belvedere - Wordsmith.org

Wordsmith.org

Magimaria's post on Venus, and the replies that ensue, remind me of a word Faldage once used to describe his dream house: he'd like it to have a belvedere at the top from which he could study the skies through a telescope I guess not unlike the one Rubrick described.

Is this word readily understood by y'all? For me it wasn't. I had a different definition of 'belvedere' in my head.

Of course I do. The original belvedere was first drawn by M.C. Escher.

http://btr0xw.rz.uni-bayreuth.de/cjackson/escher/p-escher14.htm

Strangely I went to school in Belvedere college here in Dublin.

http://www.iol.ie/~jescuria/belved.htm

This description is just so me.....

= it is up to me (to explain), I suppose.

Belvedere = bel vedere = (here vedere is used as a noun)
= a beautiful seeing, so a place from which you can see a beatiful view

Escher lived in Rome for several years indeed!

The statue of Apollo Belvedere is "good to look at".
http://makeashorterlink.com/?D276123F2

>> The College provides a rich and diverse curriculum catering of the needs of each individual student.<<

Is this standard UK usage? Have never heard anything other than "catering to the needs..."

Emanuela, yes indeed. The definition that was in my mind for 'belvedere' is a lookout point; perhaps a place you can pull your car off on a mountain road to enjoy the beautiful view.

Rubrick, thanks for the Escher!! Love it.

my first and last connotation: Belweder - polish equivalent of the White House. i know it can also be used (and perhaps sometimes even is;))) as a name of a kind of palace. it also exists as "beautiful look" but i've never heard anybody using it in that meaning. however, i'm talking only about polish of course :P

Rubrick, thanks for the Escher!!

what's most interesting about the Escher, to me, is that the top story is perfectly normal. no crossed posts or illusions...

the top story is perfectly normal. no crossed posts or illusions

Check the relationship between the top story and the one beneath it.

And, rav. Isn't the bel in belweder white?

Check the relationship between the top story and the one beneath it.

yeah, I know, but the one beneath it has all sorts of internal twists, and the top one is normal.

the one beneath it has all sorts of internal twists

I guess it depends where you draw the line between the top story and the one beneath it.

aauughh....

i'm afraid bel in belweder is still just bel

just bel

Just bel? Ain' no sech a thang as just bel!

Even the lower one is normal, try to cover the top part with a sheet.
The trick is shown from the small guy sitting in the lower left corner, he is holding a paper with "the key" of the question, the so called impossible cube.

You do realise that because of the words story and crossed posts, I was wandering about for 10 minutes clicking on links and re-reading posts trying to find some sort of story somewhere before it dawned on me that you were talking about the top storey. Bloody USns, learn to spell properly, $#@& @%$* etc. etc.

Bingley

haha!

sorry, Bingley. I wish I could say I did it on purpose, not confuse you, but to be so clever with words...

Bloody USns, learn to spell properly

I suppose it *is too much to expect y'all to look at the context of the words and decide what they mean on that basis.

Storie. There is that better?

I finally found the time to dig up my Escher book and read again about 'Belvedere'. It threw up another couple of interesting observations that I had completely skipped when I accessed the link; thought I'd share them in a post.

- Was entitled "The Phantom House" in trial studies.
- The preparatory sketches included a spiral staircase around a pillar; the definitive version has a ladder
- The top storey and the one immediately beneath, appear at right angles to each other
- Of the eight pillars that join the two storeys together, only the extreme right and the extreme left behave normally
- The other six connect the front side to the rear side somehow passing through the space in the middle
- The ladder is ramrod straight, and yet, its bottom end is clearly inside the building whilst the top end is propped against the outer edge. So is the man in the middle, inside the building or outside? aaarrrrghhhh..
- The boy at bottom left is holding a model of the framework of the cube, when actually such a model cannot be built. Belvedere spawned multiple efforts to create just such a model, but despite several attempts to do so, the closest one has come to it, is a photograph by Dr.Cochran who entitled it "Crazy Crate". His photograph was only a simulation however.
http://www.geocities.com/SouthBeach/Canal/8167/escher.html

The link above, states that the Cube was used as a detail in Belvedere; my book says the opposite. Anyone?

Thank you to both AnnaS and Rubrick for 'belvedere'. It's a most beautiful word.

Edit: The link above, states that the Cube was used as a detail in Belvedere; my book says the opposite.

No conflict here, the cube is a detail in the Lithograph. Dr. Cochran's pictorial effort came later.

- Of the eight pillars that join the two storeys together, only the extreme right and the extreme left behave normally

One minor quibble here. These two pillars cannot both be behaving normally. The respective corners of the two stories that they connect cannot both be directly in line with each other.

But they are Faldage! I went back to Rubrick's link and re-checked. I meant the pillar that the man's right hand is on and the one on the extreme left of the sketch. Both these pillars are in direct alignment with the ones immediately above them. Am I missing something else?

missing something else?

The upper level and the lower level both have a rectangular floor plan, with one dimension greater than the other. The two longer dimensions are at right angles to each other in the horizontal plane. Therefore, if the left front corners are aligned vertically, the right rear corners will not be and vice versa.


 ---Y
|   |
|   |
|   |
|   |
 ----------Y
|          |
 X----------

Indeed, Faldage! Let me change that point to: Of the eight pillars that join the two storeys together, only the extreme right and the extreme left behave normally, though they are not supposed to, considering the different dimensional perspectives of both storeys. Assuming the man on the bottom storey is looking eastward, the floor of this storey is in an east-west direction. The pillars of this storey are however aligned deceptively in the north-south axis, akin to the direction of the woman's gaze (the one on the top storey) and hence, the effect of alignment between all pillars.
Edit: all pillars - changed to - the extreme right and left one.
if i continue anymore in this vein, this will convert into an Eschersque post. Ahem...

I'm enjoying the quid-pro-quo between maahey and Faldage even though I have only half a clue what they're talking about.

Sometimes non-word posts here are extremely illuminating. I'm waiting for that "A-Ha!" moment.

I see what you're trying to say, but I still can't agree with you. If you restrict your view to the area where the two levels merge, the area where the guy in the cowl, near the top of the ladder, is, all the pillars are in direct alignment with the ones immediately above them. It's only when you take a full view of both levels that the discrepancies appear, and then you see that of the two extreme pillars, at most one can be considered possible. It could be either one but it can't be both simultaneously.

seems to me a rather strange concept...

Anyway, what is incoherent is the height of the eight pillars. Assuming that they have the same height in "reality", and assuming given the eight "basis points", AFTER FIXING ONE PILLAR - the left one, say - the perspective rules would force directly the heigth of the top points in the drawing ... and they are wrong indeed.

So, if I understand this correctly, it's all an illusion?

It's cloud illusions I recall
I really don't know clouds at all

Joni Mitchell

...at most one can be considered possible. It could be either one but it can't be both simultaneously.

Right you are, Faldage! But isn't this what Escher's work is about - the art of making the impossible, possible, simply by playing on idiosyncrasies of perspective and perception!

as far as I know, there are (in some science museums) models for the " impossible cube". Looking from a fixed point of view, you can see exactly that cube, but walking around the exhibit you can see how it is made ( not connected, " broken" )

isn't this what Escher's work is about - the art of making the impossible, possible, simply by playing on idiosyncrasies of perspective and perception!
<
I always smile at Escher's works ... and spend inordinate amount of time looking and laughing. He does challenge perceptions, doesn't it? Sort of like AWAD/board !