Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Siberian Ivory Trade
The Russian exports of mammoth ivory is up--thanks to global warming: The article Trade in mammoth ivory @ http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/03/25/europe/mammoth.php was educational + interesting + I think there will be always demand for ivory in Asia, for personal uses despite the international ban on ivory trade.
How To Be Human
The book How to be Human by Deirdre Nansen McCloskey is thought-provoking + a great read.
Useful link:
http://deirdremccloskey.org
Useful link:
http://deirdremccloskey.org
The Wittelsbach
(via Diamond Cuts in Historic Jewelry:1381-1910) Herbert Tillander writes:
The magnificent 36.56 ct Wittelsbach diamond, whose color has been compared to that of a deep blue aquamarine, was first recorded in 1664 as part of the dowry of the Spanish Infanta, Margareta Teresa, who in 1667 married the Emperor Leopold. In this way the gem came to Vienna. It was part of ‘a new aquisition of precious stones from India and Portugal’ and was possibly fashioned in Paris, since the Sancy, the French Blue, the Hortensia and a number of other important diamonds were cut or refashioned there during the seventeenth century.
Refashioning of obselete cuts was the specialty of the Paris cutters, and it is even possible that the Wittelsbach was originally a Pointed Star Cut. The Wittelsbach Brilliant is a Stellar Cut with radially bisected girdle facets. The star facets (round the table) are also radially bisected. Both the table facet and the culet are exceptionally large. The extra facets were most certainly applied to increase the gem’s brilliance, since the stone itself is shallow and dark.
The magnificent 36.56 ct Wittelsbach diamond, whose color has been compared to that of a deep blue aquamarine, was first recorded in 1664 as part of the dowry of the Spanish Infanta, Margareta Teresa, who in 1667 married the Emperor Leopold. In this way the gem came to Vienna. It was part of ‘a new aquisition of precious stones from India and Portugal’ and was possibly fashioned in Paris, since the Sancy, the French Blue, the Hortensia and a number of other important diamonds were cut or refashioned there during the seventeenth century.
Refashioning of obselete cuts was the specialty of the Paris cutters, and it is even possible that the Wittelsbach was originally a Pointed Star Cut. The Wittelsbach Brilliant is a Stellar Cut with radially bisected girdle facets. The star facets (round the table) are also radially bisected. Both the table facet and the culet are exceptionally large. The extra facets were most certainly applied to increase the gem’s brilliance, since the stone itself is shallow and dark.
The Modern Dutch School
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
It may be said, therefore, that the art of Josef Israels, though he received his training in Paris, was far more the fruit of his own experience of life than the outcome of French influence. We feel that even if Millet had never existed, Israels would not have painted otherwise than he did, and though the subject matter of their respective pictures are akin, there are considerable differences between them. Millet painted his peasants out-of-doors in the light of the sun; Israels pictured his fisher-folk by preference indoors, in dim interiors. Hence his pictures are usually more subdued in color than those of Millet. Israels painted low life in low tones and built up his visions of life, whether in oil paintings, water-colors, or etchings—and he worked in all three mediums—by broad masses of light and shade. Further, his tendency is to be more tragic than Millet, and many of his picture have not inaccurately been described as ‘piercing notes of woe.’ One of his most famous pictures, ‘Alone in the World’, contains the essence of his art. In the treatment, in the rays of light dimly illuminating the gloom which befits the subject, we see the influence of Rembrandt; while in the bowed figure of the lonely widow, with her open Bible by her side, we have a poignant expression of the artist’s deep feeling for the daily tragedy of life.
In 1870 Josef Israels left Amsterdam and moved to The Hague, where he lived till he died on August 12, 1911, respected, honored, and world-famous. He was a painter who appealed equally to the general public and to connoisseurs and though so many of his works are tragic, this never interfered with his popularity, because he pictured the tragedies of common life which all have experienced and all can understand. Further, if he reached his highest intensity of expression in rendering sorrow, suffering, endurance, and the pathos of old age, Israels was not wholly tragic in his art. Pictures like ‘A Frugal Meal’ and ‘A Happy Family’ show the reverse of the medal, the compensations of poverty, and the happiness of the humble. But even in these scenes of domestic contentment there is something touching, and the philosophy of Israels seems to bid us to ponder on the life of people who can be happy with so little.
When Josef Israels was a young man, working as a clerk under his father, one of his frequent duties was to take a money bag to the bank of a Mr Mesdag. This banker had a son Hendrik Willem Mesdag, born at Groningen on February 25, 1831, who also became a famous painter. For many years H.W. Mesdag practised art as a amateur, and it was not till he had amassed a considerable fortune in business that he retired from banking and devoted himself entirely to painting. Thus Mesdag was not only in the independent position of being able to paint what he pleased, without thinking of the taste of buyers, but he was also wealthy enough to help his brother artists whose works he admired.
In 1886, when he was thirty-five years of age, Mesdag went to Brussels, where his friends and relative Alma-Tadema was then residing. Roelofs also was living in Brussels, and it was under his guidance that the banker began the serious studies which should fit him to make art henceforward his profession. Mesdag stayed three years at Brussels and returned in 1869 to The Hague, no longer an active man of business but an artist. He was not only a painter himself but a collector of paintings, and in course of time he formed a very important collection of modern pictures, chiefly of the Barbizon and Modern Dutch Schools, which in 1903 he generously presented to the public. The Mesdag Museum at The Hague is a lasting monument of his own taste and of the genius of his contemporaries. As a painter Mesdag gave himself almost exclusively to the painting of the sea, and his marines are remarkable for thier luminosity, truth, and the vigor of their handling. ‘A Seascape’ is a good example of his power of suggesting the life and movement of the waves and of his skill in placing shipping, so that his picture is at once absolutely natural and yet decorative in design.
The numerous painters of the Modern Dutch School—almost as numerous as the ‘Little Masters’ of the seventeenth century—may broadly be divided into two classes, the figure of genre painters for whom Israels was the chief influence, and the landscape painters who were inspired by Roelofs and the French painters of Barbizon. Among the genre painters we may mention Albert Neuhuys, born at Utrecht in 1844, who approaches closely to Israels in his grave tender renderings of humble interiors; David Adolf Constant Artz (1837-90), who, in addition to interiors, painted the fisher-folk of Scheveningen out-of-doors, frequently at moments when they were resting on the sandhills; and Bernardus Johannes Blommers, born at The Hague in 1845, who developed in his own way the lighter side of the art of Israels. There is nothing tragic in the pictures of Blommers, whose favorite subjects are children playing on the sands at Scheveningen or paddling in the water. ‘On the Beach’ is a typical example of the happy seaside scenes in which the artist displays alike his love of children and his knowledge of sea and sky.
The Modern Dutch School (continued)
It may be said, therefore, that the art of Josef Israels, though he received his training in Paris, was far more the fruit of his own experience of life than the outcome of French influence. We feel that even if Millet had never existed, Israels would not have painted otherwise than he did, and though the subject matter of their respective pictures are akin, there are considerable differences between them. Millet painted his peasants out-of-doors in the light of the sun; Israels pictured his fisher-folk by preference indoors, in dim interiors. Hence his pictures are usually more subdued in color than those of Millet. Israels painted low life in low tones and built up his visions of life, whether in oil paintings, water-colors, or etchings—and he worked in all three mediums—by broad masses of light and shade. Further, his tendency is to be more tragic than Millet, and many of his picture have not inaccurately been described as ‘piercing notes of woe.’ One of his most famous pictures, ‘Alone in the World’, contains the essence of his art. In the treatment, in the rays of light dimly illuminating the gloom which befits the subject, we see the influence of Rembrandt; while in the bowed figure of the lonely widow, with her open Bible by her side, we have a poignant expression of the artist’s deep feeling for the daily tragedy of life.
In 1870 Josef Israels left Amsterdam and moved to The Hague, where he lived till he died on August 12, 1911, respected, honored, and world-famous. He was a painter who appealed equally to the general public and to connoisseurs and though so many of his works are tragic, this never interfered with his popularity, because he pictured the tragedies of common life which all have experienced and all can understand. Further, if he reached his highest intensity of expression in rendering sorrow, suffering, endurance, and the pathos of old age, Israels was not wholly tragic in his art. Pictures like ‘A Frugal Meal’ and ‘A Happy Family’ show the reverse of the medal, the compensations of poverty, and the happiness of the humble. But even in these scenes of domestic contentment there is something touching, and the philosophy of Israels seems to bid us to ponder on the life of people who can be happy with so little.
When Josef Israels was a young man, working as a clerk under his father, one of his frequent duties was to take a money bag to the bank of a Mr Mesdag. This banker had a son Hendrik Willem Mesdag, born at Groningen on February 25, 1831, who also became a famous painter. For many years H.W. Mesdag practised art as a amateur, and it was not till he had amassed a considerable fortune in business that he retired from banking and devoted himself entirely to painting. Thus Mesdag was not only in the independent position of being able to paint what he pleased, without thinking of the taste of buyers, but he was also wealthy enough to help his brother artists whose works he admired.
In 1886, when he was thirty-five years of age, Mesdag went to Brussels, where his friends and relative Alma-Tadema was then residing. Roelofs also was living in Brussels, and it was under his guidance that the banker began the serious studies which should fit him to make art henceforward his profession. Mesdag stayed three years at Brussels and returned in 1869 to The Hague, no longer an active man of business but an artist. He was not only a painter himself but a collector of paintings, and in course of time he formed a very important collection of modern pictures, chiefly of the Barbizon and Modern Dutch Schools, which in 1903 he generously presented to the public. The Mesdag Museum at The Hague is a lasting monument of his own taste and of the genius of his contemporaries. As a painter Mesdag gave himself almost exclusively to the painting of the sea, and his marines are remarkable for thier luminosity, truth, and the vigor of their handling. ‘A Seascape’ is a good example of his power of suggesting the life and movement of the waves and of his skill in placing shipping, so that his picture is at once absolutely natural and yet decorative in design.
The numerous painters of the Modern Dutch School—almost as numerous as the ‘Little Masters’ of the seventeenth century—may broadly be divided into two classes, the figure of genre painters for whom Israels was the chief influence, and the landscape painters who were inspired by Roelofs and the French painters of Barbizon. Among the genre painters we may mention Albert Neuhuys, born at Utrecht in 1844, who approaches closely to Israels in his grave tender renderings of humble interiors; David Adolf Constant Artz (1837-90), who, in addition to interiors, painted the fisher-folk of Scheveningen out-of-doors, frequently at moments when they were resting on the sandhills; and Bernardus Johannes Blommers, born at The Hague in 1845, who developed in his own way the lighter side of the art of Israels. There is nothing tragic in the pictures of Blommers, whose favorite subjects are children playing on the sands at Scheveningen or paddling in the water. ‘On the Beach’ is a typical example of the happy seaside scenes in which the artist displays alike his love of children and his knowledge of sea and sky.
The Modern Dutch School (continued)
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Preannotation Technique
(via Wired) A new facial-recognition algorithm created by Allen Yang, a postdoctoral researcher at UC Berkeley's College of Engineering is able to recognize faces with 90-95 percent accuracy, even if the eyes, nose and mouth are obscured + according to Shankar Sastry, the dean of UC Berkeley's College of Engineering, Yang's new facial-detection method also renders years of research in the field obsolete.
I think the new technique will pave the way for new business (startups) models + privacy issues + security concerns.
Useful links:
http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/~yang
http://perception.csl.uiuc.edu/recognition/Home.html
I think the new technique will pave the way for new business (startups) models + privacy issues + security concerns.
Useful links:
http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/~yang
http://perception.csl.uiuc.edu/recognition/Home.html
Feathers In Amber
The article Dino-Era Feathers Found Encased in Amber @ http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/03/080311-amber-feathers.html was fascinating and educational + an interesting spin would be the exotic collectors: they will be looking for dinosaur feathers in amber worldwide + who could afford the prices?
Buyer beware! There will be plenty of imitations in the market very soon!
Buyer beware! There will be plenty of imitations in the market very soon!
Diamond Source
According to industry analysts, Botswana is the largest producer of diamonds in the world, accounting for 25% of the production followed by Russia (22%), Canada (12%), South Africa (12%), Angola (10%) and Namibia (6%) + India is the world’s largest importer of rough diamonds and exporter of cut and polished diamonds with over 90% per cent market share.
Understanding French
A Guide to the French: Handle with Care by Elaine Sciolino @ http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/03/24/travel/23sciolino.php was brilliant + it was educational + gem dealers, jewelers, artists, businessmen should read it several times.
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