Download or read book A Real Living Contact with the Things Themselves written by Irénée Scalbert and published by Park Publishing (WI). This book was released on 2018 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book, by architectural writer Irénée Scalbert, bears witness to some of the more significant developments in architecture during the last 25 years. The essays alternate between detailed studies of major buildings, written while these were being designed or as they were being rediscovered after a period of oblivion, and broader historical surveys that seek out the origin of contemporary architectural ideas. More than their extent, however, what distinguishes these essays is that they draw from direct experience--from interviews with architects, clients, engineers and users, and from the pleasurable, at times rapturous, contemplation of architecture.
Download or read book Never Modern written by Irénée Scalbert and published by Park Publishing (WI). This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this exceptional book on the London based studio 6a architects, architecture critic Irenee Scalbert looks at the role of narrative, history, appropriation and craft in the work of Tom Emerson and Stephanie Macdonald. The book traces an architectural approach avoiding style, signature, theory and even concept in favour of metis, an ancient form of intelligence combining 'flair, wisdom, forethought, subtlety of mind, deception, resourcefulness, vigilance, opportunism, varied skills, and experience.' Structured around notions of situation, intervention, making, comedy, bricolage, chance and anthropology, the text is mirrored in a visual essay of archive photographs, artworks, film stills and recent projects by the practice.
Download or read book Rethinking Sympathy and Human Contact in Nineteenth Century American Literature written by Marianne Noble and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2019-03-28 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book analyzes the evolution of antebellum literary explorations of sympathy and human contact in the 1850s and 1860s. It will appeal to undergraduates and scholars seeking new approaches to canonical American authors, psychological theorists of sympathy and empathy, and philosophers of moral philosophy.
Download or read book Almost Nothing The 20th Century Art and Life of J zef Czapski written by Eric Karpeles and published by New York Review of Books. This book was released on 2018-11-06 with total page 496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A compelling biography of the Polish painter and writer Józef Czapski that takes readers to Paris in the Roaring Twenties, to the front lines during WWII, and into the late 20th-century art world. Józef Czapski (1896–1993) lived many lives during his ninety-six years. He was a student in Saint Petersburg during the Russian Revolution and a painter in Paris in the roaring twenties. As a Polish reserve officer fighting against the invading Nazis in the opening weeks of the Second World War, he was taken prisoner by the Soviets. For reasons unknown to this day, he was one of the very few excluded from Stalin’s sanctioned massacres of Polish officers. He never returned to Poland after the war, but worked tirelessly in Paris to keep alive awareness of the plight of his homeland, overrun by totalitarian powers. Czapski was a towering public figure, but painting gave meaning to his life. Eric Karpeles, also a painter, reveals Czapski’s full complexity, pulling together all the threads of this remarkable life.
Download or read book Henry Thoreau written by Robert D. Richardson Jr. and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2015-04-20 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The two years Thoreau spent at Walden Pond and the night he spent in the Concord jail are among the most familiar features of the American intellectual landscape. In this new biography, based on a reexamination of Thoreau's manuscripts and on a retracing of his trips, Robert Richardson offers a view of Thoreau's life and achievement in their full nineteenth century context.
Download or read book Farewell to the World written by Marzio Barbagli and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2015-10-02 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What drives a person to take his or her own life? Why would an individual be willing to strap a bomb to himself and walk into a crowded marketplace, blowing himself up at the same time as he kills and maims the people around him? Does suicide or ‘voluntary death’ have the same meaning today as it had in earlier centuries, and does it have the same significance in China, India and the Middle East as it has in the West? How should we understand this distressing, often puzzling phenomenon and how can we explain its patterns and variations over time? In this wide-ranging comparative study, Barbagli examines suicide as a socio-cultural, religious and political phenomenon, exploring the reasons that underlie it and the meanings it has acquired in different cultures throughout the world. Drawing on a vast body of research carried out by historians, anthropologists, sociologists, political scientists and psychologists, Barbagli shows that a satisfactory theory of suicide cannot limit itself to considering the two causes that were highlighted by the great French sociologist Émile Durkheim – namely, social integration and regulation. Barbagli proposes a new account of suicide that links the motives for and significance attributed to individual actions with the people for whom and against whom individuals take their lives. This new study of suicide sheds fresh light on the cultural differences between East and West and greatly increases our understanding of an often-misunderstood act. It will be the definitive history of suicide for many years to come.
Download or read book Making Things Better written by A. David Napier and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2014 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Napier demonstrates how non-Western exchange practices and beliefs can redress the ills of contemporary economic systems in which our relationship to material things transforms animate elements of social life into inanimate commodities. Such processes separate objects from domains of deep meaning and release individuals from the moral relationships on which feelings of attachment, community responsibility, and a sense of place depend.
Download or read book Henry Thoreau written by Robert D. Richardson and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 1986 with total page 476 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this new biography, based on a reexamination of Thoreau's manuscripts and on retracing of his trips, Robert Richardson offers a view of Thoreau's life and achievement in their full nineteenth century context.
Download or read book A Harmony Within Five Who Took Refuge written by William A. Reinsmith and published by Xlibris Corporation. This book was released on 2007-05-22 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We live in increasingly troubled times, with social and political instability everywhere on the globe. It is a time of breakdown, of massive transition whose end is far from sight. Incessant change, fragmentation, loss of moorings, sporadic violence, even in the Western societies, threaten many who seek to live meaningful lives, especially in terms of inward growth. To the media-driven observer the world is in turmoil and globalization by no means a friendly word. Similar conditions have prevailed at certain times in the past. Reinsmith’s port of entry is just at those periods of crisis, those transition periods when social cohesion has all but disintegrated. A Harmony Within explores five such points in the history of Western civilization: the breakdown of the ancient Greek city-state; the last days of the Roman Empire; the religious wars in France during the sixteenth century; the transition to the Industrial Age in nineteenth century America; the cataclysm of World War I in Europe. Within each historical frame the author charts the life and times of one individual who even in the midst of discord finds a way of living fruitfully, of making a profound connection which transcends the uncertainties of his particular age. In ancient Greece the philosopher Epicurus withdrew from Athens to teach inner tranquility (ataraxia) to his friends. At the end of the Roman era St. Benedict founded a safe haven at Monte Casino where he created the Rule which offered spiritual security to his monks. With strife all around him Michel Montaigne quit public life and retreated to his Tower to mingle with the great minds of the past. Viewing the desperation drudgery of his fellow citizens, Henry David Thoreau repaired to Walden Pond – there to live alone with Nature for almost two years. In a Europe slowly moving toward war Albert Einstein found refuge in the Cosmos where he could contemplate the laws of the physical universe. The names of these five individuals are known to the educated general reader. Each of them lived in a different era, discovered a different track. Yet they had one thing in common: They chose neither to grapple with their own society nor directly aid in the coming of the next. They did something more radical: They withdrew - they chose to walk away, to take refuge and follow a path where inner harmony could be attained. They took arms against the troubles of their age not by encounter, but by creative withdrawal. Epicurus - The Refuge of Philosophy St. Benedict - The Refuge of Religion Montaigne - The Refuge of Letters Thoreau - The Refuge of Nature Einstein - The Refuge of Pure Science For each of these figures their refuge proved life enhancing. Yet a great paradox ensued. Though they withdrew from the society of their times what they accomplished reached far beyond them into the future: Epicurean communities spread throughout the ancient Mediterranean world and lasted for five hundred years; Benedictine monasticism provided Western Europe with spiritual direction down to the Middle Ages; Montaigne’s Essays have found their place among the annals of great literature; Thoreau’s stay at Walden Pond - immortalized in his journal, Walden - became the exemplar for living with Nature and a guide for achieving radical simplicity; Einstein’s four papers written during his years in a Swiss Patent office would be the foundation for the theories of special and general relativity, as well as quantum physics, all of which would change our view of the universe. Each chapter opens with a brief sketch of the age in which a protagonist lives and against which he reacts. To this extent, A Harmony Within presents a rough outline of Western civilization in crisis. But the heart of the book lies in portraying how these five great spirits nursed a calling which brought inner harmony to their lives, a harmony which seems to elude most humans at any period, reg
Download or read book Rome written by Robert Hughes and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2012-10-30 with total page 546 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From Robert Hughes, one of the greatest art and cultural critics of our time, comes a sprawling, comprehensive, and deeply personal history of Rome—as a city, as an empire, and as an origin of Western art and civilization. Starting on a personal note, Hughes takes us to the Rome he first encountered as a hungry twenty-one-year-old fresh from Australia in 1959. From there, he goes back more than two thousand years to the city’s foundation, one mired in mythologies and superstitions that would inform Rome’s development for centuries. He explores in rich detail the formation of empire, the rise of early Christianity, the Crusades, the Renaissance, and takes us up to the present, through the rise and fall of Mussolini’s fascism. Equal parts idolizing, blasphemous, outraged, and awestruck, Rome is a portrait of the Eternal City as only Robert Hughes could paint it.
Download or read book The Artist s Way written by Julia Cameron and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2002-03-04 with total page 295 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "With its gentle affirmations, inspirational quotes, fill-in-the-blank lists and tasks — write yourself a thank-you letter, describe yourself at 80, for example — The Artist’s Way proposes an egalitarian view of creativity: Everyone’s got it."—The New York Times "Morning Pages have become a household name, a shorthand for unlocking your creative potential"—Vogue Over four million copies sold! Since its first publication, The Artist's Way phenomena has inspired the genius of Elizabeth Gilbert and millions of readers to embark on a creative journey and find a deeper connection to process and purpose. Julia Cameron's novel approach guides readers in uncovering problems areas and pressure points that may be restricting their creative flow and offers techniques to free up any areas where they might be stuck, opening up opportunities for self-growth and self-discovery. The program begins with Cameron’s most vital tools for creative recovery – The Morning Pages, a daily writing ritual of three pages of stream-of-conscious, and The Artist Date, a dedicated block of time to nurture your inner artist. From there, she shares hundreds of exercises, activities, and prompts to help readers thoroughly explore each chapter. She also offers guidance on starting a “Creative Cluster” of fellow artists who will support you in your creative endeavors. A revolutionary program for personal renewal, The Artist's Way will help get you back on track, rediscover your passions, and take the steps you need to change your life.
Download or read book Ars Vitae written by Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn and published by University of Notre Dame Pess. This book was released on 2020-10-15 with total page 567 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Despite the flood of self-help guides and our current therapeutic culture, feelings of alienation and spiritual longing continue to grip modern society. In this book, Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn offers a fresh solution: a return to classic philosophy and the cultivation of an inner life. The ancient Roman philosopher Cicero wrote that philosophy is ars vitae, the art of living. Today, signs of stress and duress point to a full-fledged crisis for individuals and communities while current modes of making sense of our lives prove inadequate. Yet, in this time of alienation and spiritual longing, we can glimpse signs of a renewed interest in ancient approaches to the art of living. In this ambitious and timely book, Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn engages both general readers and scholars on the topic of well-being. She examines the reappearance of ancient philosophical thought in contemporary American culture, probing whether new stirrings of Gnosticism, Stoicism, Epicureanism, Cynicism, and Platonism present a true alternative to our current therapeutic culture of self-help and consumerism, which elevates the self’s needs and desires yet fails to deliver on its promises of happiness and healing. Do the ancient philosophies represent a counter-tradition to today’s culture, auguring a new cultural vibrancy, or do they merely solidify a modern way of life that has little use for inwardness—the cultivation of an inner life—stemming from those older traditions? Tracing the contours of this cultural resurgence and exploring a range of sources, from scholarship to self-help manuals, films, and other artifacts of popular culture, this book sees the different schools as organically interrelated and asks whether, taken together, they can point us in important new directions. Ars Vitae sounds a clarion call to take back philosophy as part of our everyday lives. It proposes a way to do so, sifting through the ruins of long-forgotten and recent history alike for any shards helpful in piecing together the coherence of a moral framework that allows us ways to move forward toward the life we want and need.
Download or read book Spheres of Perception written by Theodore Holtzhausen and published by John Hunt Publishing. This book was released on 2020-06-26 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Our economic system is over-stimulated by the information age. Interconnection aids and abets companies earning trillions and their swift rise to global dominance. The 24-hour wired world has led to increased volatility; negative information, and even an accidental computer glitch can crash the market and create panic. Health, the environment, the welfare of society are pushed to the far edge of national interests. Instead, GDP and short-term monetary profit is prioritised over long-term impact on society and the environment. The world as we know it is set for collapse. Simultaneously, the science of evolution has itself evolved. In as much as “survival of the fittest” has been used to justify harsh, competition behaviour on the part of individuals and corporations, an updated understanding of evolution now tends to tell us a different story. What if written into the code of our DNA and RNA is a guide for telling us how to evolve morally and as a result improve our world and progress our epistemology? From such an understanding emerge new Spheres of Perception.
Download or read book Education the Environment and Sustainability written by Kai Horsthemke and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2024-02-15 with total page 157 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book tackles questions about the metaphysical and ethical foundations of our concern for our planet, and about educational and pedagogical implications. It pursues answers to urgent questions such as: should educational policy and practice be informed by a concern for nature and the environment for our (human) purposes? Or should we teach and learn for the natural environment in and for itself? Chapters in this volume contribute towards the unmasking and undoing of the various kinds of denialism and pernicious relativism (cultural, moral and epistemological) that have held us in their grip and that continue to thwart attempts to establish a sane and morally sustainable set of relationships between us, human beings, and other animals and the animate and inanimate environment. Education, the Environment and Sustainability provides educators and interested laypersons with tools for critical reflection and interrogation of their own and others’ assumptions, preconceptions, and practices affecting nature and the environment. This volume was originally published as a special issue of Ethics and Education.
Download or read book Museum Skepticism written by David Carrier and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 2006-05-31 with total page 334 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: DIVProminent art historian looks at the birth of the art museum and contemplates its future as a public institution./div
Download or read book Mindfulness in Good Lives written by Mike W. Martin and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2019-10-23 with total page 217 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mindfulness is celebrated everywhere—especially in health psychology and spiritual practices, but also in the arts, business, education, environmentalism, sports, and the use of digital devices. While the current mindfulness movement may be in part the latest fad in a narcissistic and therapeutic culture, it is also worthy of greater philosophical attention. As a study in ethics and moral psychology, Mindfulness in Good Lives remedies the neglect of this subject within philosophy. Mike W. Martin makes sense of the striking variety of concepts of mindfulness by connecting them to the core idea of value-based mindfulness: paying attention to what matters, in light of relevant values. When the values are sound, mindfulness is a virtue that helps implement the kaleidoscope of values in good lives. Health psychologists, who currently dominate the study of mindfulness, often present their research as value-neutral science. Yet they invariably presuppose moral values that should be made transparent. These values, which lie at the interface of morality and mental health, form bridges between philosophy and psychology, and between literature and spirituality.
Download or read book Immaterial Architecture written by Jonathan Hill and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2006-04-18 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This fascinating argument from Jonathan Hill presents the case for the significance and importance of the immaterial in architecture. Architecture is generally perceived as the solid, physical matter that it unarguably creates, but what of the spaces it creates? This issue drives Hill's explorative look at the immaterial aspects of architecture. The book discusses the pressures on architecture and the architectural profession to be respectively solid matter and solid practice and considers concepts that align architecture with the immaterial, such as the superiority of ideas over matter, command of drawing and design of spaces and surfaces. Focusing on immaterial architecture as the perceived absence of matter, Hill devises new means to explore the creativity of both the user and the architect, advocating an architecture that fuses the immaterial and the material and considers its consequences, challenging preconceptions about architecture, its practice, purpose, matter and use. This is a useful and innovative read that encourages architects and students to think beyond established theory and practice.
