Word: artistes
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...place (the Jersey Shore) is propitious for a gourmet Italian restaurant. But the struggles of the immigrant Pilaggi brothers to impose their delicate risottos on a red-sauce culture are perhaps the year's most unlikely success. Primo, the chef (Tony Shalhoub), has the soul of an artist--watchful, uncompromising, mildly depressive. Secondo, the maitre d' (Stanley Tucci, who, with Campbell Scott, wrote and directed), is trying vainly to be an American entrepreneur. Stumbling toward bankruptcy, they also sail toward wisdom in this beautifully acted and utterly delicious comedy of--shall we say?--table manners...
...Dennis Rodman and Richard Branson A pair of unblushing brides. The Chicago Bulls star decided to marry himself in a wedding gown at a Manhattan bookstore as a publicity stunt for his confessional, Bad As I Wanna Be, while the British bull artist shaved his beard of 30 years and donned a wedding dress, veil and fishnet stockings to celebrate the launching of his latest venture, the Virgin Bride boutique in London. "I've always had good legs," said Branson. Good taste is another matter entirely. The nerve of either of them to wear white...
...Life of Picasso: 1907-1917 (Random House). In the second volume of his biography, John Richardson applies his skills as storyteller and art historian to a prodigious decade in Picasso's life. At the beginning a still struggling Spanish artist in Paris, he was by the end truly Picasso, a co-founder of Cubism and perhaps modern art's paradigmatic figure. Richardson presents a behind-the-scenes look at an apotheosis...
...merely pretended to have a buyer; in fact, not a single real offer was made. Why no takers? As Tajan put it, the painting has "an odor of sulfur" about it. Indeed, the 25-in. by 31-in. canvas has a long, troubled history. Supposedly painted by the penniless artist just days before his suicide on July 27, 1890, the work was estimated at $40 million in the late 1980s. But in 1989 the French government declared it a "national monument" and forbade its exportation, thus torpedoing its worth on the international art market. Collector Jacques Walter auctioned...
...axed by a headsman, another woman with a lamp (perhaps a muse or a guide) to whom the upside-down corpse of her partner is bound. One cannot decode these too literally, but they presumably represent the chaos overtaking Beckmann's homeland. The center panel portrays the artist's dream of escape. The blue horizon (the color of peace) beckons; the king in the boat makes a calm gesture of benediction with his right hand while his left releases a school of small fish from a net trailing in the sea; and a Madonna figure with a child looks...