The story of Chicago and its hinterland is one of the wildest histories of socio-economic growth you will encounter. In our time perhaps only comparable with the rapid growth of the Chinese economy and population. The story of Chicago is perhaps also the most revealing story to understand the American Dream and American Exceptionalism on one hand and the depravity of American capitalism on the other hand.
In 1830, Chicago barely did exist, but in the minds of a few so-called boosters or land speculators and a dozen early settlers. In 1840, Chicago had grown over 500% and counted a little over 4,000 settlers. Fifty years later, Chicago boasted over a million citizens and in the 1890 census had become the second largest city in the United States, after New York City. It was selected as the site for the World’s Columbian Exhibit in 1893 that commemorated the arrival of Columbus in the continent 400 years earlier, and surpassed in grandeur even the World’s Fair or Exposition Universelle of 1889 in Paris. The Chicago Exhibit became the site of the original Ferris Wheel that outdid the Eiffel Tower. Chicago had become the beginning and end station for all rail road routes in the United States, had centered the meat packing industry and the agricultural industry, but also had become the crime capital and witness to deplorable labor circumstances and exploitation. Read more of this article »
Posted in Architecture, Book Reviews, Chicago, Fiction, Non-Fiction, USA Tagged with: architecture, chicago, crime, the devil in the white city, the jungle, upton sinclair
One of my favorite garage punk songs by English artists is the Headcoats’ ‘Art or Arse’ with Billy Childish (from Tracey Emin). With a little stretch of mind, it raises the question of all times, ‘What is Art?’. One proposition to investigate this question is to look at the neural activity during an aesthetic experience. One of the two opponents at the ‘Can neuroscience help us understand art?’ debate at NYU’s Casa Italiana, Gabrielle Starr, studied the brain activity. One of her findings is a peak activity of the occidental lobe or visual processing and the striatum or reward system of the brain. Her opponent in the debate was Alva Noe , a philosopher who spoke out against the presumption that neuroscience can help us understand the true value of art. Read more of this article »
Posted in Arts, Neuroesthetics, New York, Philosophy, Science, USA
James Turrell’s latest light work is nothing less than a visual and spacial metamorphosis of the iconic spiral of the Guggenheim into a living set of Space Odyssey 2001 where the viewer is transcended up to the ovals above.
By blending the space into the art by his use of light, James Turrell (1943-present) equally absorbs the viewer, placing us immediately into the center of the installation. Aten Reign (2013) was especially designed for the rotunda of the Guggenheim. The inner space has been closed from the outer space by a soft white fabric along the full length of the spiraling gallery. The inner space has been carefully recreated and molded into a evenly shaped cone, while the original spiral effect of line and circle, has been projected onto the ceiling and flattened into a set of embedded oval hues. Around this inner cave of false shadows, runs the original spiral designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, but it has now become an empty row, a gallery of space itself, which has been revealed in its bare original beauty, and walking through it, gives you the feeling of walking through the exoskeleton of both Turrell’s and Wright’s parallel universes. Read more of this article »
Posted in Art Review, Houston, Installation, Los Angeles, New York, USA Tagged with: Frank Lloyd Wright, Ganzfeld effect, Golden Ratio, Guggenheim, James Turrell, Quakers, Ra, Space Odyssey 2001
Bestsellers in Polyglot New York paint 50 different shades of writing.
Posted in Fiction, Mini Posts, USA
Min-Sik Choi is the godfather of the Korean actors guild. He established himself as a cult hero with his role in Oldboy (2003) and I Saw the Devil (2010).
At the Lincoln Center during the the New York Asian Film Festival 2012, Mr. Choi appeared as the leading guest of the festival speaking in Korean. Toward the end of Nameless Gangster, Mr. Choi sends his son to the US with the words ‘English makes you number 1’ and perhaps Mr. Choi is too big for Korea too. With his role in Nameless Gangster or The Golden Age of Crime he proves himself the leading actor transcending Korean cinema.
The director Jong-Bin Yoon is a fan of both Martin Scorsese and Mr. Choi, and the protagonist’s name Ik-hyun Choi (played by Mr. Choi) refers to Mr. Choi, according to the producer. Min-Sik Choi and Jung-Woo Ha (playing the role of Hyung-bae Choi) play two characters whose mind and muscle combine Read more of this article »
Posted in Korea, Movie Reviews
French philosopher Alexis de Tocqueville formulated an opinion of America that Americans still strongly believe in today, the myth of American Exceptionalism. It argues that while Europe and other continents have suffered from internal strive between nation states and ethnical conflict, America takes an exceptional position in the world, being a country of immigrants who are united by the common fulfillment of opportunity and the equality guaranteed by the constitution and democracy.
In the New York Times this weekend an article by Sam Tanenhaus, In Texas Curriculum Fight, Identity Politics Leans Right analyzing the ‘cultural war’ in America between progressives and conservatives.
The article refers to an influential essay The Search for Southern Identity by Vonn Woodward, an American historian.
Posted in USA
This Land is a weekly column by Dan Barry for the New York Times with in-depth stories about American towns and people.
Posted in Mini Posts, USA
In his project 100×100 Michael Wolf photographed 100 rooms in Hong Kong’s oldest public housing estate.
Posted in China, Mini Posts
Since the Kazynski twins took power in Poland a new post-communist reveille has awakened the Catholic conservatives in Poland’s moral revolution:
“Seventeen years after Poland swept aside communism, the government is trying to launch a moral revolution.
Under the leadership of the Kazycinski twins, the old communist archives are to be used to exclude from public life anyone who collaborated with the former regime.
The Kazycinskis talk of purifying the country, and bringing the values of the Catholic Church to the heart of public life.”
Posted in Mini Posts, Poland
One day I will understand
that straight lines are necessary,
but optimism will quiet me
and I will conclude: this is not enough!
I will start burrowing in the garbage to become surer of my belief,
and right there I will find my childhood
and, overwhelmed with hope for despair,
Mania Grandioso will take me to the eighth floor,
where a blue-eyed Angel will make me feel deeply
the existence of The Eighth Day.
Standing on one leg,
until I resemble my recognition, Read more of this article »