needle in haystack

Sven Sachsalber wants to prove the popular saying: as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack. 

The artist, known for his bizarre performances is to spend 48h looking for needle in a haystack, as part of his exposition in the "Palais de Tokyo" in Paris. The director of the museum hid the needle and the search will be "exposed" in one of the rooms of the Palais. It is due to last for about two days but the search will take as much time as Sachsalber needs to find the needle. 

Another recent strange performance of the artist is locking himself for 24h inside a room with a cow. 

It seems that today everything is considered as modern art... I'm not saying this performance is not art, though I'd rather name it challenge or spectacle to be shown in fast motion. I've always preferred classical art such as traditional paintings (including art nouveau and contemporary art such as Dali or Picasso) to this new way of understanding art... art is beauty and critics, this new wave of artists are mixing it with eccentricity and nonsense.

Catalonia overwhelmingly votes for independence from Spain in straw poll

"Catalonia overwhelmingly votes for independence from Spain in straw poll". This is how the NY Times titled the article about the 9N in Catalonia.

2,25 Million people voted yesterday in Catalonia in favor of Catalonia's independence from Spain. Catalonia's independence is an issue that has been one of the main preoccupations in Mariano Rajoy's legislature since in 2012 a massive demonstration in Barcelona claimed for independence. After a legal fight between the governments of Spain and Catalonia, the referendum that was due to be celebrated in Catalonia the ninth of November was declared illegal by the spanish. As promised in his  electoral campaign and pressured by catalan civil organizations, Mas (Catalonia's prime minister) convened a straw poll to demonstrate Catalonia's aims to vote and decide.

As I see it, Spanish government's attitude is absolutely antidemocratic and seems to be deaf in front of Catalonia's claim. This stance demonstrates a lack of consideration to the catalans, and, in my opinion, enhances catalans' hope for independence.

There's more to add: the constant propaganda against Catalonia that spanish media are promoting is creating a hate atmosphere amongst Spain. Furthermore, these media are choosing images for their covers that do not represent the Catalan movement AT ALL. 

In conclusion: as Catalan, I'd like the Spanish government to listen to us and start, at least, to debate instead of just ignoring every single movement of the catalan society. 

drawing on humour for change

Humour can change the world. And so proves Liza Donelly with her talk. 

Women have always been at the base of our society, they race our children, and they're hard workers too. Unfortunately the role of women is not always the one they decide: women are influenced by their families, by their friends, teachers, neighbours, media... women are influenced by society since they're born to play the exact role they're ment to.

After growing up surrounded by the feminist movement, Liza decided to turn her passion, drawing, into a way of changing the world. Nowadays, her witty humour inspires us on newspapers and magazines.

In my opinion Liza was really brave to step out of the box and express her feelings by drawing, and the fact that she claims for a better world, where equality and human rights are reclaims belonging to the past, makes her a current hero.

hapiness at work

Is happiness important when working?

Of course it is! Check out this infographic and discover how happiness is involved in every single thing of our daily life. In fact, it also influences on our performance at work.

Our society tends to think that the more you have the happier you are... Really? Happiness is not about having money or brand new stuff, but feeling comfortable with yourself and with your environment. The benefits of happiness are endless, though today we're focusing on one of them: being happy at work.

Being happy at work triggers an enhance of your output and make you more likely to ascend to a better post and even boost your colleagues' job performance. Besides, the improvement of your own results will make you feel more self-confident, and... guess what: happier!

 

is humour necessary?

To laugh or not to laugh... that's not a question!

Humour is an essential part of the human race that should never be questioned. Just like other feelings tha emerge from our heart spontaneously, like anger, joy or sadness, humour is present in our daily lives. Yet humour is noy only a feeling, but also a very powerful tool to be used in many ways: to overcome sadness, to socialize one or even to change the world.

We can expect many benefits of humour: to amuse us, to change our mood... but its best point is that it boosts our eagerness to live and it triggers a noticeable enhance of our health according to what scientists of Birmingham Univeristy stated as the conclusion of many years of research.

To sum up, we must always remember Stephen Hawking’s words: giving up on humour is giving ip on yourself.  

*this is fiction, any resemblance with reality is pure coincidence;)

joke!

how to make stress your friend

Psychologist Kelly McGonigal has been teaching people for more than ten years how to avoid stress, turning it into the enemy. Now, recent research has changed her mind, and so she wants to do with us: stress isn't harmful for our bodies, but how we face it can bring serious increase of heart disease risk.

It shows up that the effects on our bodies such as sweat and heart pounding that we've always associated with negative feelings aren't that bad. Stress is preparing us to face challenges, to do our best on whatever we're doing and consequently, succeed. Another amazing result of being stressed is that we become more social: the pituitary gland pumps out oxytocin, a neuro-hormon that makes us become more compassionate, empathetic and even sorround ourselves by people we care about.

To conclude, I must say that with this talk I haven't only learnt about how to stand stress but also some new vocabulary such as nudge (gentle encouragement or reminder), seek (search, look for) or vessels (where blood flows through)... So I feel like the only thing I can say about it is thanks. Thanks Kelly for teaching us! :)