GrierSun

iPhone and iSteal

2012-01-21T23:34:00.001+05:30

This is what happens when the goons go hi-tech.

“They used an iPhone-style mobile to film valuable treasures in a retired vicar’s home in Co Armagh – while an art expert on the end of the line told them what to steal.”

“The owner, a retired vicar, was beaten, bound and gagged by the armed pair who stole-to-order near-priceless paintings including Canalettos painted in the mid-1700s.

The robbers, who had Irish accents, also took valuable antique furniture and other collectables. Before fleeing they smashed up anything left behind with a hatchet.”

The Art in Anarchy

2012-01-08T11:45:00.001+05:30

Voina Explains Why Firebombing a Police Tank Is a "Piece of Art"

“In their most recent action, called “Cops Auto da Fe” or “Fucking Prometheus,” Voina used Molotov cocktails to light a tank-like police transport vehicle used to relocate prisoners.”

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“If an activist secretly burns a cop truck at night, it won’t be art. It will be the revenge of an activist,” Plutser-Sarno wrote. “But to burn it openly and proclaim to the entire country: ‘I am an artist. I burned down your prison, symbol of totalitarianism. This autodafe is our art action,’ then it becomes a piece of art. We made people discuss it as an artistic action.”

---

If this is art, we are really going downhill.

I’m having particular trouble understanding this line – ““According to Voina, the difference between performance art and political activism is art’s public nature and the importance of laying claim to your work.”

Yeah? So, let’s see, by this logic, if a bunch of terrorists bomb a public area and take credit, they can now proudly label themselves artists?

If you are a War Criminal……

2011-07-23T18:04:00.001+05:30

……Hang on to your Modigliani.

How Modigliani Helped Capture the Last Serbian War Criminal

Painting courtesy whistlepunch via Flickr via Artinfo.com

Croatian Serb leader Goran Hadzic was arrested after he tried to sell a Modigliani painting that he probably stole during the Croatian war in the 1990s.

Bullshitting The Bullshitters

2011-06-27T17:20:00.003+05:30

Artist Statement by Charlotte Young

I'm always awed and amazed by the ‘profound thoughts’ people claim to have regarding their art. Indeed, they are so profound sometimes that the explanations need to be explained and then they don’t come across as sounding particularly deep. Just daft and, frankly, dishonest.

Or, hang on, perhaps, just very, very creative. I think 'the art statement' should in itself be turned into an art genre. The artists are already outdoing each other in it as it is.

You can have a go too here at the Arty Bollocks Generator -
http://www.artybollocks.com/

Billy Bang

2011-04-15T10:36:00.001+05:30

Billy Bang Quintent–Live at the Knitting Factory

Billy Bang–Tunnet Rat

Billy Bang, Jazz Violinist And Vietnam Veteran, Dies At 63

This is fantastic music.

Raag Bhairavi- Indian Violin- Raginder Singh

2010-12-25T13:21:00.001+05:30

Raag Bhairavi- Indian Violin- Raginder Singh

Raginder Singh is just brilliant!

Here’s information about the raga he is playing -

Bhairavi – ITC Sangeet Research Academy

A nice explanation and a selection of music videos of Raga Bhairavi from Chandrakantha Courtney. She’s marvelously talented herself, by the way.

The Bombed-Out Car of Baghdad

2010-12-23T19:29:00.001+05:30

Photo Source – Guardian/Anthony Devlin/PA

More photographs can be seen at The art of war: Jeremy Deller's Baghdad car bomb installation

I propose another bright art idea – take the art savants on tour to Iraq – I mean, the whole bloody place is a piece of art by now.

Stephen Colbert and Steve Martin discuss art

2010-12-11T11:12:00.000+05:30

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Exclusive - Steve Martin Extended Segment

www.colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor & Satire Blog</a>

March to Keep Fear Alive

Can you swim in art? Of course, you can.

2010-12-10T22:02:00.000+05:30

“During the run of "Suprasensorial," MOCA's new show on Latin American light and space art that opens Sunday at its Geffen Contemporary location, a lifeguard will be in attendance. Towels will be handed out. And disposable bathing suits will be sold at the bookstore. All so that visitors can see and experience for themselves what looks like a psychedelic swimming pool.”

The highly immersive artwork was conceived by Brazilian artist Hélio Oiticica and filmmaker Neville D'Almeida

“MOCA curator Alma Ruiz says the idea behind this piece, which the museum re-created based on original drawings with input from D'Almeida, was "to bridge the language of art and cinema."

Will my opening a grocery store and having people come shop in it bridge the language of art and commerce?

Just wondering.

And the Turner Prize Goes To…

2010-12-09T20:21:00.004+05:30

No, actually, it went to Susan Philipsz.

“Philipsz is the first artist working with sound to have won the prize. I can imagine people saying she is just a singer, with the sort of voice you might feel lucky to come across at a folk club. But there is much more to Philipsz than a good voice. All singers, of course, are aware of the space their voice occupies, of the difference between one hall and another. We know it ourselves, singing in the shower. But the way Philipsz sites recordings of her voice is as much to do with place as sound. She has haunted the Clyde and filled her box-like Turner installation with the ballad Lowlands; she has called across a lake in Germany and had her voice swept away by the wind on a Folkestone headland.”

Before Ms. Philipsz turned street singing into ‘sound sculptures’, it was known as busking.

I’m not knocking music, naturally, I live for music, and I don't want to draw definite boundaries either, but I can't help wondering if it wouldn't have been more appropriate for her to have tried sweeping the Grammy’s, you know? I’m sending a visual sculpture there next year. And if they don’t accept, well, we know how it requires a certain je ne sais quoi to appreciate modern art, and many people just don’t have the broadminded intelligence.

Conceptual Art?

2010-11-25T20:58:00.001+05:30

I came across this old but interesting op-ed in the New York Times -

Has Conceptual Art Jumped the Shark Tank? – By Denis Dutton

“The appreciation of contemporary conceptual art … depends not on immediately recognizable skill, but on how the work is situated in today’s intellectual zeitgeist.

…Future generations, no longer engaged by our art “concepts” and unable to divine any special skill or emotional expression in the work, may lose interest in it as a medium for financial speculation and relegate it to the realm of historical curiosity.

In this respect, I can’t help regarding medicine cabinets, vacuum cleaners and dead sharks as reckless investments. Somewhere out there in collectorland is the unlucky guy who will be the last one holding the vacuum cleaner, and wondering why.”

Henyrk Górecki - Symphony No. 3, Op. 36

2010-11-22T16:21:00.002+05:30

Henyrk Górecki - Symphony No. 3, Op. 36

This is so utterly marvellous. Here is a description of the music ‘Symphony of Sorrowful Songs’ by Chia Han-Leon.

And two interesting interviews with the composer -

How Gorecki makes his music – an exclusive interview, By Norman Lebrech

Composer Henryk-Mikolaj Górecki, A conversation with Bruce Duffie

How Van Gogh's Bedroom Was Restored

2010-09-09T19:46:00.001+05:30

Six-Month Restoration Ends of Vincent Van Gogh's "Bedroom"

"You're always weighing up the advantages and disadvantages, what's safest for the painting, how was the painting meant to look, what impact will it (restoration) have," Ella Hendricks said. And her work is reversible if ideas change.

"We don't want to retouch everything. We want to show that the painting has a history and achieve much more of a balance," she said. "We don't have the illusion that we should return the picture to an undamaged pristine state."

After a good deal of home renovation work and a terrific Monsoon, I find myself in the unenviable position of having to restore some of my own works. Drat.

HAARRUMPH! Neigh! Neigh!

2010-03-28T10:36:00.001+05:30

Video - Spirit - Swimming (Water Horse Music) by IselinChan

An equine with an eye for art

Buggs is a 13 year old quarter horse cross, who was taught to paint by his owner Carol Jensen and now he is making a name for himself in Ironridge, USA.

"Jensen, 56, discovered Buggs' aptitude for painting while looking for ways to keep the restless horse occupied during the winter months, when poor weather keeps him cooped up in his stall. She had heard about people teaching horses to paint and figured that Buggs, whose personality equates to that of a smart child who acts up when bored, seemed like a good prospect. In October 2008 she started training the chestnut gelding to hold a stick in his mouth and target the tip on a designated area.

When he performed the action, she rewarded him by pressing a clicker and giving him a treat. Then she gave Buggs a paintbrush, moved his head up and down, and praised him when he repeated the action on his own."

You can see the video of Buggs painting here -

http://www.jsonline.com/general/37714089.html?bcpid=8725036001&bctid=71660369001

I think it's wonderful when people take the time to ensure their pets have enriched, interest-filled lives.

Look! I dressed up my kid - und es ist Kunst!

2010-03-25T18:41:00.002+05:30

Artist dresses her baby as Hitler

Mother dressed her baby as Hitler, other dictators for exhibit

Danish-Norwegian artist Nina Maria Kleivan was wheel-chair bound for some health problem, got bored and got sewing. She dressed her four-month old daughter Faustina in costumes of nine infamous dictators, sold the photographs to a collector and exhibited the collection - to overwhelming public disapproval.

The public seems to have a problem with an 'innocent' baby being 'exploited' this way. Especially with the Hitler costume. People really overdo the PC thing when it comes to Hitler. Sometimes it seems you can't even have a conversation about him without people trying to outdo each other in decrying his 'great evil'. If you don't, you know what you are. An Anti-Semite just like him. Good grief.

So what if she dressed Faustina as Hitler? It was, as she said, for her 'art' project. Soon the PC lot will be pelting potatoes at actors for having the temerity to dress up in Third Reich dramas and movies.

Anyway, I don't have that sort of a problem with Kleivan's project - her kid, her fashion sense - although the kid might have plenty to say later on, something on the usual lines of 'How you could embarass me like that, Mom? Don't you dare show those photographs to any of my friends! And don't point out the online links either!"

No, it's their family affair.

My problem is with this being hailed as art.

Ms. Kleivan obviously thinks it is and she explained, "We are all born as a blank slate, who knows who we will become. I wanted people to think about where tremendous evil comes from."

According to one of the commentators on the article, "Ms Kleivan is making a profound statement!"

Oh yeah? What nonsense. Most people either go, "Oh, she's dressed her baby as Hitler!" or "How dare she dress up her baby as Hitler!" The profound nods only come after the artistic explanation.

And in any case what is so profound about it? Yes, of course, Hitler began life as a baby. It ought to have been obvious, without having Ms. Kleivan to come point it out.

Another commentator said, "As anyone familiar with current research on child development knows we are not "blank slates" at birth. Genetics influences personality in a complex relationship with environment and experience. "

Yes. Of course.

This commentator goes on to say, "Besides, think of the guilt the "blank slate" view can bring. Should we blame Hitler's mom for the Holocaust?"

Didn't understand this one. If it's in the genes, it's Mom and Pop's fault anyway, isn't it? Can blame a whole slew of parents on this score - Chamberlain's for creating such an appeasing personality, Roosevelt's for his decision to limit U.S. border entries to Jewish refugees, Churchill's for his not ordering direct hits on the railway lines leading to the camps, and so on.

But that's drifting away from the topic.

How is this art?

Because she sews costumes?
Because she dresses up her baby?
Because she makes 'profound' statements?
Because she got a collector to buy the photos?
Because she outraged everyone?

If everything is art, why is anything art?

The Nude In The Window

2010-02-27T12:00:00.000+05:30

Hey, Look! She’s Naked! But It’s Art, So It’s All Right.

"Ms. Hanford is part of the gallery’s latest exhibit by Brian Reed. She stands fully naked under a suspended web made of various objects including shark eggs and teeth, beads and clay pipes. Her nakedness is essential, Mr. Reed explained, “so she can be fully at the center of that connectivity” of energy."

“I believe that the base of any culturally free city depends on its acceptance of the body nude, in art and in life,” Spencer Tunick wrote in an e-mail message.

“If you’re walking down a street in New York City and someone is naked in the window — and so children and whoever can see it — you’re depriving people of their choice,” said Daniel S. Connolly, a managing partner at the law firm Bracewell & Giuliani, and a former lawyer for the city who handled public nudity cases. “That’s where you butt up against other people’s rights.”

In the end, Ms. Hanford made it through her four-hour shift in the window without police intervention. Paul J. Browne, the department’s chief spokesman, said they took no action because there was no lewd act.

Beyond the legality, Mr. Kuby offered up another theory for the lack of interference: “The truth is, even the cops like looking at naked people.”

Hush Little Baby...

2010-02-03T23:10:00.000+05:30

Yo-Yo Ma and Bobby McFerrin. This is such fun! And I love their expressions.

Happy Birthday, Elvis!

2010-01-08T00:10:00.000+05:30

Elvis Presley would have been 75 years old today.

Bow Bow, I'm a Wow Wow Artist

2009-08-23T14:57:00.000+05:30

New York painter barks for art

"People don't buy a painting based on what it looks like. They want to have something by a genius and no one wants to say a dog is a genius."

Video - Tillamook Cheddar in action.

Tillamook Cheddar has been drawing since she was six months old (I started when I was two). She began with a legal pad (I began with a house wall). She's wild about drawing (So am I). She bites if anyone interrupts her work (I don't, but I ought to).

Cranach's Adam and Eve

2009-08-21T16:08:00.001+05:30

Appeals court overturns Holocaust looted-art law, but Norton Simon suit continues

This is interesting. I had no idea that in California you can sue for the return of a looted artwork only within three years of discovering its whereabout.

The case is between Marei Von Saher of Connecticut and the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena. They are wrangling over Lucas Cranach the Elder's oil on board painting 'Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden' (1530).

Von Saher is the daughter-in-law of Jacques Goudstikker, a German-Jewish art dealer, who bought the painting in Berlin in 1931 from the Soviet government. The Soviets had, of course, confiscated the painting from a Russian aristocratic family during the Russian Revolution. After the Nazis came to power, Goudstikker left Germany for Holland and the Nazis forcibly bought the painting from his art firm. After the war, the Goudstikker family gave the painting to the Dutch government.

At this point, a heir of the Russian family, George Stroganoff-Scherbatoff turned up with a strong claim to the work and the Dutch government turned it over to him. Stroganoff-Scherbatoff then sold the painting to the American industrialist Norton Simon, who set up a namesake museum and displayed the work there.

Then, in 2001 , Von Saher discovered where the painting was and filed a suit against the Norton Simon Museum. The Museum is not willing to give up the work.

And, frankly, I don't see why they should. They got it from the Russian heir who had more claim to the work than Goudstikker did.

The work, incidentally, is valued at $24 million.

Skinning The Art

2009-05-29T10:16:00.003+05:30

Body Art: Literally

Here is Andrew Krasnow, American sculptor, making art from human skin, specifically skin from dead white men. It's not morbidness or racism that drives him.

"The objective was to express my concerns about the war and that it would not be conducted in a way that was moral and ethical," he said. "Since that question wasn't permitted in a museum, the work became more complex, with all the inherent contradictions of what it means to be an American or, for that matter, to be human."

Gallery owner Robert Devcic said Krasnow uses only white skin because much of the suffering in the Americas has been caused by white people. "He uses skin to make the point that suffering is universal," he said. "It is tanned using the same process that you'd use for an animal skin."

I'm sure the dead white people, when they donated their bodies to medical science, didn't imagine their tanned hides would one day be turned into "mundane items including flags, boots and maps of America."

------

I'm not arguing with Mr. Krasnow's political stance - I lean that way myself - but skinning uninvolved dead people isn't going to bring about any changes.

You need to skin live politicians for that.

Nefertiti Neferwas?

2009-05-07T21:07:00.002+05:30

Famed Nefertiti bust 'a fake': expert

This sounds like the time auld Mr. S took a drunken drive through the corn field and the next day all the folks thought it was an UFO that had cut such an unique field pattern and Mr. S couldn't summon up the nerve to disillusion everyone........

Or like the time when I, just for the heck of it, shaped fallen flower petals into a D on my friend D's car bonnet and she went around telling everyone that the chap, you know, who kept staring at her all the time, well, he had finally got around to some action and I didn't have the heart to tell her it wasn't so, he was still inactive........

What a Lot of Flowers

2009-03-27T16:13:00.001+05:30

I was thinking of my Grandfather today. He died, aged 90, on 12th August 2001. We were very close and it still hurts that he is not around anymore.

He was rather like the character in the film 'Good-bye, Mr. Chips', funny and sweet and very, very nice. A lovely man.

I get all choked up, sad and happy at the same time, when I see these clips -

Peter O Toole singing 'What a Lot of Flowers'

Petula Clark singing 'You and I'

I Adore Elvis Presley

2009-03-17T11:21:00.001+05:30

I was reminded just how much after a recent comment on the Maysun In C blog.

Here are two of my favorites - 'Wooden Heart' from G.I.Blues and 'Crawfish' from King Creole. These two were amongst his best films. King Creole is based on the the Harold Robbins novel 'A Stone for Danny Fisher' ( a good read, by the way).

Crawfish is a duet with Kitty White, a jazz vocalist with a spine-tingling fantastic voice.

He looks so young and happy and carefree, it's heartbreaking to know what came later.

Anyway, so here's Crawfish -

And here's Wooden Heart -

Come To My Arms, My Darling Indian Shiksa

2009-03-13T13:07:00.001+05:30

Everyone's trying to be creative these days. Even the Israeli Defence Industry.

The Israeli arms company, Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, unleashed the above video at the Aero India expo in Bangalore.

Israeli man dancing with Indian woman around flower bedecked missiles to a tune lifted from Slumdog Millionaire .

Talk of chutzpah.

It is so abominably bad that it will do very well on its own merit as a defence weapon.

Just show it to the terrorists and they will die laughing .

And India will not have to pay for the college educations of the children of Israeli defence contractors.

Update:

And from Columbia, we get Discreet Inners or the Armani of the Armor Business. Now the Indian politicians can have another option on which to splurge my tax money.

No money back, I believe, if the assassin ignores the classy "revolvers to Uzi submachine guns" proof suit and shoots you in the head. Or just blows you up.

In the mood for Peer Gynt

2009-03-12T08:36:00.000+05:30

I woke up this morning with a tremendous longing to listen to Peer Gynt. The play was written by Henrik Ibsen and the music composed by Edvard Grieg.

Morning

Arabian Dance

This is the Government Speaking!

2009-02-22T09:23:00.000+05:30

So shouted Mr Gowda, Karnataka State Minister for Medical Education.

He and Ambika Soni, the Union Minister for Culture and Tourism, were invited to inaugurate the National Gallery of Modern Art in Bangalore on 18th February.

On this occasion, Mr Gowda dropped some ill-timed pearls -

"I object to pseudo-intellectuals who have distorted the tradition and culture of the country. Modern art should not be used to distort heritage and culture. I think it's because of distorted and perverted thinking by self-proclaimed intellectuals.''

And the swine of course didn't lap them up.

M.S. Murthy, a local artist: "How can you comment on art and artists? What do you know about art? I wasn't invited for this function, but I chose to come. So many senior artists have not been invited. There are no artists on the dais."

Gowda: "Get out. I ask you to leave. You are great and I will fall at your feet."

Gowda said: "Modern Art has become a convenient means for pseudo intellectuals to insult, humiliate ancient Indian culture and heritage..... Some of the connoisseurs of art of late have begun running down the widely practised art believed by millions... I welcome modern art but not at the cost of ancient Indian culture and art.... ‘Modern art must be purged of perverted views’

M S Murthy: "...a man who does not understand art, cannot pass any comments on art".

Gowda (enraged): "This is the government speaking!"

And "directed police officials to remove the protesting artist. "Pull him out...Get out", he shouted, leading to the police officials asking the artist to leave."

Now I don't agree with M.S. Murthy's assertion that people who cannot understand art cannot comment on art. I know most people not involved in the arts don't really know or understand what goes on in this field. And I do agree that Mr. Gowda, from his comments, is one of the ignorant bunch.

However, people are entitled to their comments and their opinions.

What they are not entitled to is to interfere with an artist's work, to tell an artist to stop what he/she is doing. So long as the art-making activity doesn't threaten anybody's life or physically harm anybody, does not infringe on anybody's copyright or property, there should be no limitations on art.

For example, I may poke fun at the Turner Prize winners, because I think their work more often than not borders on the ridiculous and the sensational than anything actually creative.

I'm entitled to this opinion.

However, I may not tell them to stop being ridiculous. I'm not entitled to prevent them from doing what they want to do.

In a democracy, they are well within their rights to be as ridiculous as they like.

If I find what they do offensive - I don't really - that's my problem. Not theirs. I don't have to look at that art.

There are far too many people around with delicate sentiments these days. They ought to either pour those overflowing sensitivities into making art themselves, or simply stay at home and refrain from mingling with the rest of the human race. It's really too much to expect other people to give up exploring farther horizons because you insist on having the blinkers on.

Back at the Museum of Modern Art, Ambika Soni showed she had more sense than Gowda. She interrupted the shouting match to voice her opinion -

"Art is left best to artists. Culture and civilization are produced by individuals who create it. No one, not even the government, should dictate value systems on anyone. Modern Art does not oppose Indian culture.''

No, the only real opponents of "Indian Culture" are people like Gowda. They want to foist their perverted version of what is Indian Culture on the rest of us.

This is the government speaking, indeed!

WE are the government, Mr.Gowda - YOU are our representative.

And when we tell you that your conservative views are not representative of what we think, you don't have the right to kick us out of public buildings.

Let's applaud M.S. Murthy for speaking up. Few people have the courage on such occasions.

Out-Hirsting Hirst

2009-02-21T06:52:00.000+05:30

At least this isn't in the grand tradition of appropriation. More like the tradition of inspiration. Worked too. Sold for "$41,290 Cdn to a collector in Florida."

Spanish artist shocks with Damien Hirst gun sculpture

"Sculptor Eugenio Merino's piece puts Hirst in a suicidal pose with blood pouring from a bullet wound to his head. It was unveiled at ARCO's launch over the weekend.

The piece has already been sold for $41,290 Cdn to a collector in Florida.

"Hirst is always trying to think of ways to make his art the most expensive," Merino told Bloomberg News.

"If he killed himself, then the value of his art would increase a lot."

Called For the Love of Gold, the work of parody was produced over a two-month period and refers to Hirst's For the Love of God — a diamond-encrusted platinum skull that was reportedly sold in the summer of 2007 for more than $100 million to a group of investors.

The life-size silicone sculpture uses real human hair and glass eyes. Hirst is posed on his knees with a Colt 45 in his right hand pressed against his temple wearing a skull T-shirt.

It's in a tank that looks similar to the ones Hirst himself uses to display dead animals pickled in formaldehyde."

Hilarious.

Funnier still if Koko or the Painting Elephants had come up with this.

Shepard Fairey

2009-02-19T18:32:00.000+05:30

So I've been following the Shepard Fairey drama and then I came across this unrelated writing by Brandon Hamber -

"So this is my advice for 2009: whatever you decide to do, do it with the force of a hurricane and the confidence of a prizefighter, who cares nothing for consequence. The world likes single-minded arrogance, or at least does not act against it and sometimes even rewards it."

He's talking about politics here, but it applies very well to art too, doesn't it?

As demonstrated by Shepard Fairey, who seems to be cut from the same cloth as Richard Prince.

Let other people do the hard work - create art - then we can 'appropriate' it, spew our intellectual rhetoric and drum up some publicity, hollering all the while about Fair Use.

And our Fair Use ideal, of course, conveniently stops when somebody else 'appropriates' our appropriation.

Mark Vallen's critique ought to be a must read for everyone, if only to highlight the difference between original art and manipulated 'art'.

More interesting arguments here -

http://www.myartspace.com/blog/2009/01/shepard-fairey-obey-copyright.html

http://prawfsblawg.blogs.com/prawfsblawg/2009/01/a-question-for-ip-folks.html#comments

Violin Exam Result

2009-02-18T00:53:00.000+05:30

Passed with a First Class in the Second Grade exam!

I've already begun classes for the Third Grade. Completed Raga Bihag yesterday and started Raga Alhaiya Bilawal.

I'm also studying currently for the Second Grade Vocal exam in April. I've completed Raga Kafi and hope to start Raga Bhimpalasi this week.

Here's Gulzar Khan performing Raga Bihag on the violin. Note how the violin is held in the Indian style. It's a very comfortable position.

Make No Mistake

2009-02-18T00:38:00.000+05:30

I was rather disappointed to read this -

That Synching Feeling

"My, what a standard of perfection is now demanded. No longer is a good or even a great performance good enough. Now we must have performances free from the "slightest glitch." And since no one -- not even a singer of Ms. Hudson's manifest talent nor a violinist of Mr. Perlman's virtuosity -- can guarantee that a live performance will be 100% glitch-free, the solution has been to eliminate the live part"

Here's Itzhak Perlman performing Winter from Vivaldi's Four Seasons, with Zubin Mehta and the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra -

And here he is, aged 13, playing Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto

Bhimsen Joshi: Bharat Ratna

2009-02-13T17:32:00.014+05:30

Bhimsen Joshi was awarded the Bharat Ratna in a low-key ceremony this month.

I attended a live performance of his a few years ago and it was an unforgettable experience. He is in his eighties and in frail health, but what a voice!!

Here he is energetically singing Raga Miya Malhar in the old days -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bu2O21kASKw

And here he sings Raga Shankar with another of my favorites in Indian Classical Music, Ustad Rashid Khan.

Pink Chaddis on Valentine's Day

2009-02-12T01:44:00.000+05:30

We are really looking forward to Valentine's Day here in India. What was once a celebration of commerce in the name of love has turned into a celebration of hooliganism and moral policing in the name of "culture".

Every year now we look forward to the antics of that special brand of Non-Intelligentsia, the Moral Brigade, whose main purpose in life and politics is to impose their peculiarly narrow mind-sets, regressive perspectives and muddled thinking onto others.

These morality messiahs are the self-appointed guardians of Indian Culture and of the Morality of the Indian Woman.

Without them, both the Indian Culture and the Indian Woman would have opportunities for progress.

This is exactly what they don't want. They can't deal with progress. Progress means changes and they have neither the education nor the intelligence or social savvy or resourcefulness to deal with these changes. Or if they do have the education, it's the intelligence, social savvy and resourcefulness that's lacking. Or if all these are present, it is sheer opportunism, small-mindedness, intolerance and vote bank politics that drives them.

Anyway.

So they want to 'preserve' Indian Culture. Turn it into a ritual-riddled, shackled fossil. That's the only way any culture can be preserved. Otherwise culture is a living, breathing, flowing, changing, adapting, transforming, inspiring, supporting, empowering reality.

Then they want to ensure that the Indian Woman stays put in her 'propah place', which, while not on the Sati mound these days, is being kept chained to hearth and haffice (office). Yes, the MCPs are 'willing' to let women slave at both ends. Just don't think of deviating in any way from their concept of what an ideal Bharatiya Nari can and cannot do. Be obedient, passive and unquestioning in face of all degrading rules made and imposed by the retrograde patriarchs. Stay within the imposed maryada (limit). Or Else....

Image by Carlton Braganza

The Culture Brokers choose the following ways to uphold Indian Culture -

Breaking up shops.
Vandalizing vehicles.
Vandalizing hotel lobbies.
Molesting and beating up women and girls.
Harassing young couples.
Threatening intellectuals, writers and artists.
Threatening bookshop and sweet shop owners.
Putting on LOUD MUSIC on ALL religious occasions. A bad remix of 'Brazil' at ear-splitting volume on Ganesh Chaturthi seems to be such an especial favorite, we now think of it as Brazilian Aarti.
Spitting, throwing rubbish, shitting and pissing in public. Yes, these activities are fine. Things only get 'obscene' if you hold hands with a fellow or kiss him.

And they get away with this because the Indian Government allows them to.

Here's an India 101: How to get away with public hooliganism in India -

Get a crowd together.
Go en masse to wreck public property or beat up people or molest women.
Give religion or culture or nationalism as reasons for such behavior.
Get away with it.

What the government should do is pack off these uncultured morons en masse for seven years of hard labor - you want to throw stones and destroy public property, do you, well, try breaking rocks and making yourself useful in construction activities for a change!!

What the government does instead is kowtow to their so-called religious, cultural and nationalistic sentiments.

And never mind our human rights.

Who are we after all?

We are only law-abiding tax-payers.

We don't matter.

Mainly because we allow ourselves not to matter. We are too apathetic and we don't want to tangle with the goons.

And, really, it's no joke.

Especially when the police won't protect you or will only advice you to "not do anything to provoke" the thugs.

Like the thugs even need to be provoked. They test the waters and go from strength to strength.

So what are the options?

Elect a new government
Learn self-defense
Immigrate
Protest

The last brings us to the Pink Chaddi Campaign that a lot of people, women as well as men, are currently supporting.

Here are the links -

The Pink Chaddi Campaign

Moral Police: India's Shame

A Consortium of Pub-going, Loose and Forward Women

The idea is to send the thugs pink underwear on Valentine's Day to demonstrate contempt about their thuggery.

It is NOT, as some detractors are trying to twist and portray, about -

Encouraging alcoholism
Encouraging promiscuous behavior
Fostering bad manners and disrespect

It is about having freedom of choice.

Looking around the blogosphere, I'm dismayed but not surprised at how many 'Desi Males', a large percentage of them commenting anonymously, have either entirely missed this point or choose to ignore it. Instead, with a rather disturbing vehemence that is alleviated neither by logic nor humor, they are accusing the Pink Chaddi Campaign of distasteful conduct and immorality, of making a mockery of 'Hindu Culture' and of trying to ape 'Western Culture'.

Distasteful? Yes, of course it is a distasteful show. It is distastefully and hilariously irrelevant. It needs to be to hold up a mirror to the real distasteful issues - suppressing civil liberties and harassing women.

Immorality? Does it make women immoral and shameless to take a stand against degrading treatment? If so, then such immorality is preferable to the morality that fosters abasement.

Against Hindu Culture? Really? Why? Why does culture need to be propagated at the expense of women? When saviors of culture fear their culture will totter over and fall if women are 'allowed' to do what they want, their fear is justified. It will. In fact, it ought to bloody well topple over, die and stay dead. No culture should require the sacrifice of human dignity.

Trying to ape Western Culture? Why is that so heinous? We have no problem with imbibing their scientific, technological and creative ideas, so why draw a line at culture? Any culture where people don't have to live in fear of the Moral Police is a pretty fine one. So they do have their hiccups, so what? So do we, with the humbugs toeing cherry-picked agenda from ancient, dated texts that most of them do not even have the language skills to read nor the philosophical sense to understand.

Then there are those that think the issues could have been highlighted in a better way or that there are better issues that need to be highlighted. Well, yes, sure, there's always another way and another issue. Don't let it cloud this one. Highlight it separately in its own context. Let all of us know exactly what your better way is and how you plan to implement it and how you would like us to help.

I guess by now it's fairly obvious that I support the Pink Chaddi Campaign.

I have some reservations, of course, because -

I'm cynical
I don't know if online campaigns really amount to anything
I know we all get excited about stuff today and return to our lives tomorrow
As a dog trainer, I don't believe in rewarding aggressive and unwanted behavior. By this, I intend no derogatory reference to anybody, I'm simply referring to the publicity the culture defenders are reaping here. Which is why I haven't mentioned their names. They are not getting it from me.

But then again, I wondered -

How would I like to get beaten up and humiliated because my choice of lifestyle (which doesn't harm anyone or anything) doesn't meet the conservative standards of somebody else?
How would I like to shrink my horizons because the frogs insist I stay put in the pond?
Would it comfort me if everyone took my suppression for granted and told me to 'just ignore it' or 'live with it'?

I wouldn't like that at all, so, from entirely unaltruistic and selfish reasons, I support the Pink girls and guys.

Will this campaign work and bring all the cultivated Huns to heel?

No, of course not. They are like multi-headed hydras and the problems in our society are too wide-flung and deep-rooted. The problems are not going to be resolved until the whole patriarchal framework shatters and all Indian parents start treating their daughters on par with their sons. But a start has to be made somewhere and it is big deal enough to know other women - and men - are willing to speak up when it matters.

It's nice to know some people at least care.

Why, that just validates the whole non-commercial point of Valentine's Day. That whole shebang, you know, about the importance of love, fellow feeling and kindness.

The Dreaded Cello Scrotum

2009-01-28T23:27:00.000+05:30

Video - Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello, Suite No. 1 in G Major BWV 1007

Cello scrotum? It’s a load of . . . nonsense, admits Baroness Murphy

"Dr Philip Shapiro, of Meriden, Connecticut, wrote to the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology to question a review that it had published and that mentioned cello scrotum.

“I wrote a letter to the editor saying the condition didn’t make sense,” he told The Times yesterday. “Being a cellist myself I knew that the cello comes nowhere near one’s scrotum.”

He enclosed a photograph of himself, fully dressed, playing the cello, to prove the point."

Kundan Lal Saigal - 60th Death Anniversary

2009-01-18T12:58:00.000+05:30

It is K.L. Saigal's 60th Death Anniversary. He's one of my very favorite Indian singers.

Here are a couple of informative sites on him -

http://www.kundanlalsaigal.com/index.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kundan_Lal_Saigal

Here's a site featuring his music -

http://www.raaga.com/channels/hindi/artist/KL._Saigal.html

And here's a video of 'Babul Mora' from the film 'Street Singer'. This song is one of Saigal's most celebrated ones and was composed by Wajid Ali Shah, the Nawab of Oudh, after he was deposed from his throne and sent into exile by the British -

The lyrics to Babul Mora can be found here -

http://www.kundanlalsaigal.com/Saigal-Lyrics-BaabulMoraa.htm

And here's 'Do Naina Matware' from the film 'My Sister' -

Lyrics for Do Naina Matware -

http://www.kundanlalsaigal.com/Saigal-Lyrics-DoNainaaMatavaareTihaare.htm

And my perennial favorite 'Duniya Rang Rangili' from the film 'Dharti Mata'-

Lyrics for Duniya Rang Rangili -

http://www.kundanlalsaigal.com/Saigal-Lyrics-DuniyaaRangRangiiliBaabaa.htm

My Upcoming Film - CoolKat Urbanoir

2009-01-17T23:00:00.000+05:30

Inspired by "Slumdog Millionaire", I'm going to make a movie featuring 'gritty realism' in the USA. The movie will be called 'CoolKat Urbanoir'.

The story is like this -

A young African man gets kidnapped and sold as a slave in the US of A. He goes through many trials and tribulations, marries a slave girl, they have children, the children are sold, the parents suffer, fall ill, try to escape, are caught and beaten, try again and escape, join the Native Indians, are uprooted from several reservations and starved, are hunted and die under horrible circumstances.

Flash forward several hundred years.

A descendant of these slaves is born in the most dangerous part of an Inner City neighborhood to an unwed teenage hooker with a cocaine habit. Father unknown. Child is abandoned in a garbage heap. Rescued by a church mission and taken to a hospital. Suffers terribly from drug withdrawal (got the habit from Ma during the pregnancy). Later put in an orphanage and shuffled through endless foster homes. Abused physically and sexually in the foster homes. Goes to an Inner City school infrequently and learns nothing there. Gets beaten up by street gangs to and fro from school. So, to save his own hide, joins up one of the brotherhoods. Condition is that he help them peddle drugs to school children. So he does.

Gets caught. Gets sent to jail. Gets raped in jail. And beaten. Many, many, many times. Gets plenty of tattoos too and decides to do a course in body building as well.

Comes out toughened and mean and with plenty of contacts to further advance the criminal career. Furthers criminal career. Adds pimping and armed robbery to the resume. Starts freelancing as a hitman for the Columbian, Korean, Chinese and Japanese drug cartels.

Gets involved with a white woman who wrote him love letters while he was in jail and 'true love' blooms for a while. Then she gets pregnant and wants to get married. He doesn't want to get married. She says he'll have to pay for child support anyway. He doesn't fancy paying child support for eighteen whole years. He's already been stealing money from the druglords to make ends meet. So he murders her and dumps her body over a bridge into a river.

But someone sees him do this and informs the police. He is arrested and tried.

And gets released on a technicality. The police that arrested him forgot to quote that Miranda dialogue, it seems, and subjected him to racist epithets besides.

Lays low for a while and then takes revenge on the informer (a white man, incidentally).

Then goes on a run. An exhilarating chase around and around the US of A follows. Wonderful scenic scenes. Lots of clambering around the Grand Canyon and so on. Ends up in the American South in a small town where the interbred population are still fanning the fires of the Ku Klux Klan ideology. They gladly beat up the new black man in town and strung him up from a tree outside the town. They leave him for dead....

But, of course, he is still alive. Another man comes along, sees him hanging from the tree and cuts him down (in a scene borrowed/inspired from Hang 'Em High, a tribute to lovely, wonderful Clint Eastwood).

This other man happens to be a smuggler involved in the trade of smuggling Mexicans into the USA. He's home on leave, but is off to the Mexican border again and our hero decides to go with him and see how much this type of smuggling business pays.

Unfortunately luck is not favoring our hero (like it ever did!), and, after a few smuggling rounds, he gets shot at by White Nationalists patrolling the border.

He is rescued by a black US Army sergeant, who gets him to a hospital, visits him, bonds with him and feeds him the 'Join the Army, it's a great life' spiel.

Our hero swallows, gets false identification and joins the army. And is nearly killed in basic training.

Somehow he survives and is sent to Iraq to fight the just war and protect the homeland from the wogs. Unfortunately the wogs know how to kick ass. So life in the army on the warfront is not exactly great. Our hero however gets the chance to rape plenty of enemy women and torture many enemy men. A conscientious fellow soldier complains about his behavior to the 'superiors', but the superiors exonerate him saying he is 'only following orders'.

Our hero is pleasantly surprised. This is the first time in his life that the 'establishment' ever spoke out in his support. However, pleased as he is, he ensures that the 'informant' dies in a friendly fire while out on patrol.

Later, he sees an army poster asking if anyone is interested in touring Afghanistan. Our hero volunteers and has a Rambo-like career there.

He is much decorated and felicitated and comes back home on leave as a 'hero'.

Unfortunately those pesky people in the Police Department are still on his case. They read what Thomas Friedman wrote about our hero in his usual laudatory style in the New York Times, see his photograph and exclaim "Why, that's the man we've been loooookin' for!"

So they contact the Army. The Army hedges, prevaricates, obstructs, but finally 'honorably discharges' our hero and lets the wolves have him.

The wolves have him only for a short while. Some patriotic folks, indignant that a war hero be held accountable for a long-ago murder of a long-dead woman, help him break out of police custody and drive him all the way to Canada.

He applies to stay in Canada as a conscientious protester. The Canadians don't buy that. They read Thomas Friedman in the New York Times too. They don't want him there.

So he takes a plane to Venezuela. He figures he'll be welcome in Chavez's land. Enemy of my enemy is my friend, that sort of thing. He figures that Chavez, taking a cue from the New York Times, will feature him on his TV show. He day-dreams of using the TV show to kick-start a new career as a rap artist. Maybe he'll even write an autobiography and flog it on Oprah - over videophone, of course. Our hero, you see, after a lifetime of anonymity, is beginning to enjoy the taste of fame.

However, there's fame and there is fame. Sometimes fame hurts. The minute he lands in Venezuela, he is spotted by a Columbian drug-runner. After he disappeared from their midst earlier, the druglords had figured out that he was stealing from them and now they want their pound of flesh.

Our hero is on the run again. He's running out of places to run to though. The USA is out, so also the US Army, Canada and South America. And North Korea, South Korea, Japan, and China - remember the Japanese, Korean and Chinese drugpins? They want him too and they have long arms. Italy is out too. Our hero had run-ins with the Italian Mafia when he was in jail and they're not forgetting either.

Wondering what to do, our hero seeks shelter in a low-dive in a red light area. He is nursing a drink morosely, when a stranger at the bar strikes up a friendly conversation with him. Our hero is initially suspicious, but the stranger, who is called Moshe, appears to have no underhand motives. They get along well. Just then two Arabs jump Moshe and try to knife him. Our hero goes to his assistance, saves him and their friendship is really cemented.

Our hero, over another dozen drinks, finally confides to Moshe about his 'situation'.

Moshe is sympathetic and offers to help. He is on his way back home, and suggests our hero come with him. He'll be safe there.

And so our hero goes to Israel.

-------

End of Part I. Sequel to follow, featuring lots of scenic scenes from Lebanon and Gaza. Stay glued.

------

So that's the story. Anyone wants to come and act in it? No pay. At least not before we sweep the Golden Globes.

Happy New Year

2008-12-31T22:42:00.003+05:30

May your skies be bright and cheerful around the next bend.

And here's the wonderful, wonderful.........wonderful Dmitri Hvorostovsky with 'Little Bell'.

And 'Troika' -

He has a nice official website where you can buy and download some of his latest music.

Croak???

2008-08-30T19:45:00.000+05:30

Photo - Guardian, Zuerst die Füsse by Martin Kippenberger

Pope labels crucified frog sculpture blasphemous

Martin Kippenberger meant this as "a self-portrait illustrating human angst".

And it moved Pope Benedict of the Vatican and Franz Pahl of the Alto Adige regonal government, towards some human angst of their own.

Pahl went on hunger strike, ended up hospitalized and told the press - "Surely this is not a work of art but a blasphemy and a disgusting piece of trash that upsets many people."

The Pope aired his views in a supportive letter that said this artwork "wounds the religious sentiments of so many people who see in the cross the symbol of God's love".

What I think -

It would help if the Pope and Pahl both developed some ruddy sense of humor.

There are more important things in the world to get worked up about and go on hunger strikes over, but you know how it is - small minds concentrate on small matters.

Shit! 'Twas a Windy Day!

2008-08-14T17:38:00.001+05:30

Giant dog turd wreaks havoc at Swiss museum

And here's the turd that blew away -

http://www.paulkleezentrum.ch/ww/en/pub/web_root/pro/wechselausstellungen/der_vorgarten.cfm

The Kingsland Kohn

2008-08-14T14:00:00.000+05:30

Mystery surrounds William M V Kingsland art collection

"A vintage mystery is unravelling in New York. Who was William M V Kingsland and why, on his death two years ago, was his apartment found to be stacked to the ceilings with some 300 valuable works of art, including pieces by Pablo Picasso (such as 'Tete de Femme', right) Alberto Giacometti ( 'Tete de Diego', left) and Giorgio Morandi?

Kingsland was a mysterious man. He called himself a genealogist and a writer on art and he was a reasonably well-known figure in the art world and in Upper East Side high society. He suggested that he had once been married to a member of the defunct French royal family, had been to Harvard, that his middle initials stood for Milliken and Vanderbilt and that he lived on Fifth Avenue.

But when he died, leaving no will, his life began to unravel."

Theft Notices & Recoveries-William Kingsland Collection

Dali's Daughter

2008-08-12T08:06:00.000+05:30

Woman: I'm Dali's Illegitimate Daughter

Pilar A. claimed that when she met the elder Mr. Descharnes (Dali's friend and official biographer) in Paris last year, he commented on her resemblance to Dalí.

"He said, 'You are only missing the moustache,'" she claimed.

Georges Boulanger

2008-08-05T17:45:00.002+05:30

It's been a lovely rainy week. I watched "Shane" last night and today I stumbled across this amazing video of Georges Boulanger - I was so thrilled I got goose-pimples all over - it's wonderful, wonderful, wonderful!!!

The Walton Viola Concerto

2008-07-18T21:55:00.007+05:30

The Walton Viola Concerto is one my favorite music pieces - William Walton composed it in 1929 for Lionel Tertis, on the suggestion of Sir Thomas Beecham.

A funny start really, because William Walton "knew little about the viola except that it made a rather awful sound" and Tertis, when he received it, thought it was "too modern" and sent it right back!

See Ian Lace's article "Walton's Violin and Viola Concertos"

And here are some terrific videos, the first by my perennial favorite Maxim Vengerov -

Then here's William Primrose -

And Jessica Hung -

The Art Vandalers

2008-06-21T13:43:00.001+05:30

First Goya, now Hitler.

Jake and Dinos Chapman go to work on 'abject' Hitler art

Bought anonymously from collectors around the world for a total of £115,000, the Hitler watercolours are mostly plodding landscapes and a few smaller studies. The Chapman brothers have transformed them — the gallery uses the word “annihilated” — by painting rainbows, psychedelic skies, floating lovehearts and smiley faces into the background of each picture. The resulting work is now available as a job lot for £685,000. The brothers said that they were expecting angry reactions to the work but denied that it was offensive or that they were profiting from Hitler's notoriety.

If there was no intention to profit from Hitler's notoriety, why deface his works? Or, having defaced, why reap publicity from his name?

It seems to be the PC fashion to equate Hitler's art with his political career - that was bad, so the art is bad. From what I see in the photo in the above link, he was a better painter than the Chapmans.

The Forger as a Charmer

2008-06-21T13:37:00.002+05:30

Dutch art forger proudly exhibits his works

"When a musician reproduces a sonata of Bach, one applauds him. Me, I reproduce a sonata of Picasso and I am placed under arrest," he says with a smile.

But Jansen insists he has standards: he only mimics artists he admires.

"It is essential that I like them. Without that, I am incapable of imitating them," Jansen told AFP at the chateau in Zeist where his works are on display.

Yeo! I'm not sitting on that!

2008-05-29T22:01:00.000+05:30

Photo Source - The Guardian

Jonathan Yeo - "The controversial portrait painter", don't you just love that? You can make a whole a career out of being controversial, or get an early obit - anyway, so Mr. Yeo is the artist that once collaged George Bush Jr. from pages torn from his porn magazine collection, but it seems that still left over some magazines, so - he decided to do some park chairs.

But -

Parks reject Yeo's genitalia deck chair

Jonathan Yeo's design for a deck chair for London's parks has been rejected on the grounds that it is too pornographic.

According to a Royal Parks Foundation spokeswoman: "Jonathan's design didn't lend itself to being made into a deck chair for members of the public. For children or elderly people especially, it would not have been possible."

Yeo counters: "The images are quite graphic, but unless you look very closely, you wouldn't notice that I've used details of the genitalia to look like the veins of the leaves."

And, really, how many folks out there look 'very closely' at a park chair? Most just plonk down without too much controversy.

Turner Prize, Head Lice and Death - No Shit

2008-05-19T10:05:00.000+05:30

This Turner Prize shortlist is a dud

Like........ When wasn't it?

According to Richard Dorment - "It's the kind of modern art that pundits pay deference to and that deep down nobody really likes."

Then I read the following -

Death as a work of art - a reply

German artist Gregor Schneider hopes to “exhibit” a dying person in a museum -

"The sort of person I imagine who would want to die publicly would have to be someone with whom I have a lot in common, who understands my intentions. He or she would have to find my rooms accessible. I’m looking for someone who is mortally ill. Someone who will die naturally. Because the dying person can determine everything, it could also be someone who has just died."

The comments section is the best part, some sensible people around.

"Why do artists and curators always assume that people cannot think, feel and see things if they do not occur within aesthetic institutions?" - Cedric Caspesyan

"Why don't the artist do it himself so we can experience this art first hand. Not just an idea in his head." - Edwin Casuga

"Many unethical acts are justified by making one ore more of the following statements:: 1. It is 'artistic'. 2. People taking part have given their consent. 3. The public is interested in it. 4. It is not agains any written law." - Santo Mengoli

"Dying is a private affair, and by making it public, all dignity - his supposed reason - is removed." - Alidë Kohlhaas

And

Artists catch head lice for show

"Seven German artists are living with lice in their hair in an Israeli museum for three weeks in the name of art"

"The idea is that we live in the museum as their guests, and at the same time we are hosting lice on our heads," said artist Vincent Grunwald, 23."

Now I don't think artists should have narrow interests and tunnel visions.

But -

Before making

Social Statements

And

Political Statements

And

Psychological Statements

And

Uncleanly Statements

Why not

TRY

and

make

Art Statement?

I'm TIRED of seeing cRaP and being told that it is ART.

Leopold Museum's Schiele

2008-05-18T09:34:00.000+05:30

Houses on the Lake, Egon Schiele, 1914

Photo Source - The Art Newspaper

Leopold Museum in Vienna accused over Nazi-looted art

The above painting once belonged to Jenny Steiner and confiscated by the Nazis after she fled from Vienna to Paris in 1938 - eventually she went from Paris (via Brazil?) to Manhattan and died there in 1958. She was 74 when she left Austria and 94 when she died.

Dr. Rudolph Leopold bought the painting in 1953 and he says he had no idea about the provenance.

But -

"In 1994 Dr Leopold said in an interview that, since 1950, he had owned and relied on the 1930 Schiele catalogue raisonné by Otto Kallir-Nirenstein, which also names Ms Steiner as the owner of the painting. "

Dr. Leopold's art collection has over 5,500 artworks , including a large collection of Egon Schiele paintings.

His Leopold Museum Private Foundation is co-owned by the Austrian government and publically funded - yet still considered a private institution - this premise can help refute restitution claims which are "only effective when filed against government-owned institutions."

Art? Or No Heart??

2008-03-29T13:56:00.000+05:30

S.F. gallery cancels show featuring images of animals being bludgeoned to death

"A San Francisco art gallery has canceled a show featuring video images of animals being bludgeoned to death because of "massive" protests from Northern California activists.

The Sacramento Vegetarian Society, Sacramento artist Gale Hart and In Defense of Animals of San Rafael are among groups that condemned the exhibit, "Don't Trust Me," by Adel Abdessemed.

The videos show images of six animals, including a doe, a horse, a pig and a sheep, being killed with a sledgehammer. "

Predictably the San Francisco Art Institute said -

"The exhibit reflects the institute's commitment to encourage "our students and the wider public to think about and assess the world they inhabit." Abdessemed's videos "are images of events that took place, and regularly take place, in the real world."

'NUFF of the Real World, I say!!!!!

Movie I Saw - Jodhaa Akbar

2008-03-04T20:52:00.009+05:30

I'm currently madly in love with the Jodhaa-Akbar soundtrack.

The movie is not without flaws - but, as old Marlon Brando would have said, it could have been a contender - and you want to shake Ashutosh Gowarikar for slipping up - and especially for slipping in some really retro redundant scenes.

Like the one where Hamida Banu Begum gets to say, "Beta tumhe aaram ki jarurat hai" (Son, you need rest) - you almost expect the medics to chorus, "Aur dua ki!" (And prayers!)

And the one where Jodhaa Bai prays all night in front of the Krishna Idol and divine rays emit from behind it and suddenly, lo and behold, the ailing Akbar is better. I mean, SHEESH!!

And the elephant fight scene - the poor creature looked more puzzled than enraged - like, why's this fellow running around this way? - is he going to feed me my banana?

And if it had been in a temper, the real Akbar would never, never, never have taken a flying leap onto its back - he would have known that would be a quick way to reach jannat (paradise).

Sujamal's dying scene was unmoving. Jodhaa cries, as is expected of her. You don't feel like joining in.

Adham's dying scene was better. Akbar's cold-eyed visage with the angry flaring nostrils was fantastic here. You felt like cheering him on here. Yeah, man, throw him off the parapet one more time.

Ila Arun as Maham Anga and Punam Sinha as Mallika Hamida Banu Begum were both terrific, so also Dilnaaz Irani as Salima.

I also really liked the picturization of 'Khwaja Mere Khwaja' where Akbar rises to join the dancing Sufi dervishes and the camera moves to the top angle, and the sword fight scene between Jodhaa and Akbar much later.

The love scene between them could have done with more steam. They didn't seem, like, really dedicated, too self-aware - like, the Bachchans are watching, let's not even think of kissing. Every time things look like they might get interesting, Jodhaa jumps up and moves away, and Akbar looks like, which part of the palace is she going to go to now?

And the fight between Sharifuddin Hussain and Akbar seemed kind of familiar - then I realized it had already been fought and won - way across the ocean, way back in Troy.

The main problem with the film is really the dialogues - Mr. Gowarikar should really have spent more time polishing the script and ironing out every single cheesy wrinkle - that said, I'm sure directing a film with such a large cast was no easy matter, and the clothes, the jewelry, the sets, and the cinematography are all brilliant. And the leading pair, Hrithik Roshan and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, are in excellent, not to mention beautiful, form.

And the music track.....

It is a dream. Especially 'Khwaja Mere Khwaja', which is sung by A.R. Rehman himself and 'Azeem-O-Shaan Shahenshah' and 'Jashn E Bahaaraa'.

You can listen to it online here.

Just magnificent.

Charles Saatchi's new Joffe

2008-02-02T08:20:00.000+05:30

Charles Saatchi has bought the above painting by Jasper Joffe.

"Saatchi, who is of Iraqi-Jewish descent, has not bought the painting for shock value. A spokesman said simply that he liked it."

I guess it was necessary to point out the 'Iraqi-Jewish descent' here, or there would be some major flak from the Israelis.

Personally, I think it's a rather interesting painting myself. But, in these politically correct times, where other peoples' 'sentiments' are forever hooting on the hurt, Mr. Saatchi must be applauded for his courage of buying something he 'simply liked' .

If he lived in India, he would have received a court summons by now under the dreaded Section 295A - our very special law to protect the sentiments of fundamentalists and over-sensitive/attention-seeking idiots.

The Artful Codgers

2008-01-30T20:04:00.000+05:30

Video of the Artful Dodgers.

Here's a laugh-out-loud article -

The artful codgers

"Shaun Greenhalgh, an Englishman whose furtive career has been unfolding in courtrooms, newspapers and museums for the last three months, may well be the most versatile art forger in history. He can do a convincing Gauguin, an 18th-century bronze portrait, a Barbara Hepworth sculpture or a broken chunk of Assyrian wall art. He finds it just as easy to do ancient Egyptian.

A high-school dropout at 16, Shaun taught himself painting, drawing, stone carving and several other techniques. Then, with the enthusiastic support of his family, he became an art criminal.

His story has been mostly ignored in North America because journalists here fail to see it as a saga of British craftsmanship and enterprise performing in a world where these qualities are insufficiently appreciated. In their lower-middle-class home at The Crescent, Bromley Cross, Bolton, Greater Manchester, Shaun's family has for many years operated a traditional cottage industry."

Shaun is 46 years old at present. Shaun's Mom, Olive, is 83, and Dad, George, is 84.

I'd been wondering what had happened to Shaun's Daddy. Here's what -

"Dad came to court in a wheelchair, wearing slippers, with a shawl over his legs; he apologized for being partially deaf, due to his Second World War injury. His punishment was delayed because the judge couldn't find a wheelchair-accessible jail. Apparently there are no such place. Yesterday, the judge gave him two years suspended."

They really need to be enshrined in art history.

Har Har, the Art in the Bush

2008-01-28T07:39:00.000+05:30

President George W Bush in a memo -

"When you come into my office, please take a look at the beautiful painting of a horseman determinedly charging up what appears to be a steep and rough trail. This is us. What adds complete life to the painting for me is the message of Charles Wesley that we serve One greater than ourselves."

This is the painting -

From Slate Magazine

Timothy Noah quotes the following from Jacob Weisberg 's book 'The Bush Tragedy' -

"The artist, W.H.D. Koerner, executed it to illustrate a Western short story entitled "The Slipper Tongue," published in The Saturday Evening Post in 1916. The story is about a smooth-talking horse thief who is caught, and then escapes a lynch mob in the Sand Hills of Nebraska. The illustration depicts the thief fleeing his captors. In the magazine, the illustration bears the caption: "Had His Start Been Fifteen Minutes Longer He Would Not Have Been Caught.""

And then Mr. Noah adds -

"The painting was subsequently recycled by the Saturday Evening Post to illustrate a nonfiction story. The caption that time was, "Bandits Move About From Town to Town, Pillaging Whatever They Can Find." Koerner published the illustration a third and final time in a magazine called the Country Gentleman. On this go-round, it was indeed used to illustrate a short story that related to Wesley's hymn. But the story's moral was a little off-message. According to Weisberg, it was "about a son who receives a legacy from his father—a beautiful forest in the Northeast and a plea to protect it from rapacious timber barons.""

Mein Art or Mine?

2008-01-25T06:28:00.001+05:30

Baronness Marie-Louis Bissonette, as I noted in September 2006, was in possession of the Franz X. Winterhalter painting 'Girl from the Sabine Mountains' , a work of art that was 'misappropriated' from its former Jewish owners in Nazi Germany.

Recently, she was ordered to relinquish it to the rightful owners -

"U.S. District Judge Mary Lisi ordered Maria-Luise Bissonnette on Thursday to turn over "Girl from the Sabiner Mountains" to representatives of the estate of Max Stern, who died in 1987."

And now, we have another similar case -

Video of Oskar Kokoschka paintings and prints

MFA sues to bolster claim to disputed 1913 painting

Claudia Seger-Thomschitz, an Austrian lady, wants a painting by Oskar Kokoschka, "Two Nudes (Lovers)," back from the Museum of Fine Arts.

It was owned by Oskar Reichel, who was a physician and an art gallery owner in Vienna and to whom Ms. Seger-Thomschitz was related. When the Nazis overran Vienna and things got difficult for the Austrian Jews, Mr. Reichel was forced to sell this painting along with the others in his collection.

Thomas J Hamilton, one of the lawyers representing Ms. Seger-Thomschitz, said -

"If you take away somebody's livelihood, you can't practice your profession, where are you going to get money to live on? It's a 70-year-old man and his wife trying to get by in a milieu of intense persecution."

Katherine Getchell, the MFA's deputy director, said -

"Would you also say that people who sold things [during] the Depression, yes, they sold them under duress?" she said. "Yes, if somebody sells their house now because they can't meet their high mortgage payment, is that a forced sale of a house? I think it's very dangerous to make the supposition that everything that happened during a period of time was forced."

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Now I don' t want to be a total bore on the subject, but, Tony Blair's gone and Gordon Brown's in office now and when's the Queen of England going to return our stuff? I mean, do we have to wait for William's reign or beyond?

Syed Ali Mujtaba writes -

"India's antiquates has been robbed from the time of Robert Clive conquered our country. The British took away from India any thing and every thing that was ancient and valuable in the Art world. One just has to go to the British Museum in London and look at the open plunder of the Indian heritage.

The height of British loot of Indian heritage was when they demolished a number of buildings in Delhi's Red Fort to rob its tiles. These tiles were shipped to London and were put on auction there. Luckily, there were no takers of these tiles and so the British ordered to stop further destructions of such buildings.

The destruction of the Taj Mahal was very much ordered for the same reasons. The British thought that the marble tile of the monument of love would fetch them a fortune. However, when there were no takers of such tiles that were taken from the Red Fort, they stopped the demolition of the Taj Mahal."

----

In 2004, the descendants of Robert Clive - he of the '"By God, Mr Chairman, at this moment I stand astonished at my own moderation" fame - had his India loot up for sale at Christie's.

The star of the Christie's auction was - a jewelled Mughal flask, made in jade and studded with bands of emeralds and ruby flowers set in gold, which was once part of the royal collection at the Imperial Court in Delhi, and is now valued at over £1m.

The collection included - "a hookah encrusted with sapphires which is expected to fetch £50,000 to £80,000, a decorated dagger which should sell for £35,000 to £50,000, a jade bowl and a flywhisk."

----

BBC readers have interesting and varied opinions about the return of misappropriated art.

One commenter, Mark Sargeant, wrote -

"Two wrongs do not make a right. What has been looted from other countries in the past should be returned back. If Stonehenge was on display in another country how would we feel? "

How would the Brits feel? Un-henged, probably, if anyone cared enough.

And, if Tony (forgive me for taking potshots at him; he's been on mein mind lately) were still in the hot seat, no doubt 'liberating Stonehenge' would be a good excuse for rallying up the military mob and invading practically all the nations on the map.

Ole, Pablo, what's this bull?

2008-01-24T20:45:00.000+05:30

Police: Man Posted Fake Picasso Painting On EBay

Photo from Tampa Bay Online, courtesy of Tampa Police Department

Ethem Ulge was trying to peddle this work, titled 'Man Dreaming of Three Female Nudes' on ebay. The cops got to him first and readers of Tampa Bay Online don't seem much impressed by the art forger in their midst -

"I bet there is a blank spot on his refigerator (sic)."

"Maybe something less obvious next time - like a Rembrandt?"

Sigh.

I wrote a poem once about a Phony Sheik selling a Fake Rembrandt.

----

As if, though.

Here's the real Picasso painting -

Violin Exam Result

2008-01-24T11:54:00.001+05:30

Video - Lord of the dance - Violon's party

Just got the result of my Grade 1 Violin exam - I passed with a First Class.

Hooo-Raay!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tony Blair with Red Poppy

2008-01-21T19:38:00.000+05:30

Photo Source: Times Online

Tony Blair is blooming, says painter who couldn’t keep Iraq out of the picture

War criminals aren't my cup of tea, but Jonathan Yeo is fantastic. I really like his style. This is a good painting, regardless of subject.

Speaking of Mona Lisa....

2008-01-18T12:19:00.001+05:30

Andy Tielman playing 'Mona Lisa'

Domenico Savini, a genealogist from Italy, has determined the Strozzi family to be one of several descendants of La Gioconda.

Mona Lisa descendant just grins and bears it

"A running joke in the Strozzi family today is the Medici family portraits that hang in the Strozzi dinning room.

"People say, `Why do you have portraits of your enemies in your house?'

"We say, first of all, because we respect the dead. But most of all it's a kind of vengeance because they're all dead and they're forced to watch over the Strozzis, alive and well, as we eat," the princess said."

The Emperor's stitchless....

2008-01-16T18:46:00.000+05:30

.....and getting shapeless. ;-)

Squeezing art into a Tate shape

"Art is much too important to be left to artists; it needs planning, organisation and let's face it, control. I mean, remember what things used to be like. Some "sensitive soul" - another way of saying some introspective bourgeois subject - would go out into the countryside completely uncurated! Look where that led: all those paintings by Cézanne and Van Gogh. Art with no public voice at all......."

Or as Nicholas Forrest puts it - It’s True, 95% of Art is Rubbish !!!

"One of the tactics that galleries, auction houses and other art sellers use to create the impression that an artwork is better than it really is, is to create over-intellectualized, complicated and indecipherable descriptions or analyses of an artwork that are designed to sound extremely impressive yet be so complex that people don’t realise that what they are reading is complete rubbish. "

And maybe here is an excellent explanation for this human condition - Caveman blues

"We’ve also evolved to despise being out of the in-crowd. Brain scans show that social rejection activates brain areas that generate physical pain, probably because in prehistory tribal exclusion was tantamount to a death sentence. And scans by the National Institute of Mental Health show that when we feel socially inferior, two brain regions become more active: the insula and the ventral striatum. The insula is involved with the gut-sinking sensation you get when you feel that small. The ventral striatum is linked to motivation and reward. To stave off the pain of feeling second-rate, we feel compelled to barricade ourselves behind evermore social acquisitions."

Or socially acceptable tastes.

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Johann Strauss's 'Emperor Waltz.'

This is certainly as impressive as it sounds.

---

Here's my take on how to evaluate an Artwork -

* Ignore the artspeak.

* Ignore the art agents and art galleries telling you what you ought to like.

* Don't pay too much attention to what's 'hot' on the market.

* Trust your intuition/gut feeling.

* Ask yourself -

- Does the artwork make any impression when first seen? Am I intrigued? Does it tickle my imagination? Does the artist's passion come through?

This leads to questions like -

- Am I in the mood to appreciate art at that particular time?

- Is the artwork well-displayed in a suitably lighted surrounding?

- Do I understand what I am viewing?

- Do I have an idea about the artist's intentions, work technique and philosophy?

- Do I feel the artist's intentions are better expressed in the explanation than in the artwork and that the artist would really be better off as a writer of abstract, incomprehensible fiction?

- Am I open-minded enough to consider what I've so far been conditioned against by my upbringing, social status, cultural background and so forth?

- Am I willing to have my preconceived ideas about art wobbled?

- Does the artwork appeal to me personally as an artwork?

And, of course, there are too many reasons you can like an artwork -

*You like the colors

*You like the shape/shapes

*You like the texture

*You like the material used

*You like the technique

*You like the style

*It conveys something meaningful to you

*It evokes something in your memory

*It makes you feel a certain way

*You like the artist

*You like liking something everyone else does - you want to be part of the 'In' crowd at the Tate

*You have a hangover and this feels like a cure

Mona was really Mona

2008-01-15T15:58:00.000+05:30

Video of Mona Lisa Descending a Staircase, directed by Joan Gratz

Now it's official.

Now we can stop worrying it was really Leo in drag.

Mona Lisa identified, German experts say

"....dated notes scribbled in the margins of a book by its owner in October, 1503, confirm once and for all that Lisa del Giocondo was indeed the model for one of the most famous portraits in the world...."

"...The notes were made by Florentine city official Agostino Vespucci, an acquaintance of the artist, in a collection of letters by the Roman orator Cicero.

The comments compare Leonardo to the ancient Greek artist Apelles and say he was working on three paintings at the time, one of them a portrait of Lisa del Giocondo."

Okay, so now how do we verify that Agostino Vespucci was scribbling the honest truth and nothing but the honest truth?

I mean, really, you ought to see the scribbles I transcribed about Damien Hirst's pickled shark in the margins of the TOI - oh, beauteous shark, floating in leaky formaldehyde, how fortunate we are that you aren't having a ball in the biology hall? - admittedly, Damien Hirst and the Toilet Paper of India (known officially as the Times) are a far cry from Leonardo Da Vinci and Cicero.

And I'm a far weep from Agostino Vespucci. I would never compare anyone to Apelles.

Created what, Mrs. Ambani??

2008-01-15T12:43:00.001+05:30

Just about anyone thinks they can become an artist

"Tomorrow, 30 artists from different continents will unveil their unique sculptors at Dirubhai Ambani Knowledge Centre (DAKC), where they’ve been working for a month under Harmony Art’s residency programme. “As a foundation, we wanted to create a setup which would allow Indian and international artists to exchange ideas and techniques,” Tina Ambani explains."

“They’ve had a blast — working in the day and partying at night! In fact, they’ve had so much fun that many of them have created 10-15 sculptors,” says Tina, informing the artists were short-listed from well-researched data."

This is, like, asking for an attack from the Morality Brigade.

No, It wasn't Dr. Yes after all

2008-01-14T05:59:00.001+05:30

Who made off with the Picasso and the Portinari.

And it certainly wasn't a Brazilian either.

"Thefts like this were probably not carried out by Brazilians," said the pop-star culture minister, Gilberto Gil. "They must be linked to international gangs."

Stolen Picasso recovered undamaged in Brazil

Video of Yehudi Menuhin performing Paganini's Moto Perpetuo, with Adolph Baller on piano

Also found in a neigbouring part of the world -

Two valuable Walt Disney Company watercolors depicting Mickey Mouse as the sorcerer’s apprentice in the 1940 film “Fantasia”

Mickey Mouse Paintings Are Recovered

Poor Goya, the torment goes on

2008-01-13T14:54:00.001+05:30

Look what we did

Jake & Dinos Chapman: The Rape of Creativity

Two years ago, the Chapmans bought a complete set of what has become the most revered series of prints in existence, Goya's Disasters of War. "We had it sitting around for a couple of years, every so often taking it out and having a look at it," says Dinos, until they were quite sure what they wanted to do. "We always had the intention of 'rectifying' it... So we've gone very systematically through the entire 80 etchings, and changed all the visible victims' heads to clowns' heads and puppies' heads."

This is a new low indeed, when art vandalism gets looked upon as 'modern art' and gets its own exhibition called - leaving the poor art lover no more room to even wince any further - 'Insult to Injury'.

I'd like to wish the Chapmans the torments of hell, except they'd do a makeover job on poor Satan next.

An interesting video showing the Hell panel from the Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymus Bosch.

The Apocalyse is truly coming......

2008-01-13T07:37:00.000+05:30

.....'Cause now we have Noo-Clear Art.

Artists charged over fake atomic bomb blast

'Nuclear' TV hackers face trial

Artists spliced fake nuclear blast into TV weather news

Statement made by art group ZTOHOVEN

"We are neither a terrorist organization nor a political group, our aim is not to intimidate the society or manipulate it, which is something we witness on daily basis both in real world and in the world created by the media.

Whether the reasons are political interests, market interests, financial interests or interests of supranational companies – we meet hidden manipulation and attempt to invade the subconscious mind of citizens with specific products or ideology, using all available means. We do not think that a subtle distortion of such system or an appeal to pure common sense of people and their ability to remain unaffected are harmful, not even in a democratic society. That is why, several years ago, the art group “Ztohoven” penetrated the public sphere of Prague, questioned the space given to advertisement generally and the space given to specific adverts.

On the 17th of June 2007 this group attacked the space of TV broadcasting. It distorted it, questioned its truthfulness and its credibility. It drew attention to the possibility of using images of the world created by the media in place of the existing, real world. Is everything we see daily on our TV screens real? Is everything presented to us by the media, newspapers, television, Internet actually real? This is the concept our project would like to introduce and remind of.

We believe that even the free space of public service broadcaster is able to endure such action and such impeachment. We hope our action will become an appeal for the future and remind the media of their duty to bring out the truth.

Thank you for independent media and free space for our society."

The Ideator is Bigger Than the Creator

2008-01-08T22:08:00.000+05:30

Video of 'New World Symphony' by Antonin Dvorak. Performed by the Wiener Philharmoniker, with Herbert von Karajan as Conductor.

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Art without the artist

It's all Marcel Duchamp's fault. If he hadn't gone wild with that urinal, we wouldn't have come to this pass.....

"An artwork could be a barricade of oil barrels blocking a Parisian street, or pages of a book chewed up, dissolved in acid, and then "poured" into bottles to be sent back to a library. What did it matter who did the chewing? Suddenly, the idea was more important than the creation of it."

John Baldessari, a conceptual artist, explains, "It's delegation. An architect is a classic example. He doesn't have to build a house. A composer doesn't always have to conduct his work so why should an artist?"

Another artist, Donovan, offers her take - "I'm the one in the studio making these discoveries. But because of the nature of my work, I can pass off some of the labor to others. I'm more interested in developing the phenomenological aspects of the material. Once that's done, my part is done."

Auld Lang Syne

2008-01-01T07:43:00.000+05:30

I love this version of Robert Burns's poem Auld Lang Syne.

From the film Waterloo Bridge, starring Robert Taylor and Vivien Leigh.

I love weepy, maudlin movies this time of the year. Don't ask why. There's a deep, khol aesthetically inclined explanation that I'm too lazy to go into at the moment, but all humans - except those that are very intellectually superior and crass enough to flaunt it - seem to enjoy the sight of other people suffering for love on celluloid.

Yo Ho Ho, This is a Trial

2007-12-25T17:33:00.001+05:30

I downloaded Windows Live as a Holiday present for myself, and I'm just checking if Bill's gift really works. ;-)

Now that Bombay is Mumbai...

2007-12-23T08:40:00.000+05:30

...there is no dearth in the Moral Brigade volunteers.

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Dame Kiri Te Kanawa singing 'The Heart is Slow to Learn'.

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The painter Jatin Das was 'Asked' by the Mumbai Police (Joint police commissioner KL Prasad said it was just a suggestion) to put up a 'Not Under 18' (or 'Adults Only') notice at his recent exhibition of nude paintings, Body & Line, to 'Avoid Any Trouble'.

Incidentally, I don't see the point of the 'Not Under 18' notice. Everyone that gets offended seems to be way above 18. And, personally speaking, at 18, like now, I would have been terrifically offended to have someone else decide what I should or should not view. (Under 18, I would have been terrifically curious and left no stones unturned to know what was being kept from me.)

“When I was living in Bombay it was a cosmopolitan city,” said Das, who moved to Delhi four decades ago. “I don’t know how and when it transformed into a parochial village.”

We live in a sensitive age and there seems to be an overabundance of 'sentiments' to be hurt.

In fact, you get an impression that some people would find living dull and meaningless if someone more talented and more intelligent didn't give their third-rate, mediocre sentiments a knock.

It's the only time in their sorry lives that they'd get a bit of public attention.

Otherwise there's no logic to it. I mean, why should anyone really care if Jatin Das painted nude figures? Or if Husain painted nude goddesses? Or if Sushmita Sen thinks that “No Indian has chastity or virginity anymore"?

This last, incidentally, 'didn"t go down well with the legal authorities and the moral police, who felt that such comments could affect the moral fabric of India.'

If these moral hoodlums weren't so violent, it would almost be funny.

The more such incidents I hear about the more I feel that the real problem isn't art or morality, but a failure of the education system. We should cut down on the rote system and the marks system, and put more emphasis on logical and analytical thinking abilities.

And then, maybe, people would stop and think -

Is this art exhibition/music performance/statement/opinion, like, going to knell the doom for humankind?

How exactly does someone else's thinking affect my life?

Why am I giving so much importance to someone's opinion?

Can my religion and my personal morals be so flimsy that they will come crashing down on account of something that I might not have even heard of except for the media? Or something that I haven't even personally seen, heard, or read?

If we must make a fuss, aren't there more important things in the world?

Not much hope of that though. I mean, education being a cure-all for fanaticism. Doesn't seem to have had any measure of positive effect on war-mongers like George Bush, Tony Blair, Hillary Clinton, and the rest of that morally righteous brigade.

Perhaps it's genetic modification we need to look into. ;-)

Reason I like Banksy....

2007-12-22T19:00:00.000+05:30

... is that he is so anonymously honest -

"The art world is the biggest joke going. It’s a rest home for the overprivileged, the pretentious, and the weak. And modern art is a disgrace – never have so many people used so much stuff and taken so long to say so little. Still, the plus side is it’s probably the easiest business in the world to walk into with no talent and make a few bucks."

About his Palestine graffiti-painting trip, he said -

"Every graffiti writer should go there. They’re building the biggest wall in the world. I painted on the Palestinian side, and a lot of them weren’t sure about what I was doing. They didn’t understand why I wasn’t just writing “down with Israel” in big letters and painting pictures of the Israeli prime minister hanging from a rope. And maybe they had a point. The guy that I stayed with got five days with the “dirty bag” for waving a Palestinian flag out a window. The dirty bag is when Israeli security services get a sack, wipe their shit on it, and put the bag over your head while your hands are tied behind your back. I spat out my falafel as he was explaining that to me, but he just goes, “That’s nothing. My cousin got it for two weeks without a break.” It’s difficult to come home and hear people complaining about reruns on TV after that."

The interview with Swindle magazine is a good read.

2007-12-21T11:48:00.000+05:30

Photo: AP Photo

Brazil Art theft

Pablo Picasso's 1904 painting 'Portrait of Suzanne Bloch' and Brazilian painter Candido Portinari's 1939 painting ''O Lavrador de Cafe' were stolen from the Sao Paulo Art Museum on 20 Dec.

'The thieves used a hydraulic car jack to pry their way past the pull-down metal gate that protects the museum's front entrance. Then, they smashed through two glass doors, probably using a crow bar, to get to the paintings on the second floor, police said.'

The paintings are too well-known to be sold, so the authorities suspect that some rich art-lover commissioned the theft to possess the works for his/her sole viewing pleasure.

A certain Dr. Yes, methinks.

In another part of the world, the Russians are denying the British public the viewing pleasure of a major exhibition of Russian and French masterpieces - 'From Russia: French and Russian Master Paintings 1870 - 1925 from Moscow and St. Petersburg' - which would have included works by Renoir, Cézanne, Van Gogh, Matisse, and Picasso.

Photo: Royal Academy/PA

Most of these works were taken from their aristocratic or/and rich owners - stolen, seized, appropriated, confiscated - by the Communist State after the Tzar was overthrown. And the Russians are worried that the descendants of the aristocrats who fled to the UK will make a noise about 'a return of appropriated art'.

Sergei Shchukin's grandson, after all, has already had a luckless go with several law-suits to claim back Matisse's La Danse (shown above) and other paintings belonging to the family.

To both allay the Russians' concerns and make such exhibitions possible in future, the U.K. government is introducing a new "immunity from seizure" legislation.

"The new legislation is designed to bring Britain's laws in line with the rest of Europe, including Germany, where many of the paintings are currently on display. It means descendants of the original owners cannot bring their claims on British soil."

Now this is what is known as the British Sense of Fair Play.

Beethoven's Birthday

2007-12-19T13:07:00.000+05:30

In belated honor of Beethoven's birthday, which he and his family always celebrated on 16 December.

Here're different versions of my favorite Beethoven composition - Symphony No. 9. The lyrics of "Ode An Die Freude/Ode to Joy" are from a poem by Friedrich Schiller.

Vengerov and Bassiona Amorosa

2007-12-18T06:16:00.000+05:30

Bassiona Amorosa and Maxim Vengerov play Csárdás by Vittorio Monti.

I made some beautiful music yesterday and then I saw this, which made me even happier.

By the way, Bassiona Amorosa play the Double Bass, not the Cello. Yes, there's a difference. It's twice as large and tuned in fourths, instead of fifths.

Some Desi Shit

2007-12-13T04:51:00.000+05:30

Maxim Vengerov playing with piano the Hungarian dance No.5 by Brahms

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India is popping up all over the media lately and inspiring all sorts of people in all sorts of different ways.

I just read about Santiago Sierra's new exhibition , called "21 Anthropometric Modules Made of Human Faeces By the People of Sulabh International, India." His sculptures, although you wouldn't know it to look at them or from sniffing the air around them, are cast from human excrement.

From desi shit, collected, so we are told in the Guardian, 'in New Delhi and Jaipur by the low-caste poor who, atoning for their deeds in previous lives, scavenge human faecal matter for a living.'

A shitty piece of Orientalist-type writing that, but, anyway, so the shit's from India, from 'Sulabh International, a group dedicated to improving the appalling sanitary conditions in India and bettering the lives of those forced to earn a living by manually collecting and disposing of human waste.'

The catalogue, written by Pilar Villela Mascaró, states that the artist "will be selling shit to art collectors and explicitly stating that its surplus value has been provided by labourers who sponsored the piece by working for free".

This reminded me of a stunt by the Yes Men - Let Them Eat Hamburgher.

They called a conference about WTO agribusiness policies and their economic ill-effects on the Third World countries, gave all the attendees McDonald hamburgers to eat,and suggested a solution for the 'widespread starvation in the third World'.

"The solution, as elegant as it is simple, is to provide Third Worlders with filters that allow them to recycle their food—extending the lifespan of a typical hamburger up to ten times.

In answer to one student’s outraged question, Mike explains that McDonald’s, in partnership with the WTO, is already experimenting with this technology in its products, and has been including 20% “post-consumer waste” in many of its hamburgers. Patrick’s 3-D animation of Ronald McDonald squeezing Menu Item Number Two from his colostomy bag erases any doubts about what is actually being said: the WTO believes that the poor should eat their own shit, or perhaps eat the shit of the rich, if an efficient pipeline can be established."

Maxim Vengerov

2007-12-12T09:43:00.000+05:30

I completely, completely LiKe Maxim Vengerov.

On the personal front, I'm a bit annoyed this morning - well, more than a bit, actually; it's more like shattered, heart-broken and let's go drown myself - because I really flubbed-up the violin-playing. It's become so important lately, I practice up to 4 hours a day and I'm still 'not good enough'.

The trouble is I've not really had any major failures in my life so far - or any that felt so MaJoR - and this is terribly hard to take, especially since I really, really, really love the instrument. I can't imagine not playing. So, I think I will not hang myself to-day and go practice some more.

Meanwhile, here's something interesting, G.K. Chesterton reciting 'A Ballad of Suicide' -

Appropriated Art

2007-12-10T12:59:00.000+05:30

If the Copy Is an Artwork, Then What’s the Original?

I'd never heard of Richard Prince, but he is apparently 'a pioneer of appropriation art'. This is mainly about photographing and manipulating to a very slight, non-noticeable degree the photographs taken by other photographers, and then exhibiting these photographs of photographs in galleries. The works sell for millions of dollars, which seems pretty incredible to me.

It makes you wonder, you know, how these 'art'-buying schmucks got rich in the first place? I mean, did they, like, inherit without merit or just win a random lottery?

'Cause, personally speaking, I would just take a page from Mr. Prince's book and put my money down on a high quality digital camera, the largest printer I can find and some excellent quality photo paper. And then visit his exhibition and do some 'appropriating' of me own.

One of the photographers Mr. Prince has appropriated from is Jim Krantz, who has shot many photographs for Marlboro ads. The first time he discovered his work had been used without permission was at a gallery exhibition by Mr. Prince and he says he "didn't know if I should be proud, or if I looked like an idiot."

He says - "My whole issue with this, truly, is attribution and recognition. It's an unusual thing to see an artist who doesn't create his own work, and I don't understand the frenzy around it.....If I italicized 'Moby-Dick,' then would it be my book? I don't know. But I don't think so."

The Toddler and the Turner Topper

2007-12-05T08:33:00.000+05:30

Ladusa, playing the Vivaldi Winter Violin Concerto

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Toddler fools the art world into buying his tomato ketchup paintings

I love this statement -

His mother wrote: "Freddie W R Linsky paints over and over, making us curious to know what is going on.

"It seems that one stroke is being repeated - the same stroke or one very close to it, hence the possibility of the infinite opening up of the structure of time."

I also loved the Turner Prize judges' statement regarding Mark Wallinger's 'State Britain", praising it for its -

"immediacy, visceral intensity and historic importance", combining "a bold political statement with art's ability to articulate fundamental human truths".

I only wonder why Freddie Linsky, aged 2, is supposed to have 'fool'-ed the art world, while Mark Wallinger, aged 48, is feted for "The most extraordinary work of art ever installed in the gallery."

Seems like a total case of ageism to me.

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Mr. Wallinger, incidentally, has also been applauded for wandering around in a bear suit for ten whole days in a Berlin Gallery for his film, Sleeper. The film title was inspired by Cold War spies and a film about a prince turned into a bear he saw as a child.

In the current climate, where fake bears can arouse violent passions, it is worth mentioning that Mr. Wallinger avoided controversy by not naming the bear anything.

Not 'Mo-' and not Yoggi and not Pooh.

Nora The Piano Cat

2007-11-24T14:54:00.000+05:30

This is just hilarious. I showed it to my three dogs and they howled. What a cat, they said, we'd love to chase her around to something by Mozart.

The music was so good, the little one here was lulled to sleep.

A Piss In The Tea Cup

2007-11-21T11:46:00.000+05:30

Photo Credit: The Guardian

This, apparently, is Eurostar's idea of getting more Belgians to visit Britain.

The slogan informs us that London is "just around the corner".

So, I guess, prepare yourself to appreciate its eccentricity right here.

According to Eurostar spokeswoman Lesley Retallack, Belgians 'get' the concept.

She says, "It's fun, it's supposed to show how cosmopolitan London is. Yes, I really think it says London is cosmopolitan...

....You could walk down Camden market and you can see someone like that....

....It just captures your imagination, stops you, makes you think. People get it.....

....The whole idea is that London is just around the corner. Belgians absolutely love the British and follow them closely......

....The adverts are meant to show how cutting edge London is, the amazing mix."

Really? It takes a pissing yob to bring out London's cutting edge? And what does an average Belgian think when he/she sees this?

Wow, this is so imaginatively captivating, it's bringing on the intellectual goose-pimples, it makes me want to dash on my thinking cap. I get it! Let's all take the next Eurostar to cosmopolitan London and see the talented skinheads piss in their cups at tea-time!!!!

Or - since "Belgians absolutely love the British and follow them closely" - let's pissing well start the trend in our own country?

Good Grief. Whoever came up with this concept should be awarded the Turner Prize.

Really.

The Hanging Heart of Koons

2007-11-21T11:16:00.000+05:30

Photo Credit: Sotheby's

Jeff Koons has a heart to rival Damien Hirst's skull.

I really like Jeff Koons's topiary sculpture "Puppy" at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. This looks interesting, but doesn't really tug at the, ahem, heart-strings.

Still he got a good price for it - $23.6 million.

And I'm inspired enough to write a romance with the above title. That's big business too, you know.

Everybody Loves A Lover

2007-11-10T08:26:00.000+05:30

I just switched on the computer and stumbled upon this rather sweet news bit on Yahoo - New Yorkers rally to help online romeo

The chap spotted his dream girl on a crowded subway train, lost sight of her in the crowd and, so, to find her again -

"He set up a website dedicated to finding the mystery woman -- www.nygirlofmydreams.com.

He drew a picture of the girl, who was wearing blue shorts, blue tights, and a red flower in her hair, and posted his cell phone number, e-mail address and an appeal for help finding her.

It worked."

Thanks for the first smile of the morning, Patrick Moberg.

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Video of the Papageno/Papagena duet from 'The Magic Flute' by Mozart.

Information posted for this video on YouTube is an entertaining read -

"From the Bel Canto Opera production set in England. The rustic gamekeeper Papageno is in despair at ever finding a mate, when Papagena, a Sloane Ranger, suddenly arrives to take her bit of rough to a mews house in Knightsbridge.

PAPAGENO: Bells, perform your magic,
like you did before
Situation tragic!
Help me out once more.
I'm in desperation,
Hear my anxious plea
Last hope for salvation...
bring my love to me.
But I fear...the little dear...will not appear.

THE THREE BOYS: Hey, Papageno...look who's here!

Pa pa pa pa etc.
He: I had feared I'd never see you
Papagena: Here to stay, I guarantee you.
He: From now on we'll be together
She: Like two love-birds of one feather
BOTH: Like doves in love we'll live together
HE: In a dovecote made for two...
SHE: Love in any cot will do.
HE: Come the Spring, it's time for matng.
SHE: I can't see the point in waiting.
BOTH: Hanging on is too frustrating,
Let's be gone for procreating.
A happy nesting should include lots of chicks...
five or six...
some of each,
a balanced mix...
and if we're blessed we'll fill the nest with quite a brood.
HE: First maybe comes a Papageno...
SHE: Then comes a baby Papagena
HE: Next, comes her brother Papageno
SHE: Then comes another Papagena
BOTH: Papageno, Papagena, Papageno, Papagena
SHE: We'll breed with nothing to restrain us
HE: We'll need a mansion to contain us
BOTH: With such a brood of papagenas!
We'll be one happy family.
HE: But were's the money to maintain us?
SHE: My wealthy daddy will sustain us
BOTH: and all our brood of papagenas
Papageno, Papagena, Papageno, Papagena
New blossoms on the family tree;
Papageno, Papagena, Papageno, Papagena
and when they've flown the coop, you'll see
we'll soon have grand-chicks on our knee
and they'll be clones of you and me.
Papageno. Papagena. Papageno. Papagena.
Pa-pa-pa-papageno! Pa-pa-pa-pagena!

Words © Tom Boyd."

Oh, Art

2007-11-05T08:50:00.000+05:30

In Malaysia -

"A unique project takes art out of its stuffy box and into the public domain in an attempt to engage the man in the street."

In Scotland, this principle is taken a wee bit too far -

"A PRUDISH visitor to an art gallery decided to censor a male nude painting - by sticking a piece of black paper over the offending area."

This calls for a nice, pointless debate on whether art is better off 'dictatorized' or if we should simply call for more 'democratization'.

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Video from 'Amadeus'. I saw the film the other night and it was fantastic. It was unfair on poor Antonio Salieri - it makes him out to be a second-rate composer and skips all mention of his wife and eight kids - but Tom Hulce was just brilliant as 'Wolfie' Mozart.

Except for the silly laugh, he reminded me a lot of Guy - a total dedication to music, easy talent, a near-photographic memory, no practical sense and a complete lack of reverence for 'things that matter'.

If You're Home before Me

2007-10-31T20:21:00.001+05:30

At the moment, I'm totally in love with this song 'If You're Home before Me' by Heidi and Stef.

Luciano Pavarotti

2007-09-10T16:22:00.000+05:30

The other day I came home from violin class and heard Pavarotti had died.

He was the very first opera singer I ever heard when I was a kid, and I remember falling instantly in love with his voice. Another singer I'd liked as instantly was Ustad Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. When I was an art student in Bombay, I visited a music shop, bought a tape and the shopkeeper put it on to check it. His voice filled the shop and I felt goose pimples all over. I thought, oh man, that is so great, so marvellous, so utterly incredible. The shopkeeper shook his head. That chap is going to give himself an heart-attack if he goes on that way, he said.

A matter of taste, I suppose. And Pavarotti's voice always did wondrous things for my spirit. I'm really sorry he's gone.

Here are a couple of his works that I like very much -

A french aria "Pour Mon Ame Fille" from "La Fille du Regiment", an opera by Gaetano Donizetti. This is the part that gave Pavarotti his nickname "King of the High C's". There are nine high C's and it takes a rare talent to manage them as Pavarotti did.

The second is from Giuseppe Verdi's three act opera Rigoletto.

La Donna È Mobile - Giuseppe Verdi

Yeo!! It's a Bush Portrait!!

2007-08-30T18:47:00.000+05:30

Just when all the rats are leaving the ship, an artist climbs on - it's hard to be the Decider-in-Chief of the most powerful nation in the world.

British artist, Jonathan Yeo, is responsible for an artistic outrage. He was first officially asked to paint a portrait of Bush - he's already done one of his mate Blair - and then told his services were not required.

Uhm, that apparently kind of hurt, I guess, and out of that angst came this.

No, the face is not the offensive part. The offensive part is that the portrait is composed of a collage of porn images. Jonathan Yeo apparently had a large collection of porn magazines that he sacrificed in the name of art.

The Republicans are not amused.

A spokesman for the Republican party said: "This picture is very distasteful. Why would anyone want to make a picture of our President from pornographic material?"

Why, indeed? When there were all those images from Abu Graib and all.

Yeo explained at the meisterwork's launch: "I did it for fun, not to offend, but I'm pleased with it. I did it to amuse."

The Republicans Abroad International spokesman-- “This will cause outrage in America. Some people will think it’s funny — but personally I think it is a cheap stunt.”

In any case, for Jonathan Yeo, it's Mission Accomplished.

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Image from The Register

Glass Music

2007-08-23T13:56:00.001+05:30

I thought this was tremendous.

Damien Hirst's Diamond Skull

2007-06-08T11:45:00.000+05:30

Photo from White Cube

I've just been looking at Damien Hirst's Diamond Skull over at the White Cube. I thought I would hate it when I first read about it, but, actually, I find it rather interesting.

It's called 'For the love of God' in honor of Mrs. Hirst (the artist's mother), who apparently thought now you've pickled the cow and the shark and the bull and the dove, so, Damien, what next, for the love of God?

Or something to that tune.

Anyway, it's an 18th century skull, encrusted with 8,601 diamonds, all 'ethically sourced' (all sources mention that bit), collected over a long time and bought by the artist on his own budget.

The whole piece cost him about $28 million to make and he expects to sell it for at least $100 million. The next project apparently is going to be about a diamond-encrusted foetus or something, at double the price.

Should make a nice if expensive night-lamp - the skull, I mean. Pop a bulb inside and snuggle down with the latest Stephen King comic. Kitsch time at its best.

The Artist as a Botticelli Model

2007-06-07T12:30:00.000+05:30

This is what I'd have looked like if Botticelli (not Bottabelli) had painted me.

A rather fun tool, check it out - Face Transformer

Pigasso

2007-06-07T11:28:00.000+05:30

Photo from Daily Mail

Pigasso: The little oinks making a splash in the art world

Meet Van Snout and Bottabelli of the Trotters Independent Painters. Such talent at such a young age. Oinksome!!

A Flea Market Bargain

2007-06-05T17:12:00.000+05:30

Video of Julian Lloyd Webber playing Bach's 'Air on G'. Appropriate for the Airheads below, I thought.

-----
'Clueless' thieves sell £1million painting for £350

"A £1 million painting stolen by a gang of 'clueless' thieves was discovered on sale at a flea market for £350.

Giandomenico Tiepolo's Scenes from a Venetian Carnival was stolen last year from a private collector.

It was recovered from Pordenone, near Venice, along with more than a dozen other works of art worth more than £2.5million, following raids on a number of markets across Italy.

Police also arrested several members of a gang of art thieves who had targeted homes in Rome.

A spokesman said yesterday: "This gang was peddling works of art worth millions for just a few hundred euros. They were completely clueless and had no idea of the real value.

"In fact to call them clueless would be a compliment."

Tiepolo, whose works are characterised by vivid colour and movement, was born in Venice in 1727. "

-------

Like I always say, learn the trade, not the tricks of the trade. If you're going to become an art thief, brush up on the art history, for chrissakes!

Women in Western Art

2007-05-27T15:49:00.000+05:30

I just came across this excellent video covering 500 years of women's portraits in Western Art. Wonderful and inspiring.

Art and the Hindu Fanatics

2007-05-17T10:59:00.000+05:30

Indian artists fear intolerance

"Art is subjective and not a real life depiction. For those who claim they are exercising their freedom of speech, I would say they should not be curtailing another individual's freedom of expression."

-- Karan Singh, Supreme Court lawyer

Mstislav Rostropovich

2007-05-02T12:36:00.000+05:30

Mstislav Rostropovich playing Haydn Cello Concerto in 1981. He will be missed.

---

That a man is successful who has lived well, laughed often, and loved much, who has gained the respect of the intelligent men and the love of children; who has filled his niche and accomplished his task; who leaves the world better than he found it, whether by an improved poppy, a perfect poem, or a rescued soul; who never lacked appreciation of earth's beauty or failed to express it; who looked for the best in others and gave the best he had.

- Robert Louis Stevenson

The Swine wouldn't listen...

2007-04-10T20:08:00.000+05:30

...Pearls Before Breakfast went a-waste.

I could cry. How can you walk away from something so beautiful? How could you not pause for even a moment?

This isn't really about the general public failing to recognize the genius of Joshua Bell.

This is more about all the existential questions that have been bothering me these past few weeks.

What is your life all about? Why do you work? Isn't work all about adding a shine to the whole process of living? And isn't living about noticing things, about caring for the details, about opening yourself to new experiences, about making yourself available to those you love?

I let a door close on me recently by not caring enough, and I'm being dramatic enough to wonder if I'll ever stop grieving.

Sirena Huang

2007-03-29T18:32:00.000+05:30

Absolutely, absolutely brilliant! Her obvious intelligence and poise, not to mention the depths in her playing, are just awesome.

According to Wikipedia -

Sirena Huang is an 11-year-old concert violinist. Sirena Huang started violin lessons at four, and made her professional solo debut at age nine, with the Taiwan Symphony Orchestra. Now 11, she has won top prizes in numerous international competitions, delighting audiences worldwide with her virtuosity and musical imagination.

Sirena, 12 now, started her violin study with Linda Fiore at Hartt Community Division and is presently at Juilliard School. In September 2006, she came 3rd in the junior division of the 10th triennial Wieniawski International Violin Competition for Young Violinists held in Lublin, Poland.

Here she is performing on the TEDTalks program in Monterey, CA, on February 2006.

Bach's Birthday

2007-03-22T23:36:00.000+05:30

I nearly forgot. It was Johann Sebastian Bach's 321st birthday on 21 March.

Here we have Nathan Milstein playing Partita No. 3 in E, BWV 1006

And Mstislav Rostropovich playing Bach´s Bourree - Suite No 3

Rostropovich, incidentally, is out of the hospital and apparently doing okay.

Dame Kiri wins the Underwear Case

2007-03-22T18:13:00.000+05:30

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa singing 'Dove sono i bei momenti' ('Where are they, the beautiful moments') from Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro).

-----

Dame Kiri wins axed concerts case

The 63-year-old singer cancelled shows with Australian rock star John Farnham after seeing a concert DVD where he caught underwear thrown by fans.

The DVD showed Farnham collecting the knickers thrown at him by fans and holding them up like some sort of "trophy".

"How could I, in my classical form, perform in this way?" Dame Kiri told the court in February.

I'm a Musical Thinker

2007-03-11T19:46:00.000+05:30

According to the BBC, Musical thinkers:

* Tend to think in sounds, and may also think in rhythms and melodies
* Are sensitive to the sounds and rhythms of words as well as their meanings.
* Feel a strong connection between music and emotions

Take the fun test here -

What kind of thinker are you?

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Video of the Chieftains, performing the Dublin Reels.

I'm a mad fan of Celtic music and dance, incidentally. With St. Patrick's Day approaching, I'm getting madder.

The Gucci Swindler

2007-03-01T23:43:00.000+05:30

Photo Courtesy - Blick Online

Did you always want to be a Gucci model? Did you dream of seeing your handsome mug superimposed with a Gucci Perfume Bottle, not to mention a Gucci Logo?

Well, dream on no longer, International Fame is within reach. Take a, uhm, glossy page from Juan Isidro Casilla.

Here's how you achieve it yourself.

Pose for Photo, Shoot Photo, Send Photo to Switzerland.

The SonntagsZeitung and Gucci will take care of the rest.

Schwindler fälscht Gucci-Inserate

Vom Gucci-Schwindler zum Sony-Manager

Swiss Newspaper Falls for Prankster's Fake Gucci Ad

---

Actually, the fellow suffers from Chronic Swindler Syndrome. He's also pretended to be the boss of the Cirque du Soleil, a Sony BMG manager, and, oh yes, also an Armani model.

The path ahead is strewn with book deals and movie deals. And, if he's lucky, with a confessional hour on Oprah, bless her.

He's already been getting emotional about how the present self-publicity was only intended to salve the past lack of attention in his childhood. His parents were awful, naturally.

He's sorry about all the trouble he's caused, but he says, "I know that I look good." And he's willing to make amends. "I would work gladly as a genuine Model".

Jeez, stop grumbling about the $50,000 he cost you and hire him.

--------

And, while you're at it, send me a hefty contract too.

No perfume, but I did add a digital lipstick.

--------

Via Mediabistro and Adweek

The Cardamon Quartet

2007-03-01T17:27:00.000+05:30

The Cardamon Quartet Live at Cornelia Street Cafe. I just stumbled on the video and I think they're simply marvellous!!

The group:- Dan Aran (drummer), Uri Sharlin (accordionist, pianist, and composer), Greg Heffernan (cellist), and Gilad Harel (clarinetist). Their website lists Jennifer Vincent as cellist, not present for some reason in this video.

They are mainly influenced by Jewish and Arabic music traditions, folk and classical, and are also conversant with a lot of other musical styles - Cuban, Jazz, Latin Jazz, West African, as well as classical orchestral compositions. They believe in 'working with whatever inspiration is at hand', according to their website. Check out the cool intro music there, by the way.

They have a new CD out, called 'Reflections of the Road'.

Kick George in the ass

2007-02-23T11:25:00.000+05:30

Video of 'Anti War Song' by Anti-Nowhere League

-----

Artist, my ass

Guardian's Andrew Dickson is pretty pissed off here -

"What really sticks in my craw, however, is that it's just so bitterly, absurdly disappointing, the kind of juvenile stunt that makes me want to grab the man, sit him down and force him to look at astonishing, terrifying photographs, such as the one published earlier this week, that describe the horror of actually living in Iraq. (I want to do this to Bush or Blair too, yes, many of us do, but that's another story. Or an idea for a piece of art.) Hundreds of people are dying each day, you want to yell in his face - and this is the best you can do? The biggest you can think? Your utmost artistic effort?"

NOTE : The photo link Andrew Dickson refers to - it's Cost of War

----

Mark McGowan, the 'artist', states on his website that he is -

“offering the people of America, New York and visitors a service…a kind of theraputic engagement. Hopefully people will be able to come and kick me (the President, George Bush) as hard as they like, and gain some comfort in the fact that they can say I kicked George in the ass. On a more serious note this is a protest against George Bush and his policies and i am expecting injuries, i just hope not to severe."

--------

Like kicking the ersatz item is going to solve anything. The man's an idiot. Or one of those closet masochists.

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Speaking of kicking ass, is someone going to give it to Prince Harry in the backside as well? I hear the Royal Nitwit is actually 'over the moon' about going to Iraq.