In a new music video art-directed by Hirst – for “See the Light,” a single by the indie-rock duo The Hours – the English film actress “dons a hospital gown, gets trapped in a glass case in a bag shop, smokes, talks about suicide, cries a lot, undergoes an MRI scan, and smears herself in cow’s blood in front of four eviscerated, wall-mounted bovine carcasses.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
Malcolm Gladwell – Geek Superstar Or Parasite?
The author of The Tipping Point and Blink may be a pop-intellectual rock star who rakes in “stratospheric” speaking fees, but he says, “At the end of the day, I’m just a journalist […] I spend my time talking to people who tell me things, and then I write them down. I’m necessarily parasitic in a way. I have done well as a parasite. [pause] But I’m still a parasite.”
Michael Kaiser To The Rescue Once Again
Faced with money troubles, a nearly dark season and the departure of artistic director-designate Gérard Mortier, New York City Opera is turning for help to “the performing arts world’s Mr. Fix-It,” Kennedy Center CEO Michael Kaiser, who has famously presided over turnarounds at Covent Garden and American Ballet Theater and helped steady Miami’s teetering Adrienne Arsht Center.
Trivial Pursuit Becomes A Game Show
“At the show’s Web site, average Americans (or ‘folks,’ as one always wants to call them after an election season) upload video clips of themselves asking questions. In the studio, standing on a six-spoked set paying homage to the home game, three pleasant contestants attempt to answer them.”
Gehry’s Beachfront Project In Brighton Is Killed
Funding for Frank Gehry’s £290 million King Alfred Leisure Center in the English seaside resort town has collapsed. The architect’s design plan, which featured a pair of wavy towers, is being scrapped.
The Death Of Newspapers: It’s Not Journalists’ Fault
“When the obituaries are written for America’s newspapers, count on journalists to indict themselves in their own demise… We could have saved ourselves, goes the refrain, if only we had been more creative and aggressive and less risk averse. To which I can only reply: Oh, please… Newspapers are in trouble for reasons that have almost nothing to do with newspaper journalism, and everything to do with the newspaper business.”
But Dan Savage Has An Idea To Save Them
“I mean, daily newspapers all need to put ‘f***’ in a headline above the fold one day – it’ll solve all their problems. That’s my prescription. And then in one fell swoop they’ll get rid of all those 80-year-old subscribers who won’t let them drop ‘Blondie.’ Catering to the 80-year-olds? Where’s that getting newspapers? Making sure there’s nothing in your paper that’s inappropriate for an eighty-year-old to read?”
Video Game Goes Online, Onscreen And Real-World In Real Time, All At Once
The London theater company Punchdrunk has teamed up with HP Labs, gaming company Hide & Seek, and web design firm Seeper to create Last Will, a “hybrid experience” for two on-site players, one in a “physical realm” and the other in a “virtual realm.”
Latest Candidate For The Strad Secret: Mushrooms
“A Swiss researcher said Thursday he had hit on an unlikely way of recreating the unique sound of a Stradivarius violin – by treating the wood of a replica instrument with mushrooms.”
Botero Scrutinized For Tax Evasion In Italy
“Colombian painter and sculptor Fernando Botero is being investigated on suspicion of tax evasion, Italian authorities said Tuesday.