Everlasting Blört introduces us to the extensive portfolio of Barcelonan artist Riki Blanco via his unappologetic (accomodations for inexcusable behaviour should always be called out) portrayal of Trump’s unending campaign stunt, which even the Pentagon can’t abide by calling a mission for its political overtones that not only represents a patently xenophobic Navidad whose goal of disinvitation during the holiday season means that many soldiers deployed to the southern frontier are spending it away from their families and friends, ordered to lob tear gas canisters at massing migrants—for some, fulfilling an errand sought after.
Monday 3 December 2018
radishes or lettis tow bunches a peny
Inspired by gentle author’s own piece on the cries and criers of London, Spitalfields Life hosts an article from one of the trustees of the city’s Garden Society focusing on itinerant florists and green-grocers. It’s really fascinating what sort of detail about trade and the economy that one can glean from a few sparse particulars that one took a moment to notice and document (the pictured from the scrapbook of Samuel Pepys), especially how the nature of empire and imports redefine luxury goods—bringing them from expensive, exclusive shops to street markets.
catagories: ๐ฌ๐ง, ๐, ๐♂️, food and drink
a pylori
deuces
In 1975, in order to honour a Rosetta Stone level breakthrough in ethno-linguistics by epigrapher Yuiry Valentinovich Knorozov (*1922 - †1999), the state-run printworks of the USSR issued a special edition of playing cards decorated with Mayan priestesses and chieftains and hieroglyphs.
Knorozov, who as part of the vanguard advancing into Berlin at the closing stages of World War II happened to rescue a rare manuscript from a burning university library—the Dresden Codex—one of the then-known three extant codices of Mayan script and named for its permanent home (having been spirited away with other treasures from the fire-bombed city)—a discovery that would go on to inform and inspire his career as an ethnographer specialising in Mesoamerican studies, realised in 1952 that the symbols were representational and phonetic and could consult modern, spoken Maya as a guide. Learn more and see more of the deck at Atlas Obscura at the link up top.
Sunday 2 December 2018
merrie melodies
As a coda to this day’s events, our faithful chronicler, Doctor Caligari, directs our attention to the story behind the animation studio United Productions of America (UPA), which originated over striking animators under contract with Walt Disney (who infamously denied the guild the right to organise) and a sense that animated works weren’t meant as a medium for anthropomorphising nor a reflection of the constraints—however well executed—of real models and ought to forward and promote an air of abstraction and cartoon physics. Outside of the studio system, UPA could undercut the competition and garnered contracts to relay the education and training syllabi (within budget) and established itself as a foil to the cinematic realism and didacticism of Disney fairy-tales.
sufganiyot!
Via Miss Cellania for the Festival of Lights (which begins at sunset today, 25 Kislev) and runs through nightfall on 10 December), we are treated to the musical styles of a cappella group Six13’s rendition of “Bohemian Chanukah,” which includes some historic and cultural background of the holiday. The first verse begins:
Is this the eighth night
We light with the family?
Recall with great pride
Our escape from Greek tyranny?
Kindle the lights
Remember the Maccabees
How did those five boys
Lead us to victory?
catagories: ✡️, ๐ถ, holidays and observances
5x5
village dรฉtruit: exploring nine ghost towns in northern France—via the inestimable Nag on the Lake
no longer part of the squad: the art of unfriending prior to social media—via Things magazine
onomatopoesie: a conservancy for endangered sounds—via Coudal Partners’ Fresh Signals
holidays are coming: a primer on Advent season—a movable, malleable fest
catagories: ๐ช๐บ, ๐ซ๐ท, ๐, ๐, libraries and museums, networking and blogging