Pianist Chad Lawson's New Album: The Chopin Variations

October 16, 2014, 11:36 am

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I recently had the chance to listen to pianist Chad Lawson's new album, The Chopin Variations. In this work, Lawson and fellow musicians, violinist Judy Kang and cellist Rubin Kodheli, explore Chopin's original pieces while adding their own sense of musical creativity and exploration. This beautiful conversation between Chopin and modern-day musicians reminded me how lucky we are that through music, we can still converse with ideas and sensitivities of the past, and that these ideas can still speak to our hearts with relevance.

Julie Ingram: What is your musical background?
Chad Lawson: I actually started playing the piano at the age of 5 after seeing Sha Na Na on television. Sha Na Na was a band in the late 70s/early 80s that had a TV show. As a family, we would watch the show together. I didn't come from a musical family by any means so this was literally the first introduction to music for me. I had no idea what the pianist was doing, didn't even know what a piano was, but I knew that was what I wanted to do. So, my folks rented a piano (being afraid to commit to purchasing one seeing that this was all coming from a 5 year old, mind you), and I haven't stopped playing since. Fast-forward and I find myself in classical studies. I had dreams of attending the renowned Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, so most of my youth was spent at the piano conversing with Bach, Beethoven and obviously Chopin. It wasn't until high school that I was picked up by a local wedding band that introduced me to Credence Clearwater Revival, Motown, Steely Dan, etc. Once I started learning what Reese Wynans was doing on Stevie Ray Vaughn's albums, I knew I had to learn everything I could to please my ears. I wanted to learn how to play every style and well - Rock, Pop, Country, Latin. That mindset eventually propelled me into attending Berklee College of Music where I focused my studies on becoming a studio musician.



(Photo by Michael Finster)

JI: Which musicians inspired you the most and why?
CL: Reese Wynans was a really big influence on me. Billy Preston, as well as Benmont Tench. These artists not only crafted the art of highly skilled performance, but they were saying something with their performance. It wasn't just notes on a page or 88 random choices, but they had a depth to them that is/was most often refrained. You knew at any point in time they, as musicians, could take over the song, but because of their wisdom (as well as being well-seasoned) showed their restraint. The mindset of, "What can I bring to this song/artist as a whole rather then how can I be most recognized?". That really stuck with me. It was always the "less is more" approach with them. That's something I've learned as I've grown as a musician, regardless of what style I'm playing in.

JI: How did the idea of The Chopin Variations come about?
CL: In 2011, I released an album titled The Piano. Two of the pieces I had composed were classical in nature, Chopin-esque sound if you will. But what brought the idea was when I started seeing tweets and social media posts saying, "I'm listening to Chad Lawson perform Chopin's Nocturne in A Minor," or "Chopin's Ballade in C Minor," both of which I composed. I was overwhelmed with gratitude for I dare not even consider myself in the same sentence as Chopin when it comes to composition, but because of the listener's desire for Chopin, the idea kind of wrote it self. It was obvious what the next release would be. People love Chopin. The concept of the album was to show that his works can be as spell-binding even in the most simple/bare-bone forms as they are in the traditional landscape we're already so familiar with. And since its release, the response has been completely mind-blowing.

JI: Do you feel a certain kinship with Chopin now that you've spent so much time with his music? Are there any questions you'd like to ask him?
CL: I love this question. No one has asked me this. I have a love for all things melody. Coming from a heavy jazz background one could suggest improvisation is creating continual melodies as the music moves. I'm always trying to find something that will connect with the listener and since my music is instrumental, I'm not able to provide the audience with a lyric they can associate with. So, in lieu of vocals, a strong melody is the next best thing. With Chopin, he had a great love for opera and the voice, which is rather uncanny being that he never wrote specifically for it. However, one of the things he's obviously recognized for is his ability to create melodies that almost make the piano weep. The piano became his 'voice' that he so dearly loved, and it's amazing to see how an inanimate object can transcend into such a dynamic inflection of human resonance.

JI: How did you decide upon the instrument configuration of piano, violin, and cello?
CL: On my previous release, The Space Between, I had cellist Rubin Kodheli arrange/play on a few pieces. It's incredibly difficult finding like-minded musicians that understand the importance of space. "Space is my favorite note," I always say. It is such a key element in creating a sound, but is often overlooked. Probably stems from my early impressions of the three musicians listed above regarding 'what not to play'. Rubin is one of those rare artists who understands the importance of absence. That sounds funny to say, but it's so on point. With him in mind, I also wanted to connect with violinist Judy Kang mostly because I've known her for a long time and just enjoy her as a friend as well as a musician. Here is someone that has toured with Lady Gaga, Ryuichi Sakamoto and has performed countless violin concertos, but also, as with Rubin, understands the craft of simplicity.

JI: Why did you release the album as a double album?
CL: I decided to release the album as a double disc because I wanted the audience to see the genesis of the project. I actually recorded all of the piano parts alone in my home studio, and once I was finished, I sent them to Rubin and Judy and basically said, "Play whatever you'd like." Rubin arranged and recorded his parts first and then Judy came in afterward and did the same. It was a perfect example of a collaborative effort, and I could not be more grateful for two musicians that saw the vision I had. Lastly, the 4th member of the group is the mixing engineer, Stephen Lee Price. This is actually the first classical recording that Stephen has mixed however I am such an unbelievable admirer of his skills I knew I could trust his expertise. I basically sent him the files and gave no direction. I gave him full carte blanche, and he didn't disappoint. Stephen fashioned a most beautiful landscape with this recording. All of that to say, giving the listener the chance to hear how the process was created was something I thought would be interesting to hear.

JI: How was the process for you having come from a jazz background?
CL: In a sense, I treated these as I would with a jazz chart. I had the melody, I had the chord structure and now to paint between the two. I stuck very close to the form of the actual pieces as I didn't want to sway too far from the original. They're masterpieces for a reason so no sense in trying to re-invent the wheel. Chopin was infallible in his programming of a piece.



(Photo by Michael Finster)

JI: Since the completion of this album, what have been your musical interests?
CL: Oddly enough one would think I would need a break from the Polish composer, but it's only enhanced my interest in him even more! I am reading more about his life and how he worked and thought not only as a pianist but as a teacher as well. The accounts from a few of his students have been fascinating in a sense where we learn an extension of his life from what techniques and studies he passed on to them.

JI: Is there a particular project that may be on the horizon?
CL: I do have two particular projects on the horizon, however I'm a staunch believer in not jinxing things. Some ideas I just hold really tight until the ink has dried and then...on to the next. But right now the focus is performing these pieces live and letting the audience experience Chopin's works so that they may in turn become even more interested in his music and life as well.

Lawson and his musicians will premiere The Chopin Variations on Sunday, November 23rd, 2014 at Le Poisson Rouge in New York City.

The Chopin Variations debuted at #1 on iTunes Classical. To listen, click here: https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/the-chopin-variations/id916381229

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Would I Have Been Friends With My Mom if I'd Known Her Back Then?

October 16, 2014, 11:47 am

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It's a simple question, one that many of us ask ourselves at some point.

While scrolling through #tbt photos on Instagram, Danielle Delph, a Portland-based artist, had an epiphany: she wanted to explore the idea concretely. The result is a compelling series of photographs in which she and her mother feature together, enjoying each other's company, only with a twist: they appear to be the same age.



The series has been making waves in domestic and international media. We spoke over the phone about the artistic process behind the creation of the photos, community response, and her future plans with the series:

Jesse Damiani: How'd you get the idea for this project? What were your goals? Why'd you choose your mom specifically?

Danielle Delph: One of those questions I think we all ask at some point is, "Would I have been friends with my parents if we'd known each other growing up?" You start to realize similarities you share, in senses of humor, the way you look -- especially when you come across them at different stages in life. The way I got to it actually was because I was on Instagram...as most of us are...and it happened to be Thursday, so it was Throwback Thursday. People are digging back into their past and finding pictures of themselves, their grandparents, parents, etc. I think it might've even been Mother's Day, and someone had posted a picture of their mom in high school -- it was one I'd seen before they posted it online -- and it was just one of those times where everything makes sense. I thought, "Wouldn't it be so cool if I could merge my throwback world with her throwback world?" It was a really simple idea that I thought everybody could relate to, a chance for people to imagine themselves in that space with their parents. So that's when I set to work on it.

JD: How did you decide which pictures to use?

DD: It was kind of a nightmare, because I had to be like, "Hey, Mom, can you send me every photograph of yourself as a kid?" which was difficult because a majority of our sentimental stuff from childhood: baby photos, Christmas decorations, all that, were destroyed in Hurricane Ivan, so there was a super limited amount of photos to begin with. I had to reach out to my childhood best friend, family friends, and relatives to ask for photos; I had to rummage through our lives through other people. I was really vague about what I was up to. I said I was working on a project for my mom. Everyone in my area had lost a lot of photos and tactile objects during the hurricane, too, so they all thought I was just scanning them to collect them into one place to give them back to her.

JD: Did you run into any obstacles you weren't prepared for?

DD: I remember making this comment about a series I did in college that incorporated the botanical and the medical, that they were meant to fit together, that I could find parallels where the two things just worked with one another. I found that similarity with this project, merging the two worlds. I was a little concerned I wasn't going to be able to find enough examples that worked, and even from what I had, there were several images that just didn't make the mark: one I completely finished that just didn't work as well as the others, and one that I just didn't end up finishing because there wasn't a good match, it was just a matter of choosing battles.

The biggest hurdle was image quality. Obviously we have a gigantic Internet photo album called Facebook, and I dug through my the photos there to find photos of myself from high school, and all of those were really lo-res -- you'd think in the digital world it would've been decent, but my Mom's photos were actually at a better resolution than the digital ones I'd taken from Facebook. I got into this problem where I had to diminish the quality of the photos of my mom in some of them, which was weird because they're older, and already have a worn-out quality to them; they'd scanned too well. I had to put them at a lower resolution so mine didn't look significantly worse than hers. So there was that basic pixel concern at times.

At first mention you don't really think about it, but when you work closely with something for that long, you see how the pieces fall apart, how some images start not to work, whether you're trying to make something look older, match resolutions, etc. It's two different languages you have to marry together.

One thing I noticed when I was going through all my mom's photos -- she has an older brother, and I actually have a whole pack of these particular photos I pulled aside because I really loved them -- all those old photos were for particular moments, you know, recitals, Christmas: something very specific. It's two people in a big moment -- she's wearing a dress, or her brother's wearing a tux, they're on vacation, they're in New Orleans -- these precious moments they were trying to capture. I found that it was hard for me to find photos to connect that with my life at first because we're a culture that takes a picture of a chicken sandwich, attaches hashtags to it, and glorifies it, and that obviously wasn't a thing for them. When I talked to her about that, she was like, "Film was expensive; people were precious about what they took because you had to develop it. It was an event." For us, all we deal with are gigabytes -- it's really cheap and we don't understand what it was to use film because we don't have to. Right now I have pictures from 2012 and 2013 on my phone and I keep getting this message that I'm out of storage. Today I realized that was the first time I couldn't actually take photos. Our whole culture, the way we take photos now, is completely different than it was not that long ago.

JD: When in the process did your mom find out you were doing this? What was her response?

DD: My mom never found out I was doing it, she just kept getting annoyed that I was nagging her all the time. I live in Portland, so because of the time difference, I try to call her every morning so I can talk to her on my walk to work. I'd say, "I know I asked you two weeks ago, can you send me those photo albums?" and she'd say, "I know, I'm sorry, I've got a million things to do." So it was this ongoing thing, and then I said I needed photos of me and she just said that was never going to happen because she didn't have them. Finally she made the mistake of saying she'd come across another album after sending the first, so I got on her tail to send me that one. She never thought anything of it because my whole life I've always asked for strange things for some art project, like, "Hey, Mom, I need fake hands from the nail salon for a project," so she was unfazed by it.

She realized what I'd done when I uploaded the photos to Facebook, which I thought was an interesting way to present it to her, given how we communicate now. There was something very weird about tagging myself and my mom in a photo from so long ago, because that's not something she's familiar with, or even I'd be familiar with, given the time period of the photos. I found that to be a weird layer of how I presented the project.

She left a comment where she was like, "This is so precious it makes me cry." The second one I posted was the baby one, and she left a comment saying, "Looks like you and I have the same hairdresser." Her mother cut her bangs, and my mother cut my bangs, so I was like, "That's your fault, that's totally you!" We had the same bangs, straight across. That was a similarity.



JD: How has the Internet community responded to the series?

DD: Really positively. It's been picked up quite a bit on viral blogs, and a lot of times on those things you see people who troll and leave nasty comments, and you're lucky if that hasn't happened to you, and I haven't seen anything like that come through, so I feel really lucky. It's a majority of women who are like, "This is a cool project, really beautiful." It's something people can relate to without words; you can figure it out without subtitles and have an emotional response to it, which is why I think it's been picked up internationally.

Someone made the comment that in the last picture I'm holding a Starbucks cup; I was actually very intentional about the outfits I wore, the objects I had, and the scenarios involved -- I put all those things in there as a way of reminding that I am from a different world. I wasn't trying to make myself be how I'd be in her world -- the fashion's different, you know, homecoming dresses are completely different, for instance, and you can see those differences. In the baby photo at the beginning -- you can't really tell because of how I'm positioned -- I'm wearing an Ariel shirt from The Little Mermaid. I didn't want to hide those things because I think it makes it more interesting. I wanted to put myself in her world as I was in mine; she's already been part of my world, she's known my world, she's always been part of it, so there's no reason to put her in it.

When I moved out to Portland, she had given me jewelry that was hers, and in one photo I'm wearing her bracelet. There's something very strange about that -- I shouldn't even say strange, though maybe that's the best way to describe it -- to be wearing something of hers while interacting with her before she ever owned it. It's another way of going back in time. It almost feels like a secret she's not in on: I have something of hers that she doesn't even know about.



JD: Do you feel like you learned anything about yourself or your mother you didn't already know?

DD: There was a point where I was digging through these photos so much -- I had them all over my desk at work, spread out all over my office area in general, and then I'd come home and they're spread out all over there, too -- it was like I was dissecting a mystery, finding two little girls who were lost and trying to bring them together. It was a way piecing things together to figure out these stories.

I learned that it's really easy to pass judgments on your parents. I think everybody does to some capacity, but you realize that you go through the same things they go through, and you can read those things through the ages: I started to notice when things were going really well for her, or a period where things maybe weren't as great. You just start to see certain things when you engross yourself in a different world that way. It was funny, at one point, I was really bummed out, and one of my friends said it might be because I'd seen something sad while I was digging through these photos so much, that I'd identified a part of her world I'd never seen before.

JD: Did your work in advertising have any influence on the project?

DD: Advertising's been a great venue for me to be conceptual, and if anything it's made me a more conceptual person. You have to figure out how to say something very quickly, in 15 seconds, 30 seconds, or in my case, an image. You learn how to do that nimbly.

JD: Do you have any plans for future series?

DD: Yeah, I do, it'll take some heavy digging, but I have some thoughts in mind...who knows if I can find that right imagery that'll work together again? We'll see.

I'm going to Lexington, my hometown, where all photos were taken, for Thanksgiving, so I've been calling around, looking for a needle in a haystack because it's kind of short notice, and I might've found a gallery to show it there. I wanted to have the first showing there because I felt like, these are all the people that knew us. There's something kind of weird about my mom's real childhood friends and my real childhood friends all together sharing these moments.

Another thing that happened recently is my mom said that she still knows the owners of the house where a majority of the photos were taken, her home growing up, and she was like, "If you want to go see it, I'm sure I could get us into it." She's said to me, "I look at that website every day, it's so special, it feels like déjà vu. All I want for Christmas is those photos framed." I thought how weird it would be if we took the same photos in those spaces at her old home, and then those moments would've actually happened, even though they also didn't...it would kind of solidify it, in a way.

Michael Graves: Five Decades of Architecture, Art and Design

October 16, 2014, 12:00 pm

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It's hard not to marvel at the multifaceted arc of Michael Graves' 50-year career -- and three events this fall will allow his followers to do exactly that.

One is a retrospective called "Past as Prologue," opening this Saturday at the Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton, N.J. It's a tour through seminal architecture and product design, and reflects the evolution of Graves' core principles.

"There are 2,000 objects, some from Target and JC Penney, and a few paintings in that show," he says. "There are some very early things in it too."


Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Michael Graves

Then, on Saturday, Nov. 22, The Architectural League of New York will be organizing an academic symposium in his honor at Parsons School for Design. The day-long event will consist of three panel discussions, with luminaries from the worlds of architecture, design and business discussing his five decades of design.


Alessi Tea Kettle, Michael Graves

In his lifetime, Graves has been a Harvard-trained modernist, a Rome fellow, a member of the New York Five, a postmodern master -- and a painter with a fine eye and muted palette.

That last facet is now on display at the Vendome Gallery in SoHo, with 60 of his paintings.

"The colors are very architectural," he says. "Frank Gehry once said to me that he was looking for a red that will stay red; I said I was looking for a red that will change in the sunlight, with a slight patina."

A number of the paintings were done from drawings he made while in Italy, among them landscapes and still lifes.


Acrylic on Canvas, Michael Graves

Most have been painted within the past five years, which is in and of itself a remarkable feat. Paralyzed from the waist down by an unknown virus in 2003, Graves has remained prolific in his art, his architecture and the products he designs. Among these are furnishings for a hospital room, and a new kind of wheelchair.

"I had been in and out of hospitals for three or four years and it was just awful," he says. "I've always a glass-half-full kind of person, and I thought: you're an architect and a patient - do something with that."

And so he did, designing furniture for a patient suite for Stryker, much as he'd once developed those household products for Target and JC Penney.

A chair for stroke patients features arms that bend up and out, much like a shepherd's crook. "When they can't find the arms to guide them into the seat, it allows them to grab hold as they're getting in and getting out," he says.

Perhaps his most ambitious and successful design is for the Prime TC transport chair, which enables patients to wheel themselves from hospital room to MIRs or CAT scans. "The current chair was designed in 1933," he says. "It hadn't been improved, so I decided to do something about that," he says.


Strker Prime TC, Michael Graves

When his firm was named one of the top 25 most influential designers by a leading health care magazine, that arm of his practice picked up considerably. And, he enjoys it:

"I asked an architect recently what kind of building he'd do next, and he said 'No healthcare,"' Graves says. "I said that I'd do nothing but healthcare."

His perspective, like his architecture and design, is all about enduring.

J. Michael Welton writes about architecture, art and design for national and international publications. He also edits and publishes a digital design magazine at www.architectsandartisans.com, where portions of this post first appeared.

How the Question, 'What is Art?' Got Real Yesterday in Detroit

October 16, 2014, 12:05 pm

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Yesterday, an article revealed that in its well-intentioned efforts to crack down on taggers and graffiti defacers, Detroit law enforcement planned to fine some building owners on Grand River Avenue for wall murals.



These murals are located in the Grand River Creative Corridor. The GRCC is an art initiative that facilitates the commission of large murals like the above in a struggling area of Detroit deemed by one co-worker to be "filled with heroine." Currently, over 100 murals have been commissioned and painted by artists from across the globe. The art is a strategy to combat the blight that scars the area. It seems to have proven both sustainable and successful, to judge by the steady stream of murals in progress. Not only does the GRCC beautify with its murals, it also generates amazing and provocative dialogue on the nature of art. One example is this official statement in response to the defacing of one of their murals and the ensuing comments.

According to the above linked article, fine amounts for the Grand River "defacement" were slated to top $8,000 for Derek Weaver, the founder of the GRCC. Weaver was also to receive a mandate to remove some of the additions. The article described how enforcement officers who were on the premises temporarily seized a camera from a PBS film crew that was documenting an artist painting a mural.

After this incident, Mayor Mike Duggan lifted the fines and tweeted:



A source close to the issue stated that it was necessary for this kind of incident to happen in order for the lines between art and blight to be clarified. That clarification in turn can allow this aspect of the mayor's impressive initiatives to crack down on blight to be accurately implemented. Let there be no doubt, what this administration is doing to address Detroit's blight is exemplary, inspiring and unprecedented on a national scale. And any undue fines on this matter are to be revoked, according to the most recent information available.

This near-take down of art that was created to combat blight in the first place puts the seemingly esoteric question of what art is in an all-too-real context. The above mural may easily be recognized as art, but what about this?



Or this?



Who gets to decide? Why? On what authority?

Each of the two above is also located in the Grand River Creative Corridor. In their work to address the tagging that blights Detroit, enforcement officers are being faced again and again with the question of what art is. This situation is an impressive reminder of just how important art is not just to the Grand River Corridor or Detroit, but to society and civilization at large. The study of art is often belittled, and art often goes under-appreciated but this situation is a case study in just how meaningfully art can effect social change for the better, in this case by beautifying a neighborhood. To dole out fines for wall art, or sell the Detroit Institute of Arts' assets to satisfy creditors in the city bankruptcy, would be to destroy the core of what sustains this city and will continue to make it stronger.

Car Pooling With Photographer Alejandro Cartagena

October 16, 2014, 12:12 pm

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By Helen Anne Travis

The Car Poolers photo series landed photographer Alejandro Cartagena in the international spotlight. His work has appeared in galleries from Toronto to Mexico City. He's been featured in Slate, the New York Times and the Guardian.

Not bad for someone who didn't pick up a camera until he was in his mid-20s.

Global Yodel recently caught up with Alejandro to talk more about the inspiration behind his latest print, Urban Transportation 2. Read on to learn how a new subdivision in Monterrey, Mexico, catapulted Cartagena's career.

In the summer of 2011, photographer Cartagena spent three mornings a week hunched over the railing of a pedestrian footbridge crossing one of Monterrey, Mexico's busiest highways. His assistant stood guard as Alejandro photographed the cars below.

Monterrey's construction was booming. The government had recently subsidized mass subdivision projects on the outskirts of town. But without cars or access to public transportation, the owners of these new homes had to hitch rides in the beds of their colleagues' pickup trucks to get to jobs on the other side of town. This is illegal in Mexico.

"These are people who are psychologically excited about the idea of owning a house, but they're also mad because the developers told them there would be public transit," Alejandro said. "They're risking their lives, and they're risking getting caught by the transit police. But they have to do it."

Alejandro's aerial photos of the workers sleeping and reading the newspaper in the back of the trucks landed him in the international spotlight. He credits their popularity to the images' relatability. Everyone knows what it's like to hop into the bed of a pickup truck. Alejandro just changed the perspective. It doesn't hurt that he also included a few images of burly construction workers cuddled up with their colleagues.

"Humor always softens a social or political statement," Alejandro said.

For daily travel inspiration be sure to follow Global Yodel on Facebook and Instagram. Guaranteed to awaken your travel bug!

Paris Journal: Marcel Duchamp. La Penture, Meme

October 16, 2014, 12:19 pm

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One of the most moving images in the current show of early Duchamp paintings, "Marcel Duchamp. La peinture, meme" at the Centre Pompidou, is actually the last work he ever did, Given (Etant donnes) 1: The Waterfall. 2. The Illuminating Gas. For an artist famous for trumpeting cold thought, it's a memory of lost emotion, a fading and elusive eroticism in the form of a naked spread legged woman that conveys the ephemerality of physical desire. The piece at the Centre Pompidou is a model (produced by Ulf Linde) and when you view the original work at the Philadelphia Museum of Art you can actually see the naked torso through a peep hole. Duchamp worked on this from l946-66 and much of the accompanying text for the current show, ingeniously reflects the same wistful recalling of earlier impulses--in particular the artist's one time desire to create conventional works of art (instead of the readymades, like Fountain, for which he would become famous) Here is what Duchamp says looking back on the most famous of his early paintings,

"For Nude Descending (a Staircase), I wanted to create a static image of movement; movement as an abstraction, an articulated deduction within the painting, without our knowing if a real person is or isn't descending any equally real staircase. Fundamentally, movement is in the eye of the spectator, who incorporates it into the painting."

The show begins by tracing a burst of interest in erotic drawing based on Cranach, Ingres and Courbet that occurred at the very end of his career and then goes back to his early work as a painter. Duchamp is quoted as saying,

"I believe in eroticism a lot {...}It replaces, if your wish, what other literary schools called romanticism. It could be another 'ism,' so to speak."

In Duchamp's eyes, eroticism was as much of a movement as expression and cubism. Besides unifying the concerns of Duchamp's career, the exhibition of early work also demonstrates one of the reasons that the artist may have given up painting. Duchamp was a student of contemporaries like Kandinsky, Braque, Cezanne, Manet and Matisse. Yet he was plainly not in the same league. There who can do do and those who can't do teach. Here one might iterate those who can do paint and those who can't do conceptualize. As he remarked in l949,

"The Large Glass (The Bride Stripped Bare By Her Bachelors, Even) in actual fact is not meant to be looked at (with 'aesthetic' eyes). It should have been accompanied by a 'literary' text as amorphous as possible, which never took shape. And the two elements, glass for the eyes, text for the ears and understanding, were meant to complement each other and above all prevent one or the other from taking on an aesthetic-plastic or literary form."

photo of Marcel Duchamp's Fountain by Alfred Stieglitz

{This was originally posted to The Screaming Pope, Francis Levy's blog of rants and reactions to contemporary politics, art and culture}

First Nighter: John Waters' John Lennon, Carol Burnett's Letter Writer

October 16, 2014, 8:51 pm

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Yes, I was in Shea Stadium when the Beatles shook their moptops and played their instruments for 35 minutes while not a single note was heard due to the non-stop screaming.

Yes, I attended Beatles press conferences, where, frustrated at answering the same silly questions, the four mates were so snide that I once wrote an equally snide account of what I'd just seen and subsequently received a damning note from their press rep, Derek Taylor.

Yes, for the trade magazine Record World I reviewed every album and single the group released between 1963 and 1970.

Yes, I did all that without ever getting it quite clear which were John Lennon's songs and which were Paul McCartney's. Both names were on all their songs, of course.

Now, thanks to John R. Waters, I've discovered I actually did have a fairly good idea of who was responsible for what. Waters conceived and wrote Lennon Through a Glass Onion, throughout which, with Stewart D'Arrietta singing and playing at the piano in a fedora, he offers a 90-minute tribute to the late Lennon at the Union Square Theatre.

It was Lennon who was alternately the most rebellious Beatle and the most committed -- in large part under the influence of second wife Yoko Ono -- to world harmony. McCartney was more given to whimsy and typical boy-girl romance.

I had my suspicions on Lennon's proclivities confirmed by lean, cropped-white-haired Waters, speaking in a convincing enough Liverpudlian accent and wearing black leather and black jeans. He's pretending to be a man whom he obviously still idolizes. His aim is to recount much of Lennon's life, only a part of it as the Beatle in the round glasses. An even lengthier segment is devoted to Lennon's Yoko Ono days, the ones only briefly interrupted by the West coast charging around with Harry Nilsson and the flinging with May Pang.

The celebration will be most meaningful to Beatles fans, and those particularly partial to Lennon. They may not believe, however, that Lennon would ever have comported himself in the theatrical way Waters does, greatly underlined by the hyper-dramatic lighting Anthony "Bazz" Barrett provides.

Nor might fans approve of the abbreviated material, among them what might be considered Lennon's signature songs. Just after opening, Waters begins "A Day in the Life" -- than which there might be no greater Lennon work. But he only gets partly through it when it cuts off, and he goes in another direction. No mention of first wife Cynthia or son Julian either and no inclusion of "Give Peace a Chance."

But I suppose you can't get around to everything, and Waters does cover many subjects, the pricklier ones, too. He defends Ono, more than once denying rumors she had a hand in the devastating 1970 break-up. Waters's Lennon says the boys had already been growing apart. This Lennon takes up the Beatles-bigger-than-Jesus controversy and explains it away. This Lennon also pooh-poohs any damaging friction between him and McCartney.

(I think was can assume that everything he speaks is derived from records of Lennon's remarks. Perhaps some of it comes from The Lives of John Lennon, Albert Goldman's 1988 biography, but maybe not, since Waters's Lennon is much less controversial than Goldman's. Also, the Beatles must qualify as four of the most quoted young men in the 20th century. There's so much to cull that Waters shouldn't have had to make anything up.)

For the record, Waters and D'Arrietta, who hasn't an especially light-handed way at the keyboard, get through all or part of 34 Lennon-McCartney and Lennon songs. It should go without saying that one is "Imagine." And when you think about it, you might wonder if, of all the Lennon songs, "Imagine" with its Utopian vision is the one that will last longest as time spreads far across the universe.

*************************************************************************************************

Carol Burnett is now siting and reading next to Brian Dennehy in the revival of A. R. Gurney's Love Letters, at the Brooks Atkinson. To be quick about it, she's giving an exemplary accounting of herself.

In the epistolary quasi-romance (it's never fully requited), she's the rich, increasingly troubled Melissa Gardner to Dennehy's upstanding Andy Ladd. What befalls her is much more demanding on an actor than what happens to Andy as the two of them age over 40 years from the time they meet in second grade.

Despite the depth of Gurney's look at two people involved in a love that may speak its name but can never be completely realized, he's inserted plenty of comic moments into their lives. It ought to be no surprise that Burnett mines them all, while keeping within the line-to-line demands. It's never as if she's playing opposite Tim Conway.

What also shouldn't be surprising is how well she deals with the pathos of a bright woman whose upbringing has given her privileges even as it's imprisoned her. Conveying this, Burnett is just as eloquent when not speaking as when speaking. Since the text of Love Letters is a relatively easy assignment by virtue of its being read from an in-hand script, certain requirements are obviated, but it sure would be nice to see Burnett back on Broadway in a full-out drama.

And Dennehy is just as impressive as she is. His accomplishment isn't due entirely to his now having settled into the role after a month with Mia Farrow. In some respects, he's giving a totally different performance. Previously, he barely looked up from his script and remained somber in relation to Farrow's grimmer interpretation.

Now he's all smiles through much of the action. He's continually amused by Burnett's Melissa. He gives the impression that his performance is equal part working opposite Burnett and equal part adjusting to the comic shift in the play's mood. What he's offering is an example of how tandem actors balance their emoting and how this type change reshapes a script without distorting it.

It looks as if director Gregory Mosher has also had a good time working with those appearing in the revival so far. Next at the onstage desk and two chairs: Candace Bergen and Alan Alda.

Setting Up the Jokes for Maximum Effect

October 16, 2014, 11:24 pm

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Perfection isn't always within reach. Nor are there any guarantees of success. Watch a professional golfer as he prepares to tee off. Or a pitcher as he prepares to throw a baseball toward the batter standing at home plate. They're concentrating very hard on executing a move they've been practicing for a long, long time.

When artists and athletes come close to perfection, the results are thrilling. In the following video, Osiel Gounes performs a variation from the Diana & Acteon pas de deux (having trained at the Cuban National Ballet School in Havana, the 24-year-old Gounes recently joined the Norwegian National Ballet).





It takes long hard years of planning, practicing, and discipline to make something appear effortless. In November 1999, a Los Angeles production of Putting It Together transferred to Broadway with a cast headed by Carol Burnett, Ruthie Henshall, George Hearn, Bronson Pinchot, and John Barrowman. This is what it looked like when things went smoothly as the show was being videotaped.





Then something unexpected happened to Burnett who, after years of doing comedy sketches on her television show, handled the situation like a pro.





Wardrobe malfunctions can be unsettling, hilarious, scary, or (in the case of Janet Jackson's 2004 half-time show at Superbowl XXXVIII), historic. However, when push comes to shove, if a comic element is involved, it helps to have the audience in on the joke.

Two new productions do a splendid job of achieving this goal. In one (a revival of a 420-year-old Shakespearean play), a simple hat trick clearly explains the plot's secret to the audience. In the other, a cheap shot delivers one of the funniest golden shower scenes ever filmed. As director Charlie Vaughan notes "First Period will probably offend a lot of people... with heart and emotion."

Indeed it will. Imagine a cross between Hairspray, Heathers, Carrie, and these winsome characters from Little Britain. If you're looking for the slightest hint of subtlety, abandon all hope.





Set in 1989 (hence the glaring lack of smartphones), "First Period" is only one of the many double entendres scattered throughout this film. For his first feature film script, Brandon Alexander III stars as Cassie Glenn, a teenage legend in her own mind, who has moved to a new suburban landscape.

On her first day at her new school, Cassie is determined to make new friends. At first, the only student even mildly interested in making her acquaintance is the school's social outcast, Maggie Miller (Dudley Beene), whose unfortunate nickname is "coat rack."




Cassie Glenn (Brandon Alexander III) makes friends with her new
science teacher, Mr. Klein (Jack Plotnick) in First Period


Cassie, whose mother is played by Cassandra Peterson (a/k/a Elvira: Mistress of the Dark), soon encounters such bizarre personalities as:

• Ms. Wood (Tara Karsian), the closeted guidance counselor who doesn't pick up on Cassie's hint that she recently had her "cat" shaved.


• Ms. Mallow (Diane Salinger), the deranged art teacher.


• Madam Mulva (Judy Tenuta), a low-grade, no-talent psychic with a strong bullshit detector.


• Mr. Klein (Jack Plotnick), the science teacher who likes to flirt with the girls in his class but is too grossed out by human anatomy to have a serious discussion about the female reproduction system.

Jack Plotnick as Mr. Klein, the science teacher


Cassie's determination to enter and win the school talent show immediately pits her against the vapid evil of Heather (Lauren Rose Lewis) and Other Heather (Karli Kaiser), who have the school's top two closeted jocks wrapped around their manipulative little fingers. Needless to say, the two Heathers won't hesitate to use Dirk and Brett to make sure that Cassie and Maggie get humiliated in front of the entire student body.




Brett (Leigh Wakeford), Maggie (Dudley Beene), Cassie (Brandon
Alexander III), and Dirk (Michael Turchin) in First Period


The students, of course, have their individual specialties. Maggie secretly desires to become a white, female rapper while Cassie can't wait to give her new friend a makeover. As the clueless Dirk, fashion model Michael Turchin (who will marry Lance Bass on December 20) provides plenty of eye candy with a wink and a nod to the audience that he's well aware of the stereotype he's spoofing.




Michael Turchin is Dirk in First Period


It goes without saying that the creative team behind First Period knows this film genre upside down and inside out. Michael Mullen's costume designs are hilariously appropriate for the 1980s, while the overall production design by Dudley Beene (who plays Maggie) is stunning. As director Charlie Vaughan notes:

"My heroes have always been outcasts. From the first time I saw The Bride of Frankenstein in the second grade, I knew I wanted to make movies. Discovering John Waters's Hairspray in the sixth grade only solidified this desire. I wanted the characters that inhabited his films to be my friends, but also, like Waters, I wanted to make movies with my friends. First Period is my love letter to the culty films of John Waters, and the films of my youth. Ah, the '80s. So whether or not you knew people like Cassie or Maggie in high school (or, better yet, you were like Cassie and Maggie) we are sure you will be wrapped up in the infectious fun of First Period. After all, isn't it about time to let your freak flag fly?"

Maggie (Dudley Beene) always keeps a sharp kitchen
knife handy for special occasions in First Period


Some interesting pieces of trivia dawn from First Period's press kit:

• Cassie's look was inspired by the fabulous '80s icon Molly Ringwald.


• Maggie was inspired by Jamie Gertz from Square Pegs.


• Maggie's rap battle is an homage to the movie Teen Witch where an unpopular girl suddenly and miraculously belts out a rap called "Top That."


• The name of the high school, Florence Fisher High, is named after the real recovering addict that Jerri Blank from Strangers With Candy was based on.


• After struggling to find a high school that would let First Period film at it, we lucked into two elementary church schools that welcomed us with open arms.

Brandon Alexander III (Cassie) and Dudley
Beene (Maggie) are the stars of First Period


How much viewers enjoy First Period will depend, to a great extent, on who they see it with. If you see it alone, its weak points will start to show. If you see it with a bunch of politically correct people who are in no mood for rape jokes, the film's tasteless humor will be lost on you and your friends.

If, however, you're surrounded by people with an appetite for bawdy humor, fashion violations, drag, beefcake, and the kind of double entendres that pepper the films from Q. Allan Brocka's popular Eating Out franchise, you'll have yourself a rollicking good time. Here's the trailer:





* * * * * * * * * *


Identical twins have always been a perverse source of amusement. In 1956, The Wrigley Company began using images of identical twins in their ad campaigns for Doublemint Gum.





In 1988, Bette Midler and Lily Tomlin starred in a film farce entitled Big Business. The following two clips set up the initial premise and then show the joke exploding into full force.







In 1997, a musical based on the lives of Daisy and Violet Hilton (two conjoined twins who toured the vaudeville circuit) opened on Broadway. This year's reworking of the show is about to open at the St. James Theatre on Broadway.





To fully appreciate the dramatic and comedic power of using twins, one must look back to its early source, the Roman dramatist Plautus (254-184 BC). A master craftsman of stage farce, his play, Menaechmi, drew many of its laughs from the mistaken identities of a pair of twins.




Danny Scheie and Adrian Danzig in Shakespeare's
The Comedy of Errors (Photo by: Kevin Berne)


The California Shakespeare Theater recently presented a new production of The Comedy of Errors (in which Shakespeare decided to double his comic opportunities by writing for two sets of twins instead of just one). Cleverly directed by Aaron Posner, the production relies on audiences paying careful attention to those cast members who are doubling up on characters.

• Ron Campbell doubles as Egeon (the Syracusan merchant who fathered one set of twins) and Angelo the goldsmith.


• Liam Vincent doubles as the Duke of Ephesus and Balthasar the merchant.


• Patty Gallagher doubles as a courtesan as well as Egeon's lost wife (who has become the Lady Abbess of Ephesus).

Patty Gallagher, Adrian Danzig and Danny Scheie
in The Comedy of Errors (Photo by: Kevin Berne)


In recent years, Posner has developed quite a reputation for his work staging plays such as Macbeth and The Tempest. In the following clip, he talks about how to make Shakespeare relevant to contemporary audiences.





As dramaturgy intern Aliya Charney explains with regard to the CalShakes production of The Comedy of Errors:

"Posner adds to the play's themes of doubling and confusion with a cast of seven. Both sets of twins (four characters total): Antipholus of Ephesus/Antipholus of Syracuse and Dromio of Ephesus/Dromio of Syracuse (played by Adrian Danzig and Danny Scheie, respectively) are performed by two actors, while other cast members play multiple personalities on stage as well. The actors, therefore, rely on quick changes (some of which take place on stage before the audience), accent shifts, and physical humor to tell the story of mistaken identity between two sets of brothers."

Danny Scheie in The Comedy of Errors (Photo by: Kevin Berne)


Working on Nina Ball's unit set (with some delicious costuming work by Beaver Bauer), Posner's inventiveness can be staggering. But when you have a performer like Danny Scheie (who portrays both Dromios) to work with, it's hard to go wrong. At times, it's best to let Scheie just run with a gimmick (like rotating his hat to indicate which Dromio he is portraying at any given moment). Whether interacting with his master (Antipholus of Syracuse), his master's twin (Antipholus of Ephesus), Adriana (the wife of Antipholus of Ephesus) or her sister, Luciana, Scheie never fails to delight.




Nemuna Ceesav and Danny Scheie in a scene from
The Comedy of Errors (Photo by: Kevin Berne)


While Posner's staging offers Adrian Danzig and Danny Scheie a wealth of comedic opportunities, their work is enhanced by movement director Erika Chong Shuch and Dave Maier (the resident fight director at California Shakespeare Theater).

The radiant Nemuna Ceesay (Adriana) and Tristan Cunningham (as her sister, Luciana) enjoy some spirited interplay as the two most confused women in Shakespeare's comedy (which had its first recorded performance on December 28, 1594). Easily moving in and out of supporting characters are the gifted trio of Ron Gallagher, Liam Vincent, and Patty Gallagher.




To read more of George Heymont go to My Cultural Landscape

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Homeboy Industries: "Every Angeleno Counts" 5k Race and Art Show

October 17, 2014, 6:24 am

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Art meets athletes this year for Homeboy Industries 5k Run/Walk on Saturday October 18, from 8am to noon. Along the race route, runners and walkers and experience entertainment including taiko drummers, musicians from the Compton High School Marching Band and live painting by students from the Los Angele County High School for the Arts.

Food trucks, live music and vendors are part of the community fest set up along Bruno Street at the race's start and finish line, and this year there's a new component: An art fair featuring a wide range artists reflecting the race theme of "Every Angeleno Counts."

I was honored to be asked to coordinate the art portion--which on the surface seems like a pretty monumental task: Sixty feet of chain link fence, and artists representing a wide swath of LA's vast cultural mix. Oh and three hours to hang 80 pieces for a show that lasts four hours, from 8am to noon. The outpouring of art and support was astounding and the artists made it so easy for me with their graciousness and generosity. Shepard Fairey, Juan Carlo Muñoz Hernandez and Abel Alejandre donated pieces outright, while other artists created works specifically for the event, and all of them were excited to participate in a show where a portion the sale price) went to support Homeboy Industries' many programs. Here are some images and quotes from the over forty artists participating.

KATHERINE BRANNOCK:

I'm sure anyone can identify with the feelings of being trapped in a
negative cycle with no means of escape. Homeboy's manifesto of
"self-improvement, leading to strengthened communities" seems like a
concept we all could employ within our own lives...

WINI BREWER:

I live at the Brewery. These "boys" and "girls" are my neighbors. I live in the hood! I grew up in a Connecticut suburb filled with opportunity. I want these young people to have the same opportunities i had -- the chance for a good life. They deserve our support. They deserve a chance. I can't think of a better use for my art than to help these young people.

SHEILA CAMERON:

In the busy swirl of Los Angeles, it is easy to forget "Every Angeleno Counts". Homeboy Industries isn't just making room but also providing avenues of real hope, something everyone needs. It's an honor to have my work included.

KEITH DUGAS:

I'm not a man of faith, but Father Boyle is one of my heroes. It's just about impossible to grow up in Los Angeles, and not know that man, and what he's done for this city. If Homeboy Industries asks for something, it's a really easy "Yes!"

SOPHIA GASPARIAN:

My art is concerned with equal human rights worldwide. It is a blessing to have this invitation to contribute to an incredible organization that continues to engineer solutions by creating opportunities for local people and which gives them hope and skills to become contributing members of our Los Angeles community. I hope my participation in "Every Angeleno Counts" 2014 will encourage more people to participate in making local changes that benefit people at large.

JANET GREY:

Homeboy Industries sets an impressively high standard - providing a broad spectrum of programs that truly DO serve the community at large, and at-risk youth simultaneously. We all benefit from their innovative and thorough approach to curbing gang violence. I'm so pleased to support this organization and participate in this event!

MARC TRUJILLO:

I'm happy to be a contributor to the success of Homeboy Industries- I've enjoyed the Homeboy Diner at LA City Hall and really think the whole program is important, ingenious, and a distinctly Angeleno institution, I'm a believer!

J MICHAEL WALKER

I've known Father Greg for maybe twenty years, through our mutual association with Dolores Mission Church in Boyle Heights; and I designed a tee-shirt for Homeboy back a dozen years ago or so. Like everyone who's come into contact with him, I have the utmost respect for his dedication and inspiration; and I've seen the deep and positive transformations that people undergo when they commit themselves to Homeboy's and Homegirl's community and fellowship. I didn't have to think twice about contributing a piece for this weekend's fundraiser: it's just a small thank you gift, really.

The Homeboy 5k Run/Walk will have on-site registration if the urge run or walk comes over you. For more details n the run, check out this link. And you can see more of the art on CartwheelArt.com

A Conversation With Bass-Baritone Philippe Sly

October 17, 2014, 6:25 am

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San Francisco Opera's fourth presentation in the 2014/15 season is Handel's hit from 1730, Partenope. Directed by Christopher Alden, the production debuted in 2008 and is a joint effort with the English National Opera and Opera Australia. In 2009, it won the Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Opera Production. Back in Handel's day, the title character was linked to Parthenope, "Queen of Naples" - a girl named for one of the sirens and with suitors on every side. The opera involves a trio of princes from Corinth, Rhodes, and Cumae - and a caller who arrives unexpectedly, a certain "Eurimene" who is - not like the rest of them, anyway. Alden beams the provocative Partenope and her ensemble to Paris of the 1920's. No longer a queen, Partenope is transformed into the queen bee of an avant garde, intimate and artsy salon. Canadian bass-baritone Philippe Sly - praised for his stunning performance as Guglielmo in the Company's 2013 production of Cosi fan tutte - portrays Ormonte, no longer the Queen's guard, but a sharp-eyed partisan in Madame's daily eudaemonia.

"The way Christopher has set the production," says Phil, "it makes complete sense for me to be this other kind of insinuating character. What is available to me is quite ominent. Because the text can be quite vague, we can do what we want with it. It's a great use of Handel and shows how versatile his operas really are. Once there are no more boundaries, there is so much that can be done. Within one aria you could have people either frozen or actively participating with other characters who are not singing. The character who is singing could be repeating the same thing over and over again, but going through an entire transformation while singing it."


PHILIPPE SLY. Photo, Adam Scotti

"Partenope is actually a precursor to Cosi fan tutte," said Phil, "in the sense that it's a story of multiple lovers and the foils of love. I am kind-of like her best friend, her bro - a sexually repressed individual that, in a way, hasn't come out of the closet. But by the end of the show, he completely breaks out of it. My character is about that breaking-free and accepting what's there. He is a microcosm for what the show is about, but the most minor character when it comes to the actual music."

Philippe Sly's background is all about Early Music, starting with his experience in boys choir. He was always singing from that period, he says, even before entering McGill University and its renowned program in Early Music - the largest of any in the world. The resurgence of 18th Century operas into the repertoire of major opera companies began in the early '80s. Today's market is brimming with young singers trained in the Baroque style and its use of complex and variable vocal ornamentation. Recording markets show it as the best selling genre in classical music. Handel's Partenope, one of his few comedies, emerges at the time when the composer was rebooting his opera company.

"What is so cool for me in this production is that the original conductor [Christian Curnyn], who was supposed to be here for the whole period, canceled at the last moment - the day before we started rehearsing. They spent more than a week trying to find a new conductor. Nobody knows this piece! They eventually came up with a great musician, Julian Wachner, the music director at Trinity Wall Street in New York City. He was my professor at McGill University for four years. So, it's a huge homecoming for me. McGill is a great university. It's pan musical, but it has the largest early music department of any university in the world. It's the only university that puts on a Baroque opera every year and with Baroque instruments - from Monteverdi to all the way past Handel. My major was always early music, that's all I did."


Philippe Sly (as Ormonte). Photo, Cory Weaver

Philippe knows his schedule for the next three years. During that stretch comes another recording. Right now there are three out on Analekta, a Canadian label - two recitals and one of cantatas by Rameau. Philippe has a contract with Analekta. For the vast majority of classical bass-baritones as young as Philippe, recording contracts are very difficult to come by. Track 2 from his album Les Amants Trahis - "Volez, tyrans des airs, Aquilons furieux" - explains it all. His voice is full and vibrant, the sound is enticing and heroic. The energy behind his delivery seems unstoppable. I'm friending Rameau.


Philippe Sly, Christel Lötzsch, Ellie Dehn, Francesco Demuro, and Susannah Biller. Cosi fan tutte. SFOpera. Photo, Cory Weaver

"Unfortunately, as young singers we're forced to be able to do just about anything and not really focus and specialize and really refine what we do. We just have to do too much. I'm really comfortable knowing that I can do good work if I focus-in on a few things I do well. If it's early music, Mozart, modern music, and some French repertoire - then I'm really happy. I have nothing against The Barber of Seville, but I'm really happy not to do it again. I'd rather sing other repertoire. I'd rather sing new music and try-out repertoire that hasn't been done a lot and sing as much concert repertoire as possible. I don't want to fill my schedule with opera. I'd rather do two or three operas a year maximum - with the rest of the time in recitals, oratorios, and concert music. I could spend the rest of my life just singing Handel and Bach and be blissed out of my mind. Bach will trump anything - I will always take that over anything else."

André Breton celebrated at Cahors Museum

October 17, 2014, 6:38 am

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As the world become increasingly surrealistic, it is fitting that a major exhibition on André Breton, the father of surrealism, is being held in the Cahors Museum, in southwestern France until the end of December.

The exhibit is threefold: the politically engaged writer, poet, and intellectual was an avid collector of objects--primitive sculptures from Oceania, pre-Hispanic figures from Mexico, Inuit objects as well as paintings, drawings and photographs that he acquired or was given by his friends. Here, the curators, Laurent Guillaut and Constance Krebs (who runs the official André Breton website) recreated Breton's famous desk and wall that was in his cluttered apartment in Paris' rue Fontaine with a 360 degree panoramic film taken from photographs. The wall behind his desk was considered a work of art in itself and was donated to the Centre Pompidou museum in 2003. Guillaut and Krebs borrowed the original objects and artwork from a variety of sources including Breton's daughter, Aube Breton-Elléouët. The huge collection, which included thousands of books and works of art, was dispersed in an auction in 2003 after the French government balked at buying the lot. (Luckily the entire contents of Breton's apartment were captured on film and are available on the Breton website.) Treasures in the show include a self-portrait by Frida Kahlo in an alluring, shell-encrusted frame, an Edvard Munch engraving, a "rayograph" by Man Ray, and a portrait of the photographer Dora Maar, that Picasso painted for Breton in 1940.

The exhibit also commemorates the Citizens of the World movement founded in 1949 by the American peace activist and former World War II pilot, Garry Davis. Davis' movement, which envisioned a world without borders and passports, boasted 750,000 members, of which André Breton and others--Jean-Paul Sartre, André Gide and Albert Camus. The city of Cahors joined the movement, declaring itself a "world" city in 1949 and placed one of the first milestones--the plan was for milestones to circle the world--on a road that was designated the Route Mondiale No. 1 (World road). There are video recordings of Davis and Breton speaking to crowds, newspaper clippings and an exhibition of black and white photographs commissioned by the museum on the subject of the World road. Nadia Benchallal, the photographer, followed the winding road along the river, and said her film photography images were a road trip that sought to superimpose today's territory to yesterday's world.

The third part of the exhibit that provides a link to the others and explains why the Cahors area was so important to Breton; focuses on the nearby medieval village of Saint-Cirq-Lapopie where Breton, enchanted, settled in 1951. His father helped him buy a house thus enabling him to fulfill his dream of assembling his surrealist friends where they exchanged and debated ideas, played, created and foraged together in antique shops to furnish the house.

On the ground floor of the museum a room is filled with lovely works by post-impressionist painter Henri Martin, including views of Saint-Cirq-Lapopie and André Breton's future house, the Auberge des Mariniers. One floor up, Laurent Guillaut assembled a number of objects from Breton's home in Saint-Cirq-Lapopie, including a bowl of agate stones that Breton and his surrealist friends liked to collect along the Lot river and which he wrote about in a text called "Language of Stones":

Last year when we approached, under a light rain, a bed of stones that we had not yet explored along the Lot, the suddenness with which several agates, which had an unusual beauty for the region "caught our eyes", convinced me that every further step would offer more beautiful ones and over a minute I had the perfect illusion to set foot in earthly paradise.
Besides bringing together many rare and extraordinary objects and art, the exhibit gives us the opportunity to remember, in these violent times, an avant-garde, creative thinker who used art to protest war.

Why Failing Orchestras Are the Problem of Every American

October 17, 2014, 6:49 am

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As the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra faces a lockout between its management and musicians, we find a troubled industry in the news once again. Orchestras are falling like dominoes. The mood is tense and the forecast is dismal. An erosive force, continual and subtle, is eating away the core of a cultural institution. You may have heard this story before: classical music is in decline, music education is so important, but why should you care? Failing orchestras create severe economic, social, and cultural repercussions for our nation as a whole. This is very much your problem.

Orchestras are more than just organizations that perform music. They have a direct impact on local economies. They increase tourism and raise the status of a city. Many of the musicians in orchestras are also teachers, who are actively training students in the community. When orchestras fail, high caliber musicians are more likely to look for work in other cities. Music education leads to fuller development of the brain, which leads to increased math and science scores. This leads to more engineers, scientists, and innovators. At a time when America is getting its ass kicked in math and science, music education should be more of a priority now than ever for the sheer sake of global competitive advantage.

The musicians who make up an orchestra are highly trained individuals who have devoted their lives to musical excellence. They achieve this level of mastery through hard work and discipline that begins at a young age. When you attend a live concert, there are no auto tuners or speakers. The margin of error is slim, as there are no effects that can save or distract an audience from mistakes. It is an organic experience. Such an experience should always have value in a society that is built upon work ethic and determination.

It's illogical not to give classical music a try. Hollywood makes a lot of terrible movies, but rarely do we say we will never watch a movie again if we do not enjoy it. The classical repertoire is vast, and to say you don't like classical music means that you simply haven't found something you liked. For some reason, when it comes to classical music, we don't look past the same faults that exist in popular mediums. More and more orchestras are making major changes to their programs to attract new audiences. They are trying. We should meet them halfway.

If we only support the things that have the most marketing money thrown at them, we have already lost our freedom of opinion. If we only support the things that satisfy us now, and are not good for our future, we have already lost our sense of direction. And if we only support the things that are new, then we have lost all the wisdom that has been preserved over the ages. In order to avoid the fate of fallen empires, we must recognize the things that are beneficial to our society and we must fight for them.

I've spent three years making a documentary that focuses on the world of classical music. It's taken me to seven countries, dozens of cities, and inspired me to re-evaluate what it means to be American. I've been told countless times nobody will care about a film like this in America. I disagree. This is a story of pursuing excellence through hard work and determination, it's the preservation of a diverse, yet universal language, and it's the celebration of the freedom of self-expression. If that's not American, I don't know what is.

You can learn more about David's film on Kickstarter by clicking here.

How to Be Successful Using Great Communication Skills

October 17, 2014, 7:44 am

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I have often found it's the small asides at meetings, gatherings, or discussions that contain some of the richest nuggets of information. It's rather like footnotes in a novel that take the reader exploring some new pathway of thoughts. Just a few years ago at a class I was giving as part of our Sistema Fellows program, one of my very favorite people, Lorrie Heagie (in photo right), who is heading a stunning Sistema-inspired initiative in Juneau, Alaska, suddenly threw in a comment which seemed to land and disappear in the class, but which conversely resonated with me for days. So much so, in fact, that I quietly began a study of the subject. She said very simply, "Well, of course, it's all about effective story telling." Why did this mean so much to me? What was so profound in those few words? And how could storytelling be so effective.

Storytelling is an essential part of every culture. People are always eager to hear or relate a story whether from a book, a film, a play, a remembrance from childhood or a recent vacation. We are all full of stories and they are central to our understanding of the world along with the vast body of myth, legend, fables, folk stories, plays, mysteries and the great parables of the Bible, the Koran, the Torah. Stories are not ever lectures or long dissertations, although they may have didactic or moral implications. Instead they transform ideas into something totally emotional, vibrant, and energized, which then have the power to engage our imaginations. I see stories as part of our collective consciousness, a palace of knowledge, beliefs, values, attitudes, passions, dreams, vision, hopes, fears and understanding. They touch at the center of our humanity and as such are incredibly powerful. Effective storytelling will always make the chronicler memorable and understood and will establish his warmth of personality, originality, uniqueness, and authenticity.

For young musicians to have storytelling as part of their portfolio of skills will give them an edge (I will elaborate on this in my post script) in our incredibly competitive world. I suppose you could call it "presentation skills," or "good communication," but I like to stay with "storytelling" because I believe this rubric encompasses its power. Musicians or artists skilled in storytelling, that is, telling the story of their passion for music and discovery will be incredibly successful in communicating with an audience, introducing a new work, sitting with a donor and telling the story of why a creative idea needs financial investment, or just plain selling themselves for the next gig or concert series. This edge will allow them a competitive advantage which will lead to work and repeat invitations!! (In photo above, members of the Class of 2011 Sistema Fellows at NEC).

So how on earth do you go about acquiring this skill? Well... I would suggest that it's about structure and delivery, which I see as actually connected. Structure is all about the mechanics of putting ideas into a compelling and coherent whole, and delivery is the performance aspect, how you actually tell that story to an audience, and the many techniques you can use to engage those listeners.

To begin with, let's start with some structure by establishing Intent because this will propel the story and give it foundation. If you are not intentional in life then structure and the advantages it provides will fly by you. Intent is the sum of motive and goal and the distinctiveness of both. Take a sample line: "He was so passionate about the Beethoven sonata he wanted to play it for everyone." There's a clear motive, his passion for Beethoven, and an equally clear goal, playing it for everyone. Ask yourself these two simple questions on motive and goal the next time you begin a project or prepare a presentation, and you will have begun the first discipline of storytelling structure. You are the protagonist of your story. It is your story and you are totally invested in it. So be conscious and curious about how you communicate that story. (In video below, NEC violinist Robyn Bollinger expresses her passion for the Paganini Caprices and sets them in historical context.)



Your eyes are the most important part of your engagement with an audience. As the poet said "they are the windows into your soul," and people will be making intuitive judgments about what they see reflected in your eyes. So, keep your eyes connected to your audience. Let them experience the essence of you. No burrowing your head in your notes, or looking at your shoes.

Use your voice, just as a singer or great actor does. Everyone has at least six notes in their voice which can be used for effect, for emphasis, for drama, or color. There is nothing worse than a colorless monotone. You should video yourself to see exactly how you look and sound. It is one of the most painful but also one of the most effective things you can do. Once you have become conscious of your voice and how you use it, experiment with color--from soft sounds to hard, even abrasive, sounds--and then focus on projection, making certain that your voice can be heard, across a room or across a large hall. That's the objective, after all.

After your eyes and voice, the next thing the audience will notice is your body language. Are there areas of tension? How are you using your hands and arms, which, all too often become, unrelated to the rest of you, appendages you had never noticed before? Use movement--walk around in front of your audience in a small imagined "garden" of your design, if this helps to relieve tension. Arms and hands can be used as emphatic props, so practice throwing them around to emphasize points. Practice relaxation so that tension never appears before your audience. (Here Tatjana Merzyn, Class of 2014 Sistema Fellow, makes a point.)

Engage your audience with energy. How many performances have we all experienced where the performer is just phoning it in? No contact, no engagement with the audience, and no sense that the audience is the most important group in their lives at that very moment. Be in the moment with so much energy that you will be exhausted at the end of it all. And that's great!

Use dissonance to get everyone's attention. And by dissonance I mean an idea or an image that grabs an audience's attention. Here are some opening sentences from some famous books that do just that, compelling you to read on because your attention is caught:

"Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Col. Aureliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice." - Gabriel García Márquez, 100 Years of Solitude

Or

"The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel." -William Gibson, Neuromancer.

Or

"Jack Torrence thought: Officious little prick."-- Stephen King, The Shining

These are some really effective examples of dissonance and its attention-grabbing power.

Work on the use of metaphor. It is, after all, how we try to explain the world around us. You might simply use a metaphor to create an image of your experience of something. "He's a rock star" or "Life's a balloon." It adds so much color. Here are some examples from Shakespeare, whose genius with metaphor knows no bounds. I use Shakespeare not that you need to emulate him (if that were possible) but as examples of the energy in a well- tuned phrase and image:

"Love looks not with the eyes but
With the mind,
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind."

Or

"Love is a smoke and is made with the fumes of sighs."

Or

"Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing."

A well-tuned phrase creates strong impressions and it is worthwhile finding time to think just a bit poetically because it will be that which stages in the audience's mind.

Which leads me to memorability. How do you do or say anything that could be experienced as memorable? Think about works of music, art, or literature that you can bring instantly to mind. What are their characteristics? How do they command such attention in our minds and memories?

Spending time and creative thought in honing your storytelling to incorporate some of the techniques I am outlining will take you a long way towards this. What you want is an experience that I had in my life recently, when someone came up to me and said that they heard me talk six years prior, how much it meant to them, and then started to quote me!! Now that's engagement and memorability.

Add detail to your story. It creates a stronger image and adds a sense of authenticity that will connect with your audience, as it provides that patina of mental reality. Detail can seem a throw away, something added almost as an aside, but the thought and preparation that go into producing detail is serious stuff. Just think back to that very first Star Wars movie, Episode 4, from the 1970's. I am sure we all have seen the movie a million times and I rank it as one of the most magical and memorable of all time. Here are two scenes that come to mind immediately. Obi-Wan takes Luke, R2-D2 and C-3PO to that "den of iniquity" to find Han Solo. They walk into what must pass as a bar but it is populated by the strangest creatures from all parts of the galaxy, with a band playing in the background on instruments that are equally strange. Or the scene on the Millennium Falcon when C-3PO is playing a hologram board game with Chewbacca and the pieces are actually alive and moving! None of these scenes move the story on or are necessary to the plot but...they add that authentic note to the story. You don't have to be George Lucas in terms of invention, just conscious of the moments of detail that make a difference to your story.

Use emotion in your storytelling in an authentic way. If an experience meant something to you then let the audience feel that. If you find relating the experience difficult and emotional, that's good too. Find ways to bring that authentic voice to your audience. (In photo, Sistema Fellow Eriel Huang from Class of 2014 tears up at graduation presentation.)

Work on simplicity. Being simple requires great thought and energy. That old adage "I am sorry my letter is so long but I didn't have time to write a brief one," has never been truer. Simplicity comes from the great discipline of making your message totally clear. If there are three things you want the audience to know, then how do you go about making those three things have the most clarity and simplicity so that the audience gets it, and remembers? Those three things are what you have identified as the absolute centre of your story, what it is about. It might be your passion for music, the historical context of a work and its composer, or the significance it has played in your life. But be intentional. Prepare and then deliver what is important to your story. Be painfully honest about eradicating redundancy. Clear away the rubbish to identify the shining ideas that you want to have heard but still keep the detail!

Use Silence when you speak. This is probably one of the most difficult things for anyone to do these days as we are constantly intent upon filling every space with some form of sound or noise. But silence can be used to provide emphasis and create oxygen around an idea.

And together with silence comes pacing and rhythm. Establish the pace of your storytelling based upon your intuitive and visceral response to your audience. You are not there to stand and deliver, you are there to pro-actively react to the needs and experience of the audience. So try using rhythm to help with pacing and vary this in order to provide color and emphasis.

Use humor. Humor is one of the greatest ways of allowing an audience to get to know you and trust you. Self-effacing humor is particularly effective, but using humor through your storytelling will ensure that you have a light touch and have charmed your audience. You don't have to demonstrate the brilliance of a Robin Williams, you are not doing stand-up, but we can all use the positive parts of our characters to infect those little moments where an audience smiles with you. (The 2014 Class of Sistema Fellows in a humorous presentation.)

There are lots of other refinements we could take a look at but I think the most important part of it all may be the audience. Find out as much as you can about them, who they are, where they come from, the demographics. Not the full FBI research but enough for you not to be surprised. Remember that an audience will come and see you out of curiosity and a wish to be entertained, and maybe even a desire to have something transformational and uplifting from the music you are about to perform. The audience will come as themselves, with all their lives, their problems, perceptions, histories, loves, prejudices. They are human beings after all. And they will use all of this to color in everything that you say and do.

Ending! Endings are the most difficult thing to structure in stories and in life. Saying goodbye, ending a relationship, are protracted and messy. Beethoven had the worst time in trying to end some of his works. The tonic, dominant chords seem to go on for an age. Only Haydn truly has the ending technique totally mastered. Just listen to his set of six String Quartets, Op. 76 for some of his finest examples. But when you want to end a story, that final part of your communication, what do you do? You must end with all the energy and commitment with which you began. Never go into terminal decrescendo. You should summarize and include one new element with the intention of ending in glorious D-Major. Just listen to the last movement of Mahler's Symphony No. 1, for a great example.

To illustrate such an ending is the shortest novel ever written. It's just six words long and purportedly comes from Hemingway. It demonstrates a profound use of words and images which gives to us its audience the power to create a whole story prior to those six words, and a whole story after them.

"For sale, Baby shoes, never worn."

Not D-Major I know, but such a great d-minor.

P.S. Actually, here is a D-Major ending...sort of. I want to define "having an edge," a competitive advantage, which I mentioned at the beginning. I will define this by way of a simple equation...creativity + order = a target score of 20, with 10 as the maximum per side. Creativity is what a young artist is devoted to, developing his musicianship, refining technique, working on interpretation. Order is the non-musical part of being a musician but so important in this Darwinian world of career competition. It incorporates networking, building a website, having a career plan, marketing, programming, cultivating leadership skills, practicing time management, sharpening presentational skills (storytelling!). Now rate yourself on a scale of 10 for each part--creativity and order. Most people I know give themselves high marks for creativity, but they stumble over order with a low rating. One might have a creativity rating of nine, but a low of four for order, resulting in a total of 13, towards the goal of 20. And it's the remaining seven that gives you the edge. But if you want to refine order down to what I consider the absolute essentials, then I would focus on networking and storytelling. The rest will follow because you'll be very successful. Now would Mahler be pleased with this ending??! I hope so.

P.P.S. I want to recommend a book that Lorrie Heagie gave me on this subject. Story Proof: The Science Behind the Startling Power of Story by Kendall Haven. It really changed my thinking.

Note: This material was excerpted from a class given as part of New England Conservatory's Entrepreneurial Musicianship program in September 2014 called "Tony's Talks."

Robert Risko: The World's Greatest Celebrity Illustrator Opens Up As Never Before

October 17, 2014, 7:54 am

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It's no small feat that the mighty celebrity manifesto, Vanity Fair -- first under its brilliant re-awakening by editor Tina Brown and later under Graydon Carter's decidedly if-it's-not-broken-don't-fix-it stewardship -- for the past three decades has had under contract the two absolute best graphic interpreters of the famous, Annie Liebovitz (photography) and Robert Risko (illustrator).

Though both artists couldn't be more different in approach, medium or temperament, the end result VF publishes month in, month out does connect their work in undeniable ways: Familiar, yet surprising; colorful, though often dark; uncomplicated, but complex. And as an avid reader of VF since Brown's re-launch in 1984 -- and an editor-in-chief fortunate enough to have worked with Risko for decades myself -- I can safely say that there are no better graphic artists dissecting what it means to be a celebrity than Liebovitz and Risko. I'm just lucky enough to be able to call one of them a friend.

The first time I spoke with Robert Risko, I had spent an inordinate amount of time trying to find him. In 1993, I was set to launch a magazine I was editing and I thought Risko's sophisticated artistry was needed for a particular feature I was prepping. After a few rounds of phone tag -- you do remember leaving messages "after the beep," yes? -- we connected and what was supposed to be a quick "are you free to do an illustration for so-and-so celeb?" ended up being a hilarious, spirited two-hour conversation that served as the initial indicator of how much Risko and I had in common, saw the world similarly and absolutely loved the intoxicating vocal stylings of powerhouse divas (Patti LaBelle and Donna Summer come to mind most prominently).

Over the years, I've commissioned Risko to create some of the most challenging celebrities and he consistently delivered instant classic depictions for a number of the design-forward magazines I've edited -- Garth Brooks on a cover as King Kong atop the Empire State Building, Celine Dion for a less-than-flattering cover story, Joan Rivers as defiant AIDS activist, the late ABC News anchor Peter Jennings in his final days -- striking visuals all and masterfully, seemingly effortlessly, executed.

When I announced that I was leaving Time Inc. and New York City to start a new chapter in my life producing television and films in Hollywood, my thoughtful team contacted Risko without my knowledge and commissioned an original work based on an actual photograph of mine. Risko's signature genius is evident on that oversized framed illustration, punctuated with the iconic Hollywood sign serving as a backdrop complete with Klieg lights and a director's chair. That artistic endeavor not only serves as my unofficial portrait, it proudly hangs in my home waiting for visitors to inquire how that came to be. It's a story I never tire of telling.

I caught up with Risko in his Hamptons retreat on Long Island as we reminisced about what has transpired in the more than two decades since we became acquainted to the state of the world -- both for celebrities and civilians -- and asked him the questions I really wanted to know the answers to. As always, Risko delivered.

Finding Risko all those years ago became an important milestone in my career; what I didn't realize then was it also served as a marker that I had made a genuine friend.



Robert, talk to me about your process -- there's an assignment, a blank canvas and then what happens?

Well, I do a lot of thinking and compose a visual image in my head based on everything I know about a subject through media images. I Google and YouTube the subject and flood myself with information and focus on their best and worst moments in the limelight. Then I draw away on blank paper and scan my sketch into the computer. Back in the '70s, '80s and '90s, I would airbrush the illustration by hand, but in 1998 I started airbrushing in Photoshop. I had inhaled enough paint after 30 years so it was time to start going blind from staring at the computer screen. Right? Ha! It's always something isn't it? [Laughs]

 

Do you remember a piece of art you came up with that you executed perfectly?

Only one? [Laughs] I'm a perfectionist. The question should really be "Do I remember a piece of art that was less than perfect?" and, yes, there are some where the deadline came and I had to turn in something that I didn't feel was finished. There were more than one, but I won't name names.

 

OK, the good stuff: Reveal some of your all-time favorite celebrities you've done.

Diana Ross, Jack Nicholson, Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, J. Edgar Hoover and Gloria Swanson.

 

Have any celebrities reached out to you after they've seen an illustration of them published?

Oh, yeah. Julia Roberts bought several of my pieces. Others who reached out to own their drawings include Gloria Swanson, Meryl Streep, Fran Drescher, Dionne Warwick and all the Labelle members (Patti, Sarah, Nona), Tom Hanks, Andy Cohen, Giorgio Moroder, Dustin Hoffman and Howard Stern. Richard, that's just off of the top of my head. I'd have to look in my books to remember everybody. [Laughs]

 

Do you have a fantasy celebrity encounter?

Seriously, I don't have a fantasy celebrity that I would like to draw or meet. I did when was young, but I've discovered that celebrities can be so different in person that I just take it as it comes. I've met celebrities that I had admired and was disappointed when I met them in person and I've also met celebrities who weren't on my radar that I absolutely loved.

 

Your style is so undeniably "Risko," is there anyone left to do?

Oh my! [Laughs] It seems like there are more people to draw now than ever. There's an endless stream of people who want to claim icon status today and that's more difficult now because there are so many forums to be considered famous in.

 

What's the best thing about being so identified with Vanity Fair?

I consider Vanity Fair my home because editorially we're on the same page. We enjoy the world of glamour, but we don't let anyone get away with B.S. There's a lot of "uncovering" that goes on behind the facades of the famous in Vanity Fair and I like that. I try to show both sides of glamour in my work.

 

Tell me, if not celebrity art, what would you have loved to pursue as a full-time career endeavor?

I love to sing and perform and always thought I would've liked to have been on the other side of my drawing pen; however, as I see the toll it can take on the body physically with performers that I know I've concluded that I'm fine where I am and I will occasionally step out from behind the drawing board to take a bow and maybe even sing a song -- if I wasn't going to be an artist or singer, then I'd probably an anthropologist . [Laughs]

 

Here's a question I've always to know the answer to. How important is humor and kindness in your work?

Unlike some of my contemporaries I don't always give each subject the same treatment. If I want to be funny or kind it's because I feel that way about the person. In the end I'm a seeker of truth and I think that's the key to my success more than anything else. I try to draw people the way they're perceived in the public eye. The public isn't stupid. If I do flatter someone whom is less than worthy people will know. Ha! We can't get away with anything in this world. Everyone is a [television music talent judge] Simon Cowell. [Laughs]

 

Robert, let's end this on a whimisical note, shall we?
If you could do absolutely anything right now, what do you think that would be?

You know what, that's a really interesting question. Maybe I would take a vacation, but I'm not sure. I'm enjoying my life so I never "vacate" from it. However, it might be nice to disconnect from all my responsibilities for a while... maybe. [Laughs]

Click here for more NiC stories: 

All images used with permission from artist.

Read more at http://nowitcounts.com

Amal Clooney for the Sculptures of the Parthenon

October 17, 2014, 8:30 am

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On the eve of human rights barristers Amal Alamuddin Clooney and Geoffrey Robertson's visit to the Greek prime minister, Antonis Samaras, it would seem that Melina Mercouri's dream for the return of the Parthenon sculptures, sadly known as 'the Elgin Marbles', might actually come true in the not-too-distant future.

Scholars from the world over, art lovers as well as enlightened film stars who use their fame for noble causes, seem to have moved the lines of public opinion if not public opinion itself (let us not underestimate public opinion) that made theirs move.

No, it will not be a matter of a 'breach to empty all the museums of the world' as some, ill informed or ill-disposed, would maintain. As lovers of art and museums, let us refuse to voice so irresponsible a judgement, devoid of the most elementary historical information, so much is the acquisition of the Parthenon sculptures a case apart, a bad historical novel against a background of corruption and political and personal opportunism.

Trying to generalize this particular case to apply to all collections of all museums would be as uncalled-for and unjust as the British Museum's current refusal to turn over the sculptures to the Parthenon from which they were removed.

In addition to repairing an historical injustice, the return of the sculptures will repair an artistic aberration: disfiguring the Parthenon by removing an emblematic part of its content and exhibiting the result of this disfigurement separately in a museum thousands of kilometres away renders both the part and the whole illegible for any person aware of what Greek art, constituent of European identity, represents.

The sooner the British Museum makes this decision, awaited by all Greeks as well as by all Europeans, the more it will heighten the Museum's stature. It was Lord Byron, who gave his life for Greece, whom our English friends should hear: "Society is now one polished horde / Formed of two mighty tribes, the Bores and the Bored."

Far from the 'polished hordes', it is to Citizens passionate about truth and justice that museums should dare address themselves.

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Jennie Ottinger on the ImageBlog

October 17, 2014, 8:32 am

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My most recent work deals with clubs and membership. This is about how often much importance and ceremony is given to otherwise useless objects."
Title: Special Pins
Oil on panel
30 x 40 inches
2013

Discussing the 'Death of Klinghoffer' or Stepping in It

October 17, 2014, 9:27 am

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Getting involved in the current debate about the John Adams opera The Death of Klinghoffer ("With New "Death of Klinghoffer," Furor Only Grows," NYT 10/14/14) is like intentionally stepping in dog shit. However, particularly if you haven't seen the opera, you may be tempted to step in it-- even if you're wearing sneakers with crenellated soles. Or perhaps you didn't see where you were going. But join the crowd. From journalistic accounts it's apparent the opera has elicited passions for and against by many of who have never seen it. "Many protestors, who want the Met to cancel 'Klinghoffer,' have never seen the opera," the Times remarked about the naysayers. But who ever said seeing a work of art is a qualification for making a judgment about it? One thing that can be said is that the venom of many of the opponents who have unleashed torrents of threats is reminiscent of the reaction the cartoons of Mohammad in the Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten produced among those who felt that certain people and ideas are too sacrosanct to be represented with anything short of a beatific halo, if they're allowed to be represented at all. This phenomenon might be called "dictatorship of the victimized" and it creates the kind of strange bedfellows you also find among militant feminist and fundamentalist Christians who both oppose the idea that pornography constitutes free expression. All of this is fairly familiar. Salman Rushdie's The Satanic Verses: A Novel produced a fatwa against the writer and the respected scholar Wendy Doniger's book The Hindus: An Alternative History has been banned in India. When Portnoy's Complaint came out there was an outcry that the portrayal of a Jewish character who masturbated into a piece of liver created a negative view of Jews. How many of those original critics of Portnoy actually read the book? They probably would have said they didn't need to read such filth to make a judgment. They already know what it's about. They got the idea. Sound familiar?


photo: John Adams's The Death of Klinghoffer at the Met


{This was originally posted to The Screaming Pope, Francis Levy's blog of rants and reactions to contemporary politics, art and culture}

"On the Town": It's a Helluva Show

October 17, 2014, 9:48 am

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The Bronx is still up and the Battery is still down, but the rest of this delightful new Broadway revival of On the Town has been given a facelift that turns the tale of three sailors looking for a night of romance into a sexy comedy romp enlivened by some acrobatic and dazzling choreography.

The latest incarnation of this 1944 musical, a brainchild of Jerome Robbins with music by Leonard Bernstein and a book by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, begins with a homage to the age in which it was conceived, when America was at war and a large part of its male population was in uniform. A 48-star flag serves as the curtain and the orchestra plays the Star-Spangled Banner before it comes up.

The fleet is in town and three sailors -- Gabey, Ozzie, and Chip -- disembark at the Brooklyn Navy Yards for a 24-hour shore leave. But despite all the talk about finding "dates" for their one night on the town, any pretense they are wanting anything other than one-night stands for sex is quickly dispelled by John Rando's jazzed-up direction and Joshua Bergasse's exciting choreography.

Ozzie and Chip quickly find willing and eager partners in Hildy and Claire in a taxicab and at the Natural History Museum, thoroughly modern gals who are as randy as the sailors. Gabey, however, has fallen head over heels for Ivy Smith, a girl he has seen only in a photograph on a subway poster proclaiming her Miss Turnstiles of July. The rest of the show consists of Gabey trying to track her down, abetted by his Navy buddies and their pickups.

All of this is played strictly for laughs with exaggerated performances, including some slapstick, that might seem more at home in a TV sitcom pilot. Some scenes made me think of episodes on the Carol Burnett show, especially those with Maude Dilly, Ivy's dipsomaniacal voice coach at Carnegie Hall, and the search party's bar-hopping trips to various nightclubs.

The only problem with this approach, which is quite funny and produces its fair share of laughs, is that some of the more poignant moments in the show are eclipsed, seeming at times to be almost like filler material until the sexy scenes resume.

When it first appeared on Broadway, there was a movement afoot that decreed the future of the American theater would be a serious fusion of music, dance, and words, and "On the Town" was a result of that thinking. With Bernstein composing the score and Robbins choreographing the movement, the story by Comden and Green was the least important element.

By moving the girl-hunt to center stage and giving it a 21st-century sensibility of permissive promiscuity, some of Bernstein's wistful and ruminative music, such as the first-act "Lonely Town" and "Lucky to Be Me," or the melancholic quartet "Some Other Time," and Robbins' insertion of balletic dance sequences seem almost out of place.

Bergasse's choreography for this revival is something of a tribute to Robbins. Bergasse has put together lively and energetic ensemble numbers -- especially the Times Square Ballet that closes Act 1 and one in which Ivy is tossed around by the New York Giants like... well, like a football. And the two pas de deux between Ivy and Gabey are lovely.

Megan Fairchild, a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet, is stunning in her Broadway debut as Ivy, and Tony Yazbeck delivers an admirable performance as Gabey. Clyde Alves and Jay Armstrong Johnson are commendable as Ozzie and Chip, and Alysha Umphress and Elizabeth Stanley are suitably oversexed as Hildy and Claire.

With a cast of dozens playing some 40-odd roles, there is not a sour note in the show. One standout is Jackie Hoffman as Maude Dill and a trio of nightclub warblers trying to sing "I Wish I Was Dead."

Beyond Frieze: Top 5 Satellite Events in London This Week

October 17, 2014, 10:39 am

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Part of Christie's "Multiplied" October 17-20, 2014. Victoria Arney, Geometry of a Waterfall, Etching with Chine Colle 72x72 cm, Edition of 10. Courtesy of Bearspace.


Frieze London opens this week (through Saturday, October 18), and includes a whirlwind of programs including talks, film screenings and performances. The fair itself features the work of over 1,000 artists exhibited by 160 galleries including London-based galleries such as Sadie Coles HQ, Timothy Taylor Gallery and White Cube, among many others. If you feel like venturing out of the main tent in Regent's Park, we've assembled a list of satellite events taking place around London in the coming days.

1. Check Out Glenn Ligon at the Camden Arts Centre: If you're sick of the art fair scene, then London has plenty to offer by way of excellent exhibitions including "Call and Response," an exhibition of new large-scale works by American painter Glenn Ligon. Known for creating challenging, socially conscious text-based works, the exhibition at the Camden Arts Centre is based on the minimalist composer Steve Reich's taped testimony "Come Out." Culled from testimony given by six black youths during the Harlem Race Riot of 1964, Ligon's paintings create abstraction and rhythm using their words. The exhibition also features Live on Sunset Strip, a video work that re-combines footage taken of a 1982 performance by comedian Richard Pryor.

2. Go Underground: Even from afar, it seems like Frieze has taken over most of London. If you'd like to see some of the action without having to pay for it, check out the elevators in the Regent's Park tube stop, which feature posters created by Ryan Gander and Cory Arcangel. The posters by Gander read, "very grown up," and those by Arcangel, "what are we thinking?" The cryptic messaging describes the joint working process of the two artists for the installation. The gallery that represents them, Lisson, conceives of the posters as a public extension of their booth, which will also feature an installation by Joyce Pensato that recreates part of her Brooklyn studio. If you make it into Frieze London stop by the booth if only to see the staff members and dealers sporting wearable works of art and custom-made suits.

3. Isabel Lewis Plays Hostess to the Art World: Born in the Dominican Republic and living and working in Berlin, Isabel Lewis is known for staging happenings in different cities that involve music, smells, talks, people and plants. During Frieze, Lewis will host a number of events in collaboration with ICA at the Old Selfridges Hotel (October 14 - 15) and Fenton House (October 17). Free to the public, Lewis aims to offer a space that is a salon, a lounge and a bar all at once. The Old Selfridges Hotel is also the site of a week of programming offered by the ICA that includes Rhizome talks, live performances by artists such as Korakrit Arunanondchai and a dance performance by Siobhan Davies.

4. See An Art Fair At Christie's: Now in its fifth year, Multiplied, a contemporary art in editions fair, will be held at Christie's South Kensington location from October 17 - 20, 2014. Featuring booths from 40 galleries around the world, the event will also consist programming including a live 3-D printing demonstration by Professor Steve Hoskins (11am on October 17), a talk between Yinka Shonibare and Iwona Blazwick, the director of Whitechapel Gallery (4:30pm on October 17), and a demonstration on creating Japanese ukiyo-e woodblock printing with Sara Lee (all day October 18). Plan to see prints, photographs, artist books and 3-D multiples along with work by recent graduates from London's leading arts universities. Even if you don't plan on buying anything, go for the demonstrations -- they'll teach you more not only about contemporary art, but also the way that prints have been made throughout history.

5. Visit Dominique Lévy's New Gallery: Located at 22 Old Bond Street, the space opened on October 13. Its first exhibition is "Local History," which takes place concurrently in New York and London. Bringing together early works from the 1950s to 1970s by Enrico Castellani, Donald Judd, and Frank Stella, and then juxtaposing them against later works by the same artists, the exhibition highlights not only the evolution of each practice, but also the way their aesthetic similarities. Organized by art historian Linda Norden, with Peter Ballantine, the leading expert on Donald Judd, the show provides context to the contemporary art fairs -- after all, no movement exists in a bubble, and the reverberations from artwork made in 1960s can still be seen trembling in work made today.

Read more of our picks from Frieze London here.

--Brienne Walsh is a writer and photographer who contributes to publications such as The New York Times, Art in America, Interview, ArtReview, Modern Painters, Departures, Paper, New York Magazine, and Forbes among others. She has also appeared as an art expert and blogger on television programs including Today and Anderson Cooper Live. Brienne received her BA in art history from Brown University in 2004, and her MA in Critical Studies from Columbia University in 2011.

In a Nutshell: What Inspired Me to Become a Photographer

October 17, 2014, 1:16 pm

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During yet another cold winter evening, nothing worth watching on the only black and white television channel available in those days, my maternal grandparents would fill the wooden oven with chestnuts and, while waiting for them to roast, they would pull out the photos.

This humble photographic archive of their sub-proletarian, pre-industrial life in the wild swamps of southern Tuscany, Maremma, was kept in a battered shoebox, tied up with rope.

We would spread the photos on the ancient marble kitchen table to then pick one at a time and comment on it.

There were photos of dusty roads with primitive vehicles, of family, friends, a lot of people who had died already but who were still vividly alive in my grandparents' memory through those yellowed images and the anecdotes associated with each one of them.

I remember that some of the pictures were printed on a really thin photographic paper, it felt as if they could easily crumble between your fingers and turn into dust, to be lost forever in the annals of time, just like the people they depicted.

Others, the more formal images, the individual or family group portraits, shot in early 1900s photographic studios, were mounted on cardboard and had somewhere, often in a corner, the name of the photographer or the date.

Others had been made into postcards, with fading stamps of a forgotten denomination still attached to them. On the back, they were scribbled in the doubtful calligraphy of someone struggling their way out of a historically widespread illiteracy: "Tutto bene" -- everything's alright; "Ci mancate molto"-- We miss you a lot; "Maria ha messo il primo dentino" -- Maria's first tooth just came out; "Tanti baci" -- Many kisses.

Although I was very young at the time, it was obvious to me that none of those images were casual snaps. They were precious mnemonic aids to hang on to, in the never-ending social and geographical displacement of the poorest social classes my grandparents belonged to.

Those images were a time capsule, they were the only positive, tactile evidence of the past, of a personal identity which was, and still is, extremely easy to misplace: due to many inevitable relocations, to poverty, to disenfranchisement, to years of brutal, underpaid work exploitation.

Those pictures were the first thing in my existence to suggest a strategy, a method to reduce, to fight back against the often frighteningly ephemeral quality of time, something that had always caused me great anxiety, since early infancy.

That yellowing shoebox was the first and perhaps strongest reason to inspire me, later in life, to become a photographer, to try and stop the passing of time with a camera, to attempt expressing my innermost feelings not though words but through images.

But then, the chestnuts were ready. The photos would gently go back in the shoebox and the chestnuts were pulled out of the oven and briefly wrapped in a rag. One by one, burning our fingers, we would start peeling and eating them, piping hot.

Chestnuts, "Il pane dei poveri" -- Poor people's bread.

Outside was still raining.