Oddity Central |
- Artist Twists Aluminum Wire into Beautiful Tree Sculptures
- Young Woman Is Strangely Addicted to Sponges and Soap
- Poveglia – The Venetian Island of the Dead
- Mysterious Real-Life Robin Hood Leaves Envelopes of Cash to the Needy
| Artist Twists Aluminum Wire into Beautiful Tree Sculptures Posted: 08 Mar 2012 04:02 AM PST
I find it fascinating how some artists can turn rigid materials into works of art that seem almost organic. Pint in case, Kevin Iris, a man who creates beautiful tree sculptures exclusively from aluminum wire. A self-proclaimed “treenut” Kevin Iris has been making incredibly detailed tree sculptures from aluminum wire for the last 23 years. His works vary in shape and size, as he’s trying to inspire different emotions with each one, but the most remarkable thing that’s common to all of them is that they are made only out of twisted wire. That means he uses no glue, coatings or any other substances. he simply takes tens of feet of aluminum wire and twists them into a variety of shapes. As you can imagine, Kevin’s artistic process is very laborious and time-consuming. For example, talking about the aluminum tree n the photo below, the artist says "I average about 26 leaves per strand so I have about 10,062 leaves up there on the top. This [22-inch wide] tree took about 450 hours or so of hands on twisting wire time over four months." Pretty remarkable stuff…
Photos via Kevin Iris’ Deviant Art profile. Artist Twists Aluminum Wire into Beautiful Tree Sculptures was originally posted at OddityCentral.com  |
| Young Woman Is Strangely Addicted to Sponges and Soap Posted: 08 Mar 2012 03:22 AM PST
While the rest of the world is awakening to the benefits of eating organic food, 21-year-old Kerry Trebilcock is doing just the opposite. Actually, what she eats isn't even food. The young girl from Cornwall eats (yes, eats) soap and sponges. So far, she's consumed 4,000 washing sponges and over 100 bars of soap. Well, I suppose she at least has super-clean intestines! It's no laughing matter though, as Kerry is suffering from a condition called Pica, which makes her crave things that have nothing to do with food. People with Pica are known to eat a variety of things ranging from metal to sand, and even chalk, coal, light bulbs and furniture. For a long time, Kerry's diet consisted of sponges dipped in tea or hot chocolate, or spiced up with mustard and BBQ sauce. She would never leave the house without a snack – a small plastic bag of cut up sponges and sauce in a Tupperware. Photo © The Sun But Kerry wasn't always like this, she ate normally until the year 2008. It was during a vacation in Morocco that she picked up a hookworm infection of the intestines. Things haven't quite been the same since, and her eating habits steadily worsened. Initially, she would only crave junk food, but soon that wasn't enough to satisfy her craving. Even after a double helping of lasagna and a tub of ice cream, she would still be hungry. One fine day, she happened to take a new sponge out to do the dishes and had an overwhelming desire to eat it. When she gulped it down with the help of some water, her hunger was finally gone. Photo © The Sun As satisfied as eating sponges made her feel, Kerry was terrified of what was happening to her. "I knew something was very wrong with me but I didn't want to tell anyone as I felt like a freak," she said. In 2009, she finally mustered up the courage to confide in a friend and see a doctor. It was then that she was diagnosed with Pica, and was told that her digestive system could be seriously damaged. Fortunately, Kerry has some hope of recovery and has been put on a program of counseling and vitamins as well. Now, she's been able to cut back to just one-inch squares of sponge and three teaspoons of organic soap along with each meal. "One day I will beat this and be able to have a shower or do the washing-up without feeling hungry," she says. We sure hope she does. via The Sun Young Woman Is Strangely Addicted to Sponges and Soap was originally posted at OddityCentral.com  |
| Poveglia – The Venetian Island of the Dead Posted: 08 Mar 2012 03:10 AM PST
When I first saw a picture of Poveglia Island, I couldn't help but notice how pretty it is. But then I read the story behind the place and let me tell you, there's nothing pretty about it. For centuries, the island has attracted nothing but the worst fate, with hundreds of thousands of people suffering torturous deaths. Today the island may look uninhabited, but legend suggests otherwise… Poveglia is located in northern Italy, in the Venetian Lagoons. It has no owners and entry to the place is strictly forbidden. The only time any visits are made is to harvest vineyards. Even fisherman won't venture intot the waters near the island, for fear of catching human bones in their nets. For a time, it was owned by the Italian state but was sold to a private buyer in the 1960s. The poor guy lived there for a short while, but abandoned the place after a short while. More recently, a family was known to have purchased Poveglia in an attempt to convert it into a holiday home, but again, they couldn't spend more than one night there. Rumors say that their daughter's face was split open and 14 stitches were needed to fix it. Photo by Chris 73 So what exactly is it that makes the beautiful island one of the most haunted and evil locations in the world? Well, it all began during the Roman era. Poveglia was used as a dumping ground for plague victims, in order to isolate them from the general population. Centuries later, the island served the same purpose during the period of Black Death, one of the most devastating pandemics in human history. The dead were dumped into large pits on the island and burned. In a state of panic, the people who showed even the slightest signs of illness were dragged away to Poveglia and burned alive. Legend goes that over 160,000 people were burned there during this period. Even today, the soil of the island, along with the charred remains of the bodies, has created a thick layer of sticky ash that covers the entire place. Photo by tedlum Several centuries later, in 1922, more terrible things began to happen. A large psychiatric hospital was constructed on the island, complete with a bell tower. While the doctors and nurses noticed nothing unusual, the mentally imbalanced patients reported sightings of ghosts of the plague victims. They said that they could hear the tortured people wail and scream all through the night . But no one took them seriously, considering their mental condition. And now comes the most horrible part of all, although it sounds so much like a movie that I wonder if it has been made up. There was supposedly this evil lunatic doctor at the hospital who would torture patients in the name of finding cures for insanity. He would take them up to the bell tower and perform lobotomies on them using hammers, chisels and hand drills. Photo by ntenny Legend has it that after several years of torturing patients, the evil doctor was finally able to see the spirits of Poveglia himself. In a fit of madness, he ran up to the bell tower and jumped, but the fall didn't kill him. According to witnesses, as he lay writhing in pain on the ground, a mist came up from nowhere and strangled him to death. He was then bricked up in the bell tower, according to the story, and continues to haunt the island today. Seems to me that the part about the doctor sounds totally made up, though. Photo by ntenny Nevertheless, the island paints a scary picture to all those who read about it. Psychics who have visited the place in order to investigate have left scared to death and unable to return. Everyone who has been there reports that a heavy, dark and evil atmosphere shrouds the place, and the tortured moans can sometimes be heard. A particularly scary account comes from a daredevil who managed to spend a night on the island. He said that as soon as he entered the abandoned asylum, he heard a strange, booming voice commanding him to, "Leave immediately and do not return." I don't know how he even made it out of there, if it were me, I would have died of a heart-attack right there. Poveglia – The Venetian Island of the Dead was originally posted at OddityCentral.com  |
| Mysterious Real-Life Robin Hood Leaves Envelopes of Cash to the Needy Posted: 08 Mar 2012 02:49 AM PST
It's nothing short of a modern-day miracle,when envelopes stuffed with cash just keep appearing all over town. And not just small cash, we’re talking large amounts. Since late last year, envelopes containing sums up to 10,000 euros are being mysteriously 'given' to those who are in need of money, in the German town of Braunschweig. The donated money that's been accounted for so far amounts to a whopping 200,000 euros. While the benefactor is unknown, the beneficiaries have so far “suspected” a hospice, a robbery victim, various charities, and also the family of a handicapped boy. The cash-stuffed envelopes have been left in prayer books in churches, beneath doormats and also in letterboxes. There are several theories as to who is behind this sudden 'shower' of cash in the settlement. Some say that it could be a lottery winner and others feel it's probably someone who's received a large inheritance. Whoever it may be, the person is being hailed as a present-day reincarnation of Robin Hood, who we're not yet sure if is stealing from the rich, but is certainly giving to the needy. The cash donations are accompanied by clippings from the local newspaper, the Braunschweig Zeitung, carrying a story that the paper covered about the people in need. The first envelope contained twenty 500 euro notes and was left for a crime victim, after the newspaper posted an article about her. When the paper reported the story of 14-year-old Tom, who was left seriously injured after a swimming accident, a bundle of notes was left in his name at the newspaper's office. As wonderful as the story sounds, I'm incredibly curious to know about the person behind all the envelopes. For now, the people of Braunschweig are happy, barring the Finanzamat, the local tax office. Understandably, the officials aren't particularly enthusiastic about all the tax they are getting cheated out off. For the rest of the city however, it certainly does seem to be a blessing in disguise. via Spiegel Mysterious Real-Life Robin Hood Leaves Envelopes of Cash to the Needy was originally posted at OddityCentral.com  |
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