India has great publishers and bookstores. Books are cheap and I’m always sending some home. Last week after a few months ten kilogram books arrived by sea mail. Currently reading the Sufi Message of Hazrat Iniyat Khan

“There is an ancient story in the East which tells that there was a wall of mystery. Whenever anyone tried to climb up the wall to look at the other side, instead of coming back he smiled and jumped over and never came back again. So the people of that country became very curious to know what mystery was behind that wall. Once when someone was climbing up the wall to see what was on the other side they put chains around his feet, and held him so that he would not go over. When he looked at the other side he too was delighted with what he saw and smiled; and those standing at the foot of the wall, curious to know what he had to say, pulled him back. But to their great dissapointment he had lost his speech.

The mystery of life has a great charm; every soul is curious about it; when one wants to explain the mystery of life, words are not adequate. There are many reasons for this speechlessness, for this silence. The first is that man who has seen what is on the other side of the wall finds himself among children when he returns. To him all the things to which people attach great importance and value seem worthless…”

From: The Mysticism of Music, Sound and Word
by Hazrat Iniyat Khan

In 1993 I traveled in Thailand and Indonesia. I visited briefly several Thai Islands in the Andaman sea, crossed the border to Malaysia by boat and sailed onwards to Sumatra. There I stayed for a while on Pulau Weh at the Northern tip of the archipel. It’s a tiny Blue Lagoon island. The fish we ate for lunch and diner was harpooned five minutes before on the reef.
At that time the coral was still pristine and full with life.

Today I was shocked by the news that the tsunamis sent out by a massive earthquake in the Indian ocean near Indonesia hit the Thai coast. Two friends are holidaying at some Ko (Thai island) there. These past weeks we followed their adventures on the beach in their travel log. By cell phone someone was able to contact them and put in the comments that they fled into the mountains before the tsunami swamped the island.

foto: Maurice Amoureus

www.nu.nl

Yesterday I made some comments on illustrators in Holland
My friend Mark is an illustrator and this is the new year card he send us today.
Also a Happy Merry Christmas to you Mark.
Check out his site at
www.marksmolders.com

It’s not art that dominates today’s visual culture and in the U.S. the home of Pop Art they are very aware of this. Over there illustrators are taken more serious as a creative designer and artist. It’s easier to get your illustrations put up in a decent Art gallery in the U.S. then in Holland. Generally the art-scene here is more conservative and traditional as we do have some fresh illustrators and designers but they hardly get exposure.

The paintings of Moira Hahn are very narrative and make me think she was an illustrator before, there’s also a Time cover illustration on the front page of her portfolio. There aren’t many illustrators here in Holland who crossed over from illustration to planet Art. www.moirahahn.com (link via art-bbq)