20151129 - climate paris

The 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP 21 or CMP 11 will be held in Le Bourget, from November 30 to December 11. It will be the 21st yearly session of the Conference of the Parties to the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the 11th session of the Meeting of the Parties to the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. The conference objective is to achieve a legally binding and universal agreement on climate, from all the nations of the world. Leadership of the negotiations is yet to be determined.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_United_Nations_Climate_Change_Conference
 http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/

20151128 - fukushima effects

The radiation effects from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster are the observed and predicted effects resulting from the release of radioactive isotopes from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. Radioactive isotopes were released from reactor containment vessels as a result of venting to reduce gaseous pressure, and the discharge of coolant water into the sea. This resulted in Japanese authorities implementing a 20 km exclusion zone around the power plant, and the continued displacement of approximately 156,000 people as of early 2013. Trace quantities of radioactive particles from the incident, including iodine-131 and caesium-134/137, have since been detected around the world. TEPCO and GE do not have a policy that requires them to monitor these supposed effects.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_effects_from_the_Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster

20151127 - back to school

20151126 - dutch architecture

Dutch architecture has played an important role in the international discourse on architecture in three eras. The first of these was during the 17th century, when the Dutch empire was at the height of its power. The second was in the first half of the 20th century, during development of modernism. The third is not concluded and involves many contemporary Dutch architects who are achieving global prestige.


Modernism
During the 20th century Dutch architects played a leading role in the development of modern architecture. Out of the early 20th century rationalist architecture of Berlage, architect of the Beurs van Berlage, separate groups developed during the 1920s, each with their own view on which direction modern architecture should take. Expressionist architects like Michel de Klerk and Piet Kramer were associated with Amsterdam (see Amsterdam School). Another group consisted of more functionalist architects (Nieuwe Zakelijkheid or Nieuwe Bouwen), such as Mart Stam, Leendert van der Vlugt, and Johannes Duiker, who had good ties with the international modernist group CIAM. A third group came out of the De Stijl movement, among them J.J.P. Oud and Gerrit Rietveld. Both architects later built in a functionalist style.
A 1918 reaction to Dutch functionalist architecture was the Traditionalist School, which lasted until well after 1945.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Architecture_of_the_Netherlands
 http://www.featurepics.com/online/Dutch-Architecture-1929715.aspx

20151125 - corbusier, architect

Le Corbusier was a Swiss-born French architect who belonged to the first generation of the so-called International school of architecture.

“I prefer drawing to talking. Drawing is faster, and leaves less room for lies.”

—Le Corbusier

Synopsis

Le Corbusier was born Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris in Switzerland on October 6, 1887. In 1917, he moved to Paris and assumed the pseudonym Le Corbusier. In his architecture, he chiefly built with steel and reinforced concrete and worked with elemental geometric forms. Le Corbusier's painting emphasized clear forms and structures, which corresponded to his architecture.

Early Years

Born Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris on October 6, 1887, Le Corbusier was the second son of Edouard Jeanneret, an artist who painted dials in the town’s renowned watch industry, and Madame Jeannerct-Perrct, a musician and piano teacher. His family's Calvinism, love of the arts and enthusiasm for the Jura Mountains, where his family fled during the Albigensian Wars of the 12th century, were all formative influences on the young Le Corbusier.
At age 13, Le Corbusier left primary school to attend Arts Décoratifs at La Chaux-de-Fonds, where he would learn the art of enameling and engraving watch faces, following in the footsteps of his father.
There, he fell under the tutelage of L’Eplattenier, whom Le Corbusier called “my master” and later referred to him as his only teacher. L’Eplattenier taught Le Corbusier art history, drawing and the naturalist aesthetics of art nouveau. Perhaps because of his extended studies in art, Corbusier soon abandoned watchmaking and continued his studies in art and decoration, intending to become a painter. L’Eplattenier insisted that his pupil also study architecture, and he arranged for his first commissions working on local projects.
After designing his first house, in 1907, at age 20, Le Corbusier took trips through central Europe and the Mediterranean, including Italy, Vienna, Munich and Paris. His travels included apprenticeships with various architects, most significantly with structural rationalist Auguste Perret, a pioneer of reinforced concrete construction, and later with renowned architect Peter Behrens, with whom Le Corbusier worked from October 1910 to March 1911, near Berlin.

Early Career

These trips played a pivotal role in Le Corbusier’s education. He made three major architectural discoveries. In various settings, he witnessed and absorbed the importance of (1) the contrast between large collective spaces and individual compartmentalized spaces, an observation that formed the basis for his vision of residential buildings and later became vastly influential; (2) classical proportion via Renaissance architecture; and (3) geometric forms and the use of landscape as an architectural tool.
In 1912, Le Corbusier returned to La Chaux-de-Fonds to teach alongside L’Eplattenier and to open his own architectural practice. He designed a series of villas and began to theorize on the use of reinforced concrete as a structural frame, a thoroughly modern technique.
Le Corbusier began to envisage buildings designed from these concepts as affordable prefabricated housing that would help rebuild cities after World War I came to an end. The floor plans of the proposed housing consisted of open space, leaving out obstructive support poles, freeing exterior and interior walls from the usual structural constraints. This design system became the backbone for most of Le Corbusier’s architecture for the next 10 years.


 http://www.biography.com/people/le-corbusier-9376609#synopsis
 http://www.distinctbuild.ca/le_corbusier_architecture.php

20151124 - corbusier, city planner

Charles-Édouard Jeanneret-Gris, who was better known as Le Corbusier (French, October 6, 1887 – August 27, 1965), was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now called modern architecture. He was born in Switzerland and became a French citizen in 1930. His career spanned five decades, with his buildings constructed throughout Europe, India, and the Americas.
Dedicated to providing better living conditions for the residents of crowded cities, Le Corbusier was influential in urban planning, and was a founding member of the Congrès international d'architecture moderne (CIAM). Corbusier prepared the master plan for the city of Chandigarh in India, and contributed specific designs for several buildings there.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Corbusier

20151123 - ciam

The Congrès internationaux d'architecture moderne (CIAM), or International Congresses of Modern Architecture, was an organization founded in 1928 and disbanded in 1959, responsible for a series of events and congresses arranged across Europe by the most prominent architects of the time, with the objective of spreading the principles of the Modern Movement focusing in all the main domains of architecture (such as landscape, urbanism, industrial design, and many others).

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congr%C3%A8s_International_d'Architecture_Moderne
 http://www.joostdevree.nl/shtmls/ciam.shtml

20151122 - chandigarh

Chandigarh is a city and a union territory in the northern part of India that serves as the capital of the states of Punjab and Haryana. As a union territory, the city is ruled directly by the Union Government and is not part of either state. Chandigarh and adjoining cities of Mohali(Punjab) and Panchkula(Haryana) are together called Chandigarh Tricity.
The city of Chandigarh was the first planned city in India post-independence in 1947 and is known internationally for its architecture and urban design. The master plan of the city was prepared by Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier, transformed from earlier plans created by the Polish architect Maciej Nowicki and the American planner Albert Mayer. Most of the government buildings and housing in the city, however, were designed by the Chandigarh Capital Project Team headed by Pierre Jeanneret, Jane Drew and Maxwell Fry.
The city experiences extreme climate and uneven distribution of rainfall. The roads in Chandigarh are surrounded by trees and it has the third highest forest cover in India at 8.51% following Lakshadweep and Goa.
The city tops the list of Indian States and Union Territories by per capita income in the country. The city was reported to be the cleanest in India in 2010, based on a national government study, and the territory also headed the list of Indian states and territories according to Human Development Index. The metropolitan of Chandigarh-Mohali-Panchkula collectively forms a Tri-city, with a combined population of over 2 million. This is the first smoke-free city in India.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandigarh
 http://www.mapsofindia.com/maps/chandigarh/

20151121 - german architects

German architects

The following are German-born or Germany-based architects listed according to their architectural style.

This list might be incomplete and may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by expanding it with reliably sourced entries.

Renaissance

• Joseph Heintz (1564–1609)
• Elias Holl (1573–1646)

Baroque

• Cosmas Damian Asam (1686–1739)
• Egid Quirin Asam (1692–1750)
• George Bähr (1666–1738)
• François de Cuvilliés (1695–1768)
• Johann Dientzenhofer (1663–1726)
• Johann Michael Fischer (1692–1766)
• Anselm Franz von Ritter zu Groenesteyn (1692–1765)
• Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff (1699–1753)
• Balthasar Neumann (1687–1753) – also an engineer
• Matthäus Daniel Pöppelmann (1662–1736)
• ......

•   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_architects
• http://www.phos.de/referenzen_partner.php

20151120 - bauhaus

Staatliches Bauhaus, commonly known simply as Bauhaus, was an art school in Germany that combined crafts and the fine arts, and was famous for the approach to design that it publicised and taught. It operated from 1919 to 1933. At that time the German term  Bauhaus —literally "house of construction"—was understood as meaning "School of Building".
The Bauhaus was first founded by Walter Gropius in Weimar. In spite of its name, and the fact that its founder was an architect, the Bauhaus during the first years of its existence did not have an architecture department. Nonetheless, it was founded with the idea of creating a "total" work of art in which all arts, including architecture, would eventually be brought together. The Bauhaus style later became one of the most influential currents in modern design, Modernist architecture and art, design and architectural education.The Bauhaus had a profound influence upon subsequent developments in art, architecture, graphic design, interior design, industrial design, and typography.
The school existed in three German cities: Weimar from 1919 to 1925, Dessau from 1925 to 1932 and Berlin from 1932 to 1933, under three different architect-directors: Walter Gropius from 1919 to 1928, Hannes Meyer from 1928 to 1930 and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe from 1930 until 1933, when the school was closed by its own leadership under pressure from the Nazi-led government which had claimed that it was a centre of communist intellectualism. Though the school was closed, the staff continued to spread its idealistic precepts as they left Germany and emigrated all over the world.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bauhaus
 http://www.greatbuildings.com/buildings/Bauhaus.html

20151119 - photography trends

As we sink deeper into a maze of technology, our world is becoming an interconnected mesh of ideas, differences, creative anecdotes and social upheavals. In a world that’s moving at a break-neck speed, creative photography is often a visual representation of that mesh. Trends in it are thus a representation of what we as individuals are believing, expressing, and experiencing. Getty Images shares its prediction of impending visual trends:

 http://www.picturecorrect.com/tips/2015-trends-to-watch-for-in-creative-photography/
 https://www.nobackgroundimages.com/10-digital-photography-trends-for-2015/

20151118 - typography

Typography is the art and technique of arranging type to make written language legible, readable, and appealing when displayed. The arrangement of type involves selecting typefaces, point size, line length, line-spacing (leading), letter-spacing (tracking), and adjusting the space within letters pairs (kerning). The term typography is also applied to the style, arrangement, and appearance of the letters, numbers, and symbols created by the process. Type design is a closely related craft, sometimes considered part of typography; most typographers do not design typefaces, and some type designers do not consider themselves typographers.^[2][3] Typography also may be used as a decorative device, unrelated to communication of information.


 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typography
 http://www.better2web.com/blog/details/12/free-typography-diagram-wallpaper

20151117 - berlin modern architecture

This week, with the help of our readers, our Architecture City Guide is headed to Berlin. The twentieth century changed nearly all cities, but perhaps none more so than Berlin. From its destruction in World War II that left few historic buildings intact to its division until 1989 that brought together the architecture of two competing ideologies into one city, Berlin’s modern and contemporary architecture speaks to a past that seldom accompanies such recent additions. The city is filled with new and wonderful architecture that might not have found space in other cities in Europe. With that in mind, we were unable feature all our readers’ suggestions on the first go around. We will be adding to the list in the near future, so please add more of your favorites in the comment section below. Once again, thanks to all our readers for your help.


 http://www.archdaily.com/153731/architecture-city-guide-berlin
 http://footage.framepool.com/en/shot/237242082-meinhard-von-gerkan-berlin-hauptbahnhof-steel-structure-taxi

20151116 - berlin speer

Berthold Konrad Hermann Albert Speer; (March 19, 1905 – September 1, 1981) was a German architect who was, for a part of World War II, Minister of Armaments and War Production for Nazi Germany. Speer was Adolf Hitler's chief architect before assuming ministerial office. As "the Nazi who said sorry",^[b] he accepted moral responsibility at the Nuremberg trials and in his memoirs for complicity in crimes of the Nazi regime, while stating he was ignorant of the Holocaust.
Speer joined the Nazi Party in 1931, launching himself on a political and governmental career which lasted fourteen years. His architectural skills made him increasingly prominent within the Party and he became a member of Hitler's inner circle. Hitler instructed him to design and construct structures including the Reich Chancellery and the Zeppelinfeld stadium in Nuremberg where Party rallies were held. Speer also made plans to reconstruct Berlin on a grand scale, with huge buildings, wide boulevards, and a reorganized transportation system.
In February 1942, Hitler appointed Speer Minister of Armaments and War Production. He was fêted at the time, and long afterwards, for performing an "armaments miracle" in which German war production dramatically increased; this "miracle", however, was brought to a halt by the summer of 1943 by, among other factors, the first sustained Allied bombing of 1943. After the war, he was tried at Nuremberg and sentenced to 20 years in prison for his role in the Nazi regime, principally for the use of forced labor. Despite repeated attempts to gain early release, he served his full sentence, most of it at Spandau Prison in West Berlin.
Following his release from Spandau in 1966, Speer published two bestselling autobiographical works, Inside the Third Reich and Spandau: The Secret Diaries, detailing his often close personal relationship with Hitler, and providing readers and historians with a unique perspective on the workings of the Nazi regime. He later wrote a third book, Infiltration, about the SS. Speer died of natural causes in 1981 while on a visit to London.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Speer
 http://www.secretcitytravel.com/berlin-march-2014/albert-speer-nazi-architect-berlin.shtml

20151115 - glitch

A glitch is a short-lived fault in a system. It is often used to describe a transient fault that corrects itself, and is therefore difficult to troubleshoot. The term is particularly common in the computing and electronics industries, and in circuit bending, as well as among players of video games, although it is applied to all types of systems including human organizations and nature.

Computer glitch

A computer glitch is the failure of a system, usually containing a computing device, to complete its functions or to perform them properly.
In public declarations, glitch is used to suggest a minor fault which will soon be rectified and is therefore used as a euphemism for a bug, which is a factual statement that a programming fault is to blame for a system failure.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glitch
 http://pawlakkonrad.deviantart.com/art/Life-is-a-glitch-Wallpaper-by-Me-385902872

20151114 - berlin architecture

Berlin‍  '​s history has left the city with an eclectic assortment of architecture. The city's appearance in the 21st century has been shaped by the key role the city played in Germany's 20th-century history. Each of the governments based in Berlin—the Kingdom of Prussia, the 1871 German Empire, the Weimar Republic, Nazi Germany, East Germany and the reunified Federal Republic of Germany—initiated ambitious construction programs, with each adding its distinct flavour to the city's architecture.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Architecture_in_Berlin
 http://www.e-architect.co.uk/berlin/berlin-architecture-walking-tours

20151113 - berlin history

The history of Berlin consisted of its foundation in the 13th century, and later became the capital of the small country of Prussia. Prussia grew rapidly in the 18th and 19th century, and formed the basis of the German Empire in 1871. Berlin became a major world city, known for its leadership roles in science, the humanities, music, museums, higher education, government, diplomacy and military affairs. During World War II, it was virtually destroyed by bombing, artillery, and ferocious street-by-street fighting. It was split between the victors, and lost its world leadership roles. With the reunification of Germany in 1990, Berlin was restored as a capital and as a major world city.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Berlin
 https://germanis.wordpress.com/tag/history/

20151112 - noordoostpolder

Noordoostpolder, English: North-East Polder) is a municipality in the Flevoland province in the central Netherlands. Formerly, it was also called Urker Land. Emmeloord is the administrative center, located in the heart of the Noordoostpolder. The municipality has the largest land area in the Netherlands. (Lelystad and Terschelling both technically have more total area, but in both cases it is mostly water area.)

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noordoostpolder

20151111 - nagele

Nagele (52°39′N 5°44′E) is a village in the Dutch province of Flevoland. It is a part of the municipality of Noordoostpolder, and lies about 10 km south of Emmeloord.
In 2001, Nagele had 1037 inhabitants. The built-up area of the village was 0.61 km², and contained 481 residences.

History

Nagele was designed by the architectural team "De 8" between 1948 and 1954. The final design by Aldo van Eyck and de 8 was shown at the CIAM 8 meeting in 1956. While the current condition of the town differs from the original design, some of the basic concepts remain.
The organization of the Noordoostpolder area was based on a central nucleus with smaller towns circling around connected by roads back to the center. Nagele was proposed to be southwest of the main town, and was originally to be planned to contain 300 dwelling units, 3 churches, 3 primary schools, a post office, fire station, hotel, cafes, a clinic, cemetery, sports field, swimming pool and business zone. Aldo van Eyck proposed that the town be designed around 3 principles: 1. a non-hierarchical organization with mixed social groups, 2. a windbreak of trees to give the village a spatial character and stand out in the polder landscape, and 3. an open green center. The final design accepted by the Wieringermeer board included these ideas, which can still be seen today. The dwelling units form smaller courtyards that are shared around the outside of the main green, these clusters in turn forming the visual boundaries of the center.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nagele
 http://www.slideshare.net/NederlandWordtAnders/de20-nieuwe20kaart20van20nagele

20151110 - ebenezer howard

Sir Ebenezer Howard OBE (29 January 1850 – 1 May 1928) the English founder of the garden city movement is known for his publication To-Morrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform (1898), the description of a utopian city in which people live harmoniously together with nature. The publication resulted in the founding of the garden city movement, and the building of the First Garden City, Letchworth Garden City, commenced in 1903. The second true Garden City was Welwyn Garden City (1920) and the movement influenced the development of several model suburbs in other countries, such as Forest Hills Gardens designed by F. L. Olmsted Jr. in 1909, Radburn NJ (1923) and the Suburban Resettlement Program towns of the 1930s (Greenbelt, Maryland; Greenhills, Ohio; Greenbrooke, New Jersey and Greendale, Wisconsin). Howard aimed to reduce the alienation of humans and society from nature, and hence advocated garden cities and Georgism. Howard is believed by many to be one of the great guides to the town planning movement, with many of his garden city principles being used in modern town planning.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebenezer_Howard

20151109 - london squares

Squares have long been a feature of London.
A few, such as Trafalgar Square, were built as public open spaces, like the squares found in many cities, known as a plaza, piazza, platz, etc. Most, however, were garden squares, originally built as private communal gardens for use by the inhabitants of the surrounding houses. This type of space is most prevalent in central London, but squares are also found in the suburbs. Some of these gardens are now open to the public, while others, for example around Notting Hill, are still fenced and private.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squares_in_London
 http://www.bdonline.co.uk/the-london-square-gardens-in-the-midst-of-town-by-todd-longstaffe-gowan/5039247.article

20151108 - london history

London, the capital city of England and the United Kingdom, has a history dating back over 2,000 years. During this time, it has grown to become one of the most significant financial and cultural capitals of the world. It has experienced plague, devastating fire, civil war, aerial bombardment, and terrorist attacks. The City of London is its historic core and today is its primary financial district, though it now represents a tiny part of the wider metropolis of Greater London.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_London
 http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/articles/2007/01/16/wilberforce_abolition_feature.shtml

20151107 - wolf hall

Wolf Hall (2009) is a historical novel by English author Hilary Mantel, published by Fourth Estate, named after the Seymour family seat of Wolfhall or Wulfhall in Wiltshire. Set in the period from 1500 to 1535, Wolf Hall is a highly fictionalised biography documenting the rapid rise to power of Thomas Cromwell in the court of Henry VIII through to the death of Sir Thomas More. The novel won both the Man Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. In 2012, The Observer named it as one of "The 10 best historical novels".
The book is the first in a trilogy; the sequel Bring Up the Bodies was published in 2012.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf_Hall

20151106 - climate miles

By walking The Climate Miles, Urgenda is calling attention to the action needed to avert dangerous climate change and keep the planet safe for future generations.

From the 1st to the 29th of November, Urgenda director Marjan Minnesma will walk more than 500 km from Utrecht to Paris, where the UN Climate Change Conference (COP21) will be held. Every day she will be joined by a special guest, who will leave behind a new Milestone with a message.
Anyone is free to join us, whether for a day, a week, or the entire month. While we walk, we’ll meet interesting people, visit inspiring initiatives, and cover approximately 20 kilometers per day.
Together, we will show the world that the time to act is now!

 http://www.theclimatemiles.nl/en/
 http://www.urgenda.nl/en/

20151105 - WHO healthy diet

Healthy diet

Updated September 2015

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Key facts

• A healthy diet helps protect against malnutrition in all its forms, as well as noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), including diabetes, heart disease, stroke and cancer.
• Unhealthy diet and lack of physical activity are leading global risks to health.
• Healthy dietary practices start early in life – breastfeeding fosters healthy growth and improves cognitive development, and may have longer-term health benefits, like reducing the risk of becoming overweight or obese and developing NCDs later in life.
• Energy intake (calories) should be in balance with energy expenditure. Evidence indicates that total fat should not exceed 30% of total energy intake to avoid unhealthy weight gain (1, 2, 3), with a shift in fat consumption away from saturated fats to unsaturated fats (3), and towards the elimination of industrial trans fats (4).
• Limiting intake of free sugars to less than 10% of total energy intake (2, 5) is part of a healthy diet. A further reduction to less than 5% of total energy intake is suggested for additional health benefits (5).
• Keeping salt intake to less than 5 g per day helps prevent hypertension and reduces the risk of heart disease and stroke in the adult population (6).
• WHO Member States have agreed to reduce the global population’s intake of salt by 30% and halt the rise in diabetes and obesity in adults and adolescents as well as in childhood overweight by 2025 (7, 8, 9).

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Overview

Consuming a healthy diet throughout the lifecourse helps prevent malnutrition in all its forms as well as a range of noncommunicable diseases and conditions. But the increased production of processed food, rapid urbanization and changing lifestyles have led to a shift in dietary patterns. People are now consuming more foods high in energy, fats, free sugars or salt/sodium, and many do not eat enough fruit, vegetables and dietary fibre such as whole grains.
The exact make-up of a diversified, balanced and healthy diet will vary depending on individual needs (e.g. age, gender, lifestyle, degree of physical activity), cultural context, locally available foods and dietary customs. But basic principles of what constitute a healthy diet remain the same.


 http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs394/en/
 http://www.healthyfoodhouse.com/eat-healthy/

20151104 - barcelona gaudi

Antoni Gaudí i Cornet (25 June 1852 – 10 June 1926) was a Spanish Catalan architect from Reus and the best known practitioner of Catalan Modernism. Gaudí's works reflect an individualized and distinctive style. Most are located in Barcelona, including his magnum opus, the Sagrada Família.
Gaudí's work was influenced by his passions in life: architecture, nature, and religion. Gaudí considered every detail of his creations and integrated into his architecture such crafts as ceramics, stained glass, wrought ironwork forging and carpentry. He also introduced new techniques in the treatment of materials, such as trencadís which used waste ceramic pieces.
Under the influence of neo-Gothic art and Oriental techniques, Gaudí became part of the Modernista movement which was reaching its peak in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His work transcended mainstream Modernisme, culminating in an organic style inspired by natural forms. Gaudí rarely drew detailed plans of his works, instead preferring to create them as three-dimensional scale models and molding the details as he conceived them.
Gaudí's work enjoys global popularity and continuing admiration and study by architects. His masterpiece, the still-incomplete Sagrada Família, is the most-visited monument in Spain. Between 1984 and 2005, seven of his works were declared World Heritage Sites by UNESCO. Gaudí's Roman Catholic faith intensified during his life and religious images appear in many of his works. This earned him the nickname "God's Architect"^[5] and led to calls for his beatification

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antoni_Gaud%C3%AD
 http://www.spain.info/en/reportajes/gaudi_arquitectura_de_ensueno.html

20151103 - barcelona cerda

Ildefonso Cerdá y Suñer (Centelles, December 23, 1815 - Caldas de Besaya, August 21, 1876) was the progressive Catalan Spanish urban planner who designed the 19th-century "extension" of Barcelona called the Eixample.

Biography

Cerdá was born in Centelles, Catalonia, Spain, in 1815. He originally trained as a civil engineer at the Escuela de Ingenieros de Caminos, Canales y Puertos, in Madrid. He joined the Corps of Engineers and lived in various cities in Spain before settling in Barcelona in 1848 and marrying Clotilde Bosch. After the death of his brothers, Cerdá inherited the family fortune, and left the civil service. He became interested in politics and the study of urban planning.
When the government of the time finally gave in to public pressure and allowed Barcelona's city walls to be torn down, he realized the need to plan the city's expansion so that the new extension would become an efficient and livable place, unlike the congested, epidemic-prone old town within the walls. When he failed to find suitable reference works, he undertook the task of writing one from scratch while designing what he called the 'Ensanche,' borrowing a few technological ideas from his contemporaries to create a unique, thoroughly modern integrated concept that was carefully considered rather than whimsically designed.
He continued to create projects and improve existing designs throughout his lifetime, as well as to develop his theories taking on larger planning scopes (at regional planning level), until the very end. In the process, he lost all his family's inheritance and he died in 1876 a heavily indebted near-pauper, never having been paid for his chief masterpiece, the design of Barcelona's 'Ensanche.'

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ildefons_Cerd%C3%A0
 http://es.slideshare.net/gusgogusi/pla-cerd-grup6

20151102 - barcelona history

The history of Barcelona stretches back well over 2000 years to its origins as an Iberian village named Barkeno. Its easily defensible location on the coastal plain between the Collserola ridge (512 m) and the Mediterranean sea, the coastal route between central Europe and the rest of the Iberian peninsula, has ensured its continued importance, if not always preeminence, throughout the ages.
Barcelona is currently a city of 1,620,943, the second largest in Spain, and the capital of the autonomous community of Catalonia. Its wider urban region is home to three-quarters of the population of Catalonia and one-eighth of that of Spain.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Barcelona
 https://bcn-tour.com/en/barcelona/main-facts

20151101 - jetses

Ot en Sien is an old children's book, written by a teacher in Drenthe, the Netherlands.
It was the start of a new method of writing children's books and had profound influence on Dutch elementary education in the first half of the twentieth century

The authors

Ot and Sien are the main characters in a series of Dutch children's tales that were very popular in the first half of the twentieth century. The first series titled Dicht bij Huis ("Close to home"), appeared in 1902. The second series Nog bij Moeder ("Still with mother"), followed in 1904. De author of the stories was Hindericus Scheepstra (nl). However, he acted on the inspiration of Jan Ligthart, who had the intention to expose young people to what he considered a healthy daily family life. The illustrations were made by Cornelis Jetses (nl).
After WWII the stories of Ot and Sien gradually went out of fashion and they were often ridiculed for the unrealistic picture they gave of life in the province. A century after their appearance there is a revival in the interest for the publications and in 2004 an exposition was held, focusing mostly on the artwork by Jetses.

The characters

Ot (short for Otto) and Sien (short for e.g. Francine) are two next door neighbors, a boy and a girl. Their illustrations were based on two children that actually lived in Jetses' neighborhood. The stories are situated in Drenthe that was at the time the most impoverished province of the Netherlands where quite a few people were still living in dwellings constructed of peat and sods. The surrounding poverty is nowhere to be seen in the stories that depict a very idealized version of reality.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ot_en_Sien
 http://www.rug.nl/society-business/science-shops/taal-cultuur-en-communicatie/publicaties/jetses_s-view-on-groningen-around-1880

20151031 - china medicine

Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is a broad range of medicine practices sharing common concepts which have been developed in China and are based on a tradition of more than 2,000 years, including various forms of herbal medicine, acupuncture, massage (Tui na), exercise (qigong), and dietary therapy. It is primarily used as a complementary alternative medicine approach. TCM is widely used in China and it is also used in the West.
TCM "holds that the body's vital energy (chi or qi) circulates through channels, called meridians, that have branches connected to bodily organs and functions." Concepts of the body and of disease used in TCM reflect its origins in pre-scientific culture, similar to European humoral theory. Scientific investigation has found no histological or physiological evidence for traditional Chinese concepts such as qi, meridians, and acupuncture points. The TCM theory and practice are not based upon scientific knowledge, and its own practitioners disagree widely on what diagnosis and treatments should be used for any given patient. The effectiveness of Chinese herbal medicine remains poorly researched and documented. There are concerns over a number of potentially toxic plants, animal parts, and mineral Chinese medicinals. A review of cost-effectiveness research for TCM found that studies had low levels of evidence, but so far have not shown benefit outcomes.Pharmaceutical research has explored the potential for creating new drugs from traditional remedies, with few successful results. A Nature editorial described TCM as "fraught with pseudoscience", and said that the most obvious reason why it hasn't delivered many cures is that the majority of its treatments have no logical mechanism of action.^[10] Proponents propose that research has so far missed key features of the art of TCM, such as unknown interactions between various ingredients and complex interactive biological systems.
The doctrines of Chinese medicine are rooted in books such as the Yellow Emperor's Inner Canon and the Treatise on Cold Damage, as well as in cosmological notions such as yin-yang and the five phases. Starting in the 1950s, these precepts were standardized in the People's Republic of China, including attempts to integrate them with modern notions of anatomy and pathology. In the 1950s, the Chinese government promoted a systematized form of TCM.
TCM's view of the body places little emphasis on anatomical structures, but is mainly concerned with the identification of functional entities (which regulate digestion, breathing, aging etc.). While health is perceived as harmonious interaction of these entities and the outside world, disease is interpreted as a disharmony in interaction. TCM diagnosis aims to trace symptoms to patterns of an underlying disharmony, by measuring the pulse, inspecting the tongue, skin, and eyes, and looking at the eating and sleeping habits of the person as well as many other things.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_Chinese_medicine
http://www.tcmpage.com/