PAGE 92 OF 99 /
2008·03·29 17:47:20
Not enough time? That's life
there was a nice sketch in That Mitchell and Webb Sound on Radio 4 last week.
A man has come to visit his friend in hospital and the news is bad. His friend doesnt have long to live. Making awkward small talk, the friend alludes to a famous Al Pacino line from the film Scarface ? a line that evidently sails over the dying mans head. He hasnt actually seen Scarface, he admits, when the allusion is explained to him. "You havent seen Scarface?" his friend says in appalled tones. "Its Number 36 in Total Films list of 100 Films to See Before You Die! And youre about to die!"
Fortunately, a passing doctor realises that they just have time to get a DVD copy from the hospital library. It could have been so much worse, as well. This week, after all, another newspaper (as we say in the trade) has been publishing a list of 1,000 Films to See Before You Die ? massively expanding the task for those who want to put their cinematic affairs in order before they depart.
I liked the sketch because I dont much like lists ? and this neatly skewered the silliness of one particular sub-genre, with its implication that life consists of a train-spotterly ticking of boxes. Its a journalistic fall-back that always has a faint smack of decadence to it as well ? in a world where for a lot of people the list of what to do before you die essentially consists of just one item ? Try Not to Die Too Early. And besides, the lists are always faintly preposterous anyway ? blending incontrovertible classics with movies that are just in there because inspiration was flagging and they needed to make up the numbers. Do you really need to have seen Meet the Parents before you die, as The Guardians list suggests? As it happens, I have seen it ? if there was any way in which I could trade my position (film seen, two hours spent, never to return) for yours (film not seen, two hours still in pocket), Id take the swap in a minute.
The fact that inflation seems to have struck is a bit worrying, too. A hundred films seems a manageable number for a cinematic canon ? surely enough to cover all the masterpieces that might provoke a deathbed pang of regret. But 1,000 is ridiculous, particularly when you note that ? as with all such exercises ? this one is subject to a familiar temporal parochialism. Recent films, however mediocre, greatly outnumber older ones, suggesting a steadily ascending curve of cinematic excellence which is highly implausible, to say the least. It also accentuates the essentially hopeless nature of all such enterprises, since if that graph of pre-mortem unmissability continues, the list will have grown yet longer by the time we finish plugging the gaps in our existing list. Youll wearily get to the point at which its safe to die ? having seen everything on the list ? and the bastards will add some more and youll have to cling to life for a little longer, just to make sure that there are no gaps in the collection.
It is just for fun, of course, I know that, and I know too that very few of us are entirely immune to the seductions of the canonical list ? with its agitated debates about whats in and whats out. But I still think it gets what it is to live in a culture entirely wrong, with its buried implication that accumulation is the best way to proceed. Its an assumption that finds itself neatly aligned to a world of DVD sales and film libraries ? to the whole modern apparatus of adding yet more stuff to your collection ? but it still misses the point about erudition, cinematic or literary.
To be well read may not be a matter of having read nearly everything; indeed, quite the contrary. Its more likely to be about reading well ? and an endlessly burgeoning list of essential texts is actually hostile to that, given the great truth that this particular gimmick acknowledges, which is that we only have limited time.
How much more useful, given that fact, would be a list of films that you think you ought to see ? thanks to media hype and compulsive list compilation ? but actually can get by perfectly well without. Even better, what about a list of films you would be well advised to avoid entirely (likely to stretch into five figures, I would have thought)?
And once those had cleared a bit of watching space in your overcrowded, over-subscribed life, there might, after all, be room for the best kind of list of all: Twenty Films Youll Want to Watch Again and Again, However Long You Live.
comment on this post... del.icio.us redit
Comments
Id: 28 posted in: THOMAS SUTCLIFFE
2008·03·29 17:47:20
For the love of god: a 50m work of art
it is, depending on how you look at it, the ultimate bit of bling for a morbidly minded rapper or a searching interrogation of the complex relationship between value and price-tag in the contemporary art market.
But whatever you think of Damien Hirsts latest high art provocation, there can be no disputing its brilliance - at least on a literal level. A platinum cast of a human skull has been set with 8,601 flawless diamonds, including a 52-carat, pear-shaped monster that could choke a Hollywood starlet, set off by another 37 carats of flawless whites. Displayed under spotlights in a darkened room in White Cubes Masons Yard Gallery in south-west London, the skull, which contains three times the number of diamonds in the Imperial State Crown, appears to be the only source of light, a macabre glitter ball which casts a planetarium sparkle on to the awed faces of those who have come to gaze at it. It is a genuinely remarkable object - the silvery glitter of the pav??-set diamonds pierced here and there by dazzling points of intensely coloured light.
Its title is For the Love of God. Pronounce it with a disgusted exclamation mark on the end and youve perfectly captured the reaction of those who think that Brit Arts most inventive self-publicist has just outdone himself in vulgarity. Murmur it a little more pensively and youve placed yourself in the camp of those who believe that Hirst, one of the richest of the Young British Artists, can afford to pursue his interest in our attitudes to death (and our fantasy that it might somehow be held at bay) to a point that would bankrupt all of his contemporaries.
That Hirst intends the ambiguity is unquestionable. Hes always been a mischievous titler of his works and the name of the exhibition, which contains his latest enterprise in Guinness Book of Records aesthetics, also allows for mixed reactions; Beyond Belief. There are plenty of other new works crammed into White Cubes two London galleries: a new variation on the piece which first made Hirst a cartoonists shorthand for contemporary art - a bisected tiger shark displayed in two tanks of formaldehyde and teasingly entitled Death Explained; a new series of Biopsy paintings, in which hugely magnified images of cancerous cells are adorned with a lethal glitter of scalpel blades and broken glass; more of his glass-encased parodies of devotional art, including a St Sebastian featuring a martyred, arrow-transfixed calf. But the skull is the show-stopper that will undoubtedly draw the curious. Entrance to the gallery is free but you have to book a timed ticket, and contemplation time is likely to be strictly rationed for mere spectators. Russian oligarchs and hedgefund wizards will undoubtedly get a little more time, but those who like the idea of having unlimited and exclusive access to what must be the most ostentatiously expensive sculpture ever made (the raw materials alone cost about ??14m) are going to have to find ??50m, a figure that calculatedly pushes Hirst into the salesroom stratosphere normally reserved for the dead or the definitively canonised.
The excess is an integral part of this work - encrusting the most universal symbol of the futility of worldly goods with a skin so precious that the viewer almost forgets what lies beneath. And it is, though it might be hard to credit, a work which is more restrained than it might have been. Hirst originally planned to fit a gold tooth into the one empty space on the skulls jaw but eventually decided that he didnt like the effect. Instead the original owners teeth were sent off to a private dentist for some cosmetic work and replaced in the platinum jaw, where they now grin at gallery goers - apparently delighted at their own surreal apotheosis.
Forensic work on the skull, purchased from a London taxidermy shop, has established that it belonged to a 30-year-old male of European ancestry who lived some time between 1720 and 1810 - and whose mortal remains have shaped a work of defiant extravagance.
According to one gallery insider there are already two or three buyers having serious discussions about a purchase. They wouldnt comment on whether this interest was being shown by individuals or institutions. Or whether you get a discount for a cash purchase. Provenance is hardly going to be an issue with a work this well publicised but should any buyer be anxious Hirst has signed the work, just behind the skulls squamosal suture. It also carries, for those anxious lest they be short-changed, a platinum hallmark and comes with written guarantees that all of the diamonds have been sourced from conflict-free areas.
But whether Hirst has genuinely added value to that most venerable artistic genre - the vanitas or memento mori - or merely made it a lot more expensive, is another, much larger question. "I could only have ever imagined creating the diamond skull with Bentley & Skinner of Bond Street," Hirst said, talking of the jewellers who took 18 months to plan and construct the skull. "They are a company associated with quality over cash," he added.
The remark implies that he understands and cares about the difference. Views will differ about that. But theres no question that he understands the intersection of modern art and modern publicity. For the Love of Gods catalogue note would record that it is made of platinum, diamonds and human ivory. It probably wouldnt record that it also incorporates a raw material that Hirst has nearly always included in his art - mixed media attention. And the value of that is incalculable.
comment on this post... del.icio.us redit
Comments
Id: 27 posted in: THOMAS SUTCLIFFE
2008·03·29 17:47:20
Love, not architecture, makes buildings endure
you only have to ask yourself which one is going to be there in a thousand years time and the answer is obvious," said David Dimbleby on Start the Week yesterday. He was talking about a photograph from his new book on British architecture, in which the Tower of London occupied the foreground and Norman Fosters Gherkin reared up behind it - in Dimblebys slightly prejudicial words - "like a half-inflated balloon". It was certainly obvious which answer Dimbleby himself would have given.
And hes right ... obviously ... that the Tower of London has a considerable head-start in the treasured antiquity stakes. Forced to choose between the two, most of us would give it better odds of making it to the year 3000. What was less obvious - to me at least - was why any choice was necessary. But it seems that the impermanence of contemporary architecture was specifically part of Dimblebys point: "We may be the first generation," he continued, "that leaves no architectural trace ... of who we were or what we were."
Rather oddly, Dimblebys argument seemed to rest partly on a question of materials. "If youre building in glass and steel and concrete," he said, "you dont last as long as building in stone and brick." I have no expertise as a structural engineer, but I cant help wondering about the accuracy of this remark - which in any case surely misses the point about what actually keeps buildings standing through the ages. After all, had it been neglected for the past four hundred years, the Tower of London would be little more than a pile of rubble.
What keeps it upright is the weather-proofing of public regard - a sentiment that may range in nature from nostalgic familiarity to serious historical scholarship. And though the Gherkin has still to survive that most dangerous period for any building - when it has ceased to be novel and not yet become cherishably old - I have a feeling that it stands a good chance of acquiring the patina of cultural affection.
Dimblebys remark chimed interestingly with the news, earlier yesterday, that the Cutty Sark had been damaged by fire - a story that began as heritage catastrophe but rapidly cooled to narrow escape. And again there was an odd attitude to material continuity revealed by the coverage - with much speculation about what percentage of the original timbers had been lost.
This was understandable, I suppose. There is information in ancient timber, quite apart from the historical charisma of the authentic object. But, at the same time, the first builders of the Cutty Sark would never have assumed that its integrity as a ship rested in any individual plank or timber. Indeed, had it been at sea since 1869 its likely that most of its components would have been replaced anyway (had anyone thought it worth spending the money) and yet it wouldnt have ceased to be the Cutty Sark because of that.
Ships (and buildings) have accidents or wear out and need repair. For them to receive such attention, we have to care about them more than we do about money or convenience, and I think its arguable that this intangible quality - what English Heritage sums up as "significance" - is the only critical building block of any durable monument.
Curiously, its also a quality that can be strengthened by damage. The fire might have scorched some of the Cutty Sarks planks, but it hasnt weakened our regard for the ship itself. In fact, Im willing to bet we care a lot more about its future today than we did on Sunday night.
US TV at its most pointless
Most British coverage of the Fall Upfronts - at which American networks unveil their new schedules to advertisers - concentrates on spotting the hot shows that might be heading our way. But I find myself more tantalised by the Monkey Tennis no-hopers. I dont suppose we will ever see Fat March, in which obese contestants are challenged to walk 500 miles for a cash prize, and Ill be astonished if Cavemen crosses the Atlantic.
Cavemen, left, is based on a series of adverts for online car insurance, in which resentful Neanderthals deplore their stigmatisation as primitive technophobes. "The idea is to offend everyone but offend no one," said one executive - perfectly capturing the circular pointlessness of the worst American TV.
If you have anxieties about the spread of CCTV, one solution is suggested by a London film-maker, Manu Luksch, who has recently completed a science fiction film starring herself and filmed entirely on CCTV.
Luksch discovered that the Data Protection Act gives us the right to ask for any CCTV footage on which we appear. The law states that this must be supplied within 40 days and that a maximum fee of ?10 can be charged for the service. The fact that not many people know this meant that it took Luksch nearly five years to complete her somewhat staccato labour of love. But since the cost of supplying the relevant images must considerably exceed the nominal fee, its clear that, with a bit of organisation and mischievous will, virtually any camera could be rendered more trouble than it is worth. With most CCTV cameras I dont suppose anybody could be bothered - but I cant help wondering whether congestion charge cameras are exempt from the legislation.
comment on this post... del.icio.us redit
Comments
Id: 26 posted in: THOMAS SUTCLIFFE
2008·03·29 17:47:20
The minister must learn the right lingo
iwonder how Ruth Kelly enjoyed her own first-hand experience of translation yesterday.
On Sunday she had addressed - in judicious Politese - the question of the smooth integration of immigrant communities. It was worth asking, she said, whether council translation services, far from helping new arrivals, were actually providing a counterproductive crutch.
"I do think translation has been used too frequently and sometimes without thought to the consequences," she continued. "For example, its quite possible for someone to come here from Pakistan or elsewhere in the world and find that materials are routinely translated into their mother tongue." That, she argued, removed an important incentive to learning English.
The Sun appeared to think these remarks were worthy of its front page but, knowing that its readers do not care for Politese - a colourless and troublingly indirect language - ittranslated it into Geezer, the favoured dialect of White Van Man. "Learn our Lingo," read the headline on the story - shrewdly accentuating the seductive pulse of them-and-us contained in Kellys original remarks, while also adding an imperative tense that was nowhere present in the original. The Suns translation implied an unstated "... or else".
And in this it was a little closer to the spirit of Kellys remarks - which necessarily oblige you to ask what would happen if such translation services were removed. So ... learn our lingo or else what? You fail to report that recent arrival from Karachi with the persistent tubercular cough? Or you ignore the vivid purplish blots on your feverish childs chest?
No, perhaps those wouldnt be a good sticks with which to beat reluctant EFL students into the classrooms. So, although the provision of translation in the NHS accounts for the bulk of translation services it was explicitly excluded from the proposed "questioning".
What instead then? Learn our lingo or else you dont pay your council tax on time? Perhaps thats not a brilliant idea either. What about learn our lingo or you wont know when to leave your rubbish out? Perhaps not that either - since the nitty gritty of such details is as much part of integration as anything else. And however strong an incentive it might be to learn English if you find yourself in court being cross examined, language lessons arent going to be an immediate answer to your problem.
Its possible of course that The Suns rendering isnt a faithful translation of what Ruth Kelly actually had in mind. But looking at the web forum responses to her BBC interview it was striking how many of them were similarly expressed in Geezer or Jingo. There are a lot to choose from, but this one from Brixham, on the BBCs Have Your Say site, seemed telling:
"this was first brought up in a British National party artical in 2004 when it was reported that PC Translations were costing the British tax payer millions with little to no Benefits as is clearly shown when interpriters will be used so even if it can be read an interpriter is needed to explain it (sic)."
I wont translate this into English - I dont want to give you a crutch on which you might become dependent - but you should get the gist. And if such misunderstandings can arise even between native speakers of English its perhaps not unreasonable to ask the Minister to choose her words more carefully when she next raises the issue.
Tina calls in a few favours
When Tina Brown launched Talk magazine in 1999 there was much awed (and envious) journalistic gossip about the rates being offered to contributors - including some dizzying sweetheart deals for the contributing editors. Most assumed that these modest chunks of Harvey Weinsteins fortune would simply be written off as a tax loss when Talk closed. But generous fees have a long tail... as the puffs for Browns book about Diana reveal. Simon Schama describes it as "compulsively page-turning" and Christopher Hitchens as "witty and penetrating". The only surprise is that the list isnt much longer. Either celebrity memories are short or, more likely, given Browns skills of self-publicity, there are even bigger logs poised to roll.
* I wish I lived nearer Kentucky, where the Answers in Genesis ministry has just opened the $27m (?14m) Creation Museum, offering a "walk through history" consistent with Bible teachings. Quite a short walk, from the perspective of a scientific understanding of life on Earth, lasting as it does only 6,000 years. But not without incident, it has to be said. Visitors pass through a Time Tunnel to the Six Days of Creation Theatre, past Adam and Eve and then through the Cave of Sorrows and Corruption Valley. These sound a bit depressing, to be honest, but scriptural literalists should be cheered up by Noahs Ark Construction Site, which explains, with the help of monstrous amounts of pious fudging, how it was well within the bounds of possibility for all those with a cruise ticket to get on board - and how Noah coped with all that excrement. Adult tickets are $19.95 a pop but for such dazzling and incontrovertible proof of the depths of human credulity thats a bargain.
comment on this post... del.icio.us redit
Comments
1&1 Hosting and Domains
99.9% Uptime Guarantee, 25
GBit Connectivity & 24/7 Support!
www.1and1.co.uk
- 20 random entries
- It is the death of history history
- Straight but not great music
- radioarchive.cc links
- if I'd spent less time listening to advise and more time ignoring it I'd have a lot more time dsf adsfg afg fg
- institute of contemporary arts collecting box 1980 art
- figure - shelter research
- Fix Your Script - Fonejacker.tv comedy
- Wannabe suicide bombers beware: Chris Morris movie gets go-ahead art
- French in uproar over oral sex anti-smoking posters Wednesday, 24 February 2010 random
- word random
- changed the DTD on the index site update
- "Intellectual Property" a Violation of Real Property free software
- Sigmar Polke, Whose Sly Works Shaped Contemporary Painting, Dies at 69
- Daily caffeine “protects brain” bbc
- reset gnome free software
- John Pasche - "Tongue and Lip Design" artists
- http://www.legacy.com // Online Obituaries links
- reality Tv Artistic Proposals
- Liverpudlians decapitate Ringo Starr random
- Far worse than just a recipe for resentment thomas sutcliffe
- random links
- situationist international archive
- English Dissenters
- find articles
- quoteland
- authentic history American popular culture
- artintelligence.net art
- The Huntington Library Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens
- www.sharecom.ca art critic
- utorrent Best ever free torrent tool
- 7-zip Best ever free Zip utility
- Brian Tyler Composer
- Paideia Contemporary Philosophy
- Steven Pinker Department of Psychology
- dailylit Free online books
- perfect 3 column ccs free software
- liquid layouts ccs free software
- nothingness Going into my ears...
- estetica design forum Graphic Design Forum
- ctheory Leading intellectual electronic reviews
- Online Library of Liberty Library
- marxists Marxists Internet Archive
- selfish capitalist Oliver James website
- Wordspy RSS Online dictionary
- mind42 Online mindMap Software
- PCLinuxOS OS
- PCLinuxOS Home OS
- noesis Philosophical Research
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Philosophical Research
- 7inchpunk Punk Rock Tunes
- skreemr Search 4 Mp3
- online-literature Searchable online literature
- www.point-of-departure.org Select your vector
- astro dream advisor Tools for your inevitable Transformation?
- one big torrent torrent
- colombo torrent
- the box torrent
- LegalTorrents(TM) torrent [Creative Commons]
- radio archive.cc torrent [the Spoken-Word Radio Torrent Archive]
1&1 Hosting and Domains
99.9% Uptime Guarantee, 25
GBit Connectivity & 24/7 Support!
www.1and1.co.uk .
Hits Today: 39
Total Unique Visits: 11253
