Luminous Landscape Forum
The Art of Photography => The Coffee Corner => Topic started by: Slobodan Blagojevic on April 15, 2019, 04:25:04 pm
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My condolences to our French friends.
I am crying as I am writing this. I am not Catholic, I am not even religious, but the cultural and historic loss is enormous. It survived 850 years.
Back in 2010, I took this photo inside the cathedral:
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I've been glued to my television for the last few hours. There are no words to describe this horrific event.
Fortunately, so far, no injuries.
Edit: one firefighter seriously injured.
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The most incredible thing is that something like this can happen now. 850 years of constant upheavals, wars, all kinds of calamities, and Notre Dame survived it all. It should have lasted another 850 years. Now, the only thing left is to learn why this happened.
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The most incredible thing is that something like this can happen now..l
Which got me thinking, what exactly is the fire fighting strategy for tall buildings? The first thing that came to my lauman’s mind is helicopters. We have military cargo helicopters, capable of carrying 20-25 metric tons. Could they be transformed into carrying water or other fire-fighting material? We have planes with bigger capacities, but I doubt they are precise enough for relatively small footprint in densely populated civilian areas.
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Apparently, they wanted to avoid dropping lot of water / weight on the cathedral for fear of collapsing.
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I believe Notre-Dame de Paris has suffered, if not quite this much damage, extensive damage in the past. As long as the bones of the building, the massive stoneworks, remain more or less intact the building will continue. These things are not cast in amber, but living, breathing, structures which have historically been left to rot, revived, rebuilt, reimagined, and renovated over and over.
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Fires too often happen during (roof) repairs - Would be wise to have always some firemen around during the works- at least for monuments like these.
Too late for the Notre Dame, but at least there is enough support for the rebuild. Hopefully the injured fireman recovers.
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Donation for reconstruction possible after this link:
https://don.fondation-patrimoine.org/SauvonsNotreDame/~mon-don?fbclid=IwAR3PwNPEgy-K3To7AhpmQutPGFE7_66nIh8PQ521-EAipQw3vgEln_3FSDA
Cheers,
Bernard
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The roof was from the XIX century I think, made of wood. The stained glass windows were from the 1500's or so? The cathedral needed much restoration during the 1800's, due to the ruinous condition it was in. Several works of art, thankfully, had been removed, on account of the ongoing works...
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One of the most worrying things about this tragedy - for all of us and not just the French - is that it follows a series of such occurrences . York Minster, Windsor Castle, the Glasgow School of Art (famous Scottish architect/designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh's masterpiece) twice, and no doubt others, each of which was in process of significant repair and renovation at the time and the credible causes appear to have been human accident during that work. I hesitate to draw sweeping conclusions but wonder what safeguards in addition to what at the time was considered sufficient would have been required to prevent or at least ameliorate the damage. None of my examples are quite so devastating as the damage to Notre Dame but we can scarce afford any such heritage loss and whatever extra costs might be required they would be small in financial and loss of originality in comparison to the costs subsequently incurred.
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It is interesting that the loss is considered mostly cultural, but little is said of the meaning to Catholics. Yes, the French were historically Catholic, but are now fairly diverse in faiths. So now Notre-Dame is more important as a cultural and tourism monument than as its origin of a place of worship.
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Perhaps raking would have helped ??
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/19/make-america-rake-again-finland-trump-forest-fire
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It is interesting that the loss is considered mostly cultural, but little is said of the meaning to Catholics. Yes, the French were historically Catholic, but are now fairly diverse in faiths. So now Notre-Dame is more important as a cultural and tourism monument than as its origin of a place of worship.
And historical
I don't know how many people worship there.
As AFAIK any church would do exactly the same
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... As AFAIK any church would do exactly the same
Do what?
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And historical
I don't know how many people worship there.
As AFAIK any church would do exactly the same
Ross Douthat wrote a thoughtful piece on what the destruction might mean to Catholics. As he is Catholic, it is clear Notre-Dame is still significant to the faith.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/15/opinion/notre-dame-fire-catholic-church.html
PS The article may require a subscription.
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Wonder if the hunchback found temporary quarters.
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Wonder if the hunchback found temporary quarters.
If you had to ask:
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Can't help but think that a re-build will end up looking like a Disney theme park. The money would be better spent helping starving people in the world?
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Can't help but think that a re-build will end up looking like a Disney theme park. The money would be better spent helping starving people in the world?
or farm out the construction to Chinese. They are very fast and efficient in construction of super large projects.
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It is a sad story, if it happened in my town of birth, I would be very shocked, no doubt. On the other hand, if Macron is smart, it could help him to distract the crowd from his political difficulties.
And let’s be fair, It’s weird to see the same rich family doing everything to escape to pay their taxes now pulling the wallet to donate 200 million euro’s and more.
Where are those big shots when a real human catastrophe happens? With real victims? Not a only a molested wooden contraption laid in ashes.
Is there a contemporary Hundertwasser, or even Gaudi? Would be interesting to follow the hysteria around the design of the renovation.
Maybe they can ask Calatrava.
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Of course it is a tragedy. Of course it must be rebuilt. For 850 years an almost unimaginable number of people have been in it with their hopes and fears and many have found spiritual peace there. In a world with much materialism, there need to be amazing spaces that resonate with people who want to experience more than the ephemera of everyday life. I hope it is restored with all the skill and imagination that over the years have made it what it has been and can be again.
Best wishes,
Jonathan
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My condolences to our French friends.
I am crying as I am writing this. I am not Catholic, I am not even religious, but the cultural and historic loss is enormous. It survived 850 years.
Back in 2010, I took this photo inside the cathedral:
Your photo, very nice, Slobodan. So often interior pictures of churches exclude the religious purpose of them.
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Can't help but think that a re-build will end up looking like a Disney theme park. The money would be better spent helping starving people in the world?
I have made a similar point over on TOP, but it takes a day or so for things to get vetted and posted; perhaps my divergent opinion will not be aired.
Regarding all of these things and their relevance, both culturally to the world and morally to everyone concerned, this event doesn't even begin to rate with 9/11 as disaster on every scale of human thought.
In the case of the Glasgow fires at the art school, my view would be to raze the place to the ground and create a brand new, contemporary design and probably from somebody who has had a hand in building modern Chicago as seen through the prism of one Slobodan Blagojevic.
Having lived in a city full of old, ugly buildings masquerading as art, oh! for a breath of fresh air. I tend to believe that unremitting physical bleakness can't but help impress itself upon the lives, minds and expectations of those exposed to it all their days.
My first studio was a large top-floor apartment in a part-commercial and part-residential building owned by my father-in-law; it was as ugly as sin and Charlie Dickens would have felt instantly at home, or at least, many of his characters would. The building was bought with an eye to future selling upon retirement, but it turned out to be blighted, and I choose that word carefully, with a level of listing that even controlled the type of cleaning allowed to the external surface. An unmitigated fiscal disaster that meant the survival of one of the most unpleasant looking things it has been my lot to enter. There is a madness (and political power) at play in many of those types of "conservation" concepts that belies reality and even basic concepts of good aesthetics.
Everything has its time, then it's time for the new.
Rob
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Well, Rob, it looks like Mike moderated your remarks through, but took exception to them. I was disheartened to see him referencing Stephen Pinker, who is one of those irritating buggers who thinks that expertise in one rather narrow specialty translates to expertise in, well, everything else.
I predict that they'll try to put Notre Dame back the way it was, but hold out hope they'll do something interesting and fun instead. Paris would hate it for a generation, and then love it until it fell. See also the Transamerica pyramid in San Francisco.
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Ross Douthat wrote a thoughtful piece on what the destruction might mean to Catholics. As he is Catholic, it is clear Notre-Dame is still significant to the faith.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/15/opinion/notre-dame-fire-catholic-church.html
PS The article may require a subscription.
Well I don't know that person Douthat but I doubt that this church building means to the catholic faith more than to most children of our civilization.
For a Catholic God is everywhere, it doesn't matter in which church or shack you worship.
Or so they say
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May I kindly suggest to refrain from political bickering or baiting in THIS thread?
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Your photo, very nice, Slobodan. So often interior pictures of churches exclude the religious purpose of them.
Thank you. Two more from the same visit:
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Well I don't know that person Douthat but I doubt that this church building means to the catholic faith more than to most children of our civilization.
For a Catholic God is everywhere, it doesn't matter in which church or shack you worship.
Or so they say
I don't believe in religion as my route to salvation, because religion is the reporting/invention/politics of ancient days viewed today.
That said, I most certainly do believe in a power of some sort that may be divine or something quite else, but it appears to me that there truly is a universal moral compass we fail to use at our own cost and peril. Abuses of basic humanity and good behaviour are obvious all around us; it doesn't take religious teaching (as a kid I was exposed to both Catholic and fundamentalist Protestant indoctrinations, the latter the more bizarre) to understand that we eventually do pay for our actions. That I survived it all is a credit to my family that never tried to push me one way or the other. But then it always was a strange collection individuals, which probably explains quite a lot.
Without doubt there is a comfort in spending time alone with one's thoughts and figuring out the whys of life and the things that are really important and those but conceits. Spiritual life seems to make one more content with one's lot because it also has the ability of putting a perspective on things. Therein, of course, lies the dangers of political machinations and the subjugation of peoples through religious conviction.
Brexit is far more simple to debate!
Rob
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I don't believe in religion as my route to salvation, because religion is the reporting/invention/politics of ancient days viewed today.
Rob
Rob let's give the blame to my poor Englisch
What I mean is that in re: Notre Dame de Paris - the disaster is the same for a religious as for a non-religious person
For the religious person because of his religious symbolic, for the non-religious for his historic or artistic or whatever.
I mean, for a catholic it is not sadder than for a non-catholic
And most people see in it one of many symbols of our civilization. From where many of us come from, religious or not.
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Rob let's give the blame to my poor Englisch
What I mean is that in re: Notre Dame de Paris - the disaster is the same for a religious as for a non-religious person
For the religious person because of his religious symbolic, for the non-religious for his historic or artistic or whatever.
I mean, for a catholic it is not sadder than for a non-catholic
And most people see in it one of many symbols of our civilization. From where many of us come from, religious or not.
No, I'm not misunderstamding your English, which is pretty damned good. I am thinking about the symbolism behind all of those structures built upon religious belief and, in their day, religious murder. Ask the Cathars in the south of France what they thought of it all - had any survived popes who told the armies to kill 'em all, friend or foe, because God knew his own, so it was okay. Way to go!
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albigensian_Crusade
That said, I hoped to enjoy a programme this evening about Calcutta, only to find myself listening to an Englishwoman (? - she may be Welsh or whatever) doing the contemporary, politically correct number of rewriting the story of the British in India and making apologies to anyone who would stand still and listen. I lasted about twenty minutes before my fuse blew and I reverted to the iPad.
Today, those things are about tourism and the broader economy. In fact, in France, for all I know there may even be more life in the building of mosques than of churches. Perhaps some enterprising Frenchman will think of Joel Meyerowitz and become ensconced in the clearing and recovery of the old kirk; can be a good little earner.
:-)
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Well, Rob, it looks like Mike moderated your remarks through, but took exception to them. I was disheartened to see him referencing Stephen Pinker, who is one of those irritating buggers who thinks that expertise in one rather narrow specialty translates to expertise in, well, everything else.
I predict that they'll try to put Notre Dame back the way it was, but hold out hope they'll do something interesting and fun instead. Paris would hate it for a generation, and then love it until it fell. See also the Transamerica pyramid in San Francisco.
Thanks, Andrew; I rushed out a response on the iPad, which though it lets me do my penning in comfort, can get me into the dreaded time-out situation on TOP where all is lost because unlike with the computer, I can't get it together with highlighting, saving and then reopening the site to paste what I have saved. I know, old men and yound people's toys!
Better than television these days, though!
Rob
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Well I don't know that person Douthat but I doubt that this church building means to the catholic faith more than to most children of our civilization.
For a Catholic God is everywhere, it doesn't matter in which church or shack you worship.
Or so they say
Actually, Ross Douthat says something similar to your sentiment.
Rob let's give the blame to my poor Englisch
What I mean is that in re: Notre Dame de Paris - the disaster is the same for a religious as for a non-religious person
For the religious person because of his religious symbolic, for the non-religious for his historic or artistic or whatever.
I mean, for a catholic it is not sadder than for a non-catholic
And most people see in it one of many symbols of our civilization. From where many of us come from, religious or not.
Well, you should be correct but the reality is different. The destruction of a humble rural church would mean nothing to the world, but would be everything to the congregation of that church. So while Notre-Dame is considered a cultural treasure, it may be only in so far as the capriciousness of taste and usefulness allows it. After all, the building is an exorbitant expense which luckily is a popular tourist attraction.
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No, I'm not misunderstamding your English, which is pretty damned good. I am thinking about the symbolism behind all of those structures built upon religious belief and, in their day, religious murder. Ask the Cathars in the south of France what they thought of it all - had any survived popes who told the armies to kill 'em all, friend or foe, because God knew his own, so it was okay. Way to go!
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albigensian_Crusade
Thanks Rob for the compliment about my damned English ;D Good for my ego ;)
I know about the Albigensians, about the nice Soeur Sourire singing nice songs about Dominique-nique-nique etc
I know also about Troy, about Jericho, about Jerusalem and the crusaders, about Rwanda, about Auschwitz and Co and I could continue with a long list
That's more the human condition, I guess.
What can we do? Commit Seppuku together?
That's us, not this or that religion. Just my humble opinion
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I don't see the God issue much differently than the cathedral issue. Both are old and well-documented by people whom we scarcely understand because of the radical difference in cultures. As to rebuilding the cathedral, we face two things (as I see at the moment): One is the historic glory, which may be restorable to a fair extent, and one is the opportunity to make the rebuilding relevant to the current time and the people who support it.
I think we have to be humble enough to admit that despite our wonderful technology and understanding of ancient things today, that we really can't duplicate the things that were dictated by the intent of the original builders, or those who made modifications up to a few hundred years ago.
The opportunity to update the relevance is interesting insofar as who gets behind it with whose money, and who the Church and State consider to be the rightful owners of the property (I'll just bet it's not as clear-cut as a 99-year lease).
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Do what?
"Would do" in the sense of "enough or suitable for a particular purpose"
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Wonder if the hunchback found temporary quarters.
He did (https://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/international/hunchback-forced-to-move-in-with-phantom-of-the-opera-20190416184732).
Jeremy
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Thanks, Jeremy. I'm glad to know he'll be comfortable until the church is rebuilt.
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Thanks, Jeremy. I'm glad to know he'll be comfortable until the church is rebuilt.
Quasimodo. Not a lot of people knows that he was named after a camera setting: an "almost" mode that lives just next to M.
Aren't you glad y'all came here today?
;-)
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Quasimodo. Not a lot of people knows that he was named after a camera setting: an "almost" mode that lives just next to M.
Hehe.
But anyway thanks for making me look it up in the Internet, i didn't know the meaning of the name
"quasimodo (n.)
"Low Sunday," 1706, Quasimodo Sunday, from Latin quasi modo, first words of introit for the first Sunday after Easter: quasi modo geniti infantes "as newborn babes" (1 Peter ii.2). The hunchback in Victor Hugo's novel was supposed to have been abandoned as an infant at Notre Dame on this day, hence his name.
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I know that it is Coffee Corner and that it is my own fault to have wandering in but surely as photographers - whom I would have thought are by definition either artists or at least interested in art and culture - we could refrain from bickering about something as gut wrenching as the damage to a wonderful cultural monument as Notre Dame.
Recently my 30 year old grandson despaired of the Brexit chaos and the current farrago in Canadian politics as being like "groups of high school debaters pretending to be a government" - I guess that also they have insinuated themselves here. Please grow up and just potter off to the nearest bar.
No specific names in mind just a general plea.
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I know that it is Coffee Corner and that it is my own fault to have wandering in but surely as photographers - whom I would have thought are by definition either artists or at least interested in art and culture - we could refrain from bickering about something as gut wrenching as the damage to a wonderful cultural monument as Notre Dame.
Recently my 30 year old grandson despaired of the Brexit chaos and the current farrago in Canadian politics as being like "groups of high school debaters pretending to be a government" - I guess that also they have insinuated themselves here. Please grow up and just potter off to the nearest bar.
No specific names in mind just a general plea.
Isn't that always the case when one finds an argument with which to disagree?
But hey, at thirty, I also knew the right answer to everyone's problems but my own! The kid's normal, let him be.
;-)
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I know that it is Coffee Corner and that it is my own fault to have wandering in but surely as photographers - whom I would have thought are by definition either artists or at least interested in art and culture - we could refrain from bickering about something as gut wrenching as the damage to a wonderful cultural monument as Notre Dame.
Recently my 30 year old grandson despaired of the Brexit chaos and the current farrago in Canadian politics as being like "groups of high school debaters pretending to be a government" - I guess that also they have insinuated themselves here. Please grow up and just potter off to the nearest bar.
No specific names in mind just a general plea.
I thought you had to be a moderator to lecture members?
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I know that I should not rise to the bait but :
...... Rob, even 30 year olds can sometimes be right - especially when it is so damned shamingly obvious, and,
..... Stamper, moderators are only necessary when groups lack the maturity to self discipline.
In future I will restrict my Lula activities to the photography related areas and leave you guys to amuse yourselves ... have fun.
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But hey, at thirty, I also knew the right answer to everyone's problems but my own! The kid's normal, let him be.
I know you had a smiley in this post but I just wanted to make one comment. It's a common meme in our culture (and others) that as we get older, we get wiser. As a pensioner myself, this is a seductive point of view, if a little self-serving. But we should take a step back and recognize the homily for what it is, a meaningless cliché. I know plenty of old dumb guys, I'm sure you do too. Not everyone learns as they get older, and some become much more set in their ways and close-minded, not to say stupid.
I just thought the notion needed a little pushback, it's too easy to fall into line sometimes.
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I know you had a smiley in this post but I just wanted to make one comment. It's a common meme in our culture (and others) that as we get older, we get wiser. As a pensioner myself, this is a seductive point of view, if a little self-serving. But we should take a step back and recognize the homily for what it is, a meaningless cliché. I know plenty of old dumb guys, I'm sure you do too. Not everyone learns as they get older, and some become much more set in their ways and close-minded, not to say stupid.
I just thought the notion needed a little pushback, it's too easy to fall into line sometimes.
That's an interesting point of view Robert, but did I claim to be any the wiser today?
But you're right: it really is too easy to fall into line, which is why I felt the need to offer the thought that I waste no tears for old buildings long neglected. However, were said buildings mine, my tune would be totally different.
;-)
Rob
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That's an interesting point of view Robert, but did I claim to be any the wiser today?
But you're right: it really is too easy to fall into line, which is why I felt the need to offer the thought that I waste no tears for old buildings long neglected. However, were said buildings mine, my tune would be totally different.
;-)
Rob
Some old buildings and neighbourhoods should be maintained in their pristine state, I'd say, but not all. Everything has a shelf life.
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I know that I should not rise to the bait but :
...... Rob, even 30 year olds can sometimes be right - especially when it is so damned shamingly obvious, and,
..... Stamper, moderators are only necessary when groups lack the maturity to self discipline.
In future I will restrict my Lula activities to the photography related areas and leave you guys to amuse yourselves ... have fun.
The "obvious" is an act of faith, in this case, not a reality common to all minds.
However, as stamper opined, lecturing members is a bit rich when all you can base your little lecture upon is your personal case of angst and broken heart at the partial destruction of a tourist site that has now, more than ever, focussed eyes upon Paris. You see? not all is bad that gets forged by fire.
Whether or not you choose to frequent the CC is entirely up to you; I'm sure that neither stamper nor I would wish to put any pressure on your decision which is totally yours to make. No way would I want to appear to be trying to make you think or act in any particular direction.
;-)
Rob
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Rob, just one last comment. I suspect from your phrasing that you are attributing Brexiteer opinions to me - if so you could not be more wrong.
Over and out.
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Rob, just one last comment. I suspect from your phrasing that you are attributing Brexiteer opinions to me - if so you could not be more wrong.
Over and out.
That you have no Brexiteer opinions is the best bit of news to come out of this tiny skirmish. I only wish I had been allowed a vote!
Anyway, regarding the old kirk: I have no wish to see it suffer harm, but that doesn't imply it breaks my heart should the old thing get a bump now and again; even I get those! Basically, I guess I'm saying tears, like charity, best begin at home.
:-)
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I have started this thread with a heavy heart and tears in my eyes. As I said, although my family religious tradition is Christian (Orthodox), I am not Catholic, and not even religious myself. I see Notre-Dame, as many other similar artifacts, as a great achievement of the mankind. To imagine that someone was able, 850 years ago, to construct such a building using then-available technology and know-how, is mind boggling. That it was able to survive 850 years is equally miraculous.
From this standpoint, the thread has run its course. It was not meant to give platform for political posturing or cynicism. If someone wants to opine in that direction, be my guest. Just start your own thread, where you can spit on the charred remains all you want. I've already seen thousands upon thousands of laughing smiles, mostly from Muslims, on social media. I do not want to see them here.
As the thread starter, I have the option to lock this thread, and that is what I am going to do.