Para

Parasol is for protection against sun.
Parapluie is for protection against rain.
Parachute is for protection against falling.

Why is there not a paramoon, paraflooding or ... - there must be more?

Guess what I saw yesterday morning frozen in a gate? A paradeath or paramortality?

09

This picture scares me a bit because a train can pass any moment over the track. Danger! At the same time it is mysterious - what's in and at the end of the tunnel? - and beautiful - the trees and ivy growing everywhere. Beautiful red/ lila color.

Wise men William Snell. I love 09, 11, 29 (read for dog: cat), 37 and 45.

Pina_

One day I'll visit museum 'Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo' and the Jardim da Luz in São Paulo, Brasil. I would love to see these five paintings of José Ferraz de Almeida Júnior (1850-1899) for real. Sooooo lovely. Interesting life and man. Looking for a biography now.

 Cena de Família de Adolfo Augusto Pinto (1891)

 

Estudo para Cabeça de Caipira (1893) 

Retrato de Euzébio Stevaux (1894)

 Paisagem Fluvial (1899)

Saudade (1899)

Q2!

Do Q2 stuff! Do Q2 stuff and in time you will be blown away with the result.

Q2 stuff are the important but not urgent activities that add value into our lives but ...

• No time
• Not urgent
• Stress
• Deadlines
• So much to do
• Interrupted all the time
• Regret
• ... - there must be more

P.S. I wrote on this before in post 'Will You Go?' (2011). Source matrix: here.
P.P.S. There is a lovely video about "Big Rocks": here.

Black and White. Without explanation

The request was: take a black and white picture for 7 days at a row. Out of your life, without people on it and without explanation. Here is my set of seven. Plus one for the road.

And one for the road with a piece of an individual 'homo sapiens' on it ;)

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year ...

Which reminds me to check out, how old this greeting tradition is (source):

• Although the month and date of Jesus' birth are unknown, by the fourth century the Western Christian Church had placed Christmas on December 25, a date that was later adopted in the East.
• The first Christmas cards were commissioned by Cole in London in 1843.
• One of the earliest Nativity of Christ images is on this 4th-century sarcophagus. 'Sarcofago di Stilicone' in Sant'Ambrogio basilica in Milan.

Feel It

Art of feeling ...

 

 Art of feeling ...

Art of feeling ...

Cold Coffee

Cool what artist Giulia Bernardelli makes from cold coffee:

 

P.S. More of her and her other "spilled" food art: here.

Content with Himself

He had an attic in a castle with 10,000 books hidden under plastic. He also had a number of icons hidden in a room. Both of them not for display on book shelves or walls. He was rich but lived as an ascetic. At the age of 78 he died alone in Albania leaving behind the 'A.A. Bredius Foundation' as his inheritance. This foundation aims to unlock the Byzantine culture in all its richness and versatility. Not for academic scientists only!

 

He is Arnold ("Ar") Bredius (1903-1982). A member of a Dutch patrician non-noble family who made their fortune selling (gun)powder. He studied theology but never became a priest. He was on his own. Socially awkward with a communitarian deficit. He was non-communicative about what was on his mind. He was married to Olga with whom he had a relation as brother and sister. Both of them were not interested  in lust for sex. Both injured souls. Olga: "Bredius was a child, more childlike than a child".   

Was he happy? No, he regarded his life as a burden. A life of duty and obligation. At the same time his life was successful because he left behind his Foundation as the climax of a life in which he was content with himself.

He regarded life as Whole and One. He enjoyed beautiful things. He was interested in the magic ("connectedness") of books, icons, music and places. Things outside himself. It seems that he was not interested in "knowing" himself spiritually. 

I think the author and I disagree on this. I personally think that Bredius had had his moments of enlightenment but that he had a hard time to communicate about these in spoken or written words. Was he a mystic? It seems only partly. Is that possible when it comes to propagate enlightenment? The bottomline, for me, is that his Foundation is exactly that: propagate that there is more than senses getting input and that there is magic. Stuff of mystics ...

P.S. Book: Theo Jansen, 'Arnoldus Anthonie Bredius, Schetsen van een leven' (2012).

Public Garden

You might be surprised to hear this from me. Are you? But ... I am very very fond of these posts. 

It's me time. It's time for you ... of that what was, what could and should have been. Making up my mind as honest as I can in public. As you know there is a lot of private stuff that you and I only share in our private garden. Noone needs to know! Private versus public garden.

Next to our private garden, I like this public garden too. Make up my mind. Share my dreams, fears, what I read, what I think, ... - there must be more. In a way it is for me a kind of meditation. It cleans up my mind. It sharpens my soul and gives me peace. The older I get the more fond I am that I stored all my public letters in this blog. 

What do you think should I publish my blog in a printed book? All posts? By subject? By date of publishing? With index?

P.S. Painting is from David Hockney, 'Autumn Trees' (2008).