All posts by keith

Uncategorized

In Praise of Public Libraries | by Sue Halpern | The New York Review of Books

archived 7 Apr 2019 21:46:26 UTC

Source: In Praise of Public Libraries | by Sue Halpern | The New York Review of Books

Klinenberg is interested in the ways that common spaces can repair our fractious and polarized civic life. And though he argues in his new book, Palaces for the People, that playgrounds, sporting clubs, diners, parks, farmer’s markets, and churches—anything, really, that puts people in close contact with one another—have the capacity to strengthen what Tocqueville called the cross-cutting ties that bind us to those who in many ways are different from us, he suggests that libraries may be the most effective. “Libraries are the kinds of places where ordinary people with different backgrounds, passions, and interests can take part in a living democratic culture,” he writes. Yet as Susan Orlean observes in her loving encomium to libraries everywhere, aptly titled The Library Book, “The publicness of the public library is an increasingly rare commodity. It becomes harder all the time to think of places that welcome everyone and don’t charge any money for that warm embrace.”
Art

Juxtapoz Magazine – Review: Everything is Boldness with Emilio Villalba @ Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco

San Francisco based painter Emilio Villalba exhibits a series of twenty-five new paintings (oil on canvas works dated 2023) at Dolby Chadwick Gallery, along with a series of acrylic paintings primarily on canvas paper. Many of the works feature his wife Michelle Fernandez Villalba (a recurring subject for the artist), and various associates including his close friend Jason Crase, along with self portraits in various poses, often holding a cigarette in his hand. Sensuous qualities of thick paint characterize the body of work, revealing an artist looking for new ways to convey the human experience and its varied emotions. Many of the pictures include vernacular settings, filled with elements of domesticity and immersed with familiarity. Ordinary objects like a coffee mug, toothbrush, fixed-line telephone, and bowl of fruit are among the many things depicted.

Although painted thickly, the resulting colorful pictures explore how to render the human figure with bold gestures and deceptively simple brush work. There is an acceptance, near synthesis, of the language of abstraction, specifically Expressionism, as Villalba alternates between thick swathes of impasto and carefully considered figural and spatial design. Evincing a sense of acute presence and awareness, viewers can imagine themselves in dialogue with the various personages depicted; life-size and bold renderings are the exhibitions’ hallmark. The gestural qualities of these paintings, comprising headshots, nudes, and semi-abstract faces and torsos, is apparent. Though applied abundantly, the economy of broad brush strokes interplays with unusual perspective and lines highlighting Villalba’s painterly intentionality. The exhibition at Dolby Chadwick invokes, and is in dialogue with, the work of other artists versed in this terrain, especially David Park and Joan Brown, who both utilized impasto to make brash and confident paintings. 

Source: Juxtapoz Magazine – Review: Everything is Boldness with Emilio Villalba @ Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco

Uncategorized

Scientists use seaweed to create new material that can store heat for reuse — ScienceDaily

Scientists have created a new material derived from seaweed that can store heat for re-use. It could be used to capture summer sun for use in winter, or to store heat from industry that currently goes up the chimney, potentially slashing carbon emissions. The material is in the form of small beads made from alginate, which is cheap, abundant and non-toxic. It stores heat four times more efficiently than a previous material the team had developed.

Source: Scientists use seaweed to create new material that can store heat for reuse — ScienceDaily

Uncategorized

Forests Around Chernobyl Aren’t Decaying Properly | Science| Smithsonian Magazine

 

It wasn’t just people, animals and trees that were affected by radiation exposure at Chernobyl, but also the decomposers: insects, microbes, and fungi

Source: Forests Around Chernobyl Aren’t Decaying Properly | Science| Smithsonian Magazine

According to a new study published in Oecologia, decomposers—organisms such as microbes, fungi and some types of insects that drive the process of decay—have also suffered from the contamination. These creatures are responsible for an essential component of any ecosystem: recycling organic matter back into the soil. Issues with such a basic-level process, the authors of the study think, could have compounding effects for the entire ecosystem.

Life

George Bernard Shaw Quote

This is the true joy in life, being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one. Being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances, complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live, it is my privilege to do for it what I can. I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work, the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.”
― George Bernard Shaw
Science, SF

Using mycelium to create a self-healing wearable leather-like material

Source: Using mycelium to create a self-healing wearable leather-like material

 

A pair of biotechnologists at Newcastle University, working with a colleague from Northumbria University, all in the U.K., have developed a way to use mycelium to create a self-healing wearable material. In their paper published in the journal Advanced Functional Materials, Elise Elsacker, Martyn Dade-Robertson and Meng Zhang, describe their process and how well it worked when tested.

” style=”position: absolute; width: 0px; height: 0px; left: 0px; right: 0px; z-index: -1; border: 0px none;” width=”0″ height=”0″>

Mycelium is a thread-like structure produced by some types of fungus. Prior research has shown that fungal colonies can arise with intertwining branching mycelium, resulting in the growth of large, matted structures. Such structures are typically found in the ground. Prior research has also shown that mycelium mats can be treated to produce a material known as mycelium leather, due to its resemblance to cow hide leather.

But as the research trio note, such treatments tend to kill chlamydospores—little nodules that allow the material to spring back to life given the right circumstances. After examining samples and the leathering process, they considered the possibility of changing things a bit to prevent killing the chlamydospores, which could allow the material to self-heal when put into a conducive environment.

The researchers grew their own batch of mycelium by adding active chlamydospores to a watery batch of carbohydrates, proteins and other nutrients. They then allowed enough time to pass for a thick skin to form on the liquid. The team then pulled the skin off the liquid and laid it out to dry. As it dried, they applied a mix of temperatures and chemicals that allowed the material to become leather-like without killing the embedded chlamydospores.

Testing of the resulting material showed it to be similar to other mycelium leathers in looks and characteristics. To find out if it could heal itself, the group punched holes in it and then placed it in a vat filled with the same liquid bath that had been used in its creation. Then they laid it out to dry, and as it did so, they noted that over time, the revived chlamydospores filled in the holes. Testing showed that the newly restored material was just as strong as an undamaged control sample, though they noted that it was still possible to see where the holes had been