Hello All

The email below came my way via Prague and it seems pretty interesting, check it out if you're interested.

Regards | Liam | liam@rtmdesign.com.au

Spiritus Mundi
the Spirit of the World in the year since September 11th
A baba* project

How does the world really see September 11th and its aftermath? If you are in New York, Kabul or the Gaza Strip, maybe everything did change utterly. But what if you are in Africa, in Mongolia, in the Ukraine or Australia or even, for that matter, in a rural village in France? How do you see the world from those perspectives? Who and what are the threats and, alternatively, the sources of hope and optimism?

Spiritus Mundi is a pack of 78 very varied cards, which will be published to mark the first year since September 11th 2001. Each card (or pair of cards) will be done by a different designer or artist from across the world and each will be based on a word that they have chosen to illustrate. The words will range from those we hear so much of at the moment - terror, war, damage, fear - to others that are perhaps less prevalent - money, hope, tolerance, deception, joke...

The opinions and the aesthetics shown will vary widely. Together, the full set of cards will be a clear statement that the world is full of diversity and that difference can be seen positively, and without conflict.

The cards aren't just to look at however; we are designing a number of ways in which they can be used - to play games, to do a type of Tarot reading (with some intentional irony) and even to build physical structures. The idea is that as the different viewpoints are juxtaposed in a variety of ways the cards will help us to see things afresh, and to get away from simply adopting entrenched opinions.

The project is not-for-profit, and all work will be done on a voluntary basis. Any money generated will be used to fund other not-for-profit socially useful design projects.

We are calling on designers and artists across the world to participate.

Full details, and some first examples of designs, are at:

http://www.baba-prague.com/spiritus/

For further details, please email us at info@baba-prague.com

*baba studio aims to do inclusive and socially useful design that is nevertheless gorgeous, enjoyable and life-enhancing. We took our name from a word that can, among other things, mean "old woman" in Slavic languages, 'baby' in English, 'father' in Turkish and Bengali - and a very good cake in many languages.

We have absolutely no links or affiliations with Meher Baba, Shirdi Sai Baba, Neem Karoli Baba or, for that matter, with the British Artist Blacksmith Association.