VENU #10 Nov/Dec 2011

Contemporary Culture

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November/December_CT-NY Edition

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Contents 18 / Preserving Your Past An heirloom biography - the gift that keeps on giving for generations to come

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22 / The Rogue Doctor He’s on a mission to bring health and wellness, science, art and rock to all ages in creative new ways…with a side of healthy ice cream

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24 / Adventure Expedition News 26 / Gordon’s Good Reads The place to find a good read 28 / Travel The creative tradition of Leipzig 30 / Miss Alice Antoinette DeLamar “Alice doesn’t live her anymore” 36 / Events + Gatherings 44 / Decorative Arts On the Block 46 / Crawford Contemporary Interview with Alastair Crawford

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48 / The Discreet Charm of Hats An Afternoon with Suzanne Dache 54 / Motoring BMW Art Cars

CONTEMPORARY CULTURE

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November/December_CT-NY Edition

Cover: "Nantucket by Nature" is a singular celebration of the island's natural graces. Featuring never-before-seen images of grace and beauty, it provides an extraordinary four season glimpse of the splendors of the island. Supported by stirring and poignant score recorded by local musicians, "Nantucket By Nature" is a remarkable chronicle of the island in all it's natural, jaw-dropping glory.

Armed with an artist's eye for detail, Kit Noble decided that Nantucket would be the star of his next unique and moving film event. He would take one full year to shoot this ethereal place and the images would be translated into a film documenting and respecting the rarely seen view of Nantucket's remarkable seascapes, scenery and natural habitat.

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Contents 58 / Health Make No Bones About It 60 / Blending Science–Mystery–Hope Alliance For Cancer Gene Therapy’s Marathon Man: DR. Michael T. Lotze 63 / Sport Squash: “Chess in Short Pants” 64 / Music Caroline Jones: Fallen Flower [64] Around the World in a Day with Daria Musk [65] 66 / Comic Relief WTF with Marc Maron

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68 / The Faraway Filmmaker Kit Noble, is revealing the island dubbed the “Grey Lady” in ways never seen before 74 / Art Karl Soderlund’s Iconic Obsessions [74] Robert H. Bizinsky’s paintings 60 years later [76] 80 / Stage Curtain Call takes a bow

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60 84 / Film The Big Wedding 85 / Intellectual Property Compilations and Collective Works 86 / Fiction Much Ado About Renaldo

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CONTEMPORARY CULTURE

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VENÜ is published six times a year as a fresh yet discerning guide to art, culture and style throughout Connecticut and beyond. Not too artsy or too fussy, we’re thoughtfully written for the curious, the acquisitive, and those devoted to the one-of-a-kind and hard-to-find.

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MONOTHON2011 Robert Kipniss, Honorary Chair

Silent and Live Auction and Party Saturday, November 19, 6:30 pm–9:00 pm, $25/person Champagne Preview Reception: 5:30 pm– 6:30 pm, $100/person Auctioneer: Guy Bennett William McCarthy, This Day, 2011, Monotype

The Center for Contemporary Printmaking, a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization, is offering a selection of original prints by Helen Frankenthaler, Yozo Hamaguchi, Wolf Kahn, Robert Kipniss, William McCarthy, Richard Meier, Melissa Meyer, Robert Andrew Parker, and more, at live auction on Saturday, November 19. Vacation getaways to luxury homes in Puerto Rico and Martha’s Vineyard, and other exciting opportunities are included.

All proceeds from this event support our educational and community programs.

View auction items at the Center for Contemporary Printmaking from November 16 – 19, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

Tickets and information: 203.899.7999 Mathews Park, 299 West Avenue Norwalk, CT 06850

Robert Kipniss, Forest Murmur, 2010, Mezzotint

www.contemprints.org

www.facebook.com/CenterforContemporaryPrintmaking

https://twitter.com/ccpprints

http://www.youtube.com/ContemporaryPrint

Robert Kipniss: Mezzotints and Paintings December 4, 2011 – January 8, 2012 Opening Reception: Sunday, December 4, 2:00 pm – 5:00 pm Reading and book signing: 3:00 pm Artist/printmaker Robert Kipniss reads from his autobiography “A Working Artist’s Life”, published this fall by the University Press of New England. Autographed books are available for purchase, along with paintings and prints by the artist. Come and meet the artist at this special event. Admission Free. Refreshments will be served.

“Robert Kipniss’ “A Working Artist’s Life” is the rarest of literary achievements: a personal memoir, cultural history, and textbook of craft and market. I was enlightened, entertained and frequently moved…”

– Sidney Offit, Curator Emeritus, George Polk Journalism Awards; and President, Authors Guild Foundation

For more information: 203.899.7999

CCP is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to supporting, preserving and advancing the art of the print.

www.contemprints.org

www.facebook.com/CenterforContemporaryPrintmaking

https://twitter.com/ccpprints

Mathews Park, 299 West Avenue Norwalk, CT 06850

http://www.youtube.com/ContemporaryPrint

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November/December_CT-NY Edition

President, Creative Director: J. Michael Woodside Vice President, Executive Director: Tracey Thomas Copy Editor: Brian Solomon Michael Foley Senior Arts Editor: Philip Eliasoph Film & Entertainment Editor: Peter J. Fox Decorative Arts Editor: Matthew Sturtevant Publisher: Venü Media Company Art, Design & Production: Venü Media Company, Art Director: Asami Green Contributing Writers: Jenna Blumenfeld, Cindy Clarke, Robert Cocuzzo, Gerri Corrigan, Laura Einstein, Jordan Fiellin, Nona Footz, Nancy Helle, Sasha Ingber, Lorenz Josef, Georgetta L. Morgue, Ryan Odinak, Bari Alyse Rudin, Lisa Seidenberg, Brian Solomon, William Squier Business Development: Shelly Harvey/Connecticut, Liz Marks/New York Legal Counsel: Alan Neigher, Sheryle Levine (Byelas & Neigher, Westport, CT) Distribution: Thomas Cossuto, Man In Motion, LLC Office: 840 Reef Road, 2nd Floor, Fairfield, CT 06824 +1.203.333.7300 Tel +1.203.333.7301 Fax venumagazine.com Advertising Sales: advertising@venumagazine.com Editorial Contribution: editorial@venumagazine.com Subscriptions: Call 203.333.7300 subscribe@venumagazine.com The small print: No responsibility can be taken for the quality and accuracy of the reproductions, as this is dependent upon the artwork and material supplied. No responsibility can be taken for typographical errors. The publishers reserve the right to refuse and edit material as presented. All prices and specifications to advertise are subject to change without notice. The opinions in this publication are not necessarily those of the publisher. Copyright VENÜ MAGAZINE. All rights reserved. The name VENÜ MAGAZINE is copyright protected. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted without written consent from the publisher. VENÜ MAGAZINE does not accept responsibility for unsolicited material. This is a bimonthly publication and we encourage the public, galleries, artists, designers, photographers, writers (calling all creatives) to submit photos, features, drawings, etc., but we assume no responsibility for failure to publish submissions.

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PEOPLE + IDEAS

NEW BUSINESS

Framing Your Future

By Preserving Your Past An heirloom biography - the gift that keeps on giving for generations to come

by Nancy Helle “ we

all collect photos, and behind every image lies a story, indeed many stories. However, a box of old photos tells no tales”, says Peter Savigny, who was trained as a fine artist and then enjoyed a 20-year Emmy Award-winning career as Art Director, Graphics Designer and Editor for several major television networks, including NBC and ABC.

Today he uses his artistic talents as a self-proclaimed “Personal Historian” to help folks define those old photos and preserve stories - their own story or their family’s history. His company, TimeStories, produces broadcast-quality video documentaries in which his skills in shooting, editing and graphic enhancement, as well as interviewing, are evident. He says, “I come from an “info-tainment” background, so what’s the point of preserving images if they don’t connect the viewer to the story?” He observes that as we grow, we share in collective time periods, identified by historic events and cultural trends, such as the fashions, lifestyles and the music of that

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period. We document these communal events with our photographs and preserve them in our memories, yet no two stories are the same. These individual or family experiences are illuminated in his documentaries.

“We are all defined by our life experiences,” says Savigny. “In turn we teach our children what we have learned. Our children don’t often understand why we do what we do, our values, or where and how we learned them. Which brings us to our parents and grandparents. Often we don’t pay enough attention to their stories, and only after they are gone do we realize how much we don’t know about their lives – our heritage.”

His current career in “digging up roots”, as he calls it, had a rather inauspicious beginning. But artists have a knack for discovering creative opportunities in everyday happenings. For Savigny in 2006, an innocent question from his then four-year-old son, Reed, inspired a project that ultimately led to the founding of his own business – one that happily combined >>

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PEOPLE + IDEAS

NEW BUSINESS

Old photos provide the raw material, but the magic of the story comes to life in the editing/graphics/music enhancement phase.

his fine art training with his successful television experience.

The inspiring question was, “Daddy, who is that lady in all the photographs around the house?” The reply, “It’s my mother – your grandmother,” brought forth a deluge of more questions. “What was she like? Where did she live? What did she do?” Savigny, a first-born American, realized that he really didn’t have all the answers, so he began digging into boxes of inherited photos and memorabilia. Gradually a semblance of his mother’s life emerged and he decided to preserve it as well as make it entertaining for his son. Using her photographs he created a video photomontage, and added his voice-over narration of her eulogy that he had written. He then selected appropriate music and choice images from different periods of her life, such as a costume party from her days living in China and a later U.S. “Roaring Twenties” scene, with partygoers dancing the Charleston.

His son was obviously impressed, because his next question was, “Well, what about me? Do I get to tell my story?” So Savigny put the camera on Reed and asked him questions such as, “Why is the sky blue? What do you want to be when you grow up? At what age will you get married?

Where is heaven?”

After sharing these documentaries with family and friends, he began to get requests to create other video portraits of individuals and families, as well as his “Kidographies”, a term coined by his son. “Kidographies are especially good for children between the age of four and seven, when they think they know everything, but it’s not necessarily right,” Savigny notes, adding that in years to come, these childhood proclamations will be especially entertaining at the offspring’s graduation or wedding rehearsal dinner.

“They are real family keepsakes,” he adds.

Leaving his television career behind, his business expanded to include a variety of categories. His exceptional “Ken Burns”-styled Personal Video Biographies, Personal Tribute Movies (which highlight personal achievements - perfect for birthdays, retirements and anniversaries), Family Histories or “Memoragraphies” (which can include interviews with multi-generations), Kidographies, and Corporate Heritage Videos (which outline a company’s history, mission and goals for the future). TimeStories also develops Narrative Story Photo Albums in which they interview clients about choice pictures and weave their comments into a textual story illustrated with those photos. These distinctive, professionally printed, hand-bound albums preserve cherished images by keeping the photos connected to their stories for generations to come.

Savigny is always appreciative of his studies at The New York School of Visual Arts where he honed his talents in painting, drawing and sculpture; visual story-telling skills that he applied to his television work and now imparts to his current heirloom documentaries. After a foundation in print design, he decided to expand his job credentials by taking a post-graduate course in the emerging field of television graphics production. This led to a job at NBC where he was introduced to the new electronic use of “Paintbox” graphics on NBC’s TODAY show. Previously all television graphics had been done by hand and Savigny was initially frustrated that

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“this electronic drawing was not physical art.” However, he soon loved the efficiency and gained further technical expertise but always pushed to retain art in the production. He attributes this artistic commitment to his winning of four Emmy Awards.

The first three Emmys came when he designed the 1988 NBC Olympics in Seoul, Korea, winning awards for Senior Designer, Lead Designer and Technical Team - Remote Operations. Returning home to New York after a year and a half in Seoul, he began a career as an independent television package designer, creating the identity - the look, feel, style, theme and color scheme - for various shows airing on the History and Discovery Channels, HBO, Lifetime, Cinemax, and other broadcast and cable networks. His next Emmy award was for outstanding title sequence for MSG network’s Yankees broadcast. His animated historical opening, which preceded the Yankees’ televised games, ran for many years.

Then ABC News called him to redesign and update the look of Prime Time Live, where he also met his wife-to-be. His last assignment was for the National Basketball Association, establishing the look and feel of their new graphics department for which he won additional acclaim, adding to his roster of 6 Broadcast Designer’s Association awards.

Savigny thinks of his video life-story movies as “cinematic art”. He says they are produced for a fraction of typical television production costs yet retain broadcast quality. He attributes this to his small, efficient operation, which benefits his clients. Using an exclusive list of topics from which clients may select, the filmed “discussion” time typically ranges between one and three hours per person for principal biographies, and frequently several family members may contribute segments to a longer family history.

Once the footage and family photographs have been gathered, the magic of the stories come to life in the editing / graphics / music enhancement phase, often including relevant stock footage and extensively researched images from the depths of internet archives. For every hour of recorded interview, Savigny usually spends twenty-five hours refining the final version.

“A lot of precision goes into our detailed productions to make them look seamless, and to make them engaging for generations to come,” Savigny explains. “Clients watch them as a family event - often several times in one sitting. The first few times they’re just caught up in the moment. They often express amazement at the visual materials we locate and how these images and the music selections accentuate their life story.”

“My business expands to encompass new ideas and challenges from clients as needed, Savigny observes. “There’s nothing more rewarding than to see the twinkle in the eyes of a senior person recounting their youthful escapades; to see a child strive for comprehension in his or her fledgling life, or to watch a family become reunited over stories nearly lost. “We love what we do and are proud of saving lives for future generations – one story at a time.”

For more information, visit the website: TimeStories.com or contact Peter Savigny at: peter@timestories.com.

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CONTEMPORARY CULTURE//MAGAZINE

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PEOPLE + IDEAS

ENTREPRENEUR

Left: Perry A. Brittis, MD, PhD, Co-Founder of SliceLabs, LLC. ABOVE: SliceCream and SliceJel packaging in single, push up pouches, all designed and developed

by Dr. Brittis, featuring the SliceLabs iconic character Navea, merging science with modern style.

The Rogue Doctor He’s on a mission to bring health and wellness, science, art and rock to all ages in creative new ways…with a side of healthy ice cream

by Geri Corrigan the world has become extremely complicated, however, translating complicated ideas into simplified concepts is not foreign to Perry A. Brittis, MD, PhD. The son of a highly regarded Westchester neurosurgeon, Dr. Anthony Brittis, and artist, Marianna, he inherited an interest in medicine as well as the gift of creativity. This background has enabled him to take complex concepts and present them in unique, simplified ways. To visually educate the public about the enormous complexity of brain development, in the early 1990’s, Dr. Brittis developed the concept of “Axon Art.” Axon Art places select images of his own professional and published scientific work against novel, back-lit backgrounds in contemporary frames. As a physician scientist, musician and artist, Dr. Brittis is always on the cutting edge and has succeeded in disseminating scientific ideas from the earliest point of his career, having published some of the most advanced research about brain development in premier scientific journals as well as being featured in The New York Times while only in his 20s.

What differentiates Dr. Brittis from most of today’s young physician scientists is that he has gone “Rogue” in an effort to change perceptions about health and wellness while developing new

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concepts for learning and education in medicine, science and the arts. After studying medicine and conducting ground-breaking scientific research at some of the world’s most prestigious institutions, Dr. Brittis has gone from growing nerve cells to making healthy ice cream. This is not your runof-the-mill ice cream, but high tech tasty stuff he

formulated while working with patients, researching the brain, playing music and creating art.

One can see how this transition occurred, as Dr. Brittis has been on the forefront of scientific research and development but also trained as a physician.While in medical school, Dr. Brittis became aware of the nation’s growing waistline but was unprepared for the onslaught of patients who knew nothing about the value of preventative medical care, good eating habits, and the value of nutrition and exercise. As a young resident, he frequently interacted with patients in their early fifties who, although feeling healthy, were actually sick due to poor lifestyles, and frequently ended up having heart bypass surgery.

These first-hand experiences led him to conclude the need for proper nutrition to promote, enhance and accelerate the healing process after rigorous exercise, injury, surgery or illness.

In addition to his medical training, Dr. Brittis has also been on the cutting edge of scientific research at Harvard Medical School, working for many years with genes and proteins at the academic level. Meanwhile, in his home kitchen lab he and a colleague began to experiment with various types of proteins and formulas that were both high in nutritional value and actually tasted good. He feels that proper nutrition is one of the most important aspects of health care for all ages. Yet, even today, it is often neglected by the medical establishment. While working in the hospital, he grew frustrated providing the popular, yet unappetizing, high sugar, artificial meal replacement shakes to his patients. He decided to use his free time in his home lab in Boston ultra purifying the highest quality protein to invent a healthy alternative to ice cream and traditional meal replacement shakes. The result? A product Left: Axon Art –Eruption. A group of young neurons in the developing spinal cord as they grow and begin to extend axonal connections in the developing spinal cord. Media: Print. Dimensions: 4 feet x 4 feet.

PEOPLE + IDEAS

ENTREPRENEUR

Left: SliceLabs internship visit to the Harvard Club, New York. Geri Corrigan, Director of Marketing and Dr. Brittis with SliceLabs interns and members of the Julliard Jazz Orchestra.

CENTER: Axon Art – Stepping Stone. High magnification electron microscopy of brain glial cells on biopolymer bead. Media: Printed backlit transparency with custom chrome frame.

Dimensions: Circular, 5 foot diameter. ABOVE: Dr. Brittis teaching guitar skills to Reid Blomquist.

he calls SliceCream, the world’s first frozen nutrition bar. Dr. Brittis began providing samples to patients and friends and some of these friends were Nike runners who began to spread the word. SliceCream soon caught the eye of Nike in Boston who was so intrigued and impressed that they invited Dr. Brittis to represent them at the Boston Marathon in 2010. The overwhelming response and enthusiasm received during the marathon made it apparent that SliceCream was a product that was enjoyed by all.

With the national epidemic of obesity among children and adults growing at an alarming rate, Dr. Brittis decided that it was time to give back to the public and follow his passion of making a difference in the lives of children and adults through preventative care and by developing nutritious and delicious products. “What the public does not realize is that most of the protein bars and shakes on the market have a great deal of fat and sugar and contain proteins that are not bioactive… in other words, regardless of the quantity, poor quality protein is not readily absorbed and in many cases eliminated from the body,” said Dr. Brittis.

In 2010, Dr. Brittis returned to his hometown of Bronxville, New York where he attended the local public school, played football, baseball and wrestled, and was the co-founder of the now flourishing, original lacrosse team.

Back in Bronxville, he launched his company, SliceLabs, a nutrient replenishment company that makes only the purest products, void of fillers and artificial ingredients. SliceCream is SliceLabs’ introductory product, an all-natural, ultra purified high-protein, fat-free, low-calorie, rich-tasting

and creamy textured frozen nutrition bar fortified with vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. Next up is SliceJel, a nutritious, delicious “jello-like” gelatin bar that does not require refrigeration.

Indeed, SliceLabs could make a real difference in the way the public understands the importance of preventative nutritional care.

With the national epidemic of obesity among children and adults growing at an alarming rate, Dr. Brittis decided that it was time to give back to the public and follow his passion of making a difference in the lives of children and adults through preventative care and by developing nutritious and delicious products.

Dr. Brittis’ long-term goal is to create a research and educational institute to fund scientific and medical education and carry out world-class research on nutrition and various diseases in both adults and children. To follow through on his commitment to today’s youth, SliceLabs launched its inaugural internship program this past summer, offering young college students the opportunity to learn about starting a business, health and wellness research, marketing, business etiquette and the arts, providing interns a unique, well-rounded experience that not only gives them a greater appreciation for business development but also

health science education and an opportunity to help find and develop their career passions.

Although Dr. Brittis never considered a career as an entrepreneur, starting SliceLabs has been an exciting learning experience. However, doing things in the realm outside his medical training is nothing new to Dr. Brittis, who is also a skilled jazz and rock guitar soloist and artist.

One of his passions is using his hobby as a rock guitarist to teach children to have fun appreciating music, science and the arts. “The young brain is basically an intellectual sponge, made up of neurons and synapses waiting to receive stimuli to develop, and learning and playing music is a great form of stimulation. Regardless of the unique individual ways children respond--whether through music, art or science--it’s all good because I know their young neurons are rapidly developing and forming new connections based on this stimulation,” says Dr. Brittis.

Helping people of all ages stay healthy and live balanced lifestyles so that they can achieve their desired potential is Dr. Brittis’ fundamental goal and passion. That and inspiring other professionals, regardless of field, to join him in his ‘Rogue’ mission of doing things in a unique way to help empower today’s youth and shape the future generation so that they can be the “rock stars” of tomorrow. And if they grow up to be the next Jimi Hendrix, Wynton Marsalis, Yo Yo Ma, Georgia O’Keeffe or Albert Einstein based on these principles, then that’s not a bad thing either.

To learn more about SliceLabs, visit www.slicelabs.com, or email info@slicelabs.com

CONTEMPORARY CULTURE//MAGAZINE

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ADVENTURE

expedition news

by Jeff Blumenfeld

New Zealand Sisters Achieve Second Summit of Koh-e-Baba-Tangi in Afghanistan

New Zealand sisters Patricia Deavoll, 52, and Christine Byrch, 51, recently climbed Koh-e-Baba-Tangi in Afghanistan.

Deavoll reports, "Christine and I summited Koh-e-Baba-Tangi (21,375-ft. /6515m) in the Wakhan Corridor of the Hindu Kush Range of Northern Afghanistan on August 9. Five days to the summit with some good steep ice, then two days to descend the West Ridge (line of the original 1963 ascent). Ours is only the second climb of the mountain, done via a new route up the NNW ridge."

Koh-e-Baba-Tangi is considered by many mountaineers to be the most fascinating peak in the Afghan Hindu Kush. It was first climbed by an Italian team via the West Ridge in 1963.

The mountains of Afghanistan's High Hindu Kush are located in the northeast of the country, in the long finger of land known as the Wakhan Corridor, which separates Pakistan and Tajikistan. These mountains are gradually being revisited by climbers, who report the area to be remote, safe and worlds apart from the on-going war with the Taliban. Peaks in the Wakhan Corridor were hugely popular in the 1960's and 70's, particularly among European climbers who would often reach the area overland via the "hippy trail."

They were enticed by generally easier access than found in other parts of the Himalaya/Karakoram, more stable weather

and the ability to climb without the constraints of a restrictive permit system.

But after the coup d'etat in 1978 and the Soviet invasion in 1979, the climbing became strictly off-limits and remained so for almost 30 years.

However in 2003, Carlo Alberto Pinelli, an Italian mountaineer who in the 1960s climbed extensively in the area (and was one of the first climbers on Koh-e-Baba Tangi), organized an expedition he called the Oxuz: Mountains for Peace, with the objective of climbing Noshaq (24,580-ft./7492m), Afghanistan's highest mountain. He wanted to let the Afghans know they had not been forgotten by the climbers who had benefited from their generous hospitality.

The successful expedition effectively marked the beginning of a new era of

Expedition Studies 2012 Venus Transit Venus, the planet named after the Roman goddess of love and beauty, is ready for its close-up. The Venus Transit Expedition next year is a modern day science expedition looking to emulate Captain James Cook's maiden voyage, for the Royal Society, to witness and record the path of Venus across the Sun in 1769. When Venus passes directly between earth and the sun, the distant planet is viewed as a small dot gliding slowly across the face of the sun.

A Venus transit only occurs every 120 years; after June 5-6, 2012, scientists will have to wait until December 2117. It should come as no surprise that the transit has its own website (www.transitofvenus.org) and Transit of Venus phone app.

Modern day adventurer Huw (as in "Hugh") James, 27, from Caerphilly, South Wales, is assembling a team of four people to travel to the North Pacific in 4 x 4 vehicles starting in Britain, then across Europe, across the Ukraine, Russia, Mongolia and China to Japan where the team will witness the tran-

Jeff Blumenfeld is author of “You Want to Go Where? – How to Get Someone to Pay for the Trip of Your Dreams” (Skyhorse Publishing). The book covers some of the world’s most historic expeditions and adventures with an eye towards how people can gain funding for their own projects. To order a personally signed copy, send a check for $20 (includes postage and handling) payable to Expedition News, 28 Center Street, Darien, CT 06820.

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climbing in the region. Over the past five years a steadily increasing number of expeditions have, once again, enjoyed climbing in the Afghan Hindu Kush.

Deavoll and Byrch are two highly accomplished mountaineers; between them they have over 50 years of climbing experience. Deavoll, a resident of Christchurch, has been on 10 expeditions to Asia in the past nine years, all to climb mountains between 6000m and 7000m in height. Three of these (2007, 2008, 2009) have been to Afghanistan's close neighbor, Pakistan.

Byrch, a resident of Queenstown, has also traveled extensively in Pakistan. Both were aware of the risks of traveling in a Muslim country during periods of political unrest and knew how to conduct themselves as western women in an Islamic culture.

sit, one of the rarest events in astronomy.

James, the expedition leader, is a multitalented individual with a passion for science and adventure. He runs a company in Wales that focuses on innovative ways to engage the public through informal scientific learning and adventure sports (www.huwjames. com). He united his passion for science and sport into a website called Science Junkie (www.sciencejunkies.co.uk). Log on and you'll be given helpful advice for determining your Ape Ratio: arm span divided by height. In sports such as rock climbing, a ratio greater than one is considered an advantage.

James explains the inspiration for the Venus Transit Expedition, "is to show that scientific exploration is very much still alive today and that science is not only interesting but the scientific process can be a journey of a lifetime. The reason that Darwin, Cook, Scott went on their epic voyages were to discover more about the world and to bring home scientific facts about the world around them," James said.

The expedition is seeking sponsorship funding of £80,000 ($131,180). (For more information: Lynne Edwards, Sponsorship Manager, UK +44 [0]7738166229, lynne@aventuremarketing.com).

Vern Tejas' 50th Summiting of McKinley Probably a Record

Photo: Vern Tejas

Guide Vern Tejas logged his 50th summit of Mount McKinley this summer, prompting an obvious question: Does that make him the ruler of North America's highest roost?

Beth Bragg of the Anchorage Daily News (July 20) reports officials with the National Park Service don't know if anyone has been to the top of McKinley more often than Tejas, because they didn't begin tracking summits until 1995. They think Tejas, who boasts numerous claims to fame gained in the Alaska Range and beyond, probably

owns the record for the most McKinley summits. (See EN, September 2009).

Tejas, 58, a guide for Alpine Ascents International, said his first two McKinley summits came in 1978, one as a client and one as a guide. An impressive - but not unprecedented - four summits came in 1988, when Tejas became the first person to complete a solo climb of the mountain in the winter. No. 50 came June 30, when he was the guide of an eight-person team that made it to the summit.

"Mt. Vinson in Antarctica would be my next most climbed mountain, however it's not even close to Denali at a mere 27 summits," Tejas tells the Daily News.

In 1988, Tejas made it to the top of McKinley four times, an achievement that began in March when he became the first person to make a successful solo winter ascent of the mountain. "My endless winter," Tejas calls it.

Tejas guided adventurer Norman D. Vaughan in 1994 when, at age 89, Vaughan

climbed a 10,320-foot Antarctic peak that Admiral Richard Byrd named in his honor 65 years earlier during their historic 19281930 South Pole expedition.

Tejas also continues to pursue adventures outside Alaska, but nothing inspires him like McKinley. "Denali is the most beautiful mountain in the world," he e-mailed the Daily News, "and I want to climb it as long as I can - 65 summits when I am 65 sounds great to me. A nice round number."

Mother Nature Loading Up

Wreck of Canadian Schooner Found with Masts Erect

After 105 years, the three masts of the Queen of the Lakes still stand erect - all the more remarkable because the 19th-century Canadian schooner has sat in the dark depths of Lake Ontario since it wrecked in 1906.

"We think it hit bow first because the bowsprit is broken off, but the rest of the ship looks pretty nice," undersea explorer Jim Kennard told the Associated Press last month.

Kennard and fellow shipwreck enthusiasts Dan Scoville and Roland Stevens located the 129-foot-long vessel using side-

scan sonar in 2009. They confirmed the find and captured images of it in early July using a remotely operated submersible.

The ship sits on the lakebed at a depth of 200 to 300 feet. Its masts extend as much as 100 feet upward in calm, frigid waters deprived of oxygen, conditions that account for how well it's preserved.

"When you have a temperature of, like, 39 degrees and you're at a depth where there's no wave action or current, the only thing that can damage the wood would be zebra or quagga mussels as they collect and grow in big clumps and fall off," Kennard said.

In 2008 in Lake Ontario, Kennard's team located the wreck of the HMS Ontario, the oldest shipwreck ever found in the Great Lakes. During the American Revolution in 1780, the 22-gun British warship was lost in a gale with barely a trace and as many as 130 people aboard.

Since 1970, Kennard has helped find more than 20 wrecks in the Great Lakes and about 180 others in Lake Champlain, New York's Finger Lakes and the Mississippi and Ohio rivers.

Popular New York City weatherman Bill Evans, co-author with Marianna Jameson of the new weather thriller, Dry Ice (Tor Books, 2011), writes about TESLA, a secret weather "research" station in the frozen heart of Antarctica that creates weather across the globe. In the book, the secret encrypted computer program activates, sending fatal weather worldwide, striking every continent's grain-growing region and livestock farming area.

During a presentation in New Canaan, Conn. last month, Evans disputes the claim that the Earth is fragile. "It's not fragile, it's growing, with over 300 active volcanoes at any one time. We're up to "I" on the hurricane list. In the last two years, the weather has been such an overachiever. With all our technology, we still have trouble forecasting the weather – every storm so far has been underestimated."

He warned the audience not to get lulled by nice weather. "Every sunny day – that's Mother Nature loading up for the next weather event."

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BOOKS

GORDON’S GOOD READS The place to find a good read...

by Gordon Hastings

I remind my VENÜ readers that there are many appealing titles listed at www.gordonsgoodreads.wordpress.com.

The space here does not allow me to cover all of the titles that you may find appealing. At the blog site, you will find the titles dating back to the inception of the blog in February of this year.

You might find it interesting that the most popular search subject in 2011 is Hemingway. This popularity goes back to the original blog post of Hadley, the story of Hemingway’s first wife. Adding great interest to the Hemingway renaissance was of course the movie Midnight in Paris. Movies of popular books do in fact drive great interest in the original book. This was very much the case in the popularity of my blogs on The Help and Water for Elephants.

Searches on the blog for these titles have not eclipsed Hemingway but are extremely popular.

Watch Gordon’s Good Reads for Tom Friedman’s That Used to Be Us, written with Michael Mandelbaum. I also recommend to you Friedman’s The Lexus and the Olive Tree (1999), The World is Flat (2005) and Hot, Flat and Crowded (2008). All are critically important, engaging and compelling reading for the times.

Make books a big part of your holiday season.

The Wings Of The Dove

by Henry James Those of you who have paged through Gordon’s Good Reads know that I have a penchant for playing catch-up with great writers who have escaped my time and attention.

Henry James, the American born novelist (1843-1916) whose most prolific years were spent living and writing in England, is a classic example of a novelist for whom anyone who has a love for the form will find his work a Good Read. In making my “classic” Henry James selection I chose The Wings of the Dove (1902) a book credited by many as among the best novels of the 20th Century.

Henry James writes in a unique style.

His sentence and paragraph structure is complex and his character development is intricate.

The characters are the narrators of the story.

The Wings of the Dove is typical of many James novels in that it pits American and British tradi-

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tions and values against one another. James creates eight central characters that interact in life’s dramas of love, greed, envy and deception.

The book travels from America to England and Venice.

Henry James has been described as an “Impressionist” in his ability to create characters and then with the minutest attention to personality cast them in relationships and enviornments that are so complex that they sometimes defy a “Now I understand!” moment. One is constantly required to turn yet another page for answers which often lead to more questions.

The reader of Henry James ought to be prepared to traverse a hundred pages to become accustomed to the rhythm of his prose. However, once you find the tempo the paragraphs become lyrical. You will come to be accustomed to sentence structure where a half-dozen commas and a few added semi-colons are commonplace! The complexity has a magnetic effect that draws the reader to make every word count. No skimming in reading The Wings of the Dove!

James wrote his greatest works during three periods, the 1880s, 1890s and 1900s. The first period culminated with The Portrait of a Lady (1881), which remains his most popular work of fiction. In 1886 James wrote The Bostonians themed around the early feminist movement in America. Following The Wings of the Dove, James wrote The Ambassadors (1903), and then the famous short story The Turn of the Screw, later adapted for the stage.

I have often said in these pages “The best new book is one you have not read.” Henry James, The Wings of the Dove is no easy literary undertaking but I found it to be worth every minute. Like many writers, James has favorite words which reappear throughout his work. In The Wings of the Dove you will come upon “prodigious,” again and again. It is a fitting description of The Wings of the Dove. “Impressively great in size, force and extent. Marvelous.”

Lonesome Dove Series – A Good Read For The Winter On the top shelf, back in the upper right hand corner sits Lonesome Dove, the 1985 Pulitzer Prize winner by Larry McMurtry. Who could forget Lonesome Dove? A blockbuster movie, television series, country music iconic song all attributed to McMurtry’s storytelling. All of the elements of a great western epic are incorporated in Lonesome Dove. Texas Rangers, a love story, Indians, a lawless frontier, and the sheer beauty and adventure of a cattle drive from Texas to Montana. Recalling the pleasure of reading Lonesome Dove brings into focus the entire Lonesome Dove Series.

Lonesome Dove (1985), Streets of Laredo (1989) Dead Man’s Walk (1996) Comanche Moon (2008). Although written in the aforementioned order, if you wish to read them in the chronological order of the plot setting you would begin with Dead Man’s Walk (set in the 1840s) dealing with the earliest adventures of Texas Rangers Augustus McRae and Woodrow Call set around the Santa Fe

gordonsgoodreads.wordpress.com Expedition of 1841. You will also be introduced to Comanche worrier Buffalo Hump and several other important characters that appear in the later novels.

Comanche Moon is set in the 1850s-1860s with McRae and Call in pursuit of the Comanche horse thief Kicking Wolf. Also entering the storyline is McRae’s love interest Clara Forsythe, and his rival Bob Allen. Buffalo Hump leads the Comanche Nation to war with a detailed plot of characters and twist and turns moving through the Civil War and to Lonesome Dove.

Streets of Laredo is the fourth and final book in the series, set in the 1890s. Texas Ranger Woodrow Call, now a bounty hunter, tracks a Mexican Bandit who is praying on the railroads.

Gus McRae appears protecting settlers from renegade Indians and bad folks in general. Loves are won and lost; the paternity of certain children is surprisingly identified. Judge Roy Bean, “The Law West of the Pecos” is hanged.

I read Lonesome Dove first, set in the mid to late 1870s but having done so my next step is to return to the beginning of the chronological order of the plots and pick up Dead Man’s Walk.

McMurtry’s ability to establish and carry forward characters reminds me of Tom Clancy with Jack Ryan, Jack Ryan Jr., et al. McMurtry has given us Augustus Gus” McCrae, Woodrow F. Call, Joshua Deets, Pea Eye Parker, Jake Spoon, Clara Forsythe Allen, Maggie Tilton, Lorena Wood Parker, Blue Duck, and Buffalo Hump. You will be fascinated with all of them.

disappointments and the expanse of silence and misunderstanding that can exist within the close proximity of summer rituals.

Allegory and metaphor play an extraordinary role in Woolf’s story. Those that know personally of these gatherings will see in the mirror the silent spaces that exist even in the most intimate relationships. Kind words never spoken, emotions not expressed, anger never stated, forgiveness withheld, passion restrained, while life goes on around the missed opportunities found in a perfectly orchestrated daily schedule and of course the everypresent constant of the lighthouse.

To The Lighthouse is about the human spirit and this 1927 novel set on the coast of Scotland could very well be a 21st Century family gathering in Quogue, Blue Hill, Montauk or Kennebunkport.

Journey To The Lighthouse with Virginia Woolf.

You could not ask for a better companion.

“Just as drug lords know that their products pose hazards to their customers, the Wall Street firms packaging and selling mortgage pools to investors knew well before their customers did that the loans inside the securities had begun to go bad.

But with the mortgage mania raging and profits still flowing the investment bankers had no interest in coming clean.”

“The Incident was the first of many times that the heads of organizations accused of improper conduct were not held accountable for the damage they did to shareholders and, later, to taxpayers.”

“Will a debacle like the credit crisis of 2008 ever happen again? Most certainly, because Congress decided against fixing the problem of toobig-to-fail institutions when it had the chance.”

Page by page with incredibly impressive detail, facts and substantiation, Morgenson and Rosner describe the lead-up to the carnage to the American economy and citizenry, and to the financial crisis that the government is still facing.

There are pages in this book that you simply will not want to believe. However, you will! All of the economic meltdown characters are there with the ironic twist that nearly all of them are still controlling the levers of economic power. The list of key players in the meltdown who are still on stage spans pages 305-308!

Reckless Endangerment

by Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner

To The Lighthouse

by Virgina Wolfe No matter what list, Woolf’s To The Lighthouse appears as one of the 100 Best Novels of the Twentieth Century! Surely many of you have already enjoyed this heralded work but did so at a time in life when it would have been impossible to appreciate the book’s insight into family relationships, love, estrangement, the unspoken word, jealously, empathy and hope.

A summer home gathers an annual collection of family and friends. Generations explore common interests, new love, old hatreds, bad habits,

Gretchen Morgenson has again distinguished herself as the finest reporter of financial matters in the American free press. The added research of Joshua Rosner raises the new book Reckless Endangerment to an even higher level of excellence and credibility. Recognition of the full title of this work is essential. RECKLESS-ENDANGERMENT, HOW OUTSIZED AMBITION, GREED, AND CORRUPTION LED TO ECONOMIC ARMAGEDDON.

Morgenson’s and Rosner’s investigative reporting and writing (an appropriate description) not only tells this nearly unbelievable story but it is a statement about the importance of newspapers and journalists who are committed to upholding the tenants of a free press in a democracy.

The following paragraphs from Reckless Endangerment preview the depth to which the book travels to tell the story leading up to the economic meltdown of 2008 and more disturbingly raises the prospect that at this very moment it may well be happening all over again.

Against All Enemies – A Stand Alone Tom Clancy!

I have previously referenced in an earlier post the pleasure of reading fourteen Tom Clancy novels in sequence! The characters appear and re-appear and of course there is the ever-present Jack Ryan as in the case of last year’s Dead or Alive.(See earlier Tom Clancy Blog). Against All Enemies is written with Peter Telep.

I have just completed Against All Enemies sans Jack Ryan but ex-Navy-Seal Maxwell Moore carries forward Clancy’s genius for crafting fabulous thrillers. A warning, when you arrive at Chapter 42 clear your schedule because you will not be able to put this book down until the last page.

Those of us who have already read Dead or Alive will have to wait for the next Clancy volume to find out who wins the election!

In the cue at Gordonsgoodreads.wordpress.com, Empire of the Summer Moon by S. G. Gwynne, the story of the rise and fall of the Comanche Indians of the American Great Plains, Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand, the incredible World War II POW story of Louie Zamperini, Amor Towles’ Rules of Civility and Evelyn Waugh’s A Handful of Dust.

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Travel

The Creative Tradition Of Leipzig Despite being voted number ten in The New York Times’ “31 Places to Go in 2010,” Leipzig might not cross travelers’ minds when they consider a trip to Europe.

by Sasha Ingber

Over time, a stream of notable people lived and worked here. Philosopher and mathematician Gottfried Leibniz was born in Leipzig, as was Richard Wagner. Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, widely considered the world’s first dramaturge, studied at the University of Leipzig, along with Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Friedrich Nietzsche, and the famous German socialist Karl Liebknecht. Johann Sebastian Bach filled the city’s churches with cantatas every week as cantor of Saint Thomas Church, and Jewish composer Felix Mendelssohn directed the renowned Gewandhaus Orchestra and founded Germany’s first conservatory, the Leipzig Conservatory of Music.

Faceless inhabitants of the past also resurface, like those who died fighting near Napoleon’s command post during the Battle of Leipzig in 1813. Its monument, Völkerschlachtdenkmal, stands higher than any other European memorial at almost 300ft. My grandfather was born here and aspired to be an opera singer, before being imprisoned in concentration camps. Stolpersteine, “stumble stones” made of brass and set into the sidewalks, mark the resi-

Photo: Sasha Ingber

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dences of Jews who vanished or perished during the Holocaust. “Throughout the East there are pockets of Leipzig untouched from WWII,” says Karl Owens, an American musician who visits from his home base in Berlin.

“Caved-in roofs, boarded-up buildings, and no money in the GDR for a tart-up. It is thought provoking to consider what life must have been like during those dark times.”

I have often wondered how people influence places and places influence people, and Leipzig’s residents and spaces deepen this curiosity. Today, Leipzig is still a cultural center not only of Germany but all of Europe.

Nietzsche wrote, “The German loves clouds and everything that is unclear, becoming, twilit, damp, and overcast: whatever is in any way uncertain, unformed, blurred, growing, he feels to be ‘profound.’ The German himself is not, he becomes, he ‘develops.’” Allied bombing during World War II leveled much of the city, but glossy, modern structures have risen between Renaissance and Wilhelminian buildings. As I walk along the streets, in a

Sabine Wenzel, © Asisi

Photo: Sasha Ingber

Photo: Sasha Ingber

warren of historical moments, I feel that the juxtaposition of buildings represents how Leipzig’s 522,000 citizens aren’t intimidated by their predecessors’ achievements or setbacks.

The Spinnerei, a former cotton mill dating back to 1884, has become a sanctuary for both artists and art lovers. Over one hundred studios and fourteen galleries inhabit the weathered brick buildings, showcasing contemporary paintings, prints, sculptures, and ceramics. A café serves kangaroo goulash and artists leave their studio doors ajar—with Bach playing in the background, of course. Even the renowned painter Neo Rauch has a space here. “There is so much artistic potential in Leipzig,” says Yvonne Penter, who works two other jobs to fund her charming porcelain shop nearby, Porzellanstudio Penter & Sehnert. “But art is ein ‘hartes Brot’ [a hard bread], where one needs persistence, motivation, and idealism.”

Dedication and inspiration are everywhere, even in a girl’s hand flashing across the strings of her violin as she plays a Bach piece, then the New Orleans jazz standard, “When the Saints Go Marching In.” Many street musicians blend old and new as they stretch accordions and strike glockenspiels that echo down the sidewalks. Techno and house music pulse through abandoned factory complexes and old theaters like UT Connewitz, instilling neighborhoods Plagwitz and Lindenau with a lively, underground feel. An array of music festivals cater to classical and modern tastes: Bach Fest in June features over 110 events with internationally acclaimed musicians, while alternative music thrives at Pop Up Leipzig, an annual festival that taps into the scene outside of the mainstream music industry. In addition, Euro-scene

Photo: Sasha Ingber

Leipzig in November attracts experimental theatre and dance from all corners of Europe. It’s as though the city echoes Mendelssohn’s assertion that, “Life and art are not two different things.”

Impressive collections at the Leipzig Museum of Fine Arts and the Grassi Museum, covering ethnography, applied arts and musical instruments, could leave anyone’s feet aching. But for some visitors and residents, it’s what hasn’t been built or organized that calls to them. Parks and forests make up one third of the city, and timeless places like Clara-Zetkin-Park, situated in the center of the city, and the Auenwald, almost seven square miles of floodplain forest, offer quiet for thought and rest. A walk along Karl-Heine-Kanal reveals tranquil scenes of paddlers and picnickers. Even the cavernous holes of former coal mining plants have been turned into lakes like Cospudener See, infusing the city with a beach atmosphere.

Nature and art come together in an old gasometer on Richard-Lehmann-Strasse that was repurposed by Berlin artist Yadegar Asisi. Inside the Asisi Panometer, visitors are enveloped by a circular picture that is 98ft high and 344ft in circumference. The current exhibit, Amazonia, recreates the Amazon through an artist’s perspective. The sounds of wildlife and tropical storms fill the building, a light installation hastens time by simulating nightfall and sunrise, and binoculars expose the smallest details of caterpillars on leaves. Perhaps travelers will be stirred to visit for the next exhibit in 2013, the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Leipzig. The panometer will feature an image of the city as it might have looked in 1813, reuniting once again Leipzig’s illustrious past and innovative present.

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“Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore”

by Nona Footz

During the morning rush hour my husband and I sit in our car before boarding Metro North to watch the comings and goings of the Westport commuters. We create mini-scenarios about who we see and what drama their lives might entail – storytelling for adults. And while it’s nice to relax for a few minutes constructing vignettes and sipping hot coffee before officially starting the work day, we recently came to the conclusion that it can be stressful being a part of other people’s lives. We had just spent the weekend in an old, damp, dark garage sorting through a dozen moldy broken down cardboard boxes overflowing with dusty files, crumpled snapshots and random sheets of yellowing notepaper – all in the hopes of finding the long lost autobiographical manuscript of former Weston resident Miss Alice Antoinette DeLamar.

The hunt had left us physically and emotionally spent as we were unsuccessful in our search yet felt we had somehow become intertwined into her life and couldn’t give up the quest. That missing manuscript was likely the most comprehensive collection of data ever compiled on this extraordinary woman.

A

lice DeLamar became a significant and prolific benefactor supporting some of the most notable Mid-Century figures in the arts – choreographer George Balanchine, New York City Ballet co-founder Lincoln Kirstein, actress and Civic Repertory Theatre founder Eva Le Gallienne, Igor Stravinsky’s assistant and pioneer aviatrix Lucia Davidova, Russian painter Pavel Tchelitchew, jazz great Dave Brubeck, and famed ballerina and Balanchine’s fourth wife Tally LeClercq - to name but a few. Much has changed in the Connecticut suburban lifestyle since the fifty years between 1930 and 1980 and only Alice’s stately home remains standing; however, there are a smattering of friends, former neighbors and admirers from around the world who still remember her immense generosity and genuine interests that helped jumpstart and sustain so many notable careers.

On the second day of December in 1918 Captain Joseph Rafael DeLamar, a copper and silver baron known as the “Mystery Man of Wall Street” died of pneumonia at age 75 leaving a portion of his vast $34 million fortune to only daughter Alice DeLamar. A mere 23 years old, Alice quickly became one of the richest heiresses in America with $10 million to her name and multiple properties including a 47 acre property on the North Shore of Long Island boasting an eighty room mansion (“Pembroke”), as well as a Beaux-Arts style New York City apartment on the corner of 37th street and Madison Avenue complete with 100 plus fireproof rooms and an underground garage and car elevator.

A few years after her father’s passing, Alice shed those daunting properties and bought a small apartment at 530 Park Avenue which served as her American home base in addition to buying a Parisian flat overlooking the Seine and Notre

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Dame. France was where she would have her green Lincoln Zephyr shipped and fetched by her chauffeur, and driven down to Cap d’Antibes, Saint Paul-deVence, Nice and Cap Menton. She soon also started construction on a home in Palm Beach where she had first visited as a child of five and then later in life as a teenager for Easter vacations returning every single winter thereafter.

Educated as a young lady at the Spence School on West 48th in Manhattan where her godfather William Nelson Cromwell was the school attorney, Alice benefited from founder Clara Spence’s mission that “higher education for women was of paramount importance. The outside world of politics, the arts, and the community was embraced… Spence girls developed a keen sense of selfconfidence and assumed their roles as significant members of the community.”

In addition to her commitment and participation in the arts, Alice had a life-long intellectual curiosity and was an avid reader, amassing some 7,000 tomes about art, architecture, sculpture, music, history and travel which she eventually bequeathed to the Weston Public Library helping grow their collection in addition to netting $45,000.00 in an auction and sale to the public.

A prolific letter writer, Alice did not hesitate to contact authors of books she enjoyed. In 1972 Alice felt this compulsion to correspond with Mr. Melbourne Brindle who wrote an oversized illustrative book “Twenty Silver Ghosts” about the Pre-WWI Rolls-Royce. She recounted in her highly detailed letter to Brindle that in 1915 she had occasionally gone out dancing with the Rolls-Royce agent in New York City and “Bobby” had persuaded Alice’s father to replace his dark blue Packard town car with a light café-au-lait colored Rolls. The following week Mr. DeLamar then noticed a pearl-white touring version in the showroom and

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promptly gave it to Alice for her upcoming birthday. By the time the war started, Alice became a Red Cross driver – “the equivalent of a taxi driver for army, navy and Red Cross officers” – and she used the Rolls clocking some 100,000 miles one summer.

Alice could not resist also disclosing in that five page letter that in 1919 she desperately wanted to go to France but without an official business reason to travel, her request for a passport was swiftly denied. She learned that a large seaplane “R. 34” was the first British aircraft to fly the Atlantic and a British Colonel was most anxious to host a large banquet at the Garden City Hotel in Long Island for army, navy Brass and delegates. Prohibition was in full force by this time and party host Admiral Gleaves declared, “I cannot be expected to entertain our heroic visiting flyers with ice water!” Alice and a friend rushed home to fill up the pearl white Rolls Royce with champagne, gin and whiskey from the cellar, delivered it to the banquet hall and was promptly rewarded with travel visas within a week for their “good deed.”

During the 1920’s and 1930’s Alice traveled freely and often between New York City, Paris and Palm Beach. Mary Stuart, widow of sculptor Stuart Benson had befriended Alice while in Paris and convinced her to consider moving to Weston. In 1930 land was inexpensive and with only 670 residents registered within Weston’s 21 square miles there was plenty of geography to choose from.

The area had suffered a significant Depression-induced decline in its once abundant onion, potato and apple farms. Upon her first visit Alice was delighted with the privacy the area provided away from the New York City scene and so decided to purchase 100 acres with several outbuildings, some occupied, some deserted and many in need of repair. And thus the beginning of a significant area to be called “The Valley” was in the making.

She had a large white colonial style house built on the hilly property with azure blue shutters, an artesian well-fed 90-foot long swimming pool, a tennis court, multiple servant’s quarters, a four-car garage, vegetable garden, multiple greenhouses and a large storage shed. She had a pewter and mahogany bar salvaged and reconstructed from the remains of the ocean liner SS Normandie which had sunk in the Hudson River. Once The Valley was in full blown development, Alice started offering the various cottages and barns to musicians, artists and their families and significant others who were looking for places to live for varied reasons – shelter, recluse, escape, cheaper rent, and/or inspiration.

Together with her estate manager Jacques de Wolfe Alice bought Cobb’s Mill Inn in 1936 which acted as an additional guest house for a myriad of artists beginning to stream into the area.

Originally built in 1749 as a lumber, grist and cider mill, it became a tea house in 1927 until Alice converted it into a restaurant and bar (using the remaining parts of the 30 foot long pewter Normandie bar) and for the next seven decades, long past Alice’s era, Cobb’s Mill Inn ended up hosting several U.S. presidents and thousands of weddings up until it went on the sale block in 2010.

Alice was one of the earliest supporters of the Russian born surrealist painter, set designer and costume designer Pavel Tchelitchew (1898-1957). He had fled Paris just days before the 1939 German occupation and sought refuge in America. New York art dealer Julien Levy and Alice served as sponsors at United States Customs welcoming Pavel. Levy’s gallery was becoming a major art destination and like many artists seeking relaxation away from any public attention and initial support, Tchelitchev went to stay with Alice in the Weston “Valley.” He was provided a cottage, a maid and a cook and someplace to rest, rejuvenate and create.

Alice’s pool in Weston quickly became a main attraction – the place to go. It was one of the few and large sized pools that existed in the area and Alice welcomed many to enjoy it, hosting endless luncheons and cocktail parties on the surrounding stone terrace. The pool was joined to the basement of the main house by a tunnel where one could swim out to the open area. As told to me by a personal friend of hers, Alice apparently liked to float silently in the tunnel just before entering the opening acutely listening for gossip and stories from her guests.

These highly social poolside soirees became a veritable Who’s Who of the New York City art scene with guests including famed choreographer George Balanchine, American composer and critic Virgil Thompson, ballerinas Tanaquil LeClercq and Tamara Geva, jazz clarinetist Benny Goodman, Italian opera librettist Giovanni Cardelli and fashion designer Hubert de Givenchy. Despite

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the construction of The Merritt Parkway in 1938 this was not a time when incessant paparazzi would have stormed Fairfield County in a pack of black Escalades and Jeep Wranglers, hiding in the Weston bushes with cameras poised for the shot, and thankfully neither Entertainment News nor People Magazine was in existence. These rising stars of paint and sculpture, books and magazines, stage and screen were happy to enjoy the freedom and privacy of the country, mingling and chatting up contemporaries amongst their midst. It was a crowd of very public people wanting to be private.

During 1981 novelist and short story writer Vladimir Nabokov came to lunch several times with his wife. He was apparently a lepidopterist by hobby and always had his butterfly net with him in the summer. Alice remembered him “dashing down the lawn and beyond the pool” in haste to catch small white butterflies that were abundant and “couldn’t pass up anything that fluttered, but had to pursue.”

Later in life Alice became more reclusive and trips to Paris and Palm Beach lessened. She enjoyed walking her expansive Connecticut property, tending to the garden and reading. Her eyesight had begun to deteriorate but that did not stop her from driving the windy narrow roads of Weston, experiencing more than a few fender benders. She was one of the longest-standing subscribers to the Westport Country Playhouse and supporters of the White Barn Theater.

In 1983 after losing her battle with pancreatic cancer at the age of 88 at Norwalk Hospital, Alice’s estate quickly fell into the hands of lawyers and executors.

Phillips de Pury & Company auctioned her prized collection of antique furniture: English and Spanish oak, superb American pine and tiger maple, hooked rugs, objects d’arts, end-of-day glassware, masses of books and memorabilia of world travels. Her extensive collection of Pavel Tchelitchew paintings and etchings sold handsomely at the April event in 1984 with a follow-up auction held after the discovery of additional pieces that were tucked away in storage. With no living relatives, the remainder of her personal effects essentially disappeared.

Alice had begun to divest of her real estate portfolio as she aged and her last testament and will dictated particular financial and art allocations, however, the missing dictated manuscript has yet to be found. While there have been several attempts to publish complete information about Alice DeLamar’s highly cultured life, to read the words she said aloud about her own life could reveal so much more.

The year after Alice died her property was sold. It was noted by neighbors that the pool was thereafter hardly used (the owner’s wife apparently didn’t know how to swim), there wasn’t much entertaining going on (so the pewter bar was likely untouched), and while these new homeowners undoubtedly enjoyed the immense estate, the days of The Valley were over. By that time of course Alice’s personal secretary of 15 years had all but disappeared, the caretaker of the original property who was with Alice for 18 years was long dismissed of his duties, and many friends and neighbors generally moved away.

Fast forward to August 2011 and I had all but lost hope in finding the elusive Alice DeLamar manuscript in the back of that garage. After spending endless hours touching each piece of paper, thumbing through each scrapbook and examining each photograph in those moldy boxes a revealing lead surfaced.

More ground had yet to be covered and more calls had yet to be made but that unexpected surprise gave me hope. I decided to look through one last stack of books and discovered a letter taped to the inside of a biography by Isamu Noguchi, the Japanese American artist, sculptor and landscape architect who had dined and dipped at Alice’s poolside estate. The book “Isamu Noguchi, A Sculptor’s World” contained a handwritten note taped to the front cover in black ink on stationary from the Great Northern Hotel on 118 West 57th street, New York City dated January 12, 1961:

“Dear Alice, Today I bought the factory which is hereafter to be known as my studio No. 1. I am very pleased indeed and want to thank you for having made it possible. I hope to be able to get your loan returned within a few months – say after April 15 when my show is at Knoedlers. Gratefully, with love, Isamu.”

Alas! It was a sign that the quest needed to continue and that the legacy of this generous and legendary supporter of the arts was to live on.

shop ✴ din KIMBERLY BOUTIQUE We offer incredible customer service and fabulous fashion. From denim and cashmere to blouses and pencil skirts.

Jewelry from Ann Lightfoot and Alexis Bittar. Dresses by Nicole Miller and Diane Von Furstenberg. We want you to enjoy shopping with us and to look and feel amazing in our clothing!

71 Whitfield Street (203) 453-2554 www.shopkimberly.com

GUILFORD FOOD CENTER Family Owned & Operated for 43 Years! Custom Cut Meats, Fresh Bakery, Full Service Deli, Fresh Produce, Fresh Sushi, Groceries, Catering (Lobsterbakes, Pig Roasts, BBQ’s, Buffets). Free Home Delivery. Open 7 days a week 77 Whitfield Street (203) 453-4849 www.guilfordfoodcenter.com

THE VILLAGE CHOCOLATIER Voted #1 Best Chocolates in 2011. Offering specialty chocolates and candies since 1983. Featuring Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. Home-made cream and butter fudge.

Come enjoy the sumptuous chocolate fragrances.

79 Whitfield Street On the Guilford Green (203) 453-5226 www.thevillagechocolatier.com

VERA WOLF Vera Wolf celebrates our 25 year anniversary! Local jewelry designer, Wolf Guibbory, works with the master artisans of Bali to craft our distinctive style. Voted Best Artisan Jewelry store, Vera Wolf offers a wonderful collection from other artisans all at affordable prices. You’ll be sure to discover your holiday gifts on the Guilford Green.

19 Boston Street (203) 458-1133 www.Verawolf.com

Historic

GUILFORD, Guilford is home to early American architecture, and in this historic climate lays a wonderful collection of boutiques, art galleries and specialty stores to explore.

MIX DESIGN STORE Great Gifts. Timeless Design.

Priced for Today. Voted #1 Gift Store - the-e-list. An outlet for innovative design and exciting gifts on the beautiful Guilford Green. MIX has been pleasing stylish, discerning customers with its carefully curated collection of accessories for living for women, men, children and the home.

29 Whitfield Street (203) 453-0202 www.mixdesignstore.com

GUILFORD ART CENTER Guilford Art Center’s Artistry Holiday Sale of Fine Craft and Art November 4 – January 8.

Stunning, handmade gifts by hundreds of artists—jewelry, pottery, glass, ornaments, wood, fiber and more.

Jewelry and Champagne Night December 1.

411 Church Street (203) 453-5947 www.guilfordartcenter.org

Visit the “Old Fashioned” New England Town of Guilford and begin a holiday tradition. Spend a day finding quality gifts, extraordinary customer service, and complements for home entertaining.

You are sure to make new friends here that will keep you coming back to visit again and again.

GuilfordGreenCT.com

e ✴ explore BLUE MOON ARTISANS Step inside Blue Moon and discover over 300 American Craftsmen, showcasing original art, jewelry, glass, decoys, pottery and more. Trollbeads, Simon Pearce, Ayala Bar & David Tishbe, are just a sampling. The spacious 4,000 sq. ft. store - gives off an aura that can be best described as creative, modern and eclectic. Unique displays of colorful everyday art attract the eye while leaving plenty of space to browse.

50 York Street (203) 453-5845

Exit 58! off I-95

CT

GREENE ART GALLERY Voted Best Gallery on the Shore Line in 2011.

Contemporary and Classic Realism, (new work by Ken Davies,) Impressionist and Plein Air Art. Indoor Sculpture and Sculpture Garden.

29 Whitfield Street (On the historic town green) (203) 453-4162 www.greeneartgallery.com

DETAILS Offering an eclectic mix of decorative accessories for the home. Find the perfect hostess gift, exquisite wedding presents or unique pieces for yourself or someone special.

Bridal registries are available.

61 Whitfield Street (203) 453-2347

PAGE HARDWARE & APPLIANCE COMPANY Find unique gifts and enjoy a friendly shopping experience this season. Customer service is our passion and we truly have something for everyone.

9 Boston Street (203) 453-5267 Mon-Sat 7:30AM-6PM, Sun 9AM-5PM www.pagehardware.com

CALENDAR OF EVENTS November 4, 2011 to January 8, 2012 Guilford Art Center, “Artistry” November 19, 2011 to January 16, 2012 Greene Art Gallery, “Holiday Greene” December 2, 2011 Holiday Tree Lighting on The Town Green December 20 to December 27, 2011 Hanukkah Menorah Candle Lighting For more information on sales and events visit merchant websites

CHROMA GALLERY BSK design at Chroma gallery. Bold color, contemporary and simple design describes BSK’s line of unique, affordable dichroic glass jewelry, glass plates, architectural art and sculpture!

20 C Church st (203) 453-3111 www.bskdesign.net

LULU’S BOUTIQUE Recently recognized by Lingerie Americas and six years voted best lingerie store in The New Haven Advocate, LuLu’s has long been a destination for women who crave comfortable yet sophisticated sleep and loungewear.

Featuring year round customer favorites, such as Barefoot Dreams, BedHead Pajamas, Eberjey Intimates, Calvin Klein, Wacoal, Le Mystere and Hanky Panky. We also offer one-on-one bra fittings with sizes ranging through 42E, as well as exquisite jewelry custom made by local artist Susan Roberts.

75 Whitfield Street (203) 453-6887

events + gatherings

FCBUZZ IN SOPHISTICATED RIDGEFIELD

by RYAN ODINAK

Cultural Alliance of Fairfield County

T

he drive to Ridgefield is down country roads, but once you arrive, you get both the charm of a colonial village and a hip suburban town. Not many places with a population of less than 25,000 people have a major contemporary art museum, a symphony, a performing arts center, a community theatre and an artist guild. It is clear that arts and heritage are a top priority for the people of Ridgefield.

Tucked into the Berkshire foothills, Ridgefield has a history of drawing New Yorkers like Larry Aldrich who helped create a sophisticated place to vacation and live.

The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, founded by Mr. Aldrich, is one of the few independent, non-collecting contemporary art museums in the United States, and the only museum in Connecticut devoted to contemporary art. The Museum concentrates its exhibition programming on solo exhibitions by emerging and mid-career artists. The exhibitions are complemented by acclaimed education programs that use the work on view to inform and instruct adults, families, and over 7,000 students annually.

Local and regional artists are nurtured at the Ridgefield Guild of Artists. Several hundred members have access to three gallery spaces for exhibiting their work with opportunities for artist-in residency programs. The Guild collaborates with the Aldrich on an Annual Juried Exhibit of emerging artists. The Guild also offers art lectures and art classes for children and adults.

Clockwise from top left: Nutcracker: The Nutcracker at the Ridgefield Playhouse on December 17 & 18; The Ridgefield Symphony Orchestra; The Met Opera SATYAGRAHA at the Ridgefield Playhouse; The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum

The Ridgefield Symphony Orchestra (RSO), now celebrating its 47th year, delights music fans year round. The professional symphony of 80+ musicians is under the direction of Maestro Gerald Steichen. The Ridgefield Chorale, with a repertoire ranging from Broadway and movie scores to swing, Latin rhythms and contemporary gospel, delivers two major concerts a year. While no auditions are necessary to join the Chorale, it is known for its vocal excellence.

For more than a decade, The Ridgefield Playhouse for Movies and the Performing Arts has been bringing topnotch artists and newly released movies to its comfortable, intimate 500-seat theater. Their broad repertoire of shows offers entertainment for nearly every taste in music, comedy and dance plus inspiring programs for children, at a cost that makes the performing arts accessible to the community and beyond. From rock extravaganzas, comedy and country, to holiday spectaculars, ballet and world-class opera, it all happens at The Ridgefield Playhouse.

Theatre in Ridgefield has a long history too, with The Ridgefield Theatre Barn celebrating its 46th anniversary this year.

Cabaret seating and BYO refreshments, make the “Barn” another place where the town comes together. They kick off their season in the fall and mix it up with comedy improv and a poetry night.

Ridgefield is also home to the Chekhov International Theatre Festival, which celebrates the legacy of Michael Chekhov, an international theatre legend

who developed his acting methodology in Ridgefield and moved on to California where he trained some of Hollywood’s greatest actors. The Chekhov International Theatre Festival is a weekend event that pulls from regional, national and international theatre companies that practice Chekhov and other complimentary acting techniques.

The Ridgefield Arts Council, established by the town government, strives to connect artists with audiences and each other through their website, social media and signature events. The All Artist Networking Party gives visual and performing artists the opportunity to meet fellow working artists. The Behind the Scenes Honors recognizes the volunteers who support the arts in Ridgefield. Each fall, The Ridgefield Cultural Festival presents a rich tapestry of performances on multiple stages by artists in music, dance, theater and storytelling, and celebrates the visual arts, the world of craft and more.

So take a drive through the country and arrive in Ridgefield, a great suburban cultural center.

To find out what’s happening in Ridgefield and the other cities and towns of Fairfield County visit www.FCBuzz.org presented by the Cultural Alliance of Fairfield County. This arts and culture resource offers ticket and event information for music, theatre, visual arts, history, lectures, literature, kids and families, classes, workshops, special events and much more.

For more information contact the Cultural Alliance of Fairfield County by emailing info@CulturalAllianceFC.org, or calling 203-256-2329 or visiting our Web site at www.CulturalAllianceFC.org.

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NCTV79 CELEBRATES HISTORIC NEW CANAAN LANDMARK AT FALL BENEFIT NCTV Channel 79, New Canaan public television, will hold a Festive Fall Fundraiser at the historic Crajah House, a town landmark at 757 Oenoke Ridge in New Canaan on Saturday, November 5th. The party, from 5 to 7 p.m., will feature tours of the magnificent red brick colonial home built in 1886 and beautifully renovated and expanded in 2006, as well three restored antique barns on the property which was originally part of a 45 acre farm-estate. The name “Crajah” is a combination of the initials of the original owners for whom the house was designed, Charles Riley Abbot, a distinguished professor and his wife Jane Anne Humphrey. It was recently purchased by Kevin and Debbie McQuilkin who are hosting the event. Wine, beer and hearty hors d’ouevres are included in the $75 admission which benefits NCTV and its expanded programming.

This year NCTV79 has installed new equipment at Town Hall enabling viewers to watch meetings of the Town Council, Board of Finance and other government committees “live” in real time on television as well as online on the newly revamped website, nctv79.org.

All programs are now streamed live to the website where they are also archived and accessible to viewers later “on demand”, including concerts, library author talks and other special events.

The new website also offers non-residents an opportunity to see NCTV79 programs For an invitation or more information on the Nov. 5 benefit, email: Meghan_Finnegan@yahoo.com or call (203) 594-7264.

757 Oenoke Ridge with Rachel Matthews, NCTV79 board member and benefit chair, and Debbie and Kevin McQuilkin who are opening their home for the fundraiser.

SWEDISH ARTIST JONAS WICKMAN AND ”BLUE HOUSES”

Delamar Southport and Artisan Restaurant, in Collaboration with Southport Galleries present: Swedish artist Jonas Wickman and ”Blue Houses”. A solo exhibition at the orangerie and hotel lobby, on exhibit through November 31st.

ARTIST STATEMENT: ”I'm primarily a muralist. These paintings are drawn from memories and aspects of myself slowly emerging through the haziness of time”.

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F

or the first time in thirty-five years, Artist of the Year was bestowed upon a very talented group of individuals versus a single artist. On October 15th at the First Church Congregational in Fairfield, the one hundred member strong Fairfield County Chorale delivered a powerful forty-minute program that displayed with incredible poignancy, the very reason the Fairfield Arts Center chose them for this year’s honor.

Presented with a proclamation by First Selectman Mike Tetreau, the Chorale joins a long list of illustrious recipients that includes visual artists Willem de Kooning, Gabor Peterdi, composer/musician Brian Torff, actor Keir Dullea and last year’s awardee, photographer and teacher Thomas Mezzanotte.

The Fairfield County Chorale, committed to its mission of championing the appreciation of chorale music and its associated literature, has presented over 150 works throughout the world and appeared in such prestigious venues as Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall in New York and the Kennedy Center in Washington DC performing the best of Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Stravinsky and Britten.

For further information regarding "Artist of the Year" or any FAC event or exhibit, email: info@FairfieldArtsCenter.org or call: 203-319-1419

CONTEMPORARY ARTS/CULTURE/STYLE/ CULTURE//MAGAZINE

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events + gatherings

The Exacting Eye of Walker Evans on view through January 29, 2012

The Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, Connecticut presents an exhibition that uses new scholarship to examine the post-Depression era work of photographer Walker Evans. The Exacting Eye of Walker Evans is on view through January 29, 2012. Walker Evans (1903–1975) captured a place in American social, cultural, and artistic history with his unforgettable images of the Great Depression.

Walker Evans, Houses and Billboards, Atlanta, 1936. Private Collection.

Walker Evans, Tenant Farmer’s Daughter, 1936.

Private Collection.

The photographs, particularly those of rural Southern sharecroppers, launched his career and remain among the most iconic images of American art. His work in ensuing years, however, has been largely overlooked. This exhibition recovers Evans’ post-Depression work by tracing the thread Walker Evans, Alabama of his recurring artistic themes, in the process Cotton Tenant Farmer’s revealing images of economic hard times, Wife, 1936. Private capturing the essence of local identity, and Collection. discovering the beauty in common things through the 1940s, 50s, 60s, and 70s. New research delves into his career and the artist’s life in Connecticut. No exhibition has yet addressed these decades, which Evans spent in the state as a teacher at Yale and resident of Lyme.

Evans sometimes called his work “lyric documentary,” presenting images that purport to be more or less “straight photography” but which have been captured, edited, and printed with a high degree of sensitivity to their aesthetic representations. In the guise of a documentarian he took liberties with his subject, displaying a keen awareness of the viewer’s experience of his photographs. His purposefulness as creator, editor, and collector-curator is illustrated through over 150 photographs and artifacts, borrowed from public collections, from his first endeavors with a camera to his final photographs in 1974.

Reexamining Icons Gelatin silver prints of his work for the Farm Security Administration in 1935-36 are exhibited with an invitation to re-experience these familiar images of poverty in the rural South through new, enlarged inkjet prints that are being produced under the direction of John T. Hill, former executor of the Estate of Walker Evans . Shown at large scale (some over 4 feet wide), these photos reveal Evans’s eye 38

CONTEMPORARY CULTURE//MAGAZINE

Walker Evans, New Orleans Houses, 1935. Private Collection.

for both the grit and poetry of daily life. A variety of photographic print processes are compared, exploring the special traits of each.

Evans’s sensitivity to the visual consequences of printing decisions is a theme of the exhibition. Portfolios assembled and printed in the 1970s under Evans’ close supervision present the photographer’s own retrospective thinking about his career.

Evans and the Printed Page The significance of published images in establishing and maintaining Evans’s reputation and his role as a discerning editor of these photoraphs is also addressed. His most highly acclaimed work, 1941’s Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, in which Evans’ imagery was paired with the words of renowned writer James Agee, was hailed by the New York Public Library as one of the most influential books of the 20th century. From the 1940s into the 1960s, Evans worked for Fortune magazine as a photo editor, again coupling his images with short essays he wrote on a broad array of themes and subjects in American life. A number of important editions, both periodicals and

portfolios, are displayed, including the April 1962 Fortune magazine essay “The Auto Junkyard,” which was photographed in Lyme, Connecticut. In these editions the photographer can be observed as the consummate editor, carefully controlling the viewer’s experience of his subject.

The Beauty of the Common Object Evans aesthetically considered the ordinary experiences of American life, another significant theme over his decades-long career.

The exhibition looks at the photographer’s practice of collecting common things, both actual objects and their images, and curating these collections in personal displays throughout his home. Several objects from Evans’ personal collection will be on view, some never before exhibited publically. From his collections of signs, postcards, driftwood, and other objects to his late engagement with the “common tool” of the Polaroid SX-70, Evans looked with rigor at everyday objects and scenes, selecting and recasting them as works of art.

Images on Demand When Polaroid developed the first instant print cameras, Evans was an early adopter—keeping one close at hand to document scenes and people from his daily life. He produced more than 2,500 instant color prints in the final years of his life, a rotating selection of which will be on view in the exhibition. At a time when Evans’s photographic output had all but ceased, the new camera reinvigorated him. “I bought that thing as a toy, and I took it as kind of a challenge,” Evans said. The Polaroid prints, seemingly so different in style and aesthetic quality from his work of the 1930s, discouraged serious scholarly consideration of the material for decades. This exhibition begins a much-needed inquiry by examining the formal aspects of the prints, leading to the consideration of their place in the continuity of Evans career and also as objects in and of themselves that Evans eagerly collected.

Evans’s embrace of new technology suggests that recent advances in digital photography would have fascinated him—and visitors to this exhibition benefit immensely from that technology. High-resolution scanners and inkjet printers now have the power to obtain highly detailed image files from Evans’s original plates and negatives. With a simple wireless download, modern portable electronic devices can bring these images into the palm of the viewer’s hand, fulfilling Evans’s wish for viewers to have an immersive, personal viewing experience of his photography.

Walker Evans, Brookfield Center, CT, 1930-31. Gelatin silver print. Florence Griswold Museum, Gift of the Walker Evans Estate. ©Walker Evans Archive, Metropolitan Museum of Art.

On Saturday, November 12 from 1:00-6:30, scholars and photographers will gather for a symposium presenting new research and insights into the career of one of America’s most important photographers. Delve deeper into the fascinating ongoing investigation of Evans’ importance to American culture with lectures by scholars from Yale, Brown, and the Museum of Modern Art and a panel discussion with some of Evans’ own Yale students. The day culminates with a lecture by Alan Trachtenberg. The fee for the symposium is $35 and reservations are required in advance at FlorenceGriswoldMuseum.org or 860-434-5542 x 111.

A mobile-enabled companion website launched October 1st serves as an online exhibition publication and an ongoing educational resource.

The Florence Griswold Museum is located at 96 Lyme Street, Old Lyme, CT, For more information visit: FlorenceGriswoldMuseum.org or call 860-434-5542 x 111.

Ridgefield Guild of Artists - Art in the Interior 7th Annual Festive Home: Objects for Living and Giving Members of Ridgefield Guild of Artists, along with an expanded roster of local decorators, transform the barn gallery space into a magical holiday emporium for the 7th Annual Festive Home: Objects for Living and Giving, opening Friday, November 18th and running through Saturday, December 24th.

The theme for this year’s event is Art in the Interior. Decorators, paired up with member artists, contribute their talents by creating holiday vignettes including artwork to showcase items for sale. The local decorators include: Brown Flowers & Decor; Hudson Blau Designs; Bea Schriver Florals; Hazel & Sid; Tables of Content; The Gilded Nest; Tile & Texture; Olga Adler Interiors; Olley Court; TR Design; Monarch Painting; Beth Rosenfield Design; and Molly Hirsch Interiors.

This holiday showhouse and fundraiser brings thousands of shoppers to the charming antique building every year. Shoppers will find creative gifts like one-of-a-kind handcrafted items by local artisans such as jewelry, apparel and toys, to original artwork, unique furniture and decorative and useful objects for holiday home decorating.

Festive Home merchandise

Molly Hirsch of Molly Hirsch Interiors in Ridgefield seated in front of her installation. Molly designed both her wallpaper incorporating the Ridgefield fountain and the custom concrete console.

Established in 1974, the Guild plays a major role in regional arts community.

Funds raised at Festive Home are key to keeping the Guild’s doors open and programs going like the sixteen exhibitions and opening receptions each year, to the satellite art program that brings member

artists to downtown venues, to the ARTalk lecture series with Ridgefield Library, to classes and workshops including the multiarts summer camp for kids, plus countless collaborations with many other local nonprofit organizations.

Expanded Festive Home holiday hours are Tuesday – Sunday, 11am-5pm. Galleries will be closed November 24th and 25th. The barn is also available for private parties for local business groups and non-profits during off-hours.

The Guild barn is located at 34 Halpin Lane.

Call 203-438-8863, email rgoa@sbcglobal.net or check out rgoa.org for more information about this event and all Guild offerings.

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events + gatherings

Arts and Culture a Stone’s Throw Away

By ArtsWestchester CEO Janet Langsam

W

hy is VENÜ Magazine so hot in Westchester? Well, for one reason, it’s the place to be seen if you’re an arts venue. Art-goers look to VENÜ to find the most unique places to be and to go. And Westchester is no slouch in that arena, having some of the most glamorous and historical places to see a show, hear first rate music or gaze at great paintings and sculpture.

Jazz, rock, and blues in a historic setting awaits you at Westchester’s oldest theater, the Tarrytown Music Hall. Built in 1885, it is listed on the National Register for Historic Places and serves more than 80,000 patrons a year from all over the tri-state area. Its facade is considered one of the finest examples of Queen Anne brickwork, while its interior is a mix of Queen Anne and Art Deco due to its many restorations.

Historic theaters abound in Westchester. One of the most beautiful is the Paramount Theater in Peekskill with its restored ornate ceiling. Built in 1930 as a 1,500-seat movie palace, it survives today with a roster of performing artists such as Paula Poundstone on November 19 and the Beach Boys on December 2.

Two other historic theaters in Westchester are the Rome Theater in Pleasantville, now reinvented as the Jacob Burns Film Center, and the Pelham Picture House. Both landmarked theaters are venues

restored landmark building in the heart of White Plains, which is now the home of ArtsWestchester. On view through November 23, ceramic artists from around the region will come together in an exhibition curated by Leigh Taylor Mickelson, Program Director at the Clay Art Center in Port Chester. This exhibition of ceramic sculpture and installation will highlight the importance of community involvement in our quest for positive environmental change.

Lest one think that everything in Westchester is old and historic, check out what Purchase College has to offer in their state of the art cultural facilities. Also, the Neuberger Museum of Art is just a short walk across campus from the Performing Arts Center.

The Neuberger is a teaching museum that promotes educational opportunities in the arts throughout the county, and is the premier

Paramount Center for the Arts in Peekskill, NY

for first-run productions and fine art films.

Lovers of music will especially enjoy the Caramoor Center for Music and Art, which is one of those special places where you can always find a chamber group playing in the Venetian Courtyard. Another great music venue is Copland House, based at Aaron Copland’s restored, longtime home, which is the only composer’s home in the U.S. devoted to renewing America’s musical heritage through a broad range of educational, scholarly, and public programs.

Want to go back in time to when a bank was a gorgeous mahogany and brass setting with grand architectural embellishment? You can do that by visiting The Arts Exchange, a

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ARTS/CULTURE/STYLE//MAGAZINE

Top and bottom: Courtyard, and An Evening with Kelli O’Hara at Caramoor Center for Music and The Arts located in Katonah, NY;.

museum of modern, contemporary and African art in Westchester.

This autumn, and all year round, in every corner of the county and place in between, you don’t need to travel far to enjoy the artistic offerings of the many cultural institutions of Westchester – all rich with history, each unique, and each profoundly enhancing the quality of life in our own cultural gem apart from the city. Just like you, Westchester loves the arts, and to access the complete guide to the arts in Westchester, visit www.artswestchester.org (or www.artw.org for short). Take advantage of all the magic the county has to offer!

36TH Annual Hampton Classic Horse Show August 31 - September 4, Bridgehampton, NY

T

he Hampton Classic Horse Show is unique in that it is renowned as much for its celebrities and shopping, as its world-class equestrian competition. This year, the iconic end-of-summer event celebrated its 36th Anniversary, but its success was in jeopardy due to Hurricane Irene.

Prior to the start of the show, management made the decision to take down 18 tents with 1600 stalls as well as 40 other large tents housing the chalets, VIP seating, and boutiques. Three days later, approximately 150 staff and crew worked from about 5:00 am till dark on Monday and Tuesday to restore the show grounds to its former splendor.

Fortunately, the weather for the week of the show was beautiful and the Hampton Classic managed to keep almost its entire competition schedule, albeit compressed from eight days into five. The Classic featured competition at every level from young children in the leadline division to Olympic veterans in the horse show’s main attraction, the $250,000 FTI Grand Prix and FEI World Cup™ Qualifier, which twotime Olympic team Gold Medalist McLain Ward of Brewster, NY, won for the third consecutive year and record sixth time overall.

As usual, celebrities attended the Classic throughout the week.

They included Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Diana Taylor, Mayor

NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg with Fairfield County’s Nancy Moon

Soprano’s actress Aida Turturro with Today Show Correspondent Jill Rappaport at ASPCA booth

Polo Player and Ralph Lauren model, Nacho Figueras with Kathy and Rick Hilton

World-class rider Georgina Bloomberg and Prince Borgese lended support to ASPCA

Philanthropist Betty Knight Scripps with Ringmaster Alan Keeley on left and Ted Killory on right

Two-Time Olympic Gold Medalist McLain Ward with WVVH-TV Host R Scot Evans

B. Smith with Dan Gasby

Jerry Seinfeld watching daughter, Sascha, compete

Rudy Giuliani, comedian Jerry Seinfeld, New York news anchor Rosanna Scotto, Aida Turturro of the TV hit “The Sopranos,” television commentator Lou Dobbs, Today Show correspondent Jill Rappaport, James Lipton, host of “Inside the Actors Studio”, renowned jeweler David Yurman, philanthropist Betty Knight Scripps, Today Show host Matt Lauer, and Grammy Award winner LA Reid.

In addition to its world-class equestrian competition, the Hampton Classic featured family fun with demonstrations, pony rides, and a petting zoo. All week long the Boutiques Garden offered everything from custom clothing to an auto display tent showcasing vehicles by Jaguar and Land Rover.

A new program was developed following the cancellation of the Classic’s ASPCA Adoption Day due to Hurricane Irene. The Classic initiated its 1st Virtual Adoption Month presented in partnership with the ASPCA and thanks to Virtual Celebration. Please visit the www.virtualcelebration.com/adopt website page, or go to the link on the Hampton Classic website, to peruse the extensive selection of horses, dogs, and cats waiting for new homes as part of the program.

Hampton Classic Horse Show, Inc. is a 501.c.3 charitable corporation. It benefits Southampton Hospital and other charities. www.hamptonclassic.com.

FTI Grand Prix winner McLain Ward and Antares F. with presenters left to right: Alan Keeley, Shanette Barth Cohen, Executive Director of the Hampton Classic and FTI Consulting’s Dennis J. Shaughnessy with his wife Mary

Sascha Seinfeld

Sybil and David Yurman

Photos by: VICTOR CANGRO, CEM & P, LLC, KRISTIN GRAY

Former Mayor Rudy Guiliani and Judith Guiliani Today Show Host Matt Lauer CONTEMPORARY CULTURE//MAGAZINE

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Art Greenwich Attracts Strong Attendance and Reports Early Sales

T

he First View reception and Collectors Invitational Thursday night, September 21, 2011 drew more than eight-hundred and fifty attendees to the opening of the highly anticipated Art Greenwich- aboard SeaFair- America’s Megayacht Venue.

The Vernissage aisles were crowded with collectors – among the notables were Steve and Alexandra Cohen, George & Carol Crapple, John and Charlotte Suhler, and Charles Mallory.

Local papers the following morning headlined “Floating Art Show a Marvel” and attracted a large weekend attendance to the fair. The Fair concluded Monday at 7pm with a closing attendance of over 5,500.

Among the galleries reporting initial sales included David Brooker Fine Art, Green River Stone, Haynes Fine Art of Broadway, Hollis Reh & Shariff, Jewels by Viggi, Mark Hellier 20th Century Designs, Moylan-Smelkinson, Waterhouse & Dodd, Yvel for Manfredi Jewels, Art Link International, Emmanuel Fremin, Galerie Mark Hachem, Godel & Co., Inc., ModernMasters Fine Art and New Art Concepts.

Guests commented on the diversity of the fair’s presentation.

“SeaFair was festive and elegant,” said Joanne Olian, former curator at the Metropolitan Museum, “when you’re aboard its very conducive to buying because you feel you’re truly away on holiday!”

“An unforgettable experience, SeaFair itself is like a fine work of art. I was amazed at the quality of art, antiques, jewelry, furnishings and contemporary glass. It was a treat to see so many

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well known artists on display together, from Harry Bertoia, Joan Miro, John Chamberlain, Picasso, Dufy, Warhol and Lichtenstein, there was something for everyone,” commented Tracey Thomas, Vice President and Executive Director of VENÜ MAGAZINE .

“We were especially pleased that the fair was so well received in Greenwich. We are indebted to the Bruce Museum, the Neuberger Museum, the Greenwich Arts Council, Westport Arts Center, Rye Arts Center, Greenwich Time and Chamard Vineyard for their cooperation and support,” said David Lester, Principal, IFAE and owner of SeaFair.

SeaFair’s winter schedule will commence in December with two holiday fairs, Art Tampa Holiday, December 8th-12th at the Tampa Convention Center Marina and Art Sarasota Holiday December 15th19th, at Marina Jack’s.

Both December fairs will feature an array of affordable international contemporary art and jewelry generally ranging between $500 -$50,000. Collections on display will include photography, painting, jewelry, furniture, sculpture, objet d’art and fine art glass.

The December shows will feature a special holiday Vernissage evening and corporate and private holiday events on the Sky Deck throughout the fair. An informative lecture series will be of special interest to collectors.

For more information on Art Greenwich, as well as SeaFair’s upcoming holiday fairs, please visit www.expoships.com.

Thinking of getting away this winter?

There are plenty of Art Fairs to explore in South Florida Miami International Art Fair (MIA)

The 2012 edition of the locally acclaimed Miami International Art Fair (MIA) will be held aboard the 228-ft exhibition vessel, SeaFair- America’s Megayacht Venue.

MIA features contemporary, cutting-edge art of all media including photography, painting, mixed-media, sculpture, installation and video.

The fair is unique in the unparallel support it provides to the local Miami art community, integrating innovative and educational art projects, linked to important local artists, museums and other art-related organizations.

January 13 - 16, 2012 Preview: January 12th Location: Aboard SeaFair on Collins Avenue across from the Fontainebleau Miami Beach ___________________________________________

Art Palm Beach (APB)

A fixture of South Florida’s contemporary art scene for 15 years, Art Palm Beach features national and international galleries exhibiting an outstanding array of modern masters, contemporary artists, noted photographers, prestigious sculptors and renowned glass artists, appealing to both experienced and novice collectors.

January 20 – 23, 2012 Preview: January 19th Location: Palm Beach County Convention Center 650 Okeechobee Boulevard West Palm Beach, Florida 33401 ___________________________________________

American International Fine Art Fair (AIFAF)

Now in its 16th year, the American International Fine Art Fair is the premier art, antique and jewelry fair in the United States. The fair is fully vetted by a team of museum curators and experts and features some of the

top international dealers representing all disciplines of fine art from classical antiquity to contemporary as well as an extraordinary collection of haute and period jewelry.

February 4-12, 2012 Preview: February 3 Location: Palm Beach County Convention Center 650 Okeechobee Boulevard West Palm Beach, FL 33401 ___________________________________________

Naples International Art & Antique Fair (NIAAF)

Naples International Pavilion Now in its second year, the highly successful Naples International Art & Antique Fair features a carefully selected cast of prestigious international art, antique, and jewelry dealers presenting an array of fine art from classical antiquity to contemporary as well as an extraordinary collection of haute and period jewelry. The fair is fully vetted by a team of museum curators and experts to assure the authenticity of the works for sale.

Art Naples

Art Naples, a dynamic event in beautiful Southwest Florida, presents contemporary dealers and special exhibitions from Europe, Latin America, United States and Asia as well as leading Southwest Florida dealers. The fair features paintings, sculpture, photography, design, fine art glass, video and installations from a bevy of established museum collected artists as well as some of today’s most promising emerging artists.

February 23 - 28, 2012 Preview Feb 23 Location: Naples International Pavilion 4835 Immokalee Road Naples, FL 34110

For further information please contact IAFE (International Fine Art Expositions) Phone: 239 949 5411 info@ifae.com www.ifae.com

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ON THE BLOCK Decorative Arts

by Matthew Sturtevant

On December 13th 2011 Christie’s New York will offer a selection of 80 lots of Jewelry belonging to the Estate of Elizabeth Taylor. Followed by a day sale on December 14th 2011 including an offering of a 189 additional jewels. A selection of the collection will have traveled the globe prior to the sale visiting Moscow, London, Los Angeles, Dubai, Geneva, Paris and Hong Kong gathering interest along the way no doubt.

“F

rom her most jaw-dropping diamonds, gems, and one-of-a-kind historic jewels, to cherished, It’s Tuesday, I love you gifts”, and never-before-seen keepsakes, Elizabeth Taylor’s magnificent collection of jewels promises to captivate the auction world this fall. This is without a doubt the greatest private collection of jewelry ever assembled in one place, and Christie’s is honored to have been entrusted with the global tour of the collection this fall, and the sale of the collection in its entirety this December,” said Marc Porter, Chairman and President of Christie’s Americas.

The total collection is expected to sell for more than $30 million and is capped by a 33.19 Carat white diamond ring estimate $2.5-3.5 million gifted by Richard Burton in May 1968 which she noted:“My ring gives me the strangest feeling for beauty. With its sparks of red and white and blue and purple, and on and on, really, it sort of hums with its own beatific life.”

Also to be offered is the “La Peregrina” estimate $2,000,000-3,000,000.

This remarkable pearl of 203 grains in size – equivalent to 55 carats – ranks as one of the most important historic pearls in the world. Discovered in the 1500s in the Gulf of Panama, the pear-shaped pearl became part of the crown jewels of Spain. Prince Philip II of Spain was among the first recorded owners of the pearl and it later passed on to the Spanish queens Margarita and Isabel, who proudly wore the pearl in 17th century portraits painted by Velázquez himself. Richard Burton famously purchased the pearl for Elizabeth Taylor at auction in 1969 for $37,000, after successfully outbidding a member of the Spanish Royal family. Inspired by a 16th century portrait of Mary Queen of Scots, she later commissioned Cartier to design an exquisite new mount of matched natural pearls and rubies to offset what she called “the most perfect pearl in the world.”

Among other items the “Ping Pong” diamonds with not necessarily the same pedigree as some of the other offerings but with a great story none the less. Richard Burton gifted the set of three diamond rings circa 1970 after winning a ping pong match estimate a very fair $5,000 -7,000.

Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor both loved Ping-Pong, and Elizabeth never backed down from the challenge of a good match. At home in Gstaad on one occasion, Burton promised Elizabeth a diamond if she could win 10 points against him. She did, and he promptly set off to town on a quest to find the smallest possible diamond for her. In the end, the pair came back with three small diamond rings – thereafter dubbed “The Ping Pong Diamonds”. The story itself is worth the estimate and it is highly likely that the association and fame of Elizabeth Taylor will ignite this sale.

A pair of the iconic ruby red slippers from “The Wizard of Oz” is going up for auction with an estimated price of $2 - $3 million.

California auction house Profilesin History said the slippers -- one of four known surviving pairs made for the 1939 movie -- are believed to have been worn by Judy Garland’s Dorothy when she clicks her heels to return home to Kansas near the end of the film.

The slippers will be auctioned on December 16 in Los Angeles as part of a Hollywood memorabilia sale. Profiles in History owner Joe Maddalena said he was expecting bids from around the world.

The Elizabeth Taylor Diamond, of 33.19 carats, D color, VS1 clarity, potentially internally flawless.

Gift from Richard Burton. Purchased from Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, May 16, 1968.

La Pérégrina, Early 16th century, Pearl, Ruby and Diamond Necklace, by Cartier.

Designed by Elizabeth Taylor, with Al Durante of Cartier, Gift from Richard Burton. Purchased from Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, January 23, 1969 Estimate: $2,000,000 – 3,000,000

Images courtesy of Christie’s Images LTD. 2011

Christie’s New York will present 68 of Ms. Taylor’s most iconic looks in a black-tie Evening Sale of fashion and accessories on December 14th, followed by 326 additional items in three consecutive Day Sale sessions on December 15th.

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Troy Fine Art Services, Inc. 3310 Post Road, Southport, Ct 06890 www.troyfineart.com 203.255.1555

October by Richard Bruce, 48” x 48” acrylic on panel Exclusively represented by Troy Fine Art Services,Inc.

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Silver Tray with Red Glass Handels

Silver Dragon Lamp (private commission)

Multi-Gem Crisscross Bracelet Photography: Sacia Friedman Photography

CRAWFORD CONTEMPORARY

INTERVIEW with Alastair Crawford

In a world where collectors are clamoring for the contemporary, rather than antique, where the focus worldwide is on design, and where centuries old craftsmanship is hard to find — CRAWFORD is delighted to introduce an incredible inventory of silver designs.

Venü: Alastair, you are internationally known in the antique silver trade, with an impeccable knowledge of Georg Jensen designs. What motivated you to transform your company towards a contemporary line?

Alastair Crawford: Two things: Firstly, Georg Jensen has not designed anything great in silver since about 1970. In fact nor has Tiffany, Buccellati, Christofle nor anyone else. They just repeat the same old tired designs. No one makes fabulous silver anymore. Secondly, the world is moving from the antique to the contemporary. I mean look at the art world and see what is happening. Or jewelry, or furniture. People today are buying contemporary. That is the look. The antique is outdated. Even Art Deco is passé.

What – in your mind – are the benchmarks that a new client for your silver designs should look for? What is it exactly, as we say, ‘separates the wheat

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from the chaff’ in the fine silver jewelry and design field?

Design and quality. Their instant reaction should be “Wow!” The design has to be arresting. Make you literally stop and think “now that is really cool”. We are passionate about quality too. Real workmanship often using centuries old techniques and incredibly skilled craftsmen.

We never cut corners or compromise on quality. Never. Everything is made by hand and has a lifetime guarantee. Who offers that nowadays?

Here you are now, living in Connecticut with your lovely wife Caroline, an expert in the field of American painting, and your three young children. Can you give us a bit of the ‘back story’ of how that ambitious lad working in the pub came to be one of the world’s top silver designers?

When I was 19 years old I met a man in a London pub. He offered me a commission

only sales job selling antique silver to all the big Bond Street stores. After six months I started out on my own and traveled the world dealing in antique silver. Scary, but a lot of fun. About 15 years ago, I saw how traditional antique silver was going out of fashion. I decided to deal only in vintage Georg Jensen silver and created the world’s largest business in vintage Georg Jensen.

We sold more Georg Jensen silver than the Georg Jensen Company. It was crazy.

Of course, our biggest market was the US. So I left London to move to New York to open a store on Madison Avenue. Rather by mistake I became simultaneously the largest dealer in new Georg Jensen silver as well. I guess that was my introduction to selling new rather than vintage. After over 30 years in the business, I had a good understanding about what my clients wanted and at what price. I was struck by the total lack of contemporary silver design and a huge opportunity to do something about it.

"Heart to Heart" Sapphire Pendant Necklace

Sterling Silver Lighthouse Candlestick Carousel Necklace

Silver Elasticated Bracelet

Silver and Jasper Salad Servers

Setting very high standards, you have expressed your admiration for the famed “Faberge” trademark. Explain what elements of that great house of design have inspired you?

Yes. What a brand! Fabergé utilised all the design facets that I love. Color from exotic stones and enamels. Silver looks so great when combined with color. Incredible, exquisite, painstaking workmanship.

Charming animal forms – even a touch of humor. They got it so right. There have been other great houses of design that are true inspirations. Georg Jensen of course being one of the greatest, but also Tiffany, Gorham, Asprey. The trouble is there is no house of design today actually designing or making anything new in silver – apart from us of course!

standard is around 0.9? We never rely on the tired antique or the safe bet. We always say that our silver will outlast your grandchildren’s’ grandchildren, but we also want it to appeal to them too. Truly unique and strong design should last eternally.

In a world which is increasingly uniform, monotonous and ‘cookie-cutter,’ how do your designs offer clients aspirations of individualism?

We are just totally different. We are not afraid. We make outrageous things. I mean who else would make a pair of solid 18k gold candlesticks today or the world’s most expensive cheese dish? Who else in the world makes silver designs that weigh over 200 ounces? Who else would dare to use 2mm silver gauge when the industry

Finally, share with us a bit of the complete process – when do you have a design idea? How do you invent the means to create the piece? What’s your final “aha!” moment when you sense the fruition of the project—from idea to completed artwork.

I have design concepts popping up in my head all the time. I can see them so clearly.

We will often make prototypes in clay and other materials first, before we make anything in gold or silver. In our first two

When a woman or a man wears a ‘Criss Cross’ bracelet or an ‘Inglefield necklace’ – what’s the intrinsic ‘meaning of that message?’

Our aim is that the wearer of any of our jewelry should immediately think three things: it is comfortable; I look great wearing it; I won’t find it in every high street jeweler. Our jewelry is not about big rocks and big prices. Most of our jewelry sells for under $2,000. It is about unique design that will never date.

years we have introduced over 100 new designs. No other business in our industry or house of design can make that claim.

Not even close. It is an incredible output and I don’t see it slowing down anytime soon. The “aha” moment is never reached until the design is totally finished and I get that final “Wow!” reaction!

To learn more about CRAWFORD CONTEMPORAY please call 203. 292. 3609 or visit www.crawfordcontemporary.com.

We would be delighted to show you our collection in person.

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Portrait of Lily Dache - Copyright Dache Archives

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by Lisa Seidenberg

Come on along and listen to The lullaby of Broadway.

The hip hooray and bally hoo, The lullaby of Broadway.

The rumble of the subway train, The rattle of the taxis.

The daffy-dills who entertain At Angelo’s and Maxie’s.

From the song “Lullaby of Broadway” (1935) written by Harry Warren

The Discreet Charm of Hats An Afternoon with Suzanne Dache

There was no angelo’s & Maxie’s, at least

not back then, then being the 1930’s, but there was a Stork Club and El Morocco and a 21 Club for the “bright young things” of café society to mingle as Prohibition ended in 1933, and if you were one of the soigné set to frequent such places, you most certainly would want your outfit to include – pardon me – feature, a Daché hat.

If you born with a name like Lilly Daché, why wouldn’t you be a designer of fabulous hats? A dentist or an ornithologist? Not likely.

Lilly Dache was not simply a hat designer, she was one of the most celebrated milliners of the first half of the twentieth century. A genuine rags to riches story, Dache is said to have arrived in America from France with only $13 in her pocket and a head full of innovative ideas of how American women should dress. She soon married Jean Despres, also a new arrival from France, who began as a shipping clerk with Coty, the fragrance house, to become eventually its Executive Vice-President.

The Dache-Despres partnership developed an enormously successful brand which included not only women’s head-wear but clothes, jewelry and other accessories as well. The prodigious growth of their business led them to acquire the elegant lifestyle that accompanies such success, beginning with the Dache Salon & Gallery at East 56th Street and Park Avenue in Manhattan, a 200 acre estate in Pound Ridge, NY, summer digs in Delray Beach, Florida and a villa in Meudon, France, on the outskirts of Paris (more about that later).

What was it like to grow up in such grand style, where in the fashion of the day, if you will, the couple entertained fashion industry leaders, Hollywood stars and foreign dignitaries?

For that answer, I phoned their only daughter, Suzanne Dache, a resident of Westport, and an accomplished designer in her own right who earlier worked for the influential publicist Eleanor Lambert.

“It was simply our world,” Suzanne demurs…” it was only much later, years later, that you realize that it was anything special.”

Informing me that it has been several years since she last gave an interview about the family, she nevertheless agrees to be interviewed for VENÜ Magazine. Why, I am not quite sure.

As I pull up the long driveway to her white clapboard home overlooking Long Island Sound, I am wondering if she will scrutinize my outfit for fashion mistakes, which is probably not all that difficult to do, accessorising not being my strong point. The Café Society I had known of 1980’s downtown Manhattan, involved evenings at the Mudd Club or the Odeon; one could pair black jeans with a dog collar and call it a day.

I don’t recall ever seeing Debbie Harry or Lydia Lunch in a fedora or a cloche.

I have, nevertheless, always loved hats.

“Ah, you wore a hat for me!” she exclaims with pleasure on seeing my vintage Panama Hat. (Author disclosure – my grandfather manufac-

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Lily Dache and Jean Despres at Paris train station - Copyright Dache Archives

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A female entrepreneur before there was a Martha Stewart or Diane Von Furstenberg, Lilly Dache expanded her business to include a fragrance line, Drifting and Dashing, as well as stockings, coats and dresses, lingerie, and items for the home. tured Panama Hats many decades ago when they were first popular. The company was Monticristi Hats. The Panama I am wearing, however, was purchased only recently on Ebay.)

Taking stock of an unfortunate tear in the straw brim, Suzanne dashes with the hat into her kitchen where she immediately performs emergency hat repair. Obviously, daughter, like mother, takes this hat business very seriously.

A little history is on order here:

It is difficult to imagine in these largely hatless times (and we do not count baseball caps) that there was a period when no fashionable woman – or man - was considered dressed without a hat. At the turn of the century, women wore those puffy, Victorian chapeaux, which only looked good on Mary Poppins. All that changed in 1920 when women won the right to vote. With this new emancipation and power, it was inevitable that fashion would also change to reflect the times. Lilly Dache had the great good fortune to have started her career at the precise moment of this sea change; just as Henry Ford had the terrific idea that Americans might be interested in driving automobiles and not much later, Robert Moses developed the notion that bridges and tunnels and highways should be built around New York City, which might come in handy for all those new cars.

Of course, these latter two ideas were not without serious drawbacks – Ford never imagined that fuel for cars might one day be in limited supply and Moses wasn’t terribly concerned about whose neighborhoods he was bull-dozing (in the Bronx and Harlem) to erect his massive roads.

One should also not forget that the 1930’s and ‘40’s, which was the heyday of Dache mere, was not all feathers and rhinestones. The Wall Street crash on October 29, 1929 brought years of devastating unemployment and hardship for most

Americans, which was relieved, if one can say that, with the bombing of Pearl Harbor and a belated entrance into World War Two.

“Mother believed hats lifted one’s spirits,” comments Suzanne Dache, “she was always interested in the future…anything new…anything modern.”

It is true that the thirties, though financially horrific, were also a time of great innovation and even frivolity in fashion, architecture and popular culture. In Hollywood, Busby Berkeley was producing musicals such as “42nd Street”, “Golddiggers of 1933” and “Footlight Parade”, extravaganzas of chorus girls clad in outrageously gaudy outfits with kaleidoscopic dance numbers (often shot from above for that geometric effect).

As with Dache’s style in fashion, Americans

were looking to Europe and especially to France for ideas. The Art Deco style of the 1930’s came from the French “Arts Decoratif ” after a 1925 Exposition in Paris and was most notably adopted for the Chrysler Building in Manhattan, and the Empire State Building, which were also the world’s

tallest buildings for several years. This new bold style was reflected in furniture and household objects too - think of those colorful and curvaceous telephones in old movies, ornate cigarette-holders, toasters... The future was also embodied in the dream of air travel…and communications – the first television broadcast was in 1939, FDR’s speech at the opening of the New York World’s Fair, with it’s hopeful theme, “The World of Tomorrow.”

But I digress…

The dining table at the Dache house is arranged with items from the family archives thoughtfully prepared for my visit: a photograph of Lilly Dache and Jean Despres leaving Paris for New York to embark on a transatlantic crossing, their belted valises alongside them (no carry-ons!), sketches of the Dache building and intricate pencil drawings of her costume jewelry designs and of course, the hats.

What catches the eye is their sense of humor, the whimsical shapes of the toques and Persian-inspired turbans, which Dache was especially known for. No wonder they were sought after and worn by screen stars Marlene Dietrich, Betty Grable, Carole Lombard, Joan Crawford and Loretta Young, and even by the more sober presence of the First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.

The witty fruit headdresses of Carmen Miranda, memorably worn in “Flying Down to Rio” and other movies, with their colorful tower of bananas, grapes and other tropical fruits (was there a pineapple?) has been often imitated.

“Join Audrey Hepburn as Holly Golightly who typifies and glorifies the glamourous playmates of this dizzily spinning world as she and George Peppard breeze through the glitter and shimmer of New York…” (from the film trailer for “Breakfast at Tiffany’s”)

And can one imagine “Breakfast at Tiffany’s”

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“I like beautiful shoes in gay colors, with thick platforms and high heels. I like splashy jewelry that clinks when I walk, and I like my earrings big.

I am… Lilly Daché, milliner de luxe.”

(1961) without the wide-eyes of ingénue Audrey Hepburn peering out from under those ludicrously over-blown broad brim hats? They were designed for the movie by Madame Dache, who was pals at the time with author Truman Capote.

In fact, Lilly Dache’s bio reads like a history of the fashion business of the 20th Century: she hired a young dress designer from Indiana named Halston Frowick, who later became the head milliner at Bergdorf Goodman (by then he was known as Halston) and discovered Kenneth, the high society hair stylist, who coiffed Marilyn Monroe, among others. Her friends included Greta Garbo and Lillian Gish.

Arnold Scaasi?

“My mother told him to change his name” thinking he would sell more dresses as Arnold Scaasi than as Arnold Isaacs, and she was probably right.

A female entrepreneur before there was a Martha Stewart or Diane Von Furstenberg, Lilly Dache expanded her business to include a fragrance line, Drifting and Dashing, as well as stockings, coats and dresses, lingerie, and items for the home. If you were going to cast someone to play Dache in the bio-pic of her life - where her business day routine was said to have begun around noon as she conducted affairs perched on her chaise in a mirrored circular room, tiger-skin rugs at her feet - it would not be easy to match the Grande Dame herself, or the glamorous image she wished to cultivate.

She is quoted as saying: “I like beautiful shoes in gay colors, with thick platforms and high heels. I like splashy jewelry that clinks when I walk, and I like my earrings big. I am… Lilly Daché, milliner de luxe.”

Which brings us back to the Chateau de Meudon in France. Jean Despres bought the home in Meudon for his parents who were teachers,

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and could not have afforded such a place. The chateau had been a residence for the mistress of Napolean, Emperor of France and a stone’s throw from the Emperor’s own country residence, now called l’Observatoire de Meudon, as it is that country’s leading astronomical observatory. After the purchase by Despres, it was discovered that the stately villa had a long subterranean passageway which led from the King’s house to his mistress’s, presumably for late night assignations for le Roi and his consort.

So French!! So discreet!

It is as if President Clinton had a tunnel from the White House leading to the Watergate apartment of Monica Lewinsky! Unthinkable!

I follow Dache on a tour of her Westport

home, we pass a mysterious room off a wing of the first floor. The door is opened…revealing a large chamber filled with…hats! In the semidarkness, I have only few seconds to scan the interior; there are towers of hats, smooth silhouettes of various shapes & sizes, hats that might have once graced the displays at exclusive stores

like Bergdorf Goodman and Bonwit Teller tempting the doyennes of New York society. An eerie sensation passes through me, as if I have had a rarified glimpse into the Caves of Lascaux or whatever caves Werner Herzog has been wandering in.

And then it ends. The door is closed…

As our afternoon winds down, I ask Ms. Dache how she thinks it went. She does not answer my question. She says instead, “My mother would be furious at what I am wearing!”

A day or two later, I am sent an email with a photo that she had taken of me wearing an exquisite white felt hat with a low crown, a bit if veil and angled brim, which she had chosen for me from her own design collection. Unfortunately, I ruin the picture with an anxious expression on my face.

The designer sends me this gentle lesson in hat-wearing: “The hat is very cute on you. Wish you didn’t look so worried. Women in hats need to look and be confident, as if life is all pleasure!”

Noted.

Lilly Dache retired in 1968 making an appropriately stylish exit by embarking on a round-theworld cruise with her husband Despres on the S.S. France. She died on December 31, 1989. Thirteen years later, she was posthumously awarded the Fashion Walk of Fame Award with a bronze plaque in the fashion district of New York.

Suzanne Dache is, like her mother, optimistic about the future - where hats are concerned.

The Queen will bring them back, she says. The Queen? I am dumbfounded. Not Queen Elizabeth?

No. No. The Queen of fashion she clarifies. Lady Gaga? Angelina Jolie? Not even close.

She is speaking about Kate Middleton, the future Queen of England and current darling of the fashion world.

“ She is very stylish,” says Dache, “And she knows how to wear a hat.”

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motoring

BMW ART CARS written by Lorenz Josef photographs courtesy of BMW

#1 - Alexander Calder, 1975 - BMW 3.0 CSL

rt has portrayed the automobile since motors were mated to wheels about 125 years ago. However, when did cars begin to portray art? Of course, automobile design is a well-known and respected art form in its own right.

We also know that for many years cars have been used in a graphic way to advertise a company or its products. Remember the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile? But who thought of the idea of using a car as a canvas for presenting art, especially by some of the best known artists of the 20th century?

Our own Roxbury, Connecticut art celebrity, the late Alexander Calder, is best known for defining the contemporary art form of “mobiles” and “stabiles”. Over his long life he created more than 15,000 highly sought after works of art. What is news to most of us is that he also pioneered the “Art Car”, but unfortunately he created only one. Luckily for us, several other famous artists have taken up the cause and today there is a small, but unbroken, body of work for us to admire.

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The Art Car concept was actually dreamt up by French Art Auctioneer-Dealer and sometime race driver, Herve Poulain. As Poulain has been quoted: “One day, I said to myself, now is the time to do something grandly communicative and heroic and unite my two passions, by having my racing cars painted by the leading artists of the time.”

Calder, through his art, had a long standing connection with France and was also friendly with Poulain. One day Poulain approached Calder and asked him to paint his new BMW racecar for the 1975 edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans race.

“Sandy”, as Calder was known to his friends, agreed to undertake the project. Incidentally, this was not Calder’s first foray in placing one of his paintings on fast transportation. In 1973 he painted a Braniff International Airways DC-8 and a couple of years later applied his art on a Boeing 727 to celebrate the upcoming US Bicentennial.

The first BMW Art Car was spectacular and also quick, at least for the first seven hours of the race, running as high as

#2 - Frank Stella, 1976 - BMW 3.0 CSL

#3 - Roy Lichtenstein, 1977 - BMW 320i Gruppe 5 Rennversion

#4 - Andy Warhol, 1979 - BMW M1 Gruppe 4 Rennversion

5th place, before mechanical problems ended this effort. Interestingly, this Calder designed car shares another link with Connecticut in that Poulain’s co-driver was Sam Posey from Sharon, CT. This would be Poulain’s first of eleven races at the most famous and toughest endurance track in the world. Despite his poor showing, Poulain had caught the bug and over the years went on to campaign other Art Cars painted by famous artists.

For 1976, BMW had one of their racers painted in an unusual graph paper like grid by renowned artist, Frank Stella. Not well known is the fact that Stella actually painted two BMW's.

The second was commissioned by racing driver, Peter Gregg who liked the design of the 1976 car so much that he asked Stella to paint a brand new 1979 BMW M1 Pro Car for himself. This car is not included in the group of BMW factory owned Art Cars, as it was in private hands for 20 years and has been owned by the Guggenheim Museum for the past twelve. On August 18 it was auctioned by Bonhams

at the Quail Lodge Golf Club during the prestigious Pebble Beach car extravaganza weekend. It had a pre-auction estimate of $450,000 to 600,000 and was sold to its new owner for $ 854,000!

Next, Pop Artist, Roy Lichtenstein was commissioned to paint a BMW for the big race in 1977. He did not disappoint, as he employed bold black and yellow graphics and his iconic Ben-Day Dots to make the BMW 320i racer look like it was moving while standing still. Instantly recognized as a significant work of art, it debuted at the Centre Pompidou in Paris before its second shift at Le Mans (Poulain and his co-driver came in 1st in class).

In 1979, Andy Warhol, the King of Pop Art, was asked to paint one of BMW’s M1 Supercars. Interestingly, up to that point, the previous three artists had designed their art in sketches, then on scale models of the car and subsequently had their assistants transfer the design onto the actual car.

However, it has been reported that Warhol so much liked the ARTS/CULTURE/STYLE//MAGAZINE

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motoring

#5 - Ernst Fuchs, 1982 - BMW 635CSi

#8 - Ken Done, 1989 - BMW M3

#6 - Robert Rauschenberg, 1986 - BMW 635 CSi

#9 - Matazo Kayama, 1990 - BMW 535i

#12 - Esther Mahlangu, 1991 - BMW 525i

#7 - M. J. Nelson, 1989 - BMW M3

#10 - César Manrique, 1990 - BMW 730i535i

#13 - Sandro Chia, 1992 - BMW 3 Series saloon-car racing prototype

#11- A.R. Penck, 1991 - BMW Z1 #14 - David Hockney, 1995 - BMW 850 CSi

#16 - Olafur Eliasson, Your mobile expectations: BMW H2R project, 2007

#15 - Jenny Holzer, 1999 - BMW V12 LMR Photo: Studio Olafur Eliasson © BMW Group / Olafur Eliasson

idea of painting a BMW that he started working directly on the car with paint and brush. Warhol did no silk-screening as he had with his famous Liz, Marilyn and Mao. He personally painted it! In fact, he was finished in less than half an hour!

Since then, well-known American-based artists such as Robert Rauschenberg, David Hockney, Jenny Holzer and Jeff Koons have contributed their unique art to the project. Koons, known for his large scale, highly polished “Balloon Dog” featured on the roof of the Metropolitan Museum in 2008, said he was honored to be selected and enjoyed the opportunity to paint the latest BMW Art Car which competed in the 2010 Le Mans race. In addition, international artists including Ernst Fuchs, Michael Jagamara Nelson, Ken Done, Matazo Kayama, Cesar Manrique, A.R Penck, Esther Mahlangu and Sandro Chia received commissions from BMW. However, no artist has made a bigger Art Car statement than Olafur Eliasson, the Danish artist best known by New Yorkers for having installed the well-received New York City 56

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Waterfalls about three years ago. One dramatic cascade was under the Brooklyn Bridge while the other three were located around New York Harbor. As you can imagine, the word “canvas” has a very different meaning to this innovative sculptor and large-scale installation artist.

From the beginning, this project was very ambitious as BMW asked Eliasson to utilize their Eco-friendly hydrogen powered H2R car. This BMW had already garnered a lot of publicity having written nine new international speed records into the history books to demonstrate that alternative fuel cars can be good for the environment and go very fast (over 300 kilometer per hour).

Eliasson took a bold step and stripped the sleek streamlined shell off the racer. Then he made a new framework of mirror-like steel on which he sprayed more than 500 gallons of water in a frigid environment to create an ice structure. As you can imagine, this unique Art Car exhibit required a special, temperature controlled display room. More impressive

#17 - Jeff Koons, 2010 - BMW M3 GT2

For the past 20 years or so, several BMW street cars have served as the curvaceous canvas for some very interesting and innovative art. was that when illuminated, it glowed from the inside out (Fire and Ice). Olafur entitled his work, Your Mobile Expectations. Incidentally, don’t try to find a current exhibition of this work…. it melted a few years ago!

To date, seventeen Art Cars have been created and BMW has been very pleased with the concept and the publicity they received that they expanded on Poulain’s original idea of painting only BMW race cars. For the past 20 years or so, several BMW street cars have served as the curvaceous canvas for some very interesting and innovative art. To control how their cars would be portrayed, BMW eventually established an international group of judges to select artists for Art Car projects.

BMW’s Thomas Girst stated: “In the beginning the cars were raced. There wasn’t much of a public relations effort around them... Since then, some of the Art Cars have been used in advertisements to show that BMW is a player in the arts. With the Eliasson work, part of what we are

doing is raising awareness of alternative and renewable energy sources.”

These cars have also been exhibited in the most fam ous museums throughout the world including the Guggenheim in New York and the Louvre in Paris. In March, 2009, some of the BMW Art Cars were displayed for the enjoyment of the thousands of commuters flowing through New York’s Grand Central Terminal. Although it is very rare that all of the cars are together, the complete collection was recently on display at the BMW Museum in Munich, Germany and closed on September 25, 2011.

BMW is still very much behind this 36 year old project and just announced the launch of their web based Virtual Art Car tour in July. It can be viewed at BMW's web site link: www.bmw-artcartour.com where you can enjoy the evolution of this great art form.

Don’t you want to buy a new BMW and break out your paint set?

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health

Make No Bones About It

by Cindy Clarke

W

hen it comes to keeping athletes in the game – and in one piece for that matter – there is no better man to have on your team than Dr. Kevin Plancher. Named among the top Orthopaedic Surgeons in the New York Metro area for the past 10 years, as well as being heralded as America’s Top Doctor in Sports Medicine from 2007 to 2010, Dr. Plancher has dedicated his life to helping people of all ages and abilities lead an active lifestyle.

It’s in his bones, say those who know him best, acknowledging the intentional play on words but going for it nonetheless. He was born with an athlete’s drive and spirit, I was told, swinging a tennis racket and owning the courts like a pro from the tender age of six. In fact, according to a New York Times article entitled “Sports Medicine from the Doctor’s Viewpoint,” in his youth, he always thought he would make tennis his livelihood.

That’s not surprising for a boy who grew up playing tennis, first in Forest Hills, home of the U.S. Open, and later in Long Island, and, who, as a high school tennis player, held his own in a well-played match with John McEnroe. He lost, but that’s not what stopped him from pursuing his dream as a tennis pro. A broken ankle did.

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He says it was a wake up call. Breaking his ankle while teaching his father how to improve his net game sidelined him, giving him ample time to think about his life’s career path as he recuperated. He did then what he does best now.

Think about how best to put the important parts together so one can do all the activities that they love, which, in his case, was combining his passion for science with his love for sports.

After high school, Dr. Plancher went on to Trinity College for his Bachelor of Science degree in Biochemistry and Chemistry, followed by medical school at Georgetown University, where he graduated with honors. He did his residency at Harvard’s combined Orthopaedic program and had his first Fellowship in America’s heartland, in Indiana, where, he gratefully remembers, he learned a lot about humility – and heart. That led him to a second Fellowship at a world-renowned clinic in the ski resort town of Vail, Colorado, the ideal training ground, if you will, for perfecting shoulder and knee reconstruction. He stayed on with the clinic as a practicing consultant for the next six years, commuting from New York for three-day work weekends where he saw patients and performed surgeries, ultimately realizing his dream of becoming a star player among athletes.

Since then, he has served as team physician for an impressive roster of high school, college and national championship sports teams, including the U.S. skiing and snowboarding teams.

His energy and expertise continue to keep him front and center on the playing field in the demanding world of sports medicine. Today he has offices in New York City, Westchester County and Greenwich, Connecticut. His patients come in all sizes, ages and shape, from teenage

and 20-something basketball players, ice dancers, and soccer enthusiasts who tore their ACLs or their meniscus (the ligaments and joints that, stated very simply, hold knees together), to baby boomer weekend warriors with age-related musculoskeletal ailments to the 87-year old woman who wanted her arthritic knees fixed so she could continue skiing in winter… along with scores of professional athletes who rely on Dr. Plancher to help heal their injuries and keep them healthy, safe and strong.

In addition to his iron-man surgical schedule, Dr. Plancher lectures extensively on Orthopaedic procedures and injury management around the world. He is passionate about helping others learn how to keep their bodies, and ultimately their bones, in top form. In 2004, he established “The Orthopaedic Foundation for Active Lifestyles” (OFALS), a non-profit foundation that enhances the “physical well-being of active individuals through the development and promotion of research and supporting technologies.” What this organization does is keep sports-minded souls… and their soles… in the game through a variety of invaluable, interactive teaching programs. Continuing medical education instructs health care professionals on the latest techniques and minimally invasive arthroscopic surgical treatments available to them for patient care.

Community outreach programs teach high school science students, athletes, trainers, coaches and others to stay active and healthy while competing. Clinical trials give patients access to the newest healthcare trends, breakthrough medical procedures and promising new drug therapies to keep them pain free, offering them the opportunity to benefit from the latest treatments well be-

“Whether you are into w nothing feels better than keep feeling good about

their faces, one that says they did it all by themselves. That is not only keeping in the game, that is winning.”

You can learn more about Dr. Plancher and the outstanding work he does through his Foundation at the 7th Anniversary OFALS Gala honoring Martha Stewart, Russell Warren, MD, and John and Peggy Bader on November 9 at The Harvard Club in New York.

If you are like any one of the teams of people he has helped over the years, you may be tempted to run over to him and throw your arms around him in a big thank you hug. But he’ll be the first to caution you to “Build slowly. Stay in shape. Take the time to master a move or routine before moving on. Always do your prep work.

Warm up for a few minutes, then gently stretch.”

As so many of us have found out, injuries seem to happen most when we are not thinking about our actions. Maybe a wave, a handshake or a simple thank you when you see the good Doctor would be a safer bet than a running hug.

fore they are on the market. It also funds a Medical/Research Fellowship for a qualified medical professional who exhibits outstanding skills and commitment to Sports Medicine and the care of the knee, shoulder and upper extremity.

Humbled by the work his foundation has championed over the years, Dr. Plancher is especially moved by the hands-on “operating” classes OFALS provides to students from urban public schools in the Bronx and New Rochelle and from the private Dalton School in Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

“The kids work together in teams of four to fix simulated broken bones in a hospital setting,” he explained. “This gives them a chance to apply their love of science to an actual real-life appli-

cation, pooling their new skills and their desire to learn and help others into one shared goal on behalf of the patient.” It is as inspirational as it is rewarding and it’s what keeps Dr. Plancher so in tune and in touch with the people he helps “keep in the game.”

In his words, he says “whether you are into walking, kite surfing, tennis or yoga, nothing feels better than to accomplish it yourself. And to keep feeling good about yourself, you have to stay active. When you look at the 87-year-old woman who teaches sit ups and push ups to her fellow octogenarians in a daily class at a Westchester senior center or the 8-to 10-year-olds who eagerly race down the soccer field with their classmates, you’ll recognize a certain smile on

There are going to be a lot of celebrities on hand and underfoot at the 7th annual OFALS gala at the Harvard Club in New York on November 9 from (pardon the puns, but the event benefits and promotes active healthy living, strong bones and body parts among them) and they’re all coming together to honor and support fellow philanthropists who help others “keep in the game.”

Helping people stay active, in mind, body and spirit, is the goal of the OFALS Foundation and it’s people like this year’s honorees, Martha Stewart, Russell Warren, MD, and John and Peggy Bader, along with hundreds of guests who are giving their financial support to the cause, who keep their worthy mission front and center and make their efforts a reality. Always a star-studded team event, this year the gala is welcoming luminaries from the Giants and the Yankees, and tennis legend John McEnroe among its line-up of players who will be dining on celebrity chef Mike Mina’s mouthwatering culinary creations and tapping their feet (carefully, cautions OFALS founder Dr. Kevin Plancher) to the music of the popular band, America, celebrating their 40th anniversary on the music scene as a perennial classic-rock favorite. For more information, visit www.ofals.org or www.plancherortho.com

alking, kite surfing, tennis or yoga, to accomplish it yourself. And to yourself, you have to stay active...”

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Alliance For Cancer Gene Therapy’s Marathon Man: DR. Michael T. Lotze

Blending Science–Mystery–Hope

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lliance for Cancer Gene Therapy (ACGT) founding Scientific AdviA sory Council member Dr. Michael T. Lotze is Professor of Surgery and Bioengineering; Vice Chair of Research within the Department of Surgery;

victories and the hope are all marathons. In scientific research you must go the distance, never half way.”

Assistant Vice Chancellor Health Sciences at Pittsburgh Clinical Medicine, and Director of Strategic Partnerships within the University of Pittsburgh.

He has worked in the field of immunology and clinical medicine for over 35 years and believes that a fundamental understanding of cancer biology and immunology is essential to making progress in oncology. He is the co-inventor of 10 patents in dendritic cell vaccines and antigen discovery and serves as Associate Editor of the Journal of Immunotherapy. He has over 500 publications in peer-reviewed journals.

In tandem with all of Michael Lotze’s outstanding scientific accomplishments, he has completed 60 marathons in seven countries and will compete in the New York City Marathon for the third time in 2011! How does his love for long-distance running connect with his passion for scientific cancer research?

“It stimulates the mind and body, it creates a deep understanding of focus, it motivates the attainment of goals and it allows one to establish objectives that are beyond immediate reach. I have been involved in cancer research and the field of Immunotherapy for over 35 years. The challenges, mysteries, setbacks,

ZENO’S PARADOX. THE TORTOISE AND THE HARE! Dr. Lotze says, “Setting goals brings to mind Zeno’s Paradox.” Zeno’s Paradoxes are a set of problems generally thought to have been devised by Zeno of Elea to support Parmenides’ (Ancient Greek Philosopher) doctrine that all is one.

That which is in locomotion must arrive at the halfway stage before it arrives at the goal. Says Lotze, “If you set your goal as successively reaching in intervals the halfway point, you will never get to the finish line! In cell and gene therapy research you must go the distance or you will be diverted time and again by Zeno’s Paradox!”

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THE CANCER MYSTERY “FIGHTING FIRE WITH FIRE” Gene Therapy: Gene therapy is the replacement or modification of a defective or missing gene. One area of gene therapy is immunotherapy in which researchers genetically modify a patient’s immune cells so they recognize antigens produced by cancer cells, thus destroying them and eliminating the tumor.

T-cell: A type of white blood cell that is of key importance to the immune system

At age six, Michael Lotze drew pictures of himself with a stethoscope around his neck and his mother was thrilled that young Michael would clearly follow in the footsteps of her father, Michael’s grandfather, and become a valued Western Pennsylvania general practitioner.

What Michael’s mother could not predict was that soon after receiving his medical degree from Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine within the Honors Program in Medical Education, and launching training in surgery, he traded his scalpel and stethoscope for a microscope and laboratory, beginning a journey leading to breakthrough cell and gene therapy in the fight against cancer.

Dr. Michael Lotze (right) with Dr. Christoph Bergman of Essen, Germany.

and is at the core of adaptive immunity, the system that tailors the body’s immune response to specific pathogens. T-cells are like soldiers who search out and destroy the targeted invaders.

“When I began my career, cancer was a great mystery. There was little or no biological understanding of the disease. The good news today is that some of that mystery has been lifted. We now know that cancer is fundamentally a disease of the genes and of cells. We have also come to understand that cancer cell and gene therapy is really about fighting fire with fire. It is about introducing through immunology, modified genes and killer cells (T-cells) that kill cancer cells!

“The very beginning of gene therapy and the first clinical trials were cooked up by Michael Blaese and me. (Dr. Michael Blaese was then in the Metabolism Section of the NCI and subsequently, Chief of the Clinical Gene Therapy Branch of the National Human Genome Research Institute). Dr. Blaese had been very interested in immune deficiencies and thought that gene therapy might be a way to cure some of these disorders. Since we were already giving T-cells to cancer patients, we talked about developing a new protocol that marked the T-cells as a strategy to purposefully launch genetic manipulation of the cell, which eventually became the first gene therapy.”

Injecting cells with a treated human gene at first met with extraordinary resistance. In the 1960s, the Cambridge, Massachusetts City Council actually outlawed the science at both M.I.T. and Harvard University laboratories. The modern period of cell therapy started in the 1970s and gene therapy in the 1990s. Dr. Lotze adds, “We have come a long way. We have now seen the first

approved cell therapy for the treatment of some prostate cancers. However, there as yet is no approved gene therapy for cancer treatment in the United States. Everything remains in trials. It is exciting indeed that Dr. Carl June’s breakthrough* clinical trials at the University of Pennsylvania, funded by ACGT, suggest that gene and cell therapy is going to soon be very much a part of modern therapy.”

“EXCEEDING ALL EXPECTATIONS!” ACGT Research Fellow Dr. Carl June and his team at the University of Pennsylvania’s Abramson Cancer Center and Perelman School of Medicine have made great strides in the treatment of advanced CLL (chronic lymphocytic leukemia), the most common type of the blood disease that strikes 15,000 people in the U.S. and kills 4,300 every year. The treatment uses genetically modified versions of the patient’s own T-cells, and has shown remission for up to a year in a small group of patients, several of whom are in complete remission. The protocol, which involves removing the patient’s white blood cells and modifying them, then infusing the new cells back into the patient’s body following chemotherapy, provides a tumor-attack roadmap for the treatment of leukemia and other cancers including those of the lung and ovaries and myeloma and melanoma. This is the first demonstration of the use of gene transfer therapy to create “serial killer” T-cells aimed at cancerous tumors. “Within three weeks, the tumors, which were several pounds each, had been obliterated in a way that was much more complete than we ever expected,” said senior author Carl >>

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Left: ACGT Research Fellows Dr. Carl June (left) of the University of Pennsylvaia Abramson Cancer Center with Dr. Michael Lotze. Right: At the Pittsburgh Marathon, 2010 Antonio Romo de Vivar Chavez, MD; surgical resident at the Cleveland Clinic, Christoph Bergmann, MD, PhD Otolaryngology resident in Essen Germany Richard (Pete) Peterson who wrote Growing Up with Clemente, Michael Lotze.

June, MD, director of Translational Research and a professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine in the Abramson Cancer Center, who led the work. “The results exceeded our expectations quite a bit; our entire team is really excited, and as well, the patients are excited.”

“APPROVED GENE THERAPY FOR CANCER IN THREE TO FIVE YEARS!” Michael Lotze believes the finish line for cell and gene therapy is in sight.

“I suggest that gene-modified cells are going to be part of modern cancer therapy. We may still be at the halfway mark of Zeno’s Paradox for gene therapy, but my suspicion is that within the next three to five years we will see an approved gene therapy for cancer!

“Compared to where I started thirty years ago we are now at a level of sophistication in clinical trials where we can pluck out the T-cell receptor , modify it, recognize a particular molecule on a tumor cell and then modify the patient’s own cells and introduce them back into the body as cancer-killing cells. Is that a breakthrough? Absolutely! Is it effective? Absolutely! Are there people who are cured? Possibly! Only long term follow through will determine whether these tumors will never come back. Those of us in the tumor immunology field feel that we are not going to cure cancer without the involvement of T-cells. I think the greatest breakthroughs yet to come will be when we have consilience** between cancer biology and tumor immunology.”

WITH CLINICAL TRIALS THERE IS HOPE The digital world’s access to information can create both hope and despair for cancer patients. Each day brings both good news and disappointing false starts regarding new treatments for cancer. Worldwide human trials are reported with mixed results. How does Dr. Lotze feel about patient access to trials? “I think that the new therapies available in clinical trials should be readily available for desperate patients. People deserve to live with hope. Participation in clinical trials offers that hope.”

ARE CLINICAL TRIALS FOR EVERYONE? “I believe clinical trials are for almost everyone. It has been shown repeatedly that the quality of care in a clinical protocol often offers patients better care than in conventional therapy. Some patients will not qualify for clinical trials.

Some may make the very difficult choice to have no therapy. There are more clinical trials open in the field of cancer treatment than for any other disease.

Sadly, many clinical trials are starving for patients.” Clinical trial information is available at www.acgtfoundation.org CANCER AND FITNESS Long-distance runners are obviously focused on fitness and the take on the subject by ACGT’s nationally renowned cancer research scientist, who is also a physician, presents a poignant viewpoint. Dr. Lotze: “Setting medicine and treatment aside, being trim and fit may be the only way to increase longevity.

One of the major benefits of regular exercise and staying fit is that you clear yourself of cells that can create problems for you over time.”

T.R. AND MICHAEL LOTZE? With whom would Michael Lotze like to have a philosophical conversation? Surprisingly the answer was not a scientist, but rather an amateur botanist and outdoor adventurer who became the twenty-sixth President of the United States. Teddy Roosevelt! Says Lotze, “Having just read T.R. by Edmund Morris, here is a man who overcame a childhood plagued with illness and who long before it became popular threw himself headlong into a physical fitness regimen to cure his ailments. It worked! T.R. also never set a goal of half the distance. Whether it was establishing our National Parks, making the Panama Canal a reality, dealing with the oil, railroad, and steel trusts or living off the land for a year in the Dakota Territory, Teddy Roosevelt was all about hope. He was innovative, put big ideas on the line and was willing to take risks regardless of personal popularity.”

INVESTMENT IN RESEARCH BUILDS ECONOMIES Michael Lotze believes that continued cutbacks in scientific research are devastating to solving many of the great medical mysteries and to society as a whole.

“Despite the economic difficulties in the America of 2011, the great success of the economy over the past two decades has been the consequence of innovation and funding of a broad range of research. In medicine, investing in areas such as the National Institute of Health, philanthropic organizations like ACGT and the space race, without which we would not have today’s computer technology, biotechnology, and evolving gene therapy have all paid handsome dividends. It is all about the willingness to take risks. Yes, you can cut expenditures but if you pare down research, science and education, you are looking at a bleak future across the entire economic and social spectrum. The critical role for organizations like ACGT is to keep hope alive for a group of hard working scientists whose goals are trying to solve problems and uncover many more scientific mysteries. A short time ago I was running in the Rachel Carson (Rachel Carson is the author of The Silent Spring) 35-Mile Foot Race with Carl June, and he said to me, ‘I would have been unable to do my work without the funding from ACGT.”

For Michael Lotze a break from the laboratory is in the works. He is heading to Kenya with his family in search of new mysteries. Yes, he is running in the Lewa Marathon with the Kenyans.

This is the second in a series of articles profiling the Research Stars of the Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy, a public charity based in Stamford, Connecticut, that supports scientific research in the area of cancer cell and gene therapy. This series will culminate with the celebration of the tenth anniversary of ACGT at a dinner on April 19, 2012 at the Hyatt Regency in Greenwich, Connecticut in honor of ACGT Co-Founder, the late Edward Netter. For details, please go to www.acgtfoundation.org

**In his 1998 book Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge, Pulitzer Prize- winning author Edward O. Wilson discusses methods that have been used to unite the sciences. Wilson uses the term “consilience” to describe the synthesis of knowledge from different specialized fields of human endeavor.

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SPORT

Photo: Stuart le Gassic

Ned Marks

Bradley Ball, left, John White, right

Squash: “Chess in Short Pants”

Mohamed El Sherbini of Egypt and Ricky Weisskopf of El Salvador

by Georgetta L. Morgue A sport that’s quickly gaining traction in the United States in recent years is squash. Long known inside the walls of the country’s elite country clubs and Ivy League schools, squash is becoming increasingly popular in health clubs and public schools across the nation.

“Squash is the ultimate of sports; fast action, highly competitive, incredibly aerobic, and mentally more challenging at every twist and turn than any racquet sport in the world,” says Mark Talbott, who was the #1 ranked player in North America for 12 years and now runs the Talbott Squash Academy, an Official National Training Center of U.S. Squash, the national governing body. “Squash pushes you to the limit physically and mentally like no other sport. Once you try it, you’re hooked.”

Squash is played by more than 20 million people in 185 countries across the world. Though the first American court appeared in 1884 at St. Paul’s, a preparatory school in New Hampshire, it was not until recently that the game began to flourish in the U.S.

In a 2007 article in the New York Times, Josh Haner called squash “chess in short pants” and that label has stuck. Because the court is so small, there are myriad options for hitting shots with different angles coming off the walls. Players are constantly trying to “wrong foot” their opponent with deception and force them to move in the wrong direction to retrieve a shot. “At the amateur level, you can see a clever player who has a better understanding of the court and its angles overcome the athleticism of a fitter athlete,” says Joe McManus, Commissioner and CEO of the Pro Squash Tour.

A Forbes Magazine study rated squash the No. 1 healthiest sport in the world and better in cardiorespiratory endurance, muscular strength, muscular endurance and flexibility than other activities, including swimming, rowing, running, boxing and cycling. In one hour of squash, a player may expend up to 1000 calories. Because of the constant, fast-paced, movement, stretching, twisting, turning, while simultaneously hitting the ball, squash also provides a great upper and lower body workout. Rallies between experienced players may involve 30 or more shots. Therefore, for elite players, a very high premium is placed on fitness, both aerobic and anaerobic.

A few years ago the New York Times reported that junior squash could be a ticket to college. That with some hard work, and an immersion to the game, young people could get into colleges that they might now have “reached” for otherwise. “Playing squash was a very big advantage that I had when applying to colleges,” said Omar Sobhy, a student at George Washington University.

U.S. Squash has noted that junior participation has increased by over 30 percent in recent years and the number of teams participating in sanctioned high school league play is expected to increase this season by 25 percent. Twenty years ago, lacrosse was the sport that grabbed kids’ attention. Now, squash is becoming the next sport for America’s youth.

The Basics Similar to racquetball, squash is a racquet sport played by two players in a four-walled court with a small, hollow rubber ball. The court is 32 feet front to back and 21 feet left to right. The front wall is 15 feet high and the back wall is 7 feet high.The front wall also has a service line which is 6 feet above the floor and a 19-inch-high “tin” which serves as a ‘net’ during the rally. The floor is marked with a transverse “half-court” line and further divided into two rear “quarter courts” and two “service boxes.”

The Game A match is played to the best of 5 games. Games are played to 11 though a player must win by two points. The ball is served from one service box to the opposite court. After the serve, the players take turns hitting the ball against the front wall (above the tin). The ball may strike the side or back walls at any time. Players must return their opponents shot before the ball bounces twice on the floor. Players may move anywhere around the court but accidental or deliberate obstruction of the other player’s movement is forbidden.

The Pro Squash Tour Because of the growth of the game, there are more places to play and watch the game in the U.S. The Pro Squash Tour was founded in 2009 to provide more competitive arenas for pro players in the United States and opportunities for fans to see the best the sport has to offer. With stops across the country from August through April, the Pro Squash Tour offers an eclectic mix of both international stars as well as local pros. “The Pro Squash Tour makes the sport so much more accessible for local pros to play and continue playing at a high level,” say Phil Wilkins who represented Wales as a junior and is currently a teaching pro in Tuxedo, New York. Other pros with equally as impressive careers include Bernardo Samper, three-time Colombian National Champion from Rye, Chris Walker, England former No. 1 of Greenwich, young phenom Dylan Murray, the No. 1 ranked junior in the U.S., from Bronxville and Ned Marks, former No. 1 at Denison University, from New Canaan and many more from local clubs.

Fans will also see the “legend” John White of Scotland ,who holds the record for hitting the fastest squash ball in history, John Rooney, twotime reigning Irish National Champion, Mohamed El Sherbini, Pro Squash Tour’s No. 2 player from Egypt, where many squash champions are born, plus other top players from New Zealand, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Kenya, Pakistan and more.

Watch for Pro Squash Tour stops in Westchester this winter: Mamaroneck, December. Bronxville, January. Rye Brook, February. Tuckahoe, March. For more information and tickets, visit www.ProSquasTour.net

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MUSIC

by Jordan Fiellin As a purist in her craft, Caroline prides her songwriting and performances in being truly organic.

No set lists and no self-doubt are key to Caroline’s art.

a flower leaning toward her own sun Poised beyond her years, Caroline Jones is dedicating her career to three things: inspiration, passion, and the purity of music.

I

t seems to have become a rarity that without gowns made of meat or over-processed beat samples, musical artists can effectively stake their lasting fame in the hearts of consumers.

“It’s just not how it used to be,” says Jones.

“At college my Dad would sit and spin Joni Mitchell records all day because her sound was just that inspirational.” Caroline Jones is determined to deliver raw and honest music to the masses. With no intention of burning out in a

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lackluster blaze of glory, Caroline wants to be the spark to move music back to prioritizing ingenuity and timeless talent. In a period of flux and freedom in the music industry, Caroline Jones is hitting the music scene with a powerful attitude.

This 21-year-old emerging singer/songwriter is explicit in her objectives for her career.

“Putting the power back into the hands of the craftsman is essential,” says Jones. She honors connecting to her audience more than most relevant artists and does not allow the vanity of the business to narrow her idea of success.

“My performances are acoustic to restore the intimacy, intuitiveness, and impulsive relationship between artist and listener.” You will almost always find Caroline under the stage spotlight, just her and her guitars in an unadulterated, freefalling love affair.

Caroline’s folk/country/pop melodies weave themselves around powerful lyrics of the bittersweet realities of love in her debut album, “Fallen Flower.” Her musical influences come from all directions: Jewel, Bob Dylan, Ella Fitzgerald, Patty Griffin, and Mississippi John Hurt and manifest a soulful but playful resonance. One may not normally pair opera with country, but an avid John Wayne fan and classically trained in opera since the age of nine by vocal yogi Andy Anselmo, Caroline masterfully opens a bridge through music to all of her passions and skills.

Jones owns the titles of singer, instrumentalist, and producer and got the chance to singlehandedly design her album in both Avatar Studios in New York and Loud Studios in Nashville. Being the captain of your own ship is priceless and Caroline dedicated her time as a producer to “not letting things get lost in the music.” Having the chance to be her own Clint Eastwood, she says, “was so much fun!”

Although a Connecticut native, Caroline has become a New Yorker at heart while juggling

the fast pace of being a new recording artist in the business and a student at New York University. To accomplish success in both undertakings, she values the balance of life and considers this “learning endeavor an extension of my craft.”

This fall Caroline will be touring Boarding Schools throughout New England. Reaching the young minds of students has been the biggest inspiration for Caroline. Malleable and open to progress, the younger generation is her motivation to create change and lasting impressions. Caroline fondly recalls her first boarding school performance as her deciding life moment. Performing for and with the students was a revelation when she finally became part of the movement and the action to encourage youth. “This is what I am supposed to be doing,” reflects Caroline.

As a purist in her craft, Caroline prides her songwriting and performances in being truly organic. No set lists and no self-doubt are key to Caroline’s art. “I like things to happen very intuitively and never force anything,” she says.

“Fallen Flower” is an 11-track compilation of love songs and makes it apparent that Caroline has a gift for story telling. Working with the big shots of Sony like Tommy Mottola and Chris Apostle (Mariah Carey, Jennifer Lopez, Marc Anthony) meant having larger-than-life influences on her career and Caroline realized that this was a journey she was going to have to lead on her own if it was going to be true to the artist. “Fallen Flower” was released in January 2011 and will be the parent album to two others in the works. Caroline describes her next record to be more country-influenced and “emotionally deeper. It is more about the ways that we search for love as opposed to love songs.” The second album in Caroline’s near future is expected to release before the New Year.

Her fast-growing fan base has high hopes for her future and Caroline is just as optimistic.

An unwavering goal of delivering the music in its purest form directly to fans is met with her interest in innovative ways to make those connections.

Caroline often does Live Stream performances in which her fans can watch her shows streaming live on her website. While her focus is generally on the present and what must happen now, Caroline is fascinated by the mystery of the future and can’t wait to see what will transpire both in her career and the music industry as a whole. Caroline is resolute to bring light back to the eclipsed heroism of music. Her mission is addicting and a tune the world will be humming for years to come.

To find out more information on Caroline’s tour dates and purchasing "Fallen Flower" go to www.carolinejones.com

MUSIC

© R.A. Heckler Photography/Dawntreader Images

Around the World in a Day

How Google+ Made Daria Musk an Overnight Music Sensation Ever since she was a little girl growing up in the woods of Fairfield County, Daria Musk knew that music would be her journey. But there was no way she could’ve known the vehicle that would take her there.

“I’ve been singing for trees, driving an hour to New York City to pour my heart out in noisy bars and rock clubs, grateful for every chance to pick up my guitar and play for someone,” recounts the 23year-old singer/songwriter. “[I dreamt] that maybe if I worked very hard and got very, very lucky, maybe one day I could sing for people all over the world.”

Now her dreams are coming to life, and her entire career has been dramatically fast-tracked in a remarkably short period of time. It’s all thanks to a brandnew social media platform that has very quickly been capturing the attention of the online

by Brian Solomon

public. In just a matter of days, it would change her life and her career.

“My older brother called from California and said, ‘Do you need an invitation to Google+? Maybe you could be one of the first musicians on there,’” she remembers. “I was on my way to a performance, ready to lug my amps through a downpour of rain and I said, ‘What’s Google+? I’ve got to get to my sound check!’”

Introduced earlier this year, Google’s robust answer to Facebook and Twitter has been growing in leaps and bounds, and thanks to her brother’s encouragement, Daria can literally lay claim to getting in on the ground floor. Soon, she would find herself interacting with a global community of viewers, playing live for them from her producer’s recording studio.

The first Google+ “Hangout Concert” occurred on Saturday, July 16. Created for the purpose of allowing small groups of friends to congregate in a video chat within the Google+ environment, the Hangout feature was not actually intended to be used as a venue for live musical performance, but Daria Musk became the first to do it on a professional level. Before she knew it, hundreds of people from all over were making their way to the Hangout to see her perform. Eager to perform for as many as possible, she wound up playing for 6 ½ hours that night.

“We laughed, marveled at the technology, and became friends as I played and sang through the night,” Daria says.

“It was my first time having an audience ‘lined up around the block’ waiting to hear me perform... In one night, I toured the world.”

As luck would have it, one of the individuals who witnessed the concert was Chee Chew, one of Google’s top engineers. It was Chew who found a way around the Hangout limitations of only 10 viewers at a time, and by the second Hangout Concert a week later, Daria’s performance was being streamed live to 9,000 viewers in 100 countries. This time she played for 7 ½ hours straight.

“As night turned to day for viewers in Europe, evening into the wee hours of the morning for me, and morning shifted to afternoon in Australia, I kept playing to see as many of their

beautiful faces as I could,” she says. “A hospital in Portugal fed the live-stream of the concert onto the screens in their ER room to cheer up patients and nurses. I saw little girls dance to my music on an Australian Sunday morning when it was Saturday night for me. I watched the sunrise in Norway through a new fan’s screen…

It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.”Daria even wrote a song just for the occasion, “+1 Me”—inspired by the Google+ feature that allows users to highlight content they especially enjoy. A third Hangout Concert would follow on Saturday, August 20, by which point Google+ was becoming a serious presence in the world of social media, and Daria Musk and her newfound fans (whom she calls her “G+nuises”) were a part of it all.

Things have been moving very quickly lately for Daria since making online music history. She has an EP already available through iTunes and Amazon.com (appropriately titled The Daria Musk EP), and her debut album, Laughing in the Face of the Lion, was scheduled at press time to be released during the fall.

“I’m just at the beginning of my journey,” says Daria to her ever-growing legion of G+niuses. “I’m so excited to learn with you, share these moments with you, play for you and work tirelessly for the rest of my life, giving back to you through song.”

Connect with Daria Musk: Facebook: www.facebook.com (Daria Musk) Twitter: www.twitter.com/dariamusk YoutTube: www.youtube.com/dariamusk Tumblr: www.dariamusk.tumblr.com And of course, on Google+: www.plus.google.com

© R.A. Heckler Photography/Dawntreader Images

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COMIC RELIEF

“I was on the precipice of obscurity. My manager called me into his office and told me I can’t get you any work, no clubs want to book you, no the precipice of obscurity. My manager called me TV, nothing. I can’t get you anything.” “Iintowashisonoffice and told me I can’t get you any work, no clubs

WTF

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want to book you, no TV, nothing. I can’t get you anything.”

It’s hard to believe those words were being spoken to Marc Maron by his manager just over two years ago. The same Marc Maron who has been on Conan 46 times, more times than any other stand-up comic. The same Marc Maron who has been on Late Night with David Letterman many times; hosted shows for Comedy Central; been on numerous TV shows; had three development deals; a successful one-man show that became the book “The Jerusalem Syndrome”; released many stand-up CD’s and DVD’s; and had been a popular radio host on Air America for six years.

“At the time, I had been fired from Air America and I was going through a very painful, second divorce. I left his office and I had two choices. I could commit suicide or I could figure

by Bari Alyse Rudin

something out. My producing partner from Air America and I used to joke ‘Hey, maybe if this doesn’t work out we can do our own show from my garage.’ And that’s what we did.

“I’m not a total depressive, I knew I had to do something.

I had no idea where it would go, but we decided to set up the equipment in my garage and set up a recording schedule. We decided we would record twice a week and we would release and air two podcasts a week and we just stuck to the schedule.

I just started talking alone on the microphone,” he said.

WTF with Marc Maron was born in Los Feliz, a neighborhood of Los Angeles.

“Then I started interviewing my peers, comic friends, comedy writers and it just kind of took off,” he said.

The podcast was immediately popular with comics and the entertainment industry and Maron got interviews with bigger and bigger names. He started to get calls from big names like comedy film director Judd Apatow, who were huge fans of the show and asked Maron if they could come on WTF. He has been broadcasting for two years in the garage of his home, which he affectionately calls “The Cat Ranch” for his beloved cats, including LaFonda and Monkey, who are sometimes heard in Maron’s show openings.

The 47-year-old comedian is doing the best and most defining work of his career. As someone who has watched Maron’s act develop over the years and was a fan from the start, I was always struck by his honesty, raw emotion and ability to turn real-life pain and angst into comedy. I also love his vocabulary and the passion and strong opinions he strings together so eloquently. His comedy isn’t mean. It explores the insecurities and the crazy stuff we all deal with in every day life - the regrets, mistakes and heartbreak.

Like many of his fans, when I listen to him I feel like he gets me and I get him. Maron has had a successful career because

he is so smart, funny, deep and passionate about his views.

The very thing that kept him from having “traditional commercial success” is the thing that makes him so fantastic and so beloved by fans. In other words, Maron would not be best showcased by being in a typical television sitcom.

Thankfully, he took a chance on this podcast. Now all of us have figured out this would be where Maron would shine.

He recently recorded his 200th podcast. Entertainment Weekly, Rolling Stone and the New York Times recognize his groundbreaking work. He gave the inaugural speech at the Montreal Just For Laughs Festival, a huge deal. He has two million hits, a growing fan base and is now selling out clubs and theaters.

I asked Maron what’s behind the success of the show.

“Well, I never underestimate the power of celebrity,” he said.

I had to laugh and remind Marc that even though he has interviewed Robin Williams, Ben Stiller, Jonathan Winters and Gary Shandling on WTF, that is not the reason for the popularity of the show. All those celebrities make the talk show rounds and people can get their fill of them anywhere.

But where can people get a real, honest, intimate and unscripted interview with these celebrities or other names in comedy? To me, that’s the answer to Maron’s success.

Check out Maron’s show at www.wtfpod.com, download all 210 plus episodes, and let me know what you think. I look forward to feedback from VENÜ readers and will be profiling Wendy Liebman in my next comedy column.

Follow me @BariAlyse on Twitter for more.

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The island of Nantucket can be brutal come December. As fall leafs make way for winter frost, this summer paradise thirty miles off the south coast of Cape Cod transforms into a ghost town worthy of tumbleweeds. Some islanders turn to drink, others to exercise, and many still to the monotony of the not so great indoors. Connecticut-native and professional photographer, Kit Noble, made a film.

Rewind two years: Noble is attending a summer cocktail party on Nantucket. Drink in-hand, he weighs the room as only a photographer does: Noting light and composition, and perhaps chuckling at a degree of hobnobbing only possible on a resort island. Scanning the room, his wandering eye gets caught on a television mounted on the wall like a frame without a painting. The blank rectangle looks out of place amongst the room’s otherwise thoughtful décor, prompting Noble to question aloud: “What belongs on that screen?”

Answering this query led Kit Noble on an 18-month film project entitled Nantucket by Nature. Premiering at Nantucket’s annual Film Festival this past June, the 45-minute film has since gone on to be an acclaimed anthem to the island’s enchanting landscape, or as one critic aptly put it: “It’s a love letter to the Grey Lady.” From pulverizing waves to foreboding storms to spellbinding sunsets, Nantucket by

Fairfield-photographer-turned-Nantucket-filmmaker, Kit Noble, is revealing the island dubbed the “Grey Lady” in ways never seen before

the faraway filmmaker

by Robert Cocuzzo

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Nature captures the island’s unique environment as it evolves kaleidoscopically over the course of a year.

Filming Nantucket by Nature turned Noble into a certified recluse, a contemporary Henry David Thoreau creating his version of Walden. Each morning, the intrepid filmmaker crept out into the dew-covered dawn for sunrise; each evening, he bundled up for sunset—accompanied only by his faithful Jeep and camera. Exacerbating things, Noble was new to an island that in the winter is anything but sociable. Fortunately, he seems to possess a disposition that lends itself to such a stoic existence. Upon first becoming acquainted at a ye olde Nantucket watering hole, the filmmaker was sparing with his words, almost reticent. Yet in time a sly smile began punctuating his discourse, and a wry, yet good-natured sense of humor emerged.

“The aw-shit-moment happened when I decided to film a closeup of sand blowing across the beach to illustrate the wind speed,” he began, after I solicited some adventurous, fall-through-the-ice episode that happened during filming. “The wind and sand were blowing at 40mph. Laying on my stomach, I could feel blowing sand penetrating all the openings in my clothing: neck, waistline, up the

pant legs…not to mention all my orifices.” He laughed dryly. “I grit my sandy teeth and stuck with the shot. It looked great. After 10 minutes in the sand, I knew I had the shot. It was only then that I took my eye away from the eyepiece and for the first time looked at the camera; it was covered with a quarter inch of sand. Every button, cable port, battery compartment, focus ring…all coated with sand. I spent the next two hours cleaning the camera with compressed air.”

What emerged from the months of 4 A.M. wakeups, financial headaches, and missed-shot heartbreaks was a cinematic triumph.

Nantucket by Nature dazzled audiences at the Nantucket Film Festival, including longtime summer resident and actor, Jerry Stiller. Exiting from the film’s premiere, Stiller sought out Noble in the lobby. Looking up at the filmmaker, he congratulated him with a vigorous handshake, exclaiming in his iconic voice: “Academy Award! Academy Award!”

With an original score conducted by Grammy Award-winning musician Jamie Howarth and masterful editing by Christo Tsiaras, Noble’s months of footage became a moving tribute to the island.

Sans chronology or narration, 12 chapters organized the film along such themes as “Art of Nature” and “Timescapes.” From sand’s eye

Filming Nantucket

by Nature turned Noble into a certified recluse, a contemporary Henry David Thoreau creating his version of Walden.

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to bird’s eye, Nantucket by Nature had even longtime year ‘rounders pleasantly perplexed, asking: “That’s Nantucket?!” For Noble, there could be few better words of praise.

In the months following the premiere of Nantucket by Nature, I’ve worked with Noble on a number of shoots and have become familiar with his meticulous approach to film and photo. Each shot is exhaustively calculated, with backup plans for the backup plan.

His process reflects 25 years shooting the likes of Lance Armstrong, Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, Anna Nicole Smith, and Joe Theismen for features and covers of national magazines. Today the photographer-turned-filmmaker has focused his lens solely on the Grey Lady, having recently moved his Connecticut studio to the island.

Beyond his growing love for Nantucket, Noble’s move was precipitated by an emerging relationship with The Nantucket Dreamland, a newly refurbished theater spearheaded by philanthropist, Wendy Schmidt. The 5-year, $32-million theater will be completed early this spring, and Noble has the perfect film to get the its longawaited reels spinning.

This past October, he and his Nantucket Films team orchestrated an ambitious project entitled Nantucket 24: One Day on Island

Time. In the same vein as Kevin MacDonald’s Life in a Day documentary, Noble caucused throngs of Nantucketers to film an entire movie in 24 hours. Starting at 5 A.M., hundreds took to the island equipped with handheld HD video devices to document anything and everything Nantucket. The reels and reels of footage were then submitted to Noble and his Nantucket Films crew to be distilled down into a movie mosaic telling the story of a single day on the island. “For Nantucket by Nature, the film was never going to be about town, or the people really,” Noble explains. “This new film, Nantucket 24, starts to get at the reason why I decided to move my life out here. The people. The community. It’s their story that I want to tell.”

With five other project ideas brewing, there are no bounds to where Kit Noble may take film next on Nantucket—not even the island’s 47.8-mile expanse. The filmmaker sources a creative energy to not only envision a project, but to execute it on all levels from PR to production. Of course, what he draws from the island is tremendous. His films provide an unparalleled look at an island steeped in history, calling those who’ve trudged its shores and moors for a lifetime to remember how truly unique this small spit of sand is.

From pulverizing waves to foreboding storms to pellbinding sunsets, Nantucket by Nature captures the island’s unique environment as it evolves kaleidoscopically over the course of a year.

Watch the trailer at www.nantucketfilms.com.

ART

A visitor to Karl Soderlund’s studio is likely to be awestruck by his over seven-foot-high oil paintings of Marilyn Monroe, Muhammad Ali, Audrey Hepburn and Albert Einstein, among others.

Iconic Obsessions

by Laura Einstein

In 2010, these paintings formed the basis for his exhibition at the National Arts Club in New York City, entitled Iconic Obsessions. The title points to the habit of elevating famous people to superhuman status.

They become gods in our minds; however, they are also commodities, in that reproductions of these people are as venerated as any religious icon. Perhaps it is our obsession with the lives of such icons, so often reflected in the vanity magazines and celebrity television shows, that Soderlund is masterfully revealing through his oil paintings.

In this series, he has developed a signature style in embedding within and around the contours of his figures objects from the personal histories of his subjects. It is the clever depictions of the subjects’ personal histories that enrich Soderlund’s portraits. The process of creating these Iconic Obsessions paintings begins by rendering his subject in oil on a large canvas. Each painting in this series measures 67” wide by 87”

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high. Once the initial painting is done to his satisfaction, Soderlund goes back into it to apply throughout symbols that he has found via intensive research on his subjects.

In considering Soderlund’s work, one immediately thinks of Andy Warhol and Chuck Close, who have painted contemporary icons as well.

In the 1960s, Andy Warhol developed the idea of icons as commodities by mass producing them not only in painted form but in editioned prints.

Warhol’s subjects include Marilyn Monroe and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, among others. Often, he created images in groups of nine along a grid pattern that replicates the same image again and again.

Chuck Close works in a grid pattern, but a bit differently. He defines his forms by massing oval doughnut-like shapes, a technique that he created after a catastrophic illness in 1988 left him paralyzed from the neck down. Close has devised a complex grid-based reconstruction of

the image, incorporating doughnut-like shapes that contour and articulate the forms of his subjects. Soderlund states, “There is Andy Warhol, Chuck Close and me.”

For Soderlund, however, the portrait is a point of departure.

He enjoys going beyond it to include references to personal history that is ultimately revealed in the painting. His paintings become visual biographies of the triumphs and hardships of their subjects. For instance, Muhammad Ali’s portrait includes the Olympic gold medal that he angrily threw into the Ohio River after an encounter with white racists, and butterflies and bees reflecting Ali’s famous comment, “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.”

Soderlund enjoys watching viewers identify the symbols throughout his paintings, and considers it a personal triumph to have successfully combined the elements into a holistic visual experience. Marilyn Monroe is represented by her familiar iconic stance over a subway grate with her white dress swirling up around her and champagne glasses nestled throughout. Audrey Hepburn has intricate images of children articulating her form; a tondo of a woman holding a child refers to her work as UNICEF’s spokesperson. For Paul Newman there are racecars and racing helmets, as well as images of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and his treasured performing awards.

Soderlund’s paintings without the symbols are themselves beautifully rendered portraits. In Soderlund’s typical style, there is a portrait of his wife Amanda that is treated as one of his Iconic Obsession figures.

In one of these paintings, he has created a portrait that embeds the eye and pyramid found on the back of the American dollar. Another portrait

of Amanda is a close-up restricted to her nose and chin rendered in brushstrokes and colors, making them as lush and vibrant as ripe fruit. The exquisite crimson of her lips and the rosy tones of her cheeks show warmth and vitality.

Karl is well-known not only for his portraits, but also his seascapes and landscapes. His work hangs in over 250 public and private collections, including Interpublic Companies, Merrill-Lynch, Pepsi-Cola and the Heisman Trophy portrait collection. In 2002, a portrait of his led the introduction of the Heisman Trophy Awards on national television, displaying that year’s winner.

Whatever his subject, Karl Soderlund is obsessed by portraiture. His signature style of embedding associated images throughout the canvas continues his subjects’ personal stories. Perhaps they would be complete as portraits themselves. For Soderland, however, that is just the beginning. His Iconic Obsessions resonate as masterfully painted portraits. As Soderlund states, these icons “withstand the test of time.”

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ART

ROBERT H. BIZINSKY’S PAINTINGS 60 YEARS LATER

Presenting a vividly colored panorama of urban Paris and the French countryside enfused with chromatic intensities, Robert H. (Hyman) Bizinsky (1915 -1982) re-emerges from the shadows. This fascinating re-discovery of an American original bridges the charming ambience of Paris in the late 1940s with its current showcase in Connecticut.

rediscovering

‘An American in Paris’

by Philip Eliasoph, Senior Arts Editor

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With a debt to his post-Impressionist and Fauvist mentors, Bizinsky’s romp through the cafes, corner bakeries and book stalls of the Latin Quarter, Montparnasse, or along the Quai St-Michel, evoke fragrant memories of Paris of yesteryear.

Like a dream sequence in a Chagall painting – (another Jewish artist drawn to the City of Light) – Bizinsky reveals an enraptured joie de vivre exploring the glories of Paris and its environs. Most notably, he studied with the eminent painter Achille Emile Othon Friesz (1879-1949), who was a disciple of Cezanne and one of the pioneers of the ‘wild style’ of Fauvism.

Bizinsky’s art – now and then – remains unquestionably a powerful body of exceptional paintings.

When art expert Gene Shannon and his wife Mary Anne asked me to write an authoritative introduction to Bizinsky’s career, my interest was immediately aroused. Shannon, founder of the internationally respected Shannon’s Fine Art auctioneers in Milford, Connecticut, demonstrated a prescient appreciation for Bizinsky’s legacy by guiding his artistic Estate.

“We believed –‘right down to our toes’ in the artistic quality of these canvases,” which the Shannon’s first viewed in Los Angeles in 1989 when they were being safe-guarded by the artist’s widow, Eleanor Anita Guggenheim.

This special event –hosted at Southport Galleries, is the first time viewers can appreciate Bizinsky’s major oil paintings produced ‘en plein air’ and on site during his Paris years of the late 1940s. “Surprisingly, this artistic treasure trove has been totally overlooked,” commented gallery director Katherine Cissel. “We are so pleased to participate in this eye-opening event – and to welcome new visitors to Southport’s blossoming arts and culinary scene.”

Through a wrinkle in time, and the Shannons’ heroic intervention, most of the paintings in this show have not been viewed in over 60 years. Many

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of these works were included in gallery showings in Paris between 1947-49 gaining critical accolades and widespread praise.

In the May 27, 1949 “L’Edition Europeenne du New York Herald Tribune” [published in Paris], Bizinsky’s works were critiqued for their “distinguishable temperament” which “never lose a constant quantity of spontaneity, freshness, and lyricism.”

Christopher Isherwood, whose legendary “Berlin Stories” shaped Broadway’s “Cabaret”, spoke glowingly: Bizinsky “can make you share his appetite for a scene so that you wish you could eat it. I suppose [he] gets this affect by his highly evocative use of color. But behind this brightness, there is something more mysterious and sophisticated.”

Bizinsky, a native of Atlanta, Georgia, was a battlefield artist during WWII serving as a corporal in the US Army’s 1st Armored Division in the North African campaign. His eyewitness account were depicted in the infamous Battle of the Kasserine Pass in the Tunisian desert in February, 1943 when General Rommel’s – the ‘Desert Fox’ – outmaneuvered American tanks.

“I have felt the hot and cold breath of my buddies as life ebbed out of their gaping wounds,” the artist wrote.

And that harrowing episode was documented in a series of 580 watercolors, pen and ink and pencil sketches now in the U.S. Army Historical Center in Washington, D.C. His works were featured in the National Gallery’s “Soldier Art” exhibit in the summer of 1945.

With the wonderful benefits of the G.I. Bill, his tuition at New York’s Art Students League was covered, fortuitously placing him under the instruction of Hans Hofmann. Recognizing his talent, Hofmann wrote to his colleagues teaching at the ateliers and art academies of Paris. The cultural Attache at the U.S. Embassy in Paris declared in the Parisian press: “The G.I. Bill produced at least two artists of extraordinary talent who won later fame. The first, Norman Mailer. The second, Robert Bizinsky whose modern landscapes are now commanding top prices in Paris salons.”

As a master of the ‘quick sketch,’ his methods expanded into a facile use of oil paint. With a strong affinity for the seductive powers of post-Impressionism and Fauvism, Bizinsky’s art continued the tradition of the School of Paris. Evoking the energies and passions of Matisse, Derain, Dufy and Utrillo, he transformed their styles into his own signature manner. Sparkling in their vitality, these fresh canvases offer contemporary viewers an authentic insight into Paris before the era of mass tourism ushered in 1958 when Pan Am launched its transatlantic fleet of 707 Boeing jets.

Each image depicts an authentic sense of time and place. Just as he was captured in a famous photograph for the August 22, 1949 edition of LIFE magazine, Bizinsky’s art validates the sensations we have cherished of Paris in our imaginations. “One can’t photo-shop or fake a photo like that,” commented Kelsey Biggers, gallery owner. “It authenticates his presence and helps us to respect Bizinsky’s biography.” Sissy Cargill Biggers quickly chirps in: “I’ve been to Paris innumerable times but I’ve learned to see it new ways through the artist’s eyes.”

From the shadows of time – its cozy cafes, juxtaposed streets, elegant bridges and grand monuments – these colorful locations are frozen in our joyful memories. It’s been a personal privilege to delve into the life of Bizinsky. For an American painter who held such an esteemed place among his fellow painters in Paris, one should feel gratified to see him resurrected for a new viewing audience.

Too often earnest and hard-working artists have been all but forgotten – despite a remarkable legacy. I consider this as an unquestionably significant body of newly discovered paintings. Allowing us to wander aimlessly around the very idea of Paris – Bizinsky’s art – now and then – is inescapably ‘tres magnifique!

“Robert H. Bizinsky: An American in Paris” Presented at Southport Galleries, 330 Pequot Avenue, in historic Southport Village For gallery hours and information, call (203) 292-6124 or visit: www.southportgalleries.com The exhibition closes on December 31st

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STAGE

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CURTAIN CALL TAKES A BOW THE STAMFORD THEATER INNOVATES EVEN AS IT DELIVERS FAMILIAR HITS written by William Squier photographs by Fotos By Fialla Nancy Thode and David Tate in Driving Miss Daisy

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STAGE

The cast of Noises Off.

W

ell into its 21st season as Stamford’s longest running and only year-round, non-profit community theater, Curtain Call’s biggest challenge was to put together a season that outdid its 20th. Last year’s shows regularly sold out, more new ticket buyers than ever walked onto the property and the theater received the Governor’s Award for Excellence from the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism (an honor typically bestowed on the state’s highest profile players like the Westport Country Playhouse, Michael Wilson at Hartford Stage or Michael Price at Goodspeed Opera House).

How do you top that? By devoting the prime spot on your schedule – the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays – to a musical that was, at one point, a notorious flop? Then, by following it with a three-quarter-of-a-century-old comedy by an English dramatist who is less than a household name in the U.S.? That’s what the folks there have done. And the move is typical of the creative thinking that makes a night out at Curtain Call one of the most reliably satisfying theatergoing experiences in Connecticut.

Before I explain further: full disclosure.

I serve on Curtain Call’s Board of Directors, coordinate the theater’s Monday night readings of new musicals, have had several of my shows mounted there and even appeared onstage. So, I’m obviously biased. But, with 140 nights of entertainment planned for 2011/12, including 11 fully produced shows and a host of special events, I couldn’t possibly have a personal stake

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in all of them. Yet, I find myself being blown away time and again by everything Curtain Call does! So, I’ve decided to share my enthusiasm.

There have actually been plays and musicals presented at Curtain Call’s current home in the Sterling Farms Theatre Complex on Newfield Avenue since 1972. That’s when the late Al Pia converted a dairy barn into the Sterling Barn Theatre. At that point, however, the performances took place on the second floor in the former hayloft. Eventually, the city of Stamford cleared out the cow stalls and the theater moved downstairs.

Pia continued to direct there off-and-on until his death in 2008.

Curtain Call, Inc. was founded in downtown Stamford in 1990 and didn’t take over the theater at Sterling Farms until two years later. For the first nine years, co-founders Lynne Colatrella and Laurie Guzda ran the organization. Educational programs were begun for both children and adults and they produced improv and comedy nights.

Guzda left in 1999 to pursue an acting career.

And Colatrella joined Stamford’s Downtown Special Services District’s where she oversees events like the Balloon Spectacular holiday parade and the Alive @ Five series of concerts.

Somehow Colatrella still finds time to return to Curtain Call to do a little acting or to direct, most recently A Chorus Line.

The current Executive Director, Lou Ursone, stepped into the role in September of 2000. But, Ursone was hardly a stranger to the property, having begun his theatrical life there as a teenager in 1973, before moving on to a professional acting and producing career. His ambition from day one was to turn the community theater into an

Kari Ann Sweeney and J. Kevin Smith in the Shakespeare on the Green production of MacBeth.

entertainment destination where a performance of some kind was taking place nearly every weekend of the year.

To help Curtain Call reach that lofty goal, the Kweskin Theatre, its main stage, underwent a transformation during the 2009/10 season. The renovation dramatically enlarged the facility’s lobby and restrooms, added dressing rooms for 60 performers, a loading dock and wing space that allows for elaborate scenery, an in-house costume shop and a rehearsal / dance studio equal in size to the stage.

“The renovation helped to bring people who were seeing a show at Curtain Call for the

The cast of the Summer Youth Theater production of Les Miserables

Richard Cummings and friends in The Producers

first time back again,” Ursone feels. “Because the overall experience is just that much better.”

It also made it possible for both the main stage and the theater’s cabaret-style second space, the Dressing Room Theater, to produce shows simultaneously.

While the facility was being upgraded, Ursone also set about to cultivate new works.

“As an actor there’s nothing I prefer to do more than original work,” he explains. Ursone says that there was actually quite a bit of new material performed at the Barn in the early days – at least one new play per year. But, mounting an unfamiliar play or musical at a community theater is still a risky proposition. Yet, in the eleven years that Ursone has headed up the organization, he’s found ways of attracting audiences.

For example, since 2001 Curtain Call has hosted one-night concert readings of new musicals to whet patron’s appetite for something other than the umpteenth revival of Oklahoma. And nine brand new shows have been given full productions. Some, like mine, have been able to use the fact that a local author was involved to generate public interest. Others traded on the patron’s love for a particular genre, like Associate Artistic Director Peter Barbieri, Jr.’s wacky adaptation of Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance staged in 2006. Still others built on the popularity of Mulberry Street, a romantic comedy that has become a Stamford institution since it was first performed in 1939. Ursone himself penned the

story for a musical sequel that did door-busting business in 2009 and 2010.

That brings us to Curtain Call’s latest production, Annie Warbucks, the sequel to the Broadway blockbuster Annie. The 2011/12 season has already included such classic works as Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors, Sweeney Todd and The Sunshine Boys. And the rest of the year is devoted to other well-known works like The Importance of Being Earnest, Death of a Salesman, The Sound of Music, On Golden Pond and 42nd Street. So why place a show that’s the least guaranteed to draw a crowd smack in the middle of such a winning lineup?

“I like the show,” Ursone says simply. He explains that he’s seen every version since it was workshopped as Annie 2: Miss Hannigan’s Revenge at the Goodspeed Opera House in the late 80’s, due to his friendship with the show’s animal trainer / handler William Berloni. So, despite the musical’s tumultuous past, which included extensive changes in the story, characters, casting and a disappointing tryout in Washington, DC, prior to settling into a well-reviewed OffBroadway run in 1993, Ursone has faith that Annie Warbucks will appeal to local audiences.

“There are parts of the score that I like even better than the original,” Ursone feels. But more importantly, the musical offers Curtain Call a chance to reunite many of the actors from their production its predecessor, Annie, last November. “We wanted to keep the same family of cast

members together,” he says. “They had a terrific experience as a unit. To give them the opportunity to do another show together was a great motivator.”

The person in charge of both productions, Education Director Brian Bianco, agrees.

“I would work with any one of those people again in a heartbeat,” he insists. Bianco, who has directed several new musicals at Curtain Call in recent years, is just as excited by Annie Warbucks’ script and score. “I try to approach every piece of material with a new idea or concept,” he says. “This is a little bit different.

There are no preconceived notions. Nothing saying this is the way it’s supposed to be. I like that it adheres to the idea of what the original comic strip was about: Annie’s ongoing adventures.

There’s always someone new out to get her.

Always a new villain around the corner.”

Then, in January Curtain Call will present When We Are Married, a comedy by England’s J.B. Priestley, perhaps more familiar to Americans for his novels The Good Companions and Bright Day. “I read the play a long time ago when I was prepping for an audition at Long Wharf,” Ursone recalls. “Then, I got a chance to see it in London last year. It’s a decent sized cast for us, which is always important, with a good balance of men and women who skew a bit older.” Stamford resident Joel Fenster will direct.

The choice of When We Are Married points up the obligation that a community theater like Curtain Call has to take into consideration both local theatergoers and performers. “Our audience is always our number one constituency,” Ursone emphasizes. “But our actor pool is a really close second. If we don’t do something they want to be in, we’re out of luck.” The size of the show, costume and scenic complexity, and where each production falls on the schedule are also major considerations. “We can’t have a big show like Titanic followed by another one with a huge cast,” he says.

“Every season that we put together is based on my gut more than anything,” Ursone admits.

Still he relishes the challenge and is already mulling over the possibilities for 2012/13.

“I would love to do It’s a Bird! It’s a Plane! It’s Superman! from the guys who wrote Annie and Bye, Bye, Birdie,” he reveals. “Do you think people will come to see a Superman musical?”

If it’s at Curtain Call, they just might.

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Film

Fox on Film... and Entertainment

Peter Fox

The Big Wedding

When the town of Greenwich, Connecticut is brought up in conversation, its association with maximum utility, luxury and wealth are instantly conjured, reflexively, in the mind of the speaker and listener. Consistently ranked among the leading communities in Money magazine’s “100 Best Places to Live in the United States,” it can also be found at or near the top of that publication’s “Biggest Earner” list. With its affluent populace, picturesque communities and safe streets, the mere mention of the town’s name brings to mind a lifestyle and level of utility that, to most moviegoers, has become more a symbol of a bygone age than an actual place where people live their lives and raise their families.

H

ollywood’s fascination with the culture and mystique of Greenwich has a long history. One of the first films to be photographed in Greenwich, The Little Teacher, was directed

by D.W. Griffith in 1909 and featured Mary Pickford as its lead. The major studios, lured by Greenwich’s proximity to New York City and its rich pool of professional filmmakers and actors, have always considered the town to be an ideal location. In recent years, films such as Ransom (1996), The Ice Storm (1997) and The Good Shepherd (2006) were filmed in Greenwich.

The longstanding history of filmmaking activity has given local residents a certain degree of familiarity with the politics of rubbing elbows with movie stars, musicians and television personalities, as many film stars chose to make Greenwich their home (I will spare you the list of current celebrities, as it is in the hundreds.) As such, locals do not often find themselves being starstruck. But that was not the case in August, as locals competed for sidewalk space on the perimeter of the production of The Big Wedding. Hoping to catch a glimpse of one of the many stars working on the project, or hanging out around town after a day’s filming, small packs of tourists and residents alike combed the town or stood outside restaurants and other locations used in the production. As Greenwich had never seen such a large assembly of A-list movie stars in one place for one production, the electricity around town was tangible.

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Photo: David Shankbone

Produced by the prolific Avi Lerner (he has producer credits on over 225 films, with several sources placing his actual credit list at over 350 films), it has possibly the most elite cast ever to be assembled in Greenwich for a motion picture production. The film’s strictly A-list cast boasts Robert De Niro, Katherine Heigl, Robin Williams, Diane Keaton, Susan Sarandon, Topher Grace and Amanda Seyfried as its lead actors. The story, penned by writer/director Justin Zackam (The Bucket List), centers around a long-divorced couple forced to pretend they are happily married at their son’s wedding. When the plan goes haywire, the resulting comedy is reported to deliver “a charming, rollicking movie that promises to be an instant intergenerational family comedy classic,” according to Lionsgate president, Joe Drake.

The production utilized many locations in and around Greenwich, and the paparazzi were everywhere. Locations such as

Gabriele’s Steakhouse, the Burning Tree Country Club and Christ Church frequently drew large crowds of onlookers and photographers, competing with one another for a glimpse or snapshot of the many stars working on the film.

The street outside of Gabriele’s Steakhouse was often packed with gawkers, as the production moved inside the restaurant for interior shots. The cast members were frequently spotted in local boutiques and restaurants during breaks in production.

The film, which is set for release in October 2012 and will be distributed by Lionsgate, is being produced by Lerner’s NuImage/Millenium films. There is no shortage of irony in that the film, Lerner’s biggest, most triumphant production to date, is being filmed in Greenwich. At age 63, Lerner has finally gained the status of Hollywood mogul, a status that he has spent the last 40 years of his life trying to achieve.

Born in 1947 in Haifa, Israel, Lerner was a paratrooper in the Israeli Army. After his military service, he took his first job in the film industry at Israel’s first drive-in cinema as a concessions attendant. He was promoted to manager, and eventually bought the facility. He then began producing small budget films. As his company grew, he moved into the distribution business and began distributing his own films. He continued to produce and distribute films, expanding to England and South Africa. His first significant commercial success and recognition by mainstream Hollywood mainstream was as executive pro-

about.me/foxonfilm

ducer on King Solomon’s Mines, which starred Sharon Stone and Richard Chamberlain.

Though his name was now on the Hollywood radar, blockbuster success proved to be elusive.

He continued to produce films-literally hundreds of them. Some had high B-list, or low A-list talent attached (Stephen Segal, Dolph Lundgren and Jean Claude Van Damme were among some of the actors to appear in his films), but the mainstream, wide-release hit did not come. After moving to Los Angeles in 1992, Lerner’s newly formed NuImage Productions continued to crank out dozens of suspense/action films, some of which enjoyed limited theatrical release; most were distributed strictly on cable, or went straight to video.

In 2010, he produced The Expendables, which starred Sylvester Stallone atop a cast of wellestablished action film stars. The movie cost $70 million to produce, and has grossed a whopping $275 million to date. Stallone will appear in the sequel, which will hit theaters in 2012. While Lerner has been a prolific producer, he was not a household name until the success of The Expendables. But he now has the power to make just about any movie he wants. (A former executive at William Morris Independent, Cassian Elwes, said “Every studio wants to be in business with him.”)

For others connected to the production of The Big Wedding, this was a homecoming of a different sort. Katherine Heigl moved here shortly after her birth and was raised in New Caanan. She has been a Connecticut resident for years, and frequently commutes to New York to work on various film and television projects. Robert De Niro’s last Connecticut project was Righteous Kill with Al Pacino in 2008. Many of the cast and crew live in or around the Greenwich area and commuted to work for the duration of the project.

intellectual property

Written by: Sheryle Levine and Alan Neigher Byelas & Neigher, Westport, CT

Compilations and Collective Works One of the more difficult tasks confronting attorneys who consult creative artists is explaining such terms as “compilation”, “collective work” and “derivative work”, all separately defined in the first section of the Copyright Act. This column will try to explain “compilation” and “collective work”.

Under the Copyright Act, a “compilation” is a work formed by the collection in assembling of pre-existing materials or data that are selected, coordinated, or arranged in such a way that the resulting work as a whole constitutes an original work or authorship. The term “compilation” includes collective works (emphasis added).

A “collective work” is a work such as a periodical issue, anthology or, encyclopedia, in which a number of contributions, constituting separate and independent works in themselves, are assembled into a collective whole.

Other examples of collective works are: magazines, software programs, collections of songs by third parties and retrospective collections of a particular artist’s films.

The resulting “collection” may become a separately-protectable work, if certain requirements are met.

It is important that compilers understand that compilations and collective works, to be eligible for copyright protection, must involve some originality in the selection coordination and arrangement of the materials. It is this selection, coordination and arrangement - - and not the underlying original elements - - that protect compilations and collective works. A useful example is a magazine - - a collection of articles by its publisher. The authors may own copyrights in the individual articles; the publisher will generally own the copyright in the magazine as a whole. In short, there are two distinct sets of copyrights which overlap, but which are, individually, protectable.

Keep in mind the phrase in the first section of the Copyright Act, original work of authorship. How difficult is it to establish originality? The case law seems to say that originality is not difficult to establish at all. It depends on the act of selection and editing, which the courts have held to be a “highly creative endeavor”. On the other hand, where there is no originality - - where the selection process is purely mechanical, as in the simple alphabetical arrangement of names in a phone book - - copyright protection will be much more difficult to obtain.

In short, artists, editors, film producers and publishers seeking copyright protection for “compilations” or “collective works”, will stand a much better chance if there is selection, coordination or arrangement sufficient to constitute an original work of authorship.The considered selection of prints of a certain artist, or of several stories of a prolific author, would satisfy the selection, coordination or requirement of the Copyright Act. On the other hand, the arrangement of a list of 10,000 names in alphabetical order would almost certainly not satisfy this requirement.

We will deal with the ambiguities of “derivative works” in the next article.

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Renaldo smiled at Mary, her sheer blouse billowing slightly from the breeze of the tall fan oscillating across the kitchenette. Nina’s apartment pulsed with heat. Behind the fan in the next room, the bed was partially obscured by a screen with a Chinese print of long-necked r ee sh r he y, Mar at g eddin smil cra ldo des nanes Re cen upon a pond. om fr ly ight g sl iny-bl Mos outseofbill a ow bl bab ue bed sheet atllor. n osci ll fa e ta of th eezethe hun g off e br th bed ont o the flo na’s, e. Niall nett tche the ekieng rossI wer Mar y and g ac in age d and . Bethind h he wit lsed t puw eneho but som artm ap she too kattha as d be the , k. ro next n in a gre e faen ligth th hte for gir lom tal “Nina reen schug ured obsc lly boy rtia say her new wasspa frie ndby is a so e ked -ntec long of it. intof e pr ines Ch’s tha t ashe sca with red Isn’ tha t cranes descending upon a pond.

Most of a baby-blue bed sheet hung off the bed onto the floor. Mary and I were engaged and all, but somehow she took that as a green light for girl talk. “Nina says her new boyfriend is so huge that she’s scared of it. Isn’t that hilarious? f it.” And she laughed and

FICTION

Much Ado About Renaldo

by Charles L. Stafford

It was too damn hot to be sitting at Nina’s table, which was one of those hip, modern jobs, slick and hard and crammed into her shoebox apartment. “There’s plenty more pie,” Mary said. She turned to my plate and then to me. “Babe, yours is all melted.”

“I couldn’t eat another bite,” I said. I reached for the bottle of Gordon’s stuffed in the Formica wine cooler. I topped off my Tom Collins and held up the bottle, “Anyone?”

“Just a dash,” Mary said.

“We need more ice.” Nina rose from the table. She took two short steps into the kitchenette. I poured for Mary. The bottle chilled my clutch.

Renaldo sat across from me looking downright turgid in his tropical linen button-down. He ladled another scoop of cherry pie à la mode onto his spoon. His toned bicep flexed as he hurried spoon to mouth. A bloody pink dollop trailed down his chiseled chin.

“What pie, Mary, what pie,” he repeated.

Mary smiled and pointed to her chin. She reached forward with the edge of her napkin. “You’ve got a—”

Renaldo poked his chin out. A Tupperware bowl descended with a polycarbonate clatter, a couple of cubes popping out onto the table, forming drop-sized pools instantaneously. And Nina beat Mary to it! She swiped him clean with her finger, tossing her tangle of blonde hair aside and sucking the goo with a smack of her lips.

Mary’s eyes drooped upon the consolation that was her cocktail.

“Oh, babe, that’s too much!”

“You can handle it,” I encouraged. It was all I could do—just hold my smile and endure. I set the gin down in front of Renaldo. “Guess I’m too heavy-handed.”

“No problema! Your hand is fine. Please,” Renaldo held his glass up, tilting it toward me. I grabbed the bottle by the neck and doused his ice with booze. A wave of gin splashed over the brim. “Muy bien!” he smiled. He had very good teeth.

“Renny is teaching me soccer,” Nina said, digging her hand into the bowl full of those damned curved ice cubes. I downed an inch off the top of my glass and plopped in a few more cubes. I took another pull and of course spilled half of it down my front this time, thanks to one of those fucking cubes hanging up on the rim. Everyone did a double-take, and that’s that, I’m pegged for drunk.

Mary cut me with a sidelong look sharpened by mascara. “So you’re a soccer player?” She carried on.

“Football. It’s football,” Renaldo scooped a final syrupy bite of pie into his mouth and grinned at my fiancée. “What pie!”

I swirled the cubes in my glass. “Here it’s soccer. Football’s a different sport.”

Renaldo tended to his chin with his very own napkin this time.

He pushed himself back in his chair and stretched his long legs out. His big, wide feet jutted out from under the table between Mary and me. I watched his simian toes fan apart, protruding through the black and white striped strap of his Adidas slides.

“This is the whole of the problem—”

“The whole problem,” Nina offered.

“Sí, sí, yes, the whole problem,” he waved her off. “This is why America is lousy in football.”

“Because we call it soccer?” I hit Mary with a glance she didn’t see.

“How can you be champion of a sport you give the wrong name?”

“I see your point.”

“Oh, whatever.” Nina shifted in her seat so she could reach Mary’s

bare arm with the white tip of her fingernail. “Renny’s teaching me how to do soccer and it’s a blast.” I caught the glance. And you should see him in shorts. “Mary, you should come sometime, your legs and ass scream.”

“Yes, come,” Renaldo said in our direction. His gaze fell on Mary first, then perhaps to me, way back wherever in the fuzzy distance.

“I want you to come.”

“John enjoys bowling,” Mary explained with a note of compassion, as if I’d love to partake, but for the likelihood that I would hurt myself—that or I wouldn’t come off nearly as impressive in shorts.

“Really,” Renaldo nodded his head and smiled at Mary. He turned to me, “I’m sorry, what is bowling again?”

“Oh, you know bowling, silly!” Nina slapped the knuckles of his huge hand. “You know, indoors? With the heavy ball and the funky shoes?”

She swung her arm above her head and then past the side of her chair. She dropped her hand onto Renaldo’s thigh and pinched it.

“Ah, sí, the used shoes. I remember. Disgusting.”

“They didn’t even have his size,” Nina winked at Mary.

“I have my own pair,” I announced and reached for the bottle. Renaldo smiled amicably and raised his glass for more. He was handsome, no denying it. I topped him off and returned the bottle carefully to the cooler.

My glass was full and colorless. It looked cool in there, inviting. I imagined squeezing in.

Renaldo smiled at Mary, her sheer blouse billowing slightly from the breeze of the tall fan oscillating across the kitchenette. Nina’s apartment pulsed with heat. Behind the fan in the next room, the bed was partially obscured by a screen with a Chinese print of long-necked cranes descending upon a pond. Most of a baby-blue bed sheet hung off the bed onto the floor. #

Mary and I were engaged and all, but somehow she took that as a green light for girl talk. “Nina says her new boyfriend is so huge that she’s scared of it. Isn’t that hilarious? Scared of it.” And she laughed and laughed.

“Wow, that’s some cross to bear,” I said.

“I know. I kind of feel bad for her. I mean what do you say to that?”

I shrugged. She was pulling on her diaphanous top.

“I know, right? Wouldn’t that be horrible?”

Utterly,” I agreed, zipping up my trousers.

“Nina’s dying for us to meet him.” I watched her pucker up in front of the mirror before painting on her brown lipstick with a tiny brush.

“Can’t wait,” I said.

“Me, too.” She stretched her mouth open, shut it, did that tilt of her head thing and smiled at herself. Downstairs the kitchen timer clanged.

“Will you take that out of the oven for me, babe?” Her cherry pie was ready; smelling flaky and sweetly spiced, it marked my time as sure as a gun. It was time for us to go.

Off to Nina’s to share cherry pie and smudge glasses with warm lipstick. To Nina’s, where I get to drench myself with gin and shoot the shit with Kong. #

“So the beautiful women love the bowlers too, yes?” Renaldo said.

“It’s the balls. The balls make them crazy.” I drained a good bit of my glass again. My soaked shirt moved from cool to clammy. Renaldo’s fanning toes caught my eye.

“This I believe. You should come play football. The ball is big.”

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“Yeah, but there’s only one.” I looked over to my left at Mary.

Her eyes had drifted downward, onto Renaldo’s lap. I distracted her by reaching for more gin.

“Babe, it’s hot. How about some water?” Mary’s look was mild; she’s a peach that way.

“Right.” I reached for the Tupperware bowl and filled my glass with ice. The four of us looked one another over. A cube in my glass popped.

“Renny is from Menorca. We’re going to visit his family in the fall.”

“After football.”

“That’s when football starts,” I corrected.

“You want me to fill that for you?” Mary made a move to stand.

“No, I’m all filled up right now, thanks, Mare.” I straightened up in my chair. “So what brings you here, Renaldo? I mean, what’s Brooklyn got on Menorca, you know, I mean . . . why?”

“I did not want a life in the distillery.” This time he reached for the bottle.

“Renny is an actor,” Nina said. “Top me off, hon?” Nina wiggled her glass at him.

He concentrated on the task as if engaged in a very serious business.

He raised his eyes to Nina. “Enough?”

“A little more, hon.” Renaldo filled her glass to the hilt, challenging the weak bond of surface tension. Nina bent over and bothered only to sip off the ethanol.

I stared at her, fascinated by the psychology of the sipper, all that masochistic denial, all that thirst. I looked over to Renaldo, who sat with his hands folded atop his head. “So you do a lot of acting then, do you?”

“Oh sí, mostly the soap opera.”

“Anything we might have seen?”

Do you have Telemundo?”

“No.”

“Then no, you have not seen my work.” He raised his hands into the international sign for innocence, or cluelessness, or surrender.

Nina gathered plates from the table. Mary did the same. I grabbed my plate before Mary could get it. “I’ll get this.”

“Oh no, you two boys sit—”

“I’ll do the dishes,” I blurted. I stood too fast. The table slipped away from me. I felt wobbly.

“Absolutely not—”

“Yes, sit, Juan, sit. Let the women do their work. We will relax.”

“It’s John,” I said as I plunked back into my chair.

“Would you care to cigar with me, Juan?”

“Sure, I’m always up for some cigarrring.” I rolled my r’s, then drank my melted ice. Mary and Nina stood side by side, backs to us, washing the dishes. It was going to be a dreadfully time-consuming job between all the cleanup and catching-up. Nina had chosen a smaller carbon footprint over a new dishwasher. It was this sort of megalomania through which she wielded her brand of retarded civic and environmental mindfulness that I disliked most of all, even in the face of her curvy perimeter and blonde surfer girl looks. I considered her at her best when seen, not heard. I made the mistake of saying something to that effect to Mary and got an earful on objectification. Our girls laughed over the running water. Nina stood at the sink with all her weight on one leg; her ass filled her short shorts like Renaldo filled a glass.

“Any more in that bottle?” I asked.

Renaldo narrowed his green eyes. He looked over his shoulder and then filled my glass. “Mucho gusto, Juan. Vamanos.” He stood up and crossed the main room in three strides. He slid the screen door aside and stepped out onto the narrow terrace overlooking Jay Street. It was a baby crib of a thing, good for standing or stowing stinky garbage, or perhaps jumping, depending on your story.

I followed him out there. There was just room enough to stand shoulder to shoulder. Renaldo produced two heaters and a clipper. He tipped off both cigars and handed me one. I stuck it in my mouth and thought of baseball. Renaldo held up the butane and I sucked at the flame. I don’t even like baseball—put a gun to my head and I couldn’t name three Mets. I coughed.

“No? No good?”

“It’s fine. Thank you.”

We smoked and said nothing. The air moved, cooling my gin-wet front. I rested my forearms on the iron rail, drink in one hand, cigar in the other. I squinted with each drag, gathering the thick, chocolaty smoke in my mouth, taking care not to inhale. The act of lighting-up resurrected the memory of Joanne, an old, old flame. We’d light it up on terraces and decks and low-rise rooftops all over town—any stage would do—“Jojo likes to go go,” her words. She dumped me for a biker chick

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named Jade. That’s no lie. To this day, I can’t pass a Harley without a loathsome pang of longing to see what sort of raging bonfires old Jojo and Jade conjure up.

Nicotine managed to mix with my belly full of booze and pie, and I got to feeling a little greenish, but not threateningly so. The sun was somewhere close to the horizon and the street below was shadowed and calm. Nina’s was on the eighth floor, beyond the carry of sidewalk din, but still well in range of the occasional squeals from the burnt brakes of crosstown MTAs. Sunday in the city, quiet and calm with all the rats licking their wounds and sweating themselves straight into Monday morning. I took a pull from my drink to douse my thoughts. From inside came the sounds of clattering dishes, running water and obscured, hushed voices, a laugh or two. I gulped more gin but still translated the murmurs—

“From the front it looks like he’s got a bunched up diaper or something.”

“He tucks himself in—complains he can’t wear boxers.”

Snickers.

“Todd was like that.”

“Todd? Who’s Todd?”

“Back in college, he was fun.”

“A two-hander?”

“More like three.”

“Mary, stop it!”

My script wormed its way through my insides until I sensed Renaldo’s broad shoulders heave up and down in a sigh. I tilted my head; his posture had changed. He leaned over the rail and lowered his head.

He spat a bit of tobacco out somewhere beyond our feet.

“You have a good woman.”

“Thank you.”

“She loves you.”

“That’s what she tells me.”

“Nina won’t love me.”

I took a prolonged sip from my half-empty glass. “How’s that?”

“I am only her pet, no more.” He dragged from his cigar and blew out the smoke through pursed lips. “It has happened before. But before I didn’t care; comprende?”

I held my drag, working the smoke in my mouth. I savored the taste of charred molasses and blew an honest plume into murky city air.

“No, I don’t think I comprende,” I said.

“I love her, you see? Totalmente, si?”

“Then she’s a lucky girl,” I concluded.

I followed the path of another crosstown bus. It lurched through traffic, spreading cars aside, eventually finding its way to the curb from the middle lane.

“She is cruel,” Renaldo said.

We watched the bus moan and shudder to a halt. With a blast of air, it jerked down to sidewalk level like a run-out horse.

I crunched a cube of ginny ice. I’d reached that perilous point of woozy boldness. Returning the fat cigar to my mouth, I shooed a fly off his back. “They’re all cruel.”

The door slid open behind me. Mary peeked her head out.

“We should get going if we’re going to make the 10:10.”

“Be right in,” I said to Mary. I reached over the rail and tamped my cigar against the brick siding of the building. Ignited ash sprinkled downward like tiny red tracers, their tenuous light disappearing long before reaching the street. Renaldo held out his hand and waggled his fingers.

“Lo tomare—give it.” I passed him the butt. He crushed it by rolling his big hands together, sprinkling the tobacco into a ceramic bowl by his foot.

“Good for plants,” he said with a bleak smile. He spat out another bit of tobacco. “Good to meet you, Juan.” He looked me in the eye and took my hand in both of his. He pressed tobacco remnants against my hand as he shook it.

“Gracias, likewise.” I hesitated before taking my hand back.

When I slid open the door, Renaldo turned his back to me and leaned on the rail.

In the elevator I kept my eyes on the blinking countdown. Mary waited until the door opened.

“Well, whaddya think?” her voice carried into the lobby, hollow and distant.

We stepped out on the sidewalk. The air stuck to me like brake dust.

I turned back and looked up to see Renaldo still hanging on the railing.

“He loved your pie,” I said.

Walk up the stairs.

Turn right.

Relax.

When you’re a NetJets ® or Marquis Jet Card ® Owner, private aviation is that easy.

You’re always guaranteed a plane with as little as 4-10 hours’ notice*, complete with the highest safety standards, the most experienced pilots and the most sophisticated operations in the business. No matter your type of ownership, you have the confidence of knowing that NetJets is backed by the unmatched resources of Berkshire Hathaway.

So, enjoy your flight. We’ve taken care of the rest.

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MANAGEMENT

1.877.JET.8308 | NETJETS.COM A Berkshire Hathaway company

All fractional aircraft offered by NetJets ® in the United States are managed and operated by NetJets Aviation, Inc. Executive Jet® Management, Inc. provides management services for customers with aircraft that are not fractionally owned, and provides charter air transportation services using select aircraft from its managed fleet. Marquis Jet ® Partners, Inc. sells the Marquis Jet Card ®. Marquis Jet Card flights are operated by NetJets Aviation under its 14 CFR Part 135 Air Carrier Certificate. Each of these companies is a wholly owned subsidiary of NetJets Inc. ©2011 NetJets Inc. All rights reserved. NetJets, Executive Jet, Marquis Jet, and Marquis Jet Card are registered service marks. *Advance notice requirement depends on the type of aircraft purchased or leased and on the size of the interest acquired.

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