Cultural Ties

I’ve stumbled across the Cultural Ties project a few times in the course of my travels across the web. It’s an intriguing idea: seventy-five artists, many of them well-established figures of international renown, were asked to create designs for limited-edition silk neckties. Given such a wealth of talent, it is surprising, perhaps, just how mediocre many of the designs turned out to be: neither succeeding quite as accessories, nor as works of art, and falling awkwardly somewhere in between. To my eye, some of the more subtly subversive of the designs work best:

It’s been more than three years since I last wore a tie on a regular basis. In the easy-going informality of my current office, suit-and-tie wearers are the weird-looking exception rather than the norm. In most of my jobs before this one, however, some kind of neckwear was required, or, at least, preferred. Some people strongly dislike wearing ties, but, for me, that slight constriction at the neck always seemed an apt and harmonious extension of the semi-strangulated state-of-mind engendered in me by full-time employment. Several of the ties I owned were ‘cultural’ ties of a kind, I suppose, being obviously inspired by painterly styles: I had one, for example, whose fuzzy blues, greens and lilacs were clearly derived from Monet’s waterlily canvases; and another whose bright mosaic of colours owed a clear debt to Klimt. I still have half-a-dozen ties, which normally hang folornly in a closet, but which I retrieved to present here in what may well be their final public appearance…

From left to right we see here a Redaelli tie; something from the Tie Rack chain, and a Bill Blass tie that my mother-in-law picked out for me.

Again, from left to right: the tie from the now defunct UK chain ‘Principles for men’ which I wore on our wedding-day: I don’t recall whether the oily stain is a relic of that date, or if it derives from a more recent mishap; a Kenzo tie; and a marbled-silk tie from Alberto Valese Ebrû in Venice.

The Salt, or the Ketchup?

I read Christopher Alexander’s book The Phenomenon of Life a few weeks ago, the first of four volumes in his work The Nature of Order: ‘An Essay on the Art of Building and The Nature of the Universe.’ As its subtitle implies, this is foremost a treatise on architecture, but one with general ontological pretensions. I could concur or at least sympathise with many of the points Alexander makes in the book, but found some other of its ideas very difficult to swallow.

And what I mean, in general, is that every single part of the matter-space continuum has life in some degree, with some parts having very much less, and others having very much more (p. 31).

Alexander proposes that some buildings are more alive than others; that some locales have an intense feeling of life about them, while others seem dead. Moreover, the degree of life in a building, he writes, is largely due to its architecture. He deplores much recent architectural practice, and that of the twentieth-century in particular, for its failure to breathe life into buildings. This is a point-of-view I intuitively share, as, more broadly, I can share his almost animistic view of the universe.

The general idea is that the wholeness in any part of space is the structure defined by all the various coherent entities that exist in that part of space, and the way these entities are nested in and overlap each other (p. 81).

Alexander writes that buildings, and natural structures (not excluding organisms), should be considered as wholenesses. The degree of life of a wholeness, he puts it, depends on the configuration of its constituent centers. Thus a tree, seen as a wholeness, has branches and roots for centers, and a branch, seen as a whole, has twigs as centers, which has leaves for centers, and so forth. He insists that centers are recursive entities that can be defined only in terms of other centers. All of which leads me to wonder firstly why he needs the notion of wholeness in the first place, when the tree could be seen as just one more center in the forest, say; and secondly that this definition of centers, whilst superficially a very general and useful one, could only be of limited practical value, inasmuch as its recursion continues indefinitely without ever meeting a base case. One begins to feel that ‘the wonderful thing about centers is that centers are wonderful things…’

Great fleas have little fleas,
upon their backs that bite 'em.
And little fleas have lesser fleas
and so ad infinitum.
- Augustus de Morgan.

In an Appendix, Alexander attempts a mathematical definition of wholeness using topology to describe the interrelationship of spatial regions and sub-regions. Yet, elsewhere he asserts that:

A center is not a point, not a perceived center of gravity. It is rather a field of organized force in an object or part of an object which makes that object or part exhibit centrality (p. 118).

I know next-to-nothing about mathematical topology, but my naïve supposition would be that a fuzzy and effectively boundaryless ‘field of organized force’ would not submit readily to topological scrutiny.

In Chapter Eight of the book, ‘The Mirror of the Self’, Alexander introduces ‘an empirical test for comparing the degree of life of different centers’ in which the reader is invited to choose one from various pairs of pictures of objects according to an elusive criterion that Alexander variously states as ‘which of these two things generates, in the observer, the most wholesome feeling’; or ‘which of these two things would I prefer to become by the day of my death?’; or ‘which is more deeply connected to your eternal self?’; or…

Suppose you and I are discussing this matter in a coffee-shop. I look around on the table for things to use in an experiment. There is a bottle of ketchup on the table, and, perhaps, an old-fashioned salt-shaker, both shown [below]. I ask you ‘Which one of these is more like your own self?’ […] you, your own self, in your totality (p. 316).

I make it clear that I am asking which is the better picture of all of you, the whole of you: a picture which shows you as you are, with all your hopes, fears, weaknesses, glory and absurdity, and which - as far as possible - includes everything you could ever hope to be (p. 317).

I think we can conclude, then, that the question has an aspirational, as well as a simply descriptive dimension. Alexander states that, in his experiments, more than eighty percent of respondents chose the salt. I chose the ketchup. It’s not that I even like ketchup, but it struck me that the fluid, messy stuff, an opaque mixture of disparate ingredients, and not necessarily wholesome ones at that, was more like the essential me, even in my ultimate aspirations, than was the pure crystallinity of the salt.

Alexander seems to suggest that there is only one correct answer to this, and similar questions, that there is an objectively true response based on some kind of shared human intuition or experience, and that the ketchupites can, in effect, be made to realise the error of their ways. I would beg to differ. More broadly, he is making a claim for an entirely objective aesthetics: I suppose I am extremely uncomfortable, although I might struggle to articulate exactly why, with the notion that everybody should necessarily like the same things.

Overall though, this was a very interesting book, and I found much to admire, most especially in his discussion of the characteristics he reckons to be ‘the fifteen fundamental properties of life.’ I’ll probably order volume II when it comes out. Much of what Alexander writes about architecture makes the best of sense, at least to this layman - and if I had the chance I’d invite him build a house for me: I’d just leave the job of designing a universe to someone else…

Mira Calligraphiæ Monumenta

I felt like adorning thse pages with some scans from my copy of the facsimile edition of the Mira Calligraphiæ Monumenta (a book I’ve mentioned a couple of times before), so, here we are:

Folio 3: Love-in-a-mist; sweet cherry; spanish chestnut.

Folio 10: Damselfly; French rose, pink, semidouble; spanish chestnut, spider.

Folio 13: Medlar; poppy anemone; common pear.

Folio 40: Imaginary butterfly; snakeshead; english walnut; sweet cherry.

Folio 51: Unidentifiable caterpillar; common pear; tulip - pink - bordered white; purple snail.

Folio 60: Pink tulip; imaginary insect; worm.

Folio 64: European wild pansy; artichoke.

Folio 94: Hyacinth - white bud; black mulberry; unidentifiable caterpillar.

On many of the folios the calligraphy begins flush with the left-hand edge of the page, making it difficult to scan the pages’ contents complete without mutilating the book: I settled for scanning pages where the text and image block was more-or-less centred. Click on any of the images above to see a larger-than-lifesize version of the same.

Yet More Free Books

It is time for the third in my occasional series of book give-aways. The deal is the same as before: to claim one of the books listed below, leave a comment including your e-mail address that states which of the books you’d like. Then send me an e-mail which includes a mailing address. Based on a general first-come, first-served principle, with a restriction of one-book-per-recipient, I will allocate who gets what, and will dispatch the books within a week or so. I’ll pay all postage costs. Happy reading!

1. number9dream, by David Mitchell. This was a pretty good story, I thought, that was half-spoiled by some weak side-plots that did nothing but delay moving the main plot-line along. I bought this one at the bookstore downstairs from our apartment. My copy is not quite in pristine condition, having been used to prop open a skylight for a month or two. Paperback; published by Sceptre, 418pp; ISBN: 0340747978.

2. W. Somerset Maugham’s Cakes and Ale. This is the first of Maugham’s books that I’ve gotten around to reading. It falls into the category of ‘quite enjoyed it, but, probably wouldn’t read it again.’ My copy is a Vintage Classics paperback; 196pp; ISBN: 0099282771.

3. I’d read good things about Nick Bantock’s ‘Griffin and Sabine’ books, so, when I saw a copy of his The Forgetting Room at the Akademibokhandeln store in Stockholm last month, I thought I’d give it a try. Whilst the illustrations are undeniably lovely, I found that I did not enjoy Bantock’s prose, which relates an artist’s journey of self-discovery in Andalucía, nearly as well as his artwork. This is a HarperCollins paperback; 105pp; ISBN: 0060931264.

4. I ordered Ludvik Vaculik’s novel The Guinea Pigs on the strength of a very fine and favourable review. It’s an interesting and a disquieting novel, ‘a chilling fable about dehumanization and alienation representing Vaculik’s vision of the menace of Soviet domination in the wake of the 1969 invasion [of Czechoslovakia]’ but it’s not a book that I am likely to revisit. It was translated from the Czech by Neal Ascherson. Paperback; Northwestern University Press; 168pp; ISBN: 0810107260.

5. Hunger, Knut Hamsun’s rawly intense novel does indeed seem, as has been widely noted, at least thirty years ahead of its time (1890). ‘A compelling trip into the mind of a young writer, driven by starvation to fluctuating extremes of euphoria and despair.’ My copy is of Sverre Lyngstad’s translation. Paperback; published by Rebel Inc.; 204pp; ISBN: 0862418968.

6. I thought that getting hold of a copy of The Hieroglyphics of Horapollo might feed my interest in emblems and pictorial symbolism, but, I found little enjoyment or enlightenment from this rather dry book. ‘Reputedly written by an Egyptian magus, Horapollo Niliacus, in the 4th century BC, The Hieroglyphics is an anthology of [descriptions of] nearly 200 hieroglyphics or allegorical emblems, said to have been used by the Pharaonic scribes in describing natural and moral aspects of the world.’ Paperback; Princeton University Press; 146pp; ISBN: 0691000921.

7. Victoria Finlay’s Colour: Travels through the Paintbox is an extensive travelogue through which the author traces the origins of many of the traditional pigments used by painters throughout history: ochre, vermillion, ultramarine, etc. I enjoyed this anecdote-rich book, but don’t feel the need to keep it as a work of reference. Hardback; Sceptre; 509pp; ISBN: 0340733284.

8. I don’t know what I was thinking when I ordered a translation of an obscure 16th-century alchemical work, Giovanni Battista Nazari’s Three Dreams on the Transmutation of Metals. I was curious, I suppose, and thought that the book might bear some resemblance to the marvellous Hypnerotomachia Poliphili… In any case, I was disappointed. The translation from the Italian was done by Doug Skinner. Hardback; 147pp; published by Adam McLean as part of his ‘Magnum Opus Hermetic Sourceworks’ series; (No ISBN).. Number 76 in an edition of 300.

9. The Shadow Club: The Greatest Mystery in the Universe - Shadows - And the Thinkers Who Unlocked their Secrets is the rather grandiose title given to the English translation of Roberto Casati’s book that was originally issued in Italian as La Scoperta dell‘ombra, ‘The Discovery of the Shadow.’ This is an absorbing popular-science discussion of the phenomenon of shadows, with particular reference to their rôle in the great astronomical advances of the 17th and 18th centuries. The book was translated by Abigail Asher. Hardback; 240pp; Alfred A. Knopf; ISBN: 0375407278.

10. In a previous entry here, a commenter wondered what my opinion was of the German writer Hans Henny Jahnn. I had never heard of him, but, after some searching around, was intrigued enough about this pacifist, novelist, organ-restorer, horse-breeder and self-proclaimed hormone-researcher, to order a copy of The Ship, a 1961 translation of Jahnn’s das Holzschiff, which relates the bizarre goings-on aboard a sailing ship carrying a mysterious cargo. Alas, as it turned out, I didn’t like Jahnn’s style at all, and couldn’t finish the book. Catherine Hutter did the translating from the German. Hardcover; Charles Scribner’s Sons; 210pp; No ISBN.

Athaneo

Here are some woodcuts from a 1681 publication by one Joseph Romaguera, that glories in the title of Atheneo de grandesa sobre eminencias cultas catalana facundia ab Emblemas illustrada. The book was printed in Barcelona, by the firm of Joan Jolis.

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Romaguera was an Inquisitor, and canon of the Barcelona see. He is remembered as a defender of the Catalan tongue. His book is one of several featured in an interesting on-line exhibition, Aureum Opus: ‘five centuries of the illustrated book.’

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My only reason for re-posting these woodcuts here is that they caught my eye as having an uncommon expressive force about them, so I magpied them, to better feather this virtual nest. Click on the images to see slightly larger versions of the same.

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Gertrude Hamilton

The latest of many visual delights I have discovered by way of Signor Mori’s marvellous weblog cipango are the contemporary botanical watercolours of Gertrude Hamilton.

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Although it is my subject I do not consider myself a botanical painter. I have no interest in merely copying a plant, I think that photography can do a better job. I like to capture the personality of every living thing. Every flower, every cherry is different, and this is what fascinates me… - Gertrude Hamilton.

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The blurb at the Phillips Fine Art website from where I lifted these images cites influences ‘as diverse as Pompeiian frescoes, Piero della Francesca and Dürer’. I can’t say it’s an influence, but these images, with their penlike flourishes, remind me of Joris Hoefnagel’s illustrations in the Mira Calligraphiae Monumenta.

The Grammar of Ornament

I only recently became aware of Owen Jones’ 1856 book The Grammar of Ornament:

…one of the defining works in decorative arts, the masterwork of Welsh architect and interior designer Owen Jones (1808-74), whose grand tour of Turkey, Egypt, Sicily, and Spain in 1831 marked the beginning of his fascination with illustrations of ornament. His aim was not to produce general artistic views, but to provide scientific accuracy in reproducing his exact and detailed records of colors and patterns. No printer in London at the time could meet Jones’ requirements, and eventually he set up his own press to produce the book’s 110 magnificent chromolithographs… - Michael Darby.

The book also included Jones’ design manifesto, summarised as a list of thirty-seven propositions. For example:

1. The Decorative Arts arise from, and should properly be attendant upon, Architecture.

2. Architecture is the material expression of the wants, the faculties, and the sentiments, of the age in which it is created…

3. As Architecture, so all works of the Decorative Arts, should possess fitness, proportion, harmony, the result of all which is repose.

4. True beauty results from that repose which the mind feels when the eye, the intellect, the affections, are satisfied from any want.

5. Construction should be decorated. Decoration should never be purposely constructed…

This page was my source for the images above.

Cat Pictures

I’ve been busy at work this past week, and have had little time left over for all this webloggery nonsense. As a quick interim, here are a couple of snapshots of the larger and more vindictive of our two cats…

These were among a dozen or so pictures I salvaged from an old memory-card we put aside after buying a more capacious one. They were taken two and a bit years ago, not long after we’d moved into the Mañana.

As I once said in my sleep, ‘he looks like the kind of cat who would knock things over…’

Espresso

I have been hoplessly addicted to caffeine for the past fifteen years, so, one of the first things I will do on any given morning is make myself a coffee. Although almost any kind of coffee will do at a stretch, I prefer espresso, and specifically Lavazza’s Qualità Rossa blend. Other coffees may be smoother and more refined, but I have found nothing to match Qualità Rossa’s ability to jump-start my drowsy, stimulant-starved brain into something resembling wakefulness.

For years I relied on Bialetti’s marvellous stove-top contraptions, in particular their Brikka model, to make my caffè normale, until, a couple of years ago, my wife insisted we should splash out on a Gaggia Classic Coffee machine. I’m glad she did, as it’s turned out to be an easier and more consistent way of getting that crucial first cup of the day just right.

While the Gaggia machine is reassuringly heavy-duty, its design necessarily owes more to utility than elegance. Not so the devices pictured above and below, drawn from Enrico Maltoni’s collection of antique Italian coffee-machinery, which are as much sculptures in shiny metal as they are mechanisms for dispensing coffee…

Imperial Russian Playing Cards

Meeting of Frontiers is ‘a bilingual, multimedia English-Russian digital library that tells the story of the American exploration and settlement of the West, the parallel exploration and settlement of Siberia and the Russian Far East, and the meeting of the Russian-American frontier in Alaska and the Pacific Northwest.’ Amongst the many interesting things exhibited therein is an eye-catching deck of Imperial Russian playing cards…

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The deck was issued by Sobranie, and was designed (if I’ve construed this correctly) by one K.M. Gribanov. They currently belong to the National Library of Russia’s cartography division in St. Petersburg. Click on the images to view enlarged versions of the same.

The backs of the cards are illustrated too, with maps of the relevant locales. Here are the reverses of the four cards above….

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The Trees, the Constellations

I’ve spent a lot of time walking through Amiralitetsparken, ‘the Admiralty Park’. It takes about ten minutes for Dog and I to walk around it, and we’ve walked around it at least twenty-three hundred times over the past twenty-seven months, making for an approximate total park-time in excess of sixteen days. Some of the park’s trees are already beginning to shed their leaves, which have been eased from their branches by a prematurely cold-edged breeze.

The helpful park-keepers have set up some signs which provide a key to the various species of tree that I see there every day. I have yet to make use of these, however, and, until I do, I must continue to classify them more naïvely: as big/not so big/little; spiky/non-spiky; rough/smooth-trunked; or the like. I should like to know my trees better, and be able, confronted with a tree in a new locale to say with confidence, ahh, a larch, for example. Little name tags have even been pinned to a few of the trees (perhaps at one time all of them were identified thus). One says silverlönn, (silver maple) another parklinden...

I sometimes have cause to regret my lack of botanical knowledge, such as when I read a descriptive passage in a novel mentioning an elm, let’s say, or a beech, which, in either case will evoke in me the same generic mental image: tree: large, non-spiky…

On a couple of recent clear nights, some of the lights which line the paths through the park have been dead, permitting a better than usual view of the stars, from whose spatter-pattern I could only discern the ‘W’ shape of Cassiopeia…

…and the familiar outline of Ursa Major, which I always think of, in any case, as ‘the saucepan’. Besides those two, I can readily recognise Orion, when he comes out for the hunt. It occurs to me though, that constellations really ought to be personal matters, each to his or her own, like some celestial ink-blot test: when I look up it never occurs to me to see a lion’s shape, or a scorpion’s, or an eagle’s. Indeed, looking at a list of non-standard names for star-patterns yields surprises such as ‘the Cat’, ‘the Lily’, ‘the Electric Machine’, ‘the Northern Fly’, ‘the Printing Office’ and ‘the Solitary Thrush’…