a Spontaneous Order

This project by Shahira Hammad envisions a new train station for Vienna, one that would either modify or replace the existing Westbahnhof train station.

The project keeps the existing building, but contaminated with structures that would express a complexity of programs now missing. The project was inspired both from Nature and Culture, and beyond its polemical characteristics it does intend to bring back what in science is called: Spontaneous Order.

It is, evidently, a reaction against excessive rationalism and rationalizations. Yes, it is excessive, but essentially it tries nothing else but to bring the complexities present in Nature into the urban fabric.

In a way the “project” is not really a “project,” since Shahira let what was envisioned come into being “naturally,” almost by itself, expressing not only outer realities, but also inner ones.

We could say that maybe this is an Epimethean work, as opposed to being Promethean, that is, a work in which thought comes afterwards… so the relationship between cause and effect is circular, not linear…

All in all this is an architectural meditation on Time as well, since the structures I envisioned do reflect metamorphosis, the passage of Time, change, ephemerality and even decay… themes, again, neglected by conventional architectures.

the War Water

Atlantic: Great Sea Battles, Heroic Discoveries, Titanic Storms, and a Vast Ocean of a Million Stories

“Men might as well project a voyage to the Moon as attempt to employ steam navigation against the stormy North Atlantic Ocean.”
 – Dionysius Lardner, Irish scientific writer and lecturer, 1793-1859

This quote opens Simon Winchester’s latest book, ATLANTIC. The bestselling author of KRAKATOA and THE PROFESSOR AND THE MADMAN has made a career of turning nonfiction accounts into page-turning literature. Now he is taking on the vast infinity that is the Atlantic Ocean in a work that reads like crisp fiction as it covers this immense space through a number of different themes, blending both fact and folklore along the way.

What gives the book even more poignancy is how Winchester interjects his personal experiences into the numerous references he provides regarding the great Atlantic Ocean. Once nicknamed “the pond” by Victorian sailors of the 1600s, this body of water has been the site of famous events and the inspiration for thousands of artistic and literary productions.

Early on in the preface, Winchester mentions the Atlantic Charter of 1941. U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill signed the accord that signaled a changing of the guard, with the United States taking over from Britain as titular leader of the Western world. Winchester also refers to the Atlantic Ocean as a body of water that geologists predict will continue to transform in shape and size dramatically. Because of all the change that has taken place with the ocean over thousands of years, it is a reasonable subject that can have its story told in the form of biography.

Winchester indicates that the origins of the Atlantic can be traced as far back as the Jurassic period 195 million years ago. However, it was not until the age of early aquatic explorers that this mighty ocean was discovered and recognized. The voyages of Italian explorer Christopher Columbus are well known. Yet the first European to cross the Atlantic and reach the New World was actually a Norse Viking, most likely from Norway. Prior to Columbus reaching the New World, Florentine navigator Amerigo Vespucci was the first to realize North America as a continent and the Atlantic as a discrete and separate body of water --- an ocean.

Details of the great ships that crossed the Atlantic are covered at length by Winchester, with particular attention given to the HMS Challenger. Initially a warship, the Challenger not only traversed the Atlantic visiting numerous ports along the way but also carried a team of scientists and geologists during its initial three-and-a-half-year voyage. The findings of these men of science included the discovery of hundreds of specimens --- both animal and plant --- many of which still exist today. This was a formidable intellectual achievement that opened up the world and was the most comprehensive study of an ocean ever undertaken.

ATLANTIC provides proof of the indelible inspiration the Atlantic Ocean has made in the areas of arts and literature. Thousands of poems, stories and artistic achievements claim the ocean as their muse. Among Winchester’s references are the Anglo-Saxon poem “The Seafarer” and numerous writings by the great William Shakespeare that provide some of the first Atlantic-inspired literary works. Architecture along the thousands of Atlantic coastline areas also represents respect for the sea. French composer Claude Debussy titled three of his major works “La mer,” which helped attach the word “Impressionism” to a new style of sea-centered music. Winchester also points out several famous pieces of art, with none more notable than those of English artist J.M.W. Turner, whose “The Wreck of the Minotaur” exemplified the power of the great Atlantic Ocean.

No story of the Atlantic would be complete without outlining the role this body of water has played in the war experience. The Portuguese, the French, the Dutch and the English all sailed ships across the Atlantic during colonization efforts with the intent on beating their opponents to new territories. Winchester regales us with the golden age of pirates on the Atlantic, a term that originated from the Caribbean references to buccaneers and privateers. Writers like Robert Louis Stevenson and Daniel Defoe told of the exploits of these infamous traverses and villains of the Atlantic.

What Simon Winchester does best is to make his biography of the Atlantic Ocean read like a compelling fictional narrative that is never dull. In the hands of a writer with his gifts and talent for phraseology, what could have been an antiseptic textbook type of read is instead an exciting and enthralling literary experience that will appeal to anyone who is interested in history and engaging storytelling.

Kalevala, 1835

The Kalevala (IPA: [ˈkɑlɛʋɑlɑ]) is a 19th-century work of epic poetry compiled by Elias Lönnrot from Finnish and Karelian oral folklore and mythology.

It is regarded as the national epic of Finland and is one of the most significant works of Finnish literature. The Kalevala played an instrumental role in the development of the Finnish national identity, the intensification of Finland's language strife and the growing sense of nationality that ultimately led to Finland's independence from Russia in 1917.

The first version of The Kalevala (called The Old Kalevala) was published in 1835. The version most commonly known today was first published in 1849 and consists of 22,795 verses, divided into fifty songs (Finnish: runot).The title can be interpreted as "The land of Kaleva" or "Kalevia".


Verses 221 to 232 of song forty.

Vaka vanha Väinämöinen itse tuon sanoiksi virkki: "Näistäpä toki tulisi kalanluinen kanteloinen, kun oisi osoajata, soiton luisen laatijata." Kun ei toista tullutkana, ei ollut osoajata, soiton luisen laatijata, vaka vanha Väinämöinen itse loihe laatijaksi, tekijäksi teentelihe.
Väinämöinen, old and steadfast, Answered in the words which follow: "Yet a harp might be constructed Even of the bones of fishes, If there were a skilful workman, Who could from the bones construct it." As no craftsman there was present, And there was no skilful workman Who could make a harp of fishbones, Väinämöinen, old and steadfast, Then began the harp to fashion, And himself the work accomplished.

to Love Alexandrina

“Egypt's Civilization and the Application of GIS in the Protection of Heritage” Exhibition

 The Bibliotheca Alexandrina Antiquities Museum, in collaboration with the Geographic Information System Center, is organizing "Egypt's Civilization and the Application of Geographic Information System in Heritage Protection" Exhibition from 22 to 27 September 2012.

The Exhibition will highlight recent studies determining historical sites and their characteristics, and recording the information gained in a geographic information system and in databases.

In addition, the exhibition aims to provide specific information to partners in different sectors to realize the existence of such sites during maintenance and restoration, as well as assisting national and international organizations, and institutions, whose activities include researching and protecting archaeological and historic sites, and providing them with information related to their work all over Egypt.

Μια Μυθική Κίνηση της Ζωής

Κοιτάζοντας τη Γη από ψηλά, κατάλαβα πως η ζωή πάνω της βρισκόταν παντού και συνιστούσε ένα σύνολο που βρισκόταν σε συνεχή εξελιξη. Το δάσος, το ποτάμι, η έρημος, το παγόβουνο, το νησί, το βουνό και ο ωκεανός όλα αυτά συνυπάρχουν. Το φλαμίνγκο των αλμυρών λιμνών της Αφρικής ή η αρκούδα των παγωμένων πολικών εκτάσεων συγκατοικούν σε αυτήν μαζί με μας, τους ανθρώπους. Κάθε μέρα φυτά, ζώα και άνθρωποι δίνουν μια νέα μορφή στη Γη. Είναι μια μυθική κίνηση της ζωής που συνεχώς με συγκινεί σε κάθε μου ταξίδι όπως και στην πρώτη μου πτήση. Η Αφρική μέσα από τα Μάτια των Θεών.

Εναέριες φωτογραφίες που αποκαλύπτουν την ομορφιά και τις οδύνες του πλανήτη. Σχέδια και λέξεις γεμάτες ευαισθησία επικεντρώνονται στην ανθρώπινη ύπαρξη και ανοίγονται στο όνειρο. Μέσα από τις σελίδες αυτού του βιβλίου αναγεννάται ένας άλλος κόσμος, φυσικός και αδελφωμένος. Στο τέλος του βιβλίου επεξηγούνται 100 λέξεις-κλειδιά της αειφόρου και αλληλέγγυας ανάπτυξης.

Samplings from New World

Vesterheim is a national treasure that explores the diversity of American immigration through the lens of Norwegian-American experience, showcases the best in historic and contemporary Norwegian folk and fine arts, and preserves living traditions through classes in Norwegian culture and folk art, including rosemaling (decorative painting), woodcarving and woodworking, knifemaking, and textile arts.

Vesterheim houses over 24,000 artifacts, which include large samplings from the fine, decorative, and folk arts, and the tools and machinery of early agriculture, lumbering, and other immigrant industries. The lives of the people who settled this nation were often as colorful as their folk art and their stories speak through the objects they left behind.

When Norwegian immigrants wrote back to Norway about Vesterheim, their western home, they spoke for countless others from many cultures who helped build a nation in the New World.

Just as Norwegian immigration to America began to peak in 1877, at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, Norwegian Americans began collecting and preserving objects documenting their chapter of the immigrant story, making them pioneers in the preservation of cultural diversity in America.

Today that early collection has grown into Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum, an independent not-for-profit organization, and the most comprehensive museum in the United States dedicated to a single immigrant group. Also, Vesterheim is accredited by the American Association of Museums (AAM).

But Vesterheim is more than a world-class museum. It is a cultural center dedicated to preserving living traditions by offering classes in Norwegian folk art and culture, Elderhostels, and special programs for pre-school, elementary, secondary, and college students. Vesterheim also hosts events, lectures, and special exhibitions scheduled throughout the year.

to Microsonic mUsic

Realitat’s Microsonic Landscapes use 3-D printing machinery and algorithmic mapping to arrive at physical manifestations of recorded musical sound. These handheld sculptures are unique amongst one another because each represents the formalization of a different musical recording. In this instance, each recording is actually a full-length album; the albums chosen were picked according to Realitat’s musical tastes. Their self-stated mission, to create “an algorithmic exploration of the music we love,” is successfully completed. Each album is copied onto a program called Processing which maps and extrapolates the sounds on each song into coordinates that the 3-D printer can turn into solid mass. The objects are printed in a series of rings, but aside from that, the form taken can vary wildly, with each record registering unique patterns of height, depth, solid, and void. The process employed here represents a direct and literal translation of sound into form. There are no variables or inputs applied to the algorithms that would manipulate or affect the final form.

This project represents a successful attempt at using digital means to map, extrapolate, and formalize musical sound. This process is rendered through the use of digital mapping software and a 3-D printer, creating unique and specific formations with differing patterns of solid and void, as well as height and

an Urban Toy

BLOOM is what its designers call an “urban toy.” It is a “distributed social game and collective ‘gardening’ experience that seeks the engagement of people in order to construct fuzzy BLOOM formations.” These formations are aggregate volumes composed of repeated, identical parts, which the designers refer to as “cells.” These “cells” are designed and fabricated by the designers themselves, Alisa Andrasek of Biothing, and Jose Sanchez of Plethora Project, in London. Meant to contribute an air of jovial democratized design in relation to the 2012 London Olympic Games, BLOOM is representative of the artistic, collective act. Each individual component, as the designers explain, can do nothing on its own, but instead, reach their full and limitless potential when arrayed en masse.

Each of the BLOOM pieces has three potential sites for connection along its outline, enabling it to be compiled both two and three dimensionally. This embedded form of connection, however, is all that is provided to the user, who is free to use as few or as many pieces as they choose to construct an installation. It is the simple combinations inherent between these cells that can potentially produce many different mutations. This project is emblematic of democratic design as seen through the lens of digital fabrication, aggregation, and repetition.
 

a Literal Movement

Breakfast New York City is an interactive installation in Midtown Manhattan that both mimics and responds to interactive movement. Located that the intersection of 32nd Street and 6th Avenue, this installation is a revival of an antique sign technology that utilizes over 40,000 metallic spinning dots on a computerized surface to broadcast messages, including scrolling text and images. Because of its analog technology, the mechanism that is analogous to digital pixels, actually mimics the movement and rotation of pistons on a mechanical engine. The dots are either black or white, depending on which side is exposed, creating a binary that, when taken in aggregate and seen from afar, render images and text. This literal movement, however, from black to white, is done so through mechanical means, creating various clicks, like those made on a typewriter.

The digital systems, however, interrupt the analog by allowing the interface to respond to movement located directly in front of the display. Through these means, the display is able to respond to passersby, traffic, and all manner of stimuli, which then interrupt and dematerialize the scrolled information. This system creates a highly unique, ever-changing display of information that takes on the character of urban life. This project features highly-tactile, digitally derived displays that are manifested through analog, mechanical movements. The installation responds to spontaneous urban life through the articulation and juxtaposition of these digital processes and analog displays. The following video previews the installation in greater detail.

vertical Fragmentation

Border Conditions is an academic and hypothetical project by Manuel Torres, Dimitrie Stefanescun that utilizes parametric folding to achieve complex form in an urban housing project for Utrecht, Netherlands. This project, ‘embodies a virtual study of the process of folding with its conjectural actions (re-folding, unfolding);’ creating architecture from a meta-analysis of the folding technique. 

 
 Here, form is achieved through the interrelation and formalization of different variables, labeled as: ‘horizontal fragmentation,’ ‘proportion blurring,’ ‘vertical fragmentation,’ and ‘plane abstraction.’ These variables are mapped across the site to create points of reference which are then extrapolated into lines and planes. These planes, when merged with circulation routes, generate form and space. The resulting spaces are then further manipulated by varying the points of connections between planes with regards to connection degree, length, and overall number of connections. This form is then deconstructed; unfolded, laid out, and related to the urban site.

 This project focuses on the digital manifestations- parametric form- that result from an analog process- folding and unfolding- and hows these opposing approaches to making can result in varied architectural space. Through  a process of iteration dependent of parametric values, the designers are able to achieve an architectural complexity based on physical variables that is then overlayed on an existing urban fabric.

vertical Towers

Drawing on Shenzhen’s interconnected qualities, Morphosis‘ 2009 proposal for the Four Towers Into One competition pushes the conventional urban grid to organize a complex system of four interwoven towers. The competition asked for an urban plan that would unify the Headquarters of Shenzhen Media Group, China Construction Bank, China Insurance Group, and Southern & Bosera Funds–the new global faces of Shanghai’s Financial District. Instead of vertically extruding their isolated 2D site footprints to four individual skyscrapers, the strategy of transferring air rights helps to extend the zoning envelopes of each of the projects through an interlaced system resembling a traditional Chinese puzzle.

These otherwise vertical towers overlap at the base, creating multi-dimensional traffic through meeting, office, and green spaces that presents a new icon and philosophy within the Financial District. Like the Chinese puzzle, each project retains its original identity and form while still engaging with the surrounding projects. While Steven Holl won this competition, Morphosis’ intention to create a composition greater than the sum of its parts is successful in the implementation of metaphor and manipulation of the urban grid, symbolizing Shenzhen’s financial potential in the global spectrum.

a Muscle Ski sequence

The Big Sky Ski Lodge designed by Nikita Troufanov at the Illinois Institute of Technology takes cue from the muscle system. Actions of tension, overlap, pushing / pulling are explored both formally and programatically. Working from coarse to fine grain, linear program ‘muscle’ chunks fuse and overlap and then tesselate into cellular aggregations. Spaces and structure are placed in a feedback loop where each informs another, evolving until a desired amount of coherence and unity is achieved.

Hospitality and patrol programs are overlapped and placed in spatial tension against each other through connecting views and geometry. Hospitality space is distributed on 3 half-stories that step up to gain views out into the valley, creating a spatial sequence with plateaus of specific activity and experience.

Site-cast concrete structure becomes expressed by adapting to spacial conditions. Alternating between slab and frame behaviors, deep beams become shallower until they fuse and become slabs, and slabs in turn splinter into beams, branching out and weaving through the building.

across Le Corbusier

The vision of the New Sky Condos by Los Angeles based B+U Architects is to develop a unique spatial experience for each condo unit by, on the one hand, utilizing an L‐shape sectional diagram that maximizes double height spaces and outdoor areas through interlocking the units in plan and in section (an evolution on the Le Corbusier cross section of L’Unite d’Habitation) and simultaneously developing a window typology that aims to dissolve the edges of the window frame creating a unique view to the outside. The window itself is not just a flat aperture but a three dimensional spatial object that shapes the interior walls and aims ones view to key features of the surrounding cityscape. For example it allows for views towards the San Isidro Golf Club to the north and the Ocean to the south even from spaces along the east and west facade of the tower.

The building massing was the result of intersecting several cone shaped towers dividing each floor plan into four discrete segments that coincide with the division of the program on each floor and maximize the exterior surface. The articulation of the exterior of the building is a direct result of the placement and the aiming of the apertures and their relationship between the interior spaces and points in the city. The linear extensions along the window frames create the effect of a “soft” building edge that aims at dissolving the sharp lines of a typical building skyline and creates an iconic addition for Lima.

for Congested Urban Areas

For the green innovative house, architects Achawin Laohavichairat, Montakan Manosong, and Peerapon karunwiwat designed a building that provided infrastructure, urban facilities, green area, and living space. They designed the house for congested urban areas in this case they choose “Metropolitan Bangkok”. Ecological living uses of clean, non-pollution energies, gathering of organic and inorganic waste, creation of green spaces. The green innovative house is designed with self-sufficient considerations planed to take care of the management of energy.

Bangkok area is a congested urban area; there are many types of building such as low-rise building, mid-rise building, and high-rise. The design proposed to use existing building as high rise building that produced the waste pollutions as waste water, rubbish and also use more energy in the day. From the research, the high-rise building produces the waste water 30,000 liter/day. So, according the result, we proposed to design a self-sufficient house that use the waste products to support itself, it becomes a “Zero Energy Living”. It becomes a self-sufficient as “Zero Energy Living” by using the waste products those come from the existing building to support itself in term of energy. In essence a mechanism for living, breathing, producing energy, reusing the waste products, and recycling the waste products those are come from the existing building.

an Apple option

Launched in 2009, Uncommon‘s mission is to offer its clients the option to individualize Apple product accessories with unique designs. Currently, customers have the option to print their own digital photos or featured designs by a selection of artists onto their accessories. Uncommon is the first manufacturer to offer mass customization with proprietary 3D TATT® printing on plastic to customers. Clients may also buy ready-made cases.

Recently featured illustrator Izak Zenou, known for his chic and fun illustrations featuring Paris street life, has a collection of pre-made iPhone cases ready to buy on Uncommon’s website. The cases are examples of Zenou’s iconic illustrations that convey a breezy, fashionable lifestyle–a fresh print to have on beloved Apple products. Uncommon helps promote the work of the best designers in the market, revolutionizing individual expression in everyday accessories through art.

qualitative Values

The studio’s ( Varouzhan Torosdamy, Evan Emery) journey started from investigating some certain aesthetical and architectural qualitative values within a series of 2d drawings derived from a digital scripting software . After some manual modification in the script,  certain qualities were achieved,  that were based on the initial drawing, next step was to  transit those drawings into a  2 ½  D surface and from there forth, into a project scale proposal on a corner site located in west Hollywood California.

We tried many different approaches including warping the 2 ½ D surface around the programmatic generic volumes, but eventually decided it best to  start applying some certain features [some of which are as follows: Specific Edge network system, Deep pleats, de-lamination, face transition, and etc…] from the 2 ½ D surface to a Primitive such as a cube. After some versions we agreed upon mutilating only a corner or one side of the cube rather than the whole object. In order to create an open public plaza, we decided to lift the cube off the raised ground condition in order to open space on the ground level . As a  direct result of this move object  would barely touch the ground; only through some edges and points, which along the cloth like surrounding  edge network and the deep caverns , razor sharp  meandering edges , nested hierarchies within the dome like negative inflations in the bottom surface would create a mesmerizing effect as one would experience in major middle eastern mosques under their domes. In order to maximize the desired effect we decided to reflect our initial drawing from bottom to top of the building contrasting the very formation of the object itself.

Landscape Roofs

Located in the heart of the Frankfurt city center, the MyZeil Shopping Mall’s by Fuksas Studio has been the newest hub for restaurants, fitness gyms, and retail shopping since its opening in 2009 next to the famous Zeil shopping street and the PalaisQuartier. A funneled roof landscape  takes urban shoppers into a vertical realm through six floors beneath 3,200 triangular glass pieces and one of the longest escalators in Germany (46 m). A void strategically travels through the building at multiple elevations and roots itself at the ground floor, much like a river, providing an openly lit tunnel from above and an atrium structure.

In response to historical context, a glass facade on Zeil, a famous shopping street, is sucked into a void that opens up to Thurn and Taxis palace with a much more formal facade. The uniform glass structure of the roof landscape acts as a “shell” to filter light at all levels of the building, designed by Knippers Helbig of Stuttgart. The blend of modern and the historical influences of Frankfurt can be found in the play on contrasting street facades, but also in an alternating choice of steel and glass panels on the shell facade.

similar to TOMBS

Atreo Skyscraper: Reinterpretation of the Ancient Greek Myth of Atreus

Atreus is a concept building designed by Crilo Architecture, with sharp shapes, it is lacerated in the armor of black metal and dark glass with cracks that reveal its interior. The prosthesis,projecting at different heights, are heliports. Below the complex, an underground space, infrastructural node and the heart of the ascent to the tower. The spatial nature is similar to the Etruscan funerary chambers and recalls the tomb of Atreus, whose treasure is part of the myth.

The reinterpretation of the myth is based on mutability of the past, through a continuous equilibrium between history and contemporaneity. A reinterpretation of the human tensions, which belong to every period of history. The mutability of the past is the central dogma George Orwell from “1984″

the Poetry of a Sea...a Deep Blue Sea

The Sea Around Us is a prize-winning 1951 bestseller by Rachel Carson. It reveals the science and poetry of the sea from its primeval beginnings to the latest scientific probings of its tantalizing mysteries. It is the second book Carson wrote, following the well-reviewed but poor-selling Under the Sea Wind (1941), and is the book that launched Carson into the public eye. Often described as "poetic", the book won both the 1952 National Book Award in nonfiction and a Burroughs Medal in nature writing.The book has been translated into twenty eight languages. The book remained on the bestseller list for 86 weeks.

Carson began writing the book—which she initially planned to call Return to the Sea—in 1948, just after hiring Marie Rodell as her literary agent.Carson began by writing a single chapter (what would be "The Birth of an Island") along with a detailed outline, which Rodell used to pitch the book to publishers. In researching for the book, Carson met with a number of oceanographers to discuss current research. Carson and Rodell had little initial success with magazines as venues for the islands chapter along with a second chapter titled "Another Beachhead". In April, 1949, with about a third of the chapters complete, Rodell began trying to find a publisher for the full book. By June, Carson had a contract with Oxford University Press that promised completion of the manuscript by March 1, 1950. Carson continued to write and research through 1949 and into 1950, despite unexpected health and financial difficulties. Part of the research involved a trip aboard a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's ship, Albatross III. After pushing back the completion deadline, Carson completed the manuscript in June 1950. By that time, several periodicals (The New Yorker, Science Digest, and The Yale Review) wanted to publish some of the chapters, as well.

Much of the book (nine of fourteen chapters) was serialized in The New Yorker, beginning on June 2, 1951, and the book was published on July 2 by Oxford University Press. The serialization created a very large popular response, and the book was the subject of the feature review in The New York Times Book Review the day before publication. One chapter ("The Birth of an Island") was published in The Yale Review; it won the George Westinghouse Science Writing prize from the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

The Tamil Tradition

The only Indian writings that incontestably predate the influence of classical Sanskrit are those in the Tamil language. Anthologies of secular lyrics on the themes of love and war, together with the grammatical-stylistic work Tolkappiyam (Old Composition), are thought to be very ancient. Later, between the 6th and 9th centuries, Tamil sectarian devotional poems were composed, often claimed as the first examples of the Indian bhakti tradition.

At some indeterminate date between the 2nd and 5th centuries, two long Tamil verse romances (sometimes called epics) were written: Cilappatikaram (The Jeweled Anklet) by Ilanko Atikal, which has been translated into English (1939 and 1965); and its sequel Manimekalai (The Girdle of Gems), a Buddhist work by Cattanar.

Το Ψάρι που ζήλεψε τον Κροκόδειλο

Πρόκειται για το πιο δημοφιλές ναυάγιο στον κόσμο και υπάρχει λόγος γι’ αυτό. Το SS Thistlegorm, ήταν ένα 128 μέτρων βρετανικό πλοίο μεταφοράς, το οποίο δέχθηκε επίθεση και βυθίστηκε το 1941, στο ταξίδι από τη Γλασκώβη στην Αλεξάνδρεια. Το πλοίο μετέφερε όπλα, μηχανές, πολεμικά οχήματα, ραδιόφωνα και λαστιχένιες μπότες. Όλα αυτά, βρίσκονται στο βυθό του ωκεανού, όπως και το ίδιο το πλοίο, με την μεγάλη τρύπα στο σημείο όπου το χτύπησε η γερμανική βόμβα.

Πολλοί δύτες, βουτούν γύρω και μέσα στο λασπώδες ναυάγιο με φακούς και κοιτούν τα σκουριασμένα πολυβόλα, ένα βαγόνι σιδηροδρομικής μεταφοράς εμπορευμάτων, τορπίλες και πολλά άλλα. Μπορεί επίσης να δείτε και μερικά ψάρια- κροκόδειλους, να κρύβονται στην άμμο γύρω από το ναυάγιο.


 

a Linkage Space

Performance Center Alexanderhoehe is to be located in Iserlohn, in Germany. The authors, B+U architectural firm placed the building north of the existing Parktheater and oriented it towards the inner city in order to emphasize and redefine its relationship to Alexander Heights. By orienting the building in such manner, it became possible to create a single access point for visitors to both Parktheater and the new Multifunctional Hall. In order to achieve that and avoid blocking the views from the existing Theater, a “linkage space“ was created: a generous multilevel foyer space that that allows for the actual hall to float above the ground and opens up views from the old Parktheater to the city towards the Northeast.

This linkage space between the existing Parktheater and the new multifunctional hall continues underneath the new Hall onto the plaza level. This linkage space is a combined lobby and main entrance to both the old and the new theater. There is a centrally located drop off zone for all visitors of the new Theatercenter from which the guest can proceed directly into the main lobby where they can purchase their tickets. From this point they can proceed over the Grand staircase to the different performance areas. An elevator connects the lobby space with all levels for barrier free access.

Incredible Beauty

The harsh sun, waterless dunes and spectacular, stark forms created by mountains of sand swirling in the wind are seen as inspirations of incredible beauty by architects Francisco J. del Corral del Campos and Carmen M. Barrós Velásquez, both of Granada, Spain. The two celebrate this landscape and respond to its demands in their new skyscraper design for a greenhouse tower in the Oman desert.

The architects literally cast their idea for the “Oasis” tower into the wind to help define its shape. By examining the effect of the site’s southeast wind on a tower, they designed the building to respond to the wind’s movement, its sweeping flow, by softly curving its form as it arches into the sky.

Solar energy and biogas generation from organic waste material will power the tower’s energy needs, and water from the ocean will be transported and desalinated to provide the drinking water and irrigation supply. Additionally, gray water is reused to cool the building and the surrounding environment through a spray process that creates a cooling vapor around the building.

The tower, which is easily replicated as a model that can be placed all over desert areas, will house about 500 people, who will mainly work to raise the agricultural products grown inside. In addition to housing and greenhouse space for growing, the complex will have a market and packaging, processing and storage facilities for the crops, a manmade lake for recreation and a fish farm, additional leisure space, and offices.

Whether it’s midnight at the Oasis or noon in the blistering sun, this tower’s residents will stay cool, productive and secure in this innovative commercial and residential endeavor.

to Contribute to Science

Science only knows one commandment: contribute to science. This line, spoken by the title character in Bertolt Brecht's The Life of Galileo, inspired the title of this collection of science writing by 59 diverse authors. Most of the pieces collected by editor Edmund Blair Bolles are excerpted from texts by working scientists or natural philosophers, including George Smoot of NASA's Cosmic Background Explorer to Lucretius. Marie Curie's joy on seeing the lovely, glowing bottles of impure radium in her workroom at night is just one of the vivid images to be extracted from this volume, though with far less effort than the radium cost the Curies...

Marie Curie reminisces about her and her husband's efforts to isolate the element radium. Herodotus observes the Nile Valley and concludes that it was once under water. Carl Sagan argues against assertions that aliens regularly visit Earth. These are among the literary gems...

Edmund Blair Bolles includes in GALILEO'S COMMANDMENT. Bolles has scoured the literature of science to build a treasury that is accessible and riveting, appealing to readers unfamiliar with science yet erudite enough for the scientifically initiated reader to enjoy. The authors include scientists well-known for their writing - including Stephen Jay Gould, Richard Feynman and Charles Darwin - and scientists such as Kepler, James Clerk Maxwell, Alfred Wallace, and of course Galileo himself. The writings here span time and the scientific disciplines (the earliest pieces dates to c.444 BC) and the result is a fascinating collection , ideal for browsing or for reading cover to cover...

Violin and Palette

Violin and Palette (Violon et palette), September 1, 1909. Oil on canvas, 36 1/8 x 16 7/8 inches (91.7 x 42.8 cm). Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York  54.1412. © 2012 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris

Other Cubist Works

When Georges Braque abandoned a bright Fauve palette and traditional perspective in 1908, it was the inspiration of Paul Cézanne's geometrized compositions that led him to simplified faceted forms, flattened spatial planes, and muted colors. By the end of that year, Braque and Pablo Picasso, who first met in 1907, began to compare the results of their techniques and it became obvious to both artists that they had simultaneously and independently invented a revolutionary style of painting, later dubbed "Cubism" by Guillaume Apollinaire. During the next few years the new style blossomed with stunning rapidity from its initial formative stage to high Analytic Cubism. The hallmarks of this advanced phase, so-called for the "breaking down" or "analysis" of form and space, are seen in an extraordinary pair of pendant works, Violin and Palette (Violon et palette, 1909–10) and Piano and Mandola (Piano et mandore, 1909–10).

Objects are still recognizable in the paintings, but are fractured into multiple facets, as is the surrounding space with which they merge. The compositions are set into motion as the eye moves from one faceted plane to the next, seeking to differentiate forms and to accommodate shifting sources of light and orientation. In Violin and Palette, the segmented parts of the violin, the sheets of music, and the artist's palette are vertically arranged, heightening their correspondence to the two-dimensional surface. Ironically, Braque depicted the nail at the top of the canvas in an illusionistic manner, down to the very shadow it cast, thus emphasizing the contrast between traditional and Cubist modes of representation. The same applies to the naturalistic candle in Piano and Mandola, which serves as a beacon of stability in an otherwise energized composition of exploding crystalline forms: the black-and-white piano keys all but disembodied; the sheets of music virtually disintegrated; the mandola essentially decomposed.

"When fragmented objects appeared in my painting around 1909," Braque later explained, "it was a way for me to get as close as possible to the object as painting allowed."1 If the appeal of still life was its implied tactile qualities, as Braque noted, then musical instruments held even more significance in that they are animated by one's touch. Like the rhythms and harmonies that are the life of musical instruments, dynamic spatial movement is the essence of Braque's lyrical Cubist paintings.

...his Opera, Taras Bulba

Mykola Lysenko (1842-1912--sometimes transliterated as Nikolai or Nicolai Lysenko or Lissenko) is considered the father of Ukrainian chamber music much the way that Glinka is for the Russians. He was the first Ukrainian composer to write chamber music. In 1904, he founded the first music conservatory in the Ukraine in Kiev, which today bears his name. Lysenko was born in the Poltava district of the Ukraine. He first studied piano with his mother, then formally with teachers in Kiev. After taking a degree in the natural sciences at the University of Kiev, he attended the world famous Leipzig Conservatory where he studied composition with Carl Reinecke.

An admirer of the Ukrainian poet Shevchenko, Lysenko became a nationalist for the Ukrainian cause as a student. He remained one for his entire life and was imprisoned for the cause as late as 1907 after composing a song in support of the Revolution of 1905. The bulk of Lysenko's music is for piano or for voice in one form or another such as opera, hymns, or chorales. His piano music often shows the influence of Chopin whereas his vocal music is almost always based on Ukrainian folk music such as his opera Taras Bulba. Lysenko spent considerable time trying to demonstrate the differences between Ukrainian and Russian folk melody. The only chamber music he is known to have composed is this string quartet and a string trio.

The quartet dates from 1868 when Lysenko was finishing his studies with Reinecke in Leipzig. The big, opening movement, Allegro non tanto, begins in a rather dramatic, somewhat operatic fashion. The themes bear some resemblance to those of Glinka's opera Ruslan and Ludmilla. Despite the movement's length, the drama and forward motion are almost never relaxed. The simple but charming melody of the following Adagio is in the form of a chorale. The manuscript only has three movements and it is not known whether there was a fourth movement or whether the third movement was meant as the finale. It is an engaging Minuetto, allegretto scherzando.

A collected edition of Lysenko's works, including this quartet, was published in 70 volumes between 1950 and 1959, however, a performance edition of the parts and score were never separately published. Our World Premiere Edition has been carefully edited and corrected by Loren Silvertrust from a copy of the original manuscript located in Kiev, Ukraine. Like all of our works, it is printed on top grade paper with an ornate cover and biographical information about the composer.
 

to Breath...

Για να Ζήσει ο Κόσμος
Αλέξανδρος Σμέμαν

.....Μετάφρασα το βιβλίο αυτό επειδή καταγίνεται με τον κόσμο. Κόσμο λέγοντας εννοώ ολόκληρο το φυσικό σύμπαν. Και σήμερα περισσότερο από κάθε άλλη φορά ο κόσμος ή η οικουμένη, όπως λέγανε άλλοτε το γνωστό κόσμο, ή ο πλανήτης (και οι άλλοι πλανήτες) συγκεντρώνει ολόκληρη την προσοχή του ανθρώπου, αφήνοντας περιθώρια μετρημένα για αναζητήσεις με διαφορετική κατεύθυνση - δηλαδή αναζητήσεις με κατεύθυνση, όχι προς τον κόσμο ή προς τα έξω, αλλά προς τον άνθρωπο ή προς τα μέσα. Στις περιοχές όπου ζούμε τέτοια κατεύθυνση προς τα μέσα έδωσε στον άνθρωπο ο Χριστιανισμός και, πριν από το Χριστιανισμό, η Αρχαία Ελλάδα με το στόμα του Θουκυδίδη που βεβαίωνε πως δε θα σταματήσουν ποτέ τα ανθρώπινα δεινά, πολλά και χαλεπά γινόμενα μεν και αιεί εσόμενα, όσο θα δοκιμάζομε να αλλάξουμε τον κόσμο -Μαρξ- αφήνοντας απείραχτο τον άνθρωπο (έως αν η αυτή φύσις ανθρώπων η). Σε άλλες περιοχές την ίδια κατεύθυνση ή αναζήτηση προς τα μέσα έδωσαν οι άλλες σεβάσμιες πνευματικές παραδόσεις όσες αφήσανε αχνάρια ή εξακολουθούν να υπάρχουν στις μέρες μας -να αριθμούν δηλαδή πιστούς- και στις πέντε ηπείρους. Τα πραχτικά αποτελέσματα από τις διδασκαλίες αυτές, μέσα σε τόσους αιώνες, τελικά στάθηκαν πενιχρά και, μπροστά στα τόσα μαθήματα, θα μπορούσε κανένας δίκαια να αναρωτηθεί με τον ποιητή: "Οι άνθρωποι δεν ακούνε;". Θα μπορούσε ακόμα κανένας να αναρωτηθεί και ποια θα ήταν ενδεχόμενα η κατάσταση του κόσμου δίχως τις διδασκαλίες αυτές. [...]

(από τον πρόλογο του Ζήσιμου Λορεντζάτου)

Пско́во-Печ́ерский Успе́нский монасты́рь

Pskov-Caves Monastery or The Pskovo-Pechersky Dormition Monastery or Pskovo-Pechersky Monastery (Russian: Пско́во-Печ́ерский Успе́нский монасты́рь, Estonian: Petseri klooster) is a Russian Orthodox male monastery, located in Pechory, Pskov Oblast in Russia, just a few kilometers from the Estonian border.

The monastery was founded in the mid-15th century, when the first hermits settled in local caves. The first cave Church of the Dormition of the Theotokos (церковь Успения Богородицы) was built in 1473 (its modern facade was constructed in the 18th century).

Ivan the Terrible's repentance: he asks the hegumen (father superior) Cornelius of the Pskovo-Pechorsky Monastery to let him take the tonsure at his monastery. Painting by Klavdy Lebedev.
After the monastery had been destroyed by the Livonian feudals, it was rebuilt by a Pskovian dyak Mikhail Munekhin-Misyur in 1519. A posad (settlement) was built next to the monastery, which would later grow into a town. In 1550s-1560s, Pskovo-Pechorsky Monastery and its posad were surrounded by a wall with towers (eventually, these fortifications were rebuilt in 1701).

The monastery became an important outpost for defending the western border of Russia. In 1581–1582, it withstood the siege laid by Stefan Batory’s army. In 1611–1616, the monastery repelled the attack of the Polish army led by Jan Karol Chodkiewicz and Aleksander Józef Lisowski and Swedish army led by Gustav II Adolf.

Pskovo-Pechersky Monastery lost its importance after the Great Northern War of 1700–1721. In 1920–1944, Pskovo-Pechorsky Monastery belonged to Estonia. The monastery was one of the few acting male monasteries in the USSR, having been saved from destruction by Pechory being Estonian territory before World War II. In Soviet times, famous Russian mystic Sampson Sievers briefly lived and served in the monastery.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union the monastery has flourished. Currently the monastic community numbers over 90 who through their pastoral labors live the tradition of asceticism and eldership as witnessed recently by the Archimandrite John (Krestiankin). In 2003 the monastery marked the 530th anniversary of its existence.

Pskov-Caves Monastery is one of the rare Russian monasteries that hasn't been closed in any moment of its history even during World War II and Soviet regime.

ΠΡΟΤΑΣΗ ΒΙΒΛΙΟΥ

Σχεδόν Άγιοι
αρχιμ. Τύχωνας Σεβκούνωφ
η Ρωσία του Χθες και του Σήμερα

if Bird...or Devil...!!

Έντγκαρ Άλαν Πόε (Edgar Allan Poe): "Το κοράκι"

Μια πολύ ατμοσφαιρική απαγγελία

Το πρωτότυπο :

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -
Only this, and nothing more.'

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore -
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
`'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -
This it is, and nothing more,'

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
`Sir,' said I, `or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you' - here I opened wide the door; -
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before
But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, `Lenore!'
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, `Lenore!'
Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
`Surely,' said I, `surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore -
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; -
'Tis the wind and nothing more!'

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door -
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door -
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
`Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,' I said, `art sure no craven.
Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the nightly shore -
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning - little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door -
Bird or beast above the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as `Nevermore.'

But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only,
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered - not a feather then he fluttered -
Till I scarcely more than muttered `Other friends have flown before -
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'
Then the bird said, `Nevermore.'

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
`Doubtless,' said I, `what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore -
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of "Never-nevermore."'

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore -
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking `Nevermore.'

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
`Wretch,' I cried, `thy God hath lent thee - by these angels he has sent thee
Respite - respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil! -
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted -
On this home by horror haunted - tell me truly, I implore -
Is there - is there balm in Gilead? - tell me - tell me, I implore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adore -
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels named Lenore?'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting -
`Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore

Keep on Ironing

White Tanks
Temperas
Studies
Oil
Large Images
Humanity
to Worker

industrial Archaeology

In addition to understanding artifacts, we learn about Nova Scotia’s industrial past through industrial archaeology (IA). IA is the study of the tangible evidence of social, economic and technological development of the period since industrialization. It includes buried foundations, features, and remnants normally associated with archaeological study, such as the foundry, locomotive shed and miner’s house found on our site. But equally important, it includes the landscapes, buildings, sites and structures still evident in some form around us. It is the rows of identical houses close to a vacant lot that once held a pithead; it is the uniformly-shaped manmade stream that once was a mill-race supporting water-powered factories; it is the canal that employed the technology to move vessels from one body of water to another, thereby bringing goods to market more economically. In Nova Scotia you can find it in old canneries and remnant pilings of piers, in street names and neighbourhoods, in architecture, and in slag heaps.

One thing is for certain – it is rapidly disappearing. As we move beyond the Industrial Age, once dominated by resource exploitation like mining, lumbering, and manufacturing this physical evidence is becoming harder to find. There is little trace of the substantial operations of the Sydney steel works, countless factories have disappeared, and the spatial arrangements of industrial towns are changing as the old makes way for the new. Former beehives of activity are now returning to nature. So look around you in the towns and in the woods, to see what your surroundings might tell you about the Nova Scotia of the past and the ways our parents and grandparents lived. If you see something interesting, let us know. It is part of our job to document this heritage before it is gone forever.   Contact us at industry@gov.ns.ca or 902-755-5425.

Beyond the Old, Cold Metal

Across a frozen river sterilized
by industrial pollution,
a row of rusting metal titans
stands sentinel at water's edge,
their thick, hollow arms rubbing
at roughly bolted elbows,
their bellies silent, dark
of the iron burdens of immigrants.

These black behemoths, mecha-monster
robots seized motionless in rust,
occult a city at dusk
with their mass, their height.

Higher still, above tuyeres
and empty iron ore buckets,
a city glows on Christmas night,
with white-roofed homes
like railroad model buildings,
edged in brilliant scarlet, blue,
or multicolored points of light
that wink between the flakes.

Beyond the furnaces, creaking,
reeking of half-burnt coke and coal,
row homes beckon with aromas
of roasted turkey, stuffing,
hot coffee, pumpkin pie.

Past the ice-bound truss works,
the lightless brick-lined ovens
whistling with wind,
softer walls radiate the warmth
of family.

Here, children in flannel pajamas
tinker with day-old toys,
mothers clean their kitchens,
full-bellied fathers nod off
to the static roar
of football.

Scott Speck
10/13/2003
 

a Secret Garden

The installation is a composition of three biomimetic pieces created for the Milan Design Week 2012. This project, designed by Zaha Hadid, is located in Milan’s Brera neighborhood, in the garden between the Academia Art Museum and historical roman houses. Together with Paola Navone’s installation, Hadid’s piece constitutes the ambiental whole named The Secret Garden.

“The composition of each of the three showcased works is derived from the intricate beauty of organizational systems in the natural world. These fascinating scenarios are established when energy is applied to geology–developing a geometric set of repeated growth and erosion cycles.

Each piece, immaculately crafted in marble by Citco, invites further investigation; revealing formal complexity, repetition and textures that celebrate the detailed process and fluidity of natural systems – a persuasive manifesto of nature’s unrivalled logic and unity; a journey of discovery into the forces of their creation.

The exacting arrangements, structural integrity and precision of these natural systems inform a rich architectural language with the inherent capacity for complex programming.

The formal dynamic of the pavilion’s design has been generated by subtle gestures that follow a coherent, logical order. A rhythm of slices and folds define each piece; an integration of diverse forms that reflects the individuality of each panel – yet ensures they are considered within the overall ensemble.

This dialogue of geometries establishes a direct relationship between nature and architecture, an obvious evolution of the creative language explored by the practice driven by the innovations in digital design processes and manufacturing techniques.”

to Paint Einstein

The most important scientist of the twentieth century and the most important artist had their periods of greatest creativity almost simultaneously and in remarkably similar circumstances. This fascinating parallel biography of Albert Einstein and Pablo Picasso as young men examines their greatest creations-Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon and Einstein's special theory of relativity.

Miller shows how these breakthroughs arose not only from within their respective fields but from larger currents in the intellectual culture of the times. Ultimately, Miller shows how Einstein and Picasso, in a deep and important sense, were both working on the same problem.

a Presence on Site

The Piezoelectric playground is a temporary structure designed by Margot Krasojevic for the Pioneers park in Belgrade, Serbia. It will be used as a bandstand and playground.

The canopy is a hyperbolic structure which folds in on itself draining rain water into the pool directly underneath it which diffracts light (acting as a prism) further magnifying the activities within the canopy structure. Movement agitates the semicondcuting piezoelectric crystal disks which as a result generate an electric current within the structure itself, this voltage controls the holographic glass clad canopy and optic fibre light projections choreographing a series of patterns which illuminate the immediate context according to the music or events occurring within the canopy. ; with the possible use of vibrating piezoelectric crystals releasing hydrogen and oxygen from the water molecules, piezoelectrochemical effect, supporting the hope that energy can be used to generate power from any structure which vibrates and produces noise, from passing traffic, children playing etc.

The canopy’s geometry blurs the relationship between interior and exterior spaces; as it is a surface with one boundary, mathematically the form is non-orientable which focuses on the event as a way of defining it’s physical presence on site.

The wooden frame’s looping structure is clad in reinforced optical glass tubes which house optic fibre cables that direct the light through the canopy, the light patterns and strength is influenced by the circuit of piezoelectric crystals and diodes to change charge direction therefore continually altering the direction of light and intensity of projections depend on movement throughout the canopy or sound reverberations from music.

The canopy never lights up in the same way twice and our perception of the canopy glowing and projecting light describes a very different environment every time it is used as either a playground shelter or outdoor concert canopy.

This project was inspired by Thomas Wilfred’s Clavilux projects from 1930.

Buried Offices

London architecture student Jonathan Gales doesn’t just think the 20th century’s iconic office skyscraper is outdated — he thinks it should be buried. Or chunks of it, at least.

Gales, an M. Arch student at the Bartlett School of Architecture in London, England has proposed, for his eVolo Skyscrapers competition entry, the partial deconstruction of individual skyscrapers to allow for increased green space at staggered heights throughout the city. Citing a 2009 figure from the Telegraph that 11.9 percent of offices in the city are sitting vacant (the equivalent of 10 skyscrapers), Gales poses the idea that replacing a section of each individual office tower with trees and green space would create an increased capacity for the city’s “urban lung.” And instead of sending all that metal and glass to landfills, Gales proposes a sustainable – and ideological – repurposing: re-craft these old offices into an underground tomb to honor to the outdated skyscraper, and all it represents. The Mausoleum to Late Capitalist Iconography would house a think tank dedicated to social, cultural and economic design research, and host debates and symposia below the city’s surface. In a marrying of economic theory and architectural design, Gales asks his audience to consider what the cities of the future really need, and what’s best left to the past.
 

along Drava River

This proposal was designed by Brian de Luna and  James Vincent for a new art gallery in Maribor, Slovenia is based on a relationship where the new building creates a dialog between its local environment and the larger urban context of Maribor. The project sets to create a dynamic relationship between the old city of Maribor and the new Art Gallery by creating a constant state of fluidity through the site, becoming a vital cultural hub along the Drava River. The building is composed of four continuous loops that merge into one space. Each loop contains it own separate program-the Children’s Museum, the Architecture Museum, the Creative Industrial Museum, and the Digital Arts Museum.

By allowing the museum program to be separated into four distinct programmatic and topological elements a space is created that is simultaneously public and private. With the new art gallery being located along the Drava River Front, it became critical to create a landmark that that would enhance and contribute to the regeneration of the city both locally and globally. While the new art gallery naturally erodes the sites initial spatial qualities the four components come together to frame and create unobstructed vistas towards the Drava River and the city’s surrounding local landmarks.

via suckerpunch
 

Αren't you ever scared of him?

Brenin never lay down in the back of the Jeep. He always liked to see what was coming. Once, many years ago, we had driven from Tuscaloosa, Alabama, all the way to Miami - around 800 miles - and back again. And he stood every inch of the way: his hulking presence blocking out much of the sun and all of the rear traffic. But this time, on this short drive into Béziers, near the village where we were living in the Languedoc, he wouldn't stand; couldn't stand. It was then I knew he was gone. I was taking him to the place where he would die. I had told myself that if he stood up, even for part of the journey, I would give it another day; another 24 hours for a miracle to occur. But now I knew it was over. My friend of the past 11 years would be gone. And I didn't know what sort of person he was going to leave behind.

The dark French midwinter could not have contrasted more starkly with that bright Alabama evening, in early May, when I first brought six-week-old Brenin into my house and into my world. Within two minutes of his arrival - and I am by no means exaggerating - he had pulled the curtains in the living-room (both sets) off their rails and on to the ground. Next, while I was trying to rehang the curtains, he found his way out into the garden and under the house. At the rear, the house was raised off the ground and you could access the area underneath by way of a door built into the brick wall - a door that I had obviously left ajar.


He made his way under the house and then proceeded - methodically, meticulously, but above all quickly - to rip down every single one of the soft, lagged pipes that directed the cold air from the air-conditioning unit up through various vents in the floor. That was Brenin's trademark attitude to the new and unfamiliar. He liked to see what was coming. He would explore it; embrace it. Then he would trash it.


I was a couple of years into my first job - assistant professor of philosophy at the University of Alabama, in Tuscaloosa. Tuscaloosa is best known for its university's (American) football team, the Crimson Tide, which the local community embraces with a fervour that surpasses the merely religious - although they're heavily into that, too. Life was good; but I had grown up with dogs - mostly big dogs like Great Danes - and I missed them. And so, one afternoon, I found myself looking through the want-ads section of the Tuscaloosa News.


For much of its relatively short life, the United States of America pursued a policy of systematic eradication of its wolves - through shooting, poisoning, trapping, whatever means necessary. The result is that there are virtually no free wild wolves in the contiguous 48 states. Now that the policy has been abandoned, they've started to make a comeback in parts of Wyoming, Montana and Minnesota, and on some of the islands in the Great Lakes. They have even recently been reintroduced, over the strident protestations of ranchers, into the most famous of US natural parks, Yellowstone.

This resurgence in the wolf population, however, has not yet reached Alabama or the South in general. There are lots of coyotes. And there are a few red wolves in the swamps of Louisiana and east Texas - though no one is really sure what they are, and they may well be the result of historical wolf-coyote hybridisation. But timber wolves, or grey wolves as they are sometimes known (inaccurately, since they can also be black, white and brown), are a distant memory in the southern states.

Therefore I was somewhat surprised when my eye was caught by an advertisement: WOLF CUBS FOR SALE, 96 PER CENT. After a quick phone call, I jumped in the car and headed off to Birmingham, about an hour to the north-east, not entirely sure what I was expecting to find. And so it was, a little later, that I came to be standing, eyeball to eyeball, with the biggest wolf I had ever heard of, let alone seen. The owner had shown me around to the back of the house, and the stable and pen that housed the animals. When the father wolf, Yukon, heard us coming he jumped up at the stable door, just as we arrived there, appearing as if from nowhere.

He was huge and imposing, standing slightly taller than me. I had to look up at his face and his strange yellow eyes. But it was his feet I will always remember. People don't realise just how big wolves' feet are, much bigger than those of dogs. It was his feet that announced Yukon's arrival, the first things I saw as he bounded up to lean over the stable door. They now hung over that door, much bigger than my fists, like furry baseball mitts.

One thing people often ask me about owning a wolf: aren't you ever scared of him? The answer is no. Not because I'm brave, but I think it's because I am very relaxed around dogs. And this is largely the result of my upbringing. Looking back, I realise that, when it comes to dogs, my family are just not normal. We would often take in Great Danes from rescue centres. Sometimes these were lovely animals. Sometimes they were positively psychotic. Blue, a Great Dane unimaginatively named - not by us - after his colour, provides a good case in point. Blue was about three years old when my parents rescued him. And it was easy to understand why he found himself in a rescue centre. Blue had a hobby: the random and indiscriminate biting of people and other animals. Actually, that's not fair: it wasn't random or indiscriminate at all. He just had various, let us call them, idiosyncrasies. One of them was not permitting people to leave the room when he was in it. You could never afford to find yourself in a room with Blue on your own. You always needed someone to distract him while you exited. Of course, they would then need someone else to distract Blue should they wish to leave the room. And so the great wheel of Blue's life turned. Failure to adequately distract him before exiting the room would often result in one's hindquarters being scarred for life. Just ask my brother, Jon.