I've just discovered the artist Francis Alys. His video about the fox is the perfect introduction to his work. Alys was born in Belgium and is active in Mexico City. The cover of this Phaidon Press book, shows the artist hard at work creating a five minute video called Paradox of Praxis (Sometimes making something […]
If you have ever loved a song by The Beatles you will probaby love Revolution in the Head: The Beatles Records and the Sixties by Ian MacDonald. It has one article about every song The Beatles recorded, from LOVE ME DO recorded in 1962 to the "reunion" singles of 1995. Entries range from half a […]
Last week, I caught Stratford Shakespeare Festival Archives Director Dr. Francesca Marini (right) and Archives Coordinator Christine Schindler, installing a display of Festival costumes at the Toronto Reference Library. Here they are midway through dressing Falstaff, from Stratford's 1995 production of The Merry Wives of Windsor. * The costumes will be on display on the […]
Robert Altman: The Oral Biography is 500 pages of stories told by actors, producers and film crew about their experiences working with Robert Altman, legendary director of such landmark films as M*A*S*H, Nashville, The Player, Short Cuts and Gosford Park, among many others. Mitchell Zuckoff interviewed Altman himself and over 200 of Atlman's colleagues and […]
House of Versace: The untold story of genius, murder and survival is a well-written, dramatic and absorbing story that begins in a luxury hotel room above the Spanish Steps in Rome where Donatella Versace is planning her latest show. Her deliberations are shattered by a phone call delivering the news that her brother Gianni has […]
The Shaw Festival is celebrating it's 50th Anniversary this year. To help celebrate, the Toronto Reference Library is hosting a display of five costumes from the Festival's last decade. Find them on the 2nd floor of the library, by the Main Reference desk, until the end of February. I've taken pictures of some details to […]
Scott Schuman spends afternooons looking for well-dressed strangers to photograph for his blog: The Sartorialist. "…it's almost like going out there and letting yourself fall in love a little bit every day — letting yourself be seduced a little bit every day." In 2009 his pictures were collected by Penguin Books. This recent […]
Lovers of contemporary photography, will know the names of Canadian photographers Jeff Wall and Edward Burtynsky, but may not be familiar with the work of Robert Polidori. Polidori was born in Montreal in 1951. He now works internationally. He is a staff photographer for the New Yorker. Over the past 10 years he has created […]
Asked to give the CBC Massey Lectures in 2010, Douglas Copeland responded by contributing the first work of fiction in the Lectures’ history. Player One: What Is to Become of Us: A Novel in Five Hours features four different characters stuck in a Toronto airport hotel’s cocktail lounge, during a global disaster, making entertaining mental […]
Bring some art back into your life this Thursday night. Come to a lecture at the Toronto Reference Library. Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868-1928), the strikingly original Scottish architect/designer, died in obscurity, but his reputation has deservedly experienced a revival. In an illustrated talk, Ellen Easton McLeod discusses the arc of his life and describes some […]