Colonel´s Log

The House on the Hill

2012-01-01T13:04:00.001-08:00

A little incursion on landscape, however I cannot avoid to construct a scene with a human being, in a way that that tells a story to the viewer, hopefully something subtle extrange or disturbing.

Jumpers from another time

2012-01-01T12:57:00.000-08:00

This is an unfinished painting which is a collage from a painting of Sydney Richard Percy and Wall Jumpers from Malcom Morley. The Jumpers, in this case, are running from a 19th century british lanscape. I liked very much the idea and I am planning to finish the painting soon.

A reproduction and 20' Sketches

2012-01-01T12:37:00.000-08:00

The following exercice consisted on a reproduction from Lucien Freud:This was a interesting exercice that maked me to struggle with colors and textures.

Following a set of 20' sketches on canvas mounted on carboard, I am not satisfyed with them, but they served it purpose of oblige me to sinthetize:

Human Figure Exercise (Baroque)

2012-01-01T12:27:00.000-08:00

First Step: Grisaille, lights and shadows, figure cutted on the margin, chiaroscuro

Second Step apply color, emphasis on the lights and shadows.

Colors used in thios exercise: Blue, Red, Yellow, White, Violet, Green Orange.

Human Figure Painting

2012-01-01T11:55:00.001-08:00

Exercise of human figure painting

First Step, a drawing with carbon and later painting

Second Step: Grisaille: painting the shadows and lights with grey

Third Step apply local colors over the grisaille

Fourth Step, paint over the local colors with a restricted palette.

Colors used in this exercise: Naples Yellow, Ochre Yellow, Burnt Earth Sienna, Natural Earth Umber, Burnt Earth Umber

A diptic

2012-01-01T11:27:00.000-08:00

The final exercise to finish the course I was previously describing, was the developmento of a project based on a triptic or a diptic. I choose a diptic.

The Fire

Each one of the paintings work alone however I think that they have more impact together.

The letter.

When I was working in them I was thinking in the relation between them. It is not clear, one gets the light from the other, however they might be at a world of distance, one might be a wife reading a letter from a husband (a soldier?) on the other side of the world just where the fire (explosion?) is.

This is the Diptic expected Layout

They were at an exibition in the Autumm Salon at the Chilean Society of Fine Arts, and "The Fire" got an Honourable Mention.

Variations on the same subject

2012-01-01T11:14:00.000-08:00

Because the Mische Technique is quite slow I did some variations on the subject while the layers of the main painting dried.

A simple portrait painted on white backround without a previous drawing as guideA portrait in a sort of "comic" style based on CSI las Vegas.

Egg Tempera or Mische Technique

2012-01-01T09:54:00.000-08:00

Based on the previous work (The Girl with the Pearl Earing).
I will try to apply somo old masters technique, mixing oil painting with egg tempera, this I have found the sometimes they call it Mische Technique. The steps I applied are as follows:
A wooden 55 x 46 cms panel is prepared with 6 layers of gesso. Then, it is sanded until it shines. Then a red gouache layer is applied as backround. After the gouache layer, I continued with a detailed drawing with soft pencil

The drawing is stabilized with a fixative

When the fixative is dry I applied a layer of medium (a sticky medium made with 1 part of stand oil, 1 part of turpentine and 3 parts of dammar varnish)

This layer is dryed by hand tapping over the panel until it becomes opaque

The next step is paint the lights with egg temperaAfter the lights are ready I applied a layer ocher yellow over the drawing (no a glazing, but a layer of paint) Then when it dryes I applied again the sticky medium and did more lights with egg tempera getting more volume. Then, the next step is apply a glazing on the face with Quinacridone Rose and Indian Yellow

After it comes a glazing of the sweater with cerulean blue, Quinacridone rose, and raw umber
More lights...
More glazing on the face...
More Lights...
Painting of the background...
More glazing...
More lights, etc
Patience...

And finally you may finish applying more paint (paste)

Still is an unfinished work, you have to have much patience in order to not loose the transparencies and the 3D look.

This is a Patience work but it is worth!

2010-10-10T09:58:00.000-07:00

A new semester, a new course, this time I am taking "Five Themes for a painting Project" with Patricia Claro (http://patriciaclaro.blogspot.com/).

The course, in short is as follows: you have to choose a piece of art and copy it in black (optical) and white. After you have to cite this piece of art in a piece of your own with a restricted palette (Primary Red, Lemon Yellow and Cerulean Blue) to finish later with a triptic or diptic of your own. Sounds challenging isn't it?

I began with a copy of Vermeer's "The Girl with a Pearl Earring" I am quite proud of the result, and my teacher also liked it very much, that means a lot for me since she is a great, and well known artist.

2010-10-10T08:57:00.000-07:00

After the nude from my previous post I did an incursion on abstract, painting the following with acrylics. The design was based on a collage I made with several cut outs from magazines.

I have some fun, but I am not really convinced of the result, some people like the painting but I am not convinced of the artistic quality of such a painting. I consider this somehow "decorative" instead of a piece of art.
Following my incursion in the realm of abstraction I continued using acrylics (the preferred media of my teacher, Ricardo Fuentealba-Fabio). This time I painted something related perhaps to Pop Art. The subject is a US Army Mug from the Research and Development Command (my favorite mug) and an arab shemagh I bought in Iraq, the local touch is a the strand and label of tea bag of a popular Chilean local brand which comes from the lid. I painted the background with a sponge roll as I saw on John Myatt's series on TV: the one were they were painting on the style of David Hockney.

In the following painting, still using acrylics, the theme was conflict. I got my material from the Internet, the composition was done based on a couple of photos of some palestinian kids playing soccer and a Israeli chick which was walking on the street carrying a gun. I mix the subjects and I got the following painting. The girl now is watching them on the desert. I think the idea was not bad, but I could not get the result I wanted. The painting has a quite "Comic Style" that I did not wanted this time. Anyway, a the end I participated with these three painting in the exhibition organised at the end of the course.

Many people liked them, so I guess I should be satisfied, but I think I have still a lot to practice and learn.

Human figure

2010-07-18T06:23:00.000-07:00

My first human figure painting, oil on canvas. In this ocassion I sketched with a brush with burnt sienna directly on the canvas, and began to apply shadows and some colors.

The next session I continued defining forms and enhanced shadows and textures.

Later on I began adding some lights, and defining forms a little more

I continued working with lights and on the background. Finally decides to finish the foot, but I was not very happy with it because the model change the original position.

The last session I continued refining some details, and change the foot position to a more natural one. I do not consider the painting finished, but I abandoned the work for now.

Award

2010-07-17T08:21:00.001-07:00

I participated in the Autumm Salon of the Chilean Society of Fine Arts, and I got a Honourable Mention Award for a grafite Self Portrait on paper I published peviously in this site. This was the second award I have got form three times I have sent works to contests. The first ocassion I was five years old, and I got an award from an Airline contest by depicting how comfortable were their flights with the Caravell Rolls-Royce. The second time I was a teen and I failed on getting into the jury's taste on a Soviet Union Embassy Art contest about the theme: "The Worker"; there I participated with a Lumberjack with indian ink. Now, the third time I am on my fifties, and I have got this recognition. Probably I will keep participating.

Pastels Trial

2010-07-17T08:06:00.001-07:00

I tried to do something with pastels, just about one hour trying to work a still life on paper. I was nost satisfied with the result but it still valid as an exercise.

Cartoons: 1975 - 2006

2010-03-20T15:47:00.000-07:00

In 1975 I enter the Military Academy, among the many activities there I was part of the "Journalistic Circle", we edited a school newspaper, dedicated mostly to comment life inside the Academy, poetry, historic ancedotary, and of course, pull the leg of senior cadets and officers. There I got published some of my first cartoons.

In this one above are depicted the feelings of most recruits during their first field exercices. The one below was about the extreme vigilance measures that were taken during the military government to prevent terrorist attacks.

I swear Captain that I was sure he was a terrorist trying to introduce a bomb into the Chimmenney

Almost 30 years later I tried to 'resucitate' the humor, but this time using it as a way to see with a a very personal and crictic eye some aspects of the military life.
Below is a sketch in a notepad of a cartoon drawn probably during a break at the office.

Personally I liked more the office uniform rather than fatigues which most prefer so I tried to present my arguments here:
-I think this is the most comfortable uniform we have.
-I do not think so. I think the best one are the fatigues.
-How can you say that? The fabric is harder, all wrinkled, and boots ar more uncomfortable that shoes!
-To begin, you did not notice dirt, and I do not need changing shirt every day...

Unfortunately I lost the final version, but below there is a middle stage version during photoshop processing:

Here another one: I could not understand why you could not use an umbrella to walk from the parking lot to the building: it was not par of the uniform, but come on! how do you prefer arrive to the office all soaked? and the raincoat was too warm.

Also I never liked the winter office uniform, it was not very 'functional', just good looking. I lost the final photoshop colored version of this one. Anecdotically it circulated via e-mail and was quite popular among the people in charge of ruling and procurement of uniforms. Especially the head of that department. I celebrate their humor!

A graphic story left aside

2010-03-08T15:52:00.000-08:00

I found drawings I did around twenty five years ago. By that time I sketched my last story, then I was very interested in comics, but also I was beginning to study engineering so "something's gotta give" do you guess which one did?
I have been thinking ever since on give a try on comic drawing, but my art creativity suffered in benefit of the sciences.

Oil and Egg Tempera

2010-03-06T13:36:00.000-08:00

My last work on last year's portrait painting course was a portrait of an actor. I wanted to learn how to use egg tempera, unfortunately I did not documented the sequence, but it was as follows:
1. Portrait drawing with charcoal.
2. Fix the charcoal with air spray.
3. Prepare the egg tempera. There are different methods, I use the easy one: mixing pigments (Sonnelier; burnt sienna and white) with the egg yolk (I used five eggs), I did not use any water on the mix (some recipes use distilled water, lineseed oil, etc.)
4. I applied the egg tempera to the background, then shadows and after lights. I had to work rapidly since the egg tempera dries very fast
5. The rest was oil painting, several sessions.
And the result is this:

Some try-outs on watercolor

2010-03-06T13:11:00.000-08:00

Last year I was practicing watercolor painting, here now I present a little sample of my work with this technique:

I began with some invented scenes, and copying stuff from books

Later some sketches with live model (this one is the same of my second oil painting)

The house of a neighbor

A portrait of Andrew Wyeth from a photo I got from the Net

And finally, a small self portrait on Indian ink, watercolor, and some white to fix details.

Marcela, Oil and Alkyd paint

2010-03-06T12:32:00.000-08:00

A new exercise on portrait painting using the technique of glazing, using alquidic paint, now I am using as model a photo of my wife Marcela I took during our honeymoon:

Step One: Charcoal drawing and fixing it with hairspray.

Step Two: Once the drawing is protected by the layer of hairspray give it a thin glaze with a mix of alkyd sap green and burnt sienna thinned with oil medium with a bit of alquidic medium.
Step Three: I begin to put color in it using only burnt sienna and white.

Step Four: I continue adding color, some green and blue to get in the mood, and then some glaze all over the painting with a mix of green and blue with oil and alkyd medium.

Step Five: I fix the size of the reflection which I had it wrong in the first step Continue adding painting to get more detail.
Step Six: I try to make the tones smoother and apply another transparent glaze.
Step Seven: I apply a local glaze on the reflection.

Step Eight: After another local glaze; the finished? Painting.

Even I am not fully satisfied with the painting I think it was a nice exercise. I still have to learn that what I have to do is exercises, not masterpieces, so sometimes among these exercises I might get something good.

Portrait Painting, eigth and nineth session

2009-11-02T10:33:00.000-08:00

During the eight session I worked in the bakground, homeogenizing the painting and applying a thicker layer with a bit of yellow and red, also I widened the shoulders a little, and tried to warm-up the skin. I did not attend to the studio for the nineth session because I went with my wife to a concert of "Il Divo" (I gave her tickets for her birthday) so I took the canvas home and worked based on a photography (the same I posted previoulsy) on the lights, and on the eyes which were not quite right, now they are more open and green, not blue. I also gave some touches to the air and shoulders.

Portrait Painting, seventh session

2009-11-02T10:01:00.001-08:00

During this session the work was on the skin, begining with the shadows and dark tones.

Then I continue with the hair and mid-tones. I was still working with the limited palette of red, yellow and blue, this make the work more difficult because I tried no to use different types of yellow, blue or red despite of the fact it was the teacher's idea. The color of the shirt, for example, was not possible to achieve based on ultramarine blue.

At this stage I am not really satisfied with the results, I have some concerns eith the proportions: the head looks a bit large compared with the rest of the body. I checked again with the model, and it is OK. I will check again during the following stages, and if this impression does not change I will try to fix this effect enhancing the shoulders or something else.

Portrait Painting, Sixth Session

2009-10-29T09:50:00.000-07:00

During this session the task was to paint the background to get rid of the blue, and give the subject a better contrast. After we continue with the shadows, and dark tones of the skin, to finish the session working on the yellow fabric covering the sofa.

Portrait Painting, Fifth Session, New model

2009-10-18T17:16:00.000-07:00

The next session after learning the glaze technique is quite different, now instead of begin with a charcoal portrait as base, we have to underpaint the canvas with a shade of blue, I chose Ultramarine Blue dissolved in a half-half mix of oil and alkyd medium. The layer has to be semitransparent, not thick or opaque.
The model today is a different subject with more fair complexion so we can practice with a different skin color.

The canvas this time is quite big, 1.00 m x 1,20 m so it was not easy to get it covered with blue. After we get it all covered with blue paint, it was time to use the rug to get lights to get the subject initial portrait stage.
We will continue using a limited pallette, the three basic colors , Red, Blue and Yellow and white, we may use diferent types of each one, but I will try to limit myself to Primary Red, Ultramarine Blue, and Cadmium Yellow. This time we will use oils, I will use the Louvre I have from long time ago , which I never used.

After getting the lights, and once we have an acceptable resemblance of the subject we baegin to paint the shadows.After a while I have a general draft and the proportions of the model, still I am not sure of the right proportions, but I measureed again using a stick, and they are right. I assume that the "ot of proportion" feeling is just an optical effect.We finishet this session and we have to wait for the following class.

Portrait Painting, Fourth Session

2009-10-14T09:58:00.000-07:00

Now, in the fourth session, and the last of the glaze technique, we check the painting was dry, and then applied paint to enhance the lights and some shadows to make more contrast on selected areas, finishing the painting.

Portrait Painting, third session

2009-09-13T18:52:00.000-07:00

We returned to our painting, dry again, the surface give me an almost "plastified" feeling, perhaps I used too much alkyd medium.

The first stage now was to enhance the lights. We will leave the glaze for the next session.

My next task was to work on the shirt, it was blue, but because of the limited palette I turned it green, which looks quite nice against the color of the skin.

After finished the shirt, now with a natural hair brush I applied a glaze, with black alkyd paint and normal medium on the hair and shadow areas.

Next Session we will finish with a glaze, and we will get comments and evaluation.

Portrait Painting Course, Second Session

2009-09-04T06:15:00.000-07:00

Finally, a week passed and we return to our painting, now completely dry.

Then we applied new glaze, using the same formula be used before. Warning! I forgot the mix included also non-alkyd medium so I tried to make it thinner adding more and more alkyd medium and the mix stayed very sticky, I had to wipe the excess of glaze with a rug to desaturate the canvas. This glaze was applied selectively by areas, darker in dark areas and thinner in lighter areas such as the face. Then I had the chance to fix some problems such the breast size. After the glaze we get lights again with a rug.

Now we began to paint with the glaze still wet, so we save some time, and the paint integrated easily with the previous layer.

We continue working on contrast, trying to get more volume and character. I had to apply more Burnt Sienna in order to warm up the picture, and get rid of that greenish hue.

We will wait until next session, probably the last one on applying glaze.

Portrait Painting Course

2009-08-28T11:21:00.000-07:00

I have just began to attend to a portrait painting course at the School of Arts of the Catholic University of Chile. Last semester I was attending a watercolour course, my first attempt with painting. It was a nice experience as an introduction to the technique, I will keep practicing and sketching; watercolor is not an easy technique; later I will post some of my work.

The painting sessions will we each thursday. Our teacher is Francisco Schwember, check it out his web page at http://www.franciscoschwember.cl/

Now I am so excited with my first oil painting class that I am posting a sequence of my first four- hours class. The model is in the following photo.

First, we made a portrait sketch of the model in charcoal, which I fixed with airspray (Alberto VO5 worked just OK.)

Following the drawing, we mixed Burnt Sienna and Sap Green (alkyd colors for fast dry) with alkyd medium to make a thin color to apply a glaze. I used Gamblim medium and Windsor and Newton colors. We added standard medium to make the mix thinner an less gooey.

After applying the glaze we used a rag to get the lights from the painting, and have some volumes.

We waited for the glaze to dry while we had cup of coffe, and later we prepare a palette: Sap Green, Burnt Sienna, and Zinc White, mixed with a little of Alkyd white that a classmate kindly provided -it could have been just alkyid white, but I did not get it so we had to improvise. Using just this limited palette we continued painting the subject, light to dark. Now we have to wait until the next session, on thursday evening.

My first exhibition

2009-07-01T11:49:00.000-07:00

I was invited to participate with one drawing at the Human Figure Art Exhibition at Sodimac in Santiago. I presented a chalk sketch on black paper, you may see it in this brochure.

TRUMBO

2009-06-30T08:07:00.001-07:00

I watched “Trumbo” this weekend. It was a documentary about the life of Dalton Trumbo, Hollywood screenwriter and one of the Hollywood Ten, a group of film professionals who testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1947 during the committee's investigation of Communist influences in the motion picture industry. This documentary was filmed on 2008 and it is an interesting film which gives a picture of the McCarthyism and the times and life of this interesting person.

In 1947, Trumbo, along with nine other writers and directors, was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee as an unfriendly witness to testify on the presence of communist influence in Hollywood. Trumbo refused to give information. After conviction for contempt of Congress, he was blacklisted, and in 1950, spent 11 months in prison, and later he moved to Mexico and continued writing scripts for Hollywood with a friend as a “front” for his writings.

Trumbo and others refuse to answer the Congress inquiry on their membership of the communist party, this supported by the first amendment guarantee of freedom of speech and freedom of assembly: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

Trumbo said that the sentence for contempt of the Congress was just, since he really feel contempt for such Congress. Well, I think they could have said “acknowledgement from the parties make discoveries non-essential”.

He was right to have contempt for that Congress, however he was really aligned with the communist party at that time, and later he officially joined it. In my opinion, if we analyze this with the perspective that gives the time passed, and the distance that I have to the facts. And my admiration for the United States as Nation, it is very simple to draw some conclusions that may be not very popular:

That was time of Cold War; USA was threatened by the Soviet Union. Many communists and idealists felt loyalty to the international principles of communism. The representative of communism was the Soviet Union, hence they were a clear danger, even if the idea of prosecute them was not pretty. It is the same danger that today represent Islamic fundamentalism inside the USA borders. Forbid it is un-democratic, but it could turn to be a real danger.

Freedom and democracy will be always threatened by their own philosophy: freedom of speech and freedom of assembly facilitate the work of the enemy, internal or external. On the other hand, if that system defends itself creating organisms for its protection and performing defensive actions it look also as acts against the democratic system.

This ambiguity also is fed by the protagonists. In 1939 Trumbo wrote a prize winning anti-war novel “Johnny Got His Gun” which was quite in synchrony with the feeling of the times. During the beginning years of WWII communist were against the involvement of the US in the war beside England because the USSR was at peace with Germany. In 1941 Trumbo wrote “The Remarkable Andrew”, supporting the neutrality of the United States. However after the 1941 German invasion of the Soviet Union American communists change their minds, and Trumbo decided to suspend the reprint of is previous anti-war novel “Johnny Got His Gun”. After receiving several letters from people who were against the involvement of the US in the war, and wanted a new issue of the novel, Trumbo contacted the FBI and turned these letters to them. What a different in the stand he would have years later when he refused to give information to the Congress on Communist activities!

The movie fail in giving an impartial view of the facts, I agree that Trumbo was quite a personage, and had a very interesting life, but it shows the government and those who were anti-communists at the time as the evil ones. In conclusion: nothing new, the film supports the common idea that McCarthyism was evil and Communism was not a real threat. Things were not that Black and White.

1958-2009

2009-06-25T17:29:00.000-07:00

We will miss you Michael.

Más Dibujos / More Drawings

2009-06-25T13:50:00.000-07:00

Still drawing... I found my real self again through drawing. Years passed and I dedicated myself to other interests leaving drawing and painting on a secondary place. I never stopped completely, but my hobbie was put aside, and restricted mostly to doodling, sketching during conferences and classes, reading books on art, and buying art materials.

Now I have completed the prerequisites to get an Art Diploma from the Catholic University of Chile, and I am taking a course on watercolor. Next semester I am planning on taking another course on portrait oil painting. I hope I will be able to continue on this route.

Re-activation

2009-06-25T09:20:00.001-07:00

Now I am re-activating this blog. I did not save time to do it before. I always have the intention, but I had a little issue with commitment. Now I am taking this seriously thanks to the friends that gave me comments, liked my posts, and encouraged me to continue. So far I have been drifting from professional, personal issues, and hobbies. From now on I will focus my posts on more playful interests such drawing, painting, movies, comics, etc.

Batman

2008-07-24T13:34:00.000-07:00

Por fin Batman en serio, comenzando con Batman Begins y ahora con The Dark Knight. Por fin podemos disfrutar de películas basadas en este personaje que son fieles al comic. Por supuesto se han tomado algunas libertades, pero se mantiene el espíritu del comic, que siempre fue tomado bastante en serio por los diferentes creadores que lo tuvieron a cargo. En serio a pesar de tener episodios cargados de humor, pero en general los personajes eran pensados como personas reales, probablemente con menos conflictos personales como los personajes de Marvel, pero las películas (incluyendo la clásica Serie televisiva y película de los 60’) nunca fueron fieles al espíritu del comic.
Es lamentable, al mismo tiempo que muchos de los comentarios de los medios sean hechos por personas que a veces sólo conocen las películas y no han vivido la evolución del personaje en el comic. Se sorprenden o alaban al excelente papel desempeñado por Heath Ledger como el Joker sin saber que lo más brillante de él es la fidelidad de su interpretación respecto al original. Recordemos que fue él el responsable de la muerte de Robin, después de haberlo sometido a una golpiza descomunal en “Muerte en la Familia”, y también es quién tortura a Gordon y deja paralítica a su hija (Batgirl) en “La broma asesina”.
La mejor crítica del papel de Ledger fue la de Jerry Robinson (creador del Joker en 1939 cuando trabajaba con Bob Kane) “A brilliant performance”. Por fin el Joker volvió a lo que es en el mundo del comic: un criminal sicótico, en lugar del personaje satírico del terrorista loco que personificó Jack Nicholson.

Bocetos y Viñetas

2007-10-27T17:33:00.000-07:00

First it was Science Fiction... then, everything else.

Además de la SF, Siempre me interesaron los temas relacionados con la fantasía heroica, las leyendas nórdicas y la alta edad media. Probablemente influencia de Harold Foster con "Prince Valiant", además del Señor de los anillos y las leyendas del rey Arturo.

Por mucho tiempo para mi sólo existía la tinta china, debido a mi gran interés por los comics.

Siempre con pluma y algunos toques de pincel

Esta de la derecha es una aguada del 83-84, alguna vez la tuve en un muro de la oficina, pero ahora está en una carpeta.

Algo que nunca he logrado es un retrato de Marcela que me deje satisfecho, aquí abajo tengo un boceto de una fotografía, que hice aproximadamente en 1988.

Un tiempo traté de incursionar en el Óleo y ahí traté con el retrato de abajo, pero tampoco logré lo que quería, bueno además estaba la dificultad que nunca había hecho nada al óleo.

Ahora estoy tomando clases, así que espero mejorar la técnica y espero poder intentarlo con más éxito. Eso sí que seguiré con fotos ya que no creo que logre mantenerla por dos o tres horas quieta posando para mí.

Aquí abajo hay algunos de los dibujos que he hecho ultimamente.

Native American

2007-10-27T17:25:00.000-07:00

Este el único dibujo que está enmarcado, se lo regalé a la Marce cuando estábamos recién casados, es un dibujo a tinta china, no recuerdo de donde saqué el motivo, probablemente alguna revista.

2007-10-27T17:15:00.000-07:00

He estado Fotografiando mis dibujos.

Este es uo de los favoritos de la Marce, desgraciadamente no le puse fecha, pero debe ser cerca del '85. Desgraciadamente parece que el papel tiene algun tipo de moho.

¿Pueden ver quien es?

He sobrevivido una semana

2007-10-27T10:38:00.000-07:00

Y va una semana sin la Marce, So far so good.

El sábado pasado fui a Home Center y compré una bodega de jardín: una sorpresa para el regreso. Ella ya me tuvo una vez de sorpresa un garaje.

El fin de semana pasado también les entregué a los niños mi "Orden del Día " para las vacaciones de la mamá. Fijé unas reglas simples para el orden y la convivencia. Hasta ahora han funcionado bien.
Hemos hablado todos los días con la mami. A veces me pregunto si sería mejor no hacerlo para cooperar con su desconeccíon (aunque el miércoles nos demoramos un poquitín y nos llamó ella, a pesar que era su cumpleaños y obviamente la llamaríamos de todas maneras)

He descubierto Skype! bueno, no realmente descubierto ya que tengo una cuenta hace basatante tiempo, pero ahora lo hemo usado bastante y funciona en forma excelente ¡Todavía no puedo creer que no he gastado ni siquiera tres dólares en llamada a USA!

Hoy traje un jardinero para preparar el jardin para la llegada de la Marce, es el jardinero de la oficina (no sé cómo no se ocurrió traerlo antes.) el jardín estaba hecho un desastre. Espero que a Marcela le guste como está quedando. En realidad se necesita una mano profesional de vez en cuando.

Primer día de Vacaciones de la Marce.

2007-10-19T15:46:00.000-07:00

Ayer dejamos a la Marce en el Aeropuerto, partió a Nueva York en las primeras vacaciones sola desde que nos casamos.

Ayer cuando salíamos al aeropuerto dije: “comienza la más grande aventura…” y la Marce me dijo que no la pusiera nerviosa. Le dije: “no es por tu viaje, es por mí que me quedo solo con los niños, a cargo de la casa” y era verdad.
El agujero en el estómago que tenía ayer lo tuve que disimular, por la Marce y principalmente por la Gabi que se puso muy triste cuando asumió que la mamá se iba.

Cuando llegamos a la casa la Gabi le dio comida a los gatos y le dio la misma comida al Kobe –dijo que también le gustaba. Aproveché para decirle que el martes igual invitara a dormir a la Manuela, así le sirve de compañía.

El remedio para la Gabi al final no fue tan complicado, la invité a dormir conmigo y aceptó, necesitaba un poquito de regaloneo. Así que nos pusimos a buscarle un regalo de cumpleaños a la mamá, que lo pudiéramos comprar por Internet y enviárselo a la casa de Katy, ahí se le pasó la pena. Vimos varias joyitas con motivos célticos e irlandeses, que es lo que degustaría regalarle y sé que le gustan; este fin de semana creo que lo vamos a comprar, de tal modo que le llegue el Miércoles 23. Después que Gabi se puso pijama se dedicó a estudiar matemáticas, aunque era bastante tarde, la dejé por un rato por que le gusta esa materia –potencias, y le ayudaba a quitarse la pena.
Gonza llegó tarde, no supe a qué hora, pero mantuvo la costumbre de avisar.

Hoy ya es otro día y pasó la penita.

Esta mañana me levanté rápidamente, me duché y partí a preparar desayuno, la Gabi se comió un barrita de cereal y la Kiki tenía un letrero que entraba a las 10, lo que fue bueno, ya que Gabi no quería llegar muy temprano al colegio debido al problema con unas compañeras que había tenido el día antes.

Me puse a organizar las cosas, en realidad todo está bastante ordenado, así que espero no tener que hacer muchas cosas. Por ahora organicé las colaciones para el día: Con post-it indiqué cual era la colación de cada uno y las dejé sobre la tapa de la cocina, bien alineadas.

Cuando salimos, después de lavarse los dientes, Gabi me dijo que había amanecido con los ojos chiquititos.

En el auto, me recordó que hoy, la mamá de la Javi la va llevar para la casa. Quedé de avisarle a la Patty.

Llegamos al colegio a la misma hora de siempre y le dejé bien, le dije que me llamara ante cualquier cosa y si quería me llamara en el recreo para conversar.

A la 9 llamé a la Kiki, para que no se quedara dormida.

El día siguió sin grandes novedades, Gonza me llamó a mediodía para perguntame quién iría a buscar a la Gabi a la salida del colegio y me dijo que tiene un cumpleaños.
La Kiki pasó a buscar mis llaves como a las 5pm ya que las suyas se le habían perdido (realmente estaban el la secadora de ropa en una chaqueta)
Ahora estamos en la casa y Gabi está cocinando, yo quería comoda rápida, pero ella insiste en cocinar, estoy condenado a tener siempre una dueña de casa a cargo de todo.
Acabamos de llamar a la Marce por Skype y llegó bien, está lloviendo en CT y hace un tremendo calor.

Veremos que nos espera a continuación...

2007-01-04T09:18:00.000-08:00

"El Mercurio" Miércoles 3 de Enero 2007

Frankenstein

Señor Director:

El año termina junto con el monstruo de Frankenstein.Recuerdo haber seguido las películas de Frankenstein cuando niño y recuerdo que esperaba asustarme mucho, ya que me aterrorizaba la idea de este monstruo formado con trozos de cadáveres que acechaba en la oscuridad. También recuerdo cómo poco a poco durante la película uno empatizaba con el monstruo: éste no era tan monstruoso como parecía en un principio. Nadie lo comprendía a él ni a su naturaleza. Realmente era más una víctima que un victimario. La gente se asustaba y por eso lo odiaban y deseaban destruirlo. El verdadero culpable, el malvado de la película, si había uno, era realmente el Dr. Frankenstein, su creador.

Estos recuerdos se me vinieron a la mente al conocer la noticia de la ejecución de Saddam Hussein, condenado a muerte por sus enemigos aun antes de que dejara el poder de su país. Saddam, un desalmado criminal según algunos, la mayoría de los cuales se rigen por patrones culturales diferentes y cuya concepción del mundo es totalmente ajena a aquella que tienen los protagonistas directos de esta historia, fue también el padre del Irak moderno, el artífice de la moderna red de carreteras que cruza el país, el mecenas de las artes y los artistas que proliferan en ese país, el impulsor de la ciencia y la tecnología; fue también el protector de aquel patrimonio de la humanidad que es la ciudad de Babilonia, en la cual no se dejaba ni siquiera recoger una piedra del suelo para preservarla. Aquella maravilla del mundo antiguo donde después de su derrota, acamparon los soldados de Estados Unidos sin guardar el más mínimo respeto a la integridad de la "cuna de la civilización", no sólo de Babilonia, sino de todo el país mesopotámico.

El monstruo de Frankenstein. Quizás Saddam lo fue. En internet se pueden ver videos de cuando aún era el dictador favorito de Occidente. Donald Rumsfeld lo saludaba feliz, mucho antes de desear su eliminación. Estados Unidos lo apoyaba, armándolo, mientras fuera útil.Recuerdo la última entrevista que dio Saddam a un famoso periodista norteamericano poco antes de la invasión. En esa ocasión, su intérprete le decía al periodista: Bush dijo esto y esto otro, ante lo cual Saddam Hussein interrumpió la traducción, interpelando al intérprete y corrigiéndolo: "llámelo Presidente Bush". Caballerosidad que sus enemigos jamás tuvieron con él.En Irak han muerto más iraquíes desde la invasión de la Coalición que en todo el gobierno de Saddam Hussein.

Ahora Saddam ha muerto y me deja la sensación de aquellas viejas películas de Frankenstein: una tristeza interna, una sensación de que realmente no se ha hecho justicia, más bien venganza. Quizás no sea así, pero no puedo dejar de creer que Irak (y quizás el mundo) estaba mejor con él, que como está hoy.

José D. Salinas Huerta

Ex Inspector Jefe del Equipo Multidisciplinario de UNMOVIC
Inspector de Armamento en Irak 2001-2004

2006-01-19T09:30:00.000-08:00

This January we went for holidays to Pichidangui, a beach two hours north of Santiago, there we had a nice ride!

2006-01-19T09:16:00.000-08:00

Last September I met Professor Yosi Akao, Father of Quality Function Development

2005-09-28T19:38:00.000-07:00

En Noviembre se cumpliran tres años de mi llegada a Irak como inspector de Nacionas Unidas. ¡Una experiencia única!

In November there will be three years since I arrived in Iraq as UN Inspector. A unique experience!

The Beginning

2005-09-28T19:16:00.000-07:00

Ok, this is my first entry. I hope this will be a long relationship..., well that depends in how constant I'd be. I guess at the beginning it will be somehow erratic, both in contents and timing. I'm still thinking about the language I should use, it could be Spanish or English. My English is not very good but you can reach much more people that way.I think that's all for now. See ya.