title: Billy Joel

texts:
 Brinkley joins him and kisses him.<mask> also revamped his backing band, dismissing everyone but drummer Liberty DeVitto, guitarist David Brown, and saxophone player Mark Rivera, and bringing in new faces, including multi-instrumentalist Crystal Taliefero. Storm Fronts second single, "I Go to Extremes" reached No. 6 in early 1990. The album was also notable for its song "Leningrad", written after <mask> met a clown in the Soviet city of that name during his tour in 1987, and "The Downeaster Alexa", written to underscore the plight of fishermen on Long Island who are barely able to make ends meet. Another well-known single from the album is the ballad "And So It Goes" (No. 37 in late 1990). The song was originally written in 1983, around the time <mask> was writing songs for An Innocent Man; but "And So It Goes" did not fit that album's retro theme, so it was held back until Storm Front.<mask> said in a 1996 Masterclass session in Pittsburgh that Storm Front was a turbulent album and that "And So It Goes", as the last song on the album, portrayed the calm and tranquility that often follows a violent thunderstorm. In the summer of 1992, <mask> filed another US$90 million lawsuit against his former lawyer Allen Grubman, alleging a wide range of offenses including fraud, breach of fiduciary responsibility, malpractice and breach of contract but the case was eventually settled out of court for an undisclosed sum. In 1992, <mask> inducted the R&B duo Sam & Dave into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. That year, <mask> also started work on River of Dreams, finishing the album in early 1993. Its cover art was a colorful painting by Christie Brinkley that was a series of scenes from each of the songs on the album. The eponymous first single was the last top 10 hit <mask> has penned to date, reaching No. 3 on Billboard'''s Hot 100 chart and ranking at No.21 on the 1993 year-end Hot 100 chart. In addition to the title track, the album includes the hits "All About Soul" (with Color Me Badd on backing vocals) and "Lullabye (Goodnight, My Angel)", written for his daughter, Alexa. A radio remix version of "All About Soul" can be found on The Essential Billy Joel (2001), and a demo version appears on My Lives (2005). The song "The Great Wall of China" was written about his ex-manager Frank Weber and was a regular in the setlist for <mask>'s 2006 tour. "2000 Years" was prominent in the millennium concert at Madison Square Garden, December 31, 1999, and "Famous Last Words" closed the book on <mask>'s pop songwriting for more than a decade. 1994–present: Touring

Beginning in 1994, <mask> toured extensively with Elton John on a series of "Face to Face" tours, making them the longest running and most successful concert tandem in pop music history. During these shows, the two played their own songs, covered each other's songs, and performed duets.They grossed over US$46 million in just 24 dates in their sold out 2003 tour. <mask> and John resumed the Face to Face tour in March 2009 and it ended again, at least for the time being, in March 2010 in Albany, New York, at the Times Union Center. In February 2010, <mask> denied rumors in the trade press that he canceled a summer 2010 leg of the tour, claiming there were never any dates booked and that he intended to take the year off. <mask> told Rolling Stone magazine: "We'll probably pick it up again. It's always fun playing with him." <mask> and second wife Christie Brinkley announced on April 13, 1994, that they had separated, and their divorce was finalized in August 1994. The two remained friends.1997's "To Make You Feel My Love" and "Hey Girl" both charted from <mask>'s Greatest Hits Volume III album. <mask> wrote and recorded the song "Shameless" that was later covered by Garth Brooks and reached No. 1 on Billboards country charts. <mask> performed with Brooks during his Central Park concert in 1997. To add onto his achievements <mask> was inducted into the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame in 1999. Ray Charles made the induction speech and mentioned the duet <mask> wrote for the two of them, "Baby Grand" (a track on <mask>'s album The Bridge released in 1986). On December 31, 1999, <mask> performed at New York's Madison Square Garden.At the time, <mask> said that it would be his last tour and possibly his last concert. Two of his performances from that night, "We Didn't Start the Fire" and "Scenes from an Italian Restaurant" were filmed and featured that night as part of ABC's special New Year's Y2K coverage. The concert (dubbed The Night of the 2000 Years) ran for close to four hours and was later released as 2000 Years: The Millennium Concert. In 2001, <mask> released Fantasies & Delusions, a collection of classical piano pieces. All were composed by <mask> and performed by Hyung-ki Joo. <mask> often uses bits of these songs as interludes in live performances, and some of them are part of the score for the hit show Movin' Out. The album topped the classical charts at No.1. <mask> performed "New York State of Mind" live on September 21, 2001, as part of the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert, and on October 20, 2001, along with "Miami 2017 (Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway)", at the Concert for New York City in Madison Square Garden. That night, he also performed "Your Song" with Elton John. In 2003, <mask> inducted The Righteous Brothers into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, noting that his song "Until the Night" from the album 52nd Street was a tribute to the duo. In 2005, Columbia released a box set, My Lives, which is largely a compilation of demos, b-sides, live/alternative versions and even a few Top 40 hits. The compilation also includes the Umixit software, in which people can remix "Zanzibar" and a live version of "I Go to Extremes" with their PC. Also, a DVD of a show from the River of Dreams tour is included.On January 7, 2006, <mask> began a tour across the U.S. Having not written, or at least released, any new songs in 13 years, he featured a sampling of songs from throughout his career, including major hits as well as obscure tunes like "Zanzibar" and "All for Leyna". His tour included an unprecedented 12 sold-out concerts over several months at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The singer's stint of 12 shows at Madison Square Garden broke a previous record set by New Jersey native Bruce Springsteen, who played 10 sold-out shows at the same arena. The record earned <mask> the first retired number (12) in the arena owned by a non-athlete. This honor has also been given to <mask> at the Wells Fargo Center (Philadelphia) (formerly the Wachovia Center) in Philadelphia where a banner in the colors of the Philadelphia Flyers is hung honoring <mask>'s 48 Philadelphia sold-out shows. He also had a banner raised in his honor for being the highest grossing act in the history of the Times Union Center (formerly the Knickerbocker Arena and Pepsi Arena) in Albany, New York. This honor was given to him as part of the April 17, 2007, show he did there.On June 13, 2006, Columbia released 12 Gardens Live, a double album containing 32 live recordings from a collection of the 12 different shows at Madison Square Garden during <mask>'s 2006 tour. <mask> visited the United Kingdom and Ireland for the first time in many years as part of the European leg of his 2006 tour. On July 31, 2006, he performed a free concert in Rome, with the Colosseum as the backdrop. <mask> toured South Africa, Australia, Japan, and Hawaii in late 2006, and subsequently toured the Southeastern U.S. in February and March 2007 before hitting the Midwest in the spring of 2007. On January 3 of that year, news was leaked to the New York Post that <mask> had recorded a new song with lyrics—this being the first new song with lyrics he'd written in almost 14 years. The song, titled "All My Life", was <mask>'s newest single (with second track "You're My Home", live from Madison Square Garden 2006 tour) and was released into stores on February 27, 2007. On February 4, <mask> sang the national anthem for Super Bowl XLI, becoming the first to sing the national anthem twice at a Super Bowl.and on April 17, 2007, <mask> was honored in Albany, New York, for his ninth concert at the Times Union Center. He is now holding the highest box office attendance of any artist to play at the arena. A banner was raised in his honor marking this achievement. On December 1, 2007, <mask> premiered his new song "Christmas in Fallujah". The song was performed by Cass Dillon, a new Long Island based musician, as <mask> felt it should be sung by someone in a soldier's age range (though he himself has played the song occasionally in concert.) The track was dedicated to servicemen based in Iraq. <mask> wrote it in September 2007 after reading numerous letters sent to him from American soldiers in Iraq."Christmas in Fallujah" is only the second pop/rock song released by <mask> since 1993's River of Dreams. Proceeds from the song benefited the Homes For Our Troops foundation. On January 26, 2008, <mask> performed with the Philadelphia Orchestra celebrating the 151st anniversary of the Academy of Music. <mask> performed his classical piece titled, "Waltz No. 2 (Steinway Hall)" from Fantasies and Delusions arranged by Brad Ellis. He also played many of his less well-known pieces, with full orchestral backing arranged by Mr. Ellis, including the rarely performed Nylon Curtain songs "Scandinavian Skies" and "Where's the Orchestra?". On March 10, 2008, <mask> inducted his friend John Mellencamp into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in a ceremony at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York City.<mask> sold out 10 concerts at the Mohegan Sun Casino in Uncasville, Connecticut from May to July 2008. The casino honored him with a banner displaying his name and the number 10 to hang in the arena. On June 19, 2008, he played a concert at the grand re-opening of Caesars Windsor (formerly Casino Windsor) in Windsor, Ontario, Canada, to an invite-only crowd for Casino VIPs. His mood was light, and joke-filled, even introducing himself as "<mask>'s dad" and stating "you guys overpaid to see a fat bald guy". He also admitted that Canadian folk-pop musician Gordon Lightfoot was the musical inspiration for "She's Always A Woman". On July 16, 2008, and July 18, 2008, <mask> played the final concerts at Shea Stadium before its demolition. His guests included Tony Bennett, Don Henley, John Mayer, John Mellencamp, Steven Tyler, Roger Daltrey, Garth Brooks, and Paul McCartney.The concerts were featured in the 2010 documentary film Last Play at Shea. The film was released on DVD on February 8, 2011. The CD and DVD of the show, Live at Shea Stadium, were released on March 8, 2011. On December 11, 2008, <mask> recorded his own rendition of "Christmas in Fallujah" during a concert at Acer Arena in Sydney and released it as a live single in Australia only. It is the only official release of <mask> performing "Christmas in Fallujah", as Cass Dillon sang on the 2007 studio recording and the handful of times the song was played live in 2007. <mask> sang the song throughout his December 2008 tour of Australia. On May 19, 2009, <mask>'s former drummer, Liberty DeVitto, filed a lawsuit in NYC claiming <mask> and Sony Music owed DeVitto over 10 years of royalty payments.DeVitto had never been given songwriting or arranging credit on any of <mask>'s songs, but he claimed that he helped arrange some of them, including "Only the Good Die Young". In April 2010, it was announced that <mask> and DeVitto amicably resolved the lawsuit. 2011 marked the 40th anniversary of the release of <mask>'s first album, Cold Spring Harbor. According to <mask>'s official website, to commemorate this anniversary, Columbia/Legacy Recordings originally planned "to celebrate the occasion with a definitive reissue project of newly restored and expanded Legacy editions of the complete <mask> catalog, newly curated collections of rarities from the vaults, previously unavailable studio tracks and live performances, home video releases and more", although this never fully came to fruition. The album Piano Man was re-released in a two-disc Legacy edition in November 2011. In 2012, <mask> signed an exclusive worldwide publishing agreement with Universal Music Publishing Group (UMPG), and its subsidiary Rondor Music International. Under the agreement, UMPG and Rondor replaced EMI Music Publishing in handling <mask>'s catalog outside the US.Additionally, the agreement marked the first time since <mask> regained control of his publishing rights in the 1980s that he began to use an administrator to handle his catalog within the U.S. The agreement's focus is on increasing the use of <mask>'s music in movies, television programs, and commercials. On December 12, 2012, <mask> performed as part of 12-12-12: The Concert for Sandy Relief at Madison Square Garden, a concert held for all the victims of Hurricane Sandy. He changed the lyrics to "Miami 2017 (Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway)" to make it relate to all the damage caused by Sandy. In May 2013, it was announced that <mask> would hold his first ever indoor Irish concert at the O2 in Dublin on November 1. He subsequently announced his return to the UK for the first time in seven years to perform three dates in October and November. <mask> played two arena dates in Manchester and Birmingham plus a very special show at London's Hammersmith Apollo.In October, <mask> held a surprise concert on Long Island at The Paramount (Huntington, New York) to benefit Long Island Cares. The venue holds a capacity of 1,555 and sold out in five minutes. <mask> headlined a solo arena concert in New York City for the first time since 2006 when he performed at Barclays Center in Brooklyn on December 31, 2013. <mask> announced a concert residency at Madison Square Garden, playing one concert a month indefinitely, starting January 27, 2014. The first MSG show also launched the <mask> in Concert tour, which continued at the Amway Center (in Orlando, Florida) where <mask> performed several cover songs such as Elton John's "Your Song", <mask>'s "You Are So Beautiful" (in tribute to Joe Cocker), The Beatles' "With a Little Help from My Friends", "Can't Buy Me Love", and "When I'm 64", Robert Burns' "Auld Lang Syne", and AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long" (with Brian Johnson). <mask> also performed an unusual set, including the song "Souvenir" (from 1974's Streetlife Serenade) and excluding "We Didn't Start the Fire". In 2015, <mask> performed 21 concerts in addition to his monthly Madison Square Garden residency.His August 4, 2015, engagement at Nassau Coliseum was the final concert prior to the arena undergoing a US$261 million renovation. <mask> returned to Nassau Coliseum on April 5, 2017, to

masks:
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Billy
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Billy Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Billy Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Billy Joel
Joel
Billy Preston
Joel
Joel
Joel


title: Billy Joel

type: original

texts:
 play the first concert at the newly renovated venue. Later that month, <mask> played the first concert at Atlanta's new SunTrust Park, the suburban home of the Atlanta Braves. On June 24, 2017, he returned to Hicksville High School fifty years after his would-be graduating class received their diplomas, to deliver the honorary commencement address. It was also the 25th anniversary of receiving his own diploma from the same High School. In 2019, <mask> announced a concert at Camden Yards, home of the Baltimore Orioles, marking the first-ever concert at the baseball stadium. <mask> was forced to postpone his concerts between March 2020 and August 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.Other ventures

In 1996, <mask> merged his long-held love of boating with his desire for a second career. With Long Island boating businessman Peter Needham, he formed the Long Island Boat Company.Billy Joel Timeline  . Dipity.com. Retrieved November 8, 2010. In November 2010, <mask> opened a shop in Oyster Bay, Long Island, to manufacture custom-made, retro-styled motorcycles and accessories. In 2011, <mask> announced that he was releasing an autobiography that he had written with Fred Schruers, titled The Book of Joel: A Memoir. The book was originally going to be released in June 2011, but in March 2011 <mask> decided against publishing the book and officially cancelled his deal with HarperCollins.Rolling Stone noted, "HarperCollins acquired the book project for US$3 million in 2008. <mask> is expected to return his advance on that sum to the publisher." According to Billboard, "the HarperCollins book was billed as an 'emotional ride' that would detail the music legend's failed marriage to Christie Brinkley, as well as his battles with substance abuse." In explaining his decision to cancel the book's release, <mask> said, "It took working on writing a book to make me realize that I'm not all that interested in talking about the past, and that the best expression of my life and its ups and downs has been and remains my music." In 2014, Schruers published a biography, simply titled <mask>, based on his extensive personal interviews with <mask>. Personal life
Marriage and family

<mask>'s first wife was Elizabeth Weber Small. When their relationship began, she was married to Jon Small, his music partner in the short-lived duo Attila, with whom she had a son.When the affair was revealed, Weber (temporarily) severed her relationships with both men. Weber and <mask> later married in 1973 and she became his manager. His one-time producer Artie Ripp said <mask>'s songs "She's Got a Way" and "She's Always a Woman" were inspired by her, as was the waitress character in "Piano Man". They divorced on July 20, 1982. <mask> married a second time, to model Christie Brinkley, in March 1985. Their daughter, Alexa <mask>, was born December 29, 1985. "<mask> and his 'uptown girl' have a girl".The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, December 31, 1985. p. A3. "Model Christie Brinkley has given her husband – singer-songwriter <mask> – something new to sing about, a 6-pound daughter, a spokesman for the family said Monday." Alexa was given the middle name of Ray after Ray Charles, one of <mask>'s musical idols. <mask> and Brinkley divorced on August 26, 1994. On October 2, 2004, <mask> married chef Katie Lee, his third wife. At the time of the wedding, Lee was 23 and <mask> was 55. <mask>'s daughter, Alexa Ray, then 18, served as maid of honor.<mask>'s second wife, Christie Brinkley, attended the union and gave the couple her blessing. On June 17, 2009, they announced their separation. On July 4, 2015, <mask> married a fourth time, to Alexis Roderick, an equestrian and former Morgan Stanley executive, at his estate on Long Island. Governor of New York Andrew Cuomo conducted the ceremony. The couple had been together since 2009. On August 12, 2015, the couple's daughter, Della Rose <mask>, was born. The couple had a second daughter, Remy <mask>, on October 22, 2017.<mask> bought a house in Centre Island, New York, in 2002 for US$22 million. He also owns a house in Sag Harbor. <mask>'s waterfront residence in Manalapan, Florida, went on the market in November 2015. On January 28, 2020, the 3.76-acre (1.52 ha) property sold for  US$10.2 million. Health issues
<mask> has battled depression for many years. In 1970, a career decline and personal tragedies worsened his moods. He left a suicide note and attempted to end his life by drinking furniture polish.Later he said, "I drank furniture polish. It looked tastier than bleach." His drummer and bandmate, Jon Small, rushed him to the hospital. <mask> checked into Meadowbrook Hospital, where he was put on suicide watch and received treatment for depression. In 1971, <mask> released his debut album, Cold Spring Harbor, including the track "Tomorrow Is Today", related to this incident. <mask> later recorded "You're Only Human (Second Wind)" as a message to help prevent teen suicide. In 2002, <mask> entered Silver Hill Hospital, a substance abuse and psychiatric center in New Canaan, Connecticut.In March 2005, he checked into the Betty Ford Center, where he spent 30 days for the treatment of alcohol abuse. Fundraising
Although <mask> has donated money to Democratic candidates running for office, he has never publicly affiliated himself with the Democratic Party. Although he is not known for publicly endorsing political candidates, he did play a benefit with Bruce Springsteen to raise money for Barack Obama's presidential campaign in 2008. He has performed at benefit concerts that have helped raise funds for political causes. However, in regards to celebrities endorsing political candidates, <mask> has said, "People who pay for your tickets, I don't think they want to hear who you're going to vote for and how you think they should vote." Nonetheless, in 2016, after his sarcastic dedication of "The Entertainer" to then-Republican candidate Donald Trump was taken as a serious endorsement, <mask> told the New York Daily News in an email that he would be voting for Hillary Clinton. Discography

 Awards and achievements

<mask> graduated well after his high school peers because of a missed English exam.His high school diploma was finally awarded by the school board 25 years later. <mask> has been presented with multiple honorary doctorates:
 Doctor of Humane Letters from Fairfield University (1991)
 Doctor of Music from Berklee College of Music (1993)
 Doctor of Humane Letters from Hofstra University (1997)
 Doctor of Music from Southampton College (2000)
 Doctor of Fine Arts from Syracuse University (2006)
 Doctor of Musical Arts from the Manhattan School of Music (2008)
 Doctor of Music from Stony Brook University (2015)

In 1986, <mask> was on the site selection committee for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame board. Seven members of the committee voted for the Hall to be located in San Francisco, and seven voted for Cleveland, Ohio; this tie was broken when <mask> voted for Cleveland. <mask> was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland in 1999 by one of his chief musical influences, Ray Charles, with whom he also collaborated on his song "Baby Grand" (1986). <mask> was also named MusiCares Person of the Year for 2002, an award given each year at the same time as the Grammy Awards. At the dinner honoring him, various artists performed versions of his songs, including Nelly Furtado, Stevie Wonder, Jon Bon Jovi, Diana Krall, Rob Thomas and Natalie Cole. <mask> has won five Grammys, including Album of the Year for 52nd Street and Song of the Year and Record of the Year for "Just the Way You Are".In 1993, <mask> was the second entertainer out of thirty persons to be inducted into the Madison Square Garden Walk of Fame. On September 20, 2004, <mask> received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, for his work in the music industry, located at 6233 Hollywood Boulevard. He was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame on October 15, 2006. <mask> is the only performing artist to have played both Yankee and Shea Stadiums, as well as Giants Stadium, Madison Square Garden, and Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum. <mask> has banners in the rafters of the Times Union Center, Nassau Coliseum, Madison Square Garden, Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Connecticut, Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Hartford Civic Center in Hartford, and the Carrier Dome in Syracuse. In 2003, Rolling Stones 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list included The Stranger at number 67, and 52nd Street at number 352. And in 2004, on their 500 Greatest Songs of All Time list, Rolling Stone'' included "Piano Man" at number 421.He has also sponsored the Billy Joel Visiting Composer Series at Syracuse University. On December 12, 2011, <mask> became the first non-classical musician honored with a portrait in Steinway Hall. On December 29, 2013, in Washington, D.C., <mask> received Kennedy Center Honors, the nation's highest honor for influencing American culture through the arts. On July 22, 2014, the Library of Congress announced that <mask> would be the sixth recipient of the Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. He received the prize at a performance ceremony in November 2014 from James H. Billington, the Librarian of Congress, and Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor. On July 18, 2018, Governor Andrew Cuomo proclaimed the date to be Billy <mask> Day in New York state to mark his 100th performance at Madison Square Garden. See also

 Billy <mask> Band
 List of best-selling music artists
 List of highest-grossing concert tours

References

External links

 <mask> on Instagram, archived at Ghostarchive.org.Archived from the original

1949 births
20th-century American composers
20th-century American keyboardists
20th-century American male musicians
20th-century American singers
20th-century classical composers
21st-century American composers
21st-century American keyboardists
21st-century American male musicians
21st-century American singers
21st-century classical composers
21st-century organists
Jewish American atheists
American classical composers
American harmonica players
American male classical composers
American male organists
American male pianists
American male pop singers
American male singer-songwriters
American multi-instrumentalists
American people of English-Jewish descent
American people of German-Jewish descent
American pop pianists
American pop rock singers
American rock keyboardists
American rock pianists
American rock singers
American rock songwriters
American soft rock musicians
<mask> Band members
Columbia Records artists
Entertainers from the Bronx
Former Roman Catholics
Grammy Award winners
Grammy Legend Award winners
Jewish American classical composers
Jewish American musicians
Jewish American songwriters
Jewish atheists
Jewish rock musicians
Jewish singers
Kennedy Center honorees
Living people
Musicians from the Bronx
Musicians from the New York metropolitan area
People from Hicksville, New York
Singers from New York City
Singer-songwriters from New York (state)
Sony Classical Records artists
Tony Award

masks:
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Billy Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Ray Joel
Joel
Billy Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Anne Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Joel
Billy Joel
Billy Joel


title: Natalya Varley

texts:
<mask> (, born 22 June 1947) is a Soviet and Russian film and theater actress, who became famous in 1966 for her part in the comedy Kidnapping, Caucasian Style. In 1989 she was designated as a Meritorious Artist of RSFSR. Biography
<mask> was born in Constanţa, Romania, a daughter of the sea captain <mask>, who was also a one-time City Council chairman (Mayor, in modern terms) of Murmansk where the family lived. One of his 19th century paternal ancestors was a Welsh jockey who (along with his brother) had been invited to Russia to manage a horse-breeding factory, married a Russian and settled there. Natalya's mother, Ariadna Sergeyevna <mask> (née Senyavina), a granddaughter of geologist Yevgeny Barbot de Marni, was of French and German origins, a distant relative to Alexey K. Tolstoy. Natalya was an artistic child; she started writing poetry at the age of four, was fond of painting and studied music. In the late 1950s, as the family settled in Moscow, she entered the Tsvetnoy Boulevard Circus's Children Studio and made a quick progress there, which was all the more impressive, considering she'd been a sickly child and suffered from  rheumatism-related heart disorder which for several years prevented her from taking sports at school.After graduating the State Circus and Entertainment Art college in 1965, <mask> joined the Moscow Tsvetnoy Boulevard Circus troupe as an equilibrist. Career
In 1965, in Odessa where the troupe was on tour, <mask> met Soviet clown and film actor Leonid Yengibarov. He proved to be a kindred spirit and became a close friend, as well as occasional stage partner. Once Yengibarov invited the film director Georgy Yungwald-Khilkevich to watch their performance. Stricken by <mask>'s stage persona, the latter invited her for a minor role to his latest movie, The Formula of Rainbow. During the filming <mask> was spotted by the assistant of another film director, Leonid Gaidai, who invited her to the auditions for his new project, Kidnapping, Caucasian Style. Amongst some 500 contenders there were celebrities like <mask> Fateyeva and Anastasiya Vertinskaya, but the director chose the 19-year-old amateur for the leading role.According to Gaidai, <mask> has won him with her ingénue charms, but she later opined that one particular episode might have proved to be the decisive one....So I came to the Mosfilm, read a script fragment and did the donkey scene. Then Gaidai asks me, somewhat diffidently: 'And now, Natasha, could I ask you perhaps to undress - down to a swimming suit?' 'Sure', I said, and did. Everybody just went: 'Aahh!' It is now that for actresses undressing is business-as-usual. In those years the Soviet cinema, as well as the Soviet people, were so much more shy. But for me the swimming-suit was a kind of circus uniform, I got used to it.So we shoot the episode with a swimming-suit, and I think it was the one that made all the difference. <mask> and her heroine Nina were the complete opposites. "She was supposed to be self-assured, cheeky and optimistic. Whereas I've always been rather quiet, dreamy and romantic. So Gaidai had to re-mold me almost literally during the shooting, into a true "Komsomolka, sportsmenka and an all-round looker," she later reminisced. Kidnapping, Caucasian Style, which premiered on 1 April 1967, became a huge success and <mask> found herself an overnight superstar. Hugely popular was "The White Bears' Song", recorded for the film by Aida Vedishcheva.<mask>'s speaking voice was over-dubbed too, by Nadezhda Rumyantseva. Years later, when <mask> embarked upon successful musical career (to often perform the famous song very close to the original) and herself became a well-known voiceover artist, doubts as to the wiseness of such a move were raised. "Gaidai grossly mistreated <mask> by stripping her of her own voice. Natasha would have done exactly the same [as Vedishcheva and Rumayntseva did], except that maybe less forcefully," fellow actress and Gaidai's wife Nina Grebeshkova (cast in the film as a psychiatry ward doctor) later opined. <mask> found herself in the focus of media attention; crowds of fans started to gather wherever she would arrive to perform with her Circus troupe. This sudden fame made her none the richer: <mask> claims to have been paid 300 rubles (two average Soviet monthly wages) for the blockbuster the popularity of which never waned. In October 1967 the first Soviet horror movie, Viy (after Nikolay Gogol's novella of the same name) was premiered.Here <mask> provided another striking performance, now as Pannochka, a murdered witch, rising off her coffin to torment and finally kill a hapless seminary student (played by Leonid Kuravlyov), who had inadvertently brought about her death. Several other films of the late 1960s featured <mask> <mask>in Theatre Institute student. Among them were Seven Brides of Corporal Zbruyev and The Twelve Chairs, the latter again by Gaidai. In 1971 <mask> graduated the Theatre Institute and joined the Moscow Drama Stanislavsky Theatre troupe where she worked till 1978. This was not a happy experience. Four directors came and went in the course of seven years; a long vacation had to be taken due to pregnancy (in 1972 she gave birth to her first son Vladimir) and the general atmosphere of jealousy, ill-will and petty intrigue proved to be utterly depressing for <mask>. Varley continued to be filmed throughout the 1980s, but despite some minor successes (The Great Attraction, My Father Is an Idealist, I Don't Want to Be an Adult) her career in cinema was ostensibly in decline.In the mid-1990s (after The Wizard of the Emerald City, 1994, where she played both of the two wicked witches) <mask> retired, explaining this decision with her dissatisfaction with the dire quality of the scripts she'd been offered. Prior to that, in the late 1980s <mask> joined the Maxim Gorky Literature Institute which she graduated in 1994. Some of the poetry she'd written through the years became song lyrics. Working with the composer Nikolai Shershen, she released four studio albums in 1992-1999: At the Peak of Togetherness, Don't Die, Love, Aqua Vitae and The String in Me, Don't Break. She also authored three books of poetry. In the 2000s <mask> <mask> occasionally performed (the production of Oskar by the Empire of Stars, a private theatre) and gave solo concerts. She also hosted a couple of TV shows ("Household Affairs", Domashnye khlopoty; Your Business, Delo vashe).In 2009 she took part in the Russian Channel One "Two Stars" project, to perform in tandem with Ukrainian pop veteran Nikolai Gnatyuk. Activism
From the early 1990s <mask> <mask> was a Communist Party supporter who openly voiced her dissatisfaction with Boris Yeltsin's policies. She joined the so-called "Moral Revival" committee and backed Gennady Zyuganov's 1996 election campaign. A devout Christian, <mask> took part in several public actions of protest against what she saw as the 'satanic tendencies' in the democratic Russia's cinema and modern art where scandalous 'performances' became the norm, like that of Avdey Ter-Oganyan who infamously destroyed icons with an axe in the Moscow Manege. Alongside Nikita Mikhalkov she became highly popular with the Russian Orthodox media. In 2013 <mask> was one of the organizers of the 20th anniversary event commemorating the victims of the 3–4 October 1993 events. For "statements contradicting the interests of our national security" she was banned from entering Ukraine.Private life
In 1967 <mask> <mask> married actor Nikolay Burlyaev, to a dismay of her circle of friends who tried to put it to her how passionately her fellow student Leonid Filatov was in love with her. The marriage proved to be an unhappy one and lasted less than a year. Her second husband was actor Vladimir Tikhonov, son of Vyacheslav Tikhonov and Nonna Mordyukova. In January 1972 Natalya gave birth to her first son, Vasily, but that was after the couple divorced. In 1990 Vladimir Tikhonov, long history of alcohol and drug abuse behind him, died of heart failure. Her second son, Alexander was born in 1986; the identity of his father remained unknown to the media. In 1999 <mask> married for the third time ("His name is Vladimir and he is definitely not an actor," was as much as she told the press), but again this marriage proved to be short-lived.Select filmography
 Kidnapping, Caucasian Style (1966) as Nina
 Viy (1967) as Pannochka
 The Seven Brides of Lance-Corporal Zbruyev (1970) as Galina
 The Twelve Chairs (1971) as Liza
 Circus in the Circus (1974) as Tana
 Errors of Youth (1978) as Zina
 I Don't Want to Be an Adult (1982) as Katya
 Guest from the Future (1985) as Marta Erastovna
 The Wizard of Emerald City (1994 film) as Bastinda/Gingema

References

External links

 <mask> <mask> bio at Lifeactor.ru

Living people
1947 births
People from Constanța
Russian actresses
Russian people of French descent
Soviet people of German descent
Russian people of Welsh descent

masks:
Natalya Varley
Natalya Varley
Vladimir Viktorovich Varley
Varley
Varley
Varley
Varley
Varley
Natalya
Varley
Natalya
Varley
Varley
Varley
Varley
Varley
Varley
Varley
Natalya
Varleychuk
Varley
Varley
Varley
Varley
Natalya
Varley
Natalya
Varley
Varley
Varley
Natalya
Varley
Varley
Natalya
Varley


title: Staurakios

texts:
<mask> or Stauracius (; early 790s – 11 January 812AD) was Byzantine emperor from 26 July to 2 October 811. He was born in the early 790s, probably between 791 and 793, to Nikephoros I and an unknown woman. Nikephoros seized the throne of the Byzantine Empire from Empress Irene in 802, and elevated <mask> to co-emperor in December 803. After Nikephoros fell in the Battle of Pliska on 26 July 811, <mask> was declared emperor, despite his severe injuries from the battle. His reign was short due to the political uncertainties surrounding his wounds, which included the severing of his spine; he was usurped by his brother-in-law, Michael I Rangabe, on 2 October 811. After being removed from power, he was sent to live in a monastery, where he stayed until he died of gangrene or poisoning on 11 January 812. Biography

Early life
<mask> was born in the early 790sAD,  probably between 791 and 793, to Nikephoros I and an unknown woman, often referred to as Prokopia due to confusion with her daughter, Prokopia.Nikephoros was logothetēs tou genikou (finance minister) at the time of Staurakios birth, before he revolted against Byzantine Empress Irene in 802 AD, and seized the throne for himself; <mask> was around 10–12 years old at this time. Nikephoros consolidated power in the throne, instituted caesaropapism, and implemented strict fiscal laws. For these reasons, he was hated by many, especially the contemporary ecclesiastical historians, who are the main source of history for his reign; many modern historians, therefore, doubt their assertions of his malevolent character. <mask> was not given an official government position upon his father's accession to the throne, but, in the summer of 803, Bardanes Tourkos revolted against Nikephoros in the Anatolic Theme; although his revolt was put down by early September, it convinced Nikephoros to consolidate his hold on the throne by declaring <mask> co-emperor and heir, which he did on 25 December 803. By doing so, Nikephoros removed any question of the imperial succession and increased his own legitimacy—although <mask>, now somewhere between the ages of 11 and 13, was not yet old enough to actually exercise power. After Staurakios elevation to co-emperor, he is not mentioned again in the sources until 807, when Nikephoros decided that Staurakios needed to marry, and thus held an imperial bride show to select a wife on 20 December 807. Theophano of Athens was selected, likely due to the fact that she was a kinswoman of Irene, and therefore would help add legitimacy to both Nikephoros and Staurakios rule.According to the heavily-biased Byzantine historian Theophanes, she was chosen despite the fact that she was already engaged to a man, whom she had slept with premaritally, and was not the most beautiful of the women presented at the bride show. After his marriage, <mask> is not mentioned again until 811, when Nikephoros prepared his invasion of the Bulgarian Khanate in May of that year. The Bulgarians had been a serious foreign threat to the Byzantine Empire since the reign of Constantine IV ( 668–685), who had led a disastrous invasion into their lands. Between 808 and 811, the building tension between the two powers resulted in outright warfare. Nikephoros led the campaign over the Balkan Mountains and into the Bulgarian Khanate in person alongside <mask>, his son-in-law Michael Rhangabe, a kouropalates (high-ranking court official), and many senior Imperial officials. The invasion was initially very successful, with the Byzantine forces attacking the Bulgarian capital of Pliska, defeating first the 12,000-strong garrison of the city, and then an army of 15,000 which had been sent by the Bulgarian khan Krum to relieve the city. In correspondence sent to Constantinople, Nikephoros attributed these military victories to the strategic advice of Staurakios.The victorious Byzantine forces began to march back to the Byzantine Empire, but a desperate Krum managed to trap the Byzantine army in a small valley with palisades, before launching a massive assault two days later, on 26 July 811. This battle, known as the Battle of Pliska, resulted in a Bulgarian massacre of the Byzantine forces. Much of the Byzantine army was destroyed, and Nikephoros himself was slain. Reign
The remaining Byzantine forces, including a severely wounded <mask>, retreated to Adrianople over three days. <mask> spine had been severed during the battle, which along with <mask>' demonstrated lack of ability, led the uninjured influential figures in the empire to consider the issue of Nikephoros' successor. Chiefly they were three who had traveled with Nikephoros and <mask>, the magistros (Master of Offices) Theoktistos, the Domestic of the Schools Stephanos, and Michael Rhangabe. The severity of Staurakios wounds led to speculation as to whether he would live, although eventually they judged he would make the best candidate, as the legitimate successor, and declared him emperor.<mask> gave a speech to the surviving troops, where he insulted Nikephoros military judgment, before being acclaimed by the army  28 July 811. Almost immediately after <mask> ascended the throne, Michael was pressured to usurp it, due to the legitimacy granted to him by his marriage to <mask>' sister, Prokopia, and his military abilities. Theoktistos and others attempted to convince Michael to take the throne, although he repeatedly refused at this time. <mask> was brought by litter to Constantinople. By this time, it had been discovered that he had blood in his urine, and was paralyzed from the waist down. In spite of this, <mask> did his best to assert his imperial authority, including rebuffing the attempts of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Nikephoros I, to have funds which Nikephoros had collected returned to the church. The severity of his injury, and the lack of any children to nominate as heirs led to a debate about who would succeed him, as his impending death was considered a certainty.Staurakios sister, Prokopia, backed her husband Michael, while Theophano backed herself, hoping to take the throne the same way her kinswoman Irene had. The only proof of such intrigues given by contemporary historians comes from records that <mask> became hostile to Theoktistos and Michael, which would suggest he was aware of their plottings, and that he suspected Prokopia of conspiring to kill him. <mask> wavered between two possible options for succession. The first, to make Theophano empress, and the second, attested in a ninth-century chronicle, to institute a form of imperial democracy. The second option is considered by the Byzantine historian J. B. Bury to be the machinations of an addled brain if it did in fact happen.After hearing of the two options <mask> was considering, Patriarch Nikephoros I aligned himself with Stephanos, Theoktistos, and Michael. Afraid of the possibility of a public uprising due to lack of an heir, Staurakios declared Theophano his successor. This decision united the chief leaders and officials of the Byzantine Empire behind Michael, as they did not desire to return to the uncertainty which had pervaded Irene's rule, due to her ruling despite being a woman. On 1 October 811, Staurakios summoned Stephanos, whom he trusted completely, likely because Stephanos was the first to proclaim <mask> emperor, to propose blinding Michael; <mask> was unaware that Michael had the support of Stephanos himself. Stephanos assured Staurakios of the strength of his position, and dissuaded him from having Michael blinded, saying he was too well protected to attempt it. Stephanos, after swearing he would not reveal the discussion to anyone else, gathered the remaining tagmatic forces and important officials at the Hippodrome of Constantinople, where on 2 October Michael was proclaimed emperor by the army and senate at dawn. Upon hearing of this, <mask> hastened to abdicate, fearing his execution otherwise.<mask> summoned his relative, Symon the monk, and was tonsured and dressed in monastic garb. <mask> also sent a letter of protest to Patriarch Nikephoros for his role in the coup d’état; Nikephoros answered in person, writing alongside Michael and Prokopia, and assured <mask> that he had not betrayed him, but rather protected him. <mask> was unimpressed and informed the Patriarch that "you will not find him (Michael) a better friend", meaning that Michael would not be more useful to Nikephoros than Staurakios himself had been. <mask> lived another three months before dying of gangrene on 11 January 812. He was buried in the Monastery of Braka, which was given to Theophano by Prokopia. According to the Syriac sources—the Chronicle of 813 and Michael the Syrian—and the chronicle of the Petros of Alexandria, there were rumors that <mask> had been poisoned by his sister Prokopia, rather than dying of gangrene. Theophanes considered these rumors possible and mentions that Theophano herself considered these rumors true.Historiography
The main source for the reigns of both Nikephoros I and <mask> is Theophanes Chronographia, which was tainted by Theophanes hatred of both men. Although many historians believe that both Nikephoros I and <mask> have been falsely portrayed as malevolent, few other sources exist for their reign. Most other sources take the form of short references, which provide little insight, and include many errors, especially the Syriac Chronicle of 813. Because of the brevity of <mask> reign, and the weakness and bias of the sources, much of his life is unknown. <mask> reigned only two months and eight days, and was therefore unable to leave a mark on the empire as his father had done. Hints from the Chronographia suggest that Staurakios wielded strategic understanding, and perhaps that <mask> was as strong-willed as his father, but his character is otherwise unknown. Both Nikephoros and <mask> were generally successful in maintaining the borders of the Byzantine Empire, although they did not achieve much military success, occasionally being forced to make humiliating concessions to powerful enemies, such as the Abbasid caliph Harun al-Rashid.References

Citations

Bibliography

Primary sources

Peter of Alexandria's A Brief Survey of Years

External links

8th-century births
812 deaths
810s in the Byzantine Empire
9th-century Byzantine emperors
Nikephorian dynasty
Christian monks
Year of birth unknown
Byzantine people of Arab descent
Sons of Byzantine emperors

masks: Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios Staurakios


title: Michael Leavitt (artist)

texts:
<mask> (born November 4, 1977) is an American visual artist based near Seattle, Washington responsible for a variety of pop art, fine art, design and satirical works in various media. Leavitt's sculptures are one of a kind one-off's though some of his design projects are prototypes reproduced in limited or quantities. With his HiPop Project under the name Intuition Kitchen Productions Leavitt "blends art, design and social commentary". Well known for his handmade statues of cultural icons, his more recent work includes a series of action figures reproduced by the Brooklyn, NY toy company FCTRY inspired by Leavitt's political persuasions as an 11th-generation American descendant of <mask> (1608-1691). Background

Growing up in the Pacific Northwest, Leavitt was influenced by the wood-craft and engineering of Native American, Scandinavian, and industrial craft in the region. His parents practiced education, graphic design and environmentalism, formulating Leavitt's early interests in both art and sociology. As a child he taught himself to build miniature hydroplanes in balsa wood."My mom had some drawing skills, she started as a graphic designer at Boeing," Leavitt says, "I would have her draw my action figures, and I would watch her draw." He attended The Pratt Institute in New York in 1996–97, and completed a self-designed Bachelor of Arts at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, WA in 2001. "Leavitt began crafting a motley variety of apartment friendly, popcult-themed art after dropping out of Pratt to avoid working for whoever passes for 'The Man' in the art world." (Thrillist.com) From 1998 to 2004 Leavitt executed a series of conceptual art pieces like "Push Button Performer" (2001–2004) with cabaret-style audience confrontations in public. In the same period Leavitt's studio became known as The Intuition Kitchen ArtShop in Seattle, evolving as a self-produced gallery space. His 'ArtShop' sold his trading cards and first hand-made action figures. It closed in 2004 as Leavitt showed his work in retail galleries.Since then Leavitt has continued his professional career and community activism. 1999-2008 "Portable Homeless Shelters"

Just prior to the 1999 Seattle WTO protests, Leavitt built three small, wheeled housing units to be used by tent cities for the homeless. The first two units, made from salvaged pallet wood and recycled materials, served Seattle area tent cities for 3 years to follow. "As the homeless faced the threat of street sweeps during WTO, Leavitt's creations were used as a 'honeymoon  for one couple, and as a headquarters for the Seattle Housing and Resource Effort (SHARE). Log cabins for the homeless? It is an odd invention indeed. But it may also be a solutions of sorts for homelessness in Seattle."(Real Change) To improve on his first designs, Leavitt built a third unit in 2001 using vinyl siding scraps salvaged from construction debris. Though designed as a domestic dwelling, the unit was used for 7 years as secure storage and nighttime security posts in the tent cities until it was dismantled in 2008. 2001-15 Trading Cards

With his "ArtCards" from 2001 to 2003 Leavitt painted small portraits of famous and lesser-known artists, re-printed like traditional baseball cards. "I had so many ideas- too many ideas- the opposite of writer's block" says Leavitt, "I started doing trading cards of work I had already done, ideas for things I hadn't built, and famous people... my influences, who inspired me." "ArtCard" subjects were drawn from varied genre, similar to his successive "Art Army" action figures. As described by Leavitt, the trading cards were the direct precursor to the 'action figures': "the trading cards... were like singular figures in action. Why not 3-D?Why not an action figure, a toy?" Printed and sold in limited editions, packaged in wrappers with bubble gum, "Art Cards" were also exhibited as art objects. Leavitt said, "It's a way I created to compare people and what they do across all kinds of different areas." "Many mass-produced trading cards are based on original pieces that are shrunken down to fit the space. 'I take great pride that that is the size I drew them,' Leavitt says. 'It's one of the challenges I like- it's like a game, to create art that small and make it work.'" (The Artist's Magazine)

Seattle-based independent media advocacy group Reclaim the Media collaborated with <mask> in 2008 to produce a set of "Media Heroes" trading cards.From 2009 to 2015 the Topps Trading Card company hired Leavitt to produce illustrations for their Star Wars sketch cards . 2002-19 Action Figures

Starting in 2002, Leavitt's "Art Army" series is considered fine art, though these sculptures are also described as action figures. "These are art toys with a capital 'A'." (Jason Atomic, PIMP Magazine) Leavitt is "interested mainly in the figure as sculpture, and less as a pure platform." (Dot Dot Dash, Die Gestalten Verlag) The "toy" definition describes the figures' engineering. Leavitt says, " 'action figures' are OURS, (they are) particular to the early '80's boom in mainstream toy business that predated the anti-social video game boom' and I like the connotations of the words 'action' and 'figure'- movement and motion, and figurative realism." The mixed media and wood figures range from 6 cm to 1 meter tall with moving body parts and accessories."More of a good-natured joke than a stern commentary on the commodification of art" (David Stoesz, Seattle Weekly), Leavitt's biographic series depicts subjects in an array of genres though most often contemporary visual artists. Leavitt "perceives the potential for his figures to act as bridges between pop culture and art history." (Dot Dot Dash, Die Gestalten Verlag) In over 400 different figures subjects include Jeff Koons, Ai WeiWei, Kara Walker, Cindy Sherman, Takashi Murakami, Frida Kahlo, David Byrne, Björk and Tupac Shakur. "The tributes to Leavitt's heroes will do nothing more than put a big dopy grin on your face." (Seattle Magazine)

"When it comes to art icons, <mask>tt has a deep set of beliefs about who deserves a reserved parking space in the annals of history." (Juxtapoz Magazine) Leavitt has said, "I wanted to pay respect to people's work I love, and give them a little taste of their own medicine" exploring the concept of an artist's body being consumed by their work. The 'enemy' of the "Art Army", "The Man", included Martha Stewart, Britney Spears and the John Tesh, <mask>, Kenny G "3-Headed Monster"."The project is clearly aligned against the forces of imperialism and cultural suckiness, but Leavitt makes his points with a light touch, being too high-spirited and incorrigibly silly to get bogged down in another dreary leftist critique." (David Stoesz, Seattle Weekly) "Leavitt succeeds in art’s most important function — to not only help us recognize and articulate our values, but participate in a dialog that validates them as well. At its best, art connects our best selves with each other, and he has done that... I’m grateful to artists who address the subject of 'What is it about fighting and glorifying fighting and power, anyway?' in a way that gets our minds thinking and lips moving." (Polymer Clay Daily)

Collaborating on various action figure projects, the toy company FCTRY  manufactured Leavitt's first mass-produced "Art Army" figure portraying the urban artist Banksy in 2013. Leavitt also created prototypes for Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump dolls and Bernie Sanders action figures for the same toy company in 2015 and 2016. Leavitt and FCTRY have since continued their collaboration with the production of Elizabeth Warren, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Robert Mueller and other action figures.Collaborating on different political projects, FCTRY also worked with the activist and former tennis champion Billie Jean King to formally licensed her action figure in 2019. Leavitt has created more political satire including his sculpture of Barack Obama in a Keanu Reeves/"Matrix" style robe. With a large wood cross and tentacles made of stars and stripes, the 2008 commentary was designed to counter-act negative stereotypes of the candidate during his first Presidential campaign. In 2013 Leavitt sculpted a satirical portrait of Donald Trump. The one-off piece was part of Leavitt's "Empire Peaks" series. It depicted the reality TV star as the Star Wars character Darth Vader. 2006-14 Cardboard Sculpture

"Mike Leavitt is a singularly talented Seattle artist.He makes all kinds of art, from action figures to reproductions of iconic shoes. Mike has lovingly recreated them down to the exact detail. But there is one significant difference. Although you would never know it to look at the photo, these shoes are made with cardboard. Mike Leavitt is the inventor of the cardboard shoe... a bit of a trickster, and certainly curious. "(CBC Radio)

"If only there were a way to retain a pristine version of the shoe, and save the planet from excess shoe box waste. Enter <mask> and his recycled-cardboard kicks."(Paste Magazine) In Leavitt's ongoing series of cardboard shoes and "Hip Hopjects", to-scale editions of cultural ephemera are made with recycled materials. "Though best known for his cardboard sneakers, the rest of artist Mike Leavitt’s work is just as jaw-dropping" (blog.UrbanOutfitters.com). Items such as a "ghetto blaster", baseball hat, and soccer ball have been rendered in actual scale and size with reconstituted cardboard and brown paper bag. "Give him some recycled cardboard, paper bag, along with some glue and acrylic paint, and artist Mike Leavitt could create just about anything" (JoshSpear.com)

The "Corrugated Kix" series of cardboard shoes includes "an abundance of painstakingly detailed classic kick replicas". (Hi Fructose) "Leavitt works his creative magic on a number of classic silhouettes, including the

masks:
Mike Leavitt
John Leavitt
Leavitt
Michael Leavi
Michael Bolton
Mike Leavitt


title: Michael Leavitt (artist)

texts:
 Air Jordan 1, Air Jordan 4, Vans Slip-On, and Converse Chuck Taylor. <mask> does an incredible job of recreating the colors and logos of these classics. "(NiceKicks.com) The shoes are "to not carry of course, but to admire as an art object."(nu.nl/lifestyle) "By creating cardboard sculptures of some of the most popular models in footwear he is essentially riding the commercial train and exercising his meticulous craft of making these wearable cardboard replicas... the demographic that would buy these may not usually buy a piece of art but they would buy this and call it Art." (Cyanatrendland.com)

Leavitt says, "I might dabble in satire of other essentials in a bad economy: eye glasses, winter coats, food items… but shoes are so intimately linked to our visual culture. They’re a necessity that we still get to have fun buying and wearing. I’ve always believed that fine art, high quality craft, and meaningful objects can be affordable. Galleries, museums and artists can find plenty of room for a different, affordable, more commercially sustainable kind of art-for-art’s-sake… that fits in both the museum and living room." (Seattlemet.com) Leavitt continues, "it's ironic to use a cheap disposable material like cardboard. Cheap, disposable material makes an expensive product, oddly resembling the manufacturing of boutique footwear.The simple image of the cardboard shoe speaks humorously and clearly on consumerism." (Suite101.com)

2006-12 Wedding Cake Toppers

Leavitt is also hired for his small-scale figurative work to make personalized wedding cake toppers that uniquely depict the bride and groom. "(Leavitt's) custom work is just a little bit different than most. He makes action figures, and what is more action packed than a wedding? With a few simple design modifications, Mike turned his action figure style into one of a kind cake toppers." (Handcrafted.com) Showing famous celebrity couples of modern history and same-sex marriage in gallery exhibitions, "the cake toppers are playful with a message... a look at love in the spotlight." (The Desert Sun)

2007-13 "Pitchfork Pals"

In a series entitled "Pitchfork Pals" Leavitt collaborated with the Seattle artist and iconoclast Charles Krafft.Leavitt sculpted busts of controversial icons for the project. Charles Krafft was responsible for producing the pottery by hand. Krafft is a ceramicist known for his non-traditional, kitsch-like objects. Included in the series were figures such as Kim Jong Il and Charles Manson depicted as tea pots and the British nostalgia collectibles known as Toby mugs. "They’re teapots, which is clever if not representative of each character pouring malevolence into the culture that surrounds them. "(Jailbreak Collective)

On using the Kim Jong Il tea pot, one humorist conjectured, "when drinking tea from this miserable looking device, you have to avert your eyes and be eternally grateful for such a delicious brew. If you don’t, you might ‘go missing’."(Mof Gimmers)

2013-14 "Empire Peaks"

In 2013 Leavitt created a series of articulated wooden statues lampooning pop culture icons. Leavitt's one-off hand-sculpted wood and clay "mash ups" featured celebrities, politicians, humanitarians and other famous non-fictional personalities crossed with fictional and infamous sci-fi characters. With "Empire Peaks", Leavitt is "juxtaposing the classic archetypal roles found in Yoda, Luke Skywalker, Darth Vader, and the rest of the famed cast with pop-culture personas." (Laughing Squid) "By turning well known figures such as Kim Jong Il, Che Guevara, Charles Darwin, Albert Einstein, Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, Barack Obama, <mask> and Steve Jobs into consumer products based on the popular franchise, Leavitt hopes to explore such themes as idol worship, our coveting of mass-produced collectibles and our societies need for heroes, rebels, villains and tyrants." (Trendhunter) According to the Houston Chronicle, Leavitt went "viral with his spaced-out rendition of public figures as Star Wars characters" "'Empire Peaks' is a phenomenal, Star Wars meets pop culture, collection of hand-carved action figures." (Church Mag) "Every single work in the exhibit is a stroke of genius." (Zimbio)

"Like many kids who were raised in the late '70s and early '80s, the characters of Star Wars exist in a place in Leavitt's mind that is usually reserved for real-life figures," says Fast Company Magazine, "It is this mental distinction between beloved fictional characters who feel real and real-life people who feel fictional that Leavitt explores in his latest project, Empire Peaks."2016 "King Cuts"

Leavitt created a series of wood sculptures devoted to famous film directors in 2016. "Tim Burton, Alfred Hitchcock and George Lucas have all been treated to one of Mike's makeovers, which involves merging stars from behind the silver screen with their most iconic on-screen characters" (Creative Boom) Leavitt carved the 1/4 scale, 18 inch sculptures in wood and finished the carvings with acrylic paint. "King Cuts" furthered the central themes in Leavitt's art of exposing taste-makers behind the scenes, and work consuming a creator's body. "The lives of many great film directors are undoubtedly consumed by their work, intertwined with the stories, characters and settings they seek to convey." Leavitt said, "I’m good at sculpting the likeness of a face, so it gets interesting when it’s a face maybe you wouldn’t recognize off the bat, but you know who it is. You know that person’s work. It’s the face behind the mask, the person behind the camera, the wizard behind the curtain."Critical response

Entertainment Weekly pokes fun at a piece depicting the television and film director Joss Whedon saying, "The sculptor and painter definitely got his hair and beard right, and the real Whedon also has seemingly greenish eyes — though they’re perhaps less demonic than these radioactive emeralds. Is he about to Hulk out or something?" (Entertainment Weekly )

Leavitt's Jeremy Lin sculpture created in 2012 is a source of controversy. Larry Hama, creator of the G.I. Joe action figure series says, "I don’t think this is offensive or anything, but it’s a bit of a stretch for a bad joke that’s just this side of a non-sequiter. And who in their right mind would pay that price for something that misses the mark?" (Animalnewyork.com ).Another critic adds, "While I love the fact that someone was inspired to make a Jeremy Lin action figure... did it really have to look this dopey? There's really no need to ninja-fy him." (Angryasianman.com )

Other critiques attempt to categorize Leavitt's work. "It is difficult to define what exactly Leavitt does. His extreme boredom for 'normal' art has resulted in a number of nonpareil projects displayed around the world." (Suite101.com) "His versatility as almost a modern day renaissance man" causes Leavitt's subject matter to range between politics, anthropology, and modern commerce. "Like the objects that they celebrate, Leavitt’s lightweight replicas sit on the border between culture and commerce."(Wired Magazine) "We've previously seen his ceramic teapots made to resemble notorious murderers and landscapes painted on pennies. Is there a medium that Mike Leavitt won't try?" (Neatorama)

"Leavitt hasn't always worked to solve social problems, though his artwork has always had a social angle. His interest in the individual's relationship with his or her environmental space... has long been the basis for his art. "(Real Change) Leavitt says, "The challenge is designing an object that people want, while making it about something they don't want to hear about." "... there is hope, there are a few braves who can help us try to understand this every day reality, <mask>tt is one of those. His ability to create and re-create unique pieces of work has helped modern art to be less chaotic, less elitist, and more affordable for the common people.Leavitt art is extremely fun, action driven, colorful and very dynamic. You feel you are in the game, it’s easy to become part of the experience." (Atrocidades.net)

"<mask>tt still keeps the habit of running with his dog and playing basketball everyday- even while working of his solo exhibitions in New York. His work based on well known figures in art and politics is a contrast to his simple personal life." (Obscura Magazine) "Leavitt has a raw talent for capturing prominent artists, musicians and entertainers in their elements and characterizing them into brilliant sculptures." (KidRobot)

"Artist <mask>tt continues his assault on the wider art world in the nerdiest way possible... there is no secret to the artist's fervor." (The Huffington Post) "The bravest move in art's to rebel against classical training to follow a low-culture muse- as with Marcel Duchamp's urinal...Turning a bold 'screw it' into sweet art for you, Mike Leavitt" (Thrillist.com)

"The hardest working man in the art world, Leavitt alters the everyday objects among us with his blazing technical skill and wit. "(CapativeWildWoman.com) "From my interactions with Mike, I know the artist to have 'the opposite of writer’s block' and to be constantly producing work and improving his craft. Mike Leavitt will probably create something in the time it takes you to read this." (Jeremy Brautman) Leavitt says, "I’m kind of conceptual art, but I’m not that heady. "(Port Townsend Leader) "Leavitt is a unique breed of artist. His work and execution (in both concept and finished product) are too impressive and relevant not to be considered on par with some of the most popular contemporary visual artists working today. "(Jailbreak Collective)

References

External links
Mike Leavitt official artist site
Leavitt YouTube channel

1977 births
Living people
American pop artists
American conceptual artists
Artists from Seattle
Evergreen State College alumni
Sculptors from Washington

masks:
Michael
Michael Jackson
Michael Leavi
Michael Leavi
Michael Leavi


title: Ariel Dorfman

texts:
<mask> (born May 6, 1942) is an Argentine-Chilean-American novelist, playwright, essayist, academic, and human rights activist. A citizen of the United States since 2004, he has been  a professor of literature and Latin American Studies at Duke University, in Durham, North Carolina,  since 1985. Background and education
<mask> was born in Buenos Aires on May 6, 1942, the son of Adolf Dorfman, who was born in Odessa (then Russian Empire) to a well-to-do Jewish family, and became a prominent Argentine professor of economics and the author of Historia de la Industria Argentina, and Fanny Zelicovich Dorfman, who was born in Kishinev of Bessarabian Jewish descent. Shortly after his birth, they moved to the United States and then, in 1954, moved to Chile. He attended and later worked as a professor at the University of Chile, marrying Angélica Malinarich in 1966 and becoming a Chilean citizen in 1967. From 1968 to 1969, he attended graduate school at the University of California at Berkeley and then returned to Chile. Since the restoration of democracy in Chile, in 1990, he and his wife Angélica have divided their time between Santiago and the United States.Career
From 1970 to 1973, Dorfman served as a cultural adviser to President Salvador Allende. During this time he wrote, with Armand Mattelart, a critique of North American cultural imperialism, How to Read Donald Duck. Dorfman was supposed to work on the night shift at the La Moneda presidential palace the night before the Pinochet coup, but he had swapped his shift with his friend Claudio Jimeno, not knowing what was to come. Forced to leave Chile in 1973, after the coup by General Augusto Pinochet leading to Allende's suicide at the Presidential Palace on 11 September 1973, Dorfman went on to live in Paris, Amsterdam, and Washington, D.C. Since 1985 he has taught at Duke University, where he is currently Walter Hines Page Research Professor of Literature and Professor of Latin American Studies. Dorfman was a member of the Group of 88, a group of signatories of a controversial advertisement in The Chronicle, Duke's student newspaper during the Duke lacrosse case. Dorfman details his life of exile and bi-cultural living in his memoir, Heading South, Looking North, which has been acclaimed by Elie Wiesel, Nadine Gordimer, Thomas Keneally and others.In 2020 he wrote in the Los Angeles Times: “Fifty years ago today, on the night of Sept. 4, 1970, I was dancing, along with a multitude of others, in the streets of Santiago de Chile. We were celebrating the election of Salvador Allende, the first democratically elected socialist leader in the world. President Allende’s victory had historical significance beyond Chile. Before then, political revolutions had been violent, imposed by force of arms. Allende and his left-wing coalition used peaceful means, proclaiming it unnecessary to repress one’s adversaries to achieve social justice. Radical change could happen within the confines and promises of a democracy. I have often fantasized about how different the world would be if Allende had not been overthrown, three years later, in a bloody coup.I wonder where humanity would be if his peaceful revolution had been allowed to run its course and become a template for other countries.”

Literary work

Dorfman's work often deals with the horrors of tyranny and, in later works, the trials of exile. In an interview in BOMB Magazine, Dorfman said, "I'm constantly trying to figure out how you can be true to an experience which in fact very few people in the world would understand, such as having most of your friends disappear or be tortured, and at the same time finding a way of telling that story so other people in other places can read their own lives into that." His most famous play, Death and the Maiden, describes the encounter of a former torture victim with the man she believed tortured her; it was made into a film in 1994 by Roman Polanski starring Sigourney Weaver and Ben Kingsley. Dorfman identified "the stark, painful Chilean transition to democracy" as Death and the Maiden'''s central theme. The play received a 20th anniversary revival in the 2011–2012 season at the Harold Pinter Theatre in London's West End, directed by Jeremy Herrin and starring Thandie Newton, Tom Goodman-Hill, and Anthony Calf. The story was adapted in 2020 into a second English-language film, The Secrets We Keep, directed by Yuval Adler, screenplay by Adler and Ryan Covington, and starring Noomi Rapace, Joel Kinnaman, and Chris Messina. His thesis on the absurd in plays of Harold Pinter was published in Spanish as El absurdo entre cuatro paredes: el teatro de Harold Pinter (The absurd within four walls: the theater of Harold Pinter) by Editorial Universitaria, in Santiago, Chile, in 1968 (124 pages).Pinter later became a personal friend as well as an influence on Dorfman's work and political thinking. A critic of Pinochet, he has written extensively about the General's extradition case for the Spanish newspaper El País and other publications, and in the book Exorcising Terror: The Incredible Unending Trial of Gen. Augusto Pinochet. Rather than distinguishing between politics and art, Dorfman believes "that one’s writing is deeply political," and, at its best, "engages the major dilemmas...of the community." Dorfman's works have been translated into more than 40 languages and performed in over 100 countries. Besides poetry, essays and novels— Hard Rain, winner of the Sudamericana Award; Widows; The Last Song of Manuel Sendero; Mascara; Konfidenz; The Nanny and the Iceberg, and Blake's Therapy—he has written short stories, including My House Is on Fire, and general nonfiction including The Empire’s Old Clothes: What the Lone Ranger, Babar, and Other Innocent Heroes Do to Our Minds. He has won various international awards, including two Kennedy Center Theater Awards. In 1996, with his son, Rodrigo, he received an award for best television drama in Britain for Prisoners in Time.His poems, collected in Last Waltz in Santiago and In Case of Fire in a Foreign Land, have been turned into a half-hour fictional film, Deadline, featuring the voices of Emma Thompson, Bono, Harold Pinter, and others. Dorfman's human rights play, Speak Truth to Power: Voices from Beyond the Dark (based on interviews with human rights defenders conducted by Kerry Kennedy Cuomo), premiered at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., in 2000, and subsequently aired on PBS as part of its Great Performances series. The play starred Kevin Kline, Sigourney Weaver, Alec Baldwin, and John Malkovich, among others, and was directed by Greg Mosher. It has gone on to numerous performances around the world, including a run in New York City. On May 3, 2010, a "Speak Truth to Power" benefit for survivors of the 2010 Chilean earthquake was put on by New York's Public Theater, directed by David Esbjornson, and featuring an all-star cast of Elias Koteas, Marcia Gay Harden, Alfred Molina, Julianne Moore, Viggo Mortensen, Gloria Reuben, Paul Sorvino, Meryl Streep, Stanley Tucci, and Debra Winger. Dorfman's play The Other Side had its world premiere at the New National Theatre in Tokyo in 2004 and opened off-Broadway at the Manhattan Theater Club in 2005. Other recent plays include Purgatorio at the Seattle Rep in 2005 and at the Arcola Theatre in London in 2008; Picasso’s Closet, a counterfactual history in which the Nazis murder Picasso, had its premiere at Theater J in Washington, D.C. in 2006.He is also the subject of a feature-length documentary, A Promise to the Dead: The Exile Journey of <mask>man, based on his memoir Heading South, Looking North and directed by Peter Raymont. The film had its world premiere at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival on September 8, 2007. In November 2007, the film was named by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences as one of 15 films on its documentary feature Oscar shortlist. The list was narrowed to five films on January 22, 2008, and A Promise to the Dead was not among the five Oscar-nominated documentaries. His latest works include the Lowell Thomas Award-winning travel book, Desert Memories; a collection of essays, Other Septembers, Many Americas; a novel he wrote with his youngest son, Joaquín, Burning City; Americanos: Los Pasos de Murieta; and a new volume of memoirs, Feeding on Dreams: Confessions of an Unrepentant Exile. In 2007, his musical, Dancing Shadows, opened in Seoul, Korea. This collaboration with Eric Woolfson, the principal composer for the Alan Parsons Project, won five Korean “Tony” awards.In 2011, his play "Purgatorio" has its Spanish language premiere at the Teatro Español in Madrid, starring Viggo Mortensen and Carme Elias. Dorfman currently has several film projects in development with his sons, Rodrigo and Joaquin Dorfman, including a screen adaptation of his novel, Blake’s Therapy. Dorfman also writes regularly for such publications as The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, The Guardian (where he has a featured blog), Le Monde and L'Unità. He is a member of L'Académie Universelle des Cultures, in Paris, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Selected booksEl absurdo entre cuatro paredes: el teatro de Harold Pinter. Santiago, Chile: Editorial Universitaria, 1968.How to Read Donald Duck: Imperialist Ideology in the Disney Comic (Para leer al Pato Donald, 1971), with Armand Mattelart; tr. David Kunzle.London: International General, 1975 The Rabbits’ Rebellion (La rebelión de los conejos mágicos, 1986), 2001Hard Rain (Moros en la costa, 1973), tr. George Shivers & Dorfman. Columbia (LA): Readers International, 1990Widows (Viudas, 1981), tr. Stephen Kessler. New York: Pantheon Books, 1983 The Last Song of Manuel Sendero, (La última canción de Manuel Sendero, 1982), tr. George R. Shivers & Dorfamn. New York: Viking, 1987 0140088962The Empire's Old Clothes.What the Lone Ranger, Babar, the Reader's Digest, and other false friends do to our minds, Pantheon Books, New York, 1983 (2nd edition 2010) (Patos, elefantes y héroes: La infancia como subdesarrollo, 1985)Last Waltz in Santiago and other poems of exile and disappearance (Pastel de choclo, 1986), tr. Edith Grossman & Dorfamn, New York: Viking, 1988Mascara (Máscaras, 1988), New York: Viking, 1988My House Is On Fire, short stories, tr. Seven Stories Press, 2004Desert Memories: Journeys through the Chilean North.

masks:
Vladimiro Ariel Dorfman
Dorfman
Ariel Dorf


title: Joseph P. Kamp

texts:
<mask><mask> (1900–1993) was an American political activist from New York who ran the Constitutional Educational League and was jailed in 1950, for contempt of Congress. Background

<mask> was born on May 3, 1900, in Yonkers, New York. His parents were German-born <mask>, tailor, and <mask>. He attended grammar school in Yonkers and spent a few months at Fordham Prep. Career

<mask> started his career by working in a law office, followed by work at a newspaper. In 1921, he worked in construction, at which time he first encountered and joined the Constitutional Educational League. By 1925, he had become a public speaker for the League.In 1934, <mask> became executive editor for The Awakener, founded in 1934 by Harold Lord Varney (manager of the Italian Historical Society, which shared offices with the Constitutional Educational League), with fellow editors Lawrence Dennis and Milford W. Howard. The Awakener folded in 1936. <mask> sent a manuscript to the League, which published in asa Join the C.I.O. and Help Build a Soviet America. In 1947, he joined the League's staff as executive vice chairman. In 1942 and 1943, two federal grand juries issues indictments against people and organizations conspiring against US involvement in World War II; the League appeared both times. During the 1944 presidential campaign, the Constitutional Educational League published a brochure, Vote CIO and Get A Soviet America.A federal grand jury, investigating 1944 campaign expenditures, sought to find out who the League's financial backers, as requested by a congressional subpoena; <mask> refused to answer. In December 1944, <mask> found himself indicted for Contempt of Congress. Starting June 16, 1950, <mask> was jailed for four months for refusing back in 1944 to answer questions regarding campaign activities, asked by the House Campaign Expenditures Committee. (He was also "in trouble" with the House Lobby Investigating committee for refusing to share his organization's records.) The United States Supreme Court refused to hear his appeal earlier in 1950. <mask> was tried another time for congressional defiance in 1952, when he failed to produce records for the House Lobby Investigating Committee. This time, Kamp was acquitted of the charge, as the House Committee failed to orderly disclose why Kamp was in default.Others who also defied Congress over similar issues include:  Edward A. Rumely of the Committee for Constitutional Government and Merwin K. Hart of the National Economic Council, Inc.

Kamp was acquitted of a second contempt charge in relationship with the lobbying activities of the Constitutional Educational League, an anti-communist organization. Kamp also served as a policy advisor to the Liberty Lobby. Personal life

Kamp was a great-uncle of actor Jon Voight through his mother, making him the great great uncle of actress Angelina Jolie. Kamp was associated with Alfred Kohlberg, Merwin K. Hart, Edward A. Rumely, J.B. Matthews, and William F. Buckley Jr. He also associated with Elizabeth Dilling, author of The Red Network—A Who's Who and Handbook of Radicalism for Patriots (1934). Gerald L. K. Smith (1898–1976) far-right clergyman and leader of the Christian Nationalist Crusade called Kamp a "well-informed and fearless patriot." Works
Pamphlets
Kamp seems to have penned all pamphlets published by the Constitutional Educational League:
 Hell of Herrin Rages Again (1937)
 Join the C.I.O.and Help Build a Soviet America (1937)
 Stop Lewis and Smash Communism! Program of the Constitutional Educational League (1939)
 Fifth Column in Washington! (1940)
 Fifth Column in the South (1940)
 Fifth Column vs. the Dies Committee (1941)
 The Fifth Column Stops Defense (1941)
 How to Win the War and Lose What We're Fighting For! (1942)
 Native Nazi Purge Plot (1942)
 Famine in America (1943)
 The Class War on the Home Front (1943)
 With Lotions of Love... (1944)
 Vote CIO and Get a Soviet America (1944)
 Hell with G. I. Joe! (1944)
 Audacious Aubrey Williams and the Sly Strategy of Senator Smear (1945)
 Anything But the Truth: The Story of the Man who Lied to Congress (1945)
 How to be an American, to Organize for America, to Fight Un-Americanism (1946)
 Communist Carpetbaggers in Operation Dixie (1946)
 The Fay Case (1946)
 Strikes and the Communists Behind Them (1947)
 Open Letter to Congress. Gentlemen:  Are You Mice or Men? An Underworld Secret-Police Terror Menaces America (1948)
 Behind the Lace Curtains of the YWCA (1948)
 Hitler Was a Liberal (1949)
 America Betrayed:  The Tragic Consequences of Reds on the Government Payroll!(1950)
 It Isn't Safe to be an American (1950)
 We Must Abolish the United States:  The Hidden Facts Behind the Crusade for World Government (1950)
 Was Jesus Christ a Jew? (undated)
Maps
 Join the C.I.O. and help build a Soviet America: a factual narrative (1937)
 The Fifth Column Menaces America on a Thousand Fronts (1941)
Pamphlets by other authors
 <mask>: Hero of the Pro-Fascists (Friends of Democracy)

See also

 Alfred Kohlberg of the John Birch Society
 Edward A. Rumely of the Committee for Constitutional Government
 Merwin K. Hart of the National Economic Council, Inc. The Awakener''

References

External links
FBI files
<mask>'s FBI files obtained through the FOIA and hosted at the Internet Archive

FBI headquarters files part 1
FBI headquarters files part 2
FBI headquarters files part 3
FBI headquarters files part 4
FBI headquarters files part 5
FBI headquarters files part 6
FBI headquarters files part 7
FBI headquarters files part 8
FBI headquarters files part 9
FBI headquarters files part 10
FBI headquarters files part 11
FBI headquarters files part 12
FBI headquarters files part 13
FBI headquarters files part 14
FBI headquarters files part 15
FBI headquarters files part 16
FBI headquarters files part 17
FBI headquarters files part 18

Other documents
 La Museum of the Holocaust:  RG-75.01.28, The Fifth Column in Washington. By <mask><mask>. June 1940

American activists
1900 births
1993 deaths
Old Right (United States)

masks:
Joseph P
. Kamp
Joseph Peter Kamp
Joseph Kamp
Margaret Franz Kamp
Kamp
Kamp
Kamp
Kamp
Kamp
Kamp
Kamp
Joe Kamp
Joseph Kamp
Joseph P
. Kamp


title: Diana Johnson

texts:
<mask>  (born 25 July 1966) is a British Labour Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Kingston upon Hull North since the 2005 general election. <mask> was elected as Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee on 15 December 2021, replacing Yvette Cooper. During the Brown ministry, she served as Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Schools in the Department for Children, Schools and Families, as well as being an Assistant Government Whip. Early life
<mask> was born in Northwich, Cheshire. After returning from wartime service in the Navy her father, <mask>, founded the Eric Johnson Electrical engineering (electricians) company in Little Leigh near Northwich, Cheshire (now continued by his son). She passed the Eleven plus and attended the Northwich County Grammar School for Girls (later the County High School Leftwich). At sixth form level she studied at Sir John Deane's College from 1982 to 1984 where she studied History, English and Economics.She gained an LLB in Law from Brunel University. She became a barrister in 1991. From 1999 to 2005, she was a Barrister in Law at Paddington Law Centre. <mask> was a councillor in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets from 1994 to 2002, serving as Chair of Social services. She became a member of the London Assembly on 1 March 2003 after the resignation of Trevor Phillips who became chair of the Commission for Racial Equality, having been next on the list of London-wide members at the 2000 election. She did not stand for re-election in 2004. Parliamentary career
She stood unsuccessfully in Brentwood and Ongar at the 2001 general election.At the May 2005 general election, she was elected Labour Member of Parliament for the Kingston upon Hull North constituency, succeeding veteran Labour MP Kevin McNamara. She is Hull's first female MP. In November 2005 <mask> was appointed as a Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of State for Pensions Reform, Stephen Timms. In 2007 she left this role to become an assistant Government Whip. She took on the additional role of Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Schools in the reshuffle of June 2009. During the scandal of MPs' expenses it was revealed that <mask> had claimed £987 in architects fees for her second home, which she voluntarily repaid, and had a £563 claim for crockery rejected as "excessive"

In the 2010 general election <mask> polled 39.2% of the vote and held onto the Hull North constituency for Labour with her majority reduced to 641 votes. In 2014, <mask> proposed a Bill under the Ten Minute Rule that would require sex and relationships education, including discussions around issues such as consent, to be made a compulsory part of the National Curriculum

<mask> was appointed in September 2015 by Jeremy Corbyn, shortly after he became Labour party leader, as a shadow minister in the Foreign and Commonwealth team.In late June 2016, along with colleagues, she resigned as a shadow minister, unhappy at Corbyn's leadership following the 'leave' vote in the European membership referendum. She supported Owen Smith in the 2016 Labour Party leadership election. She is co-chair of the APPG on Haemophilia and Contaminated Blood, campaigned on the Contaminated Blood Scandal and, in November 2018, received the Political Studies Association's 'Backbencher of the Year' award in recognition of her efforts. In September 2019, <mask> became the first Labour MP to face a full reselection process by her local party after members voted that she should face a challenge. On 25 October 2019, <mask>'s local party voted by 292 votes to 101 to reselect her as the candidate for the next election. She was re-elected in the 2019 general election. Political positions

Prostitution
On 9 December 2020, <mask> introduced a Ten Minute Rule bill that would introduce the Nordic model approach to prostitution, which would criminalise those paying for sex and criminalise websites which advertise prostitution.The bill was strongly criticised and opposed by sex workers including the English Collective of Prostitutes group, women's rights organisations, trade unions, Amnesty International and thousands of individuals, who argued that this legislation would push the industry underground and put sex workers in danger. Israel
In September 2020, <mask> was appointed a vice-chair of Labour Friends of Israel. In November 2021, <mask> in the Jewish News wrote an article supporting a speech by Keir Starmer that opposed the BDS of Israel. She said "Rejecting anti-Zionist antisemitism means opposing the BDS movement which demonises and delegitimises Israel, singling it out for boycotts and sanctions." Abortion

In July 2021, <mask> proposed an amendment that would liberalise abortion in England and Wales. Proponents of the amendment suggested this would bring English and Welsh law in line with recent legislative changes in Northern Ireland. However, <mask> was strongly criticised for not clarifying whether this would allow for abortion up until birth.It has also been suggested by self described pro-life organisations that this would have removed the requirement for a doctor to be involved, allow for sex selective abortion and removed conscience protections for those medical professionals who object to abortion. <mask> was also criticised by 800 medical professionals in a letter that suggested such an amendment would remove legal safeguards for both the mother and child and pointed out that extensions to the 24 week limit were only supported by 1% of the UK population according to a recent Savanta ComRes poll. <mask> received no support in Parliament for the amendment and was also criticised by pro-choice politicians. <mask> declined to take the amendment to a vote. Brexit
<mask> supported the indicative Parliamentary votes on Brexit and her local paper Hull Live reported that she had been threatened along with fellow Hull MP Emma Hardy on social media with being “shot and hanged” for this position. Votes at 16
In 2017, <mask> co-sponsored a Bill in Parliament that would have granted 16-year-olds the right to vote in Parliamentary elections. Honours
<mask> was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the 2020 New Year Honours for charitable and political service, in part for her campaigning on contaminated blood transfusions.She was appointed to the Privy Council on 10 March 2021. References

External links
  <mask> MP's website official site
 The Labour Party - <mask> MP official biography

 Guardian Unlimited Politics - Ask Aristotle: <mask> MP
 BBC Politics

News items
 Selected for the seat in February 2004

1966 births
Living people
Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies
Female members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies
Labour Members of the London Assembly
Councillors in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets
Alumni of Brunel University London
People from Northwich
21st-century British women politicians
UK MPs 2005–2010
UK MPs 2010–2015
UK MPs 2015–2017
UK MPs 2017–2019
UK MPs 2019–present
Dames Commander of the Order of the British Empire
Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom
21st-century English women
21st-century English people
Women councillors in England

masks:
Dame Diana Ruth Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Eric Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Diana Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Johnson
Diana Johnson
Diana Johnson
Diana Johnson