Philosophisches & Literarisches SehLoft

Morris Lessmore

2012-01-27T09:09:00.002-06:00

This animation video was, earlier this week, nominated for the Oscar. It is a wonderful work about the life of a writer/reader, Morris Lessmore, who loves books and discovers a fairy house full of alive, flying books.

Enjoy it!

Life's small pleasures

2012-01-26T11:37:00.000-06:00

This morning I woke up and finished Haruki Murakami's What I talk about when I talk about running. Reading early in the morning in bed and finishing a book is one of those small pleasures of life.

I was enjoying my reading, when I found this short story on the last page:

"In the 1980s I used to jog every morning in Tokyo and often passed a very attractive young woman. We passed each other jogging for several years and got to recognize each other by sight and smile a greeting each time we passed. I never spoke to her (I'm too shy), and of course don't even know her name. But seeing her face every morning as I ran was one of life's small pleasures. Without pleasures like that, it's pretty hard to get up and go jogging every morning".

Hilary Rhoda works out in TriBeCa

Hoper

2012-01-23T05:59:00.000-06:00

Tom Firestone made a clip out of Hoper's iconic "Nighthawks". Enjoy!

How to be(come) a cool guy

2012-01-21T22:00:00.000-06:00

I think this is awesome cool. Girls find it sexy.

Flat: Table Mountain, Eisberg in Weddell Sea

2012-01-18T17:56:00.000-06:00

Shipwrecks

2012-01-16T22:03:00.000-06:00

People are talking these days about the shipwreck off to Tuscany. I was reading the memoirs of a German entrepreneur, August Santleben, who established the first international diligence between USA (Texas) and Mexico. His book begins with the story of an accident off to Galveston, in which many passengers lost their lives:

The city of Galveston, Texas, was sighted about the middle of July, 1845, after making a safe voyage of seven weeks' duration, but many of those who greeted the land of their adoption with joyful expectations were destined to a watery grave when entering the harbor. I do not know what brought about the catastrophe, but my parents, who gave me this information, said that the ship was stranded when passing through the channel leading into Galveston Bay, about half a mile from shore, where it was broken to pieces, and the wreck could be seen as late as 1885. Only thirty-five of the passengers were saved, and they were rescued by a life-boat that was sent from the shore. Among them was an infant boy, about two years of age, who was thrown to my parents after they entered the boat, by some one on the vessel, under the impression that the child belonged to our family.

There is this amazing picture by Eugenio Espino Barros. I haven't been able to gather more information, but I guess it was taken in Veracruz.

Eugenio Espino Barros

Costa Concordia (2012)

Montaigne on Women

2012-01-16T21:20:00.002-06:00

Foto: Annie Lee

Two excerpts of Michel de Montaigne's Essays on women.

On Friendship

"To compare the affection toward women unto it, although it proceed from our owne free choice, a man cannot, nor may it be placed in this ranke: Her fire, I confesse it to be more active, more fervent, and more sharpe. But it is a rash and wavering fire, waving and divers: the fire of an ague subject to fits and stints, and that hath but slender hold-fast of us."

Apology for Raymond de Sebonde

"The Mexicans esteem a low forehead a great beauty, and though they shave all other parts, they nourish hair on the forehead and increase it by art, and have great breasts in so great reputation that they affect to give their children suck over their shoulders."

And he sharply adds: "We should paint deformity so."

Female Christs

2012-01-13T07:20:00.001-06:00

Édouard Charton, Le crucifix de Combapata (1863)

Félicien Rops, La tentation de Saint Antoine (1878)

Félicien Rops, La tentation de Saint Antoine - Studie (1878)

Albert von Keller, Im Mondschein (1894)

Jeanne Mammen, Woman at cross (1908)

Frantisek Drtikol, Untitled (Crucified woman) (1913-1914)

Frantisek Drtikol, Étude de la Crucifixion (1914)

Bjorn Iooss, Christ (200?)

Sabine Picalle, Ecce Homo (2008)

Eduardo Salles, Jesús murió por tus vacaciones (2011)

Richard Avedon meets Philip Larkin

2012-01-12T14:13:00.000-06:00

In jeans and sneakers, he's not called to hide

Some slight impatience with his destiny.

- Philip Larkin

Move in one direction and look backwards. It feels really bad.

Richard Avedon, Veruschka, New York (1967)

Happiness

2012-01-11T20:43:00.000-06:00

Tom Stoddart, Sudan (1998)

In Germany I got acquainted with the concept "gute Laune Musik", which means "good mood music", i.e., music which you prefer to hear when you are in a good mood, rather than melancholic or sad, for instance, but also music which helps you improve your mood.

I take it that there is also a gute Laune architecture, painting, literature, photography, etc. For instance, this is precisely the purpose of (interior) design: to make you feel cozy at home, with the stuff you have in your hands or you live with.

Martine Franck, Untitled (1995)

A shadow on the wall, a staircase full of magazines and beautiful books, posters hanging from a hanger, a wood table, a funny post...

Enrique G de la G, Brick wall (2012)

Enrique G de la G, Stair (2012)

Gun: William Klein, Helmut Newton, Carla Bruni

2012-01-10T21:23:00.000-06:00

Anger

Coolness

Sexyness

Der Berliner Hipster

2012-01-09T12:45:00.002-06:00

Ich rauche nicht, benutze weder iPhone noch iPad, habe noch nicht On the Road gelesen, bevorzüge Bionade.

Und du?

"A Thousand Thieves", by Trixie Whitley

2012-01-06T21:44:00.000-06:00

Just awesome!

2012, the pursuit of awesomeness...

Parquet: Caillebotte, Bubley

2012-01-04T20:09:00.000-06:00

Gustave Caillebotte (1875)

Esther Bubley (?)

Two pictures, one story

2012-01-04T00:02:00.001-06:00

Where is this guy swimming, what does he want to reach? He dove in the pool in 1917, and was pictured by André Kertész.

I want to think that that it took him twenty-odd years to reach her, Nude floating, by Edward Weston (1939).

Maybe I should start making up stories based on pictures...

George Méliès & Air: "Le voyage dans la lune"

2011-12-30T23:43:00.000-06:00

In 1902, George Mélies shot the first motion picture. A version was hand colored, but it went lost. In 1993, a damaged copy was found in Barcelona, carefully restored, and presented earlier this year, with music by Air.

The whole film is available on line, though in several segments.

Some monopolists I detest

2011-12-30T00:11:00.001-06:00

Sep Blatter :: Football

Fidel Castro :: Cuban life

Carlos Slim :: Mexican life & Latin American telecommunications

Vladimir Putin :: Russian life

Marcel Reich-Raniky :: German literature

Pope :: Human behavior

Nicky Oppenheimer :: Diamonds

Wall Street :: World's Economy

Anna Wintour :: Fashion

Kikkoman :: Soy sauce for sushi

Deauville: Leonard Freed, Enrique G de la G

2011-12-28T08:37:00.000-06:00

Leonard Freed, Deauville (1964)

Enrique G de la G, Deauville: Madonna est là! (2011)

Barnett Newman, Carsten Witte

2011-12-27T19:58:00.000-06:00

Barnett Newman, Euclidian Abyss (1946-1947)

Carsten Witte

Planned obsolescence

2011-12-27T18:57:00.000-06:00

This is a very well donned documentary film (in Spanish, English, German and French) about planned obsolescence, a topic which interests me, specially when people mock at me when they learn that I still use some garment which has been around for more than 15 years, or when they learn that I am not interested in buying a car or a cell phone.

I think that the credit system is a failure, and responsible for decisive economic/ecological problems.

Do not spend the money you still do not possess. Wait, be patient.

Missing Berlin, finding Mexico

2011-12-21T10:57:00.000-06:00

Brad Downey is one good reason to miss Berlin. His spontaneous sculptures surprise you in the street, as a mimic that there is (intellectual) fun and not everything is straight.

I miss that. Perhaps the only surprise I have seen during the last six months in Mexico City was –oh, surprise– in a museum: Ron Mueck.

Foto: Sarah Chahrrour

NY dramatic crosses: Hoboken, Ground Zero

2011-12-16T22:11:00.001-06:00

Henri Cartier-Bresson, Fire in Hoboken, facing Manhattan (1947)

Cross debris at Ground Zero, Manhattan (2001)

Not just a leaf: a smile, a wing

2011-12-15T15:28:00.000-06:00

Sarah Illenberger, Fallen lip

Gregory Dryapak, Untitled

Hommage à Henri Cartier-Bresson

2011-12-14T22:04:00.001-06:00

On 11.11.2011, a big lot of images by Cartier-Bresson was put under the hammer of Christie's. Magnificent, less-known portraits, such as of Lucien Freud or Helmut Newton, and very well known images, such as this one here, shot in Mexico.

Exactly one month later, I shot a hommage to Cartier-Bresson: a pilger to Guadalupe's shrine in Mexico City.

Henri Cartier-Bresson, Mexico (1963)

Enrique G de la G, Guadalupe pilgrimage (2011)

Days with Hitler

2011-12-10T11:40:00.001-06:00

This week I have been hearing and reading about Hitler all the time. Too much.

Germans talk about him on the media all the time. But the way Mexicans talk about him is completely different: with a big ignorance and without historical sensitivity whatsoever. Mostly hurting both Jews and Germans.

Yesterday I woke up and started writing a short piece about this. Letras Libres published it on the Blog de la Redacción.

Terrible Photoshop

2011-12-08T19:11:00.001-06:00

When I moved to Mexico City some months ago, I was excited about reading again a wonderful magazine, which I had lost of sight because of living in Berlin: Gatopardo.

They react very quickly to issues and I recalled reading great pieces.

But now I am completey frustrated: the editorial work is almost unexistant, many pieces are terribly boring, the correctors seem to be terribly paid or to hate their job, and even the designers are doing a very bad work.

Check out the terrible use of Photoshop. Just two obvious examples:

1. The right side of Demián Bichir's face was blurred, as if the picture has been done with a high-contrast lens. It looks fake.

2. Even worse is the right eye of Ximena Navarrete: her eyelashes have been bulkied and her eyebrow literally goes out of her face (compare it with her left eye). It looks cheap.

I wish their job will improve next year, we need better magazines here.

Unwraping flag

2011-12-05T17:17:00.001-06:00

Alberto Schommer, Andy Warhol (1982)

Silja Magg

Helmut Newton, St. Tropez (1975)

Helmut Newton meets France

2011-11-18T17:00:00.000-06:00

How badly has been Helmut Newton inspired by French painters? An excercise...

Vlaminck

Degas

Toulouse Lautrec

Rousseau

Toulouse Lautrec

Degas

Manet

Toulouse Lautrec

Degas

Duchamp

Ingres

Toulouse Lautrec

Bonnard

Seurat

Degas

Toulouse Lautrec

Cezanne

Plus Belgium and Spain...

Magritte

Velázquez

Tap & flamenco in high heels

2011-11-18T10:47:00.001-06:00

Tabitha Simmons awesome video!

United colors of Xochimilco

2011-11-17T10:59:00.001-06:00

Lost paradise: Doré, Toledano, Montgomery

2011-11-14T02:58:00.001-06:00

Thinking about the political turmoils of this year in many Arab countries (Hosni Mubarak, Muamar Gadaffi, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali) and the economic crisis in Europe (George Papandreou, Silvio Berlusconi), I recalled Proust explaining us that "The only paradise is paradise lost".

This applies also to nasty politicians. Think of Gadaffi dying next to a pipe, by mad countrymen. Just Victor Hugo had imagined a mad Jabert trying to kill Jean Valjean in the sewer of Paris.

John Milton wrote at the end of the ninth book of Paradise Lost:

They sate them down to weep, nor onely Teares
Raind at thir Eyes, but high Winds worse within
Began to rise, high Passions, Anger, Hate,
Mistrust, Suspicion, Discord, and shook sore
Thir inward State of Mind, calm Region once
And full of Peace, now tost and turbulent–

Gustave Doré, engraving of Milton's Paradise Lost (Book IX, 1121-1126)

Philip Toledano, piece from America: The Gift Shop (2008)

Robert Montgomery (Lyon, 2011)

To revolutionize

2011-11-08T10:56:00.001-06:00

Two years ago, I went to Cuba and met some artists, which belong to a privileged class. I met Raúl Castro's grandson and attended an exclusiv party, etc.

Something quite similar happened to photographer Michael Dweck. The difference is that out of it he did a sexy book and an exhibition: Habana Libre.

Here is my, his, our story (now published by Letras Libres in Spanish)...

Arnolfini, Prokofiev, Putin

2011-11-06T17:20:00.001-06:00

This is the actualization of an old post from 2006.

Stairs: André Kertész, M. C. Escher

2011-11-04T22:45:00.001-06:00

Forks: André Kertész, Fernando Cândido (& Tomaas)

2011-11-04T22:37:00.000-06:00

André Kertész, La fourchette (1928)

Fernando Cândido, Garfos (19??)

Coda:

Tomaas, Plastic fantastic (2011?)

Full & half-closed: Manuel Álvarez Bravo, Philip-Lorca diCorcia

2011-11-01T20:59:00.003-06:00

Bikeart

2011-11-01T18:11:00.002-06:00

Marcel Duchamp, Bicycle wheel (pic: 1963)

Gabriel Orozco, Four bicycles (there is only one direction) (1994)

Robert Rauschenberg, Riding bikes (1998)

Cezary Bodzianowski, Giro d'Italia (2007)

Mark Grieve & Ilana Spector, Cyklisk (2010)

Olafur Eliasson, Inner city out (2010)

Ai Weiwei, Forever bicycles (2011)

Playlist to go to work

2011-11-01T10:24:00.003-06:00

Letras Libres has been publishing for the last four weeks Rocktubre playlists, due to October, the musical month in Mexico. It has been so successful, that the playlists will linger a few more days.

My playlist to go to the office.

Sabine Weiss, Paris (1957)

Mexico: yesterday is (still) today

2011-10-31T13:48:00.002-06:00

Antonio Caso wrote in 1924:

"Lo que arraiga [en México] es la tragedia terrible en que vivimos, en que nos movemos y somos".

Ten years later, Manuel Álvarez Bravo took this image of a worker being shot. Few things have changed since then.

Manuel Álvarez Bravo, Obrero en huelga asesinado (1934)

Google's ratio

2011-10-31T11:22:00.000-06:00

This is the algorithm which has changed our lives:

PR(A) = (1-d) + d (PR(T1)/C(T1) + . . . +PR(Tn)/C(Tn)

The paper was published in Stanford in 1999. Then, Google was founded.

The rest is dailylife...

San Ángel

2011-10-28T07:50:00.002-05:00

Colombian magazine Exclama just published a piece of mine about San Ángel, a charming neigborhood in Mexico City with cute handwork made by Indians and terrible painters. My discovery was Enrique Segarra, the last disciple of Manuel Álvarez Bravo and Gabriel Figueroa.

All pictures by Colombian photographer Sebastián Arce.

The future

2011-10-28T07:45:00.003-05:00

Lying with lions

2011-10-27T18:30:00.001-05:00

This painting by Gérôme was recently discovered in Frankfurt after many decades. It was thought that it had been destroyed. The unfinished walls of the cave are magnificent!

As I already told, earlier this year I attended an exhibition on Gérôme. Quite impressive.

Now, coincidentally, Bvlgari is mimicking the same idea with Kirsten Dunst and Rachel Weisz.

Jean-Léon Gérôme, St. Jeronimo (1874)

Lawrence Alma-Tadema, Tepidarium (1881)

Henri Rousseau, La Bohémienne endormie (1897)

Rachel Weisz for Bvlgari (2011)

Surveillance: Neighbourhood, Prison

2011-10-26T08:19:00.000-05:00

Henri Cartier-Bresson, Madrid (1933)

Anonymous, Surveillance Street Art (link)

Michael Vetter dixit

2011-10-25T11:23:00.000-05:00

Explaining in an interview that he is neither Austrian nor Mexican, Michael Vetter said:

"Me considero privilegiado, porque la no pertenencia es mi libertad. Y yo soy un adicto a la libertad."

Vivian Maier, Statue of Liberty

iPod 10

2011-10-23T11:14:00.001-05:00

Today it's the tenth birthday of iPod.

A comic by Beto Oliva: Blanca Nieves y los siete nanos.

James Whistler, André Kertész

2011-10-23T10:20:00.000-05:00

Arrangement in Grey and Black: Portrait of the Painter's Mother(1871)

Hopital de Beau: Elderly Woman in Bed (1929)

Stupidly superficial

2011-10-22T20:08:00.000-05:00

I was on the top of a building yesterday, when my friend S said: Have a look, two helicopters. I was eating my chilaquiles, so it took me a while to turn around. I saw just one.

A few minutes later, a big chaos: policemen, ambulances, helicopters... The guy in the restaurant turned on the TV: a helicopter with some politicians had fallen.

According to The Economist, Mexico is one of the countries with the highest rate of car accidents in the world. More people are killed every year due to road accidents than due to criminal violence. It sounds very stupid, and it is. But when it comes to flying machines, then it is most probably an attack. Like yesterday.

At the evening I went to the spot. Nothing! Everything was perfectly clean as if nothing had happened, there was not a single sing of an accident and people being killed, not a single candle or whatsoever, besides a pieces of wood supporting the gray wall (which by the way looked still very robust).

This is Mexico. And I hate this: today, nobody remembers what happened, the government will never investigate, superficial life goes stupidly on. What a mess!

ETA's end

2011-10-20T14:02:00.000-05:00

After almost 50 years, ETA's terror is over.

This is a triumph of peace over violence and rationality over brutality. Cheers!

And my condolences to the families and friends of the 800 victims.

Consummerism

2011-10-20T10:34:00.004-05:00

It is not only about what you (or your family) wears, what car do you drive, where do you spent holidays, but also –now– which brand of flakes you have for breakfast.

Terrible!

Covers: Sex, Women

2011-10-15T12:16:00.000-05:00

Great ideas are plain creativity, thinking, effort, observing, and a bit of inspiration. It shouldn't be matter of money or sophistication. As M used to say, "Keep it simple".

Granta's cover is just perfect, as I said recently.

magnes' is awesome. I would perhaps had designed a second cover for (non) subscribers with some curved wine bottle; otherwise it seems a little too "sexist" (to use a concept I don't really understand)... but ok, it is all about a comedy.

Someecards

2011-10-15T12:02:00.001-05:00

Someecards are the most ironic cards I know. I have been following them for some time now, and they denote a clever group of curators behind them. They are making fun of current events, of mass media, they are politically active and, above all, very creative. Non professional writers belong to the team, and their most important virtue is that they are funny, plain funny people, and a very good looking design.

Mac and video games

2011-10-08T09:35:00.002-05:00

The first time I used a computer was at my cousin's place. It was summer 1985 and it has been the very only time I visit him and we haven't talked since.

He invited me (or rather his mother) after a summer camp, and was completely excited about some stuff he wanted to show me. A computer. A Mac. I hadn't seen something like that before (I had to wait one more year for my first Atari).

It was on a big, wooded table, and he turned it on. Green stuff came out as it slowly became clear, and then there was a monkey or orangutan trying to skip obstacles to get his banana. We played the whole afternoon, and I recall myself thinking how great it is and how stupid, at the same time. But in fact it was a completely new experience, and that is --now I know-- what mattered.

I proudly belong to the last generation who grew up without internet.

This morning I watched the ad clip about the new iPhone 4S, and I had to think about the monkey and its bananas: I found myself having exactly the same reaction, both fascinating and stupid. It is an enormous achievement what Steve Jobs and this geniuses have done, but I am still healthy skeptical about it. No doubt I would become absolutely obsessed if I had such an iPhone. I will still resist.

Instead I will listen this melancholic and touching new song by Lana del Rey about video games. The clip is a masterpiece, just second after her --uff-- lips...

Munkacsi, García Hubard

2011-10-07T19:04:00.000-05:00

Cartier-Bresson's life changed when he saw this picture by Martin Munkacsi: Three Boys at Lake Tanganyka. He wrote:

"The only thing which completely was an amazement to me and brought me to photography was the work of Munkacsi. When I saw the photograph of Munkacsi of the black kids running in a wave I couldn't believe such a thing could be caught with the camera. I said damn it, I took my camera and went out into the street".

After being at the Jardin de Luxembourg in Paris, the exhibition of Paulina García Hubard (by chance, a relative of mine) is being shown now at Chapultepec, in Mexico City. One of her pictures reminds me of Munkacsi.

Be, act & think different: by your own

2011-10-05T23:27:00.001-05:00

Rouzat Zissou (1911)

Last night, while reading a text on Habermas by Egon Flaig, I bumped into a quote –describing the German Volksgeist– which immediately made it to my new favorite quote and sort of life motto:

"Nicht tun dürfen, was andere tun;

tun müssen, was die anderen nicht tun."

Roughly translated as:

"Not allowed to do, what others do; have to do, what the others do not do."

* * *

I take it that the quotation could have been done by today deceased genius, Steve Jobs, or by Jacques Henri Lartigue, who took the upper picture.

On mental slavery

2011-10-04T18:53:00.000-05:00

The French man is thinking, and reminds me of a Hellenistic sculpture. Jesus is poor but well dressed, with nice pants, which are still white and clean, despite the bleeding arms and head. And she is a third sculpture, a mix between the thinker and the martyr: she is definitely considering the hardness of life, the exhaustion of her days, and the pain of her soul.

Ironically, the film being announced next to her is "Mi pecado fue nacer" (roughly: "Being born was my sin"). The original tittle is "Band of Angels", in which Yvonne de Carlo is sold as a slave...

Better to be a slave of Thinking and Enlightenment, than a slave of Religion and Superstition. "Truth shall free you".

August Rodin, Le penseur (1902)

Manuel Álvarez Bravo, Corona de espinas (1925)

Enrique Segarra, Mi pecado fue nacer (1957)

"Letras Libres" at Coverjunkie

2011-10-01T20:21:00.002-05:00

Some weeks ago, I wrote about that great blog about magazine covers, Coverjunkie.

I am today specially happy because the new cover of the magazine I am editing, "Letras Libres", got published there.

The cover depicts a photograph by Antonio Gálvez, taken in 1969 or 1970. It is being published now for the very first time.

This was a great discovery I am proud to announce, since I got lucky and I found it while doing some research. My colleague in Madrid helped me to arrange everything, many thanks.

Horst P. Horst, Madonna

2011-09-30T20:49:00.000-05:00

Today, as I was traveling back home by bus, a Madonna video called Vogue (1990) struck my visual imagination. I had never seen it before, and I am not (that) acquainted with Madonna, but one of the last scenes reminded me absolutely of Horst P. Horst (Mainbocher Corset, 1939)

Of course, any other person had known it in advance: this Vogue video is a sort of homage to Horst P. Horst (who got upset because she gave him no credits), and many others.

The Mexican Ruins

2011-09-27T23:23:00.000-05:00

September 27, 1821:

Mexico declared itself an independent country.

Today, Mexico urgently needs international help to clean up the political class and the crime scene. Otherwise, corruption and deaths will spread.

After an earthquake in 1957, Manuel Álvarez Bravo shot the ruins of our Ángel de la Independencia, the Niké statue which commemorates the Independence from Spain.

"C'était un rendez-vous", by Claude Lelouch

2011-09-26T21:55:00.000-05:00

A very touching short film by Claude Lelouch, filmed in 1976, using a Mercedes Benz, but edited with the sound of a Ferrari.

Enjoy driving through Paris... dans le vide!

What I have, what I (don't) want

2011-09-17T18:40:00.001-05:00

M told me once: "Success is to get what you want; happiness is to love what you have".

This is my front door

These are my neighbors

These are shadows on my terrace

This is the view from my room

This is the studio I would like to have (Shoreham House),

but I won't sacrifice my happiness for it (indeed I prefer wood desks)

Working women

2011-09-16T17:59:00.000-05:00

I was shocked when I first saw the picture below of a bunch of women, very well dressed, completely happy after their shift at work. They are workers at the Manhattan project, which would later kill thousands of Japanese civilians.

Their joyful dresses reminded me of the Lumière brothers' film.

By contrast, two terrible images in Mexico: an exhausted Indian trying to sell a few eggs in a town in Guanajuato, and some prostitutes, who try to look merry at Cartier-Bresson's camera in Mexico City's downtown.

Still frame of the Lumière brothers' film La sortie de l'usine à Lyon (1895)

Female workers of the "Manhattan" atomic bomb project leaving the plant Y-12 in Tennessee (1945)

Enrique Segarra, Mi pecado fue nacer, San Miguel de Allende (1950)

Henri Cartier-Bresson, Calle Cuauhtemoczin (1964)

Matter of hue: Kimiko Yoshida, Yulia Gorodinski

2011-09-10T12:58:00.002-05:00

Two of my favorite self-portrait artists are Kimiko Yoshida and Yulia Gorodinski. While you will rather rarely see Yulia's face, you will just see Kimiko's.

Kimiko is a master on monochromatic images. Name a color, remember the most fantastic hue you have dreamed of, and there she is, presenting herself as color. It reminds me of Malevich's black and Rauschenberg's white, of Yves Klein blue, of Rothko's textures.

She can be sweet dressed as a blossoming cherry tree, or ironic when she dresses up as a Chinese-communist frontier officer. Her apparent minimalism is her strength, the strength of pure color: silver, golden, green as tea, white as a nun. Kimiko is the joy of color as we hadn't seen since van Gogh.

Yulia reminds me of William Eggleston colors and his compositions. Her hues seem to be inspired by old polaroid and by the warm light of a Tel Aviv Thursday evening, when people are drowning in joy and life seems easier than never before.

She will always look for that bit of sun that will shape up her image, without sacrificing the composition. Being still, she tries to impress some slight movement on her picture, so that your eyes do not get bored or stuck at one point. But the focus is so precisely found, that your eyes will always come back to it, namely her bared breast, a tattoo, a splash, her legs...

The most beautiful Mexican girl

2011-09-01T17:34:00.001-05:00

Diego Huerta is one of my favorite young photographers in Mexico. He did a great job last year, when hurrican Alex destroyed my hometown, Monterrey.

He now discovered the most beautiful girl in Mexico. She is a Zoque indian, from Chiapas. She posed for him -- a great challenge, since she is deaf and does not speak.

This is truly beauty. Forget about ultra-sexualised kids, such as Thylane Lena-Rose Blondeau, for God's sake!

Joan Didion dixit

2011-08-31T14:34:00.000-05:00

There certainly is what doctors call a “migraine personality,” and that personality tends to be ambitious, inward, intolerant of error, rather rigidly organized, perfectionist. “You don’t look like a migraine personality,” a doctor once said to me. “Your hair’s messy. But I suppose you’re a compulsive housekeeper.” Actually my house is kept even more negligently than my hair, but the doctor was right nonetheless: perfectionism can also take the form of spending most of a week writing and rewriting and not writing a single paragraph.

In Bed

Vespa meets Adidas

2011-08-27T08:51:00.000-05:00

Monterrey 53

2011-08-26T12:28:00.001-05:00

Yesterday, a group of criminals attacked a casino in my hometown, Monterrey: they burned it up with petrol and molotov bombs short before 4pm.

53 people were killed, ten more were injured.

Monterrey is definitely not the luckiest place on Earth, Mexico neither.

This country is a chaos, the ausence of a State is notorious. We definitely need international help to stop this, since the Government, Police and Army is deeply corrupted.

We have to stop this now.

Mr. Slim, please use your financial power somehow.

Mr. Obama, please block the traffic of arms.

Mr. Ratzinger, please do not send us more blood, not even John Paul II's: we are tired of populism.

Peace, please!

Hair: Jeanne d'Arc, Evey Hammond

2011-08-25T11:07:00.000-05:00

La passion de Jeanne d'Arc (1928)

V for Vendetta (2006)

This sosias was first seen by Damien.

Músicas de viaje

2011-08-18T23:06:00.000-05:00

I used to travel to visit my girlfriend. Picnic just published two stories about music and traveling with or to visit the girlfriend.

The piece is called Músicas de viaje, and you can read it in Spanish.

(To) Cover: show, imply

2011-08-18T11:41:00.002-05:00

I am still impressed by a powerful magazine cover from Granta for their issue on "Sex", last year.

I was looking forward to find a site with the best covers, when today ZEITmagazin discovered Coverjunkie, a great blog on the best covers. I am impressed and I love it!

Not only that: I also felt very happy because the cover of Picnic is among them. And thanks to Piu I wrote two short pieces for this issue.

The cover is to the magazine, what the eyes are to the soul. Their reflection.

And Granta's cover is definitely a masterpiece: it does not show, like Courbet did in 1866, but implies.

Seward Johnson's "Promenade"

2011-08-17T23:47:00.000-05:00

Foto by Dave Aragona

My favorite painting is Paris, temps de pluie by Caillebotte. I just learned that Seward Johnson did a bronze sculpture in 1999 based on that painting. How incredible is that!

Los vándalos gourmet

2011-08-16T14:51:00.000-05:00

Letras Libres me publica la historia de cómo los vándalos del Reino Unido irrumpieron en el restaurante de Jamie Oliver y en The Ledbury, un restaurante con dos estrellas Michelin.

¡Provecho!

Life in Coyoacán

2011-08-13T08:31:00.000-05:00

Is great.

It is in fact considered Top 5 in North America! Believe it or not!

I have the sensation of being in a small neigborhood. I started knowing the people I meet everyday: there is an old man in front of my garage, and a couple of young guys in front of my main door, they all make a living out of helping people park their cars and taking care of them; José Antonio Romero is a nice, skinny old man selling the most fantastic fruit; I go to the market and started meeting the people who work there. Two former students of mine have their law office in front of my place, I could improve my Italian or dancing skills walking a few steps.

My place was built up at the end of the 17th Century or perhaps beginning of the 18th Century, while this very room where I sleep belongs to the 19th Century. It is said that this house once belonged to Agustín de Iturbide.

I have orange trees (still small, but full of fruits!) to make my orange juice in the morning... A three-meter high bouvainvillea sticks to the walls of my terrace.

I feel cozy here, despite I still have no chairs, no table, no nothing except for the bed and internet.

Peau à peau...

50 years of the Berlin Wall

2011-08-13T08:19:00.001-05:00

50 years ago, 'they' closed Berlin and built up the Wall.

Nobody thought: Where are going to play the children. Did they?

Foto: Thomas Hoepker

What a shame!

What have we learned from this?

Potsdamer Platz

Bernauer Strasse

Are they "thinking" nowadays in North Korea, South USA, Gaza...?

Emily Dickinson meets photography

2011-08-12T19:24:00.000-05:00

Emily Dickinson wrote this pretty poem:

Water, is taught by thirst.

Land —by the Oceans passed.

Transport —by throe—

Peace —by its battles told—

Love, by Memorial Mold—

Birds, by the Snow.

Michael Jang: Beauty is taught by ugliness.

Garry Winogrand: Help by necessity.

Garry Winogrand: Charity by poverty.

Garry Winogrand: Color by whiteness.

Yuhualixqui

2011-08-12T08:29:00.000-05:00

Look at this beauty!

Yuhualixqui is the name of this small volcano, south of Mexico City. It is barely known, except for the people living around it.

Some 25 years ago, it was 40 meters taller, but the exploitation of a commercial company has systematically destroyed it.

Kiss the Bishop

2011-08-11T00:34:00.000-05:00

One evening, Borges was invited to some dinner with conspicuous and boring people. He was rather shy and preferred to stay at home with his Mom and Beppo, the cat. But there he was that evening, trying to do small talk with a boring woman, a "big fan" of his literature, bla bla bla, the usual bullshit.

Borges excused himself telling her that he had to "greet the Bishop". She understood, and he in fact went to the restrooms to take a leak. I am not sure if this was a typical saying of him, or if he used it only that time.

In any case, the misfortune was on his side. A bit later, he met the same woman again. And she was excited again of meeting Borges again: "Did you meet the Bishop?", she asked him quite glad. "Yes". "Did you remember that you have to kiss the Bishop? Not the usual handshaking"...

Borges smiled prickly, turned around and left her wondering what had she done wrong.

Rogelio Cuéllar, Borges taking a pee (1973)

"Poses", by Yolanda Domínguez

2011-08-10T07:47:00.001-05:00

A clip ("living") which criticizes the fashion world and the use and misuse of women. Nice, interesting try, but the goal is somehow not completely achieved, I think.

Mona Lisa smile!

2011-08-09T23:15:00.000-05:00

This series of tourists photographing Mona Lisa's smile is my first contribution to Tóxico Cultura Blog, by TED-fellow Gabriella Gómez-Mont (many thanx!).

Enjoy!

Eating

2011-08-08T11:00:00.000-05:00

José Martí wrote about Americans: "Such people eat quantity, we quality".

The biggest pleasure you can have in Mexico is the food. It is so tasty and different, better than anywhere else, including France (including a five star hotel I stayed in in Deauville, hélas!).

Here, my newest discovery: tacos de jícama.

Coincidences!

2011-08-04T19:59:00.001-05:00

I am sitting in my office in Coyoacán, as I have been doing the last weeks, my favorite radiostation worldwide is on: MotorFM and I am listening to the music, paying attention to what is going on in Berlin, turning it off everytime the phone rings, somebody comes in or I need to concentrate deeper.

A few minutes ago, I was ready to turn off my computer and go home. When the voice mentions a name, which sounds very familiar to me. I freeze!

I listen to the voice of this girl, but it is not her... I wait and wait, the interview is about some exhibition in Berlin, a small group of artists is present in the studio. I google the name of the other guy talking, and yes, the show is about to start tomorrow, and her name is also there.

Then the voice with her trademark accent flows from the loudspeakers direct to my ears and into my brain, and I just cannot believe it. Of all people, this voice which was recorded a few hours ago and is being sent from the opposite side of the globe.

She mentions her favorite song, some David Bowie hit, which is drilling my whole being as I am writing this very words.

What a coincidence! I just cannot believe it.

The song is over, and I am gone now.

Sometimes, internet really s/fucks!

Image: JP

Music from Alaska

2011-08-04T01:17:00.001-05:00

"Portugal. The Man" is my new favorite band. These guys come from Alaska and just released two weeks ago a great album. Stay tuned!

Way too fat

2011-08-03T12:11:00.000-05:00

The bell rang and I open the front door of my building in Coyoacán. It was not the guy about to install the internet, but a small, good looking girl, with bright green eyes and a cute orange blazer. She was visiting my neighbour, who is a designer and works for succesful actresses and models.

No idea who she was, and now by chance I bumped into a picture of her: Ivanna Rodríguez, model of San Pedro, my small town.

Ivanna lost the Miss Mexico crown to Cynthia de la Vega, another girl from our town. Cynthia has been on the news this week, since her crown has taken off, allegedly because she is "way too fat".

Judge it by yourself:

I am not acquainted with the internal politics of this issue, and I really don't care.

My concern is about the wild pressure put upon girls. We -- men -- want to be able to grasp something when we take a girl by her waist.

In Germany, the largest fashion magazine, Brigitte, stopped depicting slim models to benefit "normal" women.

I like models, a lot actually, but this argument ("way too fat") is just stupid. Or a lie. Please behave!

Something positive

2011-08-03T00:19:00.001-05:00

Campus Party, Valencia

I am aware that I have been very negative the last weeks, since I came back to Mexico. The cultural shock after so many years in Berlin is immense. I do not belong either to Mexico, nor to Germany, that's the paradox.

But not everything is terrible here: the food is perfect, I tried new fruits and have met interesting people, love the plants and the easy way of the people.

A few days ago, I visited Campus Party (saw the prettiest girl I have seen in this city, so far, a hostess) and met Salles, a young designer whose blog I started following 1.5 years ago (it is just 2 years old). He has one million readers! A really interesting guy who will shape the minds of younger generations.

Last week, I bought a mattress by phone. The person was extremely polite and efficient. I had to talk to him a few times, and everything was perfect, the service was incredible, there was not a problem thanks to him. I sent today an email to the company congratulating him, and they responded quite fast and very happy. How important it is to give positive feedback...

Cheers!

Nudos narrativos, by Salles

Gmail is becoming totalitarian

2011-07-29T01:49:00.001-05:00

We all love and depend on Google, but this absolutely-knowledge is just too much and, we have to admit it, absolutely lovely.

But the new campaign of Gmail is just totalitarian in its spirit and missionary in its motivations.

Is there something more discusting? Beware of it.

To show off or not to

2011-07-29T01:36:00.000-05:00

Recently I met two people who are extreme opposites to each other. The one is very humble and easy going, has no great wishes, is always ready to be thankful for a glass of water or your opinion or advice, has never demanded something for himself, is ready to help and show understanding. His life is not easy, he has been fighting for some time.

I met the other person just recently and for the second time in my life, but I was shocked by his strong desire to show off and give an artificial impression of himself. He was not acting as one acts among normal people, but pretending to impress in a positive way to take advantage of it. He was indiscreet, uncomfortable, asking too many questions and pretending to be funny, although he was giving me a headache.

At some point, I prefer to ignore him and turn around.

Why do people try so hard to impress other people and use a mask instead of being themselves? And why the mask of success, charm and intelligence, when you are talking to a guy who is complaining exactly about it. Maybe the first measure is to have a better control of ourselves on networks (Facebook et alia), where we are all nervous and anxious about presenting ourselves taller, thinner, smarter, funnier, more interesting and sexier than we actually are. That's the game. Play it and have fun, or detect it and retreat.

"Ein Herz für Fahrräder", by Iain Masterton

2011-07-28T11:47:00.000-05:00

El que no pedelea, no avanza...

Oscar Niemeyer dixit

2011-07-27T18:06:00.000-05:00

František Drtikol

"It is not the right angle that attracts me,
Nor the hard, inflexible straight line, man-made.
What attracts me are free and sensual curves.
The curves in my country’s mountains,
In the sinuous flow of its rivers,
In the beloved woman’s body".

As quoted by Ángel Gurría

"It is not the right angle that attracts me.
nor the straight line, tough, inflexible,
created by man.
what attracts me is the free, sensual curve.
the curve I find in the mountains of my country,
in the sinuous course of its rivers,
in the waves of the sea,
in the clouds of the sky,
in the body of the favourite woman.
Of curves is made all the universe".

As quoted by the Museum of Contemporary Art at Baia de Guanabara

Black & White

2011-07-20T14:56:00.000-05:00

Robert Mapplethorpe, White Gauze, 1984

Herb Ritts, Versace (Veiled Dress), 1990

Shame!

2011-07-20T00:46:00.000-05:00

I attended today the Mexican version of TED. It is called "Pase Usted".

I don't want to be pessimistic or negative, but I just became very depressed while being there, and left.

Pase Usted has the lowest level you can dream of: it worked today as a platform for stupid politicians who came to show us how marvelous Mexico is. Bullshit. The other part of the speakers concentrated their efforts to show us how fucked up Mexico ist. Yes, brilliant!

Where is the creativity? Where is the conversation and debate of ideas and solutions? Where is the struggle for being objective and pursue a common goal?

Nothing! There was no dialogue, just monologue, and I am fed up with this.

Mexico needs a civil society open to dialogue, debate and objective seek of common projects, not a bunch of vain and conceited speakers throwing boomerang-words in order to give false impressions and to take care of their egos.

If the organizers of "Pase Usted" represent the wealthy, educated class, I reckon there is still a veeeeeeery long path to walk before I can feel proud of being Mexican.

Today, being Mexican is for me a shame. And I miss Berlin and my German friends, where you don't need to fake who you are, what you think, where you are as you are and you say what you think, and you call "der Hammer" what you think that is awesome, and you dub "Mist!" what is a fraud. But this Catholic-Barroque-twisted way of trying to impress the others with bullshit goes on my nerves.

Why is it so hard to focus on something and work?

Lux Feininger

2011-07-19T17:50:00.000-05:00

The art of equilibrium...

The real DDR

2011-07-16T01:08:00.000-05:00

A couple of months ago I visited the Zoo in East Berlin (Tierpark). Not the popular one, with famous polar bears and millions of tourists. No. The other one, which is the largest in the world according to the surface. It is such a nice park to visit and stroll around: it is a huuuge green area in the middle of the city (a 10 minutes ride from Alex, even closer than Zoologischer Garten).

If you want to have an impression of how the DDR was, it is hard to get it in Berlin. I had heard many stories, visited many places, talk to many people. And from all this, my conclusion is: the most authentic relic of the DDR is the Tierpark: the aesthetics and, above all, the people! It is worth going there: you will travel back in time. And if it happens that you are an Ossi, you will become veeeeeeeery melancholic. I'm telling you.

As melancholic as I am now in Berlin. (You can't come back to your own people without having a cultural shock. The worst part: where are the pretty girls?!?!?)

Foto: Willy Ronis, Tierpark (1967)

Farewell to two artists

2011-07-15T23:26:00.001-05:00

These days, two artists passed away.

Cy Twombly: I never liked his paintings, but his sculptural work was for me a bit more interesting. Now that he died, I have been reading more about him (don't miss the spectacular piece by Niklas Maak on the FAZ), and it seems that he was an artists for philosophers (such as R. Barthes). For me, that means that he became even less interesting than he was already for me.

This is one of my favorite Twombly. Read the story, if you don't know it.

* * *

Zdeněk Sýkora: He was a modernist from the Czech Republic, and his work is stupendous: between Pollock, op-art and a neat Kandinsky. Look at -- admire! -- this joy and happiness.

Haben will!

2011-07-14T09:43:00.001-05:00

I would love to have such a statue at home!

This one hangs in a refurbished building from the 1920s in Prague: St. Wenceslau.

The pursue of happiness

2011-07-13T09:47:00.003-05:00

Being a maverick means being happy: freedom, challenges, you are on your own.

...

I have no credit card.

No debts.

I have no cell phone.

No stress.

I have no car.

I'm happy.

Blame me!

Logorama

2011-07-12T20:47:00.001-05:00

This awesome clip won the Oscar for best animated short last year. It is a burlesque critique to wild capitalism.

Do not miss it!

Lips

2011-07-10T09:37:00.000-05:00

By Straulino and others...

Menotti on (not using) cell phones

2011-07-08T10:56:00.003-05:00

When I told my friend TS that I am interested in not having a mobile phone, he replied to me with a beautiful football story.

Antonio Ubaldo Rattin, Boca's captain, said once that his team was loosing in La Bombonera, and the fans were very negative on the players. Rattin told Menotti: "Flaco, run, otherwise they'll kill us all". And he replied: "Since when do you have to run in order to play football?"

TS elaborated on this: "The same happens with the cell phones. People think that they are more productive, but that is not necessarily the case. It is about thinking. It is not about running, but about thinking, that's the issue".

True, true!

NY girls

2011-07-07T08:09:00.000-05:00

Street Style in New York City from TrendLand.

Timing: Love story

2011-07-06T06:01:00.000-05:00

A love story shoot with a Nokia cell phone.