cinemahistorian - Tumblr blog

[cinemahistorian]

Embroidery by Severija Incirauskaite-Kriauneviciene

[cinemahistorian]

I was in highschool in the late 1970s, and our "new" computer was a DEC PDP-8, that was five years old or so.

However the school was still largely running on punch cards, and older IBM equipment from the 50s. Attendance for instance, was handled by each home room teacher putting an absent students punch card in an envelope that went down to the computer room, a process that had probably been going on for decades.

There the cards were sorted, and fed into this beast, an IBM 405 alphabetic accounting machine. This is basically a SQL statement implemented in steel, wires, and relays. It would print off a report using fields on the cards fed into it, and could be programmed via a plug board:

I will never forget the IBM service guy coming in to change the oil on this, the whole bottom of it was relays that just kind of sat in an oil bath.

So if you have computer problems, just be happy changing the oil isn't one of them lol.

[cinemahistorian]

The Mistery IV   -    Francis Di Fronzo , 2020.

American, b.1969-

Oil, watercolor and gouache on panel , 15 1/4 x 19 1/2 in.

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Dawn  -   William H. Hays , n/d.

American,b. 1956 -

Color linocut print on paper, 9 x 12 in. 23.5 x 31 cm. Ed. 95

[cinemahistorian]

This lost vocation will forever fascinate me.

Switchboard operator, 1970. From the Budapest Municipal Photography Company archive.

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Canteen of the former Pilkington glass factory, St. Helens

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“You don’t destroy people you care about. That’s not how it works, that should never be an option. Choose laughter. Choose peace. Choose love.”

— R.M. Drake

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“People grow when they are loved well. If you want to help others heal, love them without an agenda.”

— Mike McHargue

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"The University Library of the Future" envisioned in an Armstrong C-60 Luminaire Ceiling System ad, 1966.

[cinemahistorian]

November Rain, Naoya Hatakeyama

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“It’s been a tough morning for me. I used to be a children’s librarian. But this morning I had to call publishers and tell them not to send me any more books. I just can’t read them anymore, not like I used to. And that was hard. It felt like I was cutting off a lifeline. It’s disappointing, the sense of not being in control of my own life anymore. Everything depends on my medical schedule, and the chemotherapy, and what my limits are. The doctor has told me to expect a couple more years, but my caretaker says she’s seen a lot of sick people. And she thinks I could be one of the ones who can beat it. For most of my life happiness was automatic. I might have had the only career where you get told ‘I love you’ three or four times a week. Maybe it happens with teachers too, but so many little kids said those words to me over the years. And I miss that. I was damned lucky to have that experience. Happiness isn’t automatic anymore, these days I have to work a little bit more for it. In addition to all the pain and the fear and having to pee all the time, I choose to do a lot of things that will make me aware of the beauty and loveliness of life. It’s not magic. I don’t stop thinking about the scary stuff, I just find moments to push them aside with the ridiculous. There’s so much in life that’s ridiculous. Every Saturday morning I watch Popeye on Turner Classic Movies. It’s so ridiculous. Olive Oil is so obnoxious. And you know, she has all these men after her. It’s just really funny. And Popeye is so full of himself and somehow manages to come out of everything, eat his spinach, and win. Then there’s my laughing yoga classes, which I can’t do in person anymore. But I do them online. There’s this thing we do where people will get in lines of three or four, and we’ll pretend to have a boat race. Everyone rows as hard as they can. Someone chooses a winner, and if you lose you get to create a big scene and make an ass of yourself. It’s ridiculous. And then there’s you. You’re ridiculous. You’re stopping random people, presumably to entertain yourself. You’re sitting in the middle of the street. I mean, think about it. It’s pretty dumb.”

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who are you when you are not watching tv or movies? when you aren't playing video games or reading a book or fanfiction or listening to music or whatever other kind of media that you engage with? who are you when your mind isn't in another world or story, when you are forced to sit with yourself and the only experience you have is your own sensorial life? can you define yourself outside of what you consume? who is that person? do you like them? can you bear it? can you bear it?

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Vladimir Tyrtov

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Rosenfield, K. (2017, February 17). Memorial to Slice Island-Site of the Utøya Massacre in Half. Retrieved October 15, 2020, from 

https://www.metropolismag.com/design/arts-culture/memorial-slice-island-site-utoya-massacre-half/

The image above depicts Oslo’s 22 July Memorial Competition winner’s design, created by Swedish artist Jonah Dalberg. The memorial would create a three meter long divide through the island of Utoya, slicing the island into two separate parts. Dahlberg responded to backlash directed towards environmental concerns, “ “It reproduces the physical experience of taking away, reflecting the abrupt and permanent loss of those who died.” Dalhberg explains his radical, evoking plan as one that will impact visitors for a lifetime-and show the sudden, harsh change in victims and their families’ lives forever. It also depicts the two extreme ideologies that led to Andres Brevik’s attacks. 

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Kultur Tava

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“Don’t take anything personally. Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won’t be the victim of needless suffering.”

— Don Miguel Ruiz

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“The truth isn’t always beauty, but the hunger for it is.”

— Nadine Gordimer, “A Bolter and the Invincible Summer”, London Magazine