notebookism

Welcome 2007!

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Image: D. Morris
...
Felice Anno Nuovo, Gelukkig Nieuwjaar, Antum salimoun, Feliz Ano Novo, Xin Nian Kuai Le, Bonne Annee, Sun Leen Fai Lok,, Selamat Tahun Baru, L'Shannah Tovah, Feliz Año Nuevo, Prosit Neujahr, Akimashite Omedetto Gozaimasu, Manigong Bagong Taon, Happy New Year!

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Image: D. Morris
...
Felice Anno Nuovo, Gelukkig Nieuwjaar, Antum salimoun, Feliz Ano Novo, Xin Nian Kuai Le, Bonne Annee, Sun Leen Fai Lok,, Selamat Tahun Baru, L'Shannah Tovah, Feliz Año Nuevo, Prosit Neujahr, Akimashite Omedetto Gozaimasu, Manigong Bagong Taon, Happy New Year!

It was a very good year

For this last post of 2006 I would like to thank all of you, visitors and friends from near and far who have helped  Moleskinerie and Notebookism grow into communities with some of the most creative people I have known.

Blogging can get lonely; even thankless and scary especially when resources are meager and challenges seem to come from every direction. It is during these times when you have come through and made sure our little site is kept going.

As we prepare to celebrate our 3rd year at Moleskinerie on January 12, I look back at the thousands of posts with fascination and a tinge of poignancy, remembering those who are no longer with us. Yet, like a symbol of continuity our fledgeling partner site, Notebookism has taken wing and I am heartened by the warm welcome it has received.

In a couple of days we will ring in another year, hopefully with notebooks in hand. A word, a sentence, a stroke of the pen at the stroke of midnight and wishes for peace, health and prosperity for all.   

- Armand B. Frasco

Have a safe and fun New Year's! We'll see you on Tuesday with the results of our Holiday Giveaways weekly raffle draw. Thanks to Blick Art Materials for their  support.

Discover and join our communities on FLICKR and GoogleGroups.

Rodin Show Visits Home of Artist’s Muses

"Paris was abuzz. King Sisowath of Cambodia was making his first state visit to France and had taken with him his troupe of royal dancers, girls with strange short hair and agile feet who had been performing to rave reviews at the Colonial Exposition in Marseille.

Rodin, 66 at the time and already famous as a sculptor, showed up with a ticket but no tie. He was turned away, furious. He managed to see the dancers perform in the Bois de Boulogne a few days later. What he saw was so pure and startling that it sparked in him a kind of fever he could only describe as love.

“I contemplated them in ecstasy,” he said at the time, according to the exhibition catalog.

Rodin followed the dancers back to Marseille so precipitately that he left his art supplies behind and had to buy butcher paper from a grocer to draw on. “I would have followed them all the way to Cairo,” he said. "

"Rodin Show Visits Home of Artist’s Muses"

By Erika Kinetz
New York Times

LINK [Registration required]

How to Write Good

1.  Always avoid alliteration.
2. Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.
3. Avoid cliches like the plague—they're old hat.
4. Employ the vernacular.
5. Eschew ampersands & abbreviations, etc.
6. Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are unnecessary.
7. Parenthetical words however must be enclosed in commas.
8. It is wrong to ever split an infinitive.
9. Contractions aren't necessary.
10. Do not use a foreign word when there is an adequate English quid pro quo.
11. One should never generalize.
12. Eliminate quotations. As Ralph Waldo Emerson once said: "I hate quotations. Tell me what you know."

"How to Write Good"
Plain Language Humor

LINK

Image: "My writing desk"
By Lost in Scotland

Notebookism/FLICKR

    Some rights reserved.    

Ipluso Notebooks

"In a fast-paced world dominated by the Internet and Microsoft, do people still enjoy writing on the paper?

The answer is a definite "yes," according to Penny Lee, a young Chinese-Australian who opened her first store "Ipluso" specializing in designing notebooks four months ago.

The small store is tucked away behind phoenix trees on a tranquil street in the former French Concession area. A combination of Oriental Zen and Italian modern luxury lifestyle, the store is more like an art studio than a shop selling all kinds of paper works.

"When I was a little girl, I liked very much writing on the notebooks with pencils," Lee says. "However, it was rather difficult for me to find a nice notebook at that time."

That's why Lee opened this small demonstration store as soon as she had the opportunity. It sells wrapping paper and unconventional stationery as well as chic gifts that Lee brought back from Thailand. Most of the products are notebooks."

Shanghai Daily

LINK

Blank Page # 23

Every Wednesday at Notebookism we open a "Blank Page" -  your chance to ask, answer and discuss anything notebook-related.  Keep it nice, keep it relevant.

Blank Page, an Open Thread.

Inkless pen

A stainless steel pen, 8cm long. However when you unscrew the top, the 'nib' is a solid piece of metal. There is no ink, yet this pen will write on virtually any type of paper. This is what it looked like when we tried it on a piece of normal paper.

Grand Illusions
Product link

[via JGodsey]

Blick's 2007 Linoleum Block Print Contest!

Teachers! Here’s an opportunity to increase your art budget and gain national recognition for your students. The contest is offered in three grade divisions: 4–6, 7–9, and 10–12. Home-Schoolers also welcome.

A total of 15 students will win art supplies for their schools and handsome walnut mounted plaques for themselves when their prints are chosen from thousands of entries.

1st Prize $400

2nd Prize $250

3rd Prize $150

2 Honorable Mentions $50 each

Every school that enters is eligible to win Blick’s 906 Model II etching press, a $675.00 value, in our Grand Prize Drawing.

For contest details, visit this Dick Blick page.

Image: "Camera2", Grade 6
Hunter College Elementary
New York, NY

Flipbooks!

Before movies were invented, a number of optical devices were invented to show animation. With weird and unpronounceable names such as thaumatrope, phenakistoscope,  zoetrope, and praxinoscope, these devices let you view a spinning card with small images on it, each like a single cell in an animated movie. As the series of images spin by, it appears that that the image moves because persistence of vision blends the individual images into a continuous stream as it does in the movies. It is possible to buy or make these early devices, and their odd names make them great search strings on the Internet. Search for "phenakistoscope" and every site the search engine finds will have something to do with the device.

LINK

Google results for "phenakistoscope"
Image link: YouTube

Being left-handed a curse in world of righties

"A teacher in my early elementary education said I must force myself to use my right hand. She informed me left-handed people were born sinners (and this was public school), and I must correct it as soon as possible or I was headed for a life of crime and corruption. Obviously, this tactic didn’t deter me. I remain left-handed and un-incarcerated.

Every schoolchild learns early in life that certain kids are different, in very subtle ways. Sometimes the kinder lunch ladies and teachers will sit these children at the end of the table or the outside of the aisle so they don’t bump elbows with the child to their left. Sometimes they make a spectacle of them and tell them to deal with it.

Sometimes these children are given “special” scissors, and stare in wonder at the straight line they’ve cut. Other times, they have to make do with regular scissors and get low grades in art class.

“Lefties” are mostly unnoticed, or occasionally a minor inconvenience to people, who might say, “Oh, you’re left-handed?” And then forget about it. That pretty much sums up the intrigue and mystery for most. But I’m here to tell you, it doesn’t end in grade school, and it doesn’t end at scissors. Not even close. I’ll give a few examples for those of you who are used to living in a world conveniently patterned for your right-hand dominance..."

Tracy Jones
Reporter Times

LINK