Review of Czech Refugees in Cold War Canada by Jan Raska

Review of Czech Refugees in Cold War Canada by Jan Rask

Like Vessels: Giorgio Morandi and the porticoes of Bologna

A lecture presented at the Modern Interiors Research Centre, Kingston University, as part of the FLOW Conference 2011. The lecture is part of a larger mixed media project ‘Like Vessels’ (2011 – ongoing) exploring ideas around abstraction and interiority, and taking the architecture of Bologna as a starting and reference point. Abstract: An interior/exterior duality is implicit in any discussion of Giorgio Morandi’s work. On the one hand, a collection of domestic objects was the artist’s primary source of subject-matter for most of his career, during which time he worked, from 1910 to 1964, in an apartment on Bologna’s Via Fondazza, in a small studio bedroom facing onto a rear courtyard. Morandi’s images of bottles, vases and containers, however, were architectonic ‘constructions’ as much as still-life studies – their umber volumes and tower-like forms suffused with the atmosphere of the city. But Morandi’s work has never been discussed, in English, with specific and detailed reference to the architectural feature so unique to Bologna: the 37 km matrix of colonnaded streets, or portici, that likewise participate in a very particular and striking dialogue between interior space and exterior urban fabric. In disrupting the usual division of private and public, the portici set up a quasi-theatrical space between, reconfiguring boundaries and physical proximities. The obscuring of a ‘frontal’ view of the cityscape ahead also directs a shift in perspective – a sideways pan, through the arches and into the passage that adjoins the far side of the street. And, in functioning as conjunction between one interior space and another, the portici interact with the imaginative experience of the individual traversing the city. The continuous – at times barely perceptible – re-configurations of plastic vocabulary (vault, support, decoration), coupled with the contrasts and modulations of changing light, trace a multivalent and unfolding space in which to project and ‘abstract’. This paper will explore some of the interior/exterior relationships in operation in Morandi’s work, his home and recently reconstructed studio, and the architectural landscape in which both are contained. The paper will interweave discussion of relevant texts with a descriptive (and visual) account of a visit to the city

Creating Canada’s Peacekeeping Past (Book Review) by Colin McCullough

Review of Creating Canada’s Peacekeeping Past by Colin McCullough

Mediating between practitioner and developer communities: the Learning Activity Design in Education experience

The slow uptake by teachers in post‐compulsory education of new technological tools and technology‐enhanced teaching methods may be symptomatic of a general split in the e‐learning community between development of tools, services and standards, and research into how teachers can use these most effectively (i.e. between the teaching practitioner and technical developer communities). This paper reflects on the experience of transferring knowledge and understanding between these two communities during the Learning Activity Design in Education project funded by the UK Joint Information Systems Committee. The discussion is situated within the literature on ‘mediating representations’ and ‘mediating artefacts’, and shows that the practical operation of mediating representations is far more complex than previously acknowledged. The experience suggests that for effective transfer of concepts between communities, the communities need to overlap to the extent that a single representation is comprehensible to both. This representation may be viewed as a boundary object that is used to negotiate understanding. If the communities do not overlap a chain of intermediate representations and communities may be necessary. Finally, a tentative distinction is drawn between mediating representations and mediating artefacts, based not in the nature of the resources, but in their mode and context of use

Processes acting to produce glacial detritus

The traditional view of attrition and abrasion as the major agents producing glacial debris is considered in the light of recent work by engineering geologists and geomorphologists. The decomposition of certain rock types when affected by frost action leads to the concept of rock deterioration within the body of the glacier. It seems that differing rock types with varying responses to low temperature conditions would produce a heterogeneous mixture of particle size such as is usually termed glacial till. Observations in recent work on rock stability emphasise the importance of clay minerals and their mode of occurrence. It is considered that a detailed study of the stability of rocks forming the source region of a glacier should give considerable insight into the nature of the till produced

Some undisclosed points of remove

Journal article discussing 'some undisclosed points of remove', an exhibition in Chelsea College of Arts' Old College Library. The exhibition showed new, site-responsive artworks by Melanie Counsell, Sara MacKillop, Anne Tallentire, Sabine Tholen and Joëlle Tuerlinckx, as well as artists' books from Chelsea Library's collections by all five artists. The exhibition was curated by Vicky Falconer

Hydrologic Studies in the Lake Ontario Basin Using High Altitude and ERTS-1 Imagery

Hydrologic studies of Lake Ontario basin using high altitude and ERTS-1 imager

Discovering academics' key learning connections: An ego-centric network approach to analysing learning about teaching

The aim of this exploratory study is to investigate the role of personal networks in supporting academics’ professional learning about teaching. As part of a wider project, the paper focuses on the composition of academics’ networks and possible implications of network tendencies for academics’ learning about teaching. The study adopts a mixed-method approach. Firstly, the composition of academics’ networks is examined using Social Network Analysis. Secondly, the role of these networks in academics’ learning about teaching is analysed through semi-structured interviews. Findings reveal the prevalence of localised and strong-tie connections, which could inhibit opportunities for effective learning and spread of innovations in teaching. The study highlights the need to promote connectivity within and across institutions, creating favourable conditions for effective professional development

Strong Marstrand theorems and dimensions of sets formed by subsets of hyperplanes

We present strong versions of Marstrand's projection theorems and other related theorems. For example, if E is a plane set of positive and finite s-dimensional Hausdorff measure, there is a set X of directions of Lebesgue measure 0, such that the projection onto any line with direction outside X, of any subset F of E of positive s-dimensional measure, has Hausdorff dimension min(1,s), i.e. the set of exceptional directions is independent of F. Using duality this leads to results on the dimension of sets that intersect families of lines or hyperplanes in positive Lebesgue measure.Comment: 8 page

Codimension formulae for the intersection of fractal subsets of Cantor spaces

We examine the dimensions of the intersection of a subset $E$ of an $m$-ary Cantor space $\mathcal{C}^m$ with the image of a subset $F$ under a random isometry with respect to a natural metric. We obtain almost sure upper bounds for the Hausdorff and upper box-counting dimensions of the intersection, and a lower bound for the essential supremum of the Hausdorff dimension. The dimensions of the intersections are typically $\max\{\dim E +\dim F -\dim \mathcal{C}^m, 0\}$, akin to other codimension theorems. The upper estimates come from the expected sizes of coverings, whilst the lower estimate is more intricate, using martingales to define a random measure on the intersection to facilitate a potential theoretic argument.Comment: Accepted version, Proc. Amer. Math. So