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. With Books, the idea, cont’d: As monumental architecture
Mr. Portigal (thanks!) points out this Metafilter post that I’d missed:
In the capital of Turkmenistan stands an enormous statue of a book. Every evening at 8PM, the statue swings open and a recently deceased dictator’s magnum opus, the Ruhnama, is broadcast throughout the square while a video from within the statue shows his image.
The post links to a documentary maybe by Finnish filmmakers and available on YouTube in 10 parts. I did not watch the whole thing. In this part, however, at about the 4:35 mark, there’s some twilight / nighttime footage of the book swinging open. I know precisely zero about the rather dodgy-sounding politics here, but an immense book that swings open, onto which video images are projected, is fascinating.
Click to see YouTube video; I’ve punched up this image a little.
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Reader Comments
I remember reading about this, in the New Yorker I think…dodgy politics indeed, and a fascinating story worth trying to find in their archives.
I am loving this books miniseries. You are aware that you have practically no choice but to release a coffee table book about the idea of books, I hope!
Ha, yes, well, if a publisher expressed interest in such a thing, I’d be happy to do it. As you can tell, I’m addicted to this train of thought.