Selection of pictures at 3Form.com

MGM Cirque Du Soleil, Las Vegas

I´m showing today some pictures I´ve selected from 3 Form web page. 3 Form is a commercial trade mark for eco resin materials. There are different finishes and all of them are really nice to work in interior design. Specially in commercial buildings, scenographic architecture and lighting. I used it some times, and of course, it´s expensive compared to acrylics or plastics, but resin has a higher quality. I´m not advertising, just exposing some beautiful solutions.

http://www.3-form.com/installations-case_studies.php

MGM Cirque Du Soleil, Las Vegas

Adams Place

CalState Fullerton, California

Kaiser offices, California

Montclair Plaza

Smithonian Museum, Washington

Smithonian Museum, Washington

Trade Show Light Art

Urban Pastoral Hong Kong

Urbana Pastoral Hong Kong

What is the Green Man?

Greenman from Roselyn chapel column, Scotland Image from http://arthurcomegno.com/images/RoselynGreenMan.JPG

The archetypal male counterpart to the Earth Mother; the son, lover, and guardian of the Great Goddess. He is portrayed as a composite of man and leaf: a great leaf like an acanthus with masculine eyes, nose and mouth. He is also portrayed as a male face with leaves such as oak or grapevines coming out of his mouth and from between his brows, or his “third eye”. The first Green Men were found in Roman sculpture and painting in the first century, The celts saw him as Esus, the god of Spring, and Cernunnos, the god of the forest, the underworld and wealth. Like Persephone –the Greek goddess of spring who descends annually to the underworld, creating winter- the Green Man, connected to ancient forests, makes his descent to the underworld with the roots of ancient trees. There the true wealth of the soul life can be nurtured.

The image of the Green Man was carved high into the columns of eleventh-and twelfth-century European churches, often placed above statues of mary, the Grat Mother, where he seemed to protect her. The columns are like great trees or totems. Today the Green Man is often portrayed as Bacchus with grapes, appearing on fountains and planters or as decorative masks and salvaged architectural elements.

Image from http://www.stonewylde.com

Image from http://people.bath.ac.uk/liskmj/living-spring/Greenman.jpg

Green man gargoyle. From http://thumbs.dreamstime.com/

Reference

Murray, Elizabeth. Cultivating Sacred Space. San Francisco, 1997

The Variety of Architectural Orders. From The Stones of Venice

The Classical Orders. From Wikipedia.org

Excerpts from Volume I of The Stones of Venice, by John Ruskin. London, 1896

All European architecture, bad and good, old and new, is derived from Greece through Rome, and coloured and perfected from the East. The history of Architecture is nothing but the tracing of the various modes and directions of this derivation. Understand this, once for all: if you hold fast this great connecting clue, you may string all the types of successive architectural inventions upon it like so many beads. The Doric and the Corinthian orders are the roots, the one of all Romanesque, massy-capitaled buildings –Norman, Lombard, Byzantine, and what else you can name of the kind; and the Corinthian of all Gothic, Early English, French, German, and Tuscan. Now observe: those old Greeks gave the shaft; Rome gave the arch; the Arabs pointed and foliated the arch.

I have said that the two orders, Doric and Corinthian, are the roots of all European architecture. You have, perhaps, heard of five orders: but there are only two real orders; and there never can be any more until doomsday. On one of these orders the ornament is convex: those are Doric, Norman, and what else you recollect of the kind. The transitional from, in which the ornamental line is straight, is the center or root of both. All other orders are varieties of these, or phantasms and grotesques, altogether indefinite in number and species.

This Greek architecture, then, with its two orders, was clumsily copied and varied by the Romans with no particular result, until they began to bring the arch into extensive practical service; except only that the Doric capital was spoiled in endeavours to mend it, and the Corinthian much varied and enriched with fanciful, and often very beautiful imagery. And in this state of things came Christianity: seized upon the arch as her own: decorated it, and delighted in it: invented a new Doric capital to replace the spoiled Roman one: and all over the Roman empire set to work, with such materials as were nearest at hand, to express and adorn herself as best she could. This Roman Christian architecture is the exact expression of the Christianity of the time, very fervid and beautiful.

Column orders. Fromhttp://www.cvilleindustries.com/

Filippo Brunelleschi and the City

The city of Florence from the Duomo. From www.sunilshinde.com/p-italy/

Filippo Brunelleschi was born in Florence in 1377. We know nothing of his life before 1398, when, at the age of 21, he was admitted as a goldsmith to the Silk Guild. Little is known again until about 1418, the date of the competition for the model of the dome for the Cathedral. The recorded information, together with evidence derived from his works, has led to the recognition of Brunelleschi as a man of ¨universal¨genius. According to Manetti, his biographer, he was än architect, mathematician and excellent geometer, as well as a sculptor and painter.¨ He has invented various machines for constructing buildings (he utilized his goldsmith´s knowledge of clocks and bells which functioned with multiple gears moved by counterweights); he was a military, naval and hydraulic engineer; he made projects for theatrical performances and musical instruments; he studied Dante´s Divine Comedy, and achieved a deep understanding of its structure and significance.

The sacrifice of Isaac. From http://faculty.evansville.edu/rl29/art105/img/brunelleschi_sacrificeisaac.jpg

Philippo Brunelleschi. Image from the100.ru/en/architect/page179.html

The earliest works by Brunelleschi known to us are goldsmith work and sculpture: parts of the silver altar in the Cathedral of Pistoia; the group representing thea angel Gabriel and the Virgin of the Annunciation for the Porta della Mandorla on the Cathedral of Florence; and the relief panel of 1401. These works already reveal his personal break away from the elegant, rhythmic and self-contained equilibrium of Gothic sculpture in favor of a more dynamic conception in which forms creates its own space. Despite Brunelleschi´s evident mastery of sculpture, sculpture was either excluded entirely from his architecture of strictly subordinated to it. At the same time, his sculptural sense is clearly manifested in the strength and importance of his ribs, cornices, capitals, etc.

In the years 1420 to 1446, Brunelleschi single-handedly created a new architecture, proceeding from his experience of Classical, Romanesque and Gothic architecture and utilizing his own personal solution of the problem of perspective, conceived as knowledge ¨per comparatione¨ (Alberti). His achievement appears all the greater if we consider that very few of the buildings which he planned and began were actually brought to an advanced state of construction of completed before his death. His work marked a decisive moment in the history of architecture and urban design in general, and in the relationship between the artist and the community.

Brunelleschi´s works were conceived for an urban context. Indeed, the outer perimeters of the city had been defined, and a dome for the Cathedral has been foreseen by Arnolfo. Brunelleschi´s reconstructions of San Lorenzo and Santo Spirito could be interpreted as ¨modern¨ versions of medieval ecclesiastical buildings and Piazza Santissima Annunziata as a cloister transformed into a piazza. But his structures, considered both as units and in their reciprocal relationships, created a new articulation of medieval Florence based on rational, geometric order. Moreover, this order organized not only specific areas within the city, but also the city as a while with respect to its surrounding territory.

Brunelleschi conceived the city as a new rational entity in which everything, even the past, took a new meaning. A new kind of city-planning became possible: articulated, yet unified and ordered according to a rationally planned hierarchy, and logical in every part. Far from ignoring the medieval city, in fact, taking it as his starting point, Brunelleschi re-cast the entire preceding tradition in terms of a new vision which inverted and profoundly changed its significance. In this sense, Brunelleschi´s project for a piazza facing the river for Santo Spirito was an example; the church was no longer seen as the central point in the surrounding urban disorder, but as the focus of a radical reorganization of the quarter within the total urban context. In the medieval town the river, for example, had only a functional role, which concerned separate and independent stretches of it. Instead, Brunelleschi thought of the river as a major structural axis. It is really due to the work of Brunelleschi that Florence, although it is still basically medieval, has been considered a Renaissance city ever since the 15^th century, when the humanists looked on it as an example of the ideal city.

Text slightly adapted from the book Brunelleschi, by Giovanni Fanelli. Special edition for Becocci Editore. 1988. Florence.

El Teatro Colón renovó su telón histórico

Interior del teatro Colón en Buenos Aires. Foto de http://www.teatrocolon.org.ar/imagenes/nuevo%20telon/ganador/telon1.jpg

Reproduzco aquí la nota de hoy de Verónica Pages, para el diario argentino La Nación, sobre el telón del famosísimo teatro Colón, en Buenos Aires. Tengo el orgullo de conocerlo bien, por haber hecho visitas guiadas exclusivas para grupos de la Facultad de Arquitectura, Diseño y Urbanismo de Buenos Aires. Estoy ansiosa por la próxima apertura prevista para el 24 de mayo, luego de tantos trabajos de restauración. Felicitaciones a todos los trabajadores que pusieron empeño en restaurar nuestro edificio histórico.

El telón restaurado. Foto de lanacion.com

La cuenta regresiva está en marcha. Con la fecha de apertura del Teatro Colón ya anunciada para el 24 de mayo, y la certeza de que a partir del 15 de este mes van a empezar a trabajar puertas adentro los cuerpos estables, no quedan muchas dudas. Pero por si faltaba algún dato, desde anteayer volvió a cubrir la boca del escenario el telón histórico completamente restaurado. Con colores más brillantes sobre todo el gran paño de terciopelo -sólo producto de la limpieza-, el telón confeccionado en 1936 luce "lo suficientemente fuerte como para sobrevivir muchos años más", dijo el arquitecto Francisco López Bustos, encargado de la restauración de los textiles. Durante cinco meses, cerca de quince personas trabajaron en la limpieza y la restauración de los apliques y del terciopelo. El telón fue desmontado, desarmado, restaurado y luego armado en el propio teatro -específicamente en la sala de ensayos 9 de Julio-, ya que se priorizó no sacarlo para preservarlo y evitar que sufra así más desgaste.

Fueron necesarios casi veinte operarios para colgar nuevamente el telón. Cada una de las dos hojas mide 360 m2 y pesa más de 700 kilos. Se trata de un telón con sistema a la italiana, es decir que se abre en dos paños hacia los costados, lo que provocó en todos estos años de vida útil un desgaste sobre todo por la mecánica de apertura. Para evitar futuros -y prontos- problemas se cuidó de modificar los marcos de guardado. "El manto de terciopelo es excepcional, claramente de mejor calidad que el resto de los textiles, y ha sido por eso que ha resistido mucho mejor el paso del tiempo y el uso", sigue López Bustos. Lo que no luce brillos ni bríos son las aplicaciones que, aun limpias, están más opacas pero de majestuosa belleza luego de la restauración.

Sin reemplazo

En todo este tiempo, gran revuelo se armó por la posibilidad de que el telón -al que muchos llaman el original- fuera reemplazado, y en su defensa se alzaron voces del mundo de la clásica, como la de Plácido Domingo, que envió una carta para pedir su restauración. La realidad es que el primer telón era pintado y fue reemplazado poco tiempo después de su "inauguración" en la década del 30 por el actual, al que sí es correcto llamar histórico, pero no original. De tal valor es considerado que finalmente se decidió restaurarlo para preservarlo y utilizarlo sólo en galas de verdadera importancia.

En las funciones más cotidianas se utilizará el nuevo telón que creó el artista plástico Guillermo Kuitca junto a la escenógrafa Julieta Ascar. Ellos ganaron a fin del año pasado un concurso para el diseño del nuevo paño, actualmente en construcción. Se espera que este telón esté listo en octubre, ya que están tratando de que coincida su inauguración con el estreno de la obra sinfónica del Bicentenario que está componiendo Mario Perusso a pedido del teatro. Del nuevo telón, Ascar destacó su intención de hacer convivir lo histórico con lo moderno: "Si bien la imagen es contemporánea, queremos que las tradiciones textiles se mantengan. La pasamanería telonera, que es lo que permite que la tela tenga cierta morbidez, es fundamental para nosotros, lo mismo que un buen diseño".

Hasta que el nuevo telón suba a escena, será este paño histórico restaurado el que dé la bienvenida a los melómanos porteños. Hoy todavía el teatro está tomado por operarios y técnicos que buscan su restauración sin entorpecer el espíritu del trabajo que allí se ha realizado por cien años y que se espera que se pueda seguir realizando por otros cien. De hecho, con el telón ya colocado, anoche se realizaban en el teatro nuevas pruebas de acústica, la gran prueba que ahora les falta pasar.

http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1249524&origen=NLCult

Baroque Churches of San Salvador da Bahia, Brazil. In the words of Umberto Eco.

Baroque Bahia´s Church interior. From http://www.seasonsporttour.com/igf/novas_imagens/Bahia/182.jpg

From UNESCO list of the World Heritage Monuments:  As the first capital of Brazil, from 1549 to 1763, Salvador de Bahia witnessed the blending of European, African and Amerindian cultures. It was also, from 1558, the first slave market in the New World, with slaves arriving to work on the sugar plantations. The city has managed to preserve many outstanding Renaissance buildings. A special feature of the old town are the brightly coloured houses, often decorated with fine stucco-work.

http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/309

I’m presenting today, Umberto Eco’s great description of San Salvador da Bahia de Todos os Santos’s baroque churches in his book Foucalt’s Pendulum. 

Nosso Señor do Bonfim. From idasyvindas.blogspot.com/

Bahia´s baroque church. From http://www.colonialvoyage.com/viaggi/brazil71.jpg

Facade of Cathedral, San Salvador da Bahia, Brazil. From http://www.studylanguages.org/images/salvadordabahia/cathedral-salvador-bahia.jpg

Cloister of Convent of San Francisco/Sao Francisco, Salvador, Bahia. www.colonialvoyage.com/viaggi/brazilsalvador.html

“ And I saw Salvador: Salvador da Bahia de Todos os Santos, the “black Rome,” with three hundred and sixty five churches, which stand out against the line of hills or nestle along the bay, churches were the gods of the African pantheon are honored.

Amparo knew a primitive artist who painted big wooden panels crammed with Biblical and apocalyptic visions, dazzling as a medieval miniature, with Coptic and Byzantine elements. …..he spent his days dreaming in the sacristies of the sanctuary of Nosso Senhor do Bomfim: a triumph of horror vacui, scaly with ex-votos that hung from the ceiling and encrusted the walls, a mystical assemblage of silver hearts, wooden arms and legs, images of wondrous rescues from glittering storms, waterspouts, maelstroms. He took us to the sacristy of another church, which was full of great furnishings redolent of jacaranda. “Who is that painting of?” Amparo asked the sacristan. “Saint George?”

The sacristan gave us a knowing look. “They call him Saint George,” he said, “ and if you don’t call him that, the pastor gets angry. But he’s Oxossi.”

For two days the painter led us thorugh naves and cloisters hidden behind decorated facades like silver plates now blackened and worn. Wrinkled, limping famuli accompanied us. The sacristies were sick with gold and pewter, heavy chests, precious frames. Along the walls, in crystal cases, life-size images of saints towered, dripping blood, their open wounds spattered with ruby droplets; Christs writhed in pain, their legs red. In a glow of late-Baroque gold, I saw angels with Etruscan faces, Romanesque griffins, and Oriental sirens peeping out from the capitals.

I moved along ancient streets, enchanted by names that sounded like songs……At the feet of those deserted and leprous churches embarrassed by their own evil-smelling alleys, fifteen-year-old black prostitutes still swarmed, ancient women selling African sweets crouched along the sidewalks with their steaming pots, and hordes of pimps danced amid trickles of sewage to the sound of transistor radios in nearby bars. The ancient palaces of the Portuguese settlers, surmounted by coats of arms now illegible, had become houses of ill-repute.”

Umberto Eco. Foucalt’s Pendulum. Chapter 26. P. 174-175 USA 1988

Convent and Igreja de São Francisco, Salvador (Bahia). Abaroque church with a beautiful azulejos cloister. Forced to build their masters' church and yet prohibited from practicing their own religion (Candomblé), the African slave artisans responded through their work: the faces of the cherubs are distorted, some angels are endowed with huge sex organs, some appear to be pregnant. Text and picture from www.colonialvoyage.com/viaggi/brazilsalvador.html

Bahia´s Church Interior. By Tony Galvez

San Salvador da Bahia. From http://abagond.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/salvador_da_bahia_church_brazil.jpg

The Collapse of the Domus Aurea

The collapse today. Picture from Diario El País.

Today, newspapers around the world, have published about the sixty square meters (645 square feet) collapse of a gallery’s vault of the Domus Aurea.

"The real emergency is on the Palatine," said Domus Aurea Commissioner Antonello Vodret, referring to the first and greatest of Rome's hills, where the city was born and where its emperors later built their residences.
"Unless we get money soon, the whole hill could crumble".
"There are some 150 houses that have not been protected against water," Vodret said.
However, he voiced the hope that Tuesday's partial collapse of one of the tunnels of Hadrian's Baths, built over the Domus, would "hasten the arrival" of the funds.
Archeologist Andrea Carandini told ANSA that the situation of some of Ancient Rome's sites was so bad that "collapses have become a nightmare for me".
Tuesday's incident was "dramatic proof that there is a real emergency in Rome," he said, adding that it was lucky no one died when the tunnel roofing came down in what has been used since the early 20th century as a storage area for artifacts. (From ANSA.IT)

Picture from ArteHistoria

Picture from thecolosseum.net

 Picture from MSN

The Domus Aurea (“Golden House”), has been built by Emperor Nero between the Great Fire of Rome (64 AD) and his suicide (68 AD)

Wikipedia.org in English has a very good description of the villa. The following text is from this site, adapted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domus_Aurea

The Domus Area was a large landscaped portico villa, designed to take advantage of artificially created landscapes built in the heart of Ancient Rome, after the Great Fire of Rome cleared away the aristocratic dwellings on the slopes of the Esquiline Hill.

Built of brick and concrete, the extensive gold-leaf that gave it its name was not the only extravagant element of its decor: stuccoed ceilings were applied with semi-precious stones and veneers of ivory while the walls were frescoed

The estimated size of the Domus Aurea is an approximation, as much of it has not been excavated. Some scholars place it at over 300 acres, while others estimate its size to have been under 100 acres.

Suetonius describes the complex as "ruinously prodigal" as it included groves of trees, pastures with flocks, vineyards and an artificial lake— rus in urbe, "countryside in the city". Nero also commissioned from the Greek Zenodorus a colossal 35.5 m high bronze statue of himself, the Colossus Neronis.  The statue was placed just outside the main palace entrance at the terminus of the Via Appia in a large atrium of porticoes that divided the city from the private villa. This statue may have represented Nero as the sun god Sol, as Pliny saw some resemblance. The face of the statue was modified shortly after Nero’s death during Vespasian’s  reign to make it truly a statue of Sol. Hadrian moved it, with the help of the architect Decrianus and 24 elephants, to a position next to the Flavian Amphitheater. This building took the name of “Colosseum” (Coliseo) in the Middle Ages, after the statue nearby, or, as some historians believe, because of the sheer size of the building.

The Golden House was a party villa, as shown by the presence of 300 rooms without any sleeping quarter. Strangely, no kitchens or latrines have been discovered yet either.

Rooms sheathed in dazzling polished white marble were given richly varied floor plans, shaped with niches and exedras  that concentrated or dispersed the daylight. There were pools in the floors and fountains splashing in the corridors.

Some of the extravagances of the Domus Aurea had repercussions for the future. The architects designed two of the principal dining rooms to flank an octagonal court, surmounted by a dome with a giant central oculus to let in light. It was probably the first Roman use of a dome that was not in a temple dedicated to the gods, such as the Pantheon, and an early use of concrete construction. One innovation was destined to have an enormous influence on the art of the future: Nero placed mosaics,  previously restricted to floors, in the vaulted ceilings. Only fragments have survived, but that technique was to be copied extensively, eventually ending up as a fundamental feature of Christian art: the apse mosaics that decorate so many churches in Rome, Ravenna, Sicily and Constantinople.

Engineers-architects Celer and Severus also created an ingenious mechanism, cranked by slaves, that made the ceiling underneath the dome revolve like the heavens, while perfume was sprayed and rose petals were dropped on the assembled diners. According to some accounts, perhaps embellished by Nero's political enemies, on one occasion such quantities of rose petals were dropped that one unlucky guest was asphyxiated

"Nero gave the best parties, ever," archaeologist Wallace-Hadrill told an interviewer when the Golden House was reopened to visitors in 1999 after being closed for years for restorations. "Three hundred years after his death, tokens bearing his head were still being given out at public spectacles - a memento of the greatest showman of them all." Nero, who was obsessed with his status as an artist, certainly regarded parties as works of art.

After Nero's death, the Golden House was a severe embarrassment to his successors. It was stripped of its marble, its jewels and its ivory within a decade. Soon after Nero’s death, the palace and grounds, encompassing 2.6 km² , were filled with earth and built over: the Baths of Titus  were already being built on part of the site in 79 AD. On the site of the lake, in the middle of the palace grounds, Vespasian built the Flavian Amphitheatre,  which could be reflooded at will, with the Colossus Neronis beside it.The Baths of Trajan, and the Temple of Venus and Rome  were also built on the site. Within 40 years, the Golden House was completely obliterated, buried beneath the new constructions, but paradoxically this ensured the wallpaintings' survival by protecting them from dampness.

Increasing concerns about the condition of the building and the safety of visitors resulted in its closing at the end of 2005 for further restoration work. The complex was partially reopened on February 6, 2007, but closed on March 25, 2008 because of safety concerns.

The likely remains of Nero's rotating banquet hall and its underlying mechanism were unveiled by archeologists on September 29, 2009.

To read about the collapse:

http://www.elpais.com/articulo/cultura/desprende/parte/Domus/Aurea/Roma/durante/trabajos/restauracion/elpepucul/20100330elpepucul_7/Tes

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8595660.stm

http://www.ansa.it/web/notizie/rubriche/english/2010/03/30/visualizza_new.html_1738589648.html

Artistic Works Inside Egyptian Tombs

Drawing by Faucher-Gudin taken from a ¨squeeze¨ from the tomb of Ti. The domains are represented as women. The name is written before each figure with the designation of the landowner. Image from Projectgutenberg.org

This post is the second part of the previous one (About the Egyptian Village). 

http://myriammahiques.blogspot.com/2010/03/plan-of-villa-of-great-egyptian-noble.html

It is an excerpt from the book at project Gutenberg.org: History of Egypt, Chaldea, Syria, Babylonia and Assyria. By G. Maspero, who is introduced as ¨Honorable Doctor of Civil Laws, and Fellow of Queen´s College, Oxford; Member of the Institute and Professor at the College of France¨. Edited by A. H. Sayce, professor of Assyriology, Oxford. The Grolier Society, London. (out of print)

Drawing by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Dumichen, Resultate, vol.i. pl. 13. Project Gutenberg.org

¨Neither pictorial effect nor the caprice of the moment was permitted to guide the artist in the choice of his subjects; all that he drew, pictures or words, bad a magical purpose. Every individual who built for himself an "eternal house," either attached to it a staff of priests of the double, of inspectors, scribes, and slaves, or else made an agreement with the priests of a neighbouring temple to serve the chapel in perpetuity. Lands taken from his patrimony, which thus became the "Domains of the Eternal House," rewarded them for their trouble, and supplied them with meats, vegetables, fruits, liquors, linen and vessels for sacrifice.

In theory, these "liturgies" were perpetuated from year to year, until the end of time; but in practice, after three or four generations, the older ancestors were forsaken for those who had died more recently. Notwithstanding the imprecations and threats of the donor against the priests who should neglect their duty, or against those who should usurp the funeral endowments, sooner or later there came a time when, forsaken by all, the double was in danger of perishing for want of sustenance. In order to ensure that the promised gifts, offered in substance on the day of burial, should be maintained throughout the centuries, the relatives not only depicted them upon the chapel walls, but represented in addition the lands which produced them, and the labour which contributed to their production. On one side we see ploughing, sowing, reaping, the carrying of the corn, the storing of the grain, the fattening of the poultry, and the driving of the cattle. A little further on, workmen of all descriptions are engaged in their several trades: shoemakers ply the awl, glassmakers blow through their tubes, metal founders watch over their smelting-pots, carpenters hew down trees and build a ship; groups of women weave or spin under the eye of a frowning taskmaster, who seems impatient of their chatter. Did the double in his hunger desire meat? He might choose from the pictures on the wall the animal that pleased him best, whether kid, ox, or gazelle; he might follow the course of its life, from its birth in the meadows to the slaughter-house and the kitchen, and might satisfy his hunger with its flesh. The double saw himself represented in the paintings as hunting, and to the hunt he went; he was painted eating and drinking with his wife, and he ate and drank with her; the pictured ploughing, harvesting, and gathering into barns, thus became to him actual realities. In fine, this painted world of men and things represented upon the wall was quickened by the same life which animated the double, upon whom it all depended: the picture of a meal or of a slave was perhaps that which best suited the shade of guest or of master.

Even to-day, when we enter one of these decorated chapels, the idea of death scarcely presents itself: we have rather the impression of being in some old-world house, to which the master may at any moment return. We see him portrayed everywhere upon the walls, followed by his servants, and surrounded by everything which made his earthly life enjoyable. One or two statues of him stand at the end of the room, in constant readiness to undergo the "Opening of the Mouth" and to receive offerings. Should these be accidentally removed, others, secreted in a little chamber hidden in the thickness of the masonry, are there to replace them. These inner chambers have rarely any external outlet, though occasionally they are connected with the chapel by a small opening, so narrow that it will hardly admit of a hand being passed through it. Those who came to repeat prayers and burn incense at this aperture were received by the dead in person. The statues were not mere images, devoid of consciousness. Just as the double of a god could be linked to an idol in the temple sanctuary in order to transform it into a prophetic being, capable of speech and movement, so when the double of a man was attached to the effigy of his earthly body, whether in stone, metal, or wood, a real living person was created and was introduced into the tomb. So strong was this conviction that the belief has lived on through two changes of religion until the present day. The double still haunts the statues with which he was associated in the past. As in former times, he yet strikes with madness or death any who dare to disturb his repose; and one can only be protected from him by breaking, at the moment of discovery, the perfect statues which the vault contains. The double is weakened or killed by the mutilation of these his sustainers.¨

 http://www.gutenberg.org/files/17322/17322-h/v2a.htm

Romanesque Decoration

St Maur reliquary. From http://www.zamky-hrady.cz/1/img/becov_relikviar.jpg

From the book ¨The Art of The West. I. Romanesque¨, by Henri Focillon (Cornell University Press, New York, 1980) we are able to learn that Romanesque architecture is imbued in furnishings and illuminated books. It is not a condition of self similarity, because the images were not exactly the same, but I can say there was a sort of concept of self similarity in a scaling order. Let us read the a text (p. 136) from the chapter III ¨Romanesque Decoration¨.

 Romanesque church of San Isidoro, Spain. http://www.wga.hu/art/zgothic/mural/12c2/01catala.jpg

Three towers reliquary. http://www.wga.hu/art/zzdeco/1gold/14c/16f_1350.jpg

Three towers reliquary. http://www.wga.hu/art/zzdeco/1gold/14c/16f_1350.jpg

Wooden bench from Sant Climent de Tahull, twelfth century. Barcelona, Museo de Arte de Cataluña. Picture from my book ¨The Art of the West¨, by Henri Focillon

The logic of Romanesque architecture dominated the decorative arts. Obviously the application of this rule varied according to circumstances, but even metalwork was dominated by it. When the goldsmith was not a sculptor of cult images, heads or limbs, he was an architect or reliquaries. He gave to the shrines the form of chapels, adorned with arcades and covered with pitched roofs, while the pyxes were little turrets with perfectly conical roofs. The Cologne masters gave a magnificent development to the motif of the basilica of Greek-cross plan, surmounted by a cupola. Thus there was installed within the church another tinier church, not necessarily of the same type, but invariably conceived as architecture, like a microcosm surrounded by the vastness of the universe. A similar meaning must be read into the decorative architecture of the manuscripts, the canopies sculptured in stone or ivory, the arcades and pillars of carved wooden furniture. But such small scale replicas are only one form of a much wider harmony. This reacts characteristically upon wall painting. Nor does the painting of the manuscripts escape it. Like the reliquaries, most of the latter were conceived with a view of the scale of the building. They formed part of the liturgical furnishings, and have the necessary shape and format for being held by strong hands or laid on tall lecterns before which a a man stood upright, between massive columns and beneath immense vaults. The parchment on which is of the same colour as the wall, and seem to frame them within a broad border of stone. The figures with which they are adorned often possess the amplitude, the dignity and the calm strength appropriate to mural decoration.

Ivory carved book cover. From http://www.gutenberg.org/files/19870/19870-h/images/003.jpg

Los Angeles: About the Mural Conservancy

Farewell to Rosie the Riveter," a detail from the 1950s section of The Great Wall of Los Angeles mural, 1983. Mural: © Judith F. Baca and The Social and Public Art Resource Center 

http://www.getty.edu/conservation/publications/newsletters/18_2/images/p20_sm.jpg

Mother. From www.you-are-here.com/mural/mother.html

If there is something that characterizes the city of Los Angeles is the beautiful murals it has on its walls. In some buildings, the murals are not exactly what we expect for a piece of art, but anyway, even being advertising, they are really nice and impressive.

I am sorry to say, that since the last weeks I have been going to Los Angeles, usually taking the 110 freeway, and the murals that we could usually see on the freeway walls, next to Moneo’s cathedral, are completely covered by graffiti. Go ahead, and you’ll see whatever mural, on the freeways, on the buildings, in containers, in construction enclosures, also covered by graffiti, up to the freeway signs.

This excerpt below is taken from lamurals.org, in the section “about mural conservancy”. They state that the program of murals conservancy is sustained by donations and tax deducible dues. Is the current problem an issue with budgets? Or taxes? The bad economy we had since 2006? Or a control problem?

I wonder what’s going on with the so hard Los Angeles police. Mike Davis tells the story about the young men who were killed by the police while attempting to write on L.A. walls, some years ago. We do not need such brutal extremes, but maybe some streets control. These graffiti take hours to be completed, and whoever is doing so, is absolutely exposed to the public, in the most visited areas of Downtown L.A.

Is it that nobody is compromising to protect those murals? Do gangs have such an impunity?

I apologize I don’t have perfect pictures, imagine it is very difficult to take them at speed.

Graffiti in downtown LA. Picture by Myriam B. Mahiques

Graffiti in downtown LA. Picture by Myriam B. Mahiques

From lamurals.org:

“ Murals. What art form is more visible to the public eye? At the same time, what art form is there that is more exposed to the elements, more vulnerable to vandalism?

Until the 1960s, public murals in Los Angeles were few and far between, isolated instances of commemoration or appreciation. During the sixties and seventies, young artists began to look at the early-century Mexican mural movement. Such notables as David Siqueiros, Diego Rivera and Jose Orozco helped inspire a new generation of Angeleno muralists such as Kent Twitchell, Terry Schoonhoven, Judith Baca, Frank Romero, Alonzo Davis, East Los Streetscapers and many others. Today upwards of a thousand murals have been produced in L.A., with new ones appearing on a regular basis. It has been widely acknowledged that we are one of the world's mural capitals. Murals that serve as significant area landmarks have been created by both famous and anonymous artists.

All of this creative activity has served the public and enhanced the image of Los Angeles at little cost to the public. But it has also presented future generations with the problem of deterioration and vandalism. MCLA's mission is to deal with this problem NOW in order to prevent it from becoming extensive and embarassing--and expensive--to the City; and to give this art its deserved due as a significant part of our cultural legacy.

L.A. is often singled out as the Mural Capital of the World because of the number, variety and quality of murals here. Not to mention the Southern California weather, which lets muralists create pretty much year round. As new murals come into existence every year, you can count on this site being in a state of ongoing dynamic development no matter how seemingly complete it gets. We put the emphasis on murals located outdoors and in public locations (those located in private homes or other restriced access locations are excluded unless they are of unusally special note).

Just use your mouse to launch yourself into any of the sections listed and you can learn about and see the murals hundreds of thousands of Angelinos view on there daily commutes, the muralists who make them, and MCLA itself.

The programs of the Mural Conservancy are made possible by the generous tax-deducible dues and donations of our members, the Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department, the California Arts Council, the Los Angeles County Arts Commission, and the Brody Fund of the California Community Foundation” .

http://www.lamurals.org/MCLAIntro.html

Mural of Mercado La Paloma. Photo by Myriam B. Mahiques

Enjoy more murals, from the book Wall Art:

http://theclubofcompulsivereaders.blogspot.com/2013/05/from-book-wall-art-by-stefan-and-betty.html