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Monday, April 14, 2008

Vipassana

It wouldn't be a bad idea to encourage members of the gem/jewelry + art sector, gemologists, and CEOs to mirror their inner conscience (total internal reflection) by taking a vow of silence for few days or weeks every year because I think Vipassana could be an excellent + natural vehicle for cleansing one's inclusions and blemishes quietly, though difficult in the beginning, with some practice you will emerge as a more clear-headed person.

Useful links:
www.dhamma.org
www.globalpagoda.org

Cibjo Update

The World Jewelry Confederation (CIBJO) has launched an upgraded version of its website to coincide with the 2008 CIBJO Congress, opening in Dubai on April 14-16, 2008.

Useful link:
www.cibjo.org

Brain Scanner + Real-Life Decisions

(via Wired) I was intrigued by a study published in Nature Neuroscience about researchers using brain scanners to predict people's decisions seven seconds before the test subjects were even aware of making them--though I have my doubts, but it was an interesting study + I would love to see researchers do similars tests on diamond and colored stone graders, and artists to study their sensory integration/shifting neural patterns so that we could learn something new and analyze the impact.

Useful links:
www.nature.com/neuro
www.mpg.de
www.nih.gov
http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2008/04/mind_decision

The Beau Sancy

(via Diamond Cuts in Historic Jewelry:1381-1910) Herbert Tillander writes:

The dominating feature of the Beau Sancy (documented 31 January 1589) is a central star composed of eight pentagonal facets round a very small octagonal table. Between the points of the stars are eight squares or lozenges, each divided into two triangles. Together, these twenty four facets form two large interlacing squares. The remaining thirty facets (eight lozenges and twenty-two triangles) all touch the girdle. The reverse side of the gem is almost an exact replica, as far as one can judge from an examination of the diamond in its setting. That means that there are 108 faces plus the table and culet. What an incredible masterpiece of precision and artistic inventiveness! The few small irregularities and inclusions do not in the least detract from its beauty.

The light effects of the Beau Sancy itself are wonderful. The facets on the reverse reflect brilliant rays of light through the front. It was given the name ‘Beau’ Sancy to distinguish it from the Grand Sancy, and it truly deserves its title. The measurements are:

Height: 22.4mm
Width: 19.5mm
Thickness: 11.5mm

It weight has been estimated at 33-34 ct, but I suggest that 35-36 ct would be nearer the truth.

It is documented that Queen Maria de’ Medici bought the Beau Sancy from Sancy himself. The transaction is dated 1604, and she is said to have paid ‘XXVm escus’ for it. For her coronation in 1610, the diamond was set at the top of the crown which she wears in her portrait. Maria died poverty-stricken and in exile, and her creditors disposed of any jewels she still possessed. The Beau Sancy was bought by Frederick Henry of Orange, and then passed to his descendants; it has never again been put up for sale. William III of Orange gave it to his bride, Mary, and after her death it went to Frederick, the future King of Prussia.

In the late 1960s, I knew that the Grand Sancy was in England, still at that time in the possession of the Astors. I also knew that the Beau Sancy had once formed part of te Prussian Crown Jewels. Through a series of chance meetings, I learned that Viscount Astor had deposited the head of the Hohenzollern family, Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia, grandson of William II, the last German Emperor. Having discovered the whereabouts of the two diamonds, I decided to try to reunite them—in Finland! There was already a Finnish connection: Paul Demidoff, who inherited the Grand Sancy in 1836, gave it as a wedding present to his bride Aurora Karamzin, a Finnish-born lady-in-waiting at the Russian court.

Years of preparatory work, correspondence and persuasions of the relevant authorities followed, until finally, in October 1972, Prince Louis Ferdinand himself came to Helsinki to open the exhibition ‘Two Historic Diamonds’. The two brothers, the Grand Sancy and the Beau Sancy, were reunited after a separation of some 370 years.

Realism And Impressionism In France

(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:

Prior to the Salon des Rufusés Edouard Manet had little or no knowledge of Claude Monet, who was seven years his junior, but now the similarity between their names and the abuse showered upon both drew the two men together. Through Monet, Manet came to know Renoir and Sisley, who had been fellow-students with Monet in the studio of Gleyre, Whistler’s master, and this group was joined, among others, by two older artists, Camille Pissaro and Degas. As in the case of the Pre-Raphaelites, it was friendship and unjust derision which created the solidarity of the Impressionists, though the individual painters had by no means identical aims. Manet, we now realize, was far more a Realist than an Impressionist, and it is important to remember that he passed as an innovator years before Impressionism existed or was even thought of. Itr was more then ten years after the Salon des Refusés before Manet became influenced by the new ideas of color evolved by Pissaro, Monet, and Renoir. In his fine portrait ‘Le Bon Bock’, painted in 1873, Manet still reveals himself as the heir, not only of Courbet, but of Velazquez, Hals, and Goya. Nothing could be further from the once popular notion of an ‘Impressionist’ picture as a daub hastily put together, than this careful, if unconventional, portrait of his friend the engraver Belot enjoying a glass of beer. M Belot gave Manet no less than eighty sittings before this portrait was finished. It is freer than Courbet, with a greater simplifying of planes and values, but it is no revolution, it is a continuation and development of Courbet’s realism.

Quite different in style is ‘A Bar at the Folies—Bergère’, painted in 1882. We may say at once that the chief difference between the two pictures is in the color, for—to borrow a term from the wine-list—the color in ‘Le Bon Bock’ is ‘still’, while that in the ‘Bar’ picture is ‘sparkling’, sparkling especially in the wonderful painting of the bottles and glasses as we may see even in a photograph. Both pictures are magnificent, both are marvelously lifelike, but in the second there is a more searching pursuit of color, in shadow as well as in light, and a more vivacious statement of its actuality. In a word, it is a typical ‘Impressionist’ picture: and here we may well pause to inquire what is meant by ‘Impressionism’.

Realism And Impressionism In France (continue)

The Battle For The Soul Of Capitalism

The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism by John C. Bogle is an essential book for all + he gives an interesting perspective on moral capitalism and community ownership + the book also has a lot of ideas and solutions for the corporate/financial institutions + I think it will take a lot of effort on our part to change the inert system (s) that's simulated worldwide due to globalization.

Useful links:
http://johncbogle.com
www.vanguard.com

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Pendants + Charms

I really liked the simple + innovative designs @ www.bittyblock.com They looked great!

Michael Nyman

Michael Nyman is an English composer of minimalist music + pianist + librettist + musicologist + best known for the many scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway + the score to Jane Campion's award-winning 1993 film The Piano became a classical music best-seller, which I love so much, is beauty in motion.

Useful links:
www.michaelnyman.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dPS-EHl-FE

Heard On The Street

Truth at big events is a manufactured commodity, not an absolute value.

Babylon: Myth + True Facts

A must-visit: Two worlds, one exhibition + jointly with the Musée du Louvre in Paris and the British Museum in London, the National Museums in Berlin venture to explore the backgrounds behind the myth of Babel and the true facts surrounding the ancient city of Babylon + discover what lies at the bottom of the legend - the legend which accounts for today’s fascination with Babylon.

Useful links:
www.britishmuseum.org
www.smb.spk-berlin.de
www.louvre.fr
http://mini-site.louvre.fr/trois-empires/index_en.htm

Natalia Goncharova

The article about Natalia Goncharova @ http://www.economist.com/daily/columns/artview/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11037482 and her beautiful paintings were interesting + what really intrigued me is the business angle (Rothenstein family chose to sell the painting through Bonhams instead of Christie's/Sothebys): We try harder (Avis slogan)

For the Rothenstein family it must be an interesting bet.

Useful link:
www.bonhams.com

Golf, An Economic Indicator

I found the Fast Money/CNBC interview with Greg Norman @ http://www.cnbc.com/id/24068220?__source=RSS*blog*&par=RSS intriguing because he gave an interesting perspective about his company (caters primarily to the high-end market) and how it relates to the global economy.

Useful link:
www.shark.com

The Grand Sancy

(via Diamond Cuts in Historic Jewelry:1381-1910) Herbert Tillander writes:

The Grand Sancy (sometimes known simply as the Sancy and documented in June 1586) was bought by the Banque de France and the Musées de France from the 4th Viscount Astor in 1977 and is now on display in the Galerie d’Apollon of the Musée du Louvre, Paris. According to Cletscher, the rough Grand Sancy was acquired in Constantinople and fashioned in Paris. In its lifetime it has been part first of the English and then of the French Crown Jewels.

The outline and faceting of the stone: At its pointed end it looks very like a Rose Cut, which probably explains why it has so often wrongly been described as a Double Rose. But between the table and the blunt end the faceting is of a totally different design.

The central facet, the table, has always been thought to be pentagonal, but under a magnifying glass one can see that the narrow end does not, in fact, terminate in a point but has three edges, and that three of the five triangular facets which appear to meet at the point have had their apexes removed and join the table at these upper edges. This means that instead of being a pentagonal kite, as it appears to the naked eye, the table is actually eight-sided. The pavilion is faceted in more or less the same design as the crown, except that the culet, which is the same size as the table, is genuinely pentagonal. The gem is ‘convexo-convex’ (i.e the two sides are rounded) and the two convex surfaces meet at the girdle. It was not possible to study the girdle itself as this was hidden in the setting when I had it in my hands. The dimensions are:

Height: 25.7mm
Width: 20.6mm
Thickness: 14.3mm
Weight: 55.23 ct (according to Sancy himself, 60 ct including te setting of about 1.3 grams)

Through the pointed end, a distinct flaw and several abraded facet edges are visible, even in photographs.

Realism And Impressionism In France

(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:

2

Manet was the heir of Courbet with this difference, that the temper of his art was more aristrocratic. He also built up his pictures by the direct application of planes of color rather than by working up an underpainting based on linear design and light-and-shade; he also used the blonde palette of Velazquez and Hals, and he also chose his subjects from the life around him; but he painted the people and life of the middle-classes, while Courbet had concentrated on the proletariat.

Edouard Manet was born at Paris in 1833. His father was a magistrate and, like Manet was originally destined for the bar, but he eventually overcame family opposition, and when he was about eighteen he was permitted to enter the studio of Couture (1815-79). Thomas Couture was an accomplished artist whose rich colored paintings were a discreet compromise between Romanticism and Classicism, but his orthodox instruction appealed little to Manet, who from the beginning desired to observe Nature closely and reproduce it according to his own feeling. After traveling in Germany, Austria, and Italy to study the Old Masters, Manet finally found in the paintings by Velazquez and Goya at the Louvre the answer to all his questionings and aspirations for light and truth. Influenced by these masters and by the example of Courbet, he gradually evolved a new technique which presented modern aspects by modern methods. Observing how one color melted into another in nature, he declared ‘There are no lines in Nature,’ and in his pictures he abandoned the convention of the outline and shaped his forms by a modelling obtained by subtle gradations of tints which fused into one another. The problem of just illumination was to Manet a matter of primary importance. Once when he was asked to point out the principal figure in a group he had painted, he made a reply that has become historic. ‘The principal person in a picture,’ said Manet, ‘is the light.’

Manet made his first appearance at the Salon in 1861 with a portrait of himself and his young wife and another paiting, ‘The Spanish Guitar-player.’ Over both the cry of ‘Realism’ was raised, and Realism was unpopular at the moment, nevertheless the Jury, inspired by Delacroix, gave Manet an Honorable Mention. But during the next two years the partisans of the classical tradition obtained the upper hand agian, and Manet was excluded from the Salon of 1863. So many artists of admitted talent, however unpopular, had their works rejected en bloc by the Salon jury this year, that the Emperor, Napoleon III, inspired by a praiseworthy liberal thought, insisted that these innovators should at least have the right to exhibit together in a special room. Thus there came into being what was known as the Salon des Refusés: among the exhibitors there, in addition to Manet and Whistler, were Alphonse Legros, Fantin Latour (1836-1904), celebrated both as a portraitist and as a painter of flowers, Harpignies, Renoir, Claude Monet, and many others who have since become famous. One of the paintings in this exhibition, a sunset by Claude Monet, entitled ‘Impressions’, excited much laughter among the crowd that came to jeer at the ‘rejected’, and henceforward the custom arose of alluding to the new school of painters as ‘Impressionists’. Originating as a term of derision, the word remained in use, and the painters to whom it was applied adopted it as an official label which would serve, as well as any other, to cover their varied aims.

Realism And Impressionism In France (continued)

Random Thoughts

Superman (Christopher Reeve): Don't worry, I've got you.
Lois Lane (Margot Kidder): But who's got you?

A great line from the Superman movie.......

A Rare Rock Crystal Clock

It has been reported that the famous 'The Royal Skeleton Clock', a true work of art, crafted entirely of rare rock crystal + 18 karat gold, including the movement + a myriad of precious diamonds, emeralds, rubies and sapphires that adorn every inch of the timepiece, created by Asprey, commissioned by the Sultan of Brunei, has been listed for sale.

It's an amazing piece of art (http://www.rauantiques.com/29-1865.html) that's finding its way to the market.

Useful links:
www.thewdn.com
www.rauantiques.com

Price Shock

After years of years of strong global economic growth, prices of oil, grains, and some metals have risen sharply + speculative investors have also added fuel to that fire by buying up hard assets like commodities, which are viewed as a hedge against inflation, and the impact is stunning --suddenly we are all sucked into this powerful magnetic field called inflation, and slowly getting weaker together + I am seeing strange behavioral patterns of businesses and consumers worldwide.

Useful links:
www.globalinsight.com
www.mbginfosvcs.com
www.imf.org
www.federalreserve.gov

Saturday, April 12, 2008

The Tiny Overlooked Universes That Surround Us

Just look at the beauty and rarity of the photos @ http://www.wired.com/culture/art/news/2008/04/submissions_macro and the phenomenal effects -- they are so natural, it's just brilliant! The images reminded me of the spectacular inclusions in gemstones.

Lucian Freud

Lucian Freud by William Feaver is an excellent edition of Freud's work.

Lucian Freud is internationally acknowledged as one of the most important British painter working today, and now a life-size painting, Benefits Supervisor Sleeping, never been seen publicly, which features a Jobcentre worker fondly known as 'Big Sue', the subject of several masterpieces by Freud, painted in 1995, sold privately at the time, will be auctioned by Christie's next month in New York, which is expected to sell for up to £18m, one of the most expensive work by a living artist at auction.

Useful link:
www.christies.com

Arbitration Justice In Absentia

Chaim Even Zohar writes about procedural flaws in commercial disputes involving members of the diamond bourse (s) + bourse member’s unfamiliarity with the rules of sister bourses in cross-boundary arbitrations, and the impact + other viewpoints @ http://www.idexonline.com/portal_FullEditorial.asp