【推荐1】Jamie Wardley is a special kind of artist—an ice sculptor. He first trained as a sand sculptor. Later,he learnt about ice sculpture. Now he does sand sculpture in the summer. And in the winter, he sculpts ice.

When sculpting ice,Wardley has to work in cold temperatures. If the weather is cold enough, he can work outside. But winter in the United Kingdom is not always very cold. So often he works in a large freezer where the temperature is about -12℃.

Wardley enjoys sculpting ice outside in the winter. When he sculpts in the open air, people can watch. They can be part of the creative process.

Wardley makes ice sculpting sound simple. But the tools Wardley uses are sharp and dangerous. And the ice is very heavy. Each block of ice weighs 120 kilos. And some larger sculptures are made from several combined blocks of ice. Sometimes ice sculptures can be as big as buildings. In Kemi, Finland there is an ice hotel called the Snow Castle. Each year, Wardley helps build the Snow Castle.

Inside the Snow Castle, the temperature is -50℃. Even the dining tables are made of ice. So you have to wear winter clothes when eating and wear a hat when sleeping. “The ice hotel is built every year in January. Then it melts in April. Each year we rebuild it and create a new design,” Wardley said.

The Snow Castle is a large and amazing work of ice, but Wardley's smaller ice sculptures are special too. One winter, in the city of Bradford, the UK,Wardley created several small sculptures. He used the sculptures to tell a story which contained an important message about goodwill and understanding.

Ice sculptures are temporary works of art. When the temperature rises, they will melt. But that does not mean that their beauty is lost. The sculptures from that day in Bradford have now melted away, but their message of goodwill, understanding, and acceptance remains.

【推荐2】Hip hop is a subculture and an art movement that emerged (出现) from the Bronx in New York City during the early 1970s. Its development reflected the negative effects of post-industrial decline, political discourse, and a rapidly changing economy.

Looking back to New York City during this era, we see an economic collapse. The city’s economy was falling apart due to the decline of the manufacturing industry. Much of the middle class moved to the suburbs to escape the social and economic challenges.

Consequently, businesses closed their doors, causing many economic opportunities and sources of entertainment to disappear. As a result, urban youth turned to the streets for recreation and self-expression. The abandoned buildings and parking lots set the stage for block parties. These block parties laid the groundwork for early hip hop culture. DJs and MCs brought the music by setting up mobile “Sound Systems” introduced by Jamaican culture. Sheets of cardboard became dance floors for break-dancers, and brick walls transformed into canvases for graffiti. The emerging hip hop culture also became an outlet to deal with despair, abandonment and even violence.

Several people were influential in creating hip hop. Among the most famous ones is DJ Kool Herc, the “founding father of hip hop.” The Jamaican American made history in 1973 when he and his sister hosted the “Back to School” party in their apartment building. This historical party is recognized for launching the hip hop movement. Herc was also famous for creating a DJ technique called “break beat”-a mixing practice he adapted from Jamaican music. He noticed that people often waited for drum breaks of a record to dance. This took place when every instrument stopped playing except for the drums. Then the DJ would use two turntables (唱机转盘) to switch back and forth between two copies of the same record. The break section was also the most anticipated part of a song where people danced the most.

The DJ kept growing in popularity throughout the 1970s. He moved on to larger parks, played in clubs and inspired other DJs who helped this type of dance music to develop.

【推荐1】John D. Rockefeller was America’s first billionaire who founded Standard Oil Company in 1870, which eventually became a giant in the oil industry. Rockefeller’s leadership in Standard Oil brought him great wealth as well as unfavorable opinions, as many opposed Rockefeller’s business practices. Though many were critical of Rockefeller, few could devalue his philanthropic (慈善的) efforts, which led him donate $540 million (more than $5 billion today) during his lifetime to charity causes.

Though a billionaire, Rockefeller lived a relatively simple life, rarely attending the theater or other events typically attended by his peers. Since childhood, he had been told to give to church and charity and Rockefeller had routinely done so. However, Rockefeller’s enormous wealth and success made him a target of journalists, reform politicians and others who viewed him as a symbol of greed and criticized the methods with which he’d built his kingdom. With a damaged public image to improve, Rockefeller began to give away millions of dollars.

In 1896, 57-year-old Rockefeller turned over the day-to-day leadership of Standard Oil though he held the title of president until 1911, and began to focus on philanthropy. He had already contributed to the establishment of the University of Chicago in 1890, giving $35 million over the course of 20 years.

While doing so, Rockefeller also founded the Rockefeller Institute of Medical Research (now Rockefeller University) in New York in 1901. Within their laboratories, causes, cures, and various manners of prevention of diseases were discovered? including the cure for meningitis (脑膜炎) and the identification of DNA as the central genetic matter.

A year later, Rockefeller established the General Education Board. In its 63 years of operation, it distributed $325 million to American schools and colleges. In 1913, Rockefeller created the Rockefeller Foundation, with his son John Jr. as presidents to foster the well-being of men and women around the world. Through John D. Rockefeller’s philanthropic acts, the oil titan educated and saved an untold number of lives and aided medical and scientific advancement.