Άγρια Φοινικόδεντρα

...Το χτύπημα στην πόρτα ξανακούστηκε, διακριτικό κι επιταχτικό μαζί, καθώς ο γιατρός κατέβαινε στη σκάλα, με το ηλεκτρικό φανάρι να ρίχνει την αχτίδα του μπροστά, πάνω στα καφετιά σκαλιά και στην καφετιά σπηλιά του κάτω χολ. Ήταν ένα παραλιακό σπιτάκι, αν και με δυο πατώματα, και φωτιζόταν με λάμπες πετρελαίου -δηλαδή με μία λάμπα, που η γυναίκα του την είχε φέρει πάνω μαζί τους μετά το βραδινό φαγητό. Κι ο γιατρός φορούσε νυχτικιά πουκαμίσα, όχι πιτζάμες, για τον ίδιο λόγο που κάπνιζε τσιμπούκι, που ήξερε πως δεν του άρεσε και πως ποτέ δε θα του άρεσε, ανάμεσα σε κανένα πούρο που τύχαινε να του προσφέρει κάποιος πελάτης του μες στη βδομάδα, ενώ τις Κυριακές κάπνιζε τα τρία πούρα που ένιωθε πως είχε το δικαίωμα ν αγοράσει μια και ήταν ιδιοχτησία το παραλιακό σπιτάκι καθώς και το πλαϊνό, όπως και η καθαυτό κατοικία του με ηλεκτρική εγκατάσταστη και σουβαντισμένους τοίχους, στο χωριό τέσσερα μίλια πέρα. Επειδή ήσαν τώρα σαράντα οχτώ χρονών, και τον καιρό που ήταν δεκάξι και δεκαοχτώ και είκοσι χρονών, ο πατέρας του του έλεγε (και το πίστευε) πως τσιγάρα και πιτζάμες ήταν για τους λιμοκοντόρους και για τις γυναίκες...

Στις 25 Σεπτεμβρίου 1997, ο Ουίλιαμ Φόκνερ θα γιόρταζε τα 100 του χρόνια, αν ζούσε. Μια παράξενη σιωπή έχει πάρει τη θέση των εορτασμών με αφορμή αυτή την επέτειο. Και όμως, αν έπρεπε να διαλέξουμε έναν αμερικανό συγγραφέα ως τον πιο σημαντικό του 20ού αιώνα, αναμφίβολα θα καταλήγαμε στον Φόκνερ. Από τους συγγραφείς της αγγλικής γλώσσας ίσως μόνον ο Ουίλιαμ Σαίξπηρ και ο Τζέιμς Τζόις μπορούν να θεωρηθούν ισάξιοί του ως προς τη μυθοπλαστική τους δεξιότητα και την επίδραση που άσκησαν στις επόμενες γενιές. Η σιωπή αυτή λοιπόν δεν μπορεί παρά να δηλώνει το δέος των κριτικών και του κοινού μπροστά σε ένα μεγαλειώδες, διαχρονικό και αινιγματικό έργο.

a Lion! a Masterpiece!

The first unquestionably-for-adults novel Russell Hoban published, and the first Russell Hoban book I ever read (at about age twelve!), The Lion is a masterpiece by any standard. It's set in a time when there are no more lions: lions are extinct, almost legendary, like dragons or unicorns. Jachin-Boaz lives in an unspecified town in the Near East, where he owns a shop that sells all kinds of maps; maps to find water, love, money, whatever the heart desires. He tells his son, Boaz-Jachin, that he's making him a master-map that will be given to him when he is a man; a map that will contain all the secrets of the other maps combined, so that he will be able to find whatever he decides to look for, thus assuring him of a proper start in life. Jachin-Boaz shows his son the map and asks him what he would like to find. 'A lion,' says Boaz-Jachin. 'A lion,' says Jachin-Boaz. 'I don't think I understand you. I don't think you're being serious with me. You know very well there are no lions now.'

Cut to scene two, in which Jachin-Boaz, the father, in the throes of existential despair and mid-life crisis, quietly leaves home, taking the master-map and half the family's savings, and leaving behind a note which reads 'I have gone to look for a lion.' Boaz-Jachin is left alone with his embittered mother to run the map shop and wonder where his father has gone with the map that was supposed to be his inheritance.

In the desert not far from the town where Boaz-Jachin lives, there is a palace where the last king is entombed, and his lion hunt is carved in stone on the walls of the great hall. Boaz-Jachin, who has decided to track his father down and ask for his map, takes the bus to the palace where he makes a powerful connection with the image of the dying lion carved in stone. Through a simple but artistic act of sympathetic magic, Boaz-Jachin removes the spears from the throat of the wounded beast and sets its spirit free, then sets off on a cross-country journey to find his father. Meanwhile, Jachin-Boaz, who has established himself in a "great city" in another country, is working in a bookshop, living with a beautiful young woman named Gretel, and dreaming furtive, guilty dreams of the family he abandoned. It's about this time that he turns around one morning on his way to work, and finds himself face-to-face with a very live, powerful and dangerous lion--a lion that he, Gretel, and the son journeying to find him must face, understand and ultimately embrace if they are to find their way out of the uncharted territories of fear, guilt and alienation in which they've gotten lost.

to Dream of outside Lima

Sergio F. Bambaren (b. December 1, 1960, Lima, Peru) is a writer. He is noted for his love of the ocean, unknown horizons and for his books related to surfing, dreaming and journeys in a metaphorical context.

Roggero was born the first day of December of 1960 in Lima, Peru. Educated in a British High School, Sergio has been captivated from his early years by the ocean, having been born in a city that meets the sea. This would influence him for the rest of his life, and put him in a journey he would have never expected: to become a writer. His spirit of traveling took him to the United States, where he graduated as a Chemical Engineer at Texas A&M University. However, the ocean was still his greatest love, and traveling gave him the opportunity to go surfing to places such as Central America, Mexico, California and Hawaii.

After a brief stay in the country in which he was born, Sergio decided to migrate to Sydney, Australia, where he worked as a Sales Manager for a multinational company; however, he also managed to travel to the Southeast Asia and African coasts in search of the perfect wave. Legendary places like Bali, Nias, Jeffrey´s Bay, Agadir in Morocco and the Philippines, as well as Australia and New Zeeland were part of his surfing travels.

After several years in Australia, Sergio took a sabbatical and travelled to Europe in search of the perfect wave. It was in Portugal, in a wonderful beach surrounded by pine forests called Guincho, that Sergio found the purpose of his life and a very special friend. A lonely dolphin that gave him the inspiration to write his first novel: “The Dolphin, Story of a Dreamer”.

After he returned to Sydney, Sergio self-published his book in Oz. This happened in 1996. Suddenly everything in Sergio´s life changed. He sold more than 100,000 copies of “The Dolphin” in Australia in less than a year. “The dolphin” has now been translated into 40 languages and dialects. Other books followed, such as “Distant Winds”, “The Guardian of the Light”, “Thoughts by the ocean”, “Tales from Heavens”, “Nightingale Story" and others. His books have been published in more than seventy countries.

a Full color Snake

Albertus Seba's monumental 18th-century collection is a stunning visual record of the thousands of animal specimens he collected. Here are 240 full-color snake and lizard illustrations — a riot of brilliant colors, shapes, and sizes with unlimited potential as graphic and decorative elements in art, craft, and educational projects.

to Live like Him

The Life of Lazarillo de Tormes and of His Fortunes and Adversities (Spanish: La vida de Lazarillo de Tormes y de sus fortunas y adversidades) is a Spanish novella, published anonymously because of its heretical content. It was published simultaneously in two cities, in 1554 in Alcalá de Henares, Spain (seven years after Cervantes was born there), and, in 1555 in Antwerp, Flanders, then under Spanish rule, and where the similarly picaresque book Till Eulenspiegel had been published in 1529 and become popular. The book was published during the Spanish Inquisition, when the first Spanish trials against Lutherans were about to take place.

Lazarillo de Tormes was banned by the Spanish Crown and included in the Index of Forbidden Books of the Spanish Inquisition; this was at least in part due to the book's anti-clerical flavour. In 1573, the Crown allowed circulation of a version which omitted Chapters 4 and 5 and assorted paragraphs from other parts of the book. (An unabridged version did not appear in Spain until the nineteenth century.) It was the Antwerp version that circulated throughout Europe, translated into French (1560), English (1576), Dutch (1579) after Flanders came under Dutch rule (1578), German (1617), and Italian (1622).
 

to be HWKN mind

Each year the Young Architects Program creates opportunities for emerging designers to build a temporary, outdoor installation at MoMA PS1′s facility in Long Island City, Queens. New York-based HWKN is this year’s winner, with a proposal  for a multi-program structure. The project Wendy proposes a network of scaffolding on the site, combining high-tech materials with sustainable functions.

“Wendy does not play the typical architecture game of ecological apology – instead she is pro-active”, state the architects. The 5,000-square-foot structure is composed of nylon fabric treated with a ground breaking titania nanoparticle spray that neutralizes airborne pollutants. As the Titania nano-particles, used as coating for the fabric, are hit by sun, they trigger a catalytic and chemical reaction that neutralizes nitrodgen dioxide. The shape of the object has to do with amplifying the surface area, so that more air is cleaned. Also, the spiky arms spray water and push out blasts of cool air and water mists that cool the hot summer air.

The spiky structure is more of an environment than a space. The dominant object is supported by multiple social zones established throughout the courtyard and defined by tools like shade, wind, rain, music, and visual identity to reach past the confines of physical limits.

Ιεραποστολική Επίσκεψη της ΑΘΜ στη Νιγηρία

Ιεραποστολική επίσκεψη στην Νιγηρία πραγματοποιεί η ΑΘΜ ο Πάπας και Πατριάρχης Αλεξανδρείας και πάσης Αφρικής κ.κ. Θεόδωρος Β΄, από 14ης έως 22ας Φεβρουαρίου ε.ε.
Ο Μακαριώτατος αφίχθη στο Λάγκος της Νιγηρίας το απόγευμα της 14ης Φεβρουαρίου ε.ε., συνοδευόμενος από τον Πανοσιολ.Αρχιμ. κ.Παντελεήμονα Αράθυμο, Αρχιγραμματέα της Αγίας και Ιεράς Συνόδου. Στον διεθνή αερολιμένα την ΑΘΜ υπεδέχθησαν οι Σεβ.Μητροπολίτες Νιγηρίας κ.Αλέξανδρος και Καμερούν κ.Γρηγόριος, ο Εξοχ.Πρέσβης της Ελλάδος κ.Διονύσιος Σουρβάνος, ο Εντιμ.Πρόξενος της Αιγύπτου στο Λάγκος κ.Άχμετ Μπαχάα Ελ Ντιν, κληρικοί και κρατικοί αξιωματούχοι.
Στα πλαίσια της ιεραποστολικής οδοιπορείας Του ο Μακ. Πατριάρχης θα μεταβή αεροπορικώς στην Ανατολική Νιγηρία, όπου την 17η Φεβρουαρίου ε.ε., ημέρα κατά την οποία άγει τα σεπτά ονομαστήριά Του, θα τελέσει τα εγκαίνια του Ιερού Ναού του Αγίου Χριστοφόρου, ενώ την Κυριακή, 19η Φεβρουρίου, θα τελέσει την Θεία Λειτουργία στον προσωρινό Καθεδρικό Ναό Αναστάσεως του Κυρίου στο Λάγκος και θα θεμελιώσει τον νέο Καθεδρικό Ναό.
Ακόμη, θα απονείμει εκκλησιαστικά οφφίκια και διακρίσεις σε κληρικούς και λαϊκούς συνεργάτες του πολυσχιδούς ιεραποστολικού και ποιμαντικού έργου της Ιεράς Μητροπόλεως Νιγηρίας, θα έχει συναντήσεις με πολιτειακές αρχές και τοπικούς κυβερνήτες της Ομοσπονδιακής Δημοκρατίας της Νιγηρίας, με διπλωματικές αποστολές στη χώρα και εκπροσώπους χριστιανικών ομολογιών. Επίσης, θα επισκεφθή ορθόδοξες ενοριακές κοινότητες, ιεραποστολικά κέντρα και ελληνικές κοινότητες.
Την 22α Φεβρουαρίου ε.ε. η ΑΘΜ θα μεταβή στη Σιέρρα Λεόνε, ενώ την 27η του ιδίου μηνός στην Γκάμπια.

Κατά την επίσκεψή Του ο Μακαριώτατος εξέφρασε την αγάπη Του για την χώρα του Νείλου, η οποία πάντοτε σέβεται και τιμά την δισχιλιετή παρουσία του παλαιφάτου Πατριαρχείου Αλεξανδρείας ως τον αρχαιότερο ζώντα αφρικανικό χριστιανικό οργανισμό, καθώς και την βαθεία πεποίθησή Του για την πορεία προόδου και ευημερίας της χώρας.
Από την πλευρά του ο Εντιμ.κ.Πρόξενος χαρακτήρισε τιμητική την επίσκεψη του Πατριάρχου και ιδιαίτερη ευλογία.
Στην συνάντηση παρέστησαν οι Σεβ.Μητροπολίτες Νιγηρίας και Καμερούν, ο Πανοσιολ. Αρχιγραμματεύς της Αγίας και Ιεράς Συνόδου, ο Εξοχ.Πρέσβης της Ελλάδος κ.Διονύσιος Σουρβάνος και ο Εντιμ. Άρχων του Θρόνου κ.Ανέστης Αρνόπουλος.
Αρχιμ.Παντελεήμων Αράθυμος
Αρχιγραμματεύς

MUMA, geometrically

Under a commission for the show Pavilions for New Architecture at the Monash University Museum of Art (MUMA) in Melbourne, Australia, Elenberg Fraser Architecture contributed a darkly disorienting space. The pavilion is built at 1:3 scale for the exhibition and explores the viewers spatial relationship with form, creating a geometrically altered reality. Visitors crawl through the black plastic envelope on a glass walk and can be observed from various ‘portals’ extending from the vessel. The play in scale, shape and light give the pavilion a sensory manipulation often only described in two dimensional renderings of geometric abstract environments. The manipulation of visual space within the small pavilion creates an illusion of a vast inner world not connected to the same plane of that of its outer vessel in our reality.
The architects dwell on the capacity of architecture to distort environments: 1% is the development of an Architectural position that confirms the key role of the architect as manipulator. Our formula is as follows: Architecture = 1% Conception + 99% Manipulation

Our pavilion is a mirror world; contorted, modified, manipulated by design. The plastic experience of space dissolves conceptions of structure and form into the surface, our continuous world of contortion and deformation. It is an imaginary world – or is it? The reflection in the surface, shadow on mirror, this place is real and not – our disbelief is suspended – and architecture is possible.

as it was Private

Moh architects is a Vienna based group of architects dedicated to developing an innovative approach towards architecture, urbanism and design. Their work encompasses both methodical research as well as the application of innovative design strategies through built work.

The Askim Museum Competition was about designing a museum for a private art collection. The functional program of roughly 2800 sqm had to be embedded in the surrounding urban fabric in an intelligent way, credibly delivering a strong figure/anchor for the region while not overpowering the delicate natural backdrop.

The site given is located on sloped terrain, slightly elevated from the nearby city center. It is connected through a single road which terminates at a derelict quarry. The design proposes this derelict quarry to be an alternative building grounds rather than the original site, as the existing topographical changes and the resulting voids within the hillside lend themselves almost ideally for the museum’s functional spaces.
Therefore, the proposal’s programmatic distribution and spatial differentiation are directly derived from the conditions given: all primary spaces, i.e. the museum itself, are proposed to be located within existing chasm while the appending library and administration spaces are envisioned to be situated on top of the exhibition spaces. The enveloping surface of these programs is in large areas walkable and serves two main purposes: Firstly- it consolidates the different figures into one cohesive composition and secondly- it merges the surrounding natural landscape with the synthetic roof ‘landscape’ of the museum.
 

a Spherical Museum

The project for Milan’s new Museum of Contemporary Art is designed by Daniel Libeskind in cooperation with his Italian partner CityEdge. It features a vertical structure of five floors which twists from its square base and forms a circular terrace at the top. Its design references Da Vinci’s golden section, transforming in accordance to principles of self-evolution and spherical astronomy.

The most important design objective sought by city authorities and the designers was the greatest possible flexibility in order to respond to all of the, nowadays often unpredictable, needs of a space dedicated to contemporary art. This is why the five galleries of the new building are presented as stand-alone units, with a minimum height of 5.5m and equipped with complex lighting and air conditioning systems that make it possible to stage any type of exhibition while at the same time keeping the dominant line of the structure visible to the visitor, the square that becomes a circle, as it moves from the ground to the sky.

The building uses cutting-edge materials and building techniques with the objective of achieving the highest possible level of environmental compatibility. Enveloping the volume is a screen-like structure which visually speaking, enables the perception of the initial geometry of the building. The “screen” is formed by a series of bronze-colored varnished aluminium strips that also provide a great sense of lightness and luminosity.