Seed Magazine just ran an article by Carl Zimmer entitled ‘The Awe of Natural History Collections‘ as part of their Darwin 200 celebration. It was beautifully illustrated with a series of large-format photographs by artist Justine Cooper featuring the scientific collections at the American Museum of Natural History. Seed describes the series as one that “document(s) the intersection of science, curation, and human curiosity.” See more of Cooper’s beautiful and slightly creepy images here.
“These elephant skulls are located in the attic of the museum, one of its last remaining 19th-century storage places.”
[photo detail]
“These newspaper-wrapped Cretaceous bones (75-65 million years old) have not been unwrapped since they were excavated nearly 100 years ago.”
[photo detail]
“A motley crew of specimens wait to have their carpet beetle infestations dealt with by a visit to the -20°C freezer located behind the silver door.”
[photo detail]
“As objects and specimens come into the AMNH collections, they are accessioned, meaning they are assigned a number and a record of accompanying data. These are some of thee first accession books, from the gems and minerals department.”
“Didn’t you have this dream, grabbing on to a bunch of toy balloons and floating off? I think it’s something that’s shared across cultures and across borders – just this wonderful fantasy of grabbing on to toy balloons and floating into open space.”
Adventurer Jonathan Trappe is testament to the fact that some big kids never let go of their little kid dreams. On May 28th Mr. Trappe became the first person to cross the English channel held aloft by helium balloons - 52 to be exact. It took a little more than four hours to complete the 22-mile journey, floating from Ashford in Kent and landing near Dunkirk in northern France traveling at an average speed of about 25 miles per hour. Unpredictable winds blew him a bit off of his original course, and after cutting off a few balloons he landed safely in a cabbage patch.
While the trip had the sheen of a PR stunt, he’s actually a trained pilot certified for balloon flight by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and a pioneer in the world of cluster ballooning. Aside from just balloons and a chair, he traveled with an aircraft transponder, oxygen system, aircraft radios, emergency locator beacon, in-flight satellite tracking and a radio tracker. Jonathan also did his footwork and gained clearance from French and British aviation authorities and from customs and immigration offices on both sides before the trip began. [via UK Daily Mail and the Huffington Post]
See Jonathan’s blog ClusterBalloon.com to learn more about his adventure and read more media coverage.
Of course the similarities between Johnathan Trappe and Carl Fredricksen of Pixar’s UP are uncanny. After I little digging I actually found that Pixar had actually hired Jonathan to take part in a promotional world tour for the film - floating the skies in a version of Carl’s armchair.
A brief time line of flight travel across the English Channel courtesy of the UK’s Daily Mail:
1785 - French aviator Jean Pierre Blanchard successfully completed the first air crossing of the Channel, in a hydrogen balloon. It took two-and-a-half hours.
1909 - Pilot Louis Bleriot became the first to cross the Channel in a heavier-than-air aircraft, the Bleriot XI monoplane. It took 37 minutes.
1979 - The first human-powered aircraft made it across. American Bryan Allen used pedal-power for his three-hour journey.
2003 - Austrian sky-diver Felix Baumgarter completed a 20-mile freefall using an aerodynamic ‘wingsuit’ and a carbon fin. He took 14 minutes.
2008 - Swiss daredevil Yves Rossy reached 220mph using a jet-powered ‘wing’, and completed the crossing in less than 10 minutes.
2010 - Cluster balloonist Jonathan Trappe used 54 giant helium balloons to drift across, remaining airborne for three hours.
I came across this video courtesy of the folks at Good Magazine. It depicts time lapse scenes of Los Angeles magically devoid of inhabitants. Inspired by Matt Logue’s compelling series of photographs entitled Empty LA, video creator Ross Ching began to imagine how the streets of his home town might appear if everyone’s car disappeared.
It’s funny how the mind connects the puzzle pieces of memory - bear with me on the following little tangent.
Ross’ video immediately brought to mind two films I’ve seen, the first of which is 1972’s A Thief in the Night, “a powerful story of Bible prophecy.” Set against the backdrop of ‘the rapture’ (aka the ’second coming of Christ’), the non-believing lead character is left behind on Earth when all of the Christians are instantaneously transported to heaven. I saw this movie at church when I was eight and at the time it induced nightmares at the thought of everyone I knew disappearing all at once while simultaneously creating intense excitement at the possibility of wandering the aisles of our unmanned local mall and stuffing all of the velour shirts I could carry into my backpack (it was the 1970s after all.)
Oddly enough the second film is 1992’s 28 Days Later, a horror film whose amazing opening sequence depicts its the lead character walking the abandoned streets of London (as the majority of the population had been wiped out by a virus, of course). I don’t recommend either movie for kids, but have included the g-rated A Thief in the Night trailer below for your enlightenment. You can see the less g-rated 28 Days Later trailer here.
Anyhoo…
More directly related to Ross Ching’s video, I do highly recommend exploring the beautiful photographs of contemporary LA based artist Catherine Opie. Two series created early in her career depict the freeways and mini malls of Los Angeles sans cars and people. The images below, because of their tiny scale, really do an injustice to the work because in person, the beautiful prints are (and forgive me for the stereotypical ‘art-speak’) lyrical and haunting. Honestly, the curving, car-less freeways are like calligraphy. And Catherine describes her mini mall images as portraits of the American dream - unlike suburban mini malls that tend to house all of the same chain stores, these urban mini malls are composed of small mom and pop shops that embody the hopes of their predominantly immigrant owners.
Catherine Opie uses her camera to examine the world around her: documenting community, decoding identity and deciphering America. In elementary school she discovered the power of photography, after completing a report on photographer Lewis Hine who documented the plight of child laborers at the turn of the twentieth century. After receiving a Kodak Instamatic for her ninth birthday, she used that camera to photograph her friends and her neighborhood. Her fascination with community began with those first photos. Opie notes, “Basically what I did then, and I still do now is wander around with my camera to describe my relationship to the world and where I live.” - Orange County Museum of Art
I’m thinking kiddo + camera, photographing the world as they see it could have some amazing results. It did for Cathy.
Seated on a log in the middle of a bog, everyone’s favorite frog Kermit sings the “Rainbow Connection” in the opening sequence of the 1979 Muppet Movie.
Many of you with little ones in your life may know Amy Krouse Rosenthal from the children’s books she’s written - Little Pea, Duck! Rabbit! and Spoon to name a few. I first learned of her through Jen Corace who illustrated not only Mahar Drygoods but three of Amy’s children’s books (Little Pea, Little Hoot and Little Oink). And today quite by chance I learned of Amy’s penchant for performance art, video making and general loveliness.
And just last week, Amy signed on with WBEZ (the amazing Chicago Public Radio station that brings us This American Life) to created the weekly blog MISS(ion) Amy KR, which she explains this way:
Mondays: I post the week’s new mission along with a related “idea morsel” (could be a short film, a chunk of prose, a piece of art, a project, a list, a dream). Then you simply do what I’ve suggested (because you are agreeable and adventurous that way) and share your thoughts/results here.
Wednesdays: We have an “Inter Mission.” It’s just what you’d think: a short post designed to help you stretch your legs (and mind) mid-week.
Fridays: I post a curated selection of the wondrous stuff that’s come our way. If you gained something in the process (a new insight, a new friend, a moment of pleasure or clarity) and/or we changed the world, then mission accomplished.
This week’s mission has been to learn something from your kids. Here are 22 things Amy has learned from hers:
I am so taken with Amy and more so by her ability to make me want to go out into the world and do good, be kind and love my neighbor.
[Note: It has been a very wet week here in Los Angeles and one that reminded me of the following post I wrote for the Mahar Drygoods Blog back in January of 2007. Given the rising flood waters, it seemed appropriate to share this again.]
One of the few manifestations of winter in Southern California is rain - torrential downpours, flooded intersections and mudslides. Occasionally, it reaches Biblical proportions and you begin to wonder if you shouldn’t get to work on your own ark - although more often than not it dissipates in a few days, like most inclement weather around here. But even when the sky is cloudless and the streets are dry, an ark of one’s own remains appealing.
There was a church in the neighborhood where I grew up that we always referred to as the ‘Noah’s Ark Church’ because of its curved boat-like roof-line. And then I read recently about another church in Frostburg, MD whose pastor had a vision in which God instructed him to build a new church as a literal recreation of Noah’s big boat. The idea of an ark has inspired many things including countless animal shelters, horrendous made for TV movies and America’s largest water park in the Wisconsin Dells.
Constructing the ark, illustration from
the Nuremberg Chronicle, 1493
Personally, I’m a fan of the much more modest scale toy arks and model sets. Early toy arks were often referred to as ‘Sunday toys’ - as strict Victorian households forbade playing with toys on the Sabbath, but because of the ark’s religious connection it became an exception. Extremely popular in the 19th Century, many toy arks found their way into American and European homes as result of an ark making tradition rooted in the mountainous southeastern region of Germany. Early German sets that still exist now have a collectible market and can fetch crazy amounts of money.
Knowing my affinity for handmade toys, my mother-in-law recently gave me a ‘happy everything’ present, a contemporary ark set beautifully crafted by German American artist and woodworker Gunther Keil (Thanks Barbsky!). How amazing is this!…
Gunther includes a list with his arks that specify the various woods he uses to craft each animal. There are sycamore giraffes, black walnut buffalo, mahogany kangaroos and zebrawood zebras (of course). The ark itself has a removable roof and sports three divided rooms and an attic.
Noah’s Ark by American folk artist and Quaker, Edward Hicks (1780 - 1849)
So we sadly bid adieu to Art Clokey this past Friday - the creator of cultural icons Gumby and Davey & Goliath passed away at his home here in California.
My first introduction to Mr. Clokey’s work was through the stop-motion animation shorts depicting a little boy Davey and his talking dog Goliath. During the summers of my childhood, a local church held a children’s film festival which always featured these mildly moralizing (and often parodied) specials commissioned by the Lutheran Church and first airing in 1960. Davey’s Donna Reed style family lived in brilliant mid-century modern surroundings and always emphasized kindness, sharing and the virtues of being polite.
Here’s a sample Davey & Goliath episode called the Mechanical Man - many more can be found on YouTube.
Clokey’s first experiment in claymation was his jazz-fused, surreal student film called Gumbasia - a name inspired by Disney’s Fantastia and the catch-all culinary dish Gumbo. This led to the development of his most well-known character - the bendable, green Gumby. (Being a child of the 70s and 80s, I of course remember Gumby more from the Eddie Murphy spoofs on Saturday Night Live - versus his original appearances on the Howdy Doody Show in the 50s or his solo show in the 60s.)
Clokey said that Gumby’s signature wave-shaped head was fashioned after his late father’s cowlick hairdo. You never know where inspiration will strike.
Following is the opening sequence from the Gumby & Friends show:
For more than 30 years the American Museum of Natural History has created a Origami Holiday Tree. The alphabet fanatic that I am, was excited to learn that the theme of this year’s tree was Origami, A to Z, one creature or object for every letter of the alphabet. The 13 foot tree is covered in 500 folded paper creatures that were created by volunteers (who began folding in July!) In New York? Hurry, it’s only on view until January 3. And for more great photos of the ornaments visit this article on Time Out New York. [via NotCot]
“Salagadoola mechicka boola bibbidi-bobbidi-boo. Put ‘em together and what have you got?” Six decades of little kids who’ve dreamt of turning their vegetables into carriages.
While the story of Cinderella has been around for ages (the tale of the Greco-Egyptian girl Rhodopis recorded in the 1st century BC is considered the oldest known version) it was this scene from Disney’s 1950 animated classic that planted that pumpkin seed in most of our imaginations.
From cakes to actual carriages, the pumpkin coach is firmly planted in our popular culture. Here are a few of its incarnations, courtesy of the talented folks on Flickr:
Peter, Peter pumpkin eater,
Had a wife but couldn’t keep her;
He put her in a pumpkin shell
And there he kept her very well.
Peter, Peter pumpkin eater,
Had another and didn’t love her;
Peter learned to read and spell,
And then he loved her very well.
This odd little nursery rhyme is actually American in origin, first published by a Boston press around 1825. It’s meaning is one of considerable debate ranging in theory from the pumpkin as allegory for a chastity belt on a cheating wife to the hollowed pumpkin as coffin for a jealous husband’s murdered wife. Yea, kinda dark for a kiddie jingle. But time and popular culture have sanitized it’s dubious origins and now it’s a Mother Goose standard. And really, who can blame us for loving the idea of a literal pumpkin house.
In the 1950s, we saw a peculiar patch of pumpkin houses sprouting up in the nursery rhyme themed parks across the U.S. Places like Story Book Forest in Legonier, Pennsylvania (which I actually visited as a child), Storybook Land in Egg Harbor Township, New Jersey and Storybook Island in Rapid City, South Dakota. I had fun weeding out some images of Mrs. Peter’s home as they exist(ed) in these various fantasy lands (along with other pumpkin eater paraphernalia).
