Word: craftsman
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...success and talent, Spielberg's weaknesses are prominently displayed in this foray beyond the safe climes of thrill-a-minute B-movie homages and suburban kiddie flicks. He is a craftsman, not an auteur, and one hopes his artistic imperialism will not cause him to stomp all over Anglo-Saxon culture's other golems...
...artisans featured demonstrating ancient and traditional skills and trades. These artisans from the People's Republic of China show how many of the items on display are created: a woodblock printer patiently applies each separate layer of a complicated flower design; a dough-figure craftsman fashions subjects too small to be seen without a magnifying glass; and two men effortlessly manipulate a seemingly undecipherable loom to produce a spectacular piece of silk--which requires hundreds of movements for every inch of design...
Kern's itch to change and perfect is the mark of a meticulous craftsman. It is genius, though, that etches his tunes in the memory. Composer Alec Wilder, in his 1972 study American Popular Song, singled out Kern for exemplifying "the pure, uncontrived melodic line more characteristically than any other writer of American theater music." To listen to a Kern tune like They Didn't Believe Me is to realize how elegantly it obeys the laws of melody and mathematics: each succeeding phrase is both surprising and inevitable. In that one song, written for the 1914 show The Girl from...
DIED. Tapio Wirkkala, 69, Finland's foremost designer in glass, ceramics, wood and metal, and a pioneer of the elegant, functional Scandinavian look; of a heart attack; in Esbo, Finland. Combining a hands-on knowledge of industrial production techniques, a sculptor's sensibility and a craftsman's intimate familiarity with his media, he was, in the view of many critics, the pre- eminent modern maker of such objects as vases, cutlery and glassware (including the distinctive frosted Finlandia vodka bottle...
...there is something that is finally repellent about Streetwise. Bell is a fine camera craftsman: he can make a scene shot in available light look as if it were shot on a sound stage. But this virtue can be a defect, for it distances the audience from the grim occurrences. By the end of the film, DeWayne is dead, with an empty Coke can resting on his coffin. One does not question the truth of that shot, only the sensibility that permits it to survive the final cut. Streetwise keeps demonstrating the cliche that life too often resembles...