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The hyperrealist / surrealist (hyper surrealist?) painting “Paradox” by Turkish artist Rasim Aksan is a collage of facial features from different people.
In the age of Photoshop I often wonder if I would like these as much if they are done on the computer instead of by hand. If done on the computer I would have expected better workmanship. When I spoke to many hyperrealist painters in the past they too told me that they work from photographs instead of painting from memories. So what you are looking is a very skilled human producer of a Photoshop rendering, perhaps?
The painting peeked my interest enough to take a photograph but in regarded to whether I would consider purchasing it for my collection my feeling is a bit lukewarm. It might also simply not be my “thing,” but it is interesting nevertheless.
Rasim Aksan
Paradox
2011
Acrylic airbrush on canvas
100 x 150 cm
# Rasim Aksan
Lives and works in Turkey. (no further data available)
# Galerist
Founded in 2001, Galerist is the pioneering contemporary art gallery that hosts exhibitions for Turkish and international artists in Istanbul’s two different locations, Tepebaşı and Hasköy.
Mesrutiyet Cad. No. 67/1 Beyoglu
34430 Istanbul
Turkey
# SML Data
+ Date: 2013-05-23T17:44:06+0800
+ Dimensions: 4260 x 2817
+ Exposure: 1/30 sec at f/8.0
+ Focal Length: 31 mm
+ ISO: 320
+ Camera: Canon EOS 6D
+ Lens: Canon EF 17-40 f/4L USM
+ GPS: 22°16'59" N 114°10'22" E
+ Location: 香港會議展覽中心 Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC)
+ Workflow: Lightroom 4
+ Serial: SML.20130523.6D.14124
+ Series: 新聞攝影 Photojournalism, SML Fine Art, Art Basel Hong Kong 2013
# Media Licensing
Creative Commons (CCBY) See-ming Lee 李思明 / SML Photography / SML Universe Limited
“Painting by Rasim Aksan (Turkey): Paradox, 2011 (Acrylic airbrush on canvas)” / Galerist / Art Basel Hong Kong 2013 / SML.20130523.6D.14124
/ #ABHK #Photojournalism #CreativeCommons #CCBY #SMLPhotography #SMLUniverse #SMLFineArt #Crazyisgood #SMLProjects
/ #中國 #中国 #China #香港 #HongKong #攝影 #摄影 #photography #Art #FineArt #ArtBasel #RasimAksan #Gallerist #hyperrealism #surrealism #painting #acrylic #airbrush
A man jogs on the blue jogging trail at the Ma On Shan Promenade in the morning while an old lady walks behind him.
Although I have a huge problem with most of the color choices that the Hong Kong Government makes regarding most of their architecture, I absolutely love the color for this path against the greens around it.
# SML Data
+ Date: 2013-04-18T09:24:41+0800
+ Dimensions: 5472 x 3648
+ Exposure: 1/320 sec at f/5.6
+ Focal Length: 400 mm
+ ISO: 500
+ Flash: Did not fire
+ Camera: Canon EOS 6D
+ Lens: Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS USM
+ GPS: 22°25'10" N 114°13'24" E
+ Location: SML Universe HKG
+ Subject: 中國香港新界馬鞍山海濱長廊 Ma On Shan Promenade, New Territories, Hong Kong, China
+ Workflow: Lightroom 4
+ Serial: SML.20130418.6D.00964
+ Series: 體育 Sports, 男 Men, 形 Forms
# Media Licensing
Creative Commons (CCBY) See-ming Lee 李思明 / SML Photography / SML Universe Limited
“晨光慢跑 Morning Jog” / 香港體育之形 Hong Kong Sports Forms / SML.20130418.6D.00964
/ #形 #Forms #SMLForms #體育 #Sports #男 #Men #SMLMen #CreativeCommons #CCBY #SMLPhotography #SMLUniverse #SMLProjects
/ #中國 #中国 #China #香港 #HongKong #馬鞍山 #MaOnShan #人 #people #攝影 #摄影 #photography #跑 #Run
A sculpture made with cardboards and other paper waste materials found lying on the street during the 13th Annual Art Under the Bridge Festival organized by the Dumbo Arts Center in New York City. Particularly interesting is their forms which resemble tree logs, though at the same time when one thinks of paper, one also thinks of its effect with regarding to the environment. It's like a before and after dialog about the trees.
13th annual D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® (Sept 25 to Sept 27, 2009)
www.dumboartfestival.org/press_release.html
The three-day multi-site neighborhood-wide event is a one-of-a-kind art happening: where serendipity meets the haphazard and where the unpredictable, spontaneous and downright weird thrive. The now teenage D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® presents touchable, accessible, and interactive art, on a scale that makes it the nation's largest urban forum for experimental art.
Art Under the Bridge is an opportunity for young artists to use any medium imaginable to create temporary projects on-the-spot everywhere and anywhere, completely transforming the Dumbo section of Brooklyn, New York, into a vibrant platform for self-expression. In addition to the 80+ projects throughout the historical post-industrial waterfront span, visitors can tour local artists' studios or check out the indoor video_dumbo, a non-stop program of cutting-edge video art from New York City and around the world.
The Dumbo Arts Center (DAC) has been the exclusive producer of the D.U.M.B.O Art Under the Bridge Festival® since 1997. DAC is a big impact, small non-profit, that in addition to its year-round gallery exhibitions, is committed to preserving Dumbo as a site in New York City where emerging visual artists can experiment in the public domain, while having unprecedented freedom and access to normally off-limit locations.
Related SML
+ SML Flickr Collections: Events
+ SML Flickr Sets: Dumbo Arts Center: Art Under the Bridge Festival 2009
It’s Nara’s puppies! Need I say more? Loooove. :)
Yoshitomo Nara
Big Pup Head, 2007
FRP (Fibre-reinforced plastic)
59 x 48 1/2 x 49 1/4 in
150 x 123 x 125 cm
# Yoshitomo Nara
Yoshitomo Nara (美智奈良 Nara Yoshitomo, born 5 December 1959 in Hirosaki, Japan) is a Japanese artist. He lives and works in Tokyo, though his artwork has been exhibited worldwide. Nara has had nearly 40 solo exhibitions since 1984. He is represented in New York City by Pace Gallery, in Los Angeles by Blum & Poe and in London by Stephen Friedman Gallery.
Nara received his B.F.A. (1985) and an M.F.A. (1987) from the Aichi Prefectural University of Fine Arts and Music. Between 1988 and 1993, Nara studied at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, in Germany.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoshitomo_Nara
# Blum & Poe
2727 S. La Cienega Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90034
USA
# SML Data
+ Date: 2013-05-23T16:15:07+0800
+ Dimensions: 5199 x 3466
+ Exposure: 1/40 sec at f/4.0
+ Focal Length: 40 mm
+ ISO: 250
+ Camera: Canon EOS 6D
+ Lens: Canon EF 17-40 f/4L USM
+ GPS: 22°16'59" N 114°10'22" E
+ Location: 香港會議展覽中心 Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC)
+ Workflow: Lightroom 4
+ Serial: SML.20130523.6D.13914
+ Series: 新聞攝影 Photojournalism, SML Fine Art, Art Basel Hong Kong 2013
# Media Licensing
Creative Commons (CCBY) See-ming Lee 李思明 / SML Photography / SML Universe Limited
“Sculpture by 美智奈良 Yoshitomo Nara: Big Pup Head, 2007 (FRP)” / Blum & Poe / Art Basel Hong Kong 2013 / SML.20130523.6D.13914
/ #Photojournalism #CreativeCommons #CCBY #SMLPhotography #SMLUniverse #SMLFineArt #Crazyisgood #SMLProjects
/ #中國 #中国 #China #香港 #HongKong #攝影 #摄影 #photography #Art #FineArt #ArtBasel #ABHK #美智奈良 #YoshitomoNara #Nara #BlumAndPoe #Japan #puppy
See more photos of this, and the Wikipedia article.
Details, quoting from Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird:
No reconnaissance aircraft in history has operated globally in more hostile airspace or with such complete impunity than the SR-71, the world's fastest jet-propelled aircraft. The Blackbird's performance and operational achievements placed it at the pinnacle of aviation technology developments during the Cold War.
This Blackbird accrued about 2,800 hours of flight time during 24 years of active service with the U.S. Air Force. On its last flight, March 6, 1990, Lt. Col. Ed Yielding and Lt. Col. Joseph Vida set a speed record by flying from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C., in 1 hour, 4 minutes, and 20 seconds, averaging 3,418 kilometers (2,124 miles) per hour. At the flight's conclusion, they landed at Washington-Dulles International Airport and turned the airplane over to the Smithsonian.
Transferred from the United States Air Force.
Manufacturer:
Designer:
Date:
1964
Country of Origin:
United States of America
Dimensions:
Overall: 18ft 5 15/16in. x 55ft 7in. x 107ft 5in., 169998.5lb. (5.638m x 16.942m x 32.741m, 77110.8kg)
Other: 18ft 5 15/16in. x 107ft 5in. x 55ft 7in. (5.638m x 32.741m x 16.942m)
Materials:
Titanium
Physical Description:
Twin-engine, two-seat, supersonic strategic reconnaissance aircraft; airframe constructed largley of titanium and its alloys; vertical tail fins are constructed of a composite (laminated plastic-type material) to reduce radar cross-section; Pratt and Whitney J58 (JT11D-20B) turbojet engines feature large inlet shock cones.
Long Description:
No reconnaissance aircraft in history has operated in more hostile airspace or with such complete impunity than the SR-71 Blackbird. It is the fastest aircraft propelled by air-breathing engines. The Blackbird's performance and operational achievements placed it at the pinnacle of aviation technology developments during the Cold War. The airplane was conceived when tensions with communist Eastern Europe reached levels approaching a full-blown crisis in the mid-1950s. U.S. military commanders desperately needed accurate assessments of Soviet worldwide military deployments, particularly near the Iron Curtain. Lockheed Aircraft Corporation's subsonic U-2 (see NASM collection) reconnaissance aircraft was an able platform but the U. S. Air Force recognized that this relatively slow aircraft was already vulnerable to Soviet interceptors. They also understood that the rapid development of surface-to-air missile systems could put U-2 pilots at grave risk. The danger proved reality when a U-2 was shot down by a surface to air missile over the Soviet Union in 1960.
Lockheed's first proposal for a new high speed, high altitude, reconnaissance aircraft, to be capable of avoiding interceptors and missiles, centered on a design propelled by liquid hydrogen. This proved to be impracticable because of considerable fuel consumption. Lockheed then reconfigured the design for conventional fuels. This was feasible and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), already flying the Lockheed U-2, issued a production contract for an aircraft designated the A-12. Lockheed's clandestine 'Skunk Works' division (headed by the gifted design engineer Clarence L. "Kelly" Johnson) designed the A-12 to cruise at Mach 3.2 and fly well above 18,288 m (60,000 feet). To meet these challenging requirements, Lockheed engineers overcame many daunting technical challenges. Flying more than three times the speed of sound generates 316° C (600° F) temperatures on external aircraft surfaces, which are enough to melt conventional aluminum airframes. The design team chose to make the jet's external skin of titanium alloy to which shielded the internal aluminum airframe. Two conventional, but very powerful, afterburning turbine engines propelled this remarkable aircraft. These power plants had to operate across a huge speed envelope in flight, from a takeoff speed of 334 kph (207 mph) to more than 3,540 kph (2,200 mph). To prevent supersonic shock waves from moving inside the engine intake causing flameouts, Johnson's team had to design a complex air intake and bypass system for the engines.
Skunk Works engineers also optimized the A-12 cross-section design to exhibit a low radar profile. Lockheed hoped to achieve this by carefully shaping the airframe to reflect as little transmitted radar energy (radio waves) as possible, and by application of special paint designed to absorb, rather than reflect, those waves. This treatment became one of the first applications of stealth technology, but it never completely met the design goals.
Test pilot Lou Schalk flew the single-seat A-12 on April 24, 1962, after he became airborne accidentally during high-speed taxi trials. The airplane showed great promise but it needed considerable technical refinement before the CIA could fly the first operational sortie on May 31, 1967 - a surveillance flight over North Vietnam. A-12s, flown by CIA pilots, operated as part of the Air Force's 1129th Special Activities Squadron under the "Oxcart" program. While Lockheed continued to refine the A-12, the U. S. Air Force ordered an interceptor version of the aircraft designated the YF-12A. The Skunk Works, however, proposed a "specific mission" version configured to conduct post-nuclear strike reconnaissance. This system evolved into the USAF's familiar SR-71.
Lockheed built fifteen A-12s, including a special two-seat trainer version. Two A-12s were modified to carry a special reconnaissance drone, designated D-21. The modified A-12s were redesignated M-21s. These were designed to take off with the D-21 drone, powered by a Marquart ramjet engine mounted on a pylon between the rudders. The M-21 then hauled the drone aloft and launched it at speeds high enough to ignite the drone's ramjet motor. Lockheed also built three YF-12As but this type never went into production. Two of the YF-12As crashed during testing. Only one survives and is on display at the USAF Museum in Dayton, Ohio. The aft section of one of the "written off" YF-12As which was later used along with an SR-71A static test airframe to manufacture the sole SR-71C trainer. One SR-71 was lent to NASA and designated YF-12C. Including the SR-71C and two SR-71B pilot trainers, Lockheed constructed thirty-two Blackbirds. The first SR-71 flew on December 22, 1964. Because of extreme operational costs, military strategists decided that the more capable USAF SR-71s should replace the CIA's A-12s. These were retired in 1968 after only one year of operational missions, mostly over southeast Asia. The Air Force's 1st Strategic Reconnaissance Squadron (part of the 9th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing) took over the missions, flying the SR-71 beginning in the spring of 1968.
After the Air Force began to operate the SR-71, it acquired the official name Blackbird-- for the special black paint that covered the airplane. This paint was formulated to absorb radar signals, to radiate some of the tremendous airframe heat generated by air friction, and to camouflage the aircraft against the dark sky at high altitudes.
Experience gained from the A-12 program convinced the Air Force that flying the SR-71 safely required two crew members, a pilot and a Reconnaissance Systems Officer (RSO). The RSO operated with the wide array of monitoring and defensive systems installed on the airplane. This equipment included a sophisticated Electronic Counter Measures (ECM) system that could jam most acquisition and targeting radar. In addition to an array of advanced, high-resolution cameras, the aircraft could also carry equipment designed to record the strength, frequency, and wavelength of signals emitted by communications and sensor devices such as radar. The SR-71 was designed to fly deep into hostile territory, avoiding interception with its tremendous speed and high altitude. It could operate safely at a maximum speed of Mach 3.3 at an altitude more than sixteen miles, or 25,908 m (85,000 ft), above the earth. The crew had to wear pressure suits similar to those worn by astronauts. These suits were required to protect the crew in the event of sudden cabin pressure loss while at operating altitudes.
To climb and cruise at supersonic speeds, the Blackbird's Pratt & Whitney J-58 engines were designed to operate continuously in afterburner. While this would appear to dictate high fuel flows, the Blackbird actually achieved its best "gas mileage," in terms of air nautical miles per pound of fuel burned, during the Mach 3+ cruise. A typical Blackbird reconnaissance flight might require several aerial refueling operations from an airborne tanker. Each time the SR-71 refueled, the crew had to descend to the tanker's altitude, usually about 6,000 m to 9,000 m (20,000 to 30,000 ft), and slow the airplane to subsonic speeds. As velocity decreased, so did frictional heat. This cooling effect caused the aircraft's skin panels to shrink considerably, and those covering the fuel tanks contracted so much that fuel leaked, forming a distinctive vapor trail as the tanker topped off the Blackbird. As soon as the tanks were filled, the jet's crew disconnected from the tanker, relit the afterburners, and again climbed to high altitude.
Air Force pilots flew the SR-71 from Kadena AB, Japan, throughout its operational career but other bases hosted Blackbird operations, too. The 9th SRW occasionally deployed from Beale AFB, California, to other locations to carryout operational missions. Cuban missions were flown directly from Beale. The SR-71 did not begin to operate in Europe until 1974, and then only temporarily. In 1982, when the U.S. Air Force based two aircraft at Royal Air Force Base Mildenhall to fly monitoring mission in Eastern Europe.
When the SR-71 became operational, orbiting reconnaissance satellites had already replaced manned aircraft to gather intelligence from sites deep within Soviet territory. Satellites could not cover every geopolitical hotspot so the Blackbird remained a vital tool for global intelligence gathering. On many occasions, pilots and RSOs flying the SR-71 provided information that proved vital in formulating successful U. S. foreign policy. Blackbird crews provided important intelligence about the 1973 Yom Kippur War, the Israeli invasion of Lebanon and its aftermath, and pre- and post-strike imagery of the 1986 raid conducted by American air forces on Libya. In 1987, Kadena-based SR-71 crews flew a number of missions over the Persian Gulf, revealing Iranian Silkworm missile batteries that threatened commercial shipping and American escort vessels.
As the performance of space-based surveillance systems grew, along with the effectiveness of ground-based air defense networks, the Air Force started to lose enthusiasm for the expensive program and the 9th SRW ceased SR-71 operations in January 1990. Despite protests by military leaders, Congress revived the program in 1995. Continued wrangling over operating budgets, however, soon led to final termination. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration retained two SR-71As and the one SR-71B for high-speed research projects and flew these airplanes until 1999.
On March 6, 1990, the service career of one Lockheed SR-71A Blackbird ended with a record-setting flight. This special airplane bore Air Force serial number 64-17972. Lt. Col. Ed Yeilding and his RSO, Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Vida, flew this aircraft from Los Angeles to Washington D.C. in 1 hour, 4 minutes, and 20 seconds, averaging a speed of 3,418 kph (2,124 mph). At the conclusion of the flight, '972 landed at Dulles International Airport and taxied into the custody of the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum. At that time, Lt. Col. Vida had logged 1,392.7 hours of flight time in Blackbirds, more than that of any other crewman.
This particular SR-71 was also flown by Tom Alison, a former National Air and Space Museum's Chief of Collections Management. Flying with Detachment 1 at Kadena Air Force Base, Okinawa, Alison logged more than a dozen '972 operational sorties. The aircraft spent twenty-four years in active Air Force service and accrued a total of 2,801.1 hours of flight time.
Wingspan: 55'7"
Length: 107'5"
Height: 18'6"
Weight: 170,000 Lbs
Reference and Further Reading:
Crickmore, Paul F. Lockheed SR-71: The Secret Missions Exposed. Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 1996.
Francillon, Rene J. Lockheed Aircraft Since 1913. Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute Press, 1987.
Johnson, Clarence L. Kelly: More Than My Share of It All. Washington D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1985.
Miller, Jay. Lockheed Martin's Skunk Works. Leicester, U.K.: Midland Counties Publishing Ltd., 1995.
Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird curatorial file, Aeronautics Division, National Air and Space Museum.
DAD, 11-11-01
Quoting Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Curtiss P-40E Warhawk (Kittyhawk IA):
Whether known as the Warhawk, Tomahawk, or Kittyhawk, the Curtiss P-40 proved to be a successful, versatile fighter during the first half of World War II. The shark-mouthed Tomahawks that Gen. Claire Chennault's "Flying Tigers" flew in China against the Japanese remain among the most popular airplanes of the war. P-40E pilot Lt. Boyd D. Wagner became the first American ace of World War II when he shot down six Japanese aircraft in the Philippines in mid-December 1941.
Curtiss-Wright built this airplane as Model 87-A3 and delivered it to Canada as a Kittyhawk I in 1941. It served until 1946 in No. 111 Squadron, Royal Canadian Air Force. U.S. Air Force personnel at Andrews Air Force Base restored it in 1975 to represent an aircraft of the 75th Fighter Squadron, 23rd Fighter Group, 14th Air Force.
Donated by the Exchange Club in Memory of Kellis Forbes.
Manufacturer:
Date:
1939
Country of Origin:
United States of America
Dimensions:
Overall: 330 x 970cm, 2686kg, 1140cm (10ft 9 15/16in. x 31ft 9 7/8in., 5921.6lb., 37ft 4 13/16in.)
Materials:
All-metal, semi-monocoque
Physical Description:
Single engine, single seat, fighter aircraft.
• • • • •
Quoting Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Vought F4U-1D Corsair:
By V-J Day, September 2, 1945, Corsair pilots had amassed an 11:1 kill ratio against enemy aircraft. The aircraft's distinctive inverted gull-wing design allowed ground clearance for the huge, three-bladed Hamilton Standard Hydromatic propeller, which spanned more than 4 meters (13 feet). The Pratt and Whitney R-2800 radial engine and Hydromatic propeller was the largest and one of the most powerful engine-propeller combinations ever flown on a fighter aircraft.
Charles Lindbergh flew bombing missions in a Corsair with Marine Air Group 31 against Japanese strongholds in the Pacific in 1944. This airplane is painted in the colors and markings of the Corsair Sun Setter, a Marine close-support fighter assigned to the USS Essex in July 1944.
Transferred from the United States Navy.
Manufacturer:
Date:
1940
Country of Origin:
United States of America
Dimensions:
Overall: 460 x 1020cm, 4037kg, 1250cm (15ft 1 1/8in. x 33ft 5 9/16in., 8900lb., 41ft 1/8in.)
Materials:
All metal with fabric-covered wings behind the main spar.
Physical Description:
R-2800 radial air-cooled engine with 1,850 horsepower, turned a three-blade Hamilton Standard Hydromatic propeller with solid aluminum blades spanning 13 feet 1 inch; wing bent gull-shaped on both sides of the fuselage.
Quoting Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Boeing B-29 Superfortress "Enola Gay":
Boeing's B-29 Superfortress was the most sophisticated propeller-driven bomber of World War II and the first bomber to house its crew in pressurized compartments. Although designed to fight in the European theater, the B-29 found its niche on the other side of the globe. In the Pacific, B-29s delivered a variety of aerial weapons: conventional bombs, incendiary bombs, mines, and two nuclear weapons.
On August 6, 1945, this Martin-built B-29-45-MO dropped the first atomic weapon used in combat on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later, Bockscar (on display at the U.S. Air Force Museum near Dayton, Ohio) dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. Enola Gay flew as the advance weather reconnaissance aircraft that day. A third B-29, The Great Artiste, flew as an observation aircraft on both missions.
Transferred from the United States Air Force.
Manufacturer:
Date:
1945
Country of Origin:
United States of America
Dimensions:
Overall: 900 x 3020cm, 32580kg, 4300cm (29ft 6 5/16in. x 99ft 1in., 71825.9lb., 141ft 15/16in.)
Materials:
Polished overall aluminum finish
Physical Description:
Four-engine heavy bomber with semi-monoqoque fuselage and high-aspect ratio wings. Polished aluminum finish overall, standard late-World War II Army Air Forces insignia on wings and aft fuselage and serial number on vertical fin; 509th Composite Group markings painted in black; "Enola Gay" in black, block letters on lower left nose.
From the Wikipedia page on the Elgin Marbles:
[[[
The Elgin Marbles, known also as the Parthenon Marbles, are a collection of classical Greek marble sculptures, inscriptions and architectural members that originally were part of the Parthenon and other buildings on the Acropolis of Athens.[1][2] Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin, the British ambassador to the Ottoman Empire from 1799–1803, had obtained a controversial permission from the Ottoman authorities to remove pieces from the Acropolis.
There is controversy as to whether the removed pieces were purchased from the ruling government of the time or not. [3] From 1801 to 1812 Elgin's agents removed about half of the surviving sculptures of the Parthenon, as well as architectural members and sculpture from the Propylaea and Erechtheum.[4] The Marbles were transported by sea to Britain. In Britain, the acquisition of the collection was supported by some,[5] while many critics compared Elgin's actions to vandalism[6] or looting.[7][8][9][10][11]
Following a public debate in Parliament and subsequent exoneration of Elgin's actions, the marbles were purchased by the British Government in 1816 and placed on display in the British Museum, where they stand now on view in the purpose-built Duveen Gallery. The legality of the removal has been questioned and the debate continues as to whether the Marbles should remain in the British Museum or be returned to Athens.
Contents
• 3 Legality of the removal from Athens
• 5 Damage
•• 5.1 Use as a Christian church
•• 5.2 Morosini •
•• 5.4 Elgin
•• 5.6 Athens
•• 6.1 Rationale for returning to Athens
•• 6.2 Rationale for retaining in London
• 7 Public perception of the issue
••• 7.1.2 Popular support for restitution
• 8 Other displaced Parthenon art
•• 12.1 Pros and cons of restitution
Acquisition
In December of 1798, Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin, was appointed as "Ambassador Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of His Britannic Majesty to the Sublime Porte of Selim III, Sultan of Turkey". Prior to his departure to take up the post he had approached at least three officials of the British government to inquire if they would be interested in employing artists to take casts and drawings of the sculptured portions of the Parthenon. According to Lord Elgin, "the answer of the Government... was entirely negative."[5]
Lord Elgin decided to carry out the work at his own expense and employed artists to take casts and drawings under the supervision of the Neapolitan court painter Giovani Lusieri.[5] However, while conducting surveys, he found that Parthenon statuary that had been documented in a 17th century survey was now missing, and so he investigated. According to a Turkish local, marble sculptures that fell were burned to obtain lime for building.[5] Although the original intention was only to document the sculptures, in 1801 Lord Elgin began to remove material from the Parthenon and its surrounding structures[12] under the supervision of Lusieri.
The excavation and removal was completed in 1812 at a personal cost of £74,240 (about $4 million in today's currency).[13] Elgin intended the marbles for display in the British Museum, selling them to the British government for less than the cost of bringing them to Britain and declining higher offers from other potential buyers, including Napoleon.[12]
Description
Main articles: Parthenon Frieze and Metopes of the Parthenon
The Elgin Marbles include some 17 figures from the statuary from the east and west pediments, 15 (of an original 92) of the metope panels depicting battles between the Lapiths and the Centaurs, as well as 247 feet (of an original 524 feet) of the Parthenon Frieze which decorated the horizontal course set above the interior architrave of the temple. As such, they represent more than half of what now remains of the surviving sculptural decoration of the Parthenon. Elgin's acquisitions also included objects from other buildings on the Athenian Acropolis: a Caryatid from Erechtheum; four slabs from the frieze of the Temple of Athena Nike; and a number of other architectural fragments of the Parthenon, Propylaia, Erechtheum, the Temple of Athena Nike and the Treasury of Atreus.
Legality of the removal from Athens
As the Acropolis was still an Ottoman military fort, Elgin required permission to enter the site, including the Parthenon and the surrounding buildings. He allegedly obtained from the Sultan a firman to allow his artists access to the site. The original document is now lost, but what is said to be a translated Italian copy made at the time still survives.[14] Vassilis Demetriades, Professor of Turkish Studies at the University of Crete, has argued that "any expert in Ottoman diplomatic language can easily ascertain that the original of the document which has survived was not a firman",[15] and its authenticity has been challenged.[16]
The document was recorded in an appendix of an 1816 parliamentary committee report. The committee had convened to examine a request by Elgin asking the British government to purchase the marbles. The report claimed that the document[17] in the appendix was an accurate translation in English of an Ottoman firman dated in July 1801. In Elgin's view it amounted to an Ottoman authorization to remove the marbles. The committee was told that the original document was given to Ottoman officials in Athens in 1801, but researchers have so far failed to locate any traces of it despite the fact that the Ottoman archives still hold an outstanding number of similar documents dating from the same period.[16] Moreover the parliamentary record shows that the Italian copy of the firman was not presented to the committee by Elgin himself but by one of his associates, the clergyman Rev. Philip Hunt. Hunt, who at the time resided in Bedford, was the last witness to appear before the committee and claimed that he had in his possession an Italian translation of the Ottoman original. He went on to explain that he had not brought the document, because, upon leaving Bedford, he was not aware that he was to testify as a witness. The English document in the parliamentary report was filed by Hunt, but the committee was not presented with the Italian translation purportedly in his possession. William St. Clair, a contemporary biographer of Lord Elgin, claimed to possess Hunt's Italian document and "vouches for the accuracy of the English translation". In addition, the committee report states on page 69 "(Signed with a signet.) Seged Abdullah Kaimacan". But the document presented to the committee was "an English translation of this purported translation into Italian of the original firman",[18] and had neither signet nor signature on it, a fact corroborated by St. Clair.[16] The lines pertaining to the removal of the marbles allowed Elgin and his team to fix scaffolding, make drawings, make mouldings in chalk or gypsum, measure the remains of the ruined buildings and excavate the foundations which may have become covered in the [ghiaja]; and "...that when they wish to take away [qualche] pieces of stone with old inscriptions or figures thereon, that no opposition be made thereto". The interpretation of these lines has been questioned even by non-restitutionalists,[19] particularly the word qualche, which in modern language is translated as some. According to non-restitutionalists, further evidence that the removal of the sculptures by Elgin was approved by the Ottoman authorities is shown by a second firman which was required for the shipping of the marbles from the Piraeus.[20]
Despite the controversial firman, many have questioned the legality of Elgin's actions. A study by Professor David Rudenstine of the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law concluded that the premise that Elgin obtained legal title to the marbles, which he then transferred to the British government, "is certainly not established and may well be false".[21] Rudenstine's argumentation is partly based on a translation discrepancy he noticed between the surviving Italian document and the English text submitted by Hunt to the parliamentary committee. The text from the committee report reads "We therefore have written this Letter to you, and expedited it by Mr. Philip Hunt, an English Gentleman, Secretary of the aforesaid Ambassador" but according to the St. Clair Italian document the actual wording is "We therefore have written this letter to you and expedited it by N.N.". In Rudenstine's, view this substitution of "Mr. Philip Hunt" with the initials "N.N." can hardly be a simple mistake. He further argues that the document was presented after the committee's insistence that some form of Ottoman written authorization for the removal of the marbles was provided, a fact known to Hunt by the time he testified. Thus, according to Rudenstine, "Hunt put himself in a position in which he could simultaneously vouch for the authenticity of the document and explain why he alone had a copy of it fifteen years after he surrendered the original to Ottoman officials in Athens". On two earlier occasions, Elgin stated that the Ottomans gave him written permissions more than once, but that he had "retained none of them." Hunt testified on March 13, and one of the questions asked was "Did you ever see any of the written permissions which were granted to [Lord Elgin] for removing the Marbles from the Temple of Minerva?" to which Hunt answered "yes", adding that he possessed an Italian translation of the original firman. Nonetheless, he did not explain why he had retained the translation for 15 years, whereas Elgin, who had testified two weeks earlier, knew nothing about the existence of any such document.[16]
In contrast, Professor John Merryman, Sweitzer Professor of Law and also Professor of Art at Stanford University, putting aside the discrepancy presented by Rudenstine, argues that since the Ottomans had controlled Athens since 1460, their claims to the artifacts were legal and recognizable. The Ottoman sultan was grateful to the British for repelling Napoleonic expansion, and the Parthenon marbles had no sentimental value to him.[12] Further, that written permission exists in the form of the firman, which is the most formal kind of permission available from that government, and that Elgin had further permission to export the marbles, legalizes his (and therefore the British Museum's) claim to the Marbles.[20][citation needed] He does note, though, that the clause concerning the extent of Ottoman authorization to remove the marbles "is at best ambiguous", adding that the document "provides slender authority for the massive removals from the Parthenon... The reference to 'taking away any pieces of stone' seems incidental, intended to apply to objects found while excavating. That was certainly the interpretation privately placed on the firman by several of the Elgin party, including Lady Elgin. Publicly, however, a different attitude was taken, and the work of dismantling the sculptures on the Parthenon and packing them for shipment to England began in earnest. In the process, Elgin's party damaged the structure, leaving the Parthenon not only denuded of its sculptures but further ruined by the process of removal. It is certainly arguable that Elgin exceeded the authority granted in the firman in both respects".[19]
Contemporary reaction
When the marbles were shipped to England, they were "an instant success among many"[5] who admired the sculptures and supported their arrival, but both the sculptures and Elgin also received criticism from detractors. Lord Elgin began negotiations for the sale of the collection to the British Museum in 1811, but negotiations failed despite the support of British artists[5] after the government showed little interest. Many Britons opposed the statues because they were in bad condition and therefore did not display the "ideal beauty" found in other sculpture collections.[5] The following years marked an increased interest in classical Greece, and in June 1816, after parliamentary hearings, the House of Commons offered £35,000 in exchange for the sculptures. Even at the time the acquisition inspired much debate, although it was supported by "many persuasive calls" for the purchase.[5]
Lord Byron didn't care for the sculptures, calling them "misshapen monuments".[22] He strongly objected to their removal from Greece, denouncing Elgin as a vandal.[6] His view of the removal of the Marbles from Athens is also reflected in his poem "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage":[23]
Dull is the eye that will not weep to see
Thy walls defaced, thy mouldering shrines removed
By British hands, which it had best behoved
To guard those relics ne'er to be restored.
Curst be the hour when from their isle they roved,
And once again thy hapless bosom gored,
And snatch'd thy shrinking gods to northern climes abhorred!
Byron was not the only one to protest against the removal at the time:
"The Honourable Lord has taken advantage of the most unjustifiable means and has committed the most flagrant pillages. It was, it seems, fatal that a representative of our country loot those objects that the Turks and other barbarians had considered sacred," said Sir John Newport.[13]
A parliamentary committee investigating the situation concluded that the monuments were best given "asylum" under a "free government" such as the British one.[5] In 1810, Elgin published a defence of his actions which silenced most of his detractors,[4] although the subject remained controversial.[citation needed] John Keats was one of those who saw them privately exhibited in London, hence his two sonnets about the marbles. Notable supporters of Elgin included the painter Benjamin Robert Haydon.[5]
A public debate in Parliament followed Elgin's publication, and Elgin's actions were again exonerated. Parliament purchased the marbles for the nation in 1816 by a vote of 82-30 for £35,000.[6] They were deposited in the British Museum, where they were displayed in the Elgin Saloon (constructed in 1832), until the Duveen Gallery was completed in 1939. Crowds packed the British Museum to view the sculptures, setting attendance records for the museum.[5] William Wordsworth viewed the marbles at the museum and commented favorably on their aesthetics.[24]
Damage
Some of the Marbles were damaged prior to Lord Elgin's obtaining them.
Use as a Christian church
After the conversion of the Greek people to Christianity the Parthenon was eventually converted from a temple of the Virgin (Parthenos) Athena to a holy temple (hieros naos) of the Virgin Mary.[25] The church of the Parthenon and Athens in general was considered the fourth most important pilgrimage in the Eastern Roman Empire, after Constantinople, Ephesos and Thessalonica.[26] The temple's use as a Christian church constitutes the single longest period of its history (ca. 500–1450 AD) and its importance as a church and Christian pilgrimage was greater than that it enjoyed in Ancient Greece.[27] During this period, frescoes and inscriptions were added to the marble walls and columns as it was a custom of the era's pilgrim to mark their visit.[25] Altogether some 220 funerary inscriptions survive for the years 600-1200, though many more were probably lost due to structural damage to the building and erosion of the surface.[25] Similar inscriptions were found in the Propylaia as well as on the church of St. George in the Keramykos, which in antiquity was a temple of Hephaistos and is today called the Theseion.[28] From 1205 to 1456 Athens was ruled by Western Crusaders and the church was converted into a Latin cathedral, although the stream of pilgrims continued.[29]
Morosini
Another example of prior damage is that sustained during wars. It is during these periods that the Parthenon and its artwork have sustained by far the most extensive damage. In particular, an explosion ignited by Venetian gun and cannon fire bombardment in 1687, whilst the Parthenon was used as a munitions store during the Ottoman rule, destroyed or damaged many pieces of Parthenon art including some of those later taken by Lord Elgin.[30] In particular this explosion sent the marble roof, most of the cella walls, 14 columns from the north and south peristyles and carved metopes and frieze blocks flying and crashing to the ground and thus destroyed much of the artwork.Further damage was made to the art of the Parthenon by the Venetian general Francesco Morosini when he subsequently looted the site of its larger sculptures. His tackle was faulty and snapped, dropping an over life-sized Poseidon and the horses of Athena's chariot from the west pediment to the rock of the Acropolis forty feet below.[31]
War of Independence
The Erechtheum was used as a munitions store by the Ottomans during the Greek War of Independence[32] (1821–1833) which ended the 350-year Ottoman rule of Athens.
The Acropolis was besieged twice during the Greek War of Independence, once by the Greek and once by the Ottoman forces. During the siege the Greeks were aware of the dilemma and chose to offer the besieged Ottoman forces, who were attempting to melt the lead in the columns to cast bullets, bullets of their own if they would leave the Parthenon undamaged.[33]
Elgin
Elgin consulted with sculptor Antonio Canova in 1803 about how best to restore the marbles. Canova was considered by some to be the world's best sculptural restorer of the time; Elgin wrote that Canova declined to work on the marbles for fear of damaging them further.[5]
To facilitate transport by Elgin, the column capital of the Parthenon and many metopes and slabs were either hacked off the main structure or sawn and sliced into smaller sections causing irreparable damage to the Parthenon itself to which these Marbles were connected.[34] One shipload of marbles on board the British brig Mentor was caught in a storm off Cape Matapan and sank near Kythera, but was salvaged at the Earl's personal expense;[35] it took two years to bring them to the surface.
British Museum
The artifacts held in London suffered from 19th century pollution—which persisted until the mid-20th century[37] — and they have been irrevocably damaged[38] by previous cleaning methods employed by British Museum staff.
As early as 1838, scientist Michael Faraday was asked to provide a solution to the problem of the deteriorating surface of the marbles. The outcome is described in the following excerpt from the letter he sent to Henry Milman, a commissioner for the National Gallery.[39][40]
The marbles generally were very dirty ... from a deposit of dust and soot. ... I found the body of the marble beneath the surface white. ... The application of water, applied by a sponge or soft cloth, removed the coarsest dirt. ... The use of fine, gritty powder, with the water and rubbing, though it more quickly removed the upper dirt, left much imbedded in the cellular surface of the marble. I then applied alkalis, both carbonated and caustic; these quickened the loosening of the surface dirt ... but they fell far short of restoring the marble surface to its proper hue and state of cleanliness. I finally used dilute nitric acid, and even this failed. ... The examination has made me despair of the possibility of presenting the marbles in the British Museum in that state of purity and whiteness which they originally possessed.
A further effort to clean the marbles ensued in 1858. Richard Westmacott, who was appointed superintendent of the "moving and cleaning the sculptures" in 1857, in a letter approved by the British Museum Standing Committee on 13 March 1858 concluded[41]
'I think it my duty to say that some of the works are much damaged by ignorant or careless moulding — with oil and lard — and by restorations in wax, and wax and resin. These mistakes have caused discolouration. I shall endeavour to remedy this without, however, having recourse to any composition that can injure the surface of the marble
Yet another effort to clean the marbles occurred in the years 1937–38. This time the incentive was provided by the construction of a new Gallery to house the collection. The Pentelic marble, from which the sculptures are made, naturally acquires a tan colour similar to honey when exposed to air; this colouring is often known as the marble's "patina"[42] but Lord Duveen, who financed the whole undertaking, acting under the misconception that the marbles were originally white[43] probably arranged for the team of masons working in the project to remove discoloration from some of the sculptures. The tools used were seven scrapers, one chisel and a piece of carborundum stone. They are now deposited in the British Museum's Department of Preservation.[43][44] The cleaning process scraped away some of the detailed tone of many carvings.[45] According to Harold Plenderleith, the surface removed in some places may have been as much as one-tenth of an inch (2.5 mm).[43]
The British Museum has responded to these allegations with the statement that "mistakes were made at that time."[38] On another occasion it was said that "the damage had been exaggerated for political reasons" and that "the Greeks were guilty of excessive cleaning of the marbles before they were brought to Britain."[44] During the international symposium on the cleaning of the marbles, organised by the British Museum, Dr Ian Jenkins, deputy keeper of Greek and Roman antiquities, remarked that "The British Museum is not infallible, it is not the Pope. Its history has been a series of good intentions marred by the occasional cock-up, and the 1930s cleaning was such a cock-up". Nonetheless, he pointed out that the prime cause for the damage inflicted upon the marbles was the 2000 year long weathering on the Acropolis[46]
Dorothy King, in a newspaper article, claimed that techniques similar to the ones used in 1937-1938 were applied by Greeks as well in more recent decades than the British, and maintained that Italians still find them acceptable.[12] Attention has been drawn by the British Museum to a purportedly similar cleaning of the temple of Hephaistos in the Athenian Agora carried out by the conservation team of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens[47] with steel chisels and brass wire in 1953.[35] According to the Greek ministry of Culture, the cleaning was carefully limited to surface salt crusts.[46] The 1953 American report concluded that the techniques applied were aimed at removing the black deposit formed by rain-water and "brought out the high technical quality of the carving" revealing at the same time "a few surviving particles of colour".[47]
According to documents released by the British Museum under the Freedom of Information Act, a series of minor accidents, thefts and acts of vandalism by visitors have inflicted further damage to the sculptures.[48] This includes an incident in 1961 when two schoolboys knocked off a part of a centaur's leg. In June 1981, a west pediment figure was slightly chipped by a falling glass skylight, and in 1966 four shallow lines were scratched on the back of one of the figures by vandals. During a similar mishap in 1970, letters were scratched on to the upper right thigh of another figure. Four years later, the dowel hole in a centaur's hoof was damaged by thieves trying to extract pieces of lead.[48]
Athens
While the levels of nitrogen oxide, nitrogen dioxide, and particulate matter pollution in Athens are average compared to other European cites,[49] air pollution and acid rain have caused damage to marble and stonework at the Parthenon.[50] The last remaining slabs from the western section of the Parthenon frieze were removed from the monument in 1993 for fear of further damage.[51] They have now been transported to the New Acropolis Museum.[50]
Until cleaning of the remaining marbles was completed in 2005,[52] black crusts and coatings were present on the marble surface.[53] The laser technique applied on the 14 slabs that Elgin did not remove revealed a surprising array of original details such as the original chisel marks and the veins on the horses' bellies. Similar features in the British Museum collection have been scraped and scrubbed with chisels to make the marbles look white.[54] Between January 20 and the end of March 2008, 4200 items (sculptures, inscriptions small terracotta objects), including some 80 artifacts dismantled from the monuments in recent years, were removed from the old museum on the Acropolis to the new Parthenon Museum.[55][56] Natural disasters have also affected the Parthenon. In 1981, an earthquake caused damage to the east facade.[57]
Since 1975, Greece has been restoring the Acropolis. This restoration has included replacing the thousands of rusting iron clamps and supports that had previously been used, with non-corrosive titanium rods;[58] removing surviving artwork from the building into storage and subsequently into a new museum built specifically for the display of the Parthenon art; and replacing the artwork with high-quality replicas. This process has come under fire from some groups as some buildings have been completely dismantled, including the dismantling of the Temple of Athena Nike and for the unsightly nature of the site due to the necessary cranes and scaffolding.[58] But the hope is to restore the site to some of its former glory, which may take another 20 years and 70 million euros, though the prospect of the Acropolis being "able to withstand the most extreme weather conditions — earthquakes" is "little consolation to the tourists visiting the Acropolis" according to The Guardian.[58] Directors of the British Museum have not ruled out temporarily loaning the marbles to the new museum, but state that it would be under the condition of Greece acknowledging British ownership.[13]
Ownership debate
Rationale for returning to Athens
Defenders of the request for the Marble's return claim that the marbles should be returned to Athens on moral and artistic grounds. The arguments include:
• The main stated aim of the Greek campaign is to reunite the Parthenon sculptures around the world in order to restore "organic elements" which "at present remain without cohesion, homogeneity and historicity of the monument to which they belong" and allow visitors to better appreciate them as a whole;[59][60]
• Presenting all the extant Parthenon Marbles in their original historical and cultural environment would permit their "fuller understanding and interpretation";[60]
• Precedents have been set with the return of fragments of the monument by Sweden,[61] the University of Heidelberg, Germany,[62] the Getty Museum in Los Angeles.[62] and the Vatican[63];
• That the marbles may have been obtained illegally and hence should be returned to their rightful owner;[64]
• Returning the Elgin Marbles would not set a precedent for other restitution claims because of the distinctively "universal value" of the Parthenon.[65]
• Safekeeping of the marbles would be ensured at the New Acropolis Museum, situated to the south of the Acropolis hill. It was built to hold the Parthenon sculpture in natural sunlight that characterises the Athenian climate, arranged in the same way as they would have been on the Parthenon. The museum's facilities have been equipped with state-of-the-art technology for the protection and preservation of exhibits [66]
Rationale for retaining in London
A range of different arguments have been presented by scholars[13], political-leaders and British Museum spokespersons over the years in defence of retention of the Elgin Marbles within the British Museum. The main points include:
• the maintenance of a single worldwide-oriented cultural collection, all viewable in one location, thereby serving as a world heritage centre. The British Museum is a creative and living achievement of the Enlightenment, while the Parthenon, on the other hand, is a ruin that can never now be restored.[48]
• the assertion that fulfilling all restitution claims would empty most of the world's great museums – this has also caused concerns among other European and American museums, with one potential target being the famous bust of Nefertiti in Berlin's Altes Museum;[13] in addition, portions of Parthenon marbles are kept by many other European museums, so the Greeks would then establish a precedent to claim these other artworks;[12]
• scholars agree that the marbles were saved from what would have been severe damage from pollution and other factors, which could have perhaps destroyed the marbles,[12] if they had been located in Athens the past few hundred years;[13]
• experts agree that Greece could mount no court case because Elgin was granted permission by what was then Greece's ruling government and a legal principle of limitation would apply, i.e. the ability to pursue claims expires after a period of time prescribed by law;[13]
• More than half the original marbles are lost and therefore the return of the Elgin Marbles could never complete the collection in Greece. In addition, many of the marbles are too fragile to travel from London to Athens;[13]
• display in the British museum puts the sculptures in a European artistic context, alongside the work of art which both influenced and was influenced by Greek sculpture. This allows parallels to be drawn with the art of other cultures;[67]
• the notion that the Parthenon sculptures are an item of global rather than solely Greek significance strengthens the argument that they should remain in a museum which is both free to visit, and located in Europe's most visited and largest city. The government of Greece intends to charge visitors of the New Acropolis Museum, where they can view the marbles (as of 2010 the price is five Euros),
• a legal position that the museum is banned by charter from returning any part of its collection.[68]
The latter was tested in the British High Court in May 2005 in relation to Nazi-looted Old Master artworks held at the museum; it was ruled that these could not be returned.[69] The judge, Sir Andrew Morritt, ruled that the British Museum Act – which protects the collections for posterity – cannot be overridden by a "moral obligation" to return works known to have been plundered. It has been argued, however, that connections between the legal ruling and the Elgin Marbles were more tenuous than implied by the Attorney General.[70] However, despite the British Museum's charter preventing the repatriation of items within its collection, a 2005 bill concerning the repatriation of ancestral remains allowed for the return of Aboriginal human remains to Tasmania after a 20-year battle with Australia.[71]
Another argument for maintaining their location within the UK has been made by J. H. Merryman, Sweitzer Professor of Law at Stanford University and co-operating professor in the Stanford Art Department. He argued that if the Parthenon were actually being restored, there would be a moral argument for returning the Marbles to the temple whence they came, and thus restoring its integrity. The Guardian has written that many repatrionists imply that the marbles would be displayed in their original position on the Parthenon.[12] However, the Greek plan is to transfer them from a museum in London to one in Athens. The sculptures which Elgin spared have been taken down and put in the New Acropolis Museum. "Is it more spiritually satisfying to see the Marbles in an Athenian museum gallery than one in London?"[50] Other voices, this time in the House of Lords, have raised more acute concerns about the fate of the Elgin Marbles if they were to be returned to Greece. In an exchange on 19 May 1997, Lord Wyatt, stated:
My Lords, is the Minister aware that it would be dangerous to return the marbles to Athens because they were under attack by Turkish and Greek fire in the Parthenon when they were rescued and the volatile Greeks might easily start hurling bombs around again?[72]
Public perception of the issue
Neologisms
The practice of plundering artifacts from their original setting is sometimes referred to as 'elginism',[73][74][75][76] while the claim, sometimes used by looters and collectors, that they are trying to rescue the artifacts they recover has become known as the "Elgin Excuse".[77]
Opinion polls
Despite the British Museum's position on its ownership of the marbles, in 1998, a poll carried out by Ipsos MORI asking "If there were a referendum on whether or not the Elgin Marbles should be returned to Greece, how would you vote?" returned these values from the general adult population:[78]
• 40% in favour of returning the marbles to Greece
• 15% in favour of keeping them at the British Museum
• 18% would not vote
• 27% had no opinion
A more recent opinion poll in 2002 (again carried out by MORI) showed similar results, with 40% in favour of returning the marbles to Greece, 16% in favour of keeping them within Britain and the remainder either having no opinion or would not vote.[79] When asked how they would vote if a number of conditions were met (including, but not limited to, a long-term loan where by the British maintained ownership and joint control over maintenance) the number responding in favour of return increased to 56% and those in favour of keeping them dropped to 7%.
Both MORI poll results have been characterised by proponents of the return of the Marbles to Greece as representing a groundswell of public opinion supporting return, since the proportion explicitly supporting return to Greece significantly exceeds the number who are explicitly in favour of keeping the Marbles at the British Museum.[78][80]
Popular support for restitution
An internet campaign site [81], in part sponsored by Metaxa aims to consolidate support for the return of the Elgin Marbles to the New Acropolis Museum in Athens.
Other displaced Parthenon art
The remainder of the surviving sculptures that are not in museums or storerooms in Athens are held in museums in various locations across Europe. The British Museum also holds additional fragments from the Parthenon sculptures acquired from various collections that have no connection with Lord Elgin.
The collection held in the British Museum includes the following material from the Acropolis:
• Parthenon: 247 ft (75 m) of the original 524 ft (160 m) of frieze
•• 15 of the 92 metopes
•• 17 pedimental figures; various pieces of architecture
• Erechtheion: a Caryatid, a column and other architectural members
• Propylaia: Architectural members
• Temple of Athena Nike: 4 slabs of the frieze and architectural members
Further reading
• Mary Beard, The Parthenon (Profile Books, 2004) ISBN 978-1-86197-301-6
• Marc Fehlmann, "Casts and Connoisseurs. The Early Reception of the Elgin Marbles" (Apollo, June 2007, pp. 44–51)[82]
• Jeanette Greenfield 'The Return of Cultural Treasures'(Cambridge University Press 2007)
• Christopher Hitchens, Imperial Spoils: The Curious Case of the Elgin Marbles (with essays by Robert Browning and Graham Binns) (Verso, March 1998)
• Ian Jenkins, The Parthenon Frieze (British Museum Press, 2002)
• Dorothy King, The Elgin Marbles (Hutchinson, January 2006)
• François Queyrel, Le Parthénon, Un monument dans l'Histoire (Bartillat, 2008) ISBN 978-2-84100-435-5.
• William St Clair, Lord Elgin and the Marbles (Oxford University Press, 1998)
See also
• Greece – United Kingdom relations
References
• ^ "What are the 'Elgin Marbles'?". britishmuseum.org. http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/article_index/w/what_are_the_elgin_marbles.aspx. Retrieved 2009-05-12.
• ^ "Elgin Marbles — Greek sculpture". Encyclopædia Britannica. http://www.britannica.com/eb/topic-184554/Elgin-Marbles. Retrieved 2009-05-12.
• ^ www.athensguide.com/elginmarbles. http://www.athensguide.com/elginmarbles.
• ^ a b Encycolopedia Britannica, Elgin Marbles, 2008, O.Ed.
• ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Casey, Christopher (October 30, 2008). ""Grecian Grandeurs and the Rude Wasting of Old Time": Britain, the Elgin Marbles, and Post-Revolutionary Hellenism". Foundations. Volume III, Number 1. http://ww2.jhu.edu/foundations/?p=8. Retrieved 2009-06-25.
• ^ a b c Encyclopedia Britannica, The Acropolis, p.6/20, 2008, O.Ed.
• ^ Linda Theodorou; Facaros, Dana (2003). Greece (Cadogan Country Guides). Cadogan Guides. p. 55. ISBN 1-86011-898-4.
• ^ Dyson, Stephen L. (2004). Eugenie Sellers Strong: portrait of an archaeologist. London: Duckworth. ISBN 0-7156-3219-1.
• ^ Mark Ellingham, Tim Salmon, Marc Dubin, Natania Jansz, John Fisher, Greece: The Rough Guide,Rough Guides, 1992,ISBN 1-85828-020-6, p.39
• ^ Chester Charlton McCown, The Ladder of Progress in Palestine: A Story of Archaeologic
• This is a scan of this Banksy photo running in the Boston Globe on May 13, 2010. This is the first time I've made the newspaper with one of my photos :-) (The Globe later ran a longer article, titled Tag — we’re it: Banksy, the controversial and elusive street artist, left his mark here. Or did he? with a photo taken by one of their staff photographers, Essdras M. Suarez.)
• • • • •
Interestingly, both of the Boston area Banksy pieces are on Essex St:
• F̶O̶L̶L̶O̶W̶ ̶Y̶O̶U̶R̶ ̶D̶R̶E̶A̶M̶S̶ CANCELLED (aka chimney sweep) in Chinatown, Boston
• NO LOITRIN in Central Square, Cambridge.
Does that mean anything? It looks like he favors Essex named streets & roads when he can. In 2008, he did another notable Essex work in London, for example, and posters on the Banksy Forums picked up & discussed on the Essex link as well.
Is there an Essex Street in any of the other nearby towns? It looks like there are several: Brookline, Charlestown, Chelsea, Gloucester, Haverhill, Lawrence, Lynn, Medford, Melrose, Quincy, Revere, Salem, Saugus, Somerville, Swampscott, and Waltham. Most of these seem improbable to me, other than maybe Brookline, or maybe Somerville or Charlestown. But they start getting pretty suburban after that.
But, again, why "Essex"? In a comment on this photo, Birbeck helps clarify:
I can only surmise that he's having a 'dig' at Essex UK, especially with the misspelling of 'Loitering'. Here, the general view of the urban districts in Essex: working class but with right wing views; that they're not the most intellectual bunch; rather obsessed with fashion (well, their idea of it); their place of worship is the shopping mall; enjoy rowdy nights out; girls are thought of as being dumb, fake blonde hair/tans and promiscuous; and guys are good at the 'chit chat', and swagger around showing off their dosh (money).
It was also the region that once had Europe's largest Ford motor factory. In its heyday, 1 in 3 British cars were made in Dagenham, Essex. Pay was good for such unskilled labour, generations worked mind-numbing routines on assembly lines for 80 years. In 2002 the recession ended the dream.
• • • • •
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Banksy
• Birth name
Unknown
• Born
1974 or 1975 (1974 or 1975), Bristol, UK[1]
• Nationality
• Field
• Movement
Anti-Totalitarianism
Anti-War
• Works
Naked Man Image
One Nation Under CCTV
Anarchist Rat
Ozone's Angel
Pulp Fiction
Banksy is a pseudonymous[2][3][4] British graffiti artist. He is believed to be a native of Yate, South Gloucestershire, near Bristol[2] and to have been born in 1974,[5] but his identity is unknown.[6] According to Tristan Manco[who?], Banksy "was born in 1974 and raised in Bristol, England. The son of a photocopier technician, he trained as a butcher but became involved in graffiti during the great Bristol aerosol boom of the late 1980s."[7] His artworks are often satirical pieces of art on topics such as politics, culture, and ethics. His street art, which combines graffiti writing with a distinctive stencilling technique, is similar to Blek le Rat, who began to work with stencils in 1981 in Paris and members of the anarcho-punk band Crass who maintained a graffiti stencil campaign on the London Tube System in the late 1970s and early 1980s. His art has appeared in cities around the world.[8] Banksy's work was born out of the Bristol underground scene which involved collaborations between artists and musicians.
Banksy does not sell photos of street graffiti.[9] Art auctioneers have been known to attempt to sell his street art on location and leave the problem of its removal in the hands of the winning bidder.[10]
Banksy's first film, Exit Through The Gift Shop, billed as "the world's first street art disaster movie", made its debut at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival.[11] The film was released in the UK on March 5.[12]
Contents
• 1 Career
•• 1.1 2000
•• 1.2 2002
•• 1.3 2003
•• 1.4 2004
•• 1.5 2005
•• 1.6 2006
•• 1.7 2007
•• 1.8 2008
•• 1.9 2009
•• 1.10 2010
Career
Banksy started as a freehand graffiti artist 1992–1994[14] as one of Bristol's DryBreadZ Crew (DBZ), with Kato and Tes.[15] He was inspired by local artists and his work was part of the larger Bristol underground scene. From the start he used stencils as elements of his freehand pieces, too.[14] By 2000 he had turned to the art of stencilling after realising how much less time it took to complete a piece. He claims he changed to stencilling whilst he was hiding from the police under a train carriage, when he noticed the stencilled serial number[16] and by employing this technique, he soon became more widely noticed for his art around Bristol and London.[16]
Stencil on the waterline of The Thekla, an entertainment boat in central Bristol - (wider view). The image of Death is based on a 19th century etching illustrating the pestilence of The Great Stink.[17]
Banksy's stencils feature striking and humorous images occasionally combined with slogans. The message is usually anti-war, anti-capitalist or anti-establishment. Subjects often include rats, monkeys, policemen, soldiers, children, and the elderly.
In late 2001, on a trip to Sydney and Melbourne, Australia, he met up with the Gen-X pastellist, visual activist, and recluse James DeWeaver in Byron Bay[clarification needed], where he stencilled a parachuting rat with a clothes peg on its nose above a toilet at the Arts Factory Lodge. This stencil can no longer be located. He also makes stickers (the Neighbourhood Watch subvert) and sculpture (the murdered phone-box), and was responsible for the cover art of Blur's 2003 album Think Tank.
2000
The album cover for Monk & Canatella's Do Community Service was conceived and illustrated by Banksy, based on his contribution to the "Walls on fire" event in Bristol 1998.[18][citation needed]
2002
On 19 July 2002, Banksy's first Los Angeles exhibition debuted at 33 1/3 Gallery, a small Silverlake venue owned by Frank Sosa. The exhibition, entitled Existencilism, was curated by 33 1/3 Gallery, Malathion, Funk Lazy Promotions, and B+.[19]
2003
In 2003 in an exhibition called Turf War, held in a warehouse, Banksy painted on animals. Although the RSPCA declared the conditions suitable, an animal rights activist chained herself to the railings in protest.[20] He later moved on to producing subverted paintings; one example is Monet's Water Lily Pond, adapted to include urban detritus such as litter and a shopping trolley floating in its reflective waters; another is Edward Hopper's Nighthawks, redrawn to show that the characters are looking at a British football hooligan, dressed only in his Union Flag underpants, who has just thrown an object through the glass window of the cafe. These oil paintings were shown at a twelve-day exhibition in Westbourne Grove, London in 2005.[21]
2004
In August 2004, Banksy produced a quantity of spoof British £10 notes substituting the picture of the Queen's head with Princess Diana's head and changing the text "Bank of England" to "Banksy of England." Someone threw a large wad of these into a crowd at Notting Hill Carnival that year, which some recipients then tried to spend in local shops. These notes were also given with invitations to a Santa's Ghetto exhibition by Pictures on Walls. The individual notes have since been selling on eBay for about £200 each. A wad of the notes were also thrown over a fence and into the crowd near the NME signing tent at The Reading Festival. A limited run of 50 signed posters containing ten uncut notes were also produced and sold by Pictures on Walls for £100 each to commemorate the death of Princess Diana. One of these sold in October 2007 at Bonhams auction house in London for £24,000.
2005
In August 2005, Banksy, on a trip to the Palestinian territories, created nine images on Israel's highly controversial West Bank barrier. He reportedly said "The Israeli government is building a wall surrounding the occupied Palestinian territories. It stands three times the height of the Berlin Wall and will eventually run for over 700km—the distance from London to Zurich. "[22]
2006
• Banksy held an exhibition called Barely Legal, billed as a "three day vandalised warehouse extravaganza" in Los Angeles, on the weekend of 16 September. The exhibition featured a live "elephant in a room", painted in a pink and gold floral wallpaper pattern.[23]
• After Christina Aguilera bought an original of Queen Victoria as a lesbian and two prints for £25,000,[24] on 19 October 2006 a set of Kate Moss paintings sold in Sotheby's London for £50,400, setting an auction record for Banksy's work. The six silk-screen prints, featuring the model painted in the style of Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe pictures, sold for five times their estimated value. His stencil of a green Mona Lisa with real paint dripping from her eyes sold for £57,600 at the same auction.[25]
• In December, journalist Max Foster coined the phrase, "the Banksy Effect", to illustrate how interest in other street artists was growing on the back of Banksy's success.[26]
2007
• On 21 February 2007, Sotheby's auction house in London auctioned three works, reaching the highest ever price for a Banksy work at auction: over £102,000 for his Bombing Middle England. Two of his other graffiti works, Balloon Girl and Bomb Hugger, sold for £37,200 and £31,200 respectively, which were well above their estimated prices.[27] The following day's auction saw a further three Banksy works reach soaring prices: Ballerina With Action Man Parts reached £96,000; Glory sold for £72,000; Untitled (2004) sold for £33,600; all significantly above estimated values.[28] To coincide with the second day of auctions, Banksy updated his website with a new image of an auction house scene showing people bidding on a picture that said, "I Can't Believe You Morons Actually Buy This Shit."[6]
• In February 2007, the owners of a house with a Banksy mural on the side in Bristol decided to sell the house through Red Propeller art gallery after offers fell through because the prospective buyers wanted to remove the mural. It is listed as a mural which comes with a house attached.[29]
• In April 2007, Transport for London painted over Banksy's iconic image of a scene from Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction, with Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta clutching bananas instead of guns. Although the image was very popular, Transport for London claimed that the "graffiti" created "a general atmosphere of neglect and social decay which in turn encourages crime" and their staff are "professional cleaners not professional art critics".[30] Banksy tagged the same site again (pictured at right). This time the actors were portrayed as holding real guns instead of bananas, but they were adorned with banana costumes. Banksy made a tribute art piece over this second Pulp Fiction piece. The tribute was for 19-year-old British graffiti artist Ozone, who was hit by an underground train in Barking, East London, along with fellow artist Wants, on 12 January 2007.[31] The piece was of an angel wearing a bullet-proof vest, holding a skull. He also wrote a note on his website, saying:
The last time I hit this spot I painted a crap picture of two men in banana costumes waving hand guns. A few weeks later a writer called Ozone completely dogged it and then wrote 'If it's better next time I'll leave it' in the bottom corner. When we lost Ozone we lost a fearless graffiti writer and as it turns out a pretty perceptive art critic. Ozone - rest in peace.[citation needed]
Ozone's Angel
• On 27 April 2007, a new record high for the sale of Banksy's work was set with the auction of the work Space Girl & Bird fetching £288,000 (US$576,000), around 20 times the estimate at Bonhams of London.[32]
• On 21 May 2007 Banksy gained the award for Art's Greatest living Briton. Banksy, as expected, did not turn up to collect his award, and continued with his notoriously anonymous status.
• On 4 June 2007, it was reported that Banksy's The Drinker had been stolen.[33][34]
• In October 2007, most of his works offered for sale at Bonhams auction house in London sold for more than twice their reserve price.[35]
• Banksy has published a "manifesto" on his website.[36] The text of the manifesto is credited as the diary entry of one Lieutenant Colonel Mervin Willett Gonin, DSO, which is exhibited in the Imperial War Museum. It describes how a shipment of lipstick to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp immediately after its liberation at the end of World War II helped the internees regain their humanity. However, as of 18 January 2008, Banksy's Manifesto has been substituted with Graffiti Heroes #03 that describes Peter Chappell's graffiti quest of the 1970s that worked to free George Davis of his imprisonment.[37] By 12 August 2009 he was relying on Emo Phillips' "When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realised God doesn’t work that way, so I stole one and prayed for forgiveness."
• A small number of Banksy's works can be seen in the movie Children of Men, including a stenciled image of two policemen kissing and another stencil of a child looking down a shop.
• In the 2007 film Shoot 'Em Up starring Clive Owen, Banksy's tag can be seen on a dumpster in the film's credits.
• Banksy, who deals mostly with Lazarides Gallery in London, claims that the exhibition at Vanina Holasek Gallery in New York (his first major exhibition in that city) is unauthorised. The exhibition featured 62 of his paintings and prints.[38]
2008
• In March, a stencilled graffiti work appeared on Thames Water tower in the middle of the Holland Park roundabout, and it was widely attributed to Banksy. It was of a child painting the tag "Take this Society" in bright orange. London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham spokesman, Councillor Greg Smith branded the art as vandalism, and ordered its immediate removal, which was carried out by H&F council workmen within three days.[39]
• Over the weekend 3–5 May in London, Banksy hosted an exhibition called The Cans Festival. It was situated on Leake Street, a road tunnel formerly used by Eurostar underneath London Waterloo station. Graffiti artists with stencils were invited to join in and paint their own artwork, as long as it didn't cover anyone else's.[40] Artists included Blek le Rat, Broken Crow, C215, Cartrain, Dolk, Dotmasters, J.Glover, Eine, Eelus, Hero, Pure evil, Jef Aérosol, Mr Brainwash, Tom Civil and Roadsworth.[citation needed]
• In late August 2008, marking the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and the associated levee failure disaster, Banksy produced a series of works in New Orleans, Louisiana, mostly on buildings derelict since the disaster.[41]
• A stencil painting attributed to Banksy appeared at a vacant petrol station in the Ensley neighbourhood of Birmingham, Alabama on 29 August as Hurricane Gustav approached the New Orleans area. The painting depicting a hooded member of the Ku Klux Klan hanging from a noose was quickly covered with black spray paint and later removed altogether.[42]
• His first official exhibition in New York, the "Village Pet Store And Charcoal Grill," opened 5 October 2008. The animatronic pets in the store window include a mother hen watching over her baby Chicken McNuggets as they peck at a barbecue sauce packet, and a rabbit putting makeup on in a mirror.[43]
• The Westminster City Council stated in October 2008 that the work "One Nation Under CCTV", painted in April 2008 will be painted over as it is graffiti. The council says it will remove any graffiti, regardless of the reputation of its creator, and specifically stated that Banksy "has no more right to paint graffiti than a child". Robert Davis, the chairman of the council planning committee told The Times newspaper: "If we condone this then we might as well say that any kid with a spray can is producing art". [44] The work was painted over in April 2009.
• In December 2008, The Little Diver, a Banksy image of a diver in a duffle coat in Melbourne Australia was vandalised. The image was protected by a sheet of clear perspex, however silver paint was poured behind the protective sheet and later tagged with the words "Banksy woz ere". The image was almost completely destroyed.[45].
2009
• May 2009, parts company with agent Steve Lazarides. Announces Pest Control [46] the handling service who act on his behalf will be the only point of sale for new works.
• On 13 June 2009, the Banksy UK Summer show opened at Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery, featuring more than 100 works of art, including animatronics and installations; it is his largest exhibition yet, featuring 78 new works.[47][48] Reaction to the show was positive, with over 8,500 visitors to the show on the first weekend.[49] Over the course of the twelve weeks, the exhibition has been visited over 300,000 times.[50]
• In September 2009, a Banksy work parodying the Royal Family was partially destroyed by Hackney Council after they served an enforcement notice for graffiti removal to the former address of the property owner. The mural had been commissioned for the 2003 Blur single "Crazy Beat" and the property owner, who had allowed the piece to be painted, was reported to have been in tears when she saw it was being painted over.[51]
• In December 2009, Banksy marked the end of the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference by painting four murals on global warming. One included "I don't believe in global warming" which was submerged in water.[52]
2010
• The world premiere of the film Exit Through the Gift Shop occurred at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, on 24 January. He created 10 street pieces around Park City and Salt Lake City to tie in with the screening.[53]
• In February, The Whitehouse public house in Liverpool, England, is sold for £114,000 at auction.[54] The side of the building has an image of a giant rat by Banksy.[55]
• In April 2010, Melbourne City Council in Australia reported that they had inadvertently ordered private contractors to paint over the last remaining Banksy art in the city. The image was of a rat descending in a parachute adorning the wall of an old council building behind the Forum Theatre. In 2008 Vandals had poured paint over a stencil of an old-fashioned diver wearing a trenchcoat. A council spokeswoman has said they would now rush through retrospective permits to protect other “famous or significant artworks” in the city.[56]
• In April 2010 to coincide with the premier of Exit through the Gift Shop in San Francisco, 5 of his pieces appeared in various parts of the city.[57] Banksy reportedly paid a Chinatown building owner $50 for the use of their wall for one of his stencils.[58]
• In May 2010 to coincide with the release of "Exit Through the Gift Shop" in Chicago, one piece appeared in the city.
Notable art pieces
In addition to his artwork, Banksy has claimed responsibility for a number of high profile art pieces, including the following:
• At London Zoo, he climbed into the penguin enclosure and painted "We're bored of fish" in seven foot high letters.[59]
• At Bristol Zoo, he left the message 'I want out. This place is too cold. Keeper smells. Boring, boring, boring.' in the elephant enclosure.[60]
• In March 2005, he placed subverted artworks in the Museum of Modern Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum, and the American Museum of Natural History in New York.[61]
• He put up a subverted painting in London's Tate Britain gallery.
• In May 2005 Banksy's version of a primitive cave painting depicting a human figure hunting wildlife whilst pushing a shopping trolley was hung in gallery 49 of the British Museum, London. Upon discovery, they added it to their permanent collection.[62]
Near Bethlehem - 2005
• Banksy has sprayed "This is not a photo opportunity" on certain photograph spots.
• In August 2005, Banksy painted nine images on the Israeli West Bank barrier, including an image of a ladder going up and over the wall and an image of children digging a hole through the wall.[22][63][64][65]
See also: Other Banksy works on the Israeli West Bank barrier
• In April 2006, Banksy created a sculpture based on a crumpled red phone box with a pickaxe in its side, apparently bleeding, and placed it in a street in Soho, London. It was later removed by Westminster Council. BT released a press release, which said: "This is a stunning visual comment on BT's transformation from an old-fashioned telecommunications company into a modern communications services provider."[66]
• In June 2006, Banksy created an image of a naked man hanging out of a bedroom window on a wall visible from Park Street in central Bristol. The image sparked some controversy, with the Bristol City Council leaving it up to the public to decide whether it should stay or go.[67] After an internet discussion in which 97% (all but 6 people) supported the stencil, the city council decided it would be left on the building.[67] The mural was later defaced with paint.[67]
• In August/September 2006, Banksy replaced up to 500 copies of Paris Hilton's debut CD, Paris, in 48 different UK record stores with his own cover art and remixes by Danger Mouse. Music tracks were given titles such as "Why am I Famous?", "What Have I Done?" and "What Am I For?". Several copies of the CD were purchased by the public before stores were able to remove them, some going on to be sold for as much as £750 on online auction websites such as eBay. The cover art depicted Paris Hilton digitally altered to appear topless. Other pictures feature her with a dog's head replacing her own, and one of her stepping out of a luxury car, edited to include a group of homeless people, which included the caption "90% of success is just showing up".[68][69][70]
• In September 2006, Banksy dressed an inflatable doll in the manner of a Guantanamo Bay detainment camp prisoner (orange jumpsuit, black hood, and handcuffs) and then placed the figure within the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad ride at the Disneyland theme park in Anaheim, California.[71][72]
Technique
Asked about his technique, Banksy said:
“I use whatever it takes. Sometimes that just means drawing a moustache on a girl's face on some billboard, sometimes that means sweating for days over an intricate drawing. Efficiency is the key.[73]”
Stencils are traditionally hand drawn or printed onto sheets of acetate or card, before being cut out by hand. Because of the secretive nature of Banksy's work and identity, it is uncertain what techniques he uses to generate the images in his stencils, though it is assumed he uses computers for some images due to the photocopy nature of much of his work.
He mentions in his book, Wall and Piece, that as he was starting to do graffiti, he was always too slow and was either caught or could never finish the art in the one sitting. So he devised a series of intricate stencils to minimise time and overlapping of the colour.
Identity
Banksy's real name has been widely reported to be Robert or Robin Banks.[74][75][76] His year of birth has been given as 1974.[62]
Simon Hattenstone from Guardian Unlimited is one of the very few people to have interviewed him face-to-face. Hattenstone describes him as "a cross of Jimmy Nail and British rapper Mike Skinner" and "a 28 year old male who showed up wearing jeans and a t-shirt with a silver tooth, silver chain, and one silver earring".[77] In the same interview, Banksy revealed that his parents think their son is a painter and decorator.[77]
In May 2007, an extensive article written by Lauren Collins of the New Yorker re-opened the Banksy-identity controversy citing a 2004 photograph of the artist that was taken in Jamaica during the Two-Culture Clash project and later published in the Evening Standard in 2004.[6]
In October 2007, a story on the BBC website featured a photo allegedly taken by a passer-by in Bethnal Green, London, purporting to show Banksy at work with an assistant, scaffolding and a truck. The story confirms that Tower Hamlets Council in London has decided to treat all Banksy works as vandalism and remove them.[78]
In July 2008, it was claimed by The Mail on Sunday that Banksy's real name is Robin Gunningham.[3][79] His agent has refused to confirm or deny these reports.
In May 2009, the Mail on Sunday once again speculated about Gunningham being Banksy after a "self-portrait" of a rat holding a sign with the word "Gunningham" shot on it was photographed in East London.[80] This "new Banksy rat" story was also picked up by The Times[81] and the Evening Standard.
Banksy, himself, states on his website:
“I am unable to comment on who may or may not be Banksy, but anyone described as being 'good at drawing' doesn't sound like Banksy to me.[82]”
Controversy
In 2004, Banksy walked into the Louvre in Paris and hung on a wall a picture he had painted resembling the Mona Lisa but with a yellow smiley face. Though the painting was hurriedly removed by the museum staff, it and its counterpart, temporarily on unknown display at the Tate Britain, were described by Banksy as "shortcuts". He is quoted as saying:
“To actually [have to] go through the process of having a painting selected must be quite boring. It's a lot more fun to go and put your own one up.[83]”
Peter Gibson, a spokesperson for Keep Britain Tidy, asserts that Banksy's work is simple vandalism,[84] and Diane Shakespeare, an official for the same organization, was quoted as saying: "We are concerned that Banksy's street art glorifies what is essentially vandalism".[6]
In June 2007 Banksy created a circle of plastic portable toilets, said to resemble Stonehenge at the Glastonbury Festival. As this was in the same field as the "sacred circle" it was felt by many to be inappropriate and his installation was itself vandalized before the festival even opened. However, the intention had always been for people to climb on and interact with it.[citation needed] The installation was nicknamed "Portaloo Sunset" and "Bog Henge" by Festival goers. Michael Eavis admitted he wasn't fond of it, and the portaloos were removed before the 2008 festival.
In 2010, an artistic feud developed between Banksy and his rival King Robbo after Banksy painted over a 24-year old Robbo piece on the banks of London's Regent Canal. In retaliation several Banksy pieces in London have been painted over by 'Team Robbo'.[85][86]
Also in 2010, government workers accidentally painted over a Banksy art piece, a famed "parachuting-rat" stencil, in Australia's Melbourne CBD. [87]
Bibliography
Banksy has self-published several books that contain photographs of his work in various countries as well as some of his canvas work and exhibitions, accompanied by his own writings:
• Banksy, Banging Your Head Against A Brick Wall (2001) ISBN 978-0-95417040-0
• Banksy, Existencilism (2002) ISBN 978-0-95417041-7
• Banksy, Cut it Out (2004) ISBN 978-0-95449600-5
• Banksy, Wall and Piece (2005) ISBN 978-1-84413786-2
• Banksy, Pictures of Walls (2005) ISBN 978-0-95519460-3
Random House published Wall and Piece in 2005. It contains a combination of images from his three previous books, as well as some new material.[16]
Two books authored by others on his work were published in 2006 & 2007:
• Martin Bull, Banksy Locations and Tours: A Collection of Graffiti Locations and Photographs in London (2006 - with new editions in 2007 and 2008) ISBN 978-0-95547120-9.
• Steve Wright, Banksy's Bristol: Home Sweet Home (2007) ISBN 978-1906477004
External links
Fittingly, the license plate said "MEOW".
See this picture for a little more of the back, plus some annotations.
I'm not sure which Saab model it is: maybe a 90s vintage 900 or 9000, or maybe a 2000-ish 9-3 (first generation) or 9-5.
In any case, the real answer is that this car is truly one of a kind now.
* * * * *
UPDATE 12 Jan 2010: Spotted again! I saw the car while driving through Harvard Square this morning, and was able to stop & get a few more photos of this magnificent, magnificent beast of a car -- and with the better camera, too. Enjoy!
* * * * *
UPDATE 30 Mar 2010: The hunt is on! Teresa Hanafin at Boston.com's RAW Blog today ran Who drives this funny car?, in which a Globe reader from Andover is asking for info about the owner of the car, noting that it has been several times in Boston's northwest suburbs (Burlington, Arlington, Andover, Cambridge, etc). According to some commenters, the owner may live (or work?) in Belmont, as it seems like it's seen there pretty often.
I don't want to infringe on the driver's privacy too much, unless she wants to "out" herself as the owner of this fine machine, so I'll simply add the handful of clues that I have:
• Both times I've seen the car, a woman was driving it.
• When I saw it in Harvard Square in January, she was wearing a Dr Seuss hat.
• When I saw it near the Museum of Science in July 2008, there was a couple of kids in the back seat, one with curly (red?) hair.
• She's way ahead of you on the "EYESORE" jokes :-)
* * * * *
UPDATE 31 Mar 2010: The Boston.com blog post ferreted out the info within hours:
Jenny wrote to let us know that a correspondent for one of the Globe's regional editions wrote about the car, identifying the owner, about a year and a half ago.
See more photos of this, and the Wikipedia article.
Details, quoting from Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | U.S.S. Enterprise Model, Star Trek:
This model of the fictional startship Enterprise was used in the weekly hour-long "Star Trek" TV show (NBC-TV), which aired from September 1966 until June 1969. Despite its short initial run (only three seasons), Star Trek became one of the most popular shows in the history of television. The show's depiction of a mixed-sex, racially-integrated, multinational crew and its attention to contemporary social and political issues pushed the boundaries of network television, earning Star Trek a dedicated fan base that lobbied for the franchise's continuation.
The Enterprise was meant to travel many times beyond light speed, powered by a controlled matter/anti-matter system, a propulsion concept "stretched" from a then-accepted theory. The fictional ship grossed 190,000 tons, and measured 947 feet long and 417 feet in diameter. The saucer-shaped hull included 11 decks, and had a crew complement of 430.
The model's principal designer, Walter "Matt" Jefferies, worked with concepts provided by Star Trek's creator Gene Roddenberry. At first, Paramount Studios constructed a rough 4-inch balsa and cardboard prototype. A 3-foot "pilot" model mostly of solid wood was then built by model-maker Richard C. Datin under subcontract to the Howard Anderson Company. Enlarging the plans for the 3-foot model resulted in the final 11-foot model shown here. The Anderson Company again turned to Datin who contracted it out to Production Model Shop of Burbank, California, with Datin supervising the construction while he did the detail work.
Paramount donated the model to the National Collection in 1974.
Manufacturer:
Country of Origin:
United States of America
Dimensions:
Overall: 2ft 8in. x 11ft x 5ft, 200lb. (81.28 x 335.28 x 152.4cm, 90.7kg)
Other (engines): 6ft 1/4in. (183.52cm)
Other (central pod): 4ft 5 5/16in. (135.38cm)
Materials:
Primarily constructed of poplar wood, vacu-formed plastic, rolled sheet metal tubes for both the engine pods from the back of the struts to the start of the nacelle caps, and plastic for the main sensor dish and detailing (light covers, etc.). The front and rear of the engine pods or nacelles are of wood. The nacelle grill plates brass. Rolled steel wires were also inserted through its original pipe support for lights.
Gift of Paramount Pictures Inc.
This was the camera that I learned photography on. All manual. You set the exposure by spinning dials and watching the light meter, the way god intended. None of this "sports mode" or "flowers mode" or "landscapes mode" crap.
These cameras belonged to my parents before I was born, when my dad was stationed in the army in Germany. There, they bought the Nikkormat (all manual) and the slightly newer Nikomat (auto-shutter, manual aperture). By the time I was given the cameras to learn on in the late 90s, they were around 35 years old.
Drawing, seen at the Brooklyn Art Project headquarter in Dumbo, during the Art Under the Bridge Festival organized by Dumbo Arts Center in New York city, 2009.
James Cospito (Brooklyn Art Project / Facebook / Flickr / LinkedIn / SML Flickr / Twitter) is an artist, painter, photographer, illustrator, designer in New York City. He is also the co-founder of Brooklyn Art Project.
You can check out James Cospito's portfolio at brooklynartproject.ning.com/profile/jcospito
See also the 720p high-def video of James Cospito talking about BAP on Flickr.
Brooklyn Art Project (FriendFeed / Twitter) is a free online social network that connects 5500+ artists, collectors, and art enthusiasts from over 44 countries featuring over 44,000 artworks and 800+ short films and videos.
Members can participate in collaborative exhibits in Brooklyn and beyond while enjoying unlimited online gallery space, blogs, forums, chat, and tools to share / promote their artwork across the web.
See also
+ Artits on Art: James Cospito talks about his NYC Subway series (Flickr HD video)
+ Art + Artists: James Cospito talks about Brooklyn Art Project (Flickr HD video)
13th annual D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® (Sept 25 to Sept 27, 2009)
www.dumboartfestival.org/press_release.html
The three-day multi-site neighborhood-wide event is a one-of-a-kind art happening: where serendipity meets the haphazard and where the unpredictable, spontaneous and downright weird thrive. The now teenage D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® presents touchable, accessible, and interactive art, on a scale that makes it the nation's largest urban forum for experimental art.
Art Under the Bridge is an opportunity for young artists to use any medium imaginable to create temporary projects on-the-spot everywhere and anywhere, completely transforming the Dumbo section of Brooklyn, New York, into a vibrant platform for self-expression. In addition to the 80+ projects throughout the historical post-industrial waterfront span, visitors can tour local artists' studios or check out the indoor video_dumbo, a non-stop program of cutting-edge video art from New York City and around the world.
The Dumbo Arts Center (DAC) has been the exclusive producer of the D.U.M.B.O Art Under the Bridge Festival® since 1997. DAC is a big impact, small non-profit, that in addition to its year-round gallery exhibitions, is committed to preserving Dumbo as a site in New York City where emerging visual artists can experiment in the public domain, while having unprecedented freedom and access to normally off-limit locations.
Related SML
+ SML Flickr Collections: Events
+ SML Flickr Sets: Dumbo Arts Center: Art Under the Bridge Festival 2009
This is the facade of the Water Cube (水立方) looking from the inside to the outside. The outer wall is based on the Weaire–Phelan structure, a structure devised from the natural pattern of bubbles in soap lather. Each bubble has its own unique shape—no single shape is alike. Ground was broken on December 24, 2003, and the Center was completed and handed over for use on January 28, 2008.
The total construction cost was ￥940 million yuan / $ 140 million USD / € 94 million EUR. Architects responsible for the work include PTW Architects, CSCEC, CCDI, and Arup.
Photographed with the Canon EOS 6D + Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM.
# More Information
+ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beijing_National_Aquatics_Center
水立方北京國家游泳中心 The Water Cube, Beijing National Aquatics Center / 中國北京體育建築之形 Sports architecture forms in Beijing, China / SML.20140502.6D.31821.P1.BW
Mixed media paintings by Dean Russo (Facebook). Photographed inside the artist's studio during Dumbo Art Festival in 2009.
Dean Russo on the Web
13th annual D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® (Sept 25 to Sept 27, 2009)
www.dumboartfestival.org/press_release.html
The three-day multi-site neighborhood-wide event is a one-of-a-kind art happening: where serendipity meets the haphazard and where the unpredictable, spontaneous and downright weird thrive. The now teenage D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® presents touchable, accessible, and interactive art, on a scale that makes it the nation's largest urban forum for experimental art.
Art Under the Bridge is an opportunity for young artists to use any medium imaginable to create temporary projects on-the-spot everywhere and anywhere, completely transforming the Dumbo section of Brooklyn, New York, into a vibrant platform for self-expression. In addition to the 80+ projects throughout the historical post-industrial waterfront span, visitors can tour local artists' studios or check out the indoor video_dumbo, a non-stop program of cutting-edge video art from New York City and around the world.
The Dumbo Arts Center (DAC) has been the exclusive producer of the D.U.M.B.O Art Under the Bridge Festival® since 1997. DAC is a big impact, small non-profit, that in addition to its year-round gallery exhibitions, is committed to preserving Dumbo as a site in New York City where emerging visual artists can experiment in the public domain, while having unprecedented freedom and access to normally off-limit locations.
Related SML
+ SML Flickr Collections: Events
+ SML Flickr Sets: Dumbo Arts Center: Art Under the Bridge Festival 2009
Thank you for Your Visit, Have a Nice Day is a performance piece by Agata Olek (Facebook / Flickr / Portfolio) created for Art in Odd Places:SIGN, an annual festival exploring the odd, ordinary and ingenious in the spectacle of daily life.
Curated by Erin Donnelly and Radhika Subramaniam
Director of AIOP: Ed Woodham
Artist Statement
"Inspired by a uniformed attendant holding the sign Hold the Handrail in a Taipei metro station, I've created this moving installation/performance piece. In wearable sculptures of multicolored crocheted camouflage, my performers appear in various sites on 14th Street, displaying photographs of signs I've collected from different countries that are in emphatic, ironic or amused dialogue with their location."
See also video by Technology Artist filmed on the same day at www.youtube.com/watch?v=KfjXrKQVwPU
More information about the festival
Press
+ Timeout New York: Fall Preview 2009
+ Timeout New York: Own this City
Related SML Univese
+ SML Fine Art (Flickr Group) (FriendFeed / Twitter)
The Innovation Tower [1] designed by Pritzker-prize-winning architect Zaha Hadid [2] for Hong Kong Polytechnic University’s School of Design is one of those amazing architectures which I have been following since its inception—and am so glad to see it being built.
Zaha Hadid is one of my all time favorite architects, and this building will be her first permanent architectural works in Hong Kong—but hopefully not the last. As many people in the architecture world know, what is seen on paper rarely get built, so it was truly amazing to see this in person yesterday when I went to do location scouting at the PolyU yesterday.
The bamboo scaffolding has just started to be taken apart. For those who are unfamiliar with Chinese traditional structural engineering, almost all buildings in Hong Kong were built in this manner [3]. Not only are bamboo scaffolding uses nylon straps to tie knots as couplers. They are structurally strong yet light enough to carry around, thus speeding up the process to build skyscrapers both efficiently and safely.
# Notes
1. Innovation Tower: Wikipedia: EN: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innovation_Tower
2. Zaha Hadid Architects: Innovation Tower: www.zaha-hadid.com/architecture/innovation-tower/
3. Scaffolding Materials: Wikipedia: EN: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scaffolding#Materials
# SML Data
+ Date: 2013-04-25T16:46:58+0800
+ Dimensions: 3648 x 5472
+ Exposure: 1/3200 sec at f/4.0
+ Focal Length: 17 mm
+ Flash: Did not fire
+ Camera: Canon EOS 6D
+ Lens: Canon EF 17-40mm f/4L USM
+ GPS: 22°18'19" N 114°10'50" E
+ Location: 香港理工大學 Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU)
+ Workflow: Lightroom 4
+ Serial: SML.20130425.6D.03058
+ Series: 建築 Architecture, 形 Forms, Crazyisgood
# Media Licensing
Creative Commons (CCBY) See-ming Lee 李思明 / SML Photography / SML Universe Limited
“Bamboo Scaffolding Unveiling: Innovation Tower by Zaha Hadid” / 香港理工大學建築之形 Hong Kong Polytechnic University Architecture Forms / Crazyisgood / SML.20130425.6D.03058
/ #建築 #建筑 Architecture #形 #Forms #SMLForms #CreativeCommons #CCBY #SMLPhotography #SMLUniverse #SMLProjects #Crazyisgood
/ #中國 #中国 #China #香港 #HongKong #理工大學 #PolyU #攝影 #摄影 #photography #城市 #Urban #大學 #University #ZahaHadid
Artworks which are character-driven is an unusual thread seen in Asian contemporary artworks. In Japanese pop art, Yoshitomo Nara has his innocent girls and lonesome puppies. In Indonesia, artist Samsul Arifin created a whole series of work surrounding a kapok-stuffed doll with goggly plastic eyes—Goni.
The sculpture in the foreground is titled “Musafir Artist”, where Goni is seen riding a camel-like figure while carrying a bag of artist supplies with him on a journey out. In the back, a painting (triptych) titled “Petualang Ilmu di Negeri Unta” (Knowledge of the adventurous camel? Google Translate).
To the gallerists whom I talked to, Goni is seen as the artist’s own avatar, and through this avatar the artist is writing his own autobiography in the works of his art.
Samsul Arifin was born in 1979. I was as surprised as you to find someone younger than me with works at Art Basel. Indonesia is truly full of surprises. You see why I am planning for a visit soon?
Crazyisgood. SML Love.
Samsul Arifin (b. 1979 Indonesia)
Musafir Artist #1
2013
Resin, leather, jute, steel, wood
240 x 210 x 60 cm
Samsul Arifin (b. 1979 Indonesia)
Petualang Ilmu di Negeri Unta
2013
acrylic on canvas
300 x 600 cm (triptych)
# Samsul Arifin
b. March 5, 1979 in Malang, Indonesia
# Nadi Gallery
Based in Jakarta, Nadi Gallery is an art gallery founded by Biantoro Santoso, a young collector of Indonesian art. The Indonesian word nadi means "aorta", "artery", "vein" that evokes the idea of signaling pulsation. Without pulsation, the aorta soon looses its significance for life. As the name indicates, the Gallery's principal programs of exhibitions have been aspiring to present the pulses of recent developments in contemporary art in Indonesia.
Jl. Kembang Indah III Blok G3 no. 4-5 Puri Indah
Jakarta 11610
Indonesia
# SML Data
+ Date: 2013-05-23T16:35:22+0800
+ Dimensions: 5215 x 3477
+ Exposure: 1/30 sec at f/4.0
+ Focal Length: 20 mm
+ ISO: 100
+ Flash: Did not fire
+ Camera: Canon EOS 6D
+ Lens: Canon EF 17-40mm f/4L USM
+ GPS: 22°16'58" N 114°10'22" E
+ Location: 香港會議展覽中心 Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC)
+ Workflow: Lightroom 4
+ Serial: SML.20130523.6D.13970
+ Series: 新聞攝影 Photojournalism, SML Fine Art, Art Basel Hong Kong 2013
# Media Licensing
Creative Commons (CCBY) See-ming Lee 李思明 / SML Photography / SML Universe Limited
“Mixed Media Sculpture by Samsul Arifin (b.1979): Musafir Artist #1, 2013 (“Goni”: Resin, leather, jute, steel, wood)” / Nadi Gallery / Art Basel Hong Kong 2013 / SML.20130523.6D.13970
/ #Photojournalism #CreativeCommons #CCBY #SMLPhotography #SMLUniverse #SMLFineArt #Crazyisgood #SMLProjects
/ #中國 #中国 #China #香港 #HongKong #攝影 #摄影 #photography #Art #FineArt #ArtBasel #ABHK #SamsulArifin #NadiGallery #Indonesia #Goni
See more photos of this, and the Wikipedia article.
Details, quoting from Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | U.S.S. Enterprise Model, Star Trek:
This model of the fictional startship Enterprise was used in the weekly hour-long "Star Trek" TV show (NBC-TV), which aired from September 1966 until June 1969. Despite its short initial run (only three seasons), Star Trek became one of the most popular shows in the history of television. The show's depiction of a mixed-sex, racially-integrated, multinational crew and its attention to contemporary social and political issues pushed the boundaries of network television, earning Star Trek a dedicated fan base that lobbied for the franchise's continuation.
The Enterprise was meant to travel many times beyond light speed, powered by a controlled matter/anti-matter system, a propulsion concept "stretched" from a then-accepted theory. The fictional ship grossed 190,000 tons, and measured 947 feet long and 417 feet in diameter. The saucer-shaped hull included 11 decks, and had a crew complement of 430.
The model's principal designer, Walter "Matt" Jefferies, worked with concepts provided by Star Trek's creator Gene Roddenberry. At first, Paramount Studios constructed a rough 4-inch balsa and cardboard prototype. A 3-foot "pilot" model mostly of solid wood was then built by model-maker Richard C. Datin under subcontract to the Howard Anderson Company. Enlarging the plans for the 3-foot model resulted in the final 11-foot model shown here. The Anderson Company again turned to Datin who contracted it out to Production Model Shop of Burbank, California, with Datin supervising the construction while he did the detail work.
Paramount donated the model to the National Collection in 1974.
Manufacturer:
Country of Origin:
United States of America
Dimensions:
Overall: 2ft 8in. x 11ft x 5ft, 200lb. (81.28 x 335.28 x 152.4cm, 90.7kg)
Other (engines): 6ft 1/4in. (183.52cm)
Other (central pod): 4ft 5 5/16in. (135.38cm)
Materials:
Primarily constructed of poplar wood, vacu-formed plastic, rolled sheet metal tubes for both the engine pods from the back of the struts to the start of the nacelle caps, and plastic for the main sensor dish and detailing (light covers, etc.). The front and rear of the engine pods or nacelles are of wood. The nacelle grill plates brass. Rolled steel wires were also inserted through its original pipe support for lights.
Gift of Paramount Pictures Inc.
李占洋 Li Zhanyang’s sculpture gives a glimpse of what it is like to live in China. Born in Changchun, Jilin Province in 1969, he has been drawn to crowds since he was a child. So when he moved to a big city like Beijing in his late twenties, he found himself spending hours in bars, gambling dens, railway stations (pictured), brothels and bus stops. Afterwards he would go home and sculpt the scenes he has observed from memory.
When I visited cities in mainland China, I am also in awe with the amount of people everywhere, all minding their own business. In that regard, Li Zhanyang’s sculptural interpretation is a true reflection of the modern China.
This work is like a holographic 3D video still from a capture. And it was funny to me as it features three gigantic signage types which can be seen across all railway stations in China:
1. “第三候車大厅” (Train waiting area no. 3). The often obnoxiously huge characters which designate the name of the location usually placed on the facade of Chinese architectures.
2. “严禁也携带易燃易爆有毒等危险品进站上車” (Do not bring flammable, combustible, toxic or other dangerous objects into the station nor alight the trains). Official warning signs plastered everywhere at the station.
3. “嘉陵摩托” (Jialing Motors). Advertising everywhere there is space.
In this artwork, there are the Chinese Literation Army attempting to the keep the crowd in line, the bourgeois making space. Sea of people everywhere. Advertising everywhere. Modern China is full of chaos. And this artwork captures that reality honestly and magically.
Li Zhanyang
Railway Station
2004-2006
Bronze, Ed. 2/4
198.2 x 42.5 x 98.5 cm / 78 x 16 3/4 x 38 3/4 in
Signed, dated and numbered recto lower left: Li Zhanyang 2004 2/4
李占洋
火車站
2004-2006
青銅, Ed. 2/4
198.2 x 42.5 x 98.5 cm / 78 x 16 3/4 x 38 3/4 in
簽名, 日期和編號於作品正面左下: Li Zhanyang 2004 2/4
# Li Zhanyang (b.1969)
Born in Changchun, Jilin Province, China.
Lives and works in Beijing and Chongqing, China.
# References
+ www.whiterabbitcollection.org/artists/li-zhanyang/
+ www.galerieursmeile.com/artists/artists/li-zhanyang/
# Galerie Karsten Greve
Drususgasse 1-5
50667 Cologne
Germany
5, rue Debelleyme
75003 Paris
France
# SML Data
+ Date: 2013-05-23T16:10:06+0800
+ Dimensions: 4622 x 2344
+ Exposure: 1/40 sec at f/8.0
+ Focal Length: 23 mm
+ ISO: 800
+ Flash: Did not fire
+ Camera: Canon EOS 6D
+ Lens: Canon EF 17-40mm f/4L USM
+ GPS: 22°16'58" N 114°10'22" E
+ Location: 香港會議展覽中心 Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC)
+ Workflow: Lightroom 4
+ Serial: SML.20130523.6D.13894
+ Series: 新聞攝影 Photojournalism, SML Fine Art, Art Basel Hong Kong 2013
# Media Licensing
Creative Commons (CCBY) See-ming Lee 李思明 / SML Photography / SML Universe Limited
“Sculpture by Li Zhanyang 李占洋: Railway Station (火車站), 2004-2006. (青銅 Bronze, Ed. 2/4)” / Galerie Karsten Greve AG St. Mortiz / Art Basel Hong Kong 2013 / SML.20130523.6D.13894
/ #Photojournalism #CreativeCommons #CCBY #SMLPhotography #SMLUniverse #SMLFineArt #Crazyisgood #SMLProjects
/ #中國 #中国 #China #香港 #HongKong #攝影 #摄影 #photography #Art #FineArt #ArtBasel #ABHK #LiZhanyang #李占洋 #GalerieKarstenGreve #Sculpture #Bronze #crowd
Related Flickr Sets
+ Coney Island Mermaid Parade 2008
+ Coney Island Mermaid Parade 2007
Related Flickr Collection
See more photos of this, and the Wikipedia article.
Details, quoting from Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Space Shuttle Enterprise:
Manufacturer:
Rockwell International Corporation
Country of Origin:
United States of America
Dimensions:
Overall: 57 ft. tall x 122 ft. long x 78 ft. wing span, 150,000 lb.
(1737.36 x 3718.57 x 2377.44cm, 68039.6kg)
Materials:
Aluminum airframe and body with some fiberglass features; payload bay doors are graphite epoxy composite; thermal tiles are simulated (polyurethane foam) except for test samples of actual tiles and thermal blankets.
The first Space Shuttle orbiter, "Enterprise," is a full-scale test vehicle used for flights in the atmosphere and tests on the ground; it is not equipped for spaceflight. Although the airframe and flight control elements are like those of the Shuttles flown in space, this vehicle has no propulsion system and only simulated thermal tiles because these features were not needed for atmospheric and ground tests. "Enterprise" was rolled out at Rockwell International's assembly facility in Palmdale, California, in 1976. In 1977, it entered service for a nine-month-long approach-and-landing test flight program. Thereafter it was used for vibration tests and fit checks at NASA centers, and it also appeared in the 1983 Paris Air Show and the 1984 World's Fair in New Orleans. In 1985, NASA transferred "Enterprise" to the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum.
Transferred from National Aeronautics and Space Administration
• • • • •
Quoting Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Space Shuttle Main Engine:
Manufacturer:
Date:
2004
Country of Origin:
United States of America
Dimensions:
Overall: 9ft 9in. x 13ft 6in. x 7ft 8in., 14125lb. (297.18 x 411.48 x 233.68cm, 6407.1kg)
Materials:
Nozzle, partly steel; throat, copper; injector plate, steel; pipes along nozzle, non-ferrous metal; hoops around nozzle, non-ferrous metal; bulbous joint, on main pipe, on powerhead, steel; 6-inch pipe, steel; smaller pipes, primarily aluminum, some with diagonal yellow plastic wrappings; red rubber pipe holders on both sides of powerhead; impeller or pump, on left, non-ferrous metal; equi-distant nuts around this impeller, non-ferrous metal; identical impeller on right, steel; clear covering over cutaways of both impellers, plexiglass; largest, curved, main pipe around top of powerhead, from back of left impeller to back of right impeller, steel; low, V-shaped large pipe at bottom of powerhead, non-ferrous; sphere under lower right of powerhead, near right impeller, non-ferrous; black plastic wire protectors on right side of powerhead; large rectangle protruding at angle on right side of powerhead, with many electrical cables leading into it, with black and white plastic insulated wires, some wires with braided, silver, non-ferrous metal insulation; others exposed; some with white plastic covering and soft, fabric insulation; transporter, overall, steel This is the Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME). Three SSME's plus two Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs) power the reusable Space Shuttle. Each SSME produces 375,000 lbs of thrust or a total of 1,125,000 lbs and uses liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen as propellants.
This SSME is made of up of components of SSMEs that have flown into space. The flights have included the first four Shuttle missions, the second Hubble Space Telescope repair mission, the missions that launched the Magellan and Galileo space probes, and the John Glenn flight. The engine was donated by Rocketdyne to the Smithsonian in 2004.
Transferred from Boeing, Rocketdyne.
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The Arboretum has an interactive map on their web site. This map is found at the Arborway Gate.
Pasting from Wikipedia: Arnold Arboretum:
• • • • •
The Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University is an arboretum located in the Jamaica Plain and Roslindale sections of Boston, Massachusetts. It was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and is the second largest "link" in the Emerald Necklace.
History
The Arboretum was founded in 1872 when the President and Fellows of Harvard College became trustees of a portion of the estate of James Arnold (1781–1868).
In 1842, Benjamin Bussey (1757–1842), a prosperous Boston merchant and scientific farmer, donated his country estate Woodland Hill and a part of his fortune to Harvard University "for instruction in agriculture, horticulture, and related subjects". Bussey had inherited land from fellow patriot Eleazer Weld in 1800 and further enlarged his large estate between 1806 and 1837 by acquiring and consolidating various farms that had been established as early as the seventeenth century. Harvard used this land for the creation of the Bussey Institute, which was dedicated to agricultural experimentation. The first Bussey Institute building was completed in 1871 and served as headquarters for an undergraduate school of agriculture.
Sixteen years after Bussey's death, James Arnold, a New Bedford, Massachusetts whaling merchant, specified that a portion of his estate was to be used for "...the promotion of Agricultural, or Horticultural improvements". In 1872, when the trustees of the will of James Arnold transferred his estate to Harvard University, Arnold’s gift was combined with 120 acres (0.49 km2) of the former Bussey estate to create the Arnold Arboretum. In the deed of trust between the Arnold trustees and the College, income from Arnold’s legacy was to be used for establishing, developing and maintaining an arboretum to be known as the Arnold Arboretum which "shall contain, as far as practicable, all the trees [and] shrubs ... either indigenous or exotic, which can be raised in the open air of West Roxbury". The historical mission of the Arnold Arboretum is to increase knowledge of woody plants through research and to disseminate this knowledge through education.
Charles Sprague Sargent was appointed director and Arnold Professor of Botany shortly after the establishment of the institution in 1872.[2] Together with landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted he developed the road and pathway system and delineated the collection areas by family and genus, following the then current and widely accepted classification system of Bentham and Hooker. The Hunnewell building was designed by architect Alexander Wadsworth Longfellow, Jr. in 1892 and constructed with funds donated by H. H. Hunnewell in 1903. From 1946 to 1950 the landscape architect Beatrix Farrand was the landscape design consultant for the Arboretum. Her early training in the 1890s included time with Charles Sprague Sargent and chief propagator and superintendent Jackson Thornton Johnson.[3] Today the Arboretum occupies 265 acres (107 hectares) of land divided between four parcels, viz. the main Arboretum and the Peters Hill, Weld-Walter and South Street tracts. The collections, however, are located primarily in the main Arboretum and on the Peters Hill tract. The Arboretum remains one of the finest examples of a landscape designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and it is a Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site) and a National Historic Landmark.
Robert E. Cook is the seventh and current Director of the Arnold Arboretum. He is also the Director of the Harvard University Herbaria located in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Status
The Arboretum is privately endowed as a department of Harvard University. The land, however, was deeded to the City of Boston in 1882 and incorporated into the so-called "Emerald Necklace". Under the agreement with the City, Harvard University was given a thousand-year lease on the property, and the University, as trustee, is directly responsible for the development, maintenance, and operation of the Arboretum; the City retains responsibility for water fountains, benches, roads, boundaries, and policing. The annual operating budget of $7,350,644 (fiscal year 2003) is largely derived from endowment, which is also managed by the University, and all Arboretum staff are University employees. Other income is obtained through granting agencies and contributors.
Location
The main Arborway gate is located on Route 203 a few hundred yards south of its junction with the Jamaicaway. Public transportation to the Arboretum is available on the MBTA Orange Line to its terminus at Forest Hills Station and by bus (#39) to the Monument in Jamaica Plain. The Arboretum is within easy walking distance from either of these points.
Hours
The grounds are open free of charge to the public from sunrise to sunset 365 days of the year. The Visitor's Center in the Hunnewell Building, 125 Arborway, is open Monday through Friday 9 a.m.–4 p.m.; Saturdays 10 a.m.–4 p.m.; Sundays 12 p.m.–4 PM. The Visitor’s Center is closed on holidays. The Library, located in the Hunnewell Building, is open Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m.–4 p.m.. The Library is closed on Sundays and holidays. Stacks are closed and the collection does not circulate.
Area
Two hundred and sixty-five acres (107 hectares) in the Jamaica Plain and Roslindale sections of Boston, Massachusetts, located at 42°19′N 71°5′W / 42.317°N 71.083°W / 42.317; -71.083, with altitudes ranging from 46 feet (15 m) in the meadow across the drive from the Hunnewell Building to 240 feet (79 m) at the top of Peters Hill.
Climate
Average yearly rainfall is 43.63 inches (1,102 mm); average snowfall, 40.2 inches (102 centimeters). Monthly mean temperature is 51.5 °F (10.8 °C); July's mean temperature is 73.5 °F (23 °C); January's is 29.6 °F (-1.3 °C). The Arboretum is located in USDA hardiness zone 6 (0 to −10 °F, −18 to −23 °C).
Collections (as of September 14, 2007)
At present, the living collections include 15,441 individual plants (including nursery holdings) belonging to 10,216 accessions representing 4,099 taxa; with particular emphasis on the ligneous species of North America and eastern Asia. Historic collections include the plant introductions from eastern Asia made by Charles Sprague Sargent, Ernest Henry Wilson, William Purdom, Joseph Hers, and Joseph Rock. Recent introductions from Asia have resulted from the 1977 Arnold Arboretum Expedition to Japan and Korea, the 1980 Sino-American Botanical Expedition to western Hubei Province, and more recent expeditions to China and Taiwan.
Comprehensive collections are maintained and augmented for most genera, and genera that have received particular emphasis include: Acer, Fagus, Carya, Forsythia, Taxodium, Pinus, Metasequoia, Lonicera, Magnolia, Malus, Quercus, Rhododendron, Syringa, Paulownia, Albizia, Ilex, Gleditsia and Tsuga. Other comprehensive collections include the Bradley Collection of Rosaceous Plants, the collection of conifers and dwarf conifers, and the Larz Anderson Bonsai Collection. Approximately 500 accessions are processed annually.
Collections policy
The mission of the Arnold Arboretum is to increase our knowledge of the evolution and biology of woody plants. Historically, this research has investigated the global distribution and evolutionary history of trees, shrubs and vines, with particular emphasis on the disjunct species of East Asia and North America. Today this work continues through molecular studies of the evolution and biogeography of the floras of temperate Asia, North America and Europe.
Research activities include molecular studies of gene evolution, investigations of plant-water relations, and the monitoring of plant phenology, vegetation succession, nutrient cycling and other factors that inform studies of environmental change. Applied work in horticulture uses the collections for studies in plant propagation, plant introduction, and environmental management. This diversity of scientific investigation is founded in a continuing commitment to acquire, grow, and document the recognized species and infraspecific taxa of ligneous plants of the Northern Hemisphere that are able to withstand the climate of the Arboretum’s 265-acre (1.07 km2) Jamaica Plain/Roslindale site.
As a primary resource for research in plant biology, the Arboretum’s living collections are actively developed, curated, and managed to support scientific investigation and study. To this end, acquisition policies place priority on obtaining plants that are genetically representative of documented wild populations. For each taxon, the Arnold Arboretum aspires to grow multiple accessions of known wild provenance in order to represent significant variation that may occur across the geographic range of the species. Accessions of garden or cultivated provenance are also acquired as governed by the collections policies herein.
For all specimens, full documentation of both provenance and history within the collection is a critical priority. Curatorial procedures provide for complete and accurate records for each accession, and document original provenance, locations in the collections, and changes in botanical identity. Herbarium specimens, DNA materials, and digital images are gathered for the collection and maintained in Arboretum data systems and the herbarium at the Roslindale site.
Research
Research on plant pathology and integrated pest management for maintenance of the living collections is constantly ongoing. Herbarium-based research focuses on the systematics and biodiversity of both temperate and tropical Asian forests, as well as the ecology and potential for sustainable use of their resources. The Arboretum's education programs offer school groups and the general public a wide range of lectures, courses, and walks focusing on the ecology and cultivation of plants. Its quarterly magazine, Arnoldia, provides in-depth information on horticulture, botany, and garden history. Current Research Initiatives
Plant Records
Plant records are maintained on a computerized database, BG-BASE 6.8 (BG-Base Inc.), which was initiated in 1985 at the request of the Arnold Arboretum and the Threatened Plants Unit (TPU) of the World Conservation Monitoring Centre (WCMC). A computerized mapping program (based on AutoCAD (Autodesk)) is linked to BG-BASE, and each accession is recorded on a series of maps at a scale of 1-inch (25 mm) to 20 feet (1:240) or 1-inch (25 mm) to 10 feet (1:120). A computer-driven embosser generates records labels. All accessioned plants in the collections are labeled with accession number, botanical name, and cultivar name (when appropriate), source information, common name, and map location. Trunk and/or display labels are also hung on many accessions and include botanical and common names and nativity. Stake labels are used to identify plants located in the Leventritt Garden and Chinese Path.
Grounds Maintenance
The grounds staff consists of the superintendent and assistant superintendent, three arborists, and ten horticultural technologists. A service garage is adjacent to the Hunnewell Building, where offices and locker rooms are located. During the summer months ten horticultural interns supplement the grounds staff. A wide array of vehicles and modern equipment, including an aerial lift truck and a John Deere backhoe and front loader, are used in grounds maintenance. Permanent grounds staff, excluding the superintendents, are members of AFL/CIO Local 615, Service Employees International Union (SEIU).
Nursery and Greenhouse Facilities
The Dana Greenhouses, located at 1050 Centre Street (with a mailing address of 125 Arborway), were completed in 1962. They comprise four service greenhouses totaling 3,744 square feet (348 m²), the headhouse with offices, cold rooms, storage areas, and a classroom. Staffing at the greenhouse includes the manager of greenhouses and nurseries, the plant propagator, two assistants, and, during the summer months, two horticultural interns. Adjacent to the greenhouse is a shade house of 3,150 square feet (293 m²), a 12,600 cubic foot (357 m³) cold storage facility, and three irrigated, inground nurseries totaling approximately one and one-half acres (6,000 m²). Also located in the greenhouse complex is the bonsai pavilion, where the Larz Anderson Bonsai Collection is displayed from the middle of April to the end of October. During the winter months the bonsai are held in the cold storage unit at temperatures slightly above freezing.
Isabella Welles Hunnewell Internship Program
The living collections department of the Arnold Arboretum offers a paid summer internship program [2] that combines hands-on training in horticulture with educational courses. Intern trainees will be accepted for 12- to 24-week appointments. Ten interns will work with the grounds maintenance department and two in the Dana Greenhouses.
As part of the training program, interns participate in mandatory instructional sessions and field trips in order to develop a broader sense of the Arboretum’s horticultural practices as well as those of other institutions. Sessions and field trips are led by Arnold staff members and embrace an open question and answer format encouraging all to participate. Interns often bring experience and knowledge that everyone, including staff, benefits from. It is a competitive-free learning environment.
Horticultural Apprenticeship
The Arboretum created the horticultural apprenticeship program in 1997 to provide hands-on experience in all aspects of the development, curation, and maintenance of the Arboretum's living collections to individuals interested in pursuing a career in an arboretum or botanical garden.
The Living Collections department of the Arnold Arboretum offers a summer internship program[4] that combines practical hands-on training in horticulture with educational courses. Fourteen Interns/Horticultural Trainees are accepted for twelve to twenty-four week appointments. Interns receive the majority of their training in one of three departments: Grounds Maintenance, Nursery and Greenhouse, or Plant Records.
Lilac Sunday
The second Sunday in May every year is "Lilac Sunday". This is the only day of the year that picnicing is allowed. In 2008, on the 100th anniversary of Lilac Sunday, the Arboretum website touted:
Of the thousands of flowering plants in the Arboretum, only one, the lilac, is singled out each year for a daylong celebration. On Lilac Sunday, garden enthusiasts from all over New England gather at the Arboretum to picnic, watch Morris dancing, and tour the lilac collection. On the day of the event, which takes place rain or shine, the Arboretum is open as usual from dawn to dusk.[5]
Associated Collections
The Arboretum's herbarium in Jamaica Plain holds specimens of cultivated plants that relate to the living collections (ca. 160,000). The Jamaica Plain herbarium, horticultural library, archives, and photographs are maintained in the Hunnewell building at 125 Arborway; however, the main portions of the herbarium and library collections are housed in Cambridge on the campus of Harvard University, at 22 Divinity Avenue.
Publications
The inventory of living collections is updated periodically and made available to sister botanical gardens and arboreta on request; it is also available on the Arboretum’s website (searchable inventory). Arnoldia, the quarterly magazine of the Arnold Arboretum, frequently publishes articles relating to the living collections. A Reunion of Trees[6] by Stephen A. Spongberg (curator emeritus) recounts the history of the introduction of many of the exotic species included in the Arobretum’s collections. New England Natives[7] written by horticultural research archivist Sheila Connor describes many of the trees and shrubs of the New England flora and the ways New Englanders have used them since prehistoric times. Science in the Pleasure Ground[8] by Ida Hay (former curatorial associate) constitutes an institutional biography of the Arboretum.
Institutional Collaborations
The Arboretum maintains an institutional membership in the American Public Garden Association (APGA) and the International Association of Botanical Gardens and Arboreta. Additionally, members of the staff are associated with many national and international botanical and horticultural organizations. The Arboretum is also a cooperating institution with the Center for Plant Conservation (CPC), and as an active member of the North American Plant Collections Consortium (NAPCC), it is committed to broadening and maintaining its holdings of: Acer, Carya, Fagus, Stewartia, Syringa, and Tsuga for the purposes of plant conservation, evaluation, and research. The Arboretum is also a member of the North American China Plant Exploration Consortium (NACPEC).
See also
Larz Anderson Bonsai Collection, donated by businessman and ambassador Larz Anderson
The Case Estates of the Arnold Arboretum
List of botanical gardens in the United States
North American Plant Collections Consortium
External links
Arnold Arboretum Official Website
Arnold Arboretum Visitor Information
American Public Gardens Association (APGA)
Virtual Information Access (VIA) Catalog of visual resources at Harvard University.
Garden and Forest A Journal of Horticulture, Landscape Art, and Forestry (1888–1897)
I just remembered Dan Margulis' large radius USM super sharpening technique and I made these cheese yummier than life!
See also Agata Olek talks about her 100% Acrylic Art Guards (Flickr 720p HD video)
Agata Olek (Flickr)
100% Acrylic Art Guards
"I think crochet, the way I create it, is a metaphor for the complexity and interconnectedness of our body and its systems and psychology. The connections are stronger as one fabric as opposed to separate strands, but, if you cut one, the whole thing will fall apart.
Relationships are complex and greatly vary situation to situation. They are developmental journeys of growth, and transformation. Time passes, great distances are surpassed and the fabric which individuals are composed of compiles and unravels simultaneously."
Agata Olek Biography. The SPLAT! of colors hits you in the face, often clashing so ostentatiously that it instantly tunes you into the presence of severely cheeky humor. A moment later the fatigue of labor creeps into your fingers as a coal miner's work ethic becomes apparent. Hundreds of miles of crocheted, weaved, and often recycled materials are the fabric from which the wild and occasionally wearable structures of her fantasylands are born.
Olek was born Agata Oleksiak in Poland and graduated from Adam Mickiewicz University in Poland with a degree in cultural studies. In New York, she rediscovered her ability to crochet and since then she has started her crocheted journey/madness.
Resume sniffers may be pleased to know Olek's work has been presented in galleries from Brooklyn to Istanbul to Venice and Brazil, featured in "The New York Times", "Fiberarts Magazine", "The Village Voice", and "Washington Post" and drags a tail of dance performance sets and costumes too numerous to mention.
Olek received the Ruth Mellon Award for Sculpture, was selected for 2005 residency program at Sculpture Space, 2009 residency in Instituto Sacatar in Brazil, and is a winner of apex art gallery commercial competition. Olek was an artist in an independent collective exhibition, "Waterways," during the 49th Venice Biennale. She was also a featured artist in "Two Continents Beyond," at the 9th International Istanbul Biennale.
Olek herself however can be found in her Greenpoint studio with a bottle of spiced Polish vodka and a hand rolled cigarette aggressively re-weaving the world as she sees.
13th annual D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® (Sept 25 to Sept 27, 2009)
www.dumboartfestival.org/press_release.html
The three-day multi-site neighborhood-wide event is a one-of-a-kind art happening: where serendipity meets the haphazard and where the unpredictable, spontaneous and downright weird thrive. The now teenage D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® presents touchable, accessible, and interactive art, on a scale that makes it the nation's largest urban forum for experimental art.
Art Under the Bridge is an opportunity for young artists to use any medium imaginable to create temporary projects on-the-spot everywhere and anywhere, completely transforming the Dumbo section of Brooklyn, New York, into a vibrant platform for self-expression. In addition to the 80+ projects throughout the historical post-industrial waterfront span, visitors can tour local artists' studios or check out the indoor video_dumbo, a non-stop program of cutting-edge video art from New York City and around the world.
The Dumbo Arts Center (DAC) has been the exclusive producer of the D.U.M.B.O Art Under the Bridge Festival® since 1997. DAC is a big impact, small non-profit, that in addition to its year-round gallery exhibitions, is committed to preserving Dumbo as a site in New York City where emerging visual artists can experiment in the public domain, while having unprecedented freedom and access to normally off-limit locations.
Related SML
+ SML Flickr Collections: Events
+ SML Flickr Sets: Dumbo Arts Center: Art Under the Bridge Festival 2009
It was raining all day when I visited Chang Bai Mountain (長白山). It was also very cold and I ended up shivering the entire time. I ended up not taking my tripod with me mostly because of the weight, so I turned to time-lapse stacks for long exposures again.
Photographed with the Canon EOS 6D + Canon EF 24-70 f/2.8L USM. 8-second LE via median stack of 11.
河水 River / 中國東北長白山 Chang Bai Mountain, Dongbei, China / SML.20140726.6D.33208-SML.20140726.6D.33218-St.BW
See also Agata Olek talks about her 100% Acrylic Art Guards (Flickr 720p HD video)
Agata Olek (Flickr)
100% Acrylic Art Guards
"I think crochet, the way I create it, is a metaphor for the complexity and interconnectedness of our body and its systems and psychology. The connections are stronger as one fabric as opposed to separate strands, but, if you cut one, the whole thing will fall apart.
Relationships are complex and greatly vary situation to situation. They are developmental journeys of growth, and transformation. Time passes, great distances are surpassed and the fabric which individuals are composed of compiles and unravels simultaneously."
Agata Olek Biography. The SPLAT! of colors hits you in the face, often clashing so ostentatiously that it instantly tunes you into the presence of severely cheeky humor. A moment later the fatigue of labor creeps into your fingers as a coal miner's work ethic becomes apparent. Hundreds of miles of crocheted, weaved, and often recycled materials are the fabric from which the wild and occasionally wearable structures of her fantasylands are born.
Olek was born Agata Oleksiak in Poland and graduated from Adam Mickiewicz University in Poland with a degree in cultural studies. In New York, she rediscovered her ability to crochet and since then she has started her crocheted journey/madness.
Resume sniffers may be pleased to know Olek's work has been presented in galleries from Brooklyn to Istanbul to Venice and Brazil, featured in "The New York Times", "Fiberarts Magazine", "The Village Voice", and "Washington Post" and drags a tail of dance performance sets and costumes too numerous to mention.
Olek received the Ruth Mellon Award for Sculpture, was selected for 2005 residency program at Sculpture Space, 2009 residency in Instituto Sacatar in Brazil, and is a winner of apex art gallery commercial competition. Olek was an artist in an independent collective exhibition, "Waterways," during the 49th Venice Biennale. She was also a featured artist in "Two Continents Beyond," at the 9th International Istanbul Biennale.
Olek herself however can be found in her Greenpoint studio with a bottle of spiced Polish vodka and a hand rolled cigarette aggressively re-weaving the world as she sees.
13th annual D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® (Sept 25 to Sept 27, 2009)
www.dumboartfestival.org/press_release.html
The three-day multi-site neighborhood-wide event is a one-of-a-kind art happening: where serendipity meets the haphazard and where the unpredictable, spontaneous and downright weird thrive. The now teenage D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® presents touchable, accessible, and interactive art, on a scale that makes it the nation's largest urban forum for experimental art.
Art Under the Bridge is an opportunity for young artists to use any medium imaginable to create temporary projects on-the-spot everywhere and anywhere, completely transforming the Dumbo section of Brooklyn, New York, into a vibrant platform for self-expression. In addition to the 80+ projects throughout the historical post-industrial waterfront span, visitors can tour local artists' studios or check out the indoor video_dumbo, a non-stop program of cutting-edge video art from New York City and around the world.
The Dumbo Arts Center (DAC) has been the exclusive producer of the D.U.M.B.O Art Under the Bridge Festival® since 1997. DAC is a big impact, small non-profit, that in addition to its year-round gallery exhibitions, is committed to preserving Dumbo as a site in New York City where emerging visual artists can experiment in the public domain, while having unprecedented freedom and access to normally off-limit locations.
Related SML
+ SML Flickr Collections: Events
+ SML Flickr Sets: Dumbo Arts Center: Art Under the Bridge Festival 2009
Most people like to see the end result, but I prefer seeing the process. I believe that process is an important part, without it you cannot have the result.
Here's a mixed media painting in progress, seen at Dean Russo's artist studio during the 13th Annual Art Under the Bridge Festival organized by the Dumbo Arts Center in New York City in 2009.
During our interview, Dean told me about his entire process in creating his mixed media paintings, as long as I don't record it nor write it down. As such, I cannot really write about it either but all I can say is that I find it very interesting — that an artist workflow is not far from that from designers (my primary profession).
Dean Russo on the Web
13th annual D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® (Sept 25 to Sept 27, 2009)
www.dumboartfestival.org/press_release.html
The three-day multi-site neighborhood-wide event is a one-of-a-kind art happening: where serendipity meets the haphazard and where the unpredictable, spontaneous and downright weird thrive. The now teenage D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® presents touchable, accessible, and interactive art, on a scale that makes it the nation's largest urban forum for experimental art.
Art Under the Bridge is an opportunity for young artists to use any medium imaginable to create temporary projects on-the-spot everywhere and anywhere, completely transforming the Dumbo section of Brooklyn, New York, into a vibrant platform for self-expression. In addition to the 80+ projects throughout the historical post-industrial waterfront span, visitors can tour local artists' studios or check out the indoor video_dumbo, a non-stop program of cutting-edge video art from New York City and around the world.
The Dumbo Arts Center (DAC) has been the exclusive producer of the D.U.M.B.O Art Under the Bridge Festival® since 1997. DAC is a big impact, small non-profit, that in addition to its year-round gallery exhibitions, is committed to preserving Dumbo as a site in New York City where emerging visual artists can experiment in the public domain, while having unprecedented freedom and access to normally off-limit locations.
Related SML
+ SML Flickr Collections: Events
+ SML Flickr Sets: Dumbo Arts Center: Art Under the Bridge Festival 2009
Thanks to everyone that viewed my pictures, getting it to half a million this morning! I can remember when it was exceedingly rare to have a thousand views in a day, now I regularly get over 2000 a day!
It took 28 months to get to 250'000, and then 6 months to get here! I definitely can't wait for the 1 million mark!
Pasted from Wikipedia: Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey
• • • • •
The Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey is a multi-mission, military, tiltrotor aircraft with both a vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL), and short takeoff and landing (STOL) capability. It is designed to combine the functionality of a conventional helicopter with the long-range, high-speed cruise performance of a turboprop aircraft.
The V-22 originated from the U.S. Department of Defense Joint-service Vertical take-off/landing Experimental (JVX) aircraft program started in 1981. It was developed jointly by the Bell Helicopter, and Boeing Helicopters team, known as Bell Boeing, which produce the aircraft.[4] The V-22 first flew in 1989, and began years of flight testing and design alterations.
The United States Marine Corps began crew training for the Osprey in 2000, and fielded it in 2007. The Osprey's other operator, the U.S. Air Force fielded their version of the tiltrotor in 2009. Since entering service with the U.S. Marine Corps and Air Force, the Osprey has been deployed for combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Contents
•• 1.2 Flight testing and design changes
• 2 Design
• 8 Notable appearances in media
Development
Early development
The failure of the Iran hostage rescue mission in 1980 demonstrated to the United States military a need[5] for "a new type of aircraft, that could not only take off and land vertically but also could carry combat troops, and do so at speed."[6] The U.S. Department of Defense began the Joint-service Vertical take-off/landing Experimental (JVX) aircraft program in 1981, under U.S. Army leadership. Later the U.S. Navy/Marine Corps took the lead.[7][8] The JVX combined requirements from the Marine Corps, Air Force, Army and Navy.[9][10] A request for proposals (RFP) was issued in December 1982 for JVX preliminary design work. Interest in the program was expressed by Aérospatiale, Bell Helicopter, Boeing Vertol, Grumman, Lockheed, and Westland. The DoD pushed for contractors to form teams. Bell partnered with Boeing Vertol. The Bell Boeing team submitted a proposal for a enlarged version of the Bell XV-15 prototype on 17 February 1983. This was the only proposal received and a preliminary design contract was awarded on 26 April 1983.[11][12]
The JVX aircraft was designated V-22 Osprey on 15 January 1985; by March that same year the first six prototypes were being produced, and Boeing Vertol was expanded to deal with the project workload.[13][14] Work has been split evenly between Bell and Boeing. Bell Helicopter manufactures and integrates the wing, nacelles, rotors, drive system, tail surfaces, and aft ramp, as well as integrates the Rolls-Royce engines and performs final assembly. Boeing Helicopters manufactures and integrates the fuselage, cockpit, avionics, and flight controls.[4][15] The USMC variant of the Osprey received the MV-22 designation and the Air Force variant received CV-22; reversed from normal procedure to prevent Marine Ospreys from having a conflicting designation with aircraft carriers (CV).[16] Full-scale development of the V-22 tilt-rotor aircraft began in 1986.[2] On 3 May 1986 the Bell-Boeing partnership was awarded a $1.714 billion contract for V-22 aircraft by the Navy, thus at this point the project had acquisition plans with all four arms of the U.S. military.[17]
The first V-22 was rolled out with significant media attention in May 1988.[18][19] However the project suffered several political blows. Firstly in the same year, the Army left the program, citing a need to focus its budget on more immediate aviation programs.[20] The project also faced considerable dialogue in the Senate, surviving two votes that both could have resulted in cancellation.[21][22] Despite the Senate's decision, the Department of Defense instructed the Navy not to spend more money on the Osprey.[23] At the same time, the Bush administration sought the cancellation of the project.[23]
Flight testing and design changes
The first of six MV-22 prototypes first flew on 19 March 1989 in the helicopter mode,[24] and on 14 September 1989 as a fixed-wing plane.[25] The third and fourth prototypes successfully completed the Osprey's first Sea Trials on the USS Wasp in December 1990.[26] However, the fourth and fifth prototypes crashed in 1991-92.[27] Flight tests were resumed in August 1993 after changes were incorporated in the prototypes.[2] From October 1992 until April 1993, Bell and Boeing redesigned the V-22 to reduce empty weight, simplify manufacture and reduce production costs. This redesigned version became the B-model.[28]
Flight testing of four full-scale development V-22s began in early 1997 when the first pre-production V-22 was delivered to the Naval Air Warfare Test Center, Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland. The first EMD flight took place on 5 February 1997. The first of four low rate initial production aircraft, ordered on 28 April 1997, was delivered on 27 May 1999. Osprey number 10 completed the program's second Sea Trials, this time from the USS Saipan in January 1999.[2] During external load testing in April 1999, Boeing used a V-22 to lift and transport the M777 howitzer.[29] In 2000, Boeing announced that the V-22 would be fitted with a nose-mounted GAU-19 Gatling gun,[30] but the GAU-19 gun was later canceled.[31]
In 2000, there were two further fatal crashes, killing a total of 19 Marines, and the production was again halted while the cause of these crashes was investigated and various parts were redesigned.[32] The V-22 completed its final operational evaluation in June 2005. The evaluation was deemed successful; events included long range deployments, high altitude, desert and shipboard operations. The problems identified in various accidents had been addressed.[33]
Controversy
The V-22's development process has been long and controversial, partly due to its large cost increases.[34] When the development budget, first planned for $2.5 billion in 1986, increased to a projected $30 billion in 1988, then-Defense Secretary Dick Cheney tried to zero out its funding. He was eventually overruled by Congress.[32] As of 2008, $27 billion have been spent on the Osprey program and another $27.2 billion will be required to complete planned production numbers by the end of the program.[2]
The V-22 squadron's former commander at Marine Corps Air Station New River, Lt. Colonel Odin Lieberman, was relieved of duty in 2001 after allegations that he instructed his unit that they needed to falsify maintenance records to make the plane appear more reliable.[2][35] Three officers were later implicated in the falsification scandal.[34]
The aircraft is incapable of autorotation, and is therefore unable to land safely in helicopter mode if both engines fail. A director of the Pentagon's testing office in 2005 said that if the Osprey loses power while flying like a helicopter below 1,600 feet (490 m), emergency landings "are not likely to be survivable". But Captain Justin (Moon) McKinney, a V-22 pilot, says that this will not be a problem, "We can turn it into a plane and glide it down, just like a C-130".[31] A complete loss of power would require the failure of both engines, as a drive shaft connects the nacelles through the wing; one engine can power both proprotors.[36] While vortex ring state (VRS) contributed to a deadly V-22 accident, the aircraft is less susceptible to the condition than conventional helicopters and recovers more quickly.[5] The Marines now train new pilots in the recognition of and recovery from VRS and have instituted operational envelope limits and instrumentation to help pilots avoid VRS conditions.[32][37]
It was planned in 2000 to equip all V-22s with a nose-mounted Gatling gun, to provide "the V-22 with a strong defensive firepower capability to greatly increase the aircraft's survivability in hostile actions."[30] The nose gun project was canceled however, leading to criticism by retired Marine Corps Commandant General James L. Jones, who is not satisfied with the current V-22 armament.[31] A belly-mounted turret was later installed on some of the first V-22s sent to the War in Afghanistan in 2009.[38]
With the first combat deployment of the MV-22 in October 2007, Time Magazine ran an article condemning the aircraft as unsafe, overpriced, and completely inadequate.[31] The Marine Corps, however, responded with the assertion that much of the article's data were dated, obsolete, inaccurate, and reflected expectations that ran too high for any new field of aircraft.[39]
Recent development
On 28 September 2005, the Pentagon formally approved full-rate production for the V-22.[40] The plan is to boost production from 11 a year to between 24 and 48 a year by 2012. Of the 458 total planned, 360 are for the Marine Corps, 48 for the Navy, and 50 for the Air Force at an average cost of $110 million per aircraft, including development costs.[2] The V-22 had an incremental flyaway cost of $70 million per aircraft in 2007,[3] but the Navy hopes to shave about $10 million off that cost after a five-year production contract starts in 2008.[41]
The Bell-Boeing Joint Project Office in Amarillo, Texas will design a new integrated avionics processor to resolve electronics obsolescence issues and add new network capabilities.[42]
Design
The Osprey is the world's first production tiltrotor aircraft, with one three-bladed proprotor, turboprop engine, and transmission nacelle mounted on each wingtip. It is classified as a powered lift aircraft by the Federal Aviation Administration.[43] For takeoff and landing, it typically operates as a helicopter with the nacelles vertical (rotors horizontal). Once airborne, the nacelles rotate forward 90° in as little as 12 seconds for horizontal flight, converting the V-22 to a more fuel-efficient, higher-speed turboprop airplane. STOL rolling-takeoff and landing capability is achieved by having the nacelles tilted forward up to 45°. For compact storage and transport, the V-22's wing rotates to align, front-to-back, with the fuselage. The proprotors can also fold in a sequence taking 90 seconds.[44]
Most Osprey missions will use fixed wing flight 75 percent or more of the time, reducing wear and tear on the aircraft and reducing operational costs.[45] This fixed wing flight is higher than typical helicopter missions allowing longer range line-of-sight communications and so improved command and control.[2] Boeing has stated the V-22 design loses 10% of its vertical lift over a Tiltwing design when operating in helicopter mode because of airflow resistance due to the wings, but that the Tiltrotor design has better short takeoff and landing performance.[46]
The V-22 is equipped with a glass cockpit, which incorporates four Multi-function displays (MFDs) and one shared Central Display Unit (CDU), allowing the pilots to display a variety of images including: digimaps centered or decentered on current position, FLIR imagery, primary flight instruments, navigation (TACAN, VOR, ILS, GPS, INS), and system status. The flight director panel of the Cockpit Management System (CMS) allows for fully-coupled (aka: autopilot) functions which will take the aircraft from forward flight into a 50-foot hover with no pilot interaction other than programming the system.[47] The glass cockpit of the canceled CH-46X was derived from the V-22.[48]
The V-22 is a fly-by-wire aircraft with triple-redundant flight control systems.[49] With the nacelles pointing straight up in conversion mode at 90° the flight computers command the aircraft to fly like a helicopter, with cyclic forces being applied to a conventional swashplate at the rotor hub. With the nacelles in airplane mode (0°) the flaperons, rudder, and elevator fly the aircraft like an airplane. This is a gradual transition and occurs over the rotation range of the nacelles. The lower the nacelles, the greater effect of the airplane-mode control surfaces.[50] The nacelles can rotate past vertical to 97.5° for rearward flight.[51][52]
The Osprey can be armed with one M240 7.62x51mm NATO (.308 in caliber) or M2 .50 in caliber (12.7 mm) machine gun on the loading ramp, that can be fired rearward when the ramp is lowered. A GAU-19 three-barrel .50 in gatling gun mounted below the V-22's nose has also been studied for future upgrade.[31][53] BAE Systems developed a remotely operated turreted weapons system for the V-22,[54] which was installed on half of the first V-22s deployed to Afghanistan in 2009.[38] The 7.62 mm belly gun turret is remotely operated by a gunner inside the aircraft, who acquires targets with a separate pod using color television and forward looking infrared imagery.
U.S. Naval Air Systems Command is working on upgrades to increase the maximum speed from 250 knots (460 km/h; 290 mph) to 270 knots (500 km/h; 310 mph), increase helicopter mode altitude limit from 10,000 feet (3,000 m) to 12,000 feet (3,700 m) or 14,000 feet (4,300 m), and increase lift performance.[55]
Operational history
US Marine Corps
Marine Corps crew training on the Osprey has been conducted by VMMT-204 since March 2000. On 3 June 2005, the Marine Corps helicopter squadron Marine Medium Helicopter 263 (HMM-263), stood down to begin the process of transitioning to the MV-22 Osprey.[56] On 8 December 2005, Lieutenant General Amos, commander of the II MEF, accepted the delivery of the first fleet of MV-22s, delivered to HMM-263. The unit reactivated on 3 March 2006 as the first MV-22 squadron and was redesignated VMM-263. On 31 August 2006, VMM-162 (the former HMM-162) followed suit. On 23 March 2007, HMM-266 became Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 266 (VMM-266) at Marine Corps Air Station New River, North Carolina.[57]
The Osprey has been replacing existing CH-46 Sea Knight squadrons.[58] The MV-22 reached initial operational capability (IOC) with the U.S. Marine Corps on 13 June 2007.[1] On 10 July 2007 an MV-22 Osprey landed aboard the Royal Navy aircraft carrier, HMS Illustrious in the Atlantic Ocean. This marked the first time a V-22 had landed on any non-U.S. vessel.[59]
On 13 April 2007, the U.S. Marine Corps announced that it would be sending ten V-22 aircraft to Iraq, the Osprey's first combat deployment. Marine Corps Commandant, General James Conway, indicated that over 150 Marines would accompany the Osprey set for September deployment to Al-Asad Airfield.[60][61] On 17 September 2007, ten MV-22Bs of VMM-263 left for Iraq aboard the USS Wasp. The decision to use a ship rather than use the Osprey's self-deployment capability was made because of concerns over icing during the North Atlantic portion of the trip, lack of available KC-130s for mid-air refueling, and the availability of the USS Wasp.[62]
The Osprey has provided support in Iraq, racking up some 2,000 flight hours over three months with a mission capable availability rate of 68.1% as of late-January 2008.[63] They are primarily used in Iraq's western Anbar province for routine cargo and troop movements, and also for riskier "aero-scout" missions. General David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, used one to fly around Iraq on Christmas Day 2007 to visit troops.[64] Then-presidential candidate Barack Obama also flew in Ospreys during his high profile 2008 tour of Iraq.[65]
The only major problem has been obtaining the necessary spare parts to maintain the aircraft.[66] The V-22 had flown 3,000 sorties totaling 5,200 hours in Iraq as of July 2008.[67] USMC leadership expect to deploy MV-22s to Afghanistan in 2009.[66][68] General George J. Trautman, III praised the increased range of the V-22 over the legacy helicopters in Iraq and said that "it turned his battle space from the size of Texas into the size of Rhode Island."[69]
Naval Air Systems Command has devised a temporary fix for sailors to place portable heat shields under Osprey engines to prevent damage to the decks of some of the Navy's smaller amphibious ships, but they determined that a long term solution to the problem would require these decks be redesigned with heat resistant deck coatings, passive thermal barriers and changes in ship structure in order to operate V-22s and F-35Bs.[70]
A Government Accountability Office study reported that by January 2009 the Marines had 12 MV-22s operating in Iraq and they managed to successfully complete all assigned missions. The same report found that the V-22 deployments had mission capable rates averaging 57% to 68% and an overall full mission capable rate of only 6%. It also stated that the aircraft had shown weakness in situational awareness, maintenance, shipboard operations and the ability to transport troops and external cargo.[71] That study also concluded that the "deployments confirmed that the V-22’s enhanced speed and range enable personnel and internal cargo to be transported faster and farther than is possible with the legacy helicopters it is replacing".[71]
The MV-22 saw its first offensive combat mission, Operation Cobra's Anger on 4 December 2009. Ospreys assisted in inserting 1,000 Marines and 150 Afghan troops into the Now Zad Valley of Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan to disrupt communication and supply lines of the Taliban.[38] In January 2010 the MV-22 Osprey is being sent to Haiti as part of Operation Unified Response relief efforts after the earthquake there. This will be the first use the Marine V-22 in a humanitarian mission.[72]
US Air Force
The Air Force's first operational CV-22 Osprey was delivered to the 58th Special Operations Wing (58th SOW) at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico on 20 March 2006. This and subsequent aircraft will become part of the 58th SOW's fleet of aircraft used for training pilots and crew members for special operations use.[73] On 16 November 2006, the Air Force officially accepted the CV-22 in a ceremony conducted at Hurlburt Field, Florida.[74]
The US Air Force's first operational deployment of the Osprey sent four CV-22s to Mali in November 2008 in support of Exercise Flintlock. The CV-22s flew nonstop from Hurlburt Field, Florida with in-flight refueling.[5] AFSOC declared that the 8th Special Operations Squadron reached Initial Operational Capability on 16 March 2009, with six of its planned nine CV-22s operational.[75]
In June 2009, CV-22s of the 8th Special Operations Squadron delivered 43,000 pounds (20,000 kg) of humanitarian supplies to remote villages in Honduras that were not accessible by conventional vehicles.[76] In November 2009, the 8th SO Squadron and its six CV-22s returned from a three-month deployment in Iraq.[77]
The first possible combat loss of an Osprey occurred on 9 April, 2010, as a CV-22 went down near Qalat, Zabul Province, Afghanistan, killing four.[78][79]
Potential operators
In 1999 the V-22 was studied for use in the United Kingdom's Royal Navy,[80] it has been raised several times as a candidate for the role of Maritime Airborne Surveillance and Control (MASC).[81]
Israel had shown interest in the purchase of MV-22s, but no order was placed.[82][83] Flightglobal reported in late 2009 that Israel has decided to wait for the CH-53K instead.[84]
The V-22 Osprey is a candidate for the Norwegian All Weather Search and Rescue Helicopter (NAWSARH) that is planned to replace the Westland Sea King Mk.43B of the Royal Norwegian Air Force in 2015.[85] The other candidates for the NAWSARH contract of 10-12 helicopters are AgustaWestland AW101 Merlin, Eurocopter EC225, NHIndustries NH90 and Sikorsky S-92.[86]
Bell Boeing has made an unsolicited offer of the V-22 for US Army medical evacuation needs.[87] However the Joint Personnel Recovery Agency issued a report that said that a common helicopter design would be needed for both combat recovery and medical evacuation and that the V-22 would not be suitable for recovery missions because of the difficulty of hoist operations and lack of self-defense capabilities.[88]
The US Navy remains a potential user of the V-22, but its role and mission with the Navy remains unclear. The latest proposal is to replace the C-2 Greyhound with the V-22 in the fleet logistics role. The V-22 would have the advantage of being able to land on and support non-carriers with rapid delivery of supplies and people between the ships of a taskforce or to ships on patrol beyond helicopter range.[89] Loren B. Thompson of the Lexington Institute has suggested V-22s for use in combat search and rescue and Marine One VIP transport, which also need replacement aircraft.[90]
Variants
• V-22A
•• Pre-production full-scale development aircraft used for flight testing. These are unofficially considered A-variants after 1993 redesign.[91]
• HV-22
•• The U.S. Navy considered an HV-22 to provide combat search and rescue, delivery and retrieval of special warfare teams along with fleet logistic support transport. However, it chose the MH-60S for this role in 1992.[92]
• SV-22
•• The proposed anti-submarine warfare Navy variant. The Navy studied the SV-22 in the 1980s to replace S-3 and SH-2 aircraft.[93]
• MV-22B
•• Basic U.S. Marine Corps transport; original requirement for 552 (now 360). The Marine Corps is the lead service in the development of the V-22 Osprey. The Marine Corps variant, the MV-22B, is an assault transport for troops, equipment and supplies, capable of operating from ships or from expeditionary airfields ashore. It is replacing the Marine Corps' CH-46E[57] and CH-53D.[94]
• CV-22B
•• Air Force variant for the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM). It will conduct long-range, special operations missions, and is equipped with extra fuel tanks and terrain-following radar.[95][96]
Operators
•• 8th Special Operations Squadron (8 SOS) at Hurlburt Field, Florida
•• 71st Special Operations Squadron (71 SOS) at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico
•• 20th Special Operations Squadron (20 SOS) at Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico
•• VMM-161
•• VMM-162
•• VMM-261
•• VMM-263
•• VMM-264
•• VMM-266
•• VMM-365
•• VMMT-204 - Training squadron
•• VMX-22 - Marine Tiltrotor Operational Test and Evaluation Squadron
Notable accidents
Main article: Accidents and incidents involving the V-22 Osprey
From 1991 to 2000 there were four significant crashes, and a total of 30 fatalities, during testing.[32] Since becoming operational in 2007, the V-22 has had one possible combat loss due to an unknown cause, no losses due to accidents, and seven other notable, but minor, incidents.
• On 11 June 1991, a mis-wired flight control system led to two minor injuries when the left nacelle struck the ground while the aircraft was hovering 15 feet (4.6 m) in the air, causing it to bounce and catch fire.[97]
• On 20 July 1992, a leaking gearbox led to a fire in the right nacelle, causing the aircraft to drop into the Potomac River in front of an audience of Congressmen and other government officials at Quantico, killing all seven on board and grounding the aircraft for 11 months.[98]
• On 8 April 2000, a V-22 loaded with Marines to simulate a rescue, attempted to land at Marana Northwest Regional Airport in Arizona, stalled when its right rotor entered vortex ring state, rolled over, crashed, and exploded, killing all 19 on board.[37]
• On 11 December 2000, after a catastrophic hydraulic leak and subsequent software instrument failure, a V-22 fell 1,600 feet (490 m) into a forest in Jacksonville, North Carolina, killing all four aboard. This caused the Marine Corps to ground their fleet of eight V-22s, the second grounding that year.[99][100]
Specifications (MV-22B)
Data from Boeing Integrated Defense Systems,[101] Naval Air Systems Command,[102] US Air Force CV-22 fact sheet,[95] Norton,[103] and Bell[104]
General characteristics
• Crew: Four (pilot, copilot and two flight engineers)
• Capacity: 24 troops (seated), 32 troops (floor loaded) or up to 15,000 lb (6,800 kg) of cargo (dual hook)
• Length: 57 ft 4 in (17.5 m)
• Rotor diameter: 38 ft 0 in (11.6 m)
• Wingspan: 45 ft 10 in (14 m)
• Width with rotors: 84 ft 7 in (25.8 m)
• Height: 22 ft 1 in/6.73 m; overall with nacelles vertical (17 ft 11 in/5.5 m; at top of tailfins)
• Disc area: 2,268 ft² (212 m²)
• Wing area: 301.4 ft² (28 m²)
• Empty weight: 33,140 lb (15,032 kg)
• Loaded weight: 47,500 lb (21,500 kg)
• Max takeoff weight: 60,500 lb (27,400 kg)
• Powerplant: 2× Rolls-Royce Allison T406/AE 1107C-Liberty turboshafts, 6,150 hp (4,590 kW) each
Performance
• Maximum speed: 250 knots (460 km/h, 290 mph) at sea level / 305 kn (565 km/h; 351 mph) at 15,000 ft (4,600 m)[105]
• Cruise speed: 241 knots (277 mph, 446 km/h) at sea level
• Range: 879 nmi (1,011 mi, 1,627 km)
• Combat radius: 370 nmi (426 mi, 685 km)
• Ferry range: 1,940 nmi (with auxiliary internal fuel tanks)
• Service ceiling: 26,000 ft (7,925 m)
• Rate of climb: 2,320 ft/min (11.8 m/s)
• Disc loading: 20.9 lb/ft² at 47,500 lb GW (102.23 kg/m²)
• Power/mass: 0.259 hp/lb (427 W/kg)
Armament
• 1× M240 machine gun on ramp, optional
Notable appearances in media
Main article: Aircraft in fiction#V-22 Osprey
See also
• Elizabeth A. Okoreeh-Baah, USMC - first female to pilot a V-22 Osprey
Related development
Comparable aircraft
Related lists
• List of military aircraft of the United States
References
Bibliography
• Markman, Steve and Bill Holder. "Bell/Boeing V-22 Osprey Tilt-Engine VTOL Transport (U.S.A.)". Straight Up: A History of Vertical Flight. Schiffer Publishing, 2000. ISBN 0-7643-1204-9.
• Norton, Bill. Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey, Tiltrotor Tactical Transport. Midland Publishing, 2004. ISBN 1-85780-165-2.
External links
Wikimedia Commons has media related to: V-22 Osprey
• V-22 Osprey web, and www.history.navy.mil/planes/v-22.html
• CV-22 fact sheet on USAF site
• www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/aircraft/v-22.htm
• www.airforce-technology.com/projects/osprey/
• "Flight of the Osprey", US Navy video of V-22 operations
From the Wikipedia page on the Elgin Marbles:
[[[
The Elgin Marbles, known also as the Parthenon Marbles, are a collection of classical Greek marble sculptures, inscriptions and architectural members that originally were part of the Parthenon and other buildings on the Acropolis of Athens.[1][2] Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin, the British ambassador to the Ottoman Empire from 1799–1803, had obtained a controversial permission from the Ottoman authorities to remove pieces from the Acropolis.
There is controversy as to whether the removed pieces were purchased from the ruling government of the time or not. [3] From 1801 to 1812 Elgin's agents removed about half of the surviving sculptures of the Parthenon, as well as architectural members and sculpture from the Propylaea and Erechtheum.[4] The Marbles were transported by sea to Britain. In Britain, the acquisition of the collection was supported by some,[5] while many critics compared Elgin's actions to vandalism[6] or looting.[7][8][9][10][11]
Following a public debate in Parliament and subsequent exoneration of Elgin's actions, the marbles were purchased by the British Government in 1816 and placed on display in the British Museum, where they stand now on view in the purpose-built Duveen Gallery. The legality of the removal has been questioned and the debate continues as to whether the Marbles should remain in the British Museum or be returned to Athens.
Contents
• 3 Legality of the removal from Athens
• 5 Damage
•• 5.1 Use as a Christian church
•• 5.2 Morosini •
•• 5.4 Elgin
•• 5.6 Athens
•• 6.1 Rationale for returning to Athens
•• 6.2 Rationale for retaining in London
• 7 Public perception of the issue
••• 7.1.2 Popular support for restitution
• 8 Other displaced Parthenon art
•• 12.1 Pros and cons of restitution
Acquisition
In December of 1798, Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin, was appointed as "Ambassador Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of His Britannic Majesty to the Sublime Porte of Selim III, Sultan of Turkey". Prior to his departure to take up the post he had approached at least three officials of the British government to inquire if they would be interested in employing artists to take casts and drawings of the sculptured portions of the Parthenon. According to Lord Elgin, "the answer of the Government... was entirely negative."[5]
Lord Elgin decided to carry out the work at his own expense and employed artists to take casts and drawings under the supervision of the Neapolitan court painter Giovani Lusieri.[5] However, while conducting surveys, he found that Parthenon statuary that had been documented in a 17th century survey was now missing, and so he investigated. According to a Turkish local, marble sculptures that fell were burned to obtain lime for building.[5] Although the original intention was only to document the sculptures, in 1801 Lord Elgin began to remove material from the Parthenon and its surrounding structures[12] under the supervision of Lusieri.
The excavation and removal was completed in 1812 at a personal cost of £74,240 (about $4 million in today's currency).[13] Elgin intended the marbles for display in the British Museum, selling them to the British government for less than the cost of bringing them to Britain and declining higher offers from other potential buyers, including Napoleon.[12]
Description
Main articles: Parthenon Frieze and Metopes of the Parthenon
The Elgin Marbles include some 17 figures from the statuary from the east and west pediments, 15 (of an original 92) of the metope panels depicting battles between the Lapiths and the Centaurs, as well as 247 feet (of an original 524 feet) of the Parthenon Frieze which decorated the horizontal course set above the interior architrave of the temple. As such, they represent more than half of what now remains of the surviving sculptural decoration of the Parthenon. Elgin's acquisitions also included objects from other buildings on the Athenian Acropolis: a Caryatid from Erechtheum; four slabs from the frieze of the Temple of Athena Nike; and a number of other architectural fragments of the Parthenon, Propylaia, Erechtheum, the Temple of Athena Nike and the Treasury of Atreus.
Legality of the removal from Athens
As the Acropolis was still an Ottoman military fort, Elgin required permission to enter the site, including the Parthenon and the surrounding buildings. He allegedly obtained from the Sultan a firman to allow his artists access to the site. The original document is now lost, but what is said to be a translated Italian copy made at the time still survives.[14] Vassilis Demetriades, Professor of Turkish Studies at the University of Crete, has argued that "any expert in Ottoman diplomatic language can easily ascertain that the original of the document which has survived was not a firman",[15] and its authenticity has been challenged.[16]
The document was recorded in an appendix of an 1816 parliamentary committee report. The committee had convened to examine a request by Elgin asking the British government to purchase the marbles. The report claimed that the document[17] in the appendix was an accurate translation in English of an Ottoman firman dated in July 1801. In Elgin's view it amounted to an Ottoman authorization to remove the marbles. The committee was told that the original document was given to Ottoman officials in Athens in 1801, but researchers have so far failed to locate any traces of it despite the fact that the Ottoman archives still hold an outstanding number of similar documents dating from the same period.[16] Moreover the parliamentary record shows that the Italian copy of the firman was not presented to the committee by Elgin himself but by one of his associates, the clergyman Rev. Philip Hunt. Hunt, who at the time resided in Bedford, was the last witness to appear before the committee and claimed that he had in his possession an Italian translation of the Ottoman original. He went on to explain that he had not brought the document, because, upon leaving Bedford, he was not aware that he was to testify as a witness. The English document in the parliamentary report was filed by Hunt, but the committee was not presented with the Italian translation purportedly in his possession. William St. Clair, a contemporary biographer of Lord Elgin, claimed to possess Hunt's Italian document and "vouches for the accuracy of the English translation". In addition, the committee report states on page 69 "(Signed with a signet.) Seged Abdullah Kaimacan". But the document presented to the committee was "an English translation of this purported translation into Italian of the original firman",[18] and had neither signet nor signature on it, a fact corroborated by St. Clair.[16] The lines pertaining to the removal of the marbles allowed Elgin and his team to fix scaffolding, make drawings, make mouldings in chalk or gypsum, measure the remains of the ruined buildings and excavate the foundations which may have become covered in the [ghiaja]; and "...that when they wish to take away [qualche] pieces of stone with old inscriptions or figures thereon, that no opposition be made thereto". The interpretation of these lines has been questioned even by non-restitutionalists,[19] particularly the word qualche, which in modern language is translated as some. According to non-restitutionalists, further evidence that the removal of the sculptures by Elgin was approved by the Ottoman authorities is shown by a second firman which was required for the shipping of the marbles from the Piraeus.[20]
Despite the controversial firman, many have questioned the legality of Elgin's actions. A study by Professor David Rudenstine of the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law concluded that the premise that Elgin obtained legal title to the marbles, which he then transferred to the British government, "is certainly not established and may well be false".[21] Rudenstine's argumentation is partly based on a translation discrepancy he noticed between the surviving Italian document and the English text submitted by Hunt to the parliamentary committee. The text from the committee report reads "We therefore have written this Letter to you, and expedited it by Mr. Philip Hunt, an English Gentleman, Secretary of the aforesaid Ambassador" but according to the St. Clair Italian document the actual wording is "We therefore have written this letter to you and expedited it by N.N.". In Rudenstine's, view this substitution of "Mr. Philip Hunt" with the initials "N.N." can hardly be a simple mistake. He further argues that the document was presented after the committee's insistence that some form of Ottoman written authorization for the removal of the marbles was provided, a fact known to Hunt by the time he testified. Thus, according to Rudenstine, "Hunt put himself in a position in which he could simultaneously vouch for the authenticity of the document and explain why he alone had a copy of it fifteen years after he surrendered the original to Ottoman officials in Athens". On two earlier occasions, Elgin stated that the Ottomans gave him written permissions more than once, but that he had "retained none of them." Hunt testified on March 13, and one of the questions asked was "Did you ever see any of the written permissions which were granted to [Lord Elgin] for removing the Marbles from the Temple of Minerva?" to which Hunt answered "yes", adding that he possessed an Italian translation of the original firman. Nonetheless, he did not explain why he had retained the translation for 15 years, whereas Elgin, who had testified two weeks earlier, knew nothing about the existence of any such document.[16]
In contrast, Professor John Merryman, Sweitzer Professor of Law and also Professor of Art at Stanford University, putting aside the discrepancy presented by Rudenstine, argues that since the Ottomans had controlled Athens since 1460, their claims to the artifacts were legal and recognizable. The Ottoman sultan was grateful to the British for repelling Napoleonic expansion, and the Parthenon marbles had no sentimental value to him.[12] Further, that written permission exists in the form of the firman, which is the most formal kind of permission available from that government, and that Elgin had further permission to export the marbles, legalizes his (and therefore the British Museum's) claim to the Marbles.[20][citation needed] He does note, though, that the clause concerning the extent of Ottoman authorization to remove the marbles "is at best ambiguous", adding that the document "provides slender authority for the massive removals from the Parthenon... The reference to 'taking away any pieces of stone' seems incidental, intended to apply to objects found while excavating. That was certainly the interpretation privately placed on the firman by several of the Elgin party, including Lady Elgin. Publicly, however, a different attitude was taken, and the work of dismantling the sculptures on the Parthenon and packing them for shipment to England began in earnest. In the process, Elgin's party damaged the structure, leaving the Parthenon not only denuded of its sculptures but further ruined by the process of removal. It is certainly arguable that Elgin exceeded the authority granted in the firman in both respects".[19]
Contemporary reaction
When the marbles were shipped to England, they were "an instant success among many"[5] who admired the sculptures and supported their arrival, but both the sculptures and Elgin also received criticism from detractors. Lord Elgin began negotiations for the sale of the collection to the British Museum in 1811, but negotiations failed despite the support of British artists[5] after the government showed little interest. Many Britons opposed the statues because they were in bad condition and therefore did not display the "ideal beauty" found in other sculpture collections.[5] The following years marked an increased interest in classical Greece, and in June 1816, after parliamentary hearings, the House of Commons offered £35,000 in exchange for the sculptures. Even at the time the acquisition inspired much debate, although it was supported by "many persuasive calls" for the purchase.[5]
Lord Byron didn't care for the sculptures, calling them "misshapen monuments".[22] He strongly objected to their removal from Greece, denouncing Elgin as a vandal.[6] His view of the removal of the Marbles from Athens is also reflected in his poem "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage":[23]
Dull is the eye that will not weep to see
Thy walls defaced, thy mouldering shrines removed
By British hands, which it had best behoved
To guard those relics ne'er to be restored.
Curst be the hour when from their isle they roved,
And once again thy hapless bosom gored,
And snatch'd thy shrinking gods to northern climes abhorred!
Byron was not the only one to protest against the removal at the time:
"The Honourable Lord has taken advantage of the most unjustifiable means and has committed the most flagrant pillages. It was, it seems, fatal that a representative of our country loot those objects that the Turks and other barbarians had considered sacred," said Sir John Newport.[13]
A parliamentary committee investigating the situation concluded that the monuments were best given "asylum" under a "free government" such as the British one.[5] In 1810, Elgin published a defence of his actions which silenced most of his detractors,[4] although the subject remained controversial.[citation needed] John Keats was one of those who saw them privately exhibited in London, hence his two sonnets about the marbles. Notable supporters of Elgin included the painter Benjamin Robert Haydon.[5]
A public debate in Parliament followed Elgin's publication, and Elgin's actions were again exonerated. Parliament purchased the marbles for the nation in 1816 by a vote of 82-30 for £35,000.[6] They were deposited in the British Museum, where they were displayed in the Elgin Saloon (constructed in 1832), until the Duveen Gallery was completed in 1939. Crowds packed the British Museum to view the sculptures, setting attendance records for the museum.[5] William Wordsworth viewed the marbles at the museum and commented favorably on their aesthetics.[24]
Damage
Some of the Marbles were damaged prior to Lord Elgin's obtaining them.
Use as a Christian church
After the conversion of the Greek people to Christianity the Parthenon was eventually converted from a temple of the Virgin (Parthenos) Athena to a holy temple (hieros naos) of the Virgin Mary.[25] The church of the Parthenon and Athens in general was considered the fourth most important pilgrimage in the Eastern Roman Empire, after Constantinople, Ephesos and Thessalonica.[26] The temple's use as a Christian church constitutes the single longest period of its history (ca. 500–1450 AD) and its importance as a church and Christian pilgrimage was greater than that it enjoyed in Ancient Greece.[27] During this period, frescoes and inscriptions were added to the marble walls and columns as it was a custom of the era's pilgrim to mark their visit.[25] Altogether some 220 funerary inscriptions survive for the years 600-1200, though many more were probably lost due to structural damage to the building and erosion of the surface.[25] Similar inscriptions were found in the Propylaia as well as on the church of St. George in the Keramykos, which in antiquity was a temple of Hephaistos and is today called the Theseion.[28] From 1205 to 1456 Athens was ruled by Western Crusaders and the church was converted into a Latin cathedral, although the stream of pilgrims continued.[29]
Morosini
Another example of prior damage is that sustained during wars. It is during these periods that the Parthenon and its artwork have sustained by far the most extensive damage. In particular, an explosion ignited by Venetian gun and cannon fire bombardment in 1687, whilst the Parthenon was used as a munitions store during the Ottoman rule, destroyed or damaged many pieces of Parthenon art including some of those later taken by Lord Elgin.[30] In particular this explosion sent the marble roof, most of the cella walls, 14 columns from the north and south peristyles and carved metopes and frieze blocks flying and crashing to the ground and thus destroyed much of the artwork.Further damage was made to the art of the Parthenon by the Venetian general Francesco Morosini when he subsequently looted the site of its larger sculptures. His tackle was faulty and snapped, dropping an over life-sized Poseidon and the horses of Athena's chariot from the west pediment to the rock of the Acropolis forty feet below.[31]
War of Independence
The Erechtheum was used as a munitions store by the Ottomans during the Greek War of Independence[32] (1821–1833) which ended the 350-year Ottoman rule of Athens.
The Acropolis was besieged twice during the Greek War of Independence, once by the Greek and once by the Ottoman forces. During the siege the Greeks were aware of the dilemma and chose to offer the besieged Ottoman forces, who were attempting to melt the lead in the columns to cast bullets, bullets of their own if they would leave the Parthenon undamaged.[33]
Elgin
Elgin consulted with sculptor Antonio Canova in 1803 about how best to restore the marbles. Canova was considered by some to be the world's best sculptural restorer of the time; Elgin wrote that Canova declined to work on the marbles for fear of damaging them further.[5]
To facilitate transport by Elgin, the column capital of the Parthenon and many metopes and slabs were either hacked off the main structure or sawn and sliced into smaller sections causing irreparable damage to the Parthenon itself to which these Marbles were connected.[34] One shipload of marbles on board the British brig Mentor was caught in a storm off Cape Matapan and sank near Kythera, but was salvaged at the Earl's personal expense;[35] it took two years to bring them to the surface.
British Museum
The artifacts held in London suffered from 19th century pollution—which persisted until the mid-20th century[37] — and they have been irrevocably damaged[38] by previous cleaning methods employed by British Museum staff.
As early as 1838, scientist Michael Faraday was asked to provide a solution to the problem of the deteriorating surface of the marbles. The outcome is described in the following excerpt from the letter he sent to Henry Milman, a commissioner for the National Gallery.[39][40]
The marbles generally were very dirty ... from a deposit of dust and soot. ... I found the body of the marble beneath the surface white. ... The application of water, applied by a sponge or soft cloth, removed the coarsest dirt. ... The use of fine, gritty powder, with the water and rubbing, though it more quickly removed the upper dirt, left much imbedded in the cellular surface of the marble. I then applied alkalis, both carbonated and caustic; these quickened the loosening of the surface dirt ... but they fell far short of restoring the marble surface to its proper hue and state of cleanliness. I finally used dilute nitric acid, and even this failed. ... The examination has made me despair of the possibility of presenting the marbles in the British Museum in that state of purity and whiteness which they originally possessed.
A further effort to clean the marbles ensued in 1858. Richard Westmacott, who was appointed superintendent of the "moving and cleaning the sculptures" in 1857, in a letter approved by the British Museum Standing Committee on 13 March 1858 concluded[41]
'I think it my duty to say that some of the works are much damaged by ignorant or careless moulding — with oil and lard — and by restorations in wax, and wax and resin. These mistakes have caused discolouration. I shall endeavour to remedy this without, however, having recourse to any composition that can injure the surface of the marble
Yet another effort to clean the marbles occurred in the years 1937–38. This time the incentive was provided by the construction of a new Gallery to house the collection. The Pentelic marble, from which the sculptures are made, naturally acquires a tan colour similar to honey when exposed to air; this colouring is often known as the marble's "patina"[42] but Lord Duveen, who financed the whole undertaking, acting under the misconception that the marbles were originally white[43] probably arranged for the team of masons working in the project to remove discoloration from some of the sculptures. The tools used were seven scrapers, one chisel and a piece of carborundum stone. They are now deposited in the British Museum's Department of Preservation.[43][44] The cleaning process scraped away some of the detailed tone of many carvings.[45] According to Harold Plenderleith, the surface removed in some places may have been as much as one-tenth of an inch (2.5 mm).[43]
The British Museum has responded to these allegations with the statement that "mistakes were made at that time."[38] On another occasion it was said that "the damage had been exaggerated for political reasons" and that "the Greeks were guilty of excessive cleaning of the marbles before they were brought to Britain."[44] During the international symposium on the cleaning of the marbles, organised by the British Museum, Dr Ian Jenkins, deputy keeper of Greek and Roman antiquities, remarked that "The British Museum is not infallible, it is not the Pope. Its history has been a series of good intentions marred by the occasional cock-up, and the 1930s cleaning was such a cock-up". Nonetheless, he pointed out that the prime cause for the damage inflicted upon the marbles was the 2000 year long weathering on the Acropolis[46]
Dorothy King, in a newspaper article, claimed that techniques similar to the ones used in 1937-1938 were applied by Greeks as well in more recent decades than the British, and maintained that Italians still find them acceptable.[12] Attention has been drawn by the British Museum to a purportedly similar cleaning of the temple of Hephaistos in the Athenian Agora carried out by the conservation team of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens[47] with steel chisels and brass wire in 1953.[35] According to the Greek ministry of Culture, the cleaning was carefully limited to surface salt crusts.[46] The 1953 American report concluded that the techniques applied were aimed at removing the black deposit formed by rain-water and "brought out the high technical quality of the carving" revealing at the same time "a few surviving particles of colour".[47]
According to documents released by the British Museum under the Freedom of Information Act, a series of minor accidents, thefts and acts of vandalism by visitors have inflicted further damage to the sculptures.[48] This includes an incident in 1961 when two schoolboys knocked off a part of a centaur's leg. In June 1981, a west pediment figure was slightly chipped by a falling glass skylight, and in 1966 four shallow lines were scratched on the back of one of the figures by vandals. During a similar mishap in 1970, letters were scratched on to the upper right thigh of another figure. Four years later, the dowel hole in a centaur's hoof was damaged by thieves trying to extract pieces of lead.[48]
Athens
While the levels of nitrogen oxide, nitrogen dioxide, and particulate matter pollution in Athens are average compared to other European cites,[49] air pollution and acid rain have caused damage to marble and stonework at the Parthenon.[50] The last remaining slabs from the western section of the Parthenon frieze were removed from the monument in 1993 for fear of further damage.[51] They have now been transported to the New Acropolis Museum.[50]
Until cleaning of the remaining marbles was completed in 2005,[52] black crusts and coatings were present on the marble surface.[53] The laser technique applied on the 14 slabs that Elgin did not remove revealed a surprising array of original details such as the original chisel marks and the veins on the horses' bellies. Similar features in the British Museum collection have been scraped and scrubbed with chisels to make the marbles look white.[54] Between January 20 and the end of March 2008, 4200 items (sculptures, inscriptions small terracotta objects), including some 80 artifacts dismantled from the monuments in recent years, were removed from the old museum on the Acropolis to the new Parthenon Museum.[55][56] Natural disasters have also affected the Parthenon. In 1981, an earthquake caused damage to the east facade.[57]
Since 1975, Greece has been restoring the Acropolis. This restoration has included replacing the thousands of rusting iron clamps and supports that had previously been used, with non-corrosive titanium rods;[58] removing surviving artwork from the building into storage and subsequently into a new museum built specifically for the display of the Parthenon art; and replacing the artwork with high-quality replicas. This process has come under fire from some groups as some buildings have been completely dismantled, including the dismantling of the Temple of Athena Nike and for the unsightly nature of the site due to the necessary cranes and scaffolding.[58] But the hope is to restore the site to some of its former glory, which may take another 20 years and 70 million euros, though the prospect of the Acropolis being "able to withstand the most extreme weather conditions — earthquakes" is "little consolation to the tourists visiting the Acropolis" according to The Guardian.[58] Directors of the British Museum have not ruled out temporarily loaning the marbles to the new museum, but state that it would be under the condition of Greece acknowledging British ownership.[13]
Ownership debate
Rationale for returning to Athens
Defenders of the request for the Marble's return claim that the marbles should be returned to Athens on moral and artistic grounds. The arguments include:
• The main stated aim of the Greek campaign is to reunite the Parthenon sculptures around the world in order to restore "organic elements" which "at present remain without cohesion, homogeneity and historicity of the monument to which they belong" and allow visitors to better appreciate them as a whole;[59][60]
• Presenting all the extant Parthenon Marbles in their original historical and cultural environment would permit their "fuller understanding and interpretation";[60]
• Precedents have been set with the return of fragments of the monument by Sweden,[61] the University of Heidelberg, Germany,[62] the Getty Museum in Los Angeles.[62] and the Vatican[63];
• That the marbles may have been obtained illegally and hence should be returned to their rightful owner;[64]
• Returning the Elgin Marbles would not set a precedent for other restitution claims because of the distinctively "universal value" of the Parthenon.[65]
• Safekeeping of the marbles would be ensured at the New Acropolis Museum, situated to the south of the Acropolis hill. It was built to hold the Parthenon sculpture in natural sunlight that characterises the Athenian climate, arranged in the same way as they would have been on the Parthenon. The museum's facilities have been equipped with state-of-the-art technology for the protection and preservation of exhibits [66]
Rationale for retaining in London
A range of different arguments have been presented by scholars[13], political-leaders and British Museum spokespersons over the years in defence of retention of the Elgin Marbles within the British Museum. The main points include:
• the maintenance of a single worldwide-oriented cultural collection, all viewable in one location, thereby serving as a world heritage centre. The British Museum is a creative and living achievement of the Enlightenment, while the Parthenon, on the other hand, is a ruin that can never now be restored.[48]
• the assertion that fulfilling all restitution claims would empty most of the world's great museums – this has also caused concerns among other European and American museums, with one potential target being the famous bust of Nefertiti in Berlin's Altes Museum;[13] in addition, portions of Parthenon marbles are kept by many other European museums, so the Greeks would then establish a precedent to claim these other artworks;[12]
• scholars agree that the marbles were saved from what would have been severe damage from pollution and other factors, which could have perhaps destroyed the marbles,[12] if they had been located in Athens the past few hundred years;[13]
• experts agree that Greece could mount no court case because Elgin was granted permission by what was then Greece's ruling government and a legal principle of limitation would apply, i.e. the ability to pursue claims expires after a period of time prescribed by law;[13]
• More than half the original marbles are lost and therefore the return of the Elgin Marbles could never complete the collection in Greece. In addition, many of the marbles are too fragile to travel from London to Athens;[13]
• display in the British museum puts the sculptures in a European artistic context, alongside the work of art which both influenced and was influenced by Greek sculpture. This allows parallels to be drawn with the art of other cultures;[67]
• the notion that the Parthenon sculptures are an item of global rather than solely Greek significance strengthens the argument that they should remain in a museum which is both free to visit, and located in Europe's most visited and largest city. The government of Greece intends to charge visitors of the New Acropolis Museum, where they can view the marbles (as of 2010 the price is five Euros),
• a legal position that the museum is banned by charter from returning any part of its collection.[68]
The latter was tested in the British High Court in May 2005 in relation to Nazi-looted Old Master artworks held at the museum; it was ruled that these could not be returned.[69] The judge, Sir Andrew Morritt, ruled that the British Museum Act – which protects the collections for posterity – cannot be overridden by a "moral obligation" to return works known to have been plundered. It has been argued, however, that connections between the legal ruling and the Elgin Marbles were more tenuous than implied by the Attorney General.[70] However, despite the British Museum's charter preventing the repatriation of items within its collection, a 2005 bill concerning the repatriation of ancestral remains allowed for the return of Aboriginal human remains to Tasmania after a 20-year battle with Australia.[71]
Another argument for maintaining their location within the UK has been made by J. H. Merryman, Sweitzer Professor of Law at Stanford University and co-operating professor in the Stanford Art Department. He argued that if the Parthenon were actually being restored, there would be a moral argument for returning the Marbles to the temple whence they came, and thus restoring its integrity. The Guardian has written that many repatrionists imply that the marbles would be displayed in their original position on the Parthenon.[12] However, the Greek plan is to transfer them from a museum in London to one in Athens. The sculptures which Elgin spared have been taken down and put in the New Acropolis Museum. "Is it more spiritually satisfying to see the Marbles in an Athenian museum gallery than one in London?"[50] Other voices, this time in the House of Lords, have raised more acute concerns about the fate of the Elgin Marbles if they were to be returned to Greece. In an exchange on 19 May 1997, Lord Wyatt, stated:
My Lords, is the Minister aware that it would be dangerous to return the marbles to Athens because they were under attack by Turkish and Greek fire in the Parthenon when they were rescued and the volatile Greeks might easily start hurling bombs around again?[72]
Public perception of the issue
Neologisms
The practice of plundering artifacts from their original setting is sometimes referred to as 'elginism',[73][74][75][76] while the claim, sometimes used by looters and collectors, that they are trying to rescue the artifacts they recover has become known as the "Elgin Excuse".[77]
Opinion polls
Despite the British Museum's position on its ownership of the marbles, in 1998, a poll carried out by Ipsos MORI asking "If there were a referendum on whether or not the Elgin Marbles should be returned to Greece, how would you vote?" returned these values from the general adult population:[78]
• 40% in favour of returning the marbles to Greece
• 15% in favour of keeping them at the British Museum
• 18% would not vote
• 27% had no opinion
A more recent opinion poll in 2002 (again carried out by MORI) showed similar results, with 40% in favour of returning the marbles to Greece, 16% in favour of keeping them within Britain and the remainder either having no opinion or would not vote.[79] When asked how they would vote if a number of conditions were met (including, but not limited to, a long-term loan where by the British maintained ownership and joint control over maintenance) the number responding in favour of return increased to 56% and those in favour of keeping them dropped to 7%.
Both MORI poll results have been characterised by proponents of the return of the Marbles to Greece as representing a groundswell of public opinion supporting return, since the proportion explicitly supporting return to Greece significantly exceeds the number who are explicitly in favour of keeping the Marbles at the British Museum.[78][80]
Popular support for restitution
An internet campaign site [81], in part sponsored by Metaxa aims to consolidate support for the return of the Elgin Marbles to the New Acropolis Museum in Athens.
Other displaced Parthenon art
The remainder of the surviving sculptures that are not in museums or storerooms in Athens are held in museums in various locations across Europe. The British Museum also holds additional fragments from the Parthenon sculptures acquired from various collections that have no connection with Lord Elgin.
The collection held in the British Museum includes the following material from the Acropolis:
• Parthenon: 247 ft (75 m) of the original 524 ft (160 m) of frieze
•• 15 of the 92 metopes
•• 17 pedimental figures; various pieces of architecture
• Erechtheion: a Caryatid, a column and other architectural members
• Propylaia: Architectural members
• Temple of Athena Nike: 4 slabs of the frieze and architectural members
Further reading
• Mary Beard, The Parthenon (Profile Books, 2004) ISBN 978-1-86197-301-6
• Marc Fehlmann, "Casts and Connoisseurs. The Early Reception of the Elgin Marbles" (Apollo, June 2007, pp. 44–51)[82]
• Jeanette Greenfield 'The Return of Cultural Treasures'(Cambridge University Press 2007)
• Christopher Hitchens, Imperial Spoils: The Curious Case of the Elgin Marbles (with essays by Robert Browning and Graham Binns) (Verso, March 1998)
• Ian Jenkins, The Parthenon Frieze (British Museum Press, 2002)
• Dorothy King, The Elgin Marbles (Hutchinson, January 2006)
• François Queyrel, Le Parthénon, Un monument dans l'Histoire (Bartillat, 2008) ISBN 978-2-84100-435-5.
• William St Clair, Lord Elgin and the Marbles (Oxford University Press, 1998)
See also
• Greece – United Kingdom relations
References
• ^ "What are the 'Elgin Marbles'?". britishmuseum.org. http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/article_index/w/what_are_the_elgin_marbles.aspx. Retrieved 2009-05-12.
• ^ "Elgin Marbles — Greek sculpture". Encyclopædia Britannica. http://www.britannica.com/eb/topic-184554/Elgin-Marbles. Retrieved 2009-05-12.
• ^ www.athensguide.com/elginmarbles. http://www.athensguide.com/elginmarbles.
• ^ a b Encycolopedia Britannica, Elgin Marbles, 2008, O.Ed.
• ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Casey, Christopher (October 30, 2008). ""Grecian Grandeurs and the Rude Wasting of Old Time": Britain, the Elgin Marbles, and Post-Revolutionary Hellenism". Foundations. Volume III, Number 1. http://ww2.jhu.edu/foundations/?p=8. Retrieved 2009-06-25.
• ^ a b c Encyclopedia Britannica, The Acropolis, p.6/20, 2008, O.Ed.
• ^ Linda Theodorou; Facaros, Dana (2003). Greece (Cadogan Country Guides). Cadogan Guides. p. 55. ISBN 1-86011-898-4.
• ^ Dyson, Stephen L. (2004). Eugenie Sellers Strong: portrait of an archaeologist. London: Duckworth. ISBN 0-7156-3219-1.
• ^ Mark Ellingham, Tim Salmon, Marc Dubin, Natania Jansz, John Fisher, Greece: The Rough Guide,Rough Guides, 1992,ISBN 1-85828-020-6, p.39
• ^ Chester Charlton McCown, The Ladder of Progress in Palestine: A Story of Archaeologic
1. Most view: Oiiiiiii
2. Most favorites: Olivetti Letera 31
3. Most comments: WAW ~ Blythe in Profile
4. Personal favorite: Diga "xis"!
This is the north aisle, facing the west end. The rood screen is mostly 15th century, unlike that in the nave, which is a later reproduction to match.
Oh dear - the Flickr stats gremlin has struck AGAIN. The 1,500 hits earlier this evening have mysteriously shrunk to a paltry 3. GRRRRR
See more photos of this, and the Wikipedia article.
Details, quoting from Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Boeing B-29 Superfortress "Enola Gay":
Boeing's B-29 Superfortress was the most sophisticated propeller-driven bomber of World War II and the first bomber to house its crew in pressurized compartments. Although designed to fight in the European theater, the B-29 found its niche on the other side of the globe. In the Pacific, B-29s delivered a variety of aerial weapons: conventional bombs, incendiary bombs, mines, and two nuclear weapons.
On August 6, 1945, this Martin-built B-29-45-MO dropped the first atomic weapon used in combat on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later, Bockscar (on display at the U.S. Air Force Museum near Dayton, Ohio) dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. Enola Gay flew as the advance weather reconnaissance aircraft that day. A third B-29, The Great Artiste, flew as an observation aircraft on both missions.
Transferred from the United States Air Force.
Manufacturer:
Date:
1945
Country of Origin:
United States of America
Dimensions:
Overall: 900 x 3020cm, 32580kg, 4300cm (29ft 6 5/16in. x 99ft 1in., 71825.9lb., 141ft 15/16in.)
Materials:
Polished overall aluminum finish
Physical Description:
Four-engine heavy bomber with semi-monoqoque fuselage and high-aspect ratio wings. Polished aluminum finish overall, standard late-World War II Army Air Forces insignia on wings and aft fuselage and serial number on vertical fin; 509th Composite Group markings painted in black; "Enola Gay" in black, block letters on lower left nose.
Long Description:
Boeing's B-29 Superfortress was the most sophisticated, propeller-driven, bomber to fly during World War II, and the first bomber to house its crew in pressurized compartments. Boeing installed very advanced armament, propulsion, and avionics systems into the Superfortress. During the war in the Pacific Theater, the B-29 delivered the first nuclear weapons used in combat. On August 6, 1945, Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, Jr., in command of the Superfortress Enola Gay, dropped a highly enriched uranium, explosion-type, "gun-fired," atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later, Major Charles W. Sweeney piloted the B-29 Bockscar and dropped a highly enriched plutonium, implosion-type atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. Enola Gay flew as the advance weather reconnaissance aircraft that day. On August 14, 1945, the Japanese accepted Allied terms for unconditional surrender.
In the late 1930s, U. S. Army Air Corps leaders recognized the need for very long-range bombers that exceeded the performance of the B-17 Flying Fortress. Several years of preliminary studies paralleled a continuous fight against those who saw limited utility in developing such an expensive and unproven aircraft but the Air Corps issued a requirement for the new bomber in February 1940. It described an airplane that could carry a maximum bomb load of 909 kg (2,000 lb) at a speed of 644 kph (400 mph) a distance of at least 8,050 km (5,000 miles). Boeing, Consolidated, Douglas, and Lockheed responded with design proposals. The Army was impressed with the Boeing design and issued a contract for two flyable prototypes in September 1940. In April 1941, the Army issued another contract for 250 aircraft plus spare parts equivalent to another 25 bombers, eight months before Pearl Harbor and nearly a year-and-a-half before the first Superfortress would fly.
Among the design's innovations was a long, narrow, high-aspect ratio wing equipped with large Fowler-type flaps. This wing design allowed the B-29 to fly very fast at high altitudes but maintained comfortable handling characteristics during takeoff and landing. More revolutionary was the size and sophistication of the pressurized sections of the fuselage: the flight deck forward of the wing, the gunner's compartment aft of the wing, and the tail gunner's station. For the crew, flying at extreme altitudes became much more comfortable as pressure and temperature could be regulated. To protect the Superfortress, Boeing designed a remote-controlled, defensive weapons system. Engineers placed five gun turrets on the fuselage: a turret above and behind the cockpit that housed two .50 caliber machine guns (four guns in later versions), and another turret aft near the vertical tail equipped with two machine guns; plus two more turrets beneath the fuselage, each equipped with two .50 caliber guns. One of these turrets fired from behind the nose gear and the other hung further back near the tail. Another two .50 caliber machine guns and a 20-mm cannon (in early versions of the B-29) were fitted in the tail beneath the rudder. Gunners operated these turrets by remote control--a true innovation. They aimed the guns using computerized sights, and each gunner could take control of two or more turrets to concentrate firepower on a single target.
Boeing also equipped the B-29 with advanced radar equipment and avionics. Depending on the type of mission, a B-29 carried the AN/APQ-13 or AN/APQ-7 Eagle radar system to aid bombing and navigation. These systems were accurate enough to permit bombing through cloud layers that completely obscured the target. The B-29B was equipped with the AN/APG-15B airborne radar gun sighting system mounted in the tail, insuring accurate defense against enemy fighters attacking at night. B-29s also routinely carried as many as twenty different types of radios and navigation devices.
The first XB-29 took off at Boeing Field in Seattle on September 21, 1942. By the end of the year the second aircraft was ready for flight. Fourteen service-test YB-29s followed as production began to accelerate. Building this advanced bomber required massive logistics. Boeing built new B-29 plants at Renton, Washington, and Wichita, Kansas, while Bell built a new plant at Marietta, Georgia, and Martin built one in Omaha, Nebraska. Both Curtiss-Wright and the Dodge automobile company vastly expanded their manufacturing capacity to build the bomber's powerful and complex Curtiss-Wright R-3350 turbo supercharged engines. The program required thousands of sub-contractors but with extraordinary effort, it all came together, despite major teething problems. By April 1944, the first operational B-29s of the newly formed 20th Air Force began to touch down on dusty airfields in India. By May, 130 B-29s were operational. In June, 1944, less than two years after the initial flight of the XB-29, the U. S. Army Air Forces (AAF) flew its first B-29 combat mission against targets in Bangkok, Thailand. This mission (longest of the war to date) called for 100 B-29s but only 80 reached the target area. The AAF lost no aircraft to enemy action but bombing results were mediocre. The first bombing mission against the Japanese main islands since Lt. Col. "Jimmy" Doolittle's raid against Tokyo in April 1942, occurred on June 15, again with poor results. This was also the first mission launched from airbases in China.
With the fall of Saipan, Tinian, and Guam in the Mariana Islands chain in August 1944, the AAF acquired airbases that lay several hundred miles closer to mainland Japan. Late in 1944, the AAF moved the XXI Bomber Command, flying B-29s, to the Marianas and the unit began bombing Japan in December. However, they employed high-altitude, precision, bombing tactics that yielded poor results. The high altitude winds were so strong that bombing computers could not compensate and the weather was so poor that rarely was visual target acquisition possible at high altitudes. In March 1945, Major General Curtis E. LeMay ordered the group to abandon these tactics and strike instead at night, from low altitude, using incendiary bombs. These firebombing raids, carried out by hundreds of B-29s, devastated much of Japan's industrial and economic infrastructure. Yet Japan fought on. Late in 1944, AAF leaders selected the Martin assembly line to produce a squadron of B-29s codenamed SILVERPLATE. Martin modified these Superfortresses by removing all gun turrets except for the tail position, removing armor plate, installing Curtiss electric propellers, and modifying the bomb bay to accommodate either the "Fat Man" or "Little Boy" versions of the atomic bomb. The AAF assigned 15 Silverplate ships to the 509th Composite Group commanded by Colonel Paul Tibbets. As the Group Commander, Tibbets had no specific aircraft assigned to him as did the mission pilots. He was entitled to fly any aircraft at any time. He named the B-29 that he flew on 6 August Enola Gay after his mother. In the early morning hours, just prior to the August 6th mission, Tibbets had a young Army Air Forces maintenance man, Private Nelson Miller, paint the name just under the pilot's window.
Enola Gay is a model B-29-45-MO, serial number 44-86292. The AAF accepted this aircraft on June 14, 1945, from the Martin plant at Omaha (Located at what is today Offut AFB near Bellevue), Nebraska. After the war, Army Air Forces crews flew the airplane during the Operation Crossroads atomic test program in the Pacific, although it dropped no nuclear devices during these tests, and then delivered it to Davis-Monthan Army Airfield, Arizona, for storage. Later, the U. S. Air Force flew the bomber to Park Ridge, Illinois, then transferred it to the Smithsonian Institution on July 4, 1949. Although in Smithsonian custody, the aircraft remained stored at Pyote Air Force Base, Texas, between January 1952 and December 1953. The airplane's last flight ended on December 2 when the Enola Gay touched down at Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland. The bomber remained at Andrews in outdoor storage until August 1960. By then, concerned about the bomber deteriorating outdoors, the Smithsonian sent collections staff to disassemble the Superfortress and move it indoors to the Paul E. Garber Facility in Suitland, Maryland.
The staff at Garber began working to preserve and restore Enola Gay in December 1984. This was the largest restoration project ever undertaken at the National Air and Space Museum and the specialists anticipated the work would require from seven to nine years to complete. The project actually lasted nearly two decades and, when completed, had taken approximately 300,000 work-hours to complete. The B-29 is now displayed at the National Air and Space Museum, Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center.
Two Solo Exhibitions
Exhibition dates: September 26 - November 8, 2009
Artists’ reception: Saturday, September 26, 5-8pm
Smack Mellon is pleased to present Ellen Driscoll’s installation FASTFORWARDFOSSIL: Part 2 and Fernando Souto’s photographic series The End of the Trail. The two concurrent solo exhibitions compress layers of time to explore industries and lifestyles that go beyond geographic borders. Composed of thousands of discarded plastic bottles collected by Ellen Driscoll, FASTFORWARDFOSSIL: Part 2 takes a critical look at the environmental and human damage inflicted by the oil and water industries in the last two centuries on regions as diverse as Nigeria and the United States. During extended trips to cattle ranches in the American West, Australia, and Uruguay, Fernando Souto photographed the fading culture of ranchers, creating black-and-white environmental portraits in the tradition of iconic photographers such as Walker Evans and Robert Frank. Both Driscoll and Souto are intimately tied to their craft—painstakingly cutting up salvaged bottles and printing large-scale silver gelatin photographs—asserting a tactile personal connection in their work.
Ellen Driscoll
FASTFORWARDFOSSIL: Part 2
“This installation is a continuation of a multi-year series which explores the dynamics of resource harvesting and consumption. This part of the series focuses on oil and water. Rising at 5:30 AM, I harvest #2 plastic bottles from the recycling bags put out for collection on the streets of Brooklyn. For one hour, one day at a time, I immerse myself in the tidal wave of plastic that engulfs us by collecting as many bottles as I can carry. The sculptural installation for Smack Mellon comprises 2600 bottles transformed into a 28 foot landscape. Constructed solely of harvested #2 plastic, the sculpture collapses three centuries into a ghostly translucent visual fugue in which a nineteenth century trestle bridge plays host to an eighteenth century water-powered mill which spills a twenty-first century flood from its structure. The flow contains North American, Middle Eastern, and African landmasses (sites of oil harvesting and their consumer destination) buoyed by a sea of plastic water molecules. The piece looks back to eighteenth century American industry powered by water, and forward to the oil refineries of the Niger Delta, site of prolonged guerilla warfare against oil corporations and the source of over fifty percent of crude oil for the United States—the oil that produces the plastic within which our privatized water is currently bought and sold.
The wall drawings in the exhibition are based on a close study of the inner workings of an oil refinery. By using huge shifts of scale between the macro and the micro, they depict a dystopic future based on rampant oil consumption. An oil rig shares the horizon with ocean fires and garbage scows, mega shopping malls are abandoned to spontaneous communities of slums, and a refugee camp is inundated by the waters of a melting glacier. The worlds in the drawings are drained of color, but filled with the flux and spillage of a potentially chaotic future.”
Ellen Driscoll is a sculptor whose work includes FASTFORWARDFOSSIL: Part 1 at Frederieke Taylor Gallery, Revenant and Phantom Limb for Nippon Ginko, Hiroshima, Japan, The Loophole of Retreat at the Whitney Museum, Phillip Morris, As Above, So Below for Grand Central Terminal (a suite of 20 mosaic and glass images for the tunnels at 45th, 47th, and 48th Streets), Catching the Drift, a restroom for the Smith College Museum of Art, and Wingspun for the International Arrivals Terminal at Raleigh-Durham airport. Ms. Driscoll has been awarded fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Bunting Institute at Harvard University, the New York Foundation for the Arts, the Massachusetts Council on the Arts, the LEF Foundation, and Anonymous Was a Woman. Her work is included in major public and private collections including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum of Art. She is a Professor of Sculpture at Rhode Island School of Design.
Smack Mellon
92 Plymouth Street @ Washington
Brooklyn, NY 11201
Gallery hours are Wednesday-Sunday, 12-6pm.
Related SML
+ SML Flickr Collections: Events
+ SML Flickr Sets: Dumbo Arts Center: Art Under the Bridge Festival 2009
Quoting from the official pamphlet:
FAST LIGHT • May 7 + 8, 2011, 7 pm - 10 pm
Contemporary pioneers in art, science, and technology have come together at MIT to create one of the most exhilarating and inventive spectacles metro Boston has ever seen. On May 7 and 8, 2011, visitors can interact with 20+ art and architectural installations illuminating the campus and the Charles River along Memorial Drive at MIT.
Installations scattered around campus (we didn't quite see all of them), again pasting from the official flyer:
• aFloat
MIT Chapel • Saturday, May 7th ONLY
Inspired by water in the Saarinen Chapel's moat, a touch releases flickers of light before serenity returns as a calm ripple.
By Otto Ng, Ben Regnier, Dena Molnar, and Arseni Zaitsev.
• Inflatables
Lobby 7, Infinite Corridor
A dodecahedron sculpture made of silver nylon resonates with gusts of air, heat from light bulbs, and the motions of passersby.
By Kyle Barker, Juan Jofre, Nick Polansky, Jorge Amaya.
• (now(now(now)))
Building 7, 4th Floor
This installation nests layers of the past into an image of the present, recursively intertwining slices of time.
By Eric Rosenbaum and Charles DeTar.
• Dis(Course)4
Building 3 Stair, Infinite Corridor
A stairwell transformed by a shummering aluminum conduit inspired by the discourse between floors and academic disciplines.
By Craig Boney, Jams Coleman and Andrew Manto.
• Maxwell's Dream
Building 10 Community Lounge, Infinite Corridor
An interactive mural created by magnetic fields that drive patterns of light, Maxwell's Dream is a visually expressive cybernetic loop.
By Kaustuv De Biswas and Daniel Rosenberg.
• Mood Meter
Student Center & Building 8, Infinite Corridor
Is the smile a barometer of happiness? Mood Meter playfully assesses and displays the mood of the MIT community onsite and at moodmeter.media.mit.edu
By Javier Hernandez and Ehsan Hoque.
• SOFT Rockers
Killian Court
Repose and charge your electronic devices using green solar powered technology
By Shiela Kennedy, P. Seaton, S. Rockcastle, W. Inam, A. Aolij, J. Nam, K. Bogenshutz, J. Bayless, M. Trimble.
• LightBridge
The Mass. Ave Bridge
A dynamic interactive LED array responds to pedestrians on the bridge, illustrating MIT's ties to both sides of the river. Thanks to Philips ColorKinetics, CISCO, SparkFun Electronics.
By Sysanne Seitinger.
• Sky Event
Killian Court, Saturday, May 7th ONLY
Immense inflatable stars soar over MIT in celebration of the distinctive symbiosis among artists, scientists and engineers.
By Otto Piene.
• Liquid Archive
Charles River
A floating inflatable screen provides a backdrop for projections that highlight MIT's history in science, technology, and art.
By Nader Tehrani and Gediminas Urbonas.
• Light Drift
Charles River
Ninety brightly glowing orbs in the river change color as they react to the presence of people along the shore.
By Meejin Yoon.
• Unflat Pavilion
Building 14 Lawn
This freestanding pavilion illuminated with LEDs flexes two dimensions into three. Flat sheets are bent and unfurl into skylights, columns, and windows.
By Nick Gelpi
• Gradated Field
Walker Memorial Lawn
A field of enticing mounts create a landscape that encourages passersby to meander through, or lounge upon the smooth plaster shapes.
By Kyle Coburn, Karina Silvester and Yihyun Lim.
• Bibliodoptera
Building 14, Hayden Library Corridor
Newly emerged from the chrysalis of MIT's diverse library pages, a cloud of butterflies flutters above, reacting to the movement of passersby.
By Elena Jessop and Peter Torpey.
• Wind Screen
Green Building Facade, Bldg 54
A shimmering curtain of light created by micro-turbines displays a visual register of the replenishable source of wind energy.
By Meejin Yoon.
• String Tunnel
Building 18 Bridge
A diaphonous tunnel creates a sense of entry to and from the Infinite Corridor and frames the surrounding landscape.
By Yuna Kim, Kelly Shaw, and Travis Williams.
• voltaDom
Building 56-66 Connector
A vaulted passageway utilizes an innovative fabrication technique that creates complex double curved vaults through the simple rolling of a sheet of material.
By Skylar Tibbits.
• Night of Numbers
Building 66 Facade & E15 Walkway
A lighting installation enlivens MIT architectre with numbers that hold special or historical significance to the Institute. Can you decode them all?
By Praveen Subramani and Anna Kotova.
• Overliner
Building E-25 Stairwell
Taking cues from a stairwell's spiraling geometry, Overliner transforms a familiar and busy passageway into a moment of surprise and repose.
By Joel Lamere and Cynthia Gunadi.
• Chroma District
Corner of Ames and Main Streets.
Lanterns react to visitors by passing sound and color from one to another, increasing in intensity along the way and illuminating the path to MIT's campus.
By Eyal Shahar, Akito van Troyer, and Seung Jin Ham.
See also Agata Olek talks about her 100% Acrylic Art Guards (Flickr 720p HD video)
Agata Olek (Flickr)
100% Acrylic Art Guards
"I think crochet, the way I create it, is a metaphor for the complexity and interconnectedness of our body and its systems and psychology. The connections are stronger as one fabric as opposed to separate strands, but, if you cut one, the whole thing will fall apart.
Relationships are complex and greatly vary situation to situation. They are developmental journeys of growth, and transformation. Time passes, great distances are surpassed and the fabric which individuals are composed of compiles and unravels simultaneously."
Agata Olek Biography. The SPLAT! of colors hits you in the face, often clashing so ostentatiously that it instantly tunes you into the presence of severely cheeky humor. A moment later the fatigue of labor creeps into your fingers as a coal miner's work ethic becomes apparent. Hundreds of miles of crocheted, weaved, and often recycled materials are the fabric from which the wild and occasionally wearable structures of her fantasylands are born.
Olek was born Agata Oleksiak in Poland and graduated from Adam Mickiewicz University in Poland with a degree in cultural studies. In New York, she rediscovered her ability to crochet and since then she has started her crocheted journey/madness.
Resume sniffers may be pleased to know Olek's work has been presented in galleries from Brooklyn to Istanbul to Venice and Brazil, featured in "The New York Times", "Fiberarts Magazine", "The Village Voice", and "Washington Post" and drags a tail of dance performance sets and costumes too numerous to mention.
Olek received the Ruth Mellon Award for Sculpture, was selected for 2005 residency program at Sculpture Space, 2009 residency in Instituto Sacatar in Brazil, and is a winner of apex art gallery commercial competition. Olek was an artist in an independent collective exhibition, "Waterways," during the 49th Venice Biennale. She was also a featured artist in "Two Continents Beyond," at the 9th International Istanbul Biennale.
Olek herself however can be found in her Greenpoint studio with a bottle of spiced Polish vodka and a hand rolled cigarette aggressively re-weaving the world as she sees.
13th annual D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® (Sept 25 to Sept 27, 2009)
www.dumboartfestival.org/press_release.html
The three-day multi-site neighborhood-wide event is a one-of-a-kind art happening: where serendipity meets the haphazard and where the unpredictable, spontaneous and downright weird thrive. The now teenage D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival® presents touchable, accessible, and interactive art, on a scale that makes it the nation's largest urban forum for experimental art.
Art Under the Bridge is an opportunity for young artists to use any medium imaginable to create temporary projects on-the-spot everywhere and anywhere, completely transforming the Dumbo section of Brooklyn, New York, into a vibrant platform for self-expression. In addition to the 80+ projects throughout the historical post-industrial waterfront span, visitors can tour local artists' studios or check out the indoor video_dumbo, a non-stop program of cutting-edge video art from New York City and around the world.
The Dumbo Arts Center (DAC) has been the exclusive producer of the D.U.M.B.O Art Under the Bridge Festival® since 1997. DAC is a big impact, small non-profit, that in addition to its year-round gallery exhibitions, is committed to preserving Dumbo as a site in New York City where emerging visual artists can experiment in the public domain, while having unprecedented freedom and access to normally off-limit locations.
Related SML
+ SML Flickr Collections: Events
+ SML Flickr Sets: Dumbo Arts Center: Art Under the Bridge Festival 2009
Quoting Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Arado Ar 234 B-2 Blitz (Lightning):
The Arado Ar 234 B Blitz (Lightning) was the world's first operational jet bomber and reconnaissance aircraft. The first Ar 234 combat mission, a reconnaissance flight over the Allied beachhead in Normandy, took place August 2, 1944. With a maximum speed of 735 kilometers (459 miles) per hour, the Blitz easily eluded Allied piston-engine fighters. While less famous than the Messerschmitt Me 262 jet fighters, the Ar 234s that reached Luftwaffe units provided excellent service, especially as reconnaissance aircraft.
This Ar 234 B-2 served with bomber unit KG 76 from December 1944 until May 1945, when British forces captured it in Norway. Turned over to the United States, it was brought to Wright Field, Ohio, in 1946 for flight testing. In 1949 it was transferred to the Smithsonian, which restored it in 1984-89. This Arado is the sole survivor of its type.
Transferred from the United States Air Force.
Manufacturer:
Date:
1944
Country of Origin:
Germany
Dimensions:
Wingspan: 14.4 m (47 ft 4 in)
Length: 12.6 m (41 ft 6 in)
Height: 4.3 m (14 ft 2 in)
Weight, empty: 4,900 kg (10,800 lb)
Weight, gross: 10,010 kg (22,070 lb) with RATO (rocket-assisted takeoff) units
Top speed: 735 km/h (459 mph)
Materials:
Overall: Aluminum
Physical Description:
Single seat, twin engine jet bomber with RATO.
The tower was struck by lightning in 1577, which caused the spire to collapse and brought down a large section of the nave roof. The knapped flint they dressed the lower courses with was either dispensed with in the rebuilding, or possibly poorly set in the mortar, so the join between the old and new is easily visible.
Oh dear - what has happened to Flickr's stats counter? By yesterday evening I'd had about 1100 hits and then by around 10 o'clock, it dropped to a mere 2. This morning it's still insisting that I only had 51 hits all day yesterday... Is there any point grumbling to Flickr - and how would I do so?
PS It took a day, but I'm happy to say Flickr restored my missing stats, which became 1300+ rather than 51. Thank you!
Here I had a chance to do a kind of photomontage that I've wanted to try for a while, where I can sit in the same spot for a few hours and capture snippets of things that happened over time. In this case, the opportunity was a minor league baseball game at McCoy Stadium in Pawtucket, RI, where the "Pawsox" played the Columbus Clippers.
Here, we have everything from Bill Littlefield of WBUR's Only a Game sports news show having thrown the ceremonial first pitch, to the field attendants "painting" the word "Pawsox" in the dirt behind home plate, to the Pawsox replacing their pitcher, to a pitch, the delivery, and a batter about to swing at the ball. I then have the Red Sox team walking off the field after the game, and the pitcher being interviewed by a reporter about his victory.
Meanwhile, the same day, former Boston/Pawtucket star Jim Rice was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame up in Cooperstown, NY. For obvious reasons, this was unable to be included here, but believe me I tried to think of a way.
Annoyingly, the one thing I didn't think to get a picture of was the final scoreboard. Oh well, suffice to say the Pawtucket Red Sox defeated the Columbus Clippers 3-2, which is nice, because it sounds like they had been on a losing streak recently.
It was also my son's first baseball game, and he seemed to have a good time :-)
Thank You for Your Visit, Have a Nice Day is a performance piece by Agata Olek (Facebook / Flickr / Portfolio) created for Art in Odd Places:SIGN, an annual festival exploring the odd, ordinary and ingenious in the spectacle of daily life.
Curated by Erin Donnelly and Radhika Subramaniam
Director of AIOP: Ed Woodham
Artist Statement
"Inspired by a uniformed attendant holding the sign Hold the Handrail in a Taipei metro station, I've created this moving installation/performance piece. In wearable sculptures of multicolored crocheted camouflage, my performers appear in various sites on 14th Street, displaying photographs of signs I've collected from different countries that are in emphatic, ironic or amused dialogue with their location."
See also video by Technology Artist filmed on the same day at www.youtube.com/watch?v=KfjXrKQVwPU
More information about the festival
Press
+ Timeout New York: Fall Preview 2009
+ Timeout New York: Own this City
Related SML Univese
+ SML Fine Art (Flickr Group) (FriendFeed / Twitter)
North and south views around Boston Common from the Soldiers and Sailors Monument on Flag Staff Hill.
Here, we're looking roughly south. The brown skyscraper at the left edge is near Government Center, which is roughly northeast from this view; the middle horizon cuts across the Financial District and Chinatown, then the Theatre District and South End, with some of Back Bay to the southwest at the right horizon, including the John Hancock and Prudential buildings through the trees & sun.
The "straight" walkway in the foreground is actually a circular ring going around the monument, but ended up looking roughly straight in the panorama view.
Quoting from the official pamphlet:
FAST LIGHT • May 7 + 8, 2011, 7 pm - 10 pm
Contemporary pioneers in art, science, and technology have come together at MIT to create one of the most exhilarating and inventive spectacles metro Boston has ever seen. On May 7 and 8, 2011, visitors can interact with 20+ art and architectural installations illuminating the campus and the Charles River along Memorial Drive at MIT.
Installations scattered around campus (we didn't quite see all of them), again pasting from the official flyer:
• aFloat
MIT Chapel • Saturday, May 7th ONLY
Inspired by water in the Saarinen Chapel's moat, a touch releases flickers of light before serenity returns as a calm ripple.
By Otto Ng, Ben Regnier, Dena Molnar, and Arseni Zaitsev.
• Inflatables
Lobby 7, Infinite Corridor
A dodecahedron sculpture made of silver nylon resonates with gusts of air, heat from light bulbs, and the motions of passersby.
By Kyle Barker, Juan Jofre, Nick Polansky, Jorge Amaya.
• (now(now(now)))
Building 7, 4th Floor
This installation nests layers of the past into an image of the present, recursively intertwining slices of time.
By Eric Rosenbaum and Charles DeTar.
• Dis(Course)4
Building 3 Stair, Infinite Corridor
A stairwell transformed by a shummering aluminum conduit inspired by the discourse between floors and academic disciplines.
By Craig Boney, Jams Coleman and Andrew Manto.
• Maxwell's Dream
Building 10 Community Lounge, Infinite Corridor
An interactive mural created by magnetic fields that drive patterns of light, Maxwell's Dream is a visually expressive cybernetic loop.
By Kaustuv De Biswas and Daniel Rosenberg.
• Mood Meter
Student Center & Building 8, Infinite Corridor
Is the smile a barometer of happiness? Mood Meter playfully assesses and displays the mood of the MIT community onsite and at moodmeter.media.mit.edu
By Javier Hernandez and Ehsan Hoque.
• SOFT Rockers
Killian Court
Repose and charge your electronic devices using green solar powered technology
By Shiela Kennedy, P. Seaton, S. Rockcastle, W. Inam, A. Aolij, J. Nam, K. Bogenshutz, J. Bayless, M. Trimble.
• LightBridge
The Mass. Ave Bridge
A dynamic interactive LED array responds to pedestrians on the bridge, illustrating MIT's ties to both sides of the river. Thanks to Philips ColorKinetics, CISCO, SparkFun Electronics.
By Sysanne Seitinger.
• Sky Event
Killian Court, Saturday, May 7th ONLY
Immense inflatable stars soar over MIT in celebration of the distinctive symbiosis among artists, scientists and engineers.
By Otto Piene.
• Liquid Archive
Charles River
A floating inflatable screen provides a backdrop for projections that highlight MIT's history in science, technology, and art.
By Nader Tehrani and Gediminas Urbonas.
• Light Drift
Charles River
Ninety brightly glowing orbs in the river change color as they react to the presence of people along the shore.
By Meejin Yoon.
• Unflat Pavilion
Building 14 Lawn
This freestanding pavilion illuminated with LEDs flexes two dimensions into three. Flat sheets are bent and unfurl into skylights, columns, and windows.
By Nick Gelpi
• Gradated Field
Walker Memorial Lawn
A field of enticing mounts create a landscape that encourages passersby to meander through, or lounge upon the smooth plaster shapes.
By Kyle Coburn, Karina Silvester and Yihyun Lim.
• Bibliodoptera
Building 14, Hayden Library Corridor
Newly emerged from the chrysalis of MIT's diverse library pages, a cloud of butterflies flutters above, reacting to the movement of passersby.
By Elena Jessop and Peter Torpey.
• Wind Screen
Green Building Facade, Bldg 54
A shimmering curtain of light created by micro-turbines displays a visual register of the replenishable source of wind energy.
By Meejin Yoon.
• String Tunnel
Building 18 Bridge
A diaphonous tunnel creates a sense of entry to and from the Infinite Corridor and frames the surrounding landscape.
By Yuna Kim, Kelly Shaw, and Travis Williams.
• voltaDom
Building 56-66 Connector
A vaulted passageway utilizes an innovative fabrication technique that creates complex double curved vaults through the simple rolling of a sheet of material.
By Skylar Tibbits.
• Night of Numbers
Building 66 Facade & E15 Walkway
A lighting installation enlivens MIT architectre with numbers that hold special or historical significance to the Institute. Can you decode them all?
By Praveen Subramani and Anna Kotova.
• Overliner
Building E-25 Stairwell
Taking cues from a stairwell's spiraling geometry, Overliner transforms a familiar and busy passageway into a moment of surprise and repose.
By Joel Lamere and Cynthia Gunadi.
• Chroma District
Corner of Ames and Main Streets.
Lanterns react to visitors by passing sound and color from one to another, increasing in intensity along the way and illuminating the path to MIT's campus.
By Eyal Shahar, Akito van Troyer, and Seung Jin Ham.
Nicolas Flamel showed up in the first Harry Potter book. JK Rowling seemed to want to base the series at least partially in reality. (Apparently, Flamel also showed up in The Da Vinci Code too, but somehow I missed that reference.)
Interestingly, more recent photos show that the facade has changed significantly since we were there in December 2003: by May 2006 renovations had begun, and by September 2009, in addition to the stonework being cleaned up, the gothic "Auberge Nicolas Flamel" inscription over the ground floor has been removed, as has the lamp and red sign, and it looks like the doors & windows have been replaced.
Obligatory WIkipedia writeup follows:
* * * * *
Nicolas Flamel (French pronunciation: [nikɔlɑ flaˈmɛl]) (early 1330-1418 or 2009, as some say) was a successful French scrivener and manuscript-seller who developed a posthumous reputation as an alchemist due to his reputed work on the philosopher's stone.
According to the introduction to his work and additional details that have accrued since its publication, Flamel was the most accomplished of the European alchemists, and had learned his art from a Jewish converso on the road to Santiago de Compostela. "Others thought Flamel was the creation of 17th-century editors and publishers desperate to produce modern printed editions of supposedly ancient alchemical treatises then circulating in manuscript for an avid reading public," Deborah Harkness put it succinctly.[1] The modern assertion that many references to him or his writings appear in alchemical texts of the 1500s, however, has not been linked to any particular source. The essence of his reputation is that he succeeded at the two magical goals of alchemy -- that he made the Philosophers' Stone, found on page 14 of the Book of Abraham the Mage, which turns lead into gold, and that he and his wife Perenelle achieved immortality through the "Elixer of Life" found on Page 7 of the Book of Abraham the Mage.
Life
Nicolas and his wife, Perenelle were devout Roman Catholics. Later in life they were noted for their wealth and philanthropy as well as multiple interpretations on modern day alchemy.
An alchemical book, published in Paris in 1612 as Livre des figures hiéroglypiques and in London in 1624 as Exposition of the Hieroglyphicall Figures was attributed to Flamel.[2] It is a collection of designs purportedly commissioned by Flamel for a tympanum at the Cimetière des Innocents in Paris, long disappeared at the time the work was published. In the publisher's introduction Flamel's search for the philosopher's stone was described. According to that introduction, Flamel had made it his life's work to understand the text of a mysterious 21-page book he had purchased. The introduction claims that, around 1378, he travelled to Spain for assistance with translation. On the way back, he reported that he met a sage, who identified Flamel's book as being a copy of the original Book of Abraham the Mage. With this knowledge, over the next few years, Flamel and his wife allegedly decoded enough of the book to successfully replicate its recipe for the Philosopher's Stone, producing first silver in 1382, and then gold.
Flamel lived into his 80s, and in 1410 designed his own tombstone, which was carved with arcane alchemical signs and symbols. Some believe that he died shortly after the tombstone was created. Later, according to popular culture, a local criminal (possibly a tomb robber) who wished to acquire Flamel's reputed gold went to Flamel's residence. Finding nothing, but undeterred, he was said then to have gone to the gravesite with only a spade and a lantern, and dug up the grave. Upon opening the coffin, he was disappointed to find an absence of gold, but shocked to find no trace of the corpse of Nicolas Flamel.[citation needed] Some claim that it was just the grave of the wrong person who was not dead at the time, while others claim that he faked his own death, citing as evidence the fact that long after 1410 several books were published in his name.[citation needed] The tombstone is preserved at the Musée de Cluny in Paris.
Expanded accounts of his life are legendary. In addition to the mysterious book of 21 pages filled with encoded alchemical symbols and arcane writing, he may also have studied some texts in Hebrew. Interest in Flamel revived in the 19th century, and Victor Hugo mentioned him in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Eric Satie was intrigued by Flamel.[3] Flamel is often referred to in late twentieth-century fictional works such as the Harry Potter and The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel books and movies as well as The Da Vinci Code.
Death
Flamel's death was recorded in 1418, but his tomb is empty. Rumors spread that Nicolas Flamel never actually died and is still alive today, since people have claimed to have seen him and his wife roaming around Paris; Witnesses claimed to have seen him in 1761 at an opera in Paris.[citation needed]
Flamel's house, where he lived with his wife Perenelle Flamel, an alchemist in her own right, still stands in Paris, at 51 rue de Montmorency, and is the oldest house in the city. The ground floor currently contains a restaurant. A Paris road near the Louvre Museum, the rue Nicolas Flamel, has been named for him; it intersects with the rue Perenelle, named for his wife.
In popular culture
• The plot of Shadow of Destiny for the PS2 follows that of the story of Nicholas Flamel. In that game, an alchemist becomes obsessed with finding the philosopher's stone after his wife dies of an illness. The game features multiple endings, one of which allows the alchemist to save his wife by forming the Elixir of Life from the philosopher's stone, while others involve him obtaining eternal youth for himself.
• Nicolas Flamel's story is alluded to in J. K. Rowling's first Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone(1997), in which he is something of a MacGuffin; though he is the clue to the whole mystery of the book, he never actually makes an appearance. He was friends with Albus Dumbledore and is said to have lived for six-hundred and sixty-five years until the Philosopher's Stone was destroyed following the events of the book.[4]
• Flamel has been alleged to be the eighth Grand Master of the Priory of Sion (1398-1418) as part of a 1960s intrigue where his name was planted in the French National Library in the Dossiers Secrets. This resulted in him being mentioned in the 1982 pseudohistory book The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, Umberto Eco's 1988 novel Foucault's Pendulum, and Dan Brown's 2003 novel, The Da Vinci Code. Many of the names of "Grand Masters" were evidently chosen for some sort of connection with alchemy.
• Nicolas and his wife Perenelle Flamel are important characters mentioned in the Indiana Jones story Indiana Jones and the Philosopher's Stone by Max McCoy (1995), and an elderly couple named "Nicolas and Pernelle" save Indy during one scene, before professing to have followed Jones's career closely.
• Nicolas and his wife are central characters in Michael Scott's seriesThe Alchemyst: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel, The Magician: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel, The Sorceress: The Secrets Of The Immortal Nicholas Flamel ,and "The Necromancer: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel" . Also the book of Abraham the Mage is a focus in the series, called The Codex.
• He is the subject of Michael Roberts' poem "Nicholas Flamel", collected in These Our Matins (1930).
• The concept album Grand Materia (2005) by the Swedish metal band Morgana Lefay is about Nicolas Flamel, his life, and how he made the Philosopher's Stone.
• Flamel was once referenced in the anime Fullmetal Alchemist, when Edward Elric was researching alchemy in Central. The symbol on Edward Elric's coat is also known as a "Flamel."
• In the DC comics universe, Zatanna is a direct descendant of Flamel.
• Nicolas Flamel is also a character in the 1999 novel "The Burning Road" by Ann Benson. The Book of Abraham also plays a significant role in the novel.
• Nicolas Flamel is referenced in The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, père, when the title character is discussing chemistry, poisons, and alchemy with Madame de Villefort.
• Flamel is mentioned as possessing the Book of Abraham in Dennis Wheatley's novel about black magic, "The Devil Rides Out".
• Flamel is mentioned as Claude Frollo's scientific inspiration in Victor Hugo's The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Frollo seems to be obsessed with Flamel's work with the Philosopher's Stone.
• Flamel, Paracelsus, and Raymond Lull are described as "the magicians and alchemists of the Middle Ages" (62) in the 1885 sci-fi classic Tomorrow's Eve by Villiers de l'Isle-Adam (trans. Robert Martin Adams; University of Illinois Press, 1982).
• In the book series The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel by Michael Scott, he is one of the main characters, and so is his wife, Perenelle.
See also
• Alchemy
• Magic
• Gold
Notes
1. ^ Harkness, review of Dixon 1994 in Isis 89.1 (1998) p. 132.
2. ^ Laurinda Dixon, ed., Nicolas Flamel, his Exposition of the Hieroglyphicall Figures (1624) (New York: Garland) 1994.
3. ^ Wilkins 1993.
4. ^ JKRowling web page - rumour section
References
• Decoding the Past: The Real Sorcerer's Stone, November 15, 2006 History Channel video documentary
• The Philosopher's Stone: A Quest for the Secrets of Alchemy, 2001, Peter Marshall, ISBN 0-330-48910-0
• Creations of Fire, Cathy Cobb & Harold Goldwhite, 2002, ISBN 0-7382-0594-X
• The Alchemyst: The Secrets of The Immortal Nicholas Flamel, Michael Scott, 2007, ISBN 9780739350324
• Parashpathor(Philosopher's Stone) : A Bengali fiction by Adrish Bardhan,2008
• The Magician: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel, Michael Scott, 2008
• The Sorceress: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel, Micheal Scott, 2009
• Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone JK Rowling,1997
External links
• An explanation of some of the alchemical figures on Flamel's tomb
• Flamel Technology French based company named after the alchemist includes a biography of his life and major accomplishments
• Reginald Merton, "A Detailed Biography of Nicolas Flamel" Highly detailed legend.
• The Alchemy Web Site, "The Hieroglyphic Figures" Contains some of Flamel's writings
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