Sunday, July 15, 2018

Through a Glass Darkly

'Let me make quite clear that I am for abortion and, in your case Sir, we should make it retrospective:' Gough Whitlam's most devastating one-liners


How testosterone can fuel narcissism

Reaching a position of power can unleash some people's inner narcissist, new research has found.

The world lay mute, unfolding and rising somewhere above, somewhere behind and deep inside – blissfully powerless – and floated on. At times it slowed and vaguely resembled something, it branched out in trees, grafted onto the gray day a thick, glistening net of bird twittering that had been thrown over it, and moved deep into the subterranean snakelike tangle of roots, into the blind pulsing of worms and caterpillars, the muffled darkness of chernozem and clay.

The Writings Of Bruno Schultz


ThoughtCo., Jackie Craven: “Marc Chagall (1887-1985) emerged from a remote Eastern European village to become one of the most loved artists of the 20th century. Born in a Hasidic Jewish family, he harvested images from folklore and Jewish traditions to inform his art. During his 97 years, Chagall traveled the world and created at least 10,000 works, including paintings, book illustrations, mosaics, stained-glass, and theater set and costume designs. He won accolades for brilliantly-colored scenes of lovers, fiddlers, and comical animals floating over rooftops.  Chagall’s work has been associated with Primitivism, Cubism, Fauvism, Expressionism, and Surrealism, but his style remained deeply personal. Through art, he told his story…”


(Classical reference in headline.)

Drama and theater experts evaluate World Cup dives

Life is awash with inducements to stupidity and greed. Witness how the global art market is too busy acquiring to think about much of anything else Greed 

How should a novelist be? Don't read about yourself — not reviews, think pieces, stories, or tweets. Jonathan Franzencontemplates life, art, and bushtits Play with ruthless characters like you play with playdo 


Watch This Frog Light Up After It Swallows a Firefly LiveScience An anti-antidote, particularly if you like fireflies.


We’ve entered the era of ‘fire tsunamis’ Grist

Bloggers as Social Influencers: Optimizing Social Media Engagement ...



Dear Actors: Stop Whining About Audience Members Looking At Their Phones


Everybody in performance needs to toughen up and remember that "hushed reverence at public performances, from classical music to theatre, is a relatively recent invention, to keep the riff-raff out; it sounds as if attending plays in Shakespeare’s day, all tobacco and ale and raucous banter, was more closing time on a bank holiday than church service. It kept the playwrights and the actors on their toes, because they were forced to earn the audience’s attention, rather than just expect it." … Read More





BEASTLY JUSTICE: Lions eat rhino poachers in a South African game preserve.

Rangers discovered the remains of two, possibly three, people in a lion enclosure in the Sibuya reserve, near the south-east town of Kenton-on-Sea.
A high-powered rifle and an axe were also found.
There has been an rise in poaching in Africa in recent years, to feed growing demand for rhino horn in parts of Asia.
In China, Vietnam and elsewhere, rhino horn is erroneously believed to have aphrodisiac qualities.

“There is a high cost associated with building a culture: team retreats, gym memberships, personal and professional development classes. All this is to facilitate the personal evolution of each person who contributes to the company.  And, what are our results? In three years, not one employee has voluntarily left, which is a phenomenon that we believe can be replicated at any organisation. We have the receipts to show how much it cost, and we also have uncovered the more obscure internal metrics that impact employee satisfaction and prevent voluntary turnover.”
David Hassell, Founder and CEO of 15Five

A Visit To Göbekli Tepe, The Oldest Known Temple On Earth

















 

The Art Market Has Forgotten About The Art



Life is awash with inducements to stupidity and greed. The bizarre, defiantly anti-utilitarian practice of making and enjoying art can function as a respite, a space for genuine reflection and reevaluation – as R.M. Rilke learned while staring at a broken ancient statue of Apollo, art can help us see that we must change our lives, if we want to live truly well in our short time. In our time that space is being increasingly colonised by the same venal lusts that already run so much of the wider world.


AP News -I never said that! “…New technology on the internet lets anyone make videos of real people appearing to say things they’ve never said. Republicans and Democrats predict this high-tech way of putting words in someone’s mouth will become the latest weapon in disinformation wars against the United States and other Western democracies. We’re not talking about lip-syncing videos. This technology uses facial mapping and artificial intelligence to produce videos that appear so genuine it’s hard to spot the phonies. Lawmakers and intelligence officials worry that the bogus videos — called deepfakes — could be used to threaten national security or interfere in elections. So far, that hasn’t happened, but experts say it’s not a question of if, but when.