Why do our leaders all study for the same qualification?

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Group-think

A special concert to mark the life of celebrated conductor Sir Charles Mackerras is due to take place in Edinburgh.

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Tribute for conductor Mackerras

Bungalow owners enjoyed the biggest rise in property prices in Scotland over the past year, new research reveals.

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Bungalows see biggest price rises

Photographer Arthur Drooker’s haunting infrared images of the bygone U.S. While photographer Arthur Drooker’s ruins aren’t the castles and shrines that usually come to mind, his infrared images of prisons, mansions and other sites of U.S. decay evoke all the moody history and past lives of their tourist site counterparts. The Santa Fe, NM-based artist’s upcoming “American Ruins” exhibit culls these haunting photos from from his award-winning 2007 book of the same name , featuring luminescent images that with each crack and chip reveals just a bit of the America’s former splendor. To learn about how he achieves his otherworldly effects, what to expect from the show and what’s next, read our interview with Drooker below, and see more images in the gallery . If you’re in Richmond, be sure to check out the opening of American Ruins on 9 September 2010 from 5:30-7:30pm, or visit before it closes 28 November 2010. You can also get a glimpse of the work in his current show at Santa Fe’s William Siegal Gallery (through 3 September 2010), and look out for Lost Worlds , his large-format book collecting images from 33 sites in 15 countries that’s due out Fall 2011. What was the selection process in choosing photos for the exhibit? Are all of the images from the book? All the images are from the book. There are 50 prints, representing each of the 22 sites I photographed for the project. The exhibition is organized geographically, the same as the book—the geographic regions are the South, the Southwest, the East, California and Hawaii. what is it about ruins that inspires you and has kept you photographing them for years? Photographing ruins merges my passions for history and photography. I’m drawn to these sites to make a spiritual connection with those who came before us, preserve the visual poetry of what they left behind, and restore what they’ve built to our collective memory. In making these images, I confront my own mortality and become most alive. After the success of the American Ruins book, what led you to work on Lost Worlds? I wanted to continue photographing ruins. Going beyond the U.S. borders seemed to make the most sense, but not so far away that it would take too a long time to complete the project. Hence, Lost Worlds: Ruins of the Americas. In every way it is a more ambitious project: The research, trip planning, and the photography. By the time I complete Lost Worlds at the end of this year, I will have been to about 30 sites in 15 countries. That’s a lot of miles in a little over two years. How does your subject matter influence your technique or vice-versa? I photograph ruins in infrared. Infrared light is invisible to the human eye, but I use a specially adapted 35mm digital camera to record it. The ethereal effect illuminates the otherworldly atmosphere that haunts ruins, allowing a photographer to transcend mere documentation and capture the mystery and elegiac beauty of crumbling walls, weathered facades and broken arches as no other format can.

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American Ruins

Former Prime Minister Tony Blair describes Gordon Brown as “difficult, at times maddening” in his long-awaited memoirs, to be published on Wednesday.

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Brown was ‘difficult’, says Blair

Most people do not meet disabled people either in their social or working lives, suggests a survey.

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Disabled are ‘socially excluded’

Teachers’ unions are branding the government’s relaunch of academies in England as a “failure”, with only about 30 expected this term.

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Teachers claim academy ‘failure’

Nearly half of Britons got sunburnt this summer and many would be willing to do so again to get a tan, a survey reveals.

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Hot UK summer ‘gave half sunburn’

US officials say they do not believe the two Yemeni men arrested on a flight to Amsterdam were planning a terror attack.

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US urges caution over plane pair

Figures reveal stark divisions in the toll alcohol takes on health in England, with North West men more likely to die early than those in the South East.

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Problem drinking divides England

The Advertising Standards Authority is given the power to regulate ads and marketing claims on websites and services like Facebook.

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Advert watchdog gets online power

The Justice Department moved Tuesday to block a court ruling preventing the use of federal funds for embryonic stem-cell research, warning that the decision could shut down life-saving research if allowed to stand.

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Stem-cell research ruling appealed

The owners of the Chilean mine where 33 workers became trapped beg forgiveness, as drilling work on a relief shaft continues.

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Chile mine owners ask forgiveness

National Police said Tuesday an investigation that began in February has resulted in the arrest of 14 people involved in an organization dedicated to the sexual exploitation of men, Spain’s first such bust of its kind.

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Police dismantle male prostitution ring

The US financial regulator decides to drop possible fraud charges against rating agency Moody’s over a computer glitch.

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Moody’s let off fraud hook by SEC