The British Museum

The American Scene : Prints from Hopper to Pollock
Until 7 September 2008

The exhibition is on view in Room 90/ Free




The American Scene features around 150 outstanding prints by 74 leading modern American artists, including George Bellows, Edward Hopper, Grant Wood, Josef Albers, Alexander Calder, Louise Bourgeois and Jackson Pollock.

The Fifth Column: Artist: Hugo Gellert, 1943,
Colour Screenprint.
Copyright: Courtesy of the Mary Ryan Gallery, New York

The first half of the 20th century was a period of great change in America, and this exhibition examines American society and culture through the prints produced by some of the most important artists of the time.

The exhibition begins with John Sloan's Ashcan School etchings of everyday urban experience in the 1900s and concludes with Jackson Pollock and the triumph of abstract expressionism in the 1950s.

Hitch-hiker; 1937. Artist: Robert Gwathmey.
Colour screenprint.
Copyright DACS 2008

Share Croppers; 1944. Artist: Robert Gwathmey.
Colour screenprint.
Copyright DACS 2008

Combo: Artist: James McConnell, 1951
Colour Screenprint.

Many of the images in the intervening period explore the changing urban landscape of New York, the onset of the Depression, the romanticised visions of the American heartlands by the Regionalists, the response to the rise of Fascism in Europe and America’s entry into the Second World War.

All the works come from the British Museum’s own American print collection, which is the most comprehensive outside the United States covering this period.

© Text Courtesy he British Museum
© Photos. All rights reserved. Any use strictly is prohibited

Links

• The British Museum
• American Late: Independence Day at the British Museum

Espaces Arts & Objets Swiss Art Gallery

Disclaimer & Copyright

Yep, that is his ship, so close you can see the puffle! He is probably going to be here by Friday.

ESPN Hockey Talker-Aboutter Barry Melrose was officially introduced as head coach of the Tampa Bay Lightning yesterday. MYFO did not, in fact, manage to land an interview with Coach Melrose following the press conference, but if we had, it might have gone uhhhhhhlittttle somethingggg.......... liiiiiike this:

MYFO: Do you believe the Capitals are the team to beat in the Southeast?

BARRY MELROSE: I believe Alexander Ovechkin is the most dynamic player in the National Hockey League right now. He scores goals, he delivers big hits. But also, the Capitals have some talent with Semin and Green, they're a very good young hockey team.

Do you think Carolina can bounce back and be the force they were two years ago during their Cup run?

I believe Rod Brind'Amour is the best two-way player in the National Hockey League right now. Once he gets healthy, his leadership should be a huge boost for those guys, Cole, Staal, Justin Williams, young Cam Ward, Ron Francis used to play for this team.

How do you believe the Southeast Division compares to the Atlantic, which sent four teams to the playoffs last year?

I believe Sidney Crosby is the best all-round player in the game today. Malkin, Drury, Gomez, Briere, and Marty Brodeur is still Marty Brodeur. The Rangers still have Lundqvist. Rick DiPietro.

What approach will you take with the Lightning, a skilled team up front that's sort of dropped off defensively the past couple seasons?

Vinny Lecavalier, Brad Richards, Marty St. Louis, err, sorry, not Richards... Danny Boyle? Big Dave Andreychuk was a great leader. They miss Khabiboulin.

Thank you for your time, Barry. Good luck behind the bench this year.

Randy McKay. Power forward.

24 czerwca we wszystkim znanej Mleczarni odbędzie się wernisaż fotografii Macieja Waszkiewicza. Rozpoczęcie - g. 19.00, wstęp wolny.

MNC O5 to cykl fotografii składających się na dyplom Macieja Waszkiewicza, absolwenta wydziału fotografii Państwowej Wyższej Szkoły Filmowej, Telewizyjnej i Teatralnej im. Leona Schillera w Łodzi. Pomysł projektu powstał we wrześniu 2005 r. w czasie podróży po Wielkiej Brytanii. Autor tak opisuje tamte chwile: "Gdy zwiedzałem Manchester zapadł zmrok. Zapaliły się charakterystyczne lekko pomarańczowe latarnie. Miasto nabrało dziwnej, niespodziewanej magii... Wiedziałem, że kiedyś tu wrócę."

Tematem przewodnim zdjęć zrobionych kilka miesięcy później, jest samotność rodząca się w wielkim skupisku ludzi. Poczucie pustki panujące w betonowym środowisku. Emocje będące nieodłącznymi elementami życia w współczesnym mieście symbolizuje na zdjęciach brak ludzi. To widz staje się ich bohaterem. Odbiorca zostaje wprowadzony w zamkniętą uliczkę nocnego Manchesteru. Miasto odrzuca odosobnieniem i jednocześnie pociąga tajemniczością oraz niespodziewanie odkrytym pięknem. Jedynym schronieniem jest padające światło latarni. Jego ciepło wprowadza spokój, równoważy oziębłość mrocznych zakątków Manchesteru.

Dążenie autora do estetyzacji obrazu nadaje osobliwy magiczny charakter zwykłym, często brzydkim w świetle dziennym, miejscom. Wysublimowana kolorystyka przyciąga uwagę, skłania do uważniejszego wczytania się w obrazy. Wskazuje również na kunszt rzemieślniczy fotografa, dla którego głównym źródłem inspiracji były prace Hopper'a , w których pejzaż wielkiego miasta jest zarazem obrazem wszechobecnego odosobnienia.

W projekcie MNY 05 równie mocno widać nawiązania do zdjęć tła nocnego L.Owerka oraz prac N.Kandera.

Mentre i turioni edibili della giovane letteratura romena diventano sempre più rari e meno succulenti, anche perché ormai in questa nicchia editoriale vige un quasi monopolio della Polirom (che possiede pure la dependance della Cartea Romanesca), nel mondo delle arti visuali tira altra aria...la scena ribolle, si chiacchiera, si critica, si espone un po’ ovunque in Europa e negli USA. Poi, soprattutto si vende. Prendiamone uno a caso di questi artisti “tineri” : Serban Savu (classe 1978). L’occhio di Savu è intento a scorgere gesti banali, rituali posticci, frammenti di un peep show sociale che in latenza manifestano l’ansia di una realtà indistinta. Di qui poi si potrebbe prendere il largo e navigare sui cavalloni del panopticon, che in Romania prima passa attraverso lo stato - il regime comunista-, poi si trasfigura nella maldigerita società dei consumi e quidi risale dal buco della serratura artistico di Savu e di molti suoi compagni d’armi (Victor Man, Mircea Suciu, Cristi Pogacean ecc. tutti della combriccola di Cluj) per offrirsi al nostro sguardo. Frammenti di vita quelli di Savu colti da lontano che esprimono la poetica scabra della transizione romena, dove gli sfondi sfocati dominano e i volti scemano in una paradossale tensione. Savu, secondo alcuni. rielabora la desolazione di Edward Hopper, ci sta!, ma solo se il tutto è filtrato con le lenti dell'arte e della società ex sovietica, mettendoci dentro, per quanto possa sembrare sballato, Wilhelm Sasnal, Andro Wekua e un pizzico di (post) Ceausescu.

(A Keene Engineering highbanker in action)

A highbanker (also known in some mining circles as a "power sluice") is a piece of placer mining equipment used for processing auriferous gravels located some distance (typically up to 100 feet away) from a stream or water source. By using a motorized pump and tubing or hose, the highbanker is able to send a fairly large volume of water onto the unit's hopper (classifying screen) and through the sluice box to recover gold.

Highbanker pumps can be either electric (12 volt battery) or gas driven, although the gas-driven models seem to be the most prevalent out in the field. Some highbankers are also designed and constructed to re-circulate water so they can be employed in situations where there is little, or even no water at all (the miner uses jerrycans of water and a recirculation tub). Highbankers in this latter case are typically electrically driven.

Additonally, some gas-driven highbankers have the capacity to be used as a suction device, much along the lines of a small suction dredge. Obviously, the highbanker unit remains out of the water and on dry ground, but an intake hose and nozzle of 2.5"-3" diameter can be employed directly underneath the stream surface to "vacuum up" gold-bearing gravels or to clean bedrock surfaces. (I used to run a "suction" type highbanker quite frequently, so I am very familiar with them and highbankers in general.)

Highbankers are typically employed in one of two ways: auriferous gravel is shoveled onto the hopper screen or a suction nozzle is used underwater to vacuum up gold-bearing material. That's essentially it. Otherwise, the highbanker functions much in the same fashion as a regular sluice box, with a steady flow of water washing the barren and lighter materials down and away from the riffles out the lower end, while trapping the heavy black sands and gold in miner's matting or indoor/outdoor carpeting, and behind the riffles themselves.

Main Advantages of a Highbanker:

• Can process gold-bearing gravels located some distance away from a water source (you bring the water to the gravel, not the gravel to the water)
• Reasonable portability and ease of set up
• Able, in most instances, to operate (for limited periods of time) using recycled water
• Some models can "double up" for use as a suction device with small diameter intake hose and nozzle attachment
• Additionally, some models have a "garden hose" attachment that can be used for cleaning light overburden from bedrock cracks or crevices
• Extremely efficient gold-trapping ability, including very fine or "flour" gold
• Easy clean up of gold-bearing concentrates
• Overall versatility

What are the downsides to using a highbanker? Few come to mind. But they can be quite expensive ($1,200.00-$2,200, estimated) to purchase new and like anything mechanical, they can be balky at times or even break down on you. So if you don't have good mechanical skills make sure you have a back-up plan (a regular sluice box or rocker or?) out in the field. Additionally, please note that the highbanker suction hose diameter is fairly small and rock jams can be a real pain in the rear at times. Just so you know...

I've know a number of recreational placer miners over the years who designed and constructed their own highbankers, and those home-made models did a pretty good job of getting the gold out in the field. However, building a highbanker will be much more difficult and costly than constructing a home-made sluice box or rocker. So be realistic about your "do-it-yourself" abilities before taking this task on.

If you're interested in checking out some manufactured highbankers, try Keene Engineering (www.keeneeng.com). Otherwise, good luck highbanking!

(c)  J.R.  2008

Your comments and donations are appreciated.

(You can e-mail me your questions at jr872vt90@yahoo.com)  

Fleury's Agent and Ray Shero sit through the entire tape of Pens/Wings Game 5.

FLEURY'S AGENT: Or, how about 25 years, $1 trillion?

RAY SHERO: ...Deal.

FLEURY'S AGENT: I believe my client has demonstrated time and time again that, at the young age of 23, he is already an elite NHL talent capable of backstopping a team deep into the playoffs. He's followed up his 40-win '06-'07 regular season with a dominating 2008 playoff performance, winning 12 of his first 14 starts and posting a sub-2.00 Goals Against Average and a 94% Save Percentage en route to a Cup Finals berth. Therefore, my client is seeking nothing less than legitimate, top-notch goaltender money in the vicinity of $6-$7 million per year over the next five seasons.

Ray Shero pauses. He pulls out a remote control, hits a button, and a video screen drops down from the ceiling. The following clip plays:

The video screen goes back up into the ceiling. The room is silent for ten seconds.

RAY SHERO: Three years, $9 million.

Ten more seconds of silence.

FLEURY'S AGENT: ...Deal.

Say hello to the new sports phenom in Cincinnati, Jay Bruce.  This guy is an absolute monster.  In case you're not much of a Reds or MLB follower, Bruce was drafted by the Reds in 2005 with the 12th pick in the first round.  Last year he dominated the minor leagues and was named the minor league player of the year.  Before being called up last week he was hitting over .500 in Triple A with the Louisville Bats.  Even more impressive than his minor league resume has been his debut in the majors.  In his first 5 games his batting average has been .579 with an on-base percentage of over .700!  Not to mention he had a walk-off homerun in the bottom of the 10th inning today against the Braves.

Time to say goodbye to either Griffey or Dunn and welcome in the future with Jay Bruce.  I personally think the Reds will deal either Griffey or Dunn once Keppinger, Gonzalez, and Hopper make their way back off the DL.  Hopefully they will let Griffey hit his 600th homer and then trade him to Seattle.  He's not getting any younger or more productive and Seattle is more-than-willing to take his inflated salary in order to fill some seats.  With Bruce, Votto, Volquez, Cueto, and Janish all making their debut this year and with Homer Bailey and Daryl Thompson still waiting in the wings, things are looking bright in Cincinnati for a change.

My favorite Hopper works are his studies of light on classic old buildings; the psychodramas that make up much of his later work are interesting, but they don't add that much meaning for me.  I think a great deal can be implied simply by the human details (without the humans).  Besides, I think he was better at rendering buildings than humans.  

The Chicago exhibit was among the best art exhibitions we have seen.  It is over, but you can review some of Hopper's work at the following websites.

http://www.artic.edu/aic/exhibitions/exhibition/hopper

http://www.artchive.com/artchive/H/hopper.html

On the return trip from Chicago on the South Shore Line, an interurban railroad, I photographed a woman sitting alone on the passenger seat across from me.  I think it shows how I was channelling Edward Hopper on this wonderful day.

This is part of a weblog documenting my travels and photography. I am primarily a nature photographer, and you can see more of my work at http://www.leerentz.com

Click on the photograph below to see a larger version.

Quelques interviews et vidéo suivent pour essayer de transposer l'ambiance du moment. Quelques groupes de l'affiche se sont prêtés au jeu des questions : Carabine, Ed-Äke, Hey Hey My MY, Hopper et Stuck In The Sound.

seulement deux pour le moment, la suite dans peu de temps.

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(A Keene Engineering http://www.keeneeng.com/ portable sluice box in action.)

Like the rocker box, the sluice box is another basic piece of mining equipment that most, if not all, placer gold miners will employ at one time or another. Sluice boxes have been around as long, if not longer, than their smaller "cousin" and share all the advantages of a rocker box plus a few more thrown in for good measure:

Portability: most sluice boxes are very lightweight and easy to carry, and there are backpack and even "fold-up" versions that will fit into a 5-gallon bucket on the market today.

Easy Set Up: sluices are easy to set up once you get the hang of the correct slope and water flow necessary for running gold-bearing material efficiently.

Greater Processing Capacity: an average-sized sluice box correctly set up and running with peak hydraulic action can process much more gold-bearing material than a rocker and you may, at times, find yourself hard-pressed to feed an adequate amount of gravel into it.

Durability: unlike the wooden rocker box, most manufactured sluice boxes today are constructed of extremely durable materials like aluminum or high-impact plastics that are virtually unbreakable.

Excellent Recovery Rate: if set up properly, sluice boxes have an excellent gold recovery rate and will trap even the tiniest grains of flood gold.

Easy Clean Up: a good sluice box with a removable riffle tray and gold-trap carpet is extremely easy to clean up.

The main disadvantage to using a sluice box is that these little mining workhorses require a substantial water flow in order to function properly. So, if water is sparse, the sluice box would not be a good choice for processing material. That's where a good rocker box would fit in just fine.

Additionally, properly constructed home-made wooden versions work just as well as manufactured versions (my first box was a home-made version and it worked great), but the wood tends to swell up and become waterlogged over time. This makes them heavier and more unwieldy to carry, not to mention the fact that cleaning gold-bearing concentrates out of the box is more difficult with set-in riffles.

How does a sluice box work? It's quite simple and very ingenious. The head is usually flared wider than the trough of the box itself so that gold-bearing material can be either shoveled directly into this hopper area or "poured" from a 5-gallon bucket where the material has already been screened or "classified" to a smaller size.

The hydraulic action and force of the water running through the box carry off the lighter materials and they go their merry way bumping over the riffles and out the far end of the sluice box. The heavier materials such as black sand concentrates and the gold itself become trapped behind the riffles because of their high specific gravity and the eddy currents created by the riffles themselves. The tinier grains of gold and the microdot specks (called by some oldtimers "flour gold") become ensnared in the gold-grabbing material (usually indoor/outdoor carpet) lining the bottom of the box.

Nuggets, heavier flakes, and other coarse pieces of gold will usually show up in the upper end of the box, either in the hopper area or just behind the first two riffles. This is one of the prettiest and most exciting things you will see after running material through a sluice box and letting the force of the water clear it. Just imagine yourself looking down into your box in the bright sunlight and seeing those chunky pieces of gold gleaming back at you! There's nothing like it...

I've been using a Keene Engineering manufactured sluice box similar to the one in the photo for over 25 years now. It works like a champ and I wouldn't leave home without it. In fact, when I head for my "special" placer grounds along the North Yuba River in a few weeks time, my sluice box will traveling with me yet again.

So that's a crash course in sluice boxes. I hope it's been informative for you.

Good luck out there my friend.

(c)  J.R.  2008

Your comments and donations are appreciated.

(You can e-mail me your questions at jr872vt90@yahoo.com) 

One of the most basic pieces of placer gold mining equipment is the rocker box (also known as a "miner's cradle"). It's not known exactly when this piece of rudimentary placer mining gear was first used to recover gold, but early placer miners in Virginia, Georgia, and North Carolina used the rocker box in their home states' gold-bearing streams before bringing early versions with them to the rich California goldfields of 1849-1855.

 Here are some salient features of a well-constructed and properly used rocker box:

• Extremely portable and can be moved easily from location to location.
• Needs very little water to operate and that water can be reused or recycled (see schematic below)
• Less strenous effort required on your part than gold panning.
• Greater volumes of gold-bearing material can be processed (2-3 times that of a good gold panner in the same period of time).
• Excellent gold trapping efficiency, even with fine or flour gold.

A common rocker box design consists of four main parts:

1) a sloped, riffled sluice box type body with gold-grabbing indoor/ordoor carpet (or similar material) lining the box underneath the riffles, a handle attached to one side, and two crescent-shaped rocking arms underneath the box;

2) a removable, recessed "hopper" or classifying screen (typically 1/4"-1/2" mesh);

3) the hopper or "feed" box; and

4) a long-handled water dipper or "scoop."

Here's how the rocker box works:

First, the miner shovels gold-bearing material onto the removable hopper screen, uses the water dipper to flush all the dirt, clay, and gold off the out-sized rocks and gravel into the hopper box, and "rocks the cradle" side-to-side while continuing to flush water through the hopper and down the riffle box.

Next, the hopper screen is removed, the waste rock and gravel is tossed aside, the hopper screen is re-inserted into the hopper box, and the entire process is repeated until the riffles start packing up with gold and/or gold-bearing black sands called "concentrates."

Finally, the miner performs a "clean up" by flushing or transferring the concentrates from the riffle box into a 5-gallon bucket or gold pan and then panning the concentrates and recovering the gold. (In more "sophisticated" versions, both the riffle tray and the gold-grabbing carpet lining the bottom of the box can be removed to facilitate easier and more efficient clean up.) That's essentially it.

Rocker boxes are amazing little machines in their overall simplicity of design and function, and they are very good at trapping even tiny bits of placer gold if used properly (the 49ers loved them and used them extensively during the early parts of the California Gold Rush). Additionally, a rocker box requires very little expense or material outlay, nor do you have to be a journeyman carpenter to construct one.

A well-constructed rocker box should be part of every small-scale or recreational placer gold miner's arsenal of mining weapons. Why not build one for yourself and try it out?

(c)  J.R.  2008

Your comments and donations are appreciated.

(You can e-mail me your questions at jr872vt90@yahoo.com)

• Actor: Kevin Spacey
• Quote: "Let's ride!"
• Action: Allows hundreds of grains to crush his 3 friends and says a monologue on top of the pebbles that killed them.
• Clip(s):

Thats all for now! 

Aelita Hopper - różowowłosa dziewczyna, znaleziona przez Jeremy'ego w Lyoko. Przez niemal całą pierwszą serię przebywa wyłącznie w Lyoko. Pod koniec pierwszej serii w końcu Jeremy'emu udaje się ją zmaterializować. jednak znowu występują komplikacje, ponieważ od Aelity oddzielone są jej wspomnienia. Dopiero w połowie drugiej serii je odzyskuje. Okazuje się, że mieszkała w domu zwanym "Pustelnia" i jest córką Franza Hoppera, twórcy Lyoko i X.A.N.A. Dawniej nazywała się Aelita Schaeffer. Jej ojciec (Waldo Schaeffer) zmienił im obu nazwisko, a w jego przypadku także imię. Franz zwirtualizował ich obu do Lyoko. Pod koniec czwartej serii Franzowi i Jeremy'emu udaje się zniszczyć X.A.N.A., ale Franz, na oczach Aelity, ginie.

Cast & Credits

Directed by Dennis Hopper. Screenplay by Rachel Kronstadt Mann and Ann Louise Bardach; story by Rachel Kronstadt Mann. MPAA: Rated R for language, sensuality and violence. Runtime: 116 min.