skärtorsdagen

In Sweden and parts of Finland—though not an official holiday since 1772—Maundy Thursday, that day of the week already closely associated with witchcraft and magic, was according to old folkloric traditions the day that witches (påskkärringar or påskhäxa, Easter hags which children costume themselves as and entreat parents and neighbours for eggs and treats rather than a bunny) fly off to the legendary island of Blåkulla (Blockula—in the ancient rendering and not to be confused with the very real island in the Kalmar strait) to dance with the Devil. Non-celebrants take part also with some frantic spring-cleaning and hiding their broomsticks to keep black magic at bay. The observation ceased being a public holiday in the late eighteenth century with the repeal of the death penalty for practising witchcraft.

maundy thursday

Called also Sheer, Great and Holy and Green (Gründonnerstag) this day initiates the Easter Triduum, the commemoration of the passion, crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus and is derived from a corruption of the Latin term mandatum for command—from the Vulgate of John 13:34, wherein the disciple relays that there is a new directive, namely, that we love one another as I have loved you (Mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos) and whereupon Jesus demonstrates his humility and charity in washing the feet (pedelavium) of students to show there is no hierarchy in kindness. This courtesy ablution is not only a religious rite in many traditions but moreover a mark of hospitality in guest-host dynamics.

plaster of paris

Our faithful antiquarian and bibliophile, JF Ptak Science Books, is always uncovering interesting historical passages and ephemera and lately directs us to an 1834 invention by M. Richard Rettford to take casts mechanically by recording the impression of the object to be modelled by the indent on a matrix of tiny needles through a mesh. Though we all might be familiar with the pin art screens that are the domain of executive toys, back in the nineteenth century proposing such a solution as this physiognotype for non-intrusive three-dimensional sampling and replication was a really innovative idea.

gait, gallop and canter

Born on this day in 1830 (†1904) in Kingston upon Thames, Eadweard Muybridge (previously), adopting the archaic Anglo-Saxon spelling of his name and immigrating to New York and then San Francisco originally as a bookseller, would eventually become a pioneer in photography and projection, his studies in kinetics contributing to the development of motion pictures.
Aside from documenting Yosemite, the Alaskan territory and the American West, apprenticeships at dude ranches and at some of the country’s great zoological gardens and menageries furthered his interest in biomechanics and animal locomotion, leading to his stroboscopic inventions (the zoöpraxiscope and the phenakistoscope) in the early 1880s that displayed fluid movements on a rotating disk.

edc

Via the always insightful friend of the blog Nag on the Lake, we are directed to the Atlas of Everyday Objects from the Observational Practises Laboratory that aims to document changes in perception and self-curation (relatedly) of life under global self-isolating and invites the public to create a three-by-three grid of artefacts that have taken on an amplified meaning in these days of limited—albeit temporarily—horizons. Pro-tip: one does not need to use social media or a collage filter to make these grids, just a screen-shot of the gallery of one’s sequential photos, clipped to size. What’s something you imagine that you’ll never see quite the same way again? One can add a narrative or let the formerly overlooked objects speak for themselves.

for some reason, funded largely by the united states, yet very china centric

Employing much the same garbage rhetoric as he used to announce the US withdrawal from the Universal Postal Union, Trump—having ignored or disdained the pandemic outbreak of corona virus for months squandering valuable time—is telling the United Nations’ agency, the World Health Organisation, yesterday on UN World Health Day, that it “really blew it” on the deadly disease and is threatening to withhold funding.
The WHO identified a localised cluster of a novel influenza-like illness back in November and began monitoring the situation, declaring an international health emergency on 30 January prompted countries to act in the ensuing six weeks to include restriction on movement, curfews, lockdowns and social distancing. America however failed to take the matter with any gravity until the past two weeks and the message and mitigating measures implemented have been uneven and sloppy at best. While the WHO and other supranational entities may have to blunt their criticism of their backers (the US contribution to the woefully underfunded yet agile and effective WHO is about fourteen percent of its operating budget—less than a billion dollars biannually), the accusation and threat have nothing to do with the UN’s stance towards China but only in the desperate search for another scapegoat for his own seriously blowing it that will result in tens of thousands of deaths that could have been avoided.

winsor mccay: the famous cartoonist of the ny herald and his moving comic

Better known by its short title, Little Nemo, by the eponymous illustrator (previously here and here) debuted his silent, mixed live-action and animated short—one of the first of its kind and certainly counted as the most influential—based on and extending the story first framed by a full-page Sunday strip in the Herald in October 1905 on this day in New York theatres. Over four thousand drawings on rice-paper were sketched out—notably not cels due to the lack of background, and assigned series numbers for easier collation and a good portion of the film covers the foibles of production and the technical struggles of putting together the cartoon.
Little Nemo

flotsam and jetsam

Via Present /&/ Correct, we are introduced to a new form of beachcombing, mudlarking (see also here and here) that’s pivoted for one Cornwall resident from shells and lost treasures to the plastic detritus of modern times in LEGO Lost at Sea, who has nonetheless continued to collect what she can scavenge from the shores and displays them in their dismaying beauty. Learn more at the links above and share your own meticulously arranged collages of castaways.