[<<] September 2005 Jahsonic (01) [>>]
about - art - culture - dance - erotica - fiction - film - gallery - genre - history - human - home - index - lifestyle - links - music - list of qualities - search - list of sensibilities - theory - underground - world
"Method of this work:
literary montage.
I have nothing to say only to show." (Passagenwerk (1927 - 1940) - Walter Benjamin)
2005, Sep 04; 23:25 ::: Modernist readers
The Little Review, literary magazine.
Image sourced here.
The Little Review, literary magazine.
Image sourced here.Marked by a proliferation of printed materials and diverse readers, the modernist period echoed in many ways the late eighteenth century reading revolution. The first half of the twentieth century simultaneously offered new texts for consumption and opened the space for competing sites of textual authority. Emerging voices of different critics, reviewers, and advertisers clashed over definitions of books, readers, and reading practices. Furthermore, new technologies and media, such as radio and moving pictures, transformed reading as a leisure activity; one could now watch a story on a screen, or listen to a tale from a box, instead of opening a book. While some authorities believed the new mass media threatened an age-old concept of reading, others welcomed the large audiences mobilized by the new technologies as potential markets for selling books. --http://www.uweb.ucsb.edu/~seg1/test/modernist.html [Sept 2005]
The Little Review
The Little Review was a American literary magazine founded by Margaret Caroline Anderson which published modernist American and English writers between 1914 and 1929, most famously James Joyce's Ulysses. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Little_Review [Sept 2005]See also: 1914 - 1929 - modernism - books
2005, Sep 04; 23:25 ::: Mass productionMass production is the production of large amounts of standardised products on production lines. It was popularised by Henry Ford in the early 20th Century, notably in his Ford Model T. Mass production is notable because it permits very high rates of production per person and therefore provides very inexpensive products.
Benefits
The economies of mass production come from several sources. The primary cause is a reduction of nonproductive effort of all types. In craft production, the craftsman must bustle about a shop, getting parts and assembling them. He must locate and use many tools many times, perhaps hundreds of times to assemble a complex product such as a clock.In mass production, each worker repeats one or a few related tasks that use the same tool to perform identical or almost identical operations on a stream of products. The exact tool and parts are always at hand. The worker spends no time going and getting them.
Another important scale benefit is that the factory can purchase very large amounts of materials. This reduces the overhead costs (shipping, purchasing negotiations, paperwork, etc.) associated with purchasing the parts.
Assembly lines
Mass production systems are usually organized in assembly lines. The assemblies pass by on a conveyor, or if they are heavy, hung from an overhead monorail.In a factory for a complex product, rather than one assembly line, there may be many auxiliary assembly lines feeding sub-assemblies (i.e. car engines or seats) to a backbone "main" assembly line. A diagram of a typical mass-production factory looks more like the skeleton of a fish than a single line.
Vertical integration
A final very important strategy is vertical integration. In this strategy, the manufacturer produces all or most of the parts and subassemblies that go into the product. For example, at one point, Ford Motor Company literally mined iron ore in Minnesota and turned it into cars in Detroit, capturing all the profits from all the processes that added value to iron ore.Nowadays, rather than assembling everything, factory managers choose which assemblies to produce based on the return on investment (ROI) that each assembly process can produce. The basic plan is to out-source unprofitable subassemblies to other organizations. Often, such organizations can afford specialized equipment or organization that makes them substantially more efficient than an ordinary factory at a particular task.
History
While Ford was first to introduce mass production in recent times, the idea was first developed in Venice several hundred years earlier, where ships were mass-produced using pre-manufactured parts, and assembly lines.The Venice Arsenal apparently produced nearly one ship every day, in what was effectively the world's first factory that, at its height, employed 16,000 people.
Books were already mass produced since Johannes Gutenberg's Bible was published in the mid-1400s.
During the Industrial Revolution simple mass production techniques were used at the Portsmouth Block Mills to manufacture ships' pulley blocks for the British Navy during the Napoleonic Wars. It was also used in the manufacture of clocks and watches, and in the manufacture of small arms. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_production [Sept 2005]
See also: mass - production - reproduction - industrial revolution
2005, Sep 04; 22:40 ::: Charles and Ray Eames
Eames chairs
Via Functionalfate.org, a weblog that documents design, in particular the white monoblock. --http://www.functionalfate.org.
Charles and Ray Eames
Perhaps the most notable couple in the history of the field of industrial design. Americans, Charles (1907-1978) and Ray Eames (1912-1988) made major contributions to the emergence of industrial design as a mature discipline. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_and_Ray_Eames [Sept 2005]Dedicated to Mickie.
See also: furniture - design - mass - industrial design
2005, Sep 04; 22:31 ::: T S Eliot and Cultural ElitismT S Eliot's cultural criticism has had an extensive influence, not simply on the academic field of cultural studies, but on the publishing industry, through his role as editor of Faber and Faber.
In Notes Towards the Definition of Culture (Faber & Faber, 1948) Eliot considers high culture to be complex, but absolute and objectively definable. Culture is the salvation of society from the materialism and barbarism associated with industrialisation and commerce. Only 'superior individuals' are able to participate in and contribute to this culture. He advocates the replacement of the existing class system by a system of meritocracy headed by a cultural elite.
'it is now the opinion of some of the most advanced minds that some qualitative differences between individual must still be recognised, and that the superior individuals must be formed into suitable groups, endowed with appropriate powers, and perhaps with varied emoluments and honours. These groups ... will direct the public life of the nation; the individuals composing themselves will be spoken of as 'leaders' . There will be groups concerned with art, and groups concerned with science, and groups concerned with philosophy as well as groups consisting of men of action: and the groups are what we call élite.' (Notes Towards the Definition of Culture, p. 36)Eliot thus argues that efforts and expense to make culture accessible to all, predominantly through the democratisation of the education system, are inappropriate and lead to falling standards in culture and education. It is more important for a society to invest in an excellence in education, academia and culture for a limited privileged audience. --http://www.brookes.ac.uk/schools/apm/publishing/culture/theory/cultcons.html! [Sept 2005]
See also: 1943 - mass - elite - T.S. Eliot
2005, Sep 04; 10:14 ::: Notes Towards the Definition of Culture (1943) - T. S. Eliot
Notes Towards the Definition of Culture (1943) - T. S. Eliot [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
The Merriam-Webster Encyclopedia of Literature
Critical treatise by T.S. Eliot, originally appearing as a series of articles in New England Weekly in 1943, and published in book form in 1948. In the Notes, Eliot presents culture as an organic, shared system of beliefs that cannot be planned or artificially induced. Its chief means of transmission, he holds, is the family. The book has been viewed as a critique of postwar Europe and a defense of conservatism and Christianity. --via Amazon.comNotice the word the in the title of the essay. In present times one is more likely to encounter the word a as in Notes Towards a Definition of Culture. Modernist philosopy believed in the possibility of a single definition of culture. That belief is an example of a modernist metanarrative, i.e. a basic truth that excludes other truths. This contrasts which postmodernism as it is commonly understood: there is no truth, there are only versions.
See also: 1943 - culture - definition - notes - T.S. Eliot
2005, Sep 04; 10:14 ::: Deviant Modernism: Sexual and Textual Errancy in T.S.Eliot, James Joyce and Marcel Proust (1999) - Colleen Lamos
Deviant Modernism: Sexual and Textual Errancy in T.S.Eliot, James Joyce and Marcel Proust (1999) - Colleen Lamos [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
Review
"This is a controversial study recommended for upper-division undergraduates through faculty." Choice "Yet Deviant Modernism is valuable as a study of that very will to normativity which structures the conventional moral and artistic codes of these three high male modernists, deconstructing the authority os such codes by revealing their defensiveness, circular logic, and disavowed irrationality." James Joyce Literary Supplement "Deviant Modernism is extremely well researched and beautifully written." Modern Philology "...[Lamo's study of modernism] makes such intellectual labor all the more pressing and valuable." --via Amazon.comBook Description
This original study reevaluates central texts of the modernist canon--Eliot's early poetry including The Waste Land, Joyce's Ulysses and Proust's Remembrance of Things Past--by examining sexual energies and identifications in them that are typically regarded as perverse. Colleen Lamos' analysis of the operations of gender and sexuality in these texts reveals conflicts, concerning the definition of masculine heterosexuality, which cut across the aesthetics of modernism. What emerges is a reconsideration of modernist literature as a whole, gender categories, and the relation between errant sexuality and literary "mistakes."--via Amazon.comSee also: deviant - modernism - James Joyce - Marcel Proust - T.S. Eliot
2005, Sep 04; 10:14 ::: Second industrial revolutionThe Second Industrial Revolution (1871-1914) involved significant developments for society and the world.
During the Second Industrial Revolution, several developments within the chemical, electrical, petroleum, and steel industries took place. Mass production of consumer goods also developed at this time, for the mechanisation of manufacture of food and drink, clothing and transport and even entertainment with the early cinema, radio and gramophone both served the needs of the population and also provided employment for the increasing numbers. This increasing production, however, was a factor leading up to the Long Depression and the so-called "New Imperialism".
See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Industrial_Revolution [Sept 2005]
See also: 1871 - 1914 - industrial revolution - mass - 1870s - 1880s - 1890s - 1900s - 1910s
2005, Sep 03; 23:17 ::: Three Flags (1958) - Jasper Johns
Three Flags (1958) - Jasper Johns
Image sourced here.Jasper Johns, Jr. (born May 15, 1930 in Augusta, Georgia) is an American artist. He studied at the University of South Carolina from 1949 to 1951. He is best known for his painting Flag (1954). His work is often described as a 'Neo-Dadaist', as opposed to Pop Art, even though his subject matter often includes images and objects from popular culture. Early works were composed using simple schemas such as flags, maps, targets, letters and numbers. Johns' treatment of the surface is often lush and painterly; he is famous for incorporating such media as encaustic (wax-based paint), and plaster relief in his paintings. The contrast between the graphical symbolic subject matter and the loosely handled surface raises the question "can a painting be what it depicts?" Johns also produces sculptures and lithographs with similar motifs. In 1998, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York paid over twenty million dollars for Johns' White Flag. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasper_Johns [Sept 2005]
Neo-Dada
Neo-Dada is an artistic movement of the 20th century, usually thought to have begun in the 1960s. Artists of this movement derive their conceptual heritage from earlier Dada artists, most importantly Marcel Duchamp. Neo-Dada is exemplified by its use of modern materials, popular imagery, and absurdist contrast. It also patently denies traditional concepts of aesthetics. The leading artists in the Neo-Dada movement are Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns and Jim Dine. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-Dadism [Sept 2005]See also: USA - art - dada - pop art
2005, Sep 03; 23:17 ::: Modernism and new mediaA remarkable meeting took place one November day in 1929 in Paris between two famous innovators, one in literature, the other in film: James Joyce (1882-1941) and Sergei Eisenstein (1898-1948).... The historical meeting ... took place on November 30, 1929, at 2 Square Robiac, 192 rue de Grenelle, Paris 7e, where Joyce had a flat.... As far as is known, Joyce never mentioned this meeting in writing.(Gösta Werner, 1990)
The Senses of Modernism: Technology, Perception, and Aesthetics (2002) - Sara Danius [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
In The Senses of Modernism, Sara Danius develops a radically new theoretical and historical understanding of high modernism. The author closely analyzes Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain, Marcel Proust's Remembrance of Things Past, and James Joyce's Ulysses as narratives of the sweeping changes that affected high and low culture in the age of technological reproduction.
In her discussion of the years from 1880 to 1930, Danius proposes that the high-modernist aesthetic is inseparable from a technologically mediated crisis of the senses. She reveals the ways in which categories of perceiving and knowing are realigned when technological devices are capable of reproducing sense data. Sparked by innovations such as chronophotography, phonography, radiography, cinematography, and technologies of speed, this sudden shift in perceptual abilities had an effect on all arts of the time. Danius explores how perception, notably sight and hearing, is staged in the three most significant modern novels in German, French, and British literature. The Senses of Modernism connects technological change and formal innovation to transform the study of modernist aesthetics. Danius questions the longstanding acceptance of a binary relationship between high and low culture and describes the complicated relationship between modernism and technology, challenging the conceptual divide between a technological culture and a more properly aesthetic one. --source unidentified, possibly product description
It appears that Sara Danius, in her 2002 book The Senses of Modernism, pinpoints the beginning of modernism to the 1880s, a time when the first commercially available gramophones and phonographs were changing the way people listened to music. She further pinpoints the end of modernism to 1930, which was the beginning of the sound film, changing forever the way people consumed fiction. Her history of modernism is connected to new media that arose during what is sometimes called high modernism: radio, phonograph and cinema.
There is a direct link between high modernism and cinema in an encounter between Sergei Eisenstein and James Joyce.
The stream of consciousness style of modernist literature appears to be indebted to the development of cinema, where narrativity was expressed differently.
The rise of cinema and "moving pictures" in the first decade of the 20th century gave the modernism an artform which was uniquely its own.
See also: high modernism - 1880s - 1890s - 1900s - 1910s - 1920s - stream of consciousness - media - modernism - senses - cinema
2005, Sep 03; 23:17 ::: CDs, a 2002 selection
Sergei Eisenstein noted that the novels of Charles Dickens were filmed more often than any material except the Bible, and he explained this by Dickens's style. According to Eisenstein, a good source novel contains a great deal of action and extensive physical description. Novels that feature internal struggles and intellectual debate are difficult to film, but novels that offer descriptions of scenery and which posit their debates in plotting are easy to film. Since Eisenstein's time, film theorists have pointed out that film's tools and fiction's tools are radically different. While film can achieve metaphor, it is difficult and time consuming to do so (with symbolism being more common). Additionally, stream of consciousness and internal monologues can only be filmed by means of intrusive and illusion-breaking techniques (such as voice overs). Therefore, novelists such as Stephen King and Michael Crichton, who concentrate on action and externals, are readier for film than Graham Swift or James Joyce would be. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_adaptation [Sept 2005]
2005, Sep 03; 23:17 ::: Charles Dickens and film adaptationSee also: adaptation - literature - film
2005, Sep 03; 23:17 ::: Ulysses (1922) - James JoyceUlysses is a 1922 novel by James Joyce that takes its title from the Latin version of the Greek name 'Odysseus'. It is sometimes cited as the greatest English-language novel of the 20th century and has been the subject of much scrutiny, criticism and controversy. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulysses_%28novel%29 [Sept 2005]
See also: James Joyce - 1922
2005, Sep 03; 12:12 ::: Studio systemThe studio system is a name given to the means of film production popular in Hollywood during the 1930s and 1940s. The studio system referred to the practice of motion picture studios pursuing vertical integration. Additionally, many studios used block booking, a system of selling multiple films to a theater as a unit. Such a unit, frequently twenty films, typically comprised only one or two good films, the rest perceived as monetary filler to bolster the studio's finances. With the outlawing of block booking in a 1948 federal court case, the studio system effectively came to a close. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Studio_system [Sept 2005]
See also: film - American cinema
2005, Sep 03; 10:52 ::: Image and contentImage: appearance - art - eye - film - icon - idol - perception - photography - picture - poster - representation - style - vision - visual
Content: knowledge - narrative - plot - subject - representation - subject matter - theme - topic
Inspired by Stef.
2005, Sep 03; 10:52 ::: Courtly love
Courtly love
Image sourced here.Courtly love was a particular ideal and practice during the Middle Ages in Europe, which had its origins in courtly circles of Aquitaine, where William, Duke of Aquitaine, was one of the first troubadour poets, of Provence, where it was known as fin'amor of Champagne and ducal Burgundy. Courtly love was an aspect of a renewed pleasure in the refinements of the better kind of life, a first stirring of neopaganism in the "delightful understanding" or gai saber of Provençal poets, beginning about the time of the First Crusade. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courtly_love [Sept 2005]
See also: Europe - middle ages - love
2005, Sep 03; 00:22 ::: Fabliau
Reynard the Fox as depicted in an 1869 children's book.
Image sourced here.The fabliau (plural fabliaux) is a comic, usually anonymous tale written by jongleurs in northeast France circa the 13th Century. They are generally bawdy in nature, and several of them were reworked by Geoffrey Chaucer for his Canterbury Tales. All but one of the fabliaux are in octosyllabic rhyming couplets. Some 150 fabliaux are extant depending on how narrowly fabliau is defined.
Typical fabliaux concern cuckolded husbands, rapacious clergy and foolish peasants. The status of peasants appears to vary based on the audience that the fabliau was being written for. Poems that were presumably written for the nobility portray peasants (vilains in French) as stupid and vile, whereas those written for the lower classes often tell of peasants getting the better of the clergy.
Longer medieval poems such as Le Roman de Renart and those found in The Canterbury Tales have their origin in one or several fabliaux.
The fabliau gradually disappeared at the beginning of the 16th century. It was replaced by the prose short story. Famous French writers such as Moličre, Jean de La Fontaine and Voltaire owe much to the tradition of the fabliau, in their prose works as well as in their poetry.
Example tales
In "L'enfant de neige" ("The snow baby"), we hear a tale of black comedy. A merchant returns home after an absence of two years to find his wife with a newborn son. She explains one snowy day she swallowed a snowflake while thinking about her husband which caused her to conceive. Pretending to believe the "miracle", they raise the boy until the age of 15 when the merchant takes him on a business trip to Genoa. There, he sells the boy into slavery. On his return, he explains to his wife that the sun burns bright and hot in Italy. Since he was begotten by a snowflake, he melted in the heat. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabliau [Sept 2005]See also: tale - middle ages - 1100s - 1869
2005, Sep 02; 21:46 ::: Immanuel Kant on the terrifying sublimeImmanuel Kant
In human nature, praiseworth qualities never are found without concurrent variations that must run through endless shadings to the utmost imperfection.The quality of the terrifying sublime, if it is quite unnatural, is adventurous. Unnatural things, so far as the sublime is supposed in them, although little or none at all may actually be found, are grotesque.
Whoever loves and believes the fantastic is a visionary; the inclination toward whims makes the crank.
On the other side, if the noble is completely lacking the feeling of the beautiful degenerates, and one calls it trifling. A male person of this quality, if he is young, is named a fop; if he is of middle age he is a dandy.
Since the sublime is the most necessary to the elderly, an old dandy is the most contemptible creature in nature, just as a young crank is the most offensive and intolerable. --" (Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime, trans Goldthwait, 1960, p. 55)
"Monasteries and such tombs, to confine the living saints are grotesque. Subduing one's passions through principles is sublime.
Castigation, vows, and other such monks' virtues are grotesque. Holy bones, holy wood, and all similar rubbish, the holy stool of the High Lama of Tibet not excluded, are grotesque.
Of the works of wit and fine feeling, the epic poems of Vergil and Klopstock fall into the noble, of Homer and Milton into the adventurous.
The Metamorphoses of Ovid are grotesque; the fairy tales of French foolishness [fabliau?] are the most miserbale grotesqueries ever hatched.
Anacreontic poems are generally very close to the trifling" (Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime, trans Goldthwait, 1960, pp. 56-57).
--http://easyweb.easynet.co.uk/~ian.mccormick/biblio.htm [Sept 2005]See also: 1760s - Immanuel Kant - sublime
2005, Sep 02; 13:54 ::: Sneering Woman (1745)
Sneering Woman (1745) James Parsons, Crounian Lectures on Muscular Motion
image sourced here.See also: 1740s - caricature - expression
2005, Sep 02; 13:54 ::: The Indiscreet Jewels (1748) - Denis Diderot
The Indiscreet Jewels (1748) - Denis Diderot [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
Les Bijoux Indiscrets. The Indiscreet Jewels.(1963) - René Magritte
image sourced here.Les bijoux indiscrets (English title: The Indiscreet Jewels) was Denis Diderot's first novel, published anonymously in 1748.
It is an allegory that portrays Louis XV as the sultan Mangogul of the Congo who owns a magic ring that makes women's genitals ("jewels") talk.
A comparable trope that Diderot must have known is found in the ribald fabliau Le Chevalier Qui Fist parler les Cons. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_bijoux_indiscrets [Sept 2005]
Tip of the hat to Wetman.
See also: 1740s - bawdy - ribaldry - middle ages - Denis Diderot - René Magritte
2005, Sep 02; 08:14 ::: The 10 most translated authorsFor a long time Vladimir Illyich Lenin was the most translated writer in the world. His speeches and writings were available in all the languages of the Soviet Union as well as in most of the world's major languages. Up until the disintegration of the Soviet Union, that is. Now Lenin is living off past glory with the number of new translations at a standstill. There are still over 3000 translations of Lenin available-- until stocks last.
For a long time Lenin, Queen of Crime Agatha Christie, The Bible and Walt Disney jostled for a place among the top four. Lenin having fallen into fourth place the triumvirate has Ms Christie, the Walt Disney Company and The Holy Book scrambling for first place. In these days of market capitalism Disney has a definite edge with surging new found popularity in the former Warsaw pact nations.
The 10 most translated authors in the world with over 1500 translations each are :
--http://www.unesco.org/culture/xtrans/html_eng/index4.shtml [Sept 2005]
- Walt Disney Productions
- Agatha Christie
- The Bible
- Lenin
- Jules Verne
- Barbara Cartland
- Enid Blyton
- William Shakespeare
- Hans Christian Andersen
- The Grimm Brothers
See also: translation - author
2005, Sep 02; 08:14 ::: Les fiançailles de M.Hire (1933) - Georges Simenon
Les fiançailles de M.Hire (1933) - Georges Simenon
Image sourced here.
Il fidanzamento di Mr. Hire (1934) - Georges Simenon
Image sourced here.
Les fiançailles de M.Hire (1933) - Georges Simenon [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
Monsieur Hire (1989) - Patrice Leconte [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
[K]itsch's enormous profits are a source of temptation to the avant-garde itself, and its members have not always resisted this temptation. Ambitious writers and artists will modify their work under the pressure of kitsch, if they do not succumb to it entirely. And then those puzzling borderline cases appear, such as the popular novelist, Simenon, in France, and Steinbeck in this country. The net result is always to the detriment of true culture in any case. --(Clement Greenberg, 1939)
Georges Simenon
Georges Joseph Christian Simenon (February 13, 1903 - September 4, 1989) was a Belgian writer, who wrote in French.Simenon, who was born in Ličge, established himself in Paris in 1922. He travelled widely and stayed in the United States for ten years, from 1945 until 1955. In 1957, he moved to Switzerland.
Simenon was one of the most prolific writers of the twentieth century. He was able to write 60 to 80 pages a day. During his lifetime, he published about 450 novels and short stories. He is best known, however, for his 75 novels and 28 short stories featuring Commissaire Maigret. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Simenon [Sept 2005]
See also: France - Belgium - 1933 - pulp - Georges Simenon - Patrice Leconte - literature
2005, Sep 01; 21:37 ::: E2 E4 (1981-1984) - Manuel Göttsching
E2 E4 (1981-1984) - Manuel Göttsching [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
Manuel Göttsching (Berlin, September 9, 1952 - ) is a German musician.
As the leader of the group Ash Ra Tempel or Ashra, as well as solo artist, he is one of the pioneers of a music style that would later be called electronica. His 1984 album E2-E4 has been influential in the development of techno music, house music and ambient music.
In 1981 Göttsching played with Klaus Schulze on the latter's European tour. --http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manuel_G%C3%B6ttsching [Sept 2005]
See also: Manuel Göttsching - 1981 - 1984 - German music
2005, Sep 01; 21:37 ::: El Baile Aleman (2000) - Seńor Coconut y Su Conjunto
El Baile Aleman (2000) - Seńor Coconut y Su Conjunto [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
Uwe Schmidt (aka Seńor Coconut; born in Frankfurt, Germany) is a German DJ and producer of electronic music.
Uwe Schmidt, also known as Atom Heart, as well as a number of other aliases, produced dance music during the first half of the 1990s.
In 1994, Uwe started his own label, Rather Interesting with the aim of developing music that doesn't follow the "traditional paths of electronic music".
By 1996 he was thoroughly bored by European dance music and moved to Santiago, Chile to explore Latin music. He quickly adopted the intentionally ridiculous Seńor Coconut moniker, and soon released "El Gran Baile", finding time afterwards to do a little remix work for Towa Tei, formerly of the multi-national Deee-Lite.
His next release, in 2000, was the delightful Latin-Kraftwerk fusion of "El Baile Alemán". The album featured several Kraftwerk classics reworked with Latin instrumentation and rhythm. "El Baile Alemán" was intended as a salute to, and a parody of Kraftwerk as evidenced by the intro to "Autobahn" which featured the sound of a car that wouldn't start.
The album was credited to Seńor Coconut y Su Conjunto, but the album was entirely the work of Schmidt on synthesizers and samplers, with the aid of three vocalists. It received just enough critical acclaim in the U.S. for Schmidt to put together a short headlining tour. In March, 2001, Seńor Coconut, complete with a seven-piece backing band, set off for North America, but visa problems with some of the Chilean musicians forced Schmidt to cancel the tour, but he was able to play in Latin American venues in countries like Mexico. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uwe_Schmidt [Sept 2005]
See also: Uwe Schmidt - 2000 - German music
2005, Sep 01; 18:49 ::: Realism (visual arts and literature)In the visual arts and literature, realism is a mid-19th century movement, which started in France. The realists sought to render everyday characters, situations, dilemmas, and events; all in an "accurate" (or realistic) manner. Realism began as a reaction to romanticism, in which subjects were treated idealistically. Realists tended to discard theatrical drama and classical forms of art to depict commonplace or 'realistic' themes.
See also: Gustave Courbet, Edouard Manet, Winslow Homer, Barbizon school, fantastic realism, art film. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Realism#Realism_in_visual_arts_and_literature [Sept 2005]
See also: realism - neorealism
Underground as an adjective commonly refers to something that is either below the ground or outside of public consciousness. As a proper noun, the underground refers to subcultures.
2005, Sep 01; 11:55 ::: UndergroundSee also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground
See also: underground - subculture - mainstream - public - consciousness
blog archive - previous blog - other blogs and sites
