Clipmarks | ouyangwulong's Looking collection

On Architecture and Elegance

Sat, 29 Dec 2007 04:58:35 GMT

clipped by: Kore7
clipper's remarks:

[Maillart's] bridge is endowed with a subcategory of beauty we can refer to as elegance, a quality present whenever a work of architecture succeeds in carrying out an act of resistance—holding, spanning, sheltering—with grace and economy as well as strength; when it has the modesty not to draw attention to the difficulties it has surmounted.

From philosophical historian Alain de Botton's inimitable The Architecture of Happiness, itself a paradigmatic illustration of the aesthetic elegance of well-engineered minimalism (be it architectural or textual).

The NYRB's synopsis of de Botton's work makes note of this:

The simplicity of his writing is not the product of a simple mind....

In The Consolations of Philosophy (2000) he remarked that "there are...no legitimate reasons why books in the humanities should be difficult or boring; wisdom does not require a specialized vocabulary or syntax."

Clip Source: www.joelonsoftware.com

Both Robert Maillart’s Salginatobel and Isambard Brunel’s Clifton Suspension bridges are structures of strength; both attract our veneration for carrying us safely across a fatal drop—and yet Maillart’s bridge is the more beautiful of the pair for the exceptionally nimble, apparently effortless way in which it carries out its duty.

With its ponderous masonry and heavy steel chains, Brunel’s construction has something to it of a stocky middle-aged man who hoists his trousers and loudly solicits the attention of others before making a jump between two points

Clip Source: www.bristoljpg.co.uk

Clip Source: www.joelonsoftware.com

whereas Maillart’s bridge resembles a lithe athlete who leaps without ceremony and bows demurely to his audience before leaving the stage.

Clip Source: www.greatbuildings.com

Clip Source: www.joelonsoftware.com

Both bridges accomplish daring feats, but Maillart’s possesses the added virtue of making its achievement look effortless—and because we sense it isn’t, we wonder at it and admire it all the more.

Tags: architecture, elegance, bridges, bulidings, beauty, engineering, design, simplicity

Beetle Dissected, Artfully

Sat, 15 Dec 2007 11:09:56 GMT

clipped by: wildcat

Clip Source: www.livescience.com

Julie Rauer, an artist based in New York city, crafted this watercolor painting based on observations of beetle parts – mandibles, wing covers, antennae, legs and complete lyre beetles – in the collection of the American Museum of Natural History.

Titled Coleoptera Polis, the image evokes images the artist compares to a gothic cityscape.

This image was submitted as part of the 2007 International Science & Engineering Visualization Challenge, an effort jointly administered by the National Science Foundation and the journal Science. Winners from the SciViz challenges can be seen at: http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/scivis/index.jsp.

Tags: science, research, art, beetle

Baghdad museum's slow recovery

Sat, 15 Dec 2007 08:02:30 GMT

clipped by: JohnWaterman

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

The Assyrian Hall at the Iraqi National Museum is breathtaking

The Assyrians once ruled a large empire

Stone panels from the royal palace at Khorsabad run along the walls.

The carvings on the friezes depict daily life in the Assyrian royal court, which at its height about 3,000 years ago controlled a region stretching across much of the modern Middle East.

Recent work in the hall has included the addition of a modern arch, which is flanked by ancient bulls with eagle wings and human heads.

It forms the entrance to the hall, which gives you the sense of walking into an Assyrian palace.

Perhaps the Assyrian gallery is so stunning because it is so unexpected in Baghdad.

Many of Iraq's ancient treasures have been looted since 2003

That collection was devastated in the days following the US-led invasion in 2003, when looters emptied the vaults.

Some important artefacts have been returned, including the Warka vase, which is over 5,000 years old.

Iraqis are fiercely proud of their cultural heritage.

GIANT Crystals!

Thu, 13 Dec 2007 15:55:02 GMT

clipped by: ouyangwulong
clipper's remarks: Uh, yeah, I know, it's a stupid title and I normally have something more cerebral to say, but this is just plain cool.

I wonder what could possibly explain my fascination with these crystals?

Clip Source: news.nationalgeographic.com

Giant Crystal Cave Comes to Light

In the new issue of the journal Geology, García-Ruiz reports that for millennia the crystals thrived in the cave's extremely rare and stable natural environment. Temperatures hovered consistently around a steamy 136 degrees Fahrenheit (58 degrees Celsius), and the cave was filled with mineral-rich water that drove the crystals' growth.

Clip Source: news.nationalgeographic.com

Tags: giant, crystals, big, huge, enormous, phalus?

A poem.

Tue, 11 Dec 2007 09:25:42 GMT

clipped by: syncopath
clipper's remarks: the poem is here thanx to Jorge Luis Borges.
the anticipation of Love is here because of human's desire.
the Gangas river delta is here 10x to Aribeth clip..-)
Our Earth as Art is a site with views on earth through the eyes of the Landsat-7 satellite.

Both-to my eyes- Lansat-7 and Borges are working from space ...... ))

Clip Source: nonbeing.blogspot.com

anticipation of love

Neither the intimacy of your look, your brow fair as a feast day,
nor the favor of your body, still mysterious, reserved, and childlike,
nor what comes to me of your life, settling in words or silence,
will be so mysterious a gift
as the sight of your sleep, enfolded
in the vigil of my arms.
Virgin again, miraculously, by the absolving power of sleep,
quiet and luminous like some happy thing recovered by memory,
you will give me that shore of your life that you yourself do not own.
Cast up into silence
I shall discern that ultimate beach of your being
and see you for the first time, perhaps,
as God must see you --
the fiction of Time destroyed,

free from love, from me.

Jorge Luis Borges
(translated by Alastair Read)

Clip Source: earthasart.gsfc.nasa.gov

The Ganges River forms an extensive delta where it empties into the Bay of Bengal. The delta is largely covered with a swamp forest known as the Sunderbans, which is home to the Royal Bengal Tiger.

Tags: a poem, jorge luis borges, gangas delta, from space

Marvelous Mysteries of Cartography

Thu, 06 Dec 2007 16:58:14 GMT

clipped by: ouyangwulong
clipper's remarks: As a huge fan of Martin Waldseemuller, I'm glad to see his work in the news. Cartography used to be a really cool job, requiering research and interviews, and a healthy dose of speculation.

The great thing is that history is so much more complex than the writing of it, and this map is a perfect example of that. Maps were very cloak and dagger stuff back in their day. Although the story comes down that Columbus discovered America and Balboa discovered the Pacific Ocean. But a clever sleuth could have figured out that there must have been something dividing the eastern coast of China from the eastern coast of the new continent.

Also, there is the very sexy possibility that other unknown explorers had already made forays into the Pacific before Balboa got the credit.

I think its great when history starts to sound like an Arturo Perez Reverte novel!

Clip Source: news.nationalgeographic.com

December 4, 2007—As the U.S. Library of Congress readies the first map to use the name "America" for its public debut, some researchers are wondering where in the world the mapmaker got his information.

The world map, created by German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller in 1507, is the first document to show a separate Western Hemisphere and label the Pacific Ocean as its own body of water.

Before he drew the document, Waldseemüller had pored over notes from explorers Christopher Columbus and Amerigo Vespucci, as well as other unknown Portuguese and Spanish sources, according to a statement from the Library of Congress.

But some scholars are confused as to how the mapmaker knew the Pacific Ocean existed years before explorers found it, and how he depicted South America so accurately.

"From the writings of Vespucci you couldn't have prepared [this] map," John Hebert, chief of the geography and map division at the library, told Reuters.

Tags: i'm a total cartography nerd

French Atomic Bomb Test Photos from 1968

Fri, 09 Nov 2007 03:28:58 GMT

clipped by: Kore7
clipper's remarks: Never-before-seen 40-year-old pictures of French atomic bomb tests have surfaced on the internet and they are simultaneously beautiful and terrifying. The epitome of historical human achievement and wanton destruction combined in one split-second.

These are four scanned pictures of hardcopies I possess of the French nuclear test codenamed Canopus, which was fired on 24th August 1968 in the Fangataufa Atoll. The French army had those pictures taken on site.

Full-size links: 1, 2, 3, 4.

Clip Source: flickr.com

This shot was taken in 1968 by the French army in the Fangataufa atoll. Codenamed Canopus, it yielded 2600 kt.

Although this picture, like many of the series, is a work of the French Army (as far as I know) this is an original scan from a hardcopy I posess, and processed to remove dust and scratches.

A strange view on such paradise-like landscapes.

Clip Source: flickr.com

Tags: bomb, atomic, nuclear, blast, mushroom, cloud, 1968, french, france, photos

The Haunting Artistic Genius of Martin Ramirez

Tue, 06 Nov 2007 04:51:44 GMT

clipped by: ouyangwulong
clipper's remarks: The second article is well worth reading in its entirety to see how Ramirez destabilizes our expectations and categorizations.

He is a hauntingly phantasmagoria artist. He is visually accessible yet emotionally elusive. We can see the beauty in the world of his art, but it is mysterious. His art seems to have the melancholy peacefulness and yet haunting menace of De Chirico.

The fact that a full 1/3rd of his oeuvre, representing his late style and artistic evolution have just recently been discovered is a staggering windfall.

Clip Source: www.fleisher-ollmangallery.com

Clip Source: www.iht.com

A cache of Martín Ramírez works is discovered

What Anderson saw were Ramírez's unmistakable subjects - horses and caballeros, trains, tunnels, ships, Madonnas - and the grand, repetitive lines that were his trademark. And what she found when she got to Dunievitz's house in Auburn was a cache of some 140 of the drawings, all from the last three years of Ramírez's life, many of them dated and most in great shape, despite lying in a garage for almost two decades.

Clip Source: twi-ny.com

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Ramírez, who created the roughly 300 drawings that make up his known work between 1948 and 1963 while confined to a mental hospital in Northern California, is simply one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. He belongs to the group of accessible, irresistible genius draftsmen that includes Paul Klee, Saul Steinberg and Charles Schulz.

Whatever ideas about art you hold dear, expect them to be healthily destabilized here.

Clip Source: www.petulloartcollection.org

Clip Source: www.renaissancesociety.org

Clip Source: www.tfaoi.com

Clip Source: articulations.smithsonianmag.com

Tags: art, mexico, martin ramirez

Historical Atlas with 4000 year map animation

Mon, 05 Nov 2007 08:22:31 GMT

clipped by: pokkets
clipper's remarks: The Download is 2.6 MB and fairly easy to use

Clip Source: www.atlasofworldhistory.com

Free historical atlas software for Windows PCs

4000 year map animation shows change over time.
Click nations on maps for history at that time and place.
Africa, Asia, and Europe to the year 1000.

Download Free

For Windows XP and Vista PCs.
Free version is full feature. FAQ.

For Teachers For Students About Us

Tags: world, atlas, map, history, animation

Architectual Interface between Modernity and Antiquity

Tue, 30 Oct 2007 20:15:07 GMT

clipped by: ouyangwulong
clipper's remarks: I think that the narative aspect of architecture is often overlooked. Here it is brought inescapably yet eloquently to life. There is a narrative in the reflection of the Parthenon in the glass of the new museum, the interplay between the ancient past and the approaching future. In both ancient cities and modern museums, we navigate history and culture, spatially arranged and physically enclosing us, and it is the architect who controls the course of this narrative.

Clip Source: www.iht.com

No sane architect, one can assume, would want to invite comparisons between his building and the Parthenon. So it comes as little surprise that the New Acropolis Museum, which stands at the foot of one of the great achievements of human history, is a quiet work, especially by the standards of its flamboyant Swiss-born architect, Bernard Tschumi.

But in mastering his ego, Tschumi pulled off an impressive accomplishment: a building that is both an enlightening meditation on the Parthenon and a mesmerizing work in its own right. I can't remember seeing a design that is so eloquent about another work of architecture.

But by fusing sculpture, architecture and the ancient landscape into a forceful visual narrative, the New Acropolis Museum delivers a revelation that trumps the tired arguments and incessant flag waving by both sides. It's impossible to stand in the top-floor galleries, in full view of the Parthenon's ravaged, sun-bleached frame, without craving the marbles' return.

Tags: athens, acropolis museum, parthenon, modernity, antiquity, architecture

The Fascinating Art of Altered Books

Fri, 21 Sep 2007 04:29:49 GMT

clipped by: BelindaManning
clipper's remarks: This is a site of some very intriguing art.

Clip Source: centripetalnotion.com

Tags: art, books

The most addictive website I have seen in a long ...

Sat, 19 May 2007 16:45:13 GMT

clipped by: arifsali
clipper's remarks: Besides Clipmarks that is ...
This site is unbelievable, you just sit and stare.

Clip Source: flickrvision.com

Tags: flickr, pictures, maps

Dark horse nomination for most beautiful beach in the world...

Wed, 16 May 2007 08:23:40 GMT

clipped by: ouyangwulong
clipper's remarks: Third Beach, La Push, Washington, USA

Now this is what I call a beach! No sand. No palm trees. No sunshine. Pure restless brooding, shaped by the fierce creative energies bursting out of the natural world. It is a the beach of the soul, it is a mirror of the human condition. Among these rocks, I find the entire world, gestating, being carved anew. If you're on facebook you can check out more pictures...

Clip Source: www.facebook.com

Tags: photogrphy, beaches, la push, olympic penninsula