Niklas Goldbach
Proposed Performing Arts Center, Abu Dhabi
Bless You, Molly Ivins
Best-selling author and columnist Molly Ivins, the sharp-witted liberal who skewered the political establishment and referred to President Bush as “Shrub,” died Wednesday after a long battle with breast cancer. She was 62.
Letter to a Christian Nation
Forty-four percent of the American population is convinced that Jesus will return to judge the living and the dead sometime in the next fifty years. According to the most common interpretation of biblical prophecy, Jesus will return only after things have gone horribly awry here on earth. It is, therefore, not an exaggeration to say that if the city of New York were suddenly replaced by a ball of fire, some significant percentage of the American population would see a silver lining in the subsequent mushroom cloud, as it would suggest to them that the best thing that is ever going to happen was about to happen—the return of Christ. It should be blindingly obvious that beliefs of this sort will do little to help us create a durable future for ourselves—socially, economically, environmentally, or geopolitically. Imagine the consequences if any significant component of the U.S. government actually believed that the world was about to end and that its ending would be glorious. The fact that nearly half of the American population apparently believes this, purely on the basis of religious dogma, should be considered a moral and intellectual emergency.The book you are about to read is my response to this emergency…
Christian Pussy
Many conscientious ones among Jehovah’s people today have wondered if Christians should own cats in view of their somewhat sordid symbolic history and the many health risks associated therewith. While we would not wish to state an opinion on what must remain a matter of personal preference, what is acceptable to one person may, although unintentionally, stumble another.
link (thanks, Derek)
Errol Morris on Abu Ghraib
Morris introduced us to his latest project about Abu Ghraib, and the iconic images created from the prisoner torture. It’s his hypothesis that it’s a handful of those photos that we’ll remember a hundred years from now about the Iraq War. He explained that this project began with the mystery of two photos by Roger Fenton described by Susan Sontag in her book, Regarding the Pain of Others. During the Crimean War, Fenton took photos of the Valley of the Shadow of Death. Two are of the same road, one with cannonballs littering the road, one with the cannonballs in the ravine. The Mystery being which photo was taken first, which was staged?
Morris’s presentation mostly talked about that idea of the iconic photograph. What can we learn from them? To what extent are they posed or performance? An interesting aspect about the Abu Ghraib project is that Morris has the opportunity to interview the photographers. We have an opportunity for more context than just the images themselves.
Google Google
One of the top search results in Google (number 6 at the time of this writing), is “Google”. Hundreds of millions of users are trying to get to Google through Google. Does this make any sense? No. But it shows that users don’t think about Google as a specific web page, they think of it as the service, an essential part of the internet experience. They’re using this service to get to the page they want: in this case, Google.
Titus Groan by Mervyn Peake
Gertrude, Countess of Groan, gives instructions to the ancient Nannie Slagg about the Countess’s newborn son:
“Slagg,” said the Countess, “go away! I would like to see the boy when he is six. Find a wet nurse from the Outer Dwellings. Make him green dresses from the velvet curtains. Take this gold ring of mine. Fix a chain to it. Let him wear it around his wry little neck. Call him Titus. Go away and leave the door six inches open.”
(p. 41)
New additions to my iTunes library
. . . include the Repertoire (UK) remaster/reissue of Elastic Rock by Nucleus (from 1970), “One of These Days” and “Echoes” from Pink Floyd’s Meddle, and Avatar by Comets On Fire, which is going into the library right now. The opening track on this last, by the way, recalls classic mid-period Jefferson Airplane.
Siblings
The guy who tiled our bathroom wasn’t a perfectionist. His brother, who painted our house, was.
F. Murray Abraham Syndrome
“It’ll make you wonderfully happy for a night,” Fletcher has said of winning the Oscar. “But don’t expect that it’ll do anything for your career.”
Sufjan Stevens, John Wayne Gacy Jr.
Docents
Cindy: Docents! In 1980, I overheard a middle-aged, overly blonde, jewelry-as-heavy-as-her-Texas-accent docent at the Fort Worth Museum of Modern Art tell a small group, “Now I know some of you are asking youselves Is This Art? Well, it really is!”
Daryl: And then there was the time we were at the museum to see a Howard Hodgkin exhibit, and a similar docent asked a group of bored middle school students what they had learned. After a shuffling silence she said, in a high nasal whine, “Come on young pee-pull–I know you learned something.” And a fellow Flocker very close to me said, “They didn’t learn a fucking thing” and we had to exit the building very quickly. I’m sure the kids wish field trips would more regularly include such experiences.
Giant Centipede eats Bat
People
Thousands of years ago, people didn’t read tabloid magazines. Or so say archeologists.
Cancer Breakthrough?
It sounds almost too good to be true: a cheap and simple drug that kills almost all cancers by switching off their “immortality”. The drug, dichloroacetate (DCA), has already been used for years to treat rare metabolic disorders and so is known to be relatively safe.
Planimetric Composition
No one to my knowledge had noticed this sort of shot, let alone named it. I started to call it mug-shot framing, but I found that art historian Heinrich Wölfflin had called it planar or planimetric composition. I went with “planimetric” because that term suggests the rectangular geometry so often seen in these shots.
Josh Marshall Asks
When the bogus ‘Iran incident’ happens that becomes the predicate for a military attack on Iran, what will it look like? Let’s try to sketch it out in advance. Will it be a real incident in Iraq for which the Iranians are blamed? Or will it be a complete bogus incident, something that never happened, that they’re blamed for? Will we receive the news in manufactured evidence? Or will it all come through unnamed leaks and Richard Perle appearances on CNN?
The Lightbulb Act
The “How Many Legislators Does it Take to Change a Lightbulb Act” would ban incandescent lightbulbs by 2012 in favor of energy-saving compact fluorescent lightbulbs.
“Incandescent lightbulbs were first developed almost 125 years ago, and since that time they have undergone no major modifications,” California Assemblyman Lloyd Levine said on Tuesday.
“Meanwhile, they remain incredibly inefficient, converting only about 5 percent of the energy they receive into light.”
Perspective
The wife and mother-in-law of a US diplomat in Nairobi were killed by hijackers a few days ago. They were the mother and grandmother of three friends of mine, who attend or have attended TAC.
A news item in the journal that I normally would have just glanced over becomes a cold, terrible, heart-wrenching reality.
What’s Wrong with this Picture?
Scurvy Miller
Some days I just love being an archivist. This from a fellow member of the Theatre Library Association:
Colleagues: A patron has asked for biographical information about a burlesque comedian named ‘Scurvy’ Miller who practiced his art in various venues including stripclubs.
The patron recalls seeing ‘Scurvy’ Miller in Detrot in the 1940’s.
I’ve Googled and found minor mention of Mr. Miller and have found a portrait of him at Aspire Auctions — Thirty-One Male Entertainers.
Do the Right Thing
How it works: Company names are submitted by users for a 60 day evaluation period, similar to an IPO evaluation. During this stage the crowd pulls any information, historical or current, relevant to a company’s social performance. At the end of that open period – a social performance score is created. Right now there are 54 days left on the evaluation period for Starbucks, Wal-Mart and Whole Foods Market. And after the 60-day initial rating a company’s score can always change as new information is collected.
That Certain Part of Town
In a reply to Deron’s Toilet Question, Flocker Daniel Lestarjette alluded to that certain part of town where everyone’s grandparents lived.
I know that part of town. Where did your grandparents live?
Big Boy Shoes, Mach III
I knew that some of you would want, nay require, an update on my Big Boy shoes. I am wearing them again today. Now that I have divested myself of most of my earthly possessions, my Big Boy shoes are on an alternate schedule with my remaining pair of Big Boy boots (a virtually undecorated pair of brown ropers, purchased not quite 2 years ago to replace a failing pair purchased probably in the summer of 1998 or thereabouts. Big Boys keep their footware a long time.) There is a great pleasure in slipping one’s feet easily into and out of a well-broken-in pair of Big Boy boots, but the sense of excitement that accompanies wearing one’s new Big Boy shoes is not to be scorned.