to an important subject which is little understood in Europe.
Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels India (continued)
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Meet Me In St. Louis
Meet Me In St. Louis (1944)
Directed by: Vincente Minnelli
Screenplay: Sally Benson (novel); Irving Brecher, Fred F. Finklehoffe
Cast: Judy Garland, Margaret O'Brien
(via YouTube): Meet Me In St Louis - the trolley song
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UJLIrT_ALs
Meet Me In St Louis
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DuG1SQkdqc
One of the greatest American movie musicals + a great voice. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Vincente Minnelli
Screenplay: Sally Benson (novel); Irving Brecher, Fred F. Finklehoffe
Cast: Judy Garland, Margaret O'Brien
(via YouTube): Meet Me In St Louis - the trolley song
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UJLIrT_ALs
Meet Me In St Louis
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DuG1SQkdqc
One of the greatest American movie musicals + a great voice. I enjoyed it.
The Knot
New Business Models: Carley Roney and David Liu writes about how they started The Knot (www.theknot.com) + other viewpoints @ http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1663316_1684619,00.html
House Style
Good Designs: (via The Guardian) Fiona MacCarthy writes about the Bauhaus movement + how it became a fashion in itself + other viewpoints @ http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/architecture/story/0,,2212350,00.html
Reflections On Three Decades At The Helm Of ARTnews
Total internal reflections of Milton Esterow @ http://artnews.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=1214
How Jeff Koons Became A Superstar
Ann Landi writes about Jeff Koons + his curious position as a marketing phenomenon + Kelly Devine Thomas's research + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnews.com/anniversary/top10.asp
Myanmar Rubies Have Dealers Seeing Red
Mick Elmore writes about gem dealers dilema + the pros and cons of banning Burmese rubies after the recent bloody crackdown + other view points @ http://www.newsweek.com/id/70770
Paul Simon
Paul Simon, is one of America's most respected songwriters and musicians + during his distinguished career he has received many awards and prizes, including 12 Grammy Awards, three for album of the year: 'Bridge Over Troubled Water' in 1970 (with musical partner Art Garfunkel), 'Still Crazy After All These Years' in 1976 and 'Graceland ' in 1986 + he is a two-time inductee into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as half of the Simon and Garfunkel duo and again in 2001 as a soloist + he is a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame and a 2002 Kennedy Center Honoree + in 2006 Time Magazine named Paul Simon one of the '100 People Who Shaped the World' + he was the first American artist invited by President Nelson Mandela to perform in post-apartheid South Africa. Go to www.paulsimon.com for further information.
(via YouTube): Paul Simon - Graceland
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtT7Og2LBbE
Paul Simon - You can call me Al
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4kH15Ny2ho
Paul simon - The obvious child
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJdAAozwq5Y
Paul Simon - Diamonds
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNv2MoAghnU&feature=related
A real gem. I love his music.
(via YouTube): Paul Simon - Graceland
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtT7Og2LBbE
Paul Simon - You can call me Al
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4kH15Ny2ho
Paul simon - The obvious child
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJdAAozwq5Y
Paul Simon - Diamonds
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNv2MoAghnU&feature=related
A real gem. I love his music.
The Palatine Lion
(via Diamond Cuts in Historic Jewelry:1381-1910) Herbert Tillander writes:
In addition to other interesting diamond cuts, the pendant known as the Palatine Lion (in the Schatzkammer der Residenz, Munich) contains the flattest Pointed Star Cut I have ever encountered. The crown faceting is so low that it is almost impossible to distinguish—it does not even appear in a cast or impression. The flatness of the pavilion is emphasized by the culet, which is the size of a normal table facet. In fact, the diamond could just as well be set upside down and considered a thin Mirror Cut.
In addition to other interesting diamond cuts, the pendant known as the Palatine Lion (in the Schatzkammer der Residenz, Munich) contains the flattest Pointed Star Cut I have ever encountered. The crown faceting is so low that it is almost impossible to distinguish—it does not even appear in a cast or impression. The flatness of the pavilion is emphasized by the culet, which is the size of a normal table facet. In fact, the diamond could just as well be set upside down and considered a thin Mirror Cut.
The Birth Of Modern Painting
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
2
While Giotto was laying the foundations of the art of Florence, another school of painting arose in the quiet hill city of Sienna. Its founder, Duccio di Buoninsegna, is said to have been so much influenced by the Byzantine style that he has been called ‘the last of the great artists of antiquity’, as opposed to Giotto, the ‘father of modern painting’. It is not easy to understand this comment if one looks at Duccio’s pictures, one of the most famous of which—‘The Kiss of Judas’. In spite of their color and their gilding the figures are human and life-like, and the picture reflects human emotion entirely in accord with the spirit of St. Francis. There is so much sweetness and grace in the paintings of Duccio and his fellows that they have been called the first lyric painters of modern art.
Among his younger contemporaries the most gifted was Simone Martini (c.1283-1344), whose work has the pensive devoutness that marks Siennese painting and a gay decorative charm. There is a picture by him at Oxford, and another in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, but perhaps his greatest achievement is the series of frescoes at Avignon. These were once attributed to Giotto, but are now recognized to have been the work of Simone Martini and his school. Among other Siennese artists the brothers Pietro and Ambrogio Lorenzetti are noted for the dramatic vigor in their work.
In the Florentine painting of the fifteenth century, the impulse towards naturalism, first given by Giotto, branched out in two opposite directions. One was psychic, the other physical. The expression of intense and strong emotion, together with action and movement was the aim of one school; another strove after realistic probability and correctness of representation. This second school, pushed on by its love of truth, attacked and vanquished one by one various problems of technique. The approach to a closer representation of the appearance of realities involved three main inquiries: (1) the study of perspective, linear and aerial; (2) the study of anatomy, of nude bodies in repose and action; and (3) the detailed truth of facts in objects animate and inanimate.
The Birth Of Modern Painting (continued)
2
While Giotto was laying the foundations of the art of Florence, another school of painting arose in the quiet hill city of Sienna. Its founder, Duccio di Buoninsegna, is said to have been so much influenced by the Byzantine style that he has been called ‘the last of the great artists of antiquity’, as opposed to Giotto, the ‘father of modern painting’. It is not easy to understand this comment if one looks at Duccio’s pictures, one of the most famous of which—‘The Kiss of Judas’. In spite of their color and their gilding the figures are human and life-like, and the picture reflects human emotion entirely in accord with the spirit of St. Francis. There is so much sweetness and grace in the paintings of Duccio and his fellows that they have been called the first lyric painters of modern art.
Among his younger contemporaries the most gifted was Simone Martini (c.1283-1344), whose work has the pensive devoutness that marks Siennese painting and a gay decorative charm. There is a picture by him at Oxford, and another in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, but perhaps his greatest achievement is the series of frescoes at Avignon. These were once attributed to Giotto, but are now recognized to have been the work of Simone Martini and his school. Among other Siennese artists the brothers Pietro and Ambrogio Lorenzetti are noted for the dramatic vigor in their work.
In the Florentine painting of the fifteenth century, the impulse towards naturalism, first given by Giotto, branched out in two opposite directions. One was psychic, the other physical. The expression of intense and strong emotion, together with action and movement was the aim of one school; another strove after realistic probability and correctness of representation. This second school, pushed on by its love of truth, attacked and vanquished one by one various problems of technique. The approach to a closer representation of the appearance of realities involved three main inquiries: (1) the study of perspective, linear and aerial; (2) the study of anatomy, of nude bodies in repose and action; and (3) the detailed truth of facts in objects animate and inanimate.
The Birth Of Modern Painting (continued)
Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India
A continuation of the Author’s Journeys to the Diamond Mines
(via Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India / V Ball / Edited by William Crooke)
From the fortress of Rohtas to Soumelpour it is 30 coss. Soumelpour is a large town with houses built only of clay, and thatched with the branches of the coconut tree. Throughout this march of thirty coss there are jungles which are dangerous, because the thieves, who know that merchants do not visit the mine without carrying money, attack them and sometimes murder them. The Raja lives half a coss from the town, and in tents placed on an eminence. The Koel passes the fort, and it is in this river that the diamonds are found. It comes from the high mountains to the south and loses its name in the Ganges.
This is the manner in which diamonds are sought for in this river. After the great rains are over, that is to say usually in the month of December, the diamond seekers await the conclusion of the month of January, when the river becomes low, because at that time, in many parts, it is not more than two feet deep, and much of the sand is left uncovered. Towards the end of January or commencement of February, from the town of Soumelpour and also from another town 20 coss higher up the same river, and from some small villages on the plain, about 8000 persons of both sexes and of all ages capable of working assemble.
Those who are expert know that the sand contains diamonds, when they find small stones in it which resemble those we call ‘thunder stones’. They commence to search in the river at the town of Soumelpour and proceed upstream to the mountains where it takes its rise, which are situated about 50 coss from the town. In the places where they believe there are diamonds they excavate the sand in the following manner. They encircle these places with stakes, fascines, and clay, in order to remove the water and dry the spot, as is done when it is intended to build the pier of a bridge. They then take out the sand, but do not excavate below the depth of two feet. All this sand is carried and spread upon a large space prepared on the banks of the river and surrounded by a low wall a foot and half high, or thereabouts. They make holes at the base, and when they have filled the enclosure with as much sand as they think proper, they throw water upon it, wash it and break it, and afterwards follow the same method as is adopted at the mine which I have above described.
It is from this river that all the beautiful points come which are called pointes naives (natural points), but a large stone is rarely found there. It is now many years since these stones have been seen in Europe, in consequence of which many merchants have supposed that the mine has been lost, but it is not so; it is true, however, that a long time has elapsed since anything has been obtained in this river on account of the wars.
I have spoken elsewhere of another mine of diamonds in the Province of Carnatic, which Mir Jumla, General-in-Chief and Prime Minister of State of the King of Golkonda, commanded to be closed, not wishing that it should be worked further, because the stones from it, or rather from these six mines—for there are six of them, close to one another—were all black or yellow, and not one of good water.
There is, finally, in the Island of Borneo, the largest of all islands in the world, a river called Succadan, in the sand of which beautiful stones are found, which have the same hardness as those of the river Koel, or of the other mines of which I have made mention.
General Vandime once sent me at Surat six of them, of 3 to 4 carats each, from Batavia, and he believed that they were not so hard as those from other mines, in which he was mistaken, because there is no difference in that respect; it was in order to ascertain the fact that he sent them to me. When I was at Batavia one of the chief officers of the company showed me a point naive of 25½ carats, a perfect stone, obtained in this river of Succadan. But at the price which he told me it had cost him he had paid more than 50 percent than I should have been willing to give for it. It is true that I have always heard that these stones are very dear. The principal reason which has prevented me from going to this river of Borneo is that the Queen of the Island does not allow foreigners to carry away the stones, and there are great difficulties in conveying them thence—the insignificant number which are carried away secretly are sold at Batavia. I shall be asked, without doubt, why I only mention the Queen of Borneo, and not the King. The reason is that in this Kingdom it is the women who govern and not the men, because the people are so particular about having for their sovereign a legitimate heir to the throne that, the husband not being certain that the children which he believes he has had by his wife are his very own, and wife being, on the contrary, quite certain that the children are hers, they prefer to have a woman for their ruler, to whom they give the title of Queen, her husband being her subject, and not having more power than that which she chooses to confer upon him.
Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India (continued)
(via Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India / V Ball / Edited by William Crooke)
From the fortress of Rohtas to Soumelpour it is 30 coss. Soumelpour is a large town with houses built only of clay, and thatched with the branches of the coconut tree. Throughout this march of thirty coss there are jungles which are dangerous, because the thieves, who know that merchants do not visit the mine without carrying money, attack them and sometimes murder them. The Raja lives half a coss from the town, and in tents placed on an eminence. The Koel passes the fort, and it is in this river that the diamonds are found. It comes from the high mountains to the south and loses its name in the Ganges.
This is the manner in which diamonds are sought for in this river. After the great rains are over, that is to say usually in the month of December, the diamond seekers await the conclusion of the month of January, when the river becomes low, because at that time, in many parts, it is not more than two feet deep, and much of the sand is left uncovered. Towards the end of January or commencement of February, from the town of Soumelpour and also from another town 20 coss higher up the same river, and from some small villages on the plain, about 8000 persons of both sexes and of all ages capable of working assemble.
Those who are expert know that the sand contains diamonds, when they find small stones in it which resemble those we call ‘thunder stones’. They commence to search in the river at the town of Soumelpour and proceed upstream to the mountains where it takes its rise, which are situated about 50 coss from the town. In the places where they believe there are diamonds they excavate the sand in the following manner. They encircle these places with stakes, fascines, and clay, in order to remove the water and dry the spot, as is done when it is intended to build the pier of a bridge. They then take out the sand, but do not excavate below the depth of two feet. All this sand is carried and spread upon a large space prepared on the banks of the river and surrounded by a low wall a foot and half high, or thereabouts. They make holes at the base, and when they have filled the enclosure with as much sand as they think proper, they throw water upon it, wash it and break it, and afterwards follow the same method as is adopted at the mine which I have above described.
It is from this river that all the beautiful points come which are called pointes naives (natural points), but a large stone is rarely found there. It is now many years since these stones have been seen in Europe, in consequence of which many merchants have supposed that the mine has been lost, but it is not so; it is true, however, that a long time has elapsed since anything has been obtained in this river on account of the wars.
I have spoken elsewhere of another mine of diamonds in the Province of Carnatic, which Mir Jumla, General-in-Chief and Prime Minister of State of the King of Golkonda, commanded to be closed, not wishing that it should be worked further, because the stones from it, or rather from these six mines—for there are six of them, close to one another—were all black or yellow, and not one of good water.
There is, finally, in the Island of Borneo, the largest of all islands in the world, a river called Succadan, in the sand of which beautiful stones are found, which have the same hardness as those of the river Koel, or of the other mines of which I have made mention.
General Vandime once sent me at Surat six of them, of 3 to 4 carats each, from Batavia, and he believed that they were not so hard as those from other mines, in which he was mistaken, because there is no difference in that respect; it was in order to ascertain the fact that he sent them to me. When I was at Batavia one of the chief officers of the company showed me a point naive of 25½ carats, a perfect stone, obtained in this river of Succadan. But at the price which he told me it had cost him he had paid more than 50 percent than I should have been willing to give for it. It is true that I have always heard that these stones are very dear. The principal reason which has prevented me from going to this river of Borneo is that the Queen of the Island does not allow foreigners to carry away the stones, and there are great difficulties in conveying them thence—the insignificant number which are carried away secretly are sold at Batavia. I shall be asked, without doubt, why I only mention the Queen of Borneo, and not the King. The reason is that in this Kingdom it is the women who govern and not the men, because the people are so particular about having for their sovereign a legitimate heir to the throne that, the husband not being certain that the children which he believes he has had by his wife are his very own, and wife being, on the contrary, quite certain that the children are hers, they prefer to have a woman for their ruler, to whom they give the title of Queen, her husband being her subject, and not having more power than that which she chooses to confer upon him.
Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s Travels In India (continued)
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Loving America
Total internal reflections of Jay Dubashi on America @ http://www.valueresearchonline.com/story/storyview.asp?str=10618
I enjoyed it.
I enjoyed it.
Richard Wagner
(via YouTube): Richard Wagner Tannhäuser Karajan Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvieObtpItA
Beautiful music. I enjoyed it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvieObtpItA
Beautiful music. I enjoyed it.
Boris Gelfand
(via Dailyspeculations) Nigel Davies writes:
Very interesting Chessbase interview with Boris Gelfand.
Two of his most instructive comments:
'During the tournament I was concentrated solely on my games and was not thinking at all about my chances. It is a very strong tournament and I had to ensure that I'd have maximum concentration in every game and leave aside all the thoughts which could distract me. But of course, you have to keep on working hard on chess, keep you motivation and health in order to compete with younger players.'
Useful link:
http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=4216
Brilliant!
Very interesting Chessbase interview with Boris Gelfand.
Two of his most instructive comments:
'During the tournament I was concentrated solely on my games and was not thinking at all about my chances. It is a very strong tournament and I had to ensure that I'd have maximum concentration in every game and leave aside all the thoughts which could distract me. But of course, you have to keep on working hard on chess, keep you motivation and health in order to compete with younger players.'
Useful link:
http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=4216
Brilliant!
A Streetcar Named Desire
A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)
Directed by: Elia Kazan
Screenplay: Tennessee Williams (play); Oscar Saul (adaptation)
Cast: Vivien Leigh, Marlon Brando, Kim Hunter, Karl Malden
(via YouTube): A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) Full Film - Part 1/12
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9az00cDaMM
The best adaptation of a great play. Simply great. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Elia Kazan
Screenplay: Tennessee Williams (play); Oscar Saul (adaptation)
Cast: Vivien Leigh, Marlon Brando, Kim Hunter, Karl Malden
(via YouTube): A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) Full Film - Part 1/12
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9az00cDaMM
The best adaptation of a great play. Simply great. I enjoyed it.
Tutankhamun Returns In A blaze Of Publicity - And Controversy
(via Guardian Unlimited) Charlotte Higgins writes about the most talked-about exhibitions of the year, Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs + the gilded coffinette (used to store the pharoah's viscera, which is inalid with carnelian, obsidian and rock crystal; a fabulously preserved ivory and ebony box; a gessoed wooden chest with decorative fretwork) + other viewpoints @ http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/news/story/0,,2210359,00.html
Out Of The Attic
Anneli Rufus writes about the evolution and growing appreciation of American folk art + collectors perception of beauty and individuality + the high prices they pay + other viewpoints @ http://artnews.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=1203
Sorting Out The Sunflowers
Sylvia Hochfield writes about Timothy Ryback + the controversy that surrounds the work of one of the world’s best-loved painters + his research (on written expert opinions and technical laboratory analyses of van Gogh paintings, private correspondence among van Gogh scholars, court decisions, unpublished letters by the artist’s associates, unpublished manuscript, biographies of van Gogh, and three volumes of his collected letters) + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnews.com/anniversary/top9.asp
Rough Ethics In New York
Chaim Even-Zohar writes about the public letter sent by Diamond Manufacturers & Importers of America (DMIA) to the Diamond Trading Company’s (DTC) managing director Varda Shine to secure greater DTC rough supplies for its manufacturers + other viewpoints @ http://www.idexonline.com/portal_FullEditorial.asp
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