ballonflucht

In the early hours of this morning in 1979, eight members of two families, realising the fruition of a plot hatched over a year and a half beforehand with careful planning and patience so as not to arouse suspicion, one attempt that ended in resounding failure that almost led to their capture and detention and brought heavier surveillance plus three hand-stitched balloon membranes, crossed from Pößneck in East Germany to Naila just over the border in Bavaria in a hand-engineered hot air balloon with navigation improvised. Read (or listen to) the full story about the harrowing heroics of the families Strelzyk and Wetzel and their determination to secure a future in the West at the link above.

offset und verlag

Via Present /&/ Correct, we are acquainted with yet another publishing trade magazine this time in the form of the bimonthly then annual anthology editions of Graphis Press, originally founded in Zürich in 1944 and moving to New York headquarters in 1986. Featuring innovations in typography, formatting, layout, presentation, branding, logos and letterhead, past contributors include Milton Glaser, Saul Bass, Victor Vasarely and Herb Lubalin. Much more to explore at the links above.

yes r’lyeh

Via Shadow Manor’s Art of Darkness blog, we are reintroduced to the illustrations and rhyming couplets of deviant artist DrFaustusAU and his complete body of works that survey the genres of science fiction and horror in the style of Doctor Seuss. We especially liked some of the panels from The Shining and HP Lovecraft’s The Call of Cthulu. Check out the links above for more.

calvaire

A unique form of monumental public crucifix that displays scenes from the Passion, the oldest surviving examples date back to the mid thirteenth century and reflect a megalithic tradition anchored in Bretagne and spreading eastwards.
One of the first examples we encountered on a recent trip was this modern, Art Nouveau interpretation of a calvary (from Golgotha, Γολγοθᾶς, Syriac for the “Place of Skulls,” transliterated as Κρανίου Τόπος or in Latin Calvariæ Locus) in the town of Tréguier (the town of Saint Tudwal) erected by local clergy in 1904 in protest over municipal authorities choosing to honour a controversial native son, the anticlerical theological and ethnology scholar Ernest Renan with a statue provocatively in the square of the cathedral during the previous year, reserved formerly for the temporary installation of displays and processions.
Church steeples also had an interesting and individualised architectural vernacular, with flying elements and each village topped with something unique and articulated. An ancient calvary more in context we found in the churchyard of Locronan (Lokorn, the name meaning the hermitage of Rónán, a sixth century Irish missionary), and is the focal point for some of the major pardons, a Breton form of ceremonial pilgrimage—held on saint days and for which an indulgence, excuse to celebrity—like Saint Patrick’s Day in the middle of Lent, is granted.

eleven herbs and spices

A master of self-promotion with its past campaigns to include sun-screen that smelt of fried chicken and Bluetooth enabled dining tray inserts to help patrons keep their phones grease-free, we learn via Miss Cellania’s Quick Links, that the latest marketing ploy from a fast food chain is a dating simulator (I am not quite sure what that even means) called ❤️I Love You❤️ Colonel Sanders!, pursuing a hotter, younger version of the franchise’s founder, Harland Sanders—an honourary title granted by the state’s governor for excellence in restaurateurship. Inexplicably, one of the playable characters is a dog, who is also a professor at the culinary institute that you all attend.  The property will be released later in the month, for those of you who might be interested, on a platform where enthusiasts watch one another play video games.

occultation

Via Boing Boing, we are quite the privileged witnesses to a solar eclipse caused by the shadow of Io moving across the dappled clouds of Jupiter (previously). One of the Galilean Satellites discovered by the artist and polymath in 1610 and designated Jupiter I, this innermost moon is the most dehydrated body known and also the most geologically (ionically) active with over four hundred volcanoes driven by gravitation pressures and tidal heating from its host world.
The mythological figure (whose name means moon) was one of Hera high priestesses at Argos and caught the wandering eye of Zeus, whose advances she steadily rebuffed. Unhappy with the extra divine scrutiny, Io was turned out of the temple, whereupon Zeus transformed her in a resplendent white heifer in order to hide her from his wife. The deception was rather transparent and Hera dispatched an obnoxious gadfly to pester the poor cow and drive her to wonder the Earth without rest.
She crossed from Europe into Asia at the Bosporus (oxford), where she met Prometheus chained, whom despite his own torture was able to console Io was the prophesy that her humanity would be restored. Returning to Greece, prodded still ever onward, she sought relief by taking the sea route to Egypt (the Ionian), when upon arrival, Zeus was able to disenchant her. With Zeus, Io bears Apis, king of Egypt—identified with the historical pharaoh Apophis (*1575 – †1540, BC), and primogenitor of many of the ancient, semi-legendary great houses of the Mediterranean.  Among the most frequented bodies in the Solar System and well studied, inhospitable Io has been rather ignominiously described as having (the namesake—that is) the colour of pizza.

rip eddie money (*1949 - †2019)