News on Youtube Jan 31 2018

The Swan and Dolphin hotels at Walt Disney World are unique in a number of ways.

For one, they're not actually owned by Disney, and come from a time where Disney almost turned

to outside companies for all it's new resorts.

Beyond that they're iconic for their design.

Both resorts are adorned with massive statues of their namesake.

The swan with its two majestic swans, and the dolphin with… fish?

So yeah, what's up with that?

Why are there giant fish statues on the Dolphin hotel?

Well the answer is there aren't.

Those are actually dolphins, just not the kind we're used to seeing.

When the Swan and Dolphin were designed by architect Michael Graves in the late 1980s,

the statues for the two dolphins were inspired by the same design used by famous Italian

sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini.

His depictions of dolphins, most noticeable in the 1642 Triton fountain in Rome, similarly

looked like fish.

They were just scarier than what we have in Disney World today.

In fact, this inspiration is why you can find similar styled dolphins somewhere else in

Walt Disney World: Epcot.

The door handles in Epcot's Italian pavilion sport a similar design, and the pavilion's

statue of Neptune also features two pretty mean looking dolphins.

This was common as the dolphin was often associated with Neptune, who was the Roman god of the sea.

The dolphins were often shown with an exaggerated arched back, meant to represent the dolphin mid-jump.

As for why they look so different from actual dolphins?

Well while there's no clear cut answer on that, the general belief is that the lack

of easy access to dolphins meant that artists were often forced to depict them based on

word of mouth descriptions.

After all, they couldn't just check Google image search or run to the zoo.

I also believe there's an argument to be made that the inaccuracies were embraced for

their thematic purpose.

I mean, which of these says "ocean conquest" more?

The horrifying sea monster or the Lisa Frank dolphin?

So there you have it.

The fish on top of the Dolphin hotel are actually dolphins.

They're just meant to look like dolphins a sculptor made nearly 400 years ago, and

those were meant to look like dolphins as they were depicted as far back as ancient Rome.

It's just another reason on the list of reasons why the Swan and Dolphin are unique

hotels at Walt Disney World.

If you want to know more about how they came about, I have another video from a while

back on the subject and if you want to learn even more about not just those two hotels,

but that period of the company as a whole, I highly recommend Disney War by James B Stewart.

There will be a link to it in the description below.

Thanks for watching, and I'll see you next time!

For more infomation >> Why is a fish on Walt Disney World Dolphin Hotel? - Duration: 2:53.

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Perspective | Where does an artist go to resist Trump? His hotel. - Duration: 5:02.

Usually like afterwards we feel a lot better, but right now the drive down is not comfortable at all.

I grew up in Washington, D.C., and our family business was running a cemetery.

My job was like to operate a weed whacker and I would go around the graves.

I would play math like how how old were the people where they passed.

And I started to get a lot of young people.

I realized that people were dying in an unjust system.

And I think that really prepared prepared me personally for what we're up against now.

The cemetery has come up more and more recently in my life.

I didn't really kind of think about how much it affected me.

I didn't go into the family business. In my early twenties, I was working as a freelance journalist.

I had had this press credential.

And I felt very like this level of confidence like I could go and shoot,

and I'd be able to film and then walk away if things got a little hairy.

The police had already surrounded everybody,

and so everyone's already pinned in and then a window got broken.

All these arrests started happening, and I got arrested with other journalists.

And I just remember that the officer's been pretty rough, and he kept been hitting me against the bus.

And he goes, "Stop resisting." I'm not trying to resist.

I'm not trying to fall on the ground, but I'm not trying to resist.

I definitely stepped away from that experience going,

"Okay, this is the second time I've been arrested, both times are with the camera."

I want to keep working on news and media, but at the same time, I can't just be a spectator.

I also need to participate.

A little under a year later after being arrested, we organized a large anti-war concert, and we did a big projection at it.

We are going live.

This projection is with a reproductive rights group protesting Trump's global gag rule.

Aid groups can't even mention the word abortion if they want U.S. funding.

It's ridiculous, preventing women from making health decisions.

When we actually do the projection we have a few people who are helping us out with the

physicality of the projectors and moving them around

we have filmmakers and photographers who are doing their job,

and then we have people who interact with the public and security.

It's mainly hotel security

that has a problem and seemingly all the men in suits pointing their cameras in our faces.

But cops are totally fine with it. They're like, "We're just here to make sure that you're good."

Oh my God, we did that. That's hilarious.

Our actual medium is light and illumination,

so it's kind of important that we kind of follow through with that with what we actually create.

You know, taking things that are negative and putting them to light.

We're up against something really big.

We're up against people who don't want to have conversations,

who are, frankly, undemocratic.

Some of the most dangerous things about a Trump administration, we won't see until way way after he's left.

You know a lot of this stuff we're doing with projections, I look at it as

We're creating mile markers.

...And then block it yeah, cool.

We are out of here, thank you all very much.

I'm optimistic for humanity,

I'm very on guard for what's happening with the Trump administration and with people who support him.

Was that the most police presence you've ever had?

--Yeah, I think so.

--Definitely.

Democracy is kind of a process. It's not like, it's not a fact.