Posted in great irish bands, aesthetics, music on Dec 7th, 2007 No Comments »
Most of all
I love you all
and wish you well” (This is not a song)
Sean’s post about Brian led me to Setanta records, and from there back to the Frank and Walters. It turns out that they’re playing tonight (8 December) in Whelan’s, Wexford Street, Dublin. Tickets are €20, which, you’ve got to admit, is […]
Posted in aesthetics on Nov 30th, 2007 3 Comments »
For once, words fail me.
Cheers to Sean for the link.
Posted in Flann O'Brien, Bike Sex, aesthetics on Nov 17th, 2007 No Comments »
Straight out of Flann O’Brien, except it isn’t. It happened in Scotland. From the BBC.
A man caught trying to have sex with his bicycle has been sentenced to three years on probation.
Robert Stewart, 51, admitted a sexually aggravated breach of the peace by conducting himself in a disorderly manner and simulating sex.
Sheriff Colin Miller also […]
Posted in aesthetics on Nov 14th, 2007 2 Comments »
WHAT shall I do with this absurdity -
O heart, O troubled heart - this caricature,
As I would question all, come all who can;
Come old, necessitous. half-mounted man;
And bring beauty’s blind rambling celebrant
W.B. Yeats – The Tower
Quick everyone, Paddy in Letterkenny needs advice. He has to build a tower in the middle of his 4500sq ft […]
Posted in memory, aesthetics, Film on Nov 13th, 2007 2 Comments »
Lumière and Company (1995, original title “Lumière et Cie”) was a collaboration between 41 international film directors in which each made a short film using the original Cinématographe camera invented by the Lumière brothers.
Shorts were edited in-camera and abided by three rules:A short may be no longer than 52 seconds;No synchronized sound;No more than three […]
Posted in philosophy, Zaragoza, aesthetics, Working Class, Labour, satire on Nov 12th, 2007 2 Comments »
Sometimes, just sometimes, ideology can be piss-funny. I mean, intentionally so, not in an Eoghan Harris piss-funny kind of way. The following is taken from Wikipeida:
La Dialectique Peut-Elle Casser Des Briques?, in English, “Can Dialectics Break Bricks?”, is a 1973 Situationist film produced by the French director René Viénet which explores the resolution of conflict […]
Posted in Zaragoza, aesthetics, Spain, Ireland on Nov 10th, 2007 No Comments »
The Osborne bull is 51 years old. Regarded as the unofficial symbol of Spain, it began life as a roadside advertisement for a sherry produced by the Osborne family group. The iconic silhouette was designed in 1956 by Manuel Prieto Benítez, and in 2005 they were declared a national monument by Spain’s socialist government.
I […]
Posted in Economy, Education, irish culture, Irish Middle Class, Irish Working Class, aesthetics, politics/Ireland on Sep 18th, 2007 16 Comments »
… the mind of man becomes
A thousand times more beautiful than the earth
On which he dwells, above this frame of things
(Which, ‘mid all revolution in the hopes
And fears of men, doth still remain unchanged)
In beauty exalted, as it is itself
Of quality and fabric more divine. (Wordsworth. Prelude, 1805)
People are the greatest thing.
A point all […]
Posted in aesthetics, Spain, satire, Art on Aug 8th, 2007 4 Comments »
Satire is a funny old game.
A couple of weeks ago the Spanish government announced a new pregnancy incentive. It guaranteed a payment of 2,500 euro to the parents of every new child born in the country. The Barcelona-based satirical magazine El Jueves (Thursday in Spanish) decided to comment. The result was the above cartoon, which […]
Posted in phibsboro, dublin, philosophy, aesthetics on Jul 2nd, 2007 8 Comments »
We feel that even when all possible scientific questions have been
answered, the problems of life remain completely untouched.” Wittgenstein, 1919.
Derek Jarman introduced me to Ludwig Wittgenstein. Not personally, of course, but still, it’s down to him. I first saw his 1993 film biog of the man in the Lighthouse cinema on Abbey Street - now […]