Search

I must confess that – due to a broken foot – my enchantment with nature was somewhat faded. Staring at these photographs became an almost cathartic experience, serenity washing over in a dream, renewing a passion for the universe that created architecture and that, in turn, is recreated by it. If the Boa Nova Tea House were like Saramago’s stone raft, adrift in a vast ocean, then the Serralves Museum would be like one of Cesário Verde’s bucolic poems, bathed in idyllic foliage. From the very first page, one discovers the building romantically dressed in seasonal vegetation, enveloped in a curtain of greenery, which drapes leaves as floating water lilies and droplets of rain. Distant windows seem to emerge beyond the sumptuous filter, manipulating a type of picturesque nostalgia: the primitive longing for a Garden of Eden or the simple magic of a child playing outside. Having planted an oak tree in Serralves, this interpretation might be biased by my own boyish recollections or, perhaps, the landscape architect was just prone to episodes of refined apophenia. João Gomes da Silva was invited by Álvaro Siza to help mediate the relationship with Jacques Gréber’s 1932 designs, supposedly inspired by the geometries of Versailles. Having planted an oak tree in Serralves, this interpretation might be biased by my own boyish recollections or, perhaps, the landscape architect was just prone to episodes of refined apophenia. João Gomes da Silva was invited by Álvaro Siza to help mediate the relationship with Jacques Gréber’s 1932 designs, supposedly inspired by the geometries of Versailles. When Siza’s Alhambra project was exhibited here, in 2017, I pointed out that Gréber’s octagons and waterlines were connected to Granada – like those of Luis Barragán or Louis Kahn. In fact, all of Serralves can be viewed as a modern-day Alhambra and not because of its embellished gardens, protected by a stone wall, but because of its sequencing of spaces, of light and shade. [...]

The delicate necklace of threaded petals from the tomb of Rameses II, midnineteenth century glass houses built for the newly discovered Victoria amazonica , and Monet’s giant canvases in the Musee de l'Orangerie all testify to a deep human attraction to water lilies: beguiling plants with showy flowers that seem to arise nymph-like out of the mud. Like orchids, cacti, succulents, and carnivorous plants, water lilies have a dedicated band of horticulturalists devoted to growing and exploring their endless variety. The late nineteenth century craze for water lilies that attracted Monet was fueled by one such enthusiast, Joseph Bory Latour-Marliac (1), who developed hardy water lily cultivars with dazzling new flower colors ranging from “delicate yellow to fuscia and deep red.” Nymphaea thermarum , the focus of the recent paper by Povilus et al. (2), is another unusual water lily variant. The smallest water lily known, N. thermarum was discovered and described in the late 1980s (3). Endemic to hot spring lakes in the Albertine Rift Valley of Rwanda, now, just a few decades after its discovery, it appears to be extinct in the wild (4, 5). Crucially, as recognized by Povilus et al. (2), it has a small genome, only about three times larger than that of the botanical model of choice, Arabidopsis. Povilus et al. (2) provide initial documentation of that genome and use it to explore the genomic correlates and evolutionary significance of an unusual water lily trait, the complete loss of the vascular cambium that is responsible for the formation of woody tissues in almost all seed plants. Part of the interest in water lilies for Povilus et al. (2), and for contemporary plant science, flows from the phylogenetic position of water lilies in flowering plant (angiosperm) evolution. It has long been suspected that … [↵][1]1To whom correspondence may be addressed. Email: peter.crane{at}yale.edu. [1]: #xref-corresp-1-1

Journal of Business Research : JBR 110, 495-501 (2020). doi:10.1016/j.jbusres.2019.01.063, Published by Elsevier, New York, NY

Davies, Nicola. The Pond. Illustrated by Cathy Fisher. Graffeg, 2017. In this picture book, a half-finished garden pond, “a muddy, messy hole that filled our garden,” becomes a metaphor for a family’s grief at the death of a father, “a muddy, messy hole that filled our hearts.” The story highlights the fact that when someone dies, the family loses not only the person, but also the activities that the family did with that person. Eventually, the mother in this story gets the pond lined and it starts to come to life with tadpoles, dragonflies and a water lily, mirroring the family’s progression through their grief. The artwork really carries the story forward, and accompanied by the simple text Nicola Davies depicts aquatic environments in a variety of ways. Her work is cinematic, capturing the movement and messiness of pond life. She uses dark colours, splatters, scribbles and fractures in lines to depict the family’s grief. Some of the images are beautiful. Her water lilies on solid black backgrounds are exceptional. The images in this book will engage all ages. This book would be good for children coping with loss or those preparing to cope with loss and should be a part of public and school library collections. Recommendation: 4 stars out of 4Reviewer: Sean Borle Sean Borle is a University of Alberta undergraduate student who is an advocate for child health and safety.

While John Scott Bradstreet’s introduction of the Japanese jin-di-sugi method of woodworking at the Minneapolis Craftshouse has been well chronicled, his work in the more ephemeral arena of Japanese gardening has not been similarly illuminated. This article considers Bradstreet’s activities as a Japanese gardener in the context of his eleven trips to Japan, examining three gardens in Minneapolis. The broader context of the introduction of Japanese gardens to the American public at World’s Fairs is also considered, along with the development of a critical perspective among design reform advocates who discriminated between an educated approach informed by the history and symbolism of Japanese gardening, versus the popular Japoniste fad for picturesque effects.

A work of art is most often a result of an artist's inspiration, a reflection of feelings, but often a deep insight into his own personality or events and activities around. The analysis of a work of art may reveal not only a state of mind at the moment of creation, but also a deeper background, which may be a consequence of a disease. A classic example is Van Gogh's self-portrait without the ear occurring after self-injury as a result of his mental illness. In a series of paintings and prints entitled 'The Scream' Edvard Munch clearly evokes a state of panic that used to grip him occasionally, which he even verbally depicted. A great painting poet of the first half of the twentieth century, Marc Chagall, in several of his paintings, composed during the artist's hard period, varies the theme of a double-face with one usually dark side, and the other - light, indicating a bipolar disorder. However, a picture may not only be a reflection of the spirit of the artist, but it can also indicate an organic disease. It is known that Claude Monet complained of losing sight; in fact he suffered from cataracts. He perpetuated the development of this disease by a large number of paintings and drawings of water lilies in his Japanese garden, made over the period of more than 20 years. The last of these pictures, when he could see almost nothing, seem a bit abstract, full of bright colors, so he probably wanted to offset the greyness which he was surrounded by. William Utermohlen, an American painter, who suffered from Alzheimer's disease, showed the development of the diseases in a series of self-portraits. Frida Kahlo, a brave Mexican painter, had a serious car accident when she was eighteen, which left her paralyzed for life. Severe injuries she sustained in the accident are anatomically correctly immortalized in several of her paintings. Spiritual and physical conditions of an artist as a consequence of a disease can be found in other art forms too. In his novel The Idiot, Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky made a very striking description of an epileptic aura (a disease from which the author himself suffered). Franz Kafka in his novel The Trial gave a perfect description of the feeling of paranoia, and his story The Metamorphosis presented a hallucinatory state of the same basic disease.

Field observations of morphologically intermediate water lilies in central Canada suggested a hybrid origin involving the parents Nymphaea odorata Aiton and Nymphaea leibergii Morong despite the fertile nature of these plants. Sequencing of the nrITS and the plastid rps4–trnT–trnF regions further including all members of the north temperate Nymphaea subg. Nymphaea clade, and samples from other hybrids occurring in North America in the wild, allowed us to determine that individuals of N. leibergii and of N. odorata were the maternal and paternal parents, respectively. Hybrids of New England have all proven to be sterile, are genetically variable, and probably are F1. By comparison, the plants of east-central Saskatchewan and west-central Manitoba are fully fertile and genetically uniform based on ISSR and sequence data. On the basis of this evidence, the latter are here described as a new species, Nymphaea loriana sp. nov., which may have originated during the Holocene climatic optimum about 6000 years ago in a past contact zone of the parents. Further hybrids detected between N. odorata and Nymphaea tetragona Georgi, as well as between N. leibergii and N. tetragona, were always sterile. Gene trees of the temperate clade of Nymphaea converge on a clade of small-flowered water lilies (sect. Chamaenymphaea), including N. leibergii, N. tetragona, and Nymphaea pygmaea. Nuclear ITS further resolves an American clade (Nymphaea mexicana Zucc. – N. odorata) sister to all remaining species. This split into two major subclades also appears in the otherwise less resolved rps4–trnT–trnF tree. Thus the origin of N. loriana is a reticulation between long-separated parental lineages.

The literature to date has predominately focused and assumed that leader humility effect is functional across contexts. Nevertheless, scholars have speculated that leader humility may not be univer...

During a study of an Iberian population of the European pond turtle, Emys orbicularis, a very high number of water lily seeds, Nymphaea alba, was found in fecal samples. Further analysis of additional samples collected between 2003 and 2008 indicated that E. orbicularis uses water lilies as an emergent food resource during summer. It is proposed that E. orbicularis should no longer be viewed as strictly carnivorous.

Acool briny mist and the cadence of wavelets lapping against a small boat may be just the tonic needed for a jaded urbanite, but for Impressionist painter Claude Monet (1840-1926), who spent childhood days near the coast, paintingmarine scenery had a sense of familiarity as that with an old friend. Although probably best known for his water lilies and red poppies, as noted, “Monet is one of those rare artists who knew how to paint water ... ” (Sutton D. Claude Monet: The Early Years. From British Collections in aid of The Police Dependants’ Trust. London, UK: Lefevre Gallery; 1969: 12.) The range of Monet’s oeuvre was alone noteworthy, but he became an art phenom because he held fast to his vision of showing nature in a new way, awash in light. His hard-won status in the art world lies in part in his contribution to modernism, but his enduring audience appeal seems borne of his ability to create a mood. Born in Paris, at a young age Monet moved with his family to a locale near the English Channel in northern France. In the early 1850s he receiveddrawing instruction froman artist variously known as Francois-Charles or Jacques-Francois Ochard. Monet had an aptitude for caricatures and was allowed to display them at a local business. In Le Havre an encounter occurred later in the 1850s thatwould change this cartoonist into a landscapist when seascape painter Eugene Boudinwas introduced toMonet. Although initially hesitant, Monet accompanied Boudin on an outdoor painting excursion. His epiphany was absolute: “Suddenly it was as if a veil had been lifted: ‘I had understood, I had seen what painting

Night-flowering water lilies (Nymphaeaceae) in South America are pollinated by Cyclocephala scarab beetles (Scarabaeidae: Cyclocephalini) in a specialized relationship involving synchronized flowering movements, strong floral scent, food tissues, and heat-producing flowers. We report that a similar and closely related association exists in West Africa between Nymphaea lotus L. and Ruteloryctes morio Fabricius (Cyclocephalini). This finding strongly supports a late Early Cretaceous origin of a symbiosis between the night-flowering water lilies and pollinating Cyclocephalini beetles. We believe that this is the first unambiguous evidence of a plant-pollinator relationship of this age. © 2003 The Linnean Society of London, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 2003, 80, 539–543.

On hot summer days we like to see our ponds and small eutrophic lakes covered with the white, pink or yellow flowers of water lilies. Everybody knows how Claude Monet became so fascinated by his 'nympheas' that he painted them in all situations, but the Nymphaeaceae have played a role in symbolism for over 4000 years. Even more important in Asian culture, particularly in Buddhism, has been the Indian lotus, Nelumbo nucifera (Nelumbonaceae). In literature and mythology, the term lotus (in Greek lotos) has been used to cover both families, relating the high symbolic and cultural importance of the lotus in great parts of the world.

The terminology for translating the omnipresent names for lotuses and water-lilies in Sanskrit literature continues to prove problematic for various reasons. Some attempts to deal with the problem suffer from unclear botanical terminology; others use more trustworthy sources, but mixed with outdated works. Fortunately, the well-known and widely quoted article by Wilhelm Rau, the standard reference when dealing with the Sanskrit names of lotuses and water-lilies, provides a clear, but succinct orientation.

A museum fire in 1958 severely damaged a Monet “Water Lilies” (1916-1926) painting that was on display. The surface of the painting is very dark with areas of blistering and charring. Over the years, traditional techniques have been found to be ineffective at removal of the soot and char from the surface. The painting, which is now in the care of the New York University (NYU) Conservation Center of the Institute of Fine Arts, was the subject of a study to determine if atomic oxygen treatment could remove the soot and char without damaging the fragile painting underneath. For test purposes, a small chip of paint was removed from the edge of the painting by a conservator at NYU and supplied to NASA Glenn Research Center for atomic oxygen treatment and analysis. The diffuse spectral reflectance, at three locations on the paint chip, was monitored at intervals during the atomic oxygen treatment process. Photo documentation of the chip during treatment was also performed. The color contrast was calculated from the spectral reflectance data as a function of treatment duration. Results of the testing indicated that the contrast improved as a result of the treatment, and the differentiation of colors on the surface was significantly improved. Soot and char could be removed without visibly affecting the gross surface features such as impasto areas. These results indicate the feasibility for the treatment of the “Water Lilies” painting.

‘On a clear, sunny day, the Potamogetae, flourishing at a great depth amid the transparent waters, animated by numerous members of the insect and finny races present a delightful spectacle, and the long stems of the white and yellow water lilies may be traced from their floating flowers to the root. . . . . .One feels in such a place estranged for a time from the cares and vicissitudes of the world and the charms of nature penetrate, with their refining influences, the deepest recesses of the heart, denying to human language the power to give them full expression.’ W. Gardiner, 1848. The Flora of Forfarshire.

Look closely at a painting by Claude Monet and all you can see are thick daubs of coloured paint. Step back, however, and the entire picture suddenly becomes clear, complete with a wooden bridge, a tree and delicate water lilies on a pond. It is an analogy that Robert Laughlin – who shared the 1998 Nobel Prize for Physics for working out the theory of the fractional quantum Hall effect – uses to explain the phenomenon of "emergence" in his new book A Different Universe: Reinventing Physics from the Bottom Down. Put simply, emergence means that the whole is more than the sum of the parts.

Eric Heller is a scientist who has managed to bridge the divide between science and art. A professor of physics and chemistry at Harvard University, Heller is currently exhibiting his artwork at five different locations in the US. "Eric Heller is drawn to the subatomic world the way Monet was drawn to water lilies," one critic wrote in Art New England recently. "Electron flow, subatomic collisions, the being and nothingness of quantum foam – these are the abiding concerns, the haystacks and sunsets of his art."

Suggested citation: Potter P. Claude Monet (1840-1926) "Nympheas" (Water Lilies) 1916-1919 [about the cover]. Emerg Infect Dis [serial on the Internet]. 2002 Sep [date cited]. Available from: http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/EID/vol8no9/v8n9cover.htm

Comparisons are made between ancient ritual uses of the flowers of Nymphaea (Nymphaeaceae) in Maya and Egyptian civilizations. Recurrent motifs encountered in the art of both of these ancient civilizations suggests that the role fo the water lily was that of a narcotic (psychodysleptic) used to mediate ecstasis among a priestly caste. Relevant literature is reviewed as are chemical data. Elements in the complex belief systems of these two civilizations need to be reinterpreted in view of the use of two water lilies as ritual narcotics. The species implicated are Nymphaea caerulea Sav., in Egypt, and N. ampla DC., among the Maya.

A suggestion that certain water lilies might have narcotic properties is found in their frequent use as a motif in funerary art among the Egyptians as well as Mayans. The work of Rands (1953, 1955) traced the New World distribution of water lily motifs throughout Mayan art and made important mythic associations. From the middle of the Classical period until the inception of the Mexican periods, the water lily motif is extremely common and highly varied in its representation. Rands makes the association between this tradition and that in Asiatic art. Although Conard, in his 1905 monograph on the water lilies, speaks of the importance of Nymphaea caerulea Sav. (Fig. 1) in a decorative and an emblematic sense, he cannot attribute any mythic associations other than the obvious and does not mention the possibility of water lily cults. He further denies the assertions of earlier writers that the Nymphaeaceae have any real medicinal value or unusual chemical properties. This represents the current status of thought among most ethnobotanists, pharmacologists, and anthropologists. In extending the earlier works of Rands, Dobkin de Rios (1974, 1977) investigated the psychotropic flora and fauna in Mayan culture and noted the frequent use of the water lily motif in association with the toad (Bufo marinus). These toads contain bufotenine in glands located near the tympanum. The substance is released in the matrix of a milky exudate when the amphibian is aroused. Bufotenine is capable of inducing profound hallucinations after breaking the bloodbrain barrier. This led Dobkin de Rios to the assertion that Mayan depictions of the water lily were probably more than decorative and constituted a source for the development of a belief system that could be explained, in part, on the use of the toad and the water lily to alter states of consciousness. This hypothesis met with some hostile reactions from anthropologists, who found such a stylistic approach inadequate, even in light of the amassed evidence. Emboden (1974) touched upon the use of Nymphaea caerulea as a narcotic and has been in contact with Dobkin de Rios concerning the use of the water lily flower as a narcotic. This paper explores the use of water lilies as narcotics in the old world and especially in ancient Egypt. In a future paper coauthored with Dobkin de Rios we will treat transcultural phenomena related to the use of narcotic water lilies in a comprehensive manner. Of the several Mayan sites in which water lily motifs have been found, perhaps the most dramatic are the murals at Bonampak, which are so like some of the Egyptian murals that the similarity is startling. The association of the water lily with the sensory modes pointed out by Rands (1953) is strongly in evidence. In one of the principal Bonampak murals, which I have seen only recreated in the Peabody Museum of Harvard University, there is depicted a dance ritual in which water lilies are associated with the noses and foreheads of some of the dancers. Percussion instruments are played and many of the dancers are masked. Trumpets are being blown as this unexplained ceremony takes place. Diaz (1977) has commented on these depictions and supports the contention that the water lily was used as a ritual narcotic. He quotes from poetry of a ritual nature that is a kind of hymn to the "precious aquatic flowers" and the "flowers that cause vertigo, the beautiful narcotic flowers." The Nahuatl term quetzalaxochiacatl meaning

In the Botanical Garden of the University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia, is an artificial pond of oval shape, i io feet long,. 55 feet wide (33 x 17 metres) with an area of about 4,070 square feet (378 square metres). It was made some thirty years ago on a former gravel and clay bank, at least io feet higher than the present level of the ground. The pond bed was excavated in such a way as to leave borders sloping down toward the water on three sides; on the north, the greenhouses of the Department of Botany are within 50 feet. The sloping borders are rock garden, while higher up are trees now in their twentieth to thirtieth year. A weeping willow hung over the water for many years but has passed away. In the pond itself many forms of water lilies (Nvrnpliaea), lotus, Elodea and other plants have rendered it a very attractive spot. Two or more species of gold fish, minnows, occasionally Pectinatella, and a wealth of other aquatic animals have made it a prolific source of material to the zoologists of the University. Here in the autumn the wide-spread North American dragonfly, Syrnpetruin vicinufn Hagen, is regularly to be found. The bright red abdomen of the male lends a brilliant touch of color on sunny days of September and of the two following months. The duller brown of the female ordinarily renders her less conspicuous. This species has the habit of egg-laying by pairs, that is, the male and female fly together in this operation, the claspers at the hind end of his abdomen holding her head, and so united they follow the pond's margin, or cross its expanse, her abdomen every now and then dipping into the water in which her eggs fall loosely. Since this pond lies within three minutes' walk from either of the two buildings which have housed the zoological department during the pond's existence, it has been possible to avail one's self of the often limited period between classes at the middle of the day to visit the pond and to note the presence or absence of this Sympetrumn. In looking over my diaries, I find that I now have such records for twenty four years: I898-i900, 1902, 1904-07, 1910-1925. I believe that there are few observations of this nature on the same species, at the same limited locality, for an equal number of years, in existence. It has therefore seemed worth while to tabulate these observations and to compare them with the meteorological conditions for the

In reconstructing early uses of psychotogens in Mesoamerica, mushrooms have occupied the attention of botanists and anthropologists almost the exclusion of other plant motifs. Not all the images and literary fragments extant lend themselves to mycological interpretation. Some authors have interpreted the peltate leaves and flower buds of the psychotogen Nymphaea ampla as being green mushrooms and/or stalked sea shells. The context of presentation, information on the water lily in Maya antiquity, and recent information on the chemistry of this white water lily suggest that we must reassess the role of Nymphaea ampla. In a reevaluation of these ancient literary and iconographic sources, it would seem that both mushrooms and water lilies emerge as important ritual psychotogens. While the contextual use of mushrooms is well known, the water lily has been largely ignored. This presentation provides some perspective on both of these important New World narcotics.