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mefi
Imago Urbis: Giuseppe Vasi’s Grand Tour of Rome is a rich and innovative geographic database that projects Vasi's 18th century engravings of Roman architecture onto the contemporary map of Giambattista Nolli
[previously] with supplementary modern satellite, photographic and mapping overlays together with copious background detail. The work was undertaken by researchers at the
University of Oregon (announcement) [
via]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 11:21 PM on June 11, 2008
(3 comments)
"Commonwealth of Diverse Cultures: Poland's Heritage is an international educational exhibition which presents the history of tolerance and cohabitation of various ethnic groups in the territory of Polish-Lithuanian Commowealth and is addressed primarily to foreigners all around the world
". This is achieved via a very beautiful flash site.
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 9:12 PM on March 25, 2008
(12 comments)
The Gallery of Graphic Design has a huge collection of magazine print adverts from the 30s to the late 60s. The images are fairly large and organised/searchable by year, product, magazine and advertiser.
[via]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 7:37 AM on March 12, 2008
(21 comments)
The Times Machine allows easy browsing of every edition from 70 years (1851-1922) worth of New York Times in the original format. Very cool.
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 6:01 AM on February 25, 2008
(44 comments)
From her isolated rural New York property,
Cal Lane produces amazing filigree lace patterned sculptures by welding everyday and found objects. My favourites are the shovels and wheelbarrows. Background at
New York Times and
NSCAD University.
[via gardenhistorygirl]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 9:43 PM on February 2, 2008
(8 comments)
Josie's Lalaland
(embedded QT) is a delicate and ethereal short CG/animation film by Yibi Hu. It is his response to a couple of real world events.
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 1:01 AM on October 10, 2007
(13 comments)
Astrona - Space & Astronomical Art Journal
: "specialising in space and astronomical art, science fiction art, visions of future worlds, design and visualization of technologies for living in space, space exploration, spaceships, starships, space colonies, etc."
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 10:29 PM on August 29, 2007
(6 comments)
SciTalks
- from the press release
[19 June]: "The site launches today with over 1,000 lectures
online, and more are being added daily. Segments range from a series of
hour-long lectures by the late Richard Feynman, to a short, hilarious Ali G
interview with Noam Chomsky, and a fascinating talk on designing a
semiconductor-based brain, by up-and-coming Stanford researcher Kwabena
Boahen."
[via]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 1:06 AM on June 25, 2007
(7 comments)
The new
'Discover Islamic Art in the Mediterranean' site incorporates material from 14 countries through 18 exhibition sites that explore the the cultural and artistic heritage of Islamic dynasties spanning 1200 years.
[via].
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 11:27 PM on April 25, 2007
(16 comments)
For anyone with even a passing interest in Islamic history or cartography,
'The Book of Curiosities of the Sciences and Marvels for the Eyes' site at Oxford University's Bodleian Library will provide a thoroughly interesting timesink. This recently discovered 13th/14th century copy of an 11th century Egyptian manuscript was partly based on Ptolemy and includes the oldest rectangular map of the world...not to mention the famed human-bearing
Waq-Waq tree.
[via]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 1:21 PM on April 5, 2007
(7 comments)
The Rare Book Room
presents about 400 of the world's greatest books from a variety of libraries in high resolution format. For some samples, check out:
Apianus (
Astronomicum Caesareum);
Blake (
Songs of Innocence and Experience);
Braccelli (Bizzarie di Varie Figure);
Catesby (
The Natural History of Carolina...);
Dürer (
De Symmetria...);
Colonna (
Hypnerotomachia Poliphili). And on and on. The interface is great (use arrow far left at top for larger page image) but there's a slight browser resize in FFox. A couple of author names are placeholders for future uploads it seems. [
via]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 8:21 AM on March 12, 2007
(25 comments)
'Films from the Homefront'
is a (new) collection of amateur documentaries, newsreels, government films, and home movies documenting life for the ordinary people in Britain during World War II, with background text descriptions/explication.
Browse the themes. The films are QT and wmv format. I found it both poignant and funny, for instance, seeing kids don gasmasks during air raid drills then attempt to continue writing in their lessons.
[via Glasgow School of Art Library]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 7:03 AM on February 16, 2007
(4 comments)
The Cliff House
was San Francisco Mayor Adolph Sutro's amazing 7-storey Victorian chateau built in 1896 and destroyed by fire in 1907.
The Cliff House Project (photos) has a large and absorbing database of related material. [via the indefatigable
gmtPlus9 (-15)]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 10:34 PM on December 14, 2006
(14 comments)
Anna and Laura Tirocchi ran a dressmaking shop for the elite of Providence, Rhode Island between 1915 and 1947. In 1989 the building, which had been shut for 42 years, was found to contain a time capsule of the development of early 20th century fashion - from fabric and dresses to photographs and sewing machines and associated ephemera.
The A&L Tirocchi Dressmakers Project website showcases the collection
(after 12 years of research by RISD) through:
the 514 project (with
an image archive),
essays,
databases and
exhibition sections.
[via Intute]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 4:04 AM on August 18, 2006
(12 comments)
The Image Culture
- a discussion of the history, manipulation, desensitization and supplanting of language skills by the ubiquity of images. And no, there are no pretty pictures.
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 7:39 AM on November 19, 2005
(38 comments)
Electronic Biologia Centrali-Americana
is a collaboration between the Smithsonian, Missouri Botanical and Kew Gardens, the British Natural History Museum and various other institutions which has enabled the digitizing of 58 volumes of natural history about central America produced between 1880 and 1920. It includes descriptions of more than 50,000 species with images of more than 18,000
birds,
more birds,
snakes,
turtles,
centipedes,
spiders,
more spiders,
plants,
mollusks,
more plants,
butterflies,
orthoptera insects,
more butterflies and
their family's (
moth-like)
families,
mammals and even some
historic maps of the region. There is a parallel project attempting to provide access to much more scientific data and specimens between these institutions.
Note: 'next' button at top +/- bottom of these large thumb pages; large high resolution jpegs work (in most cases) but zoom and .pdfiles are not yet enabled. I've only just scratched the surface.
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 11:54 AM on September 26, 2005
(9 comments)
"A natural history of birds. Most of which have not been figur'd or describ'd, and others very little known from obscure or too brief descriptions without figures, or from figures very ill design'd.
" [1743] and "Birds of North America" [1903]
Samples
(the last 15 from each link): [1743]:
1,
2,
3,
4,
5,
6,
7,
8,
9,
10,
11,
12,
13,
14,
15.
[1903]:
1,
2,
3,
4,
5,
6,
7,
8,
9,
10,
11,
12,
13,
14,
15.
[MI]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 11:17 AM on September 10, 2005
(23 comments)
The Benedictine Vivarium
"In the Benedictine tradition of reverence for human thought and creativity, the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library preserves manuscripts, printed books and art at Saint John's University and undertakes photographic projects in regions throughout the world.
" --
"Nearly half of HMML's holdings derive from libraries in Austria and Germany, but HMML also houses significant collections from Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, England, and Ethiopia. It holds archival materials, and of particular importance are the Archives of the Knights of Malta, housed in the National Library in Valletta, and the Archives of the Roman Inquisition, located at the Cathedral Museum in Mdina.
" EXAMPLE PAGES --
Illustrations,
Photographs ,
Paintings/Iconography,
Pottery/Sculptures,
Artifacts,
Manuscripts and more - if this kind of thing interests you, then search around - I've only begun scratching the surface.
Nb. See browser setup info at bottom of page in main link.
[via]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 12:28 PM on August 28, 2005
(9 comments)
Athanasius Kircher was the
17th century's Jesuit version of the
übergeek. His scholarly attentions were drawn to egyptology, astronomy, magnetism, languages, optics, music, geology, mathematics and many many other pursuits. The
"dude of wonders" invented novel machines such as the
mathematical organ and
magnetic clock, established one of the first museums, published about 40 academic works (with
beautiful accompanying illustrations) and was globally revered as one of his time's greatest intellectuals. He is also the main link in the
Voynich manuscript mystery. [
MI]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 11:24 AM on August 7, 2005
(12 comments)
PopExperiment
"Anyway, the idea behind this site is similar to stumble: provide links and representations to (of) artists that I love. To that end I've already started populating the music, photography, visual arts and motion arts sections with some art I hope you really enjoy (and real links to the amazing artists responsible)."
[And check:
via via via]
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 2:14 AM on August 6, 2005
(2 comments)
"
Square America is a site dedicated to preserving and displaying vintage snapshots from the first 3/4s of the 20th Century. Not only do these photographs contain a wealth of primary source information on how life was lived they also constitute a shadow history of photography, one too often ignored by museums and art galleries."
via
posted to MetaFilter by peacay
at 2:21 PM on July 19, 2005
(21 comments)
