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September | World Alzheimer's Month

The theme for World Alzheimer's Day 2011 is Faces of Dementia according to the Alzheimer's Disease International - ADI - and a lot it's been deliberated.

//

Alzheimer's Disease is a specific form of Dementia, accounting about 50-70% of cases of Dementia and manifests through specific microscopic brain abnormalities.

Even today it’s almost impossible to see such brain irregularities, so for a doctor to definitively distinguish Alzheimer’s from other types of Dementia requires a thorough patient history, medical tests and an examination to define the patient’s abilities.

Alzheimer's Disease progresses slowly, beginning with loss of short-term memory, loss of judgment, the ability to feel things, consciousness, language, speech and also the ability to interact with the environment. 

Alzheimer's Disease is not a normal part of aging. It is a progressive disease (worsens over time) and is the sixth leading cause of death in the U.S..

Dementia is an impairment of thinking and memory which will interfere with a person’s ability to do things he or she was previously able to do.

In short, Dementia is more of a symptom, and encompasses the deterioration of the brain and intellectual abilities which are a result of an unspecified disease or disorder of the brain. A diagnosis of Dementia is useless in itself unless you know what is causing the Dementia. 

There are other causes of Dementia besides Alzheimer’s disease such as Parkinson’s disease, a stroke, a brain injury and even extreme dehydration.

Distinguishing Alzheimer’s disease and Dementia differences is crucial because some causes of Dementia are treatable and potentially curable, while Alzheimer's has no cure - there are treatments that slow the symptoms and ensure a better life for patients.

* Personal

During 2005 I was a volunteer at the Brazilian Association of Alzheimer's - ABRAz, for the simple commitment to volunteer.
Returned in 2011 for family reasons and in order to join the cause.

ABRAz is an non-governmental organization that provides information to families, professionals and caregivers in touch with Alzheimer's Disease patient. Helps informing the population through support groups, courses for families, scientific updates for professionals, family's personal service, newsletters, ...
ABRAz believes that information is a way to provide to a person with Alzheimer's Disease and his family a better quality of life.

As September is a month of intensive activity and with the proximity of the World's Day (21st), I decided to write this post about Tatsumi Orimoto, more specifically about the series "The Art Mama".





Before "The Art Mama" became a personal issue to my life, I used to be shocked by that artistic shameless exposure of a patient with Alzheimer's. I even wonder why that Orimoto work was called art?
And not in the foolish way to discuss what art is, but I feel sad to see that mother with no consciousness, no cognitive capacity, exposed to the world amplified in large pictures, unable to behave rationally to (possible) ridicule. Well ...



Life + Reality

Actually "The Art Mama" is very far from ridiculous. It is a work that captures the most contemporary issues about aging, self-image and 'excluded' from society.



Orimoto said:

"My art is daily life, my daily life is art.

"For a few years I've been living with my mother, who's very sick.

"Every day I care for her, cook for her, help her with everything. Although she can walk, it's very strenuous for her, so she stays in bed almost all day. She also has problems with her memory, but she recognizes me.

"Yes, it's difficult; my daily life is devoted to her.
I thought that if that's the situation I'm going to be in, then we'll just make art out of it.

"I'm interested in people, and my artistic work is communication.
"The Art Mama is the work that I do together with my mother, and I imagine that it will continue for another couple of years."

© interview by Gerhard Haupt & Pat Binder | 2001

*******

When I've questioned Orimoto's "The Art Mama" was just because my impotence to expose my mother if under similar conditions.
Fortunately today I admire the courage and strength that carries this series.



How many of us should expose issues of contemporary society as Orimoto does?
When our private problems could so explicitly benefit society in an artistic way like this?


*******

Tatsumi Orimoto was born in 1946 / Kawasaki
        studied at the California Institute of the Arts
        1971 moved to New York
         1977 returned to Kawasaki due to his mother diagnosis

        He is best known for "Bread Man" performances

         Lives and works with her mother in Kawasaki, Japan

© All copyright remains with photographer Tatsumi Orimoto, Courtesy DNA







Bibliography
ADI  |  ABRAz São Paulo  |  Issues with Alzheimer  |  Universes in Universe  |  DNA Gallery  |  DNA bio  |  TA Art Projects  |  Get Addicted to ...  |  A Foundation  |  Art in Liverpool  |  Photography Now  |  Google Images  |  Facebook

Solar System Scope is a interactive 3D model of planets and constellations moving over the night sky. Illustrates real-time celestial positions.

by Mito

Documentary about the life and ideas of Ray Kurtzweil



Barry Ptolemy director interviewed by Jason Silva

Via @JovaughnBrown

What is the future of A.I., and where could it potentially lead us?

trailer 1 | trailer 2

Plug & Pray doesn't only explore the world in which computer science, robotics, neuroscience, and psychology merge, but the philosophical questions that we must explore along the way.

Via Ray Kurzweil

C o m p e t i t i o n

Which technology do you think will have the biggest impact on human life in the next 30 years?

YOUR ENTRY here
Closing date: Tuesday 1 March 2011

Drop City is a feature-length documentary film about an experimental community that blended practices of art, architecture, and sustainable living in ways that came to define a global counterculture.



Drop City’s founders called themselves droppers in reference to their original and self-stylized form of conceptual art. The term Drop Art was coined well before the era-branding slogan Turn on, tune in, drop out.



The Droppers’ vision of life-as-art was evidenced in their iconographic dwellings, which were based on Buckminster Fuller’s geodesic domes and the crystalline designs of Steve Baer, a pioneer in fractal geometric designs and solar energy. The Droppers were opposed to work-for-pay and used salvaged materials, including culled lumber and chopped-out car tops. In 1966, Buckminster Fuller honored Drop City with his Dymaxion Award for “poetically economic structural accomplishments.”

Via an ambitious project collapsing
Drop City
A documentary film by Joan Grossman & Tom McCourt
info
watch the trailer

A clone can't live as long as you - it can live shorter or longer but mostly shorter.

A clone can live as long as it wants.

Why do we need a clone? Do you think that a clone could feel like a natural being like us, can it feel frustrated, sad, joy or even hunger?

extracted from WikiAnswers

more - - > watch Moon by Duncan Jones | 2009

The effect of the lifebox would be to make such immortality accessible to a wider range of people.
Rudy Rucker

"The superbly-designed website SpaceCollective dedicates itself to study of topics such as transhumanism, robotics, experimental architecture, and pretty much anything else that one can equate to “living the life of science fiction today.”
by Nadya Lev on December 6th, 2010
to read complete post
Coilhouse magazine + blog



# SC clipping