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Saturday 30 January 2010
Fairies, Dust and Water
EDITORIAL: Sogno D'Inverno
MAGAZINE: Grazia Italy
PHOTOGRAPHER: Signe Vilstrup
MODELS: Quinn Cooper & Masha Novoselova
I had a dream about this years ago, a woman with a dress made of the sea - except in my dream it was made of felt, sik, wire, beads, sequins, water, seaweed, netting and salt. it was amazing, i still remember it.
future of the anti-fakeworld movement - begins with cute room design
both www.marieclairemaison.com
http://www.frenchbedroomcompany.co.uk/
Wednesday 20 January 2010
Song of the Sea
Here's a cute bit of animation i discovered on another blog http://pandaleina.blogspot.com/?expref=next-blog
When i saw this i immediately thought of Scottish and Icelandic mythology, which tells of a mystical creature known as a Selkie (scots for seal) that sheds its skin from seal to become human, and can return to the sea by putting their skins back on. Stories concerning selkies are generally romantic tragedies. Sometimes the human will not know that their lover is a selkie, and wakes to find them gone. Other times the human will hide the selkie's skin, thus preventing them from returning to seal form. If a man steals a female selkie's skin, she is in his power, to an extent, and she is forced to become his wife. A selkie can only make contact with one particular human for a short amount of time before they must return to the sea. They are not able to make contact with that human again for seven years, unless the human is to steal their selkie's skin and hide it or burn it.
When i saw this i immediately thought of Scottish and Icelandic mythology, which tells of a mystical creature known as a Selkie (scots for seal) that sheds its skin from seal to become human, and can return to the sea by putting their skins back on. Stories concerning selkies are generally romantic tragedies. Sometimes the human will not know that their lover is a selkie, and wakes to find them gone. Other times the human will hide the selkie's skin, thus preventing them from returning to seal form. If a man steals a female selkie's skin, she is in his power, to an extent, and she is forced to become his wife. A selkie can only make contact with one particular human for a short amount of time before they must return to the sea. They are not able to make contact with that human again for seven years, unless the human is to steal their selkie's skin and hide it or burn it.
Monday 18 January 2010
Vampire skull!
March 10, 2009—Among the many medieval plague victims recently unearthed near Venice, Italy, one reportedly had never-before-seen evidence of an unusual affliction: being "undead."
The partial body and skull of the woman showed her jaw forced open by a brick (above)—an exorcism technique used on suspected vampires.
It's the first time that archaeological remains have been interpreted as belonging to a suspected vampire, team leader Matteo Borrini, a forensic archaeologist at the University of Florence, told National Geographic News.
Borrini has been digging up mass graves on the island of Lazzaretto Nuovo, where the "vampire" was found, since 2006.
(See mass grave pictures of plague victims on another island near Venice.)
"I was lucky. I [didn't] expect to find a vampire during my excavations," he said.
Belief in vampires was rampant in the Middle Ages, mostly because the process of decomposition was not well understood.
For instance, as the human stomach decays, it releases a dark "purge fluid." This bloodlike liquid can flow freely from a corpse's nose and mouth, so it was apparently sometimes confused with traces of vampire victims' blood.
The fluid sometimes moistened the burial shroud near the corpse's mouth enough that it sagged into the jaw, creating tears in the cloth.
Since tombs were often reopened during plagues so other victims could be added, Italian gravediggers saw these decomposing bodies with partially "eaten" shrouds, Borrini said.
Vampires were thought by some to be causes of plagues, so the superstition took root that shroud-chewing was the "magical way" that vampires spread pestilence, he said. Inserting objects—such as bricks and stones—into the mouths of alleged vampires was thought to halt the disease.
—Christine Dell'Amore
And in a fun turn of events, the production team working on 'Being Human' used this bit of superstition and archaeology in a historical flashback in Episode 3 from Series 2. I like this a lot, though i'm not sure why. A nice knowledge circle in my head i guess.
The point of Avatar
You know, since seeing this i have not stopped wanting to be part of this film. Or this world. It's so beautiful, ethereal, natural, magical and simplistic minus the war-mongering americans. Above all, i want to be part of the night, the phosphorescence, the light, the flight of lizards, the water, the trees. I'm a hippy yes, and more so now. What i wouldn't give to be so connected to my world. I have always been connected to the world though. At one point i joked that i had powers over the rain because i loved it so much, and in truth for most of last year, whenever i wanted it to rain i would wish it, and then either that day or the next day it would rain. Of course, i live in London, and it rains pretty often. Even in Syria, a country with a VERY high rainfall, my brother asked me to make it rain. so i wished. and for the next week it POURED! people were astounded and shocked, it was unheard of in Damascus. thunder, lightning, rain. it was beautiful.
I don't think there's anything wrong with the fact that Avatar is a bit preachy. Sure they try to make statements, but how is that worse than a stupid chick flick with no content, 'the hangover' with little to say but to comment on the drunken antics of 3 idiots in a surreal adventure about Las Vegas, or whatever. They raise good points, and have reached more people with a film than i think any number of charities and environmental campaigns have attempted in the last few years.
The Amazon Rainforest
The killing of the Native Americans
The displacement of indigenous people
The greed and theft of power for natural resources
The Lost Tribe of the Amazon trying to shoot down a plane flying overhead.
And the arrogance of modern society to think that people who have survived and evolved to exist in an environment should need all the things we can offer. A people stay hidden because they do not want to be found. if they needed our help, or wanted to know about us, they would.
David Attenborough says that he has never again heard of the tribe he made contact with decades ago in Papua New Guinea. They came to see who he was and what he wanted, he showed them his technology, the cameras, asked questions, and then they left. Melted into the trees. Never seen again. They don't want to be found.
History in Britain
While i went to school in Scotland, it strikes me as very odd that the history we were taught was the Tudors, the killing of Native Americans, Mary Queen of Scots and the 1st and 2 World Wars. What about the other great moments in history. What about the English Civil War? What about the dissolution of Scotland's autonomy and the wars between England? American kids may have a much shorter history than our own, but they are taught about their own history and battles, they are taught about their independence. This pisses me off quite bit. So much time was spent faffing about learning the old rhyme "divorced, beheaded, died. Divorced, beheaded, survived", and yet we missed so much of our other, most political and conflictual history.
So here is the civil war in England:
"The English Civil War (1641–1651) was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists. The first (1642–46) and second (1648–49) civil wars pitted the supporters of King Charles I against the supporters of the Long Parliament, while the third war (1649–51) saw fighting between supporters of King Charles II and supporters of the Rump Parliament.
The Civil War ended with the Parliamentary victory at the Battle of Worcester on 3 September 1651.
The Civil War led to the trial and execution of Charles I, the exile of his son, Charles II, and replacement of English monarchy with first, the Commonwealth of England (1649–53), and then with a Protectorate (1653–59), under Oliver Cromwell's personal rule. The monopoly of the Church of England on Christian worship in England ended with the victors consolidating the established Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland. Constitutionally, the wars established the precedent that an English monarch cannot govern without Parliament's consent, although this concept was legally established only with the Glorious Revolution later in the century."
Also, a great bit of British television called 'The Devil's Whore' based on these times. Watch it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBOSvgi5YVo <---- here
So here is the civil war in England:
"The English Civil War (1641–1651) was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists. The first (1642–46) and second (1648–49) civil wars pitted the supporters of King Charles I against the supporters of the Long Parliament, while the third war (1649–51) saw fighting between supporters of King Charles II and supporters of the Rump Parliament.
The Civil War ended with the Parliamentary victory at the Battle of Worcester on 3 September 1651.
The Civil War led to the trial and execution of Charles I, the exile of his son, Charles II, and replacement of English monarchy with first, the Commonwealth of England (1649–53), and then with a Protectorate (1653–59), under Oliver Cromwell's personal rule. The monopoly of the Church of England on Christian worship in England ended with the victors consolidating the established Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland. Constitutionally, the wars established the precedent that an English monarch cannot govern without Parliament's consent, although this concept was legally established only with the Glorious Revolution later in the century."
Also, a great bit of British television called 'The Devil's Whore' based on these times. Watch it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBOSvgi5YVo <---- here
The Dreamers
"A young American studying in Paris in 1968 strikes up a friendship with a French brother and sister. Set against the background of the '68 Paris student riots."
Eva Green, Louis Garrel, Michael Pitt.
Masturbating, nudity, twins doing incestuous-like things, weirdness, running about, freedom of spirit, humiliation, "you are one of us". Twin behaviour truly, really is strange, like one person split in 2, thinking the same thoughts, being one and yet separate, wanting the same things but speaking them from different mouths. curious film,
Save japan Dolphins
So this is a movie i watched about 2 weeks ago, The Cove, and it really hit me. I fell in love with dolphins at aquariums and yet the animals that live there are the product of kidnapping and mass murder - would you call it genocide? Each dolphin goes for up to $150,000. THATS CRAZY! And in the process the family and friends and whoever are brutally killed in a blood bath.
"Using state-of-the-art equipment, a group of activists, led by renown dolphin trainer Ric O’Barry, infiltrate a cove near Taijii, Japan to expose both a shocking instance of animal abuse and a serious threat to human health."
A lot of great guerrilla footage makes it quite dramatic, and the presence of Ric O'Barry (trainer of the dolphins for the Flipper tv show) make it a gripping watch. Ric is now an activist after one of his dolphins, the one he was closest to, committed suicide. While the concept of animal suicide seems odd outside of the context of humans, Ric seems to think this is what occurred. The way he describes it, she swam into his arms, looked at him, took a breath, submerged. Then she surfaced again, took another breath, submerged and never came back up. She floated to the bottom, and he is convinced that she killed herself. From that point on he has been fighting for the rights of dolphins to be free, and was arrested on that same day for trying to free another dolphin.
click here and donate by buying a t-shirt from Ecojoia. I got the '50 Tee' for Dolphins - Women's' and it's super soft and comfortable. It' s only $40 and it's worth it. give it a go.
http://www.savejapandolphins.org/
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