At last, some warmth.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
The Palace of the Legion of Honor
Madame Le Chef and I usually visit the beautifully situated Palace of the Legion of Honor on weekends. We never fail to see at least one wedding party having their pictures taken with the museum as the backdrop. We visited the Palace the day after Thanksgiving to see "Japanesque", a wonderful show of nineteenth century Japanese prints and the Impressionist prints that they influenced. Perhaps because it's the start of the holidays and wintery there were no wedding parties, but our expectations were not disappointed because there was a fashion shoot with a cold looking model.
At last, some warmth.
At last, some warmth.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Animals of all types
I've found a photo where the little girl with the monkey on her head looks happier (the monkey hasn't budged).
Monkeys were not the only pets in the village.
When the bureau chef was a kid, back in the Pleistocene Era, itinerant photographers used to come around to neighborhoods with a pony and child-sized cowboy outfits in hopes of convincing parents to pay for having their darling child photographed looking like a pint-sized Roy Rogers.
Below is the Ecuadorian version, circa 1979, except with a mariachi theme and a wooden pony. I find this creature's painted eye disturbing.
The chief and some fellow travelers walked by this stand just as the butcher had hung the pig up. He had a knife and a stack of plastic bags and a line was forming. We went off for beers (SOP) and when we walked by again, maybe 45minutes later, all that was left on the hook was the head. Unfortunately I did not take an "after" picture.
Monkeys were not the only pets in the village.
When the bureau chef was a kid, back in the Pleistocene Era, itinerant photographers used to come around to neighborhoods with a pony and child-sized cowboy outfits in hopes of convincing parents to pay for having their darling child photographed looking like a pint-sized Roy Rogers.
Below is the Ecuadorian version, circa 1979, except with a mariachi theme and a wooden pony. I find this creature's painted eye disturbing.
The chief and some fellow travelers walked by this stand just as the butcher had hung the pig up. He had a knife and a stack of plastic bags and a line was forming. We went off for beers (SOP) and when we walked by again, maybe 45minutes later, all that was left on the hook was the head. Unfortunately I did not take an "after" picture.
Saturday, November 6, 2010
The Cockfight
As bureau chief I must apologize to my faithful readers for taking so long between posts. I just didn't have anything I wanted to comment on. But now the second set of negatives and slides from my 1979 trip to Ecuador has traveled to Bangalore and back, by way of Burlingame, and I have the scans from them in hand. I realize now that I lucked out with the technician who scanned my first set of photos. He or she was an artist. This time I got a journeyman although, in her or his defense, a lot of these photos were more marginal in terms of exposure than in the first batch.
Cockfighting was legal in Ecuador in 1979 and I think still is. These photos were taken in a small cockfighting arena in the jungle town of Puyo. The owners show their birds before a match so the crowd can decide which one to bet on.
The birds wear sharp metal spikes over their natural spurs.
The handlers exploit a genetic tendency of gamecocks to become extremely aggressive just at the sight of other males.
When the fight begins the birds meet in a blur of beating wings, pecking beaks and kicking feet. They actually rise a foot or two above the dirt but can only sustain this level of activity for about a minute. If neither bird has mortally wounded the other they settle into a avian Sumo match where they circle, facing each other and trying to get their head under their opponent's wing so that they can flip him onto the dirt and finish him. This can go on for tens of minutes as they weaken from their wounds. Finally one prevails.
An owner with his losing bird. Hardly any of them recover so it's most likely the stew pot.
Much more direct and human-scale than OTB.
Cockfighting was legal in Ecuador in 1979 and I think still is. These photos were taken in a small cockfighting arena in the jungle town of Puyo. The owners show their birds before a match so the crowd can decide which one to bet on.
The birds wear sharp metal spikes over their natural spurs.
The handlers exploit a genetic tendency of gamecocks to become extremely aggressive just at the sight of other males.
When the fight begins the birds meet in a blur of beating wings, pecking beaks and kicking feet. They actually rise a foot or two above the dirt but can only sustain this level of activity for about a minute. If neither bird has mortally wounded the other they settle into a avian Sumo match where they circle, facing each other and trying to get their head under their opponent's wing so that they can flip him onto the dirt and finish him. This can go on for tens of minutes as they weaken from their wounds. Finally one prevails.
An owner with his losing bird. Hardly any of them recover so it's most likely the stew pot.
Much more direct and human-scale than OTB.
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Two Takes on the Same Subject
The bureau chief freely admits to having teared up while watching the last scene of Frank Capra's "It's a Wonderful Life" (1946). It's easy to do so, particularly after a cup of wassail. The film has become part of the American Christmas ritual and the American film canon . The chief has probably seen it five or six times. It's a wonderful mix of comedy, fantasy and sentimentality, with a solid substrata of New Deal populism and post WW II optimism. It asks the question, "What is the worth of a person's life?"
Akira Kurosawa's "Ikiru" (1952) asks the same question but from an entirely different perspective. The American occupation of Japan ended in 1952, the year of "Ikiru's" release, but there's still a sense of residual economic anxiety in the film. Unlike George Bailey (James Stewart) of Bailey Building and Loan, who in the end realizes how many people's lives he's touched, Kanji Watanabi (Takashi Shimura) is part of a city bureaucracy dedicated to passing the buck. After thirty years of work, his only accomplishment is to have stamped thousands of papers and sent them on to other offices.
"Ikiru" is not a Christmas tale and has no supernatural elements so I will end the comparisons except to point out that George Bailey, in despair, learns he has already accomplished many good things while Kanji Watanabi, in despair, realizes that he has to accomplish one. He has fatal stomach cancer. He's estranged from his son whom he has sacrificed for. He makes a brief attempt at hedonism but is badly suited for it. He decides he will accomplish one thing before he dies, he will get a children's playground built in a working class neighborhood where there in currently an insect-ridden cesspool.
The story of how he does this is shown in flashbacks during his wake. This is a wonderful scene where as the city officials and bureaucrats get more and more drunk, the truth about Watanabi's accomplishment emerges. This is a great film, wonderfully written, acted and directed. I was led to it by a review by Roger Ebert which is well worth reading.
Akira Kurosawa's "Ikiru" (1952) asks the same question but from an entirely different perspective. The American occupation of Japan ended in 1952, the year of "Ikiru's" release, but there's still a sense of residual economic anxiety in the film. Unlike George Bailey (James Stewart) of Bailey Building and Loan, who in the end realizes how many people's lives he's touched, Kanji Watanabi (Takashi Shimura) is part of a city bureaucracy dedicated to passing the buck. After thirty years of work, his only accomplishment is to have stamped thousands of papers and sent them on to other offices.
"Ikiru" is not a Christmas tale and has no supernatural elements so I will end the comparisons except to point out that George Bailey, in despair, learns he has already accomplished many good things while Kanji Watanabi, in despair, realizes that he has to accomplish one. He has fatal stomach cancer. He's estranged from his son whom he has sacrificed for. He makes a brief attempt at hedonism but is badly suited for it. He decides he will accomplish one thing before he dies, he will get a children's playground built in a working class neighborhood where there in currently an insect-ridden cesspool.
The story of how he does this is shown in flashbacks during his wake. This is a wonderful scene where as the city officials and bureaucrats get more and more drunk, the truth about Watanabi's accomplishment emerges. This is a great film, wonderfully written, acted and directed. I was led to it by a review by Roger Ebert which is well worth reading.
Monday, October 4, 2010
Art Inconnu
The bureau chief followed a link from Metafilter (cool in its own right) to Art Inconnu (Unknown Art), which is a beautiful site. Its purpose is stated thusly, "Collected here are works by artists who are forgotten, under appreciated, or little known to the mainstream". If you follow the link today, the works of an anonymous 15th Century Italian artist are displayed first but if you scroll down or click on any of the collections on the right of the screen, you will find that most of the works are from the 19th and 20th centuries. Also, almost everything in the collection is figurative.
A commenter on Metafilter pointed out that a lot of the "unknown" artists might be quite well known in their own countries and the bureau chief can testify that John French Sloan (1871 -1951) is in the collections of the biggest art museums in the US. Here's his "Six o'clock, Winter" from 1912.
On the other hand Zinaida Serebriakova (1884 - 1967) is new to the bureau chief but apparently well known in Russia and France. A self portrait from 1909.
Heinrich Maria Davringhausen (1894 - 1970) was driven out of Germany by the Nazis and his paintings were suppressed for being decadent. When he switched to an abstract style after WW II he changed his name to Henri Davring. The bureau chief knew none of this. This is his most famous painting, "Der Schieber" (The Black-Marketeer) from 1921.
The bureau chief had also never seen the work of the Scots artist Joan Eardley (1921 - 1963) who died way too young. One of her two subjects was the urchins that swarmed through the streets of the poor neighborhood were she had a studio. This is "Little Girl with a Comic".
Her other subject was the fishing village where she had a cottage. This is "Catterline in Winter".
Sometimes when you think the internet couldn't get anymore craptastic, you come across something really nice.
A commenter on Metafilter pointed out that a lot of the "unknown" artists might be quite well known in their own countries and the bureau chief can testify that John French Sloan (1871 -1951) is in the collections of the biggest art museums in the US. Here's his "Six o'clock, Winter" from 1912.
On the other hand Zinaida Serebriakova (1884 - 1967) is new to the bureau chief but apparently well known in Russia and France. A self portrait from 1909.
Heinrich Maria Davringhausen (1894 - 1970) was driven out of Germany by the Nazis and his paintings were suppressed for being decadent. When he switched to an abstract style after WW II he changed his name to Henri Davring. The bureau chief knew none of this. This is his most famous painting, "Der Schieber" (The Black-Marketeer) from 1921.
The bureau chief had also never seen the work of the Scots artist Joan Eardley (1921 - 1963) who died way too young. One of her two subjects was the urchins that swarmed through the streets of the poor neighborhood were she had a studio. This is "Little Girl with a Comic".
Her other subject was the fishing village where she had a cottage. This is "Catterline in Winter".
Sometimes when you think the internet couldn't get anymore craptastic, you come across something really nice.
Friday, September 17, 2010
Ivan's Childhood
The bureau chief freely admits there are numerous holes in his knowledge of film history. This is a side effect of having been a graduate student in an English department with a small and, in retrospect, rather eccentric film program. The emphasis was on "Experimental Films", films as fine art, films meant to be shown in museums and other noncommercial venues. Matthew Barney's Cremaster Cycle (which I've never seen) would be a current example of this genre, although Barney's films seem much grander and much more expensive to produce than anything by his forebears like Hollis Frampton or Stan Brakhage.
Actually, these film historical empty spots are good things. Being in English graduate school, where one's job is reading and having opinions about great works of literature, can have a deadening effect on one's enjoyment of same (for decades). Having never been marched through the canon of great films (if such a thing could be agreed on) has left me with nothing but discoveries ahead of me.
This is all a preamble to Andrei Tarkovsky's "Ivan's Childhood"(1962) which I just watched on DVD. It is as beautiful as any object in a museum and terribly grim. Set in WW II, it tells the story of a 12-year-old Russian boy whose family has been killed by the invading Wehrmacht and who has become a scout for the Soviet Army. The film was shot in pristine black and white by Vadim Yusov and Criterion has done their usual amazing job of finding the best looking print on the planet.
The film is divided between dreams set in a sunlit summer and the shadowy reality of the war. Death lies over the film but Tarkovsky does an interesting thing. We see the dead bodies of various characters but, unlike in current American films where endless energy is put into killing people off in cool ways, we never see the actual killing, just the aftermath.
The film was done on location next to the Dnieper river in Ukraine but the shots are so rigorously composed that it sometimes looks like it was shot on a multi-million dollar set. It has echos of Eisenstein and Bergman (who apparently loved it). I highly recommend this film but not for a first date.
Actually, these film historical empty spots are good things. Being in English graduate school, where one's job is reading and having opinions about great works of literature, can have a deadening effect on one's enjoyment of same (for decades). Having never been marched through the canon of great films (if such a thing could be agreed on) has left me with nothing but discoveries ahead of me.
This is all a preamble to Andrei Tarkovsky's "Ivan's Childhood"(1962) which I just watched on DVD. It is as beautiful as any object in a museum and terribly grim. Set in WW II, it tells the story of a 12-year-old Russian boy whose family has been killed by the invading Wehrmacht and who has become a scout for the Soviet Army. The film was shot in pristine black and white by Vadim Yusov and Criterion has done their usual amazing job of finding the best looking print on the planet.
The film is divided between dreams set in a sunlit summer and the shadowy reality of the war. Death lies over the film but Tarkovsky does an interesting thing. We see the dead bodies of various characters but, unlike in current American films where endless energy is put into killing people off in cool ways, we never see the actual killing, just the aftermath.
The film was done on location next to the Dnieper river in Ukraine but the shots are so rigorously composed that it sometimes looks like it was shot on a multi-million dollar set. It has echos of Eisenstein and Bergman (who apparently loved it). I highly recommend this film but not for a first date.
Friday, September 3, 2010
Panic!!!!!
When the DVD of "A Town Called Panic" ("Panique au village") arrived from Netflix, Mme Le Chef was skeptical that a stop motion animation made with off the shelf, mass produced little figures could be funny but I assured her that numerous critics swore it was. They didn't lie. It's very funny.
True to the name of the film, everyone is in a perpetual state of PANIC, particularly Cowboy and Indian, our hero Horse's two idiot sidekicks. The film was made by Belgian animators and is in French. The polite nature of that language adds to the amusement, "Bonjour Cheval, ça va? Ça va, Facteur". The plot is wonderfully absurd and becomes even more so as it advances. Horse's romantic interest is the town's music teacher, Mme Longray, a lovely mare with a sexy voice. Horse keeps trying to have a lesson with her but is always being interrupted by things like thieving fish creatures from the center of the Earth.
The film is only 75 minutes long but reaches its peak of comic frenzy about a half hour into it. It slows down a little towards the end but is a delight all the way through.
True to the name of the film, everyone is in a perpetual state of PANIC, particularly Cowboy and Indian, our hero Horse's two idiot sidekicks. The film was made by Belgian animators and is in French. The polite nature of that language adds to the amusement, "Bonjour Cheval, ça va? Ça va, Facteur". The plot is wonderfully absurd and becomes even more so as it advances. Horse's romantic interest is the town's music teacher, Mme Longray, a lovely mare with a sexy voice. Horse keeps trying to have a lesson with her but is always being interrupted by things like thieving fish creatures from the center of the Earth.
The film is only 75 minutes long but reaches its peak of comic frenzy about a half hour into it. It slows down a little towards the end but is a delight all the way through.
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