An Exihibition titled Reflejos (Reflections)

Friday (10 October 2014) saw the inauguration of a new exhibition titled REFLEJOS (Reflections) in Santander which was seen as an experiment of colaboration between Artists and the Writers. Marisol and I formed part of a collection of Artists who participated, although I can hardly call myself an artist. They are part of a group of artists and writers who go under the name of the Kirguise Collective. The name comes from the Spanish version of Kyrgystan which is a country in high Himalayas (I think) whose name roughly translated means 'the land of the forty clans', however I was told by Mariano (more about him later on), who knows a lot about these things, that it also could mean 'those people up in the clouds', which some of the members of the group certainly are!

Anyway after a year long battle with the authorities to get the venue and several cancellations and postponements, this project finally got under way on Friday 10th October with the inauguration of the exhibition at the new Central Library in Santander which is housed in a lovely building which used to be an old tobacco factory. This building has several exhibition spaces which are all great for varying sizes of displays.

Each visual artist paired with a writer or poet and produced a work which 'reflected' the words in the artwork in some way. Marisol chose to work with a local writer and poet Maria Jose Echevarria, with some reputation for her writings while I paired with Mariano Gomez de Vallejo (mentioned earlier) who is an artist and also known to write regularly. 

Marisol's installation titled 'Arena sin Continente' (Sand without a Continent) is based on a poem written by Maria Jose, which deals with the human condition and feelings of pain and bereavement which perhaps perhaps leaves one feeling like the sand of the title. This consists of three broken mirrors with some piece of anatomy bursting forth from the centre. The words of the poem in Maria Jose's own voice are available as a video which can be seen and heard on a TV which is also part of the installation. The other element is an unbroken mirror with a hand holding out miniature books with the words and pictures from the work printed on them. And to complete the installation there is an island of sand on the floor with broken mirrors with text embedded in the sand. The island is surrounded by black paper boats which could be seen as a blockade or a ring frame to give more visibility and harmony with the black frames of the mirrors on the wall.

Marisol's installation 'Arena sin Continente'

My own work consists of a couple of my earlier Fractals and a recently completed image which displays a colourful spacial arrangement of the chemistry based on the data of the 1st chromosome from my own DNA data (aptly named Chromosome 1). My own image can be faintly seen in this display to give it an air of a digital self portrait. The words of Mariano that reflect my work are also derived from a formula which has some parallel with my Fractals. He told me that he was excited by the prospect of trying out the Oulipo method of generating text from a given starting point, such as a definition of a Fractal. So starting from a Wikipaedea definition of Fractals he did iterations of substitutions of translations from a dictionary of various words in the text. This produced a mysterious mix of words when read out had a synergy with visual versions of the Fractals without the theretically heavy exact definition that usually requires much understanding of mathematics.

He even produced a performance in which a mysterious figure in a strange white suit mimes over a digital voice reading out his text in a somewht eclectic mix of tones and silent periods.

The exhibition is a great experience and runs until the 4th of November. In the meantime we head for distant shores to celebrate Dad's 70th birthday, their 70th wedding anniversay, and our own 40th!! 

Regards and all best.

South Wind and Heat Wave

Where we live September is the best time of the year.

The tourists have left for the rest of the year, the sun is still high in the sky and if the wind blows from the south, we get very warm conditions. 

Today was one of those days.

 It was 30+ C in the shade on our balcony and even dogs in the street were looking for the shadows of the trees. After a morning of doing chores around town I decided to hit the beach for cooling off from the heat. There was not much time and the water was cold, but once I was in, I began to enjoy the swim.

To start with I did not want to get my long hair wet, however the waves were huge and very inviting. I do like to body surf but was holding out to not ride them. By the time the fourth wave had passed me, my resolve disolved and I threw myself into the next wave.

There followed ten minutes of pure bliss...a short walk to dry off the skin and I was headed home looking forward to a much needed lunch.

What a life..someone has to live it, why not me.

Haikus about Fractals

Haikus about Fractals
The other night some poet friends were visiting and on a whim the idea of a Haiku (or two) about Fractals cameup. So everyone got their thinking and creative minds in gear and produced the following:
La otra noche unas amigas poetas visitaban y de repente surgio la idea de un Haiku (o dos) sobre el tema de los Fractales. Asi que todos pusieron su mente creativo en marcha y producieron los siguientes:

Haiku original                  Roughly translated into English

Y al infinito lo parte el tiempo, roto lo parte el tiempo. Naturaleza un mar partido sin fin caos fracturado. Entretejidas partes formando trama, todo en urdimbre. Arde la rosa, urde la noche el alba, orden en casa.

And the infinite time divides, broken time divides. Nature endless ocean divided fractured chaos. Interwoven parts forming woof* all in warp*. The rose burns the dawn warps* the night order at home. (* warp and woof are vertical and horizontal strings that hold a cloth together)

And this is what its all about - the fractals

Tumbleweed Moments and Art

Arte Santander week, and we met a huge army of art goers, lovers and gallery people. This year the half dozen of galleries from other countries have really brought a wind of change. For the usually conservative Santanderinos this is a wakeup call...hey, there is this modern, contemporary and conceptual art movement, which makes all these pictures on the wall a bit dull and boring.

It is not unsurprising therefore that at the now customary tour of the galleries around Santander during this Art Fair, I spent an extended 'quality' time with the managers of most of the foreigners. Among these were the very young German, the Italian, Portuguese and the young man from Belgium. As one may imagine the conversation was hilarious in that it was a combination of all these languages punctuated with English to make some sense of the topic being discussed.

For example at one point when we met with Marta, our favourite Art critic, who had published an article in the locally popular newspaper 'The Daily Mountain' (I know this name does not inspire confidence), about these galleries from other shores, the Brussels man came up with 'She is a Gandhi' which I found strangely confusing!! When my face showed 'not sure what you mean' he repeated 'Candy I mean she is sweet'!
Definitely a 'Tumbleweed Moment' (think western - weed tumbling across the paths of gunfights)
Later we came across a painting in one of the galleries which had the title 'work', definitely a zen inspired label. We continued the tour and each gallery came up with one course of what was effectively our dinner. Starting with Nuble and the starters, through Silio and the main course, then desert in another gallery followed by the Cava and Mojitos at the Naval College exhibition of the Sianoja artists where Marisol also has an installation.

Marisol's installation OXCAHINI

The conversations continued well into the night and we finally made our way home at about 5am. 

Well someone has to do all this..

Barcelona - June 2014

We were really looking forward to Uppinder and Sangeeta spending some time with us here in Spain, however what started as a substantial stay in Spain, got trimmed down to a bare minimum by the time the Aussies actually made their way to Spain.

On  the Wednesday, the day they were expected, we received a phone call.

" We have had to return to Paris..the car hit the kerb in Versaille and one of the tyres burst. Would you believe it, there was no spare tyre!"..they had lost a day and would acquire a new car back in Paris and start over again.

The prank with the car further reduced the stay in Spain and they only had one clear day to see the whole of Cantabria. Not recommended.

Anyway we finally met U and S in Bilbao as they made their way westwards and had a look at the Guggenheim, and catching up with Jose Luis and Pablo, who they knew from meetings in India. The next day we had to cram as much as possible into the short time in Laredo.

 The beach at Laredo

 Cantabrian hills at the La Aparecida

Many of the group who were in Delhi in 2008

There was just enough time to reunite many of the group who had gone to India for my birthday in 2008 and met Uppinder, and to take another group photo for old times sake!
The next day we headed for the beautiful area of the Rioja to take in Laguardia, Haro and the Marques de Riscal before staying the night in Zaragoza.

 Gehry's building at Marques de Riscal

Laguardia

 With Uppinder at Zaragoza

In the morning  I spotted a Sikh man in the Cathedral plaza. I ran after him and when he turned around I was amazed to find that we had met a year or two before in a quiet street in Madrid, I remembered the Bhangra dance teacher from Phagwara in deep Punjab!
Later we drove as fast as possible to Barcelona and a reunion with Guddi and Birinder who were on their way from New Jersey!

 Gaudi's Batllo building on Paseig de Gracia in Barcelona

 In front of the Sagrada Familia

Inside of Sagrada Familia

Inside of Sagrada Familia

 Guell Park

 Inside one of the towers of the Sagrada Familia

Our ladies at the Montjuic Fort

 View from the Fort

 Around Barcelona

 Remains of the columns of Temple of Augustus from 1st Century!

 Birinder and Guddi at the Olympic Port

There followed 3 days of relentless sightseeing, Gaudi's cathedral, Parque Guell, the Gaudi buildings in Paseig de Gracia, Rambla, Cathedral and all the barrio Gotico not to mention all the walking eating and drinking.
We had rented an apartment so every evening we would flop out on the sofas resting our weary legs and catchup on the news, revisit all the family stories and remember old times in all continents.
There was the curious case of this bar in Santander which had a nice trick up its sleeve. As we waited to be seated we ordered drinks and as is usual in Spain, a waiter brought us some tapas. Thinking that these came with the drinks as in many parts of Spain, we dug in, even if some of them were less than appetising to look at. Later when we came to order what we wanted to eat, we were told that we would be charged by the little sticks we collected from all the tapas (including the ones we had already eaten). Naturally we complained..the waiters said we should have asked first. So we said they should have told us as we had quite conveniently thrown away the sticks from before! After a heated debate we came to an acceptable compromise, but not before Uppinder and I had given them a bad review on Foursquare.

Exhibit at one of the Barcelona exhibitions

Finally the time came to start saying our goodbyes. First Uppinder and Sangeeta then Guddi and Birinder departed in their respective directions. We stayed on for another day to catchup on art and exhibitions followed by the flight home which flew us past Laredo!

So nice to get together with Sis, Birinder (their first time in Barcelona) and Sangeeta, Uppinder (their first time in Spain), and many thanks to them for coming to visit us...

Austin, Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon March/April 2014

Austin riverside

Nico, Manjeet and Marisol in Austin

A natural pool and rock formation near Austin

The star of Texas in Austin

Manjeet, Almu and the grandkids Manjeet and Nico were going to be in Madrid for a short period and decided to invite us to join them on their way back home to Texas. How could we say no, even though we had been with them only a few months before. So it was that one very early morning in March we set off for the Madrid airport, and as we waited for the connection to London and on to Austin, The gang of four showed up as prearranged at the departure gate! Nico and Manjeet ran to us to give us heart warming hugs and we really enjoyed their company on the long flight between London and Austin.

Nico with Manjeet Sr and Manjeet Jr

Celebrating Almu's birthday!

Once in Austin we proceeded to do what any tourist in the US would do. We ate a lot, did a lot of shopping and generally got around thanks to our TomTom GPS which was invaluable, reliable and made us look like we knew where we were going on each outing. An early outing was to revisit the lovely city of San Antonio where we caught up with a lot of Mexican culture and food. This was followed by the celebration of Almu's birthday and then there was the Grandparents day at Manjeet's school, where Manjeet told us all about the good work he has been doing at school and treated us to a lunch as well.

In San Antonio

The following week we flew to Las Vegas to sample the hedonistic environment and to enjoy the amazing interiors of the theme hotels such as the Luxor's pyramid type structure and the Venetian's fabulous canals and gondolas. Our favourite was the Bellagio with its lake and the music synchronised fountain and the most beautiful lobby with the Chihuly glass and butterfly garden. There was also the opportunity to see a show or two and we opted for the Magic show by David Copperfield and it was excellent. The highlight nevertheless was our prearranged helicopter ride to the GrandCanyon. On a windy day when it was doubtful if the helicopters would fly at all, the conditions improved just in time for our flight and with a little luck we were given the best seats at the front of the helicopter. The experience was unforgettable and words cannot describe the sights and the feelings evoked by the ride. Oh, and I forgot to mention that I managed to win seventy dollars from the Luxor blackjack tables.

The Hoover

Front row of Helicopter

Colorado in the Canyon

Which way to Las Vegas?

Chihuly at the Bellagio

The Venetian

Bellagio Fountain

New York (in Las Vegas)

The pyramid of the Luxor from the inside.

Soon it was time to fly back to Austin for one last visit to the malls and the outlets and to celebrate the birthday of Manjeet's friend Christof, which took us to a Golf entertainment facility. Now there is an idea for Europe and Spain. You go as a group and you are assigned a table with sofas in a booth much like the driving range at a golf course only more luxurious and a lot more noise. Electronics allow you to register the players while the bar staff take care of drinks and food. You then play a game (think bowling alley) in which all players take shots and score points for hitting target areas on the range. This is done by electronics on the golf balls which associate each shot with the relevant player and is then picked up on the target areas and the scores displayed on your screen. Amazing.

Golf in Austin

I have to tell you that after Manjeet won the first game (even though he has never played golf!) I came back strongly in the second game to score one of the highest scores for the whole day at the facility. That was some round as there were in excess of a hundred booths with a waiting queue and un interrupted play all day. Christof was impressed and we had dinner afterwards!

Our time was up and we flew home - 24 hours of nonstop cars planes and taxis.
We had a smile on our face but the air hostesses on the American Airlines were something else. Marisol called them 'dragons'.