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NEW YORK — The legal agreement barring Britney Spears from managing her own life and finances is now older than the pop star was when the public met her as an effervescent 12-year-old on the Disney Channel — and controversy over who steers her life is starting to boil.

Spears, 39, has lived under the strict arrangement since her infamous unravelling, which in 2008 led a California court to place her under a unique legal guardianship largely governed by her father, Jamie.

The conservatorship — the precise reasons for and terms of which are buried in sealed or redacted court documents and non-disclosure agreements — has come under increased scrutiny in recent years, especially after Spears cancelled her second Las Vegas residency in 2019 and went on indefinite professional hiatus.

Now a feature-length documentary on FX produced in partnership with The New York Times probes the popular narrative on Spears, who soared to global fame as a teenager on a burst of hits — including her breakout “Baby One More Time” — before a dramatic downfall saw her become a paparazzi punching bag.

The film emphasises the role of the early-2000s celebrity journalism machine in her collapse, depicting Spears as a relentlessly pursued media target — the blonde, bubbly, wildly successful American princess whose dirty laundry triggered the schadenfreude of a nation.

The #FreeBritney movement, fervent fans who believe she’s being held against her will, gained steam this year as the artist pushed to remove her father from the conservatorship’s charge.

Its advocates — who many people, including Jamie Spears, dismiss as conspiracy theorists — say the star is begging for help via coded messages, emojis and outfits on her eccentric Instagram account.

They’ve claimed vindication as Spears has signalled gratitude, and after her court-appointed lawyer told a judge that “my client has informed me that she is afraid of her father”.

The judge opted not to immediately remove Spears’ father as head of her estate, but did appoint financial company Bessemer Trust as a co-conservator.

Jamie Spears temporarily stepped back in 2019 as head of her person — a role that gave him power including over her medical and mental health decisions — after he suffered a ruptured colon.

The pop icon for now is not seeking to scrap the conservatorship — an arrangement normally intended for the elderly or infirm — but rather turn it over to professionals.

She would like the licensed conservator who now holds provisional control over her person to stay on, and would like a bank to oversee her estate.

The next court hearing is set for February 11.

‘Cheap shots’

The documentary “Framing Britney Spears” suggests the performer who once ruled global pop was used by some of her handlers and pummelled to the point of emotional ruin by an exploitative media environment, in which images of her went for upwards of $1 million.

The film employs the extensive cache of footage of the star who came of age as mediatised consumption of celebrity, including gossip blogs and reality television, exploded — and when mental health was taken far less seriously.

From her days as a spunky pre-teen on “Star Search” in 1992 — when host Ed McMahon awkwardly asks her if she has a boyfriend — to her infamous head shaving in 2007, the documentary traces a path that suggests a magnetic superstar who became voiceless in her own life, and whose image became everyone’s but her own.

It shows Spears as a teenager, needled over her virginity (or lack thereof). 

Prominent primetime newscaster Diane Sawyer pushes her to explain why she “did something” to cause fellow pop celebrity Justin Timberlake “so much pain” in their high-profile breakup, a situation that saw Spears cast, as one interviewee put it, as “the school slut”.

Sawyer also appeared to justify comments from Maryland’s former first lady — who said “if I had an opportunity to shoot Britney Spears, I think I would.”

“Because of the example to kids and how hard it is to be a parent,” Sawyer says to a visibly distressed Spears.

And Matt Lauer — the now-disgraced former morning television personality — pushes the star to tears in a 2006 interview in which he challenges her maternal fitness while she’s pregnant with her second child.

During her prolonged mental breakdown that followed her 2006 divorce and custody battle, Spears was captured in gas stations barefoot and driving with one son in her lap.

In another infamous scene, as her cousin begs photographers to leave, Spears takes an umbrella and begins bashing a paparazzo’s vehicle.

“It was a money shot,” that photographer says of the spectacle in the documentary.

Moya Luckett, a media historian at New York University whose research includes celebrity culture, says the “cruelty” Spears experienced today is diffused across a social media landscape in which stars can curate their own images.

“You become your own producer,” Luckett told AFP, pointing to stars like Taylor Swift or Beyonce who have seized the conversation on Instagram, or by airing their own documentaries.

As her legal battle picks up fascination with Spears is likely to persist, especially as fans — many of them in their 30s and 40s, who adored her in their youth — take her plight as their own.

“Everything that she goes through resonates with the kind of frustrations a lot of us have, in a neoliberal world, where we’re told you can do it all if you want to,” Luckett said. 

“And then find out that we really can’t.”

WASHINGTON — As new, more transmissible variants of the coronavirus spread, experts say it’s time to consider using a medical-grade respirator, or wearing a surgical and cloth mask together.

Scientists have agreed for some time the main way the virus is spread is through the air, rather than surfaces, and there’s growing evidence that small droplets from ordinary breathing and speech that can travel many metres are a common mode of transmission.

Added to this is the greater contagiousness of emerging variants, like B.1.1.7, which takes a smaller viral load to cause symptomatic COVID-19 compared to the more common strain.

Fit and filtration

Back when authorities first recommended people wear face coverings, proper masks were in extremely short supply and the public was encouraged to fashion makeshift solutions out of T-shirts or bandanas. But these are far from ideal.

Linsey Marr, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Virginia Tech, who studies airborne disease transmission, told AFP: “How well a mask works depends on two things: filtration and fit. 

“Good filtration removes as many particles as possible, and a good fit means that there are no leaks around the sides of your mask, where air — and viruses — can leak through,” she said, adding even a small gap could lead to a 50 per cent reduction in performance.

The best materials for blocking small particles include non-woven polypropylene, which is used to make N95s and many surgical-type masks, and the HEPA filters in planes. Among fabrics, tightly woven cotton works best, she added.

Doubling up

“If you wear a cloth mask, choose one that has multiple layers, ideally one with a pocket that you can slip a good filter material into”, said Marr. “Or you can double mask by wearing a surgical-type mask with a tight-fitting cloth mask over it.”

Surgical masks are made of material that filters things out well, but they tend to be loose, so adding a cloth mask on top holds down the edges and reduces leaks.

Adding an additional layer improves filtration — if one layer traps 50 per cent of all particles, combining two gets to 75 per cent.

But, she added: “We do not recommend wearing more than two masks. Adding more layers proves diminishing returns and can compromise breathability. It must remain easy to breathe through the layers; otherwise, air is more likely to leak in around the sides of the mask.”

Masks that have a metal nose bridge help ensure a snug fit, as do straps that tighten around the head, not just the ears. Braces that improve the fit of surgical masks are now available on the market.

“You should feel the mask sucking inward when you breathe in, and if you hold your hands around the sides of the mask, you should not feel any air leaking out when you breathe out,” said Marr.

Medical-grade respirators

Another option is getting hold of N95s, or their international equivalents such as KN95, FFP2 etc.

“They all provide a similar level of filtration, meaning protection of particles going in and out,” Ranu Dhillon, a global health physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School.

Dhillon, who has been advocating in favour of better masks since last spring, is frustrated by the lack of clear messaging to the public on the value of better masks. 

What’s more, “there’s not been a concerted push to really mass produce and mass distribute these higher calibre masks”.

Healthcare workers have their masks professionally fit-tested every year to ensure they’re making the right seal, but Dhillon doesn’t see this as a major obstacle.

“To teach people to fit a mask, even if not 100 per cent perfectly, but more effectively, is something that’s very doable.”

Masks in our future?

The key to conceptualising the threat is to think of cigarette smoke, said Donald Milton, a professor of environmental health at the University of Maryland.

Ventilation definitely helps, but if you’re between a person who is breathing and an exhaust vent, the virus will still reach you — which makes good masks so crucial, he said.

Milton and Dhillon are cautiously optimistic that their pleas could soon become policy under the administration of President Joe Biden, and CNN reported last week the US government was working on the first official mask standards.

Prior to the pandemic, Milton and other aerosol scientists studying the flu concluded it too is transmitted from tiny droplets from ordinary speaking and breathing, and that the role of sneezing, coughing and transmission from surfaces was smaller than thought.

Their findings stirred controversy at the time, but COVID-19 has renewed interest in the research — meaning masks could be a common sight during tough flu seasons, long after the pandemic has receded.

A long time popular player in the increasingly prolific mixed work, play and daily drive compact pick-up segment that accounts for around 90 per cent of Middle East truck sales, the latest generation Mitsubishi L200 is a radically re-imagined design refresh. Chunkier, bolder and far more confidently jutting than its discreetly styled predecessor, the new L200 made quite the impression, and even won the 2020 Middle East Car of the Year awards’ best Midsize Truck category over the deeply impressive Ford Ranger and Toyota Hilux segment stalwart.

Macho makeover

A ruggedly tough, reliable and attainably priced workhorse, the L200 newly adopted and somewhat extrovert design theme however better integrates it with Mitsubishi’s increasingly SUV-heavy line-up and the Japanese manufacturer’s new design themes, as meanwhile old favourites like the long-serving Pajero SUV are also discontinued to make way for newer replacements. Formerly understated with its sloping bonnet and clear sightlines, the new L200 however now boasts a hyper-assertive high rise aesthetic and bonnet line, to rival increasingly more aggressively designed competitors in the mostly Japanese brand dominated segment.

Something of a major design facelift over the previous L200 circa 2015, the new L200 is a far more rugged look, with its brutish new ‘Dynamic Shield’ design language, comprised of a huge, dominant and upright assembly of deep-set side lights and vast lower air intake flanked by chrome strips. Atop this dramatic fascia are the new L200’s slim swept back single-slat grille and headlights. The L200 also features more freshened up rear lights, more angular wheel arches replacing the outgoing model’s rounded arches, and other elements.

Generous output

Powered by a choice of three inline four-cylinder engines, including two work-truck oriented detuned 2.5-litre turbo-diesels and a single naturally-aspirated 2.4-litre petrol through official regional importers, the L200 is also available with more powerful diesel variants that can be independently imported. One such mid power variant of the L200’s DOHC turbocharged 2.4-litre four-cylinder diesel engine develops 151BHP at 3,500rpm and a massive 280lb/ft throughout a broad 1,500-2,500rpm rev range. Reliably tough with its chain-driven timing, it is a relatively smooth diesel without too much diesel clatter.

Low-revving and designed to deliver generous low- to mid-range torque for effortless hauling, towing and off-road driving as trucks in this segment generally are, the L200 nevertheless offers a wider torque sweet spot than expected, and is relatively quick to overcomes the initial moment of turbo lag inertia typical to such diesels at idling engine speed. A flexible and muscularly willing cruiser in mid-range, the L200 2.4 DID charges quite happily through to higher rev maximum power, and is able to achieve a 173km/h top speed.

Intuitive ability

Hauling its 1,930kg mass through the 0-100km/h benchmark in a reasonably quick for its class 12.5-seconds or less, the L200 2.4 DID delivers power to its solid rear axle or all four wheels through a choice of either, slick shifting accurate manual with intuitive clutch biting point, or smooth automatic 6-speed gearboxes. Driving the rear normally, the L200 can engage four-wheel-drive for additional traction and grip when necessary, and features a low gear transfer mode for high power 4WD driving at crawling pace for more demanding conditions and inclines.

For more treacherous conditions, the L200 also features a locking centre differential to significantly improve traction over loose surfaces, whether in high or low gear ratios, Meanwhile, Big 265/60R18 tyres well match its chunky aesthetic, and provide plenty of traction. A capable off-roader with generous 220mm ground clearance, the L200 delivers 30° approach, 24° break-over, and 45° side slope off-road angles — unchanged from its predecessor — allowing it to easily traverse rutted routes and uneven surfaces. A 22° departure angle is, however, slightly less than the previous model.

Rugged and refined

Built using rugged body-on-chassis construction with independent front double wishbone and tough live axle, leaf spring rear suspension, the L200 takes minor and more substantial road imperfections in its stride, but can be slightly bouncy at the rear when not loaded. Manoeuvrable through snaking roads with its light steering providing good in-segment precision, feel and eager, alert turn-in, the L200 is also slightly narrower and shorter in wheelbase than many competitors. Balanced through corners but with slight body lean, the L200 is meanwhile confident, settled and stable on motorways.

Refined inside and with reassuring braking and decent road views for its class, the L200 is easy to manoeuvre and place on road, despite its now higher bonnet and slightly reduced visibility. The L200’s double cab four-door, five-seat cabin is comfortable and spacious, inside, with good headroom and driving position, big side mirrors, easy access and intuitive uncomplicated controls and layouts, and delivers generous cargo capacity. Pleasantly unpretentious inside, up-market variants receive better upholstering and trim, and higher equipment and convenience features.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Engine: 2.4-litre, in-line turbo-diesel 4-cylinders

Valve-train: DOHC, common-rail injection

Gearbox: 6-speed manual, four-wheel-drive

Driveline: low gear transfer, locking centre differential

Power, BHP (PS) [kW]: 151 (154) [113] @3,500rpm

Specific power: 61.8BHP/litre

Power-to-weight: 78.2BHP/tonne

Torque, lb/ft (Nm): 280 (380) @1,500-2,500rpm

Specific torque: 155.6Nm/litre

Torque-to-weight: 196.9Nm/tonne

0-100km/h: 12.5-seconds (estimate)

Top speed: 173km/h

Fuel consumption, urban/extra-urban/combined: 9-/7-/7.7-litres/100km

Fuel capacity: 75-litres

Length: 5,225mm

Width: 1,815mm

Height: 1,795mm

Wheelbase: 3,000mm

Track: 1,520

Overhang, F/R: 885/1,340mm

Minimum ground clearance: 220mm

Loading floor height: 865mm (estimate)

Cargo bed length/width/height: 1,520/1,470/475mm

Approach angle: 30° (estimate)

Break-over angle: 24° (estimate)

Departure angle: 22° (estimate)

Side slope angle: 45° (estimate)

Kerb weight: 1,930kg

Gross vehicle weight: 2,850kg

Towing capacity, braked: 3,100kg

Suspension, F/R: Double wishbones/live axle, leaf springs

Steering: Power-assisted rack & pinion

Turning circle: 11.8-metres

Brakes, F/R: Ventilated discs, 320mm/drums, 294mm

Tyres: 265/60R18

By Ayah Murad
Clinical Dietician

For most of us, stress is a fact of life. Unfortunately, research reveals that it’s also a fact of fat!

Nutrient imbalance and deficiencies in critical vitamins and minerals can increase levels of stress and anxiety. Sticking to a diet rich in fermented yoghurt, oily fish, fruits and vegetables – B vitamins (thiamine and B6) omega-3, choline and probiotics is key to reducing general anxiety and stress. Here are more tips:

• Eating small, frequent, healthy snacks

• Drinking plenty of liquids

• Having warm soups especially at mid-day like mushroom soup with coconut milk (Vitamin D plays a role in feeling happy)

• Having a fist-size portion of magnesium-rich dried cranberries, prunes, almonds, walnuts and pumpkin seeds with a slice of fruit and some yoghurt once a day, between meals, helps control appetite and make you feel better 

• Snacking on oranges, grapefruit and other citrus fruits is a great way to get your vitamin C, which studies reveal reduces stress levels 

• Eating spinach, eggs and chickpeas can help us produce relaxing hormones. I like mashed chickpeas with avocado and two teaspoons of olive oil with a dash of Himalayan salt as a spread for my sandwiches — it’s not only yummy but will also make you smile!

• Switching up your snacks and meals to enjoy the benefits of a varied diet and filling your plate with colour will reduce inflammation by providing antioxidants and enhancing your mood

• Drinking cacao instead of coffee can reduce your cortisol hormones and provide you with magnesium, especially when taken in the morning on an empty stomach

Small changes to your diet can make a huge difference in reducing stress and regaining control of your body.

Two major stress types

• Acute stress affects all of us from time to time, like meeting a deadline or studying for an exam. This type of stress can be good for our performance by helping us accomplish tasks more efficiently

• Chronic stress builds up when exposed to a high-pressure situation over an extended period. It affects appetite, digestion and fat and sugar cravings, leading to a negative effect on weight. It also puts one at risk of developing depression, low immunity and chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease and diabetes

Reprinted with permission from Family Flavours magazine

WASHINGTON — Starting three decades ago in his garage, Jeff Bezos built one of the world’s most successful business empires — and became the richest person on the planet.

Now Bezos is turning to new challenges, giving up his role as chief executive of the technology giant to focus his energy on other business and philanthropic ventures.

Now 57, Bezos founded Amazon in 1994 and went on to grow it into a colossus that dominates online retail, with operations in streaming music and television, groceries, cloud computing, robotics, artificial intelligence and more.

Bezos announced he would transition to executive chair at the company he founded more than 26 years earlier and hand over the job of chief executive to Andy Jassy, who heads the cloud computing unit AWS.

“This journey began some 27 years ago,” Bezos said in a letter to Amazon employees.

“As much as I still tap dance into the office, I’m excited about this transition,” he wrote.

In announcing the news, Bezos said he would remain engaged at Amazon but also devote time to his other businesses include The Washington Post newspaper and the private space firm Blue Origin.

He also will concentrate on his philanthropy efforts which include his Day One Fund and the Bezos Earth Fund, to which he made a $10 billion donation last year.

“I’ve never had more energy, and this isn’t about retiring. I’m super passionate about the impact I think these organisations can have,” he wrote.

The move by Bezos comes after his ex-wife MacKenzie Scott had seized the spotlight in the philanthropic arena by pl edging to give away the majority of her wealth to social causes, starting with nearly $6 billion last year to a variety of organisations chosen with the help of advisers.

Transforming, innovating

Jeff Bezos’s stake in Amazon gives him a personal worth of some $196 billion, making him the world’s richest individual, ahead of Tesla founder Elon Musk who briefly held that distinction.

The stunning rise of Amazon has come amid a rapid global expansion and taking risks with its investments and innovation.

“It is hard to believe that Mr Bezos only founded the company some 26 years ago,” said analyst Neil Saunders of the research firm GlobalData.

“Into that short period has been crammed a whole lifetime of innovation and entrepreneurship which have transformed not only the company’s fortunes but the whole shape and configuration of the retail sector.”

“Its relentless focus on the customer and its constant pursuit of finding better ways of doing business made it not only a survivor but a leader of the internet age.” 

In the headlines

Bezos has been in the headlines in recent years not only for his business success, but for his 2019 divorce from MacKenzie, his wife of 25 years, and a blackmail attempt which he decided to make public.

He stood up to the National Enquirer, controlled by then-president Donald Trump’s ally David Pecker, who threatened to release lurid, intimate photos of Bezos and his mistress, by making details of the exchanges public himself.

“If in my position I can’t stand up to this kind of extortion, how many people can?” Bezos wrote on Medium.

Road to riches

Bezos’s penchant for experimenting reportedly dates to a young age — with one widely shared story recounting how he tried to dismantle his own crib as a toddler.

His mother was a teenager when she gave birth to Bezos in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on January 12, 1964.

She remarried when her son was about four years old, and he was legally adopted by his Cuban immigrant stepfather who worked as an engineer at a petrochemical company.

“My dad came here from Cuba all by himself without speaking English when he was 16 years old, and has been kicking ass ever since,” Bezos said in a Father’s Day tweet.

Bezos was enchanted by computer science when the IT industry was in its infancy and he studied engineering at Princeton University.

After graduating, he put his skills to work on Wall Street, where by 1990 he had risen to be a senior vice president at investment firm D.E. Shaw

But about four years later he surprised peers by leaving his high-paid position, backed by money borrowed from his parents, to open an online bookseller called Amazon.com.

Looking back at the journey so far, he offered this advice in his parting letter to staff: “Keep inventing, and don’t despair when at first the idea looks crazy.”

LONDON — Oxford University announced on Thursday it will launch a medical trial alternating doses of COVID-19 vaccines created by different manufacturers, the first study of its kind.

The trial will show whether different Covid doses — those created by the Astrazeneca and Pfizer/BioNTech pharmaceutical companies — can be used interchangeably to allow greater flexibility in pressured vaccine delivery schedules.

The British government's Deputy Chief Medical Officer, Jonathan Van-Tam, said the trial would offer "greater insight" into the use of vaccines against Covid.

"Given the inevitable challenges of immunising large numbers of the population against COVID-19 and potential global supply constraints, there are definite advantages to having data that could support a more flexible immunisation programme," Van-Tam said.

"It is also even possible that by combining vaccines, the immune response could be enhanced giving even higher antibody levels that last longer," he added.

The 13-month study will compare different combinations of prime and booster doses of the Astrazeneca and Pfizer vaccines at intervals of four and 12 weeks.

Britain, the first western nation to launch its vaccination programme, has bucked the international trend by administering vaccines at an interval of 12 weeks in a bid to give a first dose of the vaccine to more individuals.

Professor Matthew Snape from Oxford University called the study "extremely exciting", adding that it would provide "information vital to the roll out of vaccines in the UK and globally". 

If the study shows positive results, Britain's independent medicines regulator would formally assess the safety and efficacy of any new vaccination regimen before it is rolled out to patients. 

Disagreements between the UK and the European Union over vaccine supplies have boiled over in recent weeks with Brussels moving to restrict vaccine exports to Northern Ireland on Thursday before the plans were abandoned in a swift U-turn.

In the following days, EU member states and the European Commission have continued to criticise the English-Swedish drugs manufacturer AstraZeneca over slow vaccine delivery and the efficacy of the jab has also been called into question. 

On Wednesday, the British government seized on a separate study that said the AstraZeneca vaccine — which was developed in partnership with Oxford University — significantly reduces virus transmission and is highly protective after a single dose.

AstraZeneca and Oxford University said on Wednesday vaccines against new developing coronavirus variants should be ready by October.

HAWTHORNE, California — Jared Isaacman is not a professional astronaut, but by the end of the year the young billionaire will have shot around the Earth multiple times at the helm of a space mission made up entirely of tourists.

The tech entrepreneur will blast off on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, in what will be the first all-civilian mission into Earth’s orbit, which he will command and pay for himself.

The mission, named Inspiration4, “is the first step in a world where everybody can go and journey among the stars”, Isaacman said with an enormous grin as he explained the project to AFP in front of SpaceX’s headquarters in the Los Angeles suburb of Hawthorne.

The CEO of payments processing firm Shift4 Payments, which he founded at age 16 in his basement, is an experienced pilot, qualified to fly military aircraft, and already holds a world record for circumnavigating the globe in a light jet in less than 62 hours.

In 2012, he even founded his own company that trains pilots for the US military force, Draken International.

“I’ve been a space and aviation enthusiast since as long as I can remember,” the 37-year-old said. “When I was in kindergarten, I remember looking at picture books of the space shuttle. I told my kindergarten teacher that ‘Someday I’m going to go to space’.”

If all goes as planned, his childhood dream will come true in the last quarter of this year, according to SpaceX.

And the magical voyage is something he plans to share.

Isaacman is to be joined by three other novice astronauts for the multiday journey — including one lucky winner of a drawing — aboard the same model of Dragon spacecraft that carried four astronauts to the International Space Station in November 2020.

‘Everyday people’

“Probably the most exciting part of this mission is that we are opening up this crew selection process to everyday people,” Isaacman said. 

“You have folks walking around today that don’t realise in 30 days from now they’re going to get fitted for a spacesuit,” he added.

The idea, Isaacman said, is to have a crew that reflects “the key pillars of the mission”: Hope, generosity and prosperity.

The “hope” seat will be going to a female healthcare worker who survived cancer as a child following treatment at St Jude Children’s Research Hospital, which specialises in childhood cancers and paediatric diseases.

The second seat, “generosity”, will be part of a fundraiser for the hospital, he said, with a name drawn at random from online donors. Isaacman himself is additionally giving $100 million to the St Jude organisation.

The third seat, which symbolises “prosperity”, will go to an entrepreneur who can best explain “how their business is going to make a difference in the world”.

The competition is open to US residents over age 18, but does not require any unusual physical or technical skills, he said.

Isaacman recounted that SpaceX CEO and founder Elon Musk had told him that “if you can handle a really, really tough roller coaster, you should be able to handle riding on Dragon”.

The NASA astronaut selection process is so choosy that “you have a better chance of getting hit by lightning”, but that is not the case here, Isaacman said.

His mission is slated to last for several days, during which the space tourists will orbit the globe once every 90 minutes — but won’t just be watching the Earth pass by below.

“We intend to spend a lot of our time working on experiments” on behalf of St Jude Children’s Research Hospital or other organisations, Isaacman said.

At the end of the mission, the capsule will reenter Earth’s atmosphere for a water landing off the coast of Florida.

Isaacman doesn’t rule out sending more tourists into space: If the mission is successful, he said, then “there’s going to be an awful lot of people who are going to get the opportunity to go up and explore among the stars.”

SAINTE-CROIX, Switzerland — In his snow-bound workshop, Swiss master Francois Junod’s moving mechanical artworks whir into action: birds whistle, historical luminaries write poetry — traditional craftsmanship newly recognised as being among the world’s cultural heritage.

In the Jura mountains running along the French-Swiss border, the precision skills behind some of the planet’s finest watches and automatons have been handed down through the generations.

The region’s historical pre-eminence in a field combining science, art and technology has also been given a boost by the United Nations.

In December, the craftsmanship of mechanical watchmaking and art mechanics in the Juras were jointly added to UNESCO’s Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

They now sit on a par with Argentine tango, Belgian beer culture, Chinese calligraphy, French cuisine, Indian yoga, Japanese Kabuki theatre, Mexico’s Day of the Dead and Spanish Flamenco.

Junod is working on an automaton of Leonardo da Vinci. His eyelids blink, and his sparkling eyes move, following his pen strokes as his arm moves from left to right.

“It’s close to magic,” Junod told AFP as he brought Da Vinci’s head to life.

“There is renewed interest in these objects because we are living in an electronic age, and to see these mechanical artworks again — the mystery comes back, the magic returns.”

“It revives this profession which had disappeared somewhat.”

Pristine snow engulfs Junod’s studio in the village of Sainte-Croix in western Switzerland, more than 1,000 metres up in the Juras, and less than 5 kilometres from the French border.

The area is a hotbed of creation in watchmaking and its close relative, art mechanics.

It has been so since the 1685 revocation of the Edict of Nantes, which saw Protestants flee France en masse, many heading for safety in the frontier mountains, taking their skills and industriousness with them.

“The tranquillity of the mountains goes very well with the profession,” said 61-year-old Junod, who is the fourth generation of his family working in mechanics in Sainte-Croix.

His 20-year-old nephew is among the five people working in the studio: A Steampunk’s dream filled with cogs, pistons, mechanical butterflies, a cantering horse, 19th-century music boxes and colourful giant birds.

There is even a skeleton in a feathered hat, used to model movement; hands and legs hanging down from the ceiling; shelves full of miniature heads; tools galore and a giant eye with a rotating music-playing iris.

Junod and his team work on five or six pieces at once. The art form requires patience and curiosity.

The automaton of Russian writer Alexander Pushkin — which could write 1,458 poems in ink — took five years; the Tapis Volant flying carpet took two.

“You have to like difficulty. You need patience. And you have to be passionate,” said Junod.

The job satisfaction comes from seeing the finished product come to life, having overcome all the technical and aesthetic hurdles.

“Even within the same studio, everyone will have their own style in making an automaton,” said Junod.

“It’s that which gives it it’s soul. It really has a soul. No two are ever the same.

“That’s the charm of this craft.”

A timeless charm which can still find a captive audience among the smartphone generation, as happened with La Fee Ondine: A bejewelled fairy sat on a lilypad, her wings fluttering as she wakes to watch a water lily open and a butterfly emerging.

“Wherever we showed it, whether in Beijing, London, Paris or Geneva, every time, young people swarmed around it with their iPhones filming it. Because it moves. It’s poetic,” said Junod.

The local watchmaking and art mechanics industries were thought to be dying out when digital technology began to creep in from the 1970s onwards.

But traditional Swiss watches saw off the challenge, and art mechanics also survived by embracing the possibilities opened up by computer simulations and three-dimensional printing.

“Now we mix modern tools with ancient traditional methods,” said Junod, meaning the art form’s limits are an ever-moving target.

“We can design objects that were impossible to manufacture in the traditional way and thanks to 3D printing, you can make incredible parts,” he said, even in gold and silver.

“The imagination can go even further.

“Almost everything is possible.”