text:
Posted by Felipe Daniel Montero January 13, 2020
In mythology, autochthones (from Ancient Greek αὐτός "self," and χθών "soil"; i.e. "people sprung from earth itself") are those mortals who have sprung from the soil, rocks and trees. They are rooted and belong to the land eternally.
In his work titled "Deromanticizing Heidegger", Don Ihde attempts to denounce some arbitrary stances in Heidegger's thought in order to propose a philosophy of technology purged of what he deems the philosopher's romantic (Nazi) preferences. Ihde begins:
"A century after his birth, two very contrary statements can be made concerning Martin Heidegger: First, in a significant sense, he is surely one of the most important founders of the philosophy of technology… Second, we all also know that he joined the National Socialist German Workers' Party and remained with it through the war… My question is this: Is there something at the very heart of Heidegger's thought that makes both of these contraries possible?"[i].
In the present work, I'll essay an answer to Ihde's question following my reading of Heidegger's public speech titled Memorial Address (Gelassenheit)[ii]. If we look at the rest of Heidegger's works in the light of this speech, we will be able to reach a systematic perspective of the relationships that exist between art, technology and truth in Heidegger's thought. In turn, this will allow us to appreciate what aspects of Heidegger's philosophy lead him to his so-called romanticism and the consequent error of subscribing to the Nazi party. Finally, we will also be able to properly understand how, in the words uttered ten years after the end of the war, Heidegger himself already offers an alternative other than fascism to confront the threats of modern technology.
Such works as "The Origin of the Work of Art" or "The Question Concerning Technology" are filled with what we may call a romanticization of German country life that is hard not to relate to Heidegger's involvement with Nazism. However, this supposed romanticization is not the result of a mere ideological preference: I'll argue that it has its grounds in the concept of homeland (Heimat) or home ground (heimatlicher Boden) that Heidegger employs in "Gelassenheit" and which approximately correspond to what in "The Origin of the Work of Art" is called the earth. As a result of the phenomenology of the work of art that is offered in that text, Heidegger concludes that the essence of the work is the strife between earth and world: "What thus happens in the strife: the inauguration of the open in the struggle between the unconcealed and the concealed, the coming-out of hiding and deception – this self-contained event is the happening of what we call truth."[iii] The earth is that which is properly produced in the making of a work of art such as sound in music, the word in literature or color in the visual arts. However, we must not reduce the earth to such concepts as matter or the sensuous since Heidegger conceives it as the opaque aspect of beings which resists being brought to the clear of what is intelligible for us. In opposition to the earth, the world is that which is opened by the work. Earth and world then describe two different dimensions of intelligibility: the opaque, that which resists interpretation (concealment), and the world as "revealing" or the transparent aspect of entities. Art as "the becoming and happening of truth" is then the disclosure in which earth, as that which closes itself, is brought to the open of the world in the strife instigated by the work, that is, in the tensional relationship that is established between what is already there and the elusive aspect of the receding earth.
Despite the alleged ontological complexity in the concept of earth, Heidegger can claim:
"We notice that a work of art has flowered in the ground of our homeland. As we hold this simple fact in mind, we cannot help remembering at once that during the last two centuries great poets and thinkers have been brought forth from the Swabian land. Thinking about it further makes clear at once that Central Germany is likewise such a land, and so are East Prussia, Silesia, and Bohemia."[iv]
Given these statements, it seems like we should concede to Ihde that Heidegger's romantic tastes represent a great obstacle not only for the philosophy of technology but also that Heidegger's aesthetics, including his concept of truth, are intrinsically linked to his nationalist ideology. However, I'll attempt to show how this represents a hurried dismissal of Heidegger's thought that can be corrected if we approach his critique of modern technology from the horizon of the rest of his work.
As I said earlier, Heidegger claims that the essence of the work of art is the strife in which the happening of truth as unconcealment takes place. In "The Question Concerning Technology", the essence of technology as enframing (Gestell) is characterized as the hegemonic mode of unconcealing in our times. In this way, art and technology are revealed as diametrically opposed modes of unconcealment or truth. As Ihde points out, Heidegger has the tendency to oppose a "good" technology to a "bad" one. What characterizes the good technology is its artistic dimension that results from art not being yet distinguished in its particularity from the rest of technology as is the case in Greek philosophy where the concept of techné is understood as encompassing the poiesis of fine arts, the artist not being distinguished from the artisan. Yet, Ihde understands that Heidegger's distinction has its grounds in subjective preferences, in particular a nostalgia for traditional modes of production and an ecological awareness that rejects those technologies which "provoke" (herausfordern) nature. In "Gelassenheit", Heidegger claims that in order to face the threats that modern technology poses "We can use technical devices as they ought to be used…"[v]. The method of phenomenology precludes this type of normative claims, being fundamentally descriptive. Should we conclude that in this speech Heidegger betrays his arbitrariness by uttering explicitly normative claims? I believe that there are sufficient arguments to give a negative answer to this question. First, I will expound Heidegger's characterization of the provocative mode of unconcealing as derived from a more original one. Secondly, I will offer an interpretation of Heidegger's project in "Gelassenheit" that emphasizes the non-normative grounds of his statements. In both cases, the original/derived distinction grounds Heidegger's preferences. These must be understood as stemming from a purely phenomenological basis that does not allow itself to be tainted by subjective tastes or a normativity incompatible with the phenomenological method.
In the "Question Concerning Technology", after a detour through the traditional conception of technology as a means to an end and a reinterpretation of Aristotle's concept of causality, Heidegger formulates the essence of technology as the Gestell or "enframing". The Gestell marks one of the epochs in Heidegger's depiction of the history of western metaphysics. Just as the Idea was for Plato, the Gestell is the way in which being announces itself to us in our times. What characterizes our epoch is that the Gestell interpellates us to unconceal the totality of beings as "stock" (Bestand) in the manner of a provocative order or solicitation (herausfondernde Bestellen). Discerning what exactly Heidegger considers to be the particular characteristics and limits that enable us to distinguish the provocative mode of unconcealment from non-provocative ones represents a tough exegetic challenge. Why exactly does the hydroelectrical dam on the Rhine provoke Nature whereas the temple doesn't?
In regard to this, Ihde opposes Heidegger's description of the Greek temple in the "Origin of the Work of Art" to that which J. Donald Hughes offers in "Ecology in ancient civilizations". The difference between them is that, while Heidegger offers a highly romanticized depiction of the temple, Hughes emphasizes the environmental impact that one can see around the Acropolis. Hughes also mentions how already Plato witnessed this concerning ecological transformations when he visited temples devoted to the guardian spirits of streams that had dried out by his time. However, these counterexamples suffer from two defects. First, the contrast between the examples is a result of Heidegger's stance that we must understand the work of art in the context of the world that is opened by it. It is then justified to offer a romanticized depiction of the temple since only in this way can we offer an account of its original situation in which the temple properly functions as a work of art. The two examples offered by Hughes depict works whose world has already closed. Secondly, we must concede to Ihde that Hughes' examples show how the damage done to nature isn't something exclusive to modern technology. However, this does not imply that Greek technology provoked nature in Heidegger's sense. What concerns Heidegger is the total hegemony of a certain way of approaching beings which threatens to take over all other possible modes of unconcealment. We must take into account that, even if the Greeks could be said to have done the same damage to nature as did the English in the times of Francis Bacon, the difference that Heidegger is interested in is how from a certain historical horizon nature can be seen as something to be dominated and this is clearly incompatible with the Greek conception of physis.
The ultimate danger that the Gestell represents is that all modes of unconcealment would be redirected to that of provocation. This would signify the end of meditative thinking and the total hegemony of what Heidegger deems the calculative mode of thought. Heidegger claims that the Gestell, which becomes pervasively evident in our times with the advent of such technologies as the nuclear bomb, has been operating and developing itself from long ago, being itself the root of modern science's instrumental character and its understanding of nature in terms of measurable extension. In this way, Heidegger worries that the only possibility that would remain for man would be
"…of pursuing and pushing forward nothing but what is revealed in ordering (Bestellen), and of deriving all his standards on this basis. Through this the other possibility is blocked, that man might be admitted more and sooner and ever more primally to the essence of that which is unconcealed and to its unconcealment, in order that he might experience as his essence his needed belonging to revealing."[vi].
In the language of Being and Time, this is to say that man would fall into an improper mode of existence in which he would stop understanding himself from himself and thus remain oblivious to his essence as a consequence of understanding not only nature but also himself in terms of stock (Bestand). Ihde admits that "… Heidegger does not simply outright condemn modern technology – its essence, enframing, is simultaneously a revealing of the world and an openness…". In spite of this, Ihde then dismisses the danger that Heidegger warms us of by introducing this question: "In short, all of nature, including the human being, will be seen as reduced to a vast resource well (Bestand) – but the question then is: for who, or for what end?"[vii]. However, if we properly understand Heidegger's stance that the Gestell grounds an epoch of our understanding of beings, then we know that it doesn't result from any human will or in favor of any human interests. In this regard, Heidegger's stance regarding the hegemony of the Gestell can be compared to the description of power relations by Michel Foucault. Instead of the traditional models of power which seek the source of authority in an individual figure or in a particular group, the microphysics of power do not respond to any such central source; instead, oppressed individuals themselves reproduce the structures of power. The following quote from Heidegger's "Gelassenheit" is thus very relevant: "…these forces, since man has not made them, have moved long since beyond his will and have outgrown his capacity for decision."[viii].
Another aspect of Heidegger's romanticism is his nationalism in the form of the concept of home ground which is especially present in "Gelassenheit". In relation to art, Heidegger asks "…does not the flourishing of any genuine work depend upon its roots in a native soil? …does man still dwell calmly between heaven and earth? … is there still a life-giving home-land in whose ground man may stand rooted, that is, be autochthonic?"[ix]. These concepts lend themselves easily to an interpretation that relates Heidegger's thought immediately back to his involvement with Nazism. However, my stance is that the issue is more complex. The concept of earth is the result of a phenomenology of the work of art and, as is the case for the phenomenology of "equipment" in the beginning of Being and Time which focuses on the artisanal mode of production, Heidegger's phenomenology takes the thematic entity under description from the perspective of a primitive experience of it. In this way, we can say that Heidegger's phenomenology of art, although it seeks to arrive at the essence of art as such, focuses on a model of art in which the production of beautiful objects has not yet been distinguished in its particularity from the rest of technological production. In this manner, there seems to be a radical difference between the Greek temple as studied in the "Origin of the Work of Art" and the example of Van Gogh's painting that is offered in the same text. While the essence of the work of art as strife must be descriptive of all forms of art, it seems the Greek temple is limited to founding the world of the Greeks while Van Gogh's painting is what properly reveals to Heidegger the essence of art as such. Iain Thomson claims that "… in Van Gogh's painting—the strange space which surrounds these shoes like an underlying and yet also enveloping atmosphere—one can notice that inchoate forms begin to emerge from the background but never quite take a firm shape; in fact, these shapes tend to disappear when one tries to pin them down."[x] In this manner, Van Gogh's painting can be said to reflect the structure of the strife that Heidegger deems the essence of the work of art.
Meyer Schapiro famously objected that Heidegger's interpretation of Van Gogh's painting is nothing but a subjective projection of his romantic preferences since the shoes that the painting depicted were Van Gogh's own, a city man's, and not at all a countrywoman's. Most Heideggerians would claim that Schapiro misses the important aspects of Heidegger's example, namely, the ontological depth that the phenomenological description of the work seeks. While I partially agree, I believe that the fact that Van Gogh painted his own shoes is of utmost importance precisely because it means that we are facing an ontological work in the sense that it reflects on its own being. My stance is that this represents a transcendental art[xi] that reflects upon itself and reveals the conditions of its own possibility. This kind of art is altogether different to what I deem pre-transcendental art such as the Greek temple or any other work of art previous to the revolution that Cervantes put forth in his highly reflexive work Don Quixote and which is comparable to that started in philosophy twenty years later by Descartes in his Rules for the Direction of the Mind (we could also mention here another exponent of the Spanish renaissance: the painter Velazquez, known for his self-portrait Las Meninas and his extensive depiction of mirrors). We can say, without departing too much from Heidegger, that a work of pre-transcendental art is a sensible manifestation of the spirit of a community or, in less Hegelian terms, that it consolidates its ethno-political identity by providing a tangible foundation for its political organization. However, we can only claim that this is art's function because of Heidegger's radical claim that the temple founds the Greek world in the sense of a cosmovision, opening the historical horizon of intelligibility for their understanding of beings. As Heidegger says, "Standing there, the temple first gives to things their look, and to men their outlook on themselves."[xii]. While the temple's essence is the strife in which the earth is brought to the clear of human intelligibility, Van Gogh's painting reflects the strife itself as his broad brushstrokes abandon the defined lines of realism and evoke the elusive and receding aspect of the earth. In this way, we can appreciate the link that there exists between Heidegger's aesthetics and nationalism since, as long as there isn't an explicit distinction between transcendental and pre-transcendental art, the concept of Earth remains tied to that of home ground and autochthony. However, in what follows I'll show how Heidegger's "Gelassenheit" is precisely an exhortation to think a new autochthony that would allow us to dwell properly in the midst of the irreversible changes that modern technology brings about.
Releasement (Gellasenheit) is the attitude that Heidegger proposes as that which we need to assume in order to face the threats of modern technology. In "The experience of technology: Human-machine relations", Ihde states that "…there is a 'technosphere' within which we do a good deal of our living, surrounding us in part the way technological artifacts do literally for astronauts and deep sea investigators."[xiii]. Despite his romanticism, Heidegger similarly observes, "For all of us, the arrangements, devices, and machinery of technology are to a greater or lesser extent indispensable. It would be foolish to attack technology blindly. It would be shortsighted to condemn it as the work of the devil. We depend on technical devices."[xiv] Given that we depend on the world of technology or technosphere, to be released is to say "yes" to modern technology. However, the essence of modern technology, in so far as it compels us to understand nature merely as a quantitatively measurable reserve of resources (including what we deem the "human resources"), threatens to redirect all modes of unconcealment to that of provocation. Since this would signify a fall into an improper mode of existence as we stop reflecting upon ourselves to understand humanity merely in terms of stock, releasement simultaneously has to say "no" to the pervasiveness of the Gestell: "We can affirm the unavoidable use of technical devices, and also deny them the right to dominate us, and so to warp, confuse, and lay waste our nature."[xv]. This saying yes to the unavoidable character of technology acknowledges that "…a profound change is taking place in man's relation to nature and to the world. But the meaning that reigns in this change remains obscure."[xvi].
Given this opacity in modern technology's essence, the other part of Heidegger's solution is what he calls the openness to mystery. With this openness, Heidegger is simultaneously recognizing the imperative to accept the inevitable while humbly admitting that his limitations as a man of a past generation preclude him from imagining how man can dwell properly in the time of the Gestell. In so far as "mystery" is defined by Heidegger as that which shows itself at the same time as it conceals itself, the openness to mystery is the way in which we maintain meditative or self-reflexive thought alive by staying in realm of truth as unconcealment. It's worth noting how this mystery to which we are to be open evokes the concept of earth. One of Heidegger's main contributions to philosophy is his stance that humans first and foremost understand the world through the manipulation of tools and the production of works. Thus, thought as openness to mystery and art are identified as in Nietzsche's stance that art is the properly metaphysical activity of man and Danto's claim that the defining trait of 20th century art is its philosophical character as it explicitly poses the question "What is art?". Releasement and openness to mystery "…grant us the possibility of dwelling in the world in a totally different way. They promise us a new ground and foundation upon which we can stand and endure in the world of technology without being imperiled by it. Releasement toward things and openness to the mystery give us a vision of a new autochthony which someday even might be fit to recapture the old and now rapidly disappearing autochthony in a changed form."[xvii]. The lost rooting that Heidegger denounces is not simply the subordination of meditative thinking to calculative thought: the hegemony of modern technology brings about the shortening of all distances in space and time, the erasing of all localisms as a result of globalization. As Ihde claims "The dramatic space shots of Earth from the moon or a satellite are very un-Heideggerian precisely because they place Earth at a distance from Earth-as-ground. But they are also irreversibly part of the postmodern view of Earth-as-globe, with a very different sense of what constitutes our 'home'."[xviii]. However, as I attempted to show, Heidegger recognizes this irreversible aspect of the profound changes in humanity's relation to nature and the world and exhorts us to think so that we can build a "home" in the technical world. In this regard, Heidegger's thought is closer than ever to the spirit of Kant's philosophy: not only does he offer a critique of the illegitimate claims of the science of his time that threatens to warp and destroy human freedom, he also exhorts us to understand our dwelling in the world in cosmopolitan terms.
[i] Ihde, D. Heidegger's technologies: postphenomenological perspectives, (New York, Fordham University Press, 2010), 74.
[ii] Heidegger, M. Discourse on thinking.: a gr. of Gelassenheit, (New York, Harper & Row, 1959)
[iii] Heidegger, Martin. "Vom Ursprung des Kunstwerks: Erste Ausarbeitung" Heidegger Studies Vol. 5 (1989): 5-22
The original text reads: "Was so in der Bestreitung geschieht: die Eröffnung der Offenheit des Widerstreits von Unverborgenem und Verborgenem, das Herauskommen von Verdeckung und Verstellung, — dieses in sich gefügte Geschehen ist das Geschehen dessen, was wir Wahrheit nennen."
[iv] Heidegger, M. Discourse on thinking.: a gr. of Gelassenheit, (New York, Harper & Row, 1959), 47
[v] Heidegger, M. Discourse on thinking.: a gr. of Gelassenheit, (New York, Harper & Row, 1959), 54
[vi] Heidegger, M. The question concerning technology, and other essays, (New York, Harper Perennial, 2013): 26
[vii] Ihde, D. Heidegger's technologies: postphenomenological perspectives. (New York, Fordham University Press, 2010), 81
[viii] Heidegger, M. Discourse on thinking.: a gr. of Gelassenheit, (New York, Harper & Row, 1959), 51
[ix] Heidegger, M. Discourse on thinking.: a gr. of Gelassenheit, (New York, Harper & Row, 1959), 47-48
[x] Thomson, Iain, "Heidegger's Aesthetics", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2019 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2019/entries/heidegger-aesthetics/>.
[xi] There is much to develop and further enquire in regard to this concept since the reflexive character of modern art is an extensive phenomenon. For a case study of some films that can be deemed transcendental see my essay "Transcendetal cinema: When the camera turns upon itself". I also recently came upon a book by literary critic Robert Alter named "Partial Magic: The Novel as a Self-conscious Genre" which sees in the Quixote not only the birth of the novel but the archetype that cointains all the self-reflexive excercises that later novelists will eplore and exploit (with the exception of those who subscribe to literary realism). Furthermore, an interesting dialogue can be opened with Danto's philosophy of art since his periodization of the history of art responds to the degree of self-consciousness evidenced by artists. Danto distinguishes between pre-art and Art, the latter corresponding to the epoch in which artists as the makers of beautiful objects are distinguished from artisans. The infamous claim of the end of art precisely refers to the epoch in history, the 20th century, where art itself becomes philosophical as it explicitly poses the question "What is art?"
[xii] Heidegger, M. Off the Beaten Track, (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2002), 21
[xiii] Ihde, D. Technics and praxis, (Dordrecht, D. Reidel Pub. Co., 1979), 14
[xiv] Heidegger, M. Discourse on thinking.: a gr. of Gelassenheit, (New York, Harper & Row, 1959), 53
[xv] Heidegger, M. Discourse on thinking.: a gr. of Gelassenheit, (New York, Harper & Row, 1959), 54
[xvi] Heidegger, M. Discourse on thinking.: a gr. of Gelassenheit. (New York: Harper & Row, 1959), 55
[xvii] Heidegger, M. Discourse on thinking.: a gr. of Gelassenheit. (New York: Harper & Row, 1959), 55
[xviii] Ihde, D. Heidegger's technologies: postphenomenological perspectives, (New York, Fordham University Press, 2010), 85
Posted in: Philosophy, UncategorizedTagged: Aesthetics, Art Theory, Don Idhe, existentialism, Heidegger, phenomenology, Philosophy, Philosophy of technology, TechnologyPermalink2 Comments
2 thoughts on "Art, Technology and Truth in Martin Heidegger's Thought"
landzek says:
I think the very simple organization of reason which equates Heidegger with his choice to join the Nazi party is that he could not be separated from his being, there is no being, no Dasein, which is in any way separate. His whole philosophy is about the integration of being with itself. His whole philosophy was to try to describe this ultimate completion.
There was no "mistake" Of him joining the Nazi party; the Nazi party was indeed the culmination of this kind of few upon the world that sees spirit and thought and being an existence is all integrated, completely inseparable, a sort of Hegelian motion of historical consciousness.
I mean I understand how a philosopher might want to look to all his works to find out why he just made this terrible choice into the Nazi party, but I think looking for that completely mistaken the congruity of the idea with history with consciousness with being. And, of course, with time.
But we can also see with Heidegger the problem with his own philosophy. Not the choice to become in the Nazi party. It was his hesitation, his insecurity is questioning of weather that indeed should be the case. The problem with his whole philosophy is that indeed it misses the human part of being, or more precisely, it over emphasizes the human part of being, and doesn't see into the being Ness that is the coordination of all beings. That was the problem with Nazism of which Heidegger's philosophy cannot be segregated out of when we understand everything that he was saying as indeed a coordinated and inclusive effort of history time consciousness.
To segregate those things out as if we can have some sort of analysis upon it Is the problem that Heidegger was going through in his questioning of whether or not he should join the Nazi party.
And this questioning, this problem is what compelled him into taking the step into the Nazi party: because he was attempting to overcome the problem inherent to his idea of dasein: that it misses the other 95% of being it's self, or I should say the multitude of being that has nothing to do with spirit or coordination of thinking and spirit and time and consciousness, etc.
I appreciate this essay that you posted, but at the same time I kind of feel as if somehow the author is trying to argue themselves into a coordination of Dasein which justifies the analysis itself, Which is the say an entire embodiment of the problem of Heidegger's choice.
Because in fact Heidegger's philosophy makes no room for choice because it says that ultimately the choice is indeed informed by the consistency that is being in time.
And so all these subsequent philosophers so enthralled by the ideal that should be involved in a perception of spirit or what spirit should be, try to take something out of time and bring it into this time as if the spirit of thinking indeed justifies such a move eternally.
What we see bye hater she was choice is the doubt, is the requirement of a choice into Faith, which we already see with turkey guard is invalid and actually is not authentic because it is a forced authenticity.
In Heidegger's philosophy there is not supposed to be any sort of force of consciousness except that which is already involved in the force, so to speak. This is the significance of his talks upon the work of art and technology.
Lol. This paragraph "What we see bye hater she was choice is the doubt, is the requirement of a choice into Faith, which we already see with turkey guard is invalid and actually is not authentic because it is a forced authenticity".
Is ridiculous. Lol
It should read: What we see by Heidegger's choice is rather the doubt, not the confidence of being that Heidegger's philosophy would embody. What we see in Heidegger himself is what is incorrect about his ideas, the contradiction involved in his philosophy that he refuses to except but nevertheless comes upon in the event of the Nazi party. And this is to say what Kierkegaard points out, namely that where one comes upon such a choice and then makes the choice, there we see what is inauthentic about the idea, What is ultimately contradictory about such a phenomenal move. For indeed what is authentic would have been to never have to make the choice, or would I call "a choice that cannot be made". Indeed it is that the choice had to come up for him and that he was faced with that either or question of what is true, what should I do, what does this mean for what I've been knowing all this time? It is this kind of choice that one gathers or comes upon the anxiety of existence and thereby makes the wrong choice.
← Nietzsche and Wagner on Tragedy: The Slave and the Nation in Nineteenth-Century Germany
Mad(e) Men: Historicism and History as Told Through Period Drama and TV →


text:
Select Page: Where to?Uncategorized
Select Category: Where to?ABOUT US -- S2B network – About us -- Coordination -- Member Groups -- Austria -- Belgium -- Denmark -- France -- Germany -- Hungary -- Ireland -- Italy -- Latvia -- Netherlands -- Norway -- Spanish State -- Sweden -- Switzerland -- United Kingdom -- Join S2B ISSUES -- EU's Trade Strategy -- EU Investment Policy -- The ISDS Files -- Alternative Trade Mandate for the EU -- Raw Materials & Climate Justice -- Building links with Labour Movements -- EU's Free Trade Agreements -- TTIP material -- CETA material -- TiSA Material -- EU-Indonesia -- JEFTA - EU-JAPAN FTA ACTIVITIES STATEMENTS BLOG CONTACT
Seattle to Brussels Network
S2B network – About us
Join S2B
EU's Trade Strategy
EU Investment Policy
The ISDS Files
Alternative Trade Mandate for the EU
Raw Materials & Climate Justice
Building links with Labour Movements
EU's Free Trade Agreements
TTIP material
CETA material
TiSA Material
EU-Indonesia
JEFTA – EU-JAPAN FTA
Support the civil society letter on EU-Singapore and EU-Vietnam
Lucile October 24, 2018 Support the civil society letter on EU-Singapore and EU-Vietnam2019-07-08T12:50:05+00:00 Uncategorized
Call from civil society not to ratify
the EU Singapore and EU Vietnam Free Trade and Investment Agreements
The undersigned organisations call on the European Parliament and the parliaments of the European Member States not to ratify the free trade and investment agreements (FTAs) with Singapore and Vietnam that were signed on the fringes of the Asia-Europe Meeting, held on 18-19 October in Brussels.
The EU-Singapore and EU-Vietnam free trade and investment agreements talk about sustainable development and high levels of labour and environmental protection as their objective. However, they do not meet the urgent challenges that Europe and Asia face today: the reduction of inequality, the promotion of sustainable development and the mitigation of climate change.
The Singapore and Vietnam trade agreements are considered the competence of the EU only, and therefore will have to pass solely through the European Parliament.
Both the EU-Vietnam and the EU Singapore agreements lack a 'supremacy clause' that ensures international human rights law, environmental and climate agreements take precedence over free trade and investment rules;
The trade and sustainable development (TSD) chapters for both agreements fail to develop the necessary ambitious joint standards and lay down concrete commitments for the protection and enforcement of international climate, environmental, labour and human rights obligations; such chapters should govern the agreements; instead, of including effective monitoring and enforcement mechanisms, they excluded from the agreements' dispute settlement mechanism.
The agreements do not foresee in periodic assessments of the human rights, environmental and climate impacts of the agreement; crucially, they lack a 'review clause' to review (parts of) the agreement after it has been ratified and implemented, based on regular impact studies on sustainable development and human rights.
In terms of protecting human rights, the chapters on the protection of intellectual property pose an immediate threat to the availability of affordable generic medicines. The chapters fail to regulate commercial seed systems from the premise of the overarching right to food and decent livelihoods for small producers and vulnerable farming communities.
The agreements fail to adequately regulate capital flows to avoid exposure to financial instability.
The agreements fail to impose direct, binding and enforceable obligations on foreign investors to observe relevant recognised international standards for corporate social responsibility and climate policies.
The investment agreements concluded with EU-Singapore and the EU-Vietnam are considered a mixed competence and will have to go through the relevant national ratification procedures in all Member States.
The investment chapters of these agreements, which are to be ratified independently by the EU Member States' parliaments, both contain far-reaching investment protections and very wide definitions of what constitutes a covered investor/investment, including portfolio investments, bonds, goodwill and IPR, enforceable through investor-state dispute settlement mechanisms. Such wide protections are extended despite the fact that the evidence that investment protection helps attract FDI is inconclusive: Numerous studies indicate that investment protection/ISDS is hardly the determining factor for investors when making the decision to invest; other factors such as market size and growth potential, a skilled workforce, availability of natural resources and adequate infrastructure appear to be more important determinants of FDI. Such protection is extended across the board, even though not all FDI necessarily contributes to sustainable development. Research indicates that, apart from positive impacts, FDI can also have negative spill-over effects and crowd out domestic companies, create precarious jobs or reduce employment, increase income inequality, facilitate tax evasion and avoidance, and contribute to environmental degradation and pollution. This shows that it is crucial to provide for the adequate mechanisms and regulations to harness FDI for sustainable development.
Instead of including a broad denial of benefits clause, the EU-Singapore and EU-Vietnam investment chapters continue to protect all kinds of FDI irrespective of the nature of the investment, the behaviour of the investor or the social, economic or environmental impact of the investment.
Both agreements contain a clause containing a commitment on behalf of the signatory parties to enter into negotiations for a multilateral investment tribunal for the settlement of investment disputes, at a time when the legality of investor–state dispute settlement (ISDS), including in the form of an Investment Court System (ICS), in EU trade agreements under EU law is being questioned. In the absence of a ruling by the European Court of Justice, passing a bill for the ratification of the investment part of the EU-Singapore and EU Vietnam agreements may mean sanctioning agreements that are incompatible with the EU Treaties. More fundamentally, a Multilateral Investment Court will further entrench a system for the settlement of investment disputes that enables transnational corporations to wield undue power over public policy-making. In our hyperglobalised world, an increasingly concentrated group of corporations dominates global markets. UNCTAD, in its Trade and Development Report 2018, notes that the sheer size of today's transnationally operating mega-corporations reinforces ""the gradual dilution of social and political accountability of large corporations to national constituencies and labour around the world".1 The institution of a MIC would contribute to strengthening the intertwining of corporate and political power.
The human and labour rights situation in Singapore and Vietnam continues to give cause for concern.
Both Singapore and Vietnam have failed to ratify all ILO core conventions. Singapore has not ratified ILO Convention 87 on the freedom of association and the right to organise, nor Convention 111 on discrimination in relation to employment. Vietnam also does not recognise freedom of association and has not ratified the Convention on the right to organise and collective bargaining (no. 98) and the Convention on the abolition of forced labour (no. 105).
In its resolution of 14 December 2017, the European Parliament itself underlined "the deterioration of civil and political rights in Vietnam".
Human Rights Watch paints a bleak picture of the situation in both countries:
In Singapore "(c)itizens face severe restrictions on their basic rights to freedom of expression, association, and peaceful assembly through overly broad criminal laws and regulations."
"Vietnam's human rights record remains dire in all areas. The Communist Party maintains a monopoly on political power and allows no challenge to its leadership. Basic rights, including freedom of speech, opinion, press, association, and religion, are restricted. Rights activists and bloggers face harassment, intimidation, physical assault, and imprisonment. Farmers continue to lose land to development projects without adequate compensation, and workers are not allowed to form independent unions. The police use torture and beatings to extract confessions. The criminal justice system lacks independence. State-run drug rehabilitation centers exploit detainees as laborers making goods for local markets and export."
Concluding trade and investment agreements under such circumstances conflicts with the basic principles enshrined in the EU Treaties. European transnational traders, service providers and investors should not be enabled to take advantage of such conditions.
1 Power, Platforms and the Free Trade Delusion – Overview, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development Report 2018, p. 10, at: https://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/tdr2018overview_en.pdf
« European multipliers training on ISDS and corporate accountability
Campaign Strategy Meeting »
action Alternative Trade Mandate BITs CEE CETA Chemicals Civil society climate commons digital rights EU-CELAC EU-Central America FTA EU-Colombia/Peru FTA EU-Ecuador FTA EU-India FTA EU-Mexico FTA EU-Myanmar Farmin Food health ICS IIAs Intra-EU BITS ISDS Japan JEFTA labor local medicine Mercosur MIC Myanmar open letter philippines public services reform Regulatory cooperation resolution SDG Singapore TISA TTIP TTIP resolution vote WTO
Tweets door @S2Brussels

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


The Urban Dance Festival 2018 is going to be a great experience for all of you. The following schedule will be updated step by step with detailed information about the main and side events.
11.00 – Preselection "Battle of the Kids"
13.00 – Preselection "BOTY 1vs1 Undisputed"
13.30 – Preselection "NBF 1vs1 House Dance"
14.30 – Preselection "NBF 2vs2 Hip Hop"
15.15 – Preselection "FreeStyle Session Europe"
18.15 – Start: "Battle of the Year Central Europe"


text:
class QPainter;
class QGLShaderProgram;
class QGLFramebufferObject;
class RenderingLayer;
typedef QSharedPointer<QGLShaderProgram>     PQGLShaderProgram;
typedef QSharedPointer<QGLFramebufferObject> PQGLFramebufferObject;

class RenderingLayer
{
public:
  RenderingLayer(bool enabled=true);
  virtual ~RenderingLayer() {}

  bool isEnabled();
  void toggleEnabled();

  bool isGLPainting();
  void useGLPainting(QPainter *painter);
  void useQtPainting(QPainter *painter);

  bool paint(QPainter *painter, bool currentGLPainting=false);

  virtual void setEnabled(bool b);
  virtual void initGL() {}

  virtual void render(QPainter *painter) = 0;

protected:
  bool enabled;

private:
  bool glPainting;
};

struct GLBuffer
{
  GLBuffer(): buffer(0), size(0) {}

  void generate() {
    glGenBuffers(1, &this->buffer);
    this->size = 0;
  }

  void setData(GLenum target, GLsizeiptr dataSize, const GLvoid* data, GLenum usage)
  {
    glBindBuffer(target, this->buffer);
    if (this->size<dataSize) {
      glBufferData(target, dataSize, 0, usage);
      this->size = dataSize;
    }
    glBufferSubData(target, 0, dataSize, data);
  }

  GLuint buffer;
  GLsizeiptr size;
};

struct GLTexture
{
  void bind()
  {
    if (!this->size.isValid()) {
      glGenTextures(1, &this->id);
      glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, this->id);
      glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MAG_FILTER, GL_LINEAR);
      glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MIN_FILTER, GL_LINEAR);
      glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_WRAP_S, GL_CLAMP);
      glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_WRAP_T, GL_CLAMP);
      glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_TEXTURE_ENV_MODE, GL_REPLACE);
    }
    else
      glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, this->id);
  }

  void ensureSize(const QSize &newSize)
  {
    if (!this->size.isValid() ||
        this->size.width()<newSize.width() ||
        this->size.height()<newSize.height()) {
      this->size = QSize(std::max(this->size.width(), newSize.width()),
                         std::max(this->size.height(), newSize.height()));
      glTexImage2D(GL_TEXTURE_2D, 0, GL_RGBA,
                   this->size.width(), this->size.height(),
                   0, GL_RGBA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, 0);
    }
  }

  void setImage(const QImage &img)
  {
    QImage texImg = QGLWidget::convertToGLFormat(img);
    this->bind();
    this->ensureSize(texImg.size());
    glTexSubImage2D(GL_TEXTURE_2D, 0, 0, 0,
                    texImg.width(), texImg.height(),
                    GL_RGBA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, texImg.bits());

  }

  GLuint id;
  QSize  size;
};

inline bool RenderingLayer::isEnabled()
{
  return this->enabled;
}

inline void RenderingLayer::toggleEnabled()
{
  this->setEnabled(!this->enabled);
}

inline bool RenderingLayer::isGLPainting()
{
  return this->glPainting;
}

#endif

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Teen wearing DCS ankle monitor reports gunshot injury, later arrested on gun charge
Nashville police say a teen went to the hospital to be treated for a gunshot wound. They arrested him the next day.
Teen wearing DCS ankle monitor reports gunshot injury, later arrested on gun charge Nashville police say a teen went to the hospital to be treated for a gunshot wound. They arrested him the next day. Check out this story on Tennessean.com: https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/crime/2019/05/30/teen-injured-dcs-custody-arrested-weapon-home-visit-ankle-monitor-nashville/1293918001/
Mariah Timms, Nashville Tennessean Published 8:07 p.m. CT May 30, 2019
A teenager who sought medical attention for a gunshot wound Wednesday was later arrested on gun possession charges.
The child, who is 14, has not been named by the Metro Nashville Police Department.
A release from the department reported he was dropped off at Skyline Medical Center with a gunshot wound to his shoulder. He was treated and released from the hospital, police report.
The boy is in DCS custody, and was wearing an ankle monitor on a trial home visit, MNPD report.
Officers received information that the teen could be in possession of a firearm, a release said. The boy's grandmother allowed Juvenile Crime Task Force officers to search her S. 5th Street home, where the boy was living, in search of such a weapon.
There, the officers report finding a 9 mm pistol and an extended magazine with 24 bullets in the closet of the bedroom where the boy was staying. An additional round was found in the chamber of the handgun.
Metro Nashville Police report finding the handgun pictured in the bedroom of a teen released on a home visit from DCS custody. The unnamed teen was charged with with unlawful gun possession and theft of the pistol. The pistol was reported stolen from an unlocked vehicle in October 2018. (Photo: Metro Nashville Police)
The gun itself had been reported stolen on Oct. 29 from an unlocked vehicle parked on N. 18th street, according to police.
The teen was charged Thursday with unlawful gun possession and theft of the pistol. Police reported that he was "not cooperative" with detectives who attempted to investigate the shooting that sent him to the hospital.
Reach reporter Mariah Timms at mtimms@tennessean.com or 615-259-8344 and on Twitter @MariahTimms.
Read or Share this story: https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/crime/2019/05/30/teen-injured-dcs-custody-arrested-weapon-home-visit-ankle-monitor-nashville/1293918001/


text:
Long Beach State has added a darker stain to its court as part of a grittier rebrand. Photo courtesy Long Beach State.
Sep 13 2018 12:17 pm
Long Beach State gets gritty, LBCC embraces the Viking in athletics rebrands
JJ Fiddler
Mascot changes, new logos and alternate uniforms are becoming more common in the sports world, and both Long Beach State and Long Beach City College have joined that trend by rolling out new logos and names this year. The Long Beach institutions of higher learning took input and worked the rebranding process on their own campus, and while Long Beach State has decided to move away from its mascot, the LBCC Vikings are embracing theirs.
Long Beach State's new logo for athletics teams. Courtesy Long Beach State.
Athletic Director Andy Fee inherited a logo and naming crisis when he arrived on campus last year. The university has struggled for years with the dual branding of Long Beach State and Cal State University Long Beach, and it has been phasing out the 49ers moniker and Prospector Pete mascot since 2013. Since then, the athletic department stopped using 49ers in press releases and stopped having Prospector Pete appear at games. Instead, the athletic department refers to its teams as The Beach.
"With the name issue, there's certainly passionate people on both sides, but most people don't care," Long Beach State President Jane Close Conoley said last year. "I want to be cautious about moving ahead."
Last year, the campus's Associated Students Incorporated voted to form a committee on the 49ers issue which decided to move forward with changing the mascot—citing prospectors as being representative of the Gold Rush that caused "Indigenous genocide." The entire student body will eventually have to vote on that issue. This week, the university also announced it will be moving the Prospector Pete statue that's on upper campus into an alumni visitors center that hasn't been built yet.
"I'm very excited about our rebrand," Fee said. "Today we need to be more conscientious about our mascots and affiliations. We strive for inclusive excellence here, and we need to do that in everything we do."
Close Conoley told the Daily 49er that the Cal State University system has requested that its schools move away from individuals as mascots. The campus newspaper and 49er Shops on campus have not announced any plans to change their names.
"We've had focus groups and campus conversations about all of these changes and more," said university Associate Vice President for University Relations and Communications Andy Hoang. "This campaign is about unifying the university, but it is like changing tires on a moving car."
Hoang and his staff have been working with the athletic department for two years trying to rebrand their sports teams without the 49ers mascot, and the BE/CH logo is their look for the future. Fee said he wanted to make sure to incorporate the pyramid shape because the Walter Pyramid is the only pyramid in the world that hosts year-round sporting events.
Along with the new BE/CH logo, Long Beach State will adopt darker colored uniforms and signage at facilities. There is also a new dark stain on the Walter Pyramid floor that features the "LB" logo at center court for the first time ever. Fee said he wants the colors and style of the university logos to match the grittiness of Long Beach.
"We're trying to be more inclusive," Fee said. "We're not just Second Street and Naples, which is a great part of our town, and has been phenomenal with us, but this city is more than that. I think we need to acknowledge that. The history of this town, in my mind, was built with shipping and commerce and a rich tradition. We want to have a gritty, aggressive look to who we are. We've got exciting new uniforms that look like our city—that blue collar, gritty, in-your-face and out-work-you attitude."
VIDEO: Fee talks about having multiple names for the university
Fee added that the gold uniforms fans have enjoyed in the past aren't going anywhere; they'll be used as alternative uniforms to, "make a statement" in certain "Gold Out" games.
"The process included reaching out to over 100,000 people with surveys to get different perspectives," Fee said of the logo redesign. "This wasn't just a knee-jerk, let's just throw something up on the video board for the first day of school. This has been a very intensive process. Everybody has had a chance to have their voice heard."
Long Beach State fans can voice their opinions on Wednesday, Sept. 19 when Fee hosts the first of three town-hall meetings at Joe Jost's (2803 E Anaheim St.) at 6 p.m.
LBCC's new logo. Courtesy LBCC.
Athletic Director Randy Totorp wanted to update the Vikings logo when he was the interim athletic director from 2011 to 2013, but he admitted that other responsibilities of the job took precedence. That delay proved to be a blessing in disguise after LBCC hired a new executive director of public affairs and marketing, Joshua Castellanos, in January, and a new graphic design specialist, Marinda Martin, in March.
"The timing was good," Totorp said. "I wanted us to have a Viking logo for the first time in school history. When you talk about mascots and logos and putting something in place, It can be a very challenging time to get people bought in and onboard with what you're doing."
VIDEO: Totorp talks about the redesign process and the advantages of rebranding
Totorp met with Castellanos and Martin earlier this year to bounce ideas around while incorporating local flavor into the Vikings profile like the beach, palm trees and waves. The announcement and release of the logo came earlier this month.
"It was a real team effort," Castellanos said. "It was done in-house with the marketing department and designers who really just want to push the boundaries of the college. (Martin) blew our minds with what she was able to accomplish."
Martin said she researched LBCC logos as far back as the 1940's before coming up with an initial design that actually looks a lot like the finished product.
"I was really excited that both Randy and Josh trusted me enough so quickly to work on a project this big," Martin said. "I'm sort of an outsider from Georgia where we don't have palm trees and beaches. So, I kind of picked up on the things that are around here that I thought were novel."
The official LBCC logo now features a full Vikings head with large helmet and beard with waves crashing beneath him. Totorp said it was important to him that the full Viking be the logo, and that type of branding and fresh looks are something he's made a priority since being a men's volleyball coach at the school.
"It plays a part in the student experience, and that is critically important in terms of recruitment, retention and all of those things are important in the things we should be focusing on," Totorp said. "If you have an opportunity to impact that, for me, that's what I want to do."
Despite the controversial historic significance of the word Viking, and how they've been portrayed in Hollywood, Totorp said his athletic department hasn't experienced any pushback like what's happened at Long Beach State.
"Certainly there are historical references that could indicate challenges there," Totorp said. "But we have not had that here at our college. The grey skin color (of the mascot) speaks to our cultural diversity. It's something we appreciate about our mascot. There are a lot of iterations of vikings mascots. This one is ours."
A vast rebranding by athletic departments would've been huge news in years past, but the writing is on the wall that this trend is becoming synonymous with sports.


text:
Mullawirraburka (1811–1845)
by Tom Gara
in the Australian Dictionary of Biography, Supplement , 2005
Mullawirraburka (c.1811-1845), Aboriginal leader, also known as Kertamero, 'King John' and 'Onkaparinga Jack', belonged to the Kaurna people, the traditional occupants of the Adelaide Plains. Born in the Willunga area, south of Adelaide, he was aged about 25 when the first colonists arrived in 1836. His Kaurna name, which translated literally as 'Dry Forest Old Man' (from Mullawirra, the gum forest on the eastern side of the Aldinga Plain, and burka, an old man) indicated that he was a ritual leader of considerable importance.
Mullawirraburka was a skilful warrior, his fighting prowess enabling him to acquire four wives—Koa Warrarto (Maria), Yerrarto (Jane), Kertanya and Kauwadla—more than any other Kaurna man at that time. About 5 ft 8 ins (173 cm) tall, he was, according to one settler, a 'finely-built fellow'; another referred to his 'very powerful frame and commanding appearance'. Articulate and intelligent, he was regarded by settlers and the authorities as one of the chiefs or leading men of the local Aboriginal people. Although a number of other Kaurna individuals were identified in the historical records, Mullawirraburka was the most prominent.
After the colonial authorities established the 'Native Location' on the banks of the River Torrens in 1838, Mullawirraburka took up semi-permanent residence there and developed a close relationship with Christian Teichelmann and Clamor Schürmann, Lutheran missionaries based there. Mullawirraburka quickly learned to speak English and was one of several Kaurna men who taught the missionaries the local language. He spent many hours with them, discussing spiritual matters but, like most Kaurna people, he would not accept the Christian teachings; his 'attachment to the superstitions in which he was brought up' was 'invincible', according to one account.
Appointed honorary police constable by the governor in 1838, Mullawirraburka acted as an intermediary between the Kaurna and the settlers, and was regarded by the authorities as the spokesman for his people. He seems to have done his best to keep the peace between his people and the colonists. He was, however, quick to defend his land when rival Aboriginal groups, such as those from Moorundie on the River Murray, visited Adelaide, attracted by the availability of food, tobacco and other goods.
Mullawirraburka died, probably of tuberculosis, on 2 January 1845 in Adelaide, survived by two sons and a daughter. His body was subsequently smoke-dried, in accordance with the custom of southern Kaurna clans, and later buried at Noarlunga, south of Adelaide. A newspaper obituarist observed:
He was always decent and peaceable with respect to the Europeans, and would occasionally submit to labour, but nothing could overcome his habits of vagrancy, or love for wandering in the bush, far away from the haunts of civilized man.
At the time of his death, two of his wives and six of his nine children were already dead, victims, like many other Kaurna people, of introduced diseases and poor living conditions in the wake of their dispossession from their lands by the white settlers. In a sketch by W. H. Leigh, reproduced in 1839, Mullawirraburka was depicted wearing a skin cloak, with hair in long ringlets and a thick beard. A wax portrait by Theresa Walker, held in the Art Gallery of South Australia, showed him with thick, curly hair and a neat beard.
T. J. Gara, 'The Life and Times of Mullawirraburka ('King John') of the Adelaide Tribe', in J. Simpson and L. Hercus (eds), History in Portraits (Canb, 1998)
South Australian Register, 6 Jan 1845, p 3.
Tom Gara, 'Mullawirraburka (1811–1845)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/mullawirraburka-13119/text23739, published first in hardcopy 2005, accessed online 28 January 2023.
This article was published in hardcopy in Australian Dictionary of Biography, Supplementary Volume, (Melbourne University Press), 2005
View the front pages for the Supplementary Volume
Kertamero
Onkaparinga Jack
2 January, 1845 (aged ~ 34)
Indigenous leader


Why anyone would want to kill such an amazing animal like the bald eagle is beyond me. These amazing birds have come back from levels near extinction and are now thriving in states like Iowa. An new bill in the Iowa legislature would increase the penalties for killing one, and I say raise the fine all you want.
The current fine in Iowa for killing an eagle is $50. A new bill is looking to push that fine up to $2500 which would match the federal penalty for killing the bird that is our national emblem. Senators working on the bill discovered the disparity in the Iowa fine a couple of years ago. They've been working with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources to get the fine level raised.
The DNR says that there have been 40 bald eagle deaths in Iowa in recent years, with several birds being shot. Along with raising the fine for killing the bird, experts say that more education is needed to help make people advocates for the animals. Bald eagles are also federally protected under the Migratory Birds Treat Act.


text:
Q: Create List [x-n, x-n+1,...,x,x+1,x+2,...x+n] in Java I'd like to get a method returning ArrayList as following:
int x = ...;
int n = ...;
List<Integer> list = getList(x,n);
System.out.println(list.size()) // => 2n+1
int i = ...;
for(int elem : list){
  System.out.println(elem);
} // => x-n, x-n+1, x-n+2,..., x-1, x, x+1,..., x+n

For instance,
getList(3,1) // => [2,3,4]
getList(5,3) // => [2,3,4,5,6,7,8]

What is the efficient implementation of getList()?

A: this is the code basically use for loop, its initial value x-n and it will loop up to x+n
    public List<Integer> getList(int x,int n){
        int lower = x-n ;
        int upper = x + n ;
        List<Integer> ls= new ArrayList<Integer>() ;
        for(int i = lower ; i<=upper ; i++){
            ls.add(i) ;
        }

   return ls ;
}

A: The code basically loops the array once. In order to let your code be robust, you must consider cases where n is zero or negative.
public List<Integer> getList(int x, int n) {
    ArrayList<Integer> returnVal = new ArrayList<Integer>();
    if (n < 0) {
        for (int i = n; i <= -n; i++) {
             returnVal.add(i + x);
        }
    }
    else {
        for (int i = -n; i <= n; i++) {
             returnVal.add(i + x);
        }
    }
    return returnVal;
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Q: VBA Excel Loop - novice user I am a novice at VBA but I am hoping an expert can help me with what I am trying to do.
Essentially using Record Macro and my basic grasp of VBA I have created the below; what I am trying to do is change the B4,D4 to B5,D5 B6,D6 etc... for 100 loops.
I am completely stuck and was hoping that someone could point me in the right direction.
Many many thanks.
Dar
If Sheets("BUILDING").Range("B4").Value = "" Then

Else

Sheets("CALCULATOR").Select

Range("B1").ClearContents

Sheets("BUILDING").Select

Range("D4").Select

Selection.Copy

Sheets("CALCULATOR").Select

Range("B1").Select

Selection.PasteSpecial Paste:=xlPasteValues, Operation:=xlNone, SkipBlanks _
        :=False, Transpose:=False

Application.Run "Test1"

End If

A: *

*The recorder is a great tool to learn how to write specific things in vba.  It is bad in that it uses Select and Activate which are slow.

*When only values are wanted just assign the value directly.

*You loop with For, For Each, Do, ... there are others google can teach you.

Dim i as Long
for i = 4 to 104
    IF worksheets("CALCULATOR").Cells(i,"B").Value = "" then _
        worksheets("CALCULATOR").Cells(i,"B").Value = Worksheets("BUILDING").cells(i,"D").value
Next i

A: To build on Scott's answer, you could set a "range object" to a cell in your target worksheet, and offset the position of the pasted cell one click each time you loop.  That gives you a little more flexibility:
dim i as long, r as range

set r = worksheets("CALCULATOR").range("B1")

for i = 0 to 99
    if worksheets("BUILDING").cells(i + 4, "B") <> "" then
        r.offset(i, 0) = worksheets("BUILDING").cells(i + 4, "D")
    end if

next i


text:
Live at
Grand Opera House York
Mon 3 - Sat 8 Feb 2020
Tickets available from £13.00
subject to a transaction fee of £3.65
Play the full trailer
Based on a cult 2006 Irish indie feature, originally shot on a micro-budget of just $160,000, it tells the uplifting yet yearning story of a part-time Dublin guitarist busker (who works by day in his dad's Hoover repair shop) who falls unexpectedly in love with a young Czech immigrant fellow musician. As we follow their relationship across five short days, big changes happen to both of them in little ways.
Grand Opera House Yorkchange
Cumberland Street, York YO1 9SW
Mon - Sat at 19:30
Wed and Sat at 14:30
For bookings of 10 or more please contact our group teams as below;
West End venues, Group Line 020 7206 1174 or email [email protected]
All other venues please call 020 7206 1179 or email [email protected]
Why go and see it?
A Broadway and West End hit musical that's a ravishing love story with a bittersweet difference, Once casts a spell over the audience just as its two lead characters cast a spell over each other.
As conjured by a score of original Irish-inflected songs, written by the original stars of the film Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová, the atmosphere is partly a busked concert and partly an aching romance that feels both spontaneous and freshly minted. The music, played live by the actors themselves, is alternately beautiful and rousing, and Enda Walsh's script quietly overwhelms with its sense of spirit, sincerity and solitude.
There's no other show quite like it. It's the most unusual, unique and affecting musical you're ever likely to see. It has a spontaneous free-form improvisatory vitality, yet it is also emotionally precise in the understated air of longing that anyone who has ever been in love will recognise instantly. And audiences will fall head over heels in love with the show, too. Once is a genuine one-off which you'll need to see at least once -- but it's also unlikely to be your last time, as you'll want to see it again (and again).
This show wins standing ovations the old-fashioned way: with a love story, great songs, compelling characters and inventive stagecraft. At this point in Broadway history, this feels downright revolutionary
An exquisite reminder of theater's singular capacity to transport us
- Th Hollywood Reporter
A love affair with music… fresh and unexpected
- The New York Times
Nights you don't want to miss
Come and join us for our first night.
What the critics say
It's funny, its truthful, it sings
- The Times
Wins you over with its simplicity, charm and air of sweet melancholy
- The Guardian
Charmingly funny and affecting
- The Independent
York Station
Monday to Saturday 12:00 until 16:00. Sundays: Closed.
On show days, service priority is given to 'today's performance' sales and pre-paid collections. The box office remains open until 15 minutes after the start of the show. On Sundays or Bank Holidays we are open 1 hour before the start of the performance.
There are a range of bars to enjoy at the Grand Opera House at Stalls, Dress, Grand Circle levels as well as in the main Foyer.
Enjoy a VIP package for only £15 or a Grand package for £30 on top of your ticket price.
Not originally intended to be a theatre, the buildings that comprise the Grand Opera House York officially opened in 1902 with Little Red Riding Hood starring Florrie Ford. Since then it has been owned by FJ Butterworth, the Shepherd of Shambles and the India Pru Co. Ltd who spent £4,000,000 restoring the theatre to its former glory in 1987.
See other shows at this venue
The Ambassador Theatre Group
FAQsContact UsAbout UsAccess
LOVEtheatre.comJobsBlogGroupsStudent Offers
Terms & ConditionsPrivacy PolicyTerms of UseCookies
© 2019 ATG All rights reserved.
2nd Floor, Alexander House, Church Path, Woking, GU21 6EJ.


Who may use this form?
are cancelling a representative's appointment.
If you have dependent children aged 18 years or older, they are required to complete their own copy of this form if a representative is also conducting business on their behalf.
A representative is someone who provides advice, consultation, or guidance to you at any stage of the application process, or in a proceeding and, if you appoint him or her as your representative by filling out this form, has your permission to conduct business on your behalf with Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) and the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA).
You are not obliged to hire a representative. We treat everyone equally, whether they use the service of a representative or not.
you can appoint only one (1) representative for each application you submit.
Important information: You must notify IRCC if your representative's contact information changes, or if you change your representative, or cancel the appointment of your representative. For more information on updating IRCC with your representative's information, please see below section - Notify IRCC about any changes.
There are two (2) types of representatives.
Uncompensated representatives do not charge fees or receive any other form of consideration or compensation for providing advice or services to represent you before IRCC or the CBSA.
consultants, lawyers and Quebec notaries, and students-at-law under their supervision, who do not, and will not, charge a fee or receive any other consideration to represent you.
Note: You do not have to pay someone for them to be your representative. IRCC will conduct business with an uncompensated representative if an applicant appoints them on their behalf.
Compensated representatives charge a fee or receive some other form of consideration in exchange for the representation that they provide.
It is important to know that anyone who represents or advises you for payment - or offers to do so - in connection with IRCC proceedings or applications is breaking the law unless they are an authorized representative or they have a specific agreement or arrangement with the Government of Canada that allows them to represent or advise you. This applies to advice or consultation which happens before or after a citizenship or an immigration application is made or a proceeding begins.
IRCC will only conduct business with compensated representatives who are in good standing with their designated regulatory body. For more information see - Find out if your representative is authorized.
Note: If a representative is being paid or compensated by someone other than you, the representative is still considered to be a compensated representative.
notaries who are members in good standing of the Chambre des notaires du Québec and students-at-law under their supervision.
If you appoint a compensated representative who is not a member in good standing of one of these designated bodies, your application will be returned. Learn about using a representative.
Check box to indicate if you are appointing a representative to represent you with your application process. Complete sections A, B and D.
Check both boxes and complete all sections if you are cancelling a representative and appointing a new one at the same time.
Write your last name (surname or family name) and given name(s).
Write your date of birth.
the type of application you have submitted.
Write your IRCC's Identification (ID) or Unique Client Identifier (UCI) number (if known). If you have not dealt with IRCC since 1973, you will not have a UCI or a Client ID.
Write your representative's full name.
If your representative is a member of the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council (ICCRC), a law society or the Chambre des notaires du Québec, print his or her name as it appears on the organization's membership list.
Check one box to indicate if your representative is uncompensated or compensated.
the Chambre des notaires du Québec.
Write your representative's contact information.
If you are appointing a student-at-law to represent you, include their supervising lawyer's information including their membership ID.
Note: By indicating your representative's e-mail address, you are hereby authorizing IRCC to transmit your file and personal information to this specific e-mail address.
Fill in this section if you wish to cancel the appointment of a representative. Write the representative's full name.
Complete all sections of the form if you wish to both cancel a representative and appoint a new one.
By signing, you authorize IRCC to complete your request for yourself and your dependent children under 18 years of age.
For sponsorship application, your spouse or common-law partner does not have to complete a separate request. If your spouse or common-law partner is included in this request, he or she must sign in the box provided.
To authorize IRCC to release information from your case file to someone other than a representative, you will need to complete the form Authority to Release Personal Information to a Designated Individual (IMM 5475) (PDF, 593.57KB). The form is also available from Canadian embassies, high commissions and consulates abroad.
The person you designate under that form (IMM 5475) will be able to obtain information on your case file, such as the status of your application. However, they will not be able to conduct business on your behalf with IRCC.
Send this form along with your application to the office listed in the guide of your application.
You may use this Web form to upload the IMM 5476.
If you know which IRCC office is processing your immigration or citizenship application, send the completed form to the office mailing address. Consult IRCC office mailing addresses.
You must let IRCC know if any information changes regarding the person you authorized to represent you on your application.


text:
Diasparactus es un género extinto de tetrápodo diadectomorfo, quer existió durante el Carbonífero Superior en América del Norte.

Referencias

Enlaces externos

Diadectomorpha

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Convert Your Memories in Delaware to Digital Today!
Guard Special Family Memories in Delaware
Film making as we can appreciate, began in the 1890s? with the invention of motion picture filming cameras.? Way back at that time, the basic equipment was able to make films? of just one minute in length – a vast difference from today's full featured,? full length? documentaries and movies. This marked the beginning of motion picture studios.?
Back in those days, all movies were without sound and not till the late 1920s,? that equipment progress far enough,? to make movies with sound.? But in spite of the fact that there? was nothing to hear, motion pictures films became very popular. ? Stories and even news events,? were translated to moving pictures and watched by the masses.? After the Technological Revolution, and the electrification of factories,? people had more time for entertainment and leisure activities.? Once WW ll was over, folks were regularly watching motion pictures in Delaware and the fashion had become the norm.
Rapid Advancements in Technology
Because of rapid technological advancements, we can record all kinds of sounds in the form of music and voice, and immediately hear it. Video is easily recorded of weather events, news breaks, family, friends, and pets and upload it to the internet in mere minutes. Cellular phones are now made equipped with HD cameras which are a vast difference from the motion picture cameras from days of old. We'll likely be the most recorded people in all of history!?
Our family's traditions and lineage will be preserved like it never was in our past. Transfer your family lineage and memories captured on outdated formats and methods to current day formats so we can conserve and protect family histories and record them. There are programs that are in process to ensure the preservation of our commercial film roots but we each need to apply this practice to our own special moments and preserve them for future enjoyment.? Call AV Conversion Services in Delaware today and properly care for those cherished memories.
Cities We Serve in Delaware – Click Here
Camden Wyoming
Millsboro
19701, 19702, 19703, 19707, 19709, 19711, 19712, 19713, 19716, 19717, 19718, 19720, 19721, 19725, 19726, 19734, 19735, 19736, 19801, 19802, 19803, 19804, 19805, 19806, 19807, 19808, 19809, 19810, 19884, 19885, 19886, 19890, 19891, 19892, 19893, 19894, 19895, 19896, 19897, 19898, 19901, 19902, 19904, 19906, 19930, 19931, 19933, 19934, 19938, 19939, 19940, 19941, 19943, 19944, 19945, 19946, 19947, 19950, 19951, 19952, 19953, 19954, 19956, 19958, 19960, 19962, 19963, 19964, 19966, 19967, 19968, 19970, 19971, 19973, 19975, 19977, 19979


Parents get in here! Your kids' favourite cartoon characters are in Lagos for NickFest!
Rubble and Skye from Paw Patrol and Shimmer and Shine have just arrived Lagos in time for Nickelodeon's fun-filled children's festival Nickfest.
The event, which is set to hold on Saturday the 18th and Sunday the 19th of November 2017 at the Balmoral Convention Centre, at the Federal Palace Hotel in Victoria Island in partnership with Maltina, will feature lots of fun games and activities for the kids.
They get to meet some of Nickelodeon's superstars like SpongeBob SquarePants, Dora and Friends, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Chase, Marshall, Rubble and Skye from Paw Patrol and Shimmer and Shine .
IK Osakioduwa and Emmanuela of Mark Angel Comedy will also be hosting the event.
Parents and other adults are also not left out as A-list musicians such as Yemi Alade, Davido, Simi and Mr. Eazi, will be performing live.
The Celebrity Slime Challenge where popular personalities get slimed green in an effort to raise awareness and funds for Children's related project. Children and parents have the opportunity to join the slime dunk at the Slime Zone.
The two day NickFest is open to pre-schoolers, primary school goers, tweens, teens and everyone in general.


text:
Black History Month: Point Blank Talk Music Industry Matters with Elisabeth Troy
COURSES, SOFTWARE DEALS, FREEBIES & MORE
Becca Antoon
Friday, October 23, 2020 - 09:48
Point Blank joined the UK vocalist, hitmaker and Clean Bandit and MJ Cole collaborator, Elisabeth Troy, to discuss her introduction to music, how to navigate the industry as a young black woman, working in the studio on her hit 'Crazy Love' and much more.
This masterclass was hosted by their very own, Koy Redmond aka KdotMelody, a London-based writer, recording artist and Point Blank Events Executive. This month marks Black History Month where Koy will be presenting a number of thought-provoking masterclasses with impeccable musicians delving into what it means to be a black artist in today's society.
If you'd like to learn how to make music like one of the greats, then we'd highly recommend checking out Point Blank's courses in London and online. Plus, they're currently offering 25% off their selected online and Los Angeles courses until 9th November when this offer ends. To take advantage of this offer, use the codes ONLINE25 or LA25 when enrolling.
Elisabeth Troy has graced the UK Top 40 multiple times as well as featuring on numerous charting tracks with the likes of Clean Bandit, MJ Cole, B. Traits, Metrik and many more. In addition to her chart success, she's toured with Clean Bandit and had her music soundtracked in film including the 1996 cult classic, Mars Attacks!
Point Blank Point Blank Courses Tutorial Elizabeth Troy Clean Bandit 2020
Point Blank Wrapped: Best Masterclasses, Talks and Tutorials of 2021
Point Blank Review: See AIAIAI's Brand New Wireless+ TMA-2 Headphones in Action
Point Blank Tutorial: How to Create Interesting Drum Fills with Resampling in Ableton Live
The Best Gifts for Producers and DJs: Point Blank Christmas List
Point Blank Tutorial: Improve Your MIDI Workflow Using Logic Pro X's Autopunch & Replace


text:
Surecomp Enables Absa Group's Roll Out of pan-African Trade Finance Digitisation Across 10 Countries
Surecomp, the leading provider of global trade finance solutions for banks and corporates, today announced that South African bank Absa Group has gone live with the latest version of its back-office trade finance solution IMEX® in 10 countries across the continent as part of their ongoing digitisation initiatives.
A Surecomp customer since 1998, Johannesburg-based Absa Group has seen an unprecedented rise in demand for its trade finance services in the past two years. One of the main drivers for deploying Surecomp initially was to improve operational efficiency while mitigating risk and demonstrating agility in its ability to scale and meet increasing customer demand. Taking a phased approach throughout 2020 to bringing its multiple subsidiaries across Africa onto one integrated platform, the bank has now gone live on IMEX 8 in South Africa, Zambia, Botswana, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Ghana, Mauritius, Seychelles and Mozambique.
This latest digital version offers a web-based interface for remote accessibility and open API connectivity, with full integration to the Surecomp Marketplace for access to other fintech partners within the trade finance ecosystem. As a result, Absa Group is now fully equipped to continue supporting its rapid growth projections, ensuring all customers receive a consistently superior service, while setting a new standard for pan-African trade finance digital transformation.
"This project exemplifies a strength of efficiency and governess that has ultimately resulted in a very successful outcome," states Surecomp SVP of Account Management Yaron Hupert. "The Absa team was eager to learn and quickly became self-sufficient, which allowed us to move quickly and deploy ten entities in a uniquely short period of time."
"Both teams have done a fantastic job under very difficult circumstances," explains Michelle Knowles, Head of Trade Finance Product and Trade Working Capital Governance and Innovation at Absa Group. "I would like to thank Surecomp for its support in helping us meet our tight deadlines and for all their hard work, it's been a great achievement and wonderful teamwork."
TrustBills to Offer Put Options from January 2021
HSBC Becomes First Production Member of Contour's...
Cedar Oxygen Deploys First Impact Trade Financing to...
Tradeteq and Microsoft Partner to Automate Trade...
MonetaGo and GUUD Form Alliance to Strengthen Trade...
Ebury and TrustBills Partner to Provide Enhanced...
Barclays Announces New Trade Finance Platform for...
TradeSun®, Inc. Joins Contour Pte. Ltd Platform in...
Profile Software Partners With Surecomp
Bolero Partners With Mitigram on One-Stop Trade...
Surecomp® Marketplace Further Enriched with Windward's...
Contour Partners with CargoX to Transform Bills of...


Madibaz star Nobubele Phuza made an early impression at the Varsity Netball tournament when she was twice named player of the match during the opening weekend in Port Elizabeth.
Playing at Nelson Mandela University's indoor sports centre, the SPAR Madibaz team got off to a flying start with victories over University of Western Cape and Vaal University of Technology.
The 25-year-old Phuza, playing at wing defence, won both match awards, but acknowledged that there were still aspects of her game she could improve on.
"I am feeling confident in what I have achieved," the sociology master's student said.
"I managed to execute the things that I have been working on with the coaching team.
Phuza has been included in the University Sport South Africa team to compete in the World University Championships in Uganda next month and said the Varsity Netball tournament was the perfect chance to test herself.
"The UWC and VUT players have different playing styles, so the player-of-the-match recognition means I can handle a variety of opponents, something I will face in Uganda.
"With that said, we must remember that defence depends on teamwork and I must acknowledge the work done around me by my colleagues to make space for the intercepts that I took.
"On a lighter note, I have been needing new takkies after my takkies tore at practice a while back.
Phuza based the team's success at the weekend on their intensive preparation.
"As a team we have worked hard to be mentally, spiritually and physically ready for the series," she said.
"Unlike week-long tournaments, you need to pace yourself in this tournament, ensuring that you play your best netball when it counts – in the final stretch.
At the weekend, Madibaz overturned a loss they suffered against UWC at the USSA tournament and Phuza said that was a boost for their morale.
"We were obviously excited to walk away with maximum points," she added.
"But we also realise that there are things we still need to execute because the series just gets tougher from here.
"Next week [Monday] we play an experienced UP-Tuks team who have just come back from New Zealand, where they did well against some top league teams.
She said Sunday's match against University of Johannesburg would also be mentally challenging.
"They have so much spirit and give a great fight until the last whistle," she said.


Kohler, Wisconsin. After observing the creation of chocolates in a nearby community, Herb Kohler decided that the world needed a better "Turtle." He discussed the idea with Ulrich Koberstein, Group Direction of Culinary Arts at The American Club®, the Midwest's only AAA Five Diamond resort hotel. Together, they started the process of creating the best chocolate in the world. Hundreds of samples later, most of which were taste-tested by Herb and Ulrich, they launched Kohler Chocolates with Terrapins. Their chocolates were first introduced to guests at The American Club, and have grown so popular people from all over the country order them.


text:
Food innovation system from the Cloud
Posted by AFN Staff Writers on 21st December 2015
FoodLegal InHouse™ is the name of the unique subscription service and compliance platform for food companies and food retailers developed by FoodLegal, Australia's leading specialist food industry regulatory consultancy.
FoodLegal InHouse™ is believed to be the first system of its kind in the world. Its user-friendly and practical step-by-step guidance tools and powerful searching capabilities are designed to simplify company decision-making.
The system and its contents were developed by the FoodLegal team of lawyers and scientists based on more than 10 years of advising and training food companies. It addresses the vast array of compliance issues in food product composition, labelling and food marketing.
Information is all accessed by the food company through a portal dedicated to that company in one convenient location. It enables on-the-go projects to be bookmarked at any point in the process for ease of information gathering. Explanatory materials, regulatory guidance and access to a fully-searchable Food Standards Code and all other relevant information can be sorted and tailored to the user's specific needs at any stage.
The system combines the best in information technologies and advanced search software, with FoodLegal's regulatory expertise. It promises to be a 'disruptive' system transforming the way food companies can develop new products and create new marketing campaigns. It facilitates a culture of innovation with practical knowledge of compliance risks, and allows for assessment and management choices.
Ongoing updates and dynamic content
The system is maintained and constantly updated for new compliance issues and any regulatory changes.
Federal Government innovation
"The Federal government is focusing on innovation but innovative food products take time to develop," FoodLegal director Charles Fisher says.
"FoodLegal InHouse provides short-cuts to streamline the process and the workflows, but italso facilitates better working relationships between the new product development, quality assurance and marketing teams," says Fisher.
FoodLegal InHouse project Files can be shared across teams and even across different countries. According to Fisher, many of the early adopters of the cloud-based, confidential and secure system are large multinational food manufacturers.
FoodLegal InHouse is now available via a subscription to food manufacturers, retailers, marketers and importers.
For more information contact Craig Hunter, Sales and Marketing Manager at FoodLegal on (03) 9606 0022 or go to http://foodlegalinhouse.com.au/
Little Big Dairy Co takes home multiple medals from NSW dairy competition
A small regional dairy company has been named best in state at the Dairy Industry Association of Aus...
Study confirms link between feeding infants eggs, peanuts and reduced allergy risk
An academic review has confirmed a link between feeding eggs and peanuts to babies as young as four ...
JBS Australia launches large-scale industry-first traceability system
In a first for a large-scale brand in the Australian beef industry, JBS Australia has announced a p...
Australian Organic Launches First Of Its 2019 Cookbooks Celebrating The Best In Aussie Organic Produ...
It can be tough trying to find inspirational new meals which are both delicious and healthy. However...
FoodLegal announces latest online workshop: Clean Labelling
There is enormous pressure on food product suppliers and retailers to present products as natural a...
Australian winegrape prices increase, Wine Australia Vintage Report 2016
Wine Australia has reported an increase in the average purchase price of winegrapes in its Vintage R...
Australian Organic Market Report 2018 excites new investment
The Australian organics market is now estimated to be worth $2.4 billion, and has grown 88% since 20...
Domino's pays thousands for alleged Franchising Code breach
Domino's Pizza is the first company to pay penalties for alleged non-compliance under the Franchisin...


text:
Devil's Spawn
The MTV legacy of Kenneth Anger's Lucifer Rising
by Kevin B. Lee and Brandon Soderberg posted August 14, 2009
Lucifer Rising (1972) took Kenneth Anger a decade to make—and remake—after the Manson Family stole and destroyed the original print. What survives is an incantatory envisioning of a sacred rite that spans the world and traverses centuries of occult history. Despite having its copious array of montage and staging techniques pilfered by hundreds of music videos and commercials over the years, it retains a hypnotic spell untouched by its imitators.
The film opens with documentary footage of a seething volcano, paced so patiently that it threatens to lull the viewer into a passive spectacle of the picturesque. But that trance is swiftly dispatched by the stunning title sequence: the film's title in flames scrolling up over a body of water. When thinking of the influence Anger's films have had on music videos (a legacy so widely acknowledged that it's become something of a cliché), people are more likely to recall braggadoccio fluorishes like this title sequence than the more subdued footage that precedes it. But one cannot appreciate Anger's filmmaking in total without acknowledging its full range of modes and techniques in the service of a singular organic vision, something that most music videos could stand to learn from.
Whether due to their short form, their commercial orientation or their catering to an audience that typically has a small attention span, music videos have chained themselves to a compulsive need for sensory hyperbole. In doing so they take their cues from the flashier elements of Anger's cinema. The opening sequence of Lucifer Rising can trace its legacy to similarly over-the-top credits of hip-hop music video directors, especially Hype Williams, as in the opening of Jay Z's "Big Pimpin,'" or Gil Green (i.e. DJ Khaled's "We Takin' Over"). These stylistic excesses amount to a parody as well as an appropriation of Hollywood blockbusters—staking claim to the signifiers of big budgets, exaggerating them, and then, bizarrely, using them to celebrate hip-hoppers' aspirations to affluence.
Subversion and appropriation of Hollywood is also found in Anger's film, with its exotic sets and globetrotting locales subsumed into a thoroughly non-mainstream celebration of demonic power. But there remains a key distinction between Anger and his hip-hop video descendants. The latter works, in their appropriation of blockbuster aesthetics, betray a desire to make the hip-hop lifestyle legible to and legitimized within the mainstream. They want to one-up the movie stars whose glamorous big-screen presence they covet. Anger works in the opposite direction. Whether it's the Egyptian incantation sequence suggesting Cecil B. DeMille on LSD, or a wizard operating a psychic dynamo wheel, recalling lab experiment scenes in sci-fi and monster movies, the production values and narrative tropes of Hollywood are absorbed and transformed by his worldview into something so different from their origins as to be almost undefinable. They exist in their own space, on their own terms.
Another distinction can be made along the lines of stylistic innovation. Anger's film has no shortage of editing and camera trickery: sped-up film, looped images, and shock cuts. And yet each technique has its assigned place in the overall design of the film. A stream of images builds toward a vision of mounting apocalpyse. In contrast, look at Stephane Sednaoui's video for the Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Give It Away," one of the most popular art music videos in the history of MTV, which parallels Lucifer Rising in its joyful, dynamic depiction of desert ritual. It's visually inventive and delightfully bizarre, but next to the organic buildup of Lucifer Rising, it amounts to a grab bag of gimmicks. When guitarist John Frusciante spins in reverse in synch with his guitar solo looped backwards, it's a cool but overly literal visual match to an audio effect in the song.
It doesn't hold a fraction of the mystery found in the seemingly random flashes of nature footage that slip into Lucifer Rising: a tiger swimming through turquoise water, bubbles and steam emanating from a mud spring, an elephant crushing a cobra underfoot. These images have no literal connection to the ritual staged by the film, but Anger taps into the viewer's primal associations with these animals to evoke a consciousness of the natural world, seething with life and death, that encompasses his film.
But even with this interpretation in mind, these images defy description; it's the very definition of the uncanny. Anger's cinema thrives in an interzone of meaning. It's not nearly as consumable or disposable as MTV videos, but neither is it willfully obscure or any less accessible than the intense sensations it elicits. Markedly different from the grab-and-go instant wow of most MTV videos, the experience of Lucifer Rising is a slow-build that forces the viewer to probe deeper into the nature of images, to tap into their dark energies.
The menacing, cool quality of Anger's filmmaking certainly hasn't been lost on many music videos; next to Anger's trademark practice of setting action to pop music, it's his chief legacy for the medium. That sense of menace fits especially with the '90s alternative rock that made angst and obscurity fully mainstream, but videos like "Give It Away" or Mark Romanek's clip for Nine Inch Nails' "Closer" still only get it half right. "Closer" grabs some of Anger's brilliance for building odd imagery atop itself, in an attempt to unearth a Pandora's Box of uncanny dread. But there's a core sense of nihilism and disgust that Anger's work opposes. Lucifer Rising may be shocking or disturbing, but those effects are applied toward a remarkably organic worldview that celebrates death and destruction as part of an eternal process of change and rebirth. As scary as it seems, one can actually visualize people inhabiting the demonic dwelling spaces that Anger stages: Isis and Osiris' Egypt, Lilith's Mesopotamia and Altamont. Not only are they vividly realized worlds, but each of them converges upon one climactic moment that transfixes their separate spaces and times into a communal experience. None of this is present in Trent Reznor's basement freakshow. "Closer" amounts to a series of disjunctive shock images that don't build toward much more than a brief sensation of transgression that its intended audience presumably finds cathartic, or just plain cool.
Not all music videos suffer from comparison to Anger. The Wu Tang Clan's video for "Triumph," directed by—of all people—Brett Ratner, depicts a biblical plague as a visual metaphor for the Wu's mainstream music takeover—inarguably, that's Kenneth Anger territory. "Triumph" is full of CGI but the special effects enhance mythical chaos, not glamour and glitz. Moving past the six-minute mark, the video is an affront to MTV attention deficit sensibilities. Typical posse shots manifest themselves in stirring, unorthodox ways. The Clan stomp around in a tomb-like Egyptian beehive. Wu acolytes hang upside down ready to strike. The RZA's larger than life, then he's fitted with black wings and stages a jailbreak—a dark angel there to set everyone free.
The locations, that beehive, a city (and world) in panic, a nightclub, and even the cosmos break apart video expectations and put them back together as something that may genuinely kick off the "Wu Revolution." This is a journey toward rebirth, rolled up inside of tough-guy rap video signifiers. The climax, as striking as Anger's UFO arrival, is Wu fans gathered in a nightclub mutating into a swarm of bees and converging as one in the shape of a W blasted above the New York skyline. The video dramatizes street-rap peril while pushing a transgressive belief system (Five-Percent Nation meets kung fu Taoism). It's a worldview as unorthodox and cleverly rendered as the one anchoring Lucifer Rising.
A more direct homage comes from director Kris Moyes, in his video for Hercules and Love Affair's "You Belong." "You Belong" takes cues not only from "Lucifer Rising" but also from a decade's worth of urban gender-bending audiovisual culture, much the same way the song reaches into '80s house music for its pulse. Moyes's video is a fever dream of '80s drag voguing re-envisioned as a kind of sacred rite, replete with incredible visual patterns and clever references to Isaac Julien, crystal meth, and cocaine. Like Lucifer Rising and "Triumph," the implicit theme is communal convergence. Figures and objects amount to pieces in a puzzle slowly coming together, referenced outright in the Rubik's cube-like device held by one of the characters. This danceclub phantasmagoria culminates in the crystallization of several characters into a mirrorball, whose dazzling, from-out-of-nowhere appearance is akin to the arrival of the UFO at the end of Lucifer Rising.
"You Belong" explicitly engages itself with Anger's work, while "Triumph" infuses pop-mysticism into hard-edge reality rap. Both videos carry on a vital struggle evident in Anger's work: a constant battle between the immediate pleasures of pop culture and a revolutionary transcendent spirit found outside the mainstream, that builds to an improbable fusion of the two.
Read Comments (15)
Mystic Fire Video
Myriam Gibril in Lucifer Rising, directed by Kenneth Anger
Photo Gallery: Devil's Spawn
Video: The Devil's Spawn
February 22-September 14, 2009	Kenneth Anger
video essay | television | Kenneth Anger | Lucifer Rising | MTV | Hollywood | hip-hop | music video
Buy: The Films of Kenneth Anger, Vol. 2
Kevin B. Lee is editor of the Keyframe journal at Fandor and programming executive at dGenerate Films.
More articles by Kevin B. Lee
Brandon Soderberg is a critic and writer based in Raleigh, North Carolina. He writes regularly on his blog No Trivia and has contributed to Baltimore City Paper, The Village Voice, and The House Next Door.
More articles by Brandon Soderberg


LIVE A GREAT STORY is a media brand focused on spreading inspiration through stories. This Saturday they will be setting up an interactive video station for library visitors to stop by and share their story! Stop by to share bits and pieces of your story, who inspires you or what you're excited about for 2017.