10
WELCOME TO EURODESIGN
12
LETTERS
14
UPCOMING EVENTS
21
MATERIAL WORLD
Sept./Oct. 2008
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What’s
Inside
MATERIAL WORLD
The enviable, the practical, and the curious
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PHOENIX ART MUSEUM
European Collection featuring more than 1,200 paintings, drawings and sculptures FOOD FROM THE EDGE
21
47
A kitchen full of kids
50
SAVE MY CAREER
Advice for Americans who want to live abroad
MATERIAL WORLD
55
SMART BUSINESS
The turn-around of a classic brand
60
SALON AMERICA JOURNAL
A publication dedicated to the tradition of academic art past and present
66
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PARIS: YOU WON’T BELIEVE YOUR EYES
AT THE EIFFEL TOWER
My favorite place in all of Paris was at the Eiffel Tower
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MONET
Painter of the Sea, Lily ponds and Cathedrals
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ALLAN R. BANKS
An exhibition of artwork by Allan R. Banks
What’s
Inside
Sept./Oct. 2008
12
THE ADVENTURER Man vs. Machine
84
VERBATIM Francis Scott
78
ALTER EGO Grant Davis
188
PUZZLES Crosswords and more
80
NINE HOLES with John Johnson
80
MODERN VISIONS Eurodesignvip.com
All Over the Map
WHAT’S HAPPENING IN THE KEY CITIES
92
IRELAND Pastoral Walking Tours
104
CHARLOTTE Culinary Students Go Gourmet
96
LAS VEGAS Upcoming Performances
114
PHILADELPHIA City Superlatives
116
PARIS A New Way to See the Sights
100
PHOENIX Pet-friendly Sky Harbor
Featured Restaurants 194
FOUR SEASONS Fine American cuisine / NY
195
L’OULETTE Traditional French Restaurant / PARIS
196
DIMILLES An Italian Delight / SAN DIEGO
Letter from the Editor John Henry Editor-In-Chief Allan R. Banks Managing Editor Tom Cristello Copy Editor Contributing Writers John Henry Allan R. Banks Holly Banks Tom Cristello Tom Cristello Art Director Allan R. Banks Advertising & Marketing Allan R. Banks Account Executive Holly Banks Sales Assistant Arielle Evener Administrative Assistant EuroDesign Classical Living P.O. Box 233 Safety Harbor, Florida 34695 Telephone: 727.215.7801 Fax: 727.215.7802 info@EuroDesignVIP.com www.EuroDesignVIP.com
Imagine the Italian, Spanish or French hill town. The beginnings in a medieval past, evolving over time into a coherent community. Originally configured for defense. On the top a church spire from the cathedral, or perhaps a military fort. Nearby is the most public space, perhaps connected to the forecourt of the church. Under arched passageways, forming the core of the town, two to four story homes with shops underneath. A fountain plaza (read essay). Private houses and more shops line the streets radiating outwards. Narrow streets with interesting details, some opening to smaller plazas. There is a serendipity about walking around such places. Discovery makes the experience a delight. A public monument, a view down an alley, a detailed doorknob. Colors and textures, cobblestone streets, tile and stucco with stone carvings. A surprise vista with a small park overlooking the distant valley/ river. Shade and shadow. Awnings extended over market shops and quaint outdoor restaurants. A whiff of home-made bread, a musician on the street, groups of people walking, a cold drink from a vendor. This description has been replicated in this country only marginally. Two towns come to mind: Worth Ave. in Palm Beach and Santa Barbara. Neither are as interesting as the old world example, nor do they invoke all the imagery above, but the efforts made by the developers created extremely valuable real estate. Both towns function well not only for their inhabitants, but create income from tourism. They are alive, they are destination experiences. The old world example is dense, much more so than any US attempt to duplicate, due to the very narrow streets designed historically for animal and pedestrian use alone and the two to four story houses sharing common walls. These houses typically, but not in every case, incorporate a private courtyard. The hill town had no zoning; it grew organically. War, economics, culture, and the weathering of time bestow a unique charm, an authentic aura. New towns today, in order to create a ‘here’, involve a massive initial infrastructure outlay in order to create the core and preliminary background buildings. Parking needs are very difficult to accommodate. Zoning, property rights, communal upkeep, architectural control, etc. requires the most talented legal minds to create and preserve the dream. EuroDesign Classical Living is striving in many ways to bring the dream to you. Here in our pages is the first step in sharing our love for old world style and classical living.
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2007 WINNERS Best Domestic Short Nominees:
Best Producer Nominees:
Beigleiter; A Nick In Time; Tracks of Color Winner: A NICK IN TIME
Robert Davi for the Dukes; Stephen Sotor & Trace Gaynor for The Final Frontier: Explorers or Warriors; Jeff Beard, Paul Todisco, and Chris Aronoff for One Day Like Rain Winner: ROBERT DAVI - THE DUKES
Best Foreign Short Nominees: La Jaula del Monarca; Master Plan; Dreamtime Winner: DREAMTIME
Best Director Nominees: Best Domestic Documentary Nominees: Tea & Justice; Dalai Lama Renaissance; A Son’s Sacrifice Winner: TEA & JUSTICE
Best international Documentary Nominees: My Dream; Soy Andina; The Truth About Weapons of Mass Destruction Winner: THE TRUTH ABOUT WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION
Best Domestic Music Video Nominees: Falling From Mars; Albatross; The Enlightened Time Winner: THE ENLIGHTENED TIME
Robert Davi for the Dukes; Stephen Sotor & Trace Gaynor for The Final Frontier: Explorers or Warriors; Ma Xiangsheng for Impressions of Bieji Winner: ROBERT DAVI - THE DUKES
Best Student / Young Filmmaker Award Nominees: Day on Wheels; The Unfortunate Unhappiness of an Enron Prisoners; The Final Frontier: Explorers or Warriors Winner: THE FINAL FRONTIER: EXPLORERS OR WARRIORS Prize: New York Film Academy Full Tuition Scholarship to Attend One Week Digital Filmmaking Workshop ($4000 value) & $300 in Services From Duart Lab
Best International Music Video Nominees: Cola Bottle Body; Falling by The Wayside Winner: COLA BOTTLE BODY
Best Short Screenplay Nominees: Frank & Flo; Trio; Kiyala Winner: TRIO by JENNIFER BOGUSH
Best Domestic Animation Nominees: Once Upon A Christmas Village; Obra and The Merchants; Racon and Crawfish Winner: ONCE UPON A CHRISTMAS VILLAGE
Best International Animation Nominees: Janela; Marcelino & Bartolomeo: Bye-Bye!; The Cock & Bull Story Winner: COCK & A BULL STORY
Best Feature Screenplay Nominees: Hunchback of Notre Dame; More Then You Know; 3400 Miles; Boy From Mullaghamore; Lucky 7 Winner: HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME by JULIO PONCE PALMIERI & MAX RYAN
Davi-Rullo Scholarship Award ($2500) presented by Robert Davi to: JEREMY CRAIG OF COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
Best Picture Nominees: Punching at the Sun; The Dukes; Impression of Bieji Winner: IMPRESSION OF BIEJI
Humanitarian Award presented to: Roberto Monticello for his humanitarian mission in DARFUR.
Best Actor Recognition Award: presented to: Wang Liqing for his performance in IMPRESSION OF BIEJI
Outstanding Contribution To Filmmaking presented to: Director/Producer ERMENA VINLUAN TEA & JUSTICE
Best Actress Recognition Award: presented to: Li Guiping for her performance in IMPRESSION OF BIEJI
Filmmaker on the Rise Award presented to: Director/Producer Julio Ponce Palmieri
MODERN VISIONS The Modern City is zoned based on building types and function. Architectural design is not regulated and jarring juxtapositions may arise. Automobile transport is often the only option for travel between house and work. Each sector tends towards monumental showmanship. Speculative cost of land creates the need for high rise construction in city cores with few amenities given over to the public. See commentary here on planner Doxiadis’ Ekistics, Modern planning program.
A city with a signature building which acts as a foil to the “old” can be a welcome addition, but when these amorphous giants are placed row after row, the result is a Bizarro World completely alienating the citizen/pedestrian. The worst eyesore on the environment is commercial sprawl, which connects the subdivision expansions from one city to the next in relatively dense urban areas. This is a direct consequence of our car culture and reliance on cheap energy which allows low density planning. (See NU/ sprawl commentary by David Kolb.) Futuristic vision in Sant’Elia’s La Citta Nuova, right
Broadacre City (right) was Wright’s Utopia based on the idea that U.S. citizens deserved at least one acre of land for their homestead, all to be connected by auto transport and personal helicopters. The romantic notion of the endless west, bountiful land and resources supported this idea and we are now not too far from it, although the reality is that we build on less than 8% of available land mass in this country.
Modern technology and materials, maximized to yield greatest efficiency and lowest cost, results in a scale-less landscape. The absence of Old World crafts and masonry, metal, and wood details leaves a cold imprint on the Modern City. The green areas are left over right of way that seldom works best for the citizen who often cannot walk to these ‘amenities’. The International Style was imprinted on massive city building projects throughout the developing world, usually resulting in alienation of the indigenous population.
Centralization, whether expressed as the city, the factory, the school or the farm, now has the enormous power of the machine-age setting dead against it. It is in the nature of universal or ubiquitous mobilization that the city spreads out far away and thin. It is in the nature of flying that the city disappears. It is in the nature of universal electrification that the city is nowhere or it is everywhere.” Frank Lloyd Wright
Il Viale del Gardino
PAINTER OF THE SEA, LILLY PONDS AND CATHEDRALS CLAUDE OSCAR MONET (1840-1926) IMPRESSIONIST PAINTER and leader of the group of painters that pioneered the ‘and leader of the group of painters that pioneered the ‘New Painting’ as it was identified in the Paris Art world of the 1860s. Many people today know the name Monet but few know the personality behind it. Little is known of his father’s occupation but he was assumed to be in the services of the town Le Havre, a port city just beginning a modernization period. Young Monet was by his own admission disinterested in school and very restless. But his talent to draw became evident and his moter, a gifted musician, encouraged his talent. He began to do caricatures of personalities and people around him and was able to do well enough to obtain work and added to it a growing passion to paint. France as a nation was very keen to foster the arts and the Salon of Paris were world renown for its cultural achievements. So, it was not unusual for even amateurs to study painting and sculpture rather intensely. Many people from the society scene including actresses like Sarah Bernhardt took their work as a serious hobby. Monet by age twenty four moved about the café and museum scene quite easily in around Paris. The city was quickly modernizing and renewing boulevards and it’s cityscape on a grand scale, tearing down old slums to make room. All of this new activity added to the era we know today as Paris, the ‘city of lights’. Artists came from around the globe to study and soak in the atmosphere rich with new ideas and contrasting people. He would find himself in the studios of Charles Gleyre where he met fellow future impressionists Renoir, Sisley and Bazille. Later, his circle of friends included Manet, Degas and Pissarro. Working on some very large canvases of open air picnic topics and eager to gain acceptance into the annual Salon he found that he and his associates were resoundingly rejected. Official painting standards were not quite ready for the very loose and unfinished looking paintings. This rejection and others to follow would be cause for the small band of painters to pursue their own course of action and exhibit together. Monet, always fascinated by water and the shivering sunlight upon it, experimented on how to describe the phenomenon in
paint. He would also begin to explore the idea of using the same theme over and over, as in his Poplar tree series and Cathedrals at different times of the day. Anyone today seeing these works as a group becomes mesmerized by their intense appeal for both the rich impasto of the brush and delicacy of the color. Monet was often quite the dandy with tailor made suits but would scandalize his family because of his live in girl friend/model. The situation was not to the liking of his father and his lifestyle support from them eventually stopped as a result. But undaunted he pressed on with his work often with his friend Brazille, a compatriot of wealth would house him from time to time as the monies dried up. These were the lean times where Monet would seek out patronage going back an forth from his hometown of Le Havre and Paris. The city life was also too much for him as he longed for the quite and solitude in nature. His friends from around the 1870s were however making some names for themselves even if not altogether flattering. Some critics complained that the technique of smalls bits of paint dabbed on a canvas was too offensive and rough and needed to be viewed at a distance to make sense of the scene. Observations like these are still needful to explain to the untutored eye today, but the beauty of the effect still comes through as a breath of fresh air as compared to the brown school of the older masters. Ultimately after several group shows together the impressionists made their cause known and attracted an audience. This following would grow and Monet’s fortunes would change making him a wealthy painter living in his remaining years in his beloved valley of Giverny. Today Monet’s estate and gardens are easily accessible only an hour by car from Paris. His studios at the estate are completely restored as a museum that is viewed by thousands of admirers each year. The area was also populated by many artists including several American expatriates of the era. An independent spirit who was driven by a vision and remained true to it, the art world will always remember the name Monet. An independent spirit who was driven by a vision and remained true to it, the art world will always remember the name Monet.
Written by Allan R. Banks