Elyn Zimmerman

Elyn Zimmerman (born 1945) is an American sculptor known for her emphasis on large scale, site specific projects and environmental art. Along with these works, Zimmerman has exhibited drawings and photographs since graduating with an MFA in painting and photography at 'University of California, Los Angeles in 1972. Her teachers included Robert Heineken, Robert Irwin, and Richard Diebenkorn.
In the mid 1970s Zimmerman created a number of temporary, site-specific installations for museum and gallery exhibitions. Some of these projects were presented at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; Hudson River Museum, NY; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; Berkeley Art Museum, Berkeley; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles; and the Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, DC.
Zimmerman's permanent sculpture works, beginning in the 1980s, range from studio pieces and private commissions, to large scale projects for civic, university and corporate sites.
She was most recently awarded the 2016 Isamu Noguchi Award alongside Tadao Ando.
Biography.
Zimmerman's career as a sculptor began when she returned to California after a trip to India in 1977 where she was profoundly inspired by the archeological sites she visited. This trip precipitated her interest in doing outdoor projects and to work with stone. Upon her return she was invited to do temporary outdoor works at venues such as Artpark, Lewiston, NY; 1980 Winter Olympics, Lake Placid, NY; Laguna Gloria Art Museum, Austin, TX, and other spaces. As she has written, the ability to experiment with new materials and to learn while creating these temporary projects was invaluable and gave her confidence to create the permanent commissions that came later.
These permanent projects, beginning in 1980, are recognized for their use of stone, water, (reflecting pools, fountains) and landscape elements. Included among these large scale, public commissions is a fountain to memorialize the 1993 World Trade Center bombing in New York City; the design of the sculpture garden at the Birmingham Museum of Art, Alabama; a fountain and seating area for AT&T headquarters in New Jersey; and the plaza design at the National Geographic headquarters in Washington, DC featuring a large pool surrounded by polished and natural cleft granite boulders.
Early influences.
During her undergraduate years at UCLA, Zimmerman took classes in the fine arts program while completing a BA in perceptual psychology. It was her knowledge in this discipline and her interest in contemporary art that led her to start working for Jim Turrell and Robert Irwin, doing research for their joint project for the Art and Technology exhibition at LACMA in 1967.
Working as an independent student with Robert Heineken in photography and Richard Diebenkorn in painting, she was accepted into the MFA program in 1968 and graduated with an MFA in 1972.
In the 1960s and 1970s Los Angeles was home for many art communities as well as quality art colleges: Chouinard Art Institute, Otis Parsons Art Institute, California Institute of the Arts, and the art departments at UCLA and USC.
To compensate for the scarcity of art museums interested in contemporary art and the lack of art galleries, save for well-known Ferus Gallery founded by Walter Hopps, there were alternative art exhibition spaces, such as L.A.C.E and LAICA. In 1962 ArtForum was founded in San Francisco; the Feminist Art Movement began in 1971 with roots at CalArts; LACMA initiated the first museum exhibition of Art &Technology, and what came to be called the LA Light and Space Movement was generated, making use of unconventional venues to exhibit artist's projects.
Zimmerman's work in graduate school was influenced by this rich environment as well as by the young architect she lived with during those years. He had been in the peace corps and traveled through India, Nepal and Central Asia. The images and cultural influences he shared when they met fueled her desire to travel and investigate the world herself. Together they traveled throughout the American southwest and to Mexico to see Native American and Pre-Columbian archeological sites, as well as visit the progressive modern architecture.
Between her undergraduate and graduate years Zimmerman worked in a diverse number of positions. She was a part-time studio assistant for several artists until she was hired to work at Columbia Records in Hollywood as assistant to the head designer in the art department. She left that job when an offer came from the Charles and Ray Eames office in Venice to be the assistant to the house photographer and to run their darkroom.
Later influences.
Zimmerman and Kirk Varnedoe began a correspondence in 1975 after he wrote an enthusiastic article about the drawing and photographic piece she exhibited in the 1974 Whitney Biennial. She was in NYC in 1976 to install a project at PS1 when they met for coffee, from that point on engaging in a long distance relationship. In 1977 Zimmerman moved to New York City where she and Varnedoe shared a loft in the newly named Tribeca neighborhood. They married in 1983. He was a professor of art history at NYU's Institute of Fine Art and she taught studio classes at SUNY Purchase. Varnedoe's deep knowledge of western art history and his widely celebrated talent to convey this information to students, colleagues and friends enriched Zimmerman's understanding of and appreciation for these traditions. On the other hand, her studies of oriental art history, her residency in Japan, and travels to India and China became new interests of his.
In 1979, the National Endowment for the Arts started a new program called Art in Public Places. Projects using government funds were required to use a percentage of the funds for artworks specific to the project at hand. Zimmerman was awarded one of the first of these projects in 1979, for Fort Lincoln Park in Washington, DC. Although the project was never realized, it began her relationship with Cold Spring Granite Company in Cold Spring, MN. This would become her major source of stone materials for over 30 years.
When the National Geographic Society selected David Childs of SOM to design their new headquarters in Washington, DC his office sought out artists who worked with stone. This became Zimmerman's first substantial commission, reinforcing her desire to pursue this type of artwork and to learn more about all the aspects of creating outdoor public projects including: construction methods; landscape requirements; sustainable building practices and materials sources. It was after spending considerable time at stone quarries that she became interested in also making smaller more intimate stone sculptures.
Selected exhibitions.
Elyn Zimmerman has exhibited for more than 40 years in Europe, Australia, Japan, and the United States. Including but not limited to the following:
Selected collections.
Selected public and corporate collections include: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Telfair Museum Jepson Center, Savannah; Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham; Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton; Addison Gallery of American Art, Andover; AT&T Corporation, Basking Ridge; British Museum, London; Chase Manhattan Bank Corporation, New York; Clos Pegase Winery Sculpture Garden, Napa Valley; Commodities Corporation, Princeton; Equitable Corporation, New York; General Mills Sculpture Garden, Minneapolis; Goldman Sachs Corporate Collection, New York; Henry Buhl Collection, New York; Kramarsky Collection, New York.


The Country Dance

The Country Dance is an oil painting by French artist Jean-Antoine Watteau, located in the Indianapolis Museum of Art, which is in Indianapolis, Indiana. Probably one of Watteau's earliest painting, created roughly 1706-1710, it depicts a group of quite courtly peasants dancing among the trees.
Description.
Amid the trees, a group of villagers play music while a couple dances. A toddler copies the lady's motions, entertaining the company. Rather than the usual contemporary association with debauchery, music here alludes to social harmony and order. The musicians glance coyly at the viewer, actors very aware of their spectators. This sort of interaction is one of Watteau's hallmarks.
It is an image of visual extremes: the dark forest background brings the peasants' bright clothing into sharp contrast. The rustic setting and the dancers' formal attire channel both the fête galante and a formal court celebration transplanted to a charming bit of countryside.
Historical information.
This is Watteau's earliest known painting, but already he had developed his own style. Painted shortly after he moved from Valenciennes to Paris, Watteau took the merry rustic scenes favored by his Flemish antecedents like Pieter Bruegel and Peter Paul Rubens, but gave them unprecedented grace, nobility, and style. Though painting a standard northern European subject, he drew heavily on Venetian landscapes, particularly in the atmospheric effects. It is, in effect, a declaration in favor of the Rococo movement with which Watteau would become so heavily associated.
Acquisition.
"The Country Dance" was acquired by the IMA in 1974, a gift of Mrs. Herman C. Krannert. It hangs in the Charles O. McGaughey Gallery and has the accession number 74.98.


The Burial of the Sardine

The Burial of the Sardine (Spanish: "El entierro de la sardina") is an oil-on-panel painting by Spanish artist Francisco Goya, usually dated to the 1810s. The title is posthumous, referring to the culminating event of a three-day carnival in Madrid ending on Ash Wednesday. Masked and disguised revellers are seen dancing their way to the banks of the Manzanares, where a ceremonial sardine will be buried. Goya does not illustrate the fish in the painting, nor the large doll made of straw, called a "pelele", from which it hung; the centrepiece is the darkly grinning "King of the Carnival".
The painting has been dated between 1793 and 1819, but most accounts place it toward the end of this range on account of the painting's style and its place within the shifting themes of Goya's art as he aged. "The Burial" appears to fit within a progression beginning with the artist's bright, youthful works—in which he painted commissions of popular entertainments and colourful cartoon tapestries—and his much later, psychologically darker Black Paintings. The painting is certainly a tribute to the common people, depicting an exuberant crowd carousing on the first day of Lent while other Spanish Catholics worship at church. Yet the celebration takes on a sinister aspect due to the many masked and blank faces (see the detail in "Gallery") surrounding the gaily dancing women in white; the grey, distorted trees and encroaching dark colours; and the eye-catching black banner that parades an unsettling mascot. Such festivals as the "Burial of the Sardine" originated with themes of mortality: masks were worn to ward off the spirits of criminals and those who had died violently. The word "mortus" ("death") is barely visible on the banner though in a preparatory ink sketch by Goya (in the gallery below) it features prominently over an indistinct shape which may be a representation of the sardine itself. The painting forms a loose thematic set with other paintings of religious ceremony that Goya produced around the same time, among which are "A Procession of Flagellants" ("Procesión de disciplinantes") and "Inquisition Scene" ("Auto de fe de la Inquisición").
Goya scholar Fred Licht writes:


Prince of the City

Prince of the City is a 1981 American neo-noir crime drama film co-written and directed by Sidney Lumet based on Robert Daley's 1978 book of the same name about an NYPD officer who chooses to expose police corruption for idealistic reasons. The character of Daniel Ciello, played by Treat Williams, was based on real-life NYPD Narcotics Detective Robert Leuci. The large supporting cast also featured actors Jerry Orbach, Bob Balaban, and Lindsay Crouse.
"Prince of the City" was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.
Plot.
Danny Ciello is a narcotics detective who works in the Special Investigations Unit of the New York City Police Department. He and his partners are called "Princes of the City" because they are largely unsupervised and are given wide latitude to make cases against defendants. They are involved in numerous illegal practices, such as skimming money from criminals and supplying informants with drugs.
Danny has a drug addict for a brother and a cousin in organized crime. After an incident in which Danny beats up a junkie to supply another junkie with heroin, his conscience begins to bother him. He is approached by internal affairs and federal prosecutors to participate in an investigation of police corruption. In exchange for potentially avoiding prosecution as well as federal protection for himself, his wife, and his children, Ciello wears a wire and works undercover to expose the inner workings of illegal police activity and corruption. He agrees to cooperate as long as he does not have to turn in his partners, but his past misdeeds and criminal associates come back to haunt him.
One of his partners commits suicide during interrogation, and his cousin in the Mafia, who saves his life on one occasion and warns him of a contract on his life at another point, winds up dead. While confessing three crimes he committed in the 11 years he worked for the SIU, Danny perjures himself by denying the many other offenses he and his partners have committed. Despite repeated professions of loyalty, he finally gives up all of his partners, one of whom shoots himself as a result of this betrayal. Most of the others turn against him. In the end, the chief government prosecutor decides not to prosecute Ciello, and he returns to work as an instructor at the police academy.
Production.
When producer and screenwriter Jay Presson Allen read Robert Daley's book "Prince of the City" (1978), she was convinced it was an ideal Sidney Lumet project, but the film rights had been sold to Orion Pictures for Brian De Palma and David Rabe. Allen let it be known that if that deal should fall through, then she wanted the picture for Lumet. Just as Lumet was about to sign for a different picture, they got the call that "Prince of the City" was theirs.
Allen hadn't wanted to write "Prince of the City", just produce it. She was put off by the book's non-linear story structure, but Lumet wouldn't make the picture without her, and agreed to write the outline for her. Lumet and Allen went over the book and agreed on what they could use and what they could do without. To her horror, Lumet would come in every day for weeks and scribble on legal pads. She was terrified that she would have to tell him that his stuff was unusable, but to her delight the outline was wonderful and she went to work. It was her first project with living subjects, and Allen interviewed nearly everyone in the book and had endless hours of Bob Leuci's tapes for back-up. With all her research and Lumet's outline, she eventually turned out a 365-page script in 10 days. It was nearly impossible to sell the studio on a three-hour picture, but by offering to slash the budget to $10 million they agreed. (When asked if the original author ever has anything to say about how their book is treated, Allen replied: "Not if I can help it. You cannot open that can of worms. You sell your book, you go to the bank, you shut up.")
Supposedly, Bruce Willis has a role as a background actor in this film, and Treat Williams tipped him off about "The Verdict".
Orion Pictures had bought Daley's book for $500,000 in 1978. Daley was a former New York Deputy Police Commissioner for Public Affairs who wrote about Robert Leuci, an NYPD detective whose testimony and secret tape recordings helped indict 52 members of the Special Investigation Unit and convict them of income tax evasion. Originally, Brian De Palma was going to direct with David Rabe adapting the book and Robert De Niro playing Leuci but the project fell through. Sidney Lumet came aboard to direct under two conditions: He did not want a big name movie star playing Leuci because he did not "want to spend two reels getting over past associations," and the movie's running time would be at least three hours long.
Lumet cast Treat Williams after spending three weeks talking to him and listening to the actor read the script and then reading it again with 50 other cast members. In order to research the role, the actor spent a month learning about police work, hung out at 23rd Precinct in New York City, went on a drug bust, and lived with Leuci for some time. By the time rehearsals started, Williams said "I was thinking like a cop."
Lumet felt guilty about the two-dimensional way he had treated cops in the 1973 film "Serpico" and said that "Prince of the City" was his way to rectify this depiction. He and Jay Presson Allen wrote a 240-page script in 30 days. The film was budgeted at $10 million, but the director was able to make it for under $8.6 million.
Distribution.
Orion decided to open the film initially in select theaters in order to allow good reviews and word-of-mouth. It was unable to buy television advertising because of the cost and relied heavily on print ads, including an unusual three-page spread in the "New York Times".
Reception.
Response from subjects.
The film was considered authentic enough by the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration that he called Lumet for a copy of the movie for the DEA training program. Some law enforcement officials, however, criticized the film for glamorizing Leuci and other corrupt detectives while portraying most of the prosecutors who uncovered the crimes negatively. John Guido, Chief of Inspectional Services said, "The corrupt guys are the only good guys in the film."
Nicholas Scoppetta, the Special Prosecutor who helped convince Leuci to go undercover against his fellow officers, said, "In the film, it seems to be the prosecutors who are disregarding the issue of where real justice lies and the prosecutors seem to be as bad or worse than the corrupt police." In fact, only two of the five prosecutors the film focuses on were portrayed negatively. In particular District Attorney Polito, played by James Tolkan, is shown as petty and vindictive. The character is based on Thomas Puccio, the assistant United States Attorney in charge of the Federal Organized Crime Strike Force in Brooklyn, and Robert Daley agrees that he was treated unfairly in the screenplay.
One of the prosecutors who befriended the Ciello character and is shown in a very positive light was based on then rookie federal prosecutor Rudolph Giuliani. The character, Mario Vincente, played by Steve Inwood, is portrayed as threatening to resign if the U.S. Attorney's office indicts Ciello (Leuci) for past transgressions. In general, the prosecutors who argued against the prosecution of Leuci are treated sympathetically, while those who sought his indictment are shown as officious and vindictive.
Critical reception.
The initial release of "Prince of the City" garnered mixed reviews, some of the latter complaining of what was considered its excessive length, or comparing Treat Williams' performance unfavorably with that of Al Pacino in "Serpico", Lumet's previous film about police corruption. , "Prince of the City" holds a 91% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 23 reviews with an average rating of 7.4/10. On Metacritic it has a score of 81% based on reviews from 15 critics.
Roger Ebert of the "Chicago Sun-Times" called it "a very good movie and, like some of its characters, it wants to break your heart. Maybe it will." Janet Maslin of the "New York Times" praised its "sharply detailed landscape" and states that its "brief characterizations are so keenly drawn that dozens of them stand out with the forcefulness of major performances." She concludes that it "begins with the strength and confidence of a great film, and ends merely as a good one. The achievement isn't what it first promises to be, but it's exciting and impressive all the same."
The film was not commercially successful in its theatrical release, earning only $8.1 million of its $8.6 million cost.


The Valley of Vanishing Men

The Valley of Vanishing Men (1942) was the 20th film serial (of 57) released by Columbia Pictures. Directed by Spencer Gordon Bennet, it stars Bill Elliott, Slim Summerville, and Carmen Morales.
Plot.
In this serial, Wild Bill Tolliver and Missouri Benson are a pair of adventurers who ride into the vast New Mexico Territory in search of Bill's father, Henry Tolliver, who mysteriously disappeared while prospecting for gold. They soon discover that a ruthless outlaw leader, Jonathan Kincaid, owns an immense mine of gold in which he uses captured Mexican patriots, among others, to work as slaves in the mine. They also learn that Kincaid has joined forces with Colonel Carl Engler, a renegade eastern European soldier, to carry out his cruel intentions. Then Bill and Missouri meet with Consuelo Ramírez, a diligent Mexican agent, who informs them that Bill's father is among the prisoners in the mine. After that, the heroes find themselves in a conflict with the outlaws in the middle of incessant fights, chases and action.
Production.
Writing about the film's atmosphere, Cline says that this serial was a "grim tale...[with a] mood of ominous dread." Missouri was added to the cast because a normal comedy relief character would have not have worked.
Chapter titles.
Source:


National Iwo Jima Memorial

The US National Iwo Jima Memorial is a memorial on Ella Grasso Boulevard, near the New Britain/Newington town line in Connecticut. It was erected by the Iwo Jima Survivors Association, Inc. of Newington, Connecticut. It was dedicated on February 23, 1995, on the 50th anniversary of the flag raising on Iwo Jima. It is dedicated to the memory of the 6,821 US servicemen who gave their lives during the 1945 Battle of Iwo Jima. Inscribed on the base are the names of the 100 men from Connecticut who gave their lives in the battle.
The park also has an eternal flame and monuments dedicated to combat Medical Corps personnel and chaplains.


Agony in the Garden (Perugino)

Agony in the Garden is a painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Pietro Perugino, executed around 1483-1493, and housed in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence.
History.
The work was painted for the church of the convent of San Giusto alle mura together with the "Pietà" and a "Crucifixion". Renaissance art biographer Giorgio Vasari saw them in side altars of the church of San Giovanni Battista alla Calza, after the original location had been destroyed during the Siege of Florence in 1529. It was moved to the Uffizi in the 20th century.
The dating of the work is disputed: it varies from 1482, the year of Perugino's return from Rome, to a slightly later period, although before the end of the century, when the artist started to use only line oil, which in these works is used only at an experimental level.
The painting was restored in 1998.
Description.
Christ is portrayed in center of the panel above a clear sky, kneeling in the Garden of Gethsemane and receiving by an angel a divine chalice. His figure forms a triangle with the three sleeping apostles at the bottom (from the left, John, Peter and James); the triangle is connected to the painting's sides by the symmetrical line of the hills. Behind Jesus is a lake landscape, a typical element of the Italian painting at the time, with a fortified city and an ancient bridge.
At the sides, two groups of soldiers, led by Judas Iscariot, are closing to arrest Jesus.


Bobby Baker (artist)

Bobby Baker (born 1950, Kent) is a multi-disciplinary artist and activist working across performance, drawing and multi-media. Baker is the artistic director of the arts organisation Daily Life Ltd. A hallmark of Baker's work is food being used as an artistic medium. As John Daniel writes, 'Food - shopping for it, cooking it, serving it, consuming it - is a consistent feature in Baker's work, which focuses on the seemingly mundane, everyday details of life' (2007:246) Drawing from her own personal and family experiences, her work explores the relationship between art and lived experience and addresses the splitting of women's domestic and professional lives. Claire MacDonald points out how her artistic trajectory - moving from early food sculptures to later performances and installations - reflects the changing agenda of women's movement.
Information.
Baker lives in London, England. She studied painting at St. Martins School of Art (now Central Saint Martins) between 1968 and 1972. In 1973 she attended Goldsmiths, University of London to take the Art Teachers Certificate. She was awarded an honorary Doctorate by Queen Mary University London in 2011. In a career spanning over four decades she has, among other things, danced with meringue ladies; made a life-sized edible version of her family; and driven around the streets of Haarlem, Holland strapped to the back of a truck yelling at passers by through a megaphone to "Pull Yourselves Together".
Daily Life Ltd is an arts organisation that produces the work of Baker and others. Together they create powerful art that investigates and questions the way people think about feminism, daily life and mental health. These artworks cross many disciplines and provide unique, high quality artistic experiences for a wide range of audiences both nationally and internationally. They seek to challenge the stigmatisation and discrimination of people with experience of mental distress and raise public awareness of this vital sector. In March 2011 Daily Life Ltd became part of Arts Council England's National Portfolio.
Key Works.
is a performance where Baker sculpted life size models of her own family out of cake, inviting 'guests' participating in the performance to eat, as she served them tea.
is a performance to camera that depicts Baker creating a live drawing out of pressed beef, Guinness, milk, fish pie and treacle on a double white sheet. She makes a work 'parodying Jackson Pollock's vigorous masculine action painting of the 1950s, substituting the materials of a mother's experience for paint'. After covering the sheet in the materials, she clears up, packing her bags and damping away the food, before dredging the work in white flour, lying down and wrapping herself in the sheet, and dancing with difficulty to Nina Simone's 'My Baby Just Cares For Me', before walking off as the music fades.
A quintet of site-specific shows that were performed in her own kitchen, her children's school and the local church. The quintet consists of "Kitchen Show," "How to Shop, Take a Peek!, Grown-up School," and "Box Story". These were a collaboration with co-director Polona Baloh Brown
Drawing from her own experience being treated with Dialectical Behavioural Therapy (DBT) - a form of cognitive behavioural therapy - Baker performs a self-styled mental-health guru imparting an 11-steps programme for a happy life. Staged as public seminar, Baker demonstrates the programme by treating one of her patients - a frozen pea. The piece emerged out of a collaboration with psychologist and social anthropologist Dr. Richard Hallam (funded by the Wellcome Trust).
is a re-staging of the work "Drawing on a Mother's Experience" as a part of the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre, London in March 2015. The work expands on her experience as a working mother and grandmother and the challenges she faced while navigating the mental health system. She follows the original structure of "Drawing on a Mother's Experience", while now aided by a performance assistant. Once she arrives at the original ending, standing wrapped in the canvas, she unwraps herself and sets the sheet back down in order to then add chocolate cakes, ketchup, sparkling water, oats, and peas. She then hoists the sheet over her head, creating a head-hole so that the canvas can be worn like a poncho. She finally shimmies out of the canvas, dancing away once again to 'My Baby Just Cares for Me'. She revived the work for the same festival on 8 March 2020.
Activism.
Baker's 2009 Wellcome Trust Diary Drawing exhibition about her experience of mental illness and recovery launched her onto a worldwide platform of mental health and arts campaigners, connecting her with a growing network of organisations and practitioners. Since then, she has aimed to use her position to help promote and foster opportunities for diverse marginalised artists. Her work focuses on undervalued and stigmatised aspects of everyday life and human behaviour, expressly undertaking to foreground the lives of women in the mainstream and bring status to so-called ‘humble’ daily activity.
Baker's work explores feminist themes, framing the women's movement and marking its changes of agenda, moving from early work in food sculpture to later performances and installations which map the equivalences and commonalities between composing art and composing a life. She took an eight-year-long break from art to have two children, and her subsequent art investigated the relationship of art and lived experience, particularly in works such as "Cook Dems, Kitchen Show" and "How to Shop."
As an internationally acclaimed female artist with personal experience of mental illness and physical disability, Baker offers an authentic figure of recovery and leadership through creativity. She is uniquely positioned with the experience, insight, talent and extensive cross-disciplinary network to investigate and celebrate creative ways people manage difficulties and disenfranchisement. On 6 March 2020, as part of the Women of the World festival, Baker will lead a panel entitled "Sticky Labels: Women and the Mental Health System", investigating why women have been branded everything from ‘witches’ to ‘morally insane’. It is described as a discussion to explore the politics of women and mental health, and the misogyny within the contemporary psychiatric diagnostic framework. Other panelists will include Dr. Leyla Hussein, Dr. Akima Thomas, and Professor Mary Boyle.


Scene de Cirque

Scène De Cirque (circa 1970) is an oil on canvas painting by Belarusian-French artist Marc Chagall.
Description.
The canvas features acrobats, trapeze artists and clowns. The subject of circus was dear to the artist. Chagall often returned to the circus as a subject matter in his artworks. He considered clowns, acrobats and actors as tragically human beings who are like characters in certain religious paintings. Among other Post-Impressionist and Modern painters who featured the circus in their works are Georges Seurat, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Pablo Picasso, Georges Rouault, Kees van Dongen, and Fernand Léger.
Provenance.
The painting has been estate of the artist till 1998 when it was sold to private collector. In 2017 it was acquired by a private American collector at Sotheby's.


Beach in Pourville

Beach in Pourville (title in French: "La plage à Pourville, soleil couchant") is a painting by French artist Claude Monet. It is one of an 1882 series of oil-on-canvas works by Monet in the small seaside resort of Pourville-sur-Mer (now part of the "commune" of Hautot-sur-Mer), near Dieppe in northern France. Monet is considered one of the most important members of the group of painters identified as the Impressionists. The painting was bought by the National Museum, Poznań, Poland in 1906 and exhibited in the display of their collection.
Theft and recovery.
The painting was stolen from the Poznań National Museum in September 2000. It was cut out of its frame and replaced with a copy, which had been painted on cardboard. At the time, the painting was valued at more than $1 million, and was the only painting by Monet on public display in Poland. The theft was discovered on 19 September 2000, and police searched for a man who had been seen making sketches of paintings in the museum two days earlier.
The painting was recovered on 12 January 2010. Police also arrested a 41-year-old man in the southern Polish city of Olkusz, whom they believe to be the painter of the copy used in the robbery. The suspect was traced through fingerprints and other evidence left at the site of the theft.


Eight Bells (painting)

Eight Bells is an 1886 oil painting by the American artist Winslow Homer. It depicts two sailors determining their ship's latitude. It is one of Homer's best-known paintings and the last of his major paintings of the 1880s that dramatically chronicle man's relationship to the ocean.
History and description.
"Eight Bells" was the outgrowth of a series of oil paintings that Homer made using three wooden panels he found in the cabin of his brother's sloop at Prouts Neck, Maine. On two of the panels Homer painted scenes of mackerel fleets at Prouts Neck, one at dawn and the other at sunset; on the third he painted a grisaille study of the work that inspired "Eight Bells", which depicted a ship's officer standing alone, taking an observation with an octant. Several years earlier, Homer had painted a watercolor on his voyage to England that also showed a sailor performing this activity.
The painting's title is a reference to the watch system, computed as one bell every 30 minutes. Although "eight bells" can be either 8 o'clock, 12 o'clock, or 4 o'clock, the painting refers to taking the "noon sight" at local apparent noon, a standard during the days of celestial navigation. Sights are also taken at dawn or dusk.
More monumental than the three panels that preceded it, the two figures dominate the foreground of "Eight Bells", and the details of the ship are minimally rendered. Homer shows the figure at left using an octant to take a reading of the sun, the other apparently reading the altitude of a completed sight on his octant. The moment is prosaic, yet it is presented as a heroic image. In 1887 Homer produced an etching based on the painting, in which he further minimized the ship's rigging and diminished the area of sky, thereby focusing more on the figures.
"Eight Bells" was painted the same year as another of Homer's major paintings, "Undertow", both at a time when sales of the artist's work were slow, and he complained of "standing on one leg, one day, and another leg, some other day, and looking in vain for profits." The painting sold the following year, for the reportedly low price of $400 (approximately $ today), and was the first oil painting Homer had sold in over three years. Nonetheless, Homer's disappointment in his inability to find buyers prompted him to stop painting in oils until 1890.
Reception.
When "Eight Bells" was exhibited in 1888, it was praised by critics who observed that it was more complex than a purely naturalistic rendering: "For he has caught the color and motion of the greenish waves, white-capped and rolling, the strength of the dark clouds broken with a rift of sunlight, and the sturdy, manly character of the sailors at the rail. In short, he has seen and told in a strong painter's manner what there was of beauty and interest in the scene." A later biographer wrote of the painting that the men "performing their required tasks, immediately engage our confidence in their competence to deal effectively with any situation the treachery or violence of the sea may produce."
The American artist N.C. Wyeth named his Port Clyde, Maine, home "Eight Bells" in honor of Homer's painting. He installed a reproduction of the work in his living room.


Louise by the Shore

Louise by the Shore (; ) is a 2016 French animated drama film directed by Jean-François Laguionie and starring Dominique Frot. It follows an elderly woman who spends the winter in an empty French seaside town, with a dog as her only company.
Release.
The film premiered on 15 June 2016 in competition at the Annecy International Animated Film Festival. It was released in France on 23 November 2016.
Reception.
Jordan Mintzer of "The Hollywood Reporter" wrote: "Directed with hand-drawn affection by Jean-Francois Laguionie, whose critically praised "The Painting" was released in 2013, this slow-burn short feature is not exactly easy fodder for cartoon lovers, but could please viewers who want more out of an animation film than just action-packed gags." Mintzer compared the film to "The Red Turtle", "another unique 2D tale of Crusoe-esque abandon that was also made by a veteran filmmaker", but wrote that "Louise by the Shore" differs with its "more dark and probing character study". "Screen Daily"'s Wendy Ide wrote: "The relationship between Louise (Dominique Frot) and the dog Pepper (voiced by Laguionie) is reminiscent of that between the old man and his dog in Paul and Sandra Fierlinger's "My Dog Tulip", and this charming film should resonate with a similar audience."


Bubbling Over (horse)

Bubbling Over (1923–1938) was an American thoroughbred racehorse and sire, best known for winning the 1926 Kentucky Derby.
Background.
Bred in Kentucky, Bubbling Over was sired by English stakes winner North Star out of the mare Beaming Beauty, who in turn was sired by Belmont Stakes winner Sweep. He was owned by Colonel Bradley of Idle Hour Stock Farm.
Racing career.
Bubbling Over was never out of the money in 13 starts. In a year when the Preakness Stakes was run before the Kentucky Derby (May 10 and May 15, respectively), Bubbling Over, who did not enter the 1926 Preakness Stakes, won the 1926 Kentucky Derby. He ran first in a field of 13, winning by five lengths over second-place finisher Bagenbaggage, with a time of 2:03 4/5. Bubbling Over did not race again, due to lameness.
Retirement.
Upon retirement, Bubbling Over was very successful not only as a sire but as a broodmare sire. Among his progeny were Kentucky Derby winner Burgoo King; Baby League, dam of Striking, 1961 Broodmare of the Year; Hildene, dam of Preakness Stakes winner Hill Prince; and stakes winner Biologist. Baby League was also the dam of Busher, a filly who was the 1945 Horse of the Year.
Bubbling Over died in 1938 and is buried at Darby Dan Farm in Lexington, Kentucky.


John Rice (television personality)


Neeya 2

Neeya 2 () is a 2019 Indian Tamil romantic horror film written and directed by L. Suresh and produced by Sridhar Arunachalam under the banner of Jumbo Cinemas. The film stars Jai, Catherine Tresa, Raai Laxmi and Varalaxmi Sarathkumar. Jai plays a dual role in the film. The soundtrack was composed by Shabir, Gopi Krishna was the editor, Rajavel Mohan was the cinematographer. It is a sequel to the 1979 Kamal Haasan movie "Neeya" and released on 24 May 2019.
Plot.
The story revolves around Sarva, whose horoscope dangers the person he marries. Sarva marries Divya. Malar became Nagarani, a shapeshifting snake by Devi is also a shapeshifting snake, who gave curse to Malar because she killed Devi's husband Devan (Manas). Malar claims to be the wife of Vikram, who reincarnated as Sarva. If Sarva and Malar reunite, he also will turn into a shapeshifting snake.
In the end, Malar dies after bite a poison from Divya leg, leaving Sarva and Divya in peace.
Production.
The first schedule of Neeya 2 was shot in Pondicherry, and the subsequent ones were completed in Talakonam, Chennai, Madurai, and Chalakudy. The second schedule began on February 6 and the shoot go on until February 22. Jai plays the lead and will be seen in two different dimensions, Varalaxmi Sarathkumar portrays a snake woman. Raai Laxmi and Catherine Tresa are the other female lead roles. Bala Saravanan will be providing comedy. Director L. Suresh informed, “The grandeur is nowhere going to be seen as a gaudy factor. But the script demands such elements, which will definitely be a great experience to the audiences. One of the greatest highlights of this film is a 22-ft CGI motion captured serpent to be seen in an important role and will be seen throughout the movie. To make sure that we got the exact serpent as we imagined, cinematographer Rajevel and I had to travel across different places of India and Thailand. Finally, we happened to find the exact one in Bangkok.  It took enough time to understand its physique, body language and nature. We’re sure its appearance and presence throughout the film would be an enjoyable experience for universal audiences.”
Soundtrack.
The soundtrack was composed by Shabir in his second film composed after Sagaa.
Marketing.
The first look poster of "Neeya 2" shows Varalaxmi in a cobra posture. The official teaser of "Neeya 2" was released on 29 August 2018.
Release.
"Neeya 2" was released on May 10, 2019.


Black Toney

Black Toney (1911–1938) was an American Thoroughbred racehorse and sire.
Background.
Black Toney was bred by James R. Keene's Castleton Lyons Farm. Keene, whose health was failing (he died in 1913), sold all his holdings in 1912 to Colonel Edward R. Bradley's Idle Hour Stock Farm in Lexington, Kentucky. Some confusion occurred over this sale, and Bradley resold most of the lot, but one of those he kept was a very dark brown yearling he named Black Toney. The price tag for the son of future Hall of Famer Peter Pan, whose own sire was another future Hall of Famer, Commando, by the great Domino, was $1,600. Black Toney's dam was Belgravia, the best daughter of future Hall of Famer Ben Brush. This meant that the almost black yearling with no white markings and a fine head and body was a member of the last crop bred by Keene from his famous Domino/Ben Brush cross.
Racing career.
Black Toney was a good racehorse but far from a great one. He raced for four years, coming in the money in 31 of his 40 starts.
Stud record.
Black Toney became a very successful breeding stallion, siring many of the horses for which the Idle Hour Stock Farm became famous. The names of Bradley’s horses all began with a "B," a quirk of Bradley's (perhaps because his own name began with a B, or perhaps because of Black Toney.)
Bradley bred him sparingly and yet, even from 21 small crops and a total of 221 foals, the quality of his get was very high. Overall, he sired 40 stakes winners, which amounts to 18 percent of his foals. Black Toney was 10 times among the top 20 American sires by earnings. He was second on the general sire list in 1933 and fifth in 1939.
Black Toney spent his whole stud career at Idle Hour, producing many fine broodmares as well as winners. He died there on September 19, 1938, at the age of 27 of an apparent heart attack. Colonel Bradley commissioned a bronze statue that he placed over his greatest stallion's grave. It is still there today, on a part of the Darby Dan Farm.
The best of his offspring included:


John Dahlsen

John Dahlsen is an Australian contemporary environmental artist. He uses found objects, primarily ocean litter plastics, from Australian beaches in his work.
Biography.
Dahlsen studied art from 1977 to 1979 at the Victorian College of the Arts and in 1989 at the Melbourne College of Advanced Education. He completed his PhD at Charles Darwin University in 2016. In addition to his art, he also lectures at Australian universities and at environmental symposiums around the world. He has exhibited work in many solo and group exhibitions since 1979. Dahlsen currently lives in Byron Bay, New South Wales, Australia.
Awards.
In 2000, Dahlsen won the Wynne Prize from the Art Gallery of New South Wales for his piece "Thong Totems." He was also a finalist in both 2003 and 2004. In 2006 he was a finalist for the Sir John Sulman Medal from the Art Gallery of New South Wales and the second prize winner of the Signature of Sydney Art Prize. He has also won many other awards, such as the 2003 award for mixed media/new media at the Florence Biennial of Contemporary Art, Environmental Art Awards at the Swell Sculpture Exhibition in 2009 and 2010, and the Peoples Choice Award in the ArtsCape Biennial Sculpture Exhibition in 2010.
He has also been awarded several grants from the Australian government as well as private groups.


The Seducer

The Seducer (Le Séducteur, also known as The Tempter) is a surrealist painting by René Magritte. It was created in 1950 and again in 1953 in Brussels, Belgium. The 1950 version is held by the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts and the 1953 version is in a private collection. Other versions were created in 1951.
The painting portrays a fully rigged sailing ship on the sea against a blue sky: the silhouette of the ship is infilled with a continuation of the waves of the sea. The painting measures . It features dark blue and light blue colours.


Lado Bai

Lado Bai is a tribal artist from the Bhil tribe of Madhya Pradesh. Her work has been showcased in various exhibitions in India, France and the UK.
She lives and works in the Adivasi Lok Kala Academy, Bhopal.
Early life and career.
Lado Bai was born in the Badi Bawadi village of Jhabua, Madhya Pradesh in the Bhil tribal community. At a very early age, she moved to Bhopal with her family to be engaged as manual labourers in the building of the iconic Bharat Bhavan. She got married and continued to work in the building complex and also painted to de-stress after a day's work.
Lado Bai started her work alongside Bhuri Bai. Her art reflects the spirituality and animism of her community. For years, she could not pursue her art because of financial constraints. Her luck turned when she was discovered by the famous Indian artist Jagdish Swaminathan. Swaminathan encouraged her to work for the Adivasi Lok Kala Academy where she had the opportunity to transfer images of festivals, rituals and animals from wall to paper.
Bhil art.
The Bhil Tribe are indigenous, being the Second largest Tribal Community in India. Art is Integral to the Bhil Community. The rich texture of their paintings generally depict nature and Adivasi Style that is their legacy. Bhil artists are just starting to be internationally recognized. They paint the simple human joys of birth and other ceremonial occasions like harvests that are often forgotten in our modern society. The art of the Bhils along with that of other tribal groups reminds us what the simple pleasures in life are.
Inspiration and style.
Lado Bai's works are characteristic for their formal simplicity, heightened by her use of dots. Nature, spirituality and animism find dominance in her canvases. She is inspired by the stories told by elders in her community, myths and rituals of the tribe and the flora and fauna she encounters in her everyday life. Bai creates art reflects the flora and fauna of her environment along with the customs and festivals of her tribe. Her work is informed by the timeless tradition of Bhil painting, portraying ritualized depictions of Pithora, the Bhil folklore god.
Lado Bai's inspirations came from the stories told her elders, and her personal faith that the gods will be pleased by her Art.
She belongs to a community famous for their ritualistic murals of god Pithora, a centuries old tradition that was primarily a man's domain. Lado Bai carries forward this timeless tradition while at the same time, developing in a strong individual visual language.
Lado Bai is among such tribal artists who are keeping their traditional identity alive in their works and lives. Her paintings reflect all the aspects of a Bhil life. She seems completely at ease while working with fine quality brush and canvas in place of a piece of jute which she would use before. Today she is working at Adivasi Lok Kala Academy in Bhopal and is contented with her job as an artist.
In Lado Bai's work, nature, spirituality and animism of her community are dominant themes. With the encouragement and support of late Indian artist Jagdish Swaminathan, she has developed a contemporary language of traditional artforms. The main motifs in her works are the animal kingdom and Bhil rituals and festivals. Her works demonstrate an episode of a larger story from the folklore. "We prepare for a whole night before starting to paint. There are a lot of rituals that I have shown in my work, and this is exactly how the Bhil culture is," says Bai.
Awards and ceremonies.
Lado Bai is the Master Ojas Art Awardee. The Ojas Art Award 2017, instituted by Ojas Art Gallery, was awarded this year to a couple of Bhil artists from Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh at the Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF) 2017. Lado Bai was awarded under the Master Artist category, winning a sum of Rs 51,000. She belongs to the early group of artists of this genre and was among the first bheel artists, besides bhuri bai, to have worked directly with J Swaminathan.
Family.
For Lado Bai, whose family joined her in painting the canvas, the elements of the picture are drawn from the deep collective memory of her ancestors, which she has evoked in the Pithora tradition. She points to the peasants gathering harvested maize and millet, the tents and marquees of the marketplace, and the bullock carts laden with produce making their way to the bazaars. Her Daughter Anita assisted her in painting murals.
Select exhibition.
Satrang, Ojas Art Gallery, New Delhi, 2017


The Meaning of Night (painting)

The Meaning of Night is a painting by the Belgian Surrealist René Magritte. Painted in 1927, it is an oil painting on canvas with dimensions 139 cm by 105 cm and is in the Menil Collection, Houston.


Khooni Mahal

Khooni Mahal is a 1987 Bollywood horror film directed by Mohan Bhakri. It is a pornographic Hindi horror film. It was the first film of its kind of Bollywood where unknown naked female was picturised without being censored having sex with Raza Murad, Javed Khan and Kiran were the lead actors. Neelam Mehra gave some hot scenes which was later censored.
Plot.
In a village, at one night the landlord Jagira is affected by ghost soul and starts killing villagers. The village had a well established people but after incidence Jagira beaten to death by villagers, villagers left the village. Jagira at deathbed vows to take revenge those who will reside in his residence. After few years of this incidence, a newly married couple are traveling near by takes shelter at this residence. The couple is killed by the angry ghost of Jagira who is now turned into a bad soul.


Woman Kills Injured Man

Woman Kills Injured Man () is a 1994 painting by the Norwegian artist Odd Nerdrum. It depicts a man who is assaulted by a woman armed with a knife.
The painting is in the collections of the Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art in Oslo.
Description.
In a dark, rocky coastal landscape, a nude man with open mouth and twisted arms is falling headlong toward the ground. A nude woman armed with a knife is hanging in the air, falling over the man or clinging to his leg. In the background to the right are three additional people who observe the two in the foreground.
Themes.
The subject of a man and a woman in lethal struggle recurs in several of Nerdrum's paintings from the 1990s, such as "Buried Alive" from 1996. In his 1998 book "Odd Nerdrum: Storyteller and Self-Revealer", the art historian and Nerdrum scholar Jan Åke Pettersson interprets "Woman Kills Injured Man" through a personal crisis Nerdrum had gone through. In the mid 1980s Nerdrum had a relationship with a female student. He left his family for her, but was rejected when she was accepted to the Norwegian National Academy of Fine Arts. As a reaction, Nerdrum went to her home and slashed the paintings he had given her. According to Pettersson, this episode is also reflected in paintings such as "Woman with Fish", "Mann med steinbit" and "Man Bitten by a Snake".


You Wish! (film)

You Wish! is a 2003 Disney Channel Original Movie, based on Jackie French Koller's 1991 novel "If I Had One Wish". The film was directed by Paul Hoen; it stars A. J. Trauth, Spencer Breslin, Lalaine and Tim Reid. The film was filmed in Auckland, New Zealand. It was released on January 10, 2003, on the Disney Channel.
Plot.
16-year-old Alex Lansing is extremely tormented by his younger brother, Stevie because Stevie has played pranks on Alex, such as buying a turkey from a pet adoption show and making Harbour High Jocks named Gary and his friends slam a pizza on Alex's head. Most recently, Alex is forced to take Stevie to the mall with him and his friend James. Stevie receives a magical coin from Larry Pendragon, an eccentric but kindly man, who allows him to wish anything, and runs off in the mall without telling Alex. Their parents angrily punish Alex, having enough with his carelessness with Stevie, and send them to bed early. After Stevie gives Alex the coin, Alex upsettingly wishes that he had never had a little brother.
The next day, he wakes up, only to find that his wish has come true. Stevie is now a famous child actor named Terrence Russell McCormack who stars on a TV show named "Where's Stevie?". Although a cheerleader is his girlfriend now and he is mostly popular in school, Alex soon regrets a few things and that is his new popular jock friends including Gary are now tormenting Abby and James. Fiona the cheerleader is also revealed to be crude, mean, and bossy. After a while, Alex began to miss Stevie because their parents are career-obsessed, which makes him feel lonely at his home. After being kicked out of Terrance's dressing room because Terrance thinks he is crazy when he tells him about him being Stevie, Alex reflects on his life with Stevie and realizes how much he cares about him and misses him. As Alex walks home, Terrance drives by and decides to walk with Alex, who he considers his friend despite thinking he is crazy. The two escape from Terrance's driver and after realizing that this happened because of the coin, Alex and Terrance (who is convinced of the truth by Alex) set out to find the coin, enlisting the help of Abby after Alex convinces her they were friends prior to his wish. The three locate the man who gave Stevie the coin, but he was injured without Stevie there to save him and had to close his shop and sold off the coin.
After saying goodbye to Abby, Alex and Terrance are caught by the police and are taken to Alex's home where Terrance's caretaker comes to get him with the intention of covering up his running away. Terrance gets a call from his mother and is excited as he had the best night of his life, but quickly loses his excitement when learns that his mother is getting remarried. Alex and Terrance share a brotherly hug and say goodbye and Alex slips into a depression because he has no chance of returning to his world.
The next day, while Alex is trying to find something on TV that does not remind him of his relationship with Stevie, his father gives him a bunch of old coins he bought to try to cheer him up, but Alex throws them across the room, then discovers that one is the magic coin. Alex gets it, but his shout of excitement frightens his parents due to his emotional state and they decide to break his door down when he refuses to open it. Before they can, Alex wishes that he never made the first wish and wakes up back in his own world with none of it having ever happened. Alex excitedly embraces Stevie and his friends and asks out Abby, who he became attracted to while in the other world, while yelling to a passing Fiona that he is not her boyfriend, and everyone is confused with his excitement. Later, Alex, James and Abby go skating and take Stevie with them and try to teach him to skate. He gives up, but then uses the coin to become a great skater.
Cast.
Credits adapted from Rotten Tomatoes.
Critical reception.
Writing for "Los Angeles Times", Mark Sachs praised "You Wish!" for its cast, script, and direction, calling the film "one of the best efforts of the basic cable outfit's original-movie franchise".
Soundtrack.
The soundtrack included numerous songs, including:


Ruth Duccini

Ruth Leone Duccini ("née" Robinson; July 23, 1918 – January 16, 2014) was an American actress.
Biography.
Ruth is best known as the penultimate surviving Munchkin from the 1939 film "The Wizard of Oz". Her role in the film as a Munchkin villager was not credited. Her most recent appearances were when she and the other surviving Munchkins were presented with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on November 21, 2007, and attending the premiere of the film's 75th anniversary at the Grauman's Chinese Theatre. She also was seen in "Under the Rainbow" (1981) and "Memories of Oz" (2001).
While Duccini could not recall in 2013 what she earned filming "Oz", the Munchkin village actors were paid $50 a week during filming, plus room/board. She said of her World War II work:
Duccini made the news again when Margaret Thatcher died, and critics of the former British premier tried to propel "Ding-Dong! The Witch Is Dead" onto the chart to celebrate her passing. Duccini and Jerry Maren (who would become the last surviving adult Munchkin) said the song was never to be used in such a way, stating:
Death.
Duccini died of natural causes in Las Vegas, aged 95, on January 16, 2014.


The Mild Mild West

The Mild Mild West is a mural by graffiti artist Banksy, sited on No. 80 Stokes Croft, Bristol. It depicts a teddy bear throwing a Molotov cocktail at three riot police.
History.
Banksy drew the artwork over three days in broad daylight in 1999. It was drawn in response to various unlicensed raves and parties held in abandoned warehouses around Bristol in the 1990s, that drew increased attention from the police. A specific trigger for the mural was such an event at Winterstoke Road, where riot police began to attack partygoers.
The artwork is popular with the local community who consider it a good symbol of the heritage around Stokes Croft. It has been cited as an archetypal piece of Bristol culture, showing how a relaxed hippie can still fight back against the government and commercialisation.
In April 2009, the artwork was vandalised with red paint by an anti-graffiti organisation called Appropriate Media, but was quickly repaired. Bristol City Council announced plans to enclose the mural in glass in front of new flats, which was criticised by the local community because it would make it harder to see from the street. Coexist, an organisation managing regeneration of Stokes Croft, did not understand the vandalism. Their spokesman said, "I don't see how spraying red paint is helping with the positive change" and was happy that volunteers quickly came together to repair it. A dressmaking shop opposite the mural has complained about graffiti, and that continual cleaning has begun to damage the Bath stone walls.


Angelus Novus

Angelus Novus (New Angel) is a 1920 monoprint by the Swiss-German artist Paul Klee, using the oil transfer method he invented. It is now in the collection of the Israel Museum in Jerusalem.
In the ninth thesis of his 1940 essay “Theses on the Philosophy of History”, the German critic and philosopher Walter Benjamin, who purchased the print in 1921, interprets it this way:
A Klee painting named "Angelus Novus" shows an angel looking as though he is about to move away from something he is fixedly contemplating. His eyes are staring, his mouth is open, his wings are spread. This is how one pictures the angel of history. His face is turned toward the past. Where we perceive a chain of events, he sees one single catastrophe which keeps piling wreckage upon wreckage and hurls it in front of his feet. The angel would like to stay, awaken the dead, and make whole what has been smashed. But a storm is blowing from Paradise; it has got caught in his wings with such violence that the angel can no longer close them. The storm irresistibly propels him into the future to which his back is turned, while the pile of debris before him grows skyward. This storm is what we call progress.
Otto Karl Werckmeister notes that Benjamin's reading of Klee's New Angel image has led to it becoming "an icon of the left."
The name and concept of the angel has inspired works by other artists, filmmakers, writers and musicians, including John Akomfrah, Ariella Azoulay, Carolyn Forché, and Rabih Alameddine.
In September 1940 Walter Benjamin committed suicide during an attempt to flee the Nazi regime. After World War II Walter Benjamin’s lifelong friend, Gershom Scholem (1897–1982), the distinguished scholar of Jewish mysticism, inherited the drawing. According to Scholem, Benjamin felt a mystical identification with the "Angelus Novus" and incorporated it in his theory of the “angel of history,” a melancholy view of historical process as an unceasing cycle of despair.
In 2015, in conjunction with her solo exhibition at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, American artist R. H. Quaytman discovered that the monoprint had been adhered to an 1838 copper-plate engraving by Friedrich Muller after a Lucas Cranach portrait of Martin Luther.


Evelyn Roth

Evelyn Roth (born December 27, 1936) is an interdisciplinary artist who has worked in the areas of textiles, sculpture, performance, dance and interactive fabric arts. She specializes in environmentally sensitive events, festivals, school programs and art gallery exhibits. Roth is based in the town of Maslin Beach, on South Australia's Fleurieu Peninsula.
Early life.
Evelyn Margaret Yakubow was born in 1936 in Mundare, Alberta. She moved to Edmonton, Alberta in the 1950s where she took classes in art, crafts, modern, eastern and classical dance. She also took yoga and fencing classes while working in the local children’s library. In 1961, she and her husband Klaus Roth moved to Vancouver where she worked in the university library. The Roths went their separate ways in the late 1960s.
Career.
When she moved to Vancouver in 1961, Evelyn Roth joined Intermedia and became a key practitioner in the international art scene at the time focusing on art and technology, wearable art and video art. During the 1970s Roth focused her practice on knitting and crocheting with recycled materials including video tape and natural fibres. She created wearable art, textile installations and furnishings. In 1974, her book about her work, "The Evelyn Roth Recycling Book", was published by Talonbooks. She often adapted the motif of wearables, fabricating work from found materials and ingeniously using them in various festivals, events or exhibitions.
From 1973 through the 1980s Roth explored the intersections of sculpture, dance and the environment and formed the Evelyn Roth Moving Sculpture Company. A film "Woven in Time" was created in 1977 that features Roth's textile work and shows the company in various outdoor settings. Her work became a catalyst for many creators with a wide variety of interests in different countries.
Her first trip to Australia was in 1979. In 1981, she was invited to install an interactive display at the Adelaide Festival Centre Foyer which she created out of discarded TV programs (titled "Under the Billabong There Lives A Salmon"), then returned to South Australia to work with Pitjitjanjara communities and held workshops in rabbit knit and painted leather garments, as well as crocheting a shade canopy from discarded video tape and play web from nylon. The first showing of "Nylon Zoo" in Australia was in 1982 at the 1982 Commonwealth Games in Brisbane. In 1990, she set up the Evelyn Roth Celebration Centre - Point Roberts, USA (artist' studios, art gallery and performance space) This large studio allowed her to expand inflatable structures into mazes, set up a FestivalArts website and to promote her work worldwide. In 2003, "Evelyn Roth's Wearable Art, 1971 to 2003", was held at the Australian National University, Canberra, Australia. Her work is in the collections of the Vancouver Art Gallery and Surrey Art Gallery, British Columbia.
Roth has lived and worked in Australia since 1996. She has an annual residency with the Storybook Theatre Company in Hawaii.
Exhibitions/Festivals.
Roth has been featured in many solo exhibitions over the years and participated in various festivals and group exhibitions.
Awards.
In 1973, she was awarded Artist of the Year by the Vancouver Sun. In 1999 and 2006, Roth won the World of Wearable Art international design competition in New Zealand.
Personal life.
She is married to Australian artist John F. Davis.


Vincenzo di Antonio Frediani

Vincenzo di Antonio Frediani (fl. 1481 - 1504) was an Italian Renaissance painter.
Life and work.
He belonged to a modest family from the city of Lucca and, according to local documents, was there between 1481 and 1505. He was associated with the Franciscan Order and, from 1498, held various positions at the Church of Santa Maria Corteorlandini. After 1500, until his death, he was Prior of the "Compagnia dei Disciplinati del Crocifisso".
He was directly influenced by Domenico Ghirlandaio and Filippino Lippi, who worked in Lucca during the early part of the 1490s, and indirectly by Sandro Botticelli, making him the first fully Renaissance painter in that area. His composition, in particular, owes much to Lippi. He also incorporated some Flemish elements into his works;
After 1481, the documentary record of his works is quite long, although many have since been lost. The high amounts paid for these works is testimony to the high opinion in which they were held. His workshop, managed by his brother, was always busy and, in 1490, there is record of their agreement to split the profits.
Although the exact date and place of his death is unknown, he was contracted, in 1505, to paint part of an altarpiece (depicting the Virgin and Child) at the Church of San Gennaro, which had to be completed by Ranieri di Leonardo da Pisa, presumably due to Frediani's death. Documents from this time also give his wife's name as Camilla and mention three sons, none of whom followed their father into his trade.


Tony Heaton

Anthony James Heaton OBE (born 11 October 1954) is a British sculptor, disability rights activist and arts administrator, who was appointed an OBE in 2013 for services to the arts and the disability arts movement. He was CEO of the arts charity Shape until March 2017. In 2012, he won the competition to produce an installation celebrating Channel 4's involvement in the London 2012 Paralympic Games. This produced his 'Monument for the Unintended Performer'.
Early years.
Heaton was born in Preston, Lancashire, in 1954, the son of a coppersmith. When, at the age of 16, a motor bike accident left him with a spinal injury, he switched from a comprehensive school to a local arts college at Southport. From 1972, he was self-employed as artist, sign writer, disc jockey, record shop proprietor, progressive rock band member and mural painter. According to a Disability Arts Online profile, at this period "Heaton gathered enormous expertise and self-reliance whilst appearing to drift aimlessly". In 1986 he enrolled on a visual arts degree at Lancaster University whilst earning a living as a sign-painter.
A contemporary of Andy Goldsworthy, Heaton experimented with environmental sculpture on sands at Morecambe Bay. Lancaster's head of sculpture, Paul Hatton, noted that the marks left by Heaton were immediately distinguishable from the footprints of his fellow students and urged him to develop work about this. Heaton states that, "A chance comment about how the marks left in the sand by my feet and crutches made my tracks immediately identifiable became the catalyst for a whole series of works relating to disability and my interaction with the environment". Heaton exhibited a plaster cast of his feet and stick imprints, his first piece of disability art.
Artistic career.
Heaton's early sculptures often use what Disability Arts in London magazine described as "the everyday impedimenta of disability: collecting cans, NHS wheelchairs, X-rays, Part M of the Building Regulations". But his work contradicts the normal associations of such materials by turning them into "profound and joyously witty statements about the nature of our oppression".
An early piece, "Springback" (1990), is an assemblage including a spinal X-Ray juxtaposed above the shock absorber springs of a scrapped motorcycle, referring to the accident which caused his impairment and the metal strengthening spring placed inside his spine.
'Shaken..not Stirred' (1991) consisted of a seven-feet high pyramid of 1,760 charity collecting cans, its ascending ranks of red plastic referring to the hierarchical nature of the charity system. The whole edifice was brought crashing to the ground when Heaton threw an artificial leg at it, suggesting that the hierarchical system could be destroyed by the collective power of disabled people. As his work has developed, it has embodied ideas about disability and impairment. For instance, "Split" (1995) is a woodcarving made from a piece of ash discarded by a wood turner as useless because it has a shake; a fault running through it. Heaton saw this as "indicative of a society that sees only perfection and disregards all that is damaged or perceived as impaired".
The 1994 sculpture, ‘Great Britain from a Wheelchair’ is a map of Britain made from two grey NHS wheelchairs. "A delightful game, it forms a wonderful repudiation of the value judgement ('This is for some tragic bastard', in Heaton’s words) implicit in the wheelchairs." An image of this work was chosen by the National Disability Arts Collection and Archive as an example of work from the ‘golden age’ of disability arts. During the 2012 Paralympics Heaton was invited to redesign 'Great Britain From a Wheelchair' as lecterns for Lord Coe and Sir Phillip Craven during the opening and closing ceremonies.
In 2012, he was commissioned to produce ‘Monument to the Unintended Performer’, an installation for the Big 4 sculpture sited outside Channel Four's offices. It brought together three elements in addition to the Big 4: the first based on the classical Greek sculpture Discobolus, the discus thrower, evoking the spirit of the Olympics; the second element, a circle, representing the wheel of the international symbol of access; and lastly, the introduction of gold, silver and bronze considers hierarchy. Heaton stated: "I wanted to use the structure of the Big 4 as one of four elements that would fuse together to form a new cohesive piece - which would provoke thought and celebrate Channel 4's involvement and commitment to the Paralympics. The subtext is the assertion that disabled people are almost always the object of scrutiny and curiosity."
'Gold Lamé', included in the 2014 exhibition Art of The Lived Experiment, is an invalid car covered in gold leaf. The title puns on the word "lame". Heaton states that the Invacar has been “transformed from prosthetic to sculpture, transmuted from spazz blue to gold, from Lame to Lamé”, mirroring his own life adjustments, where he says, "I transmuted from biker to invalid". Gold Lamé also appeared at the Church of Our Lady and Saint Nicholas, Liverpool as the inaugural winner of the Liverpool Plinth.
Holton Lee.
From 1997 to 2007, Heaton was based in Dorset, as Director of the Holton Lee Trust which offers a mix of environmental, artistic and spiritual activities, with short stay residential facilities for Disabled people, in an SSSI comprising 350 acres of woodland, reed bed and heath land landscape adjacent to Poole Harbour.
Heaton developed a 10-year strategic plan for the organisation: a contemporary arts and education programme based on a series of accessible buildings including a gallery and artists’ studios, which would enable a new programme of artistic work, a growth in residential capacity and a focus for disability arts. All the buildings would use local materials blending in with Holton Lee's natural surroundings.
The first of these, Faith House gallery, designed by Tony Fretton was hailed by Jonathan Glancey in the Guardian as ‘one of the most beautiful new buildings in Britain’.
In 2002, Heaton organised the DA21 Disability Arts Conference at Holton Lee. He also planned the inaugural conference to discuss the establishment of what would become the National Disability Arts Collection and Archive. The idea then envisaged was to create a purpose-built archive as part of the developing Holton Lee campus. This was abandoned after Heaton moved on. NDACA will now take the form of an interactive website and catalogue, after receiving funding of nearly £1 million from the Heritage Lottery Fund in 2015.
Shape.
In 2007 Heaton became CEO of Shape Arts, the arts and disability charity founded by dancer Gina Levete. He brought to the organisation a new emphasis on disability arts and professional opportunities for artists.
He instituted the Adam Reynolds Memorial Bursary, which provides 3-month bursaries for disabled artists to undertake residencies at leading visual arts institutions. These have included the Victoria and Albert Museum, Camden Arts Centre, Spike Island, The Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, the Bluecoat Gallery and New Art Gallery Walsall. The bursary is named after the late sculptor, with whom Heaton had a close friendship. Early winners were Caroline Cardus, Aaron Williamson, Sally Booth and Noëmi Lakmaier.
He also created the Shape Open, an annual open exhibition of artwork by disabled and non-disabled artists created in response to a disability-centred theme. The exhibition's patron is Yinka Shonibare, at whose Guest Projects space in Hackney, London the 2016 exhibition took place.
Heaton has announced that he will stand down as CEO in 2017 and become Chair of the organisation.
Order of the British Empire.
Heaton was appointed an OBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours, 2013, for services to the arts and the disability arts movement.
Other information.
Heaton was chosen by artist Tanya Raabe, in an interview with BBC Ouch, as one of her ideal dinner guests, along with Michael Caine, Frida Kahlo, her husband Diego Rivera, "because he’s a womaniser and I think he’d get on marvellously with Tony Heaton’‘ and her best friend, Ann Young.


Nightmare in the Daylight

Nightmare in the Daylight is a 1992 American made-for-television thriller film directed by Lou Antonio, starring Jaclyn Smith and Christopher Reeve. It premiered on CBS on November 22, 1992.
Plot.
Sean Farrell (Reeve) is a lawyer working in San Francisco, who in the past beat his long-lost wife, Jean, who disappeared in the 1985 Mexico City earthquake. One day, he notices Megan Lambert (Smith), a Wisconsin teacher visiting the city with her husband Peter (Mason) and son Jamie (Bell). He grows convinced that Megan is his wife, and ignores any denials she is making. After kidnapping her for a short period of time, he contacts his first wife's father, who tells Sean that Megan is not his daughter. Sean, by now, is too obsessed with Megan though, resulting in the woman and her family living in constant fear.
Production.
The film was shot in San Francisco and Los Angeles.
Reception.
"Variety" wrote of the film: "The game-playing limps on, with Smith distressed and Reeve looking severe as though they'd both just read the script. Smith and Mason play well through some good naturalistic domestic scenes, but that doesn't much help the cause. By the end of the caper, "Nightmare in the Daylight" affirms the purposelessness of the venture. Tech credits are swell, with Michael Paul Clausen's production design a plus."


Lewis Croft

Lewis A. Croft (May 2, 1919 – April 29, 2008) was an American actor with dwarfism, best known for his role as a Munchkin soldier in the 1939 film "The Wizard of Oz".
Biography.
Lewis Croft was born in Shelley, Idaho in 1919 to Samuel and Roseland Crofts. Growing up in a large family, he was the fourth of 14 children. He left home when he turned 16 to work in circuses and sideshows under the stage name "Idaho Lewis" in order to support himself and his other siblings. Shortly after, he was offered a role in The Wizard of Oz as one of the Munchkin soldiers, which he accepted.
After his work as a Munchkin on The Wizard of Oz, he continued to tour at fairs, before working in a "midget" bar.
He married his first wife Delores Del Rio in 1948 and returned to his hometown of Shelley, Idaho in 1953 to raise a family. Delores died in 1978, and five years later Croft married his second wife, Eva Arwin.
In his later life he appeared at many Wizard of Oz events along with several of the other surviving actors who portrayed Munchkins in the film. Ill health later prevented Croft from attending such events such as the laying of the Munchkins' star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in November 2007 after needing to use a wheelchair full-time. His last public appearance was at the 2006 Wizard of Oz Festival in Chesterton.
He died on April 29, 2008 of natural causes, just three days before his 89th birthday. He was preceded in death by his parents, two wives, one son, Alan and nine of his brothers and sisters, and survived by his other son, Robert, four grandsons and seven great grandchildren. He was buried in Shelley's Hillcrest Cemetery.


Gordon Hempton


The Singing Detective (film)

The Singing Detective is a 2003 American musical crime comedy film directed by Keith Gordon and loosely based on the BBC serial of the same name, a work by British writer Dennis Potter. It stars Robert Downey Jr. and features a supporting cast that includes Katie Holmes, Adrien Brody, Robin Wright Penn, Mel Gibson and Carla Gugino as well as a number of songs from the 1950s.
Plot.
Detective novelist Dan Dark is hospitalized due to a skin disease named psoriasis and crippling psoriatic arthritis. Around doctors and nurses, he occasionally hallucinations them being in choreographed musical numbers. They attempt to help Dark, but are dismissed by Dark's anger and bitterness towards everyone. In an attempt to solve his mental issues, the doctors send him to psychiatrist Dr. Gibbon. The doctor suspects the thoughts behind these problems are in Dark's novel "The Secret Detective", which is about a nightclub singer/private eye, hired by Mark Binney, who takes on a strange case involving prostitutes and two mysterious men. He fantasies about the book during these meetings, with people from the real-world acting as the fictional characters.
After reading some pages, Gibbon thinks Dark may have a problem with women. This leads to Dark flash-backing to his childhood, when his mother worked as a prostitute and had sex with several men at the home, including his father's business partner. People he encountered in his childhood act as characters in fantasies of his novel; his mother is a prostitute, his father's business partner is a rich guy, and two passengers he only once encounter on a bus are thugs.
Despite his skin condition improving, his attitude worsens after learning a film studio is interested in purchasing the rights for "The Singing Detective". He is informed of this by his wife Nicola, who also is a prostitute in the book fantasies. He is paranoid that Nicola is trying to steal the work so she can make money, and that Gibbon was met by a "whore" trying to get into the situation. Additionally, the two thugs from the fantasies have entered the real world, planning to rebel against the author for making them "stand around" constantly instead of playing more important roles like being officers of the federal government.
Eventually, however, Dark is mentally cured through a civil discussion with Gibbon about his childhood. He states his father didn't care about him due to being a "pain-in-the-ass" to raise, and Dan was often alone in his room to read; the father also constantly beat up his wife and kid. Just as he is about to be released from the hospital, he has another hallucination where reality and his novel fantasies; the two thugs quickly drag his hospital bed throughout the building and attempt to kill him, while he also imagines himself as the detective alongside other vaudeville women. It ends with the fictional detective shooting the real author. After the hallucination, he leaves the hospital with his wife.
Production.
Potter's screenplay had been circulating in Hollywood for many years as Potter was enthusiastic about a film version. Robert Altman was at one time attached to direct with Dustin Hoffman in the lead, but financing proved difficult and the production was shelved. It was eventually discovered by an executive at Mel Gibson's production company Icon Productions, who loved it and got Gibson on board to produce. The screenplay had also been imagined as a horror film directed by genre veteran David Cronenberg and starring Al Pacino as the title character.
Reception.
The film scored a 39% "Rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on reviews from 108 critics, with an average rating of 5.09/10. The website's critical consensus reads: "Delightful performance from Robert Downey Jr. can't save "The Singing Detective"'s transition from TV to the big screen". While some critics, such as Roger Ebert, liked the film, others, like Joe Baltake at the "Sacramento Bee", considered it an "interesting failure".
Soundtrack.
The soundtrack to "The Singing Detective" was released on October 14, 2003. It consisted of songs from the 1950s rather than the 1940s as in the original television series.


Luis Aguad Jorge

Luis Aguad Jorge (August 25, 1925 – November 6, 2007) was a Cuban actor and salesman who, due to his small size, was better known as "El Enanito de Holsum", a bread company where he worked for many years of his life.
Early life.
Aguad Jorge was born in a Havana suburb. As a young man, he met and befriended Joaquin Monserrat, an actor who later moved to Puerto Rico and became famous there as children's character "Pacheco".
Aguad Jorge himself became involved in acting during his youth in Havana, performing at several theatrical plays there.
Life in Puerto Rico.
In 1961, Aguad Jorge moved from Cuba to Puerto Rico, where he reunited with old times friend Monserrat. He was introduced to Luis Vigoreaux, sr. and to Tomas Muniz, jr.. This in turn led him to get a role in the 1965 Puerto Rican television show "La Criada Malcriada", starring Velda Gonzalez Jacobo Morales, Emma Rosa Vicenti and Aguad Jorge himself. The show was a major hit and Aguad Jorge became a celebrity across his new country.
This show was immensely popular among Puerto Ricans (even influencing a local tomato sauce brand to rename itself as "Criada" sauce) and, in 1968, Puerto Rican marketing firm "Badillo-Compton" came with the idea for Holsum Bread to hire Aguad Jorge as national brand spokesperson in Puerto Rico. His friend and fellow Puerto Rico celebrity "Pacheco" himself introduced Aguad Jorge to his new job at Holsum. Aguad Jorge enjoyed his new job so much that he actually not only performed as the brand's spokesperson, but worked himself at Holsum's plant daily for the next 23 years until he retired in 1991. He also had Holsum make a custom sized truck that he drove himself to personal public appearances.
Aguad Jorge continued participating on Puerto Rican television until his later years, on a show named "Contra el Reloj", alongside Monserrat, on Canal 4 in Puerto Rico. In this show, he shared activities with Jeanie Carrión, sister of Josué Carrión, later to become famous as a show host and businessman in Puerto Rico.
Death.
Luis Aguad Jorge died on November 6, 2007, at a retirement home in San Juan, "Nuestra Senora de la Providencia", where he had been living since 2005.
His funeral was attended by, among others, Puerto Rican businessman, actor, show host and politician Roberto Vigoreaux-son of Luis Vigoreaux, sr.-and Holsum Puerto Rico president Ramon Calderon. As his body was driven from the funeral home to Porta Coeli cemetery in Bayamon, Holsum company trucks lined up at Las Americas Expressway, all with dark linens on, in honor of Aguad Jorge.
Due to his love for Puerto Rico and its people, Aguad Jorge had requested that, shall relations between Cuba and the United States normalize before his passing, he be allowed to die in his adopted nation. Also per his request, he was buried with his Holsum Breads uniform on, as he came to love that company and consider his co-workers there as his second family.


Windmill at Zaandam

Windmill at Zaandam or Windmill and Boat at Zaandam is an 1871 oil painting by Claude Monet. Since 1986 it has been in the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek.
Claude Monet and his family fled to London to avoid the Franco-Prussian War. At its end, he returned to France, but took a detour via Zaandam in the Netherlands on the recommendation of Charles-François Daubigny, spending five months there and producing about 20 paintings of the flat landscape thereabouts.


Balthus

Balthasar Klossowski de Rola (February 29, 1908 – February 18, 2001), known as Balthus, was a Polish-French modern artist. He is known for his erotically charged images of pubescent girls, but also for the refined, dreamlike quality of his imagery.
Throughout his career, Balthus rejected the usual conventions of the art world. He insisted that his paintings should be seen and not read about, and he resisted any attempts made to build a biographical profile. A telegram sent to the Tate Gallery as it prepared for its 1968 retrospective of his works read:
Biography.
Early years.
Balthus was born in Paris, in 1908, to Polish expatriate parents. His given name was Balthasar Klossowski – his sobriquet "Balthus" was based on his childhood nickname, alternately spelled Baltus, Baltusz, Balthusz or Balthus.
His father, Erich Klossowski, was an art historian who wrote a noted monograph on Honoré Daumier. Erich grew up in the town of Ragnit in East Prussia, now part of Russia but then in the German Empire. According to Balthus he belonged to the former Polish petty nobility (the drobna szlachta) and his family bore the Rola coat of arms. This largely undocumented family background would later be appropriated by Balthus when he decided to use the surname "Klossowski de Rola". (Had he lived in Poland, the arrangement of the name would have been Rola-Kłossowski or Kłossowski h. Rola). Balthus had the Rola arms embroidered onto many of his kimono, in the style of a Japanese .
Balthus's mother Elisabeth Dorothée Spiro Klossowska (known as Baladine Klossowska) was descended from Russian Jews who had emigrated to East Prussia. In the catalogue of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's 1984 Balthus exhibition, she was described as the daughter of a cantor from Kovelitz in Novgorod in the Russian Empire. However, Balthus told his biographer Nicholas Fox Weber that this was erroneous, and that his mother came "apparently from a Protestant family in the south of France". But according to Weber, this was a confabulation on Balthus's part. In fact, Balthus would often embroider upon his story of his mother's ancestry, saying that she was also related to the Romanovs and the Narischkins, powerful aristocratic families of Russia. In another confabulatory twist, Weber reports that Baladine's lover, the poet Rainer Maria Rilke, had said that the Spiros were descended from one of the richest families of Sephardic Jews, that is that they were of Spanish, not Eastern European origin. Weber doubted this story too, since Balthus's son Fumio, born in the late 1960s, had Tay–Sachs disease, a genetic disorder commonly associated with Eastern European Jews.
Balthus's older brother Pierre Klossowski (born 1905) later became a noted writer and philosopher.
The Klossowski children grew up in an art-world environment, with frequent visits to their household by famous artists and writers, including Rilke, André Gide (who mentored Pierre), and Jean Cocteau (who would depict the family in scenes of his 1929 novel "Les Enfants Terribles"). The artists Maurice Denis and Pierre Bonnard were also visitors, as was the art dealer Pierre Matisse. The children had a Scottish nanny, and Balthus would later say that his first language was English, although his parents spoke German to one another.
Overall, Balthus had an idyllic memory of these early childhood years, which were disrupted when the first world war forced the family to leave Paris in 1914, shortly after the war began, in order to avoid deportation due to their German citizenship. They settled in Switzerland, near Geneva.
In 1917 his parents separated, and his mother moved with the two boys to Geneva. They lived in a modest flat at 11, rue Pré-Jérôme, a comfortable neighborhood. About a year later his mother became the lover of Rilke. Balthus undoubtedly experienced this replacement of his father as a fairly traumatic event, especially given the romantic ecstasies and agonies of his mother's relationship with Rilke, which probably made him feel jealous and abandoned. However, Rilke was very impressed with the young "Baltusz"'s artistic talent, and helped him to publish his first work in 1921, at the age of 13. This was a book titled "Mitsou" which included forty drawings by Balthus and a preface by Rilke. The comic-book-style pictures depicted the story of a young boy who loses his beloved cat. The themes of the story foreshadowed Balthus's lifelong fascination with cats, along with a feeling of loss or disappearance.
At Christmas of 1921, Baladine, financially destitute, moved to Berlin with her children in order to live with her brother.
Young adulthood.
In 1926 Balthus visited Florence, where he copied many frescos by the Renaissance master Piero della Francesca. This inspired an early ambitious work of his: the tempera wall paintings of the Protestant church of the Swiss village of Beatenberg which he executed in 1927.
From 1930 to 1932 Balthus lived in Morocco. He was drafted into the Moroccan infantry in Kenitra and Fes, worked as a secretary, and sketched his painting "La Caserne" (1933).
In 1933 he moved to Paris, taking a studio in the Rue de Furstemberg. Later he would move to another studio at the nearby Cour de Rohan. Balthus showed no interest in modernist styles such as Cubism. His paintings were realistic but introverted, in the manner of the second generation of Surrealist painters such as Salvador Dalí, who often used realistic techniques to depict psychological motifs or dream images. Balthus often depicted pubescent girls in erotic and voyeuristic poses. One of the most notorious works from his first exhibition in Paris was "The Guitar Lesson" (1934), which caused controversy due to its sadistic and sexually explicit imagery. It depicts a young girl arched on her back over the lap of her female teacher, whose hands are positioned on the girl as if to play her like a guitar: one hand near her exposed vulva, and the other hand grasping her hair. Other works from the same exhibition included "The Street" (1933), "Cathy Dressing" (1933) and "Alice" (1933).
Early on his work was admired by writers and fellow painters, especially by André Breton and Pablo Picasso. His circle of friends in Paris included the novelists Pierre Jean Jouve, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Joseph Breitbach, Pierre Leyris, Henri Michaux, Michel Leiris and René Char, the photographer Man Ray, the playwright and actor Antonin Artaud, and the painters André Derain, Joan Miró and Alberto Giacometti (one of the most faithful of his friends). In 1948, another friend, Albert Camus, asked him to design the sets and costumes for his play "L'État de Siège" ("The State of Siege", directed by Jean-Louis Barrault). Balthus also designed the sets and costumes for Artaud's adaptation for Percy Bysshe Shelley's "The Cenci" (1935), Ugo Betti's "Delitto all'isola delle capre" (Crime on Goat-Island, 1953) and Barrault's adaptation of "Julius Caesar" (1959–1960).
In 1937 he married Antoinette de Watteville, who was from an influential aristocratic family from Bern. He had met her as early as 1924, and she was the model for the aforementioned "Cathy Dressing" and for a series of portraits. Balthus had two children from this marriage, Thaddeus and Stanislas Klossowski (born 1942), who recently published books on their father, including the letters by their parents. Stanislas, known as "Stash", became a figure in swinging London and Paris in the 1960s.
Champrovent to Chassy.
In 1940, with the invasion of France by German forces, Balthus fled with his wife Antoinette to Savoy to a farm in Champrovent near Aix-les-Bains, where he began work on two major paintings: "Landscape near Champrovent" (1942–1945) and "The Living Room" (1942). In 1942, he escaped from Nazi France to Switzerland, first to Bern and in 1945 to Geneva, where he became a friend of the publisher Albert Skira as well as the writer and member of the French Resistance, André Malraux. Balthus returned to France in 1946 and a year later traveled with André Masson to Southern France, meeting figures such as Picasso and Jacques Lacan, who eventually became a collector of his work. With Adolphe Mouron Cassandre in 1950, Balthus designed stage decor for a production of Mozart's opera Così fan tutte in Aix-en-Provence. Three years later he moved into the Chateau de Chassy in the Morvan, living with his step-niece Frédérique Tison and finishing his large-scale masterpieces "La Chambre" ("The Room" 1952, possibly influenced by Pierre Klossowski's novels) and "Le Passage du Commerce Saint-André" (1954).
Later years.
As international fame grew with exhibitions in the gallery of Pierre Matisse (1938) and the Museum of Modern Art (1956) in New York City, he cultivated the image of himself as an enigma. In 1964, he moved to Rome where he presided over the Villa de Medici as director (appointed by the French Minister of Culture André Malraux) of the French Academy in Rome, and became a friend of the filmmaker Federico Fellini and the painter Renato Guttuso.
In 1977 he moved to Rossinière, Switzerland. That he had a second, Japanese wife Setsuko Ideta whom he married in 1967 and was thirty-five years his junior, simply added to the air of mystery around him (he met her in Japan, during a diplomatic mission also initiated by Malraux). A son, Fumio, was born in 1968 but died two years later.
The photographers and friends Henri Cartier-Bresson and Martine Franck (Cartier-Bresson's wife) both portrayed the painter and his wife and their daughter Harumi (born 1973) in his Grand Chalet in Rossinière in 1999.
Balthus was one of the few living artists to be represented in the Louvre, when his painting "The Children" (1937) was acquired from the private collection of Pablo Picasso.
He co-authored a book of dialogues with the neurobiologist Semir Zeki, entitled "La Quête de l'essentiel."
He died in Rossinière, Switzerland. Prime ministers and rock stars alike attended his funeral. Bono, lead singer of U2, sang for the hundreds of mourners at the funeral, including the President of France, the Prince Sadruddhin Aga Khan, supermodel Elle Macpherson, and Cartier-Bresson.
Style and themes.
Balthus's style is primarily classical. His work shows numerous influences, including the writings of Emily Brontë, the writings and photography of Lewis Carroll, and the paintings of Masaccio, Piero della Francesca, Simone Martini, Poussin, Jean-Étienne Liotard, Joseph Reinhardt, Géricault, Ingres, Goya, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Courbet, Edgar Degas, Félix Vallotton and Paul Cézanne. Although his technique and compositions were inspired by pre-Renaissance painters, there also are eerie intimations of contemporary surrealists like de Chirico. Painting the figure at a time when figurative art was largely ignored, he is widely recognised as an important 20th-century artist.
Many of his paintings show young girls in an erotic context. Balthus insisted that his work was not erotic but that it recognized the discomforting facts of children's sexuality. In 2013, Balthus's paintings of adolescent girls were described by Roberta Smith in "The New York Times" as both "alluring and disturbing".
Influence and legacy.
His work has influenced several contemporary artists, notably Duane Michals and Émile Chambon. He has also influenced the filmmaker Jacques Rivette of the French New Wave, whose film "Hurlevent" (1985) was inspired by Balthus's drawings made at the beginning of the 1930s: "Seeing as he's a bit of an eccentric and all that, I am very fond of Balthus (...) I was struck by the fact that Balthus enormously simplified the costumes and stripped away the imagery trappings (...)".
His widow, Setsuko Klossowska de Rola, heads the Balthus Foundation established in 1998.
A reproduction of Balthus's "Girl at a Window" (a painting from 1957) prominently appears in François Truffaut's film "Domicile Conjugal" ("Bed and Board", 1970). The two principal characters, Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre Léaud) and his wife Christine (Claude Jade), are arguing. Christine takes down from the wall a small drawing of about 25×25 cm and gives it to her husband: Christine: "Here, take the small Balthus." Antoine: "Ah, the small Balthus. I offered it to you, it's yours, keep it."
During December 2017, a public petition was circulated requesting that Balthus's painting "Thérèse Dreaming" be removed from display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York due to its alleged explicit content and suggestive portrayal. Philip Kennicott, writing for "The Washington Post" on 5 December 2017, in an article titled "This painting might be sexually disturbing. But that's no reason to take it out of a museum", summarized the museum's long-standing position against censorship. The painting had previously been on display at the Museum Ludwig in Cologne, Germany in 2007 without incident.
Exhibitions.
Balthus held his first exhibition at Galerie Pierre, Paris, in 1934. Following the ensuing scandal, he exhibited at the Pierre Matisse Gallery, New York, from 1938 to 1977, although he never visited the United States. Balthus's first major museum exhibition was at the Museum of Modern Art in 1956. Other museum exhibitions of note include Musée des Arts Decoratifs, Paris (1966); Tate Gallery, London (1968); La Biennale di Venezia (1980); Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (1980); Musée cantonal des beaux-arts de Lausanne (1993); Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (1984, traveled to Metropolitan Museum, Kyoto); Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (1984); and Palazzo Grassi, Venice (2001). "Balthus: Cats and Girls: Paintings and Provocations" at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (September 25, 2013 – January 12, 2014) was the first U.S. museum survey of the artist's work in 30 years. A major retrospective overseen by the artist's wife, Ideta Setsuko, was held in 2014 at the Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum. An exhibition of Polaroid photographs taken by Balthus at the Museum Folkwang in Essen, Germany, was canceled over accusations of pedophilia. The German newspaper Die Zeit called the images, which depict a model named Anna from ages eight to 16, “documents of pedophile greed.”