The Art of Chinese Painting - Video Summary

Hello! Right now I'm going to make a summary of a video about Chinese Painting. I have been studying Chinese for almost a year now, so I found this video about Chinese culture really interesting and pleasing to watch. I hope you enjoy it and the summary as much as I did!

Part 1/2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSszFPOX2Pc

Part 2/2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMwo_qPoZH8

Chinese culture's paintings are one of the oldest and most interesting forms of art. In many different styles, the painters of China have struggled to represent the beauty of their country's landscape through colorful or monochrome paintings. They have created an aestethic which is truly unique to these lands of China. There are lots of Chinese Paintings masterpieces at the Victoria and Albert museum, some of them so rare that they cannot be exhibited to open public. All of these paintings where so innovative that they were centuries ahead of European forms of art. 

The woman of the video went to the Gobi desert to look at some chinese paintings that had been hidden from the world for hundreds of years. In that place, there is more than a millenium of cultural history. Most of the murals are almost intact because of the use of lapiz lazuli. This is the biggest place of buddist art in the world. This technique wasn't seen in Europe until the Middle ages. In similar caves, they found tons of manuscripts, which include the oldest printed book of all. The question is, how did  Chinese painting change over time?

The answer lies in the fact that most of the paintings were done for interior decorations, and they slowly began to adapt to the different ways of court. The woman of the video shows us several paintings showing court life, the empress life style, etc. But there was a change waiting to be completed, one that would change the Chinese Art forever.

It was an emperor who brought this change. He was both artist and ruler, so he began to support artistic progress in China. It is the same way it may happen nowadays: if a president loves cinema, he will support the film industry in his country to be able to enjoy more of it. This is exactly what happened with this emperor. He built a school for painters, so the newly educated painters began to change the way the Chinese people regarded and performed art. They began depicting highly detailed scenes, specially from nature. The Chinese were now firmly on realism. 

A new social class began to rise, one of artists with power: they were known as scholar painters. Calligraphy began to become really important for Chinese people, in a way that they were almost "writing paintings". Until nowadays, chinese artists have to practice Calligraphy. In terms of aesthetics and skill, Chinise painting can not succeed without calligraphy. If you only have basic skills, you are not a true artist, you must dominate them, but that's not enough, you have to be special on your own also. The ones who master calligraphy can paint whatever pleases them. They usually paint landscapes that only exist in their minds. Scholar paintors often went to live in the mountains to reflect on the world around us.

Another important element is black ink. Most people think black ink is only black, but there are 5 different shades of black ink that may represent different things and have different meanings. They are heavy, light, dry, thirsty and white. These shades may cover all colors in nature. They also spread out landscapes to express feelings. They want you to want to look beyond the painting.

Chinese painting is maybe the most deep kind of painting. They are minimalist. They leave some place for your own imagination, for you to complete the image, for you to know or guess what's behind what is actually painted... This is what makes it so interesting.

The Believers - The Koran

Welcome back to my blog! In this case, I'm writing  about a Chapter of the Koran titled "The believers" the chapter number is 23. I'm adding a link below to the full chapter. I hope you enjoy it!

http://en.knowquran.org/koran/23/

          
         "Blessed are the believers, who are humble in their prayers; who avoid profane talk, and give alms to the destitute; who restrain their carnal desires (except with their wives and slave-girls, for these are lawful to them: transgressors are those who lust after other than these); who are true to their trusts and promises, and dilligent in their prayers. These are the heirs of the Paradise; they shall abide in it forever." 

This is the openning line of the Koran's Chapter "The Believers". When I read it, I immediately recognized the style, but didn't remember when I had read it before. A while after, I knew where I  had seen those lines ... The Bible:

          "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled." (Matthew 5:3-6)

These two texts are similar in the ways they are written, and may tell us a lot about their corresponding religions if we analyze them well. Since the one that concerns us now  is the Koran, I can say that the phrase which most surprised me is when it speaks about the restraints of carnal desires EXCEPT with their wives and their slave-girls. This speaks about the surprisingly low status of women in this religion which may be an important factor when we analyze cultures.

There are many other similarities with Christian Catholic Bible. For example, the patriarchs are all the same: Noah, Moses... and their stories are also very similar. When the Koran says "And We gave Moses the Book, so that they might be rightly guided", they are presumably speaking about the 10 commandments of the Catholic Church, which were handed to Moses by God. The Koran also makes a reference about Jesus by saying: "We made the son of Mary and his mother a sign for mankind, and gave them shelter on a peaceful hillside watered by a fresh spring". With this, the Koran recognizes Jesus as a prophet and an example to be followed by the Muslim people, instead of recognizing him as the son of God or God himself.

Another thing I noticed in the chapter I read, is the repetitive use of "We". I presume that this refers to all the Muslims, and it surprises me that the Koran is written in first person, or at least this chapter. This is maybe because the prophet Mahoma was the one who wrote most of it, which turned him into the "creator" of Islam and the muslim religion. What I don't understand is why the Koran at the beginning of the Chapter 23 says: "We created seven heavens above you/ We first created man from an essence of clay/ The germ We made a clot of blood," as if "We" were the creators, and then aknowledges god with the phrase "Blessed be God, the noblest of creators."

Hadrian's Wall

We all have heard about the great Wall of China and admire the efforts made by these people to protect themselves from other cultures that may try to harm them or invade them. Still, not as many people know about Hadrian's Wall. I found a video that speaks about it, and I'm making a small summary about what I know and learned about Hadrian's Wall. I hope you enjoy it!

Hadrian's wall was a fortification built in Roman England from coast to coast, sea to sea, to protect Roman territory from the northern barbarians. Its name is Hadrian's Wall because of the man who built it: Emperor Hadrian, who ruled from 117 to 138. This Emperor is famous for two buildings: Hadrian's Wall and Hadrian's Villa. Hadrian's Wall wasn't very big or wide, but it was still the most imposing defensive building built by the Roman Empire. Usually, their width and height depended on the material available near it, and also on the landscape. For example, when the wall went through high hills it needed not be to too tall because the cliffs provided extra protection if the wall was to be attacked. The Wall was 75 Roman miles long, and there is a big part of it that remains until today.

It's building was much similar to how we build today. Each rock used as a brick in Hadrian's Wall was handmade by masons, and each one of them took about 20 minutes; masons had to do this thousands of times. An interesting fact shown on the video is that they used tools impressively similar in shape, size and material as those we use nowadays, such as hammers and nails. Another thing that surprised me was how easily they were able to lift several ton stones with a simple grip system consisting of a hole in the rock, three stone sticks pressed against the hole and a stone handle.

But this wasn't everything that archeologists were able to find in Hadrian's wall. Because of the soil conditions it was built in, they were able to find nearly unchanged daily life items, such as leather shoes and boots decorated by artists and other items that may tell us a lot about the lifestyle of all the people who lived in Hadrian's Wall and its surroundings. Most of these settlements were found in the many forts that are all arround the wall. Each fort was heavily garrisoned by about 600 men who kept their wives and children nearby. Also, the wall had about 1000 cavarly units on each side of the wall in case it was attacked.

A few blogs before, I talked about Valyrian Language, which is found in A Song of Ice and Fire series by George R.R. Martin. I can also relate this post to the series, because Hadrian's Wall was George's inspiration for creating The Wall, a thousand feet structure that protected Westeros from the barbarians who lived in the north. The Wall also had various forts and went from sea to sea, and was garrisoned by people from all over Westeros. When I think about it, I realize that the whole Westeros is a reproduction of England, and you can see these similarities I talk about in a map.

Imaging the Iliad - Video Summary

The Iliad by Homer is a book which speaks crudely about the Trojan war, specifically about the role the Greek Hero Achilles played in that war. The following video is about a photoshooting they made of the oldest existing complete book of Homers Iliad, Venetus A. I hope you enjoy it!

Venetus A was stored in Marciana Library in Venice for around 500 years. A group of scientists, photographers and scholars decided that it was time for modern technology to tell everybody about it, to let the world see this book and people have free access to it from wherever they are. Their objective was to be able to image the whole book and upload it to the internet, but the "how" was still not completely decided.

After all, they decided that the best way of fulfilling their objective was to keep the book in a completely controlled environment, photographing each page from the same angle, and creating a 3D computer image by using a robotic arm able to "read" 3D objects and replicate them virtually. The camera they used was of the highest definition possible, and all the lighting in the room where the book was held was planned to get the best shots while not damaging the book.

They began working very slowly and they were really  careful trying to avoid  damaging  the book, but eventually they were able to gain confidence and hurry up, because at the pace they were going at first, they would never be able to finish. The temperature of the room and near the book was greatly controlled, while there was an specialist who told when the book could and when it couldn't receive light. When they were about halfway through, they discovered something extremely discouraging, a terrible mistake they had done: their fingerprints could be seen on the pages they had already imaged. They took the news very professionally, and decided that the best way to solve this problem was to use UV light on the book. They explained how UV light would be able to make the ink more readable, in a way you could see every detail of the book as if it had just been written. The specialists had to be very careful when in the room, though, so they had to wear sunscreen FPS50 and solar lens when they were inside.

After all the hard work, they got astonishing results. They created a Google Maps interface for people to zoom in and out of the different book pages, and where able to upload the complete book with  each page's 3D model. Here, you can see things you wouldn't be able to see with naked eye, such as different colors of ink used in the book (enhanced by the UV lights) and the original strokes of the letters. If you want to see the book, you can find it on the next web page, you just need to follow the instructions.

http://chs.harvard.edu/wa/pageR?tn=ArticleWrapper&bdc=12&mn=1560

"This is what happens when scholars and scientists work together."

Pliny the Younger - Latin Literature

Welcome back to my blog! Today, I'm talking about Pliny the Younger! He was a Roman lawyer, author, and Magistrate, not to be confused with his uncle Pliny the Elder. In this case, we are going to analyze some of the different personal letters he wrote. Below is the link from where I read them.

http://ancienthistory.about.com/library/bl/bl_text_plinyltrs4.htm

You may be thinking "Okay, it's just some letters, I can do that. I don't see any sense in analyzing some letters". But if you pay attention, you'll notice something about these letters: They are ALL beautifully written and have special things in common. What do I mean when I say this? Let's see.

The first letter of the web page, the one to Fabatus, is merely speaking about seeing Fabatus again. But when you read "For I cannot tell you how we long to see you, and we shall no longer delay our visit. To that end we are even now getting our luggage together, and we shall push on as fast as the state of the roads will permit" you can only think you are reading Shakespear or an author like that. You'd never think that it is just a letter sent by a normal man to his wive's grandfather.

Another thing that was able to catch my attention was in the second letter. "It is strange how people are flocking to call upon him. Every one detests and hates him, yet they run to visit him in shoals as though they both admired and loved him. To put in a nutshell what I mean, people in paying court to Regulus are copying the example he set." It's speaking about hypocrites. These people have existed since the beginning of times, and it can be shown in this letter by Pliny to Attius Clemens. It is all politics, I think: when you are in public, you have to grieve your own and others' loses, you have to show someone empathy and do everything that is expected from you, even if you despise someone on the inside.  This is something we can all see nowadays, when almost every person has two or more faces for different occasions.

This kind of writing (personal letters) can tell us a lot about how the world and life was back then. Often, when people write history books or epics, they exagerate the facts and change the way things look, as it is said, "History is written by the victor." But when we are able to find personal letters from different people, they can tell a lot about how the times really were. Still, there's obviously some feelings and thoughts that must be hidden in these letters: what would happen if it got caught? For example in the letter 23, to Pomponius Bassus, Pliny begins with: "I have been called in by our excellent Emperor to take part and advise upon the following case." I'm sure he was thinking something more similar to "The dammed Emperor wants me to do his job again..." But, of course, that is something that can't be written! God knows who might stumble upon this letter and show it to the Emperor.

I think this whole genre of writing letters or correspondence to close friends, coworkers and family is a more reliable way of knowing what was really happening, how the different strings in the government and social life worked. Even though there is some modification, as I said in the last paragraph, you don't lie to your close friends the way you can lie to the world itself. This is why Pliny the Younger's letters have much importance when we analyze Roman lifestile and Latin literature. 

As Pliny the Younger always says: Farewell.

Constructed Languages - High Valyrian

Nowadays, there are many constructed languages which may serve for different functions. Some of these languages, like Esperanto, try to create an universal language for all people, while others have entertainment purposes. For example, we have the different languages that were created for a book series, such as the ones in The Lord of The Rings by Tolkien. Now, I'm going to speak about High Valyrian, which appears in A Song of Ice and Fire Series by George. R.R. Martin, also known as Games of Thrones.

In the books and TV series, High Valyrian was the language of Valyria and the Valyrian Freehold. It is no longer widely spoken due to the Doom of Valyria, although there are songs and books still sung and read in it. In Westeros, highborn children, specifically the Targaryens, they are taught Valyrian as a sign of their noble education. Corrupted dialects known as bastard Valyrian are spoken in the Free Cities and Slaver's Bay.

It wasn't actually created by George R.R. Martin, the author of the book, but by David J. Peterson. On the books, very few words are actually written in High Valyrian, but most of the time it is mentioned that a person is speaking a Valyrian Language. For the series, they wanted the actors to speak in High Valyrian those lines, so they decided to hire someone to build the language. The chosen one was David J. Peterson.

Peterson began working with the few words that George had published on the books, the most important ones being "Valar morghulis" and "Valar dohaeris." Peterson used these two phrases, which mean "All men must die" and "all men must serve" to create the whole conjugation of the new language. There are four grammatical numbers in the sistem: singular, plural, paucal and collective. For example, with the word "Man", the nouns are "vala" (man), "vali" (men), "valun" (some men), and "valar" (all men). There are also 4 grammatical genders, but they have nothing to do with biological gender. They are lunar, solar, terrestrial and aquatic.

This is a clip of Daenerys Tragaryen speaking High Valyrian in the TV Series, on the 4th episode of the 3 season. Here is what she says in High Valyrian, you can see the English translation on the subtitles.

Dovaogēdys!

Naejot memēbātās!
Kelītīs!

Nyke Daenerys Jelmāzmo hen Targārio Lentrot, hen Valyrio Uēpo ānogar iksan.
Valyrio muño ēngos ñuhys issa.

Dovaogēdys! Āeksia ossēnātās, menti ossēnātās, qilōni pilos lue vale tolvie ossēnātās,
yn riñe dōre ōdrikātās.
Urnet luo buzdaro tolvio belma pryjātās!

...

Dracarys!

Still, this isn't how it is actualy written in Valyrian. The creator of the Language, Peterson, decided that it was not worth it building the writing system yet, since it was barely used in the series. He says that he is looking forward building a writing system similar to hieroglyphics, even though at one point in the series a woman appears writing it in Latin Alfabet. Peterson mentions it is unfortunate that George R.R. Martin chose the word "dracarys" for dragonfire, because it is based on "draco", the latin word for dragon. Still, George R.R. Martin isn't really interested on the language. When compared to the Elvish language Tolkien constructed for LOTR, George says:

"Tolkien was a philologist, and an Oxford don, and could spend decades laboriously inventing Elvish in all its detail. I, alas, am only a hardworking SF and fantasy novel, and I don't have his gift for languages. That is to say, I have not actually created a Valyrian language. The best I could do was try to sketch in each of the chief tongues of my imaginary world in broad strokes, and give them each their characteristic sounds and spellings."

Classical (Greek and Latin) Influence in Modern Art and Architecture

Hello! On this blog, I'll speak about different examples of modern art and architecture where we can find vestiges of classical Roman and Greek pieces of art. I hope you enjoy them!

The Harold Washington Library Center, Chicago, Illinois

This is the most important library of Chicago's Public Library Program. You can easily see the Greek and roman influence on the architecture of this library. It's easy to understand, because libraries are made for cult and wise people, and the Greeks and Romans are considered to be some of the wisest cultures. The most obvious vocabulary of the building is the Pediment. As you can see in the images above, the pediment (triangular shape of the ceiling) is a modern version of the one in the Parthenon: same shape, but different material. This architectural element, the pediment, is found in classical Greek temples, renaissance and neoclasical architecture, but it was originally developed by ancient Greek civilizaation. The triangular part within  of the pediment, called tympanum,was generally  decorated with reflief sculptures,
. 

"El H. Congreso de la Unión del Estado de Sinaloa," Culiacan, Sinaloa, Mexico

"El H. Congreso de la Unión del Estado de Sinaloa" is where the legislative power of this federal entity is centered. This is found in my hometown, Culiacan. It's where all the congressmen gather to see what's best for the necessities of the city and the federal entity.  As you can see, the vocabulary imitated from the Classical Roman architecture is the use of columns in the structure of the building. The place you can see in the picture above is Magna de Leptis' ruins in Libya, an important roman city in Cartage. It was constructed during the reign of augustus and Tiberius, and has many of the architectural elements of the roman architecture. We usually see these kind of imitated vocabulary in government buildings, because most of the principles of Democracy come from Ancient Greek and Rome.

"El Angel de la Independencia," México D.F., Mexico

"El Angel de la Independencia" or Independence's Angel, is a monument built in Mexico City to commemorate Mexico's independence. It consists of a 36 mts. column with a 6.7 mts bronze statue of Nike, the Greek Goddes of Victory, also called the " el Angel", located on the top of the column. The Angel has a laurel crown in her right hand, representing victory.And, in her left hand, she holds a broken chain, symbolizing freedom.   The similarity with the column of Trajan is important and visible to naked eye. Trajan's Column also represents victory, and has a human figure on top to represent it and commemorate it.

Percy Jackson and The Olympians Books and Movie

You just have to read the name to know what these books are about. "Percy Jackson and the Olympians" is a book series written by Rick Riordan which talks about what would happen if the Greek Gods were real and they followed the 'most important civilization' which is, according to him, Western (American) civilization. The whole book is about Greek Mythologie, and in it, they mention a lot of different places and buildings that have Greek influence. These  pieces of literature show us how much the Greeks have influenced our lives nowadays. The same author, Rick Riordan, also wrote another series titled "Heroes of Olympus", which not only includes Greek culture, but also Roman culture.

Oakland Stadium, Oakland, California, United States

Oakland Raiders' Home Stadium is definitely based on the Roman Coliseum. As you can see, the similitudes between these two buildings are tremendous. Still, it's not the only stadium inspired on the Roman Coliseum: almost all stadiums copy the architecture, so that more and more people are able to apreciated the show. Back then, the Coliseum was used for watching the Gladiators fight and die, but now the stadiums are used for playing sports or having concerts. You may think it's a big difference, but when you think about it, you discover it's all for entertainment, but the only difference is how people got entertained back then and how they are entertained nowadays.