Massive sculptures are fascinating and Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty walks the fine line between nature and the artificial. In 1970, he built a 1500-foot long, 15 foot-wide counterclockwise coil out of mud, salt crystals and rocks at the Great Salt Lake in Utah.

Like most land art, the Spiral Jetty is a part of its landscape and its affected by the elements: It exists to eventually erode under natural conditions. Since its creation, the jetty has been completely covered and uncovered by water several times, being dependent on fluctuating water levels.

When Smithson set out to build ”Spiral Jetty” in 1970, he hired a contractor and another worker who used two dump trucks, a tractor and a large front-loader to move 6,650 tons of rock and earth from the shore into the water. At 1,500 feet long, the giant spiral is large enough to be seen in photographs taken from space.

Smithson had a precise vision for the project and supervised every step, making sure individual rocks fell in the right spots. ”He would raise each rock up and roll it around, then he would move this one, change that one until it looked exactly right..He wanted it to look like it was a growing, living thing, coming out of the center of the earth.”

The Tate ETC has a great article chronicling a visit to the Spiral Jetty and feelings that it evokes:

Whenever the water of the lake recedes, it leaves salt in its wake. After the recent long drought, it now encrusts almost every inch of the work and a salt bed has risen and hardened within its 1,500ft-long spiral. It appears inevitable that after a few more cycles of high water and drought – probably a matter of decades – the Jetty will disappear completely within a matrix of impacted salt: an art conservation problem for the ages.

We visitors could see the process underway. The deep water lay far out in the lake bed, a roseate sea rippling away for miles, its surface torn into whitecaps by the wind. Between the Jetty and the water’s edge were scudding, tumbleweed-like plumes and quivering masses of salt foam, the latter in various stages of coalescence into the hard white ground, still tinged with rosy algae, on which we walked and stood.

Despite the facts, I kept imagining the lake bed and the work as being ice-bound rather than salt-bound, so white has the setting become. Spiral Jetty was not even 35 years old when I saw it, yet the mind could easily accept the thought of it as 3,500 or 35,000 years old. Only a nearby derelict oil rig, the ruins of a speculator’s failed scheme, provides some anchorage in time for the disorientated visitor. That, and the presence of other visitors.

Seeing the work from the nearby ridge, dotted with 30 or 40 people, created a slightly sickening sense both of humankind’s unstoppable dispersal across the planet and of the planet’s, and the larger universe’s, utter obliviousness.

In writings and conversation, its creator emphasised the difficulty of getting a fix on the scale of the Jetty. Now I knew how literally he meant it. From up on the ridge, the sculpture looks gargantuan in its prehensile hold on the lake bed. But set foot on it, and it turns almost intimate, a mere filigree of earth-moving within a desert immensity that lacks all familiar cues to the sizes and distances of things…

Smithson himself did a film on the Spiral Jetty, which you can view on his website (quicktime). A voice-over by Smithson reveals the evolution of the Spiral Jetty and sequences filmed in a natural history museum are integrated into the film featuring prehistoric relics that illustrate themes central to Smithson’s work. Here’s a short Youtube sample:

If you’re planning on visiting it, here are directions to the jetty.

Here’s an interesting device, particularly because it offers you the ability to reflectively record and examine your life. Right now it seems to be only limited to movement tracking but I like the idea of using self-surveillance to gain knowledge about oneself. Lifestreaming on the web has already taken a step in that direction.

The simple pedometer has been given a makeover. Fitbit, a startup based in San Francisco, has built a small, unobtrusive sensor that tracks a person’s movement 24 hours a day to produce a record of her steps taken, her calories burned, and even the quality of her sleep. Data is wirelessly uploaded to the Web so that users can monitor their activity and compare it with that of their friends.

Recently came across this poster. Reminds me of the sculpture work by Umberto Boccioni, a Futurist.

The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction contest is a writing competition sponsored by San Jose State University. Entrants are supposed to compose the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels. The poorer and more cheesy your metaphors the better your chance of winning.

Interesting how most of the grand prize winners involve sex.

Some of the ones I found funny:

“The countdown had stalled at T minus 69 seconds when Desiree, the first female ape to go up in space, winked at me slyly and pouted her thick, rubbery lips unmistakably–the first of many such advances during what would prove to be the longest, and most memorable, space voyage of my career.”

“Professor Frobisher couldn’t believe he had missed seeing it for so long–it was, after all, right there under his nose–but in all his years of research into the intricate and mysterious ways of the universe, he had never noticed that the freckles on his upper lip, just below and to the left of the nostril, partially hidden until now by a hairy mole he had just removed a week before, exactly matched the pattern of the stars in the Pleides, down to the angry red zit that had just popped up where he and his colleagues had only today discovered an exploding nova.”

“Ace, watch your head!” hissed Wanda urgently, yet somehow provocatively, through red, full, sensuous lips, but he couldn’t you know, since nobody can actually watch more than part of his nose or a little cheek or lips if he really tries, but he appreciated her warning.”

“On reflection, Angela perceived that her relationship with Tom had always been rocky, not quite a roller-coaster ride but more like when the toilet-paper roll gets a little squashed so it hangs crooked and every time you pull some off you can hear the rest going bumpity-bumpity in its holder until you go nuts and push it back into shape, a degree of annoyance that Angela had now almost attained.”

“Detective Bart Lasiter was in his office studying the light from his one small window falling on his super burrito when the door swung open to reveal a woman whose body said you’ve had your last burrito for a while, whose face said angels did exist, and whose eyes said she could make you dig your own grave and lick the shovel clean.”

When you were a kid, what did you think of scientists? Smart people in white lab coats peering into a microscope on a table surrounded by test-tubes and strange machinery? These images are hard to shake.

A group of 7th graders visited a laboratory and these collections of hand drawn pictures show how their impressions of the profession changes after getting to know scientists in person.

One of the most impressive prehistoric monuments in Britain, the Castlerigg Stone Circle is located in Cumbria, a shire county in the extreme North West of England. While not as well known as the Stonehenge, the Castlerigg circle is a remarkable artifact from the past that was constructed around 3000 BC, making it one of the earliest stone circles in Britain (and maybe Europe).

It’s hard to tell from the pictures but the 38 stones in the circle are quite large. The heaviest stone is around 16 tons and the tallest is approximately 2.3m high. The diameter for the circle is approximately 30m (100ft). A collection of 10 smaller stones are arranged in a rectangle on the south-east side of the ring (something not present in other stone circles).

So why were the stones placed there? What was their purpose? Researchers are generally divided into two camps: The ones that believe that builders of the past were skilled astronomers/mathematicians who carefully designed these circles. And the ones who believe that any geometry or astronomical alignments found are purely accidental, since the stone builders were primitive humans.

There are many different theories about Castlerigg, but much of it is speculation:

1. It’s an astronomical observatory. The tallest stone is in line with Samhain sunrise in early November. Samhain is the cross quarter of the astronomical year, half way between the autumn equinox and the winter solstice.




2. It was a marketplace for the Neolithic stone axe industry. The mountains and stone axes found at the site support this theory.




3. It was a gathering point used for religious ceremonies and tribal gathering.

On a more mysterious level, the circle has been the focus of one well-recorded sighting of strange light phenomena:

In 1919 a man called T. Singleton and his friend watched as white light-balls moved slowly over the stones. Strange lights seem to be a recurring theme at ancient sites throughout the world, they may have been one of the reasons ancient man built monuments at specific sites such as this one. There has been a lot of speculation as to their nature and it’s most probable they are part of some natural phenomena.

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The Guardian has a post on the 50 greatest arts videos on Youtube. It’s a great list with many gems. I particularly enjoyed the Sylvia Plath, William Burroughs and Hendrix videos. Happy viewing!:

YouTube is best known for its offbeat videos that become viral sensations. But among its millions of clips is a treasure trove of rare and fascinating arts footage, lovingly posted by fans. Ajesh Patalay selects 50 of the best – Joy Division’s TV debut, readings by Jack Kerouac, a Marlene Dietrich screen test, Madonna’s first performance… and much more.

You know when you fall in love, you sometimes get that literal feeling of melting into the other person. Dissolving, you fuse into into this bliss-out moment of forever. Gustav Klimt’s The Kiss illustrates this perfectly. I used to have this on a postcard, a pretty remnant of the idealized past.

Coincidences are fascinating. Are they part of a predestined reality or a pure accident cognitively generated by the mind’s tendency to favor patterns? More about the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon:

Baader-Meinhof is the phenomenon where one happens upon some obscure piece of information– often an unfamiliar word or name– and soon afterwards encounters the same subject again, often repeatedly. Anytime the phrase “That’s so weird, I just heard about that the other day” would be appropriate, the utterer is hip-deep in Baader-Meinhof. Most people seem to have experienced the phenomenon at least a few times in their lives, and many people encounter it with such regularity that they anticipate it upon the introduction of new information. But what is the underlying cause?

The 36 Views of Mount Fuji is a series of woodblock prints created between 1826 and 1833 by Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai. Popular in the West, it’s one of the most well known Japanese art works due the widespread pop-culture reproduction of The Great Wave of Kanagawa (the first picture in the series) into posters, t-shirts and postcards.

On Ukiyo-e – Japanese Woodblock Prints

The term Ukiyo-e refers to ‘pictures of the floating world‘, a blossoming urban culture embodied by the lifestyles of the cultural bourgeoisie. The novelist Asai Ryoi provided a definition of the ‘floating life’ in his 1661 novel Tales of the Floating World (Ukiyo-monogatari):

“Living only for the moment, savoring the moon, the snow, the cherry blossoms and the maple leaves, singing songs, loving sake, women and poetry, letting oneself drift, buoyant and carefree, like a gourd carried along with the river current.”

Woodblock prints became popular in the Edo period during the second half of the 17th century. Mass produced for townsmen and common folk, its subject matter originally began with city life and culture before evolving into the topic of landscapes. Like almost all mediums, ukiyo-e was also used to produce sexually explicit images (shunga) and satire.

While the production process may vary, Katsushika Hokusai’s 36 Views of Mount Fuji was developed by first drawing an image on paper, which was than used as a guide to carve a wooden block. The block was then inked and applied to sheets of paper to create an image. Hokusai used a wide range of colors, thus requiring the use of multiple blocks for each image.

The pivotal point in the art of ukiyo-e came with Katsushika Hokusai, “the one obsessed with painting”. He conclusively shifted the emphasis from personal portraiture to a depiction of nature. Hokusai began by creating landscapes in the spirit of ancient Japanese art; he went on to attain a new vision of nature.

He was fascinated with European copperplate engraving, a technique which he had encountered in his studies. Through color shading and depth perspective, he strove for a new spatial reality. The results were strange, surrealistic creations of the imagination, which he soon surpassed. (source)

On Katsushika Hokusai: Legendary Artist of the Edo Period

Katsushika Hokusai is an interesting character. One of Japan’s leading experts on Chinese painting during the Edo period, he began painting by the age of 6 and was known by at least 30 names during his lifetime. He was keen on experimental displays of art: once at the competition held by the Shogun, he painted a blue curve on paper while chasing a chicken with red paint on its feet across it. He described it as a landscape showing a river with red maple leaves floating on it. He won.

He was also instrumental in the creation of the modern manga comics you see, having created the Hokusai Manga (random illustrations of animals, religious figures, and everyday people) in 1811 as a way to make money and attract students.

What I liked most about Hokusai was his view that painting was a way to develop a complete understanding of reality, a result of his belief in Nichiren Buddhism. A postscript from his work One Hundred Views of Mount Fuji reads:

From around the age of six, I had the habit of sketching from life. I became an artist, and from fifty on began producing works that won some reputation, but nothing I did before the age of seventy was worthy of attention. At seventy-three, I began to grasp the structures of birds and beasts, insects and fish, and of the way plants grow.

If I go on trying, I will surely understand them still better by the time I am eighty-six, so that by ninety I will have penetrated to their essential nature. At one hundred, I may well have a positively divine understanding of them, while at one hundred and thirty, forty, or more I will have reached the stage where every dot and every stroke I paint will be alive. May Heaven, that grants long life, give me the chance to prove that this is no lie.

Hokusai died in 1849 at 89 years old. On his deathbed, he said, “If only Heaven will give me just another ten years… Just another five more years, then I could become a real painter.” Over the span of his career, his most popular and influential work in Japan and the West was the 36 Views of Mouth Fuji, the full set of which you can view below.

You’ll notice that there are 46 prints below. The first 36 were included in the original publication, and later on 10 more prints were included, due to the popularity of the series. Fortunately, all of the images are now in the public domain because their copyright has expired.

1. The Great Wave off Kanagawa

Published in 1832 (Edo Period) as the first in Hokusai’s series, this is his most famous work. It depicts an enormous wave threatening boats near the Japanese prefecture of Kanagawa; Mount Fuji can be seen in the background. The wave is probably not intended to be a tsunami, but a normal ocean wave created by the wind.

2. Mount Fuji in Clear Weather (also known as Red Fuji)

3. A Shower Below The Summit

4. Fuji seen through the Mannen bridge at Fukagawa, Edo

5. The Fuji seen from the Surugadai hill, Edo

6. The coast of seven leagues in Kamakura

7. Senju in the Musashi Province

8. Tama River in the Musashi Province

9. Inume pass in the Kai Province

10. Fujimi Fuji view field in the Owari Province

11. Asakusa Honganji temple in the Eastern capital (Edo)

12. Tsukada Island in the Musashi Province

13. Shichiri beach in Sagami Province

14. Umegawa in Sagami Province

15. Kajikazawa in Kai Province

16. Mishima pass in Kai Province

17. Lake Suwa in the Shinano Province

18. Ejiri in the Suruga Province

19. The Fuji from the mountains of T?t?mi

20. Ushibori in the Hitachi Province

21. A sketch of the Mitsui shop in Suruga street in Edo

22. Sunset across the Ry?goku bridge from the bank of the Sumida River at Onmayagashi

23. Sazai hall – 500 Rakanji temple

24. Tea house at Koishikawa. The morning after a snowfall

25. Shimomeguro

26. Watermill at Onden

27. Enoshima in the Sagami Province

28. Shore of Tago Bay, Ejiri at Tokaido

29. Yoshida at Tokaido

30. The Kazusa Province sea route

31. Nihonbashi bridge in Edo

32. Village of Sekiya at Sumida River

33. Bay of Noboto

34. The lake of Hakone in the Sagami Province

35. The Fuji reflects in Lake Kawaguchi, seen from the Misaka pass in the Kai Province

36. Hodogaya on the Tokaido

37. Honjo Tatekawa, the timberyard at Honjo

38. Pleasure District at Senju

39. Goten-yama-hill, Shinagawa on the Tokaido

40. Nakahara in the Sagami Province

41. Dawn at Isawa in the Kai Province

42. The back of the Fuji from the Minobu river

43. Ono Shinden in the Suruga Province

44. The Tea plantation of Katakura in the Suruga Province

45. The Fuji from Kanaya on the Tokaido

46. Climbing on Fuji