USGA, The R&A Add Clarity to New Definition of “Addressing the Ball”

The United States Golf Association (USGA) and The R&A today issued a clarification of the new definition of “Addressing the Ball” with respect to the revised edition of the Rules of Golf, which took effect worldwide on January 1, 2012.

The clarification to the new definition of “Addressing the Ball,” referenced on page 22 of the Rules of Golf, deals specifically with the phrase “immediately in front of or immediately behind the ball.” In its continued review of the Rules, the USGA and The R&A have provided the following explanation to further clarify the new definition:

  • If the golf club is grounded “closely” behind the ball in a position where it would be customary for a player to ground the club prior to making a particular stroke, then the club is considered to have been grounded “immediately behind the ball.”
  • The same interpretation of the definition would apply if a player grounds his or her golf club “closely” in front of the ball prior to making a stroke.

Commenting on the clarification, USGA Senior Director of Rules of Golf Thomas Pagel said: “We remain committed to ensuring that the Rules are clear, easy to understand and relevant to today’s game. In our regular review of the Rules to ensure these goals are met, we determined that the definition of addressing the ball could be interpreted in various ways and that further explanation was necessary.”

R&A Executive Director of Rules and Equipment Standards David Rickman said an additional explanation to the definition of “Addressing the Ball” was necessary given the changes made to Rule 18-2b. “We recognise that even after an extensive review of the Rules there can be specific areas that benefit from greater clarity and understanding, and we hope that this explanation will assist players and referees.”

In January, the USGA and The R&A released the new Rules of Golf for 2012-2015 following an exhaustive, four-year review of golf’s 34 playing Rules in which nine principal Rules were amended to improve clarity and ensure penalties are proportionate to rules breaches. One significant change was made to Ball Moving After Address (Rule 18-2b). The addition of a new exception exonerates a player from penalty if his or her ball moves after it has been addressed when it is known or virtually certain that the player did not cause the ball to move. For example, if a gust of wind moves the ball after it has been addressed, there is no penalty and the ball is played from its new position.


The International Space Elevator Consortium (ISEC) is a joining together of many different organizations and people worldwide who have come together to actively promote the concept of a Space Elevator.

Our Mission Statement: “ISEC promotes the development, construction and operation of a space elevator as a revolutionary and efficient way to space for all humanity”

Each of the pillars is headed by a pillar lead, who functions much like a university’s department head. Their job is to start initiatives (projects), pursue collaborations, guide project leads and prospective project leads in pursuing their individual projects, and generally increase the activity level of their pillar.

ISEC is a California-based, non-profit corporation.  If you are interested in helping us actively promote this magnificent concept, please visit the ISEC website and JOIN.  You can also sign up for a free e-Newsletter which will keep you up-to-date on all the goings-on at ISEC.


Dreams Have Psychological Meaning and Cultural Uses, but No Known Adaptive Function

by G. William Domhoff

Dreams are so compelling, and they often seem so weird and strange -- surely they must have a "purpose"; that is, an "adaptive role" in the maintenance of our bodily or psychological health. Furthermore, all the famous theorists who talk about dreams claim that dreams do have one or another purpose (although the famous theorists disagree on just what those functions are), but the best current evidence suggests otherwise. Dreams probably have no purpose!

So let's review the arguments and the evidence. We'll start with the claims made by psychoanalysts and clinical psychologists in the first 50 years of the century based on their work with patients, then turn to more recent claims, some of which are based on work in sleep and dream laboratories that flourished in the 1950's and 1960's. The views presented here are those of research psychologists who have studied dreams inside and outside the laboratory, especially David Foulkes and Calvin Hall. References to Foulkes' work are provided at the end of this document.

The first and most famous dream theorist of the modern era, Sigmund Freud, said that the function of dreams was to preserve sleep, but that theory from the year 1900 is contradicted by the fact that dreams happen very regularly at least five or six times per night in an active stage of sleep called REM sleep (after the rapid eye movements that are part of it, along with many other neurological and physiological changes). In other words, dreams don't just happen as we are about to wake up due to hunger pangs, sexual urges, or the need to go to the bathroom, as Freud thought way back when, before REM sleep was discovered in 1953.

The other famous dream theorist of the modern era, Carl Jung, an early follower of Freud who broke away to develop a very different theory, claimed that the function of dreams is to compensate for those parts of the psyche (total personality) that are underdeveloped in waking life, but Calvin Hall's studies of two-week dream series from students and longer dream journals from adults of all ages strongly suggest that dream content is continuous with waking thought and behavior. That is, if we are outgoing and active in our waking life, and not very introspective and reflective, then so too in our dream life, which contradicts Jung's view.

Still other dream theorists say that dreams have a problem-solving function. Dreams supposedly deal with problems we can't solve in waking life and offer solutions. But a variety of systematic studies find precious little support for this view. However, this is one of those places where we have developed "uses" for our dreams as part of our cultural lore. Looking at them in the light of waking day, and believing that they may be full of insight, we may sometimes come up with new ideas or insights while studying them. That is, we have invented a "use" for dreams, but that doesn't mean that problem solving is a psychological function of dreams built into us over evolutionary time.

So much for the claims by clinical theorists. Now we look at claims that have emerged in recent years, but are tied to no particular theory or famous theorist. They are the new "common sense" of our day, based on a reverence for physiological findings and the awesome capabilities of computers.

When REM sleep was first discovered, it was thought that dreams only occurred during that stage of sleep. This led to many functional theories about dreaming that were based on alleged functions for REM sleep. But we now have reason to believe that plenty of dreams happen in non-REM (NREM) sleep, especially late in the sleep period.

Furthermore, awakenings of children under age 5 in the sleep laboratory reveal that they only report dreams from REM sleep awakenings 20-25% of the time, so REM sleep does not automatically equate to dreaming. In addition, REM sleep can be found in all mammals, and it is unlikely that they are dreaming, i.e., imagining a world or story in which they are taking part and interacting with others. Dreams, as the pre-eminent American psychologist on dreams, David Foulkes, likes to say, are a "cognitive achievement." We only gradually develop the ability to dream. What all this adds up to is that REM sleep and dreaming are not the same thing, so whatever functions REM sleep may have cannot be taken as functions for dreaming and dreams.

The fact that we remember so few of our dreams -- a few percent at best -- also argues against any function for dreams. If they are so important, why don't we remember more of them? Furthermore, the people who remember a great many dreams don't seem to be any different from those who remember few or none, at least on the standard personality tests that have been used in many studies to date. If dreams are important, why aren't the recallers of them better off in some way?

With the advent of computers, it became fashionable to say that dreams are "clearing out the software" from a busy day, or that they are a form of "off-line" processing to save the good stuff and get rid of the useless. Aside from the fact that such theories show how susceptible our supposedly highest thinking is to the dominant technology of any given era, the problem with this theory of dream function is that very, very little in dreams deals with the events of the day. Often there is some little leftover from the day, first noticed by Freud and named "day residue," but the rest of the dream is a story that does not deal with actual events. The story is usually plausible and even mundane, and it often contains the most important people and concerns of our lives, but it is nonetheless a story.

We are thinking creatures because thinking is a valuable adaptation, but that doesn't mean that all forms of thinking have a function. Dreams at this moment in the collective findings of dream researchers seem to be a "throw-away" production, an off-hand story to while the night away. That judgment could be changed tomorrow by new and original studies by a new generation of young dream researchers, but right now the preponderance of the evidence weights against any physiological or psychological function for dreaming and dreams.

(Click here for a detailed refutation of the "problem-solving" theory of dreams.)

But Dreams Have Meaning

And, Yes, Dreams Have Their "Uses"

Don't Like Your Dreams? Feel Free To Ignore Them

Most dream researchers think it is worthwhile to remember your dreams, and they have tips for improving your recall. But the evidence we have presented here suggests something else: they are not important, so perhaps not worth remembering. So, unless you find your dreams entertaining, intellectually interesting, or artistically inpiring, then feel free to forget your dreams. If they just upset you or leave you puzzled, then why bother with them?

Suggested Reading

  • David Foulkes (1985). Dreaming: A cognitive-psychological analysis. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

  • Corrado Cavallero and David Foulkes (1993). Dreaming as Cognition. New York: Harvester/Weatsheaf. [Especially chapters 1, 2, 6, and 7]

  • Allan Moffitt, Milton Kramer, and Robert Hoffman (1993). The Functions of Dreaming. Albany, NY: SUNY Press. [Especially the chapters by Foulkes and Antrobus.]

Go back to the Dream Library index.
dreamresearch.net home page dreamresearch.net contact info


The decoration of vehicles is a common practice in a number of countries in addition to Pakistan and Afghanistan. Similar techniques and materials are employed in truck and (more frequently) bus decoration in the Philippines, Indonesia, and several countries in Central and South America; in South Asia itself, Indian trucks are painted, as are the scooter rickshaws, called "Baby Taxis", of Bangladesh. What makes the case of Pakistan (and Afghanistan) unique, however, is the pervasiveness of vehicle decoration, since decoration is heavily utilized on virtually all privately and fleet-owned commercial vehicles, from the well known trucks and buses, to vans, share taxis, animal carts and even juice vendors' push carts. I am engaged in a major research topic on the decoration of trucks in Pakistan out of which I plan to produce a book and several articles. This site is intended as a very brief introduction to the importance of symbolism in Pakistani truck decoration.

It is worth noting that vehicle decoration is an expensive undertaking. On average, it costs US$5000 to do the bodywork on a truck, although in some cases people spend much more. The majority of Pakistani trucks are not owner-operated but belong to fleets, it is the norm for fleet owners to authorize the driver to take the vehicle to a coachwork shop at company expense and have it decorated according to his own taste (although in the case of many fleets all trucks have similar lettering and colors on the side panels). Given the lack of direct economic benefit in decorating a truck to the owner or operator, and the absolute pervasiveness of this form of art (it is safe to say that every intercity privately owned truck in Pakistan is decorated), it becomes obvious that the motivation to decorate lies somewhere else. The motifs represented on trucks display not just aesthetic considerations, but attempts to depict aspects of the religious, sentimental and emotional worldviews of the individuals employed in the truck industry. And since trucks represent the major means of transporting cargo throughout Pakistan, truck decoration might very well be this society's major form of representational art.

My data has been collected in northern and southern Pakistan; I've focused my attention on the Karakorum Highway, the main commercial artery which connects Pakistan to China; on Rawalpindi, where the routes to China split from the east-west route to Afghanistan, and on the commercial center of Karachi. In addition to photographing trucks to analyze their designs, I've interviewed truckers on the road, at rest stops and while they are having their trucks built up. I've visited truck design workshops, interviewed artists at their homes and places of work, interviewed artisans who manufacture the smaller pieces of art which are attached to the truck after the main designing is done. Through this research, I have identified a number of design schools, although they tend to be extremely dynamic in modifying styles and motifs, as well as unselfconscious, so that motifs are added and removed with great rapidity. Nevertheless, there are at least four basic schools of truck design. The commonest is the Rawalpindi school, which accounts for most trucks built up in the northern Punjab (Rawalpindi, Hasanabdal, Haripur, and the Gujranwala area). These trucks have ornate metal cowling above the windshield and rely heavily on plastic applique in their decoration. The trucks of Swat (a wide valley in the northwest of the country) are distinctive for their carved wooden doors and limited use of plastic and hammered metalwork. The trucks of Peshawar (a city close to the Khyber Pass on one of the two main routes connecting Pakistan and Afghanistan) fall somewhere in between the Rawalpindi and Swat schools. They often have carved wooden doors (although, unlike the trucks of Swat, their doors are likely to be painted) and they use a metal cowling, only the cowling tends to be simpler than that of a Rawalpindi truck. The Karachi school is difficult to define, and I am inclined to see it not as one school at all but an amalgamation. Karachi, as Pakistan's major sea and land port as well as primary metropolitan area, has more trucks than any other place in the country. It also has truckers and trucks from every other region, many of whom chose to decorate their trucks in the tradition of the up country region to which they belong. The only distinctive Karachi design I have been able to identify has wooden relief work colored with iridescent paints over the windshield. This design is most common in water tankers, a kind of truck ubiquitous in Karachi and not at all common in other areas.

The motifs on the trucks can be categorized in five groups:

2. Elements from modern life, such as pictures of political figures or patriotic symbols.
4. Talismanically or religiously loaded symbols, such as eyes and fish.
5. .Obvious religious symbols and images such as Buraq (a celestial horse that is believed to have carried the Prophet Muhammad on a spiritual journey to heaven).

However, by far the commonest religious symbols appearing on a truck are the Ka'ba and Prophets mosque, appearing on the left and right of the front of the truck somewhere towards the top.

Pakistani trucks transform the landscape into a check work of moving religious and cultural tableaus, mobile talismans through which the truckers protect themselves and their livelihood, and itinerant homes which bear visual testimony to the truckers' sense of place and belonging. It is not clearly established that either the truckers or the truck designers are entirely clear on what the symbolism of the motifs used in truck design actually is. In fact, many truckers I've talked to plead ignorance of all the symbols and claim that they are either purely aesthetic choices, or else were put there at the sole discretion of the truck designer. However, I would argue that religious images, even at their least denotative, or most abstract, are images nonetheless; they are perceived and – to paraphrase Paul Ricoeur – perception gives rise to symbols, and symbols give rise to thought and response.

I would argue that one can make sense of the Pakistan truck which, at first glance, appears to be an explosive expression of popular or folk art. The side panels are used to depict the imagined home, thereby situating the driver, who by definition is never at home, in a social geography. The nomadic nature of the driver is critical to his self-conception, consciously articulated by him in conversation as well as in the music he listens to. The truck functions not only as his home away from home, but also his means of livelihood as well as his partner. The last concern explains the general motivation to decorate the truck as well as to feminize it and endow it with bridal symbols. The symbolism connected with safety of person and livelihood dominates the truck and also the truckers behavior (visits to shrines, the interior of the truck).

Built into the symbol, as a perceptual metaphor, is the capacity to pattern responses concerning how the individual relates to the world or to the divine. Thus the symbols used in truck decoration in particular (and vehicle decoration in general), even when they are not consciously representative of a particular religious message in the iconic sense, are still shaped by a notion of the religious place of the individual, by a religious worldview, and they still elicit responses which are framed within the parameters of that particular worldview. That these religious symbols are pictorial, and that the religious responses are elicited by pictorial representation, raises many questions about the role of religious art in a society that views itself as resolutely aniconic, that discussion is for another time.

© Jamal Elias, 2001


Weekend snow chances? Would NWS cuts harm Minnesota?

As arctic air slides into the region, the forecast models for the weekend bear watching.

A split flow in the upper atmosphere and an active southern branch of the jet stream is spawning potential snow system. The flow is chaotic, something the forecast models don’t handle very well. The big question is how far north these southern disturbances will project snow.

Major model differences:

There are some pretty remarkable differences and “divergent solutions” between the models regarding the weekend forecast at this point. Depending on which model turns out to be right, Saturday could either be sunny and cold, or cloudy with steady light snow adding up to 1″ to 3″ for much of southern Minnesota.

Sunday into Monday could either feature a storm sliding south and producing significant snowfall for Wisconsin or Chicago, or veer north and sideswipe southeast Minnesota (and possibly even the metro) with a shot of snow.

Right now I’m leaning toward a solution which features just a chance of light snow Saturday, with the bulk of a southern branch storm sliding southeast of Minnesota Sunday into Monday.

But stay tuned for updates as the modles (hopefully) sort things out Friday….

Could NWS funding cuts affect forecast accuracy in Minnesota?

Suggested impacts of such cuts could include closing NWS offices (there was already consolidation years ago which closed the NWS office in International Falls) reducing maintenance on the doppler radar and NOAA weather radio networks and even reducing the number of upper air soundings from every 12 hours to once daily or even once every two days.

While I don’t always jump on the NWS bandwagon, it is clear to me this is not the place to start cutting budgets. Studies have shown that accurate weather forecasts save the U.S. economy as much as 4-billion dollars annually! Most of this data comes directly in one form or another from NOAA & NWS.

One area where we might see an immediate catastrophic forecast impact would be if either the number or frequency of upper air soundings is reduced. These twice daily soundings are used as initial input into numerical forecast models that we use every day to make our weather forecasts.

If the geographic coverage or frequency of upper air data input feeding into the models is reduced, it would likely drastically affect model performance.

Twin Cities upper air sounding today.

One area that could wreak havoc for Minnesota is on model performance for winter storms.

Many of our major winter storms cross the Pacific before moving into the upper air weather balloon “grid” over North America. Once the systems get “sampled” by the upper air grid, the models have much better data on storm strength, movement and thermal profile…all of which are critical in determining how much rain or snow will fall in Minnesota, and where.

This is why you’ve heard me talk about the futility of trying to predict snowfall totals more than 24 to 48 hours in advance. The forecast models just don’t have enough accurate data on the storm until the system moves over the west coast!

If we had to wait even longer to sample storms coming off the Pacific it could be a disaster on model accuracy with winter storms. Forecasting winter storms is already one of the most difficult forecasts a meteorologist in Minnesota has to make. I can’t imagine how much worse the projections would be without accurate and timely upper air data feeding into the models every 12 hours!

  • Cody

    While limited upper air soundings would cause a major annoyance when it comes to winter weather, it could cause disastrous forecast errors when it comes to severe weather and hurricane forecasting, which have gotten very good over the past 20 years and without a doubt save dozens if not hundreds of American lives every year.

    The thought of NHC not knowing what the upper air pattern is over the united states makes it almost impossible to know when or if a hurricane in the Atlantic will curve towards or away from the US.

  • Paul Huttner

    You are so right.

    I guess I’m focused on winter storms at this point, but central plains severe weather outbreaks in summer could be affected also. Satellites and Hurricane Hunter Aircraft may help more with hurricanes before landfall in the upper air network…but any data is good data!

  • Cody

    Then of course, imagine the Twin Cities office having to cover for La Crosse during a major severe weather outbreak or the other way around if one of those offices where closed for 4 weeks.

    Hopefully the word gets out that the NWS does a lot more then telling you if its going to rain today. I have little doubts that the $125m saved in cuts would end up costing more in the long run.

    Economic impacts of poorer flood, aviation, and agricultural forecasts. Increased cost of evacuated more people because of uncertain hurricane forecasts. Increased insurance costs. I would almost guarantee it would cost more then it saves.


Copyright © 1990 by . All rights reserved

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3.2 Continuum Emission

Continuum radiation from dust arises from two mechanisms: (a) fluorescence, giving rise to a red continuum; and (b) thermal radiation. The latter is observed either in the 1-60 µm range following the transient heating of a small grain by a single UV photon; or for lambda > 100 µm, where the energy is reprocessed by steady-state emission of larger grains; or in the intermediate-wavelength range, where the effects compete.

3.2.1. RED CONTINUUM Grains in the ``reflection'' nebula NGC 2023 were found to produce a red continuum that peaks at about 6800 Å (178). Subsequent studies of many such nebulae confirm that there is an extended red emission in many of them (175 and ref. therein), typically contributing 30-50% of the flux in the I band (0.88 µm). In NGC 2023, the red emission is found in filamentary structures that spatially coincide with patches of H2 infrared fluorescence and the 3.3-µm UIB emission (56) but not necessarily with the intensity of reflected light, which is determined by total dust density. IC 435, in the same molecular cloud, shows no red luminescence (174), nor does the Merope reflection nebula. A small patch of red fluorescent emission near the star gamma Cas also shows a strong H2 fluorescence in the UV (179). The ``Red Rectangle'' (HD 44179), a bipolar outflow excited by a central star, shows both strong UIBs and the red emission (140, 146).

The simplest interpretation of the red fluorescent emission is that it is excited by a strong UV flux incident upon hydrogenated carbon particles, either amorphous (46) or PAHs (32), thereby producing both the fluorescent red emission and the H2 fluorescence. A strong enough radiation field will alter the carbon particles and dissociate the H2, as might be the case in the Merope nebula.

3.2.2. 3-30 µm CONTINUUM In addition to the UIBs, there is a continuous emission in the NIR/MIR range that accounts for a large part of the radiation from reflection nebulae (151) and, presumably, from the Galaxy as a whole. A survey at 11 and 20 µm (132) found unexpectedly high diffuse galactic emission. IRAS mapped almost the entire sky at 12, 25, 60, and 100 µm and found the 12- and 25-µm intensities vary considerably relative to the 100-µm intensity (90, 91), which is roughly proportional to N(H I). The NIR/MIR emission arises from warm grains; simple considerations of the peak wavelength of the Planck function (and hence the emissivity of a grain) as a function of temperature show that this radiation must come from grains with temperatures of hundreds of Kelvins. By contrast, the mean local interstellar radiation field and optical constants for likely grain materials (carbon, silicates, organic refractory mantles) all suggest equilibrium temperatures of ~ 20 K for the grains having the sizes (> 0.01 µm) needed to account for the optical extinction (133). Grains of this size have large enough heat capacities so that their temperatures do not fluctuate appreciably after absorbing a single UV photon.

The NIR/MIR emission must be produced by grains in the size range 5-50 Å; such grains are large enough to have an almost continuous density of energy states. In this case they radiate a continuum rather than emission bands. A single UV photon heats the grain to a high peak temperature that depends upon the size of the grain and the energy of the photon (150). The grain emits the NIR/MIR radiation and cools to very low temperatures between photon absorptions. Calculations of thermal fluctuations (34, 41) have shown that very small grains can account for the spectrum of the emission. For clear discussions of the properties of small grains, see (4, 133).

3.2.3. FIR EMISSION Grains with sizes of 0.01 µm or more are cold (~ 20 K) and reradiate most of the energy they absorb into the FIR part of the spectrum. Hildebrand (70) has clearly explained the process of determining grain properties and cloud masses from FIR observations. Cox and Mezger (30), in a recent review of the galactic FIR/submillimeter radiation from dust, estimate that about 1010 Lsmsun, or 30% of the total luminosity of the Galaxy, is radiated in the FIR, mostly from dust heated in H I regions by the interstellar radiation field of early-type stars (12).

The FIR provides important information regarding the spatial variations of the interstellar radiation field throughout the Galaxy and on how molecular clouds form stars and evolve into H II regions, but is of limited use as a diagnostic of dust because each line of sight samples grains with temperatures which depend upon their local radiation fields. However, for wavelengths much longer than about 150 µm (the peak of the emitted radiation), the FIR can be used to determine the relative opacities of the emitting grains. The Galaxy is optically thin at submillimeter wavelengths, in which case the intensity of emission, Ilambda, is proportional to the opacity, klambda times the Planck function, Blambda(T). For long wavelengths, Blambda(T) varies linearly with the temperature, and thus the wavelength dependence of Ilambda provides relative values of klambda. The results for diffuse radiation from the Galaxy (115) and from other galaxies (22) show that for lambda > 100 µm, klambda is proportional to lambda-2, which is predicted by theory (e.g., DL84). The constant in the proportionality is difficult to determine because it depends on an estimation of the column density of grains, or of hydrogen, along the line of sight of the observation. The theoretical opacities of DL84, based on a graphite-silicate model for grains, are approximately half of Hildebrand's estimate (70) based on a calibration in local dense globules (cf. 124). The uncertainties are probably at least a factor of two, if not more. Table 1 uses the Hildebrand value.

The mass of interstellar dust, and thereby an estimate for the mass of the ISM, is often determined from the FIR intensity, together with the opacity of grains per mass and an estimated grain temperature. It is important to realize (40) that this procedure is reasonably safe only if the observations are all on the long-wavelength side of the Planck function of the coldest grains -normally, in the submillimeter range. For instance, ``the temperature'' obtained from the ratio of the 60- and 100-µm intensities from IRAS is biased by a few warm grains that can provide almost all of the 60-µm emission. One can easily be off a substantial factor (>3) in the resulting mass estimate!

In dust surrounding very young objects, bipolar outflows, or the cores of giant molecular clouds, the flux suggets that the opacity even in the submillimeter range (400-1300 µm) might vary as lambda-1 or lambda-1.5 (145, 162, 181) instead of lambda-2. The nebulae might be so optically thick that radiative transfer effects are important at submillimeter wavelengths. However, the grains in these extremely dense objects might not extremely small in comparison to 1 mm. Cometary grains also extend up to this size range. The growth of fractal grains (182; see Section 8) would explain the observations.

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Holly Wilmeth’s Divine Nature

This project is a series of images that represents the crossroad where woman meets the divine spirit of nature in the form of animals, and where she embraces it. There’s a long history in shamanic traditions and ancient cultures where humans have imbued themselves with the special qualities that animals have and their relationship to the world. Eating a part of the animal, or wearing a part of the animal, or using the animal as a totem deeply permeates us with their special powers. We want to come back to that state of grace where we are aligned with nature as animals are in the right relationship with their environment.”—Holly Wilmeth

(Continue Reading)

Holly Wilmeth


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Frameworks    1. Mrz - 28. Apr 2012

"Framing always sustains and contains that which, by itself, collapses forthwith." Jacques Derrida

"[T]he frame is the reward of the artist." Edgar Degas

Barbara Mathes Gallery is pleased to present Frameworks, an innovative group exhibition that examines the role of the frame in modern and contemporary art.

For centuries, the frame had been considered external to the work of art—a structuring device that mediated the boundary between the space of the viewer and the painted world of illusion. A number of modern and contemporary artists, however, have turned this tradition on its head, taking the frame as raw material for a variety of formal investigations. This exhibition will feature work by artists that play with notions of framing, either by creating their own frames, subsuming the frame into the work, or incorporating framing elements into the content of their compositions. For example, Robert Mangold's Frame/Ellipse paintings make use of a diptych format, in which one element features a dynamically shaped aperture that frames the literal space of the wall. Yayoi Kusama has frequently painted the frames of her works with her signature dots or nets, enveloping the entirety of her objects with her psychologically charged inner vision. Neil Jenney has a long history of making his paintings' frames, as he recognizes the key role they play in staging pictorial illusion. He always inscribes his titles on the lower framing bar, creating tension between text and image. Arthur Segal's painted frames extend his signature cosmic abstraction to the picture's outermost limits—a gesture he considered to be an expression of art's unity with elemental, universal forces. Stephen Antonakos often creates fractured framing motifs that give his work a playful instability. Other artists in the exhibition will include Richard Artschwager, Matthew Barney, Varujan Bohosian, Joseph Cornell, and Roy Lichtenstein among others.

Contact information:

Darstellung :    Aktuelle Ausstellungen   Vergangene Ausstellungen


ACLU Fights to Give American Taliban Group Prayer Rights in Prison

John Walker Lindh

(AP) — Two more Muslim inmates are trying to join American-born Taliban fighter John Walker Lindh and another prisoner in a federal lawsuit asking for them to be allowed to hold daily group prayers in their highly restricted cell block.

A federal judge on Monday gave the American Civil Liberties Union until Jan. 17 to respond to objections from the Bureau of Prisons.

The push to add individual plaintiffs comes after U.S. District Judge Jane Magnus-Stinson denied the case class action status last month.

Lindh, 29, and Brian Carr, 43, claim the prison’s policy restricting group prayer in the Communications Management Unit at the federal prison in Terre Haute violates their religious rights. The government contends that restrictions at the CMU are necessary for security and don’t violate inmates’ rights. Both sides hope Magnus-Stinson will rule the facts are in their favor, avoiding a trial.

Carr, who is serving a 20-year sentence for a bank robbery in Washington, joined the lawsuit in September after another inmate involved in it was released from prison, ACLU attorney Ken Falk said.

Earlier this month, the ACLU filed a motion in federal court in Indianapolis seeking to add two other inmates — Ali Asad Chandia, 34, and Rafil Dhafir, 62 — to the prayer suit. The Bureau of Prisons, however, opposed Dhafir joining the suit, saying he has not exhausted administrative remedies.

“The allegations are identical, they’re all raising the same issue,” Falk said.

Lindh and the others argue that their religion requires them to pray five times a day, preferably in a group. But group prayers at the prison are generally limited to once a week except during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, court documents said.

Terre Haute associate warden Harvey Church testified in a deposition given in January that 24 of the 41 CMU inmates were Muslim. The government says in court documents that there is no evidence that Muslims were confined to the CMU because of their religion and that most Muslims don’t adhere to the requirement of five daily prayers.

Chandia, a former Maryland teacher, was one of roughly a dozen men from the Washington area convicted as part what prosecutors called a “Virginia jihad network” that used paintball games in 2000 and 2001 to train for holy war around the globe. He was sentenced in 2006 to 15 years in prison.

Dhafir, a Muslim doctor from Syracuse, N.Y., is serving a 22-year prison sentence after his conviction in February 2005 on 59 criminal counts, including money laundering and conspiracy to violate U.S. sanctions against Iraq. He was found guilty of misusing $2 million that donors gave to his unlicensed charity, Help the Needy, and spending $544,000 for his own purposes.


The cost of driving from Tacoma, Washington to Sacramento, California is:

$107.73 one-way / $215.45 round trip

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Distance: miles km
Gas mileage: mpg L/100 km
Fuel grade:
Gas consumption: gallons litres

Route to drive from Tacoma, WA to Sacramento, CA

Road trip planner

The total cost of driving from Tacoma, WA to Sacramento, CA (one-way) is $107.73 at current gas prices.

The round trip cost would be $215.45 to go from Tacoma, WA to Sacramento, CA and back to Tacoma, WA again.

Regular fuel costs are around $3.73 per gallon for your trip. This calculation assumes that your vehicle gets an average gas mileage of 25 mpg for a mix of city and highway driving.

All currency units are U.S. Dollars. If you prefer international units, the equivalent petrol pump price is 98.4 cents/litre. This assumes a typical fuel economy of 9.4 L/100 km.

You'll go through 28.9 gallons of gas during this trip. This is equal to 109.5 litres.

If you fill your tank with unleaded gasoline, the carbon emissions will be around 566 lbs CO2. This is equivalent to 257 kg CO2e or 0.26 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents. These numbers may change depending on the exact make and model of your car. If your vehicle uses diesel instead, the CO2 emissions will be around 663 lbs CO2, which is equivalent to 301 kg CO2e or 0.30 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents.

These results are based on the actual driving distance from Tacoma, WA to Sacramento, CA, which is 723 miles or 1 164 kilometers.

Your trip begins in Tacoma, Washington. The price of regular gas is currently averaging $3.54 in Washington.

Your trip ends in Sacramento, California. The price of regular gas is around $3.91 in California.

fuel costs

The following chart displays the difference in total cost of driving given varying fuel grades. If your car requires higher octane gas, you can find out how much more it will cost you to drive between Tacoma, WA and Sacramento, CA.

Fuel grade   Avg Price   Trip Cost
Regular $3.73 $107.73
Mid-Grade $3.83 $110.71
Premium $3.93 $113.70
Diesel $4.08 $117.91

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Tacoma, Washington

City: Tacoma
State: Washington
Country: United States
Category: cities
Average gas price in Washington: $3.54

Sacramento, California

City: Sacramento
State: California
Country: United States
Category: cities
Average gas price in California: $3.91

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