No Black Shadows

Five years left

2010-03-23T15:18:00.006+01:00

Amusing and interesting video on how newscasts are produced.

I'm delighted to see how many campaigns are pushing people to take action for a better future at the moment. Here's a poster contest for a campaign to increase the visibility of the Millenium Goals in the struggle against poverty (gosh, are there really only five years left?).

---

Gerade wir wieder ordentlich auf die Schokolade gedrückt. Neben dem kurzen Neste-Greenpeace-Spot gibt es einen geringfügig längeren Beitrag in der ARD Mediathek über Kakaobohnenernte in Afrika und Kindersklaven aus Burkina Faso: Kindersklaven für Schokohasen. Mahlzeit.

Dafür noch etwas zur Erheiterung: Was ein Navi noch nie gesagt hat (aber sagen sollte)

---

Photos from the medieval fair in Waxenberg:

Spring, spring, spring

2010-03-04T16:41:00.008+01:00

Watched Sherlock Holmes. I didn't expect any similarities to the original Sherlock, so I wasn't disappointed. It's a neat film. I enjoyed it.
A lot was changed in comparision with the original books. I'm not a die-hard detective novel fan, so I don't mind. It makes me wonder why, though. There isn't much left of what Sherlock was in the 19th century. You still have the deductive intellect and the affinity to the night. But, also, now you have sex and action.
My theories are that either people don't like a perfect hero anymore, because they cannot relate to them. Sherlock is pretty much perfect, when it comes to the standards of the time in which he was written. Dr. Watson's role was also spiced up. There's no top-down hierarchy anymore. Instead, you have a flat hierarchy. What does that tell us? The western world still has mostly top-down hierarchies, and I don't think most people want to change it (do I hear yells of "anarchy!"?).
Maybe a pure detective movie wouldn't work anymore. Not enough action. Nothing to get women into the theatres.
Who knows?

***

Now there's a video game on guerilla gardening. You can see pretty neat stuff on this video. Screaming flowers. And there will be puppies.

I swear, Subterranean Press publishes the prettiest books (probably also the most expensive ones). Now there's a limited edition of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere. Awesome book. Pretty, pretty edition.
(But why does the market practically force consumers to have a credit card to acquire all the neat things?)

***

Some tiny illustrations I did for work:

There's a colored version of the latter somewhere...

Winter wonderland

2010-01-29T16:21:00.000+01:00

Some look into the future of transport by plane.

It's been snowing massively. Just beautiful. This is what my way home from work looked like on Wednesday:

The Visual and the Lexical

2010-01-06T02:20:00.001+01:00

Some interesting points concerning my diploma thesis topic from the PhD thesis of A. Hall (The Meaning of Elf and Elves in Medieval England):

- Looking at the linguistic treatment of the word "aelf", they are not small and invisible
- Elves have sometimes been related to (fallen) angels. If you leave aside the "fallen" part, elves are related to holiness. This explains why Thomas Hardy, in Jude the Obsucre, compares the female main character twice with an elf or calls her elfin - thus stressing her purity.
- In the 8th century, aelf still connotated males only. It wasn't until the 11th century that the term could also denote females.

***

The cinemas in Linz seem to be overrun because a. it's vacation time and b. Avatar is on. It's seriously impossible to reserve a seat at the evening screenings, unless you want to sit in the first four rows. Despite this, I managed to see it (in the afternoon).
Avatar is awesome. I love it. Finally, after probably a year of bad films, one worth watching (except for Up and District 9, maybe). The creature design is so-so (in general, it's pretty obvious where the film drew its inspirations from, starting with the overall story down to most creature designs). The birds are neat. So are the winged frogs and the avatars/Na'vi. Most impressive of all is the landscape design. The beauty, colourfulness and richness of the plant life is sheer overwhelming (which is probably good and necessary, if you think about the gist of the story). The cinematography was good, too. I likefd how depth and perspective were used and played with, especially in the intitial sequence. That made the 3D effect even more impressive. Later it was used in a more subdued way, which I think I prefer when it comes to 3D. It just makes you feel at home with the technology, because it seems natural. When the technology is shoved into your face, it rather screams "Look at me. See how cool I am. The special effects are all you need to pay attention to. Ignore everything else."
The acting was very convincing. Sam Worthington and Sigourney Weaver did an outstanding job both as humans and in their avatars. Cameron has created a bunch of very likable characters (I'm thinking particularly of Trudy here).
-Minor spoiler warning. Don't read on if you haven't seen the film yet-
The story - yes, it was predictable and has been there before (multiple times). Does it matter? I think not. Most stories have parallels to stories that have been here before, because, well, we're all human and pretty much the same stuff makes us all tick. We write stories that we'd want to read ourselves, so it's clear that they have certain common denominators. The message of Avatar is an important one, and it hurts not to have it repeated.
For me, the film reminded me that I have wanted to read into various indigenous cultures for some time (too much stuff I want to read). Their culture, their belief system, their rites, and, most importantly, their place in today's globalised world. And not just the major, known ones, like the Native Americans or Aboriginees. Like with languages, there's a multitude of cultures out there which are dying every moment. I can only imagine the knowledge and individuality that has been lost in this process. To learn about and listen to them is, I believe, an enriching journey.

***

An awesome video of Eiga doing oji waza. My eyes are getting watery when I watch this.

Mit dem neuen Jahr kommt auch eine neue Ausgabe des vierteljährlich erscheinenden Fanzines für Spekulative Fiktion (Fantasy/SciFi/Horror/Mystery) Specflash. 90 Seiten an Kurzgeschichten, Interviews, Artikeln und Rezensionen laden zum Lesen ein. Das Hauptthema der Ausgabe sind Vampire. Empfehlenswert ist vor allem Udo Eickenbergs Kurzgeschichte "Die letzte Prüfung", die auf die Entwicklung der Menschheit in den nächsten 150 Jahren blickt.

Ich koche ja gerne und oft, und probiere fast täglich neue Rezepte aus. Bei der Rezeptsuche und beim Foren-Lesen kommt man dabei stets über das beliebte Wort "lecker". Mittlerweile kann ich's nicht mehr sehen. So geht es wohl nicht nur mir, denn beim Stöbern in einem ausgezeichneten Koch-Blog, kam ich über diesen Eintrag. Viel Spaß beim Lexikon-Erweitern!

Goodbye 2009

2009-12-31T19:03:00.007+01:00

Another year gone. Good year. I'll miss it.

There's an old (2006), but very entertaining speech of Stephen Colbert at the White House Correspondent's Dinner - Part 1, 2 and 3.

I made a quick painting inspired by a song from La Tarantella by Galeazzi, Beasley, Arpeggiata and Pluhar. It's a collection of (I think) mostly folk songs rendered in the style of Italian classical music. I don't like classical music, but I like this CD. The background of the collection is the old belief that those who are stung by the tarantula can only be cured by dancing - which was only possible if you could find the tune that "fit" the very tarantula. Could be slow and calm, could be fast and energetic. Lovely belief, ne?
(Just as cute as the belief about the Rauhnächte - twelve nights - which says if you have white linen hanging outside during the night, the death will come and take it down, only to return during the following year to wrap you in it.)

And a photo of the Christmas present I made for my brother and his girlfriend. It's a Baroque game:

I can paint, but I can't make cookies to save my life. Those two can. They made New Year's cookies. Best cookies I've tasted in my life so far. Plus, they look awesome:

Housework

2009-11-09T16:27:00.002+01:00

I needed a lampshade...

So I made one.

It's far from perfect and I'm not really a successful do-it-yourself person, but it's 100% made by myself and a unique item, which makes it superior :)

Samhain

2009-10-31T13:50:00.003+01:00

Shortly ago, I finished reading both of George R. R. Martin's Dreamsongs volumes. They are collections of short stories and scripts for TV episodes of all kinds of genres that Martin is popular for (Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror). I can't say that I loved all stories, as I did in his collection "A Song for Lya and other stories" (which is an awesome book except for the multitude of editorial errors.
Anyway, Dreamsongs. What's really nice about the books is the variety they present. You can experience the whole of Martin's range and see if you like e.g. his SF-stuff as much as his Fantasy works. I'm still primarily a Fantasy lover, so the Science Fiction didn't appeal to me as much. But I discovered to my great surprise that I really liked his horror stories. Who would have guessed?

Today is Samhain (and Halloween, yeah, but that's by far not as appealing). Which means, for me, a time to withdraw and recollect. Time to remember and honour those who touched my life, those who came and went.
Have a good Samhain night.

***

Und für die Interessenten aus Linz und Umgebung: KendoLinz startet mit 5. November einen Grundkurs für alle, die schon immer diese wunderbare Kampfkunst ausprobieren wollten. Jetzt ist ein guter Zeitpunkt dafür ;)
Einfach auf www.kendolinz.org schauen für nähere Informationen.

Movies

2009-09-27T17:30:00.005+02:00

Election day is pretty much over. I guess it could have been worse, but I'm not exactly thrilled about the results.

Watched two movies recently, both very recommendable. The first was Pixar's Up in 3D. I'm not really one for special effects, but the 3D in both Up and Ice Age 3 amazed me. Moreso in the former, because Ice Age pushed the effects right into your face, while Up was more subtle. It felt like being in a wonderful, colourful 3D universe, with the 3D being natural rather than special. Nice.
The film itself (apart from the 3D) was quite good, too. I don't remember that any film I've watched so far has managed to make me cry in the initial 10 minutes. Pixar are masters of their craft. Particularly the non-verbal scenes right at the beginning are phenomenal. It takes an artist to create an attachment to a character with only images in such a short time.

The second movie was District 9. The trailer made me wonder if the movie had a plot. It had. The film shows some gritty, believable Science Fiction with a couple of plot holes and many open questions, which offers much material for discussion. It is also highly critical of society and has all of the good stuff - funny dialogue, intriguing background and for the mainstream folks blood and action. Good soundtrack, too. And the documentary style which the movie uses appeals to me greatly.

***

Vor zwei Wochenenden war ich auf der Wearfair, der Messe für ökologische und nachhaltige Mode, die zum zweiten Mal in Linz stattfand. Auch wenn die Kritiken die Messe als eher klein und noch aufstrebend betiteln, fand ich sie recht beeindruckend - schon umfangreich und mit vielen Ausstellern. In Linz gibt es ja nur eine handvoll Lokalitäten, wo man derlei Kleidung kaufen kann. Großteils ist man leider auf den Online-Versand angewiesen. Aber die Messe hat mir auch gezeigt, dass das Segment auch in Linz im Wachsen begriffen ist, und zumindest die Wearfair ist ein guter jährlicher Anlaufpunkt, um sich bei Bedarf mit Kleidung einzudecken.

Auf dem Weg zurück zur Straßenbahn kam ich dann noch über eines der Projekte des Kranken Hasen, den ich seit meiner Visite beim Haus der Geschichten kenne. Ich mag die Aktionen, die der kranke Hase bringt - Tanzen zu unhörbarer Musik, auf Leute in der Einkaufsstraße wirr einreden und, wie in diesem Fall, eine Baumdisco. Die Dinge sind so schön skurril, kurios und abseits der Norm, dass man sie doch nur mögen kann. Denn was ist schon normal.

Your soul is a river

2009-09-01T22:58:00.006+02:00

Lots of things are changing. It's amazing. It is also kinda weird to feel everything evolving so quickly, especially when you notice it's not just outside. The galaxy inside you moves at a much faster pace than the one outside, and you just stand there, baffled by the realization of your capabilities. I can only repeat, life is awesome.

I've been reading loads of books, since I'm not longer bound by the reading list of my thesis or my exams. So I'm using the time I have left to make book loans from the uni library. Can't read all I want because there's not enough time (umm, two weeks until I return to Salzburg for maybe the last time). But I'm certainly reading quickly, and working through 7 books in 2-3 weeks.

Most of them get internalized into my mental bookshelf of ideas and thoughts. One that I enjoyed exceptionally much was Patrick Rothfuss' Name of the Wind, a fantasy trilogy (I think). The first part of the series. It's probably a bit cliché. A brooding, strong protagonist, his helper, magic, love. All the good stuff. It also reminds me a bit of the Dark Elf trilogy. But it's very enjoyable. And Rothfuss loves Whedon. We're all family here.

***

Diesen Sommer konnte ich auch einmal den Baumwipfelweg besteigen, eine Holzkonstruktion 30m über dem Waldboden. Ziemlich cooles Teil.

Und diese Woche war ich subversiv unterwegs. Gestern auf dem Weg zum Hermes-Paketshop (coincidentally, auch der Weg zum Kendo-Training) habe ich dieses eine LoveGuerilla Plakat aufgehängt. An der Straßenbahnhaltestelle, direkt auf der Werbetafel. Hab mich dabei ganz evil gefühlt ;)

Heute kam ich dabei dann zuuufällig vorbei, als ich komplett unbeabsichtigerweise wieder den Weg zum Kendo-Training einschlug. Meine Erwartung war, dass jemand das Plakat entfernt hätte. Unautorisierte Plakate auf Plakatwände kleben und so. Doch nein, es war noch da. Und zwei der Streifen fehlten bereits. Was braucht es mehr, um etwas Wärme im Herzen aufkommen zu lassen?
In den nächsten Tagen verunstalte ich dann die Kulturhauptstadt mit ein paar mehr Plakaten. Spread the love.

Entertainment

2009-07-15T23:36:00.004+02:00

I feel bad for only fulfilling 15 of 100 basic skills for geeks. Ah, it seems my nerd days are over.

Instead, I find myself enjoying this Kendo video way too much. I want to play it over and over again, just to enjoy that feeling of pure love that Kendo gives me and to exult in the joy of gogi. Every inch of that video speaks through body language (which I'm probably only reading because I understand at most 5% of what is said ... taisho, shimpan, shiai, ippon, yuko datotsu, tehehehe). The people clapping, the kenshi's utter look of bewilderment. Pure love.

Another lovely film is this stop-motion production. Very cute.

***

Der Rechberger Mittelaltermarkt fand wieder statt, und nach dem wunderbaren Erlebnis letztes Jahr hatte ich natürlich hohe Erwartungen. Leider wohl zu hoch, denn dieses Jahr fand ich ihn etwas enttäuschend. In der Lagerwiese waren "Löcher", wo letztes Jahr Gruppen waren, und einige der hochwertigen Händlerstände, die mir noch gut in Erinnerung waren, fehlten auch. Dafür gab's Jonglage zum Mitmachen und die Möglichkeit einer Quickie-Hochzeit.
Das Ambiente ist allerdings unschlagbar, daher: Nächstes Jahr wieder!

21 Steps to Enlightenment

2009-06-13T22:50:00.001+02:00

While I was gone, Joss Whedon's Dollhouse started to kick in real good and came to a (temporary) finish. Looking at the big picture, I didn't like the first couple of episodes too much. They had potential, but only so much as the series as a whole had - the premise, plot, etc. After five episodes, though, all the good stuff came rushing in. I became involved by all the plot reveals and turns and, above all, the fantastic acting that most of the characters showed (all except Eliza Dushku). And Alan Tudyk in the final episode - hell yeah! Rarely have I seen such a fun and entangling acting. The world needs more well acted multiple personalities. The quality of acting made me feel compelled to re-watch several episodes of Firefly; which is probably the only series that I regularly re-watch (I sometimes watch the first episodes of Buffy before I get bored, don't ever watch B5, although I dream of Star Trek Voyager).
The second season looks promising.

Auf WDR gab es eine Diskussionsrunde über die Trickserei, die im Lebensmittelbereich mit Kunden gemacht wird. Das ganze kann man sich per WebTV hier ansehen und ist sogar viel unterhaltsamer, als ich angenommen hatte.

Ein weiteres interessantes Detail, über das ich stolperte: Man vergleiche die Pringles-Wikipedia-Einträge in englisch und deutsch. Der deutsche ist ungleich kritischer und zeigt, was für ein Mist in den Chips eigentlich drin ist. Im englischen keine Spur davon.

Recherchebedingt war ich im Haus der Geschichten. Eine nette unterrepräsentierte Kulturstätte, die tief berühren kann, wenn man sich darauf einlässt. Auch schön, dass sie interaktiv ist - was mich dazu veranlasste, einen Teil meiner eigenen Geschichte dort zu lassen. Fotos:

Among the Living

2009-05-28T11:22:00.005+02:00

I'm back. I have tons to write, and I'm writing tons, only in tons of places. Sort of ;)

There's a bad photo of the costume I designed and made some time ago:

In April, there was an exhibition on Japanese art in Salzburg. I wrote a report on it here, with photos.

In the Biologiezentrum Dornach the exhibition "Gefangen in Bernstein" is currently taking place. Quite nice for a short afternoon trip.

This Saturday, there will the the Fairplanet Festival in Linz. A week later, there's the Fest der Sinne in Wels. In September, we'll have another installment of the Wearfair. Nice!
(I just wish the Wearfair didn't always take place when I'm out of town.)

I'm also now co-habiting with six Kendo-infested beings.

And because I adjust to all kinds and tastes, I have given them both names:

and numbers:

And I also revamped my website. Go check it out.

Goodbye, Life

2009-03-25T23:56:00.003+01:00

That was a short visit. Hope to see you again in a couple of weeks.

As you might have noticed, this and the last posting lacked the picture/painting I had intended to post with every blog entry. Alas, I still have no camera, and the cam on my phone stopped working as well, so I can't take photos of the stuff I produced in the last couple of weeks. But since I'm probably going to disappear again for a few weeks, there won't be that many postings without pictures. Quid pro quo. Or something like that.

Watched Watchmen. Then read the comic (which, surprisingly, was available in our University library; I love my English department for its open-mindedness). I liked the film. It was intriguing, partly confusing and left certain stuff open (which is neither good nor bad). Upon reading the comic, I figured the confusing stuff mostly came from the changes that had taken place for no conceivable reason. The film seems to push the vigilantes into harsher good/bad-directions, while the comic leaves them pretty much in the middle-field. The comic also and unsurprisingly explains their behaviours better. It's nice to have such well thought-out and complex personalities in the superhero genre.
I guess Heroes tries to follow that direction a bit, since its characters are quite grey, as well, but that might just be due to a general lack of a well thought-out concept, resulting in a change of character-direction in order to surprise the viewer again by putting the character into the other party. (Yes, Heroes is slowly starting to bore me.)

What does not bore me, but rather gets better bit by bit, is Joss Whedon's new show, Dollhouse. While I'm not too fond of Faith's, err, Eliza Dushku's acting, I like the direction of the show and hope it gets beyond the damsel-in-distress stage.
I miss Joss' humour. It's what made Firefly brilliant.
Still, lots of potential in the show.

***

In Linz eröffnete vor einigen Wochen die Tolouse-Lautrec Ausstellung in der Landesgalerie - eine sehr empfehlenswerte Ausstellung mit vielen beeindruckenden Bildern des Malers der Pariser Bordellszene. Mich beeindruckten vor allem die verschiedenen Stilrichtungen, in denen die Gemälde angefertigt wurden, und natürlich begeisterten mich am meisten die Bilder, in denen deutlich der Einfluss der japanischen Malerei zu sehen war. Hat mich auch etwas überrascht zu sehen, dass der japanische Einfluss damals schon so groß war. Und weil das so toll ist, geht's demnächst in die Sensai-Ausstellung in Salzburg.

Hello, Life

2009-03-14T08:03:00.000+01:00

Well, life has me back. For a while. The question is whether this is a good or bad thing, considering that life's a bitch and all.

But, disappointingly, there are only a few links to post. The rest will follow (soon, as my former Arindal colleagues would have said).

To begin with, I have a nice video on guerilla gardening.

On the other side of a mirror, there's a shocking article on the consequences workers making antique style jeans face. The cynical part of me thought "How handy. With stuff like that, you can both make fashion and kill people."
Then it came to me that this thought isn't so ironic after all. Fashion and death are actually closely linked together - sweatshops, ridiculous beauty ideals, pesticides in the cotton plantations, etc.
Sad world.

For something more positive:
Very exciting deviation about digital comics. I love the interactive-ness and it feels so much more alive than traditional comics.

And to finish off, two in German.

Ich bin ja nicht so der Fan von Raps, Der hier hat's mir allerdings angetan.

Nachdem im deutschene Raum die Petition zum Grundeinkommen so gut durchgegangen ist, hier ein Film über's Grundeinkommen. Sehr interessant und informativ.

XXI The World

2009-02-08T00:14:00.004+01:00

Style inspired heavily by James Jean. Theme inspired heavily by my bi-monthly visits at the hospital :)

***

Seit Ende letzten Jahres gibt es im ehemaligen Central-Kino den Ruhepol, zum bewussten Austreten aus der lärmüberlasteten Welt, zum Auszeit-Nehmen und zum Erleben der Stille. Nachdem ich es lange vor hatte, konnte ich der Örtlichkeit nun auch einen Besuch abstatten, und ich muss sagen: Ich bin beeindruckt. Das Innendesign ist atemberaubend; schlicht, puristisch und "grundlegend". Man fühlt sich wie in einer anderen Welt. Im Zentrum liegt man in einem der ehemaligen Kinosäle und schaut auf Holzplatten, wo einst die Leinwand war - eine Ironie, die mich begeistert. Der Ruhepol ist für Linz eine große Bereicherung, und als ich ihn verließ, fühlte ich in mir schon Bedauern, wissend, dass er im November wieder geschlossen wird.

Not a triumph, but a try

2009-02-03T22:37:00.001+01:00

There were so many possible titles for this blog entry -
"Two pages on why I'm not a comics creator"
"Fabrizio Eva in a nutshell"
"Slaughtering globalisation theories"

Ah well. I guess it is better to have a bad start somewhere than to not start at all.

From March 6-8 there's a comics festival in Linz. There'll also be a 24-hour-comic project. I'm very tempted to participate, despite my lack of comic creation abilities and despite it being the weekend before I have my diploma exam. It probably is loads of fun.

You're valuable (and so is everybody else)

2009-01-19T00:41:00.001+01:00

Back in October Neil Gaiman made a 9-city tour, reading a chapter of his latest novel, The Graveyard Book in each city. The book has been, afaik, in the bestselling lists ever since it was published - justifiably so, I believe. It took a long time, but over many nights in a half-dozing state I listened to the whole tour and enjoyed it greatly. It is very recommendable. You can find the videos here.

There is also another recommendable video for today, a short film named Validation. It's awesome. I love it. It sincerely moved me to tears.

And to end the linkage: I also stumbled over a nice blog with some interesting kendo articles.

***

Some costume designs. Costume designs are fun (although I'll probably never sew them, unfortunately):

AEC09

2009-01-08T01:21:00.005+01:00

Jeder Besuch im Linzer Ars Electronica Center ist ein Erlebnis. Die Symbiose von Technologie und Kunst schafft es immer wieder, in mir Visionen der Welt zu wecken, wie sie in der Zukunft sein könnte - nicht immer zum Guten, aber immer inspirierend.
Am Wochenende wurde das neue AEC mit drei Open House - Tagen eröffnet, und die Massen stürmten hinein, bis die Türen verschlossen wurden. 4.5 Stockwerke voller Neuheiten waren überfüllt, so dass es viel zu sehen aber nicht so viel zum Ausprobieren gab, weshalb ich demnächst irgendwann noch einmal hingehen werde. Es gibt dort einfach zu viele Dinge, die mich fasziniert haben. Mit jedem Stockwerk stieg auch meine Begeisterung.
Im Keller ist die Umwelt-Abteilung eingesiedelt, in der man Retina-Scans machen kann, die an Bilder vom Universum erinnern. Daneben gibt es Mikroskopie bis in die mehrere tausendfache Vergrößerung und in sich geschlossene Lebensräume, sowie aufgespaltete und mit menschlichem Auge sichtbare Tomaten-DNA. Und, am Besten, Bücher! Ich könnte mich dort eingraben zwischen den Werken über Medienkultur und Körperkult. Auch einige bekannte Technologien waren dort zu finden, wie z.B. das Herausboxen der Form des eigenen Lampenschirms und 3D-Zeichnen mittels 3D-Brille.

Im Erdgeschoss ist die Robotik-Abteilung sowie die Nachfolge vom Cave, in der wir Das letzte Abendmahl digital zusammengesetzt aus vielen, vielen Einzelbildern gesehen haben, weit reingezoomt, so dass selbst der 1cm große, fast verblasste Kirchturm nebem Jesus' Kopf deutlich sichtbar wurde. Mir hat es dort aber v.a. das japanische Klettermännchen angetan, das im Originalversuch über 6h mit seiner Batterie einen Berg erklommen hat.

Das erste Stockwerk war sehr musikalisch angehaucht; mein absolutes, unschlagbares Highlight eine Nachbildung inspiriert von Animusic Pipe Dream. Ab dieser Entdeckung konnte ich mich nicht mehr zurückhalten, wurde verbal sehr reduziert und hatte vermutlich ein unverkennbares Leuchten in den Augen.

Obwohl ich dachte, meine Gefühle zu dem Zeitpunkt wären nicht mehr zu toppen, kam die Begegnung mit meiner momentanen großen Liebe im zweiten Stockwerk, das für mich eindeutig das Steampunk-Stockwerk ist. Maschinen, Zahnräder, Mechanik. Alles da, hübsch, ästhetisch, kunstvoll und brilliant. Man muss es gesehen haben, so lässt es sich nicht in Worte fassen. Ein Werk hat Bewegung auf Null reduziert, indem jedes Zahnrad sich immer langsamer dreht. Zehn Zahnräder, aber die Bewegung erkennt man ab dem dritten schon fast nicht mehr.

Steampunk hat einfach was.

Yule

2008-12-25T16:32:00.001+01:00

Not really using canned vegetables often, I now have a reason to not use them at all. I needed some beans for cooking and ended up with a stone in the food. Holy crap. I cannot image the bad production criteria that let a stone get into the can.

Talking of food:
Awesome bentos. I love such a creative and aesthetic use of food. That's the kind of attention to detail and dedication that creates a great food culture

And another video on an important topic: Act Now

***

In Linz gibt es gerade die Ausstellung "Kulturhauptstadt des Führers" im Schlossmuseum. Die Aussstellung ist in verschiedene Schwerpunkte aufgeteilt (Architektur, Kunst, Literatur, Theater) und beleuchtet die Pläne, die Hitler für Linz hatte, und inwieweit diese umgesetzt wurden. Der Kunst-Bereich ist äußerst umfangreich und beinhaltet zahlreiche Bilder aus der Zeit der 30er und 40er. Man wird förmlich von der Kunst erschlagen. Die Ausstellung ist sehr empfehlenswert, da informativ (in erdrückendem Ausmaß), und brachte mir als Linzer einiges näher, wovon ich vorher nur wenig Ahnung hatte, auch wenn mir persönlich der Architektur-Teil ist leider etwas zu kurz gekommen (obwohl er auch umfangreich ist; da er für mich aber der interessanteste Bereich war, hätte ich mir gerne noch mehr gewünscht).
Die Ausstellung liefert auch kleine Einblicke in die Kindheits- und Jugendhintergründe und ich dachte mir öfters, dass deutlich wird, welche innerliche Verhärtung jemand erlebt, der immer wieder enttäuscht wird (Wiederholungsprüfungen in der Schule, mehrfaches Versagen in der Realschule, zweifache Ablehnung der Kunstuni, etc.). Mit 15 hatte er schon deutliche Umbaupläne für Linz. Derart gerichtete frühe "Ambitionen" indizieren doch, dass die Person schon jung sehr unzufrieden gewesen sein muss.

***

Am dritten Adventwochenende gab's auch einen mittelalterlichen Weihnachtsmarkt am Froschberg in Linz, auf den ich kurz zur Ablenkung vom Lernmarathon geschaut habe. Er war sehr klein mit wenigen Händlern, aber ich hatte eh nicht vor lange zu bleiben. Hängen geblieben bin ich dann doch, und zwar bei den lieben Menschen vom Mjöllnir Clan, die mich etwas über die Wikinger aufgeklärt haben und mir gleichzeitig ein bisschen linguistisches Fachwissen vermittelten, das mir bei meiner Prüfung in der darauf folgenden Woche geholfen hat. Ich bedanke mich herzlich und verneige mein Haupt ob der Liebe und Arbeit, die die niederösterreichischen Wikinger ins Handwerk stecken. Hat mich tief beeindruckt. Für mich ist jetzt auch nachvollziehbarer, was die Wikinger-Darstellung so reizvoll macht. Mal sehen, was das neue Mittelalter-Jahr bringen wird.

***

To finish off:
Here is an awesome song and video (ending song of the game Portal). It was, of course, written by the awesome Jonathan Coulton.

***

This year's Christmas card. Had planned to make real cards and send them off, but ran out of time. Thus, the cheap version.

What I learned from my thesis

2008-12-16T13:45:00.000+01:00

Some concepts I came across while writing....

Religious transcendence.
In Christianity: transcending life and death.
In Buddhism: transcendence between the enlightened and unenlightened being.
Jean-Paul Satre: transcending the ego; meaning: allowing others to influence you.

engl. emancipation
* Befreiung
* Emanzipation
* Gleichberechtigung
(Nope, I was not aware of all these meanings.)

And some absolutely fantastic quotes from May Kendall's and Andrew Lang's That Very Mab (while I love Fiona Macleod's "The Annir-Coille" deeply, and of all texts for my thesis it is still my favourite one, when it comes to socio-political satire nothing can beat That Very Mab):

"[...] we are being educated up to a very high point. It saves people the trouble of thinking for themselves, certainly; they can always get all their thoughts now, ready made, on every kind of subject, and at extremely low prices. They only have to make up their minds what to take, and generally they take the cheapest. There is a great demand for cheap thought just now, especially when it is advertised as being of superior quality."

"[...] education is compulsory. Eating is not compulsory; you may starve, you must learn."

"[...] it is part of their religion to walk as fast as they can, not only through Cheapside but through life. The one who can walk fastest, and knock down the greatest number of other people, gets a prize."

"Even the dynamiters themselves don't appear to have gone into the whole logic of it. I suppose that they are tired of only blowing things up on paper, and they are people who have a great objection to things in general. They complain that they can't get justice from the universe in its present state of preservation, and therefore they are going to blow as much of it as possible into what they call smithereens, and try to get justice from the smithereens. It is a new scheme they have hit upon, a kind of scientific experiment. The theory appears to be, that justice is the product of Nihilism plus public buildings blown up by dynamite, and that the more public buildings they blow up the more justice they will obtain."

***

But the most important thing I learned from my thesis - stress, and that it's not really worth it. To continue with the quotes:

All the e-mails I get these days start with sorry but I've been busy, and I don't understand how we can be so busy and then have nothing to say to each other.
- Jon McGregor, "if nobody speaks of remarkable things"

We're taught that being busy and occupied means being industrious and hardworking. To me, however, it feels like a loss of the quality of life. The last few weeks, I've been so glad I'm doing Kendo, because it gave me the opportunity to get out and away from work and hit people. And, sometimes, that's just what you gotta do.

Ahem. But to stick to the truth, it's not the hitting-people thing that I needed. It's the part about getting away and emptying my mind. 'tis good that Kendo exists in my life.

***

It "only" took nine sessions of live-drawing and repeated urges from the supervisor for me to try out a different medium. Charcoal. It's actually quite cool and fun. I think I end up with better results for the 10-minute poses than with graphite. The longer poses still yield in nicer pictures with graphite.

Winter is coming

2008-11-28T14:17:00.002+01:00

It appears there is nothing that puts me more off a film than having it begin with Keira Knightley, looking even more anorexic than usually, trying to sing erotically, followed by a close-up of Scarlett Johannson's mouth trying to exhale cigarette smoke erotically.
British films are really at their best when they do not try to imitate Hollywood and instead use their typical wit and charm, with actors that look like real people (with wrinkles and all).
(see Plots with a View for a great example of such films)

***

Some more stuff from the recent live-drawing sessions. We finally had a male model, and I quickly realised that drawing him isn't any different from drawing her. In the end, they're all objects consisting of light and shadow and are mostly, sadly, objecitfied by me.

We also did some movement studies, which I hate, hate, hate with a passion. How are you supposed to find an accurate line if the line changes all the time? (And the light and shadow changes, too.)

Evolution is Science Fiction

2008-11-08T02:13:00.001+01:00

I read Serenity by Keith DeCandido, after the film of the same name, based on the best SciFi-series ever. The novel follows the series and the film very, very closely. This is a shame, because I liked the style of the author and he seems like someone who could bring neat additions to novels that follow films. Content-wise, the book doesn't add anything if you've seen the series/film, and it even seems awkward if you've read the unauthorized essays, because some of the character's thoughts don't add up (others, rarely, explain certain events better, which is what such a novel should do, in my book).
Novels that are fashioned after films usually disappoint me. It's rare that they bring originality into the plot, often because the writers are simply not allowed to think for themselves and expand the verse - the creator's fear of having someone else kill their darlings.
(A fear that may be understandable if you know certain types of fanfiction.)

***

There's this theory that was apparently very prominent in the 19th century. It describes the existence of "a racial or animal memory throughout the evolutionary process - a subliminal knowledge of generic past experience in each individual creature at her particular level of developed consciousness."
Today you call it basic instinct, I guess. Still, something in me refuses to accredit this theory. It seems weird to believe that, if you speak in theological terms, some memory or, rather, being of Lilith and Eva should be in me (given they existed, but we're talking theoretically here, so that's not the point). That all the past that there is in one's bloodline could be summoned up if you reach a certain level of consciousness, from the oppression in patriarchy back to the times when there were matriarchates.
We're more than the sum of our parts, true, but are we that much more?

***

I love this song by Tori Amos.

It reminds me of the time when I went to a ball and couldn't really relate to any of the people there, so I just went around trying to smile happily, while I was utterly bored inside. At some point a guy told me "You smile nicely, but you don't talk at all", which kinda ruined my attempt to fit it.
And this is what the song is to me.

Political Propaganda

2008-10-10T11:50:00.003+02:00

Some interesting stuff I came across yesterday:

- Apparently Napoleons first words when meeting Goethe were "You're a man". This seems peculiarly surreal.
- Napoleon was not actually short, but rather of average height. His alleged shortness seems to have resulted from firstly political propaganda and secondly a mixing up of French and British inches.

And from my thesis:

- In former times, especially in Scandinavia, Elves and Dwarves were of the same origin (same race). Dwarves were a "tribe" of Elves that moved to the mountains and set up their habitations there (if I understood it correctly).
Elves, brownies, pixies, etc. are also often associated with the Lapps and some assume that the mythology of Elves and Fairies have their origin in reality, the Lapps. Asiatic people were also often called Dwarves.
Making me wonder how the contemporary distinction between Elves and Dwarves actually came into existence (my older sources describe Dwarves as beautiful, musical, etc. - so there is quite a conceptual jump in there). I'm guessing as globalisation took place in the last centuries, people became more nationalistic and ethnocentric, at the same time putting down other races, e.g. the Lapps and asiatic people (the Dwarves), resulting in an increasingly unattractive image of Dwarves.
I have, however, no confirmation whatsoever for that theory.

***

I'm deluding myself into thinking that I've actually improved a bit during the last three live-drawing sessions. My approach to drawing seems to have changed a bit (moving more towards volume rather than stick figures) and I seem more patient when rendering out sketches. Aaah, pretty delusions.
When I took classes five years ago this week's model was there, too. I think I even drew her in exactly the same pose in one case. Now I regret having thrown out all my sketches when I moved. Would have been nice to compare them.

Another bunch

2008-10-02T01:18:00.000+02:00

Tehehehe.

I know now where I'll go looking if I'm lacking inspiration for my characters' clothes.

***

Amazon is granting a 10% discount for all books ordered in October by Austrian customers. Ohmigod. I did not want to buy even more new books in the near future, but I am SO gonna buy LOADS of books that are on my wishlist. (Hello consumer society. This is me. I fear I cannot refuse you if you offer me the printed word on paper between cardboard boxes.)
So in November, instead of writing a book, I will have to rent a thatched hut in Ireland, shut myself and read.
Arrrr.
Books.
Boooooooks.

Ahem. Excuse me. My not-so-secret addition might have briefly taken over my brains. But I'm fine now. I think.

***

We did some 10min-poses today (usually it's twenty minutes). I also started a new sketchpad with darker paper, making it a pain to scan and and interesting experiment with highlights (failed experiment nonetheless).
Three hours isn't enough.

Linkage and Nekkid People

2008-09-26T13:22:00.000+02:00

I've decided to keep this blog bilingually from now on, meaning I'll partly write entries in German if the content isn't really relevant for the non-German speaking world. I'm guessing that most will stay in English, though.

***

An artifical waterfall in Canal City, Fukuoka (Japan). Some really nice stuff going on there, especially towards the end.

And the new season of Heroes has started. Very nice start - I got a bit bored by in the middle of Season 2, but the first two episodes of number three are very promising.

***

I started live-drawing again, after not having done it for five years due to my studies. It's good to be drawing live models again. Hopefully it will improve my anatomy and drafting skills. Right now I probably have to focus on the anatomy and the lineweight; I'm still pronouncing parts of the body that lie further back too much.

***

Zwei interessante Artikel aus dem Standard: Am 23. September wurden die weltweiten Ressourcen verbraucht (in Österreich sogar schon im April, was uns wirklich zu denken geben sollte).

und ein Interview mit der 11-jährigen Tochter einer Ukrainerin über das Leben in Österreich und die gefühlte Ausländerfeindlichkeit.

Rhiannon

2008-09-02T11:07:00.002+02:00

And here's the finished picture of the whole band:

Golling 2008

2008-09-01T12:42:00.002+02:00

Went to the medieval fair in Golling yesterday. No photos, since my camera is broken. Instead, I used it for some life drawing and post-market sketching.
I enjoy life drawing so much at the moment. After some sketches, I tend to do more dynamic and interesting poses even without a model. And I tend to notice many more details about people's appearances and body-language when I draw them.

Quickie

2008-08-10T00:49:00.002+02:00

Quick sketch before going to bed.

(The Lord of War audio commentary is kickass. With a quality like that, you watch the film once, and every subsequent time you watch the commentary because it has more interesting information to offer.)

Byzantine WIP 3 - Mission Failed

2008-08-03T21:59:00.003+02:00

The board is done and must be done anew. I messed up, so it has too few playing fields. Ahem. Sixteen are missing. Better luck next time.
So, when I said "if I ever do something like that again, I'll do everything differently" in my last posting, I didn't expect the "again" to happen so soon.

There're still so many things you can do with it and use it for. You only can't play chess.

And some by-products from my woodworking spree. Yes, they all look more or less the same, but it was fun, and that's all that counts :D

One of the necklaces gracefully shown off by Tigris:

Byzantine WIP 2

2008-07-22T03:01:00.000+02:00

Next step. I did lots of rasping and sanding and sawing. Learned lots about different wood types, too. So, if I ever do something like that again, I'll do everything differently ;)

Next stage is the coloring.

Byzantine WIP 1

2008-07-17T22:52:00.004+02:00

I started working on the Byzantine Chess. Bought the raw materials last weekend, before going to Vienna for the medieval fair at the Heeresgeschichtliche Museum and a friend's birthday party. There's too much chipboard and not enough solid wood in DIY superstores.
Today I played a bit with the wood to see how it behaves and to find a design for the mini-pillar.

Finding Serenity

2008-07-06T23:13:00.001+02:00

As an avid fan of Joss Wheedon's Firefly (I'm sure I've mentioned that brilliant series often enough) I'm constantly on the lookout for more information about the characters, the world, etc., since a cancelled show alone isn't satisfying enough.
My most recent informant is the essay collection Finding Serenity, edited by Jane Espenson. The works in there have been eye-openers several times.
When watching the series I've mostly been a fan of Inara, as her grace and geisha-like status seemed very appealing. Now, after reading some of the essays, my focus shifted a bit to Zoe. I'm seeing how Inara is trapped by her own character weaknesses, while Zoe seems so much stronger. From Mercedes Lackey's essay:

"She seems to have come to a Zen-like state of acceptance of whatever enters her world; it is not good, it is not bad, it merely is, and she will deal with it. She plays whatever hand she is dealt, and waits and watches for the single opportunity to make her move."

At that point I felt strongly reminded of Kendo (looking at the microcosm). And it goes on, with the macrocosm:

"I think she sees the really big picture; she lived through the defeat of the Independents, but she knows that this current situation can't last. She might not live to see the Alliance fall, but she knows it will, eventually, and she's hoping that a little push here, and another one there, on her part, might bring that day a little closer. This may be why she maintains an outwardly unruffled composure; she knows what will happen in the end, whether or not she is there to see it. For her, freedom or lack of it is just another situation to deal with. Or not. There are only two constants in her life - her loyalty to Mal and her love for Wash - and as long as she has those, she can work with what's thrown at her. Everything else is subject to change, and change is what she handles best. I believe she knows exactly what the situation is with regard to the Alliance, and she is doing her best to help Mal maintain his illusion of freedom, while she herself is perfectly well aware of how much of an illusion it is."

There are so many interesting and intriguing ideas in that paragraph, you don't know where it is best to begin pondering. Everything seems so applicable to our real world.

1. The concept of religion:
The Firefly-verse is multi-cultural, being set in a time when the East and the West collaborate, or have once collaborated as equals, thus sharing Western and Asian cultural traits. Superficially, Inara seemed to be the one to depict the Asian side (one reason why I was drawn to her): Her status as a Companion goes back to the Japanese geisha and she is described several times as a Buddhist.
Yet it is Zoe who, according to Lackey, incorporates the Zen-ideas most. (I don't remember Zoe's religion, but I'd guess she's an atheist.) Here we have an example of the difference between the faith one claims to have and our behaviour, the actions we take - how we live, or do not live, that faith.
At one point in the series Inara also says she does not want to die at all, a quote that drew speculations about Inaras big, big (still unreveavled) secret. Contrastingly, Zoe repeatedly throws herself into battle, accepting possible death as a consequence and not fearing it.
So by action, Zoe is the Buddhist, living by Zen-principles.

2. The concept of our impact on the future:
As someone who's big on the ecology-movement, organic stuff, saving the planet and preserving nature, etc. etc. etc., the question that constantly rises for me is if my action, small as they are, do really have any positive consequences. So I could identify with Zoe's "little push here, and another one there". It's a nice idea, to not needfully have to see and experience what we live for, but simply to believe that what we do will be a little push in the right direction.
(A shoutout to Be Humble. To not expect too much and that even if our single actions are not visible in the big picture, they contribute to it.)

3. The concept of only two constants in the middle of lifelong change:
Most of us need constants in our life. Some more, others less. I usually suspected these constants need to be material, because for me, they usually are. In the last years I realized I need a place that I can "come home to" every day. Splitting my belongings, my feelings for a "home" between two places (Linz and Salzburg) was not satisfying and gave me a home neither here nor there. So, for me, a place to come home to is a constant that I need (the one I'm most aware of).
For Zoe, these constants are mental, based on feelings for people (granted, the people are material, but the people alone don't make the constants). Having the constants grounded in people and feelings, rather than material belongings, sounds very appealing to me (and invovles again an immaterial thinking that seems based on Zen-philosophy).
In addition, Zoe's two constants are two of the most profound human ideals, going back centuries and centuries. They are two of the three principles of the Claddagh ring (friendship, loyalty, love) - which may just be the three elements people really need in life, and are thus good constants to build your life around.

4. The concept of keeping up others' illusions
Zoe helps Mal in keeping up his illusion of freedom. Me, being someone who doesn't speak much, but when I do it's often uncomfortably direct and sometimes radical for people who are not used to it (especially when I'm in a situation of stress and pressure), I generally follow the train of thought that people need to be pulled out of their holes of illusions and redirected when they are walking down a path that's not real but imagined. Hard, crushing, painful truth (at least when I can be bothered, which is seldom enough).
I still have to come to grips with the fact that this is not necessarily the best for the people in question and that they might dislike me for confronting them with the direct, hard, crushing truth.
(My diplomacy skills are probably at something around -12.)
Now, in Firefly we have a strong, independent woman, who helps a strong, independent man, captain of his crew, who is more than anyone else leader, father and guardian of these people, keep up his illusion; someone, who you wouldn't think needs an illusion.
How sensitive to other people's needs do you need to be to realize not only what is fact, but also which facts other people do and do not need and what illusions to encourage and which do dispell?

Does this show to some extent why Zoe is not only a strong character, but also deeply admirable in her beliefs, personality and actions?
And why I simply adore Firefly. There's no series or film that has come even close to the ideas and ponderings this one gave me. It's like Kendo kata. It seems simple enough when you watch and do them for the first time, once you get the movements and reactions into your mind, but when you leave the surface behind and delve deeper into it, the more complex and intriguing it gets - and the more you get out of it.

***

A stencil design inspired by one of Jayne's t-shirts. Initial sketch on the left side, altered design on the right.

The Handmaid's Tale and Rechberg

2008-07-02T14:12:00.002+02:00

Book recommendation: The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

With The Handmaid’s Tale Margarte Atwood follows the tradition of George Orwell’s 1984 by drawing up the picture of an alternative, dystopian present. The novel’s reality is based on a well-controlled patriarchate in which women are put into a position that is reminiscent of the nineteenth century. “Families” consist, if they are lucky, of a husband and a wife, between who there is often no love lost, and a Handmaid, whose job it is to get pregnant, give birth to a child and then to be referred to the next family.
The protagonist of the novel is one of these Handmaids and tells her version of the time before society changed and how she now lives after the change. While rather little actually happens in the novel, the reader’s interest is kept throughout the 280 pages by the glimpses that Atwood gives us about “her” society. We learn about its rules, people’s resistance and find enjoyment in discovering similarities to religious dogmas and society as it was a century ago.

What I find fascinating about the dystopian stories that I have come across recently is their obsession with childhood and childbirth. I was strongly reminded of the film Children of Men when I read The Handmaid’s Tale. Both stories pick out childbirth, or rather the lack of it, as a central theme. It’s probably reasonable enough – after all, Science Fiction criticizes the present by showing how the future may look like if we continue as we do; and children are one of the strongest symbols for the future. No children – no future.

***

This weekend was another medieval fair, this time in Rechberg. The promotion already started a week before the event, on Monday, when the band Rhiannon began a trip on foot from Linz to Rechberg (60km) in four days, accompanied by a baker with his donkey, the Tuchfärberey. Which is an endeavour that, in my eyes, absolutely rocks.

The market itself was wonderful. Situated in the middle of Mother Nature, very large and friendly. The music seemed to be more of the quiet kind, which is rare on markets, as the bands usually need to gather attention. I enjoyed the more peaceful music a lot.
Unfortunately the market only takes place once every two years, and it isn’t sure if it will be the same next time, which is a shame. I could have spent days there (Sunday alone went by too fast and simply wasn’t enough).

The beginning of the trip on Monday in Linz.

Some of the musicians played additionally apart from the announced program. Here's the new band member of Rhiannon with her harp.

We squeezed in a little photo session on one of the sidetracks that led from one area to another. (Her smile is actually nervous. "Wellll. I'm sitting on a slippery, moss-covered stone and at some point I need to get off again.")

"Now I'll freeze like that, become a statue, then I won't have to get off at all."
(Medieval leather-shoes are actually very tough for walking and climbing around like that. Christine rescued me several times from fallling very hard.)

20.000 shades of green.

A highlight of the fair. This German Spitz was the most hyperactive dog I've ever seen. In a cute "Give me attention! I wanna play! I'm here! Look at me!" sort of way. And whenever he got the attention of his owner he happily freaked out :D

After the end of the fair Christine and I went to the near observation tower in the forest.
I'm biased, but I think the Mühlviertel has some of the most beautiful landscapes in Austria. Forest, hills, all very soft and round and green.

And became queens of the world for some odd minutes (Well, she did. I was much too concerned by the suspicious noises the wood of the tower made whenever we moved).

Not quite an adventurous pirate lass, but maybe at some point in the future...

Medieval Fair on Burg Clam

2008-06-11T16:19:00.000+02:00

Some pictures from the medieval fair on Burg Clam from June 1st. It was a nice fair, beautiful setting and relaxed atmosphere.

A car-view of the castle

Absolute highlight of the fair was the Fangdorn-show, with an immensely moveable dragon (10m long, 3m tall), breathing smoke and fire (not as much fire as he'd have liked to, due to Austrian security regulations, but still quite impressive). The actors were incredibly funny. They were prevented from doing some of the special-effects, so they compensated a bit with hilarious side-comments. Spontaneity rocks.

Afterwards the kids could go and touch Fangdorn. You wouldn't believe how quickly a giant dragon can get drowned in kids.

***

Apparently our fast-paced society already began in the fifteenth century, when the chess rules were altered in order to allow for a quicker game.

Inspired by one of the craftsmen in Clam, I designed a Byzantine Chess:

The ornaments are based on clothes patterns from ancient Byzanthium, as is the clothing of the figure in the middle (symbolizing luck/destiny). The craftsman who was working on a Merels game board in Clam also told us that, in medieval art, women whose face was painted in two colours symbolized unstaete (falsehood or inconsistency), which I shamelessly took over for my design.

In the dojo now

2008-05-13T21:08:00.003+02:00

A martial art from the Rising Sun
Before you do it, it sounds like fun
You're in the dojo now
Oh, oh, you're in the dojo now

Now you remember what the chairman said
Just some suburi on a fictitious head
You're in the dojo now
Oh, oh, you're in the dojo now

You’ll be the hero of the shiai-jo
If only you could hit some do
You're in the dojo now
Oh, oh, you're in the dojo now

Polite bows before the “hajime!”
When your true weakness shows there’s just one way
You're in the shiai-jo now
Oh, oh, you're in the shiai-jo now

Men ippon scored in only one go
It hurts a lot when you are toe on toe
If you want to survive you better practice do
You're in the shai-jo now
Oh, oh, you're in the shiai-jo now

Kiai ring out in the dead of night
The sensei calls (stand up and fight)
You're in the dojo now
Oh, oh, you're in the dojo now

You've got your training schedule
Be it dark or light
You practice footwork
But it don't seem right
You're in the dojo now
Oh, oh, you're in the dojo now
You're in the dojo now
Oh, oh, you're in the dojo now

After 1000 haya-suburi there’s only sweat I see
Are kata illusion or reality?
You're in the dojo now
Oh, oh, you're in the dojo now
You're in the dojo now
Oh, oh, you're in the dojo now

Once

2008-05-02T00:00:00.000+02:00

Some quotes I stumbled over in the last weeks:

From Babylon 5 (I re-watched all seasons recently - fun :D)

"I don't watch TV. It's a cultural wasteland filled with inappropriate metaphors and an unrealistic portrayal of life created by a liberal media elite."

(not quite as good as Ivanova's:
"Who is this? Identify yourself?"
"Who am I? I am Susan Ivanova, Commander, daughter of Andre and Sophie Ivanov. I am the right hand of vengence and the boot that is gonna kick your sorry ass back to earth. I am death incarnate. And the last living thing that you are ever going to see. God sent me."
...but also quite amusing when hearing it in the series.)

And from a book I've just finished reading:

"Linda Stone [...] labeled the disease of the Internet age 'continuous partial attention'-two people doing six things, devoting only partial attention to each one-she remarked to me, 'We're so accessible, we're inaccessible. We can't find the off switch on our devices or on ourselves. We want to wear an iPod as much to listen to our own playlists as to block out the rest of the world and protect ourselves from all that noise. We are everywhere-except where we actually are physically."

and

"Does your society have more memories than dreams or more dreams than memories?
By dreams I mean the positive, life-affirming variety. [...] 'One thing that tells me a company is in trouble is when they tell me how good they were in the past. Same with countries. You don't want to forget your identity. I am glad you were great in the fourteenth century, but that was then and this is now. When memories exceed dreams, the end is near. [...]' In societies that have more memories than dreams, too many people are spending too many days looking backward. They see dignity, affirmation, and self-worth not by mining the present but by chewing on the past. And even that is usually not a real past but an imagined and adorned past. Indeed, such societies focus all their imagination on making that imagined past even more beautiful than it ever was, and then they cling to it like a rosary or a strand of worry beads, rather than imagining a better future and acting on that."

***

Last week I noticed one of the small, private bookshops in downtown had closed down. It had been a family business for 200 years. The small note on the door sounded as if the owner had had a very hard time actually deciding he had to close the shop for good. Seeing it hit me by surprise, too, even though it shouldn't. You grow so familiar with the small businesses that you walk past regularly that you take them for granted.
But, shamefully I have to admit it has been years since the last time I bought a book there. My tries to buy local products haven't really gone much further than the food-sector.

I was similarly surprised when I walked into the Moviemento on Thursday and saw masses of people queuing up for the film I wanted to see. It seems arthouse films aren't so much arthouse anymore when it comes to the audience. That's probably good. Hollywood shouldn't be the only one to make money.
The film I saw was Once. I was a bit unhappy at first, because the film had German subtitles, but ended up being happy about that because the story is set in Dublin and one of the protagonists is Irish - so I got to listen to that lovely Irish accent after not having heard it in a long time. Overall, the language was a big treat in the film. Like many other aspects, it felt very natural and realistic. It isn't the polished, movie-English that you get in most films nowadays. It's colloquial, down-to-earth and how I remember people speak (sometimes painfully so, bringing up old memories).
The music is another treat. It has a big part in the film, and admittedly, I only wento to watch the film because I had listened to the soundtrack over and over again in the last weeks and it stayed with me all the time (you can listen to all of it here).
All in all, it's a very rare and special film. I don't remember the last time I sat in a cinema and forgot where I was, completely emerged in the story that evolved between the screen and my mind. Walking out of the cinema, I was speechless, slightly confused and in a way out of touch with my surroundings, as a part of me was still within the story.
It was quite an experience.

***

Small memory from last month:

Langenzersdorf

2008-04-16T23:12:00.005+02:00

I paid Vienna a visit this weekend and went to the medieval craft fair in Langenzersdorf. It was a really nice event - no fee and very much focused on education and passing on information on all sorts of stuff from the Middle Ages. I loved how open and friendly everyone was, ready to explain everything and talk about anything, especially the guys from the Wiener Wache/Dreynschlag. Markus and me spent a long time talking to them about their group, fighting styles and training. Very, very informative and interesting (of course, I couldn't stop finding comparisions to Kendo).
Just a pity that the weather wasn't all that good. That night there had been a storm, and the people sleeping in tents had a quite eventful "rest".
Also talked a bit with Viatores Vitiosus about leatherwork, since I'm really intrigued by it and would like to start it myself. It looks like that will be a bigger (ahem, financial and temporal) investment, so I need to think about it some more.

Photos:

Pretty armor

Arduinnas Gefährten showing their skills with a bow (later they shot with their feet - yes, really)

Music, my favourite part of these markets

The highlight of the day - two trebuchets. One big, one smaller, shooting 150m into a field. In the evening, they shot fireballs :->

Sunday was Kendo training in Vienna. It amused me to see how everything is connected. One day I talk with Dreynschlag about footwork in historical fencing, the next day we practice ashi sabaki. Everything's connected, and the more you learn, the more connections you find.

An Ode to Humanity

2008-04-08T16:03:00.005+02:00

From my research:

The folk tale is not afraid of greatness. It believes that humanity is not a drab collection of mediocrities, but that nearly everybody has some poetry in him, and that it can flower at times into something which leaves the earth altogether and strikes the stars. Because it believed in human nature it believed that human nature could transcend itself [...]
- John Buchan, The Novel and the Fairy Tale

We're living in a time that likes to emphasise the wounds that mankind deals to nature. Many people feel they have an easier time dealing with inanimate matter than with other people; - which makes this almost a century old sentiment nicely refreshing. It's good to be reminded every now and then that everybody is special in their own way, and you only need to take the time to discover their singularity (the "greatness of little things in others", as the Book of Tea says). I like to lament the self-destructive way of mankind myself quite often, but if All of Humanity was really that bad, I think we wouldn't be here anymore. Most of the people we encounter are inherently good.
The quote also reminded me of one of my teachers in my first year of uni, who made us learn a poem by heart. He said that in several years' time we probably wouldn't remember the poem anymore (he was right), but that a small part of the poem would remain within us and make us more beautiful.

This also ties in with something that Takuan writes about education:

Menschenliebe ist die natürliche Gesinnung des Menschen. Pflicht ist der natürliche Weg des Menschen. Wie traurig ist es, wenn einer seinen Weg verlässt und nicht darauf wandelt, wenn einer sein Herz verloren gehen lässt und nicht weiß, wie er es wieder finden kann!
Wenn einem Menschen ein Huhn oder ein Hund verloren geht, so weiß er, wie er sie wieder finden kann; aber sein Herz geht ihm verloren, und er weiß nicht, wie suchen. Die Bildung dient uns zu nichts anderem als nur dazu, unser verlorengegangenes Herz zu suchen.
- Zen in der Kunst des kampflosen Kampfes

Which makes poetry one of the means to find our heart and the love within us, in order to transcend ourselves and reach the stars. People should read more.

***

Last week I went to a cabaret. The media was there, so now here's a short video of the music that was played there with an interview of Leonding-based band Rhiannon.

***

Tehehe :->

(Apologies for only posting these small, silly comic pictures recently. There's not much time to work on the big illustrations.)

Impressions

2008-04-03T16:29:00.006+02:00

I love how life repeatedly shows me that it is to a great degree fate-based. Things you do show their after-effects almost a decade later (e.g. if I hadn't played a certain MMORPG in 2001, I wouldn't be doing Kendo now). Sometimes it seems that most of the good stuff in life is based on coincidences. Maybe karma has its part, too. Whatever it is, I like it.

***

Small stuff that found its basis in the Kendo training of the last few days.

From the weekend:

And from Monday's training:

(Uh, I should stop mixing languages in pictures...)

Greenspace

2008-03-22T01:30:00.000+01:00

I came across some photos of New York's Park Avenue through the years. The first one looks awesome - very exotic compared to today's city areas. It reminds me of those dystopia stories in which nature has overcome mankind and the cities are all overgrown with plants and inhabited by wildlife. Having such places in cities would be quite nice.

(I've heard one of the squares in Linz is to be turned into something similar, much to the dismay of car drivers. Let's hope it will see the light of day.)

***

Continued working on one of the WIPs:

Jubel!

2008-03-08T21:50:00.000+01:00

Upper Austria now has a Society for the Faciliation of Historical Festival Culture, Verein Stupor Mundi. More medieval stuff in Upper Austria. Makes me very happy.

I love my town <3

***

Older picture that I never finished, but reworked now:

Braindead II

2008-03-05T02:25:00.004+01:00

(because everything needs a sequel these days)

Kendo often results in the blissful state of the post-Kendo-zombie-phase, which is mainly defined by my brain's inability to formulate even one coherent thought. When you're a very advanced kenshi, you can summon it up even before training ends, call it mushin and people look at you admiringly for it. As a newbie kenshi like me, you are a victim rather than a summoner and call it the much less flattering term *TILT*.

Braindead

2008-03-03T01:08:00.001+01:00

Thoughts

2008-03-01T02:42:00.002+01:00

I enjoy reading lots of artbooks right now. Firstly, on J. W. Waterhosue (my favourite Pre-Raphaelite painter) and secondly Origins: The Art of John Jude Palencar (Palencar won the Grand Master Award of this year's Spectrum). Both very recommendable books. I particularly loved the analyses and connections the the book on Waterhouse drew between the art and the artist. It gets you to think about the paintings in depth and is quite inspiring.

***

There are strange tendencies in today's consumer culture. Years and years ago, it used to be cheaper to buy raw materials and make the finished product yourself. When I started sewing, I thought it great, because by this I would get clothes that I liked and wanted and it would be cheaper (the latter proved to be untrue) - preconceptions from former times.
(Nowadays, I appreciate paying a bit more for the fabric and knowing the clothes are made by me and not by Chinses children, which is something I didn't care about much when I got into sewing.)
Same for food. You tend to pay almost more for basic foodstuff that you prepare into finished meals than for instant food or cheap take-away meals. It's easily justifyable by arguing for the quality of the finished product, but it's still something that's developed in years and hasn't been here all the time. An effect of globalisation?

***

Another cultural oddity: We seem to be more tolerant towards people who we don't know or don't care for much. Simply knowing that we have to, intend to, or want to spend a significant time of our future lives with certain people lets us judge them by harsher standards than people who we know will not be part of our lives for more than a fleeting moment. Awful, isn't it?
Maybe it is because we want to eliminate possible conflicts as soon as possible before they can turn into big issues. Maybe it's a sign that we second-guess our decisions of wanting to share our lives with the person/people. Maybe it's a gender thing (as my brother suggest).
Ideally, we should show more tolerance and understanding towards the people who we care for (especially understanding, because we are more familiar with their way of thinking, so it should be easier). So why doesn't it work? Why can't we care less about minor issues with people who are more important to us?

***

Uh. I have no idea where this picture is going. I'm trying out new stuff with it every time I open the file.
(Dammit, why did I have to start incorporating photos, against my better judgement? This will turn into a major pain.)

Linkage

2008-02-22T03:27:00.000+01:00

Cool links ahead:

* I stumbled over Geocaching, which seems like an awesome way to get out into the wilderness and discover your surroundings. I really want to do that, too! :D

* Mark Kennedy wrote a brilliant blog entry about the original Star Wars, analysing the first hour of the film.

***

This started as another sketch/idea for a bedroom painting. But it decided pretty quickly that this isn't what it wants to be.
(Pose again from ref, and general idea not really original - I forgot the artist who gave me the inspiration, though.)

Sketchy sketch:

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

2008-02-14T18:45:00.003+01:00

I'm probably referring to my Popular Culture lecture from Oxford way too often. But sometimes life gives you stuff that sticks with you mentally and every now and then your mind opens up the drawer in which it was hidden.

A film that we watched in that lecture was The Unbearable Lightness of Being. It was an interesting film, but I didn't fully understand its point and in general it wasn't the type of film that I normally like.
Still, something in the title intrigues me. Wikipedia says:

According to Kundera, "being" is full of "unbearable lightness" because each of us has only one life to live: "Einmal ist keinmal" ("once is nonce", i.e., "what happened once might as well have never happened at all"). Therefore, each life is ultimately insignificant; every decision ultimately does not matter. Since decisions do not matter, they are "light": they do not tie us down. But at the same time, the insignificance of our decisions—our lives, or being—is unbearable. Hence, "the unbearable lightness of being".

Which is something I need to internalise. I simply can't make decisions and usually let life and fate make them for me (which works surprisingly well).

***

I remained pretty unaffected by today for most of the day. But ... at some point, the urge to do something grew too strong and I couldn't resist any longer.

Spread the love.

And this isn't a subtle hint that my cannibalistic tendencies and my appetite for sweets are interrelated. Tehehehe :->

Sweet Dreams

2008-02-08T02:52:00.000+01:00

Intending to paint some oil or acrylic pictures for my flat - bedroom first. So I'm just throwing around some ideas for the time being (heavily referenced):

Something remarkable

2008-01-31T12:51:00.000+01:00

He says my daugther, and all the love he has is wrapped up in the tone of his voice when he says those two words, he says my daugther you must always look with both of your eyes and listen with both of your ears. He says this is a very big world and there are many many things you could miss if you are not careful. He says there are remarkable things all the time, right in front of us, but our eyes have like the clouds over the sun and our lives are paler and poorer if we do not see them for what they are.
He says, if nobody speaks of remarkable things, how can they be called remarkable?

- Jon McGregor, "if nobody speaks of remarkable things"

Average student hit by origami plane from space

2008-01-29T00:13:00.000+01:00

More stuff from New Scientist: A Japanese engineering professor wants to launch a 20cm Origami airplane from ISS.
The things you learn from unconventional ideas - I'd never have guessed that light objects don't heat up much when entering the atmosphere. I'd have thought a paper plane entering the atmosphere would make *poof*.

***

The government made a social survey on students. I'm guilty of being interested in knowing the averages about my field of study (It's a general problem of humanity, I think - we need to know all kinds of averages, so we can compare ourselves and see if we're average enough. Only then can we rest easy) - that interest, however, has never been satisfied, because nobody seems to take us literature students seriously enough to justify talking to us about our averages.
Anyway, now I know - again - that I'm atypical (or maybe les beaux arts are simply atypical by themselves, and therefore nobody investigates them - why look at something that you know will disappoint your expectations, eh?).

Apparently, a majority of students gets public funding. The average student also has a monthly budget of over 1000€ (imagine how many books you can buy for so much money), and spends 970€ (a majority of that is spent on accommodation and food - knowing how much accommodation roughly costs, I can estimate what is left for food, which isn't bad; although I do wonder if "food" includes all the money spent on party drinks; hmmm). The average student has a 45-hour-week (33h for studies, 11.5h for work). Only one third of all students has no stress-induced health problems (!).

So we have a body of over-worked, under-paid future labourers who are already damaged before they take up their intended position in society. That's good. Because, you know, broken people do so much better work.

***

I think I haven't shown these before ... they're quite old. I tried to make some simple icons depicting German idioms. Some more simple than others ;)

Globalisation

2008-01-23T01:25:00.000+01:00

Some interesting stuff I came across:

- Cranberries are good against infections. That effect seems to only take place with women, though.

- We laugh 3-4 times less than people did 40 years ago. Today, an adult laughs about 15 times a day. Seems like much?

- Potatoes have their origin in the Andes (where they were grown by the Inkas) and only came to us about 500 years ago. Considering that they are pretty essential to Austrian food now, that makes me wonder which food will be "domestic" here in 500 years' time (with the climate change and all). Ginger? Mangoes? Bananas?
Also, looking at where potatoes have been produced in the last years, you notice the typical trend: Production in the Western world has remained constant or been reduced, while it has almost doubled in today's "production countries" China and India.

- New Scientist writes that Probiotic bacteria could keep us slim. My first thought was "Great, more food additives", then "Right, give the population a reason to think even less about what they eat". Then I went and read parts of the original research paper, understood about 17% of it, but at least it explains stuff a bit more thoroughly than the article. And you get some insight into what is necessary to come to such findings, animal testing and all.

***

I watched some of the DVD features of Children of Men. One of the extras, "The Possibility of Hope" really caught me. It shows statements of activists, ecologists, scientists, etc. about the current state of the world and outlooks on the future, reality and utopias and social economy. Naomi Klein is one of them, and so is James Lovelock, who says:

"I look on the earth as an elderly patient. She is a someone, who would be - if she were human - in her 80s. In other words, strong, vigorous full of her 80s, but not as young as she once was. [...] Because she is quite old, any stress she receives, like it's the same with one of us -- I'm at about her age in my 80s, and if I get influenza it will be a lot more serious than if you get it. Well, our patient Earth has the problem of humans. There are, I'm afraid, too many of them and they are doing too much damage to her capacity to regulate her temperature and composition."

Which is an analogy that I really, really like.

And Fabrizio Eva talks about globalisation, culture and identity, reminding me strongly of John Storey's work and what I learned in that context.

"This globalisation process does not extinguish other cultures, because it takes a long time for other cultures to disappear. Yet, it has repercussions between young and old people. Young people are willing to move, so they already have a preexisting conviction that they don't have to accept their culture the way it is. When they realize that life somewhere else might be better, they move to find their own, new identities."

Identity creation is a fascinating topic. We redefine ourselves continually through the different surroundings we put ourselves in - put on different masks, or show different aspects of our personality when we're online, among friends, among strangers, in our jobs, etc. Theoretically, this gives us so many opportunities for different identities that there's no need to move far away. You'd probably only move (based on the reason of identity) if you can't get to grips with any aspect of your living environment at all.
But, what this actually reminded me of: We used to be part of a single living environment decades or centuries ago (one village). Now that it is far easier to travel greater distances, we are part of multiple living environments, multiple cultures.

I wish more DVDs had great extras like that.

***

Continueing on the WIP. Not much progress - still trying to incorporate more brands, which proves a bit tricky.

Pushing Ethics

2008-01-13T03:02:00.000+01:00

I wonder what it is that makes people feel the urge to push their own standards on others. In the end, everybody lives by their own standards, and chases after their own ideals and goals forever without ever fully reaching them (because that's the essence of ideals - they don't exist in reality). So, while that chase is challenging enough for us, we nonetheless spend time trying to push our ideals on others - which, in turn, makes it harder for them to work towards their ideals.
And sometimes we just want to discuss, but unintentionally end up pushing. And other times, we just want to relax and not discuss, and end up being pushed. It seems to be really hard to find that mutual point at which it's alright to discuss diverging concepts.

***

Next WIP. Very much WIP. Maybe even illegally WIP.
This picture has been in my mind for years, truly. I never felt confident enough to pull it off as it deserve to. Let's see if I'll manage...

Bouncing off clouds

2008-01-06T20:53:00.000+01:00

Finished. This one was much less planned than most of my other pictures. Didn't even do a pencil sketch, just began straight away in Photoshop and made lots of mid-painting changes.
The initial idea, story-wise, also changed. I'm not entirely sure where it ended, though. I believe she's just waiting for Zeus to pick her up (she's not Europa, though), if he ever gets around to doing so and doesn't forget her (which he will). So she's just enjoying the stars and the moon while she can.

I finally managed to save over the original file while painting, thus losing a night's work (or two). That probably has to happen to everyone at least once. Let's hope that was my once (and only).

Keinohrhasen

2008-01-05T14:43:00.000+01:00

German films usually don't appeal to me at all. I normally find them too rough and the humor not subtle enough. For some reason I ended up watching Keinohrhasen nevertheless and I was quite impressed. Sometimes you don't even notice it's a Romance. The self-reflexiveness and self-irony of the film and Til Schweiger intrigued me a lot - the statements he makes about actors and the world of stardom, the media and male and female thinking are more profound than you'd expect in your average film (at least those films that Hollywood churns out).
I was thinking recently which film of 2007 I liked best, but couldn't find any that I'd recommend without any "if"s and "but"s. Stardust came closest, but had too many kitsch elements in a few scenes. In contrast, I never felt that Keinohrhasen was really kitschy at any point. It was throughout funny and enjoyable. I couldn't really name the difference to Hollywood, though. Just that this is the first film in a long time that I'd watch more than once.
(But, incidentally, I didn't feel like watching another film after leaving the cinema. I guess there are two types of films that do that to you - those that are utterly crap and don't fulfill your expectations the least, and make you lose your faith in the film industry; and those that are very good, so you don't need to see another film in a while, because they give you all you search for in a film.)

***

Came across a nice page that shows how food looks in ads compared to what you get when you actually buy it. But, frankly, not even the ads really make me want to buy/eat that stuff, because they scream Fast Food (or maybe it's because pictures don't convey smell?).

***

Small preview of a painting I'm working on right now:

Everything you want is not everything you need

2008-01-01T18:19:00.000+01:00

I rediscovered Vertical Horizon's Everything You Want again after looking up some word concepts. I like the music video. Such combinations of visuals and text are always very appealing to me. They remind me of Serial Experiments Lain (although Lain's texts are of course much less straightforward).

Also came across a nice quote:
"Man muss noch Chaos in sich haben, um einen tanzenden Stern gebären zu können."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
("You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.")

***

Something from my thesis got me thinking...
Fairies might come from the Persian peris (it's a minority theory, as most researcher believe the Grimms' theory). That made me read up a bit on Persia. I've always had troubles with grasping that Persia and Iran are the same countries. I connect Persia with a rich culture, traditions and exotic tales; something out of a book rather than reality, and fully positive. Iran, on the other hand, is to me related to war, rural and poor areas and nuclear weapons. It's interesting how two words can refer to the same thing, but create completely different concepts in one's head. I bet the advertisement industry works a lot with that, just in reversal. Take something negative, give it a new name and image and turn it into something positive.
(I don't see the point in renaming geography, though. Persia turned into Iran, Edo became Tokyo, Lentos was renamed first Lentia and then Linz, etc. I mean, alright, I can understand the reasoning behind the renaming of Edo, but for the most part, there are no reasons given for renaming geographic points, and it's just immensely confusing when you find out after years that two names that you always treated as being separate from each other are actually one and the same thing).

***

I used the ending of last year and beginning of the new one for another cooking feast (because when there are so many people in the house who will possibly eat what you cook without running away in panic, you need to seize the opportunity). Unlike the Paella cooking in February, though, it was not one big thing but many little ones - sauces, desserts, etc. After not having been able to try out some new recipes in the last weeks, I had lots of fun with this.

Grapefruit-shrimps-salad:

Attempting to make sushi for the first time. I need to try this more often. Haven't quite figured out how to roll it in a nice way. I still have two other types of sushi to try out anyway. Here, Nigiri-sushi and Maki-sushi:

Finally, Dim Sum and Onigiri:

At some point I managed to leave the kitchen and joined the group. We spent a fun game evening playing Uno and Kragmortha (cool game - not quite as good as real roleplaying, but it really got me into the mood again) and following some superstitions and rites. Then the new year began with snowfall, and everything was perfect. I really like this year so far.

Not as expected

2007-12-27T21:40:00.000+01:00

Well. I wanted to paint a vampire to practice (undead) skin tones. But it looks like I got Hermione from Harry Potter. This seems like a really bad bargain.

Maybe better luck next time.

Merry Christmas

2007-12-24T17:38:00.000+01:00

Here are the remaining two sculptures. I guess the people who got them are less recognisable, but they liked them, and that's all that's important.

(Hmm, maybe I should get people presents that are useful instead of stuff that will clutter up their flats...)

I wish you all a Merry Christmas, if you celebrate it, and a stressless, quiet, enjoyable rest of the day if not. Hope you all get the calm, rest and affection that you wish for and that your evening is as you want it to be.

Looking Back

2007-12-20T21:50:00.000+01:00

Yesterday was the end of a 9-successive-days-of-Kendo-period, thanks to the seminar we had this week (and it really should have been 10 days). The seminar went pretty well, considering that I had to hop through the flat on one leg last Wednesday because the other hurt just a little too for me to bother with walking properly. Interesting experience.
It was fun (just too short), and I learned loads - more than on the last one, I think. Made me realize again how much I still have to learn about the very basic techniques. It's great to have so many people who give you helpful criticism.
And good that you only feel how tired you are when everything's over.

***

Less than two weeks till new year, so I think it's time to reflect a bit on 2007. Chronologically:

January: First discussions with my supervisor concerning my thesis topic. Broke up all contact with my ex. Turned out to be an excellent decision, letting me move on with my life without draging old baggage behind.
February: The DAF community project Zoomquilt II, to which I contributed, was released.
March: Did some radical food experiments in my first week of the new semester, which caused my immune system to break down and left me first "only" ill, then with high fever and finally with an infection of my middle ear for two weeks. Wrote a short story containing talking food (Fairtrade milk and organic milk argued with each other about which is better) during that fever at 2am (I submitted that story to a writer's contest. Surprisingly, it didn't win). Decided to not ever repeat that food experiment. Found a second roleplaying group to DM. Started Kendo in Salzburg.
May: Went to Graz to for the Schandmaul concert, visited the Riegersburg and Zotter chocolate factory. Lots of fun. Also went to two medieval fairs on my birthday weekend, which was the best present Markus and Christine could have given me.
June: Determined my thesis topic after lots of reading during the semester.
July: Got to know an almost completely different kind of Kendo in Linz. Sticked with it. Began my daily holiday schedule of staying in the garden during the day, swimming 1-2h per day and reading books for my thesis the rest of the time. Figured that combining physical with mental work is really the most enjoyable way to get work done.
August: Went to my first Kendo seminar. Also went to several medieval fairs and visited the Turba Ferox in Vienna.
September: One week Lesereise of the Germanistik. Ate the best organic apples I've ever tasted there. The lack of a computer for a week and the sense of quietude, increased time and heightened achievement made me rething my computer habits (but, alas, still nothing has changed).
October: New semester of uni started. Found out my timetable is even less crowded than I thought. Consequently decided to move out of my flat in Salzburg. Got bogu. Got stressed because a friend who had started working on her thesis at the same time as I did had already begun writing hers.
November: Got even more stressed because said friend reached page 70 of her thesis, while I still wasn't writing. Had a 2-weekend communication workshop at uni, learning a lot about voice and breathing. Started fighting in bogu. Spent a weekend training Kendo in Innsbruck. Went to the Gesundheitsmesse in Wels, catching the wrong train for the first time in my life (resulting in me finding creative ways to spend an hour at a pitch-black, open train station in the cold). Started sculpting. Went to the first research conference in my life.
December: Said friend finished her thesis. Started writing mine. Had my second Kendo seminar.

So, none of my decisions backfired on me, which is great. All in all, it was a really, really good year. Better than 2006, I think. Actually, thinking back, it was probably the best after 2004/05 (simply because it takes a lot to top the year I spent in Oxford). I'll only reluctantly say goodbye.

Plans for 2008: Finish uni, find a job, move into my own flat. Paint more and improve my technique. Continue Kendo. Spend less money (or rather, spend money only when it's really necessary, and more specifically, buy books only when I'm through with the pile of unread books next to my bed).

***

As written above, I started sculpting about a month ago. I always wanted to get into it, but couldn't get Super Sculpey anywhere. When I ran out of patience (or was at a point of too much motivation) I looked a bit around online and found that a few sculptors use Fimo Soft and Green Stuff and have good end results. Since Fimo is much more easily to get, I just tried it. Here, then, are the first two (fairly average) sculptures of my life (and more to follow after Christmas).
The first one's not in it's finished stage, because I painted over some of the stuff on his clothes after having taken the pictures; but it's still 94% finished.

Easy targets

2007-12-08T02:54:00.000+01:00

Just marginally picking up on the topic of aims in talkshows/courtshows again. Here is a YouTube video (German) that points out the false statements the media makes on ego shooters (usually in relation to shootings at schools). Ego shooters are such a nice scapegoat, and TV viewers who don't go hunting for more information by themselves are usually let in the dark about really significant details.
We talked in one of my courses about the media coverage of the shooting at Erfurt. As the video says, they guy who did it didn't play Counterstrike, even though the media keeps repeating it endlessly, and continuously states that it helped him practice his aim and plan the shooting. What the media doesn't say is that he was member of his local shooting association where he had access to real guns (not the ones controlled by a computer mouse) and practice (and from what I remember of the discussion the course, he also was allowed to use a pump gun because he had a "proven need to shoot" or something like that).
So why mention Counterstrike and not the shooting association? The media debate that followed the shooting resulted in stricter laws in Germany concerning computer games to protect the youth - even though, clearly, even if these laws had been in action before the shooting, they wouldn't have changed what happened.
According to my lecturer, the shooting association was not mentioned because playing ego shooters happens in private, so it is easier to stigmatise it (in the worst case people hide and don't admit to playing the games), while being part of an association is far more in the public domain, so it's more obviously damaging. In the end, though, it probably wasn't mentioned because the German government wanted to get that law approved.
I used to think the media targets ego shooters because they're an easy and accessible scapegoat, so people don't have to blame themselves for raising their children poorly or being socially incompetent by ignoring bullying. But maybe there's a more complex agenda behind these media reports.
Ah well. Just another reminder that not all that's in the news is always even remotely true.

***

More experimenting with techniques. I think I'm slowly getting where I want to be.

Many Meetings

2007-11-26T13:48:00.000+01:00

Had a nicely busy last week. I'm starting to like these weekends when I'm up and about every day. Time seems to move slower then, and you experience much more.

But first, books I finished and liked.

Humphrey Carpenter - J. R. R. Tolkien, A Biography
Biographies usually don't appeal to me too much. Recently I've been enjoying them, though. You learn a lot about other people's dreams and ideas. Carpenter moves chronologically through the stages of Tolkien's life, from South Africa through the war to Oxford and Tolkien's last years in South England. If you've read the Lord of the Rings, Tolkien's biography is a small treasure chest. It made me realize that all of Tolkien's life echoes in his works (especially in LotR). Every inch of the way the Fellowship travels is an inch on the way of Tolkien's life. I find this quite amazing.
Reading about all the experiences Tolkien had in his early life was also very interesting. It's a bit intimidating to know about all the languages he taught himself even before going to University and the depth of his love for language. Then his experiences in the World War - a very short chapter, but nevertheless very shocking, especially since the book contains letters from Tolkien and his friends which reflect their feelings more authentically than a simple report could. You get a tiny sense of how crushed he must have been when he lost almost all of his close friends to the war. We probably can't even begin to imagine the full extent of what people felt during the wars. Lucky us.
Tolkien must have been a brilliant man. He had his failings (incidentally, they are sometimes described as his strengths ... shows you how subjective certain things are) and made mistakes, but it seems he usually acted with the best intent and purely out of love for his passions - an attitude that is quite inspirational. Maybe that's what biographies are for; to inspire you and give you an idea of how much can be achieved in a lifetime.

Peter S. Beagle - Tamsin
My sentiments towards Peter S. Beagle are a bit split. Watching the Last Unicorn has become a personal Christmas tradition through the years (even now that I have it on DVD and don't have to wait for December 24th to see it on TV). I probably love the film more than any other animation, simply for its underlying concepts that are hinted at, but not told, and for the ideas these concepts gave me in my childhood. And Christopher Lee's voice as King Haggard is simply wonderful.
The book, however, and other books I'd read so far by Peter S. Beagle, is a different matter. I could never fully take to the writing style. The thing I liked most about it was that it explained some of the concepts the film had hinted at further. But my heart was always with the film, not with the book. Beagle got a second chance when I read The Innkeeper's Song, which was even worse (stylistically). Good story, ideas and concepts, but the style made it very tedious for me. Then I tried his short story collection, The Line Between, of which I remember absolutely nothing.
Still, I didn't give up at that point. I just loved the film too much, and this made me want to love the author and his other books, too. So I let some months pass and gave it a fourth try. Fourth time's the charm, eh?
Tamsin tells the story of a girl, Jenny, who is forced to move from America to England upon her mother's second marriage. The family moves to a rural area into a farm house. Here Jenny begins to see the ghost of a girl, Tamsin, who she befriends. And slowly the story on the history of the farm, Tamsin's life and death and Jenny's coping with her new surroundings and family unravel.
It's the strong voice of the protagonist that made this book so appealing. From the beginning her teenage emotions draw you in and carry you through the story - from the sulkiness due to the unfairness of life up to the utter and overwhelming curiosity she displays at everything and everyone in the world, so you begin to share her interest in the farm and its history. I guess this shows you again how important appealing protagonists are (at least for me). They can kill the story or bring it to life.
Fourth chances are good. You just need to search for long enough and at some point it will click. I only needed to go through four average books to get to a sweet one ("sweet" is probably the right category. I assume the target group are children and teenagers, but I can easily enjoy it even though I'm slightly older ;)

***

That's it concerning books for now. On to last week's business. There was a conference on Popular Culture vs. High Culture in Salzburg from Thursday to Saturday, which I attended on Thursday afternoon and Friday morning. Special guest was John Storey, professor of cultural studies. He specialises, among other things, in popular culture, identity, consumption and globalisation. In my Pop Culture lecture in Oxford three years ago we read one of his books (I still remember most of what he wrote in it, which tells you how accessible he can make his research topics).
It was my first conference and I enjoyed it thoroughly. The topics were great. John Storey talked about the concepts of pop and high culture; another talk was on Doctor Who and its intertextuality and relation to British Culture (comparisions with Buffy, the Vampire Slayer were thrown in occasionally), and my favourite talk was on TV Judges and the Law. The talk analysed the success of courtroom shows. In one of my lecture we had discussed talkshows and their aims the week before, so I constantly compared the talkshows with the court shows. Basically, it was said that talkshows aim at establishing borders and boundaries for social behaviour. They are manufacture for consensus (Konsensmanufakturen), shown by the fact that according to surveys most of the audience (in the studio and in front of the TV) is under the impression that the show host "always agrees with me". People don't primarily watch talkshows to make fun of people's behaviour, but to be told which behaviour is acceptable and which isn't. The host is the one who established these boundaries - if one of the guests breaks through the boundaries that the show aims at building, s/he gets sent off the stage (sometimes even without applause, which tells the audience that his behaviour was utterly inacceptable and out of the norm).
In court shows, not the host but the law sets the boundaries. So in the end court shows aim at reassuring the audience that the country's law system works and is reliable. Unlike talkshows, court shows don't work in all countries, because the court system is very different in some parts. British audience never took a liking to the court shows, so they are virtually unknown in Britain. Allegedly the reason for this is that the law is always portrayed negatively on regular TV (in films, series, etc.), so the British audience rejects a TV format that is affirmative towards the law. Quite fascinating. I wonder what this tells you about the countries that broadcast court shows successfully. It seems we need (or are pressured to find) reassurance in everything - social behavour through talkshows, the law through court shows. What's next? People used to live by trial and error and the experiences of their elders for centuries, but now we need how-to's, workshops and TV shows for everything.

***

Friday afternoon/evening and Saturday was spent in Innsbruck, practicing Kendo, meeting many new people, learning lots and having tons of fun. Warm-ups with 18 people are just great. There's so much more energy present right from the beginning.
Sunday went by with moving stuff from Salzburg to Linz ... not fun. You realize how much stuff you've accumulated when you need to move. And the next time I move there'll be even more stuff to take care of (e.g. all the stuff that's towering up left and right of me and that I have to step over at the moment when I want to walk through my room).

And now it's snowtime! By far not as beautiful as the awesome view we had in Innsbruck on Saturday morning from our sleepingplace (somewhere between mountains, mountains and rocks), but nevertheless I love the sight of the first significant snow on Linz.

Stardust and Hyperion

2007-11-10T22:39:00.000+01:00

Finally watched Stardust (in German, reluctantly). The book is based on, by Neil Gaiman, is one of my favourites - it's a beautiful fairytale that you wish would never end. So my expectations for the film were quite high, although I lowered them, partly because it has been ages since I read the book and also because I realize that, yes, a film is different to a book.
All in all I liked the film. It's not perfect. It has weaknesses (as do most films). There's a bit too much Hollywood kitsch and melodrama in it. The first part is a bit tedious, but the nice bits increase in quantity after some time and by the middle the film is quite enjoyable. I even like some of the changes that were made when translating the book to the screen. Captain Shakespeare is a very nice character and the dancing scene on his ship emphasized the glow of the star/Yvaine in a really nice way.
I also liked the camerawork and the effects. The aforementioned glow was fabulous and the green fire effects impressed me, too (and made me wonder when green fire effects in films became a fashion). They seemed appropriate for the kind of film it is and not over the top.
Also, Claire Danes surprised me with her performance. I was not sure she would fit the role of Yvaine, because I always imagined the star as a quite young girl in the book (appearance of a 13-year-old, but wisdom of the ages, that kind of thing). For the film-Yvaine, though, Claire Danes was very fitting and convincing. I also loved her monologue when Tristan's a mouse.
So Stardust turned out to be a nice and very sweet film; special in its own way, as it does not try to copy a film that has been here before and instead sets its own atmosphere.

***

I also finished reading Dan Simmon's Hyperion. It's a nicely different Science Fiction; almost completely character-driven, and very little actually happens in the book. You basically just get to know the characters' background stories (what a clever way to make the reader buy the sequel) as a set-up for the plot development that is to come. I like that. The little emphasis on character is what usually puts me off SciFi. You even have some of the social criticism that's typical for SciFi. I really enjoyed the religious discourse that worked its way through the book - the novel presents a wealth of world religions (in their futuristic variety) like Judaism, Zen Buddhism and Christianity, competing with each other through the characters (most characters have an emphasis on one religion).
It seems to me that Science Fiction that uses religion as a driving force for the plot or the characters is rare. If religion is present in SciFi, it's only visible as fanaticism (and even then mostly just in end-of-world-scenarios). I guess that's because a futuristic, science- and technology-based world is bound to lose its faith and searches for new gods (e.g. computers, or - as it is probably at least partly the case in the present - Fantasy literature as replacement for the loss of past mysticism, which was greatly based in religious texts).
True enough, Hyperion has an Armageddon-scenario. But it seems to me the religious discourse is still more focused compared to other novels. Moreover, Simmons seems to have researched the religions very thoroughly and developed quite a detailed futuristic version of each, making them more believable. Now I'm very curious how this discourse will resolve itself in The Fall of Hyperion and whether Simmons will actually give one religion a preference (which, I imagine, could be quite tricky).

***

More experimenting with techniques. I used the same technique as in the last painting, but somehow it didn't work so well this time. Apparently some techniques are better for certain subject matters than others (doh). I'm just surprised because I'd have thought this technique would be better for the pretty-girl-paintings than my normal working habit. Gotta experiment a bit more with it.
(Or maybe it's the colour ... it seems I can get the values alright with this technique, but it messes up the colours so much that I have to do a lot of post-painting editing.)
(And the composition is by far less than perfect...)

The Last Lecture

2007-11-05T03:26:00.000+01:00

Here is the video of a lecture by Randy Pausch, in which he talks about achieving his dreams and helping others to achieve theirs. It's a bit long, but definitely worth watching. The lecture is funny and insightful, and above all inspiring.
(I love listening to people talk about something they're passionate about. Working all the time just isn't worth anything if you don't have a dream you can work towards to. "If you aim for nothing you will hit every time, but if you aim for the stars at the very least you'll touch the sky.")

***

Some more late night scribbling:

Echoes of Darkness

2007-11-01T00:11:00.000+01:00

Have a good Samhain night!

Walk the Walk

2007-10-26T20:14:00.000+02:00

Scientists have a tendency to prove what common sense and life experience made you suspect even before it was researched. This seems to happen every couple of months. October's revelation is that Lack of sleep is a lot like mental illness. It is. I know that I feel a little bit crazy when I didn't get enough sleep. Although I'd also say that I feel more drunk than insane when I'm sleep-deprived - with shorter attention spans and less concentration, feeling like I'm walking through mist and am less connected to the real world.

***

I read That Very Mab, a fairy story by folklorist Andrew Lang and May Kendall for my diploma thesis. It's delightful and very "Victorian". It tells how the fairies left England because of the Puritans and moved to Polynesia. When this country gets conquered by the English, too, Fairy Queen Mab decides to go back to England, which she finds profoundly changed. An owl shows Queen Mab all these changes and you can't help but enjoy the critical comments the authors make on late Victorian life through the characters of Mab and the owl. Some of it is distinctly applicable to the 19th century, but a lot of it seems universal, like the owl's explanation on education:

"We are being educated up to a very high point. It saves people the trouble of thinking for themselves, certainly; they can always get all their thoughts now, ready made, on every kind of subject, and at extremely low prices. They only have to make up their minds what to take, and generally they take the cheapest. There is a great demand for cheap thought just now, especially when it is advertised as being of superior quality."

Which reminded me very much of an Austrian newspaper, which advertises by saying that through buying and reading the newspaper, you will quickly and easily gain an (/their) opinion (causing me to wonder why I would want that, as opposed to being able to make up my own mind).

Or this wonderful paragraph about "dynamiters":

It is one of the problems of the nineteenth century. Even the dynamiters themselves don't appear to have gone into the whole logic of it. I suppose that they are tired of only blowing things up on paper, and they are people who have a great objection to things in general. They complain that they can't get justice from the universe in its present state of preservation, and therefore they are going to blow as much of it as possible into what they call smithereens, and try to get justice from the smithereens. It is a new scheme they have hit upon, a kind of scientific experiment. The theory appears to be, that justice is the product of Nihilism plus public buildings blown up by dynamite, and that the more public buildings they blow up the more justice they will obtain. [...] It is reported, also, that if the Nihilists can't obtain justice enough by any less extensive measures, they will lower a great many kegs of nitro-glycerine to the molten nucleus of the globe and then [...] the globe will explode, and all the inhabitants, even the dynamiters themselves; but justice will remain; according to the theory, that is. But it is rather an expensive experiment."

When I first came across older texts that showed people's fears of terrorists I was surprised that they pretty much showed the same attitudes and emotions concerning the topic that are spread in the world now. And this text tells me to a degree that it's not just something that was present in the mid- and late 20th century, but also already appeared in the 19th century.
I guess that's how we are; we like to think we're so high and mighty, and above all special, that we are the first to go through certain troubles and feelings. But the more I read the more I feel that everything we experience has been here long before us. We're just recycling thoughts, mindsets and emotions of our ancestors.
Looking at it logically, it's not so much of a surprise. Everyone lives their average 70+ years and uses this time to develop their thoughts. We start when we are born and don't stop until the end. We don't have much more to help us on this journey that people 100 or 200 years ago didn't have. Makes you realize how little we really learn from the past, as every generation goes through the same development again and again.
Could we accelerate our individual development? We read the books that people who made these experiences wrote, which pushes us into a certain direction. But often we don't fully understand their deeper intent and insights, especially when it comes to philosophy. I imagine this means that you need life experience to really understand it - walk down the road to see and understand what you previously only read about.
That's demotivating and exciting at the same time. It makes you realize that there are many experiences ahead of you that are just waiting there to be discovered, but you also get a glimpse of how much life experience is lost with every human being and that when you're old and dying you'll know that those who come after you will make the same darn mistakes that you made. Sweet circle of life.

So - Carpe Diem, and put your foot on the road.

***

And, as always and lastly, today's painting results. I actually wanted to do the fairies, but then didn't feel like tackling a bigger painting. So I just ended up scribbling away. The character turned out more androgynous than intended.

Do one thing every day that scares you

2007-10-21T03:14:00.000+02:00

Click here to view an absolutely wonderful video that simply fills me with a warm, happy feeling and contains a lot of truth.
(Although I disagree about the sunscreen to a degree. Sunscreen has INCIs which are partly bad for you. But I'll admit that sunscreen is still preferable to skin cancer.)
(And: Heh, how apt. My current worries never crossed my worried mind, until it blindsided me at 3pm on this idle Wednesday. Nice...)

***

Sketches for a painting I might do. Might, because my day just hasn't enough hours at the moment (well, maybe I can squeeze something into that additional hour on Sunday ;).

Painting = Stress Therapy Deluxe

2007-10-14T15:17:00.001+02:00

Boy, I cannot even begin to tell you how much is needed this painting. Listening to other diploma students worrying and stressing over their theses is not good for your own stress level. It pretty much does all it needs to make you freak out, too.
So my mind told me to paint, and I did, resulting in another painting session from midnight till dawn. Joy :)

***

I also figured that long-term planning is absolutely no use and just a waste of time. People walk into and away from your life all the time, and all the big, life-changing stuff happens spontaneously and without you being prepared for it. So no need to get all worked up about what'll be in a year from now. Carpe diem, live in the present and do what you enjoy.
(Or maybe that's only the case until you get a job and have the same daily schedule for 40 years and all the life-changing stuff is already past, hmm.)

***

John Howe wrote a nice and interesting statement on Fantasy art in the age of science on his website. Well worth reading.

Tread Soflty

2007-10-05T15:49:00.000+02:00

Since I couldn't go to one Kendo practice this week, I decided to instead raid the university library for interesting books (as long as I still can, which won't be long, as I now, err, rather spontaneously decided to fully move back to Linz; still can't believe I'm practically finished with my studies - it happened so fast and just when I was getting comfortable with everything).
So I read Musashi's Book of Five Rings the last days. I really liked the Ground Book. It contains some very, very nice analogies (even though it sort of told me with every word that Kendo isn't what I should do, hmmm). The other Books had some interesting tidbits, too - I particularly liked "Always keep in mind that you can clench your left hand into a fist and thrust it at your enemy's face" - but seemed less informative for me compared to the Ground Book. Maybe you need to do ji-geiko to get more out of them. I also liked the introduction and the notes (which were very helpful!). They made me look forward to reading Hagakure and Bushido.
All in all an interesting and quick read, although I'm not fully convinced by the translation. I have the feeling that it's a secondary translation based on an English translation.
The book also gave me lots of inspiration for new paintings, which is always a big plus!

This painting began with one sentence from Musashi, but then quickly went into the direction of William Butler Yeats:

He Wishes For the Cloths of Heaven
Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

Which is an absolutely beautiful poem. Not for the love-poem-part, but for the last line. It's the purest expression of caritas. When I end up in an embarrassing situation, I usually just say or do anything to get the situation over with as quickly as possible. The problem is that this is sometimes, unintentionally, done at the expense of others. So this is a reminder to myself that other people have feelings too and that I should think twice (or five times or ten) before saying or doing something rashly to get out of a situation - because in the long run it's much more satisfactory for both to be careful in expressing yourself, so you say exactly what you mean and nothing else.

And here's probably the first environmental painting I've ever done. Created for the weekly challenge over at DAF.

Slaughtering Stories

2007-10-02T01:12:00.000+02:00

If one-and-a-half chicken produce one-and-a-half eggs in one-and-a-half days, how many eggs do nine chicken produce in nine days?

Many months ago I saw I, Robot on TV and liked it enough to eventually buy the book, which I finished reading yesterday. Plot-wise, it was probably the most surprising book I have ever read. If you have a film fashioned after a book, you expect them to have roughly the same plot (with many cuts and edits, granted, but essentially similar). This is not the case here. What I, Robot the film and I, Robot the book have in common are an Earth that has managed to manufacture robots and the three Laws of Robotics - nothing else. My distant memory of the film tells me its plot was altogether different to what I have just finished reading.
Which is unexpected, surprising, but not necessarily bad. (It means you definitely get more plot than you could ever have expected.)
Isaac Asimov's novel is different to the books I usually read, because it does not build up suspense through character interaction and character development, which are my main interests. I normally find it hard to enjoy a novel if it has no appealing characters. That's probably why I don't read so much Hard Science Fiction - it often evolves more about the future scenario than about single people (here is, to my understanding, the essential difference between Fantasy and SciFi; Fantasy uses a world's destiny and future to build up a story around people, and SciFi uses people to visualise a possible future of our world). Surprisingly enough, I enjoyed I, Robot nevertheless and read through it quite quickly. It's a bit like a short story collection on a common theme and tells about the different stages of robot "evolution" on Asimov's Earth. It's interesting to read about these Laws of Robotics that Asimov invented and at the same time (/in the same book) he pointed out the mistakes and possible fallacies in them; an exemplary thought experiment.

***

Plot discrepancies till the end weren't the only surprise yesterday. I read that Hayao Miyazaki is a feminist, which is a term I'd never have associated with him. I guess it makes sense - the strong female characters are distinctive for his films. Still, I wouldn't have classfied the working women in Mononoke Hime as a sign for feminism; rather as an analogy to the women who had to work during war times - that's probably part of what you miss out on when you watch films from a different culture; you tend to put the situations in them into your own mindframe. Makes me wonder how many more layers foreign films have that I have no access to.

***

Lastly, I came across a great song by the comedy act Tripod. Both their song and their website make my geek heart beat a bit louder.
(Ghost Ship is quite good, too.)

***

Sketches for poses, movements, (weird) anatomy, etc.:

Lady Grey

2007-09-24T01:01:00.000+02:00

I just read a bit through my old blog. It's interesting to see the change over the years. January 06 says:

I'm reading Naomi Klein's "No Logo" at the moment. It's a wonderful book. It was recommended to us in my lecture on Popular Culture in Oxford, and I finally got around to buying it. Klein shows a nicely critical view on how branding works and how brands influence our society. I didn't think I could get really interested in such a topic, but the book has really been an eye-opener (not that it's any likely I'll change my consumer habits, but at least I'm aware of certain things now).

20 months later my consumer habits have changed dramatically (and quite a lot of other stuff too, i.e. my relationship with sports). I still hold Naomi Klein's book in the highest regard. I guess it's my personal bible of sorts, if you define bible as "book that carries an ideology which causes people who read it to take over that ideology and maybe even go a step further".
And what we can learn from that is to never say never and that change is often unsuspected and good.

***

I put some colour on the lady:

(Now I wish I had a dress like that ... or at least the top.)

You violate the ninja code by falling in love

2007-09-20T12:18:00.000+02:00

There's now a Black Google. If you're on a CRT, you're saving energy by using it. There seems to be a dispute over whether black on white is easier to read than white on black. But it's easier on the eyes to look at a screen (/TV/etc.) with a brightness adapted to your surroundings (which is why you should generally have a small light on at night to reduce the contrast). So if you do a lot of web-surfing at night, Blackle is probably closer to your surrounding brightness than Google.

***

I stumbled upon some brilliant Japanese Tradition videos on sushi, chopsticks and, best of all, apologizing.

***

Aaand, a character sketch:

RIP Robert Jordan

2007-09-17T09:24:00.000+02:00

I've followed Robert Jordan's blog, in which he wrote about the progress of his disease, since I found out that he suffered from amyloidosis. His updates showed so much strength and determination that I believed he would live forever. Reading that he died yesterday came as a surprise and was followed shortly by disbelief. Although I stopped reading his books some years ago, his blog entries made me look up to his courage and optimism. The world has lost a great man.

***

In remembrance of Robert Jordan: Lady Moiraine, the WoT character that appealed to me artistically from the beginning.

Incest Reading in a Castle

2007-09-11T21:26:00.000+02:00

The whole last seven days were spent by me and several other students reading at the castle Alt-Pernstein. Some of the students had organized a reading trip to this idyllic place so we could get some of the compulsory reading for our reading list done and discuss the books (which were themed around incest).
I spent a week reading, walking around in the massive forest that surrounds the castle and talking and listening to these highly intelligent people sharing their ideas. There was no TV and no computer. The serene silence was only interrupted whenever one of the students took his viola to play for us (and although I'm not into classic music, I found that it served quite well to order your thoughts and ponder on all sorts of stuff). It's amazing how many hours a day can have when you don't spend it among technology.
Coming back from the castle was almost like a culture shock. You're among these highly educated and thoroughly kind and pleasant people all the time. There are no arguments, only focused discussions on a civilized level (friendly, productive arguments, so to say). When you come home from such a trip, even a not-so-serious argument seems quite harsh. You realize how uncommunicative it is to sit in front of the TV while talking (because suddenly people don't even seem to hear your questions, when you got used to having even a hint of an attempt to say something recognized).

This made me once again realize how much influence the people who you surround yourself with make on you and your sense of happiness and satisfaction. As the article from my last posting says: "True satisfaction comes only through direct relationships with living realities. A good conversation with dear friends is far and away a greater source of joy than viewing a DVD."
It makes such a big difference to be among people who are not trying to be better than you or put you (or others) down, or who have so much anger inside that they forget to enjoy the small pleasures life offers. But within a few days, I'll probably go back to my old ways without realizing how harsh parts of it are. It's a shame you can't bottle feelings in small vessels to preserve them.

Non-attachment

2007-08-29T13:15:00.000+02:00

I took a walk in the nearby forest yesterday. At some point, while I was enjoying nature around me, I thought "If I was mistress of this forest, if I owned it, I would be happy walking here all the time." Of course, a split second later I realized that how I feel while taking a walk is not related to whether I own the ground I walk on or not. I wonder why our first impulse is always to connect happiness with property, when usually it's the other way round. Owning property makes you afraid of losing it. On the other hand, you need to own enough to have a certain minimum living standard (which varies from person to person) to fulfil the basic human needs.
But since we're living in the Western world, I can assume that most people have more than they need. We could all do with less.
I'm guessing that it's a cultural thing. Buddhism seems to be strong on simplicity and non-attachment. As the article says, we're living in a culture that values property and urges people to consume. So we don't usually think in terms of getting rid of our property.
Later, when I came home in the evening, I discovered that about half of my internet bookmarks had somehow disappeared. I was annoyed at first, then wondered which bookmarks had actually gone - the ones I use on a daily basis were still there. It took me some time to remember that they were my reference bookmarks that I use occasionally to look something up (quite a lot for online shops, Fairtrade websites and living history pages). I was annoyed again, but then somehow relieved and ended up feeling quite positive. It's a bit like starting anew.
Of course, then I found a way to recover the bookmarks and was slightly disappointed at this failed opportunity. But I still remember that sense of relief I felt.
I'll take this as a sign to go through my cupboards, wardrobe and anything else and throw away what I don't need anymore. I used to do this every summer until two years ago. Time to start anew.

***

Sketches:

Golling

2007-08-22T12:58:00.000+02:00

I came across this test in which you can try to distinguish fake smile from real ones. I got 19 out of 20 right, which surprised me. It's amazing how close you can get when you know what to look for.

***

This weekend was our traditional annual medieval fair in Golling. Unfortunately, our friends from Lower Austria with who we usually met up there didn't come, but it was a lot of fun nevertheless.
What I love about the fair in Golling is that it's surrounded by beautiful mountains and forests. Usually a part of the fair was held in the city and the majority just a little outside on a field and, after a short path through the forest, on a big clearing with a lake. This year the part from the city was moved beyond the lake on (again) a big field next to the forest. This enhanced the atmosphere even more. We took some time to just lie on the grass next to the lake and enjoyed the cool air that came from the forest. All in all it was a wonderful fair, lots of fun and I discovered a great music group.

The lake:

Christine and I in the new dresses we made. I also made my brother's trousers. Next I'm planning to make a complete outfit (including underdress) based on medieval drawings. Concerning that one, I want to try to push the authenticity level as much as possible concerning the cut.

Granum

2007-08-19T22:53:00.000+02:00

My first Kendo Seminar is over. It was an interesting and fun experience, and I learned a lot (although I only ever realize how much I actually learned when I look at the notes I took every day, which comprise two pages of small, squashed handwriting). While I didn't reach the limits of my bodily energy and felt it could have been more exhausting, I probably did reach the limits of my mental learning capacities with the nine Kihon-waza.
Interestingly enough, as the days went by I got gradually less sleep, which I didn't mind until the last day on which I was walking around like a zombie after midday and fell asleep when I came home. Allegedly you need less sleep when you exercise a lot. I'd believe it if I didn't know that I got up at 6am on Saturday because my brother had said that my strikes suck and I therefore wanted to be in the dojo a bit earlier to practice a bit.
On the one hand I'm sorry it's over, but on the other glad, because I got a few painful do strikes on the hip and a men on my fingers on the last day, and everybody's concentration wouldn't have increased, so such accidents might have happened more often. There's also this huge amount of experiences you get within a few days - I held a Iaido sword in my hands, learned nine Kihon-wazas and a Nihon-kata, consulted Google and YouTube more than ever, needed a tape for my feet for the first time, had my first exam and have now tons of stuff that I know I have to improve on - I'll need some time to process all of that.

Again, I can't help but to see the similarity to drawing. There's always room to improve, and especially as a beginner or amateur you feel overwhelmed and sometimes demotivated at this huge task ahead of you.

***

I finished Not on the Label today. The last chapter on The Ready Meal was very interesting and insightful, although only partly applicable for me, as I don't eat ready meals. The rest of the book was nice, too, but not as useful. The last chapter talked not only about ready meals, but also about the ingredients of yoghurts and how eating habits have changes through the decades (e.g. We now consume many more omega-6 fatty acids than omega-3 fatty acids. The ratio should be 1:1, but is now at 10:1 or even 20:1. The chapter also discussed how there may be a link between omega-3 fatty acids and a reduction of violence).

I also quite liked the afterword of the book:
"Food is one of life's great pleasures. Shopping for it, preparing it and eating it has bound people together for centuries. It is in eating together that we are socialized. In the end, it's about what kind of society we want."

***

A quick design I made for a roleplaying game:

Zen and Jedenspeigen

2007-08-10T00:39:00.000+02:00

Kendo training on Thursday was great. Afterwards it felt as if endorphins rather than blood and water were flowing through my body. I again realized that I really have to work on my concentration. It seems to have deteriorated over the years, and I'm now much too easily distracted (causing me afterwards to do some research on the philosophy behind it. Wikipedia says it takes many years to be capable of mushin. I think that's an understatement).
I'm trying to apply what I learn from Kendo to drawing/painting. There are similarities. My arm and wrist are tensed up during Kendo; that's probably also what makes my sketches look so unappealing (apart from the anatomy mistakes). Maybe my grip on the pencil should be much more relaxed and not as tight as it is, so the end result won't look forced and I can pay more attention to the lineweight. I probably also should approach drawing more analytically - observe, notice patterns and causes for mistakes and eradicate them. You learn more effectively when you're aware of every step you take, because then you see when you take the wrong path.

***

I spent the weekend in Vienna, buying books and going to a medieval fair. I finished reading one book on the train and came back with five new books. The shelf next to my bed is now officially unable to take more books.
I started reading Not on the Label, which seems to be very similar to We Feed the World, only that it's specific to the British market. The author had a look at products from Sainsbury and Wal-Mart, talked to workers in Birmingham, etc. So in the end it will probably be not as useful to me as it could be, but I got it for 1€, so I won't complain. So far I found out that packaged salad is put into water with chlorine before being packaged, with a chlorine level twenty times higher than in swimming pools. Yummy. Another good reason for me to buy organic food.

The market in Jedenspeigen was nice, although I guess that was mostly because of the people I met there. Rhiannon played quite frequently, but apart from them the program didn't interest me that much. The market was also fairly small and took place on a field (the organizers had lots of hey put on the ground). The earth was extremely dry, there were lots of people, resulting in lots of dirt being whirled up and blown into our faces. I was regularly trying to get the dirt out from under my contact lenses. However, what I really liked about the market was that the people from the craft guild (Handwerksgilde) were there and gave you lengthy explanations when you asked about their work. I learned a lot from listening to them. They were also very friendly and approachable.

A very nice church that we came across while walking to the market. Lovely architecture.

One of the craft guild.

Two "knights" practicing their sword play. That was also a very nice visual image, those two silhouettes moving about in front of the sky.

Weiche, Satan

2007-08-04T11:32:00.000+02:00

Finished this painting after what must have been almost a year. I had a looong break in between because I continually did some research on the topic (child abuse) and that dragged me down, so I didn't want to work on it anymore. Also because the topic is important to me, therefore I wanted the picture to be good and I invested more time in it than usually. Now I call it finished/abandoned, although there are several points I'm not happy with. Can't improve them with my current skills, so I need to improve my skills (with more sketches and paintings).

***

Here's something for the "Fantasy readers worship Satan" faction (who are probably not reading this blog):

While this is a topic that I'm not researching, it might have been my topic if my first noe had been rejected and I'm still moving on its borders (in an unplanned sort of way). I may be wrong, but my reading so far suggests otherwise. It seems that Fantasy was initially not written to fulfill all our devilish desires, to oppose the Pope and the Church and to lead unsuspecting children to black masses, so they try cursing each other with wands. Quite the contrary.
Tolkien may be the godfather of Fantasy, but the genre started earlier - that is, in my thesis period, the Victorian age. And it began with writers William Morris and George MacDonald, who were devoutly Christian (isn't that a surprise?). How did this happen? My semi-proved theory says that the Enlightenment caused people to become rational on the one hand, but on the other hand a group of people formed a counter-movement to rationality and fully delved into Victorian sentimentality. With the Enlightenment, people brutally found out that man is fallible and imperfect and that their Eden-esque ideal does not and cannot exist. Imagine how crushed they were. So the crushed people tried to hold up their ideal and their moral standards by writing books of morality. Either realistic novels in which the protagonist is some kind of emotional and social uber-human who is - despite what science had shown - perfect, or Fantasy novels that bring the protagonist into a different world (-> "Otherworld Fantasy"), which resembles Eden, where he/she experiences stuff that improves him/her morally and from whence he/she returns as an improved human being to spread the love.
(Sort of like going out to do a sport that challenges you physically and mentally and returning as a better person.)
So, there you go, book-burners! The original idea of Fantasy was not to make people worship Satan, but to turn them into good Christians. I'll just sit here and cringe for a bit as this insight fully fills my mind.

Harry Potter 7

2007-07-26T16:19:00.000+02:00

New Scientist has an article saying that obesity is possibly (socially) contagious. It sounds ridiculous at first, but when you read the article and think about it, it makes sense. I guess it ranges in the same category as peer pressure/soft power. We proclaim our individuality, but simultaneously became more of the same.

***

Finished reading HP7 (so rejoice, this will be the last HP posting for a long while). Overall, I enjoyed it. The first two thirds could have been more interesting. You notice that J.K. Rowling is not used to deviating from the usual Hogwarts school year structure. It was nice that quite a few characters died (could have even been more - I was hoping Harry would die). The last third was absolutely wonderful; very capturing (although I didn't need the heaven-scene and the epilogue). I loved Snape's memories. The book is a good ending to a good series. And, as always, I'm happy to finish off a series so I can start something new.

***

Couple of sketches from the Irish Pub and FNM. It's amazing how you notice that many different people sit in the same position a lot.

Harry Potter 5

2007-07-14T20:45:00.000+02:00

There's a nice article on organic farming over at New Scientist.

***

I watched HP5 a couple of days ago. It was nice - dark and moody. The essentials of the book were in it (as far as I could remember), but - of course - a lot was cut, so the film really could have been longer. Despite the 140 minutes it seemed quite short and a little too fast-paced. I don't think cutting Daniel Ratcliffe's hair was a good decision aesthetically and Sirius again looked too elegant and handsome. I'm also not sure if people who haven't read the book understand all that is going on in the film (Tonks' red hair wasn't explained at all, also pretty much her whole appearance; same with Kreacher). Still, as someone who has read the book and who watched the film for a nice visual reminiscence of a known story, it was good and enjoyable. The film has some very amiable characters who partly don't get enough screen time (Tonks, for instance). And some who do get their due screen time - I was looking forward to every appearance of Luna Lovegood and I still love Katie Leung's (Cho Cang) accent. All in all recommendable, even if you don't know the book.
Hm, I do wonder if it's common for British girls to yell "cute" and "awww" whenever a teenage character appears and does something "cute" (I admit, Ron had a nice hero-scene when he defended Harry, but it's nothing that I find culturally justifyable to go vocal about).

***

Started as a sketch to get into the flow, thus the boring content:
Loosely inspired by George MacDonald's At the Back of the North Wind

Back to Camelot

2007-07-12T13:35:00.000+02:00

The fair in Linz was nice. Huge masses of people, which got annoying around midday, but in the evening there were fewer people, the heat cooled down and we had a good time. There was some very good stuff at the fair. Some of my favourite merchants (Windalf, for example) and nice, skilled artists. Frank und Frey did an awesome fireshow with eight people and Discordia, as ever, showed a highly motivated swordfight, which resulted in one of the fighters injuring his knee. The fair was just a bit weak on the music side, which is a shame, since that's my favourite part.

Photos:

Going to the fair in the morning, posing with our mead horns.

This was a fairly young group from Linz. They were nice (although it was obvious they were still inexperienced) and tried to involve the kids, which was good, as the fair was aimed at families.

Angus der Barde, who was the most entertaining musician at the fair (of the two that played). And he was nice enough to keep playing a bit when the artist who was scheduled after him could not come.

Aaaand the jester. He was awesome. At the fairs, the good jesters can be as good as the music (for me), and sometimes even better. He was definitely a good one. Poor him could not speak German and tried to communicate in English with the children (who had no idea what he wanted). Very sweet guy.

Kendo and BBC

2007-07-03T22:17:00.000+02:00

Since I have holidays now there's not University Kendo training. So my brother and me contacted the Kendo society in Linz and asked if we could train with them. On Tuesday was our first day.
It needs to be said that the Kendo I do in Salzburg is more free, less perfectionist and less aimed at tournaments, while my brother's society in Graz and the one in Linz (especially the one in Linz) go all the way for tournaments. So I now next to nothing about all the formalities, what the single kata are called, what a big men and a small men is, etc. And, sure enough, this hit me right at the beginning when everybody got into a circle and we did exercises with everybody counting to ten ... in Japanese. Imagine you're standing around with, oh, say twelve people and all of them count perfectly in Japanese, even your own brother (hmpf, what a betrayal). In the end I sort of whinced my numbers and hoped it would be over soon. Oh the shame. I need to learn Japanese till next week.
Apart from that, it was great. The different level of the group in Linz gives me a wonderful chance to improve a lot and to learn massively. Especially because, and this is what I like most about it, every advanced kendoka gives helpful instructions to the novices during the exercises (so in my case, everybody else tells me what I am doing wrong, haha!). I'd probably be scared and intimidated to death if the people weren't so friendly. Well, I'm looking forward to learning and improving. Everybody is a novice of anything at some point of their life.

***

I also seem to have a British Films - phase. I liked Plots with a View from the first time I saw it, then saw Calendar Girls some time last week and watched several of the BBC evening shows the last two days. Granted, most of them I don't find great and kept watching them purely for their accents. I liked Liar though. It's an interesting show, the audience seems involved and I love the parts where the people throw in colloquial English. I also saw Little Britain, which seems to have a fanship among some students of English in Austria. Not sure what to think of it. Some is funny, some is gross, some I just don't understand. Nod and accept, I guess.

So, on Saturday we have the medieval fair (yay!) and in two weeks Alex is visiting me (I'm noticing a peculiar tendancy in my life involving guys who are willing to drive 8-10h to see me ... hmmmm). Ah, yes: Also, one of my paintings is featured in the Ascheherold 6, which is a magazine providing adventures and other materials for the free RPG Darkage. I'm not too familiar with the RPG (although it sounds interesting and fun, from what I've read), but there's also an artist's portrait (of me) in the Ascheherold, and also a part about life, battle and fashion in the Middleages, so it's worth checking out.
(Err. That is, if you speak German. Otherwise you can just look at the pictures

It's getting dark

2007-06-18T18:45:00.000+02:00

The program for the medieval fair in Linz was announced (here). It seems the organizers are trying to even top last year's fair. There's again free entry, plus free breakfast (as long as there is food), some kind of prize draw for people in costumes (yay!), a beer tasting and horse-drawn carriage rides. And again, the fire show at night and a concert. I can only repeat my statement from last year: Linz is great and I'm deeply impressed by the cultural program it offers, especially if you compare this fair with some others that you have to pay for.
...like Salzburg's, which was last weekend. The fair was pretty much like last year. Same program and same merchants, just some different musicians (who were as good as last year). It was a nice, little market, nothing overly exciting, but nice. Of course, usually it's the company who makes the market, and I went with two roleplay geeks and enjoyed their company a lot. No photos, because I forgot my camera in my flat.
So far, of the three fairs I've been to this year, I enjoyed Schörfling most. And not just because it caused me to appear on the front page of an online magazine on medieval fairs :)

I'm looking forward to the summer vacation. Then I'll get back into my habit of painting 5+ hours every day. And, of course, there'll be my research trip to England!

Sketches:
(the first pages of my sketchbook-to-go)

Haul the Colours Up High

2007-05-31T12:11:00.000+02:00

I went to see Pirates of the Carribean in English last week. What a pain (the process of getting there, not the film). I missed the bus by two minutes, so I had to get to the cinema in 20 minutes (the bus takes 10 minutes). Miraculously, I managed it and was only five minutes late, wondering if I was in the wrong film since the people on screen were talking (singing) in German. There were lots of language issues in the whole film - German sound, no sound, etc. In the end, we got our money back, because the group of English people complained (they probably didn't understand a word in the German parts).
All in all, though, I liked the film. Definitely better than the first sequel and I liked Jack better as well. Ooooh, his first scene. It was brillliant. I first thought "Hmmm, this is ... kinda abstract" until he appeared on the screen and everything made sense. So, unlike the second film, worth watching.

***

The medieval fairs were good. Lots of fun, lots of nice sellers. On Saturday we got into a thunderstorm and hid in the car for an hour. Tittmoning was the bigger market, more merchants, more visitors, more people in appropriate garment. My brother bought some clay dishes. Schörfling was a quite small town market. Fewer people and merchants and (at the beginning) almost no people in garment except for us. But this meant we had more time to peacefully walk through the area and watch the shows. Surprisingly, we also bought more stuff there. I got myself an amber bracelet and (tam-tam-tam) a leather armguard from AC Atelier (I wanted to have something like that since I saw two friends from Amsterdam wearing them). Markus got a dagger from them. I was very impressed with their work ethics - the normal armguards sold at such markets are for men, so far too big for me. I told the merchant that I'm looking for something smaller, and he said he could custom-make one for me in an hour. We went away so I could think about it (it would have cost 30€), and when we came back some time later to give him the commission, he had one ready and gave it to me for 15€. Awesome! Next my brother is getting a sword from him and I probably a fibula or some buttons.
We also found our favourite mead seller in Schörfling, who renamed her shop, but will be at a lot of the fairs we will be going to this summer (now there's a bottle of hemp mead in our cellar). We also found out that there will again be a fair in Linz this year. With all the nice stuff we got and the information, it was a really good birthday.

***

A quick portrait I made for a dear friend. Alex's character:
(roughly referenced off the mirror in my room)

Aggression and Responsibility

2007-05-18T23:36:00.000+02:00

New Scientist has an article about the "quirkier" scientific breakthroughs in the world of science. It's a nice read (yes, I admit I'm interested in some abnormal sciences, including popular anthropology).

The website also has an article on Bipolar Disorder. Most of what it says is common knowledge, but one remark made me hesitate.

"Carlson says many parents and doctors would prefer to have a medical diagnosis rather than accept that a badly behaved child is psychologically normal."

Is this so common nowadays? Do we prefer children with psychological children to badly behaved children (i.e. refuse to take responsibility for their upbringing), as we prefer thinking that violent shooters make teens aggressive rather than considering their upbringing and surroundings? Nobody wants to take responsibility anymore.
Just today, I experienced what was probably the strongest outbreak of aggression in my life so far (thinking back, I really can't remember anyone getting even close to that level of physical violence, the closest being an ex of mine whose aggression was mostly on the verbal level - physical violence seems to be 98% absent from my life). It was at a Magic - The Gathering tournament that's held weekly in one of the local shops. Two guys drank too much and one of them got fed up to the point that he pushed his table hard at the other player (the owner's helper), threw his mobile phone around (hitting me and Christine) and made threats (while ignoring his girlfriend who was in mourning). I heard the other player kicked said helper hard last week when the helper tried to get him out because he was smoking. Responsible, of course, is the alcohol. Really gets you thinking (also in relation to the alcohol anthropologics I've posted about some time ago). I've been wondering for the last few hours if the majority of the world is that aggressive, or has the potential to be.
A part can't help to be fascinated by all the emotional interactions and by seeing how people react to the outbursts. I love watching people interact, observing their gestures and their behaviour. I think it's very beneficial for your creative work, be it painting or writing.

***

Here's the finished version of the WIP painting I showed some months ago. I didn't touch it for several months because I was afraid of painting the guy's pose. It turned out alright, but I had some higher hopes for it. Ah well.
It's an illustration of the medieval story "Lanval". I'd pull out the original text from the Norton Anthology and type it, but after what happened to day I'm not much in the mood for it. It's a beautiful story though, well worth getting a copy of (or looking up online).
Still, medieval painting, here you go. Next weekend I'll be on two medieval markets, in Tittmoning (Germany) on Saturday and in Schörfling am Attersee on Sunday. I've been excited about these two for a long time now. It will be awesome!

Weekend Fun

2007-05-06T21:10:00.000+02:00

I'm back from an absolutely fantastic weekend in Graz. I went there Friday afternoon to see the Schandmaul concert and then stayed till today, visiting the Zotter chocolate factory and the Riegersburg with my brother and some friends.

The concert was, in my opinion, the best to date (apart from the fact that I had to throw away my water bottle because it had a cap). Good atmosphere, very good view to the stage and great songs. Schandmaul always manages to connect to the audience really well and interacts a lot. It seems to me that they even became better at that.
On Saturday we first went to the Zotter factory, where we got a short introduction and could then try out a good variety of their chocolate types (100, all in all) and also got some drinking chocolate. I decided that dark Whiskey chocolate tastes better than I'd have thought.
In the afternoon we went to the Riegersburg and had a look at the castle and the museum, and later watched a bird of prey show with hawks, vultures, eagles and Hedwig. The whole castle and the show were breathtaking. We were lucky to have a beautiful weather, so we could enjoy everything to its fullest extent. Allegedly the castle is the biggest in Europe. It's certainly one of the nicest I've ever seen, with a lot of garden space and absolutely beautiful landscape all around. The birds were cooler than expected. I usually prefer hawks over all others, but this time the vulture was my favourite. It was about 2.5m long and made an awful sound when breathing, which really gave you the chills. We were told its favourite place is down in the town at some cafe, where all the tourists go. It ravages the tourists' handbags, because it expects them to contain meat (like their trainers' bags).
And the rest was all good food. In the evening some pubs with lots of billiard playing (among them an Irish Pub in which I confirmed that Irish Coffee tastes a lot better in Ireland and that buying a small sketch to carry around was the best purchase in the last few months), and today we went to my brother's favourite Chinese for lunch, which now is also my favourite Chinese. Chinese food that doesn't all taste the same is good - especially if there are fruits and ginger in it.

The inventor of Zotter chocolate, Mister Zotter.

The chocolate shop with 100 different flavours and some chocoholics. They all left the shop with grins on their faces. I'm guessing everyone was high from the very strong chocolate smell inside.

The Riegersburg. Isn't it beautiful?

The cool vulture who eats tourist handbags.

Hedwig. She didn't like this at all, being thrown among a heap of tourists who want to look at her and take a photo with her. Poor Hedwig screamed all the time.

***

I put a review of Tad William's Rite up on my Website (in German; it's here. More to follow.

Gattaca

2007-04-22T17:19:00.000+02:00

Denni, friend and RPG victim, lent me Gattaca, a Science Fiction film from back in the days when I didn't go to the cinema yet and therefore missed some good stuff (that's 1997, the year in which I went to the cinema precisely once to see Titanic). I'm impressed by what the film succesfully tries to communicate. There are so many layers of meaning in it that I probably haven't even glimpsed some of them. It's fantastic, and definitely helps my current thirst for SF-films that are set in a near future and show up possible scenarios.
Moreover, it's not typical SF with lots of action and technology and modern design. It's a quiet and peaceful and intelligent film. Very recommendable.

***

Very rough idea sketch for a painting I want to do:

The Freedom You Desire

Not Buying It

2007-04-17T23:10:00.000+02:00

I finished reading the book. It was okay - some good stuff and some stuff that wasn't interesting for me. The book is divided in chapters, one for each month. The first three months didn't give me much useful/interesting information. After that it got better, as the author got involved with groups and visited people who follow an alternative lifestyle.
Overall, though, the book didn't fullfill the hopes I had in it. Mostly it showed me that compared to some of the Americans described in the book, my own way of living is alright. I raised my eyebrows a few times as I read about kitchens containing at least four types of rice and about people who are proud to have eaten out only under ten times in the last six months.
The insights at the end were interesting, and mostly comply with my own point of view. I was surprised by the impact that year had on the author's relationship with her partner (they did the year without shopping together). For some reason I have the opinion that most guys wouldn't want to break free from the comfort culture (because they see no use in it?). If I did something like that, I wouldn't even consider asking my partner to join me - probably because most people in my surroundings get annoyed whenever I raise the topic ethic living.

I figured there are three behaviour types that are considered to be ethical in respect to consuming:

a. Buying organic goods
b. Buying Fairtrade goods
c. Cosuming less

While you can always do c, you get some problems when you try to combine it with both a and b. Firstly it's hard to find stuff that's both Fairtrade and organic - shops specialise either in organic goods or Fairtrade. Secondly, Fairtrade goods come from very, very far away, which increases the good's environmental footprint. Combine that with the try to buy groceries from local farmers and avoid fruits, vegetables, etc. from far away countries, and you're facing tough decisions.
If you want to buy apples, and have the choice between common apples from Austria/your country and organic apples from Spain or Italy, which is the better choice?
Thing is, every one of the categories I stated above stands for something else. Organic goods are produced with regards to the environment (their impact on your pocket will probably be bigger than their impact on your health, and they probably taste the same). Fairtrade goods center on human rights. Consuming less is a statement against pop culture and consumer culture. I guess you have no other choice than to set priorities (apart from c, which you can do regardless). Which is more important, human rights or protecting the environment? Does the organic-ness of the apples from Spain even out the transport effects on the environment? I have no idea.
(In the end I went for Austrian apples, though.)

***

Kendo training was outside today. What an amazing experience. We're lucky that our dojo is part of a leisure activity centre for children and youths, so there is a big greenspace attached. Not to mention how handsome the guys in the hakama look when they're standing on the grass and the wind moves the garment slightly (ever since I started Kendo and saw the sensai in his hakama for the first time I wanted to make a painting depicting it). Today's training was less exhausting, because we just worked on the zen mindset and practiced cutting techniques involving three enemies. Most of all, I like the constant support of the sensai - improving our techniques without saying what we're doing is wrong, adapting individually to our various needs. Shame I didn't start with it earlier.

***

Rough painting I did for one of the contests over at the ImagineFX website. The face is heavily referenced, obviously, to get the likeness. I still need to go over it again to polish it a bit - which I had intended to do before submitting it, but since I somehow messed up the deadline and had a day less than expected, this is how far it got. Those are the problems you're confronted with when you don't just paint for yourself :)

What's with all the screaming?

2007-04-14T03:42:00.000+02:00

Ah, springtime. All the sun, birds and the warmth put me into a very giggly and playful mood, which I use to the utmost extend. I forgot how much fun teasing everybody around me is.

Now I am really ready for all the medieval fairs.

I went downtown today because I needed an envelope to submit a short story to a writing competition (I wrote the story when I had 38.5 degrees and everything was spinning around me - thankfully I've been more or less healthy again the last few days, after literally weeks of being ill).
"Pure Irony", I thought on the tram to the city. I was reading Not Buying It: My Year Without Shopping by Judith Levine while I was on my way to go shopping. When you do that, thoughts about shopping for pleasure roam around in your head all the while you're walking in and out of shops. Not that I bought much (compared to other people), but most of what I got was probably not necessary. I checked out a couple of shops that sell organic clothes, bought envelopes, a small sketchbook to carry around with me, two CDs, an organic Fairtrade shirt and a tiny lipstick box. (If you now think "What the hell?" you're entirely right to do so. That was just my thought the first time I saw the lipstick boxes. It seems ridiculous that a market exists for such a thing. However, the box has the perfect size to put some small pencils and an eraser in, to carry around with the sketchbook.)
70€ total, roughly. 10€ of that are for things that I needed (envelopes and office material). For all the stuff that's not needed, I have excuses. With the shirt I support the local Weltladen, and I'm on an all-time-low for shirts anyway, because I gave away a lot. I want to sketch more, so I needed a sketchbook and the lipstick-soon-to-be-pencil-box. I need new CDs to not go insane, because you tend to listen to a lot of CDs when you paint several hours a day.
I see I'm still quite a bit away from my year without shopping. I'd probably even try it as a project, but I just can't see how I could live without going to the cinema and buying books. I breathe and eat books. The last two weeks, I've been devouring them (seven books in ten days, mostly for uni or my diploma thesis). More, I don't just need books, I need to own the books I read. Books are the one thing that I need to possess and dominate, I reckon (probably for lack of anything else I can dominate, so maybe I can stop buying books once I have a pet).
Ah, books. Source of wisdom, travel companion, burglar stunner; I could not live without your pages of words.

Of course, a month without shopping is on my 101 list. A month is ok. I have enough books to last me a month. I just need to find a month without good films (and looking at most of the recent films, the possibility of such a month arriving gets increasingly likely).

These thoughts crossed my mind while I walked through the streets and shops of Linz, feeling increasingly bad due to the increasing weight of my shopping bag. Back on the tram, on my way home, however, I consoled myself by looking at all the teenage boys and girls with their plastic bags from H&M and all the women with their plastic bags from Kleiderbauer, some of who had more mass in their bags than in and on their bodies (shocking, really), while sitting there with my book and my cloth bag, in which I had conveniently hidden the plastic bag I had got when the shot assistant hadn't asked me whether I even wanted one.

***

I stumbled across musician Jonathan Coulton the other day. His songs are very entertaining. Typical pop tune, but the lyrics are hilarious. I especially like Skullcrusher Mountain. First of May and Chiron Beta Prime are also quite funny. Shame that it seems I can't get his CDs anywhere here.

***

Current insights from my reading of secondary literature for my diploma thesis:

Amazons

Amazons somehow got pregnant (through raping their future victims, I presume) and killed their male babies (instead of bringing one or two up as a baby-making-machine).

They also cut off one of their breasts in order to improve their usage of the bow.

(Makes you wonder if that really works. My bow-shooting skills are quite good even though I have two breasts.)

(What do Amazons have to do with Victorian fairies, you ask? Nothing at all, love, and at the same time everything. Sexual liberation and independence.)

***

Sketches: Some mermaids here, because they've been part of my thesis reading as well, next to Amazons. Nina Auerbach compares them to angels in Woman and the Demon, saying both creatures submerge themselves, but to different means.

You would not want to make a universe angry

2007-04-10T19:43:00.000+02:00

The weather's great. I went for a walk in the northern forest - I had completely forgotten how wonderful it is to explore a forest that I don't know by heart yet. The northern forest must be the more beautiful one when it's sunny and warm, and more scary when it's dark and cold; probably because it's deeper and further away from civilisation. All you hear is the water from the brook and the birds chirping. Seeing nature like that is simply amazing.

***

Neil Gaiman's Hugo nominated short story "How to talk to girls at parties" is up at his website as an audio file. It's cute and I love the Britishness of his phrases and expressions (probably emphasized by his accent).

***

Roll, Roll, Rock'n'Roll

2007-03-30T23:20:00.000+02:00

A first (or second?) Stardust Trailer is up. It's looking good. Maybe a bit crowded with action, which makes you wonder if they aren't trying to press too much story and action into one film, but overall it looks exciting. I'm looking forward to the film. There haven't been nearly enough good films in the cinema recently (I had to switch from going to the cinema once or twice a week to once a month because there are simply no good films that I want to see - and the good ones like Pan's Labyrinth only make me realize how bad the bad ones are, so I'm not even trying to see the films that look okay but might be bad).

***

I had my first game with the German RPG system Das Schwarze Auge (The Black Eye). It's insane. You have to do three die rolls to see if you managed to make a spell or to see if you managed a skill check. If one of them fails, you're out. It's not even as if the three checks were easy.
You also have to roll die when you gain a level to see if you even level up - a roll for every skill and ability and spell you want to level. This means if you roll really badly, you can level up without improving your character at all (unlikely, but still).
I like the theory behind all this, which is that a skill is influenced by several abilities; but it's not practical at all. Maybe it will get better after I've played a few times. I certainly hope so.

***

San Francisco and Paris banned plastic bags from supermarkets. That's great. One thing that always annoyed me a bit in Oxford was that I usually ended up with three or more plastic bags, because the cashiers were so overwhelmingly helpful to pack them for me (which isn't done in Austria and which I found nice service). Problem was, that usually didn't give me the time to get out my cloth bags and pack them, and the cashiers put only about 4-5 items into one bag, leaving huge amounts of space there (probably because otherwise they'd rip). The general attitude is nice, because you're not so stressed about packing your bags quickly - but it would be perfect if I could still pack them myself and have the other customers wait patiently (which they almost always did in Britain and never do in Austria).

***

Two designs of skirts I intend to sew, and some scribbles:

I'll be back

2007-03-20T22:55:00.000+01:00

Still ill. Not fun.

It's snowing too, now (for the fifth time this winter). Last weekend I was running around in a poncho and the last two days I've been freezing in a coat. Really weird weather.

It looks like I'll be spending some time in Britain again, as I had hoped I could do. Everything seems to be much less hassle and more common than I'd thought at first (apparently almost every past diploma/PhD student of my supervisor did it). Maybe it will be Liverpool, unless I find a library/archive that suits my research needs better.
I'm surprised how smoothly everything develops. Cheers for our government funding research trips. Now I just need to get well again so I can start work properly.

***

New WIP shot:

Modern wizards and witch-hunters

2007-03-13T19:01:00.000+01:00

So now terrorists have started to notice that Austria exists and threatened us as well. Nice. Not that I really get their way of thinking. Two equal messages, one to Germany and one to Austria, while Germany has 3000 soldiers in Afghanistan and Austria has a stunning army of 4.
Needless to say that a threat gets less threatening if you don't get your facts straight. It's four soldiers, not five as the video says. We spend money on Bush? We support Bush? Hell, no. How you can support anyone significantly with four people is beyond my imagination anyway.

Although I do have to admit I'm surprised about the knowledge the video shows about our current political state, the broken election promises above all.

You gave the far right parties some more oil for their fires. Well done.

***

I've been quite ill the last few days (still am). After it got much worse yet again during the night, I finally surrendered and saw a doctor this morning. It was interesting. He looked into my ear and said "You can't have slept well at all with an ear like that" (I wholeheartedly agreed). Much like a wizard looks at people and knows their past deeds, he looks at ears and knows their owner's past night's sleep. Neat. Modern Magic.

(I'm only so amazed because I'm not used to obviously competent doctors. The doctors I usually go to listen, nod, don't say much and give you pills. This one listened, filled the gaps that I hadn't even thought of telling and emphasized in how much pain I must be, showing that he knows more about me than I do myself.)

Since I'm encouraged by competent people, I went straigth to uni instead of back to bed to listen to a lecture on American culture. I don't have an anti-American attitude (as the Americans I have got to know personally have been mostly normal, sensible people), but after this semester, I think I may have one. The second half of the lecture we watched a documentary about American views. I was repelled in many ways by a lot of the images shown and the things said. The patriotism and God-thing is probably the main cause.
I think most Austrian people aren't very patriotic. It's nice to be Austrian, but it's equally nice to be European. There are certainly some who wouldn't even care if they're Austrian or, say, Spanish. In the end it's just a country - land to build on. Raising the country's flag in one's yard would be considered very odd by most people here.
And the God-thing ... one thing that was said went something like (quoting for meaning here, not word-for-word) "We can be ethnocentric and self-righteous because God likes us best". Half of the people in the lecture chuckled at that.
It just seems so stereotypical and a bit narrow-minded, and I find it hard to believe that there's a country in which most people should carry an attitude like that. Admittedly, I haven't ever argued with any American whether the US sucks or if God really likes them best (or prefers the Irish); so I never tried to touch the core of anyone's cultural beliefs. I guess I just always assumed that it's common to not think too highly of oneself and to not believe one's country too important (I've been making too many intentional fallacies like that recently).
That's another point the documentary made - in Germany children are told that the government is bad, the country is economically wasting away, that the child will never fulfil his/her dearest dream and should just get down to earth again and get a proper job, etc., while in the US the children are told how much they are loved, how great the country is, how wonderful the government, that your dreams can come true and that they are loved, again that they are loved and that the country is great. I can accept that as accurate because I know the German part is true (and also partly true for Austria).
So the subtle, less problematic cultural differences from Watching the English suddenly become vastly different, entirely problematic differences when you look to the other side of the ocean. It's interesting. Certainly not easy to be not biased, or to judge objectively (one person clapped during a particularly big cultural difference shown in the documentary that was somewhat offensive towards Americans). It is also harder to believe what is said because I have no way of comparision. With British culture and behaviour it's easy, because I gathered enough background knowledge myself during my year abroad to know that what is written in a book is true (making it likely that the parts that I don't know about discussed in the book are true as well). With the US, it's been almost a decade since I've been there for the last time, and back then I was not as perceptive about cultural issues as I am now.

I do hope we'll have some people from the US in the lecture who give us their view on what is said.

After the lecture I had a short talk with the supervisor of my diploma thesis again to finally set the topic. It's now back to fairies (yay), restricted to the Victorian times. Maybe from a feminist view, but I'll still have to check on that and see if I like it. Victorian fairies rock.
I seriously have the best supervisor in the world (so glad I'm studying in Salzburg). Not one teacher has managed to get me excited and motivated about a topic like her.

***

Since my health has kept me from sketching and painting in the last few days, I give you some photos from my walks in the forest (been doing them once a week for some weeks now). Regular walks are great for observing a particular subject matter, because every time you go there again you see more details and find new things you hadn't noticed before. The last time I was particularly impressed by the colour contrast of the green moss and the withered red leaves on the ground, and how treestumps and roots glow with bright green moss.
Mostly though, I collected textures.

Run from typcial blog stuff. Shut down your computer.

2007-03-09T11:41:00.000+01:00

Participate in Shutdown Day. (Easy for me, since that's a point of my 101 list anyway and I don't care which day I actually do it.)
I still think only one day without a computer is pathetic. A week would be alright. Sadly, I find that I wouldn't be able to go through with that unless I'm on holidays.

***
(If you dislike typical annoying blog stuff and finding out more stuff about my personal me, skip the following up to the sketch.)
***

I normally don't do memes, but this one was for a friend over at LJ, so I might as well repost it here.

1. Can you cook? Yes, and I love it. I try to cook something new every week.

2. What was your dream growing up? Being a princess (how typically girly of me ;). Then I wanted to be a teacher, then a fashion designer. I think at some point I even went back to wanting to be a princess.

3. What talent do you wish you had? Hm. I'm actually quite happy with the skills I have. Most talents are only learned skills anyway, and if I wanted to have them I could just learn them.
Hmmmm. Maybe a talent for discourse and diplomacy, so people don't get offended when I tried to compliment them.

4. Favorite place? In the woods.

5. Favorite vegetable? Ginger is probably considered a spice and not a vegetable, so I'll say onions.

6. What was the last book you read? Last book I finished: Kate Fox - Watching the English. Book I'm reading right now: George R. R. Martin - A Feast for Crows

7. What zodiac sign are u ? Gemini

8. Any Tattoos and/or Piercings? Apart from my ears, no.

9. Worst Habit? Procrastinating online when there's nothing interesting to find online.

10. Do we know each other outside of lj? Only in some former art communities, I think.

11. What is your favorite sport? I don't like and don't do sports. I sometimes go swimming in summer, and I've taken up Kendo this semester to try it out. Maybe I'll like it.

12. Negative or Optimistic attitude? Optimist who scolds people for their pessimistic attitude.

13. What would you do if you were stuck in an elevator with me? Paint on the walls, maybe.

14. Worst thing to ever happen to you? I tend to see the positive side of bad things, and "worst thing" sounds as if I wanted that it never happened. So I could say "Having been bullied at school", but that probably caused me to read Fantasy, get into art and find true, long-term friends, who I love to bits.

15. Tell me one weird fact about you: I lived the first two years of university mostly on crispbread, because I was afraid the 25 people who I had to share kitchen with would laugh at my newbie cooking skills (and because the kitchen was never clean and there was never space to cook properly).

16. Do u have any pets? Sadly, no.

17. Do u know how to do the macerana? Not anymore.

18. What time is it where u are now? 11.22

19. Do you think clowns are cute or scary? I go for annoying. If you talk about proper, medieval court jesters from medieval fairs, though, who entertain the children, they are both cute and awesome and funny.

20. If you could change one thing about how you look, what would it be? My bum, I guess. Working on it.

21. Would you be my crime partner or my conscience? Conscience. I'm as optimistic conscience as optimistic conscience can be.

22. What color eyes do you have? grey-blue

23. Ever been arrested? No.

24. Bottle or Draft? Draft (just to pretend that I fully know what the question is about).

25. If you won $10,000 dollars today, what would you do with it? Get a new desktop computer, go on holidays to Ireland with my brother and Christine, buy all stuff from my Amazon wishlist, donate some to a good cause, and save the rest.

26. What kind of bubble gum do you prefer to chew? None at all.

27. What 's your favorite bar to hang at? I don't like bars, but I'll take any pub any time.

28. Do you believe in ghosts? No, but in Shadows.

29. Favorite thing to do in your spare time? Read and paint and hang out with friends.

30. Do you swear a lot? Not really.

31. Biggest pet peeve? Ignorant people (now that's a good category - I can put all the stuff in it that I dislike - people who talk in the cinema or who talk to me during lectures, people who act all high and mighty when they're not and even told that they're not, etc.).

32. In one word, how would you describe yourself? Windy.

33. Will you repost this so I can fill it out and do the same for you? Probably not, since I don't use LJ.

***

This was sort of fun, even if inaccurate:

The Everything Test

There are many different types of tests on the internet today. Personality tests, purity tests, stereotype tests, political tests. But now, there is one test to rule them all.

Traditionally, online tests would ask certain questions about your musical tastes or clothing for a stereotype, your experiences for a purity test, or deep questions for a personality test.We're turning that upside down - all the questions affect all the results, and we've got some innovative results too! Enjoy :-)

Personality

You are more emotional than logical, more concerned about others than concerned about self, more atheist than religious, more loner than dependent, more lazy than workaholic, more rebel than traditional, more engineering mind than artistic mind, more cynical than idealist, more leader than follower, and more extroverted than introverted.

As for specific personality traits, you are intellectual (73%), romantic (57%).

Stereotypes
College Student	88%
Prep	62%
Hippie	43%

Life Experience
Sex	27%
Substances	14%
Travel	32%

Politics
Your political views would best be described as Liberal, whom you agree with around 73% of the time.

Socioeconomic
Your attitude toward life best associates you with Lower Middle Class. You make more than 0% of those who have taken this test, and 82% less than the U.S. average.

If your life was a movie, it would be rated PG.
By the way, your hottness rank is 57%, hotter than 82% of other test takers.

TAKE THE TEST
brought to you by thatsurveysite

Alcohol Anthropologics

2007-03-04T23:09:00.001+01:00

Still reading Kate Fox's Watching the English. Right now I'm finishing the part on drinking and rules of drunkenness. It says this:

In some societies (such as the UK, the US, Australia and parts of Scandinavia), drinking is associated with aggression, violence and anti-social behaviour, while in others (such as Latin/Mediterranean cultures) drinking behaviour is largely peaceful and harmonious. This variation cannot be attributed to different levels of consumption or genetic differences, but is clearly related to different cultural beliefs about alcohol, different expectations regarding the effects of alcohol and different social norms regarding drunken comportment. [...] The experiments show that when people think they are drinking alcohol, they behave according to their cultural beliefs about the behavioural effects of alcohol. The English believe that alcohol is a disinhibitor, and specifically that it makes people amorous or aggressive, so when they are given what they think are alcoholic drinks - but are in fact non-alcoholic 'placebos' - they shed their inhibitions: they become flirtatious, and males (young males in particular) often become aggressive.

This is a very interesting insight, both about the different cultural expectations concerning drunkenness and also about the effect of placebo drinks. From my limited knowledge it seems plausible.
So, I'd say in Austria the general expectation concerning the effect of alcohol is to be more outgoing (and louder), more talkative and - especially among the younger people - to make more of a fool of yourself, which is what I also observe at parties.
Basically, this means the way you think about the effects of alcohol influences your actual behaviour when drunk majorly. Isn't that interesting? You can't blame the alcohol any longer, because it's not in the alcohol, it's in your head. Boy, this opens up so many wonderful opportunities to look into people's minds.

This knowledge is also quite abusable, I think, since you could give people placebo drinks in order to make them behave in a certain way, without them being able to blame it on the alcohol in the end.

I can only repeat what an awesome book this is.

***

Here is some info on the next Pixar film. It sounds exciting. I admit I'm a sucker for moving and interacting gadgets (like that mini-sequence of a Win and a Mac computer getting close to each other). There's something intriguing about the idea of "cold" machines with human emotions, if it's not overdone and the specific characteristics of the machines are retained (this doesn't include cars walking on two wheels).

***

And lastly, Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sleep. Because how you spend those 4-12 hours has major consequences on how you spend the rest of the day.

***

The whole family went to the Energiesparmesse in Wels today. It was mostly about stuff that I didn't have much of a clue about anyway, so I was basically walking through the dark all the time, not knowing what the thing in front of me was actually used for. But I made good use of my time there by taking lots of photos for textures and references.
Seriously, if you need textures, go there; there's wood, stone, grass, marble, clay and loads of other stuff that I partly don't even know what it is (because it's stuff that is hidden somewhere in the building of your house behind all the stone and tapestries). I was overwhelmed by the thousands of different textures.

At the entrance. Ah, Wels. Lots of good memories from the two medieval fairs that we visited there years ago.
(photo courtesy of Christine)

Right after the entrance. Too many people. I do prefer medieval fairs, not just because there aren't by far as many people there.

There was a small section in one of the halls on gardening. I liked that, since it emphasized the decorative aspect (unlike most of the stuff there, which was more about the vital aspects of house building). I also liked the fences.

I'm still not quite sure what it is. A fountain? A bird pond? Some capitalists mad fancy?
Who'd put that into his yard?
(photo courtesy of Christine)

Meeting the Mightly Beast

2007-02-25T22:47:00.000+01:00

While my mother apparently needs to tell sect people that she doesn't have time for them, it seems I have an aura that makes them willing to leave without a word from me.

Nearing midday, the bell rings and I find an elderly gentleman and a younger guy in a suit in front of our door. "They're either from our church and want money, or they're fanatics from some sect" I think. Their very first sentence revealed the truth.

Old Guy: Morning.
Me: Morning.
Young Guy: We won't bother you for long. I just have this ... a question for you. Don't you also think that it's always of advantage to tell the truth?
Me: (thinking for a second) Well, no, actually not always.
(pause)
YG: But ... you'd certainly wish people would.
Me: Yeah, but it's not always an advantage.
YG: Uh, okay. We just have a little leavlet here for you to read.
Me: Thanks. Goodbye.

It probably would have been more fun if they had tried to defend their point. But since they made their opinion so clear, I don't have to read that leaflet titled "Do we always have to tell the truth?" since I already know what will be written in there.

(I bet they walk in pairs like that so the person opening the door can get talked to by the Witness who is closest to their age.)

***

After stumbling over this little gem from a English book for Japanese people I suddenly much less concerned about my own use of inappropriate words during lessons at school and also about my actual teaching of inappropriate words at school when planning a lesson on British slang.

(Yeah, yeah, it does involve a lot of cussing, but people really underestimate the importance of slang. Until I planned that lesson I never really understood the Orange "Bob's your uncle" ads. Slang is vital and everybody should learn slang words in SLL.)

And here is an entertaining explanation from a Russion book for English learners on how modern English even came into existence.

***

Been playing some Final Fantasy V the last few days. Nice game, and the first Final Fantasy game that made me care quite a bit about the characters.

The sisters rock. Presenting to you, Reina and Faris:

Rite

2007-02-19T21:45:00.000+01:00

So, Amazon did get its copies of Tad Williams' Rite, by Subterranean Press, and shortly later, it gave one to me. Since the book is a short story collection, I had intended to read it in pieces. Instead, it turned out, I rather gulped it down it big chunks - and how delicious it was!

It is really a beautiful book. Nice, cloth-bound hardcover (although I like the image of the protective cover quite a lot) and an illustration that goes with every short story. The illustrations are beautiful, too, black-and-white drawings (ink, I suppose) of which I like the compositions best. Anatomy and everything else it top-notch, too, but it's really the composition and the little details that made me look at every illustration twice (or thrice, or ...). The stories themselves are a pleasure to read, as well. Probably more down-to-earth than Tad Williams' novels (read: more bordering on the SF and F genre than delving straight into the middle of it), and also more humorous. I like it. It is rare that I find a short story collection that I like throughout, but with this book, this is the case. There's something I can get out of every story. It was comforting to find out that there are other people in the world who are somewhat uncomfortable using planes and revisiting Otherland was a joy, as well.
There are a few printing errors (e.g. italicized v's are barely visible), but I didn't mind them that much. The v's were actually intriguing, and at first I wasn't even sure if it was intentional or not. I can imagine a book having a letter that's not used very often in its title (in some special rendition, like the v's) and have that letter, when it crops up in the stories, look like the cover-letter. It could look nice and give the book a special touch, I think.

All in all, Rite is a book well worth reading. The fact that SP already ran out of copies should prove this, too.

***

Come Hither

Little butterfly,
won't you come and sit with me for a while?
I will tell you about loneliness,
and you will show me how to make it go away.

Of course, little butterfly is not coming. He is flying away, because that is what pretty butterflies do when they have had enough of your garden. And she does not even have a garden, so there is nothing for him to find here.

It's a bit of a style experiment, this one. Trying to learn to do lineart. Every ten months I get a bit crazy and do a manga picture, so this is it for a while then. I have no idea how you're supposed to colorize it properly; didn't know how to paint a mouth like that (so I, err, just didn't, as you can see). I prefer semi-realism, that seems a bit easier.

So have a little preview of a proper illustration I'm working on right now:

Cooking Goodness

2007-02-15T14:42:00.000+01:00

It is somewhat comforting to know that the headlines in Austrian newspapers also reach the news in other countries. At school you always have some lessons in which you take newspaper articles of different newspapers and compare them. I never found much interest in it, but I (occasionally) like comparing articles from different countries. It shows how facts change when crossing borders and how different facts get highlighted.
I never read in any of the Austrian articles that they lived in an upper-middleclass suburb. Maybe the newspapers just assume that, as a local, I know what social class people living in that part of town belong to (I don't. I'm also fairly sure people living further away don't.). I wouldn't even know how to translate "upper middleclass" - not in the context in which English people use it. Funny thing.

In relation to that, I'm currently reading "Watching the English" by Kate Fox, an anthropology book on English behaviour. I've only read the first few chapters so far, but I can already tell that the book is awesome. It's intelligent, funny, cleverly written and insightful. It's also very helpful when looking back in retrospect on experiences in England and helps explain stuff that seemed strange in my time in Oxford, i.e. when you meet your boyfriend's friends and offer them your hand as a greeting, and they look at you as if you're barking mad; after reading the chapter on greetings you know that you are not the one who is mad.
It's such a shame that you can't study anthropology in Austria. I first got in contact with anthropology in Oxford, where I took a lecture on pop culture and a seminar on Japanese art. Loved it. It seems like a wonderful thing to delve into.

***

Last weekend I made Paella for the whole family (without the mussels). Christine used the opportunity to try out her new camera (which is way superior to mine, as it can do videos with sound, as opposed to mine, which is restricted to videos without sound).
Fun!

A small part of the ingredients. Not visible are peas, chicken wings and all the liquid parts.

Prawns in the pan (after getting some colour). I was glad that I didn't have to behead them and rid them of their intestines. That sounded a bit gross and violent.

After some time Markus decided to take over the pan and pretend to be important, so he could get all the fame, while I was left with spicing the chicken wings. After some evil glares I took over the pan again.

Yummy!

Here we again fought over who was allowed to put the finishing touches on everything (and also who got to eat some of the sausage while decorating the rice stuff). We managed a more or less peaceful solution after neither of us had won another glaring contest.

Here is the almost finished meal, before it was shoved into the oven and forgotten.

Check out this awesome natural lighting. The blue comes from the window (no artificial lightsource responsible for that). Who'd have thought midday could produce such a saturated metallic blue?

Aaaand here's the result of the 2h cooking marathon as presented on Christine's dish.

Zoomquilt

2007-02-11T14:43:00.000+01:00

Over at DAF the second Zoomquilt, to which I contributed a tile, got finished. It's very (long? deep? extensive?) ... there are lots and lots of tiles and worlds to discover in it; quite amazing.
(You can change the zoom-in/out speed through the bar on the left.)

***

Over at Youtube Randis Albion uploaded some videos showing him paint. He makes painting look easy and effortless, which is impressive.

***

It seems that in response to Get a First Life the legal department of Linden Lab has sent a not-quite cease-and-desist letter to the website owner. It's funny as hell and a quite clever move of LL. Kudos to them, also for allowing the creator the use of the altered logo on his sellable goods.

***

Not sure if I have posted this image yet. I started it months ago but didn't find the time to finish it during the semester. Some weeks ago I took it up ago and finished it. Not quite happy with it, with the light situation and the guy's anatomy.

It's an illustration of The Story of Brutus and Diana's Prophecy from "The History of the Kings of Britain" by Geoffrey of Monmouth (12th century).

What's this body thing and what do I do with the dangly bits?

2007-01-30T04:58:00.000+01:00

Link roll.

Here is a long, brilliant article on MMORPG development. Lots of true stuff in it (and lots that I recognized from previous discussions with my ex).

***

Holidays now. Which is fortunate in multiple ways, partly because I just read that somebody shot several times at the bus I'm always taking in Salzburg (three stations away from my flat). Of course, something like this happens a day after a drunk guy had to chat me up and spontaneously decided to follow me home (in the same bus line that was shot at).
Sometimes I think that all the lunatics gather in Salzburg.

***

I believe those familiar with Second Life will enjoy First Life, too. (Or not.)

***

And lastly, just because Neil Gaiman asked nicely, I'm linking to his blog post about Penn Jillette.

Bad drawing day. Time to do a couple of pages hands again.

This bus is under attack. Please dial 999.

2007-01-26T21:27:00.000+01:00

Apparently there are tons of OverheardIn-Websites out in the deep darknesses of the internet. I've only looked at a couple of them from Britain. They are deeply entertaining, particularly the London one. I love the idle comments that bus/tube drivers make over their speakers. It made me remember some of the nice accents and funny comments of the Ryanair and Easyjet captains on the planes, and also the conversation of an American dad with his son in the Collosseum in Rome (of which, unfortunately, I only remember that it was about a cat that could cross the boundaries to the restricted section of the Collosseum).

I've felt like going away again for a bit recently. It's probably just because it's winter and my last medieval fair has been months ago, and now there aren't any fairs nearby, so I can't go off for a weekend and have fun with like-minded people. Right now I'm just glad that my D&D group in Salzburg works out so well. The guys are really nice and work well together, so I'm always looking forward to meeting up.

***

Apparently this video showing the WoW GM powers has been going around and depressing some players. I'm not a WoW player, so I guess I'm not so emotionally involved. Still, it surprises me that such a video would gain such interest and cause such emotions. The powers shown in the video are far from surprising - basic stuff that, I reckon, GMs/developers in all online games can do (I could in the games that I GMed). I also always thought that most players are aware that GMs can do stuff like that, and everybody I asked has agreed with me.
This is interesting: People know about the GM powers, have always known about them, but seeing them in action still depresses them. One reply I got was that "It's depressing to see how one line of command has the same effect as weeks of work for me". Well, if you consider levelling "work" then there're already some issue arising, I think (as a game's a game and work's work, and work can be fun, but games being work is a different thing altogether).

People don't consider that, while you can do that stuff as a GM, you really can't do it for your own character (or if you do, Blizzard hopefully fires you instantly). It's not that much fun anyway. When you can change your character's level at will, the level doesn't matter anymore, because you lose your goals (of gaining levels) - and goals are the most important factor to keep playing, at least for most players. In the end these powers mean nothing to you. Enjoying yourself while playing no matter what level you are is more important then (and if there's a community, the focus shifts from the levelling to the community).

I think you get better off if you enjoy playing and interacting instead of working on gaining the next level.

***

So ... I'll try to post at least one picture with every post from now on (even if it's just a crappy sketch with bad anatomy, like ... today). Just to make this blog more artsy again and to force me to practice more. I do really need it.

Bad Day (rant, rant, rant)

2007-01-17T22:45:00.000+01:00

No particularly interesting information included here, so skip if you like (just me ranting).

The day started with falling asleep again after the alarmclock had woken me up (so that point of 101 in 1001 starts again for the third? time), so I was almost late for school. Then the lessons that were taught were mostly boring because of the ever-evil frontal teaching (at least the supervisor noticed it and said that now he knows how his pupils feel). Then I had to go to Salzburg even though I hadn't intended to, because I have an exam tomorrow for which I need the video of one of my lessons and the tutor hadn't been there on Monday to do the DVD stuff for me. Today he was there, but apparently hadn't done it ... after having had 9 days to transfer the video from my cassette to a DVD (which takes 90 minutes). Yes, I love throwing money at the train company for nothing. I also love having to chose an extract of the DVD by chance tomorrow for the exam because I can't look at it beforehand.

Geez, the stupidity of mankind. You can't put your trust in anyone because eventually you'll be disappointed anyway for sure; and if you want to have something done properly you have to do it yourself because other people just don't manage to do it even if it's their job.

I can forgive a mistake once (sometimes, depending on the circumstances). But I went to that guy twice last week and twice this week; no result. Others went to him once and got their DVD after 1.5 hours. I'm silently swearing and cursing guys a lot right now.

***

Amazon doesn't love me either. There are two books by Subterranean Press that would have looked nice on my bookshelf (Beagle's "The Last Unicorn: The Lost Version" and Tad William's "Rite: Short Works"), but they were sold out before they were even shipped. I guess that was predictable since it's Limited Edition stuff.

***

Also, still no lasting snow and getting warmer. Everybody's probably just happy that they don't have to cope with ice this winter, but hopefully some realize that it's due to the climate change (I hear it's also ten degrees warmer than usually in Canada).
I'm not a snow-person, but I want a normal climate, not a messed up, pole-melting sauna.