January 11th is the feast day of Theodosius the Cenobiarch. He was a great ascetic of the Eastern Orthodox Church. In his travels, when he reached Antioch, he visited and was influenced by St. Simeon the Stylite, a Christian ascetic saint who achieved fame because he lived for 37 years on a small platform on top of a pillar near Aleppo in Syria.
Ziegler's painting, highlighting the transition to the art of tbe Fascist era, was owned by Hitler and decorated his Munich apartment in the late 1930s.Ziegler later curated the famous exhibition of "Degenerate Art."
Following the chaos of World War I, a move emerged toward figuration, clean lines, and modeled form and away from the two-dimensional abstracted spaces, fragmented compositions, and splintered bodies ofCubism,Futurism,Expressionism, and other avant-garde styles of the opening of the 20th century. In response to the horrors initiated by the new machine-age warfare, artists sought to recuperate and represent the body, whole and intact. For the next decade and a half, classicism—a return to order, synthesis, organization, and enduring values, rather than the prewar emphasis on innovation at all costs—dominated the discourse of contemporary art.Chaos and Classicism: Art in France, Italy, and Germany, 1918–1936traces this interwar trend as it worked its way from a poetic, mythic idea in the Parisian avant-garde; to a political, historical idea of a revived Roman Empire, under Benito Mussolini; to a neo-Platonic High Modernism at the Bauhaus, and finally to the chilling aesthetic of nascent Nazi culture. The exhibition interweaves the key movements that proclaimed visual and thematic clarity, Purism, Novecento Italiano, and Neue Sachlichkeit, through several closely related but distinct themes. This vast transformation of interwar aesthetics in Western Europe encompasses painting, sculpture, photography, architecture, film, fashion, and the decorative arts, and the show presents works by Balthus, Giorgio de Chirico, Jean Cocteau, Otto Dix, Pablo Gargallo, Hannah Höch,Fernand Léger,Henri Matisse, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe,Pablo Picasso, and August Sander.Chaos and Classicismis curated by Kenneth E. Silver, Guest Curator and Professor of Modern Art, New York University, assisted by Helen Hsu, Assistant Curator, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, with Vivien Greene, Curator of 19th- and Early-20th Century Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, as curatorial advisor.
Wired UK reports that:
"Sega has announced that it's testing consoles called "Toylets" in urinals around Tokyo, which asks the user to strategically vary the strength and location of his urine stream to play a series of games.
"Each urinal is installed with a pressure sensor and an LCD screen is mounted on the wall above, which lets you select from and play four different minigames. There's "Mannekin Pis", which simply measures how hard you can pee, and "Graffiti Eraser", which lets you remove paint by pointing a hose in different directions."
"There's the faintly misogynistic "The North Wind and Her", where you play as the wind trying to blow a girl's skirt up, and the harder you pee, the harder the wind blows. Finally, the bizarre "Milk from Nose" is a multiplayer game where you compete against the person who last used the urinal. The strength of your urine streams are compared, and translated into milk spraying out of your nose. If your stream is stronger, your milk-stream knocks your opponent out of the ring. If you do particularly well on any of the games, you can download and save your information to a USB stick."
Aside from the bizarre concept of creating competition over urine-stream pressure, the system also will offer advertisements to the (captive) audience. Details from Wired.UK here
A Florida professor was arrested and removed from a plane Monday after his fellow passengers alerted crew members they thought he had a suspicious package in the overhead compartment.
That "suspicious package" turned out to be keys, a bagel with cream cheese and a hat.
Ognjen Milatovic, 35, was flying from Boston to Washington D.C. on US Airways when he was escorted off the plane for disorderly conduct following the incident.
Monday's incident is another example of other passengers essentially becoming the authority on terrorist activity on planes. Details here
Yes, but this begs the question -- if they would arrest the guy for a bagel, what would they do aboutroti?
Ted Williams, Brooklyn-born Ohio resident, on hard times, has an amazing radio voice, which has resulted in his discovery and a possible new radio career, on a Columbus, Ohio radio station. Check out this cool clip of the guy with the great, mellow voice:
"For the last dozen years or so, there has been a dominating presence of both the 0 and 1 and the 1 and 2 patterns. These are numbers that push things apart and away. So while the obvious political, military and religious forces continue to bring conflict and separation, there is actually an underlying evolution taking place on a deeper and more humane level, carrying us toward a more harmonious existence while the changes playing out on the surface seem to be pushing us toward our ultimate demise.
Unfortunately, we might not see the effects of this harmonious existence until a few more years down the line. On the visible stage, 2011 still brings stagnation, denial and downright obstruction on a national and global level. More and more, it appears that people focus on the differences between them, causing hateful rhetoric and violent encounters. There will also be a further widening of economic gaps in developed countries, and most visibly in the United States -- the rich get richer and the poor get poorer ... and the percentage of people considered to be poor increases exponentially. Religions, without exception, also become more polarized, and this reflects itself in less tolerance, more dogmas and likely more violence. In fact, look at any aspect of human life -- political, religious or any other -- and simply sharpen the angles, and there is the picture for 2011."
"Looking at 2011 month by month, January stands out as chaotic, bringing unexpected changes that will see us, figuratively speaking, reeling and scrambling to survive. Not so metaphorically will be the real danger of volcanoes, earthquakes and other acts of God that we can expect during January, with a second wave occurring in October.
February of 2011 is more stable and brings some of our basic needs to the foreground, especially family affairs and loyalty. The economy shows signs of improvement, and one or more important medical breakthroughs may give hope and brighten the future for many. March then brings with it acts of religious fanaticism and other dangerous side-effects of spiritual and intellectual ignorance.
April is ruled by an 8 and should bring a measure of balance, but also more violence and aggression, especially by and against authority. May should have a calming effect, bringing progress in many areas, but mostly in politics and diplomacy, including a genuine effort to bring peace to parts of the world where harmony has been a rare commodity.
June and July bring a surge of energy with some sensational and history-making events, scientific breakthroughs and a boost to the global economy. Then August has a more creative energy.
September puts the brakes on everything and is the month most illustrative of the energies and influences of the year 2011 as described before; including the lack of vision and the emphasis on trivial matters. October is disruptive and brings turmoil similar to what occurred during January, while November brings a more compassionate energy.
December will go down as the month when a new voice is first heard worldwide, a voice of reason, a voice of humanity, a voice of hope. For those of us who can read the subtle signs, it offers the first glimpse of the hidden evolution that was mentioned earlier. In a way, December is a precursor to what the second half of this transformative nine-year cycle brings.
A lame duck plutocrat Mayor who is detached from governing? Labor organizations covertly fighting budget cuts and staffing reductions by a political culture that overlooks the economic failures of Wall Street speculators and bubble manufacturers and blames the civil service class for pension, health and economic benefits that were hammered out over many decades through collective bargaining. An extreme storm brought on by climate change in conjunction with the Christmas holiday.
Besides the unploughed streets, so many sidewalks unshoveled. Is everyone giving up? Tired? In surrender to the complexity, despair, and pessimism of the 21st century recession and decline of empire?
Or just the snowstorm that fell through the cracks?
Incredibly, it appears the uptown Q isn't running on the normal Q/B line, it is running on the D line between Coney Island-Stillwell and DeKalb Avenue, meaning our section of Brooklyn is still without subway service (except for hiking a mile over to the Flatbush Junction) and still unplowed, preventing any automobile access. Downtown q may be intermittently available.
Following oral surgery last week, I needed a follow up visit with my oral surgeon. Of course, the Q wasn't running, and the #3 train, which I walked to and took to my office in Brooklyn Heights yesterday, terminates at the Flatbush Junction.
My Better Half who kindly offered to come along for the walk and I set out for our hike from near Glenwood Road to Voorhees near Avenue Z. Only express buses headed for Manhattan ran on Ocean Avenue. There were no local buses. Sidewalks near many apartment buildings were clear, but many stretches remained covered in snow. It was quite a hike.The dental thing worked out OK, and I had a chat with a bilingual Haitian Creole Special Ed teacher and a retired assistant principal from Staten Island.
It appears there are still issues with the Q train, which was running earlier, but is either experiencing delays or down again.
After getting home, shoveling the cars with my son, (with no plans to go anywhere in the near future), settling issues for my oldest daughter before she takes the Chinatown bus up to Boston for a few days, I dried off and settled down to watch the excellent Never Cry Wolf, directed by Carroll Ballard and starring Charles Martin Smith, as a biologist living alone in the Canadian arctic wilderness regions, studying wolves. A great thoughtful film about nature, humans, and unexpected adventures, whether involving force majeure like blizzards, bumbling political-plutocrats with whisk brooms and snow shovels, or arctic hikes along Ocean Avenue. Curious Twenty first century experiences and dreams, in a modern metropolis, brought to heel by Gaia.
After hearing the Mejor announce how all city offices were open even though many people decided to stay home, I once again had to come to grips with the fact that Mayor Mike is an extremely wealthy patrician with seemingly well-meaning intentions, generally with a control of the media that is quite remarkable, but who, once in awhile, displays ignominious traits that belie his apolitical, compassionate stance. As Jedediah Leland says to Charlie Kane:
The Q train still isn't running, so I walked a mile or so to the Flatbush Junction. Streets are littered with abandoned cars and buses. Rappelling snow banks to get to the train. People, incredibly, still trying to use their autos, even though the end of most Brooklyn streets terminate in a snowdrift or an abandoned vehicle.
Getting on the 3 train at around 7 AM , it was like the last train leaving Saigon, people squeezing in, arguing:
Woman #1 - "Move your fat ass so I can get on the train!"
Woman#2- "You ain't no size 8 neither!" followed by a mutual exchange of barnyard epithets and vituperation.
Things finally settled down around Franklin Ave. as folks got off to switch for the Lex. I got off at Borough Hall -Brooklyn stop, grabbed a yogurt and a coffee and fell on my butt near the corner of Court and Livingston, near where Barney's (Beauty Aids/Pharmacy/Cigar Vault) stood for many years.
I made it in and am trying to accomplish a few things, amidst new people appearing and comparing Snowpacalypse notes. Although I am glad that My Better Half and the kids are saved from the travel chaos by the holiday break, it promises to curtail our activities for the rest of the week. As it is, My Better Half (AKA +0.5) and two of my daughters just lit out for the Junction to accompany our other daughter back home, who is training back to Flatbush on the less familiar IRT line, having been stranded in the Slope for two nights.
May the end of 2010 bring a Happier 2011 for all. Ciao.
Belatedly, Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn acknowledges the sad passing of Captain Beefheart, poet, painter, musician, bluesman, of complications from multiple sclerosis, at the age of 69, on Friday, December 17. Several years ago I had the pleasure of seeing an exhibit of Don Van Vliet's work at the Michael Werner gallery.
The facts, or those most often stated, are that he was born on Jan. 15, 1941, in Glendale, Calif., as Don Vliet. (He added the “Van” in 1965.) His father, Glen, drove a bakery truck.
Don demonstrated artistic talent before the age of 10, especially in sculpture, and at 13 was offered a scholarship to study sculpture in Europe, but his parents forbade him. Concurrently, they moved to the Mojave Desert town of Lancaster, where one of Don’s high school friends was Frank Zappa.
His adopted vocal style came partly from Howlin’ Wolf: a deep, rough-riding moan turned up into swooped falsettos at the end of lines, pinched and bellowing and sounding as if it caused pain.
“When it comes to capturing the feeling of archaic, Delta-style blues,” Robert Palmer of The New York Times wrote in 1982, “he is the only white performer who really gets it right.”
He enrolled at Antelope Valley Junior College to study art in 1959 but dropped out after one semester. By the early 1960s he had started spending time in Cucamonga, Calif., in Zappa’s studio. The two men worked on what was perhaps the first rock opera (still unperformed and unpublished), “I Was a Teenage Maltshop,” and built sets and wrote some of the script for a film to be titled “Captain Beefheart vs. the Grunt People.”
The origins of Mr. Van Vliet’s stage name are unclear, but he told interviewers later in life that he used it because he had “a beef in my heart against this society.”
By 1965 a quintet called Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band (the “his” was later changed to “the”) was born. By the end of the year the band was playing at teenage fairs and car-club dances around Lancaster and signed by A&M Records to record two singles.
The guitarist Ry Cooder, then a young blues fanatic whose skill was much admired by Mr. Van Vliet, served as pro forma musical director for the next record, “Safe as Milk” (1967), which showed the band working on something different: a rhythmically jerky style, with stuttering melodies. The next album, “Strictly Personal” (1968), went even further in the direction of rhythmic originality.
But it was “Trout Mask Replica” that earned Mr. Van Vliet his biggest mark. And it was the making of that album that provided some of the most durable myths about Mr. Van Vliet as an imperious, uncompromising artist.
The musicians lived together in a house in Woodland Hills, in the San Fernando Valley; what money there was for food and rent was supplied by Mr. Van Vliet’s mother, Sue, and the parents of Bill Harkleroad, the band’s guitarist (whom Mr. Van Vliet renamed Zoot Horn Rollo). One persistent myth has it that Mr. Van Vliet, who had no formal ability at any instrument, sat at the piano, turned on tapes and spontaneously composed most of the record in a single marathon eight-and-a-half-hour session.
What really happened, according to later accounts, was that his drummer, John French (whose stage name was Drumbo), transcribed and arranged music as Mr. Van Vliet whistled, sang or played it on the piano, and the band learned the wobbly, intricately arranged songs through Mr. French’s transcriptions.
“Trout Mask” offers solo vocal turns that sound like sea shanties; intricately ordered pieces with two guitars playing dissonant lines; and conversations with Zappa, the record’s producer. But its most recognizable feature is its staccato, perpetually disorienting melodic lines.
Band members’ accounts have described Mr. Van Vliet as tyrannical. (Both Mr. French and Mr. Harkleroad have written memoirs with dark details about this period.)
Mr. Van Vliet’s eccentricity and his skepticism about the music industry had much to do with why his music remained mostly a cult obsession. His band was offered a slot at the Monterey International Pop Music Festival in 1967, but Mr. Cooder had quit a week before, and Mr. Van Vliet was too spooked to perform. In the following years, when the band was at its creative peak, it played relatively few concerts.
The Magic Band’s first records after “Trout Mask Replica,” starting with “Lick My Decals Off, Baby,” had a more mature sound, but by “Clear Spot,” in 1973, the band had turned toward blues-rock. It later made a few ill-conceived concessions to commercialism, and in 1974 the band quit en masse after the critically panned “Unconditionally Guaranteed.”
After a long falling-out, Mr. Van Vliet reunited with his old friend Zappa to tour and make the album “Bongo Fury” in 1975, then assembled a new band to record “Bat Chain Puller,” which was never released because of contractual tie-ups. Parts of it were rerecorded in 1978 for an album released by Warner Brothers, “Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller).”
When his business affairs cleared in the early 1980s, Mr. Van Vliet made two albums for Virgin, “Doc at the Radar Station” and “Ice Cream for Crow,” with a crew of musicians who had idolized him while growing up. The albums were enthusiastically received.
But “Ice Cream for Crow” was his last record; in 1982 he quit music to focus on his painting and moved to Trinidad, near the Oregon border, with his wife, Jan, who is his only survivor.
In the exhibition catalog to a show at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the museum director, John Lane, wrote of Mr. Van Vliet’s work, “His paintings — most frequently indeterminate landscapes populated by forms of abstracted animals — are intended to effect psychological, spiritual and magical force.”
Some of the images were a continuation of his songwriting concerns, especially those involving animals. A lot of his work dwells on the beauty of animals, on animals acting like humans and even on humans turning into animals. In “Wild Life,” he sang, “I’m gonna go up on the mountain and look for bears,” and in “Grow Fins,” an extraordinary blues from the album “The Spotlight Kid” (1972), he threatened a girlfriend that if she didn’t love him better he would turn into a sea creature.
Mr. Van Vliet had rarely been seen since the early 1990s and seldom at his gallery openings.
“I don’t like getting out when I could be painting,” he told The Associated Press in 1991. “And when I’m painting, I don’t want anybody else around.”
