Tag: #SquareOdds

Odd a Lot

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It’s Shrove Monday or Rose Monday in areas where they celebrate carnival. It’s another odd carnival year, thanks to – dare I mention it – COVID – with few if any public happenings.

But I couldn’t let the occasion pass without at least one costume. We all had a blast a few years back with this odd costume. The dinosaur was hilarious – it kept losing air and the girl inside kept tumbling over because her sight was limited. It was a lot of fun if a bit odd, or rather, a lot.

To top it all, the photo itself is an exception to my month of oddities. It is the only photo that I had prepared in advance and not waited for other contributions to inspire me.

Thanks to Becky once again for having the idea and hosting. It’s been fun as well as odd.

Odd Square #28

Squaring the Bell

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Debbie’s oddity of today is Bell Rock. Since this rock formation has a kind of angular look to it I remembered that I have an odd bell in my collection, a square one, in fact. It’s a fire warning bell that is housed in an old wooden tower that is otherwise used to hang fire hoses to dry: Der Schlauchtrockenturm in Ritschweier.

Odd Square #27

Corner the Market

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or is it: Rounding the meerkat?

Jude is featuring oddities from the zoo for the square challenge this month and today she has a meerkat on display. I have a whole ball of meerkats on offer and if that weren’t odd enough in itself I was wondering why a few years back meerkats were so in fashion. I am not only thinking of Sergei and an Aleksandr of tv fame but of the many meerkat figurines that appeared in first garden centres and then front yards. They have been replaced by llamas if I’m correct. I find these fashions in ornaments odd. What do you think?

Odd Square #25

I’ll Be Back!

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Not a quote from the Terminator but from Mother Nature herself.

Becky showed us some extreme gardening as an oddity today so I am showing off some involuntary gardening. Isn’t it odd to have a tree growing in what used to be a living room?

Odd Square #19

A Really Large Folly

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Sue’s series of follies had me thinking. There are certainly follies in Germany (I am only talking of the architectural type, I’m sure there are enough follies in many other areas) but there is no proper name for them. I found an interesting discussion amongst translators and although a number of possible words are discussed, the final conclusion is that “folly” is best left unchanged.

The largest folly I know is the Red Mosque in the palace gardens in Schwetzingen. It was built in the late 18th century, not as house of worship but because eveything oriental was in fashion at the time. It was meant as a monument to oriental thought and wisdom, many supposedly Arabic quotes were used to decorate the insides. Oddly enough – it has been used by Muslims for worship (for example by French prisoners of war from the Maghreb after the Franco-Prussian war in 1870/71) as well as a jazz club by the US American occupying forces after world war II.

Odd Square #18

Thoughts About a Sculpture

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Geriatri’x’ oddity of the day is a sculpture with many faces – more elaborate and less crude than this one:

Faces in the “Skulpturenpark” in Bad König – which is basically an abandoned lot where a couple of artists have left their works for everybody to look at. The pieces are kind of weird, intriguing even. I’m not sure I like the words that one of them often added to his scultpures – I think it limits the interpretation of the onlookers. If I hadn’t gone for a square format I would have cut off the writing completely. So, in true odd fashion, I left half of it in the photo rather than losing some of the faces.

If you are curious here is the translation:

“Rather the cleverest among the stupid than the stupidest among the clever” Paul August Wagner 2020

I am not sure I agree with the quote, reminiscent of something Julius Caesar has said (according to Plutarch): “I had rather be first in a village than second at Rome.” I say reminiscent because the meaning is quite different. And this is exactly why I find these added words unsuitable: I have now thought about the saying, what it might mean and what it alludes to, and neglected to reflect about the piece of art. I wonder if that was the artist’s aim. Odd.

Odd Square #17

What an Odd Place

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It’s not the shop that’s odd, not the bright colour beneath the old grey stones, not even the skeleton in the entrance or the huge nose with glasses. It’s the sticker on the top of the nose I find odd. Who put it there? And why? Nobody can see it or read it. Was it put up before the nose was hoisted up?

I went to my Edinburgh archives from a single day in the wonderful city and of course, it was Debbie’s oddity that provided the impulse.

Odd Square #16