eteorite impacts are getting plenty of respect these days. The public regards them as the established destroyer of dinosaurs and the possible destroyer of civilization. Increasing numbers of geoscientists are coming to appreciate the importance of meteorite impact events and the extent of their influence on the geological and biological history of Earth. However, despite the growing importance of meteorite impact phenomena in terrestrial geology, the topic is still not widely addressed in general geoscience textbooks and references. This author attempts to fill this gap and provide for geoscientists a detailed introduction and overview of impact processes, crater formation, and shock metamorphism. The book is not aimed primarily at specialists actually working in impact geology. It is intended for geoscientists of all kinds: students who want to learn about the importance of meteorite impact; professors who want to add impact information to their geoscience courses; and professional geologists who may unexpectedly encounter an impact structure in the next field area or in the next drill core. Traces of Catastrophe is intended to serve as a combination of sourcebook, laboratory manual, and reference for working geologists. The chapters are designed to be read independently, depending on the background and needs of the reader. Literature references are included to help readers explore the field further.
Traces of Catastrophe is available on line in PDF format. PDF files posted on the LPI's Web Site require the use of Adobe Acrobat Reader version 3.0 or higher. Click here if you need to upgrade.
IT IS midnight on 22 September 2012 and the skies above Manhattan are filled with a flickering curtain of colourful light. Few New Yorkers have seen the aurora this far south but their fascination is short-lived. Within a few seconds, electric bulbs dim and flicker, then become unusually bright for a fleeting moment. Then all the lights in the state go out. Within 90 seconds, the entire eastern half of the US is without power.
A year later and millions of Americans are dead and the nation's infrastructure lies in tatters. The World Bank declares America a developing nation. Europe, Scandinavia, China and Japan are also struggling to recover from the same fateful event - a violent storm, 150 million kilometres away on the surface of the sun.
It sounds ridiculous. Surely the sun couldn't create so profound a disaster on Earth. Yet an extraordinary report funded by NASA and issued by the US National Academy of Sciences (NAS) in January this year claims it could do just that.
Over the last few decades, western civilisations have busily sown the seeds of their own destruction. Our modern way of life, with its reliance on technology, has unwittingly exposed us to an extraordinary danger: plasma balls spewed from the surface of the sun could wipe out our power grids, with catastrophic consequences.
The projections of just how catastrophic make chilling reading. "We're moving closer and closer to the edge of a possible disaster," says Daniel Baker, a space weather expert based at the University of Colorado in Boulder, and chair of the NAS committee responsible for the report.
It is hard to conceive of the sun wiping out a large amount of our hard-earned progress. Nevertheless, it is possible. The surface of the sun is a roiling mass of plasma - charged high-energy particles - some of which escape the surface and travel through space as the solar wind. From time to time, that wind carries a billion-tonne glob of plasma, a fireball known as a coronal mass ejection (see "When hell comes to Earth"). If one should hit the Earth's magnetic shield, the result could be truly devastating.
The incursion of the plasma into our atmosphere causes rapid changes in the configuration of Earth's magnetic field which, in turn, induce currents in the long wires of the power grids. The grids were not built to handle this sort of direct current electricity. The greatest danger is at the step-up and step-down transformers used to convert power from its transport voltage to domestically useful voltage. The increased DC current creates strong magnetic fields that saturate a transformer's magnetic core. The result is runaway current in the transformer's copper wiring, which rapidly heats up and melts. This is exactly what happened in the Canadian province of Quebec in March 1989, and six million people spent 9 hours without electricity. But things could get much, much worse than that.
Worse than Katrina
The most serious space weather event in history happened in 1859. It is known as the Carrington event, after the British amateur astronomer Richard Carrington, who was the first to note its cause: "two patches of intensely bright and white light" emanating from a large group of sunspots. The Carrington event comprised eight days of severe space weather.
There were eyewitness accounts of stunning auroras, even at equatorial latitudes. The world's telegraph networks experienced severe disruptions, and Victorian magnetometers were driven off the scale.
Though a solar outburst could conceivably be more powerful, "we haven't found an example of anything worse than a Carrington event", says James Green, head of NASA's planetary division and an expert on the events of 1859. "From a scientific perspective, that would be the one that we'd want to survive." However, the prognosis from the NAS analysis is that, thanks to our technological prowess, many of us may not.
There are two problems to face. The first is the modern electricity grid, which is designed to operate at ever higher voltages over ever larger areas. Though this provides a more efficient way to run the electricity networks, minimising power losses and wastage through overproduction, it has made them much more vulnerable to space weather. The high-power grids act as particularly efficient antennas, channelling enormous direct currents into the power transformers.
The second problem is the grid's interdependence with the systems that support our lives: water and sewage treatment, supermarket delivery infrastructures, power station controls, financial markets and many others all rely on electricity. Put the two together, and it is clear that a repeat of the Carrington event could produce a catastrophe the likes of which the world has never seen. "It's just the opposite of how we usually think of natural disasters," says John Kappenman, a power industry analyst with the Metatech Corporation of Goleta, California, and an advisor to the NAS committee that produced the report. "Usually the less developed regions of the world are most vulnerable, not the highly sophisticated technological regions."
According to the NAS report, a severe space weather event in the US could induce ground currents that would knock out 300 key transformers within about 90 seconds, cutting off the power for more than 130 million people (see map). From that moment, the clock is ticking for America.
First to go - immediately for some people - is drinkable water. Anyone living in a high-rise apartment, where water has to be pumped to reach them, would be cut off straight away. For the rest, drinking water will still come through the taps for maybe half a day. With no electricity to pump water from reservoirs, there is no more after that.
There is simply no electrically powered transport: no trains, underground or overground. Our just-in-time culture for delivery networks may represent the pinnacle of efficiency, but it means that supermarket shelves would empty very quickly - delivery trucks could only keep running until their tanks ran out of fuel, and there is no electricity to pump any more from the underground tanks at filling stations.
Back-up generators would run at pivotal sites - but only until their fuel ran out. For hospitals, that would mean about 72 hours of running a bare-bones, essential care only, service. After that, no more modern healthcare.
72 hours of healthcare remaining
The truly shocking finding is that this whole situation would not improve for months, maybe years: melted transformer hubs cannot be repaired, only replaced. "From the surveys I've done, you might have a few spare transformers around, but installing a new one takes a well-trained crew a week or more," says Kappenman. "A major electrical utility might have one suitably trained crew, maybe two."
Within a month, then, the handful of spare transformers would be used up. The rest will have to be built to order, something that can take up to 12 months.
Even when some systems are capable of receiving power again, there is no guarantee there will be any to deliver. Almost all natural gas and fuel pipelines require electricity to operate. Coal-fired power stations usually keep reserves to last 30 days, but with no transport systems running to bring more fuel, there will be no electricity in the second month.
30 days of coal left
Nuclear power stations wouldn't fare much better. They are programmed to shut down in the event of serious grid problems and are not allowed to restart until the power grid is up and running.
With no power for heating, cooling or refrigeration systems, people could begin to die within days. There is immediate danger for those who rely on medication. Lose power to New Jersey, for instance, and you have lost a major centre of production of pharmaceuticals for the entire US. Perishable medications such as insulin will soon be in short supply. "In the US alone there are a million people with diabetes," Kappenman says. "Shut down production, distribution and storage and you put all those lives at risk in very short order."
Help is not coming any time soon, either. If it is dark from the eastern seaboard to Chicago, some affected areas are hundreds, maybe thousands of miles away from anyone who might help. And those willing to help are likely to be ill-equipped to deal with the sheer scale of the disaster. "If a Carrington event happened now, it would be like a hurricane Katrina, but 10 times worse," says Paul Kintner, a plasma physicist at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.
In reality, it would be much worse than that. Hurricane Katrina's societal and economic impact has been measured at $81 billion to $125 billion. According to the NAS report, the impact of what it terms a "severe geomagnetic storm scenario" could be as high as $2 trillion. And that's just the first year after the storm. The NAS puts the recovery time at four to 10 years. It is questionable whether the US would ever bounce back.
4-10 years to recover
"I don't think the NAS report is scaremongering," says Mike Hapgood, who chairs the European Space Agency's space weather team. Green agrees. "Scientists are conservative by nature and this group is really thoughtful," he says. "This is a fair and balanced report."
Such nightmare scenarios are not restricted to North America. High latitude nations such as Sweden and Norway have been aware for a while that, while regular views of the aurora are pretty, they are also reminders of an ever-present threat to their electricity grids. However, the trend towards installing extremely high voltage grids means that lower latitude countries are also at risk. For example, China is on the way to implementing a 1000-kilovolt electrical grid, twice the voltage of the US grid. This would be a superb conduit for space weather-induced disaster because the grid's efficiency to act as an antenna rises as the voltage between the grid and the ground increases. "China is going to discover at some point that they have a problem," Kappenman says.
Neither is Europe sufficiently prepared. Responsibility for dealing with space weather issues is "very fragmented" in Europe, says Hapgood.
Europe's electricity grids, on the other hand, are highly interconnected and extremely vulnerable to cascading failures. In 2006, the routine switch-off of a small part of Germany's grid - to let a ship pass safely under high-voltage cables - caused a cascade power failure across western Europe. In France alone, five million people were left without electricity for two hours. "These systems are so complicated we don't fully understand the effects of twiddling at one place," Hapgood says. "Most of the time it's alright, but occasionally it will get you."
The good news is that, given enough warning, the utility companies can take precautions, such as adjusting voltages and loads, and restricting transfers of energy so that sudden spikes in current don't cause cascade failures. There is still more bad news, however. Our early warning system is becoming more unreliable by the day.
By far the most important indicator of incoming space weather is NASA's Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE). The probe, launched in 1997, has a solar orbit that keeps it directly between the sun and Earth. Its uninterrupted view of the sun means it gives us continuous reports on the direction and velocity of the solar wind and other streams of charged particles that flow past its sensors. ACE can provide between 15 and 45 minutes' warning of any incoming geomagnetic storms. The power companies need about 15 minutes to prepare their systems for a critical event, so that would seem passable.
15 minutes' warning
However, observations of the sun and magnetometer readings during the Carrington event shows that the coronal mass ejection was travelling so fast it took less than 15 minutes to get from where ACE is positioned to Earth. "It arrived faster than we can do anything," Hapgood says.
There is another problem. ACE is 11 years old, and operating well beyond its planned lifespan. The onboard detectors are not as sensitive as they used to be, and there is no telling when they will finally give up the ghost. Furthermore, its sensors become saturated in the event of a really powerful solar flare. "It was built to look at average conditions rather than extremes," Baker says.
He was part of a space weather commission that three years ago warned about the problems of relying on ACE. "It's been on my mind for a long time," he says. "To not have a spare, or a strategy to replace it if and when it should fail, is rather foolish."
There is no replacement for ACE due any time soon. Other solar observation satellites, such as the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) can provide some warning, but with less detailed information and - crucially - much later. "It's quite hard to assess what the impact of losing ACE will be," Hapgood says. "We will largely lose the early warning capability."
The world will, most probably, yawn at the prospect of a devastating solar storm until it happens. Kintner says his students show a "deep indifference" when he lectures on the impact of space weather. But if policy-makers show a similar indifference in the face of the latest NAS report, it could cost tens of millions of lives, Kappenman reckons. "It could conceivably be the worst natural disaster possible," he says.
The report outlines the worst case scenario for the US. The "perfect storm" is most likely on a spring or autumn night in a year of heightened solar activity - something like 2012. Around the equinoxes, the orientation of the Earth's field to the sun makes us particularly vulnerable to a plasma strike.
What's more, at these times of year, electricity demand is relatively low because no one needs too much heating or air conditioning. With only a handful of the US grid's power stations running, the system relies on computer algorithms shunting large amounts of power around the grid and this leaves the network highly vulnerable to sudden spikes.
If ACE has failed by then, or a plasma ball flies at us too fast for any warning from ACE to reach us, the consequences could be staggering. "A really large storm could be a planetary disaster," Kappenman says.
So what should be done? No one knows yet - the report is meant to spark that conversation. Baker is worried, though, that the odds are stacked against that conversation really getting started. As the NAS report notes, it is terribly difficult to inspire people to prepare for a potential crisis that has never happened before and may not happen for decades to come. "It takes a lot of effort to educate policy-makers, and that is especially true with these low-frequency events," he says.
We should learn the lessons of hurricane Katrina, though, and realise that "unlikely" doesn't mean "won't happen". Especially when the stakes are so high. The fact is, it could come in the next three or four years - and with devastating effects. "The Carrington event happened during a mediocre, ho-hum solar cycle," Kintner says. "It came out of nowhere, so we just don't know when something like that is going to happen again."
Severe space weather events often coincide with the appearance of sunspots, which are indicators of particularly intense magnetic fields at the sun's surface.
The chaotic motion of charged particles in the upper atmosphere of the sun creates magnetic fields that writhe, twist and turn, and occasionally snap and reconfigure themselves in what is known as a "reconnection". These reconnection events are violent, and can fling out billions of tonness of plasma in a "coronal mass ejection" (CME).
If flung towards the Earth, the plasma ball will accelerate as it travels through space and its intense magnetic field will soon interact with the planet's magnetic field, the magnetosphere. Depending on the relative orientation of the two fields, several things can happen. If the fields are oriented in the same direction, they slip round one another. In the worst case scenario, though, when the field of a particularly energetic CME opposes the Earth's field, things get much more dramatic. "The Earth can't cope with the plasma," says James Green, head of NASA's planetary division. "The CME just opens up the magnetosphere like a can-opener, and matter squirts in."
The sun's activity waxes and wanes every 11 years or so, with the appearance of sunspots following the same cycle. This period isn't consistent, however. Sometimes the interval between sunspot maxima is as short as nine years, other times as long as 14 years. At the moment the sun appears calm. "We're in the equivalent of an idyllic summer's day. The sun is quiet and benign, the quietest it has been for 100 years," says Mike Hapgood, who chairs the European Space Agency's space weather team, "but it could turn the other way." The next solar maximum is expected in 2012.
Michael Brooks's latest book is 13 Things That Don't Make Sense (Profile, 2008).
In this keynote at Handheld Learning 2008 in London, David Puttnam addresses some of the institutional-structural challenges that face technology and education.
Puttnam's big picture is useful, even if somewhat familiar to those of us already in the choir. Recently, there was a thread on the Writing Program Admins list about what it would mean to envision FYC as a "born-digital" enterprise. That is, what would FYC look like if we thought of it as digital?
Clearly FYC is not and cannot be born-digital; it will have to be an immigrant. That said, I think the question must go beyond the traditional mechanism of what the individual instructor does in his/her classroom. What Puttnam points out is that the kind of shift we are looking at requires collaboration between business and education. We can build whole new technologies and applications to pursue digital composition, but we can't do that on an individual level. Despite that, this also may not function best through a top-down, institutional strategy. Large-scale collaboration of teachers, researchers, programmers, designers, students and others is also necessary. But I don't think that we can continue to foreground the atavism of the traditional classroom. We need to recognize what is truly valuable about FTF and integrate it into wherever we are going.
Puttnam also moves into a discussion of Ken Robinson and the issue of creativity. This is key as well. Because technological-educational reform isn't really about getting technology to help us better achieve the goals we have established. Instead it's about gaining a better understanding of creativity (including, but also beyond traditional artistic notions), understanding the role of emerging technology in how creativity will be developed and communicated, and building pedagogy from there.
. SATO, Michèle; PASSOS, Luiz A. Versos e reversos da diversidade. In: SIMPÓSIO SUL BRASILEIRO DE EDUCAÇÃO AMBIENTAL & II SIMPÓSIO GAÚCHO DE EDUCAÇÃO AMBIENTAL, Anais... (Conferência de abertura). Erechim: URI, 2002, p. 115-126. http://www.hortaviva.com.br/midiateca/bg_polenizando/msg_ler.asp?ID_MSG=121
A exposição apresenta obras de pintura em que a temática da paisagem vai de encontro ao contemporâneo, a representação dá lugar à evocação. Para Rita Carreiro “as viagens frequentes para conhecer e experimentar, levam a uma eventual produção artística, onde se vai encontrar e exprimir a interpretação pessoal da paisagem em si".
Paisagens conceptuais que se tornam vivas através de linhas criadoras de um forte movimento. Segundo a artista são paisagens em aberto, são “Ilhas, montanhas, horizontes, caminhos… representações de elementos que surgem como sinais, símbolos, referencias pessoais e idiossincráticas para um lugar idealizado e reflectido. O natural passa a artificial, ou fabricado, ao metamorfosear-se em registos mentais da paisagem que se materializam em representações plásticas que compõem um novo espaço. O lugar criado e intrinsecamente limitado, resulta de um processo contínuo de construção e reconstrução, mimético da constante mutação da paisagem em si.
Elementos de estruturas lineares e planos assentes numa linguagem de formas e ritmos coordenados e sobrepostos originam um espaço de paisagem simulada, de "não real", de onde emergem elementos icónicos que transportam
Ring-Around, 1999 Weißer Zement/white cement 170 x 82 x 70 cm Besitz des Künstlers/possession of the artist
Paul Wallach (b.1960 in New York), who lives in Paris, is largely known for small abstract sculptures made from fragile materials such as plaster, rusty metal or driftwood, which are never placed free-standing in open spaces, but against walls or in places rarely used to display works of art, such as the corners of rooms. The sculpture and its location creates an "interspace" - and together they form a coherent entity. This always creates a delicate mutual relationship, which the viewer is drawn into as a partner for further dialogue. In this way the basic Minimalism of the sculptures takes on a human dimension.
Paul Wallach was born in New York in 1960. After his undergraduate studies at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, he entered the Masters Program in Artisanry at Boston University. After two years in Florence, Italy, he returned to the United States, where he worked as Artist-in-Residence at the studio of American sculptor Mark Di Suvero. In 1987, he received an Individual Fellowship in the Visual Arts from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, and held his first solo exhibition at the Denise Cadé Gallery, New York in 1990. Since 1994, he has lived and worked in Paris.
Wallach’s sculptures incorporate their very surroundings, whether by projecting from the wall into the viewer’s space, or by using reflected color on the wall as an integral part of the work itself. His understated media – wood (often raw), paint, paper, metal – lend the work a simplicity that allows us to concentrate on their basic forms, relations between elements, textures, colors, and light, direct or reflected. They are contemplative works, subtle in their intricacy, yet profound in their impact.
“E se as histórias para crianças fossem de leitura obrigatória para os adultos?
Seríamos realmente capazes de aprender aquilo que há tanto tempo ensinamos?”
José Saramago
O Herói da Flor
Era uma vez um rapazinho que não sabia ler nem escrever… Vivia numa ilha encantada, tinha alegria e casas por todo o lado! Mas não havia escola, por isso tinha de arranjar alguma coisa que gostasse de fazer. Este menino chamava-se José Saramago. De facto, era conhecido como o “Letras”, pois naquela ilha era o único com imaginação para quase tudo! Uma vez, preocupado por não ter imaginação, foi até aos confins da ilha sem se preocupar com mais nada… Foi tão longe que, quando se lembrou de que estava sozinho, seguiu para onde o destino o levasse… Se já ninguém sabia dele, podia continuar a sua viagem perdida! Pelo caminho, encontrou uma flor. Era estranha, mas o mais engraçado é que chamava muito a sua atenção. Ficou um longo tempo a olhar para a pequena flor murcha e, logo depois, lembrou-se de ir buscar água ao rio. Foi um longo caminho, mas voltou para ao pé da flor num instante! Sem imaginar que poderia acontecer uma coisa tão fascinante, a flor subiu, subiu e subiu cada vez mais… A flor, naquele estado, parecia do tamanho do mundo! O sono, de repente, chegou aos olhos do pequeno rapaz, o “Letras”. A flor, para lhe agradecer, decidiu dar uma das suas pétalas para servir de cobertor durante algum tempo… Entretanto, os pais do rapaz já estavam preocupados. Deram a volta à ilha encantada, mas nada… De repente, uma porta, vinda do nada, abriu-se… Os pais, com algumas esperanças, atravessaram a porta e um pouco mais à frente encontraram o José… Finalmente em casa, José Saramago foi até ao centro da ilha ver a grande flor. Com um sorriso na cara, as pessoas que lá viviam deram um abraço ao “Letras” e todas juntas disseram: - Este é o nosso herói! Tentei cumprir a promessa de escrever esta história com outras palavras. Espero que esteja bem contada, para mais tarde escrever as minhas próprias histórias!
Welcome to Dinotopia where author and illustrator James Gurney escorts visitors—adults and children alike—to the wondrous lost island of Dinotopia, an enthralling world of art, science, exploration, and invention in which humans and dinosaurs live peacefully together.
James Gurney introduced Dinotopia in a series of illustrated books beginning in 1992, based on the journals of explorer Arthur Denison, who was shipwrecked on the island in 1862. Dinotopia also appeared as a TV miniseries in 2002.
Cinimod Studio is a cross-discipline practice based in London specializing in the fusion of architecture and lighting design. It was started by the architect Dominic Harris, whose passion for interactive art and lighting design has produced built projects now found across the international art and architecture scene.
The ongoing work of Cinimod Studio is both visually stunning and technologically advanced. A dedication to research and development ensures that the studio stays abreast of the latest technologies and fabrication techniques. The studio is currently involved in several projects in both the UK and abroad, and has designed bespoke lighting products that are now in production.
FIVE BEST IN SHOW Lindsay Seers: Extramission 6 (2008) Clever semi-fictionalised documentary about a woman who turns into a camera, then a projector. Peter Coffin: Untitled (2009) Animations projected onto works from the Tate collection — magical, especially the projection onto Thornycroft’s Teucer. Loris Gréaud: Tremors Were Forever (2008) Mesmerising minimalist sci-fi — like a set from 2001 A Space Odyssey. Charles Avery: The Islanders (2008-9) Hugely talented London-based artist who is elaborating his own allegorical fantasy world — just don’t mention Lord of the Rings. Franz Ackermann: Gateway – Getaway (2008) His best work in years: a synthesis of modern cities, geographies, designs, architectures and logos, like no other.
FIVE WORST IN SHOW Ruth Ewan: Squeezebox Jukebox (2009) Each day at 2pm, two musicians play political protest songs on it. There is a difference, I regret to inform you, between social history and art. Subodh Gupta: Line of Control (2008) A mushroom cloud made of pots and pans about Indian nuclear power. Whatever will he do next? A replica of the Eiffel Tower? Shezad Dawood: Feature (2008) Matthew Barney-esque long film which taps into too many film clichés.
Marcus Coates: The Plover’s Wing (2008) Coates takes his animal experiments to the Middle East. Olivia Plender: Machine Shall Be the Slave of Man, But We Will Not Slave for the Machine (2008) Political correctness with a degree of naivety that you only find today in the art world.
Altermodern review: 'The richest and most generous Tate Triennial yet'
Dr. Noel Gough . Professor of Outdoor and Environmental Education
Research Interests
Environmental education: environmental education has been one of my most enduring and significant research interests, as was recognised in 1997 by my being awarded the inaugural Australian Museum Allen Strom Eureka Prize for Environmental Education for 'environmental education research of a substantive nature which contributes to professional thinking and practice'. The prize citation states that it was awarded 'for research on recent cultural and philosophical movements, such as postmodernism, which has translated and applied complex social theories to theory and practice in environmental education'.
Other research interests include: internationalisation, globalisation and curriculum change; science education; narrative and other arts-based methodologies in educational inquiry; popular media culture in/and education; poststructuralist and postcolonialist analyses of curriculum.
A quoi ressemblera notre futur? Nous savons déjà qu’il ne pourra se construire dans la continuité de notre présent, car les ressources planétaires s’épuisent bien plus vite que nous ne leur laissons le temps de se régénérer. L’architecte visionnaire bruxellois Luc Schuiten estime que nous avons peut-être trop vite oublié que nous sommes avant tout des êtres biologiques installés sur une planète elle-même vivante. A travers différentes perspectives futuristes et évolutives, se construit progressivement un monde cohérent et poétique faisant appel à l’imaginaire. Les propositions originales présentées et les visions d’un avenir positif se déclinent à travers la création d’une nouvelle relation entre l’homme et son environnement naturel. Ces représentations d’un futur s’inspirant de multiples écosystèmes sont étayées par la collaboration étroite que l’artiste entretient avec les biologistes de l’association de Biomimicry Europa.
Pour un développement durable, intégré et modulaire, Luc Schuiten propose de donner corps à une utopie créatrice, basée sur une architecture qui utilise principalement les formes d’organismes vivants comme matériaux de construction. Vegetal City poursuit la réflexion entamée par Archiborescence et s’adresse aux architectes, aux urbanistes, à un vaste public préoccupé par les questions d’environnement et d’écologie et à tous ceux qui aiment son dessin poétique et son imagination créatrice. Ce livre illustre aussi l’exposition de Luc Schuiten intitulée Vegetal City qui débute au Musée du Cinquantenaire à Bruxelles en avril 2009, pour quatre mois, avant de rejoindre d’autres villes européennes.
'Contemporâneo de Moholy-Nagy, Calder chega a Paris vindo dos Estados Unidos em 1926, e baseia os seus primeiros trabalhos na construção de brinquedos. Sob o ponto de vista de Calder as qualidades predominantes de um brinquedo, como os ritmos invulgares e o efeito surpresa, poderiam ser explorados de um modo estético mais ambicioso. Através de uma consciente introdução de elementos humorísticos na elaboração da obra de arte, Calder assume uma independência das doutrinas academistas da escola surrealista, ligando-o mais directamente às correntes do dadaísmo.
A construção do seu famoso Circo em miniatura em 1926 e uma vasta série de brinquedos animados de arame, são a prova desta preocupação.Calder fez várias apresentações do seu Circo em Paris entre 1927 e 1928 que rapidamente atraíram a elite dos artistas vanguardistas. As personagens do circo, eram detentoras de um movimento que reflectia com naturalidade, os ritmos variáveis e incontroláveis do quotidiano. A teatralização das personagens do Circo correspondia directamente à teatralização da vida real. O Circo traçou os primeiros passos no desenvolvimento artístico do escultor, as suas personagens não são meros brinquedos construídos a partir de materiais pouco ortodoxos, representam formas a três dimensões desenhadas no espaço através de linhas de arame em que o fundo da figura é transparente.As criaturas animadas que constituem o circo ou os bonecos de arame suspensos, são o ponto de viragem na obra de Calder que a partir de 1930 toma um rumo diferente, com a construção daquilo que iria ser a sua obra de eleição e que aperfeiçoaria ao longo de toda a vida – o Mobile'.
Née en 1929 au Japon, Yayoi Kusama, s'embarque pour les Etats-Unis en 1957. Dès 1959 à New York, où elle fréquente des artistes avant-gardistes tels que Frank Stella et Donald Judd, elle expose sa peinture, abstraite, sans composition, souvent monochrome et répétitive jusqu'à l'obsession. Outre la mode, la réalisation de films ou l'écriture, elle aborde en parallèle la sculpture et les installations environnementales qui feront sa notoriété, en recouvrant des objets quotidiens de protubérances molles phalliques. Ces objets inclassables se multiplient en même temps que l'artiste met en œuvre des actions de rue – happenings et performances dénudées – dans les lieux symboliques de la ville tout autant que des orgies débridées dans son propre atelier. En 1973, malade, elle repart pour le Japon où elle s'enferme dans un hôpital psychiatrique qu'elle n'a plus quitté depuis. Trouvant refuge et confort, suivie par des médecins amis, elle s'y organise une vie de travail et d'écriture, à l'écoute de la ville et protégée d'elle en même temps. La reconnaissance venue dès les années 1980 et la consécration internationale des années 1990 lui confèrent désormais une place de tout premier plan dans l'histoire des avant-gardes mais aussi dans l'actualité d'aujourd'hui.
Do Éden à Babilônia, imagem poética dos jardins já rendeu muito material para o imaginário coletivo e, mais ainda, para a inspiração artística. Seja como símbolo da supremacia do conhecimento humano e de seu poder de intervenção na natureza ou como exemplo de ambientes artificiais destinados à contemplação, os jardins já serviram de inspiração para grandes nomes como Monet e Bosch. Trabalhando em um contexto muito diferente, a artista portuguesa Gabriela Albergaria chega à Bahia para participar do Programa de Residências Artísticas do Museu de Arte Moderna (MAM), instituição ligada ao Instituto do Patrimônio Artístico e Cultural (IPAC), órgão da Secretaria de Cultura.
Integrando o calendário especial de atividades da Semana Nacional dos Museus do MAM, Gabriela Albergaria ministra de 13 a 16 de maio um workshop com 20 estudantes do Colégio Ipiranga, no qual demonstra algumas das técnicas que emprega no seu trabalho de recomposição das árvores. O resultado do workshop e da residência que a artista faz até o dia 28 de maio, pode ser conferido na exposição Abracadárvore, que entra em cartaz a partir do dia 26 de junho, na Galeria 3 do MAM, à partir das 19h. Para os que ficarem mais intrigados, no dia 27 haverá ainda uma conversa com a artista.
Em um mundo acostumado a destruir a si mesmo, que tenta congregar as diferenças, as arvores de Gabriela são um verdadeiro libelo contra a brutalidade, um conjunto magnífico formado a partir da relação com o outro, a salvação pelo amálgama e da possibilidade de evolução. “Um dos meus pontos de interesse é a colonização das plantas em território adverso, como metáfora de uma idéia de desenvolvimento social e de evolução do homem.”
Formada pela Faculdade de Belas Artes da Universidade do Porto e passando por períodos de residência em Paris e Berlim, Gabriela que expôs também no Canadá e na Espanha, e que, no Brasil, é representada pela renomada Galeria Vermelho, cria, através de seus “jardins” e de seu interesse por plantas e pela botânica, trabalhos tão ricos em significado quanto o seu primeiro referente óbvio. Na verdade, nem tudo no trabalho de Gabriela são jardins, ela promove verdadeiras intervenções em árvores mortas e pedaços de madeira, recompondo sua estrutura, misturando arvores diferentes e “construindo” o que até hoje só se pode ver por obra da própria natureza. Trabalho que ela realiza em sua residência no MAM, que durante este período funcionará também como seu ateliê.
A recomposição destas árvores implica uma reinterpretação e sugere um tipo de “estética da reparação”, a idéia de tentar refazer algo que, de certa forma, foi destruído pela ação de outro (o homem ou o tempo). É um elogio da delicadeza, construído através de rudes emendas, que remetem tanto a ligação quanto a ruptura. É com este tipo de paradoxo que o observador se depara quando está em contato com o trabalho de Albergaria, uma artista que usa a própria intervenção para recompor (e reinventar) o que foi destruído pela “intervenção” de outro, algo que não se pode definir só como uma crítica à interferência humana ou apenas como uma reflexão sobre os modos fazê-la.
Outro aspecto da reflexão presente no trabalho de Gabriela diz respeito à diversidade, à importância da mistura, da hibridização ou – usando um termo mais apropriado ao objeto em questão – do enxerto. Em Portugal, Gabriela Albergaria trabalhou com árvores dos jardins tropicais, nos quais se cultivam plantas originárias das antigas colônias portuguesas, principalmente do Brasil.
A composição com o material encontrado nos jardins tropicais revela um verdadeiro mosaico da colonização e traz um novo referente para a idéia de intervenção através do trabalho desta portuguesa que usa as árvores das antigas colônias para criar beleza através da matéria morta, fala muito sobre as relações de dominação e fragilidade.
Segundo a própria Gabriela o resultado exposto em Abracadárvore (termo retirado da obra do poeta Jacques Prévert) “tenta mais uma vez refletir sobre este momento de artificialidade e de uma poética da natureza, na sua dimensão metafórica de reparação, reconstrução. E uma atenção a determinados fatores históricos, políticos e sociais”.
Colóquio Memória e Sabedoria FLUL, 9 e 10 de Dezembro de 2009
Por vezes, implicitamente, outras vezes, de uma forma claramente dita, a vocação última do conhecimento vai além da erudição e expressa-se na demanda de um saber que é também um regime de vida, uma orientação perante os outros e o mundo, enfim, uma sabedoria. Ao longo dos tempos, o que nesta demanda foi sendo visto e percebido ganhou corpo e não raramente constituiu-se em múltiplas tradições. Na possível transmissão da sabedoria, a memória, na sua faculdade qualitativa de esquecer e tornar presente, desempenha um papel activo e decisivo.
Colóquio Internacional "Aesthetics of emotion: worlds of affects, books of experience / Estética das Emoções: Mundos de Afectos, Livros de Experiência" FLUL, 26 e 27 de Outubro de 2009
O colóquio “Aesthetics of Emotion: Worlds of Affects, Books of Experience /Estética das Emoções: Mundos de Afectos, Livros de Experiência" pretende inaugurar uma linha de pesquisa que se constitua como primeira etapa de um projecto destinado a compreender e indagar o papel das emoções e dos afectos na história das sociedades ocidentais, em particular a partir das obras fundadoras de Descartes e Spinoza, tendo em conta a evolução dos padrões da vida emocional e afectiva nas esferas pública e privada da modernidade à pós-modernidade nos meios de sociabilidade e suas instituições, sem esquecer os modelos e protocolos de conhecimento científico, e os critérios de avaliação e demonstração da verdade e da autenticidade, em geral e em particular.
![[Traces of Catastrophe]](http://www.lpi.usra.edu/publications/books/CB-954/trace_ban.gif)
eteorite impacts are getting plenty of respect these days. The public regards them as the established destroyer of dinosaurs and the possible destroyer of civilization. Increasing numbers of geoscientists are coming to appreciate the importance of meteorite impact events and the extent of their influence on the geological and biological history of Earth. However, despite the growing importance of meteorite impact phenomena in terrestrial geology, the topic is still not widely addressed in general geoscience textbooks and references. This author attempts to fill this gap and provide for geoscientists a detailed introduction and overview of impact processes, crater formation, and shock metamorphism. The book is not aimed primarily at specialists actually working in impact geology. It is intended for geoscientists of all kinds: students who want to learn about the importance of meteorite impact; professors who want to add impact information to their geoscience courses; and professional geologists who may unexpectedly encounter an impact structure in the next field area or in the next drill core. Traces of Catastrophe is intended to serve as a combination of sourcebook, laboratory manual, and reference for working geologists. The chapters are designed to be read independently, depending on the background and needs of the reader. Literature references are included to help readers explore the field further. 
![[] Eduardo Kac](http://images.google.pt/imgres?imgurl=http://www.viewingspace.com/genetics_culture/pages_genetics_culture/gc_w03/kac_webarchive/gfp_bunny_page/albagreen.jpeg&imgrefurl=http://www.viewingspace.com/genetics_culture/pages_genetics_culture/gc_w03/kac_webarchive/gfp_bunny_page/gfp_bunny.htm&usg=__P5bQ2hQouNV7f8FkDSRxvgfiQWY=&h=357&w=432&sz=31&hl=pt-PT&start=1&sig2=Rf99g2rwIUp4dGaGW3QV1Q&um=1&tbnid=kB6iIQRufA1LXM:&tbnh=104&tbnw=126&prev=/images%3Fq%3Deduardo%2BKac%26hl%3Dpt-PT%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26channel%3Ds%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:pt-PT:official%26sa%3DX%26um%3D1&ei=iGjaSbCXIYaQ_Qax-LXwDA){kind=link}
![[] Pieter Brughel . Queda de Ícaro](http://images.google.pt/imgres?imgurl=http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_va89eTF6-EE/SLnB4SPnc9I/AAAAAAAAAQU/zftsl2Ht-ps/s320/Carlo%2BSaraceni.jpg&imgrefurl=http://lula-gigante.blogspot.com/2008/08/as-quedas-de-caro-anlise-de-quatro_5442.html&usg=___tBtaHa0yw1MyjrD6j_uzbTuhWU=&h=246&w=320&sz=20&hl=pt-PT&start=43&sig2=setWLx8Y8TFR4H3kwCA-rA&tbnid=w6AWGvjCfqxS1M:&tbnh=91&tbnw=118&prev=/images%3Fq%3DBrughel%2Be%2Ba%2Bqueda%2Bde%2Bicaro%26gbv%3D2%26ndsp%3D21%26hl%3Dpt-PT%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:pt-PT:official%26sa%3DN%26start%3D42&ei=qMxNSpK-Ms6D-Qapken-Aw){kind=link}