![]() But in that case the lesson will be repeated, more and more painfully, until we learn it, or our children must. The opposite, more likely: it will simply be a further emanation of that disproportionate self-assurance that I have been speaking of. But this will not be a sign that they have understood the message that the crisis sent us. ![]() Until they are released and allowed to return to our minds things will not go well."Īfter this crisis a thousand and one theorists will emerge to describe precisely how and why it happened and how to prevent it happening in future. Strangeness, unnaturalness, mystery, inconceivability have been shifted out of the world of serious thought into the dubious closets of suspicious people. Not to bring oneself to admit it is the path to hell. Strange things are happening and will happen. A small and inconspicuous challenge for us not to take everything automatically for granted. "I regard the recent crisis as a very small and very inconspicuous call to humility. He takes the recent economic crash as an example of the way in which an apparently rational and entirely controlled system suddenly showed that it was neither of these things. Vernissage, de Václav Havel (extrait) Compagnie Libre dEsprit 16 subscribers Subscribe 1 Share 231 views 6 years ago 13 février 2016 à 18h, au Centre Tchèque de Paris. And perhaps the most attractive and persuasive part of Havel's speech is that he knows this. Naturally this won't convince anyone who finds self-evident the foundations of their own world view. We have totally forgotten what all previous civilisations knew: that nothing is self-evident." We are convinced that this supposed omniscience of ours which proclaims the staggering progress of science and technology and rational knowledge in general, permits us to serve anything that is demonstrably useful, or that is simply a source of measurable profit, anything that induces growth and more growth and still more growth, including the growth of agglomerations.īut with the cult of measurable profit, proven progress and visible usefulness there disappears respect for mystery and along with it humble reverence for everything we shall never measure and know, not to mention the vexed question of the infinite and eternal, which were until recently the most important horizons of our actions. ".not only a globally spreading short-sightedness, but also the swollen self-consciousness of this civilisation, whose basic attributes include the supercilious idea that we know everything and what we don't yet know we'll soon find out, because we know how to go about it. Havel was speaking at a conference which focusses on architecture but he sees exurban sprawl as the outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual disgrace: This is a similar vision of the horror of modern life to that which animates Rowan Williams, with his talk of "the fantasy that you can organise the world to suit yourself". There is emerging a new type of a previously described existential phenomenon: unbounded consumer collectivity engenders a new type of solitude." And on the occasions it tries to imitate something local or original, it looks altogether suspect, because it is obviously a purpose-built fake. The Los Angeles Chapter of the Czechoslovak Society of Arts & Sciences sponsored a first-class reception in the museum’s garden before the actual film screening, and the guests appreciated the Czech specialities."Our cities are being permitted without control to destroy the surrounding landscape with its nature, traditional pathways, avenues of trees, villages, mills and meandering streams, and build in their place some sort of gigantic agglomeration that renders life nondescript, disrupts the network of natural human communities and under the banner of international uniformity it attacks all individuality, identity or heterogeneity. Jim McDonald, the film’s main figure, was present and applauded. The audience was greeted by Justin Jampol, the Wende Museum’s founder and director, by Adam Hyman, Executive Director of Los Angeles Film Forum, and by Consul Josef Smyček of the Consulate General of the Czech Republic in Los Angeles. ![]() The Panel was moderated by Joes Segal, chief curator of the Wende Museum. Kate Dollenmayer,Īmerican actor and film preservation specialist, who has credit for preserving this film, took part in the Panel as well. The Society’s Secretary General Georges Eichler came from Paris to honor the late Ambassador Perina and to take part in the Panel Discussion. The film was introduced by his daughter Kaja Perina who lives in New York. ![]() Ambassador Rudolf Perina, distinguished member of the Czechoslovak Society of Arts & Sciences, who personally took part in the 1968 film making and its 2018 preservation, had planned to introduce this film to the public in person. The Wende Museum, specializing in the Cold War artefacts, has preserved and digitalized the only remaining copy of this 50-minute documentary, with financial support from the National Film Preservation Foundation sponsored by the U.S. Kate Dollenmayer, Georges Eichler, Kaja Perina, Joes Segal
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