3rd March 2003

The good Dr Inversus points out re the diatoms: 'why is there a copyright symbol and a K in the diatom in the third row, first column?'
Well, it's all part of the move towards advertising via genetically modified organisms, and this is a first try using something small - or possibly before the advertisers realised that the market share they'd get from touting their wares to amateur microscopists is ludicrously small. I heard on the radio the other day that butterfly genomes are being investigated with a view to printing 'Coca-Cola' across their wings, with the reservation being that the words would have to be a palindrome of symmetrical letters to make any sense at all. Re cola, there have recently sprouted a couple of 'ethical alternative' or 'anti-imperialist' colas: Qibla Cola, which gives 10% of its profits to third world charities including Palestinian causes, and the splendid:

Bet they still rot your teeth though.

comment

4th March 2003

Massive thanks to Jouke for pointing out the amazing and complete Kunstformen der Natur by Ernst Haeckel, with giant scans and luscious colours. Rarely does one's mouth almost drop open when looking at a website, but this one does it. Now you'll be able to recognize me this summer by my iron-on t-shirt.

comment

7th March 2003

hommage à ftrain

comment

10th March 2003

Adam Faith died this weekend. In the 1960 film Beat Girl his character had this to say:

A striking and controversial statement at the time, and one which seems quite apposite just at the moment.

comment

11th March 2003

comment

12th March 2003

Thanks to the kindness and herculean labours of imaginary friends (stand up, Ms Miranda Gaw!), I now have a comments system.

                                        * * *

An assiduous reader sends a joke (thanks Al):

How do you disarm Saddam Hussein?
Tell him how much you like his moustache.

comment

14th March 2003

In her book On Photography, Susan Sontag opens with a queasy dismissal of the practice of photography as a useless duplication of the world, a violation of Occam's Razor which needlessly produces more and more copies of what is already there.
Well, so what. A reductio ad absurdam of this view would leave us with no representations of anything, stripping us back to the mop and bucket of practical objects. Of course Sontag isn't proposing this, but opening a book which ends up sympathetic to photography in this way leaves a strange taste in the mouth. Her proposal that reality has become swamped with false or low-grade copies of itself doesn't really stand up: photography in fact is rather rare in the world considered as a whole, with the world representing itself in the main. The world is very much there all right - there are many human artifacts which detract from things we like about it, but photography is low on the list.
David Hockney has tried blanket photographic coverage of certain areas, and I always come back to looking at Pearblossom Highway, with its heightened perspective and meticulous recording of detail - but even this massive collage merely chips away at one tiny part of the planet's surface, duplicating as it does just one view of a square mile or so - while providing us with a fine artwork, of course.
But producing objects extraneous to basic existence is one of the things our species does best - we love to duplicate things over and over again, perhaps something that stems from playing at reproducing ourselves. We can make copies of what is already there, flawed copies, enhanced copies, copies spun and built and covered in chocolate sauce with a cherry on the top. Or we can choose not to. Or we can do anything in between.

comment

17th March 2003

comment

18th March 2003

comment

20th March 2003

Music as science fiction: strange sounds from another star. If you've never heard music from Ethiopia, this is how it may strike you. Tezeta* is the Ethiopian blues: slow, nostalgic, aching music that sounds as though it comes through the musicians straight out of the ground. But like the blues, it's a young music - it may sound eternal, but the sleevenotes to Ethiopiques 10: Tezeta suggest that it evolved only about 40 years ago. Here's Mahmoud Ahmed, one of the less unknown Ethiopian musicians in the west, with a smouldering twelve minute tezeta.

* The word means 'memory' in the Amharic language.

comment

22nd March 2003

comment

24th March 2003

comment

25th March 2003

To the Wim Wenders photographic exhibition, Pictures of the Surface of the Earth, at Haunch of Venison Yard, W1.
Mr Wenders takes pictures which are very large - some cover almost the entire wall of the exhibition space. His pictures are mostly empty of humanity, and show deserted buildings or empty landscapes. The paintings of Mr Edward Hopper often have many of the same qualities:

Early Sunday Morning, by Mr Hopper

Street front in Butte, Montana, by Mr Wenders

I understand from the exhibition catalogue that Mr Wenders also directs motion pictures. Judging by his photographs, I would expect his pictures to be long, with few characters or conversations.

Your correspondent then went around the corner and ordered a falafel sandwich. The pitta was warm and crisp, the falafel were aromatic, with the shells of coriander seeds embedded in their surfaces. There was chili sauce, and tahini. It was very good.

comment

26th March 2003

The season's news ticker, the chiff-chaff alerts me through the window of my meeting-room that great things are afoot outside. He's eager, and early - last year he didn't contact me for another month.

comment

28th March 2003

comment

29th March 2003

I'm a bit behind things as usual, but the Invisible Library is back, after having had an up and down career for the last few years. One of their special requests at the moment: books found in P. G. Wodehouse's stories. I've just mailed them with a few bits and pieces that were missing, and I'm sure I'll remember some more in time to come.

                                        * * *

Scary moment when I looked at walden.org and found that almost all of Thoreau's journals had disappeared off the site. A response to my querulous demands from the nice people who run it:

Phew.

comment

31st March 2003

comment