Category Archives: Europe

The Feast of Venus

Posted on November 22, 2020 by Brian D. Butler

Last year, the Belgian tourist bureau VisitFlanders commissioned the folks at SkullMapping to create a wonderful bit of projection mapping to entertain passengers while they waited for flights at Brussels National Airport. With some clever digital trickery, a cheeky little … Continue reading →

Posted in Air Travel, Animation, Art, Europe, Film, Museums, Public Transport, Tech, Tourism | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Another Reason To Envy Norwegians

Posted on November 17, 2020 by Brian D. Butler

Norway has some of the globe’s most scenic geography, one of the world’s highest standards of living, and a genuinely happy populace, and now they also have these amazing passport’s too. Norway’s new passports were developed by creative agency Neue … Continue reading →

Posted in Art, Europe | Tagged , | 2 Comments

The Five-Minute Museum

Posted on November 16, 2020 by Brian D. Butler

British filmmaker and animator Paul Bush‘s  short film The Five-Minute Museum is a mindboggling tour through the history of Western Civilization at breakneck speed. The stop motion trip carries the viewer through the cultural history of civilization by way of … Continue reading →

Posted in Animation, Art, Europe, Film, History, Museums, Photography | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

More than Nordic Noir

Posted on November 8, 2020 by Brian D. Butler

In recent years, there has been an amazing interest around the world in Nordic Noir literature. But long before it became trendy, Iceland  was producing compelling books. I first became interested in Icelandic writers way back in the 7th grade. … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, Europe, Writing | Tagged , , | 3 Comments

Help Save a Paris Landmark

Posted on November 2, 2020 by Brian D. Butler

I have had the pleasure of visiting Paris many times over the last 40 years. And ever time that I’m in Paris the iconic bookstore Shakespeare and Company is one of my first stops. Even if you have never been … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, Bookstore Tourism, Europe, History, Libraries | Tagged , , , | 6 Comments

Halloween Travel Haunts

Posted on October 31, 2020 by Brian D. Butler

I have to admit that I was surprised to discover that Larnach Castle in Otago, New Zealand was on a list of 45 haunted travel destinations in a Condé Nast Traveler article on the spine-tingling subject. When I visited the … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Asia, Canada, Europe, Tourism, Uncategorized, USA | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Building Bridges

Posted on October 20, 2020 by Brian D. Butler

I’ve crossed the historic Charles Bridge in Prague dozens of times and never stopped to consider what an amazing feat of engineering it took to build this beautiful structure.The animation below details how the  famous 14th-century Charles Bridge was built … Continue reading →

Posted in Animation, Architecture, Europe, Film, Tourism | Tagged , , | 3 Comments

Three-Paragraph Problem

Posted on October 18, 2020 by Brian D. Butler

“A Problem” by Jorge Luis Borges Translated by Andrew Hurley Let us imagine that a piece of paper with a text in Arabic on it is discovered in Toledo, and that paleographers declare the text to have been written by … Continue reading →

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It is a river, this language

Posted on October 16, 2020 by Brian D. Butler

I can recall my amazement in reading Chaucer in high school English and marveling at the extent that the English language had changed over time. The short video below by A.Z. Foreman is an enlightening marvelous journey through thirteen centuries … Continue reading →

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Reading Art

Posted on October 15, 2020 by Brian D. Butler

 

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