Artist Turns Volcano Into Naked-Eye Observatory 55
An anonymous reader writes "Unlike most Bond villains, 70-year-old James Turrell has turned a 389,000-year-old extinct volcano into something other than a secret hideout; he's turned it into a naked-eye observatory. From the article: 'Inside, the crater's naturally lit viewing rooms are precision-engineered to observe specific celestial events. While outside, Turrell has reformed the rim of the crater to create a beautiful "vaulting effect" of the sky in a way that we almost never see it. "I'm very interested in how we perceive, because that's how we construct the reality in which we live," Turrell says, "and I like to tweak that a little bit. I make structures that arrest and apprehend light for our perception."'"
"Unlike most Bond villains" (Score:3, Funny)
Poor sentence structure here. Is he a Bond villain? Is he not? We need to know, surely.
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Re:"Unlike most Bond villains" (Score:5, Funny)
My demands!? My demands!? Hahaha, Mr Bond. Surely you jest!
I demand that we should sit quietly together and contemplate creation, and yes, be good to each other and... I think that on the whole that pretty much covers it, when you really get down to it.
Oh yes, yes. Sorry I forgot HAHAHAHA AND THEN YOU DIE
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You can argue that it makes no strict inference, but 'unlike most X, X2 is...' is in common vernacular as a way to introduce a fact about X2 that subsets it within X, does it not?
I think the term you looking for is "English pragmatics [wikipedia.org]". Of course, that's the stuff you won't find in the parse tree.
(Although, perversely, reliably constructing a parse tree for a natural language sentence without understanding pragmatics is often impossible even if the resulting parse tree won't contain it, it's probably not the case here - you can't parse it just fine; however, only pragmatics will tell you that "unlike most Bond villains" could imply that it could refer to Turrell as well.)
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I clicked "Caldera" (Score:2)
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http://www.homeaway.co.uk/p1023812 [homeaway.co.uk]
http://search.savills.com/property-detail/grsavl41 [savills.com]
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That the basement is full of water just means that it is perfect for parking your secret fleet of nuclear mini-submarines.
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sometimes that water gets hot, stinky, and spews molten rock....not sure I'd want that under my butt
Too many beeers? (Score:1)
Something about artists observing naked virgins falling into volcanoes?
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More likely too many Orange Crushes.
All is light (Score:2)
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The guy has some interesting ideas.
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All is light. That is all.
That proton over there disagrees.
James Turrell is on the donation drive again (Score:5, Interesting)
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Well if he's nice enough to let backpackers on his property without shooting them on site, thats good enough for me. He seems at least willing to let the poor view his work along with the contributers. I think his end goal may be to drive a road out there and let people on the interstates hit it as a tourist attraction.
Fair enough.
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Or even to sell it to someone eventually that would do the same. Sorry for the double post.
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Well that is a bloody shame. Maybe the ownership of the project is already out of his hands and he just wants the publicity to see it completed. Like if he already sold it, but needed a bit more money to complete it.
Too bad he sold out.
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Well I would pass on it in my current. But if I was filthy rich, I might pander to his sense of ego just for giggles. So your ideas have merit, which were never under dispute.
But it doesn't make much logical sense to do what he's doing in my opinion.
Lets say he opened it to the public right now with a donation box out front and people put a dollar in. He may start raising money immediately. But as you said. It is your opinion he doesn't want it complete. I could agree that may be the case. Not really just b
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he doesn't want to have to pay for repair costs, anti-graffiti, security, etc. As long as h
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Honestly I can to some degree respect that. I think there are vastly more people who would appreciate him and his art on the level your illustrating than a few rich folk. But I can respect wanting to keep it private as well.
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Interesting. I figured that some jurisdictions were lax in this regard. Like the Mexican border. Not advocating anything. I personally wouldn't take the risk of ending up in a volcanic vent where theres going to be very little evidence.
But maybe. Depends. I would probably call the guy and ask nicely. Or send him a nice letter first. Before making assumptions about him. Plus the idea of doing day labor at the "sight" is even easier and more straight forward.
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Well if he's nice enough to let backpackers on his property without shooting them on site, ...
Well, it's not necessarily him being nice; he could hardly shoot them on site if he didn't let them come on site in the first place, could he?
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*sight =)
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Destination art.
He should put in a private airstrip (he's a pilot, so he may already have one) and let the rich folks fly in to look. For a fee, of course.
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Destination art.
He should put in a private airstrip (he's a pilot, so he may already have one) and let the rich folks fly in to look. For a fee, of course.
if you're that rich and into that sort of stuff, you're more likely to go see "authentic"(that is, historic) building observatories.
thanks for posting this one (Score:2)
No details. (Score:2)
While it sounds kind of interesting, neither the article nor the website for the project has more than a fairly vague description that is barely more informative than the slashdot blurb. Considering that it's been under construction for more than 30 years, you would think that they might be able to come up with a little more information.
I live just a few hours away, and could see myself making the trip to see something like that .. but only if I had a better idea of what to expect.
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From what I saw on the site, it's tantalizing. You're right, it's not finished, and I didn't get a real specific idea of any finished 'art spaces' but it still might be good for a Saturday's jaunt.
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https://local.google.com/maps?q=Roden+Crater&hl=en&ll=35.425884,-111.258831&spn=0.000811,0.001206&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=51.177128,79.013672&hq=Roden+Crater&t=h&z=20 [google.com]
Of course, that doesn't tell you all that much either.
You could probably view it by signing up as a day labourer and joining a work crew; other than that, it's unlikely you'll see it in your lifetime for any ticket value approaching reasonable.
Saw it on TV (Score:3)
I saw a preview of what the artist has done with the volcano on the TV series "Sculpture Diaries". BTW, I don't know why they are calling this an "observatory". It really is an art piece (depending on you view of what is art).
I'd visit it if I could.
For deep crater action Liamuiga is the place. (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not sure what's going on in the article, it seems more of an artsy-fartsy place than really rugged volcano-ey belly of the beast thingy. If you are looking to trek up, over and down into a hopefully-extinct volcano will take your breath away, that is accessible and is not overrun by tourists and access roads, here's the place:
http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=17.369741&lon=-62.80873&z=14.2&r=0&src=yh [flashearth.com]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Liamuiga [wikipedia.org]
http://www.peakware.com/peaks.html?pk=2174 [peakware.com]
http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g147374-d147557-r157740414-Mount_Liamuiga-St_Kitts_St_Kitts_and_Nevis.html [tripadvisor.com]
http://www.nytimes.com/1990/11/18/travel/climbing-a-st-kitts-volcano.html [nytimes.com]
Here's my suggestion: plan a night in the crater. Everyone should be in decent shape. The hike up the mountain is not too demanding and even pleasant if you make a 4-5 hour trek of it. Take at least 1-1/2 gallon drinking water per person, compact food for a couple good meals, mosquito repellent and light tents for shelter from bugs and rain. There is a lake in the crater that you might find drinkable. I did, it was the most delicious water I have ever tasted. Make sure everything is carried on your backs or can dangle comfortably, you will need both hands and feet for the final ~400' climb down into and out of the crater. It will be a careful scramble using both hands to cling to tree roots as you face the hillside and lower yourself, there are short lengths of rope left by previous climbers. Bring 50-100' of rope to use if existing ropes are in bad condition and to leave for future adventurers. It is rigorous but I do not recall that any part of the decent as terrifyingly vertical or overhanging.
Once you're down in the crater set up camp. There are a few active fumaroles along the rim, in places you can see faint steam rising and there is a faint odor of sulfur but the crater has good air circulation within it. As a common sense precaution site your camp on high ground within the crater, and if you are particularly nerdy you can bring a gas detector to check for H2S but it's probably not a big deal.
Regardless of the weather you will be in a place like no other and will consider yourself grateful to be alive. Framed by the circular crater rim's cliffs above you a sharp celestial bowl of stars might roll above you, untainted by light pollution. Or perhaps a light rain punctuated by echoing thunder and circle of lightning along the sharp peaks of the rim.
If you camp overnight have at least one good hands-free head mounted flashlight in the group in case of emergency, for someone would need to climb up to the crater's rim to call for help. Volcanic craters tend to have bad cellphone reception.
It is a little known fact that compatible and like-minded individuals are implicitly married as they descend into the crater of hopefully-extinct volcanoes so there is no need for pomp or ceremony. Just get on with it.
Sure he's an artist (Score:3)
With the exception of Dr. No, I seem to recall pretty much every Bond villain played some other role to the outside world. Wealthy industrialist, media mogul, Prime Minister, horse breeder, philanthropist... So why not an artist?
Sky looks different down there? (Score:2)
Is it true that from the bottom of a deep well (or a volcano as the case may be) the sky looks darker and you can see stars in broad daylight?
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http://www.snopes.com/science/well.asp [snopes.com]
Unfortunately not it seems.
- Toast
Direct Link (Score:2)
Here [rodencrater.com] is a direct link to the project's website for anyone who hasn't forgiven Wired for the Wikileaks affair.
The article is basically a summary of the site.
One page to see all images. (Score:2)
http://www.wired.com/design/2013/05/james-turrell/?viewall=true [wired.com]