It was a rough week, ending in a beautiful-open-sky evening, the beginning of hopefully a beautiful summer in Rio.
Had a caipirinha with a good friend who decided I needed some soul. Some calls around and we ended up in a beautiful hillside house overlooking Rio with some of the finest music performances I’ve ever attended… ethereal vocals over marimbas and steel drums..

Was dropped off at Lagoa at sunrise and walked home at 5am, just when the rowing club opened.
And decided to enroll. Life should be more often light and sunny.

Track in MP3 here; you should buy the full album here, you’ll cherish the soul of these guys.

Bob Burnquist, one of the most famous Brazilian skateboarders. Last year he became the first skateboarder to land a fakie to fakie 900 on a megaramp.

éS Menikmati Part 7 Bob Burnquist from éS Skateboarding on Vimeo.

TV Escola made these excellent series about Brazilian a few years ago and now they can be found on Youtube.
The world has changed (a lot) since these series were made, nevertheless interesting to watch.

Rio de Janeiro:

Brasilia:

With the upcoming 2014 Worldcup and 2016 Olympics, the Brazilian police will start using small cameras fitted to glasses that can capture 400 facial images per second and end them to a central computer database storing up to 13 million faces.
The system can compare biometric data at 46,000 points on a face and will immediately signal any matches to known criminals or people wanted by police.
If there is a match a red signal will appear on a small screen connected to the glasses, alerting the police officer of the need to take further action or make an arrest.

Article in The Telegraph of this weekend.

This system would be quite useless in Holland and Belgium, it would give constant errors:

Video from James Fitzpatrick “Traveltalk” to add to the many books we crave on Rio de Janeiro in the 20s – 60s.

Sometimes, in the midst of treadmill, 48h of uncertainty is all one needs to remember what’s truly precious in life.
Thanks to all who stood strong by our side.

Sometimes, when all that’s lost remains
Drink from the fountain of youth and never age again
Sometimes we jump across to every cloud
Fly away get lost and never be found

Brazilian designer Frederico Duarte was featured in the South African Design Indaba last year.

Big fan of the makeover of houses he did in the Santa Marta favella in Rio.

Sao Paulo has had its SP-Arte for many years, the next edition is form may 12-15.

Good to read that also Rio will now have its yearly contemporary art exhibition: ArtRio, taking place from April 7-11. 77 galleries already confirmed attending.

Jens Mollenvanger got featured on Rio Etc.

Check out his book “Antwerp Street Style”