Thursday 28 June 2007

Polkyth take 5 medals at Kent International

Polkyth Judo Club is based in Polkyth Leisure Centre, St Austell, Cornwall.

Head Coach Ronan Byrne said that he was "overjoyed with the huge success achieved" by his players at the Kent International Judo Championships, held at Crystal Palace on the 23rd June 2007.

Ronan said "I was extremely proud with the courage, conviction and fighting spirit in which they fought". It was extra special as it was the childrens first International Competition.

Danny Byrne won every contest to win a Golg Medal in the "Under 50kg" category. Jamie Grigg also took a Gold Medal in the "Under 55kg" category.
Nathan Fitzgerald gained a Silver in the "Under 34kg", while Edward Tse also gained a Silver in the "Under 42kg".
Kimberley Holness gained a Bronze Medal in the girls "Under 40kg" event.
Mason Rescorla, Andrew Palmer, Jade Skews and Henry Stittle also fought extrmely well with Henry Stittle winning 5 out of his 6 contests with "Ippon" the maximum 10 point score, only narrowly losing in the semi-final.

Ronan would like to take this opportunity to thank the coaching staff, Kylie, Frank & Neal, the Parents and Polkyth staff for all their help & support. Finally, and most importantly, Ronan would like to thank the children for all their hard work, dedication and loyalty to the Polkyth Judo Club.

Images of the Club with their medals and in action can be viewed at www.kasstzam.com

Media images available on request to info@kasstzam.com
Photo credit: www.kasstzam.com
Images not for unauthorised distribution/copying
All rights reserved. © 2007 kazam media ltd


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Children's Commissioner for England visits Biscovey

Professor Sir Albert Aynsley-Green spent the morning in Cornwall visiting children from Biscovey Junior School. As part of his visit, Al (as he likes to be know) spent time with Biscovey Junior School's Council. The School Council members gave a presentation and discussion on elections and Council business. They were also encouraged to grill Al on his job and being the leader of "11 Million".
Photographs from the event can be viewed at www.kasstzam.com

Professor Sir Albert Aynsley-Green is the first ever Children's Commissioner for England and leads 11 MILLION.
He was appointed full time in July 2005 to be the independent voice for all children and young people and represent their views, opinions, interests and rights to the people who make decisions that affect them.
Before becoming the Children's Commissioner, Al was a children's doctor for 30 years.

Media images available on request to info@kasstzam.com
Photo credit: www.kasstzam.com
Images not for unauthorised distribution/copying
All rights reserved. © 2007 kazam media ltd

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Monday 25 June 2007

Sticker 5 Mile Race & 1 Mile Fun Run 2007

The Sticker 5 is part of the Cornish Grand Prix series.
This years event saw the largest ever field with 394 competitors battling along the narrow country lanes of Sticker and the surrounding areas.
The Fun Run was also well attended, with children and adults competing against each other over a 1 mile course.
Full results and photos of every competitor in both events can be found at www.kasstzam.com

Media images available on request to info@kasstzam.com
Photo credit: www.kasstzam.com
Images not for unauthorised distribution/copying
All rights reserved. © 2007 kazam media ltd

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Friday 22 June 2007

Seed sculpture opens at Eden

The much-anticipated Seed sculpture was formally opened to the public yesterday (June 21), marking the completion of the Eden Project’s education centre the Core.

On June 11, the giant 70-tonne work of art created by the internationally-acclaimed artist Peter Randall-Page was gently lowered by crane into the bell-shaped chamber at the centre of the building.

Yesterday, Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, Chairman of Eden’s architects Grimshaw and President of the Royal Academy of Arts, performed the opening ceremony in front of 400 guests including the artist and his family, Eden Chief Executive Tim Smit, Judith Donovan of the Big Lottery Fund, and Simon Robertson, Chairman of Rolls Royce and an Eden Trustee who, with his wife Virginia, sponsored the sculpture with a generous donation.

The dedication began with Tim Smit introducing a choir of gifted and talented children who sang a new song to “The Elders of our Community”, including a group of people in their eighties and nineties from Cornwall who were invited specially for the event. The same choir opened a celebration concert on Wednesday (June 20) featuring Peter Gabriel, Show of Hands and Charlie Winston, in the Eden arena.

Tim Smit introduced Mr and Mrs Robertson and talked about the “Capsule” containing letters to the future written by Her Majesty The Queen, who officially opened the Core last year, and ten schools from the Restormel area of Cornwall who led the sculpture on its last journey in a colourful parade before it was installed. Also contained were the hopes for the future of the Eden team.

Mr Roberston placed the container in a trough underneath the flat bottom of Seed, ready for the gap to be sealed to form a time capsule for the next 300 years.

Heralding the completion of the Core and arrival of Seed, Tim Smit said: “It is the strangest and most wonderful thing to build a magnificent structure with its centrepiece missing.

“It feels like finding the last piece of a jigsaw, which makes sense of the whole picture at last. This sculpture is utterly wonderful and worthy of the phrase ‘awesome.’

“It draws together everything that Eden is about – the perfection of nature and the difference between substance and hype.”

He added: “We have been so lucky with our friends and collaborators who shared a vision that we hope will mark a moment for reflecting on our generation’s need to work with the grain of nature, rather than against it.”

Sir Nicholas said that there was a lot of talk about the relationship between art and architecture and here was a relationship between a sculpture and a building that really worked.

He said the Core was a building with the lowest carbon footprint it was possible to have, adding: “Until the seed arrived, it was as if the building was missing a vital organ.”


Images available at www.kasstzam.com
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Monday 18 June 2007

Get Set (Top Box) for Summer

We all like a bit of sunshine, but if you don't keep your set-top box cool, you may find your TV freezes or goes blank.

So if you keep your box in a cabinet, it's a good idea to leave the doors open.

It's also important to make sure the air vents on your set-top box aren't covered by anything, including other equipment like DVD players or video recorders. This will help ensure you don't lose your service.

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Tuesday 12 June 2007

Seed sculpture planted in the Core of Eden

When Seed, the 70-tonne solid Cornish granite sculpture, is lowered gently to the ground within the central chamber of the Core building at the Eden Project, it will be the fulfilment of a long-held ambition of the acclaimed artist Peter Randall-Page.

For many years he has wanted to make a sculpture whose mass would almost totally fill an architectural space offering an awe-inspiring experience.

The search for a stone big enough to be turned into this most challenging art work and then the painstaking and intricate process of fashioning it into an ovoid and carving 1,800 nodules into its surface has spanned four years.

Today (June 11) the silver-grey stone is due to be lowered by giant crane through the circular roof of the Eden Project's education building to sit within the bell-shaped chamber specifically designed and built to receive it.

It will be a slow, precise process. The gap between the top rim of the chamber and the edge of the sculpture will be a matter of inches as Seed descends into the centre of the space.

Heralding the arrival of the sculpture, Eden's chief executive Tim Smit said: "Seed is the perfect embodiment of Eden's creative approach to public engagement. This is a fantastic work of art that will stand forever as a symbol of our generation's recognition that we are part of nature, not apart from it, and that to survive we must learn to work with the grain of nature."

The sculpture will be celebrated with a concert featuring Peter Gabriel on June 20 and officially opened on June 21 when visitors to Eden will be able to experience the stone within its chamber.

Like Magritte's painting 'The Listening Room' in which an over-sized apple fills a room, there will be a surreal dimension to the experience of seeing 'Seed' occupying the space and coming to within 250 cm of the walls.

Seed makes a play on scale, offering an Alice in Wonderland-like experience: Alice who grows to fill a room and also shrinks to be dwarfed by ordinary domestic objects.

In the manner of Rothko who stipulated the dimensions and light conditions of the rooms in which his work should be seen, the chamber and art work were conceived as one.

Peter Randall-Page very much wanted to separate this inner sanctum from the bustle outside to give the chamber a meditative and contemplative atmosphere.

Seed will be lit from the natural daylight filtering down through the central aperture, meaning that the weather and seasons will play across the sculpture's surface.

From the very outset, Peter Randall-Page worked closely with Jolyon Brewis of Grimshaw architects, who designed the world famous Biomes at Eden and was lead architect on The Core itself.

Peter said: "The shape of the chamber echoes that of the stone, like a seed in its pod. The space between the sculpture and the walls will create extraordinary spatial drama. Being in a confined space with such a monumental mass should be exciting.

"The whole process has been an enormous challenge because of the sheer scale and complexity of the sculpture.

"Many people have been involved in helping me bring this project to fruition: quarrymen, engineers, architects, computer experts but particularly my own remarkable team of technicians and stone carvers."

Jolyon Brewis said: “Seed was not only a fitting centrepiece for the building but was a crucial part of it.

"The design of this building has been a true collaboration between architects and an artist. Peter Randall-Page has been involved in setting the geometry of the structure as well as the design of the sculpture inside.

"The roof of the building is based on spiral geometries found in nature. They can be seen in the heads of sunflowers and many other plants. They are linked to the system of proportion used in classical architecture and have a well-known mathematical basis.

"Peter's sculpture will sit in a specially designed room at the heart of the building and will be carved with the same pattern of spirals.

"This will be much more than a sculpture inside a building. Art and architecture combine in a way that is rarely achieved. This should be one of the finest rooms in the world."

Explaining how the sculpture is integral to the building, Eden's Director of Learning Dr Jo Elworthy said: "Seed and the Core roof pay homage to nature, efficiency and collaboration. Take the sunflower as an example. The giant bloom is made of hundreds of little flowers that combine together to create a massive functional landing pad for bees. Its efficiency and strength symbolises what can be achieved when people work closely, both together and with the grain of nature.

"We're planting the Seed in the middle of the Core to symbolise the next stage in Eden's development: to sow ideas for the 21st century and work towards a world we want to live in.”

She said that the Core building was a perfect marriage of art, technology and science and was educational in form as well as function.

"It is crafted from natural materials and is an exemplar of sustainability in its approach, design and actual construction. A centre for learning and discovery, the Core contains permanent and temporary exhibitions, hosts events, including workshops, talks and short films, is home to Eden's innovative schools programmes and has a tasty little café with a solar terrace that will soon look down on the Seed."

Dr Elworthy added: "Nature has a fundamental blueprint which goes beyond DNA. We have translated that blueprint into the structure of Eden's Core. Seed is the last piece of the puzzle and the start of a new beginning. We can now work on sowing ideas for the 21st century."

Grimshaw's chairman Sir Nicholas Grimshaw said: "I think it is a wonderful thing when a work of art and a building come together like this. The geometry generated from the Fibonacci series unites the two but until Peter's wonderful sculpture arrived the building seemed to lack a vital organ."

Press Release - Eden Project

View images from this event here

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All rights reserved. © 2007 kazam media ltd

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Saturday 2 June 2007

Search for Madeleine McCann

Madeleine McCann was born 4 years ago. She has one brother Sean and a sister Amelie. She lives with her family in Rothley, Leicestershire.

Her father comes from Glasgow and has 3 sisters, Patricia, Jacqueline and Phil, and a brother John. Madeleine's Grandmother, Eileen lives in Glasgow. Her other grandparents, Sue and Brian live in Liverpool.

Both sides of the family are very close and all are working in different ways to try and help in the search for Madeleine.

Phil, who resides in Ullapool and is a teacher, has asked that the heartfelt thanks of the whole family be passed to everyone who has helped in the search so far. She said "There have been so many messages of support and prayers from people all over the world. We (the family) are overwhelmed with your assistance. The media people have been wonderful and so helpful in making everyone aware of our plight. Madeleine’s family are so grateful to you all. Please keep Madeleine in your thoughts and prayers. We pray that she will be returned to us safe and well."

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Madeleine was abducted from her bed in the Ocean Club Resort, Praia da Luz, on Thursday 3rd May 2007. She has not been seen since.

Please help Madeleines family by showing your support, either by donating funds to "Madeleines Fund: Leaving No Stone Unturned" or by placing a poster or banner available from here.

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The Official Website is available here: http://www.bringmadeleinehome.com/