Linkdump #103

NeSpoon is a Polish street artist who creates lovely murals based on traditional lace patterns: https://tinyurl.com/52sxpydh

Redecorating the Oval Office isn’t just a statement of the president’s taste. It’s also a statement of control: https://tinyurl.com/ny9nx2rc

Comprising a hundred and fifty male couples, Thebes’s Sacred Band was undefeated until it was wiped out in 338 B.C. In the nineteenth century, the mass grave of the men was found: https://tinyurl.com/vp3wbrwp

An educational Twitter thread about tiny snakes and their weird jaws (It’s pretty heavy on the science terms, but the pics are still cool): https://tinyurl.com/hukvc7tv

Please give it up for Mr. Handsome!: https://tinyurl.com/yuw4rjyc

Of COURSE it lives in Australia: https://tinyurl.com/rexw978z

Good news! Your dazzling designer pizza purse dreams have been realized!: https://tinyurl.com/vx8hzvu4

Dr. Christine Na-Eun Millar is a physician, gamer, and costumer who loves to unwind by crafting lovely and impressive historical gowns and outfits: https://tinyurl.com/r4uhtc3d

Powerful portraits by Sophie Rowan: https://tinyurl.com/4d22bxc4

The amazing life, and tragic death, of Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, She was an educator, political campaigner, suffragist, and women’s rights activist, and the mother of the beloved activist and Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti: https://tinyurl.com/j8b3smk5

A pair of orbiting black holes millions of times the Sun’s mass perform a hypnotic pas de deux in a new NASA visualization. The movie traces how the black holes distort and redirect light emanating from the maelstrom of hot gas, called an accretion disk, that surrounds each one: https://tinyurl.com/5buktr5z

Bolivia’s Lake Uru Uru was once a beautiful and thriving ecosystem, but was sadly overtaken by a seemingly endless sea of plastic waster and chemicals. Now hundreds of volunteers have come to clean it up: https://tinyurl.com/7b9krhzw

“Mind The Gap” is a downloadable clinical handbook of signs and symptoms in Black and brown skin, designed to highlight the lack of diversity in medical literature and education: https://tinyurl.com/225ckkpr

You may have seen posts of Louise Bourgeois’ giant spider-like sculpture, but you may not know the story and trauma behind its creation: https://tinyurl.com/3ec833av

The volcano that burns blue: https://tinyurl.com/jts5n2hp

“Every single Imperial occupation of Afghanistan since Alexander the Great has had the same justification. They were all defensive invasions, necessary to reduce the “threat” from Afghanistan to the Imperial power”: https://tinyurl.com/852yut44

A collection of ridiculous over-acting and corny dialogue from the 1978 disaster movie ‘The Swarm’. African killer bees invade Texas, provoking a considerable amount of melodrama: https://tinyurl.com/4pzukzbx

Valeska Gert was a fascinating character. Born in 1892, she became renowned as a dancer, choreographer, mime, and cabaret artist. Some crowds were entranced by her boldness, and others repelled and angered by the “grotesqueness” of her performances. Some even credit her for planting the seeds of the punk movement, but everyone seems to have their own thoughts and feelings about this artist. Here’s a short performance piece she did, and there are loads more links about her online: https://tinyurl.com/3v2rr3jt

A lovely little banjo cover of Aphex Twin’s “Avril 14th”: https://tinyurl.com/ub79zvtx

A painting transforms before your eyes: https://tinyurl.com/332ksjt6

“Do you want a thread exploring the links between that ship stuck in Suez, the Trojan War, the founding of Singapore, and Chinese foreign policy, from the Belt and Road and South China Sea to Taiwan? Of course you do!”: https://tinyurl.com/k6de4j9c

Here’s what it’s like to spend the night in Chernobyl: https://tinyurl.com/57bn7vj4

This pterosaur supported its giant neck with bones built like bicycle wheels: https://tinyurl.com/29fy7pur

Georgia’s (The country, not the U.S. state) pre-Christian festival of Berikaoba nearly vanished before one woman made it her mission to revive it: https://tinyurl.com/xkp55ez6

Ahhhh, I do love the DIY inventiveness of Russians: https://tinyurl.com/3tdyx96p

A valiant tweeter shares fun and educational reviews of animal bites: https://tinyurl.com/39umrzzp

For the 3D printing nerds out there, a triple axis tourbillon mechanism (Yes I absolutely had to google what a tourbillon is): https://tinyurl.com/j3w92erk

The Titanic’s lost Chinese survivors: https://tinyurl.com/wx2b493t

From Bored panda, a giggle-worthy thread of non-traditional science paper titles: https://tinyurl.com/3vp2zekb

Photojournalist Brian Skerry explores the culture of whales: https://tinyurl.com/4zs8jedz

A lovely short film about the Nez Peace and local farmers working together to restore the Lostine River and its once-flourishing fish populations: https://vimeo.com/527606800

A living hammock made from weeping willow branches: https://tinyurl.com/ravpb7vp

Have you ever heard the drumming of a male Ruffed Grouse?: https://tinyurl.com/3d8wrh9y

This little turtle is NOT having it: https://tinyurl.com/p8t7t5up

The Lomax Digital Archive (Part of the Library of Congress) provides free access to audio/visual collections compiled across seven decades by folklorist Alan Lomax (1915–2002) and his father John A. Lomax (1867–1948): https://tinyurl.com/nmh85c3v

A lovely infographic about cephalopods: https://tinyurl.com/4dn9cdbn

Linkdump #102

So it appears that bees can actually tell time: https://tinyurl.com/2a8ac4jv

Dr. Jen Gunter gives a brief lesson on how hormonal birth control treats acne (FYI Dr. Gunter is NOT a fan of naturopathic medicine): https://tinyurl.com/mu5h7mre

If you’re trying to build something that involves bending wood, you may find this video quite helpful: https://tinyurl.com/yfdw4mea

Back in the Ancient Times (commonly known as “The 80s”), Joe Strummer decided to make a black-and-white improvisational gangster film inspired by Italian neorealism: https://tinyurl.com/2md7p3he

Support your local library!: https://tinyurl.com/39mut5ka

Carrie Fisher’s Star Wars audition: https://tinyurl.com/4ffk49s3

If you love sharks you might be interested in this cool wall chart: https://tinyurl.com/s3kbavhs

Smithsonian takes us on a tour of some of the world’s most unusual (and sometimes disturbing) books: https://tinyurl.com/2dev294e

The sounds of a harp-like instrument called the yazh, named for the mythological animal Yali whose image was carved into its stem, once filled the halls of temples and royal courts in southern India. Over time, however, the Tamil musical tradition all but vanished: https://tinyurl.com/bmc8r27m

Before there was Javier Botet, before there was Doug Jones, there was Bolaji Badejo: https://tinyurl.com/22yshu9a

Otters, otters, and MORE OTTERS!: https://tinyurl.com/d5rmruf5

Artists and scientists come together to create eerie, otherworldly music out of spider webs (Scroll down to the bottom to watch the videos): https://tinyurl.com/4p7ukuut

Scotland and Kenya come together in an unexpected way: https://tinyurl.com/s6cak5ah

Cynthia Consentino’s Porcelain Madonna series morphs traditional Madonna statues into new and unique forms: https://tinyurl.com/yy899n46

The strange case of the rabbits that walk on their hands: https://tinyurl.com/4w5z978h

In case you didn’t know, the Louvre’s entire collection is now available to explore online: https://tinyurl.com/vsxvk95t

“Found a good outfit” is a Twitter account dedicated to showing you how you, too, can dress like classic characters from TV, movies, books, video games, and more: https://tinyurl.com/bycw4ak

Located above the Arctic Circle, the Norwegian city of Lofoten sits in the middle of an unusual temperature anomaly that makes it surprisingly livable: https://tinyurl.com/9fubffpa

In today’s weird nature news, scientists discover a species of ant that can shrink and then re-grow their brains: https://tinyurl.com/bjy9wsju

Please enjoy the Strange Cats: https://tinyurl.com/6vx6v56h

On some beaches rip currents are responsible for up to 80% of lifeguard rescues, and part of why they’re so dangerous is that you have no idea they’re there until one grabs you. But if you COULD see a rip current it would look something like this: https://tinyurl.com/yha7zdzd

Follow Conservation Display Specialist Rachael Lee on a design journey to create a bespoke visual interpretation of the iconic artist Frida Kahlo, unique to the exhibition ‘Frida Kahlo: Making Her Self Up’: https://tinyurl.com/wc8nxmyy

Jared Cowen is a photographer and cameraman who also writes and podcasts specifically about film locations for a variety of publications. His latest traces how East L.A. became the unheralded star of the classic hip-hop movie Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo: https://tinyurl.com/d9ew3zft

The Corridor Crew is a (very) popular visual effects-centered YouTube channel, and among their many projects is the series VFX Artists React, where they watch famous and obscure clips from movies and TV, breaking down how they were done. Their April Fools video had their reaction to the footage of the Apollo moon landings: https://tinyurl.com/hesfkdap

This website shows a map of Reddit, and each dot is a subreddit”: https://tinyurl.com/v9k5py7u

If you’ve ever wondered how an escalator works but were afraid to ask, this delightful model shows you all the inner workings that make escalators go: https://tinyurl.com/a7vw95p8

So how do you acquire an “Acquired taste” anyway?: https://tinyurl.com/znupc4zt

A gripping drama about dumplings, consortiums, and the history of emojis: https://tinyurl.com/ymypmsbw

Google Earth Time-lapse lets you look at various parts of the world and see how they’ve changed over the years (Hopefully your computer is newer than mine because mine is sooooo slooooowwwww and it ruins the effect a bit): https://tinyurl.com/hm6hr62

Image source: https://fyfluiddynamics.com/2021/04/wrinkles-on-collapsing-bubbles/

Linkdump #101

The story of young Vinny Byrne, a fourteen-year-old boy who found himself fighting for Ireland in the Easter Rising. An eighty-year-old Vinny reminisces on his time with the volunteers, which took him around the city during the fighting. With Vinny’s Dublin brought to life by handmade miniature sets and puppetry, the film offers a uniquely charming first-hand account of the 1916 Rising: https://tinyurl.com/wuh5ch8z

Interpreting some of the world’s oldest known rock art: https://tinyurl.com/2nfptw8z

If you love science illustrations, Twitter’s #SciArtTweetStorm hashtag brings us a wealth of posts from illustrators around the world: https://tinyurl.com/pj9x28a9

Some folks may not be aware that in certain cultures, during certain time periods, it was completely normal and acceptable for men to wear corsets, sometimes for fashion and sometimes, as is the case in this article, as a medical device: https://tinyurl.com/udvw4hts

I’m a 70s kid so weird macrame wall hangings and plant hangers were an everyday part of the landscape, but Sandra de Groot takes it to a whole now and glorious level: https://tinyurl.com/p97d8b9j

A wonderful song and video from Trio Mandili, three Georgian polyphonic singers – Tatuli Mgeladze, Tako Tsiklauri, and Mariam Kurasbediani: https://tinyurl.com/9k6bwtsc

“Pleasant people doing pleasant things and there’s not much drama and you just kind of feel lovely about the world”: https://tinyurl.com/ysmubype

If you’ve never heard the sound a baby rhinoceros makes: https://tinyurl.com/jmdp7nk

A weird website of imaginary friends: https://tinyurl.com/54vk4enw

Interesting scientific article about a washed up minke whale that was found to have scoliosis. It certainly happens in animals, as it does in humans, but it’s not often that we find examples like this: https://tinyurl.com/34tad63t

Radiohead’s “Creep” performed in 13 different styles: https://tinyurl.com/3v4zfwym

Ravel’s Bolero performed by four musicians on one cello: https://tinyurl.com/y5myrfd9

Beautifully decorated Easter eggs by artist Dinara Mirtalipova: https://tinyurl.com/3dpkchxw

New style of stringed instrument just dropped and I have to say I’m a fan: https://tinyurl.com/3t225rj3

An experiment devised by one of Greece’s greatest thinkers and scientists, Eratosthenes, was recreated once again recently by students from 35 nations around the globe as part of an annual scientific project: https://tinyurl.com/jzc54daz

A Leonia High School teacher has created a poignant, Latin language cover of “Let It Be,” among the most famous songs by the Beatles: https://tinyurl.com/hp2f5jd9

Relearning a centuries-old technology to save Scandinavia’s beloved stave churches: https://tinyurl.com/5tadpes7

“The Bombay Highway Code“ is a poem, a postcard and a love letter bundled up in one short film shot on the streets of Mumbai: https://tinyurl.com/5a5x2mnv

From TYWKIWDBI, a brief post about gene transfer between insects and plants, with links to more detailed articles: https://tinyurl.com/9s7s6jx9

A celebration of contemporary paper art, a new book gathers a wide-ranging collection of collages, quilled portraits, and intricately cut landscapes from 24 artists and studios around the globe: https://tinyurl.com/8wkuacmp

A cool little lesson on how various manmade objects can impact water flow: https://tinyurl.com/6rnjbsve

If you were wondering how the world’s billionaires have been doing over the last year: https://tinyurl.com/3538juj5

Dr. Nehemiah Mabry, PE, knows a lot about bridges. Nehemiah is a structural engineer and an educator; and he builds bridges for a living. Dr. Mabry sits down with WIRED to talk about all different kinds of bridges from around the globe: https://tinyurl.com/4cv7de9m

New York’s 300-year-old trash becomes treasure in the hands of urban archaeologist and artist Scott Jordan: https://tinyurl.com/yabdctht

For anyone who happens to be interested in such things, here’s a transcript of the court proceedings against John Bellingham, the man who assassinated the British Prime Minister in 1812, and was subsequently executed and then sent to the St Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical School for dissection and study. Before the Anatomy Act of 1832, using the bodies of executed criminals was really the only legitimate way that English medical schools could get cadavers for research and teaching. The other method involved doing business with local body snatchers, a practice that was quit illegal but still quite common: https://tinyurl.com/5czpxv7f

The church forests of Ethiopia are small and precious oases in a land where the old growth forests have been almost completely wiped out to make way for agriculture: https://tinyurl.com/2jj5mnpe

Image source: https://www.discoverthewild.co.uk/resources

Linkdump #100

This Academy Award-winning animated short centers around five individuals fighting to maintain balance: https://tinyurl.com/2svku83e

Dong Yuan is considered a pioneer of Chinese landscape painting. His artwork ‘Awaiting the Ferry at the Foot of the Mountains in Summer’ is considered so delicate, it can only be viewed for up to thirty minutes. But recreating this masterpiece in CGI reveals a new perspective, exposing how this innovative depiction of nature was intended to be seen by the observer: https://tinyurl.com/f68hscfa

That time a Russian ship used classical music to save 2000 trapped beluga whales: https://tinyurl.com/58as9ztd

A fun little website that shows you a model of the human mouth, tongue, and throat, and lets you move the various parts around to change the sound, pitch, and air flow: https://tinyurl.com/nxsx3v44

Haretopia is a charming interactive website that….well, just see for yourself: https://tinyurl.com/343jw57y

I think this is the first time I’ve seen a cross-stitch wall mural: https://tinyurl.com/wx2pmey5

In modern day Afghanistan some people are still using a centuries old method to keep grapes fresh all winter long: https://tinyurl.com/473nujne

Photographer John Moore brings us stories from the U.S.-Mexico border: https://tinyurl.com/hexs3xb6

“How Deadly” is a YouTube channel that breaks down viral videos about dangerous Australian animals: https://tinyurl.com/y63pm8cx

Did you know that you could explore inside the International Space Station on Google maps?: https://tinyurl.com/5b3jxae8

The Artists’ Grief Deck. “These cards were made by artists and by caregivers experienced with supporting people in processing loss, to help so many of us who have lost someone or something, and who may not be able to safely grieve together. There is no one correct way to use these cards, but we have these suggestions”: https://tinyurl.com/j5c9mccj

A Twitter thread ranking supernatural monsters by sex appeal: https://tinyurl.com/u2n27xvb

Did you know that some species of crocodiles can gallop? SURPRISE!: https://tinyurl.com/4seafv6y

Filmmaker Andrei Golovnev captured this hypnotic aerial footage on Russia’s Kola Peninsula in the Arctic Circle. The animals use this cyclonic motion to protect members of the herd from predators: https://tinyurl.com/4rzntsja

How a historic monument to graffiti art was unrecognizably transformed into a luxury high rise with the personality of a sad hotel lobby: https://tinyurl.com/3bdc6nud

What it’s like to live in a country that doesn’t officially exist: https://tinyurl.com/3whxevbn

An open source AI that lets you upload songs and then extract/isolate vocals, instruments, etc (I haven’t actually tried it out myself yet, so I can’t say how well it works): https://tinyurl.com/cvmvwxds

21st Century Baroque (Some photos show scenes of violence, but not bloody ones): https://tinyurl.com/3ykhkfd6

If you’ve ever wondered if you’re pronouncing “Lilac” correctly: https://tinyurl.com/ktmxuxfr

From the Anatomika Science Instagram feed, a sad and interesting story of bone cancer in a snake (No gore, just a few pics of the intact snake, and one of its skeleton): https://tinyurl.com/s2w4hbd3

If you’ve ever seen those fascinating diaphonized specimens, as in the bodies of dead creatures that have been specially prepared and dyed so the tissues are clear but the bones and cartilage are brightly colored, here’s a nice little video series about how that whole process works. It’s not bloody, but it does feature dead critters being de-fleshed and prepared: https://tinyurl.com/bffduf

Some great vintage photos of contestants in the 1966 24th World Science Fiction Convention costume contest: https://tinyurl.com/4vmcv38h

That’s the most impressive lava bread I’ve ever seen (Also the only lava bread I’ve ever seen): https://tinyurl.com/24awpeuf

This lawyer reacting to My Cousin Vinny is like a full-on Courtroom Law 101 class in a single video (And really, who DOESN’T love that classic Marissa Tomei scene?): https://tinyurl.com/f3kstybb

BABY BIRBS: https://tinyurl.com/v7b8d5

14 key pieces from museums from all over the Highlands of Scotland, brought to you online via film and photography with supporting stories and archive images from each museum: https://tinyurl.com/52pwkrku

The Mashua is a flowering plant that produces edible tubers, and has been a staple crop in the Andean highlands for centuries. I’d actually never heard of it and only just learned about it when I was googling around trying to learn about the history of potato cultivation in the Americas: https://tinyurl.com/w6nsj8

Image source: https://tinyurl.com/nu9mrvvc