W. Eugene Smith was known as the pioneer of photo-journalism. The photo-essay above of Dr Ernest Ceriani, a country doctor in Colorado was widely acknowledged as an original journalistic form. One of the most vivid images shows Ceriani looking exhausted in a kitchen, having performed a Caesarian section during which both mother and baby died.…
The Arts
Books, Complex & Simple, Persons, Places, Posts, The Arts
The Genesee Diary – A Reflection on the Monastic Life by Fr Henri Nouwen (1976)
I chanced upon the Genesee Diary in a Thriftbooks store somewhere in my travels. It was owned by an ‘Anne Green’, scribbled in pencil on a discreet corner of the first page. The cover was tattered and a little worse for wear, an added attraction to a yet unread book with a strange title and…
Complex & Simple, Persons, Posts, The Arts
Discovering Ryuichi Sakamoto (1952-2023)
It seems to me that the genius of the late composer & musician Ryuichi Sakamoto was in his offerings of serenity and momentum, with subtleties of transitions, always with exquisite timing, as befitting the visual imagery and the moment. Listen to his composition Blu, commissioned for the 50th Anniversary of the Aoyama clothing company in…
Books, Complex & Simple, Persons, Posts, The Arts
“The rescue of drowning men is, then a duty worth dying for, but not worth living for” CS Lewis
That magnificent quote, from CS Lewis’ Sermon, “Learning in War-Time”, is a wonderful paradigm for our times, in this year, the year of the pandemic war.
Complex & Simple, Places, Posts, The Arts
Copenhagen – Of Rivers, Bikes, Beers and Museums
City of rivers, bikes, beers and museums. Beneath the neat and shallow archetypes, there was a real sense of tolerance for diversity than most places, and a beer can be consumed on the move in the streets (unlike in some cities). The travelers’ experiences of rivers (and riverbanks and boat-houses), bikes (and safe biking-lanes), street-side beers…
Books, Complex & Simple, Persons, Posts, The Arts
Things Fall Apart; The Centre Cannot Hold…..
“The Second Coming” Turning and turning in the widening gyreThe falcon cannot hear the falconer;Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhereThe ceremony of innocence is drowned;The best lack all conviction, while the worstAre full of passionate intensity.Surely some revelation is at hand;Surely the…
Books, Complex & Simple, Nature, Persons, Places, Posts, The Arts
Serendipitous Journey to the Hidden Church in Kyushu, Japan
Traveling through rural Japan, in the island of Kyushu, one is reminded of the fate of the Christian missionaries who were mercilessly persecuted by the then Shogunate of the Edo era. The fate of those who ministered to the Way, and their proselytes have been dramatized in the 2016 Martin Scorsese’s period portrayal of Shūsaku Endō’s…
Complex & Simple, Nature, Persons, Places, Posts, The Arts
Defining the Examined Life: The Assisi Story that spans 800 years and beyond
Ninety hours in the pilgrim town of Assisi brought me from the milieu of an interesting cultural experience, to the dissonance of attempting a meditative journey amidst the life-line and highway of a major tourist town, and thence to a more balanced reflection on the 800 years that had since passed from the austere beginnings…
Complex & Simple, Persons, Posts, The Arts
The Calling of St Matthew
The Calling of Saint Matthew is a masterpiece by Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, depicting the moment at which Jesus Christ inspires Matthew to follow him. It was completed in 1599–1600 for the Contarelli Chapel in the church of the French congregation, San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome, where it remains today. It hangs alongside two other paintings of Matthew by Caravaggio, The Martyrdom of Saint Matthew (painted…
Books, Complex & Simple, Nature, Persons, Places, The Arts
A Different Drummer
“Walking through one of the buildings where I hadn’t been before, I came across a reproduction of Hazard Durfee’s beautiful flute player with the text by Henry David Thoreau: ‘Why should we be in such desperate haste to succeed and in such desperate enterprises? If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps…