Video timeline: 0:00 India lands on the south pole of the moon 0:53 Why the south pole? 2:37 Why Russia and India want to be first 4:32 New space race
Both countries launched rockets in recent weeks, hoping to be the first to successfully complete the mission. Why were they racing to reach the lunar south pole? WSJ explains the significance of both missions for Moscow and New Delhi.
A modern art pioneer, renowned Swiss painter Ferdinand Hodler (1853–1918) created works that range from vast symbolist compositions to intimate, realist portraits and nearly abstract landscape paintings. This exhibition of approximately sixty works, primarily on paper, will focus on the role of drawing in his practice, from quick compositional sketches to elaborate oil studies.
Most of the drawings Hodler produced were preparatory studies for his large-scale figure compositions; these offer a fascinating account of his working process, which involved technical experiments with imprints, tracing, and collages. A few of his portrait drawings will also be featured, including a poignant series in which he recorded the illness and death of his lover Valentine Godé-Darel.
These rarely seen drawings offer a compelling survey of Hodler’s singular contribution to early modernism.
Video timeline: 00:00 – Intro to the Modern Brick House 00:32 – The Location of the Home 00:49 – William Tappin and His Designs 01:05 – Handling the Connection Between Old and New 02:01 – Requirements of the Brief 02:25 – The Interpretation of Arts & Crafts 03:07 – Behind the Kitchen Design 03:30 – A Walkthrough of the Upstairs 04:18 – The Architect’s Proud Moments
Located in the eclectic neighbourhood of South Yarra in Melbourne, William Tappin House depicts the sensitive layering of a historical footprint with contemporary innovation. Originally designed and occupied by its namesake, William Tappin – a renowned Queen Anne-style architect – the connection between old and new was something the architect wanted to handle sensitively, and this influenced the positioning of the building on site.
The existing structure is restored to remain the hero, whilst the new addition is recessive and humble in design. Restorations include revealing the original brickwork and limestone, restoring the existing verandah and carved wooden features. Exposed details, such as the fingerprints of makers on the tiles and original brick, become a symbol of the heritage façade of this home. New additions are highly sensitive to the brick home’s foundation.
The rear addition is constructed from limed timber and off-form concrete that calls back to the tonality of the limestone and basalt detailing of the original structure. Terracotta tiles also wrap the faceted roofscape in an ode to the bespoke red brick. What the house tour shows is a strong connection between inside and out, which prevails throughout the home. The entire ground floor, which contains the kitchen and living areas, opens to the exterior, with views extending all the way out to the garden and beyond – made even more accessible through sliding glazed doors.
THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR – AUTUMN 2023:
Making sense of the life of a poet about whom we know so little
by Sarah Ruden
Great works of literature are sly and powerful beasts that pounce on their readers, grabbing them by the neck and shaking them back and forth. The young Augustine looks like a typical victim of Vergil’s Aeneid. The schoolboy being brought up as a Christian in fourth-century CE North Africa found the first-century BCE epic poem of pagan Rome the most impressive thing in his cultural life to date. Tellingly, his reaction shows no interest in the poem’s theme of individual sacrifice in the name of imperial destiny; rather, into middle age, the great theologian and founder of institutional Catholic monasticism remembered weeping for Dido, who commits suicide after her lover, Aeneas, abandons her at the end of Book IV.
Oglethorpe University’s time capsule was meant to last thousands of years, but will it?
by Colin Dickey
A filming location for Queen Charlotte: a Bridgerton Story, this 17th-century home has been used as a set for many popular TV series and movies. Belton can be seen in the 1995 production of Pride and Prejudice starring Colin Firth and, most recently, has featured as King George III’s palace in the Bridgerton universe.
Along with a tour of some familiar scenes from the silver screen, you’ll take a closer look at a jewel in the furniture collection – a one-of-a-kind lapis lazuli cabinet. A deep blue gemstone, lapis lazuli has been used as decoration for centuries – perhaps most notably in the funerary mask of Tutankhamun. For a cabinet to be almost entirely covered in the material makes it an extremely rare object.
The Guardian Weekly (August 25, 2023) – The issue features ‘Fever Pitch’ – The unstoppable rise of women’s football; ‘Trust me, I’m a nurse’ – How a British child serial killer went undetected, and Art, where you least expect it…
The conviction and sentencing of Lucy Letby, who murdered seven babies while working as a hospital nurse, shocked Britain this week. As she becomes only the country’s fourth woman to receive a whole-life imprisonment term, Josh Halliday recounts her dreadful crimes and why she was not investigated for so long, despite several colleagues’ suspicions.
Sports writer Paul MacInnes reports from Jeddah on Saudi Arabia’s bid to buy up chunks of world sport using its $600bn public investment fund, a makeover project that is particularly pertinent in the light of allegations in a Human Rights Watch report this week.
Culture catches up with Devo, the new wave band from Akron, Ohio, who are hanging up their curious “energy dome” hats after 50 years. And there’s a lovely feature by Claire Armitstead about hidden art, from underwater sculpture parks to pinhole dioramas concealed inside traffic bollards.
Near misses involving U.S. commercial airlines happen on average multiple times a week, a New York Times investigation found.
American strategists say Ukraine’s troops are too spread out and need to concentrate along the counteroffensive’s main front in the south.
A mix of devastating wildfires, tropical storms, mudslides and heat waves foreshadows a future of intensified extremes as the world warms.
The former White House chief of staff, a key witness to Donald J. Trump’s efforts to remain in power after his 2020 election loss, maneuvered to provide federal prosecutors only what he had to.
Country Life Magazine – August 23, 2023: This week’s issue features the ‘Scotland special’, filled with castles, nature and 43 pages of magical dream property.
Christopher Woodward dives into the pools that keep the golden age of swimming alive
Brooding on its island cliff top, Dunvegan Castle, Isle of Skye, has been splendidly restored to glory, finds John Goodall
Vital to the water of life, whisky barrels require ancient skills. Joe Gibbs visits Speyside Cooperage to witness the magic
Small details put the finishing touch on Backhouse Rossie in Fife. Caroline Donald visits a garden redolent with history
Vientiane, the capital, is the site of the That Luang monument, where a reliquary reportedly houses the Buddha’s breastbone, plus the Patuxai war memorial and Talat Sao (Morning Market), a complex jammed with food, clothes and craft stalls.
Boomers Daily 