Category: Tumblr

The London riots have been on my mind a lot this week, and I posted various links to pieces which I thought were interesting: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Perhaps indirectly related, an article about poverty in the US; and one about extreme wealth in the US which serves as a companion piece.

That’s a C19th robe from Central Asia. I also posted a couple of others (1, 2), all from the Smithsonian’s collections, but this one’s my favourite. That slightly fuzzy appearance comes from ikat weaving, where the thread itself is dyed in patterns before weaving. I also posted a rather lovely woven raffia mat from Benin made using the same technique.

Oddities: an iPad cover made from Bernie Madoff’s trousers — jugs with lips — sycamore goblets — an axe with a spine — melon bowls — a guinea pig masquerading as a hippo.

The geometry of butterflies, drawn by Nabokov  — a ladybird spider —  an Audubon swan — some elegant kelp.

I found an online copy of Illustrations of Himalayan Plants from 1855 and I thought the illustrations were particularly beautiful even by the standards of botanical illustration. I posted the title page and several of the plates, but rather than see them on Tumblr, check it out on archive.org.

It’s that time of the week again. Let’s start with what might be my favourite image of the year, a long-exposure shot of star trails with fireflies. Go to NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day to see it larger or super-big.

Two ancient Persian drinking horns: shaped like a wild cat — shaped like a wild goat [maybe a Nubian Ibex?]. A Greek wine-cooler decorated with soldiers riding dolphins. A medieval Russian church gate. A C14th painting of a Tibetan abbot.

Acrobatic weaver birds — tunicates — shark with lionfish — a flashy bustard.

Articles: Sperm whales have culture. Fish form shoals the size of Manhattan.

Beautiful corsets: C18th Spanish — C19th American. A Jean-Paul Gaultier jacket. American typography: Lectures on Ventilation — library paste — red stamping ink. Curious buildings: Laos — Mali — Portugal.

All at Sea, Claire Partington 2011. Egon Schiele’s bedroom, 1911. Aurora Borealis, Frederic Edwin Church 1865. Île-Saint-Denis, Willy Ronis 1956. Allegory of the Planets and Continents, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo 1752.

I haven’t posted that much to Tumblr this week for the same reason I haven’t been posting to the blog: possible incipient RSI. But here’s some of my favourite things from this week.

Sagra buqueti, a beetle so extraordinary I resorted to Google to check it wasn’t photoshopped:

A gruesome squid dish — a cactus pouffe — an outfit by Alexander McQueen — a good joke — a Madonna by Lorenzo Lotto — Wulfenite with Mimetite and Barite — a painting of Halley’s comet

The Cuban vine Marcgravia evenia uses a specially shaped sonar reflector to attract pollinating bats.

Penguins use bubbles to give themselves a speed boost underwater.

Dolphins use what used to be whiskers to detect electric fields.

Canadian cod numbers are finally starting to recover nearly 20 years after fishing them was banned.

EDIT. Whoops, nearly forgot:

Spitalfields Life has a great post about an annual east London coracle race.

A selection of the stuff I’ve posted to Tumblr in the past week.My favourite thing from the past week is this, mainly because it looks like a Death Star:

Actually it’s a round clay tablet from Ur which dates back to 2039BC. It records areas of fields and barley yield. I also posted a picture of an even older tablet from Uruk, 3300BC-3100BC, which uses a symbol for barley that looks like, well, an ear of barley.

Some decorative woodcuts by Fernand Chalandre, from about 1919: Peasant girl carrying pail — poplars near water — a bowl of flowers — the town of Nevers. And some aquatints by the Australian artist Fred Williams: Road and Saplings, Cottlesbridge — Trapeze — The Can Can — Burning Log.

A great photograph of Lucian Freud from the 60s. RIP.

There are some interesting photographs of Greek shadow-puppet shows in the British Museum. My favourite is Karagiosis the Astronaut, above, but Karagiosis can also be seen ‘In the Claws of the Gestapo‘ and shooting the head off a Turk.

Some links: why people are better at paper-scissors-stone if they are blindfolded.

The problems with software patents.

The perils of trusting your data to the cloud (or in this case, to Google).

Neptune’s heart, zipperback and the gangly lancer are among 10 new names that have been given to British plant and animal species, thanks to Natural England’s “Name a Species” competition.

An interesting new approach to designing wind farms.

Decorated initials: P — Q — E — B. Satellite photographs, via NASA: Alaska — Australia — Iowa — Bahamas.

Some odds and sods: baby millipedes — a weird caterpillar — a Brooklyn stoop, 1976 — Japanese iris plate — Gisèle à “La Boule Blanche”, Montparnasse, 1932 — an ingenious crossword — woman with garlic.