Not Sweating the Small Stuff

2011-06-26T00:24:00.001-07:00

Étienne-Louis Boullée - Sliding Doors

Cénotaphe à Newton (1784, sphere of 150 m or 500 ft in diameter)

I was doing some serious time-travelling this morning, way way back into distant antiquity: my first degree in fine art.

I was browsing one of my trusty but now metaphorically yellowing course books for a unit I took on C20 architecture, naturally from the aesthetic rather than engineering perspective. As Isipped my coffee (I wonder why 'sipping' seems such a tea thing?), I was flicking through the tome in question, my Charles Jencks's 'Modern Movements in Architecture', and was put in mind of megalomaniac and a visionary C18 architect Étienne-Louis Boullée (1728-1799).

Boullée's abstract geometric style, inspired by C17 and C18 French Classical architecture, took geometric forms to a giagantic and simplified scale. His proposed works that were devoid of ornament and used light and shadow and a sense of movement in highly innovative ways.

Cénotaphe à Newton: Interior

'Newton's cenotaph was designed to isolate, to reinvent, the huge movement of time and celestial phenomena. Inside, the viewer is isolated too, on a small viewing platform. Along the top half of the sphere's edges, apertures in the stone allow light in, in pins, creating starlight when there is daylight. During the night a huge and otherworldly light hangs, flooding the sphere, as sunlight. During the day, the "night effect." During the night, day.'

Entree du cimmetiere (c1780-90)

The French architect was interested in making architecture expressive of purpose, an approach his detractors termed 'architecture parlante' ('talking architecture').

Interior space is opened up to flow from one functional area to another rather than such areas being closed off in descrete separate 'rooms'.

By now you can see where this is heading!

Cénotaphe de Turenne

Cénotaphe égyptien (c1786)

Of course Boullée's work was re-discovered in the late C19 and early C20, influencing architecture, even as recently as that of Aldo Rossi (1931-1997) ...

... in his Bonnefanten Museum in Maastricht ...

Bonnefanten Museum in Maastricht

You'll also know Rossi from his designs for Alessi ...

'La Cupola' Espresso Maker

'Il conico', 1986

'La conica', 1982

However, apart from a number of private houses designed beween 1762 and 1778, none of Boullée's large scale works were ever built, though his designs in engravings were circulated widely in professional circles.

I can't help having a sliding doors moment, wondering about the course of C19 architeture had it moved forward on Boullée's ideas and not taken to its various backward-looking Gothic/Rennaissance/electic diversions.

PS: Boullée recently-ish popped up unexpectedly at the movies. In Peter Greenaway's film 'The Belly of an Architect' (1987), whose main character, Stourley Krackite, is obsessed with celebrating the C18 French architect's work.

2011-06-20T22:46:00.000-07:00

Oscar Wilde Reaches Across Time

After recently posting on gay hero Quentin Crisp, there seemed a kind of follow on logic for one on Oscar Wild as recently I came across the only recording of the poet and playwright's voice. In which he recites nearly two verses from the fourth canto of 'The Ballad of Reading Gaol' ...

In Reading Gaol by Reading Town
There is a pit of shame,
And in it lies a wretched man
Eaten by teeth of flame,
In burning winding-sheet he lies,
And his grave has got no name.

[And there, till Christ call forth the dead,
In silence let him lie:]

No need to waste the foolish tear,
Or heave the windy sigh:
The man had killed the thing he loved,
And so he had to die.

As we all know, Wilde was imprisoned in 1895 for two years with hard labour after the follow-up trials to his failed attempt to sue the Marquess of Queensbury for the calling card libel of 'For Oscar Wilde, posing sodomite'.

'The Ballad of Reading Gaol' was written in France in Berneval or Dieppe on or about 19 May 1897 and was initially published under the the name 'C.3.3' - for cell block C, landing 3, cell 3 of Wilde's incarceration.

Wilde in Exile in France c1900

The poem was inspired partly by the hanging in 1896 of a fellow prisoner, Charles Thomas Wooldridge, for the throat-cutting murder of his wife - 'The man had killed the thing he loved, And so he had to die.'

I am fascinated to know the particular character of the poet and playwright's voice, as it must give a clue to the delivery of those deliciously paradoxical aphorisms we love to find occasion to remember and perhaps quote ...

We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

A man's face is his autobiography. A woman's face is her work of fiction.

A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.

A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal.

Ambition is the last refuge of the failure.

A man can't be too careful in the choice of his enemies.

Alas, I am dying beyond my means.

All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That's his.

All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling.

Wilde seems much more theatrical and arch than I would have imagined, even taking into account the performance tradition of the time. In this context and in retrospect, Lord Olivier used to make fun of this earlier style of delivery, likening it to singing arias in opera.

Curiously and incidentally, Wilde's voice reminds me more than a little of the vocal manner of a particular group of older queans I knew as a kid in London and so has a further resonance for me.

VID

This audio recording, imaginatively at least, lets me know this great writer just a tiny bit better. There is something of the quality of the living breathing human voice that reaches across time and emotionally connects up.

2011-03-15T22:26:00.001-07:00

The Circus Really Does Eventually Come To Town

Being in Australia can at times leave you feeling just that little bit disconnected from the rest of the world and the things that go on out there.

And, as a kid, I guess this was probably one of the driving forces for me living in England and France for five years. With numerous European top-ups since - and a year in the Peoples' Republic of China.

But then sometimes the big things come to us here.

Like the Ballets Russes visits from the mid thirties to the early forties, taking the opportunity to perform during the disruptions of World War 2 elsewhere. It came in various guises - The Original Ballets Russes, Colonel de Basil's Ballets Russes de Monte Carlo, Covent Garden Russian Ballet.

A highlight of these visits would have been the 1940 re-staging by Serge Lifar of his ballet 'Icare' (1935), with new percussive music by Antal Dorati and with new sets by Sydney Nolan ...

Lifar took the lead role of Icarus at the premier ...

... but then it was danced on subsequent performances by Roman Jasinsky ...

Amazingly, there's quite a lot of colour film of the performances of the Russian Ballet during these visits, including of footage of 'Icare' with Jasinsky.

So I've cobbled together a video around Serge Lifar, Roman Jasinsky, the Ballets Russes in Australia and 'Icare', and included some black and white 1950s film of Lifar teaching the principle role to a dancer at Le Palais Garnier in Paris ...

Hope you like it as much as I did putting it together!

I must say I really like ruminating on all the angles of being drawn to the arts of places elsewhere on the planet other than where you live ... while not descending into some kind of cultural cringe.

2011-03-07T01:27:00.000-08:00

Caught on Film!

I'm not a royalist or a monarchist but have always had a soft spot for horny old Lothario Edward VII - known fondly as 'Edward the Caresser' (as opposed to Edward the Confessor).

And I was surprised, the other day, to find so much film existed of the king. In social as well as ceremonial occasions. Surprising given that the king died in 1910 at the very dawn of motion pictures.

So I thought a compilation seemed in order - sadly now split into three cos of Blogger upload limits ...

These little scraps of footage, some quite up-close and personal, really do give some sense of this larger than life Dionysian character.

I've added, as the audio track, part of Edward Elgar's 'Enigma Variations' as this music so strongly reflects the nostalgia an empire quickly slipping away at the turn of the C20.

2011-02-28T03:34:00.000-08:00

Serge Lifar - 'Les Sylphides

This is unique June 1928 silent film footage of the original now fabled Ballets Russes of Serge de Diaghilev.

It shows Serge Lifar and rehearsing 'Les Sylphides' with a corps de ballet outdoors at the 'Fetes de Narcisses' in Montreux, Switzerland.

What makes this discovery particularly exciting is that Diaghilev never permitted the Ballets Russes to be filmed, and so this unauthorised rehearsal footage may well be the only record of the company.

The footage was originally uploaded by British Pathe onto their website (http://www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=79902), unrecognised, until identified in February 2011 by Jane Pritchard, curator of the Ballets Russes (Ballet Russe) exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, and Susan Eastwood, a member of the London Ballet Circle.

They were aided in their identification by a photograph taken during the Ballets Russes' first visit to the 'Fetes de Narcisses' in 1923, which showed the company on an outdoor stage performing 'Aurora’s Wedding'.

The Ballets Russes, 'Aurora’s Wedding', the Fêtes des Narcisses, 1923

There are now many articles on the internet about the discovery including one by Jane Pritchard herself:

http://www.vam.ac.uk/things-to-do/blogs/diaghilev-and-ballets-russes

Ms Pritchard says:

What we see is I believe the June 1928 Festival (the topiary arch indicates this is the Ballets Russes second visit to Montreux when they danced 'Les Sylphides', 'Cimarosiana' and the Polovtsian dances from 'Prince Igor'). I believe that Serge Lifar was dancing the lead role – sometimes referred to as the poet. No doubt the long wig worn confused the [British Pathe] cataloguer to suggest ‘One female dancer (representing Narcissus?).

The film confirms what many have said - that while the principle dancers were often extraordinary (Vaslav Nijinsky, Tamara Karsavina, Leonid Massine and so on), the corps could be a far more ordinary affair.

I have added an audio - music from 'Les Sylphides' which does not attempt to be that of the various little mini segments of choreography in the footage.

Hope you are as bowled over by the find as I was - I never expected such a thing!

2011-02-23T05:59:00.000-08:00

A Scrapbook Memoriam of Great Charm

Angus Fitzroy

Toby McCutcheon

The other day, Art Mariano sent me the URL for a curious little 85 page scrapbook memorial put together by Angus Fitzroy to commemorate the thirty year relationship with his friend/lover (?) Toby McCutcheon.

I thought it was absolutely charming, if somewhat slight, but have found myself coming back to it over and over again. A sure sign of something of greater interest. And for a post.

The book charts the relationship between the two men in a potpourri of sketches, photographs, cards, magazine covers and stamps. Most are captioned - with pithy, erudite, thought-provoking, gay funny, or just plain quirky remarks.

There are images of the two friends at home in England. And in gay company. The comments here often reflect the particular humour of the period - like a photograph of two men dancing captioned 'Foxtrot anyone?'

There are pictures of Angus and Toby in all corners of the globe - from France to Cuba to Algeria to Athens to Istanbul to Egypt. One with the cute 'I was forever hungry in Hungary'.

Snaps of muscular athletic men, mostly from the athletics/health magazines of the day. One sticks in my mind - of a body builder whose nipples Angus has saliently 'annotated' with gold stars.

Tender reflections on the relationship - Will something of me survive? And ask 'What was that?' 'You?'

There are sketches of nudes - the one I love best is of a guy with a hard-on, captioned 'Surprise!'

This is the most easy and delicious document of gay social history.

Now I've probably overdone the inclusions but ...

Then, after all the gaiety and lovely lightness of the scrapbook, there is a final entry opposite a woodblock of a medieval knight ...

... which brings the notebook into closing dedicatory focus:

Dear Toby, you shall forever be my number one man. My knight in armour. You will forever shine in my dreams as hero. Galahad has nothing on you. I would rededicate myself to you over and over again for all time.

The perfect epitaph we'd all want our loved one to be able to write of us. Or vice versa!

After wiping the tear from your eye, were there any entries that particularly took your fancy?

2011-02-22T05:47:00.000-08:00

Sing It Out Baby, Sing It Out

Jean Mounet-Sully as Hernani in Victor Hugo's 'Hernani ou l'honneur castillan'

A few months back, I saw a London Weekend Television extended biographic interview - 'Lawrence Olivier - A Life'.

And I was reminded of a section in it today, watching early C20 film, with added wax cylinder audio track, of the great Comedie Francaise actor Jean Mounet-Sully (1841-1916) playing Oedipus in 'Oedipe Roi'.

In fact I was almost rolling round on the floor, shrieking and kicking my legs in the air, as Mounet-Sully melodrama-ed and sang his way through the Sophocles text - way way beyond what I thought was humanly possible. And he was considered the Great Classical Actor of the French theatre of his day!

Olivier touches on this 'phenomenon' in the context of the Royal Shakespeare Company of the same period and the delivery of blank verse ...

... with John Gielgud reflecting on how early in his career he must have seemed like 'an old operatic diva singing'!

At the beginning of the French footage, you'll need to listen behind the talking head for Mouney-Sully but by the end he's in full flight, singing out his 'aria'. Dramatic high notes, and seriously fortissimo!

So without further ado, buckle your seats belts ... so you don't do yourself a harm.

Any broken bones from tumbling your chair over?

But seriously, it's interesting to reflect on just how the measure of great acting (or anything much) is relative to the tastes and fashion of the time.

2011-02-20T08:06:00.000-08:00

Way To Nail An Audition

This is most definitely the way to nail an American Idol audition - well, any audition for that matter ...

... and to see one of our own up there doing it in such style is for me icing on the cake.

I just love how, in a completely controlled way, Jacob pours all of his heart and soul into this performance of 'God Bless The Child'.

Delicious!

2011-02-20T07:47:00.000-08:00

The Peace Hotel On The Bund, Shanghai

The Peace Hotel, The Bund, Shanghai, China

One of the great joys of travel can be the hotels and 'hotels' you stay in - whether it's a yurt in in Huahouta in Inner Mongolia ...

... the Maharajah of Jaipur's Palace in India ...

... or the back-packer Sun Hotel ...

... with its resident monkeys ...

... and peerless view over the Ganges and its ghats ...

... at extraordinary Varanassi ...

I lived for a year in China - in 1988, just before the Tiananmen Square incident - and had another of those magic hotel experiences at the famed Peace Hotel on the Shanghai Bund alongside the Huangpu River ...

Completed in 1929 as the exclusive expatriate mens' club, the then Sassoon House was in a severe Art Deco style, but with lavish interiors ...

The Ballroom (During Restored)

A Passage Way and Stairs (During Restored)

... its passage ways and rooms encrusted with now priceless Lalique glass artwork. still in evidence when was stayed there.

There have of course been changes since the late '80s, not the least of which the transformation of the paddy fields on the opposite side of the river, viewable in 1988 from the second floor dining room, into the now bustling metropolis of Pudong ...

But what's in fact really amazing about this establishment is its quirky and anecdotal history.

In 1949, with bullets flying round the streets outside the hotel, a desperate refugee from the mayhem banged admittance on the front door, only to be asked by those leaning over from an upper balcony:

But are you a member sir?

The reply No! led to a hastily convened club committee meeting to advice on the complex question of temporary membership. It's not recorded whether the motion was passed or otherwise!

A myriad of delicious memories now come flooding back.

A hotel employee telling me that in the 1920s at the racecourse nearby there was a sign that read 'No dogs or Chinese allowed'.

And another that Noel Coward finished 'Private Lives' in the hotel.

But in fact my most enduring recollection is of the jazz band that had been performing in the basement since the 1930s ...

... with its then trumpet player a dead ringer of the Great Helmsman, Mao Zedong - a totally surreal experience at 3am!

So, at least for me, my accommodation can be a far greater part of the travel experience than is conventionally accepted!

Have you guys had any such out-of-body hotel experiences?

2011-02-20T07:45:00.001-08:00

Things That Usually Happen Only In Nightmares

A number of people have emailed me about the recent flooding in the state of Queensland here.

And I've been thanking them for taking the time to ask and feeding back a bit about the disaster.

The worst inundation has been about 500 miles north of Sydney and, while the loss of life and the damage to property is obviously horrific, the full and tangible impact of the catastrophe only became apprent to me today, looking at a set of photographs taken on a farm at Heidon as the Lockyer Creek ran it's banks.

As you can see from the time on each image, the surrounding countryside was submerged in just 22 minutes - 3.16pm to 3.38pm.

Like in a nightmare where legs turn to lead and you can't escape trains bearing down on you, or approaching thugs intent on robbery ... I can too easily imagine the feeling of helplessness in the face of such rapidly on-coming waters.

Some of the footage of people telling of loved ones lost and lifetimes' work swept away has been truly heart-breaking.

And I reflected on how easy it is to watch the litany of tragedies around the world on the evening news with chilling detachment. Pause for thought.

2011-02-20T07:28:00.000-08:00

Question is, gentlemen, ... .

Question is love of which of the two following 'blast from the past' music videos would best suggest ...

[1] a fine taste in popular music?

[2] unexcelled retro fashion sense?

[3] faultless appreciation of high production values?

[4] a deep understanding of the choreographic possibilities of a piece of music?

[5] a general smoothness and all-round super and current coolness?

Better accompany your choice with reasons, guys.

Courage ladies and gentlemen!

BTW this post is perhaps just an excuse to have two oldies but goodies out there ... yet again.

2011-02-07T08:40:00.000-08:00

Just There Leaning Out A Window

Just about everyone must know about Anne Frank and her now famous dairy - German born and moving to near Amsterdam in the 1930's to flee anti-Jewish sentiments, hiding with her family in concealed rooms in her father Otto's office building when Hilter's forces occupied the Netherlands, dying with her sister Margot of typhus in March 1945 in the concentration camp of Gergen-Belsen.

What fewer may know is that the diarist was filmed in 1941 leaning out of a window during a neighbour's wedding day.

The Merwedeplein building where the Frank family lived from 1934 to 1942

I love Anne's gesture of tossing back her hair as she turns to respond to something happening in the room behind her - it's hard not to try to imagine the dimensions of this cheerful domestic situation - so at odds with the horrors to come.

'A Window Out The Past' rather than one into it.

2011-02-01T04:35:00.000-08:00

The Last Tasmanian

Fanny Cochrane-Smith (1834-1905)

Mainstream white histories tell us that Trugernanner [Truganini] (1812-1876) ...

Trugernanner [Truganini] (1812-1876)

... was the last surviving full-blood Tasmanian aboriginal.

As a not directly relevant issue here, aboriginal people I know say aboriginality is a matter of identification rather than full bloodedness.

Truganini is now widely used by liberals, like me (and you?) to signify the genocide with repect to the indigenous inhabitants of this country by the European settlers.

However, born on Flinders island of a Tanganutura mother of the North-eastern tribe and of a Nicermenic father from the Robbins Island group of the Northwestern tribe, Fanny Cochrane-Smith (1834-1905) LINK can better claim to be the last of her race from the Australian island State of Tasmania.

That Fanny's claim has been largely ignored may well be due to the politics surrounding identity and its requirement of living a more complete and typical indigenous lifestyle. From the age of seven and with no known aboriginal name, she lived and later worked in white homes and institutions and married married a white man, the English lawyer and ex-convict, William Smith.

Fanny, husband William Smith and perhaps two of her sons

However, Fanny continued traditional practices - hunting, gathering bush food and medicines, making baskets, diving for shellfish and engaging in aboriginal religious rituals. And was heralded as the 'last Tasmanian aboriginal' at a concert held in her honour in 1899 in Hobart.

You must know by now I'm pretty drawn in by the 'Window into the Past' experience - and it was flung wide open this morning in cyberspace, when I happened across some wax cylinder recordings made by Fanny between 1899 and 1903.

Fanny - 1903 Recording

They are the only extant examples of a Tasmanian aboriginal dialect - spoken and in song, songs which in some cases she also recorded in English ...

... and just just managing to survive, due to the dawn of wax cylinder recording!

2011-01-27T03:27:00.001-08:00

A Story Looking For Its Movie

Some stories just seem to be looking for their movie, and this one is particularly high on that list.

Rather than a too long-winded telling the story, I thought I'd bullet point a few of the more startling events in the particularly startling life of Mathilde Kschessinskaya (1872-1971) - and there were certainly plenty of them.

As the C19 drew to a close, she was the Prima Ballerina Assoluta of the Imperial Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg

At the age of seventeen, the ballerina had became the mistress of Nicholas II, when grand duke

Even more scandalously for the day, she then formed a ménage à trois with two Grand Dukes of the Romanov family - Sergei Mikhailovich and his cousin Andrei Vladimirovich

In 1902, she gave birth to a son, Prince Vladimir Sergeyevich Romanovsky-Krasinsky ('Vova'), who quite naturally was never sure who his father was

Throwing realism completely to the wind, the ballerina would have selections from her valuable jewels sewn onto her costumes - for example, coming on stage as the Princess Aspicia in The Pharaoh's Daughter wearing a diamond encrusted tiara and choker - not a little like the American opera singer Leontyne Price who infamously jewelled up for the role of the enslaved Nubian princess in 'Aida'

Kschessinskaya comissioned the famed Russian jeweller, Carl Faberge, to design a fetching gold and pearl encrusted, shall we say, 'top'

It was from the balcony of her elegant house in Moscow that Lenin addressed a revolutionary crowd on his return from Finland in 1917

In staggeringly stereotypic fashion, Mathilde escaped the Russian revolution with her jewel collection intact, moved to Europe and in 1921 married Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich, becoming Her Serene Highness Princess Romanova-Krasinskaya

The impresario Serge de Diaghilev invited the prima ballerina to dance with the famed Ballets Russes at the Paris Opera but she declined

The family moved to Monte Carlo, where Mathilde dissipated the remaining wealth of family at the gamblimg tables - the remainder was sequestered by the crash of 1929

Back in Paris, Grand Duke Andre was reduced to driving a taxi

Kschessinskaya opened a ballet school in the French capital, teaching at times the likes of Ballets Russes ballerina Dame Alicia Markova, the Ballets Russes 'baby ballerinas' Tatiana Riabouchinska and Tamara Toumanova and The Royal Ballet's Dame Margot Fonteyn

Mathilde Kschessinskaya teaching 'baby ballerina' Tatiana Riabouchinska

The prima ballerina absoluta performed one last time, aged 64, at a charity event with TheRoyal Ballet at Covent Garden

Mathilde Kschessinskaya died in her 100th year.

'Alright already'!

Now this post was primarily prompted by my having come across 1920s footage of this 'larger than life' character at some kind of outdoor social gathering - she is seen in characteristically imperious mode greeting guests and firmly directing proceedings. And at the end there's a little section showing her son 'Vovo' loading up his plate from the outdoor buffet!

Her dying words?

'My life was beautiful'

You betcha baby!

And it makes our own seem just a tad on the dull and uneventful side. Well, mine at least - I don't know about yours!!!

2011-01-27T03:16:00.000-08:00

The Story of Jinny

My Grandmothers' Younger Brother, Roy, on Jinny at a Picnic in the Bush, c1900

As a very little kid, my (truly beloved) grandmother used to read me a story she'd written about Jinny, a little Shetland pony owned by her family.

What's so remarkable about this perhaps seemingly unremarkable event is that she was almost totally uneducated - reaching grade four in elementary school. Her family lived on their farm way way (way) out in the country in north eastern Victoria near the New South Wales border. The nearest town was fifty miles away. No roads - just a few dirt tracks. The neighbours miles away.

My Great Grandmother

Somehow, as a young woman, my grandmother had entered the nursing profession, becoming the matron of a hospital in a largish town near Bendigo in central Victoria.

My Grandmother c1915

After her husband died, she turned her mind to new things - one being writing. Poetry came first, with a collection eventually being published, to her almost uncontainable joy. Poems mainly about migrating to Australia in the 1850s and the country life thereafter.

There were also a few short stories, one written for children about a dearly beloved family pet - a Shetland pony named 'Jinny'.

There are many things I love about this particular piece of writing.

Most immediate for me is the obvious love of story telling - a real joy in bringing the late C19 vividly alive for young listeners - 'Jinny' was to be read aloud rather than for reading. And this is realised in part in the language itself, which reads as speech more than prose much of the time.

There is some craft skill in structuring the discourse. We first hear of the arrival of the pony one dark night, and then go back in time to how the little creature had been bought, and to its journey to the farm and its arrival that night - finishing with 'You know what happened after that'.

I'm always surprised how much social history is unobtrusively packed in. In a way that moves the story forward rather than seeming like 'teaching'.

We meet the hawkers who travel from homestead to homestead, their horse-drawn vans traveling shops selling 'darning wool, strong black cotton, bootlaces ... stockings'. At each farm they'd spend a few days, tidying up their shop, doing their washing and giving their horses a rest. Hawkers would have a third horse for when the roads were wet and 'heavy'.

We become aware of the knowledge people had of the different kinds of horses of the day - draught horses, cart horses, saddle hacks and pairs for the buggy.

And aware of domestic social history. That fireplaces had their backs painted white to radiate heat out into the room. And that lamps were moved around the room depending on what people were doing, from the mantle piece to the table and so on. That the primary school curriculum involved 'spelling, tables and poetry'. That 'tea' (dinner) could consist of fried eggs and bacon, and fried bread, and 'fresh bread with melon jam and thick scalded cream, and hot scones and butter'. Yum but mighty cholesterol-ific - so how did my grandmother manage to live to 88 years of age!

And there's also a sense of the world beyond - we hear about Pirate - in the background of the photo, behind Jinny's head - a horse taken by a soldier relation to the Boer War.

Enough yak yak yak, hope you find the story half as charming and engaging as I do.

'Jinny'

This is a true story about a much loved family pet. Our father bought her for us when we were little children.

The little boy sitting on Jinny's back in the photo was our baby brother Roy. It was taken by a travelling photographer at our Pompapiel School picnic.

The horse just beyond Jinny's head was called 'Pirate'. His owner was a friend of ours, who went to the Boer War in South Africa. He was one of the 'Australian Light Horse', and he took Pirate with him to the war. Pirate was a very smart and flash horse before the war, but he looks rather tired in this photo. I suppose he got tired at the war. He was one of lots of horses 'hitched to the posts of the fence for the day', at the picnic.

It was about 6 o'clock on a Friday evening. It was winter, and so it was quite dark, and very cold. There was a lovely log fire blazing in the big whitewashed fireplace at one end of the room, and it was just about teatime.

We had had a bowl of soup when we came home from school, but we were hundgry again by this time and quite ready for our tea.

It was the kind of tea we all loved - fried eggs and bacon and fried bread, then fresh bread and melon jam with thick scaulded cream, and hot scones and butter.

Our mother use to make buttermilk scones, which are really bettter than any other kind of scones - you do not cut them with a knife - you just break them open and put little rolls of butter on while they are hot: the butter melts and 'oh'! I feel hungry when I remember them, and there was hot cocoa made with milk.

We had got our written homework done before the table had to be set for tea, and we were learning our spelling and tables and tables and poetry as we sat on the sofa, and on the floor in front of the fire.

The table was at one end of the room and the sofa at the other sides, and so our mother used to put the lamp on the mantlepiece so that we could all see better. The light from the fire helped us to see better too, when we sat on the floor.

When mother said 'tea's ready' there was a rush to put our books away and 'sit up to the table'. Mother would put the lamp back on the table and someone would say grace, and off we'd go'. No-one liked to be 'Last finished!'

On this Friday night we were all ready to have our tea without any arguing or disputing about anything. We were all extra good, and anxious to get our tea over quickly, because we were waiting for something terribly special. We had never been so excited in our lives.

Well, we had finished our bacon and eggs, and had some bread and jam and cream, and mother had just put a big plate of hot buttermilk scones on the table, when Barney barked.

Barney was our dog.

We all stopped and looked at each other, and mother told us to get on with our tea, and we said we'd all had enough - that we'd had such a big bowl of soup afer school that we couldn't eat another scrap, and please could we leave the table.

Before there was time for her to say 'Yes' or 'No' the door opened and Bob stood in the doorway.

Bob was a very big man, nearly as high as the door, and he had a huge raincoat on with a big cape on it, and so he filled the doorway. He said 'Well, bad luck, I couldn't bring her!'

We all just groaned and sat down.

Mother said, 'What about a hot scone after all?' but we were all too disappointed to bother about eating any more.

And then Bob walked through the doorway and into the middle of the room, and close behind him walked- what we'd been waiting for - the darlingesy little Shetland Pony you ever saw - Bob leading her by her little bridle!

The scramble was dreadful - chairs pushed aside - all of us pushing each other and sort of gasping with delight and surprised, and, well we could hardly believe it.

Bob quietly took a piece of cake from the table and gave it to the pony, and then a lump of sugar, and she just ate both quietly and stood there in the middle of the room.

We were just amazed and thrilled beyond words. We all crowded around her and patted her and cuddled her around the neck, and it was all too wonderful!

The Bob said, Now, she's tired and we must let her go to bed. Tomorrow is Saturday - no school - and you'll be able to see her all day.' Someone got the lantern and we all swarmed out after Bob, who was still leading Jinny. He put her in the loose box in the stable where there was some clean straw on the floor for a bed. He took off her bridle and put some nice sweet hay in the manger and some chaff and oats in the feed box. We wanted to leave the lantern on for her but Bob said there was no need for that, so we said 'Good night' to her and came inside to talk about it all.

Our farm was in the real country - not near a town or even a township.

There were different kinds of animals on the farms and lots of horses for riding and driving and working in the paddocks, but there was not a pony anywhere in that part of the country.

Well, one day our father was at a town (Bendigo) some distance away, and in one of the quiet streets he saw a little black Shetland pony. It had a bridle on and the bridle rein was tied to a post by the footpath. Father went over to it and patted it and spoke to it. He thought of us, his children at home, so he waited over to it and patted it and spoke to it. He thought of us, his children at home, so he waited nearby until a man came up to the pony.

Father spoke to him, and he said the pony belonged to him. Father asked if it would let children ride it and he said 'Yes, Jinny is very quiet.' Father asked him if he would sell her and offered him a good price, and the man said 'Alright', so father bought the pony, and also paid the man a price to take her to 'The Old House At Home. The man said he knew where the place was and that he would take her and leave her there the next week.

'The old House at Home' was a bush inn on the road about thirty miles from the town and people coming to town from the country could get a meal, and stay overnight if they wished. Our farm was about thrity miles farther on.

Father called at 'The old House at Home' and arranged for the man there to take charge of Jinny when she arrived, and look after her till he could get someone to fetch her home.

As well as paying for her 'board and lodging' he paid a special fee (he called it a tip) so that she would be cared for extra well.

When he came home and told us we were delighted, but we didn't quite know what the pony would be like - we had never seen a Shetland pony. though we knew all about draught horses, cart horses, buggy horses, saddle horses, 'pairs' for the buggy, etc.

Father said it might be weeks before he would be able to get someone to bring her home, so we had to be satisfied to wait, but we became sort of heros at the school when the news got around, spead largely by ourselves, that we were getting a pony.

Now, in the country there were no shops, and of course motor cars had not been invented in those days, and so people on farms had to do their shopping mostly from hawkers.

A hawker was a man who had a shop in a big van which he drove around the country. It was drawn by two horses, or sometimes three if the roads were very wet and muddy - (they called them 'heavy' roads), and he used to call at the farms to sell his goods.

Sometimes the mothers on the farms would be 'right out' of darning wool or strong black cotton or bootlaces, or someone would need new stockings, and so they were always glad to see the hawker coming.

He would always be invited to have a meal; or to stay the night at whichever farm he arrived at at evening time. He slpet in his van.

Well, Bob was a hawker, and he often used to stay for the week-end at our place, to do his washing, give his horses a spell, and tidy up his 'shop'.

And so father arranged for Bob to collect Jinny next time he was passing 'The old House at Home' after being to the town to buy things for his 'shop'. He often used to do messages for our parents and his other customers when he went to the town. He said it would be no trouble to bring Jinny. He owuld have to tie a rope to her bridle rein, and tie the rope to the back of the van, and just lead her that way.

They would not travel very fast and she would be able to trot along quite comfortably. They would stop for a drink of water and a feed of chaff once or twice, by the roadside, and she would be able to eat some grass while they were resting.

Well, Bod expected to be coming on that Friday, for the weekend. He was not there when we got home from school, and he was still not there when it was dark - and six o'clock - and tea time, and we were all asking mother and father lots of questions about it, and they could only say 'Well, I don't know dear'. Everything was most uncertain - and then Barney barked.

You know what happened after that.

2011-01-24T06:07:00.000-08:00

The Orson Wells Legend -
Finally, I'm Starting To Get It!

Watching Michael Parkinson introduce a 1970's interview with Orson Wells, I realised I'd not fully appreciated the legend of this Hollywood legend. And in particular, the extraordinary diversity of his accomplishments - to the extent of a not exactly momentary 'career' as a bull-fighter!

So I fossicked round for something earlier and found the 1960 Paris interview with Merv Griffin ...

What's particularly disarming in this encounter, among so many disarmaments, is the actor/director/writer's unexpected frankness and seductive self-deprecating qualities. And the ease and almost eagerness with which he canvasses his own limitations and failures. Though this of course may give rise to charges of disingenuousness.

With controversial issues, Orson Wells has that delicious ability to warmly and genuinely acknowledge other points of view ... but just as a starting point to state his own. Which of often individual and distinctive, and one that doesn't sound contrived to elicit admiration. Such as when he explores the differences in difficulty of directing yourself on stage as opposed to in the movies.

And to top it all off, there's that quite incredible voice - deep, resonating, sonorous and boundlessly expressive - which Wells plays like a fabulous Stradivarius violin! Any actor would kill to have such an instrument!

I'm an (at least momentary) Wells devotee - any others out there?

2011-01-24T05:45:00.000-08:00

Sylvia Beech Talks of Shakespeare and Co. in Paris in 1919, and of Ernest Hemingway and James Joyce

Sorry guys for going all blue stocking again, and so soon ... but, having put out a post on my extraordinary experience with respect to the famous English language bookshop in Paris 'Shakespeare and Company' (LINK) ...

... I couldn't resist another when I stumbled across a 1950s interview with its 1919 founder, Sylvia Beech.

Sylvia and girlfriend Adrienne Monnier, ...

... who ran a French language lending library, ...

... formed, as the little documentary surrounding the interview says, 'the nexus for the interchange between French and English literature' in the 1920s and beyond. 'Shakespeare and Company' was one of the major centres for much of activity of the ex-pat American artistic community.

In this interview, Sylvia Beech talks about her friendship with writer James Joyce and her publishing his 'Ulysses' in 1922. It had been serialised in 'The Little Review' between 1918-1922.

She also speaks about her relationship with Ernest Hemingway ...

As with all footage like this, for me the thing is getting a sense of the person, as much as engaging with the content. A bit like Peter Seller's 'being there'.

Really hope you like this one!

2011-01-24T05:19:00.001-08:00

Coronations And Things In The Dragon Kingdom

Decided to post this one again cos I can now do extra large images - and these photographs really deserve the best format.

Over the past five years, I've rather self-indulgently done more than a ton of posts on places I've been.

And I've particularly enjoyed putting together my journeyings to remote and/or perhaps, for me, exotic places - like Mongolia, Laos, Egypt, India, Varanassi and Nepal and The Philippines.

As you do, I was roaming round in cyber space this morning and happened on images of the 2008 coronation of King Jigme Khesar Namgyl Wangchuck ...

... in Himalayan-bordering Bhutan ...

... and it occurred to me to post on somewhere I haven't been but would love to visit.

The kingdom came into being in the C17 from a number of warring states, under the leadership of Tibetan lama and military leader, Shabdrung Ngawang Namgyal. The lama had fled from religious persecution in Tibet and constructed a Bhutanese identity. In a way, a bit like Italy's Risorgimento (Unification) of 1861.

An absolute monarchy, the country had its first democratic elections in 2008 and has joined the UN ...

The climate ranges from subtropical in the south to sub-alpine in the north ...

... already I more than suspect that this post is going to be a tad too 'National Geographic-ish'!

But in my defence, I would dare anyone to make the following set of coronation images look other than they came from that magazine ...

Ladies of Bhutanese royal family before the coronation

Some of the international visitors

And then challenge anyone to cast the next shots in a less than Shangri La-ish manner ...

Takeshang Gompa, Tiger's Nest Monastery

Haa Valley

Tashichoedzong, Thimphu, seat of the Bhutanese government from 1952

Gangkhar Puensum from Ura La, Bhutan

To this absolute riot of pageantry and colour and to this grand panorama of pristine natural beauty, throw in the snow leopard or two ...

... and maybe National Geographic got it right all along!!!

2011-01-24T05:17:00.001-08:00

Vertigo Can Be A Good Thing!

Well, I'm not saying it's as good as rolling round the sack with a hot guy for hours on end ... but teasing my (slight) tendency to vertigo is for me a pretty intense almost erotic experience.

An experience that the Willis Tower (formerly the Sears Tower) in Chicago happily offers with comparative (imagined?) safety.

They offer solid glass viewing platforms ...

... at the 103rd floor ...

... 1,353 feet above the ground ...

Just love this down shot past the kids feet and through the glass floor of the viewing platform ...

... and this one of a kid ...

... doing a bit of inverse flying?

2011-01-24T04:56:00.000-08:00

The Beautiful Gianni Morandi

No confessions are necessary - you know I'm addicted to Italian pop songs of the sixties.

And when the song is delivered by a total hottie like Gianni Morandi ...

... then my addiction ...

.... is complete ...

You'll know 'Parla piu piano' - used much later in 'The Godfather' ...

Now in 'Non son degno di te', beware - because in this second offering, you may be more than mildly distracted ...

... by the truly Olympic gold medal winning beehive ...

... which - curiously, or maybe not so curiously - reminds me of the Leaning Tower if Pisa.

Enjoy!

2011-01-24T04:55:00.001-08:00

Recalcitrant Pumps III - The Experience Evolves

Before re-posting this one let me say there was obsolutely no set up whatsoever involved - life can just be strange like this - blogger's word of honour, which should settle the matter - LOL!

I've done two some might be tempted to say quirky posts over the last couple of years - 'Recalcitrant Pumps' (19 November 2007) ...

... and 'Recalcitrant Pumps 2' (20 July 2008) ...

... to put on record a recurring and somewhat surreal experience. One that usually happens on the way to my favourite Kings Cross cafe for a morning latte, and perhaps this may turn out to be significant?

Well, there was a recurrence this morning, which I instinctively knew would require another post.

As I wandered home, naturally my mind was racing with all sorts of angles - from Marcel Duchamp's 'objets trouvés', such as his 1917 urinal as a fountain ...

... to the more obvious foot fetish implications ...

On a mundane and surface level, of course this particular sighting suggests the aftermath of a night of wild partying ...

... and the inherent complications of getting home in the morning ...

But I'm open to other interpretations - cos I'm a guy with less than rigid and fixed opinions.

So, guys, does this say something about me and what I attend to?

Or do you reckon there are there other forces at work here?

2011-01-24T04:52:00.000-08:00

Magical Dali in Far Western China

A few years back, I was wandering round far western China, as you do, and I happened across the ancient local capital of Dali. In fact the city was the centre of both the Bai kingdom of Nanzhao (8th and 9th centuries) and the Kingdom of Dali (937-1253).

The approach by boat across Erhai lake past an island temple heralded something special ...

So when I landed ...

... I headed off in the very highest spirits to the city gate ...

... and, almost a daze, just wandered round the narrow streets ...

... crowded with old buildings ...

... and shops ...

When I poked my nose into this alley way leading to the courtyard of a home, the inhabitants invited me in for tea - the magic continued to be woven!

I'd heard there was a temple complex in the nearby hills ...

... and when I arrived all was shrouded in mist ...

... the magic was not letting up!

Walking back down to Dali, I by chance wandered into the rarest temple of all in the Peoples' Republic - one still functioning for religious observance ...

... and replete with resident monks ...

... who had just in fact completed their daily laundry.

The magic was still in top gear!

Back in town, I was feeling more than a bit fazed. A couple of travellers began chatting to me and everything cleared quite quickly - I realised I hadn't spoken at any length for a couple of weeks and that this had led to the disorientation.

Having perked up, my new friends and I followed this group of women ...

... to what turned out to be the local market day ...

One of by new companions couldn't resist this trio of older men just calmly watching life go by ...

As you'll have noticed, everyone but everyone is dressed in traditional clothing.

The people in this region belong to one of China's (92) minority groups - and dress as they do to demonstrate themselves as separate and different from the Han majority.

A bit of reading back in Australia confirmed the development of a movement in the area for local autonomy.

2011-01-22T09:57:00.000-08:00

Into The Tardis Again - Berlin, 1900

Paul in NY just made some slight and wistful noises about my 'Berlin in 1900' post on the old blog - it was more than enough to provoke an instant re-post here!

Time to time travel again - I've already buckled up my seat belt and am set to go!

This particular journey is the result of seeing a most poignant piece of footage - Berlin between 1900 and 1910, just before the carnage that was World War One.

People seem prosperous and confident, a world of such seeming certainties - the ultimate calm before the storm.

There's the hustle and bustle of the streets - just a slice, across the social spectrum, of ordinary people going about their daily business ...

And images of individual people, close-ups of shadowy often unsuspecting figures, frozen in time ...

... people about whose lives I can't help speculating about!

There are snatched impressions of old and new forms of transport ...

... and famous landmarks ...

Brandenburg Gate

There are examples of new social activities, such as bicycling ...

... and new jobs, like directing traffic ...

...and those minuscule usually unrecorded commonplace business activities, such as paying for a cab ...

Finally, there's a bunch of folk out on that new-fangled contraption, the bicycle - performing a cute though perhaps not-quite-Busby-Berkley-standard routine for the camera ...

So, without delay, to the video ...

... which I hope you'll like.

2011-01-22T09:05:00.000-08:00

Time In The Electric Shock Therapy Room

Just couldn't resist having this post on the new blog - justification being it's not often I laugh out loud and long during a movie - tears simultaneously rolling down my cheeks are rarer. And the whole lot on a repeat viewing ... can't remember when.

I don't want to say too much about this scene just in case you haven't seen 'My Best Friend's Wedding', as if. Enough that it involves the Rupert Everett gay character fantastically and maliciously inventing how he supposedly met and fell in love with the Julia Roberts character - for the guests at an engagement party around a dinner table in a restaurant.

So some sharing with a serious risk of revealing my low sense of humour - 'low' said in the manner in Bette Midler in 'Divine Madness'.

Had to split the video to be able to upload it, so ...

Okay, let the brick bats begin - again, and even more for re-posting!

2011-01-22T08:58:00.001-08:00

An Unexpected New Coffee Brew

You may well wonder what's the connection between the two images below - that of the Asia civet and roasted coffee beans.

The opening image of course may have given you a clue.

Let me give you a couple more ...

Any ideas yet?

Okay, for those still none the wiser, all is revealed in this little Animal Planet video ...

Well well well ... .

Look, I've travelled a fair bit, guys, and see things as best judged and valued within the cultural context in which they occur ... and I'd give the brew a shot.

If you want to read more ... LINK

2011-01-22T08:57:00.001-08:00

A Bromic Of Bromeliads?

Not so sure of my group words this morning - well, at the 3am part of it.

As you'll notice, we've kept the pink and the fragrance thing going from the last post ...

Continuity is everything in my view.

At the moment, the garden is everywhere burgeoning with seductively luscious yet spiky pink blooms ...

So the challenge will now be going indoors ...

... without cutting a very large bunch for that ever voracious vase ... slying crouching in wait on the dining room table!

2011-01-22T08:51:00.001-08:00

Big Big Bawdiness In Weimar Republic Germany

Sometimes the impact of a personality is just so arresting that, even with great distances of time and place, it demands your attention.

And so it is for me with Claire Waldoff, rough and bawdy Berlin carbaret singer of the 1910's and 1920's.

Born Clara Wortmann, the singer arrived for work in Berlin in 1903, saying:

I fell passionately in love with Berlin. Not because the city was beautiful or the Imperial capital, but because it was Berlin, with its special atmosphere, its vivacious and curt character

For the stage, she adopted a gruff persona and the rough slang of the working class native Berliners, full doubles entendres and sexual innuendos:

I began to become the Berliner, a prototype of the Berliner, a representative of modern Berlin

This is typified in ''Ach Gott Was Sind Die Männer Dumm'' ('My God How Stupid Men Are'):

A regular at the Chat Noir in Friedrichstraße, and the Eldorado ...

Eldorado 1932

... Claire Waldoff limited her performances to three songs only, with no encores, which allowed her to play a number of different venues each night, establishing herself as a major star.

The rise of Hitler and fascism in the 1930s put an end to Waldoff's career, and she and the lover with whom she had always lived openly, Olga Von Roeder ...

Claire Waldoff and her lover, Olga Von Roeder

... went to love in Bayerisch Gmain - and took up gardening in a very serious manner.

Sadly, or otherwise, after listening to 'Ach Gott Was Sind Die Männer Dumm' I feel just a tad more 'delicate' and less hairy-chested than usual!

How bout you?

I guess the Isherwood posts put me in the mood for things of this sort, and the angle it gives on gay social history.

If you'd like more, then I came across an interesting blog 'Berlin Cabaret' - LINK.

The post on Anita Berber, who you may know through Otto Dix's painting ...

... is particularly good.

And my bet is this work was used as one of the models for the look of the dykes at the Kit Kat Klub in the 1972 film of 'Cabaret. What do you reckon?

Another more obvious model being Dix's portrait of the same year ...

... of Sylvia von हर्दें.

2011-01-22T08:50:00.001-08:00

Magical Dali in Far Western China

So when I landed ...

... I headed off in the very highest spirits to the city gate ...

... and, almost a daze, just wandered round the narrow streets ...

... crowded with old buildings ...

... and shops ...

When I poked my nose into this alley way leading to the courtyard of a home, the inhabitants invited me in for tea - the magic continued to be woven!

I'd heard there was a temple complex in the nearby hills ...

... and when I arrived all was shrouded in mist ...

... the magic was not letting up!

Walking back down to Dali, I by chance wandered into the rarest temple of all in the Peoples' Republic - one still functioning for religious observance ...

... and replete with resident monks ...

... to what turned out to be the local market day ...

One of by new companions couldn't resist this trio of older men just calmly watching life go by ...

2011-01-08T08:06:00.000-08:00

Music That Catches The Zeitgeist

You know how some pieces of music capture a whole culture and era, well, one aspect any way ... well, at least stereotypically any way ... .

This is one of those.

And in this context, I just love the way Rita metamorphoses over the decade to keep in tune ...

Hope you like this one from the mid 1960s ...

... I'm still buzzing round the room to it!

2011-01-08T07:39:00.000-08:00

Another Holy Grail

Just when I thought I'd seen all the film footage associated with the Ballets Russes and it's Prima Ballerina Absoluta ...

... I Amazon-ed up this 1970s interview ...

Hope you enjoy this rarity!

2010-11-08T05:43:00.000-08:00

'Mack the Knife' - The Original

Bertolt Brecht - 'It is easier to rob by setting up a bank than by holding up a bank clerk'

Guess we all probably know 'Mack the Knife' from Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald or Frank Sinatra.

Or from Lotte Lenya if we're a bit aware of the leftist anti-fascist theatre of Bretolt Brecht and Kurt Weill.

Well, in my peripatetic travels about cyberspace today, I came across the original - in the sense that Bertolt Brecht is singing ...

He gives it that hard edge the meaning of the song dictates - partly it's all those harshly flapped [r]s!

I've thrown in Lotte Lenya Singing 'Seeräuber Jenny' ('Pirate Jenny') also from 'The Three-Penny Opera' ...

... for those whose tastes run this way.

Enjoy!

2010-11-08T05:29:00.001-08:00

A Serious Exercise in Nostalgia -

Bette in Full Flight @ The Continental Baths (1971)

This is going to be a serious exercise in nostalgia - Bette Midler in full flight at the Continental Baths in 1971 singing 'I Shall Be Released'. Barry Manilow is on piano and Joey Mitchell on drums.

Hope you can be patient with the quality of Jimmy Vito's amateur footage - the frames jump around a bit at the beginning but the issue is straightened out by about half way through.

Cos if you can accept the technical inadequacies the performance it's the kind of classic high-voltage compelling performance you'd expect from The Divine Miss M at that period.

Enjoy!

2010-11-08T05:28:00.001-08:00

Finding Desktop Background Images

'Wuthering Heights' (1992)

I don't know about you guys but I tend to change my desktop background image every few days. Otherwise I just stop 'seeing' them.

And I'm often scratching my head about where to find new kinds of images, having run the gamut of works of art, travel snaps, old family photographs - the usual stuff.

I used to use porn images but occasional unexpected visits associated with urgent needs to check email lead to some decent surprises for all concerned.

Now the point of this post is that I've just found a whole new venue for harvesting images - snags of films I'm watching on my puter. And I'm stunned how often I reach for the icon of my SnagIt software to capture yet another indispensable image.

Today's collection came from the 1992 'Wuthering Heights' (above), 'The City of Your Final Destination' (2009) ...

'The City of Your Final Destination' (2009)

... and 'Assault Girls' ...

'Assault Girls'

... and 'True Blood' - for something completely different ...

One of Lafayette's V-Visions from 'True Blood'
(Season 3, Episode 10)

Which as much as anything says something about what movies I watch ... and how many a day!

Any confessions on your part here?

2010-11-08T05:26:00.001-08:00

Strange How Things Travel About

I was thinking this morning how strange it is the way things unexpectedly move about the globe.

A few years back, we were rough travelling through the rice terraces of Northern Luzon.

It's an area so rugged it was quite isolated during the Spanish occupation and only visited by non-Filipinos in the 1950s - by American missionaries.

We'd hiked into Sagada, one of the larger towns of the region, and were walking down the main street when we wandered into a shop ...

... and happened to notice a highly patinated old hat worked from very finely woven reeds and topped by a carved wooden anito or animist figure.

I'm not sure what the shop-keepers imagined we might buy as we wandered around but they were highly amused when we said were interested in the hat - it was the everyday head gear of the owner's grandfather.

We struck a deal to everyone's satisfaction ... and this beautiful hand-crafted object duly took its place in our ever-expanding collection of travel bring-backs.

Strange how things move about the globe.

So are you guys rabid collectors and hoarders like us?

2010-10-18T19:56:00.000-07:00

Another Holy Grail

Just when I thought I'd seen all the film footage associated with the Ballets Russes and it's Prima Ballerina Absoluta ...

... I Amazon-ed up this extraordinary 1970s interview ...

Hope you enjoy this rarity!

2010-08-25T08:19:00.001-07:00

Hard Hard Work in Bucharest at the Turn of the C20

Young Street Busker

With the social reform movements in Europe in the C19, photographers felt encouraged to record the plight of working men and women of the time - here in Bucharest round the turn of the twentieth century and up to the 1920s.

Though the names of some of these professions which have pretty mush disappeared may have a strange romantic resonance in popular culture today, everyone knows the reality would have been very different.

The obvious pathos in the image of the street musician encouraged me to place it first.

The second shows women gathering each day at some predetermined spot in the hope of being offered temporary work as maids.

Maids for Rent

Counter to expectation, the Library of Congress informs that chimney sweeping ...

... has been a steady profession right up to today.

A post on working class professions in the street in Romania would hardly be complete without an image of a fortune teller.

Fortune Teller

Physically demanding itinerant jobs included tinkering ...

Tinker

... wood cutting ...

Wood Cutters

... and iron working ...

Iron Worker

Though life would hardly have been much easier for organ grinders ...

Organ Grinders

An Organ Grinder

To finish, an image ...

... of 'the oldest profession in the world'.

A post dedicated to those who usually slip through the cracks in the system.

2010-08-17T21:08:00.000-07:00

One Of The Seriously Less Serious Moments of Dance

These days when people speak of the Ballets Russes, it's often in hushed and reverential tones.

So it's great to see film of dancers from this legendary company(ies) away from the hallowed halls of 'The Theatre' (said in the manner of Bette Davis in 'All about Eve', 1950).

Particularly when they were having fun in the surk and the sun, as in this slow motion, silent but colour amateur footage taken during the 1938-9 tour of Australia by the 'Covent Garden Russian Ballet'.

The first film is straight-forward enough - larking round with ballet movements and positions and starring Paul Petroff and, I suspect, Hélène Kirsova ...

But the second film seems to have a much 'darker' tone.

A Lothario (above) and a friend observe a dramatic sea rescue ...

... which dissolves into a 'From Here to Eternity' moment ...

... followed, curiously, by more than a hint of the final act of 'Romeo and Juliet' ...

But then unexpectedly things seem to go wrong ...

... or right?

So what's your story board on this one?

2010-08-17T00:44:00.001-07:00

The Joys of Impulse Purchasing

Nagaland Glass Beads mid C20

I suspect the best purchases are often on impulse and so, recently and again, browsing turned to buying ... Ethnic Jewellery and Adornment: Australia, Oceania, Asia, Africa (Adelaide and Melbourne, 2009), a very large format and weighty semi coffee table tome of nearly 400 pages.

Aboriginal Bark Armband Tiwi People C19-20

In an attempt perhaps to lessen my guilt, I'm posting a few of the astounding images I found inside - I'm determined to flip through the book just the once as there are so many arresting things I'll get bogged deep down in choice if I do otherwise.

Bedouin Bridal Veil, Palestine, Gaza, mid C20

Bedouin forehead ornament (kaffa) Saudi Arabia Early C20

Triangular Necklace, Oman, Early C20

Ear Ornament Tamil Nadu, C19-20

Man's Ceremonial Head Dress, Motu people, PNG, C19

Chief Lama's Ceremonial Hat, Ladakh, India Early-mid C20

Buddhist Woman's Ceremonial Crown C18-19

Qing Hairpin, China C20

Embroidered Baby's Bonnet, Yunan, China Early C20

Man's Cuirass to deflect arrows, Indonesia, Papua Province, Early C20

Qing Hairpins, China C19-20

Chief's Dancing Apron c1930, PNG

Bridegroom's Head Decoration, Sumatra, Indonesia, Early C20

Man's Bandolier, of Ant-Eater Claws, Myanmar, Early-mid C20

Necklace of Woven Human Hair and Whale Ivory, Hawaii, mid C19

Man's Head Ornament, Katji people, Arnhem Land, Northern Territory - collected in 1930

A feast for the eyes and the senses, don't you think!

2010-08-17T00:43:00.001-07:00

To Nip and Tuck or Not - Voting of a Different Kind

It's Saturday morning and, as you do, I was online browsing 1925 Rolls Royce Phantom 1s for sale.

Usually of course they come like this ...

... and very nice indeed, well, at least for me.

Then to my real surprise I happened across this 1925 Phantom 1 curiosity ...

... which had started life in the above manner, bodied by Hooper.

In the 1930s, it was bought by the Raja of Nanpara and transformed by the Belgian coachbuilder, Jonckheere, into something more befitting the style of that decade, undergoing a number of more minor 'face lifts' over succeeding years ...

... before reaching it's present state of restored glory in 2005 ...

... winning many awards, including its first concourse entry in le Prix de Cannes (whatever that might be).

As I browsed over the site again, the question for me was which did I prefer - the 'before' or the 'after' version.

While it seemed somewhat sacrilegious to tamper with a classic Roller design, I must say the result was something unique and wonderful.

What's your opinion?

2010-08-17T00:39:00.000-07:00

Diaghilev Ballets Russes Prima Discusses Performing the Role of 'Firebird'

It's a bit like coming across an ancient carved stone in some dusty old castle cellar - a stone on which Noah had put down his instructions for making an ark. Or an erotic love letter ... written by Cleopatre. Or ... you get the picture.

So it is with this footage of an interview, I guess in the 1970s, with Diaghilev Ballets Russes prima ballerina absolute absoluta Tamara Karsavina (1885-1978) ...

... discussing performing the title role in 'L'Oiseau de Feu' ('The Firebird', 1910) ...

Tamara Karsavina 'Firebird' London, 1911

Madame Karsavina says she was fascinated by Stravinsky's music for the ballet but found it very difficult.

Tamara Karsavina 'Firebird' London, 1911

On performing the role, she states she 'never counted the bars' because it 'deflected her attention'.

Tamara Karsavina Adolph Bolm 'Firebird' London, 1911

And then goes on the say Stravinsky was 'really kind' - he would come before a rehearsal and play the piano for her and 'explain me all these different parts' which 'was a great help for me'.

Tamara Karsavina Adolph Bolm 'Firebird' London, 1911

Apart from everything else, what totally fascinates and surprises me about this footage is the quality of Karsavin's voice - deep, dark, rich and resonant ... with such strong and definite self confident accents.

Hope you find this interview as extraordinary as I did!

2010-08-17T00:38:00.001-07:00

'Geometric Composition'

I'm an old unrepentant formalist and was provoked to do this post when I heard French father of modern photojournalism Henri Cartier-Besson (1908-2004) ...

... declare ...

... 'la joie c'est la géométrie ... tout est en place' ('the joy of geometry - when everything is right).

And was unable to prevent myself posting out a few of his city and landscapes ...

Hyères, 1932

Brie, France, 1968

Rue de Cléry, Paris, 1952

... his portraits ...

Colette with her companion Pauline, Paris 1952

Truman Capote, New Orleans 1947

François Mauriac, Paris, 1952

Albert Camus, Paris, 1944

Christian Dior, Paris 1953

Simone de Beauvoir, Paris, 1946

... and people and activities around the globe ...

Beijing, China, Dec 1948

Rush to retrieve gold from a bank, Shanghai, 1948

Shanghai, China, 1949

Daughters of the Confederacy, Richmond, Virginia, 1960

New York, 1961

San Francisco, 1960

Bankers Trust, New York, 1960

New York, 1960

Baroda, India, 1948

Dessau, Germany, April 1945

'Looking for any kind of work' Hamburg, 1952-3

Juvisy, France, 1938

La Villette, Paris, 1929

Market in the Rue Longue, Marseille, 1954

Opening of the Cannes Film Festival, 1953

Naples, Italy, 1960

Rome, 1952

Pskov, Russia, 1973

Mexico City, 1934-5

Calle Cuauhtemocztin, Mexico City, 1934-5

Alicante, Spain 1933

Coronation of King George VI, London, 1937

Lady and Horse British Museum

England, 1953

Brussels, 1932

Women Praying In Kashmir

Georgian family picnicking near a medieval monastery, 1972

So much is going on in Cartier-Bresson's work - catching something of momentous events, social satire (Diane Arbus without the edge), National Georaphic-ish recording of culturally-specific activities ... all within a strictly formalist framework.

But ultimately this is a post of pure indulgence on my part - I find these images endlessly fascinating and come back to them again and again.

Hope you'll be equally interested.

2010-08-17T00:36:00.001-07:00

And Now For Something Completely Different

I hope that stunned stupefaction won't be your only and abiding reaction to this post ...

... and that you'll indulge me a little guys ...

... cos this footage from 1940 ...

... of then the Soviet ballet dancers ...

... Galina Ulanova and Konstantin Sergeyev ...

... in a pas de deux ...

... from an Act 1 of 'Swan Lake' ...

... gives me the biggest aesthetic 'jollies' ...

... and I can only hope it triggers some reaction from the organ between your ears ...

'Business as usual' a little later on today!

2010-07-28T03:43:00.001-07:00

Kinda of Warm and Fuzzy

By now you've probably got the idea I'm pretty (read 'very') addicted to images of (non-human) animals.

And so when Alan down there in Florida put some my way this morning, I just couldn't resist ...

And three I hope not too saccharine sweet images ...

... to finish off.

I don't know about you, but I've got the serious warm and fuzzies!

2010-07-28T03:15:00.002-07:00

Rudolph Valentino - A Curious Little Tease

Not quite sure what I have here - I guess a publicity teaser, yet again reconstructing the idea of 'The Great Lover'.

Whatever, I find it curiously erotic!

After getting out of his car ...

... Valentino gives one of those desperately self-conscious stretches - exactly as a lot of guys (including me) do in a gay bar just before they say 'Do you cum here often?

After a quick survey and in a prelude to things to come ...

... he takes off his jacket ...

... and goes back to his car ...

... giving some pretty good bubble butt on the way ...

Then Valentino strip teases, unbuttoning his collar ...

... and then his shirt ...

... before getting his suspenders (braces) off his trousers ...

Vulnerable - unbuttoned and with his arms up and back as he peels off his braces - he notices us.

And we can almost smell, on this hot summer day, the sweat of his armpits on his freshly ironed cotton shirt.

Valentino feigns coy modesty ...

... but we sense more an erotic invitation ...

... as he draws down the blind ...

Enhanced by what we now know of Valentino's sexual orientations, I get a real strong homoerotic charge from this footage! Call me crazy ... but!

It's that he's seductive but essentially passive - a dynamite combination for me. You'd need to take all the initiative - from getting into the back seat with him on.

Images can of course only say so much - it's really all about the movie ...

... don't you think?

PS I'm also entranced by the gorgeously shiny paintwork of the car!

2010-07-28T03:15:00.001-07:00

News Flash - Postscript to 'Being a Dompteuse de Cirque Is One Answer'

I've just added a postscript to 'Being a Dompteuse de Cirque Is One Answer' - a re-post of an interview I included within 'A Real Cracker of a Story' (LINK).

It is discussion on French television in 1967 with Prince Felix Yusupov about his involvement in the assassination of Gregori Rasputin.

2010-07-28T03:14:00.001-07:00

Five Animals ... and a 'Brazilian'

Sorry guys ... I'm at it again!

Like masturbation ... once you've started it's a life-time thing ... with occasional/many diversions, of course!

Maybe voting for the best (or more) of the six would help?

I'll go first - I love 1, 2 and 3. Though 4 has a bit of a claim on my affections.

2

3

4

5

6

Ok, your turn ... ?

2010-07-28T03:11:00.002-07:00

Being A Dompteuse de Cirque Is One Answer

Just how would you go about your life were you the daughter of one of history's, shall we say, less warm-and-fuzzy characters?

Maria (1898-1977) ...

... and her younger sister Varvara were the two daughters of Gregori Rasputin and are perhaps photographed here with their father ...

Maria's less than commonplace story is told in an excellent French documentary I was watching last night - 'Memoires d'Exil: L'autre Russie', which can be found in seven parts on You Tube or alternatively at BluePlayer.com (LINK).

It examines the phenomenon of the White Russian exile, where there is not only separation from country but from a class culture that in fact no longer exists - except in the hot house form of expatriate communities.

There are interviews with a number of descendants of that part of the aristocracy which survived the Revolution. And a great deal of archival film I've not seen before.

Extraordinarily, there is extant footage of Maria Rasputin.

First, she is seen filmed in an open courtyard - at a distance and then closer up. Rather unfortunately, the script writers of this documentary attempt to find in the footage a hypnotic stare to consolidate Maria's connection to the 'mad monk' ...

Rasputin's daughter must have been somewhat complicit in this as she planned her future to depend on the connection.

We then see Maria working life as a 'Dompteur de Cirque' ('Circus Animal Trainer') ...

... with some wonderful close ups towards the end ...

Of course a post like this would be nothing without the footage itself and so without further delay ...

Hope you find Maria Rasputin as compelling and sympathetic as I did.

And in fact, the whole of 'Memoires d'Exil: L'autre Russie' is well worth the watch.

Postscript

A while back I did a post - 'A Real Cracker of a Story' (LINK) - around an interview in 1967 with Prince Felix Yusupov and his wife Princess Irina Alexandrovna, niece of Tsar Nicholas II.

I thought I'd post the interview again here ...

... as it was the Prince who, with accomplices, assassinated Rasputin.

And it was in this year of his death that he first publicly talked about this momentous event.

2010-07-28T03:11:00.001-07:00

More Than a Modicum of Levity?

I generally hate, and I do mean hate (even eschew!), jokes of this kind - the type that are almost certainly set-ups. The ' students' ' handwriting just shouts 'ADULT!!!'

After I'd pee-ed my pants over the first few, I overcame myself (!), thought 'What the heck!' and went about posting ...

To be roaring away with tears running down my face, I either have a very 'low' (said in the approved Bette Midler manner of 'Divine Madness') sense of humour or I'm in a very strange mood tonight.

Neither option seems particularly attractive!!!