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Comments on Greek painting, art, contemporary thought
Our aim is to present the Greek landscapes in a holistic way: Greek landscapes refer to pictures and images of Greece, to paintings and art, to poetry and literature, to ancient philosophy and history, to contemporary thought and culture...
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greek artists, contemporary thought, greek painters, literature, greek paintings, modern greek artists
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greek artists, contemporary thought, greek painters, literature, greek paintings, modern greek artists
Saturday, December 22, 2012
Monday, November 5, 2012
50 New Bookmarks from Yannis Stavrou' s paintings...
Just edited! 50 New Bookmarks from Yannis Stavrou' s paintings at the POLITEIA bookshops, 1 Asklipiou St, Athens, Greece...
Social & Economic Crisis - Time for Reading
Friday, September 28, 2012
Go, my songs, seek your praise from the young and from the intolerant...
Ezra Pound
Some Poems
Ité
Go, my songs, seek your praise from the young
and from the intolerant,
Move among the lovers of perfection alone.
Seek ever to stand in the hard Sophoclean light
And take you wounds from it gladly.
The Coming Of War: Actaeon
An image of Lethe,
and the fields
Full of faint light
but golden,
Gray cliffs,
and beneath them
A sea
Harsher than granite,
unstill, never ceasing;
High forms
with the movement of gods,
Perilous aspect;
And one said:
'This is Actaeon.'
Actaeon of golden greaves!
Over fair meadows,
Over the cool face of that field,
Unstill, ever moving
Hosts of an ancient people,
The silent cortège.
PHASELLUS ILLE
This papier-mâché, which you see, my friends,
Saith 'twas the worthiest of editors.
Its mind was made up in 'the seventies',
Nor hath it ever since changed that concoction.
It works to represent that school of thought
Which brought the hair-cloth chair to such perfection,
Nor will the horrid threats of Bernard Shaw
Shake up the stagnant pool of its convictions;
Nay, should the deathless voice of all the world
Speak once again for its sole stimulation,
Twould not move it one jot from left to right.
Come Beauty barefoot from the Cyclades,
She'd find a model for St. Anthony
In this thing's sure decorum and behaviour.
SURGIT FAMA
There is a truce among the gods,
Kore is seen in the North
Skirting the blue-gray sea
In gilded and russet mantle.
The corn has again it's mother and she, Leuconoe,
That failed never women,
Fails not the earth now.
The tricksome Hermes is here;
He moves behind me
Eager to catch my words,
Eager to spread them with rumour;
To set upon them his change
Crafty and subtle;
To alter them to his purpose;
But do thou speak true, even to the letter:
‘Once more in Delos, once more is the altar a-quiver.
Once more is the chant heard.
Once more are the never abandoned gardens
Full of gossip and old tales.’
CODA
O My songs,
Why do you look so eagerly and so curiously into
people's faces,
Will you find your lost dead among them?
Monday, September 24, 2012
Absurdity and perversity remain the masters of the world
Arthur Schopenhauer (1815), portrait by Ludwig Sigismund Ruhl
Arthur Schopenhauer
Quotes
All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
Change alone is eternal, perpetual, immortal.
Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world.
The wise have always said the same things, and fools, who are the majority have always done just the opposite.
The doctor sees all the weakness of mankind; the lawyer all the wickedness, the theologian all the stupidity.
Friday, August 31, 2012
The holy, unspeakable, mysterious Night...
Yannis Stavrou, Nocturnal (detail), oil on camvas
Aside I turn to the holy, unspeakable, mysterious Night. Afar lies the world -- sunk in a deep grave -- waste and lonely is its place. In the chords of the bosom blows a deep sadness. I am ready to sink away in drops of dew, and mingle with the ashes. -- The distances of memory, the wishes of youth, the dreams of childhood, the brief joys and vain hopes of a whole long life, arise in gray garments, like an evening vapor after the sunset. In other regions the light has pitched its joyous tents. What if it should never return to its children, who wait for it with the faith of innocence?
What springs up all at once so sweetly boding in my heart, and stills the soft air of sadness? Dost thou also take a pleasure in us, dark Night? What holdest thou under thy mantle, that with hidden power affects my soul? Precious balm drips from thy hand out of its bundle of poppies. Thou upliftest the heavy-laden wings of the soul. Darkly and inexpressibly are we moved -- joy-startled, I see a grave face that, tender and worshipful, inclines toward me, and, amid manifold entangled locks, reveals the youthful loveliness of the Mother. How poor and childish a thing seems to me now the Light -- how joyous and welcome the departure of the day -- because the Night turns away from thee thy servants, you now strew in the gulfs of space those flashing globes, to proclaim thy omnipotence -- thy return -- in seasons of thy absence. More heavenly than those glittering stars we hold the eternal eyes which the Night hath opened within us. Farther they see than the palest of those countless hosts -- needing no aid from the light, they penetrate the depths of a loving soul -- that fills a loftier region with bliss ineffable. Glory to the queen of the world, to the great prophet of the holier worlds, to the guardian of blissful love -- she sends thee to me -- thou tenderly beloved -- the gracious sun of the Night, -- now am I awake -- for now am I thine and mine -- thou hast made me know the Night -- made of me a man -- consume with spirit-fire my body, that I, turned to finer air, may mingle more closely with thee, and then our bridal night endure forever.
Novalis (1772-1801)
Hymns to the Night
Saturday, July 7, 2012
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Days of vandalism in Athens
Scenes from the present...
Scenes from the future...
The play is completed...
End of a period...
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