A fine art, film, history and literature site oriented to, but not exclusively for, the gay community. Please be aware that there is mature content on this blog. Information on images and links to sources will be provided if known. Enjoy your visit and please subscribe.
Photographer Unknown, (A Mirror Image )
“For I do not exist: there exist but the thousands of mirrors that reflect me. With every acquaintance I make, the population of phantoms resembling me increases. Somewhere they live, somewhere they multiply. I alone do not exist.”
―
Photographers Unknown, The Village of Monsanto, Portugal
Monsanto is a village and a former civil parish in the municipality of Idanha-a-Nova, Portugal. In 2013, the parish merged into the new parish Monsanto e Idanha-a-Velha. It covered an area of 131.76 km² and had a 2011 population of 828 inhabitants.
It was the principal town of the concelho between 1174 and the beginning of the 19th century, and the county seat in the period of 1758-1853. In recent decades, Monsanto has become popularly known as “the most Portuguese village of Portugal” in a class of twelve classified historic villages in Portugal.
The emblem of Portugal, the Silver Rooster (Galo de Prata), designed by Abel Pereira da Silva, can be seen atop the Clock Tower or Lucano.
Photography of Samurai by Felice Beato
Felice Beato, who was born in Venice but became a British citizen by virtue of his family’s residence in Corfu which was a UK protectorate at the time, began his photographic career with a trip to Constantinople, now Istanbul, alongside Robertson who later became his business partner and brother-in-law.
When war broke out in the Crimea in 1855, Beato journeyed to Balaklava to document the progress of the conflict – and, in the process, became one of the world’s first war photographers.
Later, he journeyed to India before arriving in China in 1860 where he photographed the progress of the Anglo-French military expedition slugging it out against the indigenous Qing Dynasty in the Second Opium War.
His photographs of China, some of the earliest ever taken, include numerous shots of Victorian Hong Kong and a gruesome set featuring the Taku Forts surrounded by the bodies of Chinese troops who died defending them against the British.
Three years later, Beato moved to Japan where he remained until 1877. Based in Yokohama, he was given an unusually large amount of freedom by the ruling Shogunate which allowed him to tour the country, taking photos as he went. The photographs, which date from between 1863 and 1877, taken by Felice Beato are among the earliest examples of coloured photography ever produced.
Photographer Unknown, (Train Station)
Reblogged with thanks to the artist’s site http://railroad-girl-in-germany.tumblr.com
Espen Alfons and Sam Folkes, “Endless Harmony”, 2013
Photography: Espen Alfons (Shot on Nikon D5000 with Tokina 11-16, and 1 sequence with Sigma 70-300
Music composed by Sam Folkes.
Photographer Unknown, (The Dawn Arises)
“À l’aurore, armés d’une ardente patience, nous entrerons aux splendides Villes.”
“In the dawn, armed with a burning patience, we shall enter the splendid Cities.)”
― Arthur Rimbaud
Masanori Ota, (Shiro Masamune), “Ghost in the Shell”, Computer Graphics, Animation Film Gifs
Yoko Kanno, “Macross Frontier” Concert
Yoko Kanno is a Japanese composer, arranger and musician best known for her work on the soundtracks on anime films, television series, live-action films, video games, and advertisements. She was born in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan.
She has written scores for Cowboy Bebop, Darker than Black, Macross Plus, Turn A Gundam, The Vision of Escaflowne, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, Wolf’s Rain, Kids on the Slope, Zankyō no Terror, and has worked with the directors Yoshiyuki Tomino, Shinichiro Watanabe and Shoji Kawamori.
Kanno has also composed music for pop artists Maaya Sakamoto and Kyōko Koizumi. She is also a keyboardist, and is the frontwoman for the Seatbelts, who perform many of Kanno’s compositions and soundtracks.
If you have not heard any of her work, well, you are definitely missing something major. She is probably one of the best composers out there. Her anime work is outstanding. Lots of her songs on this posting.
Howard S. Sewall, “In the Garden”, Oil on Canvas, 1937, Timberline Lodge, Oregon
Timberline Lodge is a mountain lodge on the south side of Mount Hood in Clackamas County, Oregon, about 60 miles (97 km) east of Portland. Constructed from 1936 to 1938 by the Works Progress Administration, it was built and furnished by local artisans during the Great Depression.
Howard S. Sewall was born in Minneapolis, MN, in 1899 and moved to Oregon in 1920. From the 1930s to the early 1940s, Sewall taught at the Salem Art Center and at various art studios in Portland and also worked as a WPA artist.
Sewell is well known for his abstract mural paintings which include images of common working people. Two murals depicting iron and wood workers are in the Timberline Lodge collection and Sewall painted sixteen murals for Oregon City High School in the 1930s. Sewall also produced textiles and hand loomed rugs. He died of cancer in 1975.
Arthur Runquist, “Lunch”, 1939, Oil on Canvas, Fine Arts Program, Public Buildings Service, U.S. General Services Administration
Arthur Runquist, the elder of the two Runquist brothers, was born in South Bend, Washington in 1891 and educated at the University of Oregon. He was Alfred Schroff’s assistant there until he left in 1920 to study at the Art Students League. Like his brother Albert, he exhibited at the New York World’s Fair in 1939 and the American Artists Congress in New York a year later. In addition, Arthur had work at the Golden Gate International Exposition in 1939. Working for the WPA, he completed two murals with the theme, Tree of Life, painted in 1938 at the University of Oregon.
His painted documentation of the workers gained him a reputation for social commentary. Figures are more prominent in his work than in those of his brother Albert Runquist. Even landscapes were secondary in importance to the people appearing in them. Like his brother, he recorded life on the Oregon coast with sensitivity. In their early works it is often difficult to distinguish one brother’s work from the other. It was only later that their styles began to differ. Arthur’s work was somewhat tighter, more linear and figure centered, while Albert’s work was looser, more painterly, showing atmosphere and effects of light.
Photographer Unknown, (The Hooded Figure)
Photographer Unknown, (Blue Fox)
“Nothing’s perfect,” sighed the fox. “My life is monotonous. I hunt chickens; people hunt me. All chickens are just alike, and all men are just alike. So I’m rather bored. But if you tame me, my life will be filled with sunshine. I’ll know the sound of footsteps that will be different from all the rest. Other footsteps send me back underground. Yours will call me out of my burrow like music.”
―
Chas, The Adriatic Sea Near Acaya, Italy, October 2017
Photographer Unknown, (Feet in Red Light)
Steve McCurry, “Sri Lankan Stilt Fishermen”
in this photo of Sri Lankan stilt fisherman, men sit perched far from shore atop crude crucifixes of sticks and twine, dangling fishing rods into schools of fish. The approach looks prehistoric, but is only 70 years old.
The practice started during World War II when food shortages and overcrowded fishing spots prompted some clever men to try fishing on the water. At first they used the wreckage of capsized ships and downed aircraft, then began erecting their stilts in coral reefs. Two generations of fishermen have eked out this physically demanding existence at dawn and dusk along a 30-kilometer stretch of southern shore between the towns of Unawatuna and Weligama.