Neil Gaiman in Israel!

Last night I participated in a lecture by the legendary Neil Gaiman, in the annual Sci-Fi conference of Israel, Icon 2006. To tell you the truth, this conference is a real Geek-Land show, but this is a subject for a separate post... anyway I came in to see and hear Gaiman, and I was not disappointed.

If you had a chance to take a look at my Library you would understand how important this creator is to me. If you don't know who Neil Gaiman is, you should get to know him right away - a writer of prose novels, graphic novels (comics), screenplays and audio-books, and the creator of the monumental Sandman series.

I have been reading Gaiman for years and when I heard he will be the guest of honor in this conference I phoned in and got tickets to some of his lectures.

Last night the theme was "transferring the narative among different media types" - basically, what are the processes and pressures that a creation goes through when it is being translated from a prose book to a movie or a radio play, how a series transforms into a book and vice versa, and how a creator decides which work will be created as a graphic novel, which as a full scape book etc.

Since gaiman has been creating in so many different media, he had some intelligible yet funny stories to tell, and this guy can sure hold an audience. Some cool jokes about the big Holiwood Studio Sharks really got me laughing my socks off.

I am planning to go on thursday to a reading event, in which Neil Gaiman will be reading select chapters from some of his books, and he also promised a first exposure of a completely new short story.

Stay tuned...

I cataloged my personal library with Library Thing (http://www.librarything.com) and this is just great.
Now I don't have to memorize all the books that I have, and I can share my literary flavors with everyone.

I added to my blog a random selection of 3 books from my library - you an see them on the right just below my Profile. Every time you visit, you will see 3 new books.
you are most welcome to take a look at these books and comment.

"To See the World in a Grain of sand" - the most amazing miniature artist in the world

I just had a most amazing experience looking at the web site of Willard Wigan.
Wigan creates miniature sculptures which are hard to to believe a human being can create. I'll put a few snapshots in this post as a teaser, but you must visit the site and see for yourselves.

Here is an example of a miniature Statue of Liberty, placed inside ... A needle hole!


This is real, folks, no photoshop or anything.

Wigan has a pretty amazing human story as well - for example, he is dislectic and has trouble reading and writing. None of that stops him from creating his superb art pieces.

This art is even more overwhelming if you consider that the most accurate human hand can reach a resolution of 1/10 (one tenth) of a millimeter, which is almost 100 times larger then the minute features that Willard carves in his sculptures. So in theory, it is anatomically impossible to do what he is doing.

The site describes his technique - using single grains of sand, rice, and sugar, which he manipulates with a surgical knife. While he works, he puts himself into a meditative trance, slowing down his breath and heart rate, and he only touches the material in between two heartbeats. He works at night when there are no environmental vibrations (like cares going by) and when his dog is asleep ...

So just try to imagine what kind of a human could create this figure of a girls holding a red balloon, which stands on ... An eyelash glued to a needle!













When Willard exhibits his works in public, there is a Microscope positioned in front of every piece of work, so people can see the fine details.

I really recommend to take a look - I will definitely try to take a look at that if I get to Manchester any time soon... Enjoy: http://www.willard-wigan.com/index.html

This is me sitting next to Fontana De Trevi in Rome ... actually I only uploaded this so I can post this picture in my profile ;-)

First post in All That Web

This is my first post - trying out this Blog site - I'll probably remove it after I really get started :)