Edward Brooke Hitching, history-hound, lover of quirky things and writer for the ever-popular and erudite quiz show QI, has written The Sky Atlas. A treasury and history of some of humankind’s most beautiful maps and charts. Yet this book is more than that, it’s a sparkling and glittering array of sky-bound achievements. It’s a visual history of what it has felt like over aeons to look up at the heavens in wonder.
Each page is richly illustrated with expansive manuscripts, quirky star catalogues, antique instruments and historical oddities. Yes there is a lot of research and depth to the writing here too, which is entertaining and enjoyable.
The Sky Atlas is a definitive history of the sky from folklore and mystical origins of weather gods, wizards, daemons, medieval aliens, sky-dwelling dragons and other splendid mythological creatures.
It’s a way to uncover the origins of Tibetan sky burials and glittering and exquisite Inuit dancing coats used in weather rituals. This is the world’s history looking upwards and outwards from early antiquity to today.
I have to admit I found the last third of the book a little boring compared to the first two thirds. That’s simply because of my personal love of ancient and medieval history, and I have comparatively less interest in the development of modern technology in the 20th century until now. However if you are the opposite and love to read about modern technology, then there is something here for space tech boffins to enjoy too.
As a self-confessed Intergalatic Space Māori, The Sky Atlas hit all of the right buttons for me. I think you will like it too. A great coffee table book, reference book or a beautiful gift for lovers of history, art and technology. 5*/5
Roll-up, roll-up for another big top edition of 10 Interesting Things I Found, edition number 67, it’s a strange world we live in filled with strange, half-human half-creature beings that inhabit positions of power. Needless to say all we can do is escape into a world of our own making, so here it is…
Elegant and languid Art Deco flamingo font from the turn of last century
This Art Nouveau flamingo alphabet was designed by E. Mulier and published in “Lettres et Enseignes Art Nouveau”, Paris, 1901. Via Art Nouveau Deco on Twitter.
I like this guy’s calm and gentle voice, the bear obviously did not feel threatened by him. Also he had this demeanor of awe about him and the mother bear and him were clearly communicating.
The Egyptian House, located in the Neustadt quarter (10 rue du Général Rapp), was designed by young, self-taught architect Franz Scheyder in the early 20th century. The building’s style is a blend of Art Nouveau and an idealized interpretation of ancient Egyptian esthetics. This unusual apartment building is easily recognizable by its large central fresco, and by its wrought-iron balconies wth stylized bat motifs.
A terrifying cacophony of noise crashes across the night sky; demonic howls hang on the wind and blast through the dark forest; deep thunder rumbles across the moorland and lightening streaks across the bruised purple sky. Children cower and hide in fear, while their parents hurriedly murmur a quiet prayer; it is the passing of the dreaded Fantastic Hunt.
The Armies of the Dead or King Arthur’s Dreaded Fantastic Hunt by Bon Repos Gites
In Brittany, several superstitions once attributed marvellous origins to the strange noises heard on the wind during the dead of night. Such noises, reverberated, amplified and distorted by fear or lack of understanding, were believed by some to have been produced by supernatural hunts from the Otherworld or armies of the dead in the throes of some great battle that traversed the night sky.
The furnaces of the world are now burning about 2,000,000,000 tonnes of coal per year. When this is burned, uniting with oxygen, it adds about 7,000,000,000 tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere yearly. This tends to make the air a more effective blanket for the earth and to raise its temperature. The effect may be considerable in a few centuries.
Whatever you are physically…male or female, strong or weak, ill or healthy-all those things matter less than what your heart contains. If you have the soul of a warrior, you are a warrior.
Having been to the Warsaw Uprising Museum in Warsaw was such a deeply moving experience, seeing all of the young people who fought with everything they had against the Nazis.
If you are afraid….keep going
A friend and all round great guy, Craig said this to me and I’ll never stop living by this.
When your legs shake with fear stand up and walk through it. A better life is waiting the other side
Here Craig shares his story about growing up in a violent home, having dyslexia and how he overcame these difficulties in his early life to become one of the most well-known and respected wildlife photographers and conservationists in Britain. He is also interviewed here.
This was a bit of a random assortment of goodies this week, I hope you enjoyed them or found something interesting let me know what you thought below… stay cosy and have a great week…
With one good friend, having Nothing feels simply enough, and going Nowhere is the most exciting journey. Cherish good friends. #wisdom @googiemccabe #bookquote #DwieSiostry
A beautiful compendium of universal wisdom that’s simple, wise, soulful and timeless. I fell in love with this book as soon as I saw it. The illustrations and words are by my wise and kind friend Googie McCabe who wrote this book for her two beloved daughters, as a way of healing and dealing with her depression, and also as a manifestation of her artistry, imagination and love for her two girls. It features advice on life, death, love of self, love of others, finding your calling, and how to deal with life’s dark times.
This is an incredible book. Written by Desmond Morris who is a prominent Zoologist and well-known for his book The Naked Ape. It’s possibly less widely known that Morris was himself a surrealist and knew many of the prominent surrealists in the art movement.
I have to admit not knowing much about Surrealism prior to reading this book. I have seen a lot of Salvador Dalí and Man Ray’s work in exhibitions in the past. It resonates deeply with me on a soul level.
Picnic: Nusch and Paul Eluard, Roland Penrose, Man Ray; and Ady Fidelin, Île Sainte-Marguerite, Cannes, Frances (1937, photograph by Lee Miller)
The Lives of the Surrealists is Morris’ insider view into Surrealism. Instead of focusing on a theoretical understandings of Surrealist art and philosophy, Morris focuses on 35 amazing, temperamental and strange luminaries of the Surrealist movements. What kinds of foods did they like to eat? How did they have sex and with whom? All of the drama, relationships, controversy, tragedy and triumph of these very singular, unusual and unorthodox people who rebelled against norm.
La Lampe Philosophique (1936) by René Magritte
The moniker and label of an artist being a Surrealist is problematic and flexible. Morris does a good job of explaining the trickiness of this label. He includes artists in here that may not be considered as Surrealist in other books, such as Picasso and Francis Bacon.
Andre Breton, the founder of the movement and minor artist himself in the would regularly boot people out of the group if they failed to adhere to its rules.
The irony was the Surrealism didn’t really adhere to any fixed visual code but rather tapped into workings of the unconscious mind,, the darkest wells of irrational thought. So trying to harness and control that would have been like trying to control a violent storm on the ocean – impossible.
I particularly enjoyed reading about the women in the Surrealist movement, who are lesser known than their more famous male counterparts. This in itself is a tragedy because they are amazing both as artists and as strong women, burning as bright as Roman candles.
Leonora Carrington, Dorothea Tanning and Leonor Fini were rebellious, wild and iconoclastic women living in the early 20th century when it was a difficult time for women to be true to themselves. The art that they created in spite of the two world wars, estrangement from family and friends and a lot of tragedy in their lives is incredible.
Leonora Carrington with her lover and fellow Surrealist Max Ernst (1937, photograph by Lee Miller)
While some of the Impressionists were extremely eccentric, others such as Spaniard Joan Miró lived a conventional and happy middle-class life and had only one wife throughout his life. It seemed that Miró saved up all of his bizarre weirdness for the canvas itself.
The idiosyncracies, complex love lives and theatrical nature of these singular people is told in a rollicking, fast-paced and gossipy tone. Yet far from being irritating, I found this style utterly addictive.
Despite the gossipy nature of the book, the appendix and references are hefty and speak to Morris’ research for the book. He splices in amusing vignettes from his encounters with the artists from his own life.
This is an incredible book for artists, writers and anyone creative. It reinforces that when people dare to live outside of the prescribed norm of society – they can produce sublime beauty and unique ideas that become timeless.
The Giantess (The Guardian of the Egg) by Leonora Carrington 1947
That time when Pink Floyd (musical Surrealists if ever there were), Salvador Dalí and Walt Disney collaborated…
Curl up in a cosy corner and feast your mind on these glittering gems and little known wonders. I hope you like edition #66, the first edition of 2022.
From the 1920’s. This comfortable and chic indoorwear from a century ago looks just as amazing 100 years on. I would most definitely wear these clothes now and be ready for some lockdown lounging.
Florence Fang decided to put up her middle-finger up to people in her conservative neighbourhood in California, with her fluorescent home and dinosaur statues. Who knew that giraffes existed during the time of T-Rex hehe? Apparently she rents this place out for thousands of dollars per night as an Air B&B. The local council have tried to sue her because of the way this place looks, however (internet legend says) she wins these court cases and uses the money from winning to buy more dinosaurs. I love you Florence…you have a fan in me! Via Reddit
The level of artistry in this is INSANE! The end results look like something out of a Ghibli film. I love the soothing and gentle music too, very enjoyable seeing the journey from clay pieces to masterpiece!
With a speckled, iridescent membrane, the aquatic animal is almost entirely transparent—only its optic nerve, eyes, and digestive tract are visible to humans—and sightings like these are so infrequent that scientists previously resorted to studying the species only after pulling it from the stomachs of its predators.
Bird of Prey is a multi award-winning feature-length documentary from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, weaves a remarkable story of the world’s rarest eagle species and the heroic individuals working tirelessly to save these creatures. Click to view the whole documentary on Youtube.
Yellena James grew up and attended art school in Sarajevo. At the age of 18 she moved to the US. After gaining her BA in painting and graphic design at UCF, she eventually made her way to Portland, Oregon. Using pens, inks, markers and acrylics, she combines complex abstract forms and creates mystical and imaginary ecologies in her paintings.
Her colorful arrangements of organic shapes and tangled lines are at once floral and alien, organic and sci-fi. Each intimate world she creates seems to posses its own ethos and its own special ability to radiate emotion.
If you want to be everywhere at once, then you can’t stand firm anywhere.
‘The engrossed are concerned with the present time alone, and it is so brief that it cannot be grasped, even this is filched away from them distracted as they are by many things. The mind that is untroubled and tranquil has the power to roam into all parts of life, but the mind of the engrossed, as though weighted by a yoke, cannot turn and look behind. And so their life vanishes into an abyss’ – Seneca.
It is important to dwell on your own past, but also on the past of the culture to which you are embedded. Even better if you are able to practice its living traditions. When you learn a traditional indigenous practice or an ancient practice of your people, it is only possible because of the many people who came before you.
Svend Brinkmann is a Danish Professor of Psychology in the Department of Communication and Psychology at Aalborg University, Denmark. He serves as a co-director of the Centre for Qualitative Studies. He is the author of ‘The Joy of Missing Out’ and ‘Stand Firm.’
Lost Wisdom and its two other companion books Lost Crafts and Lost Lore are beautifully typeset and laid out. Their contents are a cabinet of curiosities – a wunderkammer of the same sort as the Book of Barely Imagined Beings, which I have mentioned in the past.
Although in this case Lost Wisdom runs the rich gamut of human history – not a small task! And the clever, pre-industrial ways that we have dealt with life, death, birth, marriage and everything else in between.
This is a wonderous and obscure treasure that I found in the library. Written by Compiled by Una McGovern and Paul Jenner in 2009 it is designed to completely wallow in; with beautiful images and areas of interest grouped logically. Lost Wisdom is a part of a trilogy of books that provides us with insight into ways and methods of everyday living, crafts and lore and it glimmers with the shared knowledge of our foremothers and forefathers.
This is a compendium of old wive’s tales and medieval European wisdom that has guided and sustained people for many centuries before modern technology ran the whole show.
Like the connections between the moon and the tides, and navigating by the stars in both hemispheres of the earth. Herbal preparations for brushing your teeth, cleaning your hair and staunching heavy bleeding. Predicting the weather, mourning deaths, predicting the sex of a baby.
There’s a distinct lack of reviews out there of this complete treasure. It seems that The Guardian or review journals missed this one and we are all the poorer for it.
Ho-ho-ho and a bottle of LSD spiked egg nog…welcome to another edition of 10 Interesting Things, featuring maurauding evil elves, rainbow coloured tinsel, yuletide kitsch and ephemera to tickle your fancy and hopefully make you chuckle (as if you haven’t been exposed to enough Christmas BS already)…perhaps you may blow chunks instead of chuckle…let me know your thoughts below!
Wassailing is an ancient pagan tradition that comes from Anglo-Saxon and means ‘good health. At Yule, waeshaelers would sing together loudly to banish away bad spirits and herald a season of good health for everyone in the community. It’s where caroling comes from. Via Twitter
#WyrdWednesday WASSAILING A pagan tradition, the word coming from the Anglo-Saxon word "waeshael" which translates as good health. Every Yule, wassailers would roam their villages, singing loudly to banish evil spirits and wishing good health to everyone for the new year.. pic.twitter.com/hgGGndUdyL
I love this guy and his channel, it certainly has to be one of the most criminally underrated channels on YT, today he discusses a history of the word feast.
In Corsica, to be judged worthy to learn the secrets of the old healers & spell casters, some folk would rush from house to house to have 7 vigils before Midnight Mass; such knowledge could only be shared on Christmas night & only to those who had made the 7 vigils. Via the always fascinating blogger Bon Repos Gites.
Baby Jesus wept to be upstaged by an overweight feline on the occasion of his birth. Via My Modern Met.
Merry Christmas and yuletide greetings to you and yours. I hope you have a restful and enjoyable break away from work and commitments, don’t do anything Santa’s elves wouldn ‘t do. I hope you enjoyed these, let me know if they tickled your fancy below…
Dr Haare Williams MNZM has been Dean of Māori Education and Māori Advisor to the Chief Executive at Unitec. He was General Manager of Aotearoa Radio. He set up a joint venture with the South Seas Film and Television School to train Te Reo speakers as producers and operators in film and television. He has worked closely with iwi claimant communities and was responsible for waka construction and assembly at Waitangi for the 1990 commemorations. He has published poetry, exhibited painting and written for film and television. He was a cultural advisor for the Mayor of Auckland and is Amorangi at the Auckland War Memorial Museum.
This week I look closely at the faces of Lambs of God and examine the meaning of the world through the lens of the internet, amongst other unknown pleasures.Hope you will join me…
The restoration of a famous painting of Christ – Adoration of the Mystic Lamb was meant to be an improvement, instead the fierce, wide-eyed and piercing stare of Christ as a lamb seems to be dulled and softened a little bit post-restoration. Which one do you prefer? I like older untouched version personally.
Whether you choose to call it street art or simply common graffiti, the walls of several Breton towns have been enriched by some wonderful examples of the craft in recent years. In an earlier post, I highlighted some works from the north coast Breton city of Saint-Brieuc and this post features many new murals that now adorn that town as well as a few that were painted over. Additionally, some works spotted in the towns of Morlaix and Brest were just too good not to share here too.
“All is not well with the world. The children are tired. The animals and birds are tired and so are the plants. We must make it so the Sun and the Moon do not see the same. We must put out one of the eyes of the Sun so that the world is in darkness for half of the time and the children can sleep.”
I love how these gigantic behemoths understand their size relative to people and they are gentle. We must protect them from the savagery that their kind witnessed in the Faroe Islands. If you’re not an animal activist yet…what exactly are you doing with your one precious life?
Evelyn De Morgan was a Pre-Raphaelite artist of the Victorian era who defied the conventions of the deeply conservative Victorian society she was raised in, Evelyn De Morgan dared to be different and studied at the prestigious Slade School of Art, before being invited to exhibit at the exclusive Grosvenor Gallery when she was just 20 years old. This was an astonishing achievement for a woman at the time. Her hope for a feminist future is highlighted in the paintings on display in the exhibition.
I love how they do all of the minor facial expressions and gestures of the ABBA in a very artful way, as though they’ve studied the video clip a thousand times over. They have also done Spice Girls – 2 Become 1 and many others, they are called Isolation Creations…I find them very amusing definitely worth a subscribe!
You know these tilt and turn window casements you find in Continental Europe really blow my mind because they simply don’t exist in the antipodes, who knows why? it’s dumb though, because these windows are far superior to any other design! I do like a good French door. I think the glass block windows look very 80’s and ugly, although who knows? maybe one day they will be in fashion again! Via Infographics on Reddit.
Perhaps there was a copyright issue with using the name Evian, anyway if you say Evian…I say Ovian. Water is a basic human right, but not if you ask Nestle.
I like this guy and his YT channel of interviews, his previous one with philosopher Marianne Williamson was also very insightful. Jaron Lanier is also an interesting guy.
What did you think about this selection? Please don’t drive heavy machinery after consuming this or you may cough up rainbows.
Content Catnip 
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