Log24

"I am trying to introduce a narrative,
something magical and seductive…."

— Oslo artist Josefine Lyche, translated
from the Norwegian by Google

Perhaps something like Arcade Fire or
Taylor Swift? (Click links for related posts.)

Or: Debriefing Josefine

From the CV of Oslo artist Josefine Lyche:

Selected Collections/ Public Commissions:
2016 Jarfjord Grensevaktstasjon,
Jarfjord/Kirkenes, NO (upcoming) 

From an Amazon.com customer review of a book on
northern Norway in World War II, Fire and Ice —

"… Hunt doesn't take sides. He approaches
the story as a journalist and documentary maker,
rather than as an academic."

The book, as the author notes, was published in Britain
on October 6, 2014.

A synchronicity check of the publication date yields 
a variation on the "Fire and Ice" theme —

____________________________

"Jeg prøver å innføre et narrativ, noe magisk og forførende,
samt erstatte den iboende materialistiske logikken med
esoterisk kosmologi og symbolikk." — Josefine Lyche

See Instantia Crucis and Josefine Lyche's
One-Night-Only exhibition in Oslo Jan. 5.

JOSEFINE LYCHE
ABSOLUTE ALT. VOL. 2
17. april – 23. mai [2015] —

"I kjernen av mitt arbeid er en pågående
utforskning av esoteriske konsepter…."

"At the core of my work is an ongoing
exploration of esoteric concepts…."

See also 
http://issuu.com/tmrk/docs/spritenkunsthall_2015_cut .

Related material:  Hard Core.

This post is a sequel to Pythagorean Selfie (Sept. 30, 2014)
and October Nine: Lyche at Bodø.

Today’s Instagram photos from Josefine Lyche, still at Bodø:

The figure at left appears to be diving. This suggests a review of posts on
the late film director Tony Scott.

(The phrase is from Don DeLillo and Josefine Lyche.)

See “Complex Grid.”

See as well Bill O’Reilly’s remark, “Do not be a coxcomb,”
and an artist‘s self-portrait:

Grid Designer

Ben Brantley in The New York Times  today on a Broadway opening:

“As Christopher navigates his way through an increasingly
unfamiliar landscape, both physical and emotional, the arcs
of his adventures are drawn into being.

So are the shards of sensory overload.”

Arc — See a search for Line at Infinity:

Shard — See Shard and Pythagorean Selfie:

Related material:

Here “Lucifer’s temple” refers to Josefine Lyche’s Lynx 760 gallery in Oslo.

Recommended reading for Josefine Lyche:

See also Ayn Sof (Jan. 7, 2011).

To thine own selfie be true .

* Title suggested by The Tiffany Puzzle (Dec. 7, 2010).

“Robust and compact, conforming to international standards,
the Altivar 08 is a universal product.”

“. . . the bottom line of the grid is a naked and determined materialism.”

— Rosalind Krauss, quoted by Josefine Lyche

See also http://www.dailymotion.com/video/
x164rmi_britt-ekland-nude-wicker-man-1973_people.

“Paradigm Talent Agency are supporting with casting.

Emperor  is described as a look at a debauched world
of wealth, sex, manipulation and treason.”

— The Hollywood Reporter : “Cannes: Adrien Brody
to play Charles V in Lee Tamahori‘s ‘Emperor,'”
2:54 AM PST May 19, 2014, by Scott Roxborough

Related material from Santa Cruz, California:

“On or about or between 11/22/2013 and 11/24/2013….”

Related material from this journal:

“Fiction,” a post of St. Cecilia’s Day, 11/22/2013.

See, too, yesterday’s noon post “Nowhere” and
the April 27-28, 2013, posts tagged Around the Clock.

“Even paranoids have real enemies.”

— Attributed to Delmore Schwartz

“There is a difference as to whether you are describing paranoia
or whether you in fact are paranoid yourself.”

— The late Frank Schirrmacher,  dw.de , July 2, 2013.

Schirrmacher reportedly died on Thursday, June 12, 2014.
See that date in this journal.

Paranoia is, of course, a fertile field for politicians and filmmakers:

Related material in this journal:

I, Frankenstein (May 15, 2014) and, for the Eckhart film “Erased,”
Hour of the Wolf (Nov. 9, 2006).

“The yarns of seamen have a direct simplicity, the whole meaning
of which lies within the shell of a cracked nut. But Marlow was not
typical (if his propensity to spin yarns be excepted), and to him the
meaning of an episode was not inside like a kernel but outside,
enveloping the tale which brought it out only as a glow brings out a
haze, in the likeness of one of these misty halos that sometimes
are made visible by the spectral illumination of moonshine.”

— Joseph Conrad in Heart of Darkness

Photo of full moon over Oslo last night by Josefine Lyche:

A scene from my film viewing last night:

Some background (click to enlarge):

Note:

The “I, Frankenstein” scene above should not be interpreted as
a carrying of Martin Gardner through a lyche gate.  Gardner
is, rather, symbolized by the asterisk in the first image from
the above Google search.

See last night’s pentagram photo and a post from May 13, 2012.

That post links to a little-known video of a 1972 film.
A speech from the film was used by Oslo artist Josefine Lyche as a
voice-over in her  2011 golden-ratio video (with pentagrams) that she
exhibited along with a large, wall-filling copy of some of my own work.
The speech (see video below) is clearly nonsense.

The patterns* Lyche copied are not.

“Who are you, anyway?” 

— Question at 00:41 of 15:00, Rainbow Bridge (Part 5 of 9)
at YouTube, addressed to Baron Bingen as “Mr. Rabbit”

* Patterns exhibited again later, apparently without the Lyche pentagram video.
It turns out, by the way, that Lyche created that video by superimposing
audio from the above “Rainbow Bridge” film onto a section of Disney’s 1959
“Donald in Mathmagic Land” (see 7:17 to 8:57 of the 27:33 Disney video).

The title is that of a short story in Dubliners , by James Joyce.
See in that story the phrase “Grey-green eyes.”

See also the tag #greygreengrids on an Oslo artist’s photo today.

Some background for a recent photo
by Josefine Lyche:

The Boys from Uruguay and Witch Ball.

The photo:

Two timely images for Oslo artist Josefine Lyche —

Backstory:  Searches for “Blazing World” and for “Josefine + Lyche + Pink”
in this journal.

The image above is by a man, Brian Stauffer. Related material:

An image from today’s NY Times Sunday Book Review —

This  image is by a non-man, Kelsey Dake.

The first image above, since it combines Lyche’s enthusiasm for the color
pink and (apparently) for fishnet stockings, seems to me the better picture,
despite its prurient nature.

(Updated through 10 AM ET)

“The name Siri is Norwegian, meaning
‘beautiful woman who leads you to victory.'”

I prefer Josefine.

For Oslo artist Josefine Lyche, who sometimes
seems to think my work resembles that of the
deranged Anthony Hopkins in the film of David
Auburn's play "Proof."

See another artist's images of Hopkins-like work
I just discovered online —

"The Proof," by David Colosi.

From the New York Times  obituary of philanthropist
Fred Kavli, who died on Thursday, November 21—

” In 2005, when Mr. Kavli announced that
he planned to start the prizes, he recalled
skiing in the Norwegian mountains as a boy.

‘At times,’ he told a gathering in New York,
‘the whole sky was aflame with the Northern Lights
shifting and dancing across the sky down to the
white-clad mountaintops. In the stillness and
loneliness of the white mountains, I pondered the
universe, the planet, nature and the wonders of
man. I’m still pondering.’ “

“And we may see the meadow in December, icy white
and crystalline….” — Johnny Mercer, lyrics to Lionel
Hampton and Sonny Burke’s “Midnight Sun”

* Lyche

Some backstory for this post's title—

• Last evening's post
• Mrozek and Stoppard
• Vril Chick 
• Stoppard and Lyche
• Iron Sky.

A post from the day of Mrozek's death may also be relevant—

I have a nightmare.

You say goodbye, I say …

A YouTube video uploaded on March 2, 2012—

This  journal on the date of the above video's uploading— March 2, 2012:

"…des carreaux mi-partis de deux couleurs par une ligne diagonale…."

See also Josefine Lyche in Vril Chick and Bowling in Diagon Alley.

Here is the link to an MIT Scratch project from the above comment.

See also a comment by a Random Norwegian Dude:

For related art, see 
"4D AMBASSADOR (HYPERCUBE)" for Steven H. Cullinane
by the Norwegian artist Josefine Lyche.

This post was suggested by today's previous post,
"Bali High Chair," that links to an empty chair award for
evangelical supporters of Mitt Romney, by Bauhaus style,
and by the example of Norwegian  design shown below—

(Happy Frigg's Day to Josefine Lyche.)

Barry Schwabsky in The Nation  on October 16, 2012:

"… sculpture is the most inconvenient of the fine arts.
Tedious physical labor is often involved in its making—
not necessarily the artist’s, but still, someone’s."

Happy Frigg's Day to Josefine Lyche.

A non-Lyche* gate—

Part of the Andrew Amesbury series Archway to Highgate.

* See Lyche gate  in this journal.

Happy feast of Saints Peter and Paul.

An earlier verse in 1 John—

1 John 1:5 "This then is the message
which we have heard of him,
and declare unto you, that God is light,
and in him is no darkness at all."

Catechism from a different cult—

"Who are you, anyway?" 

— Question at 00:41 of 15:01,
Rainbow Bridge (Part 5 of 9) at YouTube

See also the video accompanying artist Josefine Lyche's version
of the 2×2 case of the diamond theorem.

* Title of a Robert Stone novel

A Parting Glance

(See also Josefine Lyche, Lens Flare.)

"These lowbrow, popular cultural references bring the possibilities
of interpretation down to an everyday level, forcing us to acknowledge
that not every painting that looks like a splatter is necessarily a
homage/anti-homage to Jackson Pollock."

— Stina Högqvist, review of the art of Josefine Lyche

(Not  necessarily for Rainbow People )

About the artist—

(The title is a nod to Peter Woit's recent post "Nothingness Smackdown.")

"To wrestle new mediums to the mat of specificity has been a preoccupation of mine since the inception of October , the magazine I founded in 1976 with Annette Michelson, the first issue of which carried my essay 'Video and Narcissism' which attempts to tie the essence of video to the spectacular nature of mirrors."

— Rosalind Krauss, 2008, introduction to Perpetual Inventory  (MIT Press, 2010)

Related material— The video art and mirror art of Josefine Lyche.

See also Krauss's essay on video in Perpetual Inventory—  "Video: The Aesthetics of Narcissism" (first published as "Video and Narcissism," October , no. 1 (Spring 1976))—

"In The Language of the Self , Lacan begins by characterizing the space of the therapeutic transaction as an extraordinary void created by the silence of the analyst. Into this void the patient projects the monologue of his own recitation, which Lacan calls 'the monumental construct of his narcissism.'"

— and related remarks on October  and the void quoted here March 10 in "Boo Boo Boo."

From "The Talented," a post of April 26, 2011—

And for Josefine Lyche—

Unity in Multiplicity —

Pink  in Wikipedia

(Continued from Big Art , 1 PM EST yesterday)

In related news…

Ralph McQuarrie, who designed the Star Wars  trilogy, died yesterday.

See also Haunting Time.

For Women's History Month—

The Beam of Pink Light

From a post linked to on Lyxe's upload date, Feb. 6, 2012—

“… with primitives the beginnings of art, science, and religion
coalesce in the undifferentiated chaos of the magical mentality….”

— Carl G. Jung, “On the Relation of Analytical Psychology to Poetry,”
     Collected Works, Vol. 15, The Spirit in Man, Art, and Literature,
     Princeton University Press, 1966, excerpted in
    Twentieth Century Theories of Art, edited by James M. Thompson.

See also the NY Lottery for St. Luke's Day, 2011, publication date
of the new edition of Philip K. Dick's VALIS  quoted above.

For those who think "right-brain" means something—

• Josefine Lyche's new "Grids, You Say?,"
• an image search on Argyle, and
• the Hollywood Argyles.

For Fischer's fellow database enthusiast Codd, see Cross-Referenced (April 24, 2003).

For Birtel's fellow pseudoscience enthusiast Frank Tipler, see the artist's comment linked to in Romancing the Omega (April 19, 2011)—

"Omega Point" is a term used by mathematical physicist Frank Tipler for what he maintains is the ultimate fate of the universe required by the laws of physics."

— Josefine Lyche, 2009

(Continued from June 21)

Footnote to a new web page from the European Culture Congress—

Photo credit: Josefine Lyche, “The 2×2 Case (Diamond Theorem)
after Steven H. Cullinane”, 450 x 650 cm,
Tromsø Kunstforening, 2010, image courtesy: the artist.

Part I— A Naples, Florida obituary for artist Robert Vickrey, who died Sunday.
            (See also this evening's earlier post Soul Art.)

Part II— "Stairway to Heaven," by Vickrey

Part III— Definition of "cornette"

Part IV— Recent photo of artist Josefine Lyche

A Story in Pictures

Errol Morris in The New York Times  on March 9—

"If everything is incommensurable, then everything is seen through the lens of the present, the lens of now ."

"Borges concluded by quoting Chesterton, 'there is nothing more frightening than a labyrinth that has no center.' [72]"

Now Lens—

Uncertified Copy—

Del Toro—

Plato's Diamond—

Portrait of an Artist—

Meanwhile, back at the Times—

"…the farther back we manage to wiggle
 the more we need the loan of a lens…." —Finnegans Wake

For some background on the lens below, see the sermon on February 20th, 2011.

Finnegans Wake –

“The quad gospellers may own the targum but any of the Zingari shoolerim
 may pick a peck of kindlings yet from the sack of auld hensyne.”

The above "Zingari shoolerim" passage was quoted here in Frame Tales (November 10th, 2008).

That post concerned the Heinrich Zimmer tale "The King and the Corpse." Some related material—

And I'd  like to thank the heroine of Finale —

*  The title refers to a 2009 sculpture by Lyche —

   For a related shape, see today's noon post.

A Theory of Pure Design

by Denman Waldo Ross

Lecturer on the Theory of Design
in Harvard University

Boston and New York
Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1907

PREFACE

"My purpose in this book is to elucidate, so far as I can, the
principles which underlie the practice of drawing and painting
as a Fine Art.  Art is generally regarded as the expression of
feelings and emotions which have no explanation except per-
haps in such a word as inspiration , which is expletive rather
than explanatory.  Art is regarded as the one activity of man
which has no scientific basis, and the appreciation of Art is
said to be a matter of taste in which no two persons can be
expected to agree.  It is my purpose in this book to show how,
in the practice of Art, as in all other practices, we use certain
terms and follow certain principles.  Being defined and ex-
plained, these terms and principles may be known and under-
stood by everybody.  They are, so to speak, the form of the
language.

While an understanding of the terms and principles of Art
will not, in itself, enable any one to produce important works,
such works are not produced without it.  It must be understood,
however, that the understanding of terms and principles
is not, necessarily, an understanding in words.  It may lie in
technical processes and in visual images and may never rise,
or shall I say fall, to any formulation in words, either spoken
or written."

_________________________________________________

One of Ross's protégés, Jack Levine, died yesterday at 95. He
is said to have remarked, "I want to paint with the dead ones."

Related material: This journal on the day of Levine's death
and on the day of Martin Gardner's death.

The latter post has an image illustrating Ross's remarks on
formulations in words—
 

For further details, see Finale, Darkness Visible, and Packed.

On Misplaced Concreteness—

An excerpt from China and Vietnam: The Politics of Asymmetry, by Brantly Womack (Cambridge U. Press, 2006)—

The book is intended to be a contribution to the general theory of international relations as well as to the understanding of China and Vietnam, but I give greater priority to “the case” rather than to the theory. This is a deliberate methodological decision. As John Gerring has argued, case studies are especially appropriate when exploring new causal mechanisms.²  I would argue more broadly that the “case” is the reality to which the theory is secondary. In international relations theory, “realism” is often contrasted to “idealism,” but surely a more basic and appropriate meaning of “realism” is to give priority to reality rather than to theory. The philosopher Alfred North Whitehead defined the Fallacy of Misplaced Concreteness as “neglecting the degree of abstraction involved when an actual entity is considered merely so far as it exemplifies certain categories of thought.”³ In effect, the concept is taken as the concrete reality, and actual reality is reduced to a mere appendage of data. Misplaced Concreteness may well be the cardinal sin of modern social science. It is certainly pandemic in international relations theory, where a serious consideration of the complexities of real political situations is often dismissed as mere “area studies.” Like the Greek god Anteus who was sustained by touching his Mother Earth, theory is challenged and rejuvenated by planting its feet in thick reality.

² John Gerring, "What Is a Case Study and What Is It Good For?"
   American Political Science Review  98:2 (May 2004), pp. 341-54
³ Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality
   (New York: Harper, 1929), p. 11

Remarks—

"Whitehead defined the Fallacy of Misplaced Concreteness…."

The phrase "misplaced concreteness" occurs in the title of a part of an exhibition, "Theme and Variations," by artist Josefine Lyche (Oslo, 2009). I do not know what Lyche had in mind when she used the phrase. A search for possible meanings yielded the above passage.

"In international relations theory, “realism” is often contrasted to “idealism….”

For a more poetic look at "realism" and "idealism" and international relations theory, see Midsummer Eve's Dream.

"Greater East Asia" (大東亜, Dai-tō-a)
was a Japanese term
(banned during the post-war Occupation)
referring to Far East Asia. —Wikipedia

Related historical remarks from Wikipedia—

"From the Japanese point of view, one common principal reason stood behind both forming the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere and initiating war with the Allies: Chinese markets. Japan wanted their 'paramount relations' in regard to Chinese markets acknowledged by the U.S. government. The U.S., recognizing the abundance of potential wealth in these markets, refused to let the Japanese have an advantage in selling to China."

"Shine on, shine on,
there is work to be done
in the dark before the dawn."

— Daisy May Erlewine

"The exhibition title Theme and Variations
hints at the analytical-intellectual undertone
Josefine Lyche takes this time, but
not without humorous touches."

For Memorial Day Weekend:

Finn, again!

See also Time and Chance: Log24 Posts of Oct. 24, 2006*, which include a link to the work of Msgr.^✝ Robert Sokolowski of the Catholic University of America.

_{* For the connection between Finnegans Wake  and the date October 24, 2006, see Polyglot Joyce, p. 223, and Phrase Finder.}

_{^✝ From the posts of Saturday, May 22— "The Lyche Gate was the covered gateway at the entrance of the church yard, where the corpse was rested until the priest issued from the church to meet the procession."}

_{— Ancient English Ecclesiastical Architecture, by Frank Wills, published by Stanford and Swords, 1850}

The weekend's posts in this journal coincided,
more or less, with the finale of the TV series "Lost."
Recalling each story brings to mind
the subtitle of Heinrich Zimmer's classic
  The King and the Corpse —

Tales of the Soul's Conquest of Evil.

Here, in the spirit of "The Fifth Element," is a
brief graphic summary of such a conquest—

The Soul

(Click for details)

Evil

(from Saturday morning)