Word: nouveau
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Still, based on reading the script (hasn't everybody?) and seeing scraps of the film, we get intimations of something fresh, handsome, grand. Naboo's golden underwater city glows like an Art Nouveau chandelier, while the Jedi knights' home base, Coruscant, could come from a spiffier Blade Runner. The new sidekick, a computer-birthed frog boy named Jar Jar Binks, is a vexing, endearing mix of Kipling's Gunga Din and Tolkien's Gollum, and speaks in a pidgin English ("Yousa Jedi not all yousa cracked up to be!") that will be every kid's secret language this summer. Even...
...entrances to the subway system he designed for Bilbao in northern Spain: hoods of glass, like segments of a nautilus shell ribbed with stainless steel that curve downward and carry the eye to the spaces underneath--by far the most elegant subway entrances since Hector Guimard's Art Nouveau designs for the Paris Metro a century...
England made his fortune. He was what the English upper classes--both hereditary aristocrats and nouveau riche --had wanted but not found: a portraitist who could perform in the Grand Manner. There had been none since the death of Thomas Gainsborough a century before, and Sargent, with his tremendous fluency and genuine empathy for the social levels of his sitters, filled the gap to perfection. He had no interest in politics past or present, was completely without class resentment and seemed to be devoid of irony. As a biographer who knew him pointed out, "He would have been puzzled...
...enough are the roasted nut and pseudo-pizza stands that greet commuters upon departure from the train. Even worse, though, is the blinding array of CVS marquis, Gap displays and trendy nouveau cuisine eateries that vex disillusioned Harvard students yearning for the long-lost quaintness of charismatic local city neighborhoods. Today, convention is readily acquired by the swipe of a credit card, and one need not venture outside the 1-mile radius of Store 24 to take a virtual walk through similarly commercialized Beantown. The mom & pop establishments with faded awnings, friendly hellos and century-old traditions are rapidly disappearing...
...certain degree, it's simply its turn. As Art Nouveau and Art Deco became too popular and expensive, younger people began to search for something else that looked cool enough to claim as their own. The '50s were a neat fit. Like the current decade, it was a time of optimism and excitement when rapid technological change led people to think about the future. Financially, things were on an upward tick, and America saw few imminent threats to its power. But more important than the current premillennial bout of optimism, the fascination with the stark elegance of the '50s reflects...