View allAll Photos Tagged Terrifyingly
Actually I had asked to see the room before checking in, and looked for bed bugs. Didn't see any, so I checked in, went back up to the room, still refrained from placing my gear on the bed, checked the sheet again, AND THERE S/HE WAS. (I'd never seen one IRL before.) Horrified and disappointed (as was tired and sweaty and had been looking forward to a few supercomfy nights after a 12 h train ride and whatnot), I grabbed my gear and ran like hell. With the bed bug in a piece of paper. To the reception. They didn't seem suitably upset, and started to hand me the key to another room. UM, NO THANKS. Apparently it was impossible to give me all the money back; they kept about €10. (But will hopefully have lost more than that once I'm done warning people about their pest problem on Insta and Flickr. *lolz*) "I will review you", I told them, hopefully sounding terrifyingly like a travel blogger with 10 million readers. (I... recently left a very delayed Google review.)
I could find no other accommodation in town (or in Cinque Terre, which was what I was really after), so I Interrailed on. To little Monterosso, where I slept on a station bench, which was painful, but approximately 100000000000000000 times better than getting bed bugs. (And 100000000 times better than paying for Monterosso's €100 "hostel".) In the morning I went to Genova, checked into the rather good Castle Hostel, and fucking commuted to Cinque Terre for a couple of days. I finally went swimming there, on this my 3rd try. (2011: Period. 2012: Rain.) MANAROLA was the place to swim!
PS. I don't always tag photos with animal names in the local language, but when I do... it's done to exact maximal revenge on Hotel Aurora. Tihi. >:B
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Vegan FAQ! :)
The Web Site the Meat Industry Doesn't Want You to See.
Please watch Earthlings.
Henri Polaklaan 16/12/2014 21h31
One of the most ingenious and mysterious art objects of the 2014/2015 Amsterdam Light Festival are these projections on the Henri Polaklaan on trees and facades between Wertheimpark and Artis Zoo. Slowly moving green objects change into silhouettes of people and disappear in the dark. Hard to take photos of. But at least I tried.
Amsterdam Light Festival
The third edition for this Winter event in the city of Amsterdam. The theme for this year’s festival, ‘A Bright City’, challenges artists to create a tribute to life the city. The resulting artworks present a unique take on the modern city of Amsterdam.
The city will be complemented by light sculptures, projections and installations by contemporary (inter)national artists. The boat route, Water Colors, will take visitors past artworks along Amsterdam’s canals and the Amstel. The walking route, Illuminade, winds through the city center. During the festival, light will play a central role in the city as museums and institutions organize light-related activities, introducing visitors to innovations in light art.
The third edition of the festival will take place from 27 November 2014 to 18 January 2015. The boat route, Water Colors, will take place from 27 November 2014 to 18 January 2015, and the walking route, Illuminade, from 11 December 2014 to 4 January 2015.
www.amsterdamlightfestival.com
Landschapslumen
Artist: Beeldjutters (The Netherlands)
Location: Henri Polaklaan
If you’re going to get lost somewhere, let it be here. This is the Henri Polaklaan, a wonderful street in Amsterdam that (ok, in the summertime at least) is greener than you would expect from a place that’s so centrally located. Trees and shrubs, their ‘feet’ firmly anchored in the ground and their ‘arms’ dancing in the wind, look like they’re from a Tim Burton film set or enchanted by Jim Henson’s magic. This moving land- scape, however, is the work of Julian Buul and Vincent Vriens, the Dutch artist duo that is referred to as the Beeldjutters (or ‘Image Roamers’).
Landschapslumen is the name of this work and it’s not the first time that the duo has created a moving artwork. These projections – combinations of film shots of dancing people and of nature, swaying and rustling in the wind – can be considered their trademark. For example, at Oerol, an annual festival for site-specific theater and landscape arts on the island of Terschelling, they brought the coastal dunes to life. During Into The Great Wide Open on Vlieland they created video projections in the forest and on Ibiza, the duo animated palm trees lining the edge of a pool. The soundscapes that accompany the projections are equally impor- tant as the moving images; often made by composer Joost van Dijk, they mix studio-created sounds and sounds from nature.
Landschapslumen is a cross between location-theater and installation in the public space. Both are intended to provide a completely different context and remove traces of reality. Down to the smallest details, all parts of the installation have been created to achieve this effect. Even the beamers in their weatherproof casing blend into the environment; Vriens and Van Buul have experimented once again with a variety of materials, building boxes using scraps of wood to protect the beamers. In this way the technology isn’t distracting and visitors find themselves enchanted by the sensuous and surreal experience that is the result of walking down this street.
Add to this a whole new experience, that of the strange creatures of nature moving in the night. It reminds us of Indonesian paper shadow puppets that appear as dark silhouettes against white, backlit canvases. One minute they’re terrifyingly large, the next they’re small, but they’re always convincing. You don’t need much to create the perfect illusion.
The beauty of it is that no matter how simple it is, once you’ve seen it, it will stay with you. Amsterdam’s Henri Polaklaan will never be the same after Landschapslumen. The trees will forever dance in the heads of the visitors, even when they’re long gone.
Beeldjutters (The Netherlands)
Beeldjutters is a collaborative project between Julian Van Buul (1984), Vincent Vriens (1977) and composer Joost van Dijk. After studying interactive media at the Utrecht School of Arts, Van Buul founded the company Movesome and now creates video content. Vriens founded the company Victor-Zorro and specializes in video projections. They produced their first installation, Zandlumen, when they met at Atelier Oerol in 2010.
This will definitely startle your date and how do you even clean it? Do you have to store it like you do other fur coats????
This is the long corridor of A Deck. Most of the First Class cabins can be seen here. It's hard to impress how long this corridor is! The Queen Mary is larger and longer than the famous Titanic, and this corridor demonstrates it.
All the decks on the Queen Mary have a slight curve to them. It's not much, but it's enough that in this corridor the end is lost because it's so long that the floor curves up to meet the ceiling. You don't have to believe me, just check out the full size photo.
When the ship first launched, her corridors had no handrails as she was so long her designers thought that she would have minimal roll as her length would "span even the greatest trough between wave".
Unfortunately, it turned out that despite her length the Queen Mary was a roll-prone ship... something that many of her passengers discovered through fatal falls! In rough waters she can roll as much as 30 degress to either side!! More terrifyingly, especially for those who recalled (or were on!) the Titanic she would hang at that 30 degree list for several moments before slowly rolling back again... about 3 seconds after you were sure the ship would capsize! As the old show Red Dwarf put it: definitely brown trouser time!
As a result of the occassional fatality, several injuries, and many terrified passengers, handrails were installed to try and reassure passengers (I'm sure it was a big help. I often seek the comfort of handrails when I think the ship I'm on is going to capsize). The handrails were made of the lightest, strongest material of the time - bakelite, the earliest form of plastic. Fortunately plastic was a bit a novelty so it wasn't seen as a cheap move on management's part. Of course, had the passengers realized the toxic chemicals used to create bakelite one could forgive them if they might have begun to wonder if the management were intentionally trying to kill them.
Somehow the management realized that toxic handrails weren't the greatest comfort and later in the QM's life installed a little thing called stabilizers. (actually, bakelite is pretty safe. The danger is in the chemicals used to produce it, primarily phenol... but it was too good a line to resist!).
At the start of this section I said that the Queen Mary is significantly larger and longer than the famous Titanic and that this corridor demonstrates that and so it does: this corridor is nearly as long as the total length of the Titanic.
Kathmandu Durbar Square or Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square is the plaza in front of the old royal palace of the then Kathmandu Kingdom. It is one of three Durbar (royal palace) Squares in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, all of which are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
The Durbar Square is surrounded with spectacular architecture and vividly showcases the skills of the Newar artists and craftsmen over several centuries. The royal palace was originally at Dattaraya square and was later moved to the Durbar square location.
The Kathmandu Durbar Square holds the palaces of the Malla and Shah kings who ruled over the city. Along with these palaces, the square surrounds quadrangles revealing courtyards and temples. It is known as Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square, a name derived from a statue of Hanuman, the monkey devotee of Lord Ram, at the entrance of the palace.
HISTORY AND CONSTRUCTION
The preference for the construction of royal palaces at this site dates back to as early as the Licchavi period in the third century. Even though the present palaces and temples have undergone repeated and extensive renovations and nothing physical remains from that period, names like Gunapo and Gupo, which are the names referred to the palaces in the square in early scriptures, imply that the palaces were built by Gunakamadev, a king ruling late in the tenth century. When Kathmandu City became independent under the rule of King Ratna Malla (1484–1520) the palaces in the square became the royal palaces for its Malla kings. When Prithvi Narayan Shah invaded the Kathmandu Valley in 1769, he favored the Kathmandu Durbar Square for his palace. Other subsequent Shah kings continued to rule from the square until 1896 when they moved to the Narayan Hiti Palace.
The square is still the center of important royal events like the coronation of King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah in 1975 and King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah in 2001.
Though there are no written archives stating the history of Kathmandu Durbar Square, construction of the palace in the square is credited to Sankharadev (1069–1083). As the first king of the independent Kathmandu City, Ratna Malla is said to have built the Taleju temple in the Northern side of the palace in 1501. For this to be true then the temple would have had to have been built in the vihara style as part of the palace premise surrounding the Mul Chok courtyard for no evidence of a separate structure that would match this temple can be found within the square.
Construction of the Karnel Chok is not clearly stated in any historical inscriptions; although, it is probably the oldest among all the courtyards in the square. The Bhagavati Temple, originally known as a Narayan Temple, rises above the mansions surrounding it and was added during the time of Jagajaya Malla in the early eighteenth century. The Narayan idol within the temple was stolen so Prithvi Narayan Shah replaced it with an image of Bhagavati, completely transforming the name of the temple.
The oldest temples in the square are those built by Mahendra Malla (1560–1574). They are the temples of Jagannath, Kotilingeswara Mahadev, Mahendreswara, and the Taleju Temple. This three-roofed Taleju Temple was established in 1564, in a typical Newari architectural style and is elevated on platforms that form a pyramid-like structure. It is said that Mahendra Malla, when he was residing in Bhaktapur, was highly devoted to the Taleju Temple there; the Goddess being pleased with his devotion gave him a vision asking him to build a temple for her in the Kathmandu Durbar Square. With a help of a hermit, he designed the temple to give it its present form and the Goddess entered the temple in the form of a bee.
His successors Sadasiva (1575–1581), his son, Shiva Simha (1578–1619), and his grandson, Laxmi Narsingha (1619–1641), do not seem to have made any major additions to the square. During this period of three generations the only constructions to have occurred were the establishment of Degutale Temple dedicated to Goddess Mother Taleju by Shiva Simha and some enhancement in the royal palace by Laksminar Simha.
UNDER PRATAP MALLA
In the time of Pratap Malla, son of Laksminar Simha, the square was extensively developed. He was an intellectual, a pious devotee, and especially interested in arts. He called himself a Kavindra, king of poets, and boasted that he was learned in fifteen different languages. A passionate builder, following his coronation as a king, he immediately began enlargements to his royal palace, and rebuilt some old temples and constructed new temples, shrines and stupas around his kingdom. There also took the massacre called Kot Parva where the queen, prime minister, head of the states,and other people with guards died. This massacre took place in the court yard inside the palace.
During the construction of his palace, he added a small entrance in the traditional, low and narrow Newari style. The door was elaborately decorated with carvings and paintings of deities and auspicious sings and was later transferred to the entrance of Mohan Chok. In front of the entrance he placed the statue of Hanuman thinking that Hanuman would strengthen his army and protect his home. The entrance leads to Nasal Chok, the courtyard where most royal events such as coronation, performances, and yagyas, holy fire rituals, take place. It was named after Nasadya, the God of Dance, and during the time of Pratap Malla the sacred mask dance dramas performed in Nasal Chok were widely famed. In one of these dramas, it is said that Pratap Malla himself played the role of Lord Vishnu and that the spirit of the Lord remained in the king's body even after the play. After consulting his Tantric leaders, he ordered a stone image of Lord Vishnu in his incarnation as Nara Simha, the half-lion and half-human form, and then transferred the spirit into the stone. This fine image of Nara Simha made in 1673 still stands in the Nasal Chok. In 1650, he commissioned for the construction of Mohan Chok in the palace. This chok remained the royal residential courtyard for many years and is believed to store a great amount of treasure under its surface. Pratap Malla also built Sundari Chok about this time. He placed a slab engraved with lines in fifteen languages and proclaimed that he who can understand the inscription would produce the flow of milk instead of water from Tutedhara, a fountain set in the outer walls of Mohan Chok. However elaborate his constructions may have been, they were not simply intended to emphasize his luxuries but also his and the importance of others' devotion towards deities. He made extensive donations to temples and had the older ones renovated. Next to the palace, he built a Krishna temple, the Vamsagopala, in an octagonal shape in 1649. He dedicated this temple to his two Indian wives, Rupamati and Rajamati, as both had died during the year it was built. In Mohan Chok, he erected a three roofed Agamachem temple and a unique temple with five superimposing roofs. After completely restoring the Mul Chok, he donated to the adjoining Taleju Temple. To the main temple of Taleju, he donated metal doors in 1670. He rebuilt the Degutale Temple built by his grandfather, Siva Simha, and the Taleju Temple in the palace square. As a substitute to the Indreswara Mahadeva Temple in the distant village of Panauti he built a Shiva temple, Indrapura, near his palace in the square. He carved hymns on the walls of the Jagannath Temple as prayers to Taleju in the form of Kali.
At the southern end of the square, near Kasthamandap at Maru, which was the main city crossroads for early traders, he built another pavilion named Kavindrapura, the mansion of the king of poets. In this mansion he set an idol of dancing Shiva, Nasadyo, which today is highly worshipped by dancers in the Valley.
In the process of beautifying his palace, he added fountains, ponds, and baths. In Sundari Chok, he established a low bath with a golden fountain. He built a small pond, the Naga Pokhari, in the palace adorned with Nagakastha, a wooden serpent, which is said he had ordered stolen from the royal pond in the Bhaktapur Durbar Square. He restored the Licchavi stone sculptures such as the Jalasayana Narayana, the Kaliyadamana, and the Kala Bhairav. An idol of Jalasayana Narayana was placed in a newly created pond in the Bhandarkhal garden in the eastern wing of the palace. As a substitute to the idol of Jalasayana Narayana in Buddhanilkantha, he channeled water from Buddhanilkantha to the pond in Bhandarkhal due bestow authenticity. The Kalyadana, a manifestation of Lord Krishna destroying Kaliya, a water serpent, is placed in Kalindi Chok, which is adjacent to the Mohan Chok. The approximately ten-feet-high image of terrifyingly portrayed Kal Bhairav is placed near the Jagannath Temple. This image is the focus of worship in the chok especially during Durga Puja.
With the death of Pratap Malla in 1674, the overall emphasis on the importance of the square came to a halt. His successors retained relatively insignificant power and the prevailing ministers took control of most of the royal rule. The ministers encountered little influence under these kings and, increasingly, interest of the arts and additions to the square was lost on them. They focused less on culture than Pratap Malla during the three decades that followed his death, steering the city and country more towards the arenas of politics and power, with only a few minor constructions made in the square. These projects included Parthivendra Malla building a temple referred to as Trailokya Mohan or Dasavatara, dedicated to Lord Vishnu in 1679. A large statue of Garuda, the mount of Lord Vishnu, was added in front of it a decade later. Parthivendra Malla added a pillar with image of his family in front of the Taleju Temple.
Around 1692, Radhilasmi, the widowed queen of Pratap Malla, erected the tall temples of Shiva known as Maju Deval near the Garuda image in the square. This temple stands on nine stepped platforms and is one of the tallest buildings in the square. Then her son, Bhupalendra Malla, took the throne and banished the widowed queen to the hills. His death came early at the age of twenty one and his widowed queen, Bhuvanalaksmi, built a temple in the square known as Kageswara Mahadev. The temple was built in the Newari style and acted as a substitute for worship of a distant temple in the hills. After the earthquake in 1934, the temple was restored with a dome roof, which was alien to the Newari architecture.
Jayaprakash Malla, the last Malla king to rule Kathmandu, built a temple for Kumari and Durga in her virginal state. The temple was named Kumari Bahal and was structured like a typical Newari vihara. In his house resides the Kumari, a girl who is revered as the living goddess. He also made a chariot for Kumari and in the courtyard had detailed terra cotta tiles of that time laid down.
UNDER THE SHAH DYNASTY
During the Shah dynasty that followed, the Kathmandu Durbar Square saw a number of changes. Two of the most unique temples in the square were built during this time. One is the Nautale, a nine-storied building known as Basantapur Durbar. It has four roofs and stands at the end of Nasal Chok at the East side of the palace. It is said that this building was set as a pleasure house. The lower three stories were made in the Newari farmhouse style. The upper floors have Newari style windows, sanjhya and tikijhya, and some of them are slightly projected from the wall. The other temple is annexed to the Vasantapur Durbar and has four-stories. This building was initially known as Vilasamandira, or Lohom Chok, but is now commonly known as Basantapur or Tejarat Chok. The lower floors of the Basantapur Chok display extensive woodcarvings and the roofs are made in popular the Mughal style. Archives state that Prthivi Narayan Shah built these two buildings in 1770.
Rana Bahadur Shah was enthroned at the age of two. Bahadur Shah, the second son of Prithvi Narayan Shah, ruled as a regent for his young nephew Rana Bahadur Shah for a close to a decade from 1785 to 1794 and built a temple of Shiva Parvati in the square. This one roofed temple is designed in the Newari style and is remarkably similar to previous temples built by the Mallas. It is rectangular in shape, and enshrines the Navadurga, a group of goddesses, on the ground floor. It has a wooden image of Shiva and Parvati at the window of the upper floor, looking out at the passersby in the square. Another significant donation made during the time of Rana Bahadur Shah is the metal-plated head of Swet Bhairav near the Degutale Temple. It was donated during the festival of Indra Jatra in 1795, and continues to play a major role during the festival every year. This approximately twelve feet high face of Bhairav is concealed behind a latticed wooden screen for the rest of the year. The following this donation Rana Bahadur donated a huge bronze bell as an offering to the Goddess Taleju. Together with the beating of the huge drums donated by his son Girvan Yudha, the bell was rung every day during the daily ritual worship to the goddess. Later these instruments were also used as an alarm system. However, after the death of his beloved third wife Kanimati Devi due to smallpox, Rana Bahadur Shah turned mad with grief and had many images of gods and goddesses smashed including the Taleju statue and bell, and Sitala, the goddess of smallpox.
In 1908, a palace, Gaddi Durbar, was built using European architectural designs. The Rana Prime Ministers who had taken over the power but not the throne of the country from the Shahs Kings from 1846 to 1951 were highly influenced by European styles. The Gaddi Durbar is covered in white plaster, has Greek columns and adjoins a large audience hall, all foreign features to Nepali architecture. The balconies of this durbar were reserved for the royal family during festivals to view the square below.
Some of the parts of the square like the Hatti Chok near the Kumari Bahal in the southern section of the square were removed during restoration after the devastating earthquake in 1934. While building the New Road, the southeastern part of the palace was cleared away, leaving only fragments in places as reminders of their past. Though decreased from its original size and attractiveness from its earlier seventeenth-century architecture, the Kathmandu Durbar Square still displays an ancient surrounding that spans abound five acres of land. It has palaces, temples, quadrangles, courtyards, ponds, and images that were brought together over three centuries of the Malla, the Shah, and the Rana dynasties.
VISITING
Kathmandu's Durbar Square is the site of the Hanuman Dhoka Palace Complex, which was the royal Nepalese residence until the 19th century and where important ceremonies, such as the coronation of the Nepalese monarch, still take place today. The palace is decorated with elaborately-carved wooden windows and panels and houses the King Tribhuwan Memorial Museum and the Mahendra Museum. It is possible to visit the state rooms inside the palace.
Time and again the temples and the palaces in the square have gone through reconstruction after being damaged by natural causes or neglect. Presently there are less than ten quadrangles in the square. The temples are being preserved as national heritage sites and the palace is being used as a museum. Only a few parts of the palace are open for visitors and the Taleju temples are only open for people of Hindu and Buddhist faiths.
At the southern end of Durbar Square is one of the most curious attractions in Nepal, the Kumari Chowk. This gilded cage contains the Raj Kumari, a girl chosen through an ancient and mystical selection process to become the human incarnation of the Hindu mother goddess, Durga. She is worshiped during religious festivals and makes public appearances at other times for a fee paid to her guards.
WIKIPEDIA
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I N F O R M A C I Ó N D E L A P R O D U C C I Ó N
SINOPSIS CORTA
Cuando cuatro tipos poco convencionales descubren lo que hacen los grandes bancos, los
medios y los reguladores gubernamentales al ignorar el inminente colapso de la economía global, se les
ocurre una idea: La Gran Apuesta. Sus audaces inversiones los llevan al lado oscuro de la industria
bancaria moderna, donde deben cuestionar a todas las personas y todas las cosas. Basada en una
historia verdadera y el libro best seller de Michael Lewis (The Blind Side, Moneyball), dirigida por Adam
McKay (Anchorman, Step Brothers), La Gran Apuesta es protagonizada por Christian Bale, Steve Carell,
Ryan Gosling y Brad Pitt.
SINOPSIS LARGA
En 2005 MICHAEL BURRY (Christian Bale), un excéntrico administrador de mesa de dinero
y entusiasta de la música heavy metal que vive en San José, estudia miles de créditos individuales
agrupados en bonos hipotecarios de alta clasificación y descubre algo sorprendente: los productos
financieros están cargados con préstamos inmobiliarios falaces con vencimiento en los siguientes años.
Mientras los banqueros de Wall Street y las agencias reguladoras del gobierno ignoran esta bomba de
tiempo que ya comenzó su cuenta regresiva, Burry inventa un instrumento financiero llamado permuta
de incumplimiento crediticio con objeto de “acortar” el floreciente mercado inmobiliario, lo cual
consterna mucho a los propietarios e inversionistas de su fondo de cobertura.
Cuando JARED VENNETT (Ryan Gosling), un joven y eficiente banquero de Wall Street,
deduce la estrategia de Burry, utiliza una torre de inestables bloques Jenga para persuadir al irascible
administrador de fondos de cobertura MARK BAUM (Steve Carell) de que él también debe invertir
millones en permutas de incumplimiento crediticio. Al principio escéptico, Baum y su entusiasta equipo
de jóvenes analistas (Jeremy Strong, Hamish Linklater y Rafe Spall) hacen su propia investigación. Al
estudiar el mercado inmobiliario en Florida, entrevistan a varios agentes hipotecarios elocuentes que
suelen obtener créditos para compradores evidentemente subcalificados, incluyendo a una bailarina de
un club de strippers que adquirió varias propiedades sin un enganche inicial.
Mientras tanto dos jóvenes administradores de mesa de dinero, JAMIE SHIPLEY (Finn
Wittrock) y CHARLIE GELLER (John Magaro) también descubren la burbuja del mercado
inmobiliario. Ellos desean entrar en las grandes ligas financieras y se decepcionan cuando se enteran de
que su fondo de US$30 millones queda muy por debajo de los requisitos de casi US$1.5 mil millones
necesarios para lograr una silla en la mesa de los adultos. Así que recurren a BEN RICKERT (Brad
Pitt), un banquero convertido en fatalista ambiental, que usa sus conexiones para ayudarlos a que hagan
su propia apuesta contra Wall Street.
Cuando el mercado finalmente explota en 2008, estos inversionistas contrarios ganan miles de
millones, sin embargo quedarán afectados para siempre debido a su experiencia. Y mientras las
instituciones financieras cuya conducta irresponsable causó el problema son rescatadas por los
contribuyentes de Estados Unidos, millones de ciudadanos perdieron sus casas, sus trabajos y sus
ahorros para el retiro en una catástrofe económica cuyos efectos aún se perciben hoy en día.
Paramount Pictures y Regency Enterprises presentan una producción de Plan B
Entertainment, La Gran Apuesta, dirigida por Adam McKay (Step Brothers, Anchorman), protagonizada
por Christian Bale, ganador de un Premio de la Academia®, junto a Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling y Brad
Pitt, todos ellos nominados a un Oscar®. Los productores ejecutivos son Louise Rosner-Meyer (The
Hunger Games, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire) y Kevin Messick (Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues).
Producida por el equipo ganador de un Premio de la Academia: Brad Pitt, Dede Gardner (Selma, 12
Years a Slave), Jeremy Kleiner (Selma, 12 Years a Slave), con Arnon Milchan (Birdman: Or (The Unexpected
Virtue of Ignorance), Fight Club), nominado a un Oscar. El guión es de Charles Randolph (Love & Other
Drugs, The Interpreter) y Adam McKay, basado en el libro The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine
escrito por Michael Lewis (Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, The Blind Side: Evolution
of a Game). El director de fotografía es Barry Ackroyd (Captain Phillips, The Hurt Locker), nominado a
un Oscar. El diseñador de producción es Clayton Hartley (Horrible Bosses 2, We’re the Millers). La edición
es de Hank Corwin (The Tree of Life, Natural Born Killers). La diseñadora de vestuario es Susan Matheson
(Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, Step Brothers) y la música es de Nicholas Britell (A Tale of Love and
Darkness, The Seventh Fire).
ACERCA DE LA PRODUCCIÓN
El escritor y director Adam McKay es mejor conocido como la mente maestra detrás de los
éxitos taquilleros de las comedias de Will Ferrell, entre ellas Step Brothers y Anchorman: The Legend of Ron
Burgundy, así como de “You’re Welcome America”, el espectáculo de Broadway nominado a un Tony
Award®. Sin embargo cinco años atrás, cuando leyó The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine, le
fascinó la idea de realizar un proyecto completamente distinto. Intrigado por la mezcla de comedia,
drama y profunda tragedia en la brillante perspectiva tras bastidores de Michael Lewis sobre el preludio
del colapso económico global, McKay anhelaba tomar un descanso de las comedias ligeras y llevar La
Gran Apuesta a las pantallas de cine.
“Comencé el libro como a las 10:30 de la noche y pensé, ‘Sólo voy a leer 40 páginas’”, recuerda
McKay. “No podía dejar la lectura. Leí toda la noche y acabé el libro a las 6 de la mañana. Ese día le
conté a mi esposa acerca de los personajes y la forma en que la trama entrelaza todas las distintas líneas
argumentales y consigue una ‘rica’ historia que a la larga describe el colapso del sistema bancario, la
corrupción y la complacencia, pero al mismo tiempo es divertida y es conmovedora. Ella me respondió,
‘Debes realizarla’. Le objeté, ‘Soy el tipo que hizo Step Brothers’. Ni siquiera lo considero probable, yo
supongo que Scott Rudin o Plan B ya compraron los derechos de este libro”.
Y de hecho Plan B Entertainment, la compañía de producción de Brad Pitt, se había asociado
con Paramount Pictures para desarrollar La Gran Apuesta como un largometraje. El productor Jeremy
Kleiner descubrió profundas similitudes entre el enfoque del autor Michael Lewis hacia el béisbol y
hacia Wall Street en su libro Money Ball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game. Comenta él, “Money
Ball y La Gran Apuesta abordan temas familiares que las personas creen que entienden, pero plantea
grandes interrogantes”, explica Kleiner. “La Gran Apuesta también tenía este elemento distintivo de
que los protagonistas no son los típicos ‘bienhechores’. Pensamos que esto era muy emocionante, así
que Paramount, nuestro socio, dio un paso adelante y adquirió los derechos. Ellos comenzaron el viaje
por nosotros”.
Una vez que McKay terminó de dirigir la exitosa secuela Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, su
agente le planteó el reto de nombrar la película que más le gustaría dirigir. “Antes de darme cuenta de lo
que decía, respondí, ‘Si pudiera hacer algo, sería La Gran Apuesta’”. Plan B envió a McKay una versión
preliminar del guión escrita por Charles Randolph. “Consideré que el guión tenía cosas buenas, pero
también sabía exactamente cómo mejorarlo”, afirma McKay. “Me reuní con Jeremy y Dede Gardner, el
presidente de Plan B, para presentarles mi propuesta”.
El guión resultante incorporó el agudo ingenio de McKay en una historia acerca de un
momento que definió una era en la historia reciente de Estados Unidos. “La gente me conoce por
películas como Talladega Nights y Anchorman, o por los videos Funny or Die, pero siempre estoy
involucrado en distintas causas”, explica McKay, que dominó la sátira política como escritor principal
de “Saturday Night Live” antes de incursionar en su carrera cinematográfica. “Siento que tu trabajo
como ciudadano es poner atención a lo que ocurre tanto en la política como en la sociedad. Puedes ser
un payaso y ser rociado con botellas de soda, pero también debes votar y conocer lo que ocurre a tu
Los Inconformistas
El libro que emocionó tanto a McKay como a Plan B para realizar una película acerca de los
eventos que derivaron en la crisis bancaria proviene de la mente de Michael Lewis, maestro narrador de
historias de no ficción. Después de trabajar en un gran banco de Wall Street él mismo durante la década
de 1980, Lewis escribió el best seller Liar’s Poker, un libro divertido y revelador que describe el mundo
lucrativo y engañoso de las operaciones de bonos. El autor no tenía planes de escribir una secuela hasta
que ocurrió el colapso financiero en 2008. “Comencé a leer que los grandes bancos parecidos a donde
yo trabajé perdieron cientos de miles de millones de dólares en operaciones del mercado de bonos
hipotecarios de alto riesgo”, recuerda Lewis. “Los bancos pusieron sobre la mesa dinero falso y
perdían enormes cantidades... así que me pregunté, ‘¿Cómo puede ocurrir esto?’”.
En busca de respuestas, Lewis se reunió con ex banqueros inversionistas que se quedaron sin
trabajo después del colapso. “Salimos a tomar una cerveza y me dijeron extra oficialmente, ‘La única
razón por la cual te explico por qué perdí 10 mil millones de dólares en una sola operación es que tú
eres la razón por la que estoy en el negocio. Leí Liar’s Poker y me emocionó tanto que decidí ser
corredor de Wall Street’. Después de algunas conversaciones pensé, ‘¡Jesucristo, yo generé esta crisis!’
Tenía una influencia personal en estos tipos responsables de perder todo este dinero pues ingresaron a
la profesión por el libro que yo escribí. Entonces traté de entender cómo estas instituciones, que son el
corazón del capitalismo, se volvieron semejantes estúpidas e hicieron cosas tan suicidas. Los bancos
como Goldman Sachs están llenos de tipos extremadamente brillantes, bien educados y los mejores
egresados de Harvard, Yale y Princeton”.
Sin embargo, no fueron estos antiguos Amos del Universo de Ivy League los que terminaron
como protagonistas en el libro de Lewis. Más bien él centró su atención sobre los inconformistas que
desafiaron la sabiduría dominante de los bancos, los reguladores gubernamentales y los gurús de los
medios, para apostar todo lo que tenían a una falla sin precedentes del mercado inmobiliario
estadounidense. “Advertí que fueron estos tipos inconformistas de la periferia los que descubrieron la
corrupción que había invadido el sistema”, explica. “Ellos son los hombres que convirtieron mi idea en
el libro La Gran Apuesta y no se quedó simplemente en un artículo para una revista. Los hombres que
apostaron contra los bancos y consiguieron fortunas, ellos fueron los personajes que me interesaron”.
Dinero Inteligente
Uno de los excéntricos tipos poco convencionales fue el Dr. Michael Burry, un neurólogo
ubicado en San José y convertido en administrador de mesa de dinero, con un ojo de vidrio y la
tendencia de ir a trabajar descalzo. Christian Bale, actor ganador del Oscar, se identificó de inmediato
con Burry cuando el elenco se reunió en una sesión maratónica de 9 horas para conocerse antes de la
producción.
“Mike no interactúa mucho con otras personas, pero es uno de los hombres más brillantes,
conmovedores y sinceros que he encontrado”, dice Bale. “Mike estudió miles y miles de hipotecas
individuales con objeto de crear un patrón. Nadie más tuvo la energía para hacer eso. Todos los otros
sólo se divertían y ganaban mucho dinero. Nadie deseaba gritar, ‘Detengan el autobús, me quiero bajar’,
pero Michael sí lo hizo. Él descubrió que esto era un fraude total”.
Con la postura de visionario antisocial que interpreta, Bale no interactuó con las otras estrellas
en La Gran Apuesta. Casi todas sus escenas ocurren frente a una computadora o en una amontonada
sala de grabación donde su personaje libera tensión tocando la batería. “Yo estuve solo en una oficina
durante dos semanas interpretando mi papel, así que cuando vi el resto de la película fue una completa
revelación”, dice el actor británico. “No tenía idea de lo que estaban haciendo, pero ahora que la vi creo
que Adam creó algo enormemente divertido”.
McKay se maravilló de la plena inmersión de Bale dentro del papel. “Burry y Bale comparten
este rasgo cuando ambos se dedican únicamente a trabajar”, dice el director. “La gran concentración y
detalles que Christian aporta a su personaje son increíbles. ¡El primer día de filmación lo vi integrarse
en el papel y ¡boom! Se convirtió en Michael Burry durante el resto de la película, captó su ritmo y sus
rasgos físicos. Como a la mitad del rodaje, después de trabajar con Christian, le pregunté si no se había
cansado de mí después de decirle tantas veces, ‘Estupenda toma’”.
Un ejemplo de la concentración impecable de Bale fue su capacidad de interpretar la secuencia
de batería de heavy metal a pesar de que tenía una grave lesión en la rodilla que le ocurrió mientras se
balanceaba en un trampolín con sus hijos. “Christian les decía a todos, ‘Estoy bien, estoy bien’, pero
después veías su rodilla y estaba muy inflamada”, recuerda McKay. “Se lastimó todo, sus ligamentos, su
rótula, su menisco, otras cosas de las que nunca había oído hablar, así que le dije, ‘No puedes trabajar
así, no vas a tocar la batería, conseguiremos un doble’”. Pero Bale, que aprendió a tocar la batería en
sólo dos semanas para dar vida al personaje, insistió en hacer la secuencia él mismo. “Interpretó toda la
escena, salió perfectamente y después se retiró del set. En lo que se refiere a dominar el dolor, ésta es
una de las cosas más increíbles que he visto”.
El Cruzado de Wall Street
En el centro moral de la historia está el irascible administrador de fondos de cobertura
conocido en la película como Mark Baum, interpretado por Steve Carell, actor nominado al Oscar.
Baum, que dirige la subsidiaria de Morgan Stanley en FrontPoint, fascinó a Carell en varios aspectos.
“Mark tiene un compás moral muy sólido, pero al mismo tiempo está inmerso en el mundo de Wall
Street, por eso creo que en cierta forma se siente atormentado”, dice el actor. “Mark considera que es el
caballero en la brillante armadura, incluso si ésta tiene algunas abolladuras. La reducción del mercado
inmobiliario comienza como un intento de fastidiar a los bancos y él demostrará que estos tipos están
equivocados. Pero a la larga, ¿qué significa esa victoria en términos de colateral humano? ¿Quién resulta
realmente afectado? Mark se siente en conflicto debido a que gana toneladas de dinero de los bancos
que exprimen a personas comunes de la clase media. Es un aspecto espinoso que debe resolver”.
La rabia de Baum hacia la avaricia de Wall Street está llena de angustia por una dolorosa
pérdida que su esposa Cynthia (Marisa Tomei) le exige que reconozca. “Mark tiene un vínculo visceral
con este terrible evento que ocurrió y se culpa a sí mismo en cierta medida”, explica Carell. “Él se
pregunta, ‘¿Podría haber hecho algo más para evitar la tragedia? ¿Esto me transformó en alguien que no
me agrada y nunca quise ser así en primera instancia?’ Hay muchas cosas que inquietan a Mark Baum en
Para ayudar a Baum en su cruzada están los eficientes analistas de FrontPoint: Danny Moses
(Rafe Spall), Porter Collins (Hamish Linklater) y Vinnie Daniel (Jeremy Strong). En apoyo a la causa de
Baum estos sarcásticos jóvenes reformistas estudian números, formulan preguntas capciosas y hacen
investigación de campo. “Estos tipos tienen corazones de leones”, afirma Carell. “Aunque parece que
se divierten mucho, el verdadero trabajo nunca se aleja de sus mentes”.
Al retirar la cortina que cubre las tretas de Wall Street, Baum y sus protegidos emergen como
un quimérico equipo de cruzados brutalmente honestos. “Si Michael Burry es el oráculo solitario que
vio venir la catástrofe antes que nadie, los analistas de FrontPoint son los tipos en el nivel de la calle”,
explica McKay. “Ellos bromean, maldicen, son divertidos, buenos chicos. En el centro de FrontPoint
está Mark Baum, el feroz individuo que no confía en el sistema”.
La interpretación de Carell figura como la más reciente de varias colaboraciones que realizó
con McKay, a quien conoció cuando ambos actuaban en la troupe de improvisación Chicago’s Second
City; después volvieron a hacer equipo en las películas de Anchorman. Eso ocurrió antes de que Carell
fuera nominado a un Oscar por su papel como John du Pont, el multimillonario filántropo de la vida
real que se convirtió en asesino, en la película Foxcatcher. “Steve siempre fue un gran técnico con un
ritmo perfecto, pero cuando lo vi en Foxcatcher, pensé ‘¡Santo Dios!’”, dice McKay. “Su interpretación
me impactó de verdad”.
Carell aportó una inexorable búsqueda de excelencia para su papel, explica el director. “Steve
se exigía a sí mismo sin cesar, una toma tras otra. Yo afirmaba, ‘Eso fue grandioso’, pero él respondía,
‘No, no, no, debe haber algo más’, y sin duda lograba profundizarlo. Fue una fabulosa colaboración”.
Parte de este trabajo conjunto incluyó tratar a administradores de mesa de dinero de la vida
real. “Me reuní con algunas personas representadas por este personaje y analicé sus cerebros”, explica
Carrel. “No deseas hacer una personificación de alguien, pues ése no es realmente el punto. Pero sí
buscas reflejar una actitud y una forma de ser que estos hombres tienen”.
Carell se conectó instintivamente con el hallazgo de su personaje de que la corrupción que
contamina el mundo empresarial se extiende mucho más allá de Wall Street. “Creo que al final de la
película Mark tiene el corazón roto pues percibe la profundidad del fraude. Está rodeado de hombres
despreciables que actúan por los motivos más tristes, huecos y egoístas, percibe la peor inmoralidad en
las personas. Siempre esperas algo mejor de tus camaradas humanos”.
El Oportunista Honesto
El hábil operador del Deutsche Bank, Jared Vennett, interpretado por Ryan Gosling, actor
nominado a un Oscar, desempeña un rol fundamental al dar entrada a Mark Baum a los entresijos de
estos bonos hipotecarios mal respaldados. “La idea de Michael Burry confirma la sospecha de Jared de
que el mercado inmobiliario es demasiado bueno para ser verdad”, explica Gosling. “No pasa mucho
tiempo antes de que Jared reconozca el genio de lo que hace el Dr. Burry”.
Apodado por sus colegas como “Chicken Little” y “Bubble Boy”, Vennett convence a Baum y
a su compañía del inevitable fracaso de las obligaciones de deuda garantizadas (CDO) respaldadas por
“tramos”, es decir capas, de créditos hipotecarios de alto riesgo para gente con mal historial crediticio y
baja calificación FICO. “Jared emplea los bloques apilables del juego Jenga para demostrar a Baum y a
su banda cómo se construye un CDO sobre un cimiento endeble que inevitablemente se derrumbará.
Cuando Jared jala unas pocas piezas, toda la estructura colapsa”.
Vennett interpreta una secuencia muy importante cuando reta a Baum para que asista al Foro
de Valores Estadounidense en Las Vegas. “Jared esencialmente le dice a Mark, ‘Tu apuesta es contra
dinero tonto y te demostraré lo tonto que es realmente este dinero’”, explica Gosling. “Cuando lleva al
grupo de FrontPoint a Las Vegas, ellos definitivamente perciben lo inconscientes y arrogantes que son
estos administradores de mesa de dinero”.
Gosling tuvo oportunidad de conocer en la vida real al banquero de Wall Street en el que se
basa su personaje. “Fue muy útil en términos de decirme cómo concentrarme en el idioma y explicarme
lo que de verdad sucedió”, dice el actor.
A diferencia de otros protagonistas de la cinta, Jared Vennett aparece como un interno de Wall
Street de fácil discurso, cuyo cabello está arreglado por la estilista Adruitha Lee y el creador de pelucas
Alex Perrone, además de estar inmaculadamente vestido con trajes a la medida elaborados por la
diseñadora de vestuario Susan Matheson. Como representa un doble papel y también es narrador en la
película, a veces Jared se dirige al público directamente. Gosling aprovechó el encanto superficial de su
personaje para dar claridad a una historia que suele ser mal entendida.
“La inspiración que me atrajo para trabajar en este proyecto es que trata a los espectadores
como personas inteligentes”, explica. “Gran parte de la terminología de Wall Street está diseñada para
aprovecharse de los clientes. La forma en que Adam narra esta historia ayuda a entender lo que ocurrió
Los Advenedizos de Colorado y el Guerrero Zen
La tercera faceta de La Gran Apuesta implica a los novatos administradores de mesa de dinero
conocidos en la película como Jamie Shipley y Charlie Geller, interpretados por Finn Wittrock y John
Magaro. “Charlie es neurótico y le agradan los libros, mientras Jamie es más atlético pero también
increíblemente inteligente”, explica Wittrock, mejor conocido por su excelente papel en la exitosa serie
“American Horror Story”. “Cuando Jamie y Charlie descubren la burbuja inmobiliaria y analizan los
números, los dos piensan, ‘¿Estamos locos o esto es verdadero?’”
Con objeto de prepararse para el papel de Charlie Geller, Magaro invirtió tiempo observando a
los operadores de Wall Street. “Mi hermano trabaja en finanzas, así que visité su compañía de fondos
de cobertura y les di un curso sobre colapso ahí”, explica Magaro. “Considero que Charlie y Jamie son
jóvenes que funcionan como los personajes comunes en la película. Ellos en realidad no saben en lo
que se meten cuando descifran cómo es la situación verdadera. Imagino que muchas personas en el
público también aprenderán todo esto mientras ven la película”.
Trabajando en un garaje de Colorado donde crearon el Fondo Brownfield de US$30 millones
provenientes de US$110,000 de su propio dinero, los jóvenes inversionistas recurren al ex banquero
Ben Rickert (Brad Pitt) para que les ayude a asegurar un contrato maestro ISDA, el cual les permitirá
eludir a los corredores y tratar directamente con los grandes bancos. “Ben es un fatalista neurótico que
hace predicciones sombrías, come únicamente alimentos orgánicos y está convencido de que el mundo
se acabará en cualquier momento”, observa Wittrock. “Pero aún tiene las conexiones con el mundo de
la banca que Charlie y Jamie necesitan para acortar el mercado inmobiliario”.
Filmar escenas junto a Pitt, actor dos veces nominado al Oscar y productor ganador del Oscar,
fue algo especial para los jóvenes actores. “Es asombroso trabajar con Brad”, dice Wittrock. “Es muy
relajado y cualquier cosa que se requiera, la realiza sin problemas. Además es capaz de improvisar unos
diálogos increíbles que te inducen a reírte, incluso en una escena donde habla por teléfono.
Antes de la filmación, Pitt se sumergió en las creencias poco convencionales de Ben Rickert.
“El tipo real está convencido de que el cambio climático y las economías corruptas están destruyendo
los recursos naturales”, resalta McKay. “Él de verdad piensa que el mundo se va a terminar en los
siguientes 50 o 100 años. Brad expresa bien todo eso. Tiene algunas escenas geniales que improvisó,
como cuando dice ‘No usen semillas de Monsanto; deben ser semillas puras’. O puedes verlo en el
aeropuerto usando una mascarilla quirúrgica. Brad quiso profundizar en esta mentalidad debido a que
Ben no es simplemente un espontáneo fatalista loco. Es un hombre brillante y todo lo que hace está
respaldado por datos, incluso si la combinación de todo ello parece bastante loca. Ésta fue una de las
cosas realmente divertidas para Brad cuando interpretó este personaje”.
Las Celebridades Explican
Debido a que La Gran Apuesta ocurre en un ámbito de la industria plagado de terminología
compleja, McKay decidió que necesitaba una forma entretenida de aclarar ciertos conceptos esenciales
para el público “La gente debe conocer estas cosas para entender la historia, pero cuando escuchas las
primeras frases como ‘obligación de deuda garantizada’ o ‘crédito de intercambio’, te hacen sentir tonto
y aburrido”, afirma McKay. “Los banqueros hacen todo lo posible para que estas operaciones parezcan
muy complicadas, así que se nos ocurrió la idea de tener celebridades que emergen en la pantalla a lo
largo de la película y explican directamente los conceptos al público”.
Las estrellas invitadas aparecen en escenificaciones inteligentes e incluyen a Margot Robbie,
actriz de The Wolf of Wall Street, que desmitifica los valores garantizados por hipotecas mientras bebe
champagne en un baño de burbujas, así como a Anthony Bourdain, chef/anfitrión de TV que compara
las sobras de pescado con los activos financieros tóxicos.
McKay afirma que reclutó a Bourdain para la escena después de leer sus memorias Kitchen
Confidential. “Él dice a los lectores que no deben ordenar la sopa de mariscos pues ahí es donde los
cocineros ponen todas las porquerías no pueden vender”, comenta el director. “Yo pensé ‘Oh Dios,
ésta es una metáfora perfecta para una obligación de deuda garantizada (CDO), donde los bancos
agrupan un montón de hipotecas pésimas y venden eso como un producto financiero de clasificación
Para ilustrar el desastroso efecto dominó generado por el colapso de las así llamadas “CDO
sintéticas”, McKay reunió a Selena Gómez con el Dr. Richard Thaler, economista conductual, en una
escena ubicada en un casino. Mientras Thaler expone el concepto de “Sesgo de Extrapolación”, que es
la tendencia a suponer que algo que ocurre ahora continuará ocurriendo, Gómez está sentada frente a
una mesa de blackjack con un enorme montón de fichas. “Es una especie de dinámica alta-baja donde
tenemos a Selena que juega blackjack mientras los observadores hacen apuestas sobre su mano”, dice
McKay. “Fueron los inversionistas que hacían estas apuestas laterales sobre obligaciones garantizadas
por hipotecas a través de las CDO los que impulsaron la economía de todo el mundo hacia el punto
donde tuvo que explotar”.
Gómez admite que le sorprendió la llamada de McKay para La Gran Apuesta. “Leí el guión y
no entendí casi nada, eso me asustó mucho pues pensé que debía aprender acerca de nuestro sistema
económico”, dice la joven actriz y súper estrella pop. “Pero después de hablar con Adam me pareció
lógico ser parte de esta película. Me daba oportunidad de usar mi plataforma para comunicar esto a las
personas que se interesan en mí. Mi generación es la que tomará las riendas después. Es importante que
podamos comprender lo que ocurrió”.
Dirección de Fotografía de Alta Energía
Al director de fotografía Barry Ackroyd, el drama impulsado por diálogos de McKay le ofreció
una oportunidad de cambiar el ritmo después de filmar aclamadas películas de suspenso y acción como
The Hurt Locker, Captain Phillips y United 93. “Cuando Adam se acercó y me dijo que haría La Gran
Apuesta, mencionó como referencia United 93 debido a que hay gran cantidad de acción en esa cinta,
pero también es muy confinada”, explica el director de fotografía nominado a un Oscar. “Él y yo
hablamos acerca de cómo elevar la energía de las escenas donde las personas hablan en oficinas para
integrar al público en la conversación. Deseábamos que los espectadores sintieran que estaban en ese
lugar con el sujeto y pudieran escuchar lo que se decía”.
McKay aprecia la capacidad de Ackroyd para crear sensaciones a través de su experta
colocación y movimiento de las cámaras. “Barry utiliza una especie de técnica de filmación neo-vérité que
genera cierta intimidad y urgencia dentro del cuadro. En contraste, si filmas con el tradicional cuadro de
proscenio y tres capas de luces todo es más brillante y eso resulta intimidante para el público”.
Ackroyd colaboró de cerca con el diseñador de producción Clayton Hartley y la diseñadora de
vestuario Matheson, que trabajaron antes con McKay en Tallageda Nights, Step Brothers y Anchorman 2:
The Legend Continues. “Barry tiene el don de captar la humanidad de los personajes y transmite eso a
nuestros jefes de departamento”, dice McKay. “Uno de los retos más grandes a lo largo de toda la
película consistió en asegurar que nuestras locaciones y sets tuvieran vida propia por el modo en que se
filmaron y se diseñaron, lo mismo ocurrió con el vestuario, los peinados y el maquillaje. Todo se debía
sentir lleno de vida, con un poco de rispidez por la forma en que se presentaban las escenas”.
Ackroyd y McKay fomentaron una dinámica relajada en el set que permitió a los actores un
amplio espacio para explorar sus personajes. “Barry trabajó con Ken Loach, que es muy amigable con
los actores”, observa Gosling. “Él acomodaba las cámaras en la esquina de la habitación con grandes
lentes, así que los actores nos podíamos mover libremente dentro del espacio e interactuar unos con
otros de manera natural. Creo que todos hicieron su mejor trabajo en este entorno”.
Un Imán Cinematográfico
Con una perspectiva fresca e irreverente sobre uno de los sucesos más comentados del siglo,
La Gran Apuesta transforma un sombrío capítulo de la historia estadounidense en una narración
atractiva y cuidadosa a través del humor negro y los personajes ingeniosos.
Carell espera que la película sacuda algunas plataformas. “Si estuviéramos en una fiesta y
alguien me preguntara sobre lo que trata la película, le diría, ‘¿Recuerdas cuando las hipotecas de alto
riesgo explotaron y todas esas compañías salieron del negocio, pero ninguna persona fue a la cárcel?
¿Recuerdas eso? ¿Recuerdas cómo simplemente todo colapsó? ¿Y después el gobierno intervino y
exentó a todos y pareció que no pasó nada y todo estaba bien? De eso trata esta cinta. Es una película
de horror y resulta mucho más terrorífica que lo que acabo de describir’”.
McKay visualiza La Gran Apuesta como una llamada a la acción para los cinéfilos que están
cansados de las prácticas empresariales abusivas. “Esta película explora cómo una cultura entera puede
quedar atrapada entre las redes de un sistema corrupto”, comenta. “En mi optimista sueño fantástico,
mi esperanza es que esta cinta realmente indigne a las personas y salgan enojadas del cine y le pregunten
a su congresista cómo vota sobre la reforma bancaria. Éste es mi gran sueño. Mi sueño es que todos
hablen con su congresista y le digan ‘Si no limitas a los grandes bancos, sin importar si eres del ala
derecha o del ala izquierda, no votaré más por ti”.
Dejando a un lado el activismo, McKay espera que La Gran Apuesta lleve al público a un
paseo emocionante y formativo a través del asombroso mundo de los tratos financieros en las sombras
de Wall Street. “Es algo extraño debido a que el tema es bastante denso, pero si realizamos bien esta
película, La Gran Apuesta debe ser disfrutable y además abrirá muchos ojos. Michael Lewis escribe
estos libros interesantes sobre temas complejos y no puedes dejar de leerlos. De igual forma, espero
que La Gran Apuesta sea apasionante”.
ACERCA DEL ELENCO
CHRISTIAN BALE (Michael Burry) es uno de nuestros actores más admirados y un
intérprete bien conocido por la intensidad y versatilidad de su oficio. Su interpretación en The Fighter le
aportó el Oscar® en 2011 como Mejor Actor de Reparto y fue honrado además con un Golden Globe®
y muchos otros premios. También recibió nominaciones a un Premio de la Academia® y un Golden
Globe por su interpretación en American Hustle.
Bale podrá ser visto pronto en Knight of Cups, de Terrence Malick, junto a Natalie Portman y
Wes Bentley. Actualmente se encuentra en una locación en Europa filmando el drama The Promise, de
Terry George, coprotagonizado por Oscar Isaac y Charlotte Le Bon.
Sus otros créditos cinematográficos incluyen Henry V, The Portrait of a Lady, The Secret Agent,
Metroland, Velvet Goldmine, All the Little Animals, American Psycho, Laurel Canyon, The Machinist, Batman
Begins, The New World, The Prestige, Harsh Times, Rescue Dawn, 3:10 to Yuma, I’m Not There., The Dark
Knight, Public Enemies, The Flowers of War, The Dark Knight Rises, Out of the Furnace y Exodus: Gods and Kings.
Nacido en Gales, Bale creció en Inglaterra y Estados Unidos. Debutó en el cine con un papel
en Empire of the Sun, de Steven Spielberg, una cinta épica sobre la Segunda Guerra Mundial.
RYAN GOSLING (Jared Vennett) es uno de los talentos más buscados en la industria y una
genuina estrella de cine. Por su papel en Half Nelson, dirigida por Ryan Fleck y Anna Boden, recibió una
nominación a un Premio de la Academia como Mejor Actor. Gosling interpretó a Dan, un maestro de
bachillerato drogadicto. Gosling también fue nominado como Mejor Actor por Screen Actors Guild,
Broadcast Film Critics Association, Film Independent Spirit Awards, Chicago Film Critics Association,
Online Film Critics’ Society, Toronto Film Critics Association y Satellite Awards. Recibió el Premio
como Intérprete Masculino Destacado por parte de National Board of Review y reconocimientos como
Mejor Actor en el Festival Internacional de Cine de Seattle y de Estocolmo.
El año siguiente Gosling fue honrado con nominaciones al Golden Globe y al SAG Award
(Mejor Actor) por su trabajo en Lars and the Real Girl. De nuevo fue nominado a un Golden Globe por
el drama Blue Valentine, coprotagonizado por Michelle Williams.
Gosling debutó como director con Lost River, estrenada en abril de 2015. Recientemente
terminó la producción de la cinta The Nice Guys, de Shane Black, donde trabajó junto a Russell Crowe.
Gosling podrá ser visto pronto en la película Weightless, de Terrence Malick. También protagoniza La
La Land, al lado de Emma Stone, escrita y dirigida por Damien Chazelle.
Gosling consiguió el controversial rol principal en The Believer y eso representó un hito en su
carrera. Su interpretación le aportó críticas favorables, amplia atención de la crítica y el premio del Gran
Jurado en el Festival de Cine de Sundance en 2001. También recibió nominaciones como Mejor Actor
por parte de Spirit Awards y de London Film Critics’ Circle. En 2004 fue reconocido como Estrella
Masculina del Mañana por ShoWest.
Sus otros créditos cinematográficos incluyen The Slaughter Rule, junto a David Morse; la cinta de
suspenso psicológico Murder by Numbers, al lado de Sandra Bullock; The United States of Leland, con Kevin
Spacey y Don Cheadle; The Notebook, junto a Rachel McAdams; Fracture, con Anthony Hopkins; Crazy,
Stupid, Love, al lado de Steve Carell y Julianne Moore; Drive, con Albert Brooks y Bryan Cranston; The
Ides of March, junto a George Clooney; The Place Beyond the Pines, con Bradley Cooper y Eva Mendes;
Gangster Squad, también protagonizada por Emma Stone, Sean Penn y Josh Brolin; así como Only God
Forgives, con Kristin Scott Thomas.
STEVE CARELL (Mark Baum) es un actor nominado a un Premio de la Academia, bien
consolidado en Hollywood como una fuerza multifacética. Inicialmente obtuvo celebridad por su
contribución como corresponsal del programa “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart”, de Comedy
Central, ganador de un Emmy Award®. Más adelante Carell transitó con éxito de la televisión hasta
llegar a la gran pantalla. Como testimonio de que sus talentos se extienden más allá de la actuación y la
escritura, Carell también estableció Carousel Productions, su propia compañía de producción.
El año pasado Carell protagonizó junto a Mark Ruffalo, Channing Tatum y Vanessa Redgrave
el drama Foxcatcher, nominado a un Oscar. Dirigida por Bennett Miller, la trama describe los eventos de
la vida real que rodearon la muerte del luchador olímpico David Schultz, asesinado por John du Pont.
En la película Carell interpreta a du Pont, que entrenó al prometedor luchador Mark Schultz (Tatum) y
su equipo para los Juegos Olímpicos de Verano de Seúl en 1988. Por su impactante interpretación
Carell recibió nominaciones al Oscar como Mejor Actor, al Screen Actors Guild Award en la categoría
de Interpretación Destacada por un Actor en un Papel Protagónico, al BAFTA como Mejor Actor de
Reparto, así como al Golden Globe como Mejor Actor en una Película Dramática.
En octubre de 2015 Carell protagonizó Freeheld, de Peter Sollett, al lado de Julianne Moore y
Ellen Page. Basada en el documental de 2007 acerca de Laurel Hester y Stacie Andree, la película narra
la historia de una pareja del mismo sexo que luchó para modificar la Ley de Asociación Doméstica con
objeto de que todos los empleados públicos de New Jersey pudieran otorgar los beneficios de su
pensión a sus parejas domésticas.
Carell terminó hace poco la producción de la siguiente película de Woody Allen, como parte de
un elenco coral que incluye a Blake Lively, Parker Posey, Kristen Stewart, Jesse Eisenberg y Corey Stoll.
En 2016 Carell comenzará la producción de Battle of the Sexes junto a Brie Larson, dirigida por
Jonathan Dayton y Valerie Faris, el dúo de directores de Little Miss Sunshine. Con un guión escrito por
Simon Beaufoy, ganador del Premio de la Academia, la historia se centra en el épico partido de tenis
jugado en 1973 entre Billie Jean King (Larson) y Bobby Riggs (Carell). El partido tuvo los más altos
índices de audiencia televisiva desde la llegada del hombre a la Luna.
Carell interpretó su primer papel protagónico cinematográfico hace 10 años en The 40-Year-Old
Virgin, película que él coescribió con el director Judd Apatow. La película alcanzó los primeros lugares
en las taquillas durante dos fines de semana consecutivos y recaudó más de $177 millones alrededor del
mundo, ocupando al lugar No. 1 en su estreno en 12 países. También generó más de $100 millones en
ventas de DVD en Estados Unidos únicamente. La cinta fue honrada con un AFI Award como una de
las 10 Películas Más Destacadas del Año y recibió el Premio a la Mejor Película de Comedia en el 11º
Evento Anual de Critics’ Choice Awards. Asimismo, Carell y Apatow compartieron una nominación al
WGA Award como Mejor Guión Original.
En 2010 Carell prestó su talento vocal al rol protagónico de Gru en la cinta animada Despicable
Me, que se estrenó como #1 en las taquillas y recaudó más de $500 millones alrededor del mundo. En
junio de 2008 Carell protagonizó el papel de Maxwell Smart en Get Smart, al lado de Anne Hathaway y
Alan Arkin. La película recaudó más de $230 millones globalmente. También prestó su voz en Dr.
Seuss’s Horton Hears A Who! dirigida por Jimmy Hayward (Finding Nemo, Monsters, Inc.) y Steve Martino
(The Peanuts Movie, Ice Age: Continental Drift), protagonizada junto a Jim Carrey. La película obtuvo más
de $297 millones en todo el planeta. En 2006 coprotagonizó Little Miss Sunshine, que fue nominada al
Premio de la Academia como Mejor Película y ganó el SAG Award como Interpretación Destacada por
un Elenco en un Largometraje.
Otros créditos notables incluyen Crazy, Stupid, Love, al lado de Julianne Moore, Ryan Gosling y
Emma Stone, producida por Carousel Productions, la compañía de producción de Carell; Seeking a
Friend for the End of the World, junto a Keira Knightley; Hope Springs, con Meryl Streep y Tommy Lee
Jones; The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, con Jim Carrey y Steve Buscemi; Despicable Me 2, que recaudó más
de $918 millones; The Way Way Back, escrita y dirigida por Nat Faxon y Jim Rash, ganadores del Premio
de la Academia; Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, junto a Will Ferrell y Paul Rudd; Alexander and the
Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, junto a Jennifer Garner, dirigida por Miguel Arteta.
En 2011 Carell terminó su temporada de ocho años en la adaptación estadounidense de la
aclamada serie británica “The Office”, de Ricky Gervais, nominada a un Emmy Award. En 2006 Carell
obtuvo un Golden Globe Award como Mejor Interpretación por un Actor en una Serie de Televisión -
Musical o Comedia (seguida por dos nominaciones más en la categoría) por su papel de Michael Scott,
el petulante y tramposo jefe de una compañía de papel en Pensilvania. También fue nominado a seis
Emmy Awards como Mejor Actor Protagónico en una Serie de Comedia. El programa ganó el Screen
Actors Guild Award como Interpretación Destacada de un Ensamble en una Serie de Comedia.
En 2016 TBS estrenará “Angie Tribeca” bajo Carousel Productions, la compañía de Carell.
Creada por Carell y su esposa Nancy, la comedia es una visión satírica sobre los procedimientos
policiacos y es protagonizada por Rashida Jones. La serie se proyectó el 14 de marzo de 2015 en el
Festival de Cine South by Southwest. Carell fue productor ejecutivo, escritor y director.
Nacido en Massachusetts, Carell reside actualmente en Los Ángeles con su esposa la actriz
Nancy Carell (“Saturday Night Live”), a quien conoció cuando ambos eran miembros del Second City
Theater Group en Chicago. Es el orgulloso padre de una hija y un hijo.
JOHN MAGARO (Charlie Geller) se convirtió rápidamente en uno de los actores jóvenes
más atractivos y buscados en Hollywood; a la fecha tiene un diverso grupo de trabajos que incluyen
cine, televisión y teatro. Coprotagonizó Not Fade Away junto a Bella Heathcote, James Gandolfini, Jack
Huston y Christopher McDonald, dirigida por David Chase. La cinta se estrenó en el Festival de Cine
de Nueva York en 2012 y la interpretación de Magaro fue reconocida con el Spotlight Award por parte
de Hollywood Film Awards.
Magaro podrá ser visto en Carol, de The Weinstein Company, al lado de Rooney Mara y Cate
Blanchett. Ubicada en Nueva York en los años 50, la cinta narra la historia de un empleado de una
tienda departamental que sueña con una vida mejor, pero se enamora de una mujer mayor y casada.
Magaro trabaja actualmente en la producción de War Machine, también protagonizada por Brad
Pitt, que será estrenada por Netflix en 2016. Esta comedia satírica se basa en el libro bestseller The
Operators: The Wild and Terrifying Inside Story of America’s War in Afghanistan. Así mismo, Magaro
participó en The Finest Hours, de Disney, con Chris Pine, Casey Affleck y Ben Foster. Ubicada en 1952,
la historia se enfoca en una audaz misión de rescate de la Guardia Costera cuando un par de buques
petroleros quedan destruidos durante una tormenta cerca de Cape Cod.
Sus otros créditos cinematográficos incluyen Unbroken, Liberal Arts, Down the Shore, My Soul to
Take, The Box, Assassination of a High School President, The Life Before Her Eyes, The Brave One y Don’t Worry
También familiarizado con la pequeña pantalla, Magaro interpretó roles de estrella invitada en
diversos programas de televisión, como “The Good Wife”, “Person of Interest”, “Body of Proof”,
“Law & Order”, “Law & Order: SVU”, “Taking Chance”, “Conviction” y “Orange Is the New Black”.
Como actor teatral Magaro dio vida al papel protagónico en una producción aclamada por la
crítica de “Tigers Be Still”, escrita por Kimberly Rosenstock y dirigida por Sam Gold para Roundabout
Theatre Company. Magaro interpretó además el rol principal en “Good Television” de Rod McLachlan,
dirigida por Bob Krakower, para Atlantic Theater Company.
ACERCA DE LOS REALIZADORES CINEMATOGRÁFICOS
ADAM McKAY (Director, Escritor) está detrás de muchas influyentes y exitosas cintas a lo
largo de su carrera. Además dejó una huella indeleble en el mundo de los comediantes como miembro
fundador de la troupe de comedia Upright Citizens Brigade y como escritor principal de la venerable
institución de comedia “Saturday Night Live”, donde conoció a Will Ferrell, su socio de producción y
escritura hace mucho tiempo.
McKay y Ferrell han colaborado en varias películas, entre ellas Step Brothers, Talladega Nights
y The Other Guys. La asociación de McKay con Ferrell continuó cuando McKay regresó para coescribir y
dirigir Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, secuela de su cinta clásica de culto Anchorman: The Legend of Ron
Burgundy. McKay produjo también Welcome to Me, protagonizada por Kristen Wiig, además escribió Ant-
Man, el éxito del verano de Marvel.
El talento de McKay se extiende más allá del cine. Es frecuente colaborador en el Huffington
Post y escribió para diversos proyectos, como “The Awful Truth” de Michael Moore; también dirigió y
produjo “Eastbound & Down” de HBO, además de producir la serie “Drunk History”, nominada a un
Emmy Award. En Broadway McKay dirigió la obra “You’re Welcome America”, que recibió una
nominación a un Tony Award®. En conjunto con Ferrell y Chris Henchy, McKay comenzó el sitio Web
de comedia Funny or Die, que recibe más de 35 millones de visitas cada año.
MICHAEL LEWIS (Autor) publica muchos libros sobre diversos temas y todos, excepto
uno, se convirtieron en best sellers del New York Times. Sus obras más recientes son The Big Short:
Inside the Doomsday Machine y Boomerang: Travels in the New Third World - ambas narrativas
ubicadas en la crisis financiera global, además de Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt, que se publicó en
abril de 2014.
The Blind Side, editada en 2006, narra la historia de Michael Oher, un niño afroamericano
pobre y analfabeta que vive en las calles de Memphis y cuya existencia se transforma cuando lo adoptan
unos cristianos evangélicos blancos. Antes escribió Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game,
una obra que trata aparentemente sobre el béisbol, pero también sobre la forma en que los mercados
valoran a las personas. Dos de estos libros con tema deportivo se convirtieron en películas nominadas a
diversos Premios de la Academia.
Otros trabajos de Lewis incluyen The New New Thing, acerca de Silicon Valley durante el
boom de Internet; Coach: Lessons on the Game of Life, que narra el poder transformador del
entrenador de beisbol de su propio bachillerato; Losers, sobre la campaña presidencial de 1996; así
como Liar’s Poker, una historia de Wall Street basada parcialmente en su propia experiencia cuando
trabajó como vendedor de bonos para Salomon Brothers.
Lewis es columnista de Bloomberg News y escritor colaborador de Vanity Fair. Sus artículos
han aparecido en The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Gourmet, Slate, Sports Illustrated, Foreign
Affairs y la revista Poetry. Trabajó como editor y columnista para el semanario británico The Spectator,
además de ser editor senior y corresponsal de campaña para The New Republic. Adicionalmente Lewis
filmó y narró cortometrajes para “Nightline” de ABC-TV; creó y presentó un documental de cuatro
partes sobre las consecuencias sociales de la Internet para la BBC, además grabó historias para el
programa radiofónico público estadounidense “This American Life”.
Lewis creció en Nueva Orleans y se mantiene hondamente interesado e involucrado en la
ciudad. Ostenta una licenciatura en historia del arte de Princeton, así como una maestría en economía
por parte de London School of Economics. Actualmente vive en Berkeley, California, con su esposa
Tabitha Soren y sus tres hijos Quinn, Dixie y Walker. En 2009 publicó Home Game: An Accidental
Guide to Fatherhood, acerca de sus intentos de criar a sus hijos.
CHARLES RANDOLPH (Escritor) es un guionista que trabajó con muchos realizadores
cinematográficos importantes, entre ellos Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Milos Forman y Ridley
Scott. Sus créditos en escritura de películas incluyen Love and Other Drugs, de Ed Zwick (2010), con Jake
Gyllenhaal y Anne Hathaway; The Interpreter, de Sydney Pollack (2005) con Sean Penn y Nicole Kidman;
así como The Life of David Gale , de Alan Parker (2003), protagonizada por Kevin Spacey, Laura Linney
y Kate Winslet.
Randolph escribe actualmente un Western para Michael Mann.
Para televisión, Randolph escribió y fue productor ejecutivo de los pilotos de HBO: “The
Wonderful Maladys” (2010), una comedia y el drama “The Missionary” (2013).
El escritor vive en Nueva York con su esposa, la actriz Mili Avital y sus hijos Benjamin y
LOUISE ROSNER–MEYER (Productora) produjo el éxito de Sundance: The Last Time I
Committed Suicide, con Thomas Jane, Keanu Reeves y Adrian Brody; así como la comedia Denial, de
Adam Rifkin. Actualmente se encuentra en producción de la comedia de acción The Brothers Grimsby,
creada y protagonizada por Sacha Baron Cohen, al lado de Mark Strong, Rebel Wilson y Penélope
Cruz. Rosner trabajó como productora ejecutiva de los éxitos taquilleros The Hunger Games y The Hunger
Games: Catching Fire, protagonizados por Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth y
Woody Harrelson.
Rosner se unió al aclamado director Marc Forster como productora ejecutiva en Machine Gun
Preacher. Protagonizada por Gerard Butler, Michelle Monaghan y Michael Shannon, la película narra la
verdadera historia de Sam Childers (Butler), un delincuente que se convierte en defensor de los niños
desesperados e indefensos en un país desgarrado por la guerra en África.
Asimismo Rosner fue productora ejecutiva en las comedias The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard y
Baby Mama, con Tina Fey y Amy Poehler. En 2004 Rosner coprodujo Mean Girls, de Fey, que resultó un
éxito taquillero y de crítica. Sus créditos adicionales como productora ejecutiva incluyen Paparazzi, On
the Line y Firestorm.
Rosner coprodujo Hot Rod, protagonizada por Andy Samberg; Fracture, con Ryan Gosling y
Anthony Hopkins; Beauty Shop, con Queen Latifah; Get Over It, con Kirsten Dunst y Ben Foster; así
como la favorita de los adolescentes She’s All That. Adicionalmente Rosner fue productora de línea en
A Kid In King Arthur’s Court y Boys and Girls.
JEREMY KLEINER (Productor) es copresidente de Plan B Entertainment, de Brad Pitt.
Junto con Dede Gardner, supervisa la claqueta de producción y desarrollo de Plan B, que incluye
proyectos con los realizadores cinematográficos Bennett Miller, Bong Joon-ho, Yann Demange y Felix
van Groeningen, así como algunos prospectos de televisión en HBO, Netflix y AMC.
En 2014 Kleiner produjo 12 Years a Slave (New Regency), drama ganador de un premio de la
Academia, dirigido por Steve McQueen, así como Selma (Paramount), nominada a un Premio de la
Academia en 2015, dirigida por Ava DuVernay. Hoy en día se encuentra en producción de War Machine
(Netflix), dirigida por David Michôd y protagonizada por Brad Pitt; The Lost City of Z, dirigida por
James Gray, con Charlie Hunnam, Sienna Miller y Robert Pattinson; además de Moonlight, dirigida por
Barry Jenkins.
En televisión Kleiner fue productor ejecutivo de “Nightingale” (HBO), cinta nominada a un
Emmy Award, dirigida por Elliott Lester y protagonizada por David Oyelowo. Actualmente trabaja en
la preproducción de la próxima serie televisiva “The OA” (Netflix), de los creadores Brit Marling y Zal
Antes Kleiner produjo World War Z, de Marc Forster (Paramount), protagonizada por Brad
Pitt; también fue productor ejecutivo en las películas de Plan B: Kick-Ass, Eat Pray Love y The Private
Lives of Pippa Lee.
ARNON MILCHAN (Productor Ejecutivo) es ampliamente reconocido como uno de los
más prolíferos y exitosos productores de cine independiente durante los pasados 25 años, con más de
100 películas entre sus créditos. Recientemente Milchan produjo Gone Girl, dirigida por David Fincher y
protagonizada por Ben Affleck y Rosamund Pike; la ganadora del Oscar como Mejor Película Birdman:
Or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance), dirigida por Alejandro González Iñárritu y protagonizada por
Michael Keaton, Emma Stone, Andrea Riseborough y Ed Norton; la cinta épica Noah, dirigida por
Darren Aronofsky, con Russell Crowe; así como True Story, con Jonah Hill y James Franco.
Sus próximos estrenos incluyen The Revenant, de Iñárritu; protagonizada por Tom Hardy y
Leonardo DiCaprio, así como Assassin’s Creed, dirigida por Justin Kurzel, con Michael Fassbender y
Marion Cotillard.
Nacido en Israel, Milchan estudió en la Universidad de Ginebra. Su primer logro empresarial
fue transformar el modesto negocio de su padre en una de las compañías agroquímicas más grandes del
país. Esta temprana hazaña fue un heraldo de la reputación ahora legendaria de Milchan dentro del
mercado internacional como un hábil empresario.
Pronto Milchan emprendió proyectos en áreas que siempre le interesaron especialmente: el
cine, la televisión y el teatro. Sus primeros trabajos incluyen “Dizengoff 99”, “La Menace”, “The
Medusa Touch”, la miniserie “Masada”, así como la producción teatral de “Amadeus”, de Roman
Polanski. Al terminar la década de 1980, Milchan había producido películas tales como The King of
Comedy, de Martin Scorsese; Once Upon a Time in America, de Sergio Leone, así como Brazil, de Terry
Después del gran triunfo de Pretty Woman y The War of the Roses, Milchan fundó New Regency
Productions y siguió adelante para producir una cadena de exitosas películas, entre ellas JFK, Sommersby,
A Time to Kill, Free Willy, The Client, Tin Cup, Under Siege, L.A. Confidential, The Devil’s Advocate, The
Negotiator, City of Angels, Entrapment, Fight Club, Big Momma’s House, Don’t Say a Word, Daredevil, Man on
Fire, Guess Who, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Big Momma’s House 2, Alvin and the Chipmunks, The Fountain, Mirrors,
Jumper, What Happens in Vegas, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, Love & Other Drugs, Big Momma’s:
Like Father, Like Son, Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked, In Time y 12 Years a Slave.
A lo largo del camino Milchan se unió a dos poderosos inversionistas y socios que comparten
su visión: Nine Network y Twentieth Century Fox. De hecho Fox distribuye las películas de Regency
en todos los medios alrededor del mundo, excepto en la televisión internacional de paga y libre, donde
Milchan aprovecha el creciente mercado de televisión y nuevos medios.
Milchan diversificó con éxito las actividades de su compañía en la esfera del entretenimiento,
específicamente en el mundo televisivo, a través de Regency Television (“Malcolm in the Middle”, “The
Bernie Mac Show” y “Windfall”) y en el ámbito deportivo, donde la compañía fue en algún momento la
accionista mayoritaria de Puma, la corporación global de ropa y zapatos atléticos ubicada en Alemania.
Puma se vendió en 2003, después de una exitosa renovación de marca. Asimismo Regency adquirió los
derechos mundiales de televisión para los torneos de la Asociación de Tenis Femenil (WTA) de 1999
hasta 2012 y cedió la licencia de estos derechos a Pan European Broadcaster Eurosport S.A.
Regency es propietaria de una significativa cantidad de acciones en Israeli Network, cadena de
televisión que llegó a Estados Unidos a través de un contrato de distribución por satélite con Echostar.
Regency también adquirió una importante cantidad de acciones en Channel 10, una de las dos únicas
estaciones de transmisión comercial en Israel.
KEVIN MESSICK (Productor Ejecutivo) se unió a Gary Sanchez Productions, la compañía
de producción de Will Ferrell y Adam McKay, en enero de 2009. La primera cinta donde fue productor
ejecutivo para la compañía fue la exitosa comedia “The Other Guys”, protagonizada por Will Ferrell,
Mark Wahlberg, Eva Mendes, Dwayne Johnson y Samuel L. Jackson. Él produjo, con Ferrell y McKay,
la aventura de cuento de hadas Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters, protagonizada por Jeremy Renner y
Gemma Arterton, que recaudó más de $220 millones alrededor del mundo. También fue productor
ejecutivo de Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, donde volvió hacer equipo con Will Ferrell, Steve Carell,
Paul Rudd y David Koechner; la comedia Tammy, protagonizada por Melissa McCarthy; así como Get
Hard, con Will Ferrell y Kevin Hart.
Messick fue productor ejecutivo en la cinta de suspenso y acción Jack Reacher, protagonizada
por Tom Cruise, además de Casa de mi Padre, una película en español protagonizada por Will Ferrell,
Diego Luna y Gael Garcia Bernal. Con Ferrell y McKay, Messick también produjo la comedia The
Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard. Messick tiene diversas películas en el horizonte, entre ellas Daddy’s Home,
donde vuelve a trabajar con Will Ferrell y Mark Wahlberg, que se estrenará el Día de Navidad; la
comedia de acción Masterminds, protagonizada por Kristen Wiig, Zach Galifianakis, Owen Wilson y
Jason Sudeikis; así como The Boss, con Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Bell y Peter Dinklage.
Antes de unirse a Gary Sanchez Productions, Messick era un productor independiente. Sus
créditos incluyen The Answer Man, protagonizada por Jeff Daniels y Lauren Graham (Selección Oficial
en el Festival de Cine de Sundance en competencia dramática); A Lot Like Love, con Ashton Kutcher y
Amanda Peet; el documental American Pimp, dirigido por Allen y Albert Hughes (Selección Oficial en
Sundance en competencia de documentales); Truth or Consequences, N.M, dirigida por Kiefer Sutherland y
protagonizada por Vincent Gallo; The Babysitter, con Alicia Silverstone; y Surviving the Game, dirigida por
Ernest Dickerson y protagonizada por Rutger Hauer y Ice T.
Messick obtuvo una Maestría en Bellas Artes por la Escuela de Teatro, Cine y Televisión de la
BARRY ACKROYD, B.S.C. (Director de Fotografía), es un director de fotografía
nominado al Oscar, así como ganador del BAFTA y del European Film Award, que adquirió la
reputación de filmar películas provocativas y dinámicas con directores de alto perfil, como Paul
Greengrass, Kathryn Bigelow y Baltasar Kormákur. También es conocido por su larga colaboración
cinematográfica con el creador británico Ken Loach. Ackroyd filmó por lo menos 12 películas para
Loach y culminó con The Wind that Shakes the Barley, ganadora de la Palma de Oro en el Festival de Cine
Los antecedentes de Ackroyd en documentales son evidentes en su trabajo ficticio y los mejora
con su sensibilidad afinada durante años de filmación en películas tales como The Leader, His Driver and
the Driver’s Wife, de Nick Broomfield, y Anne Frank Remembered, ganadora de un Premio de la Academia.
Realizó una exitosa transición de documentales a largometrajes, manteniendo la disciplina relajada y
libre que adquirió en sus primeros días como director de fotografía.
Ackroyd comenzó a trabajar con el director Paul Greengrass en United 93 y siguió con Green
Zone, protagonizada por Matt Damon, además de Captain Phillips, que le aportó nominaciones al ASC y
al BAFTA Award. Su colaboración continúa con la más reciente película de la perdurable franquicia
Jason Bourne.
Sus otros créditos incluyen The Hurt Locker, de Kathryn Bigelow, por la cual fue nominado a un
Premio de la Academia y obtuvo un BAFTA; la cinta Parkland, dirigida por Peter Landesman; así como
Dark Places, adaptación de la novela de Gillian Flynn, protagonizada por Charlize Theron y dirigida por
Gilles Paquet-Brenner. También trabajó como director de fotografía en la próxima cinta del director
Sean Penn, The Last Face.
Ackroyd asistió a la escuela de arte en el Norte de Inglaterra y originalmente estudió para ser
escultor. Comenzó a trabajar como director de fotografía debido a su amor por el cine francés New
CLAYTON HARTLEY (Diseñador de Producción) estudió arte y arquitectura en la
Northwestern University. Posteriormente comenzó a trabajar y ascender los rangos como asistente de
producción en Bad Boys y pronto pasó al departamento de arte en Strangers Kiss y Friday the 13th: A New
Beginning. Continuó su camino y trabajó como asistente del director artístico en The Return of the Living
Dead y Hoosiers y más adelante como director artístico en The Other Sister y Jerry Maguire.
Después Clayton se convirtió en diseñador de producción en varias películas, como Almost
Famous, Cheats, American Wedding, Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, Kicking & Screaming, Talladega
Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, Semi-Pro, Step Brothers, She’s Out of My League y The Other Guys. Entre los
directores con los que colabora a menudo se encuentran Cameron Crowe y Adam McKay.
Hartley recibió una nominación a la Excelencia en Diseño de Producción por parte de Art
Directors Guild debido a su labor en Almost Famous. Su película Daddy’s Home llegará a los cines pronto;
actualmente se encuentra en producción de la película The House, para New Line.
HANK CORWIN (Editor) editó diversas películas de alto perfil, entre ellas The Tree of Life,
Snow Falling on Cedars, The Horse Whisperer, Nixon y Natural Born Killers. Entre los aclamados directores
con los que colaboró se encuentran Oliver Stone, Robert Redford, Michael Mann, Barry Levinson,
Bennett Miller y Terence Malick.
Como uno de los editores más influyentes en el mundo publicitario, la cartera creativa de
Corwin también incluye numerosas campañas galardonadas para agencias globales. Fundador de la
compañía editorial Lost Planet, Corwin aplica su sutil y matizado estilo de edición en campañas
publicitarias globales para diversas marcas, entre ellas American Express, Cadillac, Nike, Adidas, ESPN
y Absolut. Su trabajo comercial fue reconocido con honores por parte de AICP, Festival Internacional
de Publicidad de Cannes, Clio Awards, One Show, British Design & Art Direction (D&AD) y ANDYs.
NICHOLAS BRITELL (Compositor) es un galardonado compositor, pianista y productor.
Su música brilló prominentemente en 12 Years a Slave, película ganadora del Oscar del director Steve
McQueen, para la cual compuso e hizo arreglos de música de cámara, entre ellas interpretaciones de
violín, coros espirituales, canciones de trabajo y danzas. Los proyectos de Britell se han destacado en
diversas publicaciones que incluyen los diarios Wall Street Journal y New York Times, así como las revistas
New York y Vogue. Hace poco terminó la banda sonora para la película A Tale of Love and Darkness, que
marca el debut de Natalie Portman como directora y fue seleccionada para una proyección especial en
el Festival de Cine de Cannes en 2015.
Britell musicalizó el documental The Seventh Fire, de Jack Pettibone Riccobono, que se proyectó
en el Festival Internacional de Cine de Berlín en febrero de 2015. Britell escribió la banda sonora para
la película Gimme the Loot (dirigida por Adam Leon), que obtuvo el premio del Gran Jurado en SXSW
en marzo de 2012 y fue selección oficial en el Festival de Cine de Cannes en 2012 (Un Certain Regard).
Fue galardonado con el Henry Mancini Fellowship por parte de ASCAP Foundation en diciembre de
2012 y también obtuvo el ASCAP/Doddle Award
Website | Instagram | Google+ | Flickr
Headshots - Samantha
London
UK
2016/05/11
Returning to some previous portraits to try out some new post production techniques I've learned on a training course.
Behind the scenes production stills taken using the terrifyingly accurate Eye-AF mode on the A7R2 with the beautiful Zeiss Batis 85mm f/1.8 lens.
Model: Samantha Loxely
Make-up: Kate Roe
#tbt #SamanthaLoxely #kateromakeup #Model #Actress #Headshot #Shoot #Portraits #Portrait #Faces #Eyes #Zeiss #Batis #85mm #ZeissBatis #London #EyeAF #Sony #SonyA7R2 #A7R2 #SonyA7RII #A7RII #SonyAlpha #SonyPhotography #SonyImages #Lightroom6.5 #LR6 #ナイジャルレイモンド #PostProduction #Photoshop #Beauty #Retouch #NigalRaymond #www.nigal-raymond.com
Priceless London Wonderground at Southbank Centre is a brand new festival.....a playground of wonders and curiosities! More: pricelesslondonwonderground.co.uk/aboutus
Among the cabaret, circus shows, collection of preserved freak animals and other Coney Island-style attractions at the South Bank's Priceless London Wonderground is a terrifyingly high-spinning swing ride....... www.guardian.co.uk/travel/2012/jul/27/london-top-five-fam...
Kathmandu Durbar Square (Nepali: वसन्तपुर दरवार क्षेत्र, Basantapur Darbar Kshetra) in front of the old royal palace of the former Kathmandu Kingdom is one of three Durbar (royal palace) Squares in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, all of which are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Several buildings in the Square collapsed due to a major earthquake on 25 April 2015. Durbar Square was surrounded with spectacular architecture and vividly showcases the skills of the Newar artists and craftsmen over several centuries. The Royal Palace was originally at Dattaraya square and was later moved to the Durbar square.
The Kathmandu Durbar Square held the palaces of the Malla and Shah kings who ruled over the city. Along with these palaces, the square surrounds quadrangles, revealing courtyards and temples. It is known as Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square, a name derived from a statue of Hanuman, the monkey devotee of Lord Ram, at the entrance of the palace.
CONTENTS
HISTORY AND CONSTRUCTION
The preference for the construction of royal palaces at this site dates back to as early as the Licchavi period in the third century. Even though the present palaces and temples have undergone repeated and extensive renovations and nothing physical remains from that period. Names like Gunapo and Gupo, which are the names referred to the palaces in the square in early scriptures, imply that the palaces were built by Gunakamadev, a King ruling late in the tenth-century. When Kathmandu City became independent under the rule of King Ratna Malla (1484–1520), the palaces in the square became the Royal Palaces for its Malla Kings. When Prithvi Narayan Shah invaded the Kathmandu Valley in 1769, he favored the Kathmandu Durbar Square for his palace. Other subsequent Shah kings continued to rule from the square until 1896 when they moved to the Narayan Hiti Palace.
The square is still the center of important royal events like the coronation of King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah in 1975 and King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah in 2001.
Though there are no written archives stating the history of Kathmandu Durbar Square, construction of the palace in the square is credited to Sankharadev (1069–1083). As the first king of the independent Kathmandu City, Ratna Malla is said to have built the Taleju temple in the Northern side of the palace in 1501. For this to be true then the temple would have had to have been built in the vihara style as part of the palace premise surrounding the Mul Chok courtyard for no evidence of a separate structure that would match this temple can be found within the square.
Construction of the Karnel Chok is not clearly stated in any historical inscriptions; although, it is probably the oldest among all the courtyards in the square. The Bhagavati Temple, originally known as a Narayan Temple, rises above the mansions surrounding it and was added during the time of Jagajaya Malla in the early eighteenth century. The Narayan idol within the temple was stolen so Prithvi Narayan Shah replaced it with an image of Bhagavati, completely transforming the name of the temple.
The oldest temples in the square are those built by Mahendra Malla (1560–1574). They are the temples of Jagannath, Kotilingeswara Mahadev, Mahendreswara, and the Taleju Temple. This three-roofed Taleju Temple was established in 1564, in a typical Newari architectural style and is elevated on platforms that form a pyramid-like structure. It is said that Mahendra Malla, when he was residing in Bhaktapur, was highly devoted to the Taleju Temple there; the Goddess being pleased with his devotion gave him a vision asking him to build a temple for her in the Kathmandu Durbar Square. With a help of a hermit, he designed the temple to give it its present form and the Goddess entered the temple in the form of a bee.
His successors Sadasiva (1575–1581), his son, Shiva Simha (1578–1619), and his grandson, Laksmi Narsingha (1619–1641), do not seem to have made any major additions to the square. During this period of three generations the only constructions to have occurred were the establishment of Degutale Temple dedicated to Goddess Mother Taleju by Shiva Simha and some enhancement in the royal palace by Laksminar Simha.
UNDER PRATAP MALLA
In the time of Pratap Malla, son of Laksminar Simha, the square was extensively developed. He was an intellectual, a pious devotee, and especially interested in arts. He called himself a Kavindra, king of poets, and boasted that he was learned in fifteen different languages. A passionate builder, following his coronation as a king, he immediately began enlargements to his royal palace, and rebuilt some old temples and constructed new temples, shrines and stupas around his kingdom.During the construction of his palace, he added a small entrance in the traditional, low and narrow Newari style. The door was elaborately decorated with carvings and paintings of deities and auspicious sings and was later transferred to the entrance of Mohan Chok. In front of the entrance he placed the statue of Hanuman thinking that Hanuman would strengthen his army and protect his home. The entrance leads to Nasal Chok, the courtyard where most royal events such as coronation, performances, and yagyas, holy fire rituals, take place. It was named after Nasadya, the God of Dance, and during the time of Pratap Malla the sacred mask dance dramas performed in Nasal Chok were widely famed. In one of these dramas, it is said that Pratap Malla himself played the role of Lord Vishnu and that the spirit of the Lord remained in the king's body even after the play. After consulting his Tantric leaders, he ordered a stone image of Lord Vishnu in his incarnation as Nara Simha, the half-lion and half-human form, and then transferred the spirit into the stone. This fine image of Nara Simha made in 1673 still stands in the Nasal Chok. In 1650, he commissioned for the construction of Mohan Chok in the palace. This chok remained the royal residential courtyard for many years and is believed to store a great amount of treasure under its surface. Pratap Malla also built Sundari Chok about this time. He placed a slab engraved with lines in fifteen languages and proclaimed that he who can understand the inscription would produce the flow of milk instead of water from Tutedhara, a fountain set in the outer walls of Mohan Chok. However elaborate his constructions may have been, they were not simply intended to emphasize his luxuries but also his and the importance of others' devotion towards deities. He made extensive donations to temples and had the older ones renovated. Next to the palace, he built a Krishna temple, the Vamsagopala, in an octagonal shape in 1649. He dedicated this temple to his two Indian wives, Rupamati and Rajamati, as both had died during the year it was built. In Mohan Chok, he erected a three roofed Agamachem temple and a unique temple with five superimposing roofs. After completely restoring the Mul Chok, he donated to the adjoining Taleju Temple. To the main temple of Taleju, he donated metal doors in 1670. He rebuilt the Degutale Temple built by his grandfather, Siva Simha, and the Taleju Temple in the palace square. As a substitute to the Indreswara Mahadeva Temple in the distant village of Panauti he built a Shiva temple, Indrapura, near his palace in the square. He carved hymns on the walls of the Jagannath Temple as prayers to Taleju in the form of Kali.
At the southern end of the square, near Kasthamandap at Maru, which was the main city crossroads for early traders, he built another pavilion named Kavindrapura, the mansion of the king of poets. In this mansion he set an idol of dancing Shiva, Nasadyo, which today is highly worshipped by dancers in the Valley.
In the process of beautifying his palace, he added fountains, ponds, and baths. In Sundari Chok, he established a low bath with a golden fountain. He built a small pond, the Naga Pokhari, in the palace adorned with Nagakastha, a wooden serpent, which is said he had ordered stolen from the royal pond in the Bhaktapur Durbar Square. He restored the Licchavi stone sculptures such as the Jalasayana Narayana, the Kaliyadamana, and the Kala Bhairav. An idol of Jalasayana Narayana was placed in a newly created pond in the Bhandarkhal garden in the eastern wing of the palace. As a substitute to the idol of Jalasayana Narayana in Buddhanilkantha, he channeled water from Buddhanilkantha to the pond in Bhandarkhal due bestow authenticity. The Kalyadana, a manifestation of Lord Krishna destroying Kaliya, a water serpent, is placed in Kalindi Chok, which is adjacent to the Mohan Chok. The approximately ten-feet-high image of terrifyingly portrayed Kal Bhairav is placed near the Jagannath Temple. This image is the focus of worship in the chok especially during Durga Puja.
With the death of Pratap Malla in 1674, the overall emphasis on the importance of the square came to a halt. His successors retained relatively insignificant power and the prevailing ministers took control of most of the royal rule. The ministers encountered little influence under these kings and, increasingly, interest of the arts and additions to the square was lost on them. They focused less on culture than Pratap Malla during the three decades that followed his death, steering the city and country more towards the arenas of politics and power, with only a few minor constructions made in the square. These projects included Parthivendra Malla building a temple referred to as Trailokya Mohan or Dasavatara, dedicated to Lord Vishnu in 1679. A large statue of Garuda, the mount of Lord Vishnu, was added in front of it a decade later. Parthivendra Malla added a pillar with image of his family in front of the Taleju Temple.
Around 1692, Radhilasmi, the widowed queen of Pratap Malla, erected the tall temples of Shiva known as Maju Deval near the Garuda image in the square. This temple stands on nine stepped platforms and is one of the tallest buildings in the square. Then her son, Bhupalendra Malla, took the throne and banished the widowed queen to the hills. His death came early at the age of twenty one and his widowed queen, Bhuvanalaksmi, built a temple in the square known as Kageswara Mahadev. The temple was built in the Newari style and acted as a substitute for worship of a distant temple in the hills. After the earthquake in 1934, the temple was restored with a dome roof, which was alien to the Newari architecture.
Jayaprakash Malla, the last Malla king to rule Kathmandu, built a temple for Kumari and Durga in her virginal state. The temple was named Kumari Bahal and was structured like a typical Newari vihara. In his house resides the Kumari, a girl who is revered as the living goddess. He also made a chariot for Kumari and in the courtyard had detailed terra cotta tiles of that time laid down.
UNDER THE SHAH DYNASTY
During the Shah dynasty that followed, the Kathmandu Durbar Square saw a number of changes. Two of the most unique temples in the square were built during this time. One is the Nautale, a nine-storied building known as Basantapur Durbar. It has four roofs and stands at the end of Nasal Chok at the East side of the palace. It is said that this building was set as a pleasure house. The lower three stories were made in the Newari farmhouse style. The upper floors have Newari style windows, sanjhya and tikijhya, and some of them are slightly projected from the wall. The other temple is annexed to the Vasantapur Durbar and has four-stories. This building was initially known as Vilasamandira, or Lohom Chok, but is now commonly known as Basantapur or Tejarat Chok. The lower floors of the Basantapur Chok display extensive woodcarvings and the roofs are made in popular the Mughal style. Archives state that Prthivi Narayan Shah built these two buildings in 1770.
Rana Bahadur Shah was enthroned at the age of two. Bahadur Shah, the second son of Prithvi Narayan Shah, ruled as a regent for his young nephew Rana Bahadur Shah for a close to a decade from 1785 to 1794 and built a temple of Shiva Parvati in the square. This one roofed temple is designed in the Newari style and is remarkably similar to previous temples built by the Mallas. It is rectangular in shape, and enshrines the Navadurga, a group of goddesses, on the ground floor. It has a wooden image of Shiva and Parvati at the window of the upper floor, looking out at the passersby in the square. Another significant donation made during the time of Rana Bahadur Shah is the metal-plated head of Swet Bhairav near the Degutale Temple. It was donated during the festival of Indra Jatra in 1795, and continues to play a major role during the festival every year. This approximately twelve feet high face of Bhairav is concealed behind a latticed wooden screen for the rest of the year. The following this donation Rana Bahadur donated a huge bronze bell as an offering to the Goddess Taleju. Together with the beating of the huge drums donated by his son Girvan Yudha, the bell was rung every day during the daily ritual worship to the goddess. Later these instruments were also used as an alarm system. However, after the death of his beloved third wife Kanimati Devi due to smallpox, Rana Bahadur Shah turned mad with grief and had many images of gods and goddesses smashed including the Taleju statue and bell, and Sitala, the goddess of smallpox.
In 1908, a palace, Gaddi Durbar, was built using European architectural designs. The Rana Prime Ministers who had taken over the power but not the throne of the country from the Shahs Kings from 1846 to 1951 were highly influenced by European styles. The Gaddi Durbar is covered in white plaster, has Greek columns and adjoins a large audience hall, all foreign features to Nepali architecture. The balconies of this durbar were reserved for the royal family during festivals to view the square below.
Some of the parts of the square like the Hatti Chok near the Kumari Bahal in the southern section of the square were removed during restoration after the devastating earthquake in 1934. While building the New Road, the southeastern part of the palace was cleared away, leaving only fragments in places as reminders of their past. Though decreased from its original size and attractiveness from its earlier seventeenth-century architecture, the Kathmandu Durbar Square still displays an ancient surrounding that spans abound five acres of land. It has palaces, temples, quadrangles, courtyards, ponds, and images that were brought together over three centuries of the Malla, the Shah, and the Rana dynasties. It was destroyed in the April 2015 Nepal earthquake.
VISITING
Kathmandu's Durbar Square is the site of the Hanuman Dhoka Palace Complex, which was the royal Nepalese residence until the 19th century and where important ceremonies, such as the coronation of the Nepalese monarch, took place. The palace is decorated with elaborately-carved wooden windows and panels and houses the King Tribhuwan Memorial Museum and the Mahendra Museum. It is possible to visit the state rooms inside the palace.
Time and again the temples and the palaces in the square have gone through reconstruction after being damaged by natural causes or neglect. Presently there are less than ten quadrangles in the square. The temples are being preserved as national heritage sites and the palace is being used as a museum. Only a few parts of the palace are open for visitors and the Taleju temples are only open for people of Hindu and Buddhist faiths.
At the southern end of Durbar Square is one of the most curious attractions in Nepal, the Kumari Chok. This gilded cage contains the Raj Kumari, a girl chosen through an ancient and mystical selection process to become the human incarnation of the Hindu mother goddess, Durga. She is worshiped during religious festivals and makes public appearances at other times for a fee paid to her guards.
WIKIPEDIA
It's just a psychotic use of light modifiers kind of morning isn't it?
If I'm totally honest this was a test shot for another idea and this is just what my face looks like when I'm concentrating but it turned out so terrifyingly I thought I'd share it
Kathmandu Durbar Square (Nepali: वसन्तपुर दरवार क्षेत्र, Basantapur Darbar Kshetra) in front of the old royal palace of the former Kathmandu Kingdom is one of three Durbar (royal palace) Squares in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, all of which are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Several buildings in the Square collapsed due to a major earthquake on 25 April 2015. Durbar Square was surrounded with spectacular architecture and vividly showcases the skills of the Newar artists and craftsmen over several centuries. The Royal Palace was originally at Dattaraya square and was later moved to the Durbar square.
The Kathmandu Durbar Square held the palaces of the Malla and Shah kings who ruled over the city. Along with these palaces, the square surrounds quadrangles, revealing courtyards and temples. It is known as Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square, a name derived from a statue of Hanuman, the monkey devotee of Lord Ram, at the entrance of the palace.
CONTENTS
HISTORY AND CONSTRUCTION
The preference for the construction of royal palaces at this site dates back to as early as the Licchavi period in the third century. Even though the present palaces and temples have undergone repeated and extensive renovations and nothing physical remains from that period. Names like Gunapo and Gupo, which are the names referred to the palaces in the square in early scriptures, imply that the palaces were built by Gunakamadev, a King ruling late in the tenth-century. When Kathmandu City became independent under the rule of King Ratna Malla (1484–1520), the palaces in the square became the Royal Palaces for its Malla Kings. When Prithvi Narayan Shah invaded the Kathmandu Valley in 1769, he favored the Kathmandu Durbar Square for his palace. Other subsequent Shah kings continued to rule from the square until 1896 when they moved to the Narayan Hiti Palace.
The square is still the center of important royal events like the coronation of King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah in 1975 and King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah in 2001.
Though there are no written archives stating the history of Kathmandu Durbar Square, construction of the palace in the square is credited to Sankharadev (1069–1083). As the first king of the independent Kathmandu City, Ratna Malla is said to have built the Taleju temple in the Northern side of the palace in 1501. For this to be true then the temple would have had to have been built in the vihara style as part of the palace premise surrounding the Mul Chok courtyard for no evidence of a separate structure that would match this temple can be found within the square.
Construction of the Karnel Chok is not clearly stated in any historical inscriptions; although, it is probably the oldest among all the courtyards in the square. The Bhagavati Temple, originally known as a Narayan Temple, rises above the mansions surrounding it and was added during the time of Jagajaya Malla in the early eighteenth century. The Narayan idol within the temple was stolen so Prithvi Narayan Shah replaced it with an image of Bhagavati, completely transforming the name of the temple.
The oldest temples in the square are those built by Mahendra Malla (1560–1574). They are the temples of Jagannath, Kotilingeswara Mahadev, Mahendreswara, and the Taleju Temple. This three-roofed Taleju Temple was established in 1564, in a typical Newari architectural style and is elevated on platforms that form a pyramid-like structure. It is said that Mahendra Malla, when he was residing in Bhaktapur, was highly devoted to the Taleju Temple there; the Goddess being pleased with his devotion gave him a vision asking him to build a temple for her in the Kathmandu Durbar Square. With a help of a hermit, he designed the temple to give it its present form and the Goddess entered the temple in the form of a bee.
His successors Sadasiva (1575–1581), his son, Shiva Simha (1578–1619), and his grandson, Laksmi Narsingha (1619–1641), do not seem to have made any major additions to the square. During this period of three generations the only constructions to have occurred were the establishment of Degutale Temple dedicated to Goddess Mother Taleju by Shiva Simha and some enhancement in the royal palace by Laksminar Simha.
UNDER PRATAP MALLA
In the time of Pratap Malla, son of Laksminar Simha, the square was extensively developed. He was an intellectual, a pious devotee, and especially interested in arts. He called himself a Kavindra, king of poets, and boasted that he was learned in fifteen different languages. A passionate builder, following his coronation as a king, he immediately began enlargements to his royal palace, and rebuilt some old temples and constructed new temples, shrines and stupas around his kingdom.During the construction of his palace, he added a small entrance in the traditional, low and narrow Newari style. The door was elaborately decorated with carvings and paintings of deities and auspicious sings and was later transferred to the entrance of Mohan Chok. In front of the entrance he placed the statue of Hanuman thinking that Hanuman would strengthen his army and protect his home. The entrance leads to Nasal Chok, the courtyard where most royal events such as coronation, performances, and yagyas, holy fire rituals, take place. It was named after Nasadya, the God of Dance, and during the time of Pratap Malla the sacred mask dance dramas performed in Nasal Chok were widely famed. In one of these dramas, it is said that Pratap Malla himself played the role of Lord Vishnu and that the spirit of the Lord remained in the king's body even after the play. After consulting his Tantric leaders, he ordered a stone image of Lord Vishnu in his incarnation as Nara Simha, the half-lion and half-human form, and then transferred the spirit into the stone. This fine image of Nara Simha made in 1673 still stands in the Nasal Chok. In 1650, he commissioned for the construction of Mohan Chok in the palace. This chok remained the royal residential courtyard for many years and is believed to store a great amount of treasure under its surface. Pratap Malla also built Sundari Chok about this time. He placed a slab engraved with lines in fifteen languages and proclaimed that he who can understand the inscription would produce the flow of milk instead of water from Tutedhara, a fountain set in the outer walls of Mohan Chok. However elaborate his constructions may have been, they were not simply intended to emphasize his luxuries but also his and the importance of others' devotion towards deities. He made extensive donations to temples and had the older ones renovated. Next to the palace, he built a Krishna temple, the Vamsagopala, in an octagonal shape in 1649. He dedicated this temple to his two Indian wives, Rupamati and Rajamati, as both had died during the year it was built. In Mohan Chok, he erected a three roofed Agamachem temple and a unique temple with five superimposing roofs. After completely restoring the Mul Chok, he donated to the adjoining Taleju Temple. To the main temple of Taleju, he donated metal doors in 1670. He rebuilt the Degutale Temple built by his grandfather, Siva Simha, and the Taleju Temple in the palace square. As a substitute to the Indreswara Mahadeva Temple in the distant village of Panauti he built a Shiva temple, Indrapura, near his palace in the square. He carved hymns on the walls of the Jagannath Temple as prayers to Taleju in the form of Kali.
At the southern end of the square, near Kasthamandap at Maru, which was the main city crossroads for early traders, he built another pavilion named Kavindrapura, the mansion of the king of poets. In this mansion he set an idol of dancing Shiva, Nasadyo, which today is highly worshipped by dancers in the Valley.
In the process of beautifying his palace, he added fountains, ponds, and baths. In Sundari Chok, he established a low bath with a golden fountain. He built a small pond, the Naga Pokhari, in the palace adorned with Nagakastha, a wooden serpent, which is said he had ordered stolen from the royal pond in the Bhaktapur Durbar Square. He restored the Licchavi stone sculptures such as the Jalasayana Narayana, the Kaliyadamana, and the Kala Bhairav. An idol of Jalasayana Narayana was placed in a newly created pond in the Bhandarkhal garden in the eastern wing of the palace. As a substitute to the idol of Jalasayana Narayana in Buddhanilkantha, he channeled water from Buddhanilkantha to the pond in Bhandarkhal due bestow authenticity. The Kalyadana, a manifestation of Lord Krishna destroying Kaliya, a water serpent, is placed in Kalindi Chok, which is adjacent to the Mohan Chok. The approximately ten-feet-high image of terrifyingly portrayed Kal Bhairav is placed near the Jagannath Temple. This image is the focus of worship in the chok especially during Durga Puja.
With the death of Pratap Malla in 1674, the overall emphasis on the importance of the square came to a halt. His successors retained relatively insignificant power and the prevailing ministers took control of most of the royal rule. The ministers encountered little influence under these kings and, increasingly, interest of the arts and additions to the square was lost on them. They focused less on culture than Pratap Malla during the three decades that followed his death, steering the city and country more towards the arenas of politics and power, with only a few minor constructions made in the square. These projects included Parthivendra Malla building a temple referred to as Trailokya Mohan or Dasavatara, dedicated to Lord Vishnu in 1679. A large statue of Garuda, the mount of Lord Vishnu, was added in front of it a decade later. Parthivendra Malla added a pillar with image of his family in front of the Taleju Temple.
Around 1692, Radhilasmi, the widowed queen of Pratap Malla, erected the tall temples of Shiva known as Maju Deval near the Garuda image in the square. This temple stands on nine stepped platforms and is one of the tallest buildings in the square. Then her son, Bhupalendra Malla, took the throne and banished the widowed queen to the hills. His death came early at the age of twenty one and his widowed queen, Bhuvanalaksmi, built a temple in the square known as Kageswara Mahadev. The temple was built in the Newari style and acted as a substitute for worship of a distant temple in the hills. After the earthquake in 1934, the temple was restored with a dome roof, which was alien to the Newari architecture.
Jayaprakash Malla, the last Malla king to rule Kathmandu, built a temple for Kumari and Durga in her virginal state. The temple was named Kumari Bahal and was structured like a typical Newari vihara. In his house resides the Kumari, a girl who is revered as the living goddess. He also made a chariot for Kumari and in the courtyard had detailed terra cotta tiles of that time laid down.
UNDER THE SHAH DYNASTY
During the Shah dynasty that followed, the Kathmandu Durbar Square saw a number of changes. Two of the most unique temples in the square were built during this time. One is the Nautale, a nine-storied building known as Basantapur Durbar. It has four roofs and stands at the end of Nasal Chok at the East side of the palace. It is said that this building was set as a pleasure house. The lower three stories were made in the Newari farmhouse style. The upper floors have Newari style windows, sanjhya and tikijhya, and some of them are slightly projected from the wall. The other temple is annexed to the Vasantapur Durbar and has four-stories. This building was initially known as Vilasamandira, or Lohom Chok, but is now commonly known as Basantapur or Tejarat Chok. The lower floors of the Basantapur Chok display extensive woodcarvings and the roofs are made in popular the Mughal style. Archives state that Prthivi Narayan Shah built these two buildings in 1770.
Rana Bahadur Shah was enthroned at the age of two. Bahadur Shah, the second son of Prithvi Narayan Shah, ruled as a regent for his young nephew Rana Bahadur Shah for a close to a decade from 1785 to 1794 and built a temple of Shiva Parvati in the square. This one roofed temple is designed in the Newari style and is remarkably similar to previous temples built by the Mallas. It is rectangular in shape, and enshrines the Navadurga, a group of goddesses, on the ground floor. It has a wooden image of Shiva and Parvati at the window of the upper floor, looking out at the passersby in the square. Another significant donation made during the time of Rana Bahadur Shah is the metal-plated head of Swet Bhairav near the Degutale Temple. It was donated during the festival of Indra Jatra in 1795, and continues to play a major role during the festival every year. This approximately twelve feet high face of Bhairav is concealed behind a latticed wooden screen for the rest of the year. The following this donation Rana Bahadur donated a huge bronze bell as an offering to the Goddess Taleju. Together with the beating of the huge drums donated by his son Girvan Yudha, the bell was rung every day during the daily ritual worship to the goddess. Later these instruments were also used as an alarm system. However, after the death of his beloved third wife Kanimati Devi due to smallpox, Rana Bahadur Shah turned mad with grief and had many images of gods and goddesses smashed including the Taleju statue and bell, and Sitala, the goddess of smallpox.
In 1908, a palace, Gaddi Durbar, was built using European architectural designs. The Rana Prime Ministers who had taken over the power but not the throne of the country from the Shahs Kings from 1846 to 1951 were highly influenced by European styles. The Gaddi Durbar is covered in white plaster, has Greek columns and adjoins a large audience hall, all foreign features to Nepali architecture. The balconies of this durbar were reserved for the royal family during festivals to view the square below.
Some of the parts of the square like the Hatti Chok near the Kumari Bahal in the southern section of the square were removed during restoration after the devastating earthquake in 1934. While building the New Road, the southeastern part of the palace was cleared away, leaving only fragments in places as reminders of their past. Though decreased from its original size and attractiveness from its earlier seventeenth-century architecture, the Kathmandu Durbar Square still displays an ancient surrounding that spans abound five acres of land. It has palaces, temples, quadrangles, courtyards, ponds, and images that were brought together over three centuries of the Malla, the Shah, and the Rana dynasties. It was destroyed in the April 2015 Nepal earthquake.
VISITING
Kathmandu's Durbar Square is the site of the Hanuman Dhoka Palace Complex, which was the royal Nepalese residence until the 19th century and where important ceremonies, such as the coronation of the Nepalese monarch, took place. The palace is decorated with elaborately-carved wooden windows and panels and houses the King Tribhuwan Memorial Museum and the Mahendra Museum. It is possible to visit the state rooms inside the palace.
Time and again the temples and the palaces in the square have gone through reconstruction after being damaged by natural causes or neglect. Presently there are less than ten quadrangles in the square. The temples are being preserved as national heritage sites and the palace is being used as a museum. Only a few parts of the palace are open for visitors and the Taleju temples are only open for people of Hindu and Buddhist faiths.
At the southern end of Durbar Square is one of the most curious attractions in Nepal, the Kumari Chok. This gilded cage contains the Raj Kumari, a girl chosen through an ancient and mystical selection process to become the human incarnation of the Hindu mother goddess, Durga. She is worshiped during religious festivals and makes public appearances at other times for a fee paid to her guards.
WIKIPEDIA
Babubazar bridge, Monday. The evening is descending in the old quarters of Dhaka with the aging darkness that it befriended since the dawn of time. Working people of the city are returning to their domiciles on the other side of the river Buriganga, everyone's in a hurry, they are trying to leave behind whatever misdeed they've done in the last 10 hours. The massive swarm of people includes day laborers, street vendors and maid servants. All of a sudden I see this face emerging from under one streetlamp to the other, an unnamed angst and sadness gripping her face.
She is crying.
Perhaps it's because her employer had tried to take advantage of her in the morning, perhaps her lover died recently, perhaps she just discovered that there's an unborn inside her with no one to take responsibilities, perhaps a nail penetrated her feet on the way to the bridge's approach road...who knows. I don't want to at least, I've my own problems to masquerade behind.
I like this photograph, I don't know why...this might not hold any real value to someone who is just seeing this in some other part of the planet in his/her perfect little online world..but I was there, and she was terrifyingly tactile.
You know what, nothing as it seems, only on black does justice.
British postcard in the Picturegoer series, London, no 707 H. Photo: Universal.
British actor Boris Karloff (1887-1969) is one of the true icons of the Horror cinema. He portrayed Frankenstein's monster in Frankenstein (1931), Bride of Frankenstein (1935), and Son of Frankenstein (1939), which resulted in his immense popularity. In the following decades, he worked in countless Horror films, but also in other genres, both in Europe and Hollywood.
Boris Karloff was born William Henry Pratt in 1887 in London, England. Pratt himself stated that he was born in Dulwich, which is nearby in London. His parents were Edward John Pratt, Jr. and his third wife Eliza Sarah Millard. ‘Billy’ never knew his father. Edward Pratt had worked for the Indian Salt Revenue Service and had virtually abandoned his family in far-off England. Edward died when his son was still an infant and so Billy was raised by his mother. He was the youngest of nine children, and following his mother's death was brought up by his elder brothers and sisters. As a child, Billy performed each Christmas in plays staged by St. Mary Magdalene's Church. His first role was that of The Demon King in the pantomime Cinderella. Billy was bow-legged, had a lisp, and stuttered. He conquered his stutter, but not his lisp, which was noticeable throughout his career in the film industry. After his education at private schools, he attended King's College London where he took studies aimed at a career with the British Government's Consular Service. However, in 1909, the 22-year-old left university without graduating and sailed from Liverpool to Canada, where he worked as a farm labourer and did various odd itinerant jobs. In Canada, he began appearing in theatrical performances and chose the stage name Boris Karloff. Later, he claimed he chose ‘Boris’ because it sounded foreign and exotic, and that ‘Karloff’ was a family name. However, his daughter Sara Karloff publicly denied any knowledge of Slavic forebears, Karloff or otherwise. One reason for the name change was to prevent embarrassment to his family. He did not reunite with his family until he returned to Britain to make The Ghoul (T. Hayes Hunter, 1933), opposite Cedric Hardwicke. Karloff was distraught that his family would disapprove of his new, macabre claim to world fame. Instead, his brothers jostled for position around him and happily posed for publicity photographs. In 1911, Karloff joined the Jeanne Russell Company and later joined the Harry St. Clair Co. which performed in Minot, North Dakota, for a year in an opera house above a hardware store. While trying to establish his acting career, Karloff had to perform years of difficult manual labour in Canada and the U.S. to make ends meet. He was left with back problems from which he suffered for the rest of his life. In 1917, he arrived in Hollywood, where he went on to make dozens of silent films. Some of his first roles were in film serials, such as The Masked Rider (Aubrey M. Kennedy, 1919), in Chapter 2 of which he can be glimpsed onscreen for the first time, and The Hope Diamond Mystery (Stuart Paton, 1920). In these early roles, he was often cast as an exotic Arabian or Indian villain. Other silent films were The Deadlier Sex (Robert Thornby, 1920) with Blanche Sweet, Omar the Tentmaker (James Young, 1922), Dynamite Dan (Bruce Mitchell, 1924) and Tarzan and the Golden Lion (J.P. McGowan, 1927) in which James Pierce played Tarzan. In 1926 Karloff found a provocative role in The Bells (James Young, 1926), in which he played a sinister hypnotist opposite Lionel Barrymore. He worked with Barrymore again in his first sound film, the thriller The Unholy Night (Lionel Barrymore, 1929).
A key film which brought Boris Karloff recognition was The Criminal Code (Howard Hawks, 1931), a prison drama in which he reprised a dramatic part he had played on stage. With his characteristic short-cropped hair and menacing features, Karloff was a frightening sight to behold. Opposite Edward G. Robinson, Karloff played a key supporting part as an unethical newspaper reporter in Five Star Final (Mervyn LeRoy, 1931), a film about tabloid journalism which was nominated for the Oscar for Best Picture. Karloff's role as Frankenstein's monster in Frankenstein (James Whale, 1931), based on the classic Mary Shelley book, propelled him to stardom. Wikipedia: “The bulky costume with four-inch platform boots made it an arduous role but the costume and extensive makeup produced the classic image. The costume was a job in itself for Karloff with the shoes weighing 11 pounds (5 kg) each.” The aura of mystery surrounding Karloff was highlighted in the opening credits, as he was listed as simply "?." The film was a commercial and critical success for Universal, and Karloff was instantly established as a hot property in Hollywood. Universal Studios was quick to acquire ownership of the copyright to the makeup format for the Frankenstein monster that Jack P. Pierce had designed. A year later, Karloff played another iconic character, Imhotep in The Mummy (Karl Freund, 1932). The Old Dark House (James Whale, 1932) with Charles Laughton, and the starring role in MGM’s The Mask of Fu Manchu (Charles Brabin, 1932) quickly followed. Steve Vertlieb at The Thunder Child: “Wonderfully kinky, the film co-starred young Myrna Loy as the intoxicating, yet sadistic Fah Lo See, Fu Manchu's sexually perverse daughter. Filmed before Hollywood's infamous production code, the film joyously escaped the later scrutiny of The Hayes Office, and remains a fascinating example of pre-code extravagance.” These films all confirmed Karloff's new-found stardom. Horror had become his primary genre, and he gave a string of lauded performances in 1930s Universal Horror films. Karloff reprised the role of Frankenstein's monster in two other films, the sensational Bride of Frankenstein (James Whale, 1935) and the less thrilling Son of Frankenstein (Rowland V. Lee, 1939), the latter also featuring Bela Lugosi. Steve Vertlieb about Bride of Frankenstein: “Whale delivered perhaps the greatest horror film of the decade and easily the most critically acclaimed rendition of Mary Shelley's novel ever released. The Bride of Frankenstein remains a work of sheer genius, a brilliantly conceived and realized take on loneliness, vanity, and madness. The cast of British character actors is simply superb.” While the long, creative partnership between Karloff and Lugosi never led to a close friendship, it produced some of the actors' most revered and enduring productions, beginning with The Black Cat (Edgar G. Ullmer, 1934). Follow-ups included The Raven (Lew Landers, 1935), the rarely seen, imaginative science fiction melodrama The Invisible Ray (Lambert Hillyer, 1936), and The Body Snatcher (Robert Wise, 1945). Karloff played a wide variety of roles in other genres besides Horror. He was memorably gunned down in a bowling alley in Howard Hawks' classic Scarface (1932) starring Paul Muni.. He played a religious First World War soldier in John Ford’s epic The Lost Patrol (1934) opposite Victor McLaglen. Between 1938 and 1940, Karloff starred in five films for Monogram Pictures, including Mr. Wong, Detective (William Nigh, 1938). During this period, he also starred with Basil Rathbone in Tower of London (Rowland V. Lee, 1939) as the murderous henchman of King Richard III, and with Margaret Lindsay in British Intelligence (Terry O. Morse, 1940). In 1944, he underwent a spinal operation to relieve his chronic arthritic condition.
Boris Karloff revisited the Frankenstein mythos in several later films, taking the starring role of the villainous Dr. Niemann in House of Frankenstein (Erle C. Kenton, 1944), in which the monster was played by Glenn Strange. He reprised the role of the ‘mad scientist’ in Frankenstein 1970 (Howard W. Koch, 1958) as Baron Victor von Frankenstein II, the grandson of the original creator. The finale reveals that the crippled Baron has given his face (i.e., Karloff's) to the monster. From 1945 to 1946, Boris Karloff appeared in three films for RKO produced by Val Lewton: Isle of the Dead (Mark Robson, 1945), The Body Snatcher (Robert Wise, 1945), and Bedlam (Mark Robson, 1946). Karloff had left Universal because he thought the Frankenstein franchise had run its course. Karloff was a frequent guest on radio programs. In 1949, he was the host and star of the radio and television anthology series Starring Boris Karloff. In 1950, he had his own weekly children's radio show in New York. He played children's music, told stories and riddles, and attracted many adult listeners as well. An enthusiastic performer, he returned to the Broadway stage in the original production of Arsenic and Old Lace (1941), in which he played a homicidal gangster enraged to be frequently mistaken for Karloff. In 1962, he reprised the role on television with Tony Randall and Tom Bosley. He also appeared as Captain Hook in the play Peter Pan with Jean Arthur. In 1955, he returned to the Broadway stage to portray the sympathetic Bishop Cauchon in Jean Anouilh's The Lark. Karloff regarded the production as the highlight of his long career. Julie Harris was his co-star as Joan of Arc in the celebrated play, recreated for live television in 1957 with Karloff, Harris and much of the original New York company intact. For his role, Karloff was nominated for a Tony Award. Karloff donned the monster make-up for the last time for a Halloween episode of the TV series Route 66 (1962), which also featured Peter Lorre and Lon Chaney, Jr. In the 1960s, Karloff appeared in several films for American International Pictures, including The Comedy of Terrors (Jacques Tourneur, 1963) with Vincent Price and Peter Lorre, The Raven (Roger Corman, 1963), The Terror (Roger Corman, 1963) with Jack Nicholson, and Die, Monster, Die! (Daniel Haller, 1965). Another project for American International release was the frightening Italian horror classic, I tre volti della paura/Black Sabbath (Mario Bava, 1963), in which Karloff played a vampire with bone-chilling intensity. He also starred in British cult director Michael Reeves's second feature film, The Sorcerers (1966). He gained new popularity among the young generation when he narrated the animated TV film Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas (Chuck Jones, Ben Washam. 1966), and provided the voice of the Grinch. Karloff later received a Grammy Award for Best Recording For Children after the story was released as a record. Then he starred as a retired horror film actor in Targets (Peter Bogdanovich, 1968), Steve Vertlieb: “Targets was a profoundly disturbing study of a young sniper holding a small Midwestern community, deep in the bible belt, terrifyingly at bay. The celebrated subplot concerned the philosophical dilemma of creating fanciful horrors on the screen, while the graphic, troubling reality was eclipsing the superficiality so tiredly repeated by Hollywood. Karloff co-starred, essentially as himself, an aged horror star named Byron Orlok, who wants simply to retire from the imagined horrors of a faded genre, only to come shockingly to grips with the depravity and genuine terror found on America's streets. Bogdanovich's first film as a director won praise from critics and audiences throughout the world community, and won its elder star the best, most respectful notices of his later career.”. In 1968, he played occult expert Professor Marsh in the British production Curse of the Crimson Altar (Vernon Sewell, 1968), which was the last Karloff film to be released during his lifetime. He ended his career by appearing in four low-budget Mexican horror films, which were released posthumously. While shooting his final films, Karloff suffered from emphysema. Only half of one lung was still functioning and he required oxygen between takes. he contracted bronchitis in 1968 and was hospitalized. In early 1969, he died of pneumonia at the King Edward VII Hospital, Midhurst, in Sussex, at the age of 81. Boris Karloff married five times and had one child, daughter Sara Karloff, by his fourth wife.
Sources: Steve Vertlieb (The Thunder Child), Wikipedia, and IMDb.
French postcard in the Collection Cinéma by Editions Art & Scene, Paris, no. CA 43. Robert de Niro in New York, New York (Martin Scorsese, 1977).
Legendary American actor Robert De Niro (1943) has starred in such classic films as Taxi Driver (1976), Novecento/1900 (1978), The Deer Hunter (1978), Awakenings (1990) and GoodFellas (1990). His role in The Godfather: Part II (1974) brought him his first Academy Award, and he scored his second Oscar for his portrayal of Jake La Motta in Raging Bull (1980). De Niro worked with many acclaimed film directors, including Brian De Palma, Francis Coppola, Elia Kazan, Bernardo Bertolucci and, most importantly, Martin Scorsese. He has also appeared in French, British, and Italian films.
Robert Anthony De Niro was born in the Greenwich Village area of Manhattan, New York City, in 1943. His mother, Virginia Admiral, was a cerebral and gifted painter, and his father, Robert De Niro Sr., was a painter, sculptor and poet whose work received high critical acclaim. They split ways in 1945 when young Robert was only 2 years old after his father announced that he was gay. De Niro was raised primarily by his mother, who took on work as a typesetter and printer to support her son. A bright and energetic child, Robert De Niro was incredibly fond of attending films with his father when they spent time together. De Niro's mother worked part-time as a typist and copyeditor for Maria Piscator's Dramatic Workshop, and as part of her compensation, De Niro was allowed to take children's acting classes for free. At the age of 10, De Niro made his stage debut as the Cowardly Lion in a school production of The Wizard of Oz. De Niro proved to be uninterested in school altogether and, as a teenager, joined a rather tame street gang in Little Italy that gave him the nickname Bobby Milk, about his pale complexion. While De Niro was by all accounts only a very modest troublemaker, the gang provided him with the experience to skilfully portray Italian mobsters as an actor. He left school at age 16 to study acting at Stella Adler Conservatory. Adler, who had taught Marlon Brando and Rod Steiger, was a strong proponent of the Stanislavski method of acting, involving deep psychological character investigation. He studied briefly with Lee Strasberg at the Actor's Studio in New York City and then began auditioning. After a momentary cameo in the French film Trois chambres à Manhattan/Three Rooms in Manhattan (Marcel Carné, 1965), De Niro's real film debut came in Greetings (Brian De Palma, 1968). However, De Niro's first film role already came at the age of 20, when he appeared credited as Robert Denero in De Palma’s The Wedding Party (Brian De Palma, Wilford Leach, 1963), but the film was not released until 1969. He then appeared in Roger Corman's film Bloody Mama (1970), featuring Shelley Winters. His breakthrough performances came a few years later in two highly acclaimed films: the sports drama Bang the Drum Slowly (John D. Hancock, 1973), in which he played a terminally ill catcher on a baseball team, and the crime film Mean Streets (1973), his first of many collaborations with director Martin Scorsese, in which he played street thug Johnny Boy opposite Harvey Keitel.
Robert De Niro and Martin Scorsese worked successfully together on eight films: Mean Streets (1973), Taxi Driver (1976), New York, New York (1977), Raging Bull (1980), The King of Comedy (1983), Goodfellas (1990), Cape Fear (1991), and Casino (1995). In 1974, De Niro established himself as one of America’s finest actors with his Academy Award-winning portrayal of the young Vito Corleone in The Godfather: Part II (Francis Ford Coppola, 1974), a role for which he learned to speak Sicilian. Two years later, De Niro delivered perhaps the most chilling performance of his career, playing vengeful cabbie Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976) alongside Jodie Foster. His iconic performance as Travis Bickle catapulted him to stardom and forever linked his name with Bickle's famous "You talkin' to me?" monologue, which De Niro largely improvised. In Italy, De Niro appeared opposite Gérard Dépardieu in the epic historical drama Novecento/1900 (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1976). The film is an exploration of life in Italy in the first half of the 20th century, seen through the eyes of two Italian childhood friends on opposite sides of society's hierarchy. He also starred in The Last Tycoon (1976), the last film directed by Elia Kazan. The Hollywood drama is based upon Harold Pinter's screenplay adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's 'The Last Tycoon'. De Niro continued to show his tremendous skill as a dramatic actor in the Vietnam War drama The Deer Hunter (Michael Cimino, 1978). The film follows a group of friends haunted by their Vietnam experiences. De Niro later portrayed middleweight boxer Jake LaMotta in the commercially unsuccessful but critically adored film Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese, 1980). The previously skinny De Niro had put on 60 pounds of muscle for his riveting turn as LaMotta and was rewarded for his dedication with the 1981 Academy Award for Best Actor.
In the 1980s, Robert De Niro's first roles were as a worldly ambitious Catholic priest in True Confessions (Ulu Grosbard, 1981), an aspiring stand-up comedian in Scorsese's The King of Comedy (Martin Scorsese, 1983), and a Jewish mobster in the sprawling historical epic Once Upon a Time in America (Sergio Leone, 1984). Other notable projects included the Sci-Fi art film Brazil (Terry Gilliam, 1985) and the British drama The Mission (Roland Joffé, 1986), about the experiences of a Jesuit missionary in 18th-century South America, which won the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival. It was followed by films like the crime drama The Untouchables (Brian De Palma, 1987), in which De Niro portrayed gangster Al Capone opposite Kevin Costner as Eliot Ness, the mysterious thriller Angel Heart (Alan Parker, 1987), and the action-comedy Midnight Run (Martin Brest, 1988). De Niro opened the 1990s with Goodfellas (Martin Scorsese, 1990), yet another acclaimed gangster film from Scorsese that saw the actor teaming up with Ray Liotta and Joe Pesci. De Niro next starred in a project that earned him another Oscar nomination, portraying a catatonic patient brought back to awareness in Awakenings (Penny Marshall, 1990), co-starring Robin Williams as a character based on physician Oliver Sacks. Dramas continued to be the genre of choice for De Niro, as he played a blacklisted director in Guilty by Suspicion (Irwin Winkler, 1991) and a fire chief in Backdraft (Ron Howard, 1991). Soon afterwards, the actor was once again front and centre and terrifyingly reunited with Scorsese, bulking up to become a tattooed rapist who stalks a family in Cape Fear (Martin Scorsese, 1991). The film was a remake of the 1962 thriller starring Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum. Peck and Mitchum made appearances in the remake as well. De Niro received his sixth Academy Award nomination for Fear, with the film becoming the highest-grossing collaboration between the actor and Scorsese, earning more than $182 million worldwide. After somewhat edgy, comedic outings like Night and the City (1992) and Mad Dog and Glory (1993), another drama followed in the form of This Boy's Life (Michael Caton-Jones, 1993), in which De Niro portrayed the abusive stepfather of a young Leonardo DiCaprio. That same year, De Niro made his directorial debut with A Bronx Tale (Robert De Niro, 1993), a film adaptation of a one-man play written and performed by Chazz Palminteri. In 1994, De Niro was practically unrecognisable as the monster in actor/director Kenneth Branagh's adaptation of the Mary Shelley novel Frankenstein (Kenneth Branagh, 1994). It was followed by another Scorsese telling of mob life, this time in Las Vegas. De Niro portrayed a character based on real-life figure Frank ‘Lefty’ Rosenthal in Casino (Martin Scorsese, 1995), co-starring Sharon Stone and Joe Pesci. In Heat (Michael Mann, 1995), De Niro re-teamed with fellow Godfather star Al Pacino in a well-received outing about a bank robber contemplating getting out of the business and the police detective aiming to bring him down.
For the rest of the 1990s and into the new millennium, Robert De Niro was featured yearly in a big-screen project as either a lead or supporting figure. His films include the legal crime drama Sleepers (Barry Levinson, 1996), the black comedy Wag the Dog (Barry Levinson, 1997), the crime drama Cop Land (James Mangold, 1997), the crime thriller Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997), the spy action-thriller Ronin (John Frankenheimer, 1998) and the crime comedy-drama Flawless (Joel Schumacher, 1999). At the turn of the century, De Niro struck out into decidedly different territory with Analyze This (Harold Ramis, 1999), a hilarious and highly popular spoof of the mob movies that had garnered him fame. Analyze This earned more than $100 million domestically, with De Niro playing a Mafioso who seeks help from a psychiatrist (Billy Crystal). De Niro took on another comedy, Meet the Parents (Jay Roach, 2000), as Ben Stiller's future father-in-law. The smash hit spawned two sequels: Meet the Fockers (Jay Roach, 2004) and Little Fockers (Paul Weitz, 2011), both of which were also box-office successes. De Niro continued to switch between comedic and serious roles over the next few years, reuniting with Billy Crystal for Analyze That (Harold Ramis, 2002), and starring in the spy thriller The Good Shepherd (Robert De Niro, 2006) with Matt Damon and Angelina Jolie. The following year, De Niro was featured as a secretive cross-dressing pirate with a heart of gold in the fantasy flick Stardust (Matthew Vaughn, 2007), while 2009 saw a return to dramatic fare with Everybody's Fine (Kirk Jones, 2009). In Italy, De Niro starred in the romantic comedy Manuale d'amore 3/The Ages of Love (Giovanni Veronesi, 2011). De Niro earned yet another Academy Award nomination for his turn in David O. Russell's Silver Linings Playbook (2012), playing the father of a mentally troubled son (Bradley Cooper). De Niro teamed up again with Silver Linings Playbook director Russell and stars Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence for the biopic Joy (David O. Russell, 2015), based on the life of Miracle Mop inventor Joy Mangano. Later that year, De Niro starred as a widower who returns to the workforce in The Intern (Nancy Meyers, 2015), with Anne Hathaway. In 2016, he starred in another biopic, Hands of Stone (Jonathan Jakubowicz, 2016), playing Ray Arcel, the trainer of Panamanian boxer Roberto Durán. That same year, De Niro received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Obama for his contribution to the arts. De Niro, who has long resided in New York City, has been investing in Manhattan's Tribeca neighbourhood since 1989. His capital ventures there included co-founding the film studio TriBeCa Productions in 1998 and the Tribeca Film Festival (since 2002). De Niro married actress Diahnne Abbott in 1976. The couple had one son, Raphael, before divorcing 12 years later, in 1988. De Niro then had a long relationship with model Toukie Smith. They had twin sons, Aaron Kendrick and Julian Henry, in 1995. Then in 1997, De Niro married Grace Hightower, with whom he has two children.
Sources: Biography.com, Wikipedia, and IMDb.
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Front row: Cousin Geoff, Kate and Linda at Aunt Marguerite Solomon’s memorial service.
Some words about her mom from Linda:
Thank you for coming. I'm sorry you're so far away in camera, but there we go. I would just like to start by thanking everybody for being here, and for being such a good friend to Margaret. She was a good friend to many people. And I can see from the number of people that are here today, that that was reciprocated, so it's lovely. Thank you.
I'm just going to tell you a bit about mom's life. She was born in Clinton, Ontario, Marguerite Grace Shepherd, the daughter of Clarence Percival Shepherd and Lula Mae Harkness. She had three younger siblings, Ruth, Larry and Tom. Her dad was in the bank so they moved around a bit. So, after, after Clinton they were in St. Thomas, then Campbellford ON, and finally in Iroquois which was really fortunate because that was her mother's hometown. She'd grown up there. Margaret was a good student. She was particularly good at mathematics.
She took piano lessons like lots of kids. She loved to sing. When she left Iroquois she was given a hymnal by the people in her church with that was inscribed. We found it when we were clearing things out after she moved to Central Place.
The other thing about Marguerite that some of you may know, but maybe most don't know, was that she was a really good sports woman. She loved to swim in Iroquois. She swim in the canal. That was before the St. Lawrence Seaway, but there was a canal there that she loved to swim in. She loved to play tennis. She was a good tennis player. She tells a story of when she was about 16 she wanted her father to come down and play tennis with her so she could show him how well she played tennis. Dad, come and play. Come and play. So finally he came down to play tennis with her. He stood in the middle of the court and just went, pop, pop, pop to each side, and she ran back and forth the whole time. She said, I never asked him to go again. She was also good at athletics. She was the school athletics champion. And she did the long jump, and she was a sprinter, and it's funny how genes passed down, because when I was in athletics at school, I was good at long jump and sprinting, and my son when he did athletics, was long jump and sprinting, so we've got something passed down from mom. It's lovely. In her older age, she still was she still followed sports. She swam regularly. She went to her aqua aerobics. She did lawn bowling. She did lane bowling. She was a curler, and anything she did, she got good at very quickly. With her curling she quickly surpassed Harold her father in law, who she loved dearly. And they were once in a bond spiel. Mom was the skipper. Harold was the Vice, and they got an Eight Ender. We still have her little trophy from that. She used to go hiking hiking. She learned to ski when she was in her 40s, which is kind of late to begin, but she did it.
So back to her growing up. She spent her teenage years, the later ones in Iroquois, and then went to Toronto went to secretarial school. And after that was the secretary for Dr. Bill Robinson who was a pathologist at Toronto General Hospital. When she was in Toronto she met Keith, who became her husband at Grace United Church. They went to the same church and dad was in the choir. She had not made the choir. She was quite disappointed. They said she didn't sing well enough to be in the choir, so it must have been a special choir. But she met Keith, and she told me once that she wasn't really all that interested in him. She was really interested in guy called Mike Sayer, but her cousin Allison, who was her best friend nabbed Mike. Allison's daughter is here today, Christy, thank you for coming.
And so, dad went then overseas. He went to war. She went out with Mike’s good friend Norm while Keith was overseas. She said, Oh, I felt sorry for him so I wrote him letters. They wrote regularly and she said we really got to know each other through those letters, and then when he came back, the rest is history for them. They were married in 1947.
Back in Toronto, though she was when she was still there, while he was away, she came into... she had trouble the shorthand, even though she was a secretary, and she she'd done a shorthand exam for the third time, and failed it yet again. So she came back to the office and she burst into tears and Dr. Robinson said, What's the difference? I’ll never get out of here. I have to get out. And he said, Oh, and he questioned her a bit and he came back two days later and he said, How would you like to go to Kingston and learn to be a lab technician? Great, because in the meantime her father had died. Her mother was alone with three children at home. It wasn't an easy time. So Kingston was a lot closer to Iroquois. So she moved back there to Kingston, and she learned to be a lab technician in the hospital. She learned on the spot. It was Marguerite that was sent down to New York to meet Dr. Georgios Papanikolaou, who had developed the pap smear. She learned how to do that. She was the first person to bring that back to Canada. So a lot of us of a certain gender are very grateful for that.
She showed her strength of conviction. I remember she told me a story one time about going on the bus from from Kingston to Iroquois, and the bus driver was so terrifyingly driving, and she stood up in the bus and said, You stop this bus and let me off right now, and he did. I don't know how she got to Iroquois.
After she was married of course she moved to Meaford, and didn't work as most women in those days didn't, but she learned to play bridge bridge, under the tutelage of her mother in long Mernie who was a very good bridge player. She quickly surpassed her husband Keith, who thought he was a good bridge player, but mom left him for dead, and those of you who like grandmother know that she was pretty good at it. She also continued to play tennis. She had a friend called Mariel Grant. Some of you may remember Muriel. She had a private tennis court across the road from her house which I think is where the ball park was eventually built, so when the ballpark was built the tennis court went. There was no public tennis court in Meaford ON at that time, but she was pleased to play tennis with Muriel. I can remember going and sitting and watching her do that so, but that that came to an end, because there wasn't a tennis court anymore. She loved an active life. I can remember as a child going on picnics and hikes, just all sorts of things outside, camping. We camped often with our cousins, with the Carthews. Scott’s here today. Thank you. One of the... we’d do on camping trips down east, and also we spend a lot of time with the Shepherds, and that was with her brother, Larry's family. We've got quite a few of them here today. Thank you so much for coming.
She was a good friend. She was a good relative. She kept in touch with people, and I think a lot of people appreciated that.
She loved to hike, and when dad got involved in the Bruce Trail, of course she was involved as well. He did. He did the finding the landowners and getting the trail built, but it was mom behind the scenes who really was the driving force between behind setting up the Beaver Valley Bruce Trail Cup. She did all the paperwork and that stuff. Dad got the glory for it. She always stood in the background. She let him take the credit for things, but really she was a strength, I think, in their relationship, without ever letting anybody know that.
So she, she did sort of work, the things that her husband wanted to do, but she enjoyed them as well. And going hiking down in the United States in Vermont, New Hampshire and New York. Just all those things she just loved being outside. When dad died, even before he died, she went in and started helping the insurance business. She really transformed the business. Dad didn't like asking people for money. Mom wasn't afraid to ask people for money. She had the business incorporated which saved her when he had his early death. It was a very good thing that that had happened, but that was due to her. As Geoff said, I didn't realize that. Geoff said that. But when dad died, she really blossomed. She was so strong. She tried to run that business herself, despite enormous pressure from somebody trying to buy it from her. She wouldn't sell it because she didn't believe in the ethics of the person who wanted to buy it. She really stood stood her ground until Geoff came, and then she helped with the business for many years. She once was visiting me in Australia, when she said, They've got a new computer system. She learned about computers before anybody else in town I think before they'd got a new computer system. It won't balance. It's a one cent every month. It's driving me nuts. She said. I don't need this stress. I'm 78 years old. When I go home I'm going to retire, and she did.
Marguerite did a lot of volunteer work. She was really active for many years in the United Church Women. She was an Explorer Leader. Later when I was a child, she was a Cub leader.
She was instrumental in getting the Midas Mart set up. So she was in the beginning of that. She helped set up the marathon branch, which I think is maybe defunct now but it went for many years, and she was very involved in the Bruce trail. Once again, as I said on some of these things she did it quietly in the background, but she did it, always very organized.
She was a terrific mother. Marguerite, like she just... she was very firm, very firm, but I think she was fair.
She was always there for us, because she didn't go to work, so I can remember coming home and saying, Mom, I'm home, and she was just always there.
She loved parties. She loves Christmas, especially but she parties. There's a picture we have of a Halloween party that that she did for us kids. I don't know. Geoff maybe looks like he was only about five, we were quite young, but there all these children are sitting up at the dining table with her good China, and her good silver. I thought, I don't think that you’d do that with kids these days, but if it was a party, it didn't matter whether you were eight, or whether you were 80, she was going to serve you the same way.
She was saying what she thought about what you were, what you were doing. If she didn't like it, which to me in particular, because, never mind, I don't think you should be doing that Linda. And I said, Well, that's too bad. I'm doing it anyway, and she never ever would say it again. She never harped on about it. She never nagged, Once it was said, you knew what she thought, and then it was up to you. And I really admired that, and valued that in her. She had real inner strength. You know I think in 1970-71, Harold, her father in law, whom she loved dearly, died. Then Geoff had his accident, then her mother died a couple of months later, all within that time. And you know she never, she never gave any sort of... she didn't give any sign of being really needy. She was... she was terrific, real inner strength. She never complained.
So she'd come out of the shadow, after her dad died.
She just had real principles, I think. After dad died and after Geoff was here, and she was a bit freer she, she went into her travel years and she went all around the globe. She did a lot of elder hostile trips to Lapland to Great Britain. I don’t know where else, but she also came to Australia, every couple of years and stayed with me for a couple of months which was lovely so my children got to know her really well. She went cycling in Holland. That was a bit disastrous that trip, if any of you remember it, but she visited us also when we lived in New Zealand, and she always took me on a trip when she came to visit. We’d go off for a week and do something, or else she’d go on her own trips as well. Into her 80’s she stopped coming, and got her cats. She loved her cats we have a younger one earlier called Yogi that she had stolen from a child. Somebody had left her cats on the side of the road at lunchtime when kids were coming home from school, and this kid she'd been trying to get this little black kitten out, and some child came along and managed to grab this kitten, and she just pounced on it, grabbed it saying, He’s mine. She took him home.
As you will know, Margaret was blunt. She could be blunt. She spoke her mind. Sometimes she could be a little bit hurtful, but she never meant to be hurtful. It was always her heart. She had a heart of gold. She had many friends. She was a good friend to many people, an independent, no nonsense... You know she was still climbing up ladders when she was 90 and 92, which was a bit silly, trying to get up on chairs to try to get things out of top cupboards. So the fact is that she lived by herself until she was 95, just shows how independent she was. Though I've been really fortunate for the last 20-30 years to be able to come quite regularly to see her, and I'm really going to miss her.
Sally Anne said that she was Christian, yes she was, but she also said she didn't think there was anything beyond, so that when you die, you're just dead. That’s it. There’s nothing else. But I expect that she's probably found out now that she was wrong, and I hope that she's with all those dear friends of hers that she missed so much when they left before she did.
So, Thank you. Thank you mom for being such a good mother, such a good friend, and God bless you. Bless your spirit.
Thank you.
I must have a terrifyingly warped imagination. Sky worms, indeed.
For those of you who actually want to know what it is, this is the Whittle Arch, which sits outside the Coventry Transport Museum - it was built to commemorate Frank Whittle, who was the inventor of the jet engine. Not jet worms :) And it's hayoooge.
Also in black and white (which I prefer) here:
SO many berries around at the minute. I've never paid any attention to their arrival before, but the small one is VERY keen on picking them, rather terrifyingly.
How could she see me in the middle of the 40 000 spectators!
All over the capital, the Arirang adverts (« Grand mass gymnastic and artistic performance », « Welcome to Pyongyang » and so on) warn the profane…Between August and October, takes place one of the biggest and most impressive performances in the world. The tone is set : even the Beijing Olympics ceremony can’t compete with the mass games organized by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK). The show is held several times a week and welcomes tourists from all over the World, including the US, in one of the most isolated and despised country on earth. The well-called « mass games » are designed to emphasize group dynamics rather than individual performances as the supreme emblem of communism. Prepared by hundred of thousands performers all along the year, after their classes for the youngest of them, they are entirely dedicated to the NK’s leader Kim Jong Il and his deceased father Kim Il Sung, considered as the « Eternal president » and « sun of the 21st century »…
In the surroundings of Pyongyang's May Day giant Stadium, two girls are running to perform for the Arirang show. They are already dressed in their gymnastic outfits, as well as some 100,000 others who participate to the performance. They all come to honour their self-proclaimed « dear leader » Kim Jong Il, after a very hard and gruelling training, since their earliest age. Yet, it has been many years that Kim Jong Il has not shown up, formally for business reasons. But officials now admit the western medias’ assertions of illness. Anyways, Kim Jong Il or not, the mass games are held every year in Pyongyang, as a means for the regime to show to the entire world the country’s strength and good shape. To reach this sole purpose, not less than 100,000 people are involved in a choreographed show of simultaneous dancing and gymnastics. Many symbols are displayed by thousands of trained athlets, whether they are adults or even children. Hand over their heart, the young pupils sing in chorus "We are the happiest children in the world", one of the famous propaganda songs in North Korea. Many dancers make movements either with ribbons or colourful flowers named « kimjonglias » after the leader Kim Jong Il. All along the show, a live band plays a ceremonious music.
On the background, some 20,000 young koreans sit on the terraces, facing the spectators. They flip coloured cards at a high speed to form a fresco of animated and detailed images, changing from one to another. Each time they turn the page to create a new giant picture, they cry out. It creates a awe-inspiring atmosphere, as the shout is mixed with the noise of thousands of pages turned at the same moment. The figures are stunning : to compose these images, 2000 children are needed to make only one soldier, 20,000 for a north korean flag. Hiding a much more grim reality, the panels represent Pyongyang enlightened by night, wheat fields ready for harvest, scientists at work, atoms as symbols of the nuclear bomb and others for the reunification of two Koreas. One of the North Korea’s myths (history according to them) is recounted by the means of a huge image made by thousands of children. It represents the two pistols reportedly used by Kim Il Sung, when he founded the Anti-Japanese People’s Guerrilla Army in 1932. When the pistols appear, the audience applauses loudly. Among them, many soldiers attend the show as the ultimate award after years of good and faithful service.The thousands and thousands of boys and girls involved create a giant mass movement in the stadium which leaves the public stunned. These talented performers are used to that kind of performance: in North Korea they have to dance, sing, jump and spin around as many times as there are celebrations, always in praise of their leaders. There are mainly two sorts of shows. The first one is the classical artistic show, named "Arirang" after the famous korean folk song (whose story sometimes changes, but most often recounts the legend of a disappointed woman who hopes that her lover will return to her –metaphor of the break-up with South Korea). The second one is a more political show, which was untitled in 2008 "Prosper our country" and intended to show the country’s greatest achievements and its struggle against the foreign oppressors.
The show continues in the same way for one hour. Thereafter, the thousands of people present vanish in the dark and silent streets of Pyongyang, which contrast with the flood of lights and music in the stadium. Within the space of a few hours, it gives us a a strange feeling, between the real and unreal, of another universe both terrifying and fantastic.
Dans toute la ville, les publicités d’Arirang (« Grande représentation gymnastique et artistique de masse », « Bienvenue à Pyongyang » etc.) mettent le profane en garde …Entre août et octobre, a lieu l’une des plus grandes et impressionnantes représentations au monde. Le ton est donné : pas même la cérémonie des Jeux de Pékin ne peut rivaliser avec les mass games organisés par la République Démocratique Populaire de Corée (RDPC). Le spectacle se tient plusieurs fois par semaine et accueille des touristes du monde entier, y compris des Etats-Unis, dans l’un des pays les plus isolés et méprisés sur terre. Les biens nommés mass games (« mouvements de masse») sont conçus pour mettre en avant les dynamiques de groupe plutôt que les performances individuelles comme emblème suprême du communisme. Préparés par des centaines de milliers d’artistes tout au long de l’année, après les cours pour les plus jeunes d’entre eux, les jeux sont entièrement dédiés au leader de la Corée du Nord, Kim Jong Il, et feu son père Kim Il Sung, considéré comme l’ « Eternel président » et « soleil du 21ème siècle »…
Aux environs du Stade géant May Day de Pyongyang, deux filles courent pour participer au spectacle de Arirang. Elles sont déjà en costume de gymnastique, tout comme quelque 100 000 autres qui participent à la représentation. Tous viennent pour honorer leur autoproclamé « cher leader » Kim Jong Il, après un très difficile et éprouvant entraînement, depuis leur plus jeune âge. Pourtant, cela fait plusieurs années que Kim Jong Il ne s’est pas montré, formellement pour des raisons professionnelles. Mais des officiels admettent les assertions des médias occidentaux sur sa maladie. Quoi qu’il en soit, Kim Jong Il ou pas, les jeux de masse ont lieu chaque année à Pyongyang, comme moyen pour le régime de montrer au monde entier la puissance et bonne santé du pays. Pour atteindre ce seul but, pas moins de 100 000 personnes sont engagées dans une chorégraphie de danses et gymnastiques synchronisées. De nombreux symboles sont affichés par des milliers d’athlètes entraînés, qu’il s’agisse d’adultes ou même d’enfants. Main sur le cœur, les jeunes élèves chantent en chœur « Nous sommes les enfants les plus heureux du monde », l’une des chansons de propagande les plus connues en Corée du Nord. De nombreux danseurs font des mouvements avec des rubans ou avec des fleurs colorées appelées « kimjonglias », du nom du leader Kim Jong Il. Tout le long du spectacle, un orchestre joue une musique solennelle.
À l’arrière-plan, quelque 20 000 jeunes coréens sont assis sur les gradins, faisant face aux spectateurs. Ils retournent des cartes colorées à une grande vitesse pour former une fresque d’images animées et détaillées, changeant de l’une à l’autre. Chaque fois qu’ils tournent la page pour créer une nouvelle illustration, ils crient. Cela crée une atmosphère impressionnante, le cri étant mêlé avec le bruit de milliers de pages tournées au même moment. Les chiffres sont stupéfiants : pour composer ces images, 2000 enfants sont nécessaires pour faire un seul soldat, 20 000 pour un drapeau de la Corée du Nord. Cachant une réalité bien plus dure, les panneaux représentent Pyongyang éclairée la nuit, des champs de blé prêt à être récolté, des scientifiques au travail, des atomes comme symboles de la bombe nucléaire et d’autres pour la réunification des deux Corées. L’un des mythes de Corée du Nord (ou histoire selon eux) est relaté au moyen d’une image gigantesque faite par des milliers d’enfants. Elle représente les deux pistolets que Kim Il Sung aurait utilisés quand il a fondé l’armée de guérilla populaire anti-japonaise en 1932. Lorsque les deux pistolets apparaissent, le public applaudit bruyamment. Parmi eux, de nombreux soldats assistent au spectacle comme récompense ultime après des années de bons et loyaux services. Les milliers et milliers de garçons et de filles participant créent un mouvement de masse géant dans le stade, qui laisse le public ébahi. Ces artistes talentueux sont coutumiers de ce type de représentation : en Corée du Nord ils doivent danser, chanter, sauter et virevolter autant de fois qu’il y a de célébrations, toujours à la gloire de leurs chefs. Il existe principalement deux sortes de spectacles. Le premier est le spectacle classique artistique, appelé « Arirang » d’après la célèbre chanson folklorique coréenne (dont l’histoire quelques fois change, mais qui raconte le plus souvent la légende d’une femme déçue qui espère que son amant lui reviendra –métaphore de la séparation avec la Corée du Sud). Le second est un spectacle plus politique, qui était intitulé en 2008 « Que prospère notre pays » et qui tentait de montrer les plus grandes réalisations du pays et sa lutte contre les oppresseurs étrangers.
Le spectacle continue de cette façon pendant une heure. Ensuite, les milliers de personnes présentes disparaissent dans les rues sombres et silencieuses de Pyongyang, ce qui contraste avec le déluge de lumières et de musique dans le stade. En l’espace de quelques heures, cela nous donne un étrange sentiment, entre le réel et l’irréel, d’un autre univers à la fois terrifiant et fantastique.
© Eric Lafforgue
Tungam or Terrifying Deities dance at Paro Dzong during Tsechu festival in Bhutan. /// La danse des déités térrifiantes pendant le festival de Paro, Bhoutan.
© David Ducoin
I've hired a wide-angle prime lens (a terrifyingly expensive piece of glass) for a very special photoshoot tomorrow.
I figured I should muck about with it and get a feel for it before the main event, so took some snaps around London this afternoon. This lens weighs a ton but damn, is it sharp!
I just love the snarky look on this clone's face--anyone know who she is?
Tracy is the girl on the right one of the Starr family--she's got a scar on her chin, but I couldn't resist her. There's something terrifyingly awesome about her face....
The octopus (plural octopuses) is a soft-bodied, eight-limbed mollusc of the order Octopoda (/ɒkˈtɒpədə/, ok-TO-pə-də). Around 300 species are recognised, and the order is grouped within the class Cephalopoda with squids, cuttlefish, and nautiloids. Like other cephalopods, the octopus is bilaterally symmetric with two eyes and a beak, with its mouth at the center point of the eight limbs.[a] The soft body can rapidly alter its shape, enabling octopuses to squeeze through small gaps. They trail their eight appendages behind them as they swim. The siphon is used both for respiration and for locomotion, by expelling a jet of water. Octopuses have a complex nervous system and excellent sight, and are among the most intelligent and behaviourally diverse of all invertebrates.
Octopuses inhabit various regions of the ocean, including coral reefs, pelagic waters, and the seabed; some live in the intertidal zone and others at abyssal depths. Most species grow quickly, mature early, and are short-lived. In most species, the male uses a specially adapted arm to deliver a bundle of sperm directly into the female's mantle cavity, after which he becomes senescent and dies, while the female deposits fertilised eggs in a den and cares for them until they hatch, after which she also dies. Strategies to defend themselves against predators include the expulsion of ink, the use of camouflage and threat displays, the ability to jet quickly through the water and hide, and even deceit. All octopuses are venomous, but only the blue-ringed octopuses are known to be deadly to humans.
Octopuses appear in mythology as sea monsters like the Kraken of Norway and the Akkorokamui of the Ainu, and probably the Gorgon of ancient Greece. A battle with an octopus appears in Victor Hugo's book Toilers of the Sea, inspiring other works such as Ian Fleming's Octopussy. Octopuses appear in Japanese erotic art, shunga. They are eaten and considered a delicacy by humans in many parts of the world, especially the Mediterranean and the Asian seas.
ETYMOLOGY AND PLURALISATION
The scientific Latin term octopus was derived from Ancient Greek ὀκτώπους, a compound form of ὀκτώ (oktō, "eight") and πούς (pous, "foot"), itself a variant form of ὀκτάπους, a word used for example by Alexander of Tralles (c. 525–605) for the common octopus. The standard pluralised form of "octopus" in English is "octopuses"; the Ancient Greek plural ὀκτώποδες, "octopodes" (/ɒkˈtɒpədiːz/), has also been used historically. The alternative plural "octopi" is considered grammatically incorrect because it wrongly assumes that octopus is a Latin second declension "-us" noun or adjective when, in either Greek or Latin, it is a third declension noun.
Fowler's Modern English Usage states that the only acceptable plural in English is "octopuses", that "octopi" is misconceived, and "octopodes" pedantic; the latter is nonetheless used frequently enough to be acknowledged by the descriptivist Merriam-Webster 11th Collegiate Dictionary and Webster's New World College Dictionary. The Oxford English Dictionary lists "octopuses", "octopi", and "octopodes", in that order, reflecting frequency of use, calling "octopodes" rare and noting that "octopi" is based on a misunderstanding. The New Oxford American Dictionary (3rd Edition, 2010) lists "octopuses" as the only acceptable pluralisation, and indicates that "octopodes" is still occasionally used, but that "octopi" is incorrect.
ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY
SIZE
The giant Pacific octopus (Enteroctopus dofleini) is often cited as the largest known octopus species. Adults usually weigh around 15 kg, with an arm span of up to 4.3 m. The largest specimen of this species to be scientifically documented was an animal with a live mass of 71 kg. Much larger sizes have been claimed for the giant Pacific octopus: one specimen was recorded as 272 kg with an arm span of 9 m. A carcass of the seven-arm octopus, Haliphron atlanticus, weighed 61 kg and was estimated to have had a live mass of 75 kg. The smallest species is Octopus wolfi, which is around 2.5 cm and weighs less than 1 g.
EXTERNAL CHARACTERISTICS
The octopus is bilaterally symmetrical along its dorso-ventral axis; the head and foot are at one end of an elongated body and function as the anterior (front) of the animal. The head includes the mouth and brain. The foot has evolved into a set of flexible, prehensile appendages, known as "arms", that surround the mouth and are attached to each other near their base by a webbed structure. The arms can be described based on side and sequence position (such as L1, R1, L2, R2) and divided into four pairs. The two rear appendages are generally used to walk on the sea floor, while the other six are used to forage for food; hence some biologists refer to the animals as having six "arms" and two "legs". The bulbous and hollow mantle is fused to the back of the head and is known as the visceral hump; it contains most of the vital organs. The mantle cavity has muscular walls and contains the gills; it is connected to the exterior by a funnel or siphon. The mouth of an octopus, located underneath the arms, has a sharp hard beak.
The skin consists of a thin outer epidermis with mucous cells and sensory cells, and a connective tissue dermis consisting largely of collagen fibres and various cells allowing colour change. Most of the body is made of soft tissue allowing it to lengthen, contract, and contort itself. The octopus can squeeze through tiny gaps; even the larger species can pass through an opening close to 2.5 cm in diameter. Lacking skeletal support, the arms work as muscular hydrostats and contain longitudinal, transverse and circular muscles around a central axial nerve. They can extend and contract, twist to left or right, bend at any place in any direction or be held rigid.
The interior surfaces of the arms are covered with circular, adhesive suckers. The suckers allow the octopus to anchor itself or to manipulate objects. Each sucker is usually circular and bowl-like and has two distinct parts: an outer shallow cavity called an infundibulum and a central hollow cavity called an acetabulum, both of which are thick muscles covered in a protective chitinous cuticle. When a sucker attaches to a surface, the orifice between the two structures is sealed. The infundibulum provides adhesion while the acetabulum remains free, and muscle contractions allow for attachment and detachment.
The eyes of the octopus are large and are at the top of the head. They are similar in structure to those of a fish and are enclosed in a cartilaginous capsule fused to the cranium. The cornea is formed from a translucent epidermal layer and the slit-shaped pupil forms a hole in the iris and lies just behind. The lens is suspended behind the pupil and photoreceptive retinal cells cover the back of the eye. The pupil can be adjusted in size and a retinal pigment screens incident light in bright conditions.Some species differ in form from the typical octopus body shape. Basal species, the Cirrina, have stout gelatinous bodies with webbing that reaches near the tip of their arms, and two large fins above the eyes, supported by an internal shell. Fleshy papillae or cirri are found along the bottom of the arms, and the eyes are more developed.
CIRCULATORY SYSTEM
Octopuses have a closed circulatory system, in which the blood remains inside blood vessels. Octopuses have three hearts; a systemic heart that circulates blood around the body and two branchial hearts that pump it through each of the two gills. The systemic heart is inactive when the animal is swimming and thus it tires quickly and prefers to crawl. Octopus blood contains the copper-rich protein haemocyanin to transport oxygen. This makes the blood very viscous and it requires considerable pressure to pump it around the body; octopuses' blood pressures can exceed 75 mmHg. In cold conditions with low oxygen levels, haemocyanin transports oxygen more efficiently than haemoglobin. The haemocyanin is dissolved in the plasma instead of being carried within blood cells, and gives the blood a bluish colour.
The systemic heart has muscular contractile walls and consists of a single ventricle and two atria, one for each side of the body. The blood vessels consist of arteries, capillaries and veins and are lined with a cellular endothelium which is quite unlike that of most other invertebrates. The blood circulates through the aorta and capillary system, to the vena cavae, after which the blood is pumped through the gills by the auxiliary hearts and back to the main heart. Much of the venous system is contractile, which helps circulate the blood.
RESPIRATION
Respiration involves drawing water into the mantle cavity through an aperture, passing it through the gills, and expelling it through the siphon. The ingress of water is achieved by contraction of radial muscles in the mantle wall, and flapper valves shut when strong circular muscles force the water out through the siphon. Extensive connective tissue lattices support the respiratory muscles and allow them to expand the respiratory chamber. The lamella structure of the gills allows for a high oxygen uptake, up to 65% in water at 20 °C. Water flow over the gills correlates with locomotion, and an octopus can propel its body when it expels water out of its siphon.
The thin skin of the octopus absorbs additional oxygen. When resting, around 41% of an octopus's oxygen absorption is through the skin. This decreases to 33% when it swims, as more water flows over the gills; skin oxygen uptake also increases. When it is resting after a meal, absorption through the skin can drop to 3% of its total oxygen uptake.
DIGESTION AND EXCRETION
The digestive system of the octopus begins with the buccal mass which consists of the mouth with its chitinous beak, the pharynx, radula and salivary glands. The radula is a spiked, muscular tongue-like organ with multiple rows of tiny teeth. Food is broken down and is forced into the oesophagus by two lateral extensions of the esophageal side walls in addition to the radula. From there it is transferred to the gastrointestinal tract, which is mostly suspended from the roof of the mantle cavity by numerous membranes. The tract consists of a crop, where the food is stored; a stomach, where food is ground down; a caecum where the now sludgy food is sorted into fluids and particles and which plays an important role in absorption; the digestive gland, where liver cells break down and absorb the fluid and become "brown bodies"; and the intestine, where the accumulated waste is turned into faecal ropes by secretions and blown out of the funnel via the rectum.
During osmoregulation, fluid is added to the pericardia of the branchial hearts. The octopus has two nephridia (equivalent to vertebrate kidneys) which are associated with the branchial hearts; these and their associated ducts connect the pericardial cavities with the mantle cavity. Before reaching the branchial heart, each branch of the vena cava expands to form renal appendages which are in direct contact with the thin-walled nephridium. The urine is first formed in the pericardial cavity, and is modified by excretion, chiefly of ammonia, and selective absorption from the renal appendages, as it is passed along the associated duct and through the nephridiopore into the mantle cavity.
NERVOUS SYSTEM AND SENSES
The octopus (along with cuttlefish) has the highest brain-to-body mass ratios of all invertebrates; it is also greater than that of many vertebrates. It has a highly complex nervous system, only part of which is localised in its brain, which is contained in a cartilaginous capsule. Two-thirds of an octopus's neurons are found in the nerve cords of its arms, which show a variety of complex reflex actions that persist even when they have no input from the brain. Unlike vertebrates, the complex motor skills of octopuses are not organised in their brain via an internal somatotopic map of its body, instead using a nonsomatotopic system unique to large-brained invertebrates.
Like other cephalopods, octopuses can distinguish the polarisation of light. Colour vision appears to vary from species to species, for example being present in O. aegina but absent in O. vulgaris. Researchers believe that opsins in the skin can sense different wavelengths of light and help the creatures choose a coloration that camouflages them, in addition to light input from the eyes. Other researchers hypothesise that cephalopod eyes in species which only have a single photoreceptor protein may use chromatic aberration to turn monochromatic vision into colour vision, though this sacrifices image quality. This would explain pupils shaped like the letter U, the letter W, or a dumbbell, as well as explaining the need for colourful mating displays.
Attached to the brain are two special organs called statocysts (sac-like structures containing a mineralised mass and sensitive hairs), that allow the octopus to sense the orientation of its body. They provide information on the position of the body relative to gravity and can detect angular acceleration. An autonomic response keeps the octopus's eyes oriented so that the pupil is always horizontal. Octopuses may also use the statocyst to hear sound. The common octopus can hear sounds between 400 Hz and 1000 Hz, and hears best at 600 Hz.
Octopuses also have an excellent sense of touch. The octopus's suction cups are equipped with chemoreceptors so the octopus can taste what it touches. Octopus arms do not become tangled or stuck to each other because the sensors recognise octopus skin and prevent self-attachment.
The arms contain tension sensors so the octopus knows whether its arms are stretched out, but this is not sufficient for the brain to determine the position of the octopus's body or arms. As a result, the octopus does not possess stereognosis; that is, it does not form a mental image of the overall shape of the object it is handling. It can detect local texture variations, but cannot integrate the information into a larger picture. The neurological autonomy of the arms means the octopus has great difficulty learning about the detailed effects of its motions. It has a poor proprioceptive sense, and it knows what exact motions were made only by observing the arms visually.
Ink sac
The ink sac of an octopus is located under the digestive gland. A gland attached to the sac produces the ink, and the sac stores it. The sac is close enough to the funnel for the octopus to shoot out the ink with a water jet. Before it leaves the funnel, the ink passes through glands which mix it with mucus, creating a thick, dark blob which allows the animal to escape from a predator. The main pigment in the ink is melanin, which gives it its black colour. Cirrate octopuses lack the ink sac.
LIFECYCLE
REPRODUCTION
Octopuses are gonochoric and have a single, posteriorly-located gonad which is associated with the coelom. The testis in males and the ovary in females bulges into the gonocoel and the gametes are released here. The gonocoel is connected by the gonoduct to the mantle cavity, which it enters at the gonopore. An optic gland creates hormones that cause the octopus to mature and age and stimulate gamete production. The gland may be triggered by environmental conditions such as temperature, light and nutrition, which thus control the timing of reproduction and lifespan.
When octopuses reproduce, the male uses a specialised arm called a hectocotylus to transfer spermatophores (packets of sperm) from the terminal organ of the reproductive tract (the cephalopod "penis") into the female's mantle cavity. The hectocotylus in benthic octopuses is usually the third right arm, which has a spoon-shaped depression and modified suckers near the tip. In most species, fertilisation occurs in the mantle cavity.
The reproduction of octopuses has been studied in only a few species. One such species is the giant Pacific octopus, in which courtship is accompanied, especially in the male, by changes in skin texture and colour. The male may cling to the top or side of the female or position himself beside her. There is some speculation that he may first use his hectocotylus to remove any spermatophore or sperm already present in the female. He picks up a spermatophore from his spermatophoric sac with the hectocotylus, inserts it into the female's mantle cavity, and deposits it in the correct location for the species, which in the giant Pacific octopus is the opening of the oviduct. Two spermatophores are transferred in this way; these are about one metre (yard) long, and the empty ends may protrude from the female's mantle. A complex hydraulic mechanism releases the sperm from the spermatophore, and it is stored internally by the female.
About forty days after mating, the female giant Pacific octopus attaches strings of small fertilised eggs (10,000 to 70,000 in total) to rocks in a crevice or under an overhang. Here she guards and cares for them for about five months (160 days) until they hatch. In colder waters, such as those off of Alaska, it may take as much as 10 months for the eggs to completely develop. The female aerates the eggs and keeps them clean; if left untended, many eggs will not hatch. She does not feed during this time and dies soon afterwards. Males become senescent and die a few weeks after mating.
The eggs have large yolks; cleavage (division) is superficial and a germinal disc develops at the pole. During gastrulation, the margins of this grow down and surround the yolk, forming a yolk sac, which eventually forms part of the gut. The dorsal side of the disc grows upwards and forms the embryo, with a shell gland on its dorsal surface, gills, mantle and eyes. The arms and funnel develop as part of the foot on the ventral side of the disc. The arms later migrate upwards, coming to form a ring around the funnel and mouth. The yolk is gradually absorbed as the embryo develops.
Most young octopuses hatch as paralarvae and are planktonic for weeks to months, depending on the species and water temperature. They feed on copepods, arthropod larvae and other zooplankton, eventually settling on the ocean floor and developing directly into adults with no distinct metamorphoses that are present in other groups of mollusc larvae. Octopus species that produce larger eggs – including the southern blue-ringed, Caribbean reef, California two-spot, Eledone moschata and deep sea octopuses – do not have a paralarval stage, but hatch as benthic animals similar to the adults.In the argonaut (paper nautilus), the female secretes a fine, fluted, papery shell in which the eggs are deposited and in which she also resides while floating in mid-ocean. In this she broods the young, and it also serves as a buoyancy aid allowing her to adjust her depth. The male argonaut is minute by comparison and has no shell.
LIFESPAN
Octopuses have a relatively short life expectancy; some species live for as little as six months. The giant Pacific octopus, one of the two largest species of octopus, may live for as much as five years. Octopus lifespan is limited by reproduction: males can live for only a few months after mating, and females die shortly after their eggs hatch. The larger Pacific striped octopus is an exception, as it can reproduce multiple times over a life of around two years. Octopus reproductive organs mature due to the hormonal influence of the optic gland but result in the inactivation of their digestive glands, typically causing the octopus to die from starvation. Experimental removal of both optic glands after spawning was found to result in the cessation of broodiness, the resumption of feeding, increased growth, and greatly extended lifespans. It has been proposed that the naturally short lifespan may be functional to prevent rapid overpopulation.
DISTRIBUTION AND HABITAT
Octopuses live in every ocean, and different species have adapted to different marine habitats. As juveniles, common octopuses inhabit shallow tide pools. The Hawaiian day octopus (Octopus cyanea) lives on coral reefs; argonauts drift in pelagic waters. Abdopus aculeatus mostly lives in near-shore seagrass beds. Some species are adapted to the cold, ocean depths. The spoon-armed octopus (Bathypolypus arcticus) is found at depths of 1,000 m, and Vulcanoctopus hydrothermalis lives near hydrothermal vents at 2,000 m. The cirrate species are often free-swimming and live in deep-water habitats. Although several species are known to live at bathyal and abyssal depths, there is only a single indisputable record of an octopus in the hadal zone; a species of Grimpoteuthis (dumbo octopus) photographed at 6,957 m. No species are known to live in fresh water.
BEHAVIOUR AND ECOLOGY
Most species are solitary when not mating, though a few are known to occur in high densities and with frequent interactions, signaling, mate defending and eviction of individuals from dens. This is likely the result of abundant food supplies combined with limited den sites. The larger Pacific striped octopus however is social, living in groups of up to 40 individuals that share dens. Octopuses hide in dens, which are typically crevices in rocky outcrops or other hard structures, though some species burrow into sand or mud. Octopuses are not territorial but generally remain in a home range; they may leave the area in search of food. They can use navigation skills to return to a den without having to retrace their outward route. They are not known to be migratory.
Octopuses bring captured prey back to the den where they can eat it safely. Sometimes the octopus catches more prey than it can eat, and the den is often surrounded by a midden of dead and uneaten food items. Other creatures, such as fish, crabs, molluscs and echinoderms, often share the den with the octopus, either because they have arrived as scavengers, or because they have survived capture. Octopuses rarely engage in interspecific cooperative hunting with fish as their partners. They regulate the species composition of the hunting group - and the behavior of their partners - by punching them.
FEEDING
Nearly all octopuses are predatory; bottom-dwelling octopuses eat mainly crustaceans, polychaete worms, and other molluscs such as whelks and clams; open-ocean octopuses eat mainly prawns, fish and other cephalopods. Major items in the diet of the giant Pacific octopus include bivalve molluscs such as the cockle Clinocardium nuttallii, clams and scallops and crustaceans such as crabs and spider crabs. Prey that it is likely to reject include moon snails because they are too large and limpets, rock scallops, chitons and abalone, because they are too securely fixed to the rock.
A benthic (bottom-dwelling) octopus typically moves among the rocks and feels through the crevices. The creature may make a jet-propelled pounce on prey and pull it towards the mouth with its arms, the suckers restraining it. Small prey may be completely trapped by the webbed structure. Octopuses usually inject crustaceans like crabs with a paralysing saliva then dismember them with their beaks. Octopuses feed on shelled molluscs either by forcing the valves apart, or by drilling a hole in the shell to inject a nerve toxin. It used to be thought that the hole was drilled by the radula, but it has now been shown that minute teeth at the tip of the salivary papilla are involved, and an enzyme in the toxic saliva is used to dissolve the calcium carbonate of the shell. It takes about three hours for O. vulgaris to create a 0.6 mm hole. Once the shell is penetrated, the prey dies almost instantaneously, its muscles relax, and the soft tissues are easy for the octopus to remove. Crabs may also be treated in this way; tough-shelled species are more likely to be drilled, and soft-shelled crabs are torn apart.
Some species have other modes of feeding. Grimpoteuthis has a reduced or non-existent radula and swallows prey whole. In the deep-sea genus Stauroteuthis, some of the muscle cells that control the suckers in most species have been replaced with photophores which are believed to fool prey by directing them towards the mouth, making them one of the few bioluminescent octopuses.
LOCOMOTION
Octopuses mainly move about by relatively slow crawling with some swimming in a head-first position. Jet propulsion or backwards swimming, is their fastest means of locomotion, followed by swimming and crawling. When in no hurry, they usually crawl on either solid or soft surfaces. Several arms are extended forwards, some of the suckers adhere to the substrate and the animal hauls itself forwards with its powerful arm muscles, while other arms may push rather than pull. As progress is made, other arms move ahead to repeat these actions and the original suckers detach. During crawling, the heart rate nearly doubles, and the animal requires ten or fifteen minutes to recover from relatively minor exercise.
Most octopuses swim by expelling a jet of water from the mantle through the siphon into the sea. The physical principle behind this is that the force required to accelerate the water through the orifice produces a reaction that propels the octopus in the opposite direction. The direction of travel depends on the orientation of the siphon. When swimming, the head is at the front and the siphon is pointed backwards, but when jetting, the visceral hump leads, the siphon points towards the head and the arms trail behind, with the animal presenting a fusiform appearance. In an alternative method of swimming, some species flatten themselves dorso-ventrally, and swim with the arms held out sideways, and this may provide lift and be faster than normal swimming. Jetting is used to escape from danger, but is physiologically inefficient, requiring a mantle pressure so high as to stop the heart from beating, resulting in a progressive oxygen deficit.
Cirrate octopuses cannot produce jet propulsion and rely on their fins for swimming. They have neutral buoyancy and drift through the water with the fins extended. They can also contract their arms and surrounding web to make sudden moves known as "take-offs". Another form of locomotion is "pumping", which involves symmetrical contractions of muscles in their webs producing peristaltic waves. This moves the body slowly.
In 2005, Adopus aculeatus and veined octopus (Amphioctopus marginatus) were found to walk on two arms, while at the same time mimicking plant matter. This form of locomotion allows these octopuses to move quickly away from a potential predator without being recognised. A study of this behaviour led to the suggestion that the two rearmost appendages may be more accurately termed "legs" rather than "arms". Some species of octopus can crawl out of the water briefly, which they may do between tide pools while hunting crustaceans or gastropods or to escape predators. "Stilt walking" is used by the veined octopus when carrying stacked coconut shells. The octopus carries the shells underneath it with two arms, and progresses with an ungainly gait supported by its remaining arms held rigid.
INTELLIGENCE
Octopuses are highly intelligent; the extent of their intelligence and learning capability are not well defined. Maze and problem-solving experiments have shown evidence of a memory system that can store both short- and long-term memory. It is not known precisely what contribution learning makes to adult octopus behaviour. Young octopuses learn nothing from their parents, as adults provide no parental care beyond tending to their eggs until the young octopuses hatch.
In laboratory experiments, octopuses can be readily trained to distinguish between different shapes and patterns. They have been reported to practise observational learning, although the validity of these findings is contested. Octopuses have also been observed in what has been described as play: repeatedly releasing bottles or toys into a circular current in their aquariums and then catching them. Octopuses often break out of their aquariums and sometimes into others in search of food. They have even boarded fishing boats and opened holds to eat crabs. The veined octopus collects discarded coconut shells, then uses them to build a shelter, an example of tool use.
CAMOUFLAGE AND COLOUR CHANGE
Octopuses use camouflage when hunting and to avoid predators. To do this they use specialised skin cells which change the appearance of the skin by adjusting its colour, opacity, or reflectivity. Chromatophores contain yellow, orange, red, brown, or black pigments; most species have three of these colours, while some have two or four. Other colour-changing cells are reflective iridophores and white leucophores. This colour-changing ability is also used to communicate with or warn other octopuses.
Octopuses can create distracting patterns with waves of dark coloration across the body, a display known as the "passing cloud". Muscles in the skin change the texture of the mantle to achieve greater camouflage. In some species, the mantle can take on the spiky appearance of algae; in others, skin anatomy is limited to relatively uniform shades of one colour with limited skin texture. Octopuses that are diurnal and live in shallow water have evolved more complex skin than their nocturnal and deep-sea counterparts.
A "moving rock" trick involves the octopus mimicking a rock and then inching across the open space with a speed matching the movement in the surrounding water, allowing it to move in plain sight of a predator.
DEFENCE
Aside from humans, octopuses may be preyed on by fishes, seabirds, sea otters, pinnipeds, cetaceans, and other cephalopods. Octopuses typically hide or disguise themselves by camouflage and mimicry; some have conspicuous warning coloration (aposematism) or deimatic behaviour. An octopus may spend 40% of its time hidden away in its den. When the octopus is approached, it may extend an arm to investigate. 66% of Enteroctopus dofleini in one study had scars, with 50% having amputated arms. The blue rings of the highly venomous blue-ringed octopus are hidden in muscular skin folds which contract when the animal is threatened, exposing the iridescent warning. The Atlantic white-spotted octopus (Callistoctopus macropus) turns bright brownish red with oval white spots all over in a high contrast display. Displays are often reinforced by stretching out the animal's arms, fins or web to make it look as big and threatening as possible.
Once they have been seen by a predator, they commonly try to escape but can also use distraction with an ink cloud ejected from the ink sac. The ink is thought to reduce the efficiency of olfactory organs, which would aid evasion from predators that employ smell for hunting, such as sharks. Ink clouds of some species might act as pseudomorphs, or decoys that the predator attacks instead.
When under attack, some octopuses can perform arm autotomy, in a manner similar to the way skinks and other lizards detach their tails. The crawling arm may distract would-be predators. Such severed arms remain sensitive to stimuli and move away from unpleasant sensations. Octopuses can replace lost limbs.
Some octopuses, such as the mimic octopus, can combine their highly flexible bodies with their colour-changing ability to mimic other, more dangerous animals, such as lionfish, sea snakes, and eels.
PATHOGENS AND PARASITES
The diseases and parasites that affect octopuses have been little studied, but cephalopods are known to be the intermediate or final hosts of various parasitic cestodes, nematodes and copepods; 150 species of protistan and metazoan parasites have been recognised. The Dicyemidae are a family of tiny worms that are found in the renal appendages of many species; it is unclear whether they are parasitic or are endosymbionts. Coccidians in the genus Aggregata living in the gut cause severe disease to the host. Octopuses have an innate immune system, and the haemocytes respond to infection by phagocytosis, encapsulation, infiltration or cytotoxic activities to destroy or isolate the pathogens. The haemocytes play an important role in the recognition and elimination of foreign bodies and wound repair. Captive animals have been found to be more susceptible to pathogens than wild ones. A gram-negative bacterium, Vibrio lentus, has been found to cause skin lesions, exposure of muscle and death of octopuses in extreme cases.
EVOLUTION
The scientific name Octopoda was first coined and given as the order of octopuses in 1818 by English biologist William Elford Leach, who classified them as Octopoida the previous year. The Octopoda consists of around 300 known species and were historically divided into two suborders, the Incirrina and the Cirrina. However, more recent evidence suggests that Cirrina are merely the most basal species and are not a unique clade. The incirrate octopuses (the majority of species) lack the cirri and paired swimming fins of the cirrates. In addition, the internal shell of incirrates is either present as a pair of stylets or absent altogether.
FOSSIL HISTORY AND PHYLOGENY
Cephalopods have existed for 500 million years and octopus ancestors were in the Carboniferous seas 300 million years ago. The oldest known octopus fossil is Pohlsepia, which lived 296 million years ago. Researchers have identified impressions of eight arms, two eyes, and possibly an ink sac. Octopuses are mostly soft tissue, and so fossils are relatively rare. Octopuses, squids and cuttlefish belong to the clade Coleoidea. They are known as "soft-bodied" cephalopods, lacking the external shell of most molluscs and other cephalopods like the nautiloids and the extinct Ammonoidea. Octopuses have eight limbs like other coleoids but lack the extra specialised feeding appendages known as tentacles which are longer and thinner with suckers only at their club-like ends. The vampire squid (Vampyroteuthis) also lacks tentacles but has sensory filaments.
The cladograms are based on Sanchez et al., 2018, who created a molecular phylogeny based on mitochondrial and nuclear DNA marker sequences.
RNA EDITING
Octopuses and other coleoid cephalopods are capable of greater RNA editing (which involves changes to the nucleic acid sequence of the primary transcript of RNA molecules) than any other organisms. Editing is concentrated in the nervous system and affects proteins involved in neural excitability and neuronal morphology. More than 60% of RNA transcripts for coleoid brains are recoded by editing, compared to less than 1% for a human or fruit fly. Coleoids rely mostly on ADAR enzymes for RNA editing, which requires large double-stranded RNA structures to flank the editing sites. Both the structures and editing sites are conserved in the coleoid genome and the mutation rates for the sites are severely hampered. Hence, greater transcriptome plasticity has come at the cost of slower genome evolution. High levels of RNA editing do not appear to be present in more basal cephalopods or other molluscs.
RELATIONSHIP TO HUMANS
CULTURAL REFERENCES
Ancient seafaring people were aware of the octopus, as evidenced by certain artworks and designs. For example, a stone carving found in the archaeological recovery from Bronze Age Minoan Crete at Knossos (1900–1100 BC) has a depiction of a fisherman carrying an octopus. The terrifyingly powerful Gorgon of Greek mythology has been thought to have been inspired by the octopus or squid, the octopus itself representing the severed head of Medusa, the beak as the protruding tongue and fangs, and its tentacles as the snakes. The Kraken are legendary sea monsters of giant proportions said to dwell off the coasts of Norway and Greenland, usually portrayed in art as a giant octopus attacking ships. Linnaeus included it in the first edition of his 1735 Systema Naturae. One translation of the Hawaiian creation myth the Kumulipo suggests that the octopus is the lone survivor of a previous age. The Akkorokamui is a gigantic octopus-like monster from Ainu folklore.
A battle with an octopus plays a significant role in Victor Hugo's book Travailleurs de la mer (Toilers of the Sea), relating to his time in exile on Guernsey. Ian Fleming's 1966 short story collection Octopussy and The Living Daylights, and the 1983 James Bond film were partly inspired by Hugo's book.
Japanese erotic art, shunga, includes ukiyo-e woodblock prints such as Katsushika Hokusai's 1814 print Tako to ama (The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife), in which an ama diver is sexually intertwined with a large and a small octopus. The print is a forerunner of tentacle erotica. The biologist P. Z. Myers noted in his science blog, Pharyngula, that octopuses appear in "extraordinary" graphic illustrations involving women, tentacles, and bare breasts.
Since it has numerous arms emanating from a common centre, the octopus is often used as a symbol for a powerful and manipulative organisation, company, or country.
DANGER
Octopuses generally avoid humans, but incidents have been verified. For example, a 2.4-metre Pacific octopus, said to be nearly perfectly camouflaged, "lunged" at a diver and "wrangled" over his camera before it let go. Another diver recorded the encounter on video.
All species are venomous, but only blue-ringed octopuses have venom that is lethal to humans. Bites are reported each year across the animals' range from Australia to the eastern Indo-Pacific Ocean. They bite only when provoked or accidentally stepped upon; bites are small and usually painless. The venom appears to be able to penetrate the skin without a puncture, given prolonged contact. It contains tetrodotoxin, which causes paralysis by blocking the transmission of nerve impulses to the muscles. This causes death by respiratory failure leading to cerebral anoxia. No antidote is known, but if breathing can be kept going artificially, patients recover within 24 hours. Bites have been recorded from captive octopuses of other species; they leave swellings which disappear in a day or two.
FISHERIES AND CUISINE
Octopus fisheries exist around the world with total catches varying between 245,320 and 322,999 metric tons from 1986 to 1995. The world catch peaked in 2007 at 380,000 tons, and fell by a tenth by 2012. Methods to capture octopuses include pots, traps, trawls, snares, drift fishing, spearing, hooking and hand collection. Octopus is eaten in many cultures and is a common food on the Mediterranean and Asian coasts. The arms and sometimes other body parts are prepared in various ways, often varying by species or geography. Live octopuses are eaten in several countries around the world, including the US. Animal welfare groups have objected to this practice on the basis that octopuses can experience pain. Octopuses have a food conversion efficiency greater than that of chickens, making octopus aquaculture a possibility.
IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
In classical Greece, Aristotle (384–322 BC) commented on the colour-changing abilities of the octopus, both for camouflage and for signalling, in his Historia animalium: "The octopus ... seeks its prey by so changing its colour as to render it like the colour of the stones adjacent to it; it does so also when alarmed." Aristotle noted that the octopus had a hectocotyl arm and suggested it might be used in sexual reproduction. This claim was widely disbelieved until the 19th century. It was described in 1829 by the French zoologist Georges Cuvier, who supposed it to be a parasitic worm, naming it as a new species, Hectocotylus octopodis. Other zoologists thought it a spermatophore; the German zoologist Heinrich Müller believed it was "designed" to detach during copulation. In 1856 the Danish zoologist Japetus Steenstrup demonstrated that it is used to transfer sperm, and only rarely detaches.
Octopuses offer many possibilities in biological research, including their ability to regenerate limbs, change the colour of their skin, behave intelligently with a distributed nervous system, and make use of 168 kinds of protocadherins (humans have 58), the proteins that guide the connections neurons make with each other. The California two-spot octopus has had its genome sequenced, allowing exploration of its molecular adaptations. Having independently evolved mammal-like intelligence, octopuses have been compared to hypothetical intelligent extraterrestrials. Their problem-solving skills, along with their mobility and lack of rigid structure enable them to escape from supposedly secure tanks in laboratories and public aquariums.
Due to their intelligence, octopuses are listed in some countries as experimental animals on which surgery may not be performed without anesthesia, a protection usually extended only to vertebrates. In the UK from 1993 to 2012, the common octopus (Octopus vulgaris) was the only invertebrate protected under the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986. In 2012, this legislation was extended to include all cephalopods in accordance with a general EU directive.
Some robotics research is exploring biomimicry of octopus features. Octopus arms can move and sense largely autonomously without intervention from the animal's central nervous system. In 2015 a team in Italy built soft-bodied robots able to crawl and swim, requiring only minimal computation. In 2017 a German company made an arm with a soft pneumatically controlled silicone gripper fitted with two rows of suckers. It is able to grasp objects such as a metal tube, a magazine, or a ball, and to fill a glass by pouring water from a bottle.
WIKIPEDIA
Kathmandu Durbar Square (Nepali: वसन्तपुर दरवार क्षेत्र, Basantapur Darbar Kshetra) in front of the old royal palace of the former Kathmandu Kingdom is one of three Durbar (royal palace) Squares in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, all of which are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Several buildings in the Square collapsed due to a major earthquake on 25 April 2015. Durbar Square was surrounded with spectacular architecture and vividly showcases the skills of the Newar artists and craftsmen over several centuries. The Royal Palace was originally at Dattaraya square and was later moved to the Durbar square.
The Kathmandu Durbar Square held the palaces of the Malla and Shah kings who ruled over the city. Along with these palaces, the square surrounds quadrangles, revealing courtyards and temples. It is known as Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square, a name derived from a statue of Hanuman, the monkey devotee of Lord Ram, at the entrance of the palace.
CONTENTS
HISTORY AND CONSTRUCTION
The preference for the construction of royal palaces at this site dates back to as early as the Licchavi period in the third century. Even though the present palaces and temples have undergone repeated and extensive renovations and nothing physical remains from that period. Names like Gunapo and Gupo, which are the names referred to the palaces in the square in early scriptures, imply that the palaces were built by Gunakamadev, a King ruling late in the tenth-century. When Kathmandu City became independent under the rule of King Ratna Malla (1484–1520), the palaces in the square became the Royal Palaces for its Malla Kings. When Prithvi Narayan Shah invaded the Kathmandu Valley in 1769, he favored the Kathmandu Durbar Square for his palace. Other subsequent Shah kings continued to rule from the square until 1896 when they moved to the Narayan Hiti Palace.
The square is still the center of important royal events like the coronation of King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah in 1975 and King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah in 2001.
Though there are no written archives stating the history of Kathmandu Durbar Square, construction of the palace in the square is credited to Sankharadev (1069–1083). As the first king of the independent Kathmandu City, Ratna Malla is said to have built the Taleju temple in the Northern side of the palace in 1501. For this to be true then the temple would have had to have been built in the vihara style as part of the palace premise surrounding the Mul Chok courtyard for no evidence of a separate structure that would match this temple can be found within the square.
Construction of the Karnel Chok is not clearly stated in any historical inscriptions; although, it is probably the oldest among all the courtyards in the square. The Bhagavati Temple, originally known as a Narayan Temple, rises above the mansions surrounding it and was added during the time of Jagajaya Malla in the early eighteenth century. The Narayan idol within the temple was stolen so Prithvi Narayan Shah replaced it with an image of Bhagavati, completely transforming the name of the temple.
The oldest temples in the square are those built by Mahendra Malla (1560–1574). They are the temples of Jagannath, Kotilingeswara Mahadev, Mahendreswara, and the Taleju Temple. This three-roofed Taleju Temple was established in 1564, in a typical Newari architectural style and is elevated on platforms that form a pyramid-like structure. It is said that Mahendra Malla, when he was residing in Bhaktapur, was highly devoted to the Taleju Temple there; the Goddess being pleased with his devotion gave him a vision asking him to build a temple for her in the Kathmandu Durbar Square. With a help of a hermit, he designed the temple to give it its present form and the Goddess entered the temple in the form of a bee.
His successors Sadasiva (1575–1581), his son, Shiva Simha (1578–1619), and his grandson, Laksmi Narsingha (1619–1641), do not seem to have made any major additions to the square. During this period of three generations the only constructions to have occurred were the establishment of Degutale Temple dedicated to Goddess Mother Taleju by Shiva Simha and some enhancement in the royal palace by Laksminar Simha.
UNDER PRATAP MALLA
In the time of Pratap Malla, son of Laksminar Simha, the square was extensively developed. He was an intellectual, a pious devotee, and especially interested in arts. He called himself a Kavindra, king of poets, and boasted that he was learned in fifteen different languages. A passionate builder, following his coronation as a king, he immediately began enlargements to his royal palace, and rebuilt some old temples and constructed new temples, shrines and stupas around his kingdom.During the construction of his palace, he added a small entrance in the traditional, low and narrow Newari style. The door was elaborately decorated with carvings and paintings of deities and auspicious sings and was later transferred to the entrance of Mohan Chok. In front of the entrance he placed the statue of Hanuman thinking that Hanuman would strengthen his army and protect his home. The entrance leads to Nasal Chok, the courtyard where most royal events such as coronation, performances, and yagyas, holy fire rituals, take place. It was named after Nasadya, the God of Dance, and during the time of Pratap Malla the sacred mask dance dramas performed in Nasal Chok were widely famed. In one of these dramas, it is said that Pratap Malla himself played the role of Lord Vishnu and that the spirit of the Lord remained in the king's body even after the play. After consulting his Tantric leaders, he ordered a stone image of Lord Vishnu in his incarnation as Nara Simha, the half-lion and half-human form, and then transferred the spirit into the stone. This fine image of Nara Simha made in 1673 still stands in the Nasal Chok. In 1650, he commissioned for the construction of Mohan Chok in the palace. This chok remained the royal residential courtyard for many years and is believed to store a great amount of treasure under its surface. Pratap Malla also built Sundari Chok about this time. He placed a slab engraved with lines in fifteen languages and proclaimed that he who can understand the inscription would produce the flow of milk instead of water from Tutedhara, a fountain set in the outer walls of Mohan Chok. However elaborate his constructions may have been, they were not simply intended to emphasize his luxuries but also his and the importance of others' devotion towards deities. He made extensive donations to temples and had the older ones renovated. Next to the palace, he built a Krishna temple, the Vamsagopala, in an octagonal shape in 1649. He dedicated this temple to his two Indian wives, Rupamati and Rajamati, as both had died during the year it was built. In Mohan Chok, he erected a three roofed Agamachem temple and a unique temple with five superimposing roofs. After completely restoring the Mul Chok, he donated to the adjoining Taleju Temple. To the main temple of Taleju, he donated metal doors in 1670. He rebuilt the Degutale Temple built by his grandfather, Siva Simha, and the Taleju Temple in the palace square. As a substitute to the Indreswara Mahadeva Temple in the distant village of Panauti he built a Shiva temple, Indrapura, near his palace in the square. He carved hymns on the walls of the Jagannath Temple as prayers to Taleju in the form of Kali.
At the southern end of the square, near Kasthamandap at Maru, which was the main city crossroads for early traders, he built another pavilion named Kavindrapura, the mansion of the king of poets. In this mansion he set an idol of dancing Shiva, Nasadyo, which today is highly worshipped by dancers in the Valley.
In the process of beautifying his palace, he added fountains, ponds, and baths. In Sundari Chok, he established a low bath with a golden fountain. He built a small pond, the Naga Pokhari, in the palace adorned with Nagakastha, a wooden serpent, which is said he had ordered stolen from the royal pond in the Bhaktapur Durbar Square. He restored the Licchavi stone sculptures such as the Jalasayana Narayana, the Kaliyadamana, and the Kala Bhairav. An idol of Jalasayana Narayana was placed in a newly created pond in the Bhandarkhal garden in the eastern wing of the palace. As a substitute to the idol of Jalasayana Narayana in Buddhanilkantha, he channeled water from Buddhanilkantha to the pond in Bhandarkhal due bestow authenticity. The Kalyadana, a manifestation of Lord Krishna destroying Kaliya, a water serpent, is placed in Kalindi Chok, which is adjacent to the Mohan Chok. The approximately ten-feet-high image of terrifyingly portrayed Kal Bhairav is placed near the Jagannath Temple. This image is the focus of worship in the chok especially during Durga Puja.
With the death of Pratap Malla in 1674, the overall emphasis on the importance of the square came to a halt. His successors retained relatively insignificant power and the prevailing ministers took control of most of the royal rule. The ministers encountered little influence under these kings and, increasingly, interest of the arts and additions to the square was lost on them. They focused less on culture than Pratap Malla during the three decades that followed his death, steering the city and country more towards the arenas of politics and power, with only a few minor constructions made in the square. These projects included Parthivendra Malla building a temple referred to as Trailokya Mohan or Dasavatara, dedicated to Lord Vishnu in 1679. A large statue of Garuda, the mount of Lord Vishnu, was added in front of it a decade later. Parthivendra Malla added a pillar with image of his family in front of the Taleju Temple.
Around 1692, Radhilasmi, the widowed queen of Pratap Malla, erected the tall temples of Shiva known as Maju Deval near the Garuda image in the square. This temple stands on nine stepped platforms and is one of the tallest buildings in the square. Then her son, Bhupalendra Malla, took the throne and banished the widowed queen to the hills. His death came early at the age of twenty one and his widowed queen, Bhuvanalaksmi, built a temple in the square known as Kageswara Mahadev. The temple was built in the Newari style and acted as a substitute for worship of a distant temple in the hills. After the earthquake in 1934, the temple was restored with a dome roof, which was alien to the Newari architecture.
Jayaprakash Malla, the last Malla king to rule Kathmandu, built a temple for Kumari and Durga in her virginal state. The temple was named Kumari Bahal and was structured like a typical Newari vihara. In his house resides the Kumari, a girl who is revered as the living goddess. He also made a chariot for Kumari and in the courtyard had detailed terra cotta tiles of that time laid down.
UNDER THE SHAH DYNASTY
During the Shah dynasty that followed, the Kathmandu Durbar Square saw a number of changes. Two of the most unique temples in the square were built during this time. One is the Nautale, a nine-storied building known as Basantapur Durbar. It has four roofs and stands at the end of Nasal Chok at the East side of the palace. It is said that this building was set as a pleasure house. The lower three stories were made in the Newari farmhouse style. The upper floors have Newari style windows, sanjhya and tikijhya, and some of them are slightly projected from the wall. The other temple is annexed to the Vasantapur Durbar and has four-stories. This building was initially known as Vilasamandira, or Lohom Chok, but is now commonly known as Basantapur or Tejarat Chok. The lower floors of the Basantapur Chok display extensive woodcarvings and the roofs are made in popular the Mughal style. Archives state that Prthivi Narayan Shah built these two buildings in 1770.
Rana Bahadur Shah was enthroned at the age of two. Bahadur Shah, the second son of Prithvi Narayan Shah, ruled as a regent for his young nephew Rana Bahadur Shah for a close to a decade from 1785 to 1794 and built a temple of Shiva Parvati in the square. This one roofed temple is designed in the Newari style and is remarkably similar to previous temples built by the Mallas. It is rectangular in shape, and enshrines the Navadurga, a group of goddesses, on the ground floor. It has a wooden image of Shiva and Parvati at the window of the upper floor, looking out at the passersby in the square. Another significant donation made during the time of Rana Bahadur Shah is the metal-plated head of Swet Bhairav near the Degutale Temple. It was donated during the festival of Indra Jatra in 1795, and continues to play a major role during the festival every year. This approximately twelve feet high face of Bhairav is concealed behind a latticed wooden screen for the rest of the year. The following this donation Rana Bahadur donated a huge bronze bell as an offering to the Goddess Taleju. Together with the beating of the huge drums donated by his son Girvan Yudha, the bell was rung every day during the daily ritual worship to the goddess. Later these instruments were also used as an alarm system. However, after the death of his beloved third wife Kanimati Devi due to smallpox, Rana Bahadur Shah turned mad with grief and had many images of gods and goddesses smashed including the Taleju statue and bell, and Sitala, the goddess of smallpox.
In 1908, a palace, Gaddi Durbar, was built using European architectural designs. The Rana Prime Ministers who had taken over the power but not the throne of the country from the Shahs Kings from 1846 to 1951 were highly influenced by European styles. The Gaddi Durbar is covered in white plaster, has Greek columns and adjoins a large audience hall, all foreign features to Nepali architecture. The balconies of this durbar were reserved for the royal family during festivals to view the square below.
Some of the parts of the square like the Hatti Chok near the Kumari Bahal in the southern section of the square were removed during restoration after the devastating earthquake in 1934. While building the New Road, the southeastern part of the palace was cleared away, leaving only fragments in places as reminders of their past. Though decreased from its original size and attractiveness from its earlier seventeenth-century architecture, the Kathmandu Durbar Square still displays an ancient surrounding that spans abound five acres of land. It has palaces, temples, quadrangles, courtyards, ponds, and images that were brought together over three centuries of the Malla, the Shah, and the Rana dynasties. It was destroyed in the April 2015 Nepal earthquake.
VISITING
Kathmandu's Durbar Square is the site of the Hanuman Dhoka Palace Complex, which was the royal Nepalese residence until the 19th century and where important ceremonies, such as the coronation of the Nepalese monarch, took place. The palace is decorated with elaborately-carved wooden windows and panels and houses the King Tribhuwan Memorial Museum and the Mahendra Museum. It is possible to visit the state rooms inside the palace.
Time and again the temples and the palaces in the square have gone through reconstruction after being damaged by natural causes or neglect. Presently there are less than ten quadrangles in the square. The temples are being preserved as national heritage sites and the palace is being used as a museum. Only a few parts of the palace are open for visitors and the Taleju temples are only open for people of Hindu and Buddhist faiths.
At the southern end of Durbar Square is one of the most curious attractions in Nepal, the Kumari Chok. This gilded cage contains the Raj Kumari, a girl chosen through an ancient and mystical selection process to become the human incarnation of the Hindu mother goddess, Durga. She is worshiped during religious festivals and makes public appearances at other times for a fee paid to her guards.
WIKIPEDIA
-> einspunktacht.blogspot.de/2015/10/endlich-ich.html
finally me
i wear it far too long
no, i can't seem to let go of it
i shine light a diamond, but nobody sees the shadow
it suits me terrifyingly well,
fuck, sometimes i believe myself
it shows no sign of weakness, until it's down
she keeps a promise and feelings away
i shine in the wrong light
the shadow's getting larger in me
it weighs about a ton - my maske - my guilt
she crushes who i am, she blocks my clear sight
endlich ich
ich trag' sie schon viel zu lang, nein ich komm' nicht von ihr los
ich strahl' wie ein diamant, aber keiner sieht den schatten in mir
sie steht mir erschreckend gut, fuck, ich glaub's mir manchmal selbst
sie lässt keine schwäche zu, bis sie fällt.
sie hält, was sie mir verspricht und gefühle auf distanz
ich glänze im falschen licht, immer größer wird der schatten in mir
sie wiegt eine tonne schwer - meine maske - meine schuld
sie erdrückt, was ich bin, sie versperrt meine klare sicht.
song copyright by batomae
Pay no attention to the man behind the hand. This is Bartholomew. If you have to speak then you shall first talk to the hand to ascertain if the topic, tone, and terrifyingness of the conversation can be carried on without the use of a reptilian representative. Should the subject be maths related then Bartholomew can still assist as he is a bit of an adder.
This is how it isn't but it's how it could be, nay should be. Words always manage to travel from my brain down my arms and out the fingertips far easier, articulately, and with a better chance of comprehension that when I try using the hole in the middle of my face. So what would be the most apt solution to this problem? Giving the hand a way to verbalise. We could use the term "Genius" here but that would be an exaggeration of monumental proportions.
Wonder if I'd need to get him a name badge for work? He does have suitable attire for such an occasion. It's a boa tie but I'm sure he'll get away with it otherwise it'll look like he's naked. Wait...will he need a mask? We could say he has asthma but with his speech impediment he might think we're taking the pith.
This unique area on the west side of Maui resembles something from another planet. An example of the amazing ancient volcanic forces at work, the area was aptly named Dragon's Teeth because the rock structures look like large, terrifyingly jagged teeth. Located in Kapalua adjacent to the Ritz Carlton Hotel and sprawling golf course, Dragon's Teeth is a sacred spot that was an ancient burial ground. Visitors are asked to respect the area while enjoying the natural beauty.
AT A GLANCE:
During the time period of ancient Hawaii when the Maui Volcano was active, molten lava from the volcano flowed freely into the ocean where it was pushed back by strong ocean currents and winds. After being forced back ashore, it cooled into the stunning formations of Dragon's Teeth (also called Makaluapuna Point.) This was one of the last lava flows on the island, adding to the uniqueness of the sight. The frequent spray of salt water over the rocks over the years has bleached the color of the lava, so the originally black "dragon's teeth" are now white.
There is a small parking lot at the end of Lower Honoapiilani Rd. Visitors can park here, and then walk along the edge of the golf course toward the ocean. Be sure to stay to the right of the signs separating the narrow walkway from the golf course.
Just a short drive from most of West Maui's resorts, Dragon's Teeth is a beautiful place to watch the sun rise or set. Sea turtles can often be spotted as they swim up around the rocks.
The octopus (plural octopuses) is a soft-bodied, eight-limbed mollusc of the order Octopoda (/ɒkˈtɒpədə/, ok-TO-pə-də). Around 300 species are recognised, and the order is grouped within the class Cephalopoda with squids, cuttlefish, and nautiloids. Like other cephalopods, the octopus is bilaterally symmetric with two eyes and a beak, with its mouth at the center point of the eight limbs.[a] The soft body can rapidly alter its shape, enabling octopuses to squeeze through small gaps. They trail their eight appendages behind them as they swim. The siphon is used both for respiration and for locomotion, by expelling a jet of water. Octopuses have a complex nervous system and excellent sight, and are among the most intelligent and behaviourally diverse of all invertebrates.
Octopuses inhabit various regions of the ocean, including coral reefs, pelagic waters, and the seabed; some live in the intertidal zone and others at abyssal depths. Most species grow quickly, mature early, and are short-lived. In most species, the male uses a specially adapted arm to deliver a bundle of sperm directly into the female's mantle cavity, after which he becomes senescent and dies, while the female deposits fertilised eggs in a den and cares for them until they hatch, after which she also dies. Strategies to defend themselves against predators include the expulsion of ink, the use of camouflage and threat displays, the ability to jet quickly through the water and hide, and even deceit. All octopuses are venomous, but only the blue-ringed octopuses are known to be deadly to humans.
Octopuses appear in mythology as sea monsters like the Kraken of Norway and the Akkorokamui of the Ainu, and probably the Gorgon of ancient Greece. A battle with an octopus appears in Victor Hugo's book Toilers of the Sea, inspiring other works such as Ian Fleming's Octopussy. Octopuses appear in Japanese erotic art, shunga. They are eaten and considered a delicacy by humans in many parts of the world, especially the Mediterranean and the Asian seas.
ETYMOLOGY AND PLURALISATION
The scientific Latin term octopus was derived from Ancient Greek ὀκτώπους, a compound form of ὀκτώ (oktō, "eight") and πούς (pous, "foot"), itself a variant form of ὀκτάπους, a word used for example by Alexander of Tralles (c. 525–605) for the common octopus. The standard pluralised form of "octopus" in English is "octopuses"; the Ancient Greek plural ὀκτώποδες, "octopodes" (/ɒkˈtɒpədiːz/), has also been used historically. The alternative plural "octopi" is considered grammatically incorrect because it wrongly assumes that octopus is a Latin second declension "-us" noun or adjective when, in either Greek or Latin, it is a third declension noun.
Fowler's Modern English Usage states that the only acceptable plural in English is "octopuses", that "octopi" is misconceived, and "octopodes" pedantic; the latter is nonetheless used frequently enough to be acknowledged by the descriptivist Merriam-Webster 11th Collegiate Dictionary and Webster's New World College Dictionary. The Oxford English Dictionary lists "octopuses", "octopi", and "octopodes", in that order, reflecting frequency of use, calling "octopodes" rare and noting that "octopi" is based on a misunderstanding. The New Oxford American Dictionary (3rd Edition, 2010) lists "octopuses" as the only acceptable pluralisation, and indicates that "octopodes" is still occasionally used, but that "octopi" is incorrect.
ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY
SIZE
The giant Pacific octopus (Enteroctopus dofleini) is often cited as the largest known octopus species. Adults usually weigh around 15 kg, with an arm span of up to 4.3 m. The largest specimen of this species to be scientifically documented was an animal with a live mass of 71 kg. Much larger sizes have been claimed for the giant Pacific octopus: one specimen was recorded as 272 kg with an arm span of 9 m. A carcass of the seven-arm octopus, Haliphron atlanticus, weighed 61 kg and was estimated to have had a live mass of 75 kg. The smallest species is Octopus wolfi, which is around 2.5 cm and weighs less than 1 g.
EXTERNAL CHARACTERISTICS
The octopus is bilaterally symmetrical along its dorso-ventral axis; the head and foot are at one end of an elongated body and function as the anterior (front) of the animal. The head includes the mouth and brain. The foot has evolved into a set of flexible, prehensile appendages, known as "arms", that surround the mouth and are attached to each other near their base by a webbed structure. The arms can be described based on side and sequence position (such as L1, R1, L2, R2) and divided into four pairs. The two rear appendages are generally used to walk on the sea floor, while the other six are used to forage for food; hence some biologists refer to the animals as having six "arms" and two "legs". The bulbous and hollow mantle is fused to the back of the head and is known as the visceral hump; it contains most of the vital organs. The mantle cavity has muscular walls and contains the gills; it is connected to the exterior by a funnel or siphon. The mouth of an octopus, located underneath the arms, has a sharp hard beak.
The skin consists of a thin outer epidermis with mucous cells and sensory cells, and a connective tissue dermis consisting largely of collagen fibres and various cells allowing colour change. Most of the body is made of soft tissue allowing it to lengthen, contract, and contort itself. The octopus can squeeze through tiny gaps; even the larger species can pass through an opening close to 2.5 cm in diameter. Lacking skeletal support, the arms work as muscular hydrostats and contain longitudinal, transverse and circular muscles around a central axial nerve. They can extend and contract, twist to left or right, bend at any place in any direction or be held rigid.
The interior surfaces of the arms are covered with circular, adhesive suckers. The suckers allow the octopus to anchor itself or to manipulate objects. Each sucker is usually circular and bowl-like and has two distinct parts: an outer shallow cavity called an infundibulum and a central hollow cavity called an acetabulum, both of which are thick muscles covered in a protective chitinous cuticle. When a sucker attaches to a surface, the orifice between the two structures is sealed. The infundibulum provides adhesion while the acetabulum remains free, and muscle contractions allow for attachment and detachment.
The eyes of the octopus are large and are at the top of the head. They are similar in structure to those of a fish and are enclosed in a cartilaginous capsule fused to the cranium. The cornea is formed from a translucent epidermal layer and the slit-shaped pupil forms a hole in the iris and lies just behind. The lens is suspended behind the pupil and photoreceptive retinal cells cover the back of the eye. The pupil can be adjusted in size and a retinal pigment screens incident light in bright conditions.Some species differ in form from the typical octopus body shape. Basal species, the Cirrina, have stout gelatinous bodies with webbing that reaches near the tip of their arms, and two large fins above the eyes, supported by an internal shell. Fleshy papillae or cirri are found along the bottom of the arms, and the eyes are more developed.
CIRCULATORY SYSTEM
Octopuses have a closed circulatory system, in which the blood remains inside blood vessels. Octopuses have three hearts; a systemic heart that circulates blood around the body and two branchial hearts that pump it through each of the two gills. The systemic heart is inactive when the animal is swimming and thus it tires quickly and prefers to crawl. Octopus blood contains the copper-rich protein haemocyanin to transport oxygen. This makes the blood very viscous and it requires considerable pressure to pump it around the body; octopuses' blood pressures can exceed 75 mmHg. In cold conditions with low oxygen levels, haemocyanin transports oxygen more efficiently than haemoglobin. The haemocyanin is dissolved in the plasma instead of being carried within blood cells, and gives the blood a bluish colour.
The systemic heart has muscular contractile walls and consists of a single ventricle and two atria, one for each side of the body. The blood vessels consist of arteries, capillaries and veins and are lined with a cellular endothelium which is quite unlike that of most other invertebrates. The blood circulates through the aorta and capillary system, to the vena cavae, after which the blood is pumped through the gills by the auxiliary hearts and back to the main heart. Much of the venous system is contractile, which helps circulate the blood.
RESPIRATION
Respiration involves drawing water into the mantle cavity through an aperture, passing it through the gills, and expelling it through the siphon. The ingress of water is achieved by contraction of radial muscles in the mantle wall, and flapper valves shut when strong circular muscles force the water out through the siphon. Extensive connective tissue lattices support the respiratory muscles and allow them to expand the respiratory chamber. The lamella structure of the gills allows for a high oxygen uptake, up to 65% in water at 20 °C. Water flow over the gills correlates with locomotion, and an octopus can propel its body when it expels water out of its siphon.
The thin skin of the octopus absorbs additional oxygen. When resting, around 41% of an octopus's oxygen absorption is through the skin. This decreases to 33% when it swims, as more water flows over the gills; skin oxygen uptake also increases. When it is resting after a meal, absorption through the skin can drop to 3% of its total oxygen uptake.
DIGESTION AND EXCRETION
The digestive system of the octopus begins with the buccal mass which consists of the mouth with its chitinous beak, the pharynx, radula and salivary glands. The radula is a spiked, muscular tongue-like organ with multiple rows of tiny teeth. Food is broken down and is forced into the oesophagus by two lateral extensions of the esophageal side walls in addition to the radula. From there it is transferred to the gastrointestinal tract, which is mostly suspended from the roof of the mantle cavity by numerous membranes. The tract consists of a crop, where the food is stored; a stomach, where food is ground down; a caecum where the now sludgy food is sorted into fluids and particles and which plays an important role in absorption; the digestive gland, where liver cells break down and absorb the fluid and become "brown bodies"; and the intestine, where the accumulated waste is turned into faecal ropes by secretions and blown out of the funnel via the rectum.
During osmoregulation, fluid is added to the pericardia of the branchial hearts. The octopus has two nephridia (equivalent to vertebrate kidneys) which are associated with the branchial hearts; these and their associated ducts connect the pericardial cavities with the mantle cavity. Before reaching the branchial heart, each branch of the vena cava expands to form renal appendages which are in direct contact with the thin-walled nephridium. The urine is first formed in the pericardial cavity, and is modified by excretion, chiefly of ammonia, and selective absorption from the renal appendages, as it is passed along the associated duct and through the nephridiopore into the mantle cavity.
NERVOUS SYSTEM AND SENSES
The octopus (along with cuttlefish) has the highest brain-to-body mass ratios of all invertebrates; it is also greater than that of many vertebrates. It has a highly complex nervous system, only part of which is localised in its brain, which is contained in a cartilaginous capsule. Two-thirds of an octopus's neurons are found in the nerve cords of its arms, which show a variety of complex reflex actions that persist even when they have no input from the brain. Unlike vertebrates, the complex motor skills of octopuses are not organised in their brain via an internal somatotopic map of its body, instead using a nonsomatotopic system unique to large-brained invertebrates.
Like other cephalopods, octopuses can distinguish the polarisation of light. Colour vision appears to vary from species to species, for example being present in O. aegina but absent in O. vulgaris. Researchers believe that opsins in the skin can sense different wavelengths of light and help the creatures choose a coloration that camouflages them, in addition to light input from the eyes. Other researchers hypothesise that cephalopod eyes in species which only have a single photoreceptor protein may use chromatic aberration to turn monochromatic vision into colour vision, though this sacrifices image quality. This would explain pupils shaped like the letter U, the letter W, or a dumbbell, as well as explaining the need for colourful mating displays.
Attached to the brain are two special organs called statocysts (sac-like structures containing a mineralised mass and sensitive hairs), that allow the octopus to sense the orientation of its body. They provide information on the position of the body relative to gravity and can detect angular acceleration. An autonomic response keeps the octopus's eyes oriented so that the pupil is always horizontal. Octopuses may also use the statocyst to hear sound. The common octopus can hear sounds between 400 Hz and 1000 Hz, and hears best at 600 Hz.
Octopuses also have an excellent sense of touch. The octopus's suction cups are equipped with chemoreceptors so the octopus can taste what it touches. Octopus arms do not become tangled or stuck to each other because the sensors recognise octopus skin and prevent self-attachment.
The arms contain tension sensors so the octopus knows whether its arms are stretched out, but this is not sufficient for the brain to determine the position of the octopus's body or arms. As a result, the octopus does not possess stereognosis; that is, it does not form a mental image of the overall shape of the object it is handling. It can detect local texture variations, but cannot integrate the information into a larger picture. The neurological autonomy of the arms means the octopus has great difficulty learning about the detailed effects of its motions. It has a poor proprioceptive sense, and it knows what exact motions were made only by observing the arms visually.
Ink sac
The ink sac of an octopus is located under the digestive gland. A gland attached to the sac produces the ink, and the sac stores it. The sac is close enough to the funnel for the octopus to shoot out the ink with a water jet. Before it leaves the funnel, the ink passes through glands which mix it with mucus, creating a thick, dark blob which allows the animal to escape from a predator. The main pigment in the ink is melanin, which gives it its black colour. Cirrate octopuses lack the ink sac.
LIFECYCLE
REPRODUCTION
Octopuses are gonochoric and have a single, posteriorly-located gonad which is associated with the coelom. The testis in males and the ovary in females bulges into the gonocoel and the gametes are released here. The gonocoel is connected by the gonoduct to the mantle cavity, which it enters at the gonopore. An optic gland creates hormones that cause the octopus to mature and age and stimulate gamete production. The gland may be triggered by environmental conditions such as temperature, light and nutrition, which thus control the timing of reproduction and lifespan.
When octopuses reproduce, the male uses a specialised arm called a hectocotylus to transfer spermatophores (packets of sperm) from the terminal organ of the reproductive tract (the cephalopod "penis") into the female's mantle cavity. The hectocotylus in benthic octopuses is usually the third right arm, which has a spoon-shaped depression and modified suckers near the tip. In most species, fertilisation occurs in the mantle cavity.
The reproduction of octopuses has been studied in only a few species. One such species is the giant Pacific octopus, in which courtship is accompanied, especially in the male, by changes in skin texture and colour. The male may cling to the top or side of the female or position himself beside her. There is some speculation that he may first use his hectocotylus to remove any spermatophore or sperm already present in the female. He picks up a spermatophore from his spermatophoric sac with the hectocotylus, inserts it into the female's mantle cavity, and deposits it in the correct location for the species, which in the giant Pacific octopus is the opening of the oviduct. Two spermatophores are transferred in this way; these are about one metre (yard) long, and the empty ends may protrude from the female's mantle. A complex hydraulic mechanism releases the sperm from the spermatophore, and it is stored internally by the female.
About forty days after mating, the female giant Pacific octopus attaches strings of small fertilised eggs (10,000 to 70,000 in total) to rocks in a crevice or under an overhang. Here she guards and cares for them for about five months (160 days) until they hatch. In colder waters, such as those off of Alaska, it may take as much as 10 months for the eggs to completely develop. The female aerates the eggs and keeps them clean; if left untended, many eggs will not hatch. She does not feed during this time and dies soon afterwards. Males become senescent and die a few weeks after mating.
The eggs have large yolks; cleavage (division) is superficial and a germinal disc develops at the pole. During gastrulation, the margins of this grow down and surround the yolk, forming a yolk sac, which eventually forms part of the gut. The dorsal side of the disc grows upwards and forms the embryo, with a shell gland on its dorsal surface, gills, mantle and eyes. The arms and funnel develop as part of the foot on the ventral side of the disc. The arms later migrate upwards, coming to form a ring around the funnel and mouth. The yolk is gradually absorbed as the embryo develops.
Most young octopuses hatch as paralarvae and are planktonic for weeks to months, depending on the species and water temperature. They feed on copepods, arthropod larvae and other zooplankton, eventually settling on the ocean floor and developing directly into adults with no distinct metamorphoses that are present in other groups of mollusc larvae. Octopus species that produce larger eggs – including the southern blue-ringed, Caribbean reef, California two-spot, Eledone moschata and deep sea octopuses – do not have a paralarval stage, but hatch as benthic animals similar to the adults.In the argonaut (paper nautilus), the female secretes a fine, fluted, papery shell in which the eggs are deposited and in which she also resides while floating in mid-ocean. In this she broods the young, and it also serves as a buoyancy aid allowing her to adjust her depth. The male argonaut is minute by comparison and has no shell.
LIFESPAN
Octopuses have a relatively short life expectancy; some species live for as little as six months. The giant Pacific octopus, one of the two largest species of octopus, may live for as much as five years. Octopus lifespan is limited by reproduction: males can live for only a few months after mating, and females die shortly after their eggs hatch. The larger Pacific striped octopus is an exception, as it can reproduce multiple times over a life of around two years. Octopus reproductive organs mature due to the hormonal influence of the optic gland but result in the inactivation of their digestive glands, typically causing the octopus to die from starvation. Experimental removal of both optic glands after spawning was found to result in the cessation of broodiness, the resumption of feeding, increased growth, and greatly extended lifespans. It has been proposed that the naturally short lifespan may be functional to prevent rapid overpopulation.
DISTRIBUTION AND HABITAT
Octopuses live in every ocean, and different species have adapted to different marine habitats. As juveniles, common octopuses inhabit shallow tide pools. The Hawaiian day octopus (Octopus cyanea) lives on coral reefs; argonauts drift in pelagic waters. Abdopus aculeatus mostly lives in near-shore seagrass beds. Some species are adapted to the cold, ocean depths. The spoon-armed octopus (Bathypolypus arcticus) is found at depths of 1,000 m, and Vulcanoctopus hydrothermalis lives near hydrothermal vents at 2,000 m. The cirrate species are often free-swimming and live in deep-water habitats. Although several species are known to live at bathyal and abyssal depths, there is only a single indisputable record of an octopus in the hadal zone; a species of Grimpoteuthis (dumbo octopus) photographed at 6,957 m. No species are known to live in fresh water.
BEHAVIOUR AND ECOLOGY
Most species are solitary when not mating, though a few are known to occur in high densities and with frequent interactions, signaling, mate defending and eviction of individuals from dens. This is likely the result of abundant food supplies combined with limited den sites. The larger Pacific striped octopus however is social, living in groups of up to 40 individuals that share dens. Octopuses hide in dens, which are typically crevices in rocky outcrops or other hard structures, though some species burrow into sand or mud. Octopuses are not territorial but generally remain in a home range; they may leave the area in search of food. They can use navigation skills to return to a den without having to retrace their outward route. They are not known to be migratory.
Octopuses bring captured prey back to the den where they can eat it safely. Sometimes the octopus catches more prey than it can eat, and the den is often surrounded by a midden of dead and uneaten food items. Other creatures, such as fish, crabs, molluscs and echinoderms, often share the den with the octopus, either because they have arrived as scavengers, or because they have survived capture. Octopuses rarely engage in interspecific cooperative hunting with fish as their partners. They regulate the species composition of the hunting group - and the behavior of their partners - by punching them.
FEEDING
Nearly all octopuses are predatory; bottom-dwelling octopuses eat mainly crustaceans, polychaete worms, and other molluscs such as whelks and clams; open-ocean octopuses eat mainly prawns, fish and other cephalopods. Major items in the diet of the giant Pacific octopus include bivalve molluscs such as the cockle Clinocardium nuttallii, clams and scallops and crustaceans such as crabs and spider crabs. Prey that it is likely to reject include moon snails because they are too large and limpets, rock scallops, chitons and abalone, because they are too securely fixed to the rock.
A benthic (bottom-dwelling) octopus typically moves among the rocks and feels through the crevices. The creature may make a jet-propelled pounce on prey and pull it towards the mouth with its arms, the suckers restraining it. Small prey may be completely trapped by the webbed structure. Octopuses usually inject crustaceans like crabs with a paralysing saliva then dismember them with their beaks. Octopuses feed on shelled molluscs either by forcing the valves apart, or by drilling a hole in the shell to inject a nerve toxin. It used to be thought that the hole was drilled by the radula, but it has now been shown that minute teeth at the tip of the salivary papilla are involved, and an enzyme in the toxic saliva is used to dissolve the calcium carbonate of the shell. It takes about three hours for O. vulgaris to create a 0.6 mm hole. Once the shell is penetrated, the prey dies almost instantaneously, its muscles relax, and the soft tissues are easy for the octopus to remove. Crabs may also be treated in this way; tough-shelled species are more likely to be drilled, and soft-shelled crabs are torn apart.
Some species have other modes of feeding. Grimpoteuthis has a reduced or non-existent radula and swallows prey whole. In the deep-sea genus Stauroteuthis, some of the muscle cells that control the suckers in most species have been replaced with photophores which are believed to fool prey by directing them towards the mouth, making them one of the few bioluminescent octopuses.
LOCOMOTION
Octopuses mainly move about by relatively slow crawling with some swimming in a head-first position. Jet propulsion or backwards swimming, is their fastest means of locomotion, followed by swimming and crawling. When in no hurry, they usually crawl on either solid or soft surfaces. Several arms are extended forwards, some of the suckers adhere to the substrate and the animal hauls itself forwards with its powerful arm muscles, while other arms may push rather than pull. As progress is made, other arms move ahead to repeat these actions and the original suckers detach. During crawling, the heart rate nearly doubles, and the animal requires ten or fifteen minutes to recover from relatively minor exercise.
Most octopuses swim by expelling a jet of water from the mantle through the siphon into the sea. The physical principle behind this is that the force required to accelerate the water through the orifice produces a reaction that propels the octopus in the opposite direction. The direction of travel depends on the orientation of the siphon. When swimming, the head is at the front and the siphon is pointed backwards, but when jetting, the visceral hump leads, the siphon points towards the head and the arms trail behind, with the animal presenting a fusiform appearance. In an alternative method of swimming, some species flatten themselves dorso-ventrally, and swim with the arms held out sideways, and this may provide lift and be faster than normal swimming. Jetting is used to escape from danger, but is physiologically inefficient, requiring a mantle pressure so high as to stop the heart from beating, resulting in a progressive oxygen deficit.
Cirrate octopuses cannot produce jet propulsion and rely on their fins for swimming. They have neutral buoyancy and drift through the water with the fins extended. They can also contract their arms and surrounding web to make sudden moves known as "take-offs". Another form of locomotion is "pumping", which involves symmetrical contractions of muscles in their webs producing peristaltic waves. This moves the body slowly.
In 2005, Adopus aculeatus and veined octopus (Amphioctopus marginatus) were found to walk on two arms, while at the same time mimicking plant matter. This form of locomotion allows these octopuses to move quickly away from a potential predator without being recognised. A study of this behaviour led to the suggestion that the two rearmost appendages may be more accurately termed "legs" rather than "arms". Some species of octopus can crawl out of the water briefly, which they may do between tide pools while hunting crustaceans or gastropods or to escape predators. "Stilt walking" is used by the veined octopus when carrying stacked coconut shells. The octopus carries the shells underneath it with two arms, and progresses with an ungainly gait supported by its remaining arms held rigid.
INTELLIGENCE
Octopuses are highly intelligent; the extent of their intelligence and learning capability are not well defined. Maze and problem-solving experiments have shown evidence of a memory system that can store both short- and long-term memory. It is not known precisely what contribution learning makes to adult octopus behaviour. Young octopuses learn nothing from their parents, as adults provide no parental care beyond tending to their eggs until the young octopuses hatch.
In laboratory experiments, octopuses can be readily trained to distinguish between different shapes and patterns. They have been reported to practise observational learning, although the validity of these findings is contested. Octopuses have also been observed in what has been described as play: repeatedly releasing bottles or toys into a circular current in their aquariums and then catching them. Octopuses often break out of their aquariums and sometimes into others in search of food. They have even boarded fishing boats and opened holds to eat crabs. The veined octopus collects discarded coconut shells, then uses them to build a shelter, an example of tool use.
CAMOUFLAGE AND COLOUR CHANGE
Octopuses use camouflage when hunting and to avoid predators. To do this they use specialised skin cells which change the appearance of the skin by adjusting its colour, opacity, or reflectivity. Chromatophores contain yellow, orange, red, brown, or black pigments; most species have three of these colours, while some have two or four. Other colour-changing cells are reflective iridophores and white leucophores. This colour-changing ability is also used to communicate with or warn other octopuses.
Octopuses can create distracting patterns with waves of dark coloration across the body, a display known as the "passing cloud". Muscles in the skin change the texture of the mantle to achieve greater camouflage. In some species, the mantle can take on the spiky appearance of algae; in others, skin anatomy is limited to relatively uniform shades of one colour with limited skin texture. Octopuses that are diurnal and live in shallow water have evolved more complex skin than their nocturnal and deep-sea counterparts.
A "moving rock" trick involves the octopus mimicking a rock and then inching across the open space with a speed matching the movement in the surrounding water, allowing it to move in plain sight of a predator.
DEFENCE
Aside from humans, octopuses may be preyed on by fishes, seabirds, sea otters, pinnipeds, cetaceans, and other cephalopods. Octopuses typically hide or disguise themselves by camouflage and mimicry; some have conspicuous warning coloration (aposematism) or deimatic behaviour. An octopus may spend 40% of its time hidden away in its den. When the octopus is approached, it may extend an arm to investigate. 66% of Enteroctopus dofleini in one study had scars, with 50% having amputated arms. The blue rings of the highly venomous blue-ringed octopus are hidden in muscular skin folds which contract when the animal is threatened, exposing the iridescent warning. The Atlantic white-spotted octopus (Callistoctopus macropus) turns bright brownish red with oval white spots all over in a high contrast display. Displays are often reinforced by stretching out the animal's arms, fins or web to make it look as big and threatening as possible.
Once they have been seen by a predator, they commonly try to escape but can also use distraction with an ink cloud ejected from the ink sac. The ink is thought to reduce the efficiency of olfactory organs, which would aid evasion from predators that employ smell for hunting, such as sharks. Ink clouds of some species might act as pseudomorphs, or decoys that the predator attacks instead.
When under attack, some octopuses can perform arm autotomy, in a manner similar to the way skinks and other lizards detach their tails. The crawling arm may distract would-be predators. Such severed arms remain sensitive to stimuli and move away from unpleasant sensations. Octopuses can replace lost limbs.
Some octopuses, such as the mimic octopus, can combine their highly flexible bodies with their colour-changing ability to mimic other, more dangerous animals, such as lionfish, sea snakes, and eels.
PATHOGENS AND PARASITES
The diseases and parasites that affect octopuses have been little studied, but cephalopods are known to be the intermediate or final hosts of various parasitic cestodes, nematodes and copepods; 150 species of protistan and metazoan parasites have been recognised. The Dicyemidae are a family of tiny worms that are found in the renal appendages of many species; it is unclear whether they are parasitic or are endosymbionts. Coccidians in the genus Aggregata living in the gut cause severe disease to the host. Octopuses have an innate immune system, and the haemocytes respond to infection by phagocytosis, encapsulation, infiltration or cytotoxic activities to destroy or isolate the pathogens. The haemocytes play an important role in the recognition and elimination of foreign bodies and wound repair. Captive animals have been found to be more susceptible to pathogens than wild ones. A gram-negative bacterium, Vibrio lentus, has been found to cause skin lesions, exposure of muscle and death of octopuses in extreme cases.
EVOLUTION
The scientific name Octopoda was first coined and given as the order of octopuses in 1818 by English biologist William Elford Leach, who classified them as Octopoida the previous year. The Octopoda consists of around 300 known species and were historically divided into two suborders, the Incirrina and the Cirrina. However, more recent evidence suggests that Cirrina are merely the most basal species and are not a unique clade. The incirrate octopuses (the majority of species) lack the cirri and paired swimming fins of the cirrates. In addition, the internal shell of incirrates is either present as a pair of stylets or absent altogether.
FOSSIL HISTORY AND PHYLOGENY
Cephalopods have existed for 500 million years and octopus ancestors were in the Carboniferous seas 300 million years ago. The oldest known octopus fossil is Pohlsepia, which lived 296 million years ago. Researchers have identified impressions of eight arms, two eyes, and possibly an ink sac. Octopuses are mostly soft tissue, and so fossils are relatively rare. Octopuses, squids and cuttlefish belong to the clade Coleoidea. They are known as "soft-bodied" cephalopods, lacking the external shell of most molluscs and other cephalopods like the nautiloids and the extinct Ammonoidea. Octopuses have eight limbs like other coleoids but lack the extra specialised feeding appendages known as tentacles which are longer and thinner with suckers only at their club-like ends. The vampire squid (Vampyroteuthis) also lacks tentacles but has sensory filaments.
The cladograms are based on Sanchez et al., 2018, who created a molecular phylogeny based on mitochondrial and nuclear DNA marker sequences.
RNA EDITING
Octopuses and other coleoid cephalopods are capable of greater RNA editing (which involves changes to the nucleic acid sequence of the primary transcript of RNA molecules) than any other organisms. Editing is concentrated in the nervous system and affects proteins involved in neural excitability and neuronal morphology. More than 60% of RNA transcripts for coleoid brains are recoded by editing, compared to less than 1% for a human or fruit fly. Coleoids rely mostly on ADAR enzymes for RNA editing, which requires large double-stranded RNA structures to flank the editing sites. Both the structures and editing sites are conserved in the coleoid genome and the mutation rates for the sites are severely hampered. Hence, greater transcriptome plasticity has come at the cost of slower genome evolution. High levels of RNA editing do not appear to be present in more basal cephalopods or other molluscs.
RELATIONSHIP TO HUMANS
CULTURAL REFERENCES
Ancient seafaring people were aware of the octopus, as evidenced by certain artworks and designs. For example, a stone carving found in the archaeological recovery from Bronze Age Minoan Crete at Knossos (1900–1100 BC) has a depiction of a fisherman carrying an octopus. The terrifyingly powerful Gorgon of Greek mythology has been thought to have been inspired by the octopus or squid, the octopus itself representing the severed head of Medusa, the beak as the protruding tongue and fangs, and its tentacles as the snakes. The Kraken are legendary sea monsters of giant proportions said to dwell off the coasts of Norway and Greenland, usually portrayed in art as a giant octopus attacking ships. Linnaeus included it in the first edition of his 1735 Systema Naturae. One translation of the Hawaiian creation myth the Kumulipo suggests that the octopus is the lone survivor of a previous age. The Akkorokamui is a gigantic octopus-like monster from Ainu folklore.
A battle with an octopus plays a significant role in Victor Hugo's book Travailleurs de la mer (Toilers of the Sea), relating to his time in exile on Guernsey. Ian Fleming's 1966 short story collection Octopussy and The Living Daylights, and the 1983 James Bond film were partly inspired by Hugo's book.
Japanese erotic art, shunga, includes ukiyo-e woodblock prints such as Katsushika Hokusai's 1814 print Tako to ama (The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife), in which an ama diver is sexually intertwined with a large and a small octopus. The print is a forerunner of tentacle erotica. The biologist P. Z. Myers noted in his science blog, Pharyngula, that octopuses appear in "extraordinary" graphic illustrations involving women, tentacles, and bare breasts.
Since it has numerous arms emanating from a common centre, the octopus is often used as a symbol for a powerful and manipulative organisation, company, or country.
DANGER
Octopuses generally avoid humans, but incidents have been verified. For example, a 2.4-metre Pacific octopus, said to be nearly perfectly camouflaged, "lunged" at a diver and "wrangled" over his camera before it let go. Another diver recorded the encounter on video.
All species are venomous, but only blue-ringed octopuses have venom that is lethal to humans. Bites are reported each year across the animals' range from Australia to the eastern Indo-Pacific Ocean. They bite only when provoked or accidentally stepped upon; bites are small and usually painless. The venom appears to be able to penetrate the skin without a puncture, given prolonged contact. It contains tetrodotoxin, which causes paralysis by blocking the transmission of nerve impulses to the muscles. This causes death by respiratory failure leading to cerebral anoxia. No antidote is known, but if breathing can be kept going artificially, patients recover within 24 hours. Bites have been recorded from captive octopuses of other species; they leave swellings which disappear in a day or two.
FISHERIES AND CUISINE
Octopus fisheries exist around the world with total catches varying between 245,320 and 322,999 metric tons from 1986 to 1995. The world catch peaked in 2007 at 380,000 tons, and fell by a tenth by 2012. Methods to capture octopuses include pots, traps, trawls, snares, drift fishing, spearing, hooking and hand collection. Octopus is eaten in many cultures and is a common food on the Mediterranean and Asian coasts. The arms and sometimes other body parts are prepared in various ways, often varying by species or geography. Live octopuses are eaten in several countries around the world, including the US. Animal welfare groups have objected to this practice on the basis that octopuses can experience pain. Octopuses have a food conversion efficiency greater than that of chickens, making octopus aquaculture a possibility.
IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
In classical Greece, Aristotle (384–322 BC) commented on the colour-changing abilities of the octopus, both for camouflage and for signalling, in his Historia animalium: "The octopus ... seeks its prey by so changing its colour as to render it like the colour of the stones adjacent to it; it does so also when alarmed." Aristotle noted that the octopus had a hectocotyl arm and suggested it might be used in sexual reproduction. This claim was widely disbelieved until the 19th century. It was described in 1829 by the French zoologist Georges Cuvier, who supposed it to be a parasitic worm, naming it as a new species, Hectocotylus octopodis. Other zoologists thought it a spermatophore; the German zoologist Heinrich Müller believed it was "designed" to detach during copulation. In 1856 the Danish zoologist Japetus Steenstrup demonstrated that it is used to transfer sperm, and only rarely detaches.
Octopuses offer many possibilities in biological research, including their ability to regenerate limbs, change the colour of their skin, behave intelligently with a distributed nervous system, and make use of 168 kinds of protocadherins (humans have 58), the proteins that guide the connections neurons make with each other. The California two-spot octopus has had its genome sequenced, allowing exploration of its molecular adaptations. Having independently evolved mammal-like intelligence, octopuses have been compared to hypothetical intelligent extraterrestrials. Their problem-solving skills, along with their mobility and lack of rigid structure enable them to escape from supposedly secure tanks in laboratories and public aquariums.
Due to their intelligence, octopuses are listed in some countries as experimental animals on which surgery may not be performed without anesthesia, a protection usually extended only to vertebrates. In the UK from 1993 to 2012, the common octopus (Octopus vulgaris) was the only invertebrate protected under the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986. In 2012, this legislation was extended to include all cephalopods in accordance with a general EU directive.
Some robotics research is exploring biomimicry of octopus features. Octopus arms can move and sense largely autonomously without intervention from the animal's central nervous system. In 2015 a team in Italy built soft-bodied robots able to crawl and swim, requiring only minimal computation. In 2017 a German company made an arm with a soft pneumatically controlled silicone gripper fitted with two rows of suckers. It is able to grasp objects such as a metal tube, a magazine, or a ball, and to fill a glass by pouring water from a bottle.
WIKIPEDIA
I think the front of the arch is supposed to round out quite a bit. Those gaps also look terrifyingly huge.
Done in Ai, Finalized in Photoshop and Photoscape X
"When the stars flicker and the void sings, he is near."
Behold Xhar’Zhul, a towering alien warlord sheathed in obsidian-black scales and an advanced cybernetic exo-shell. His glowing violet eyes pierce through space-time itself, reflecting the cold intelligence of a mind that commands entire fleets. Ancient, silent, and terrifyingly efficient, Xhar’Zhul stands aboard the Void Bridge, the nerve center of the Celestial Rift Armada — a fleet capable of breaching reality itself.
His armor is a fusion of Rhyzek bio-tech and void-forged alloys, lined with pulsating energy veins and runes lost to time. The ridges along his head echo his reptilian origins, but beneath the surface lies a strategist without equal — a master of quantum warfare and interdimensional dominion.
This piece captures the moment before battle — deep in the heart of his flagship, where alien glyphs glow, nebulae swirl beyond reinforced glass, and destiny is written in stellar fire.
This book took me from 1-13-14 to 4-24-14 to read, and it is 387 pages. I thought I would like it because of the stitchery part, since that is a hobby of mine. But I did not like this book at all. I have read other Barbara Michaels books, like Smoke And Mirrors and The Dancing House, as well as her Egyptian books she writes under the name Elizabeth Peters. I have liked all of those, but this one I just couldn't stand. I kind of liked the main character Adam, but not much. The other characters I couldn't stand, although sometimes the tenderness they would show in different ways would be the only parts I liked. It is about a haunted quilt, with disgusting pieces sewn into it, like fingernails and human hair. While there might actually be quilts that were made like this for the same reason, I just didn't like it. It was gross. It took place at Christmastime, and none of them were Christians, and to me being a Christian it doesn't make sense to even celebrate the holiday unless you are doing it for the real reason. That was the biggest "take-away" I got from this book. How empty the holiday is without Jesus. Anyway, the back of the book says: "When an antique bridal quilt appears under mysterious circumstances at the vintage clothing shop where Rachel Grant works, she is fascinated. She has never been able to resist handmade textiles from the past, for she believes that through the ages, women wove protective magic into their fabrics in order to mark the important events of their lives: birth, marriage, and death. But there is more than good in the quilt's magic power. Day by day Rachel sees and feels the power growing, as she senses the quilt influencing her thoughts and actions. Much as Rachel's logical mind longs to deny the supernatural, the aura of evil coming from the quilt is terrifyingly real, and it seems to carry a sinister legacy into the lives of the people Rachel loves.
/ My Blog / Best Served Cold /
After a look around the ice caves in the glacier, I took some time to admire the view. Then stuck a neutral density filter on and took some long exposure shots of the Bellecote cable cars to make them look as terrifyingly fast as they felt when we came up on one!
Au 51 de la rue Saint-Louis-en-l’île se trouvel’Hôtel de Chenizot. Cet hôtel particulier construit dans les années 1620 pour Pierre de Verton, comprend un corps de logis aligné sur la rue et un deuxième entre cour et jardin, qui s'étendait jusqu'au quai d'Orléans.
Transformé en 1719 par Jean-François Guyot de Chenizot, receveur généraldes finances à Rouen. Son architecture rocaille est toujours saisissante. La façade sur rue, en pierre, s'élève sur un rez-de-chaussée entresolé surmonté de deux niveaux couronnés par un étage sous combles. Son porche est à bossages vermiculés dotés d’une tête de faune rehaussé d’un balcon en fer forgé soutenu par des chimères à l’aspect terrifiant, réalisé par Pierre de Vigny en 1726. Il est surmonté par un balcon sinueux soutenu par deux consoles représentant des chimères et d'une tête de faune. Un fronton triangulaire orné de bas-reliefs couronne la baie de l'étage noble. On retrouve le même style de rocaille sur les façades des bâtiments sur cour. Escalier ancien documenté à cette adresse. En 1840, l’hôtel fut loué par l’Etat et devint la résidence à l’archevêché de Paris Mgr Affre. C’est d’ici que le 25 juin 1848, il se rendit place de la Bastille avec le désir de s’interposer entre les troupes et les insurgés. Il était sur le point de réussir sa mission de paix quand, malheureusement, une balle tirée d’une fenêtre lui brisa les reins. Il devait mourir deux jours après. L’année suivante, l’archevêché quitta l’hôtel et fut remplacé par une unité de gendarmerie et cela pendant douze ans, ce qui mutila sérieusement l’hôtel. Aujourd’hui la dégradation est visible ainsi que les traces d’un incendie dont il fut victime. Dans la seconde cour, une méridienne verticale déclinant de l’après-midi, en bon état donne l’heure de midi toute l’année – s’il y a du soleil, bien sûr. Elle date de 1730.
At 51 Rue Saint-Louis-en-l'Île is Chenizot Hotel. Dating from 1641, but transformed in 1719 by Jean-Francois Guyot de Chenizot, receiver general of finances in Rouen. Its rocky architecture is always striking. Its porch is bossed vermiculated with a head topped with a wrought iron balcony supported by the chimeras of a terrifying aspect. In 1840, the hotel was leased by the state and became the home to the Archbishop of Paris Mgr Affre. From here, June 25, 1848, he went up to the Bastille with the desire to mediate between troops and insurgents. He was on the verge of success in its peacekeeping mission, when, unfortunately, a bullet fired from a window shattered his back. He died two days later. The following year, the archbishop left the hotel and was replaced by a gendarmerie unit and that for twelve years, which severely mutilated the hotel. Today degradation is visible and traces of a fire which it was a victim. In the second court, a sundial declining in the afternoon, in good condition, gives the hour of noon during the whole year - if there is sun, of course. It has been built in 1730.
Black Rollerball Pen and Gouache on Bristol Plate
Inspired by reading Emile Zola's moving wartime novel reconstructing events surrounding the Franco Prussian War of 1870....and by current unsettling events once again throwing the scales of reason into a terrifyingly teetering balance.
Strong, armored, and agile, Mantis Aliens are terrifyingly effective predators.
Featured on Life In Plastic: nerditis.com/2017/01/16/life-in-plastic-toy-review-mantis...
Kathmandu Durbar Square or Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square is the plaza in front of the old royal palace of the then Kathmandu Kingdom. It is one of three Durbar (royal palace) Squares in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, all of which are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
The Durbar Square is surrounded with spectacular architecture and vividly showcases the skills of the Newar artists and craftsmen over several centuries. The royal palace was originally at Dattaraya square and was later moved to the Durbar square location.
The Kathmandu Durbar Square holds the palaces of the Malla and Shah kings who ruled over the city. Along with these palaces, the square surrounds quadrangles revealing courtyards and temples. It is known as Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square, a name derived from a statue of Hanuman, the monkey devotee of Lord Ram, at the entrance of the palace.
HISTORY AND CONSTRUCTION
The preference for the construction of royal palaces at this site dates back to as early as the Licchavi period in the third century. Even though the present palaces and temples have undergone repeated and extensive renovations and nothing physical remains from that period, names like Gunapo and Gupo, which are the names referred to the palaces in the square in early scriptures, imply that the palaces were built by Gunakamadev, a king ruling late in the tenth century. When Kathmandu City became independent under the rule of King Ratna Malla (1484–1520) the palaces in the square became the royal palaces for its Malla kings. When Prithvi Narayan Shah invaded the Kathmandu Valley in 1769, he favored the Kathmandu Durbar Square for his palace. Other subsequent Shah kings continued to rule from the square until 1896 when they moved to the Narayan Hiti Palace.
The square is still the center of important royal events like the coronation of King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah in 1975 and King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah in 2001.
Though there are no written archives stating the history of Kathmandu Durbar Square, construction of the palace in the square is credited to Sankharadev (1069–1083). As the first king of the independent Kathmandu City, Ratna Malla is said to have built the Taleju temple in the Northern side of the palace in 1501. For this to be true then the temple would have had to have been built in the vihara style as part of the palace premise surrounding the Mul Chok courtyard for no evidence of a separate structure that would match this temple can be found within the square.
Construction of the Karnel Chok is not clearly stated in any historical inscriptions; although, it is probably the oldest among all the courtyards in the square. The Bhagavati Temple, originally known as a Narayan Temple, rises above the mansions surrounding it and was added during the time of Jagajaya Malla in the early eighteenth century. The Narayan idol within the temple was stolen so Prithvi Narayan Shah replaced it with an image of Bhagavati, completely transforming the name of the temple.
The oldest temples in the square are those built by Mahendra Malla (1560–1574). They are the temples of Jagannath, Kotilingeswara Mahadev, Mahendreswara, and the Taleju Temple. This three-roofed Taleju Temple was established in 1564, in a typical Newari architectural style and is elevated on platforms that form a pyramid-like structure. It is said that Mahendra Malla, when he was residing in Bhaktapur, was highly devoted to the Taleju Temple there; the Goddess being pleased with his devotion gave him a vision asking him to build a temple for her in the Kathmandu Durbar Square. With a help of a hermit, he designed the temple to give it its present form and the Goddess entered the temple in the form of a bee.
His successors Sadasiva (1575–1581), his son, Shiva Simha (1578–1619), and his grandson, Laxmi Narsingha (1619–1641), do not seem to have made any major additions to the square. During this period of three generations the only constructions to have occurred were the establishment of Degutale Temple dedicated to Goddess Mother Taleju by Shiva Simha and some enhancement in the royal palace by Laksminar Simha.
UNDER PRATAP MALLA
In the time of Pratap Malla, son of Laksminar Simha, the square was extensively developed. He was an intellectual, a pious devotee, and especially interested in arts. He called himself a Kavindra, king of poets, and boasted that he was learned in fifteen different languages. A passionate builder, following his coronation as a king, he immediately began enlargements to his royal palace, and rebuilt some old temples and constructed new temples, shrines and stupas around his kingdom. There also took the massacre called Kot Parva where the queen, prime minister, head of the states,and other people with guards died. This massacre took place in the court yard inside the palace.
During the construction of his palace, he added a small entrance in the traditional, low and narrow Newari style. The door was elaborately decorated with carvings and paintings of deities and auspicious sings and was later transferred to the entrance of Mohan Chok. In front of the entrance he placed the statue of Hanuman thinking that Hanuman would strengthen his army and protect his home. The entrance leads to Nasal Chok, the courtyard where most royal events such as coronation, performances, and yagyas, holy fire rituals, take place. It was named after Nasadya, the God of Dance, and during the time of Pratap Malla the sacred mask dance dramas performed in Nasal Chok were widely famed. In one of these dramas, it is said that Pratap Malla himself played the role of Lord Vishnu and that the spirit of the Lord remained in the king's body even after the play. After consulting his Tantric leaders, he ordered a stone image of Lord Vishnu in his incarnation as Nara Simha, the half-lion and half-human form, and then transferred the spirit into the stone. This fine image of Nara Simha made in 1673 still stands in the Nasal Chok. In 1650, he commissioned for the construction of Mohan Chok in the palace. This chok remained the royal residential courtyard for many years and is believed to store a great amount of treasure under its surface. Pratap Malla also built Sundari Chok about this time. He placed a slab engraved with lines in fifteen languages and proclaimed that he who can understand the inscription would produce the flow of milk instead of water from Tutedhara, a fountain set in the outer walls of Mohan Chok. However elaborate his constructions may have been, they were not simply intended to emphasize his luxuries but also his and the importance of others' devotion towards deities. He made extensive donations to temples and had the older ones renovated. Next to the palace, he built a Krishna temple, the Vamsagopala, in an octagonal shape in 1649. He dedicated this temple to his two Indian wives, Rupamati and Rajamati, as both had died during the year it was built. In Mohan Chok, he erected a three roofed Agamachem temple and a unique temple with five superimposing roofs. After completely restoring the Mul Chok, he donated to the adjoining Taleju Temple. To the main temple of Taleju, he donated metal doors in 1670. He rebuilt the Degutale Temple built by his grandfather, Siva Simha, and the Taleju Temple in the palace square. As a substitute to the Indreswara Mahadeva Temple in the distant village of Panauti he built a Shiva temple, Indrapura, near his palace in the square. He carved hymns on the walls of the Jagannath Temple as prayers to Taleju in the form of Kali.
At the southern end of the square, near Kasthamandap at Maru, which was the main city crossroads for early traders, he built another pavilion named Kavindrapura, the mansion of the king of poets. In this mansion he set an idol of dancing Shiva, Nasadyo, which today is highly worshipped by dancers in the Valley.
In the process of beautifying his palace, he added fountains, ponds, and baths. In Sundari Chok, he established a low bath with a golden fountain. He built a small pond, the Naga Pokhari, in the palace adorned with Nagakastha, a wooden serpent, which is said he had ordered stolen from the royal pond in the Bhaktapur Durbar Square. He restored the Licchavi stone sculptures such as the Jalasayana Narayana, the Kaliyadamana, and the Kala Bhairav. An idol of Jalasayana Narayana was placed in a newly created pond in the Bhandarkhal garden in the eastern wing of the palace. As a substitute to the idol of Jalasayana Narayana in Buddhanilkantha, he channeled water from Buddhanilkantha to the pond in Bhandarkhal due bestow authenticity. The Kalyadana, a manifestation of Lord Krishna destroying Kaliya, a water serpent, is placed in Kalindi Chok, which is adjacent to the Mohan Chok. The approximately ten-feet-high image of terrifyingly portrayed Kal Bhairav is placed near the Jagannath Temple. This image is the focus of worship in the chok especially during Durga Puja.
With the death of Pratap Malla in 1674, the overall emphasis on the importance of the square came to a halt. His successors retained relatively insignificant power and the prevailing ministers took control of most of the royal rule. The ministers encountered little influence under these kings and, increasingly, interest of the arts and additions to the square was lost on them. They focused less on culture than Pratap Malla during the three decades that followed his death, steering the city and country more towards the arenas of politics and power, with only a few minor constructions made in the square. These projects included Parthivendra Malla building a temple referred to as Trailokya Mohan or Dasavatara, dedicated to Lord Vishnu in 1679. A large statue of Garuda, the mount of Lord Vishnu, was added in front of it a decade later. Parthivendra Malla added a pillar with image of his family in front of the Taleju Temple.
Around 1692, Radhilasmi, the widowed queen of Pratap Malla, erected the tall temples of Shiva known as Maju Deval near the Garuda image in the square. This temple stands on nine stepped platforms and is one of the tallest buildings in the square. Then her son, Bhupalendra Malla, took the throne and banished the widowed queen to the hills. His death came early at the age of twenty one and his widowed queen, Bhuvanalaksmi, built a temple in the square known as Kageswara Mahadev. The temple was built in the Newari style and acted as a substitute for worship of a distant temple in the hills. After the earthquake in 1934, the temple was restored with a dome roof, which was alien to the Newari architecture.
Jayaprakash Malla, the last Malla king to rule Kathmandu, built a temple for Kumari and Durga in her virginal state. The temple was named Kumari Bahal and was structured like a typical Newari vihara. In his house resides the Kumari, a girl who is revered as the living goddess. He also made a chariot for Kumari and in the courtyard had detailed terra cotta tiles of that time laid down.
UNDER THE SHAH DYNASTY
During the Shah dynasty that followed, the Kathmandu Durbar Square saw a number of changes. Two of the most unique temples in the square were built during this time. One is the Nautale, a nine-storied building known as Basantapur Durbar. It has four roofs and stands at the end of Nasal Chok at the East side of the palace. It is said that this building was set as a pleasure house. The lower three stories were made in the Newari farmhouse style. The upper floors have Newari style windows, sanjhya and tikijhya, and some of them are slightly projected from the wall. The other temple is annexed to the Vasantapur Durbar and has four-stories. This building was initially known as Vilasamandira, or Lohom Chok, but is now commonly known as Basantapur or Tejarat Chok. The lower floors of the Basantapur Chok display extensive woodcarvings and the roofs are made in popular the Mughal style. Archives state that Prthivi Narayan Shah built these two buildings in 1770.
Rana Bahadur Shah was enthroned at the age of two. Bahadur Shah, the second son of Prithvi Narayan Shah, ruled as a regent for his young nephew Rana Bahadur Shah for a close to a decade from 1785 to 1794 and built a temple of Shiva Parvati in the square. This one roofed temple is designed in the Newari style and is remarkably similar to previous temples built by the Mallas. It is rectangular in shape, and enshrines the Navadurga, a group of goddesses, on the ground floor. It has a wooden image of Shiva and Parvati at the window of the upper floor, looking out at the passersby in the square. Another significant donation made during the time of Rana Bahadur Shah is the metal-plated head of Swet Bhairav near the Degutale Temple. It was donated during the festival of Indra Jatra in 1795, and continues to play a major role during the festival every year. This approximately twelve feet high face of Bhairav is concealed behind a latticed wooden screen for the rest of the year. The following this donation Rana Bahadur donated a huge bronze bell as an offering to the Goddess Taleju. Together with the beating of the huge drums donated by his son Girvan Yudha, the bell was rung every day during the daily ritual worship to the goddess. Later these instruments were also used as an alarm system. However, after the death of his beloved third wife Kanimati Devi due to smallpox, Rana Bahadur Shah turned mad with grief and had many images of gods and goddesses smashed including the Taleju statue and bell, and Sitala, the goddess of smallpox.
In 1908, a palace, Gaddi Durbar, was built using European architectural designs. The Rana Prime Ministers who had taken over the power but not the throne of the country from the Shahs Kings from 1846 to 1951 were highly influenced by European styles. The Gaddi Durbar is covered in white plaster, has Greek columns and adjoins a large audience hall, all foreign features to Nepali architecture. The balconies of this durbar were reserved for the royal family during festivals to view the square below.
Some of the parts of the square like the Hatti Chok near the Kumari Bahal in the southern section of the square were removed during restoration after the devastating earthquake in 1934. While building the New Road, the southeastern part of the palace was cleared away, leaving only fragments in places as reminders of their past. Though decreased from its original size and attractiveness from its earlier seventeenth-century architecture, the Kathmandu Durbar Square still displays an ancient surrounding that spans abound five acres of land. It has palaces, temples, quadrangles, courtyards, ponds, and images that were brought together over three centuries of the Malla, the Shah, and the Rana dynasties.
VISITING
Kathmandu's Durbar Square is the site of the Hanuman Dhoka Palace Complex, which was the royal Nepalese residence until the 19th century and where important ceremonies, such as the coronation of the Nepalese monarch, still take place today. The palace is decorated with elaborately-carved wooden windows and panels and houses the King Tribhuwan Memorial Museum and the Mahendra Museum. It is possible to visit the state rooms inside the palace.
Time and again the temples and the palaces in the square have gone through reconstruction after being damaged by natural causes or neglect. Presently there are less than ten quadrangles in the square. The temples are being preserved as national heritage sites and the palace is being used as a museum. Only a few parts of the palace are open for visitors and the Taleju temples are only open for people of Hindu and Buddhist faiths.
At the southern end of Durbar Square is one of the most curious attractions in Nepal, the Kumari Chowk. This gilded cage contains the Raj Kumari, a girl chosen through an ancient and mystical selection process to become the human incarnation of the Hindu mother goddess, Durga. She is worshiped during religious festivals and makes public appearances at other times for a fee paid to her guards.
WIKIPEDIA
double exposure - book/Gato Negro wine bottle....
appropriate because alcohol was one of the many drugs abused by author/journalist Hunter S. Thompson while on this assignment...a true horror story...scarier than any book I've ever read...
From the back cover:
He did not exist . . . or did he? He had destroyed his punch cards and changed his face. There was no credit card, birth record, or passport for him in the International Data Bank. His names were many . . . any he chose. His occupation was taking megarisks in the service of a vast global detective agency. His interworld assignments were highly lucrative, incalculably vital, and terrifyingly deadly. And more often than not His life was a living hell!
Kathmandu Durbar Square (Nepali: वसन्तपुर दरवार क्षेत्र, Basantapur Darbar Kshetra) in front of the old royal palace of the former Kathmandu Kingdom is one of three Durbar (royal palace) Squares in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, all of which are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Several buildings in the Square collapsed due to a major earthquake on 25 April 2015. Durbar Square was surrounded with spectacular architecture and vividly showcases the skills of the Newar artists and craftsmen over several centuries. The Royal Palace was originally at Dattaraya square and was later moved to the Durbar square.
The Kathmandu Durbar Square held the palaces of the Malla and Shah kings who ruled over the city. Along with these palaces, the square surrounds quadrangles, revealing courtyards and temples. It is known as Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square, a name derived from a statue of Hanuman, the monkey devotee of Lord Ram, at the entrance of the palace.
CONTENTS
HISTORY AND CONSTRUCTION
The preference for the construction of royal palaces at this site dates back to as early as the Licchavi period in the third century. Even though the present palaces and temples have undergone repeated and extensive renovations and nothing physical remains from that period. Names like Gunapo and Gupo, which are the names referred to the palaces in the square in early scriptures, imply that the palaces were built by Gunakamadev, a King ruling late in the tenth-century. When Kathmandu City became independent under the rule of King Ratna Malla (1484–1520), the palaces in the square became the Royal Palaces for its Malla Kings. When Prithvi Narayan Shah invaded the Kathmandu Valley in 1769, he favored the Kathmandu Durbar Square for his palace. Other subsequent Shah kings continued to rule from the square until 1896 when they moved to the Narayan Hiti Palace.
The square is still the center of important royal events like the coronation of King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah in 1975 and King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah in 2001.
Though there are no written archives stating the history of Kathmandu Durbar Square, construction of the palace in the square is credited to Sankharadev (1069–1083). As the first king of the independent Kathmandu City, Ratna Malla is said to have built the Taleju temple in the Northern side of the palace in 1501. For this to be true then the temple would have had to have been built in the vihara style as part of the palace premise surrounding the Mul Chok courtyard for no evidence of a separate structure that would match this temple can be found within the square.
Construction of the Karnel Chok is not clearly stated in any historical inscriptions; although, it is probably the oldest among all the courtyards in the square. The Bhagavati Temple, originally known as a Narayan Temple, rises above the mansions surrounding it and was added during the time of Jagajaya Malla in the early eighteenth century. The Narayan idol within the temple was stolen so Prithvi Narayan Shah replaced it with an image of Bhagavati, completely transforming the name of the temple.
The oldest temples in the square are those built by Mahendra Malla (1560–1574). They are the temples of Jagannath, Kotilingeswara Mahadev, Mahendreswara, and the Taleju Temple. This three-roofed Taleju Temple was established in 1564, in a typical Newari architectural style and is elevated on platforms that form a pyramid-like structure. It is said that Mahendra Malla, when he was residing in Bhaktapur, was highly devoted to the Taleju Temple there; the Goddess being pleased with his devotion gave him a vision asking him to build a temple for her in the Kathmandu Durbar Square. With a help of a hermit, he designed the temple to give it its present form and the Goddess entered the temple in the form of a bee.
His successors Sadasiva (1575–1581), his son, Shiva Simha (1578–1619), and his grandson, Laksmi Narsingha (1619–1641), do not seem to have made any major additions to the square. During this period of three generations the only constructions to have occurred were the establishment of Degutale Temple dedicated to Goddess Mother Taleju by Shiva Simha and some enhancement in the royal palace by Laksminar Simha.
UNDER PRATAP MALLA
In the time of Pratap Malla, son of Laksminar Simha, the square was extensively developed. He was an intellectual, a pious devotee, and especially interested in arts. He called himself a Kavindra, king of poets, and boasted that he was learned in fifteen different languages. A passionate builder, following his coronation as a king, he immediately began enlargements to his royal palace, and rebuilt some old temples and constructed new temples, shrines and stupas around his kingdom.During the construction of his palace, he added a small entrance in the traditional, low and narrow Newari style. The door was elaborately decorated with carvings and paintings of deities and auspicious sings and was later transferred to the entrance of Mohan Chok. In front of the entrance he placed the statue of Hanuman thinking that Hanuman would strengthen his army and protect his home. The entrance leads to Nasal Chok, the courtyard where most royal events such as coronation, performances, and yagyas, holy fire rituals, take place. It was named after Nasadya, the God of Dance, and during the time of Pratap Malla the sacred mask dance dramas performed in Nasal Chok were widely famed. In one of these dramas, it is said that Pratap Malla himself played the role of Lord Vishnu and that the spirit of the Lord remained in the king's body even after the play. After consulting his Tantric leaders, he ordered a stone image of Lord Vishnu in his incarnation as Nara Simha, the half-lion and half-human form, and then transferred the spirit into the stone. This fine image of Nara Simha made in 1673 still stands in the Nasal Chok. In 1650, he commissioned for the construction of Mohan Chok in the palace. This chok remained the royal residential courtyard for many years and is believed to store a great amount of treasure under its surface. Pratap Malla also built Sundari Chok about this time. He placed a slab engraved with lines in fifteen languages and proclaimed that he who can understand the inscription would produce the flow of milk instead of water from Tutedhara, a fountain set in the outer walls of Mohan Chok. However elaborate his constructions may have been, they were not simply intended to emphasize his luxuries but also his and the importance of others' devotion towards deities. He made extensive donations to temples and had the older ones renovated. Next to the palace, he built a Krishna temple, the Vamsagopala, in an octagonal shape in 1649. He dedicated this temple to his two Indian wives, Rupamati and Rajamati, as both had died during the year it was built. In Mohan Chok, he erected a three roofed Agamachem temple and a unique temple with five superimposing roofs. After completely restoring the Mul Chok, he donated to the adjoining Taleju Temple. To the main temple of Taleju, he donated metal doors in 1670. He rebuilt the Degutale Temple built by his grandfather, Siva Simha, and the Taleju Temple in the palace square. As a substitute to the Indreswara Mahadeva Temple in the distant village of Panauti he built a Shiva temple, Indrapura, near his palace in the square. He carved hymns on the walls of the Jagannath Temple as prayers to Taleju in the form of Kali.
At the southern end of the square, near Kasthamandap at Maru, which was the main city crossroads for early traders, he built another pavilion named Kavindrapura, the mansion of the king of poets. In this mansion he set an idol of dancing Shiva, Nasadyo, which today is highly worshipped by dancers in the Valley.
In the process of beautifying his palace, he added fountains, ponds, and baths. In Sundari Chok, he established a low bath with a golden fountain. He built a small pond, the Naga Pokhari, in the palace adorned with Nagakastha, a wooden serpent, which is said he had ordered stolen from the royal pond in the Bhaktapur Durbar Square. He restored the Licchavi stone sculptures such as the Jalasayana Narayana, the Kaliyadamana, and the Kala Bhairav. An idol of Jalasayana Narayana was placed in a newly created pond in the Bhandarkhal garden in the eastern wing of the palace. As a substitute to the idol of Jalasayana Narayana in Buddhanilkantha, he channeled water from Buddhanilkantha to the pond in Bhandarkhal due bestow authenticity. The Kalyadana, a manifestation of Lord Krishna destroying Kaliya, a water serpent, is placed in Kalindi Chok, which is adjacent to the Mohan Chok. The approximately ten-feet-high image of terrifyingly portrayed Kal Bhairav is placed near the Jagannath Temple. This image is the focus of worship in the chok especially during Durga Puja.
With the death of Pratap Malla in 1674, the overall emphasis on the importance of the square came to a halt. His successors retained relatively insignificant power and the prevailing ministers took control of most of the royal rule. The ministers encountered little influence under these kings and, increasingly, interest of the arts and additions to the square was lost on them. They focused less on culture than Pratap Malla during the three decades that followed his death, steering the city and country more towards the arenas of politics and power, with only a few minor constructions made in the square. These projects included Parthivendra Malla building a temple referred to as Trailokya Mohan or Dasavatara, dedicated to Lord Vishnu in 1679. A large statue of Garuda, the mount of Lord Vishnu, was added in front of it a decade later. Parthivendra Malla added a pillar with image of his family in front of the Taleju Temple.
Around 1692, Radhilasmi, the widowed queen of Pratap Malla, erected the tall temples of Shiva known as Maju Deval near the Garuda image in the square. This temple stands on nine stepped platforms and is one of the tallest buildings in the square. Then her son, Bhupalendra Malla, took the throne and banished the widowed queen to the hills. His death came early at the age of twenty one and his widowed queen, Bhuvanalaksmi, built a temple in the square known as Kageswara Mahadev. The temple was built in the Newari style and acted as a substitute for worship of a distant temple in the hills. After the earthquake in 1934, the temple was restored with a dome roof, which was alien to the Newari architecture.
Jayaprakash Malla, the last Malla king to rule Kathmandu, built a temple for Kumari and Durga in her virginal state. The temple was named Kumari Bahal and was structured like a typical Newari vihara. In his house resides the Kumari, a girl who is revered as the living goddess. He also made a chariot for Kumari and in the courtyard had detailed terra cotta tiles of that time laid down.
UNDER THE SHAH DYNASTY
During the Shah dynasty that followed, the Kathmandu Durbar Square saw a number of changes. Two of the most unique temples in the square were built during this time. One is the Nautale, a nine-storied building known as Basantapur Durbar. It has four roofs and stands at the end of Nasal Chok at the East side of the palace. It is said that this building was set as a pleasure house. The lower three stories were made in the Newari farmhouse style. The upper floors have Newari style windows, sanjhya and tikijhya, and some of them are slightly projected from the wall. The other temple is annexed to the Vasantapur Durbar and has four-stories. This building was initially known as Vilasamandira, or Lohom Chok, but is now commonly known as Basantapur or Tejarat Chok. The lower floors of the Basantapur Chok display extensive woodcarvings and the roofs are made in popular the Mughal style. Archives state that Prthivi Narayan Shah built these two buildings in 1770.
Rana Bahadur Shah was enthroned at the age of two. Bahadur Shah, the second son of Prithvi Narayan Shah, ruled as a regent for his young nephew Rana Bahadur Shah for a close to a decade from 1785 to 1794 and built a temple of Shiva Parvati in the square. This one roofed temple is designed in the Newari style and is remarkably similar to previous temples built by the Mallas. It is rectangular in shape, and enshrines the Navadurga, a group of goddesses, on the ground floor. It has a wooden image of Shiva and Parvati at the window of the upper floor, looking out at the passersby in the square. Another significant donation made during the time of Rana Bahadur Shah is the metal-plated head of Swet Bhairav near the Degutale Temple. It was donated during the festival of Indra Jatra in 1795, and continues to play a major role during the festival every year. This approximately twelve feet high face of Bhairav is concealed behind a latticed wooden screen for the rest of the year. The following this donation Rana Bahadur donated a huge bronze bell as an offering to the Goddess Taleju. Together with the beating of the huge drums donated by his son Girvan Yudha, the bell was rung every day during the daily ritual worship to the goddess. Later these instruments were also used as an alarm system. However, after the death of his beloved third wife Kanimati Devi due to smallpox, Rana Bahadur Shah turned mad with grief and had many images of gods and goddesses smashed including the Taleju statue and bell, and Sitala, the goddess of smallpox.
In 1908, a palace, Gaddi Durbar, was built using European architectural designs. The Rana Prime Ministers who had taken over the power but not the throne of the country from the Shahs Kings from 1846 to 1951 were highly influenced by European styles. The Gaddi Durbar is covered in white plaster, has Greek columns and adjoins a large audience hall, all foreign features to Nepali architecture. The balconies of this durbar were reserved for the royal family during festivals to view the square below.
Some of the parts of the square like the Hatti Chok near the Kumari Bahal in the southern section of the square were removed during restoration after the devastating earthquake in 1934. While building the New Road, the southeastern part of the palace was cleared away, leaving only fragments in places as reminders of their past. Though decreased from its original size and attractiveness from its earlier seventeenth-century architecture, the Kathmandu Durbar Square still displays an ancient surrounding that spans abound five acres of land. It has palaces, temples, quadrangles, courtyards, ponds, and images that were brought together over three centuries of the Malla, the Shah, and the Rana dynasties. It was destroyed in the April 2015 Nepal earthquake.
VISITING
Kathmandu's Durbar Square is the site of the Hanuman Dhoka Palace Complex, which was the royal Nepalese residence until the 19th century and where important ceremonies, such as the coronation of the Nepalese monarch, took place. The palace is decorated with elaborately-carved wooden windows and panels and houses the King Tribhuwan Memorial Museum and the Mahendra Museum. It is possible to visit the state rooms inside the palace.
Time and again the temples and the palaces in the square have gone through reconstruction after being damaged by natural causes or neglect. Presently there are less than ten quadrangles in the square. The temples are being preserved as national heritage sites and the palace is being used as a museum. Only a few parts of the palace are open for visitors and the Taleju temples are only open for people of Hindu and Buddhist faiths.
At the southern end of Durbar Square is one of the most curious attractions in Nepal, the Kumari Chok. This gilded cage contains the Raj Kumari, a girl chosen through an ancient and mystical selection process to become the human incarnation of the Hindu mother goddess, Durga. She is worshiped during religious festivals and makes public appearances at other times for a fee paid to her guards.
WIKIPEDIA
British postcard by Pyramid, Leicester, no PC 8292. Caption: Robert DeNiro (sic) - Shirt & Tie.
Legendary American actor Robert De Niro (1943) has starred in such classic films as Taxi Driver (1976), Novecento/1900 (1978), The Deer Hunter (1978), Awakenings (1990) and GoodFellas (1990). His role in The Godfather: Part II (1974) brought him his first Academy Award, and he scored his second Oscar for his portrayal of Jake La Motta in Raging Bull (1980). De Niro worked with many acclaimed film directors, including Brian De Palma, Francis Coppola, Elia Kazan, Bernardo Bertolucci and, most importantly, Martin Scorsese. He has also appeared in French, British, and Italian films.
Robert Anthony De Niro was born in the Greenwich Village area of Manhattan, New York City, in 1943. His mother, Virginia Admiral, was a cerebral and gifted painter, and his father, Robert De Niro Sr., was a painter, sculptor and poet whose work received high critical acclaim. They split ways in 1945 when young Robert was only 2 years old after his father announced that he was gay. De Niro was raised primarily by his mother, who took on work as a typesetter and printer to support her son. A bright and energetic child, Robert De Niro was incredibly fond of attending films with his father when they spent time together. De Niro's mother worked part-time as a typist and copyeditor for Maria Piscator's Dramatic Workshop, and as part of her compensation, De Niro was allowed to take children's acting classes for free. At the age of 10, De Niro made his stage debut as the Cowardly Lion in a school production of The Wizard of Oz. De Niro proved to be uninterested in school altogether and, as a teenager, joined a rather tame street gang in Little Italy that gave him the nickname Bobby Milk, about his pale complexion. While De Niro was by all accounts only a very modest troublemaker, the gang provided him with the experience to skilfully portray Italian mobsters as an actor. He left school at age 16 to study acting at Stella Adler Conservatory. Adler, who had taught Marlon Brando and Rod Steiger, was a strong proponent of the Stanislavski method of acting, involving deep psychological character investigation. He studied briefly with Lee Strasberg at the Actor's Studio in New York City and then began auditioning. After a momentary cameo in the French film Trois chambres à Manhattan/Three Rooms in Manhattan (Marcel Carné, 1965), De Niro's real film debut came in Greetings (Brian De Palma, 1968). However, De Niro's first film role already came at the age of 20, when he appeared credited as Robert Denero in De Palma’s The Wedding Party (Brian De Palma, Wilford Leach, 1963), but the film was not released until 1969. He then appeared in Roger Corman's film Bloody Mama (1970), featuring Shelley Winters. His breakthrough performances came a few years later in two highly acclaimed films: the sports drama Bang the Drum Slowly (John D. Hancock, 1973), in which he played a terminally ill catcher on a baseball team, and the crime film Mean Streets (1973), his first of many collaborations with director Martin Scorsese, in which he played street thug Johnny Boy opposite Harvey Keitel.
Robert De Niro and Martin Scorsese worked successfully together on eight films: Mean Streets (1973), Taxi Driver (1976), New York, New York (1977), Raging Bull (1980), The King of Comedy (1983), Goodfellas (1990), Cape Fear (1991), and Casino (1995). In 1974, De Niro established himself as one of America’s finest actors with his Academy Award-winning portrayal of the young Vito Corleone in The Godfather: Part II (Francis Ford Coppola, 1974), a role for which he learned to speak Sicilian. Two years later, De Niro delivered perhaps the most chilling performance of his career, playing vengeful cabbie Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976) alongside Jodie Foster. His iconic performance as Travis Bickle catapulted him to stardom and forever linked his name with Bickle's famous "You talkin' to me?" monologue, which De Niro largely improvised. In Italy, De Niro appeared opposite Gérard Dépardieu in the epic historical drama Novecento/1900 (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1976). The film is an exploration of life in Italy in the first half of the 20th century, seen through the eyes of two Italian childhood friends on opposite sides of society's hierarchy. He also starred in The Last Tycoon (1976), the last film directed by Elia Kazan. The Hollywood drama is based upon Harold Pinter's screenplay adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Last Tycoon. De Niro continued to show his tremendous skill as a dramatic actor in the Vietnam War drama The Deer Hunter (Michael Cimino, 1978). The film follows a group of friends haunted by their Vietnam experiences. De Niro later portrayed middleweight boxer Jake LaMotta in the commercially unsuccessful but critically adored film Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese, 1980). The previously skinny De Niro had put on 60 pounds of muscle for his riveting turn as LaMotta and was rewarded for his dedication with the 1981 Academy Award for Best Actor.
In the 1980s, Robert De Niro's first roles were as a worldly ambitious Catholic priest in True Confessions (Ulu Grosbard, 1981), an aspiring stand-up comedian in Scorsese's The King of Comedy (Martin Scorsese, 1983), and a Jewish mobster in the sprawling historical epic Once Upon a Time in America (Sergio Leone, 1984). Other notable projects included the Sci-Fi art film Brazil (Terry Gilliam, 1985) and the British drama The Mission (Roland Joffé, 1986), about the experiences of a Jesuit missionary in 18th-century South America, which won the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival. It was followed by films like the crime drama The Untouchables (Brian De Palma, 1987), in which De Niro portrayed gangster Al Capone opposite Kevin Costner as Eliot Ness, the mysterious thriller Angel Heart (Alan Parker, 1987), and the action-comedy Midnight Run (Martin Brest, 1988). De Niro opened the 1990s with Goodfellas (Martin Scorsese, 1990), yet another acclaimed gangster film from Scorsese that saw the actor teaming up with Ray Liotta and Joe Pesci. De Niro next starred in a project that earned him another Oscar nomination, portraying a catatonic patient brought back to awareness in Awakenings (Penny Marshall, 1990), co-starring Robin Williams as a character based on physician Oliver Sacks. Dramas continued to be the genre of choice for De Niro, as he played a blacklisted director in Guilty by Suspicion (Irwin Winkler, 1991) and a fire chief in Backdraft (Ron Howard, 1991). Soon afterwards, the actor was once again front and centre and terrifyingly reunited with Scorsese, bulking up to become a tattooed rapist who stalks a family in Cape Fear (Martin Scorsese, 1991). The film was a remake of the 1962 thriller starring Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum. Peck and Mitchum made appearances in the remake as well. De Niro received his sixth Academy Award nomination for Fear, with the film becoming the highest-grossing collaboration between the actor and Scorsese, earning more than $182 million worldwide. After somewhat edgy, comedic outings like Night and the City (1992) and Mad Dog and Glory (1993), another drama followed in the form of This Boy's Life (Michael Caton-Jones, 1993), in which De Niro portrayed the abusive stepfather of a young Leonardo DiCaprio. That same year, De Niro made his directorial debut with A Bronx Tale (Robert De Niro, 1993), a film adaptation of a one-man play written and performed by Chazz Palminteri. In 1994, De Niro was practically unrecognisable as the monster in actor/director Kenneth Branagh's adaptation of the Mary Shelley novel Frankenstein (Kenneth Branagh, 1994). It was followed by another Scorsese telling of mob life, this time in Las Vegas. De Niro portrayed a character based on real-life figure Frank ‘Lefty’ Rosenthal in Casino (Martin Scorsese, 1995), co-starring Sharon Stone and Joe Pesci. In Heat (Michael Mann, 1995), De Niro re-teamed with fellow Godfather star Al Pacino in a well-received outing about a bank robber contemplating getting out of the business and the police detective aiming to bring him down.
For the rest of the 1990s and into the new millennium, Robert De Niro was featured yearly in a big-screen project as either a lead or supporting figure. His films include the legal crime drama Sleepers (Barry Levinson, 1996), the black comedy Wag the Dog (Barry Levinson, 1997), the crime drama Cop Land (James Mangold, 1997), the crime thriller Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997), the spy action-thriller Ronin (John Frankenheimer, 1998) and the crime comedy-drama Flawless (Joel Schumacher, 1999). At the turn of the century, De Niro struck out into decidedly different territory with Analyze This (Harold Ramis, 1999), a hilarious and highly popular spoof of the mob movies that had garnered him fame. Analyze This earned more than $100 million domestically, with De Niro playing a Mafioso who seeks help from a psychiatrist (Billy Crystal). De Niro took on another comedy, Meet the Parents (Jay Roach, 2000), as Ben Stiller's future father-in-law. The smash hit spawned two sequels: Meet the Fockers (Jay Roach, 2004) and Little Fockers (Paul Weitz, 2011), both of which were also box-office successes. De Niro continued to switch between comedic and serious roles over the next few years, reuniting with Billy Crystal for Analyze That (Harold Ramis, 2002), and starring in the spy thriller The Good Shepherd (Robert De Niro, 2006) with Matt Damon and Angelina Jolie. The following year, De Niro was featured as a secretive cross-dressing pirate with a heart of gold in the fantasy flick Stardust (Matthew Vaughn, 2007), while 2009 saw a return to dramatic fare with Everybody's Fine (Kirk Jones, 2009). In Italy, De Niro starred in the romantic comedy Manuale d'amore 3/The Ages of Love (Giovanni Veronesi, 2011). De Niro earned yet another Academy Award nomination for his turn in David O. Russell's Silver Linings Playbook (2012), playing the father of a mentally troubled son (Bradley Cooper). De Niro teamed up again with Silver Linings Playbook director Russell and stars Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence for the biopic Joy (David O. Russell, 2015), based on the life of Miracle Mop inventor Joy Mangano. Later that year, De Niro starred as a widower who returns to the workforce in The Intern (Nancy Meyers, 2015), with Anne Hathaway. In 2016, he starred in another biopic, Hands of Stone (Jonathan Jakubowicz, 2016), playing Ray Arcel, the trainer of Panamanian boxer Roberto Durán. That same year, De Niro received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Obama for his contribution to the arts. De Niro, who has long resided in New York City, has been investing in Manhattan's Tribeca neighbourhood since 1989. His capital ventures there included co-founding the film studio TriBeCa Productions in 1998 and the Tribeca Film Festival (since 2002). De Niro married actress Diahnne Abbott in 1976. The couple had one son, Raphael, before divorcing 12 years later, in 1988. De Niro then had a long relationship with model Toukie Smith. They had twin sons, Aaron Kendrick and Julian Henry, in 1995. Then in 1997, De Niro married Grace Hightower, with whom he has two children.
Sources: Biography.com, Wikipedia, and IMDb.
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Kathmandu Durbar Square or Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square is the plaza in front of the old royal palace of the then Kathmandu Kingdom. It is one of three Durbar (royal palace) Squares in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, all of which are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
The Durbar Square is surrounded with spectacular architecture and vividly showcases the skills of the Newar artists and craftsmen over several centuries. The royal palace was originally at Dattaraya square and was later moved to the Durbar square location.
The Kathmandu Durbar Square holds the palaces of the Malla and Shah kings who ruled over the city. Along with these palaces, the square surrounds quadrangles revealing courtyards and temples. It is known as Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square, a name derived from a statue of Hanuman, the monkey devotee of Lord Ram, at the entrance of the palace.
HISTORY AND CONSTRUCTION
The preference for the construction of royal palaces at this site dates back to as early as the Licchavi period in the third century. Even though the present palaces and temples have undergone repeated and extensive renovations and nothing physical remains from that period, names like Gunapo and Gupo, which are the names referred to the palaces in the square in early scriptures, imply that the palaces were built by Gunakamadev, a king ruling late in the tenth century. When Kathmandu City became independent under the rule of King Ratna Malla (1484–1520) the palaces in the square became the royal palaces for its Malla kings. When Prithvi Narayan Shah invaded the Kathmandu Valley in 1769, he favored the Kathmandu Durbar Square for his palace. Other subsequent Shah kings continued to rule from the square until 1896 when they moved to the Narayan Hiti Palace.
The square is still the center of important royal events like the coronation of King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah in 1975 and King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah in 2001.
Though there are no written archives stating the history of Kathmandu Durbar Square, construction of the palace in the square is credited to Sankharadev (1069–1083). As the first king of the independent Kathmandu City, Ratna Malla is said to have built the Taleju temple in the Northern side of the palace in 1501. For this to be true then the temple would have had to have been built in the vihara style as part of the palace premise surrounding the Mul Chok courtyard for no evidence of a separate structure that would match this temple can be found within the square.
Construction of the Karnel Chok is not clearly stated in any historical inscriptions; although, it is probably the oldest among all the courtyards in the square. The Bhagavati Temple, originally known as a Narayan Temple, rises above the mansions surrounding it and was added during the time of Jagajaya Malla in the early eighteenth century. The Narayan idol within the temple was stolen so Prithvi Narayan Shah replaced it with an image of Bhagavati, completely transforming the name of the temple.
The oldest temples in the square are those built by Mahendra Malla (1560–1574). They are the temples of Jagannath, Kotilingeswara Mahadev, Mahendreswara, and the Taleju Temple. This three-roofed Taleju Temple was established in 1564, in a typical Newari architectural style and is elevated on platforms that form a pyramid-like structure. It is said that Mahendra Malla, when he was residing in Bhaktapur, was highly devoted to the Taleju Temple there; the Goddess being pleased with his devotion gave him a vision asking him to build a temple for her in the Kathmandu Durbar Square. With a help of a hermit, he designed the temple to give it its present form and the Goddess entered the temple in the form of a bee.
His successors Sadasiva (1575–1581), his son, Shiva Simha (1578–1619), and his grandson, Laxmi Narsingha (1619–1641), do not seem to have made any major additions to the square. During this period of three generations the only constructions to have occurred were the establishment of Degutale Temple dedicated to Goddess Mother Taleju by Shiva Simha and some enhancement in the royal palace by Laksminar Simha.
UNDER PRATAP MALLA
In the time of Pratap Malla, son of Laksminar Simha, the square was extensively developed. He was an intellectual, a pious devotee, and especially interested in arts. He called himself a Kavindra, king of poets, and boasted that he was learned in fifteen different languages. A passionate builder, following his coronation as a king, he immediately began enlargements to his royal palace, and rebuilt some old temples and constructed new temples, shrines and stupas around his kingdom. There also took the massacre called Kot Parva where the queen, prime minister, head of the states,and other people with guards died. This massacre took place in the court yard inside the palace.
During the construction of his palace, he added a small entrance in the traditional, low and narrow Newari style. The door was elaborately decorated with carvings and paintings of deities and auspicious sings and was later transferred to the entrance of Mohan Chok. In front of the entrance he placed the statue of Hanuman thinking that Hanuman would strengthen his army and protect his home. The entrance leads to Nasal Chok, the courtyard where most royal events such as coronation, performances, and yagyas, holy fire rituals, take place. It was named after Nasadya, the God of Dance, and during the time of Pratap Malla the sacred mask dance dramas performed in Nasal Chok were widely famed. In one of these dramas, it is said that Pratap Malla himself played the role of Lord Vishnu and that the spirit of the Lord remained in the king's body even after the play. After consulting his Tantric leaders, he ordered a stone image of Lord Vishnu in his incarnation as Nara Simha, the half-lion and half-human form, and then transferred the spirit into the stone. This fine image of Nara Simha made in 1673 still stands in the Nasal Chok. In 1650, he commissioned for the construction of Mohan Chok in the palace. This chok remained the royal residential courtyard for many years and is believed to store a great amount of treasure under its surface. Pratap Malla also built Sundari Chok about this time. He placed a slab engraved with lines in fifteen languages and proclaimed that he who can understand the inscription would produce the flow of milk instead of water from Tutedhara, a fountain set in the outer walls of Mohan Chok. However elaborate his constructions may have been, they were not simply intended to emphasize his luxuries but also his and the importance of others' devotion towards deities. He made extensive donations to temples and had the older ones renovated. Next to the palace, he built a Krishna temple, the Vamsagopala, in an octagonal shape in 1649. He dedicated this temple to his two Indian wives, Rupamati and Rajamati, as both had died during the year it was built. In Mohan Chok, he erected a three roofed Agamachem temple and a unique temple with five superimposing roofs. After completely restoring the Mul Chok, he donated to the adjoining Taleju Temple. To the main temple of Taleju, he donated metal doors in 1670. He rebuilt the Degutale Temple built by his grandfather, Siva Simha, and the Taleju Temple in the palace square. As a substitute to the Indreswara Mahadeva Temple in the distant village of Panauti he built a Shiva temple, Indrapura, near his palace in the square. He carved hymns on the walls of the Jagannath Temple as prayers to Taleju in the form of Kali.
At the southern end of the square, near Kasthamandap at Maru, which was the main city crossroads for early traders, he built another pavilion named Kavindrapura, the mansion of the king of poets. In this mansion he set an idol of dancing Shiva, Nasadyo, which today is highly worshipped by dancers in the Valley.
In the process of beautifying his palace, he added fountains, ponds, and baths. In Sundari Chok, he established a low bath with a golden fountain. He built a small pond, the Naga Pokhari, in the palace adorned with Nagakastha, a wooden serpent, which is said he had ordered stolen from the royal pond in the Bhaktapur Durbar Square. He restored the Licchavi stone sculptures such as the Jalasayana Narayana, the Kaliyadamana, and the Kala Bhairav. An idol of Jalasayana Narayana was placed in a newly created pond in the Bhandarkhal garden in the eastern wing of the palace. As a substitute to the idol of Jalasayana Narayana in Buddhanilkantha, he channeled water from Buddhanilkantha to the pond in Bhandarkhal due bestow authenticity. The Kalyadana, a manifestation of Lord Krishna destroying Kaliya, a water serpent, is placed in Kalindi Chok, which is adjacent to the Mohan Chok. The approximately ten-feet-high image of terrifyingly portrayed Kal Bhairav is placed near the Jagannath Temple. This image is the focus of worship in the chok especially during Durga Puja.
With the death of Pratap Malla in 1674, the overall emphasis on the importance of the square came to a halt. His successors retained relatively insignificant power and the prevailing ministers took control of most of the royal rule. The ministers encountered little influence under these kings and, increasingly, interest of the arts and additions to the square was lost on them. They focused less on culture than Pratap Malla during the three decades that followed his death, steering the city and country more towards the arenas of politics and power, with only a few minor constructions made in the square. These projects included Parthivendra Malla building a temple referred to as Trailokya Mohan or Dasavatara, dedicated to Lord Vishnu in 1679. A large statue of Garuda, the mount of Lord Vishnu, was added in front of it a decade later. Parthivendra Malla added a pillar with image of his family in front of the Taleju Temple.
Around 1692, Radhilasmi, the widowed queen of Pratap Malla, erected the tall temples of Shiva known as Maju Deval near the Garuda image in the square. This temple stands on nine stepped platforms and is one of the tallest buildings in the square. Then her son, Bhupalendra Malla, took the throne and banished the widowed queen to the hills. His death came early at the age of twenty one and his widowed queen, Bhuvanalaksmi, built a temple in the square known as Kageswara Mahadev. The temple was built in the Newari style and acted as a substitute for worship of a distant temple in the hills. After the earthquake in 1934, the temple was restored with a dome roof, which was alien to the Newari architecture.
Jayaprakash Malla, the last Malla king to rule Kathmandu, built a temple for Kumari and Durga in her virginal state. The temple was named Kumari Bahal and was structured like a typical Newari vihara. In his house resides the Kumari, a girl who is revered as the living goddess. He also made a chariot for Kumari and in the courtyard had detailed terra cotta tiles of that time laid down.
UNDER THE SHAH DYNASTY
During the Shah dynasty that followed, the Kathmandu Durbar Square saw a number of changes. Two of the most unique temples in the square were built during this time. One is the Nautale, a nine-storied building known as Basantapur Durbar. It has four roofs and stands at the end of Nasal Chok at the East side of the palace. It is said that this building was set as a pleasure house. The lower three stories were made in the Newari farmhouse style. The upper floors have Newari style windows, sanjhya and tikijhya, and some of them are slightly projected from the wall. The other temple is annexed to the Vasantapur Durbar and has four-stories. This building was initially known as Vilasamandira, or Lohom Chok, but is now commonly known as Basantapur or Tejarat Chok. The lower floors of the Basantapur Chok display extensive woodcarvings and the roofs are made in popular the Mughal style. Archives state that Prthivi Narayan Shah built these two buildings in 1770.
Rana Bahadur Shah was enthroned at the age of two. Bahadur Shah, the second son of Prithvi Narayan Shah, ruled as a regent for his young nephew Rana Bahadur Shah for a close to a decade from 1785 to 1794 and built a temple of Shiva Parvati in the square. This one roofed temple is designed in the Newari style and is remarkably similar to previous temples built by the Mallas. It is rectangular in shape, and enshrines the Navadurga, a group of goddesses, on the ground floor. It has a wooden image of Shiva and Parvati at the window of the upper floor, looking out at the passersby in the square. Another significant donation made during the time of Rana Bahadur Shah is the metal-plated head of Swet Bhairav near the Degutale Temple. It was donated during the festival of Indra Jatra in 1795, and continues to play a major role during the festival every year. This approximately twelve feet high face of Bhairav is concealed behind a latticed wooden screen for the rest of the year. The following this donation Rana Bahadur donated a huge bronze bell as an offering to the Goddess Taleju. Together with the beating of the huge drums donated by his son Girvan Yudha, the bell was rung every day during the daily ritual worship to the goddess. Later these instruments were also used as an alarm system. However, after the death of his beloved third wife Kanimati Devi due to smallpox, Rana Bahadur Shah turned mad with grief and had many images of gods and goddesses smashed including the Taleju statue and bell, and Sitala, the goddess of smallpox.
In 1908, a palace, Gaddi Durbar, was built using European architectural designs. The Rana Prime Ministers who had taken over the power but not the throne of the country from the Shahs Kings from 1846 to 1951 were highly influenced by European styles. The Gaddi Durbar is covered in white plaster, has Greek columns and adjoins a large audience hall, all foreign features to Nepali architecture. The balconies of this durbar were reserved for the royal family during festivals to view the square below.
Some of the parts of the square like the Hatti Chok near the Kumari Bahal in the southern section of the square were removed during restoration after the devastating earthquake in 1934. While building the New Road, the southeastern part of the palace was cleared away, leaving only fragments in places as reminders of their past. Though decreased from its original size and attractiveness from its earlier seventeenth-century architecture, the Kathmandu Durbar Square still displays an ancient surrounding that spans abound five acres of land. It has palaces, temples, quadrangles, courtyards, ponds, and images that were brought together over three centuries of the Malla, the Shah, and the Rana dynasties.
VISITING
Kathmandu's Durbar Square is the site of the Hanuman Dhoka Palace Complex, which was the royal Nepalese residence until the 19th century and where important ceremonies, such as the coronation of the Nepalese monarch, still take place today. The palace is decorated with elaborately-carved wooden windows and panels and houses the King Tribhuwan Memorial Museum and the Mahendra Museum. It is possible to visit the state rooms inside the palace.
Time and again the temples and the palaces in the square have gone through reconstruction after being damaged by natural causes or neglect. Presently there are less than ten quadrangles in the square. The temples are being preserved as national heritage sites and the palace is being used as a museum. Only a few parts of the palace are open for visitors and the Taleju temples are only open for people of Hindu and Buddhist faiths.
At the southern end of Durbar Square is one of the most curious attractions in Nepal, the Kumari Chowk. This gilded cage contains the Raj Kumari, a girl chosen through an ancient and mystical selection process to become the human incarnation of the Hindu mother goddess, Durga. She is worshiped during religious festivals and makes public appearances at other times for a fee paid to her guards.
WIKIPEDIA
Kathmandu Durbar Square or Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square is the plaza in front of the old royal palace of the then Kathmandu Kingdom. It is one of three Durbar (royal palace) Squares in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, all of which are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
The Durbar Square is surrounded with spectacular architecture and vividly showcases the skills of the Newar artists and craftsmen over several centuries. The royal palace was originally at Dattaraya square and was later moved to the Durbar square location.
The Kathmandu Durbar Square holds the palaces of the Malla and Shah kings who ruled over the city. Along with these palaces, the square surrounds quadrangles revealing courtyards and temples. It is known as Hanuman Dhoka Durbar Square, a name derived from a statue of Hanuman, the monkey devotee of Lord Ram, at the entrance of the palace.
HISTORY AND CONSTRUCTION
The preference for the construction of royal palaces at this site dates back to as early as the Licchavi period in the third century. Even though the present palaces and temples have undergone repeated and extensive renovations and nothing physical remains from that period, names like Gunapo and Gupo, which are the names referred to the palaces in the square in early scriptures, imply that the palaces were built by Gunakamadev, a king ruling late in the tenth century. When Kathmandu City became independent under the rule of King Ratna Malla (1484–1520) the palaces in the square became the royal palaces for its Malla kings. When Prithvi Narayan Shah invaded the Kathmandu Valley in 1769, he favored the Kathmandu Durbar Square for his palace. Other subsequent Shah kings continued to rule from the square until 1896 when they moved to the Narayan Hiti Palace.
The square is still the center of important royal events like the coronation of King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah in 1975 and King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah in 2001.
Though there are no written archives stating the history of Kathmandu Durbar Square, construction of the palace in the square is credited to Sankharadev (1069–1083). As the first king of the independent Kathmandu City, Ratna Malla is said to have built the Taleju temple in the Northern side of the palace in 1501. For this to be true then the temple would have had to have been built in the vihara style as part of the palace premise surrounding the Mul Chok courtyard for no evidence of a separate structure that would match this temple can be found within the square.
Construction of the Karnel Chok is not clearly stated in any historical inscriptions; although, it is probably the oldest among all the courtyards in the square. The Bhagavati Temple, originally known as a Narayan Temple, rises above the mansions surrounding it and was added during the time of Jagajaya Malla in the early eighteenth century. The Narayan idol within the temple was stolen so Prithvi Narayan Shah replaced it with an image of Bhagavati, completely transforming the name of the temple.
The oldest temples in the square are those built by Mahendra Malla (1560–1574). They are the temples of Jagannath, Kotilingeswara Mahadev, Mahendreswara, and the Taleju Temple. This three-roofed Taleju Temple was established in 1564, in a typical Newari architectural style and is elevated on platforms that form a pyramid-like structure. It is said that Mahendra Malla, when he was residing in Bhaktapur, was highly devoted to the Taleju Temple there; the Goddess being pleased with his devotion gave him a vision asking him to build a temple for her in the Kathmandu Durbar Square. With a help of a hermit, he designed the temple to give it its present form and the Goddess entered the temple in the form of a bee.
His successors Sadasiva (1575–1581), his son, Shiva Simha (1578–1619), and his grandson, Laxmi Narsingha (1619–1641), do not seem to have made any major additions to the square. During this period of three generations the only constructions to have occurred were the establishment of Degutale Temple dedicated to Goddess Mother Taleju by Shiva Simha and some enhancement in the royal palace by Laksminar Simha.
UNDER PRATAP MALLA
In the time of Pratap Malla, son of Laksminar Simha, the square was extensively developed. He was an intellectual, a pious devotee, and especially interested in arts. He called himself a Kavindra, king of poets, and boasted that he was learned in fifteen different languages. A passionate builder, following his coronation as a king, he immediately began enlargements to his royal palace, and rebuilt some old temples and constructed new temples, shrines and stupas around his kingdom. There also took the massacre called Kot Parva where the queen, prime minister, head of the states,and other people with guards died. This massacre took place in the court yard inside the palace.
During the construction of his palace, he added a small entrance in the traditional, low and narrow Newari style. The door was elaborately decorated with carvings and paintings of deities and auspicious sings and was later transferred to the entrance of Mohan Chok. In front of the entrance he placed the statue of Hanuman thinking that Hanuman would strengthen his army and protect his home. The entrance leads to Nasal Chok, the courtyard where most royal events such as coronation, performances, and yagyas, holy fire rituals, take place. It was named after Nasadya, the God of Dance, and during the time of Pratap Malla the sacred mask dance dramas performed in Nasal Chok were widely famed. In one of these dramas, it is said that Pratap Malla himself played the role of Lord Vishnu and that the spirit of the Lord remained in the king's body even after the play. After consulting his Tantric leaders, he ordered a stone image of Lord Vishnu in his incarnation as Nara Simha, the half-lion and half-human form, and then transferred the spirit into the stone. This fine image of Nara Simha made in 1673 still stands in the Nasal Chok. In 1650, he commissioned for the construction of Mohan Chok in the palace. This chok remained the royal residential courtyard for many years and is believed to store a great amount of treasure under its surface. Pratap Malla also built Sundari Chok about this time. He placed a slab engraved with lines in fifteen languages and proclaimed that he who can understand the inscription would produce the flow of milk instead of water from Tutedhara, a fountain set in the outer walls of Mohan Chok. However elaborate his constructions may have been, they were not simply intended to emphasize his luxuries but also his and the importance of others' devotion towards deities. He made extensive donations to temples and had the older ones renovated. Next to the palace, he built a Krishna temple, the Vamsagopala, in an octagonal shape in 1649. He dedicated this temple to his two Indian wives, Rupamati and Rajamati, as both had died during the year it was built. In Mohan Chok, he erected a three roofed Agamachem temple and a unique temple with five superimposing roofs. After completely restoring the Mul Chok, he donated to the adjoining Taleju Temple. To the main temple of Taleju, he donated metal doors in 1670. He rebuilt the Degutale Temple built by his grandfather, Siva Simha, and the Taleju Temple in the palace square. As a substitute to the Indreswara Mahadeva Temple in the distant village of Panauti he built a Shiva temple, Indrapura, near his palace in the square. He carved hymns on the walls of the Jagannath Temple as prayers to Taleju in the form of Kali.
At the southern end of the square, near Kasthamandap at Maru, which was the main city crossroads for early traders, he built another pavilion named Kavindrapura, the mansion of the king of poets. In this mansion he set an idol of dancing Shiva, Nasadyo, which today is highly worshipped by dancers in the Valley.
In the process of beautifying his palace, he added fountains, ponds, and baths. In Sundari Chok, he established a low bath with a golden fountain. He built a small pond, the Naga Pokhari, in the palace adorned with Nagakastha, a wooden serpent, which is said he had ordered stolen from the royal pond in the Bhaktapur Durbar Square. He restored the Licchavi stone sculptures such as the Jalasayana Narayana, the Kaliyadamana, and the Kala Bhairav. An idol of Jalasayana Narayana was placed in a newly created pond in the Bhandarkhal garden in the eastern wing of the palace. As a substitute to the idol of Jalasayana Narayana in Buddhanilkantha, he channeled water from Buddhanilkantha to the pond in Bhandarkhal due bestow authenticity. The Kalyadana, a manifestation of Lord Krishna destroying Kaliya, a water serpent, is placed in Kalindi Chok, which is adjacent to the Mohan Chok. The approximately ten-feet-high image of terrifyingly portrayed Kal Bhairav is placed near the Jagannath Temple. This image is the focus of worship in the chok especially during Durga Puja.
With the death of Pratap Malla in 1674, the overall emphasis on the importance of the square came to a halt. His successors retained relatively insignificant power and the prevailing ministers took control of most of the royal rule. The ministers encountered little influence under these kings and, increasingly, interest of the arts and additions to the square was lost on them. They focused less on culture than Pratap Malla during the three decades that followed his death, steering the city and country more towards the arenas of politics and power, with only a few minor constructions made in the square. These projects included Parthivendra Malla building a temple referred to as Trailokya Mohan or Dasavatara, dedicated to Lord Vishnu in 1679. A large statue of Garuda, the mount of Lord Vishnu, was added in front of it a decade later. Parthivendra Malla added a pillar with image of his family in front of the Taleju Temple.
Around 1692, Radhilasmi, the widowed queen of Pratap Malla, erected the tall temples of Shiva known as Maju Deval near the Garuda image in the square. This temple stands on nine stepped platforms and is one of the tallest buildings in the square. Then her son, Bhupalendra Malla, took the throne and banished the widowed queen to the hills. His death came early at the age of twenty one and his widowed queen, Bhuvanalaksmi, built a temple in the square known as Kageswara Mahadev. The temple was built in the Newari style and acted as a substitute for worship of a distant temple in the hills. After the earthquake in 1934, the temple was restored with a dome roof, which was alien to the Newari architecture.
Jayaprakash Malla, the last Malla king to rule Kathmandu, built a temple for Kumari and Durga in her virginal state. The temple was named Kumari Bahal and was structured like a typical Newari vihara. In his house resides the Kumari, a girl who is revered as the living goddess. He also made a chariot for Kumari and in the courtyard had detailed terra cotta tiles of that time laid down.
UNDER THE SHAH DYNASTY
During the Shah dynasty that followed, the Kathmandu Durbar Square saw a number of changes. Two of the most unique temples in the square were built during this time. One is the Nautale, a nine-storied building known as Basantapur Durbar. It has four roofs and stands at the end of Nasal Chok at the East side of the palace. It is said that this building was set as a pleasure house. The lower three stories were made in the Newari farmhouse style. The upper floors have Newari style windows, sanjhya and tikijhya, and some of them are slightly projected from the wall. The other temple is annexed to the Vasantapur Durbar and has four-stories. This building was initially known as Vilasamandira, or Lohom Chok, but is now commonly known as Basantapur or Tejarat Chok. The lower floors of the Basantapur Chok display extensive woodcarvings and the roofs are made in popular the Mughal style. Archives state that Prthivi Narayan Shah built these two buildings in 1770.
Rana Bahadur Shah was enthroned at the age of two. Bahadur Shah, the second son of Prithvi Narayan Shah, ruled as a regent for his young nephew Rana Bahadur Shah for a close to a decade from 1785 to 1794 and built a temple of Shiva Parvati in the square. This one roofed temple is designed in the Newari style and is remarkably similar to previous temples built by the Mallas. It is rectangular in shape, and enshrines the Navadurga, a group of goddesses, on the ground floor. It has a wooden image of Shiva and Parvati at the window of the upper floor, looking out at the passersby in the square. Another significant donation made during the time of Rana Bahadur Shah is the metal-plated head of Swet Bhairav near the Degutale Temple. It was donated during the festival of Indra Jatra in 1795, and continues to play a major role during the festival every year. This approximately twelve feet high face of Bhairav is concealed behind a latticed wooden screen for the rest of the year. The following this donation Rana Bahadur donated a huge bronze bell as an offering to the Goddess Taleju. Together with the beating of the huge drums donated by his son Girvan Yudha, the bell was rung every day during the daily ritual worship to the goddess. Later these instruments were also used as an alarm system. However, after the death of his beloved third wife Kanimati Devi due to smallpox, Rana Bahadur Shah turned mad with grief and had many images of gods and goddesses smashed including the Taleju statue and bell, and Sitala, the goddess of smallpox.
In 1908, a palace, Gaddi Durbar, was built using European architectural designs. The Rana Prime Ministers who had taken over the power but not the throne of the country from the Shahs Kings from 1846 to 1951 were highly influenced by European styles. The Gaddi Durbar is covered in white plaster, has Greek columns and adjoins a large audience hall, all foreign features to Nepali architecture. The balconies of this durbar were reserved for the royal family during festivals to view the square below.
Some of the parts of the square like the Hatti Chok near the Kumari Bahal in the southern section of the square were removed during restoration after the devastating earthquake in 1934. While building the New Road, the southeastern part of the palace was cleared away, leaving only fragments in places as reminders of their past. Though decreased from its original size and attractiveness from its earlier seventeenth-century architecture, the Kathmandu Durbar Square still displays an ancient surrounding that spans abound five acres of land. It has palaces, temples, quadrangles, courtyards, ponds, and images that were brought together over three centuries of the Malla, the Shah, and the Rana dynasties.
VISITING
Kathmandu's Durbar Square is the site of the Hanuman Dhoka Palace Complex, which was the royal Nepalese residence until the 19th century and where important ceremonies, such as the coronation of the Nepalese monarch, still take place today. The palace is decorated with elaborately-carved wooden windows and panels and houses the King Tribhuwan Memorial Museum and the Mahendra Museum. It is possible to visit the state rooms inside the palace.
Time and again the temples and the palaces in the square have gone through reconstruction after being damaged by natural causes or neglect. Presently there are less than ten quadrangles in the square. The temples are being preserved as national heritage sites and the palace is being used as a museum. Only a few parts of the palace are open for visitors and the Taleju temples are only open for people of Hindu and Buddhist faiths.
At the southern end of Durbar Square is one of the most curious attractions in Nepal, the Kumari Chowk. This gilded cage contains the Raj Kumari, a girl chosen through an ancient and mystical selection process to become the human incarnation of the Hindu mother goddess, Durga. She is worshiped during religious festivals and makes public appearances at other times for a fee paid to her guards.
WIKIPEDIA
construction on algonquin river state hospital began in 1868, and the first patients were admitted in 1871. when funding was exhausted and construction finally stopped in 1871, algonquin river state hospital was unparalleled in scale and opulence. there was great controversy at the time about how over budget and schedule it was, but the final product was nothing short of spectacular: stained glass windows abounded, ornamental wood and stone carvings adorned door frames, and everywhere one looked the breathtaking high victorian architecture and immaculate grounds provided another awe-inspiring vista. at its peak in the 1940s and 1950s over 6,000 people were treated here.
now it is unrivalled in the sheer scope of its devastation; as the demand for inpatient hospitalization declined with the introduction of psychotropic drugs and community based treatment, algonquin river was shut down in stages, starting with the male and female wings in the 1970s and culminating with the administration section in 2001. algonquin river has suffered more dramatically from the elements than any other state hospital due in part to the expensive yellow pine floors' deterioration, and after a massive fire (and the resulting effort to extinguish it) gutted its wings in 2007 what remains is one of the most hauntingly epic and terrifyingly dangerous buildings in existence.
more pictures online on my website at: www.abandonedamerica.us/portfolio159696.html
Marguerite Solomon’s portrait.
SOLOMON, Marguerite Grace - Born in Clinton, Ontario on November 29, 1921, a daughter of the late Clarence Percival and Lulu Mae (nee Harkness) Shepherd, Marguerite passed away at Central Place Retirement Community in Owen Sound on Monday March 18, 2019 at the age of 97. Marguerite is remembered as a loving mother by her daughter Linda and her husband Michael Bryan of Australia, daughter Kathleen ‘Kate’ (late Doug) Grant and partner Al Thompson of Markdale and son Geoff Solomon and his wife Mary (nee Bradford) of Meaford. She will be the sorely missed grandmother and great grandmother of James Bryan (Kate Smyth) and their children Sam and Sophie, Nichola Bryan (Marty Kolos) and their children Patrick, Oliver and Louis, Anna Bryan, and Kiera Bryan; Jeremy Grant (Dana) and children Logan and Taylor, and Lyndsay Grant and daughter Emma; Christine (nee Solomon) Doyle (Christopher) and children Liam and Kayleigh, and Evelyn ‘Evie’ Solomon. Cremation has taken place and a visitation and memorial funeral service celebrating Marguerite’s life will be held at the Ferguson Funeral Home in Meaford at a date in July to be announced. As your expression of sympathy, donations to the Bruce Trail Conservancy or Meaford Hospital Foundation would be appreciated and may be made through the FERGUSON FUNERAL HOME , 48 Boucher St. E., Meaford, ON N4L 1B9. www.fergusonfuneralhomes.ca 13331516.
Some words from Linda, her eldest child:
Thank you for coming. I'm sorry you're so far away in camera, but there we go. I would just like to start by thanking everybody for being here, and for being such a good friend to Margaret. She was a good friend to many people. And I can see from the number of people that are here today, that that was reciprocated, so it's lovely. Thank you.
I'm just going to tell you a bit about mom's life. She was born in Clinton, Ontario, Marguerite Grace Shepherd, the daughter of Clarence Percival Shepherd and Lula Mae Harkness. She had three younger siblings, Ruth, Larry and Tom. Her dad was in the bank so they moved around a bit. So, after, after Clinton they were in St. Thomas, then Campbellford ON, and finally in Iroquois which was really fortunate because that was her mother's hometown. She'd grown up there. Margaret was a good student. She was particularly good at mathematics.
She took piano lessons like lots of kids. She loved to sing. When she left Iroquois she was given a hymnal by the people in her church with that was inscribed. We found it when we were clearing things out after she moved to Central Place.
The other thing about Marguerite that some of you may know, but maybe most don't know, was that she was a really good sports woman. She loved to swim in Iroquois. She swim in the canal. That was before the St. Lawrence Seaway, but there was a canal there that she loved to swim in. She loved to play tennis. She was a good tennis player. She tells a story of when she was about 16 she wanted her father to come down and play tennis with her so she could show him how well she played tennis. Dad, come and play. Come and play. So finally he came down to play tennis with her. He stood in the middle of the court and just went, pop, pop, pop to each side, and she ran back and forth the whole time. She said, I never asked him to go again. She was also good at athletics. She was the school athletics champion. And she did the long jump, and she was a sprinter, and it's funny how genes passed down, because when I was in athletics at school, I was good at long jump and sprinting, and my son when he did athletics, was long jump and sprinting, so we've got something passed down from mom. It's lovely. In her older age, she still was she still followed sports. She swam regularly. She went to her aqua aerobics. She did lawn bowling. She was a curler, and anything she did, she got good at very quickly. With her curling she quickly surpassed Harold her father in law, who she loved dearly. And they were once in a bond spiel. Mom was the skipper. Harold was the Vice, and they got an Eight Ender. We still have her little trophy from that. She used to go hiking. She learned to ski when she was in her 40s, which is kind of late to begin, but she did it.
So back to her growing up. She spent her teenage years, the later ones in Iroquois, and then went to Toronto went to secretarial school. And after that was the secretary for Dr. Bill Robinson who was a pathologist at Toronto General Hospital. When she was in Toronto she met Keith, who became her husband at Grace United Church. They went to the same church and dad was in the choir. She had not made the choir. She was quite disappointed. They said she didn't sing well enough to be in the choir, so it must have been a special choir. But she met Keith, and she told me once that she wasn't really all that interested in him. She was really interested in guy called Mike Sayer, but her cousin Allison, who was her best friend nabbed Mike. Allison's daughter is here today, Christy, thank you for coming.
And so, dad went then overseas. He went to war. She went out with Mike’s good friend Norm while Keith was overseas. She said, Oh, I felt sorry for him so I wrote him letters. They wrote regularly and she said we really got to know each other through those letters, and then when he came back, the rest is history for them. They were married in 1947.
Back in Toronto, though she was when she was still there, while he was away, she came into... she had trouble the shorthand, even though she was a secretary, and she she'd done a shorthand exam for the third time, and failed it yet again. So she came back to the office and she burst into tears and Dr. Robinson said, What's the difference? I’ll never get out of here. I have to get out. And he said, Oh, and he questioned her a bit and he came back two days later and he said, How would you like to go to Kingston and learn to be a lab technician? Great, because in the meantime her father had died. Her mother was alone with three children at home. It wasn't an easy time. So Kingston was a lot closer to Iroquois. So she moved back there to Kingston, and she learned to be a lab technician in the hospital. She learned on the spot. It was Marguerite that was sent down to New York to meet Dr. Georgios Papanikolaou, who had developed the pap smear. She learned how to do that. She was the first person to bring that back to Canada. So a lot of us of a certain gender are very grateful for that.
She showed her strength of conviction. I remember she told me a story one time about going on the bus from from Kingston to Iroquois, and the bus driver was so terrifyingly driving, and she stood up in the bus and said, You stop this bus and let me off right now, and he did. I don't know how she got to Iroquois.
After she was married of course she moved to Meaford, and didn't work as most women in those days didn't, but she learned to play bridge bridge, under the tutelage of her mother in long Mernie who was a very good bridge player. She quickly surpassed her husband Keith, who thought he was a good bridge player, but mom left him for dead, and those of you who like grandmother know that she was pretty good at it. She also continued to play tennis. She had a friend called Mariel Grant. Some of you may remember Muriel. She had a private tennis court across the road from her house which I think is where the ball park was eventually built, so when the ballpark was built the tennis court went. There was no public tennis court in Meaford ON at that time, but she was pleased to play tennis with Muriel. I can remember going and sitting and watching her do that so, but that that came to an end, because there wasn't a tennis court anymore. She loved an active life. I can remember as a child going on picnics and hikes, just all sorts of things outside, camping. We camped often with our cousins, with the Carthews. Scott’s here today. Thank you. One of the... we’d do on camping trips down east, and also we spend a lot of time with the Shepherds, and that was with her brother, Larry's family. We've got quite a few of them here today. Thank you so much for coming.
She was a good friend. She was a good relative. She kept in touch with people, and I think a lot of people appreciated that.
She loved to hike, and when dad got involved in the Bruce Trail, of course she was involved as well. He did. He did the finding the landowners and getting the trail built, but it was mom behind the scenes who really was the driving force between behind setting up the Beaver Valley Bruce Trail Cup. She did all the paperwork and that stuff. Dad got the glory for it. She always stood in the background. She let him take the credit for things, but really she was a strength, I think, in their relationship, without ever letting anybody know that.
So she, she did sort of work, the things that her husband wanted to do, but she enjoyed them as well. And going hiking down in the United States in Vermont, New Hampshire and New York. Just all those things she just loved being outside. When dad died, even before he died, she went in and started helping the insurance business. She really transformed the business. Dad didn't like asking people for money. Mom wasn't afraid to ask people for money. She had the business incorporated which saved her when he had his early death. It was a very good thing that that had happened, but that was due to her. As Geoff said, I didn't realize that. Geoff said that. But when dad died, she really blossomed. She was so strong. She tried to run that business herself, despite enormous pressure from somebody trying to buy it from her. She wouldn't sell it because she didn't believe in the ethics of the person who wanted to buy it. She really stood stood her ground until Geoff came, and then she helped with the business for many years. She once was visiting me in Australia, when she said, They've got a new computer system. She learned about computers before anybody else in town I think before they'd got a new computer system. It won't balance. It's a one cent every month. It's driving me nuts. She said. I don't need this stress. I'm 78 years old. When I go home I'm going to retire, and she did.
Marguerite did a lot of volunteer work. She was really active for many years in the United Church Women. She was an Explorer Leader. Later when I was a child, she was a Cub leader.
She was instrumental in getting the Midas Mart set up. So she was in the beginning of that. She helped set up the marathon branch, which I think is maybe defunct now but it went for many years, and she was very involved in the Bruce trail. Once again, as I said on some of these things she did it quietly in the background, but she did it, always very organized.
She was a terrific mother. Marguerite, like she just... she was very firm, very firm, but I think she was fair.
She was always there for us, because she didn't go to work, so I can remember coming home and saying, Mom, I'm home, and she was just always there.
She loved parties. She loves Christmas, especially but she parties. There's a picture we have of a Halloween party that that she did for us kids. I don't know. Geoff maybe looks like he was only about five, we were quite young, but there all these children are sitting up at the dining table with her good China, and her good silver. I thought, I don't think that you’d do that with kids these days, but if it was a party, it didn't matter whether you were eight, or whether you were 80, she was going to serve you the same way.
She was saying what she thought about what you were, what you were doing. If she didn't like it, which to me in particular, because, never mind, I don't think you should be doing that Linda. And I said, Well, that's too bad. I'm doing it anyway, and she never ever would say it again. She never harped on about it. She never nagged, Once it was said, you knew what she thought, and then it was up to you. And I really admired that, and valued that in her. She had real inner strength. You know I think in 1970-71, Harold, her father in law, whom she loved dearly, died. Then Geoff had his accident, then her mother died a couple of months later, all within that time. And you know she never, she never gave any sort of... she didn't give any sign of being really needy. She was... she was terrific, real inner strength. She never complained.
So she'd come out of the shadow, after her dad died.
She just had real principles, I think. After dad died and after Geoff was here, and she was a bit freer she, she went into her travel years and she went all around the globe. She did a lot of elder hostile trips to Lapland to Great Britain. I don’t know where else, but she also came to Australia, every couple of years and stayed with me for a couple of months which was lovely so my children got to know her really well. She went cycling in Holland. That was a bit disastrous that trip, if any of you remember it, but she visited us also when we lived in New Zealand, and she always took me on a trip when she came to visit. We’d go off for a week and do something, or else she’d go on her own trips as well. Into her 80’s she stopped coming, and got her cats. She loved her cats we have a younger one earlier called Yogi that she had stolen from a child. Somebody had left her cats on the side of the road at lunchtime when kids were coming home from school, and this kid she'd been trying to get this little black kitten out, and some child came along and managed to grab this kitten, and she just pounced on it, grabbed it saying, He’s mine. She took him home.
As you will know, Margaret was blunt. She could be blunt. She spoke her mind. Sometimes she could be a little bit hurtful, but she never meant to be hurtful. It was always her heart. She had a heart of gold. She had many friends. She was a good friend to many people, an independent, no nonsense... You know she was still climbing up ladders when she was 90 and 92, which was a bit silly, trying to get up on chairs to try to get things out of top cupboards. So the fact is that she lived by herself until she was 95, just shows how independent she was. Though I've been really fortunate for the last 20-30 years to be able to come quite regularly to see her, and I'm really going to miss her.
Sally Anne said that she was Christian, yes she was, but she also said she didn't think there was anything beyond, so that when you die, you're just dead. That’s it. There’s nothing else. But I expect that she's probably found out now that she was wrong, and I hope that she's with all those dear friends of hers that she missed so much when they left before she did.
So, Thank you. Thank you mom for being such a good mother, such a good friend, and God bless you. Bless your spirit.
Thank you.
I work for the marketing department of ERIKS (a top international industrial service provider) and last week we organized Technivent 2011, a huge exhibition for the OEM and MRO industry in Homeboxx, Nieuwegein - about innovation and sustainability.
Former NASA astronaut Wubbo Ockels gave an inspiring lecture about his projects and ideas.
Over one hundred industrial suppliers showed their innovations and special products. One of the many highlights were the demonstrations of our 3D printer, the terrifyingly realistic Festo race simulator (ran by pneumatic 'muscles') and innovations in motion control and sealing technology.
Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8
In between all kinds of organizational activities I had the time to walk around, trying to capture the atmosphere of the exhibition. I was glad I still had the Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 which worked excellent under the difficult light conditions, such a nifty little gem that lens. It's for sale though!
I'm not really into event photography but I'm glad I could give it a try this way, I've learned a lot.
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Date: Taken on November 23, 2011 at 16:54 h / 4.54pm CET
Exif data
Camera Nikon D90
Exposure 0.025 sec (1/40)
Aperture f/4.0
Focal Length 11 mm (Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8)
ISO Speed 800
The terrifyingly talented @thekatmonster (@katmonsterart) recently brought this soul-sucking clown look to town.
paulannegelhoff.myportfolio.com/
@paulannegelhoff
1. Tico Fernando Roho was born in little town in southern Mexico, somewhere more or less middle of the rain forest which is kinda almost hacked down in most of the Mexico, not too far from local Mayan ruins. Town is really small, with 2 hour drive to nearest city. Whole town has one factory in it and most of the villagers don't have a inside toilet. Whole town has 3 TV's, one computer, 5 cars, and 12 phones. People aren't exactly starving to death and boohoo poor, they just don't have stuff or feel need to have too much. Almost every houshold has a radio, and town ever getting more old people are more intrested going to church, than anything happenijng in outside world. Nearest city is very small too, so getting to the big world has been quite a shock to poor Tico.
2. Tico's mother can't read. She is very obsessed about religion, while his daddy was very cynical, atheistic drunk. Marriage was never a happy one. I don't have to tell you it was arranged right? xD Tico has six siblings: Juanita, Marcoh, Maria, Marina and little sisters Isabella and Anabella. he has friendly relationship with Juanita, rivalry with Marcoh, he is Marias personal punchingbag, he's partners in crime with Marina and he absolutely adores the younger sisters more than anything in a world. He has always been very proud to be someones older brother, and lil'sisters adore him.
3. Tico, is by nature, very sweet guy. He smiles sweetly and seems to love every person he meets. He is truly intrested about what others have in mind, but doesn't like to talk too much about himself. He speaks of people dear to him and thinks he likes, but not about himself if avoidable. He has a bit of superhero syndrome, and let's face it, he is dumb as a boot. But everything he does, he does straight from the heart. He tryis to keep situation calm and be friends with anyone, but when he flips, he flips hard. He is very fiery little mexican, and his moodswings can be terrifying. Cute and cuddly, sweet boy can turn in to annoying, nervewracking dramaqueen in matter of seconds.
4. In age of 9, Tico was visitng neighbor to get something for mommy. Their neighbor lady used to be nurse once, so she kinda worked as local midwife. And Tico bumped in in middle of delivery. Woman the neighbor was trying to help was first timer and really frightned, and there was umbilical cord around the babies neck. Not badly, but the neighbor, Arcelia, coun't work with freting mother. So when they boy stumbled to the room, she saw him as free labour. She told the boy hold the mother's hand and as mother was focused to the boy, she saved the baby. No need to say Tico was very baffled by all this. People of the town where really old fasioned and consired this all some kind of scandal. Tico as very quiet for long time, until few weeks later other woman came to give birth to neighbors house. Boy came to the door and asked Arcelia if he could help. Arcelia, who considered attitude of the towns people as dumb, agreed and asked the boy fetch some towels. Later on Tico studied himself as a nurse and a midwife, currently working on maternity ward in London general hospital.
5. While being midwife was only dream jod Tico ever had, he almost gave up on it on public presure. That was until his best friend Paloma, girl he had huge crush on, mae a suicide. Paloma had been acting weird on years, never telling anyone what it was about. In her suicide letter she told that she had been abused by her father. Town's people didn't believe it, but Tico did. He got so sick of the overall attitude of the town that he desited to collect enough money to study in Mexico City.
6. While Tico started his school in Mexico city, his daddy left the family, leaving them a mountain of bills. To keep his place in school and pay the bills, Tico ended up working on shady club. For next 3 years, he entertained, had sex, stole some minor stuff and cars for money, staying as host in the club at nights, studying the days. When he finally got debts paid and scholarship which allowed him to go complete his school in England, he was recovering alcoholic, nothing but bag of bones and scared even his own shadow. to his luck, he got himself very leverheaded tutor Geoffrey McGilligan, who's calm attitude, precise scedcules and low tolerance to bullshit gave little mexican change to heal - and for once in his life, just be himself.
7. If I say it really ugly way, Tico is attention whore. But not the way you might first think. His father made his mother very sad, and as middle child he was left with little attention in the first place. His other siblings where louder and more demanding than he was. So Tico, to get momma's attention, was the sweetest angel she could think of. He was total mama's boy, always making everything to make his mother happy. As a result, Tico slowly started to connect "being useful" to "getting attention" and both of these to feeling of pleasure. This has developed very dangerous result, where Tico measures his usefulness from the amount of attention he gets. He doesn't require constant attention. But when he gets attention, and it is in any way possible to count as positive, his insecure mind takes hold on that. He is addicted to it. And he is ready to do anything for it. Ss a result he tends to get very reckless, he doesn't think things trough and he ends up in front of hard decisions. As a insecure guy he loves feeling himself special. So only thing you need to manipulate him, is making him feel more special than anything else. Good thing he is now dating Geoffrey, who more or less seem to be indifferent about other human beings than his mexican. There is no more spacial place than be center of someone's world. And that Tico rewards very generously. Yup, Tico ended up together with his tutor. Boys are in many things like day and night, but on other things almost terrifyingly similar.
8. He likes legs. and butts. And usually ain't shamed to show it. He doesn't shout it out, but good pair of legs always gets a approving smile from him. If their female legs. He is as attracted to male legs too, but he doesn't want to admit it out loud. He is afraid people will consider him wierd or sick because of that.
9. Tico loves pop music. Britney Spears, George Michael, you name it. He also loves Shakira and latino rythms, and some techno. Anything to make you dance really. His ultimate music love is no other than Queen of pop, Madonna. He is a real hardcore fan. And yes, he like Gaga too, but no, don't tell him if you think Gaga is better than Madonna. Just don't he will make you burn. xD
10. As said, back in home people tended to be very old fashioned. Tico was always an oddball since he was always better with girls, and generally is a slightly more femine than many other males. He is ok with his bisexuality, and dreses up a bit girlish in times, but loves soccer, poker and action movies. While he might seem really tolerant guy in these matters in first glance, some of those things learned from home have sticked. Tico thinks boyish girls are as cool as girly girls, but she only gets attracted to femine girls. Ironically, he also gets attracted to guyish guys. His ideal girlfriend is someone to protect and keep as his own princess, but as boyfriend he rather takes a bear to protect him from harm. Acctually he can't stand girly men, meaning what he consideres too girly. having femine qualitys is ok, but too much seems to be just that. xD He is specially freaked out by men who wear dresses. Absolutely petrified