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Mishima and the Japanese Spirit
Yukio Mishima committed suicide by seppuku, a ritual also known as ´harakiri´, after writing his last novel The Decay of the Angel, which would culminate his tetralogy. It was considered as the peak of his ideology. He delivered it to his publisher and then went on to Japanese Army Headquarters, where he carried out his last action. For Mishima, the defeat of a Samurai Army which had the Emperor´s name engraved in their heart was the first sign of Japan´s decline. Precisely, Runaway horses, the in the second book from The Sea of Fertility tetralogy, the characters connect with this army to keep their spirit alive, on the fringes of the law. The influence of the West, not only due to World War II, was a symbol of corruption at the time. However, the writer keeps many contradictions, because in he was actually fascinated by Western culture. His works have a strong Western influence; his own grandmother was a member of an Aristocracy which loved European culture and Mishima himself read the work of Rilke and Oscar Wilde. Japanese Obsession In the same manner that he was obsessed with the concept of West versus East, he was preoccupied with other controversies: body versus mind and theory versus practice. In his childhood, he was indoctrinated in an Aristocratic way, which stressed the importance of the mind’s development as opposed to the body cult. When he was declared unfit for military service during the war, after lying about his health condition, he felt guilty and weak. This situation was translated into an urgent need to transform any idea in action. In...
Holy Week in Seville, an amazing spectacle
Semana Santa (Holy Week/Easter) has been one of the most important celebrations in Spain since centuries, above all in Andalusia, and if we had to choose a nerve centre, that would be Seville. Hermandades and cofradías (religious brotherhoods) spend the whole year preparing anything regarding the Holy Week in great detail. They proceed in penitence through the (many narrow) streets of the city, from their church to the Cathedral and back, taking the shortest possible route, as decreed in the rule of the ordinances by Cardenal Niño de Guevara in the 17th century. This year, Semana Santa will take place from the 28th March (Palm Sunday) until the 4th April (Easter Sunday). Most brotherhoods carry two floats: a float with a figure of Christ, representing the distinct stages of the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ and a float with a Dolorosa (Mary the Virgin in pain) under a canopy. We hope the weather will be calm, because if not, that would be the worst setback for Sevillian people. An event that attracts millions of tourists If you have planned to visit Seville during the Holy Week, you better hurry up. Seriously. Seville–like in many others Spanish cities at this time-, is jam-packed with tourists. The number of spectators may rise up to the impressing number of one million people. Take note, you’ve been warned… The most important night La Madrugá, the early morning of Good Friday is the most important moment during the Holy Week, which is when the brotherhoods of el Silencio, el Gran Poder, La Macarena, El Calvario, La Esperanza de Triana and los Gitanos...
Sound:Frame Festival, the visualisation of electronic music
Sounds odd, doesn’t it? We can visualise many things, even non-happened events -you all know how powerful imagination can be- but how the hell do we visualise music? Well, promoters of Vienna’s audiovisual sound:frame Festival not only want us to visualise music but specifically digital music. That’s what the fourth outing of the internationally established audiovisual festival is all about. Because visuals now belong to clubbing just as much as the sound. The topic for this year is “Dimensions”, and so the focus is on the audiovisual playing of three-dimensional structures. The most unusual locations It might be seem a little bit complex, at first glance, but most important thing is that if you have planned to go to this prestigious meeting –one of the most popular audiovisual festivals in the whole Europe- you won’t know what to choose among so many programmed activities. As usual, the events of sound:frame 2010 involve exhibitions, live events, performances, symposia and workshops. All of them will take place at various highly unusual locations, such as in the – also artistically speaking – highly active scene spot Pratersauna, at Fluc, in the Ottakringer Brauerei in the 16th district and in smaller galleries. In the urban space, for example on Karlsplatz, the aim is to draw attention with large façade projections. International artists will give live acts, including the Sofa Surfers, Planning to Rock, Lusine and Jack the Rapper. If you are one of those people who are expecting anxiously the arrival of Sonar Festival or Klubbers Day, you must go to this Viennese appointment. Sound:frame will change your pre-conceived idea about this city....
Rocky Horror Picture Show in Barcelona
If you have never heard of the “Rocky Horror Picture Show” cult movie and its audience participation, you are missing one of the most fun and crazy parties worldwide… So let me introduce you to the Rocky phenomenon and its presence in Barcelona. “Rocky Horror” was born in the first seventies as a british musical, parody of the classic pulp terror and science fiction movies, but adding a glam-camp touch that created an atmosphere of joy, fun and lack of inhibitions. The musical was a great success, and so in 1975 the movie version was filmed, with the presence of Susan Sarandon in her first starring role. The movie may not be a masterpiece cinematographically speaking, but it radiates imagination, humour, catchy songs, and transgression spirit. It was also the first movie to include a transvestite character, Dr. Frank´n´Furter (depicted by Tim Curry – photo above) that was not included in the movie as comic relief, as was the Hollywod habit those days, but presented as a strong and likable character inmediatly loved by the audience. The movie became a commercial failure but a cult classic, and it was projected over and over again worldwide, normally at midnight late shows in little cinemas. That was the perfect atmosphere in which a new form of movie watching could be born… The audience started to interact with what was happening on screen! Dressing like the movie characters, throwing rice in a wedding scene, talking directly to the characters, dancing during the “Time Warp” or “Sweet transvestite” songs or shooting with water guns in all directions to mimic the rainy scenes. The...
Dans Le Noir: Eating in the Dark
The best cooks in the world are constantly looking for new dishes, new combinations and they love experimenting with food. But having dinner is also about the atmosphere, right? For a romantic night out with your hubby, you’d pick a different restaurant then you would for a bachelor party. But what about eating in the dark? It’s the newest restaurant in Barcelona: Dans Le Noir. The concept is simple: the surprise menu costs €39, the a la carte menu €34. A waiter guides you to your table, where you sit down and try to discover your knife without cutting yourself. You never realise how difficult it is to drink without actually seeing your glass until you try it. Don’t worry if you have to go to the bathroom, you’ll not break your neck, since (like in kindergarten) you have to ask to the waiter to accompany you. Another advantage: when your glass of wine is empty, you can secretly drink that of your neighbour without anybody noticing! It’s not that we are scared of eating in the dark; it’s that we are a little worried about what we are going to eat. Because let’s be honest: €39 for a menu without drinks is expensive. And imagine you don’t like to food at all. The first dish tastes like wilted lettuce with sour tomatoes. Then they give you fried potatoes (drowned in oil) with a leathery steak and overcooked beans and for dessert you get a vanilla flan. But when you exit, they tell you that you had a cucumber-tomato salad with balsamic vinegar, followed by tenderloin steak with oven...
The sensitivity of the writer Stefan Zweig
I admire Stefan Zweig for his incredible masculine sensibility, for his overwhelming ability to express women´s feelings in a way that no woman could, and for his mesmerizing writing that makes you travel to the privacy of human beings in perpetual conflict with their obsessions, passions, anxieties and secrets. Zweig committed suicide in Petropolis in 1942 with his wife, after a life devoted to writing, journalism and translation of other works. He was born in Vienna (1881) and had a Jewish education. He is a classic of German literature, a great genius whose sensibility marked his whole life, all his work and all his readers. The disappointments of the war The outbreak of World War represented the end of the humanism for Zweig and at a personal level it was a moment when he fell into a deep depression. Like many artists of his generation, Zweig is deeply scarred by the atrocities in Europe, but with the support of the writer Romain Rolland, he went ahead. The inhumanity and death prevailing in Europe at the beginning of the century traumatize Zweig so much that he focuses his attention on the search of human feelings. He gets into the souls of his characters, travelling through Europe and India, he becomes friends with Sigmund Freud, he translates Baudelaire, Rimbaud, Verlaine, Keats… He wrote some poems, theatres, plays, and especially short stories such as Amok (1922), 24 Hours in the Life of a Woman (1927), Letter from an Unknown Woman (1927)… The female characters of Zweig In Zweig´s works, the action is not based on facts, but on the character’s feelings, where...
Turkish Baths, the best pleasure in Istanbul
Travelling to Istanbul and not enjoying a relaxing Turkish bath is like going to London and not trying a typical English breakfast, a sin! The Turkish baths, known as Hamams, are the quintessence of Turkey. While the pearl of the Danube collects eastern and western scents to combine them together in a unique essence, the Hamam could be the Turkish equivalent of Western spas. The Turkish bath is a place to relax, where you combine the wellness with some body treatments. Here several elements are combined: the dry heat, the moist heat, the cold, the massages and the peelings. In fact, the word Hamam means “the place that heats”. These look a lot like the former Roman baths, not only in their structure, but also in their socio-cultural function. Though now a bit of this tradition has been lost, much of the Arab social life used to be developed in the baths; moreover, it was common for the bride to celebrate her bachelor party at the Hamam. Usually in the Turkish baths men do not mix with women as in most of the Western spas. The Turkish bath is like a wet sauna, but with a closer practice of the Roman bath: one must first relax in the warm room – a room heated with hot air; then you go to an even hotter room, called hot room and then you dive into a cold pool. Then, you receive a full body wash and a massage; to finish, you access the cooling room where you take a further period of relaxation. There isn’t a limited time to enjoy the...
Armando Andrade Tudela in the MACBA Chapel
Last Thursday in the MACBA chapel an exposition of Peruvian conceptual artist Armando Andrade Tudela was inaugurated. Chus Martínez is responsible for curatorial projects of the museum. This expo opens a new challenge for the expositive space, improving a work that was specifically created to be presented in that place. This is a direct relation between the piece of art and the architectonic concept of the space. The work of the denominated artist “Without Title” (2010) includes two films of 16 mm recently produced by the artist and a piece of wall composed by a game of marks, Passe-partouts and crystals, that establishes a strange a-synchrony between form and content. All the present elements are thought to fit the image and from there constitute a figure. Thus, the image is not other than the rebellion of everything what would have to be to the margin of it instead of constituting a new image. The “alteration” of the form and the primary function of those specific objects of an artistic method investigate our relation with the images and our capacity to locate them in a context with cultural sense. The film shows one of these places where, for diverse reasons, different furniture and devices are going to stop. The accumulation of objects originates an accumulation of forms, forms that have not been thought by nature but by man and they are a part of the history of “design”, of the history of the adaptation of the form to the uses in order to create styles. The work, that will remain open until the 6 of June of 10:00 to 19:00...
The best Turkish and world cuisine in Istanbul
This year, Istanbul has been designated as European Capital of Culture, a chance to showcase its cultural life and development. So, one of the numerous activities planned for this year is the 8th International Istanbul Gastronomy Festival that will be held between the dates 18-21st of March. If many of you are already well familiar with this festival, then you know that professional chefs and gastronomy fans will meet once again where the continents meet history. As the spring season starts to show the beauty of lovely Istanbul, we guarantee you that you will enjoy being here. Foods from around the world will meet Turkish cuisine at the Tuyap Istanbul Exhibition Palace during four days. A competition to choose the best chef In fact, this is about a competition. International chefs will compete against top Turkish cooks, providing visitors with a good opportunity to discover new culinary pleasures. One of the goals of this convention is to affiliate Turkish chefs with the best of those around the globe and allow an exchange of knowledge of the profession that will result in personal growth and achievement. The chef who comes out winner of the competition will not only receive medals as a reward, but will also receive internationally accredited certificates. Are you gonna miss this chance to savour delicious cuisine? Just taking a walk through the exhibition site perceiving dishes’ scent must be a delight for senses. Yummy! Imagine yourself tasting dolmaks (vine leaves cooked with olive oil and stuffed with a rice-spice mixture, meat or vegetables), the famous Turkish pizza or Lahmacun and as a dessert a delicious baklava,...
