Category: people

For the first time, the roster of honorees has expanded from five to six.

As a harpsichordist, scholar, conductor, and founder-director of the ensemble Il Complesso Barocco, Curtis brought an enormous amount of neglected music – opera and vocal works in particular – from the 17th and 18th centuries to modern ears. In recent years he was known for a series of Handel opera recordings funded by mystery author Donna Leon.

“This is exactly what he wants. He wears his warrants on his sleeve like badges of honor. He’s using the judicial system and the media to market himself. It’s a minor investment and in return his name stays relevant. He’s been doing this for years, and he’s great at it.”

He made his name in the RSC’s marathon production of Nicholas Nickleby in 1980, became known to millions through roles in the series Cheers and The West Wing, and (between the occasional major film) maintained a long and successful career as a stage actor and director on both sides of the Atlantic.

“The design, which has been dated to around 1492, included both a drawing of the machine and a theoretical explanation of how it would work … It was likely designed for drinks, or perhaps sorbets and desserts, the report says.”

Fairey, 45, is accused of causing about $9,000 in damage to nine illegally tagged properties while he was in Detroit in May. He was invited to the city for commissioned work that included an 18-story mural on One Campus Martius for Dan Gilbert’s Bedrock Real Estate Services and others.

“Tests conducted after two of the musical icon’s 11 adult children said their father had been murdered showed the cause of death was Alzheimer’s disease, plus physical conditions including coronary disease, heart failure and the effects of Type 2 diabetes, Clark County Coroner John Fudenberg told The Associated Press.”

“World-renowned street artist Shepard Fairey is planning to turn himself in to Detroit authorities today on charges that he illegally tagged public and private property in the city.”

“[He] was involved from the 1920s until the mid-1940s with a series of far-right fascist publications that were anti-Semitic, often racist, and always totalitarian and ultra-nationalist. … [ He] attended fascist rallies in the 1920s, privately supported the Nazis, and sought work between 1940 and 1942 in Marshall Pétain’s Vichy. (Albeit Le Corbusier, intriguingly, also sought employment in Soviet Russia, but was turned down.)”

Marcia Hafif, now 86, “speaks softly and moves gracefully. But the unassuming manner belies a bold adventurousness. A discussion about painting might segue nonchalantly to talk about ‘a little affair’ in Mexico, her journeys through Iran or her larger-than-life Circassian great-grandfather, who fought against the French in Mexico in the late 19th century.”