Passage de la Tour

The Passage de la Tour sculpture is very enigmatic. By structure its a dead end but it is full of mind broadening books. The only way I could drill into it was through investigation of artist's motive. After a little history gathering on the project, his evolving annual sculpture quest, I tried to arrive at how the artist highlighted the books to make the people notice, before they are recycled.

Silo

At a second hand book fair at the church

Books lie around

like bricks unclaimed

Unbranded

Year 0

The arch is wide

Another pillar to balance the space

Stacked books in a column become the Atlas

Once two humans form a base with

their hands, others begin to form

The human pyramid

We always want to hoist something

Lift the world

The world of books

Year 1

The arch is wide

The space murmurs like a hive of

Paper wasps

Like a wooden box full of

Pigeonholes at a corner store

The hive is thin

Before the hive gives out

Before the books go to the pound

Before the words are pulverised

The words are in the dictionary but a particular long sequence is in that book. Save it as is. Or revise it with your life. Preserve the book. Pickle it. Increase its Shelf Life.

Note: Some wasps build their nests out of mud but ‘paper wasps’ use wood to make hives with papery material.

An experiment in science class

Fill a beaker with water upto half

Tie three seeds to a stick

Dip it in water

Let the bottom one be

Immersed in water

The middle one dangling

In water and air and the

Third fully aerated

The one that sprouts

Swims in amniotic fluid

and breaths in

aerated blood

How to read a potato in a painting as a potato and not a solar symbol?

This book is about writing on art.It has sections to equip you with what to keep in mind while writing an essay, research paper or review of an exhibit.

The book has sample examples for comparitive essays and reviews with a good analysis on the organization of the material, its purpose and aptness for the reader.

The checklist on writing on art can be extended to writing on books too. The many references to artists of all times with your interest will give you a walk through the whole of history of art.

The sections on what is art, interpretation, the importance of seeing for creating art and quotes by many writers and artists are interesting to read.

Sep 4, 2006

Excellent book on art

This book is an excellent study of Palestinian art and its history. Art work of Ismail Shammout, Sliman Mansour, Kamal Boullata are extensively described with the relevant context to the times and loss of Palestine inhabitants.

One comes across not only paintings but also other forms of expression - 'mud on wood'(page 84).

One of the paintings 'Whereto?' on page 49 shows the effect of influence of 'absence of a character (part of defined standard of family)' by exclusion from the figure-ground of a painting but not from a higher space of our understanding. While paintings are assumed to be more real by blending into the atmosphere i.e extending onto the walls that they are placed. This one creates a great seperation. It is to such art that you get introduced to in this book.
Mona Hatoum's work is described , most of which is daily home objects turned useless in a very prickly way, the source of it being her sense of alienation from home.
The same themes are explored in works of Khalil Rabah and Asad Azi.


sep 10, 2006

Affecting the outcome

Author: Hart Seely

The author has practised Juju for a long time. In the kingdom of baseball he knows what works what doesnt. Voodoo out. Anything that works for three times In. He has a whole set of instructions with dos and donts. He beseeches the need for helping hands for the juju to work for sure. A Harry Potter world with its own lingo. But not a world that defies physics. Heisenberg's Uncertainity principle still holds. Thats the basis of observation influences.
If you are not mentioned in the book, you must not be a Yankee fan.
The author takes the whole Juju thing so seriously that he has explored the negative side of it too, for world peace and safety.
Yankiverse. The author relates Yankees and US performance. If they have been wronged, the nation goes down.
Yankee fan through and through, he sustains the book just on Yankity. The high and low of the fictive 'juju' element is maintained consistently in the book. It is easy to come up with an imaginary thing but selling it is what Seely is good at what with the math of guaranteed thirteen wins which is thirteen less losses. The pace of the book is quick. All the trades, its effects, wins.

Pennant race
Snake oil
Also-ran

Then and now

Author: Charles Dickens

Pantechnicon

Postilion

Character Tom Noddy

Modern Tom Noddy - Bubble magic

Palace of Popes is now a museum.

Morra (game)

Rhythm

Dance. Music. Instruments.

Designed to fly
fagot - bundle of sticks

That particular point in time

Flash point. Now I understand why my friends car stalled after he filled it with diesel instead of gas.
Since the stories are from writers, it is not surprising that many moments deal with how writers found  their spirit of writing, came to their book or are praised by John U in a letter.
The secret life of parents if funny. Is our baby being disillusioned too when she watches her parents busy in the kitchen cooking for themselves?

Keebler cookies in cornrows.

Science in food

Author's food website

Little miss millet stood with her skillet
Why curing(with salt) as a food preservation technique, was necessary in countries like Scandinavia with little sun?
Why toast can be crisp on top (Thermal diffusivity)?

Father

Author: Elisha Cooper

The tiny picture at the beginning of the chapter, a mom covered in sheets, the outline looks like Africa.

Stretchable fabric book covers

Exterior Decoration

Some houses in rural India
have a border of red
lined with raised stone
in front as if
on a pedestal

An artist and a child

This is the story of the great painter Goya, and Rosarita, a poor child who dreams of 'the art of strokes', while her canvas is the earth, and her finger the only sketch.

Goya moves from the King's Court to a rustic life, so that he can paint in peace and not worry about what theme in his painting will offend the church.

When Rosarita chalks out a picture of him as a wicked man, he is impressed by her talent ,but realises that she needs help in 'seeing' more than just two eyes can see, to be a good painter.

He then appoints Rosa's mother as the housekeeper giving them a roof. While he is doing paintings in his own style, he also teaches Rosa to finetune her skills and lets Rosa do an ivory painting. She does the ivory more justice than expected from a child.

Two extremes in relation to parents, children and art can be seen. Goya's son is a failure at art. Rosa's mother believes art's no good to earn bread.The son's dedication for father, trying to get him out of Inquisition, have been well brought out.

Towards the end, an important point is driven home, that it is scary to express your innermost fears, but the result will relieve you, for having found the expression. After all, what good is art if you cannot communicate your deep felt emotions.

Aug 30, 2005

Anterooms

first drafts poetry and first drafts nonfiction (more at the bottom of that link)