My bookshelf in the Ancient Library of Alexandria
My grandfather told me the story of The Ancient Library of Alexandria. It has been present in my mind with a sense of loss since childhood. I imagined the burnet scrolls. What was in them? What have we lost? I imagine the toga-wearing scholars wondering about the gardens, conversing with each other, discussing Aristotle’s […]
Mound Hacker on his way to Rome
My late grandfather, the architect Issac Kipnis, was the first to tell me the story of the burnt library of Alexandria. I was eight years old. The lost knowledge of the western world intrigued me ever since. I will be lecturing at The Arts and Sociaty Conference at Rome this week. Mound Hacker, will be probably restless, trying to pull me out of the lecture […]
What is this blog about?
My first memory of collecting and organizing knowledge is from the age of six. In a new notebook, I wrote all I knew about my ancestors and the pyramids. Since it felt important, I buried it in the courtyard for people of the future to find and know what happened here. I probably still […]
Be my Guest: Dimitris Pikionis and Euclid
Clio points out the beauty of the pavements as we are walking towards the Acropolis. The sun sets into to the Mediterranean sea. I find it a bit irritating to step on art. This is how I learn about Dimitris Pikionis. I discover endless compositions and mirrors. As I am on my journey to Ithaca, I notice Euclid’s triangles mingled with […]
Dogon on my computer
1995 Isaac Rabin was murdered. That week I was in Paris with our 18 years-old daughter. It was her birthday present to visit museums in the city of lights. We called her sister and father in Israel, from a booth phone to say good-bye as they were leaving that night to Kenya for a beetle […]
Alexandria remains
Images of Alexandria Library are on my mind. Playing in the sand tray – visions emerge: a scribe and scrolls. Euclid in Greece sits next to another scribe, connected through a golden triangle to an Egyptian on the south bank of the Mediterranean Sea. Δ Under the library, in a cellar, with a flashlight […]
Be my guest: Bill Viola and Gaston Bachelard
BE MY GUEST is a venue for others to share their art; I assemble between creators in my sitting room. Linear time and locality are not relevant. Bill Viola is speaking about his video artwork, Ocean Without a Shore – exhibited at Venice Biennale 2007. He points out the link between the dead and the […]
Be my Guest- Gabriel Orozco and Alex Epstein
BE MY GUEST is a venue for others to share their art; I assemble between creators in my sitting room. Linear time and locality are not relevant. httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7yNaqYEheg I learned about Gabriel Orozco mostly through the Internet. I read stories by Alex Epstein in Hebrew. I join them as my guests, since they both remind me of sailing […]
Sun print 2
As I leafed in the pile of documents my mother handed me, I found more fragments of the past; I saw this curious photograph of Issac Kipnis, my grandfather, respectfully shaking hands with a person in a bathing outfit. It was weird for me to see him bowing deeply towards another person. I think he is smiling. […]