среда, 14 марта 2012 г.

Roman Ondák

OXFORD, UK

MODERN ART OXFORD

March 12-May 20

Curated by Michael Stanley

Slovakian neo-Conceptualist Roman Ond�k creates powerful works of art through seemingly simple shifts. During the 2009 Venice Biennale, he famously turned his country's pavilion inside out, allowing the surrounding garden to occupy the building's interior. In another recent piece, he transformed viewers into subject matter, directing gallery attendants to mark visitors' names and heights on the museum wall in an …

39 people injured after accident at church concert

At least 39 people were injured, three of them seriously, when the floor of a local church filled with teens collapsed during a concert.

Police said about 1,000 youths were at the Central Heights Church in Abbotsford, British Columbia, to hear the Christian rock band Starfield when a large area in front of the stage gave way Friday night, sending people in the crowd falling several feet (meters) into the basement below.

By late evening, David Plug, a spokesman for the local health authority said 23 people were treated in the Abbotsford Regional Hospital, while hospitals in the nearby cities of Chilliwack, Mission and Langley treated 16 people between …

[ METRO BRIEFS ]

Woman set home afire, cops say

A Round Lake Beach woman accused of setting her house on firewhile her four children were inside has been charged with aggravatedarson, police said. No one was injured in the blaze, which began at arear outside wall about 1:25 a.m. Friday and was quicklyextinguished. Debra J. Barraza, 41, first blamed the fire on a friendbut then was charged after she admitted starting it, Round Lake Beachpolice said. The children are ages 14, 15, 18 and 20, police said.Bail for Barraza was set at $200,000. She remained in the Lake CountyJail. Police contacted the Department of Children and FamilyServices, and the children were staying at an undisclosed …

Uncontested consolidation

When you walk into the office, it doesn't look much different than any other modem workplace. On the wall behind the reception desk, the name O'Brien & Sanderson gleams in big, brass letters and employees work diligently in their cubicles. It all sounds fairly commonplace, as professional offices go, but there's so much more to this particular business. Behind the gleaming letters, diligent employees and cubicles' there lies a history, rich in principles and commitment, that has become an integral part of the services that O'Brien & Sanderson extends to clients.

In 1929, Fort Wayne was home to many businesses, one of which was Citizens Bank. Following the stock market …

Chiefs QB Croyle out for season

Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Brodie Croyle limped off with a sprained right knee against the Tennessee Titans on Sunday, his first game back since separating his shoulder in the season opener.

After the game, Chiefs coach Herm Edwards said Croyle's injury would end his season.

The oft-injured Croyle, back after missing four games, was injured on Kansas City's 14th play …

Vatican Opposes Removal of Feeding Tubes

VATICAN CITY - The Vatican reiterated Friday that it considers the removal of feeding tubes from people in vegetative states to be an immoral act.

The Vatican issued the statement in response to questions from bishops in the United States in July 2005 - just months after the case of an American woman, Terri Schiavo, made world headlines.

She died March 31, 2005, in a Florida hospice after her parents unsuccessfully battled a court order to have her feeding tube removed. She died 13 days after the tube was removed.

"A patient in a 'permanent vegetative state' is a person with fundamental human dignity and must, therefore, receive ordinary and proportionate care which includes, in principle, the administration of water and food even by artificial means," the Vatican said in a statement.

At the time, the Vatican condemned Schiavo's death as "arbitrarily hastened" and called the removal of her feeding tube a violation of the principles of Christianity and civilization.

Friday's statement said the Vatican was asked whether the administration of food and water to a patient in a vegetative state was morally obligatory except when they cannot be assimilated by the patient's body or administered without causing significant physical discomfort. The answer was yes.

The statement said exceptional cases, such as the inability of a patient to cope with feeding or food shortages in poverty-stricken or remote areas, "take nothing away from the general ethical criterion."

The Vatican noted that Pope John Paul II told a 2004 medical conference on ethical dilemmas that providing food and water to people in vegetative states should be considered natural, ordinary and proportional care.

Bishop William E. Lori of Bridgeport, Conn., chairman of the U.S. bishops Committee for Doctrine, said the American bishops hoped the Vatican's explanations would provide guidance to pastors, ethicists, doctors, nurses and families involved in the issue.

Boat sinking after whaling clash in Antarctica

A conservation group's boat had its bow sheared off and was taking on water Wednesday after it collided with a Japanese whaling ship in the frigid waters of Antarctica, the group said. The boat's six crew members were safely rescued.

The clash was apparently the most serious in the past several years, during which the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has sent vessels into far southern waters to try to harass the Japanese fleet into ceasing its annual whale cull.

Clashes using hand-thrown stink bombs, ropes meant to tangle propellers and high-tech sound equipment have been common in recent years, and collisions between ships have sometimes happened.

The society said its boat Ady Gil _ a high tech speed boat that resembles a stealth bomber _ was hit by the Japanese ship the Shonan Maru near Commonwealth Bay and had its bow sheared off.

"The condition of the Ady Gil now is that it is inoperable and the crew of the Ady Gil has been transferred to our other vessel, the Bob Barker," Locky Maclean, the first mate of the society's lead ship told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio.

The Ady Gil's captain had stayed on board to try to save equipment from the boat "before it floods too severely," he said.

Japan's Fisheries Agency, which has no direct involvement in whaling but overseas all the country's fishing operations, said it was still checking details about the clash.

"We have confirmed that there was a collision, but we have no other details. We have not heard that any boats have sank. We are now trying to confirm details of why the collision occurred," said Fisheries Agency spokesman Toshinori Uoya.

Uoya said there were no injuries on the Japanese side, but said he was not sure about the Sea Shepherd crew members.

Sea Shepherd sends boats to Antarctic waters each southern summer to try to stop the Japanese whaling fleet killing whales under what it calls a scientific whaling program. Conservationists and many countries say the program is a front for commercial whaling.

Earlier Wednesday, the Institute of Cetacean Research, the nonprofit organization that conducts the hunt, said in a statement that one of the ships in the whaling fleet was attacked by the Ady Gil, but it did not mention a collision.

It said the Ady Gil arrived on the scene at about 1800 GMT and that its crew threw ropes at the whaling mothership, the Nisshin Maru. It said another Sea Shepherd vessel, the Bob Barker, had already arrived in nearby waters.

The Ady Gil came "within collision distance" of the Nisshin Maru's bow and repeatedly dangled a rope in the water in an attempt to entangle the ship's rudder and propeller, and lobbed small projectiles designed to release a foul smell.

The whalers responded by firing high-powered hoses to keep the Sea Shepherd vessels away.

"The obstructionist activities of the Sea Shepherd threaten the lives and property of those involved in our research, are very dangerous and cannot be forgiven," the statement said.

Each side routinely alleges the other engages in dangerous activity during what has become a cat-and-mouse chase in one of the world's most remote and isolated regions. Australia and New Zealand _ which both have Antarctica territories and are among the closest nations to the waters where the hunt goes on _ have urged both sides to show restraint, warning that they are far from rescue of anything goes wrong.

Japan's whaling fleet in November left for its annual hunt in the Antarctic waters. Uoya said that for security reasons, details of the fleet's composition, the number of whales it hopes to take and the number of crew members is not being released to the public.

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Associated Press Writer Eric Talmadge in Tokyo contributed to this report.