Jørgen Leth was born on June 14, 1937 in Århus, Denmark. He is a director and writer, known for  “The Five Obstruction”  (2003), “The Perfect Human”(1967) and “Life in Denmark”  (1972).

Leth studied literature and anthropology in Århus and Copenhagen and was a cultural critic (jazz, theatre, film) for leading Danish newspapers from 1959 to 1968. His first book was published in 1962. He has written 10 volumes of poetry and eight non-fiction books. He made his first film in 1963 and has since made 40 more, many distributed worldwide.

He has been a creative consultat  for the Danish Film Institute (1971–73, 1975–77) as well as chairman of the Institute’s board (1977–82). He has also been a professor at the Danish National Film School in Copenhagen, at the State Studiocenter in Oslo and has lectured at UCLA, Berkeley, Harvard and other American universities.

Jørgen Leth Wikipedia

66 Scenes from America (1982)

“As a visual narrative 66 scener from America is reminiscent of a pile of postcards from a journey, which indeed is what the film is. It consists of a series of lengthy shots of a tableau nature, each appearing to be a more or less random cross section of American reality, but which in total invoke a highly emblematic picture of the USA.”

66 Scenes from America IMDB

Henry Art Gallery
Seattle, Washington, USA
On view: April 22, 2006 – September 03, 2006

View along boardwalk over restored wetlands to viewing platform overlooking Baker Bay at Cape Disappointment.(Photo courtesy Maya Lin Studio and Gagosian Gallery)

Pin River is a linear view of a river system, composed of tens of thousands of straight pins pushed into the wall to create a flow of silver that is a shadow image of (Photo: arcspace)

Water Line is a line drawing in space of a particular underwater location on the Mid Atlantic Ridge. The site rises a few miles from the sea floor and is visible on the surface as Bouvet Island, one of the most remote islands in the world. Working with scientists at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, Lin and members of her studio, developed a topographic rendering of the seascape. The rendering was translated into architectural scale and fabricated from quarter-inch diameter aluminum tubes.((Photo: arcspace))

http://www.arcspace.com/exhibitions/unsorted/maya-lin-systematic-landscapes/#.U35ibOIQcpo.facebook

“A hundred years ago, books and travel were the only means of getting to know other countries, and the time that you had to devote to these was much greater than we have to devote to the same aim today. The book, even a travel guide such as “Baedeker”, was an authoritative and inexhaustible source of information, while the journey itself was at a slow pace which brought you into actual contact with the human and material civilisation of each country. History, that is the rational narration of the experience of the past as apprehended by the present , was a comparatively recent and fascinating discovery on which a large part of education was based. For every young architect and artist the confirmation of the book throught travel was the most important vision at the end of the studies. This irresistible attraction  of history was also felt by Charles-Edouard Jeanneret when he finished his study of decorative arts at La Chaux-de-Fonds in the mountains of Switzerland and a passion for architecture had broken out within him.”

Panayotis Tpurnikiotis , domes magazine , September 2011

Instambul: View of the Seraglio from Bosphorus 1911 

Pompei , Carnet 4, p.99

“To see the Acropolis is a dream one treasures without even dreaming to realize it.  I don’t really know why this hill harbors the essence of artistic thought.  I can appreciate the perfection of these temples and realize that nowhere else are they so extraordinary;  and a long time ago I accepted the fact that this place should be like a repository of a sacred standard, the basis for all measurement in art.  Why this architecture and no other?  I can well accept that according to logic, everything here is resolved in accordance with an unsurpassable formula, but why is it that the taste—or rather the heart that guides people and dictates their beliefs despite their tendency to ignore it at times—why is it still drawn to the Acropolis, to the foot of the temples? ….Why must I, like so many others, name the Parthenon the undeniable Master, as it looms up from its stone base, and yield, even with anger, to its supremacy?”

Charles-Edouard Jeanneret (Le Corbusier).  Journey to the East (Cambridge, MA:  The MIT Press, 2007), pp. 216-217.