Carnival - Sunday Stamps

Morris Dancing is a traditional English form of folk dancing. It has been practiced for hundreds of years. The dances are usually performed at festivals such as May Day, Whitsun and Christmas.

The name may refer to the possibility of the form of dancing coming to England from the Moors of North Africa; or it may have been called 'Moor-ish' simply because the dancers sometimes painted their faces black.
The lively dancing is accompanied by an accordion player, a melodeon or fiddle player or a noisy band with a drum; also the dancers wear different clothes depending on the part of the country - often dressed in white with coloured baldrics (coloured belts) across their chests. Six or eight dancers are arranged in two lines or in a circle facing each other. The dancers may carry white handkerchiefs that they shake, or short sticks that they bang against each other as they dance. Some dancers have bell-pads tied at their knees, which make a loud and cheerful rhythm as they dance.

 

I wonder whether this Carnival stamp was posted on a cruise liner, otherwise I have nothing to add.

I expected to find some stamps from Brazil, but didn't have any relating to the theme. I chose Mexico instead.

Apparently in the Oaxaca Valley each village performs the Dance of the Feather (Danza de la Pluma) on their own Saint's Day.

More carnival stamps at Viridian's Sunday Stamps 10

A Cooperative Adventure - Sepia Saturday

I had to take a bit of a tour to come up with a match this week.

Starting in 1956 I decided I needed a car to help me on my way.

 As I've always wanted a Ferrari what better that this Ferrari 410 Super American which made its debut at the 1956 Turin Motor Show.

If that's not to your taste then how about joining me in a pink Cadillac:

1956 Cadillac Series 5-6019X (60 Special Sedan) at Sinsheim Auto & Technick Museum, Sinsheim/Germany - By Gamsbart (C C ASA 3.0 Unported License)

But how could I resist travelling in my first car, a Morris Minor like this:

By Charles01 - CC ASA 3.0 License

This Morris Minor is from March 1956 the year before it became the Morris Minor 1000. The original car had semaphore-style indicators, but the car in the picture has been modified to include flashing indicators.

If like me you are getting older and fear having to use a Zimmer frame, perhaps you would prefer this American made classic car:

Zimmer American made classic car - by Ammar Shaker

I don't know about you but by this time I'm in need of a drink so we'll stop off in Germany again:

Tempo Hanseat (1949 - 1956) in livery of Alt beer brewery UERIGE, Duesseldorf, Germany 

(By Detectandpressure - CC ASA 3.0 Unported  License)

Then we arrive back in England in a modern(?) car driving away from the Stroud Road Coop, the former Gloucester Cooperative Store:

(By David Stowell - geograph.org.uk - CC ASA 2.0 Generic License)

However we have to go Australia for our final stop:

Fisherman's Coop on Stanley Street, South Brisbane ca 1930. The Fisherman's Cooperative fish shop next to a butcher's shop and a hotel - ex John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland.

I hope they have spare rooms at the hotel to cope with all the sepia-saturday-65 guests.

Flea Market Postcards - Camp des jeunes

This card shows the youth camping site at Lourdes and is postmarked June 1973. I've found some recent photos on Flickr but none that I can use without infringing copyright. The site is more wooded now and the style of tent has definitely changed - they no longer look as if it is a scout or army camp.

Looking at the picture the style of shorts has changed as well.

Temenos

Temenos has been described as a giant net-stretched stocking, a trawler net in the sky and as a real jewel in the crown of the area, a signature of what Middlesbrough and the Tees Valley is about.

The 48m high sculpture is the first of the planned five Tees Valley Giants to be completed. It spans a corner of the dock at the Middlehaven site in Middlesbrough and was officially handed over to the town’s Mayor Ray Mallon in June 2010.

The 32m diameter circular ring weighing 56 tonnes is joined to a 28m x 16m elliptical, 24 tonne ring at the other by steel cabling. The supporting mast weighs in at 56 tonnes and the whole 110m long structure at 156 tonnes. While these dimensions are impressive so is the £2.7m cost of this public work of art.

Giant works of art are also intended as regeneration projects in each of the other for Tees Valley’s boroughs. It will be interesting to see if in the present economic times whether they are built to form the biggest public art project in the world.

Temenos is the result of cooperation between artist Anish Kapoor and engineer Cecil Balmond who are also to design and build the Arcelor Mittal Orbit tower at the 2012 Olympic Park. The pair has worked together on other large public works of art including the Cloud Gate in Chicago and the Sky Mirror in New York.

Temenos which in Greek means sacred ground or a place apart sits a stone’s throw from Middlesbrough’s Riverside football stadium and in sight of the iconic Transporter Bridge opened in 1911 for a cost of £84,000.

 Meanwhile the old dock clock tower stands guard.

Christmas and Pirates - Sunday Stamps

I think I've failed to come up with children's art on stamps. I decided in the end to settle on what might appeal to children starting with these Christmas stamps from Denmark (1969)

 

Staying in Scandinavia I found these two from Sweden (1978)

:

But knowing most kids at some time are hooked on pirates I've left my favourite to last:

 

You can read about this English pirate at: Mary_Read on wikipedia.

Please visit sunday-stamps-9  at Viridian's Postcard Blog

Doubles - Thematic Photography

I have found this one of the more difficult themes set by Carmi hence the late post.

The Temenos piece of public art by Anish Kapoor at Middlehaven dock in Middlesbrough.

 I'll put up a separate blog post about Temenos later, but for now count the doubles.

There is no doubting the double connection in the figureheads from the maritime museum at Tresco on the Isles of Scilly.

Or the trees in Tresco's Gardens.

Many more doubles at Carmi's thematic-photographic

Beshekee

I've had trouble matching Alan's theme this week. I've struggled to find a picture of my own involving longhorn cattle so I've had to resort to searching the web. I hope you like with the result.

This is meant to be a restful exercise so I was pleased to find a picture called 'Repose.'

(Artist - Darley, Felix Octavius Carr - 1822-1888)

It is not just the longhorns that were at ease.

You have to have sharp eyes to see the longhorn in this picture from Earls Court in London:

 

These were the cattle in Buffalo Bill's Wild West at Earls Court in 1937 (I think).

The next picture that caught my eye was of  the Ojibwe chief, Beshekee.

(Marble bust by Francis Vincenti)

No horns but in Ojibwe his name is spelled Bizhiki; (Buffalo in English).

The world's largest buffalo may be found in Jamestown, North Dakota:

Sculptured after a male bison in full stride and anatomically correct.

I must confess I was not impressed by the size of his horns.

However I did like this animation of a buffalo at the gallop by Eadweard Muybridge:

For a really magnificent beast I located this by Indigo Valley

However the picture that really sickened me was one ex wikipedia. 

A photo from the 1870s of a pile of bison skulls waiting to be ground for fertiliser. 

(Author unknown, derative work PawelImm)

Would you have posed in front of the pile for a shot like this?

On a lighter note I do have one photo taken after a liquid night of a pair of horns from a Mexican bull.

The poser wishes to remain anonymous.

More  posts at: Sepia Saturday 64