Topic: Opinion
Realism-Only Policy at Hirschl & Adler Galleries


Lord Frederick Leighton, 1877, "The Music Lesson"

http://www.artrenewal.org/articles/2003/Hirschl_and_Adler/hirschladler1.asp

I never liked non-representational art, and have had to defend it against some of my friends in college who snobbed it. HAH! H&A is a respected art gallery who have seen the light. I can't believe we as a society has been bamboozled into believing that dipping a cat in blue paint and hurling it at policemen is art.It's funny, but it's not art.

Maybe soon poems that rhyme will make a come-back?

Excerpted from reviewer Sherry Lazarus Ross: "Inherent to Hirschl & Adler's recognition of realism is their understanding that artists of stature must now be dedicated to the kind of training and skill acquisition that was expected of an artist in pervious centuries. In other words, the hard work of learning how to draw and paint.

"The modernist ideologies are no longer convincing this new generation of collectors and art enthusiasts, i.e. that abstract art is art, simply because they are told so. Hirschl and Adler see this so clearly, that they have now made it their policy to no longer represent abstract artists. They now represent a wide range of Realist artists who have obviously made the commitment to mastering the skills of drawing and painting in the Realist Tradition. It was the only form of art that truly mattered throughout history - for the language of Realism is not fashionable, it is universal, and will still be the visual language of the human race in the distant future, as it always has been."

Topic: Review
I love The Explainer on Slate.

explainer: Answers to your questions about the news.

Why Is Mars Red?
Basically, the whole planet is rusty.
By Brendan I. Koerner
Posted Monday, Jan. 12, 2004, at 12:56 PM PT

Spirit, NASA's scrappy exploration robot, has been snapping some breathtaking photos of Mars. More portraits of red-tinged landscapes should emerge shortly, as Spirit ventures forth from its lander. But why does every nook and cranny on Mars invariably look red?

The simple explanation is that the planet's soil is rich in iron oxide, but there's much debate as to why the mineral is so ubiquitous in the Martian environment. The old theory is that the oxidization process began early in Mars' life cycle, when warm water flowed on the planet--water that may have carved out the long, now-barren channels that snake through portions of the planet. Rocks containing iron would have slowly been worn away by rivers and seas, and the oxygen in the water would have combined with the iron to create iron oxide--or, in lay terms, the iron would have rusted into red dust. Flecks of the reddish mineral would then have been dispersed all over the planet via raindrops. Scientists who believe that Mars was once flooded with water have pointed to the abundance of iron oxide as proof of their claims. And where there's water, of course, there may also be life.

[for full article follow link above]

Topic: Review
http://slate.msn.com/id/2093814/

Eat Catfish!

hey, wait a minute The conventional wisdom debunked.

The Perils of Aquaculture
It's the salmon farms, not the risks of dioxin in farmed salmon, that we ought to be worried about.
By Douglas Gantenbein
Posted Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2004, at 6:42 AM PT

What's in your salmon?

It turns out that farmed-raised salmon, touted as inexpensive fare for heart-healthy diets, may not be such a good mealtime addition after all. On Jan. 9, the journal Science published an article detailing an exhaustive analysis of some 700 farm-raised salmon. Most had levels of dioxin--cancer-causing chemicals that are the byproduct of various industrial processes--as much as 11 times higher than those found in wild salmon. The best explanation for the big dose of dioxin is that farm-raised fish are eating badly themselves--food pellets mostly derived from ground-up fish. A less-diverse diet than wild salmon eat, it allows concentrations of chemicals to pass easily to farmed salmon.

There's a certain "So what?" element to all this. The tested fish were not skinned or cooked, two steps that greatly reduce dioxin. And, as many food experts have pointed out, the added risk of the dioxin is probably more than compensated for by the benefits of eating salmon. That's because salmon, an oily fish, is rich in omega-3 fatty acids, a substance that almost certainly helps protect against heart disease and may also reduce the risk of cancer and Alzheimer's. Salmon--even farm-raised salmon--also are low in mercury, a chemical prone to show up in tuna and other fish. The average American is far more apt to croak from heart disease due to too many Big Macs than from cancer caused by a few helpings of ranch-raised salmon.

That doesn't let farmed salmon off the hook, though. Why? Because the aquaculture industry that creates them also creates plenty of other problems. Farm-raised salmon were largely unheard of 20 years ago. But after getting their start in northern Europe and then spreading to places such as Chile and British Columbia, Canada, "salmon farms" grew rapidly. Today they account for some 60 percent of salmon worldwide--1.4 million metric tons in 2002, which is a lot of salmon steaks. The abundance of farmed salmon has helped make a fish that once was largely a luxury item (or an expensive canned fish) into a commonplace meal in homes and restaurants.

[for rest of the excerpted article follow link above]

Aquaculture doesn't have to be a bad deal. Catfish and other species are raised successfully and fairly cleanly by fish farmers. (Asian shrimp farms, though, may be even worse than salmon farms.) Good aquaculturalists carefully monitor water quality, use minimal antibiotics and pesticides to keep fish healthy, and ideally raise their crop in closed systems--not in pens stuck near the open ocean. (And they push for better quality pellets to feed their fish, too.) If the current scare inspires consumers to make it clear they want wild salmon, not farm-raised fish, then perhaps the market will help rein in what has become a marine menace.

Topic: Personal
Gaaaaah!

Have gained 10 pounds since the wedding. If same rate of increase continues, by the time I'm 40 I would be generating my own gravitational field. Small animals would be orbiting my butt in a spacious and yet somehow mildly aesthetic series of ellipses. This planetary prospect fills me with dread.

Topic: Personal
On Monday, I came to work in the morning to find no computer at my desk. The IT technician had taken it away for rebuilding, and had promised me that it'd be back by Monday. So, I call the help desk, and it being Monday morning, got transferred to their "overflow" answer service, which I think is located in Bangladesh, based on the amount of help I was able to get from them.

Anyways, the technician arrives with my computer at 9am, by which time I was fuming. The man walked into such a tirade as you would not believe. I had sadly lost my normally composed mien, and berated him roundly for several minutes. Then, while he was busy working on my computer, I start to go through my InBox...where I found some health-insurance snafu paperwork. So I call R, and berate him roundly for a minute or two, just to stay on my roll.

I put the phone down, looked at the technician beavering away at the computer (and trying to make himself as small as possible), and said, "You a married man, John?" He replies, "Hell no."

Ah ha ha.

So finally he's finished with the work, and informs me that I needed FMIS installed but he couldn't do it, the FMIS guy has to come do it. I shot him a look - perhaps you know to what type of 'look' I am referring here - and he stepped back away from me, whipped out his Nextel, and says, "I'll call him RIGHT NOW."

Laughing, I said, "Yeah, better him than you, eh?"

His response? "Well, I wouldn't wish you on anybody or anything, but..."

WHAT?

"...when you call the help desk, we all draw straws, and the short straw has to call you back."

I related the story to S, who said, "Is that what happened to R? Did he take one for the team?"

Oh, people think they're so funny...

Topic: Review
How simple stories move me.

Every Cat, by Laura Wenger, as posted on http://www.1000words.net/

Seems as good an idea as any.
Topic: Fun

Japanese businessmen hold a service aimed at fending off viruses and glitches for their computers in a purification ceremony conducted by a Shinto priest according to Shinto rituals at Kanda Myojin shrine in Tokyo January 6, 2004. REUTERS/Haruyoshi Yamaguchi

Topic: Fun
In a rare moment of candor, Washington insiders reveal something you NEVER thought they would!

From San Diego's STAR100.7 radio station site...

Topic: Fun
What happens when you have:

1) nothing to do;

2) a sharp knife;

3) a large lime;

4) a patient cat;

5) too much tequila and

6) it's football season?

Are You Stresse?

"Stress sneaks upon us so easily, that so very often we're not even aware of it when it hits. Take this self-stress test by hitting the link below. You might be surprised as to how stressed out you really are."

This might prove to you that you're needing a vacation.