With the New York Giants down 10-9 to the New England Patriots at halftime of Super Bowl XLVI last night, coach Tom Coughlin was, undoubtedly, giving the soon to be champs a “give ‘em hell” soliloquy. Still, last night’s most memorable pep talk came from an unlikely hero, Clint Eastwood.

During a night when Hollywood rolled out blockbuster trailers for big-budget films like “The Avengers” and “Battleship” and companies like Go Daddy and H&M used the ubiquitous and, dismally, unoriginal tried-and-true sex sell to pawn off the latest of whatever it is you don’t really need, Chrysler took an inspirational approach, with a compelling two-minute narrative created by Wieden+Kennedy of Portland, that may have left the night’s most lasting impression.

Nice to see a bit of poignancy as antidote slipped into the annual corporate fest of gluttony and excess. And yes, I’m perfectly aware that the cost of this creative brilliance could have fed the children of Indianapolis for a long time to come.

 

VIEW

 

 

Filed under: Entertainment, New & Notable Tagged: Chrysler, cint eastwood, halftime in America, superbowl 2012 ]]> http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/02/06/halftime-in-america/feed/ 1 Errant Aesthete Picture 3 http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/02/03/pink-no-more/ http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/02/03/pink-no-more/#comments Sat, 04 Feb 2012 00:37:52 +0000 Errant Aesthete http://theerrantaesthete.com/?p=31226 ]]>

 

It started like the disease it hopes to cure. Quiet. Innocuous. Just another news clip in the Associated Press. No one paying attention. No one really noticing — much like the whole issue of women’s heath care in this country. Within hours the disease was ravaging the internet, the media, the corridors of public opinion, spreading like cells of breast cancer that maim, disfigure, kill.

The fabled protector of women’s health across the country and around the world, one of the largest charities devoted to the mission of saving women’s lives, the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation, was, in one fatal diagnosis, fabled no more. Supporters of women’s health rights and proponents of Planned Parenthood everywhere were giving the Komen foundation pink slips of their own with Facebook protests, donations to Planned Parenthood, tweets of outrage and in true revolutionary fashion, good old reliable hacking into Komen’s website around midnight Thursday, with hackers writing, “Help us run over poor women on our way to the bank.” It would have made Susan B. Antony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton proud.

Three short days after the furor started, the Susan G. Komen for the Cure announced today it was abandoning plans to eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood. The dramatic retreat was stunning in the speed of its reversal. If only the passing of legislation were so swift. The New York Times in an editorial published yesterday labeled it “A Painful Betrayal,” saying that the Komen for the Cure foundation “had suffered a grievous, perhaps mortal, wound this week.”

The following is from Wikipedia:

“Critics point out that Komen’s new rules were created after the hiring of its new senior vice president for public policy Karen Handel, who stated during her unsuccessful 2010 Georgia gubernatorial campaign that “I do not support the mission of Planned Parenthood” and who pledged to eliminate funding for breast and cervical cancer screenings provided by Planned Parenthood.[55][56] Komen founder Nancy Brinker is a longtime GOP donor with strong Republican ties and served as ambassador to Hungary under George W. Bush, and the decision came shortly after Komen unveiled a new partnership with the policy-making arm of George W. Bush’s presidential library.[57] Following the decision, Komen’s director of community health programs resigned in protest over the grant cutoff.[58] On February 1, 2012 Komen board member John D. Raffaelli confirmed to the New York Times that the new rules were created specifically to defund Planned Parenthood.[59]“

It is disappointing that, after 30 years of honoring her sister’s memory with an effective, if inflexible, education campaign, Mrs. Brinker has chosen to lead it into bitter partisan politics. In one fell swoop she has performed a double mastectomy, that may or may not save the victim’s life.

The backlash, like the ubiquitous pink ribbons signifying the Komen logo, have been sweet:

Yesterday, I wrote a check for $1000.00 to the Susan G. Komen Foundation. And then in pink glitter pen, I wrote the word VOID across it, slipped it into a pink envelope, addressed it, and dropped it in the mailbox…

Talk about empowerment.

 

ADDED 2/4/12: “This is a watershed moment in the contemporary conversation about reproductive rights. This is a story in which we see the possibility of a turned tide, a new way to gauge how the public actually feels about women’s rights and health, and a new way to talk about it, as well. Because what we saw this week was big. … It was powerful. It was mass. It was direct. It was emotional. And it restores women as the moral center of this conversation — which is where they belong.”

“Susan G. Komen’s priceless gift“

 

 

Filed under: New & Notable, Political Theatre, Uncategorized Tagged: Planned Parenthood, politics, Susan G. Komen for the Cure ]]> http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/02/03/pink-no-more/feed/ 9 Errant Aesthete pink-ribbon http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/28/the-truthiness-of-political-theater/ http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/28/the-truthiness-of-political-theater/#comments Sat, 28 Jan 2012 23:17:36 +0000 Errant Aesthete http://eaesthete.wordpress.com/?p=31176 ]]>

 

Since the beginning of 2012, a mere twenty-eight days ago, justice, or more accurately, injustice has been the theme of the Errant Aesthete. Beginning with the ominous opening day greeting of the new year with the announcement that “you can now be detained — indefinitely” as a result of the new year’s eve signing into law of the National Defense Authorization Act, and the following call to action a few days later to occupy the courts in protest of the Supreme Court’s ‘United Citizens’ decision, the year, thus far, is spawning a tsunami of rage that seems destined to happen.

This morning’s news that Twitter is preparing to clip its own wings is just the latest in, yet, another assault waged against freedom:

“One year after the beginning of the Egyptian uprising that it helped make possible, Twitter began its descent down what media commentator Jeff Jarvis called the “slippery slope of censorship,” announcing that it would begin to locally censor tweets that governments find objectionable.”

While the renegade in all of us might want to rant, riot or ruffle the collective ennui, comedian and South Carolina’s foremost satirist, Stephen Colbert, of Comedy Central, tilted the scales of justice in his own bold and truthi-way last week by reviving the Cain Train (you may remember the former presidential hopeful), with a “Rock Me Like a Herman Cain South Cain-olina Primary Rally” at the College of Charleston in South Carolina on January 20.

While many could accuse Colbert of ratings-driven motives for staging such a showy antic in his home state, there is no doubting the earnestness of civic service behind his latest prank on a political system that all too frequently veers into self-parody without any help from the good people at Comedy Central.

“Announcing that he was running for president (again) was one way to demonstrate, by simple insinuation, that any clown with the requisite money and vanity could buy a chance to become this season’s hanging chad (with a follow-up book deal and a stint as Fox News pundit in the bag). And attempting to sponsor the S.C. primary was a witty strategy to point out how branding and voting are disturbingly codependent activities in this, the America of the 21st century.” Amen.

Truthdig, in naming Colbert the “truthdigger of the week,” supported their choice with a few truths of their own:

“We think Colbert deserves the laurels this time for the work he’s done to share his platform with the unfunny problem of campaign funding gone berserk. Establishing what is now known as “The Definitely Not Coordinating With Stephen Colbert Super PAC,” thanks to a mysterious induction ceremony involving Colbert, his lawyer, Jon Stewart and intentionally bad special effects, was an intentionally confusing way to bring the Supreme Court’s scary Citizens United ruling into focus on a national scale. Certain operatives from all points along the political spectrum would do well to fixate less on crashing their fellow Americans’ commitment ceremonies and instead channel their energies into busting up the unholy marriage between money and politics over which our enrobed friends at SCOTUS presided back in 2010.”

It would seem that loosening up flimsy campaign finance regulations that still hang over the body politic “like a cheap camisole” has made way for some pretty bawdy power grabs by parties with deep pockets and questionable intentions toward our civil liberties. So, though Comedy Central’s funnyman may not be president anytime soon (nor, thankfully, will Herman Cain), mockery might make for good policy if Colbert can make his super PAC ‘play money’ talk in the preferred language of our country’s prevailing corporate politicians.

 

Image: Clown, David Teniers, oil painting, Russia, Moscow, Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts

 

 

Filed under: Political Theatre ]]> http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/28/the-truthiness-of-political-theater/feed/ 4 Errant Aesthete clown http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/22/fashionably-snowed/ http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/22/fashionably-snowed/#comments Sun, 22 Jan 2012 21:17:47 +0000 Errant Aesthete http://theerrantaesthete.com/?p=31079 ]]>

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jacques Henri Lartigue, Photographer, Bibi. Megevè, janvier 1930
Victor Strelkvosky, Photographer
Alfred Eisenstaedt, Photographer, Ice skating waiter, St.Moritz, Switzerland, 1932
Rene Jacques, Photographer
Andre Kertesz, Photographer,1977
Hans Klaus, Photographer
Jaques Dubois, Photographer, Bronze statue of the Rivers, 1981
David Douglas Dunkan, Photographer, Turkish Cavalry on Russian Border, 1948
Harry Callahan, Photographer, 1950
Andre Kertesz, Photographer, Snow Covered Bench, Washington Square Park, 1959
Brassai, Photographer, 1953
Bill Schwab, Photographer, Snow Dog, Belle Isle, Detroit, 1996
Alfred Stieglitz, Photographer, Two towers – New York, 1913
Paul Strand, Photographer, 1916
Jacques Henri Lartigue, Photographer, Doriane, Megève 1930
Jacques Henri Lartigue, Photographer, Patinage sur le lac du bois de Boulogne. Paris, 1906.
Jacques Henri Lartigue, Photographer, Bibi. Megevé, janvier, 1930

 

 

 

Filed under: Mother Earth, Photography Tagged: alfredeisenstaedt, alfredstieglitz, AndreKertesz, DavidDouglasDunkan, France, harrycallahan, JacqueHenriLartigue, JacquesDubois, jacqueshenrilartigue, paulstrand, Photography, ReneJacques, snow, victorstrelkovosky, winter ]]> http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/22/fashionably-snowed/feed/ 2 Errant Aesthete 273.lartigue dog&ball eisenstaedt.skate renejacques snow-overhead AUSTRIA WEATHER Dubois feininger-chelsea turkishcavalry callahan-trees Kertesz-bench Brassai billSchwab-dog steiglitz-branch paulstrand 275.lartigue 437.lartigue 274Bibi.lartigue http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/20/this-days-notable-aesthetic-7/ http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/20/this-days-notable-aesthetic-7/#comments Sat, 21 Jan 2012 00:32:00 +0000 Errant Aesthete http://theerrantaesthete.com/?p=30975 ]]>

 

For whatever reason that only those who study the mind could comprehend, the uncertainty of the times and the protests that seem to have become a condition of consciousness and daily life never fails to send me backwards in time to get reacquainted with what has past and what was missed. Maybe I seek a bit of nostalgia or a remembrance of what once brought comfort (for me the habits, veils, and rosaries of the nuns), or the tranquility of a world that moved in a measured stride always accompanied by the adjective, confident, that didn’t leave us inwardly shivering and outwardly wary.

In my new pursuits that pull me away from these pages, I learned not only of this painting by Sir John Everett Millais, entitled ‘The Vale of Rest’ that had the dubious distinction of shocking the Art world of 1859, (“This is the year Mr. Millais gave forth those terrible nuns in the graveyard,” sniffed one critic), but discovered a revolutionary new way of not only learning, but genuinely appreciating how art, particularly paintings, are being, not simply viewed, but experienced, in the 21st century.

 

 

A bit of background. It is said that of all the pictures that Millais created, this, ‘The Vale of Rest’, subtitled ‘Where the weary find repose’, was his favorite. Both come from Mendelssohn’s part-song ‘Ruhetal’ from Sechs Lieder, Opus 59, no.5. Millais heard his brother William singing the song and felt it suited the painting and theme perfectly.

 

 

The theme of mortality and the suggestion of the macabre is explicit. The nun on the left is digging a grave, positioned in such as way that the viewer appears to be in it alongside her, while the second nun’s rosary is adorned, not with the crucifixion, but with a skull. In the background a coffin-shaped cloud – a harbinger of death, according to Scots legend – appears in the evening sky.

A nun features in an earlier drawing, St Agnes Eve of 1854 (private collection), and according to Millais’ wife, Effie, ‘It had long been Millais’ intention to paint a picture with nuns in it.’

 

 

The idea for the picture occurred to him on honeymoon in Scotland in 1855. As Effie explains, ‘On descending the hill by Loch Awe, from Inverary, he was extremely struck with its beauty, and the coachman told us that on one of the islands were the ruins of a monastery. We imagined to ourselves the beauty of the picturesque features of the Roman Catholic religion.’

It was another three years before Millais began work on this painting. One October evening, he was so taken by the beauty of the sunset that he fetched a large canvas and set to work immediately. Following the Pre-Raphaelite aesthetic of truth to nature, he painted the bulk of the picture, including the figures, in the open air.

The setting – excluding the tombstones, but including the terrace, shrubs and the wall in the background, with poplars and oak trees behind it – was Effie’s family’s garden at Bowerswell, Perth. Effie recalled, ‘The sunsets were lovely for two or three nights, and he dashed the work in, softening it afterwards in the house, making it, I thought, even less purple and gold than when he saw it in the sky. The effect lasted so short a time that he had to paint like lightning.’ The grave and gravestones were painted some months later at Kinnoull, an old churchyard in Perth.

When the painting was first exhibited in public, it was denounced for its methods, as were all the early works of the Pre-Raphaelites, and unjustly criticized for the ugliness and “frightfulness” of the figures. The kinder of the critics permitted it a certain “nobility of horror.”

As a result of the attacks, John Ruskin, the foremost art critic of his day was asked to intervene, which he did, writing a letter to The Times on behalf of the young artists. From this intervention came the meeting between Ruskin and Millais, which resulted as events often do, in the most famous sexual scandal of the day.

Ruskin had married Euphemia Chalmers Grey, daughter of a Scottish family living near Perth. Ruskin, his wife, and Millais set off together on a holiday in Scotland, and a strong attraction developed between Effie Ruskin and Millais. It came to light that Ruskin had not consummated the marriage. What is beyond our own sexually promiscuous mores to understand, was that Effie knew that something was missing from her marriage, but was so innocent she could not identify its reason.

Following an acrimonious and notorious divorce case, Effie married Millais, and in rapid succession, produced eight children. One can only imagine the woman’s ecstatic relief to learn what had been denied her. It is interesting to note that the publicly humiliated Ruskin had the generosity of spirit to continue to provide critical support for the artist.

 

Millais: The Vale of Rest – Smarthistory

 

All of what you have just read was without the direct aid of the picture. When you read about the skull on the nun’s rosary, for example, you had to scroll to the painting to view it and then resume your place in the text. Now imagine viewing “The Vale of Rest,” while simultaneously hearing more about the masterpiece John Everett Millais created. That is the simple concept of wonderment developed by smarthistory.org, a site devoted to bringing the viewer into the work, and education into the future.

Gobsmacked I am. Enthralled and enchanted, for sure. Here is how they tell it:

 

“In Smarthistory, we have aimed for reliable content and a delivery model that is entertaining and occasionally even playful. Our podcasts and screen-casts are spontaneous conversations about works of art where we are not afraid to disagree with each other or art history orthodoxy. We have found that the unpredictable nature of discussion is far more compelling to students, museum visitors and other informal learners than a monologue. When students listen to shifts of meaning as we seek to understand each other, we model the experience we want our visitors to have—a willingness to encounter the unfamiliar and transform it in ways that make it meaningful to them. We believe that Smarthistory is broadly applicable to our discipline and is a first step toward understanding how art history can fit into the new collaborative culture created by web 2.0 technologies.”

 

How perfectly wonderful the world can be sometimes.

 

 

Sir John Everett Millais, The Vale of Rest: where the weary find repose, 1858 (partially repainted 1862), oil on canvas, 40 1/2 x 68 inches (Tate Britain, London)
John Everett Millais,Portrait of the Painter, 1880,Oil on canvas
The Vale of Rest: where the weary find repose, alternate view
St. Agnes Eve,Wood engraving, 1857, John Everett Millais
Smarthistory video

Filed under: Art & Architecture, The Examined Life Tagged: arthistory, EuphemiaChalmersGrey, JohnEverettMillais, ValeofRest ]]> http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/20/this-days-notable-aesthetic-7/feed/ 2 Errant Aesthete Picture 1 millais_portraitofthepainter millais_-_das_tal_der_stille john_everett_millais_34_st_agnes_eve Picture 2 http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/18/undiminished/ http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/18/undiminished/#comments Thu, 19 Jan 2012 06:37:59 +0000 Errant Aesthete http://theerrantaesthete.com/?p=30938 ]]>

 

 

Dinner with Diana Vreeland, from What Am I Doing Here? by Bruce Chatwin

 

Her glass of neat vodka sat on the white damask table-cloth. Beyond the smear of lipstick, a twist of lemon floated among the ice-cubes. We were sitting side by side, on a banquette.
‘What are you writing about, Bruce?’
‘Wales, Diana.’
The lower lip shot forward. Her painted cheeks swivelled through an angle of ninety degrees.
‘Whales!’ she said. ‘Blue whales!… Sperrrm whales!… THE WHITE WHALE!’
‘No… no, Diana! Wales! Welsh Wales! The country to the west of England.’
‘Oh! Wales. I DO know Wales. Little grey houses… covered in roses… in the rain…’

 

She was incomparable, indomitable, unshrinking from one end of her sumptuous life to the other. This quote from director, Elia Kazan, so beautifully summed her up:

 

The real challenge
is not simply to survive.
Hell, anyone can do that.
It’s to survive as yourself,
undiminished.

 

Dianna Vreeland, New York, 1980, Harry Benson

Filed under: FASHION, Notable Aesthetes, Uncategorized Tagged: DiannaVreeland, FASHION, harrybenson, quote ]]> http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/18/undiminished/feed/ 2 Errant Aesthete harry-benson_vreeland.rev http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/18/in-protest/ http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/18/in-protest/#comments Wed, 18 Jan 2012 15:57:10 +0000 Errant Aesthete http://theerrantaesthete.com/?p=30922 ]]>

STOP CENSORSHIP

 

UPDATE: THE AFTER GLOW OF MAYBE

Text: fightforthefuture.org

Today was nuts, right?

Google launched a petition. Wikipedia voted to shut itself off. Senators’ websites went down just from the sheer surge of voters trying to write them. NYC and SF geeks had protests that packed city blocks.

You made history today: nothing like this has ever happened before. Tech companies and users teamed up. Tens of millions of people who make the internet what it is joined together to defend their freedoms. The free network defended itself. Whatever you call it, the bottom line is clear: from today forward, it will be much harder to mess up the internet.

The really crazy part? We might even win.

Approaching Monday’s crucial Senate vote there are now 35 Senators publicly opposing PIPA. Last week there were 5. And it just takes just 41 solid “no” votes to permanently stall PIPA (and SOPA) in the Senate. What seemed like miles away a few weeks ago is now within reach.

But don’t trust predictions. The forces behind SOPA & PIPA (mostly movie companies) can make small changes to these bills until they know they have the votes to pass. Members of Congress know SOPA & PIPA are unpopular, but they don’t understand why–so they’re easily duped by superficial changes. The Senate returns next week, and the next few days are critical. MORE

 

Filed under: Ethical Living ]]> http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/18/in-protest/feed/ 1 Errant Aesthete http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/14/invincible-summer/ http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/14/invincible-summer/#comments Sat, 14 Jan 2012 21:55:09 +0000 Errant Aesthete http://theerrantaesthete.com/?p=30877 ]]>

 

 

I spent my Christmas this year on a Houseboat in Seattle. It was as near a blissful time as one might imagine. So this Boathouse designed as a contemporary week-end retreat in the Lower Mill Estate in the Costwolds, a range of hills in west-central England, has just the sort of idyllic reverie one might crave for a bone-chilling day in the middle of January in a year filled with uncertainty.

 

 

 

 

“The boathouse was conceived
to serve as a tranquil retreat,
the concept being that it should
float over the lake.”

 

 

 

 

“The construction and appearance
is highly contemporary,
but the use of traditional materials
like neural oak and slate
pay tribute to its rural setting.”

 

 

 

 

On my houseboat holiday, I, too, sat on an Adirondack chair high up on the roof one night, just before Christmas, bundled in a comforter and warmed with a brandy, to watch a procession of boats glide by in the night, silently moving across the water like proud black swans adorned in a raiment of lights glittering against the sky like small beckoning jewels.

 

 

 

 

Living at the water’s edge
is different–
it’s where two worlds meet,
where weather systems collide,
where views are longer,
and where you can almost feel
that you own a
little piece of infinity.

 

 

 

 

“The building consists
of a 4-legged
steel frame structure
sitting on concrete piles
[Concrete piles? So inelegant.
I prefer to say "mounds of
what the Roman's
called opus caementicium]
sunk into the lake.”

 

 

 

 

“The large expanse of sliding glass panels
affords spectacular, uninterrupted views
of the surroundings
and the overhanging roof
provides ample shade
on a hot summer’s day.”

 

 

 

 

“In the
midst
of winter
I found,
within me,
an
invincible
summer.”

 

 

 

Boathouse design by AR Design Studio
Source: Home DSGN
Quote (1): A House on the Water, Robert Knight
Quote (2): Albert Camus

 

 

Filed under: Art & Architecture, Design, New & Notable Tagged: Architecture, boathouse ]]> http://theerrantaesthete.com/2012/01/14/invincible-summer/feed/ 2 Errant Aesthete Boathouse-05-800x530 Boathouse-07-800x591 Boathouse-08-800x600 Boathouse-04-800x651 Boathouse-03-800x263 Boathouse-02-800x600 Boathouse-01-800x600 Boathouse-06-800x264