A Merry New Year

New Year Journey - Schnitkunst by Nigel A.  JAMES

New Year 2011






I would not only like to wish you a very happy new year, but also, and, perhaps more importantly, I would like to wish you yourself!



All the very best to you,

Nigel A. JAMES - Vienna









My email address is the following: njmailboy@gmail.com

Carolina Gabmeyer

Carolina Gabmeyer with her mother, Sissi Gabmeyer - photo by Nigel A. JAMES

Christmas Carol


The best Christmas presents of all are the people one meets! And, the best surprises of all are the friends who step out of the past. And, just two or three days ago, at the Christmas market at Schönbrunn in Vienna, I had the tremendous pleasure of meeting, once again, Carolina Gabmeyer.

Time goes quickly, this we all know, and, the ten - or so - years since last I saw her have gone like the unseen wind that blows the days and the time on their way; but, currents of air can bring people together again.

Within the last ten years, Carolina’s life has taken her from the sleepy little town of Baden, just south of Vienna, to St.Polten, the provincial capital of Lower Austria, where she started her studies, and, finally to Berlin where she is currently finishing her studies in the field of graphic-arts.

Of course, living in Berlin, Carolina is able to compare Vienna, the capital of Austria with Berlin. Berlin, she says, has a hum and a drum about it which makes it the best place to be when one’s young. Vienna, on the other hand, is a place which provides a deep cultural balance and a chance to turn down the action to a speed that’s in-between running and jogging. In other words, both places are great, it’s all a question of timing and age!

But, home is home wherever one may be, and, just south of Vienna upon the plain where the wine slopes end, is the place that Carolina will always come back to!

Ice Berg or Opera House or Neither

Opera Dream - pencil drawing by Nigel A. James

Visual Harmonics!

This was how the Sydney Opera House should have been! The real thing turned out to be a little bit different. This construction, just like the Sydney opera house, relies upon water to give it that extra dimension of depth, which - of course - can only be obtained if the height has identical dimensions! Of course, being in Australia, or, if you prefer, Down-under, the opera house has to be the same from which ever angle you choose to admire it from! Down is up, and up is down! The only differences in the construction are the shades, which, due to the fact that the building is in the southern hemisphere, are automatically reversed.

My e-mail address is, njmailboy@gmail.com

Anita Nitsch-Fitz

The Dream Keeper


There is something extremely enchanting about a cinema, and, it takes a very magical person to run one; and one such spellbinding person is Anita Nitsch-Fitz. And her cinema, the Breitenseer Lichtspiele, is something quite special. It is not only the oldest in Vienna, but also the oldest of all. Wherever in the world you may go, you will find none that is older.

In its canyon of permanent darkness, the Breitenseer Lichtspiele has been playing out the magical world of shadows and light since 1905; and, it was into this world, in which moving dreams could be frozen, re-wound, fast-forwarded and repeated at will, that Anita Nitsch-Fitz was born and grew up in.

Hers was the time of the black and white greats: Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplain, and the Keystone Cops amongst others. Theirs was the world of silent expression in which the pure art of acting excluded the need of speech which was wasted.

The silent films were globalization in the truest sense of the word, and, it was to this world of innocent fun, that thousands were able go and to hide from a desperate world that was sliding and sinking into an ever-deepening hole of suffering and chaos.

But, when it gets dark the morning always comes, and, at the end of the war, the Breitenseer Lichtspiele was still there; and when Anita Nitsch-Fitz took it over, the cinema was experiencing its best time of all. TV was still a dot upon the horizon, and, night after night, all over the world, illusions and dreams were still shining brightly and brilliantly going from reel to reel.

Now-a-days, with the changing of times, Anita Nitsch-Fitz has changed her cinema as well. It has now become a monument to the very best of what this greatest art form has ever produced. Her programme is not only interesting and varied, but it is full of surprises as well.

But one thing is sure, and that is, as long as Anna Nitsch-Fitz keeps opening her doors, our illusions and the magic of the dark, the light and the shadows can continue. For Anita Nitsch-Fitz is a keeper of dreams.

Our joy can continue!


The Breitenseer Lichtspiele - 1140 Wien. Breitenseerstrasse 21.
http://www.bsl-wien.at/

My address. njmailboy@gmail.com