It rested softly in her hands, aged and frail. “Do you want to open it now?” asked Angela. Her brother shook his head and looked toward the black cockatoos brutally pruning the eucalypts by the creek. The land sloped down from the house, overgrown shrubs crowding around what had once been an expanse of lawn. […]
Body polemics ala Turka
Singer and producer Bülent Ersoy, a male-to-female transsexual and a national icon, was harassed by Mustafa TopaloÄŸlu, a singer who often appears on weekend programes airing on religious-leaning channels. While at an anniversary party for the Association of Customs employees on Friday, December 8, TopaloÄŸlu claimed to the press that “Miss Bülent” was not showing […]
Alessandro Piangiamore
Galleria Paolo Bonzano – Rome November 16 – 20, 2006 For the occasion of his first solo gallery exhibition, Alessandro Piangiamore created his own wall text that announced the title of the show: Sfidando la verità con la gravità (Challenging truth through gravity). But rather than a conventional typeface neatly adhering to the wall, the […]
Taoist Beatles Propaganda
I have been following the Paul McCartney-Heather Mills breakup quite closely. (I recognize this is morally wrong, however.) Yesterday, Sir Paul locked her out of their London townhouse. When Heather’s bodyguard climbed to the second floor to enter the window, McCartney had him arrested. I was surprised to learn that Paul is now worth $1.5 […]
Tsotsi: A Humanist Revolution
This year’s Academy Award winner for Best Foreign Film , Tsotsi, marks a revolution for “third-world” filmmaking. It contradicts the usual standards to which such films are held. This memorable film, made and set in post-apartheid South Africa is proof of the growing accessibility of the film culture. Director Gavin Hood has produced a piece […]
Israel, take a break
Last week a gaggle of awkward political bed fellows turned up for the Kadima party’s first annual conference. With no clear manifesto on domestic issues, and no consensus on how to handle the countries many security quandaries, Kadima is symptomatic of the national disorientation that is prevalent in Israel today. Israel‘s political ‘big bang’ saw […]