Eaton has found an artist’s office job — a management position that calls for raw creativity and that satisfies both her idealism and her longing for community. She is Project Manager of Outside the Lines, an art-based day program for adults with developmental disabilities run out of a giant warehouse on the Tufts University campus. The people served by O.T.L. are not simply given art projects to do, they are managed as artists — it is both a workshop and a gallery space in which participants’ artwork graces the walls and gets sold at shows.

“We’re different from other programs,” Eaton explains, “because a lot of them are work-related programs where people mostly just do piece work.”

O.T.L. is an experimental offshoot of the nonprofit organization, Resources for Human Development (R.H.D.). “We call ourselves an ‘alternative day program.’ We give them work that’s more meaningful, I would say.”

Eaton and the staff she oversees are different from most social workers. They are themselves, artists, and they know how to treat their clients as such. Everyone in the building shares the same talents and obsessions, and they enjoy learning from one another.

“Hiring artists works, because we’re all sensitive, we’re intuitive. We’re free with them, and we can treat them like human beings, rather than, like, ‘You’re a patient and we’re going to analyze you,’ we can just be like ‘We are who we are and you are who you are,’ and we appreciate them for that.”

Eaton is 30 years old. She is tall, and although she is soft-spoken, her stature and her constant state of calm make her a convincing figure of authority. She could not, however, be easily mistaken for corporate. While her office is the only closed room with a desk in the scattered warehouse, her speech and dress are informal. Today, she wears a short skirt over a pair of jeans, a dark blouse and a colorful silk scarf.

Eaton was not always specifically drawn to working with the disabled. She has, however, always been an artist. Before O.T.L., she struggled to find an artistic community that felt like home. At Mount Holyoke College, she majored in art and anthropology, and while these disciplines excited her, the “art crowd” she discovered, did not.

A painting by Jose DeJesus, who was awarded “Best in Show” in a recent statewide exhibition at the capitol building for his piece Man from Burma

“I actually got really fed up with the whole ‘Art World.’ It can be really inclusive, if you’re in it. People are making pieces that are speaking to other artists—meaning that those other artists have prior knowledge of art history, or contemporary artists — rather than having an original vision of how to express themselves, with the idea that they can reach people through what they’re creating.

“But art for me is really just doing a thing that I like. Something that I feel like I always have to do — is part of my life in some way. I have to manipulate materials and make pretty things — well not necessarily pretty, but visually interesting. When I was at school though, I got involved with that whole scene.”

Eaton spent her junior year studying photography in Florence, Italy. Her exploration of this new medium combined with her experience abroad and her studies in anthropology led to a new inspiration.

“I wanted to travel, I wanted to tell people about what’s going on in the world through art. I was idealistic, and I did do that for a while. I did travel the world and take pictures. I went to Southeast Asia. I went to Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos. That was pretty awesome. It was really amazing.”

Before long, however, she ran into a barrier. Just as she hadn’t been able to connect with what she perceived as the art world, she came to feel that photojournalism prevented her from connecting with the people she found on her travels.

“I took pictures. I mean, I had my camera with me. I was a person with a camera. People would ask me for money for taking their pictures. That’s when I realized that it wasn’t what I really wanted to do.”

Back from the States and out of college, Eaton continued to pursue her skills where she could, but there was a lot missing. “I was working for a jewelry designer and working as a house painter,” she recalls with a laugh, “so the stuff I was doing was kind of isolating and I really felt like working on my own artwork was self-indulgent. I really wanted to be able to reach out to people and be creative.”

Eaton heard about O.T.L. from a friend who worked there before it had a management structure. She began on the floor, as a “Direct Support Professional,” and was prompted once R.H.D. decided a manager was necessary. Her first breakthrough with an artist did not come while working on an art project, but it did call for an important kind of creativity. She was working with a woman known for acting out.

“If she’s not getting what she wants she’ll do temper tantrum kinds of things like, screaming and whining. So she started to do that one day, and I started whining back, and I made it into like, oh, you sound like a seagull,’ Eaton remembers, laughing. “And it totally just threw her off. She thought it was hilarious. So she started doing it in a way where she was calling like a seagull, and then I was calling back like a seagull, and it was just really funny.”

Eaton calls this “redirecting,” and it is central to the work of O.T.L. where one of the defining practices in working with the developmentally disabled is never to punish, never to provide negative attention. As much as in designing art projects, this is where the creativity and sensitivity of the artist are called upon. It’s about finding ways to make abnormal behavior OK, to laugh together and direct focus back to the shared value of art-making. This seems to be exactly the atmosphere Eaton has been searching for, and she is not alone.

“There is a strong feeling of community here,” says Allison Stroh, an Art Therapist, recently hired for the ‘Direct Support’ role. “Everyone here feels part of it. When Else walks in, all of the artists smile. She has a million tricks up her sleeve to make them feel at ease. Meanwhile, she’s got me singing, dancing, working on giant monsters– stuff I never thought I’d get to do at work.”

“We really try to make it so that everyone here just feels comfortable being who they are. No matter who they are,” says Eaton. You know we’re all awkward and weird in some ways and we just let that be. Both the staff and the clients, their personalities really come out here.”

Outside of Eaton’s office, a heavyset man wearing an unattached pair of earphones is showing off his brand new cowboy boots — from L.L. Bean, he boasts — to a bespectacled twenty-something in skinny jeans. The subject exhausted, he shows off his latest glowing cityscape. The kid looks impressed. So does The Hulk.

LA JOLLA, Calif. — We’re very happy to have Dr. John F. Asmus, noted professor at the University of California San Diego (UCSD) with us for this story. Asmus brings to The Power Behind Closed Doors staff an exceptional technical and political background as an Internationally known expert in the dark and mysterious world of Laser Technology.

After a diverse career between working for the government and various businesses, Asmus invented the technology to use lasers to restore art and is one of the few people in the world allowed to touch the Mona Lisa. We have known Dr. Asmus for a long time and acknowledge one of his government recognized abilities a s a “Keen Observer of Events.” Asmus is constantly traveling to other countries technical laser conferences which he attends as an active participant. UCSD has always appreciated his abilities as an international representative of UCSD.

Recently Asmus told us that he had received an invitation to deliver the keynote address at the international conference, “Il Reunion International: Optica, Vida y Patrimonio” at the Capitolio Nacional in Havana, Cuba. American travel to Cuba, a one party communist state, has been restricted, and travel there has been almost nonexistent. This conference appeared to be an excellent opportunity for Asmus to see, firsthand, what Cuba is like and how the average Cuban is doing under the current political system.

Asmus’ first observation, before he started his adventure, was to realize the strong and somewhat emotional feeling in unison among his wife, family, friends, and associates. They all pleaded with him to ignore the invitation. Everyone believed that if he went it would be the last time anyone would see him.

In terms of the conference Asmus said that the invitation was completely unexpected . Not only on the fact that he, an American, was invited to give the Key Note Speech at a Cuban Conference but the fact that Cuba itself would be hosting an international conference on laser technologies for the conservation, restoration, analysis, and presentation of the artistic and cultural heritage of the countries comprising the Western Hemisphere.

Asmus said that he had been completely surprise the previous year when he discovered Argentinean and Greek art conservators employing Cuban-manufactured lasers in their work. “For years following my 1980s work in Xi’an it had been his expectation that economical Chinese lasers would become the world standard in conservation studios,” he said, reminiscing about his restoration of the Emperor Qin Terracotta Army. Initially, Asmus said that he was bemused by the idea of economical Cuban lasers competing in the world’s high-tech commercial market, although this thought seemed to be purely based off the ongoing Political Embargo the United States has had on Cuba. Eventually, Asmus discerned that the Cuban success in the commercial laser field was due to a spin-off of Fidel Castro’s medical treatment initiatives of the 1960s and 70s.

Upon arriving at the Capitolio National for the laser conference, Asmus had an opportunity to scan the conference program. There was at least one paper by a Cuban author on almost every current topic that is featured at the laser-society conferences held in the USA, Europe, and Asia. Asmus said that, “Later that week, it turned out that Cuban presentations were of the highest caliber although like all conferences, others were superficial and elementary,” he said.

The second startling feature of the program was the geographical representation. Latin Americans were to be expected. However, almost every European country was represented, as well as a scattering of representatives from other countries. Asmus was the only American who attended the conference.

Asums’ third revelation was the degree of Russian influence, both direct and indirect, which was prevalent at the conference’s technical and social activities. This is in spite of the collapse of the Soviet Union, the world economic recession, the termination of massive Soviet assistance to Cuba, and the travel distance between the two countries.

As for the conference, a feeling of deja vu swept over Asmus as the program revealed familiar names such as Vadim, Parfenov, Kaloshin, Shevchenko, Irina, Shikunova, Vladimir, Kurlov, Volkov, Viktor, Loschenov, Galina, and Nemova. Chatting with these authors at coffee breaks led to many new revelations. Mentors, collaborators, past publications and scientific issues as well as mutual friends of a bygone era were recalled. Although Asmus had never met these people, he discovered that their resumes bore eerie similarities. Asmus was well aware that that fifty-five years ago this world had been the focus of his professional career.

At one level the Havana laser conference resembled the end of a spy movie or novel where the opposing operatives meet and reminisce about their respective roles and tactics in playing the game. Some sort of bond can develop between contentious old “Cold Warriors” in reliving the moves and counter moves; in recognizing the implementation of similar strategies. Nevertheless, one significant difference in outcome bubbled up. Several of the Soviet Cold War scientists whose research Asmus had tracked during his Washington years had immigrated to countries such as Australia, Canada, Finland, and Brazil. Toward the end of the conference Asmus found himself chatting with Professor Maxim Tomilin of St. Petersburg State University. It appeared that they had attended all of the same meetings on the merits of neutral particle beams, charged particle beams, excimer lasers, blue-green lasers, etc., only on opposite sides of the world.

Since its inception in Venice 37 years ago, laser-implemented art conservation has been spreading across much of the globe. A major factor has been academic and professional exchanges involving Western European, Chinese, and American conservation scientists. While this was taking place many failed to notice that the Soviet Union was filling a void that opened upon the departure of the US from Cuba. While we in America were focused on cigars and missiles in Cuba, Cuba’s best and brightest were going to the Soviet Union for advanced studies. The Cuban laser accomplishment is one fruit of that protracted academic exchange. The successful laser-implemented restoration of the H.M.S. Swift by Dr. Alberto Orsetti, and the ongoing laser restoration of the fascist interrogation cells in Argentina (as historical memorials) by Professor Gabriel Bilmes are examples of their reducing the science into practice.

Asmus commented that during a coffee break during the conference, “both Dr. Tomilin and I agreed that the new blood in the field was discovering possibilities far beyond our imaginations.” This can be seen in the joint Mexican-Cuban initiative that has developed an automated laser system that selectively blasts thorns from the agave plant, thereby improving both the efficiency and quality of Tequila production. Better tequila, now who can complain about that?

Blast, based in Boston, has a bureau in San Diego with entertainment and political reporting.

Prosecutors, in return for a guilty plea on the three charges, dropped 11 other defacing property cases against him.

“I am very pleased that a reasonable resolution to my court cases in Boston has been reached,” Fairey said in a statement. “I want to apologize to the City of Boston for posting my art in unauthorized spaces without the consent of the owner.”

“I believe in the importance of making art accessible through many avenues, and I will continue to advocate the use of legal public spaces for meaningful artistic expression and communication,” he said. “Freedom of expression is the bedrock of our democracy. However, I also believe it is important that people respect private property.”

“Shepard looks forward to continuing to bring his art to people everywhere whether it is inside a museum or in publicly available spaces,” said Jay Strell, a spokesman for Fairey. “As an artist with a traveling exhibition surveying two decades of his work, which includes many examples of public art and the iconic Obama ‘Hope’ poster, Shepard believes that it is important for artists everywhere to have access to public spaces to display their work, but do so in a respectful manner.”

Fairey will return to Boston on July 31 for a closing party at the Institute of Contemporary Art to celebrate the end of his exhibition there, which ends August 16.

“We are thrilled to learn that Shepard Fairey’s legal issues with the Boston Police have been resolved,” said Jill Medvedow, director of the ICA. “With this matter now behind him, the focus of the conversation can return to where it belongs: on Fairey’s artistic accomplishments.”

According to Strell, the show has drawn more than 100,000 visitors. The Fairey show will next turn to Pittsburgh’s Warhol Museum in the fall.

Fluffy may have few options when it comes to disposing of Spot’s body, but for Icanhascheezburger.com enthusiasts, the possibilities for funny captions are endless. And that’s essentially all the site is: pictures of cats with funny captions. Simple? Genius? Lucrative? Yes, yes, and yes.

Since its debut in 2007, the site, which began as a joke between two friends, has exploded into an empire with a cult following. Pet Holdings, Inc., the company behind the site, has 18 spinoff sites, including Ihasahotdog.com, Totallylookslike.com, and Failblog.org. Ten of those sites, such as Thisisphotobomb.com, Pictureisunrelated.com, and Ugliesttattoos.com, all debuted this June, spreading humor like dogs spread fleas and giving us ten more excuses to put off doing anything productive—not that writing funny captions isn’t productive in its own creepy-I’m-obsessed-with-my-cat-and-dress-him-up-in-cute-little-outfits kind of way.

The flagship site is visited monthly by 2.1 million LOLcat fanatics around the world, and approximately 10 million humor-loving Web surfers also check out the spinoff sites each month. So who exactly are the Cheezburger obsessed? According to Quantcast.com, the site—ranked at 1,124^th for most visited by U.S. Web surfers—has a demographic mainly of educated young adult Caucasian women who shop at Hot Topic. Who knew that purple-spiked-haired, all-black-wearing goth chick who sat behind you in chemistry class had such a soft side?

But it’s not just casual entertainment for some registered users of the site, which has reached subculture-esque proportions. Take user “jimincairns”, who has created a whopping 1,527 captioned pictures (known as LOLz), or user “Thecat” who has 1,917 friends on the site and 11,900 favorite LOLz. And take a peek at “10puppyluv10″’s profile: “i luvs goggies, and we has wun, but den mai kitteh ran awai. Iz so sad! […] dis iz wun uf meh top favurit sites! i luvs hoomans, so feel free to rekwest meh as a frend.” Ummm, what?

Ah yes, LOLspeak, a few funny pictures away from taking over the English language as we know it. Some common words and phrases? Goggie (dog), fud (food), ohai! (greeting), nom (verb meaning “to eat,” also sometimes substituted for “fud” as a noun), interwebs (Internet), kthxbai (goodbye).

Clearly, this empire has attracted more than the attention of sullen cat-loving goth chicks. Icanhascheezburger.com won a 2008 Blogger’s Choice Award for Best Animal Blogger, and that same year won two prestigious People’s Voice Webby awards for the Humor and Weird categories. In 2009, Failblog.org won two People’s Voice Webby awards for the same categories as its predecessor.

It may seem to be at the top of its game, but Icanhascheezburger’s popularity isn’t about to dwindle. The site has a page on Facebook, a surprisingly difficult and addictive online game called NomNomNom4Fud, an application for IPhones, and even a book.

Blast wanted to peek inside the genius minds behind the LOLcats, so we spoke with Pet Holdings, Inc.’s CEO, Ben Huh, who answered our tough, probing questions about this growing empire.

Blast: Can you briefly tell us how Icanhascheezburger.com began?

BH: Icanhascheezburger.com was started by two friends in Hawaii back in January of 2007. They exchanged some LOLCat pictures over IM and the site was born the next day.
Blast: So. What’s with this elusive cheezburger? Do cats like burgers? Did I miss something?

BH: It takes a cat to understand the mind of a cat… I’m pretty sure we’re missing everything.
Blast: Do you know about the online LOLspeak glossary? And do you foresee this taking over the English language as we know it? Can people actually misspell LOLspeak, or is it constantly evolving?

BH: We started speaklolspeak.com. It’s an evolving Internet-based language that’s incorporating parts of text-speak, IM-speak and l33t-speak [a language that substitutes numbers for letters, as in “n00b” for “newbie”].
Blast: There are “Star Trek” conventions, “Star Wars” conventions, “Lost” conventions… will there ever be a LOLcat convention? And if so, will there be cheezburgers?

BH: *shrug* I don’t see why not?
Blast: Do you have a favorite LOL? If so, what is it?

BH: I have lots of favorite LOLz here: http://cheezburger.com/pictures-by-I-Can-Has-Cheezburger/favorites
Blast: Do you make LOLz yourself, or just sit at a desk reading them all day? Oh, and are you hiring?

BH: I do make them myself, but NOT A SINGLE ONE has ever been voted on to the homepage. And yes, we’re hiring.

Blast: So who invented much of the LOLspeak? Geniuses over at corporate or obsessed fans? Or both? Any you are responsible for?

BH: I think we’re all a little bit responsible for LOLspeak. Like any real language, it’s a cultural evolution.
Blast: Why do you think your sites have become so insanely popular and have attracted such a following?

BH: I think there’s a great sense of community behind them. They’re powered by the very people who enjoy the content. That tells you about what a little bit of effort can do for Internet culture.

A master artist, Travalena became known throughout his field as “The Man of a Thousand Faces.” He entered Las Vegas in 1971 and has sported impressions of people from Frank Sinatra to Jack Nicholson for more than three decades.

This is yet another entertainment personality to have passed away this week. Incidentally, he made brief appearances on The Tonight Show with host Johnny Carson in the early 80s. Mr. Travalena was 66.

Award-winning artist Peter T. Quidley deserves a prize for versatility. You can see his range for yourself at Quidley & Company (118 Newbury Street), where his works are on display through June 25.

It is difficult to believe that this Boston native taught himself how to paint. His signature technique, glazing, involves applying very thin layers of oil paint to paneling, allowing light to shine through. He then applies varnish and finely sands the piece, buffing it to a glass-like shine. Without knowing about his technique, it would be easy to bet (and lose!) that some of his pieces, especially “The Sketch,” (see picture at right) are set behind glass.

The glazing effect also gives his pieces a luminous quality, as if they are bathed in sunshine. The effect can seem as somewhat of a purposeful contradiction. Take his piece “The Storm,” in which two women are walking on a beach; one woman is in a long, flowing dress, and the other is wrapped in a towel. Their backs are turned to the viewer, who acts as an observer walking behind them. The scene is in soft focus, with light wisps of pink, blue, and white. It’s serene and airy, save for the gray clouds entering the scene in the distance, competing with a light blue sky. The women, linking arms, walk slowly toward the storm clouds, not seeming to notice or care. The painting’s luminescence causes the viewer to almost have to search for any sign of the storm after which the piece is named.

“Stardust,” which features Quidley’s granddaughter, nearly sparkles off the wall. His subjects, as in this piece, are often in nightgowns or in long, flowing dresses adorned with lace, which adds to the ethereal quality of his works. The women in his life — his daughter and granddaughter, for example — are his muses. His paintings act as windows looking out on moments in time, whether real or imagined. His eye for detail and composition speaks to his experience behind the camera lens.

His works take up only a small space in the back of the modestly sized Quidley & Company — which is owned by the artist’s son, Chris — but putting together a show at all is a challenge, said Rob Giacchetti, managing partner of the company.

“His work is so sought after that it’s unusual to have this many pieces,” he said.

Because of the intricacy of his technique, Quidley paints only eight to 12 works a year. And unless you’ve got as much money as a Saudi Arabian king, his prices will astound you; “The Storm” is priced at $8,500, “The Sketch” at $42,000, and “Labor of Love”? $67,500! But can you really put a price on a work of art? For the rest of us, many of his prints can be found on the artist’s website, www.Quidley.com, for $25 to a few hundred dollars.

And though relatively speaking the exhibit may house an impressive number of Quidley’s works, don’t expect to spend all day there; it is a small collection that deserves a look while spending the day shopping or dining on Newbury Street.

I fell in love with music and with poetry all over again. I craved some mash-ups that I’d never, ever see. To wit: taking the best of Keats and Billy Corgan, how about “Ode to Mellon Collie?” From Shelley and Gerard Way, “The Masque of Anarchy leads the Black Parade?”

Schuftan’s book, still for some stupid reason not available in the States, is an amazing success.

I recently talked the book up to a punk friend of mine from college, whose name, on her request, I have left out. I include it here because, frankly, I love the book too much not to.

Me: So this book I am reviewing, you would love it. When you come and visit me you should borrow it. It’s not out in the states yet so you are SOL.

ANON: Whee! Oh snap.

Mme: It’s about the roots of punk, pop, emo and goth in I SHIT YOU NOT LORD BYRON AND SHELLEY. it. is. the. greatest.

A: Byron and Shelley were the ORIGINAL GOTH KIDS.

Me: Actually Milton was but whatever. Then again maybe Milton was more of a punk.

A: Nah, Milton was a nerd.

Me: using his art to be a revolutionary and whatnot.

A: Okay, maybe he was a punk.

The author’s passion for tunes, pop, emo, punk and goth is matched with his love for Romantic poetry (and this author would have a tough time pitting the two against each other in the Thunderdome, and is content to see them share the stage) and 19th century history.

Look, honestly? This book needs to be released in the States yesterday. I had a blast reading it.

The book starts out with a confession: Schuftan likes My Chemical Romance. And I have to confess, similarly, that so do I, after reading “Hey! Nietzsche!” If only because reading the book gave me a much bigger appreciation for where the band’s music is coming from, historically and artistically. It’s easy to point at Gerard Way’s Black Parade makeup and derisively laugh, “emo kid,” but when Way calls emo “a pile of shit,” he starts to sound a bit more like Byron when he went to go fight in Greece.

Mechanically, Schuftan illustrates his point by juxtaposition and historical inference. It’s quite brilliant, really, in the sense that when you take a good long look at Bryon’s pallor, his disinterest in people, and his massive poetic talent, he really does look like Rivers Cuomo. Similarly, when you think about Gerard Way voicing a desire to save the world with rock and roll, it sounds a lot like Milton’s Satan.

And really? If it sounds like this praise is too high, or to elevate Weezer and MCR up to the heights of a pair of the greatest poets to ever commit pen to paper, the point is lost on you, dear reader. Byron, Schuftan’s Adam from which all this pale, black-wearing music descended, was a rock star. People read his poetry and loved him Beatles-style. Calling cards arrived in buckets, and Bryon, like a rock star, took in the sex, booze and drugs en masse, with the perfect nonchalance.

The biggest success in the book is making the connections seem so obvious. Schuftan doesn’t strain to make a point once in the book’s 300 pages. The book concludes with an affirmation, and so must I. Love your Byron, listen to your Weezer, and for the love of God, read this book.

Yes, really.

The story of Farley, as he’s affectionately called by his friends in narratives compiled almost a decade after the “Saturday Night Live” star’s death by cocaine overdose, is on the one hand a group of friends remembering a person frequently described as a force of nature, and something of a book of regrets: looking back on their friend’s all-consuming drug problems, alcoholism and inexorable self-destruction, the closest friends and colleagues of Chris Farley are sorry they didn’t do anything to save their friend.

You’ve heard it before, the story of The Great Artist brought down by drugs; Edie Sedgwick comes to mind; Jimi Hendrix; and of course, John Belushi.

And so the book takes two directions, and is pulled between them constantly. Was Chris Farley a comic genius, a force of charisma unlike anything his friends — teammates at Second City and “Saturday Night Live” — had ever seen? Or was he, as his brother describes him, a deeply religious kid, ashamed of his weight and scared of the devil, hungry for love?

I suppose the question is: why can’t we think of him as both? The book, a series of interlocking, transcribed oral narratives, constantly toes the same line between self-important exoneration and apology with which most celebrity postmortems wrestle, to no clear answer.

Is that the core of the narrative? It has to be. The book might be an oral history, but given that it was co-authored by the man who, essentially, taught Chris Farley how to live, it has to have been delicately constructed to toe the line.

When the book’s authors made the decision to get away from straight-forward narrative biography and let the voices of Farley’s friends simply take over, the reader is thrust into a complicated narrative less about the actor himself and more about the difficult feelings everybody had for Farley.

Should they save him, or should they laugh? Nobody outside of Farley’s family admits to guilt by complicity; only Farley’s own siblings recognized in the book that Farley, and their entire family, had serious issues.

And in a way, co-author Tanner Colby is to blame. Early in “The Chris Farley Show,” Farley’s brothers discuss how Chris read Colby’s book about John Belushi’s drug problems, “Wired,” and describe how he took all the wrong lessons away from the narrative. According to “The Chris Farley Show,” what Farley learned form Colby’s book about his on-screen idol was, essentially, that if Farley drank to excess and was a wild and crazy man, people would love him.

The worst part of the whole sordid thing is that everybody did love Chris Farley despite, or in spite of, his incredible self-immolation. I got the feeling from the book that the people around Farley thought of him as a beautiful train wreck: a huge, powerful force, completely destroyed. They wanted to slow down and watch, but couldn’t bear to pull bodies from the wreckage.

The troubling thing is, reading the book and watching clips of Farley’s performances, I couldn’t help but read into them deeply. When Farley’s most famous character, motivational speaker Matt Foley (named after a childhood friend) scolds David Spade and warns him that he will end up thrice divorced and in a van by the river, I couldn’t help but wonder if Farley was yelling at himself: an alter-ego character that came out and talked to everybody but the actor responsible for bringing him to life.

The book, like Farley as he’s described, will draw you in, and you won’t want to look away. I found myself captivated as much by the better days Farley had, the honest-to-god funny stunts he pulled growing up, as I was by his absolutely stupid binge-drinking once he found fame at Second City and “SNL.” I couldn’t decide which was more powerful, the good or the bad, and I get the impression that this is what the authors wanted.

After all: if they’re wrestling with their own guilt, shouldn’t the reader? If everybody who ever knew Chris Farley beyond his shitty, fratboy movie was so conflicted about him, shouldn’t people who are drawn to his story also wrestle with it?

So that’s what you get when you pick up “The Chris Farley Story”: conflict, indecision and guilt. Thinking back on it, I can’t help but think about Macbeth’s soliloquy: “Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more.”

What have we got to remember Chris Farley? YouTube, Hulu, DVDs, and “Tommy Boy.”

From a corner of the room a pianist and a conductor begin a musical score and the dancers rise. The ballet features George Balanchine’s “Prodigal Son,” Vaslav Nijinsky’s “Afternoon of Faun,” Michel Fokine’s “Le Spectre de la Rose,” and Jorma Elo’s world premiere of “Le Sacre du Printemps.”

First to perform is “Prodigal Son.” The choreography is full of acrobatic endeavors that make it exciting and thrilling to watch, because this  is a great ballet for those new to dance. Watching the dancers twirl and lift to the beat of the music felt like a montage from the recent film “Pride and Prejudice,” captivating onlookers.

Playing the male lead is Jared Redick. This will be Redick’s last performance with the Boston Ballet after dancing with the company for seven years.

We had a chance to speak with Redick, and he said that playing the part of the Prodigal Son has always been a dream.

“This role is one you wait your whole career to do. This is a gift for me, I’m going out with a bang,” he said.

For years, Redick has been up before the sun for ballet practice with the Boston Ballet and then teaching at the Ballet’s Norwell School on the South Shore.  The principal dancer says he is looking forward to having his mornings back, but don’t think that having restful mornings means that he will get lazy or out of shape. He wants to stay active and try new things like martial arts and snowboarding.

“I can finally snowboard!” he said. He doesn’t have to worry now about injuring himself on the slopes, or hurting his ankle so that he can’t dance for several months.  As Redick looks back on all the opportunities he has had in his career and the major roles he has performed, he said happily, “I have been so fortunate in my career.”

The Boston Ballet will be performing Ballets Russes to celebrate 100 years since its establishment by Russian impresario Serge Diaghilev.

“The Ballets Russes became one of the most influential ballet companies of the 20th century, presenting ground-breaking artistic collaborations among choreographers, composers, and artists,” the Boston Ballet says on its website. Among the classic works by Balanchine, Nijinsky and Fokine, resident choreographer Jorma Elo will premiere a new work, his sixth for Boston Ballet, to Igor Stravinsky’s “Le Sacre du Printemps.” The Ballets Russes will be at the Wang from May 14 to 17.

But it may not be true.

A new book, based on the original police report of the event, suggests that Van Gogh’s friend, French post-impressionist Paul Gauguin, may have swiped off Van Gogh’s ear with a sword during a rift outside a brothel.

Hans Kaufmann and Rita Wildegans, the authors of “In Van Gogh’s Ear: Paul Gauguin and the Pact of Silence”, argue that the original historical account is inaccurate and contains several irregularities.

Kaufmann and Wildegans looked at witness reports and letters exchanged between the artists, and have since concluded that Gauguin was the one responsible for carving Van Gogh’s lobe clean off his head. The German scholars also claim that Van Gogh then wrapped his severed ear in cloth and handed it to a prostitute named Rachel, according to the BBC.

Kauffman says they do not know whether the act was intentional, however they are certain that the legendary artists agreed to invent and push the story that Van Gogh cut it off himself in order to protect Gauguin. That makes it sound like it was an accident, though I don’t see how you can cut someone’s ear off by accident.

In the legendary tale, Gauguin was not present when Van Gogh cut his ear off. “As for Van Gogh, he didn’t confirm anything. Their behaviour afterwards and various suggestions by the protagonists indicate they were hiding the truth,” Kauffman told France-based Le Figaro newspaper.

So did Gauguin force Van Gogh to go along with the myth that he de-eared himself? Or was it really an accident that Gauguin, an avid fencer, chopped it off outside a brothel? It may never be known.

Van Gogh later moved to Tahiti, and then to France where he died after shooting himself in the chest. Maybe that was Gauguin, too.

The Miracle at Naples is certainly a play to be enjoyed by all. This old, Italian-influenced play tells a more modern tale about people, young and old, understanding love.

The story is about an acting troupe that travels Italy during the Renaissance. The eldest member and founder, Don Bertolino Fortunato brings the troupe back to his home town in Naples to perform. During their stay, they realize the town is waiting for the miracle of San Gennaro, a tradition in Naples where the statue of Gennaro cries blood as a foretelling of good things to occur.

During his stay, Don Bertonlino runs into an old friend, Francescina who has seemingly peaked his fancy. Unfortunately, for Don Bertolino, however, Francescina is unwilling to settle as his Naples lady friend and make him dinner. Francescina is a strong woman who decided to stay in Naples to nanny the now-fully-grown Flaminia.

Flaminia is approaching woman-hood and is on the search for love. She notices Giancarlo, the lead actor of Don Bertonlino’s acting troupe and immediately falls in love. Meanwhile, the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern of the play, Matteo and Tristano decide to find mischief. These two are clearly the comedic relief of the story, though clearly it is not necessary, given the play in its entirety is filled with laughter and general amusement.

Matteo and Tristano were also looking for love when Don Bertonlino, as to silence them, gave them a fake love potion to help them in their travels. The so-called potion was really an alcoholic beverage, which later got the two inebriated. Intoxicated, Matteo and Tristano found themselves trying to seduce the naive and lovesick Flamenia with the help of their “potion.” Reluctantly, Flamenia drinks the potion in hopes to attract Giancarlo, but rather becomes inebriated herself. The three, drunk looked nothing short of a scene out of bad teen movie. Like students at a frat party, the three start to experiment with the potion and find themselves in an unholy situation between themselves.

While the three are romancing, Franscesina walks in to find her sweet, once-virgin, Flamenia sandwiched between two strange men. Francescina chases the boys out of her house. From outside, Don Bertolino witnesses the event. The two elders get in an argument about the situation, and such is the first half of the play. Flamenia still hasn’t won Giancarlo over, the two boys are still in a loss for love and the elders are in a spat over their “kids” being kids.

After intermission, we are rejoined with Don Bertolino outside his wagon and we’re introduced to his short, “unattractive” daughter. Piccola, nicknamed the “little one.” She proves herself to be quite the spitfire.

Lucy DeVitto gives a great performance as the tough, take-no-crap girl in the all-male comedy troupe. We learn that Piccola, who is as quick-witted as her Father, is more of the organizer of the troupe, but is also in love with Giancarlo. Giancarlo is more interested in the beautiful Flaminia, but too shy to express himself. Finally, we see Giancarlo and Flaminia by the statue of San Gennaro trying to get each other’s attention. The two meet and express their love for one another.

Meanwhile, Matteo and Tristano are still drunk and finding themselves in a playful position. The two complain about not finding love and laughing about the threesome that got broken up. Matteo and Tristano finally decide that the love potion did work, but instead of on a lady, it was on one another.

Don Bertolino and Franscesina are finally in a more relaxed state with one another and find that they are rather fond of one another.

Although everything seems nice and lovey, we find that Piccola is having Giancarlo’s baby and Tristano is not yet willing to admit to his true sexuality. Through a series of comedic events including slapstick comedy and puns, things get resolved. Giancarlo is forced to be Piccola’s husband, Flamenia finds happiness in herself (rather than a significant other), Tristano admits to his love for Matteo and Don Bertolino finally gets to eat.

This comedy is definitely one to see and enjoy. It is filled with laughter in an old setting but with a modern turn of events. People of all ages, gender and sexuality can relate to this play. I recommend it to all of you.

In an age where people have films and video games to do the imaging for them, a new type of literature is emerging to bring the characters and stories into the reader’s world for a change. Sean Stewart, Jordan Weisman and Cathy Briggs, the co-authors, illustrators, and creators of a book series with a fully functioning understand the need for this change and have fused the gap between books, technology and their audience with their novels “Cathy’s Book,” “Cathy’s Key” and the upcoming “Cathy’s Ring.”

The “Cathy” series is part of a new genre dubbed “interactive fiction” and comes complete with working telephone numbers, websites and e-mail addresses — bringing the characters to life in the reader’s world. “Cathy’s” author, Sean Stewart claimed, “This kind of interactive entertainment will surely be to the 21st century what film was to the 20th in terms of being the defining art form.”

From what Blast has seen so far, there’s a definite possibility for this prediction to become reality.

The idea behind interactive fiction was born in 2001 when Stewart was hired to be involved in a project building a fully functional online world surrounding the Stephen Spielberg movie “A.I.” The project, dubbed “The Beast” due to its dauntingly huge list of requirements, entailed creating the world of this movie so that even five months before it came out, people could go to the website, which was according to Stewart, “literally hundreds or thousands of web pages deep”.

“You’ll go to a person’s blog and it’ll look like a real blog, except in the future . . . it’ll have a link of where they went to school, which then has links for 60 or so departments, all of which are up and running. When you e-mail these people, they will e-mail you back. We’re going to create a world and actually let you touch it. Instead of watching what happens to Lucy when she goes through the wardrobe to Narnia, we’ll let you go through the wardrobe yourself and see and touch Narnia as much as you can.”

The problem was, once the movie came out and the project was finished, it was left for dead. Stewart found himself and his colleagues saying, “that was really cool but now it’s over and people can’t play anymore because it’s over,” so they had no choice but to move on.

In creating “Cathy’s Book” and the subsequent sequels, Stewart and Weisman wanted to make sure that people could come across the series five years later and still play along. Running Press is set to release “Cathy’s Ring,” the third book in the New York Times bestselling teen trilogy. Despite the approaching end to the series, people will be able to enjoy the interactivity for a long time to come. The co-authors also wanted to make sure that it could stand alone as any other book would without the addition of its real-life communicative capabilities.

“We built it with a very simple premise: if all you ever did was just read the words of the book, that should be a great experience and you should feel fully satisfied, that by itself, should work as a book,” they said.

And it does. The story on its own is compelling and relatable, yet wildly fantastic — ready to compete with any other young adult series out there, complete with immortal boyfriends, Asian assassins, and witty banter. However, despite the inherent fantasy of the plot, opening the book itself brings you into a strange false sense of reality.

The series’ illustrator, Cathy Briggs, had a lot to do with this. Each page’s margins are covered in sketch-like illustrations, as if the artistic Cathy Vickers — the protagonist — drew these doodles while writing in her journal. Each drawing carries significance to what is happening on the particular page, and every now and then there will be little scratched in commentaries about what is printed.

Needless to say, Stewart and Briggs had to work together on this one. Stewart explained the process, saying “Jordan Weisman and I will usually talk about what we’re thinking of doing in a book and then I will go off and write the book and then send in a manuscript and we’ll go through revisions. Then I’ll sit down and write down some ideas for illustrations.”

After jotting down the ideas, Stewart and Brigg would collaborate on what drawings to include on each page, and were definitely on the same page about one aspect of the illustrations: they should not interrupt the reading of the story.

“A lot of the doodles and illustrations should be in the background and a second read, not a distraction, but yeah, we worked quite closely on developing what those illustrations should be,” Brigg explained.

Stewart conveyed the same idea: “It works the same way that a soundtrack in a movie does”.

Even as a background, it is hard not to consider how time consuming illustrating every page of a novel could be.

“It was quite intense,” Brigg admitted. “My hand was definitely falling off by the end. Some of them look quite sketchy — very crude, almost — but even so, they take quite a lot of time.”

You might have noticed the “Cathy” similarity as well – it’s no coincidence, Cathy the character is based off of Cathy the illustrator.

It was hot and sunny as Henry Splinter tossed a ball up into the air.  It was way up there, yardsticks high.  The audience sat comfortably tan or flushed in the face.  There were couplets of attendees fanning themselves with conversations until the umpire quieted them.  The umpire sat on the edge of the court with an umbrella and bottled water and watched Henry with desperation.  After all, the umpire’s job depended on Henry; well, it depended on every tennis player, but most importantly on Henry at that moment.  The ball boys and girls were all where they needed to be and there were white lines framing action.  Henry knew he had to do something to the ball floating above his head.  His body was already arched; his arm drawn back and his feet ready to lift themselves off the ground. One swift overhand slam shot the ball towards the net.  It was too close.  The umpire raised his voice and called “Let,” as the neon ball slapped the top of the net.

Henry paced at the baseline and waited for his opponent to ready.  The tennis ball sprang back up from the ground and he watched his opponent shuffle around his own baseline in navy blue shorts that swayed in unison with his body and the rare breeze that rushed from the top of the arena down into the faces of the crowd.  There was sweat on his brow, it was shiny, and depending on the angle of his head you couldn’t see his face.  When Henry did catch a glimpse at it, his eyes were darting left to right at the crowd around him.

Henry’s opponent wiped his brow and readied himself; knees bent like arrowheads, and squinted between the sun and the court at Henry.  Henry tossed the ball up again, high above his head, his body arched and his feet left the ground, slamming the ball over the net.  He was quick to ready himself after the serve. His coach always reminded him to be ready for a return no matter how much better you think you are.  Henry didn’t like that he was thinking about his coach right then. It distracted him, and when his opponent returned his serve he almost didn’t have time to set his body up for a strong, two handed backhand.  The thought of losing a match today frightened Henry.  Just a couple years ago he was ranked third in the world, on the court that day he ranked somewhere in the twenties and found himself caught by an unranked African at what Henry thought was the end of his match.

Henry faced the left side of the court; his whole body faced that side, and stepped into the return quickly.  The top spin he applied to the tennis ball he prided himself on.  He managed to do that with a backhand every time and most other players couldn’t handle it.  When he first made a name for himself two years ago on a misty grass court in the dead of summer, he knocked the number two ranked player, Leonardo Sandal, a man not unlike every other skilled tennis player out in a quarterfinal bout at Wimbledon.  Henry only made it one step further.

He regained his footing on this desert colored clay court and the crowd gasped as his return made his opponent lunge.  Good, he thought, he won’t beat me.  Henry won that point and continued to win every point for the rest of the match.  He beat his opponent, Tsonga Djimbe, 6-3, 6-1, 6-0.  It was a clean sweep pretty much and the news broadcasters and the fans draped themselves over the guardrails of the stadium in an attempt to get Henry’s attention.  Two young Americans with red and white face paint waved an American flag up and down. Cameras in the stadium matched Henry and the American flag on all the oversized screens above the crowd.

On his way to the locker room a few people stood around handing out directions to anyone.  A twenty something man with a polo shirt and khakis and a camera around his neck stood with them.  He acknowledged Henry and smiled with everything but his eyes.  Henry wanted to ignore him but he flashed a bright white light at Henry and developed a picture for some paper somewhere.  Henry blinked rapidly and thought about breaking the camera.  Just a thought.  If he did anything, the inevitable lawsuits would put a strain on his bank account and he needed money.  His wife waited in the locker room.

#

In Henry’s awkwardly lit locker room were his wife, Melanie Splinter, and his niece Vanessa.  Melanie wore her brown hair in a ponytail, up in a pink visor, and had a natural tan about her. Henry knelt down and hugged his niece.

Henry spent a lot of time playing tennis because he loved it but the way his wife and niece dressed and acted.  It told Henry they didn’t feel the same way.  He loved the intensely intimate atmosphere of a duel between two people and when he hugged Vanessa it reminded him.  The amount of pressure on the tennis player’s shoulders gave him confidence; every success or mistake rested solely within himself.  He thought of people like his wife and niece who wore Polo shirts and khakis to these games; you know, those people who spent a significant amount of time buying merchandise rather than enjoying a good match.  They were just one big vampire, sucking all that was good out of it.

Henry was bitter and cynical, and some would say without cause.  In the locker room after his match, that was all that he was. His wife had begun to sigh as she watched him caught in a stupor.  His mind was completely detached from his body and she read it through the dullness of his eyes and face.

Six months ago Melanie started to notice the amount of time Henry spent just zoning out.  The first time she noticed it, he had been sitting in the living room with no television on, no radio, nothing, in a pair of pajama bottoms and his father’s beaten up posture.  He looked awake and he was breathing, but he sat like royalty.  Eyes straight ahead until somebody asked for them.  He snapped out of it a couple seconds after she put her purse down on the coffee table.  The same thing happened the next day.  This time he was sitting in the kitchen with a warm cup of coffee and an unfolded crossword puzzle hardly filled.

She thought he was depressed but Henry wasn’t only depressed.  He was distracted too.  Depression wasn’t something that Henry really needed to deal with or address.  Sure he was depressed, but that depression he always muffled with a pillow in the back of his mind.  Not to say that he never dealt with it, but he was stronger than it.  It all had to deal with spirit, for Henry.  If you’ve got enough spirit, he used to say, you’ll ace it every time.  Sometime around his peak, after he’d reached the highest point he was going to reach in his career, he started to lose spirit.

It hit him heavy one night after practicing for a few hours before his next tournament.  When he was twenty-three and finding his name on sports networks worldwide calling him the next Pete Sampras, he had it all.  He had everything he’d asked for as a child.  He had fame, health, a wife, a salary.  He rode that wave for as long as he could and he felt it slope downward once some new talent joined the circuit.  Once he lost.  He was never going to be that good again and it tore him apart.  He didn’t know how to replace what he’d lost; he wanted to get it back.  If it was something in particular, a technique, he’d fix it as quickly as he could.  But, it wasn’t any specific thing.  It was more like he’d lost a persona.  He’d lost that spirit of youth and confidence he’d once had in just about five years time, that fast.

In the green tiled locker room, where the fluorescent lights flickered from a bad electrical current, where Henry’s wife stood with all her weight on one leg and his niece squinted her eyes even harder than Henry did, he couldn’t take his eyes off Melanie.  She still had everything he’d lusted after when they first met.  Although her skin crinkled around her eyes a little more when she laughed and her body had filled with age.  When he could see her bra strap, it paved valleys in between her soft skin.  They were his, his little villages in between mountains, where he’d call himself mayor when his fingers dug under them.  She had some success in selling real estate around St. Louis and people still acted like she was something special.  Henry didn’t think he was good enough for her sometimes, or more that they both differed enough that he could never find himself committing as sincerely as some other people would whenever the two of them would go out to eat or have sex.

“That was a tough match, baby,” said Melanie.  Her tone wasn’t pleasant when she said baby.

“Huh . . .” Henry said.

“Don’t say too much at once,” Melanie said, resting one hand on her hip.

Her hips were already starting to look like her mother’s.  “What do you want me to say?  I’m tired.” He paused and looked up at the lights and shut his eyes tight.

“Well I thought you did great, Hank!” said Vanessa.  She smiled at Henry sitting slumped over with his elbow on his knee in a chair with his duffel bag and racquet next to him.  Henry smiled back.

“Don’t worry honey, he’s upset right now,” she said and winked at Vanessa, who smiled and asked if she could go.  Melanie told her she could wait outside.

Henry and Melanie had been taking care of Melanie’s niece for a few months now.  The child was sent to them as a last resort.  Melanie’s sister was the only other surviving member of her immediate family, and she wound up dead last May.  The coroner pronounced it as a heart attack . . . at thirty-three . . . Vanessa didn’t have anywhere else to live.  She told a policewoman about Melanie, and the next thing Henry knew they had something like a daughter.

“So, do you want to talk about this?”

“The Lost Symbol” has been in a five year stasis during which time Brown has researched yet another intriguing combination of history and secret codes for main character Langdon to research. Originally titled “The Solomon Key,” “The Lost Symbol” is the third installment of Brown’s Robert Langdon series which began with “Angels & Demons” in 2000 and was followed by the controversial “The Da Vinci Code” in 2003.

The novel follows Langdon over a 12 hour period of time.

“This novel has been a strange and wonderful journey,” said Brown in a press release. “Weaving five years of research into the story’s twelve-hour timeframe was an exhilarating challenge. Robert Langdon’s life clearly moves a lot faster than mine.”

The April 20th announcement of the books release date coincides with the upcoming release of “Angels & Demons,” starring Tom Hanks as Langdon. “Angels & Demons” follows Langdon as he investigates a series of murders in Vatican City.

“The Lost Symbol” can be reserved on Amazon.com.

So what do you think, Blast readers? Are you going to reserve your copy of “The Lost Symbol” and see “Angels & Demons” the day it comes out? Or do you think Dan Brown is past his prime in the world of thriller novels? Give us your feedback, and the first 10 commenters will receive an exclusive pass to a pre-screening of “Angels & Demons” in Boston as well as a free promotional movie poster.

Boston Ballet’s The Sleeping Beauty danced its way into the hearts of a packed house Friday night. 

The opening curtain revealed vibrant costumes of red and orange.  Women of the Court and their men dressed in their best were present at the christening of the Princess Aurora. Young Fairy Godmothers contrasted the Women of the Court in cool colored costumes of blues and purples. The Godmothers each honored the infant princess with a solo dance. Some more traditional, others with flare that caused pleasant laughter throughout the theater. Their graceful flutters across the stage melted with the musical score to tell the story of a happier time.

While out of synch in places, the use of lines and beautiful choreography made this act a favorite among the audience. At the end of the prologue Fairy Carabosse, arrives and is angered that she has not been invited to the celebration. Riding on stage with the help of her four evil hobbit-like attendants in a chariot made of twisted branches, she casts a dark spell upon the young royal,  distressing everyone on stage until the beautiful Lilac Fairy comes to the rescue.

In act one the audience meets the young, graceful, and high-energy princess Aurora. Celebrating her twentieth birthday, four suitors come to court her but she dances with and dismisses them all.  When presented with a sparkling spindle from an ominously trudging hooded stranger, she leaps and twirls around the stage with excitement until she pricks her finger. At that moment the hooded stranger reveals herself as the evil Fairy Carabosse and the princess and all her guests fall into a deep sleep that will last for a hundred years until the spell is broken with a kiss from a prince. Layers of curtains fall to build a dense forest around the sleeping princess as act one ends.

The love story between Prince Florimud and princess Aurora comes to life in act two. While hunting in the forest, the prince sees the ethereal dancing princess in visions created by good Lilac Fairy. The Prince tries to dance with the beautiful vision but to his frustration cannot touch her and is soon led by the Lilac Fairy to his sleeping love. Mounting a boat and floating across the stage through fog and woods they finally enter the great gates where the princess lays. The prince enters the room and kisses his love to break the spell.

In the final act the wedding takes place. Everyone from mythical lands attends, from the Puss in Boots and the White Cat to Belle and the Beast. Each performs a duet to honor the soon to be newlyweds.

While some partners danced several times and seemed to take away from the love story, others added comic relief and refreshment. The audience cheered while the White Cat swatted away the advances of Puss and laughed as the two danced in circles chasing each others tails. This act felt very long and didn’t seem to focus on the lovebirds, Florimud and Aurora, who had a few duets with beautiful choreography in which the prince lifted his love into the air in stunning formations.

In the end, the audience gave a standing ovation. The prologue definitely stole the show as well as the Puss in Boots and the White Cat. 

The Boston Ballet’s performance of The Sleeping Beauty swept up its audience in a timeless love story while still not taking itself too seriously — incorporating silly anecdotes throughout the performance. The show is a hit for all ages with something for everyone and the vibrant costumes and beautiful backdrops are sure to have you sitting on the edge of your seat for the whole Theatre through May 3.

It’s Easy Being Green by Crissy Trask
In It’s Easy Being Green you can learn how to make better choices for the environment. This is what the busy person needs to start making changes today. Get informative, comprehensive and practical information for adopting greener buying habits and identifying earth-friendly products; shopping for green products online; participating in online activism; and learning from over 250 eco-tips for cultivating a sustainable environment.

Some very simple tips include installing rain gutters and rain barrels to collect rainwater from your roof to use in the garden. Shifting appliance use to off-peak hours. Making your own household cleaners instead of relying on toxic commercial products. Or submerging a plastic bottle in your toilet tank to save one quart of water per flush and thousands of gallons a year.

This book concurrently presents a plan, tips and an Internet resources list that you can use to follow-through on good intentions. An extensive product labels list is also provided to help interpret how some foods are produced. If you haven’t invested in substantially greener behaviors, consumerism and politics because you didn’t know how or thought it was difficult, help is here: It’s Easy Being Green is a handbook for all those who aspire do more to protect the environment but want it to be simpler.

Microgreens by Eric Franks
This can become your guide to growing nutrient-packed greens. Microgreens-vegetables harvested soon after sprouting-are expected to be one of 2009’s hottest food trends. With simple instruction, Microgreens teaches how to plant, grow, and harvest microgreens from one’s own garden. The small amount of space needed to grow microgreens-a porch, patio, deck, or balcony will do-allows anyone to easily incorporate them into their daily meals, and the greens’ nutritional potency make them a must-eat in a healthy diet.  Some of the microgreens discussed include amaranth, arugula, basil, beet, cilantro, cress and mustard.

Green by Design: Creating a Home for Sustainable Living by Angela M. Dean
In this book, Dean offers specific, hands-on advice for creating sustainable homes. The book’s four primary chapters cover design intent, design process, design strategies, and design specifics. Each of these chapters provides some information in the main text, then conveys a lot more information through detailed case studies. Although it is not a detailed reference guide, this book does provide a solid overview of green building for homeowners. So, if you are planning a remodeling in your apartment or venturing into buying a new house you can find out what options you have  to create a environmentally aware home.

Charles Perrault first published the traditional fairytale of Sleeping Beauty in 1697.  In 1890 Sleeping Beauty was preformed as a ballet in St. Petersburg to a score by Pytor Tchaikovsky with choreography by Marius Petipa. It would come to be known as Tchaikovsky’s first major success in ballet composition and the choreography was held as a standard for composers to come.

A cross between exquisite solos and elaborate party scenes Sleeping Beauty has every element of a fairytale ballet.  There is the evil witch with her menacing accomplices, good fairies, prince charming, and a blonde princess. Over the 100-year span it covers birth, death, marriage and everything in-between.  The ballet becomes more than just a story of love and spinning wheels, but a narrative carefully told through movement, expression and music.  With the single flick of a finger a ballerina may express what had taken a song in any cartoon version.

With updated scores by Jonathan McPhee, Boston Ballet Musical Director, and choreography by Artistic Director Mikko Nissinen The Sleeping Beauty never gets old at the Boston Ballet.  Running at the Wang Theater from April 23, 2009 to May 3, 2009, The Sleeping Beauty promises to revisit old memories and create new ones.

This marks the beginning of “Either You’re In, or You’re In the Way,” a memoir and how-to book by young film-makers (and twin brothers) Logan and Noah Miller. After washing out of minor league baseball, the boys decided that instead of working on construction back home in Northern California, they’d crash on their buddy’s floor in Los Angeles and become screenwriters. Their first film, “Touching Home,” chronicles the story of the brothers and their father, a talented craftsman and roofer who died in poverty after succumbing to alcoholism.

With no money, no contacts, and no initial clue about how to make a movie, the two young men proceeded to produce, direct and star in their film, opposite famed actors Ed Harris and Brad Dourif, within one year. The film is tentatively slated for release sometime this fall. The Millers gave Blast movie critic Emma Rose Johnson a call from their home in Northern California to discuss inspiration, fate and Brad Dourif’s theories on goat milk. In form true to the first line of the Millers’ book, they speak in one voice.

Emma Rose Johnson: First, I just want to congratulate you on the film and on the book — it sounds like it was great experience for you guys. And, really, quite extraordinary, the fact that you guys managed to pull this together, with nothing that people usually would have. I would just like to talk briefly about how you became interested in film. You two started out wanting to be ballplayers. When did you think this was a better route?

Miller Brothers: Thank you first of all for the compliment. We always loved movies growing up. We tried to go to as many movies as possible — we’d usually go to the 11 a.m., the matinee, and then you know, just sneak around jumping from one movie theater to the next (laughter). Actually, no, we paid for every single movie — I just want to make that clear we don’t do that anymore. And we had a buddy who was living in Los Angeles — I don’t know if you know the geography out West, but we were living in Tucson at the time, and Tucson is connected to Los Angeles on I-10, it’s a straight shot and I-10 would take us to I-5, which would take us up to Northern California. We didn’t really want to go back home and pound nails, and our buddy said, “Hey look, you guys need to go through L.A. on your way home, why don’t you guys just crash on the floor of my apartment for a few months until you figure out what you want to do with your lives.” (Actually it was a few weeks, which turned into a few months.)

So we went and crashed on our buddy’s floor. Baseball hadn’t worked out, and we wanted to figure out what we were going to do with our lives. And we always had people growing up telling us, “Do what you love.” So baseball was our first love and movies were sort of our second favorite thing to do. And we had this story that we wanted to tell about our dad and we wanted to turn it into a movie. So we bought a book on screenwriting, called “Lew Hunter’s 434″ and we read it. It just sort of made sense to us. So we started writing the screenplay for “Touching Home” about us and our dad. We got the writing bug after that.

EJ: When I read the book, it really is a fascinating insight into the world of film making, especially on the West coast. You worked with non-professional actors in Tucson, you worked with people who’d just come to California to get their start and then you worked with major people in production, people like Robert Dalva, and then of course with Ed Harris and Brad Dourif. What was it like working in this nexus between A-list people and people who were just hoping for a break?

MB: It was a very exciting dynamic, I think. You had a passion and a desire and the really intensive enthusiasm of people that were like us, like first-timers; and then you had the insight and the wisdom and the experience and also the passion of the veterans. It really created a very exciting sort of mixture with a really diverse crew. Each side sort of fed off of each other you had the young, passionate up-and-comers, and the seasoned veterans that provided insight and experience. So it was pretty fascinating. I think the veterans got a kick out of working with the people who were trying to break in, and the first-timers did with them.

EJ: You did get to work with some truly terrific actors. Was it frightening being in control of all that talent?

MB: I think you have the same fears and doubts as anyone going into this. But we weren’t going to allow that fear to prevent us from realizing our dream from making this movie. And at the same time we tried to break out of that intimidation by saying “These are people just like us who are actually here to help us make our movie, not hinder us from making our movie.” We said in the book that making movies is a team art. So we had this extraordinary team of people who are helping us make the movie. Ed [Harris] came up two days early to rehearse and get to know us a little more and we drove out to all the locations and talked about our dad quite a bit; Ed was trying to discover who our dad was. And he asked us where we could have a good cheeseburger, and we knew this burger joint called Ebenezer down the road, and we got burger and shakes. About half way through he said, “I want to let you know that I understand what you guys are up against, and that you’ve got a tremendous amount of pressure on you. But I’m here to help you realize your dream, so I’m here for you guys. Whatever you need just let me know.” And that released a lot of pressure, the moment he said that.

EJ: So it almost helped having a guy there who knew that this was hard, who knew the score.

MB: Absolutely.

EJ: You talk a lot about angels in your book, people who just sort of fell into your lap who were just terrific and really brought you forward. I think a lot of people have this image of the film industry as just soulless and unhelpful, but that doesn’t seem to be the case for you.

MB: Well, it’s not like we didn’t meet a lot of soulless people. No, we just highlighted the people that we were able to get on board and who believed in us. We were really extremely fortunate, that there were so many people that helped us along the way. It definitely gave us a really positive outlook of the movie business in general, I would say. At least the people that made movies, from the actors to the crew, to everyone involved overall in the production — we were really, really, fortunate to assemble a team that we did. We got really lucky.

EJ: There were so many ways that this could have failed. Do you think there’s an idea that maybe fate was in play here?

MB: I guess whatever you call it — faith, luck, coincidence, I think you could bundle them all together. We never had many breaks prior to that, and then all of a sudden it just started happening for us. I guess I feel like our dad was with us, because there were so many times when it seemed like this kind of miraculous event occurred that actually was in our favor. So we definitely felt like our dad was pulling some strings from somewhere. Whatever you luck he had that he wasn’t able to use in life he used it to help us in death. I think that also, we’re not afraid to ask people for help or to place a phone call to a stranger. I think the world opens up to you if you’re willing to just go after it.

EJ: I’m a massive fan of Brad Dourif, and I was wondering if you could just talk about working with him for a minute. He sounded just so interesting and strange.

MB: He’s a fascinating, fascinating man. We call him a genius. He’s one of the smartest people we’ve ever met. You can have a conversation with him on astronomy, and rocket science, and then switch right into the nutritive qualities of goat milk. I’m serious.

EJ: You had a conversation about goat milk?

MB: Oh yeah, absolutely! He told us all about the health benefits and the importance of rearing children on goat milk — I wish I could remember more of the details. He has an expansive intellect and he’s really extraordinary artist. He’s very eccentric, in a good way, a way that keeps you fascinated and keeps you curious. He taught us quite a bit about the art of not just acting but of film making in general. He’s done so many movies that if he wanted to, he could direct. That’s how extensive his knowledge is of the overall craft. He’s definitely one of a kind. I’ve never met anybody like him.

EJ: I have to ask — you guys talk about “sleep-directing” which is this weird hallucination/dream while you were in production. Has that stopped?

MB: Oh, no, that just lasted a short time. Now we just don’t sleep. I’d much rather be sleep-directing than have no sleep. Yeah it’s pretty crazy — I think because it’s so intense when you’re shooting you don’t…that’s you’re still in it when you’re sleeping because you’re so completely focused with your entire mind, solving all these problems. So then when you try to go to sleep you’re still in that, you can’t escape it. I don’t know if you’ve ever waited tables, or done any sort of job where it’s the same exercise over and over and over, and you try to go to sleep that night and you’re still doing that, that’s what happens when you’re directing.

EJ: What gave you the idea to write a book about your experience?

MB (Logan): We had no intention of writing a book, until we started telling people how we made our movie. We got in the editing room, and had a little bit of time to where we would run into people on the street and catch them up on what we’ve been doing for the past year. And almost to the person, when we would tell our story, they would go, “Wow, you should make that your next movie, or write a book about it.” For a while we didn’t really give much thought to it. We figured we needed time to finish the movie. But we kept hearing it over and over, and Noah kept saying, “Look, we should write the book,” and I kept saying, “We’re editing the movie right now, we don’t have time, how are we going to write this book?” And he kept saying, “Look, Robert, our editor, he doesn’t show up until 10:30 or 11. We could get up at 5:30, write until Robert shows up, and we’ll have first draft in a few months and we’ll be glad that we did it.” He kept pounding me every single day, over and over again. “We gotta write this book, we gotta write this book, we gotta write this book.” Finally, I just gave in because I just wanted him to shut up.

Then there are the Miller brothers.

Logan and Noah Miller, twin brothers from Northern California, had a very singular experience with the Hollywood machine, which they describe with pinache and infectious style in their first book “Either You’re in, or You’re in the Way.” The brothers, after the death of their father, made a promise to get their script “Touching Home” made into a film within one year, with Ed Harris as the star. One year. With no money, and no real contacts in Hollywood. THe book tells the story of that eventful year, in which they wheeled, dealed, and maneuvered every level of the film industry to make their dream come true. They worked with everyone from non-professional actors and young hopefuls, to method actors, to angry teamsters, to Academy Award-winning production people. It’s not too much of a spoiler to say that they’re successful in their quest; though the book is a mix of memoir, family history, and how-to book for young, aspiring film makers, “Either You’re In” is actually a fascinating look at the way such success always happens in America: a madcap combination of hard work, daring, embellishment and a heavy dose of pure dumb luck.

In case you’re keeping count, there are literally thousands of ways this enterprise could have failed, and part of the great fun of the book is watching two young, gregarious, slightly wild men walk into big important offices, with big important people, and manage to wrangle talent, support and money out of them. Instead of the faceless monster of Big Hollywood, we see reasonable people who truly, actually want to see a creative duo succeed in their quest. The brothers wrote the film about their father, a brilliant craftsman and roofer who fell to alcoholism and became homeless for years before his death.

The brothers (who speak as one being, saying in the beginning of the book “Bro is me and I am bro.”) have a knack for easy and capable, if not terribly complex, storytelling. As the overarching arc (two guys with a dream) is somewhat trite, the true gems lie in the characters who people the landscape of their story. Especially delightful is their strange experience working with brilliant character actor Brad Dourif, who loves astronomy and cannot work without a hi-definition television, a moving scene where they have lunch at a burger joint with true mensch Ed Harris and a hysterical night they spend in Tuscon pulling off a difficult scene while their ruffian assistants get drunk on the set.

This is a truly American story — a couple of outlaws breaking all the rules and getting fame and glory in the process (there’s a reason one major chunk of the book is called “Desert Shoot-Out”). I’m a pretty cynical person, but who doesn’t want to see these guys strike it rich with a little film they wrote, produced, directed and starred in themselves, with nothing to their names but about $50,000 in credit card debt? If anyone in the sunlit universe of Southern California can prove Ellroy wrong, these are the two to do it.

“If I had to choose a few books for our leaders today to read they would be Vergil’s Aeneid and some Greek and Roman classics,” says Marie Bolchazy, executive vice president of Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers. “The classics are the foundation of our civilization, and we still live by and debate the same ideas they did back then, whether we realize it or not.”

Bolchazy recommends four books that have a wide-ranging appeal and can get anyone up to speed on how our past informs our future:

• “Vergil’s Aeneid,” translated by G. B. Cobbold:
  An action-packed epic tale, the Aeneid is the story of a man whose city is destroyed by war, who struggles to find a higher purpose in life and leaves the woman he loves to fulfill his destiny. The eternal struggle between good and evil is featured in this fast-moving history of Rome. The debate over war and morality could just as easily be taking place in the halls of Congress or the opinion pages of today’s newspapers.
• “Classical Considerations — Useful Wisdom from Greece and Rome:” Even thousands of years ago people knew that wisdom comes from sharing ideas with each other and with those who have gone before. In this book, a diverse group, including students, a psychiatrist, Vietnam veterans and no less an authority on leadership than Penn State football coach Joe Paterno, share in their own words how these ancient writings have influenced their lives.
• “The Epic of Gilgamesh” by Danny P. Jackson: The epic of Gilgamesh goes back to 2800 BC. Translated for the first time in the 1850’s, this ancient work, which predates the Bible, created a theological stir in Christian Europe. The story of the flood, the myth of the loss of immortality due to a serpent and the civilization of the first male are some of the stories found 2,000 years later in the Bible. The historical hero Gilgamesh goes through various stages of manhood — hormonal, intimacy, empire-building, awakening, search for immortality, finally obtaining the herb of immortality and ultimately losing it to a serpent. This Bolchazy-Carducci edition has been favored by the Great Books Foundation and Prentice-Hall (which includes it in their literature anthology), and was translated into Turkish. It is also published with a Hebrew translation. The epic is read by thousands of students in college and high school, with 15 original illustrations in color and 18 illustrations depicting the ancient world of the Mesopotamians. The epic is extremely important in comparative mythology and religions.
• “When in Rome:” When you just can’t bring yourself to sit down with heavy themes like the battle between good and evil, you can laugh and learn with a book of cartoons featuring Julius Caesar, Medusa and the Trojan War. Because, after all, if you can’t laugh at history, you won’t learn from it.

  Courtesy of ARAcontent

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/03/learning-about-the-past-can-help-you-prepare-for-the-future/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/03/nus-new-dance-crew-debut/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/03/nus-new-dance-crew-debut/#comments Wed, 25 Mar 2009 18:48:22 +0000 Blast Magazine Newsroom http://blastmagazine.com/?p=11449 Northeastern University’s newest dance organization, No Limits Dance Crew, is preparing for their first performance, which will be held at the Tower Auditorium Theatre at The Massachusetts School of Art and Design on April 3 at 7:30 p.m.

  The one-time only show is free to the public and is expected to fill up fast. This student-run dance group has more than 120 dancers and will be showcasing 16 dance pieces in various styles, including Jazz, Hip Hop, Belly dancing and Lyrical genres to name a few. The all-inclusive No Limits Dance Crew is open to the entire Northeastern Community, and in addition to holding its own performances, the group is dedicated to collaborating with other NU creative arts groups and to being involved in the community.

  

  The group also offers classes in all genres for $2 each for non-members. Classes are free for members. The classes are member-taught and the performance pieces are member-choreographed and this organization is truly a labor of love, and that love is for dance.

  The Tower Auditorium is located directly in front of the Green Line E Branch’s Longwood Avenue stop at 621 Huntington Avenue.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/03/nus-new-dance-crew-debut/feed/ 15 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/03/waging-peace-at-boston-college/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/03/waging-peace-at-boston-college/#comments Wed, 25 Mar 2009 16:51:27 +0000 Terri Ciccone http://blastmagazine.com/?p=11427 CHESTNUT HILL — Imagine walking into someone’s home and seeing a child’s drawing on the refrigerator. It’s filled from edge to edge with bright colors, wobbly lines and adorable depictions of everyday scenes. Now imagine taking a closer look at that drawing and noticing that in it there is a helicopter shooting bullets at a person who’s lying dead on the ground with blood coming out of his head. Meanwhile, a lime green and pink tank spits bullets at a cozy yellow and orange home made up of the most basic of shapes.

  A child who escaped the nightmare in Darfur drew this disturbing image coated in candy colors.

  Waging Peace
  Showing until March 27
  Boston College’s Gargan Hall in the Bapst Library

  That drawing is among a set of 500 others done by child refuges of Darfur as part of a traveling exhibition called Waging Peace.  The event is sponsored by Boston College’s center for Human Rights and International Justice, and the Center for the Arts and Social Responsibilities.

  In 2007, Waging Peace member Anna Schmitt went to the country of Chad to learn about the living situations and humanitarian rights of Darfuri and Chadian refugees. Schmitt began collecting testimonials from adults in these areas when her focus turned to the youth, who had witnessed just as much terror as their elders. Schmitt handed out paper and pencils to kids between the ages of 6 and 18, and asked them to draw their future hopes and their strongest memories. What she found were honest depictions of the horror that these children witnessed in their everyday lives.

  The government of Sudan’s story of the events that have unfolded in the past four years is not surprisingly very different from the pictures drawn by the children. What makes this exhibit fascinating is that the viewer enters with the back-of-the-mind thought that children have no reason to dramatize or fabricate their illustrations. At this age they are naïve to the workings of politics and of government and its role in the gore and terror that they witnessed.

  They just drew what they saw.

  The sketches in the exhibit feature a number of elaborate events. Just as an American child might draw a scene from their home or school, the Darfuri children depict villages on fire, men on horseback shooting machine guns into crowds, and tanks and helicopters shooting into the air and dropping bombs on towns. The one common element that ties all of the drawings together is the blatant, and obvious red scribbles. Thick red smudges draw the viewer’s eye to outlines of adults, animals, and babies that lie on the floor of the representational villages, unmistakably and brutally murdered.

  The images serve a duel purpose. While serving as a form of therapy for children that have obviously been emotionally scarred, the pictures also serve as an eye opener to audiences that may be unaware of the crisis that has taken over Darfur. The illustrations also provide evidence that there is much more brutality happening in Darfur than is being represented by its government. Therefore, many of the pictures will be submitted as evidence to the International Criminal Courts in the proceedings against officials of Sudan that have denied policies of genocide. The drawings certainly bring a level of awareness of the tragedy in Darfur to Boston, and shows how art therapy can be a useful tool when helping children and others deal with a crisis.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/03/waging-peace-at-boston-college/feed/ 1 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/03/mcsweeneys-video-art-spiegelman-book/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/03/mcsweeneys-video-art-spiegelman-book/#comments Wed, 04 Mar 2009 16:58:33 +0000 Emma Rose Johnson http://blastmagazine.com/?p=10441 Literary web site McSweeney’s celebrated the arrival of Art Spiegelman’s new book with a beautiful two-minute video chronicling the inner-workings of the celebrated graphic novelist.

  Spiegelman, who wrote and illustrated the Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel “Maus”, released his latest compilation “Be a Nose!” March 1. The book is a reproduction of the artist’s sketchbooks, a meandering panoply of eerie musings from what many consider to be the father of the mopdern graphic novel.

  The video, also titled “Be a Nose!” and directed by Lars Edwards, is a work of art in itself. Edwards took a few of Spiegelman’s drawings and animated them, fitting the barely two-minute video to the cool stylings of Pat Carney, the drummer for The Black Keys.

  It’s strange how weirdly affecting this little opus is: tiny creatures crawl out of heads, arrows point to nowhere, or lead you right back to the beginning on where you were. A short interlude where a hook-nosed creation goes fishing while wondrous sea creatures floating gently below his boat is particularly moving.

  It’s a lovely rendition of Spiegelman’s work: many times when reading his novels it’s impossible to tell whether his ideas come from his dreams or his nightmares. Carney was an excellent choice for music as well- his drumming in this is “cool” in the way that I believe that word was actually intended.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/03/mcsweeneys-video-art-spiegelman-book/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/03/treasure-in-three-jewels/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/03/treasure-in-three-jewels/#comments Wed, 04 Mar 2009 06:32:14 +0000 Gina Fraumeni http://blastmagazine.com/?p=10434 The Boston Ballet’s Jewels was definitely a show that shined through and through. A unique gem, it is composed of three acts, representing three distinct flavors and nationalities in the form of emeralds, rubies and diamonds.

  

  The first act is made up of classical dancing with duets that suggest a love story. The dances are elegant in composition and the dancers are great at letting the dance take them over, allowing a fluid collaboration throughout. There are solos that allow the dancers to show off their strengths and abilities, while the duets and corps work together like one body in the music. Watching the dance is mesmerizing like a bonfire on a cold night.

  The second act, Rubies was more contemporary with some sultry jazz influence. It was much more playful. Some of the use of form and ways they held themselves in general were reminiscent of the Spanish flamenco. There was a sense of freedom in the air, as the dancers ran about the stage, chasing one another, almost like a game of tag. Much bolder, the dancers showed true professionalism in their confidence in one another. One of the most impressive aspects of this act was that some of the dancing relied dancers “falling” on one another, leading them into another step or pace- this took much trust and good collaboration.

  Finally, Diamonds, the final act picked up where the first act left off in that it was much more classical. We pick back up with the implied love story, and go on to more mature, perhaps conservative dancing. The form was more Russian than French, which can be much more delicate and graceful to the eye. In terms of their costume and posing, many of the dances reminded me of a Degas painting. Others were suggestive of the Three Graces more commonly recognized in Botticelli’s “Primavera” and in Greek mythology.

  The final act was truly a work of art and the whole show is worth seeing. The Boston Ballet really out-did themselves in terms of their hard efforts and very apparent talent.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/03/treasure-in-three-jewels/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/03/lol-cats-sell-out/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/03/lol-cats-sell-out/#comments Tue, 03 Mar 2009 21:12:23 +0000 Steve Macone http://blastmagazine.com/?p=10402 If you’ve turned on a computer in the last two years, you’ve probably seen Lolcats, those funny feline photos, the ones that use misspelled captions and capture cats, as John Hodgman puts it in his introduction to this new book, “at the precise moment they are talking.”  
  The Laugh-Out-Loud Cats Sell Out
  By A. Koford
  Abrams ComicArts
  $12.95

  Now comes The Laugh-Out-Loud Cats Sell Out, a collection of distantly related comics drawn in an old-timey style. The book’s premise is that the comics, written by cartoonist, walrus hunter, spy, hobo and retired U.S. senator Aloysius Gamaliel Koford, first appeared in newspapers between 1912 and 1914. None of this is true, of course, and the book is probably (definitely) the work of “Aloysius’ great-grandson,” Adam Koford, who is real. 

  Written in that distinctly “Icanhascheezburger” speak, the book is a series of single-frame escapades involving the hobo-cat duo Kitteh and Pip, all of which take place in the early twentieth century. There’s no real plot, just a series of recurring themes, such as Pip’s obsession with “Caturday” and things being invisible (Invisbl everything? Kitteh: No, itz snow”) References include Lord of the Rings and Lovecraft.

  Hodgman writes in his introduction that the production of the original online Lolcat pictures is a “challenging hobby” that is “much, much harder than just sitting down and drawing an old-timey picture of cats.” This is apparently him joking, calling attention to the superficial creation of this viral phenomenon and the often-underrated artistic street cred of cartoonists. (Hodgman later calls Koford a genius.) But in fact, Koford’s cartoons do, in the end, leave the question of what work is being done by their creation. They reference things, yes, and are occasionally stand-alone funny. But an original Lolcat picture, when done right, is without question a kind of work, a situation and a funny punchline in the form of the caption.

  Or a triangulation of sorts: the photo of a cat doing something-which we find all the more funny because the notoriously uncooperative animal is clearly not in on the joke-and the creative affixing of the anthropomorphism, just so, enchanting the scene so that now that cat jumping is actually riding an invisible bike! Then there’s the play between the facial expressions that are so spot-on, almost intelligently human, and the grammar that butchers the sentiment and reminds us that cats are cats and not as smart as us, that if they could talk and think out loud, well, those silly guys would still never master grammar. I mean, c’mon, they’re cats.   

  So, like Chuck Norris facts, Lolcats succeed so frequently because they are an inherently silly premise that ultimately serves as a blank canvas. And the work with the online Lolcats has always been in the painting onto that canvas, even if there is no drawing being done. But with Koford’s cartoons, since the raw material is not the reality of a digital photograph but whatever he decides to sketch, there remains the question of what work is actually being done, of what the point of Koford’s cartoons are if they’re not to be consistently, well, laugh out loud funny.  

   

  What is done is something subtler. At first glance they appear to be a cartoonist having a little fun, meshing the old Krazy Kat style with this new Lolcat speak. But, Koford’s cartoons also raise a deeper question: just how do we categorize this current Lolcat phenomenon in the ever-thickening file cabinet our cultural legacy? Especially as these files now become electronic, where will these less-than-serious artifacts end up, say, when we are as far removed from Lolcats as we are from the original old-timey cartoons? 

  So when Koford sketches pip chasing after a spool and saying “I Love Where Dis Thread Iz Going!” we groan at the pun, and then realize how unsettling it is to hear this almost hyper-timely speech applied to characters in hobo cloths. And because these characters are using this i-can-has way of talking the scenes become not merely pat, linear jokes about how things are different now from how they were back then. These are not Plugger cartoons.

  No, a project centered this boldly on something so recent and possibly transient has the effect of eviscerating any linear humor-time continuum, of asking, where will Lolcats-and cartoons and memes and humor, and possibly even the recently overdone concept of fake-premise humor books, for that matter- be when Koford is, as the fictional creator of this book is supposed to currently be, 117 years-old?  

  This is, I guess, what they are doing. It’s kinda cool. Still, call me new-fashioned, but I like the original (newer) version of Lolcats, where they just make silly faces.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/03/lol-cats-sell-out/feed/ 4 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/03/in-other-rooms-other-wonders/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/03/in-other-rooms-other-wonders/#comments Mon, 02 Mar 2009 04:54:28 +0000 Kristen V. Brown http://blastmagazine.com/?p=10178 Pakistani author Danyal Mueenuddin begins his inaugural book simply, with a dedication to his mother and an epigraph: “Three things for which we kill — Land, women and gold.”

  The Punjabi proverb, written in English and the highly stylized lettering of Urdu calligraphy, anticipates with startling accuracy the source of conflict in Mueenuddin’s brilliant debut collection of fiction, In Other Rooms, Other Wonders.

  In the title story, the wealthy patriarch of a feudal landowning family, KK Harouni, falls for Husna, a shrewd, young social climber looking to integrate herself into the glitzy, jet-setting life of Lahore’s wealthy elite. Much to the chagrin of Harouni’s europhile daughters and estranged wife, Harouni takes Husna, with her simple clothes and unrefined manners — imagine a Pakistani Eliza Doolittle, if you will — under his roof, at first only as a servant of sorts, but eventually as a mistress.

  Husna shows up at Harouni’s door, a distantly related young girl of a family that “had not so much fallen into poverty as failed to rise”. Harouni, a disinterested old man who seems bored to tears with almost everything, finds in Husna a relief from the redundancies of upper crust Lahore. As he explains to his daughter, “She keeps me company. She’s no genius, if you like, but she can play cards and so on.” Mueenuddin’s characters seldom try to sugarcoat the facts of life.

  As many of the women in the Mueenuddin’s grim fairy tales, Husna assumes she can use feminine wiles to climb the social ladder, and avoid marriage to “a compromise, a salary man.” And at first, she succeeds, until, also like many of Mueenuddin’s stories, the fairytale ending is pulled right out from beneath her.

  Mueenuddin builds up his reader’s hope for his characters, only to vindictively strip all hope away in the end. In ‘Saleema’, a young woman and her drugged-up husband move to the cramped servant quarters of the Harouni estate. The woman, Saleema, is the daughter of a prostitute mother and a heroin addicted father seeking for herself a better life. As a maid for the Harouni’s, she meets Rafik, a gentle and reserved valet. Saleema hopes that their affair can somehow make of her an honest woman. Before Rafik, “her love affairs had been so plainly mercantile transactions that she hadn’t learned to be coquettish. But that little hopeful girl in her awoke now.”

  The reader can’t help but root for the honest and wide-eyed (though admittedly shrewd) Saleema, but it’s not long before she winds up drug-addled and dead herself, her child with Rafik begging “in the streets, one of the sparrows of Lahore”.

  In Other Rooms, Other Wonders is partly an exploration into the harsh realities of a modern-day society still bound by class. If this had been Cinderella, most of Mueenuddin’s stories would have ended halfway through, but instead, in his Pakistan, happiness is usually short-lived. Like Husna and Saleema, his characters end up learning a harsh lesson: you can move up or down the ladder, but in the end, motion in Pakistan is only horizontal.

  The collection is, in the tradition of Balzac’s original Comédie humaine, eight stories bound together by the common thread of the moneyed KK Harouni’s household and extended family. Characters reappear throughout the book — sometimes on the main stage, and sometimes as a side note. Set in the Pakistani district of Punjab, Mueenuddin’s stories follow the lives of the rich and powerful Harouni family and its employees — from the managers, drivers, gardeners, cooks, and servants to the patriarch’s young, traveled nephew in Paris.

  The collection sheds light on contemporary Pakistan’s many faces, from the inhabitants of impoverished rural Pakistan to the young, bored nouveau- rich gracing Mueenuddin’s pages feasting on lavish picnics of champagne and cheese or as coke-snorting snobs at Halloween parties in Islamabad.

  Reading In Other Rooms, In Other Wonders, you often get the sense that writing the collection was in some ways Mueenuddin’s method for working out his own problems of identity and feelings towards Pakistan. He spent the first years of his childhood in Pakistan, then was shipped off to an East Coast boarding school at 13 and went on to attend Dartmouth College. A decade after first moving to America, he returned to Pakistan to help his aging father uphold family property that was in danger of being taken over by crafty managers. He spent seven years alone on this farm – an isolated 10 hours from Lahore by a bumpy road – before he moved back to the US to study law at Yale and practice corporate law in New York. Eventually, Mueenuddin, tired of the corporate sector, received a Master of Fine Arts and returned to manage the Pakistan farm, in his spare time writing what would become the stories of In Other Rooms, Other Wonders, which were first picked up by literary rags like The New Yorker and Granta.

  In Mueenuddin’s work, you easily see the characters and colors of his own life. The crafty managers and wily servants of his father’s farm are the same characters who occupy KK Harouni’s farm and Lahore estate, and color the pages in tales like ‘Provide, Provide’ (writes Mueenuddin, Jaglani “would receive a brief telegram, NEED FIFTY THOUSAND IMMEDIATELY” and he would “sell the land at half price, the choice pieces to himself, putting it in the names of his servants and relatives.”). In ‘Lily’, the title character’s eventual betrothed manages his father’s old farm, 10 hours from Lahore by a rough road, where he is beginning to grow vegetables in greenhouses, just as Mueenuddin himself does now. And in the tale ‘Our Lady of Paris’, the character, Sohail, perhaps bears resemblance to Mueenuddin’s own identity struggle: the wealthy Yale law school-educated son of KK Harouni’s brother, Sohail struggles with what to do next in his life – move back to Pakistan and take over his father’s business dealings or live in America with his American girlfriend Helen.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/03/in-other-rooms-other-wonders/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/2009/03/a-blast-tale-wood-and-metal-and-plaster/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/2009/03/a-blast-tale-wood-and-metal-and-plaster/#comments Sun, 01 Mar 2009 04:43:04 +0000 Roger Gude http://blastmagazine.com/?p=9621 An original story by Blast writer Roger Gude

  I was eating hot air when mom told me we were out of gas.  I didn’t like that she included me, I wasn’t out of gas.  She neglected to buy gas in the last town we had passed through, that’s why our car came to a sputter halt on U.S. Historic Route 66.  Hell, I was downright pissed that we were here.  It was hot, I wanted to be somewhere else, and mom had been regurgitating her failing relationship with my father for the past two days so much so that I couldn’t stand sitting in this beat up station wagon anymore.

  “So?” I said.

  “So. . . we’re stranded in the middle of nowhere, it’s hot, I’m grouchy, and-”

  “Just shut up Mom, you put us here.”

  “Don’t talk to me like that.  You wouldn’t be anywhere without me.  Now help me find my phone, I should be able to call someone to help us out.”

  I crossed my arms as she got out of the car.  This 1987 station wagon was a joke.  It’s the year 2005 and she’s still driving her dad’s car.  It was two years ago today that she got the keys to it.  Her father passed away hiking up Mt. Pilatus in Switzerland, he slipped on a rock, and when she met with the rest of her family to receive his will all he left her was a set of car keys and some memories.  This thing has over 100,000 miles on it and guzzles gas like a champ.  The engine coughed like someone with emphysema every time we started it up and the metal surrounding the radio kept me from tampering with it.  It heated up fast in the sunlight.  The tires reeked of use and as nice as wood paneling goes for the color of a car, it’s time had passed.

  I watched mom shuffle through her purse in the backseat, her expression of desperation faded when her fingers rubbed against the familiar grooves of her cell phone.  The leather on the seat had started to boil my skin.  I was used to the heat by now, even the way the leather grabbed onto my skin, but the metal on my seatbelt made me hiss as I feigned interest at her.  We couldn’t get reception out here.  Satellites don’t care about us.

  “Found it!” she exclaimed.

  “Great. . .”

  After about fifteen minutes of fidgeting with her phone she gave up.  I’d begun to watch the road through the passenger’s side rearview mirror.  I watched the wavering heat rise from the pavement and listened to the wind tickle my ears.  She said something about her phone not working.  She decided that our only plan of action was to hitchhike to a gas station.  My tennis shoes hadn’t seen a good walk in a while and I was glad to get away from this old, four-wheeled cocoon, plastered with images of my father and mother’s failure.

  I got out of the wagon, opened the backseat door, it took two pulls of the handle to get the door open, and grabbed my duffle bag.  It was a heavy log with a strap attached.  Mom was struggling with her three suitcases and oversized purse when I walked around the back of the car and grabbed one of them for her.  They all matched, had jewel encrusted initials on the top, S.K.O., and shined like wasted money.  But the worst part about them was the fact that they weren’t even very big.  The suitcases were small and cute and matched and that negated the idea of a suitcase in the first place.  A suitcase should be practical and carry as much as possible without breaking bones instead of being cute and impressive to people who don’t travel.

  It took us a couple hours of walking through the heat before we took a break.  I finally agreed with her when I couldn’t take her whining anymore.  She’d been telling me to take a break every fifteen minutes with excuses ranging from, “My feet hurt,” to “I feel like I’m about to die,” and my nerves were bound to concede.  That and the fact that my clothes were plastered to my skin, my hair was drenched, and this damn suitcase was killing my arm were about all I could handle.  We found a few large boulders off to the right of the highway and sat near them, flirting with shade.

  “What’s in those suitcases, anyways?”

  “Nothing really,” she tugs at her shirt and straightens her shorts out, “just some clothes and stuff.,,”  She lights the cigarette.  “It’s important to me.  You wouldn’t want me to throw away all of you comic books because they were too heavy would you?”

  “No, but I didn’t bring all of my comic books on a trip across the country, now did I?”

  She didn’t respond.

  I watched the cigarette smoke leave her lungs and wondered how that could offer her any relief.  She’s filling her body up with something from outside for just a couple seconds and for what?   Satisfaction?  You can’t be satisfied this way.  Relief is nice, but temporary relief should not be a goal.  We human beings should try and obtain permanent relief and as much as we want to take a drag from a cigarette permanently that just can’t happen, well it could I guess, but those people would smell horrible and die in a couple years.

  Watching her sit there with her cigarette in her mouth made me feel the heat even more.  It was a stupid idea to travel across the country in the middle of the summer.  It made sense to vacation to the south in the winter time; cold hurts because the spring and summer make use forget about it, but huffing across the country when I should be back at home playing video games and smoking pot made me boil.

  Her oversized glasses, her obviously dyed brown hair lightly framing her sweat profile, and her consciously slumped posture under the shade of the rocks made me despise her.  I don’t know why she got to me so much when we first took a break; I think it was my arm.  The muscles in my arm were fighting each other and it felt like both sides were losing.  The pain from carrying the largest of the cute suitcases for a couple hours was catching up to me and venting on her was the best I could do to alleviate myself.  But who was she feeling?  I was the only one around for the next 20 miles or so and she was acting like at any moment some mechanic with broad shoulders would appear out of thin air and whisk her off her feet.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/2009/03/a-blast-tale-wood-and-metal-and-plaster/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/02/heide-hatrys-heads-and-tales/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/02/heide-hatrys-heads-and-tales/#comments Fri, 27 Feb 2009 03:21:07 +0000 Terri Ciccone http://blastmagazine.com/?p=10152 CAMBRIDGE — In artist Heide Hatry’s exhibit “Heads and Tales,” at the Pierre Menard Gallery there is a table. It is a long, slender, metallic and sturdy table often seen in a hospital operating room. The table symbolizes all that we know and are comfortable with.  On top of this table, however, is an idea of much contrast. A decaying body lays on top of it, as though abandoned at her time of death by an entire room of hospital patrons, left to rot and decompose.

  

  And this isn’t even the most disturbing piece at the Harvard Square Gallery.

  Heads and Tales
  Showing until March 15
  Pierre Menard Gallery, 10 Arrow Street, Cambridge
  See also:
  Berkeley Beacon

  Around this body, and around the rest of the gallery, hangs images not so monstrous but equally disturbing. On the walls are pictures of women, shot from only the shoulders up, framed in thick black frames. A closer observation reveals that the women look as if they are not present. They have features that make them look like a woman — pouty lips, all different styles and colors of hair, big black eyes, and some even have nice clothing and accessories. Their eyes are large and dilated, and seem to be fixed on something that is not there. Their skin looks creamy and soft, but at the same time it looks awkward and pale — too pale for the living. That is because they too are dead.

  They look as though they should be seen in a casket, not on gallery walls. Their makeup is heavy and waxy, and the gallery looks like a mortician’s portfolio.

  What makes these woman look so life-like and yet no longer on this earth, are because of the unconventional materials used by Hatry. A sped up projection of the artist creating the pieces is shown on a gallery wall. She pulls apart pig skin and body parts. She unwraps fresh pig eyes from their sockets with the haste and regularity of unwrapping a piece of chocolate. She then carefully sculpts and molds materials that should be in your frying pan to a manikin like frame to give life to a dead woman.

  Some of the women look less fearsome than the others. In the work titled “Head of Debbi Tale: What happened to her by Rebecca Brown,” the woman in the photo looks happy. She has a small smile on her face as she looks at the camera with her head slightly tilted. Her curly blonde hair playfully dances in her face. Other women in the exhibit are not so fortunate, however. One of the more grotesque images, aside from the body, is called “Head of Jennifer, Tale: Goes to the Dogs by Selah Saterstrom.” In this photo, Jennifer does not appear only to be physically dead, but the expression on her face is dead too. Almost her entire eye is black, dilated with a pupil fixed on nothing. Tiny flies crowed her lips, and attempt to cover entire her eyeball. She does nothing, she can’t.

  But it is not only in appearance that Hatry gives the deceits a life-like quality. Juxtaposed with each woman is a frame of text from different writers who the artists asked to pick a woman and give her a story. This creates for a variety of tales for each woman, written as though the viewer has randomly opened a page in a large text book and started reading. Some are written in prose, others are written in the form of poems, stream of consciences, and screen plays, all as different as the women in the frames.

  In the case of the work titled “Head of Nanny, Tale: Losing sequins by Jennifer Belle,” we can read only a snippet of one woman’s life story. The photo is of a darker skinned woman with plump rose-colored lips made of pig parts. Her hair is curly and a wild fiery red. She is photographed like so many others outside in front of leafy green trees. The prose starts of with the sentence, “Before she came to take care of the baby there were several before her who hadn’t worked out, mostly because they got on the nerves of the mother.” The story goes on to tell a short tale of Nanny’s interaction with the child and mother. “Head of Jill, Tale: Big With Child by Rosanna Yamagiwa Alfaro,” we read her story in the form of a play. “Jill: I can feel it (presses the left side of her belly) right here it’s like a little knot. Steve (to audience) she asks me to feel it ten times a day.” We read on to learn that Jill and Steve are getting an abortion.

  Some of the stories are simply small windows into a stranger’s life, and some are more dark and disturbing. By adding these stories to her pictures, Hatry does something that we do not often do in life. She forces us to acknowledge the fact that the dead do not simply become bodies, they were once women with a life, women with a story to tell. We realize that all of these women — sisters, girlfriends, nannys, rape victims, strippers, little girls and housewives will all end up like the woman on the table: dead and decaying, losing their story with their physical appearance.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/02/heide-hatrys-heads-and-tales/feed/ 1 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/oh-my-iyeoka/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/oh-my-iyeoka/#comments Wed, 25 Feb 2009 15:19:19 +0000 Gina Fraumeni http://blastmagazine.com/?p=10052 Looking for something inspirational and a bit international? Check out Iyeoka Okoawo. This woman is an artist of an up and coming genre, known only as “poetry slam.”

  It’s a genre where poetry is read in a rhythmic conduct along with a soulful motif. It can be very inspiring, and it touches the soul. Iyeoka Okoawo is a poetry slammer of Nigerian decent who plans to make a difference with her words.

  In 2006, Okoawo won a New England Urban Music Award for the Best Female Spoken Word Poet, and in 2007 she received a Massachusetts Industry Committee Hip-Hop Award for Spoken Word Artist of the year.

  Iyeoka is also known world-wide. She was sought out by the president of Rwanda to perform a poem for a dinner he was hosting. Her art is like a rap song with more soul and more relevance to a larger audience. Though her medium is unusual where she does not sing her rhythmic words, they are piercing with poignancy.

  

  She was recently at Boston University, where Blast had the chance to see her in action. She will be performing three more times in Massachusetts — Wednesday in Wellesley College at 7 p.m.; at Harper’s Ferry Friday in Allston; and March 13 at Alchemist Lounge in Jamaica Plain.

  Do not miss out. Check out her website at http://www.iyeoka.com.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/oh-my-iyeoka/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/gallery-the-boston-ballet-at-practice/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/gallery-the-boston-ballet-at-practice/#comments Fri, 13 Feb 2009 21:10:44 +0000 Jessica Lander http://blastmagazine.com/?p=9277 Blast Magazine had the chance to attend a Boston Ballet practice session on Friday afternoon, the day after the opening night and American debut of Jiří Kylián’s Black and White.

  We raved about Black and white (see our review) and were also able to get some pictures of Heather Myers, who we interviewed earlier in the week.

  

  All photos: Blast Magazine staff photo/Jessica Lander

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/gallery-the-boston-ballet-at-practice/feed/ 1 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/excellence-as-clear-as-black-and-white/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/excellence-as-clear-as-black-and-white/#comments Thu, 12 Feb 2009 22:24:28 +0000 Gina Fraumeni http://blastmagazine.com/?p=9183 4 out of 4 stars

  Boston Ballet’s Black and White will be a hit. I attended the preview show early this week, and although costumes were not used, the dancing and choreography were phenomenal.

  In the first dance, it was not taken seriously by some of the dancers. One was giggling and losing form while another was behind a beat. However, as the music persisted, the dancers became in-tune with the rhythm. They synced up perfectly.

  Black and White
  2 for $50 or 2 for $100
  Feb. 12-15
  The Citi Wang
  See also:
  Heather Myers interview
  Gallery of the ballet at practice

  The choreography was stunning. Dancers acted like moving sculptures that imitated visual, abstracted interpretations of the classical music used in this show. Choreographer, Jiří Kylián is truly an artist. In this show, the music is his canvas and the dancers are the paint. This show is truly reminiscent of surrealist painting in terms of their abstract movements and bold, yet crisp expression.

  The dancers are obviously talented, and they perform several means of bending and lifting to form human structures. They literally mold themselves to become a single art piece. Even when they move differently, they move in sync with one another. The music puts the dancers (as well as the audience) in a trance, while they put their all into the music.

  This being said, however, one flaw I did notice in the choreography, that is very common in most professional acts, is that although unique lifts can be impressive, they can also be unattractive, as the dancers (regardless of how strong or experienced they are) tend to tremble. During one of the lifts, one person was balanced with one foot on the back of another’s knee, which was awe-provoking, but also nerve-wracking, as the bottom (and as a result the top) dancer was inclined to shake.

  Sometimes, it just looked painful.

  But this is a great show. The first alf is breathtaking with music from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Johann Sebastian Bach and unique interpretations of the songs and concepts, while the second half is just hilariously entertaining. The second half plays with gender roles and awkward situations such as romantic infidelity. The show leaves you feeling upbeat and content with its beautiful concepts and comical finale. If you like contemporary ballet or modern dance forms, or just art in a broad sense, I urge you to see this show. Boston Ballet’s Black and White is truly a show that will keep you continuously entertained.

  Second look: John Guilfoil

  4 out of 4 stars

  I attended opening night on Thursday at the Wang and was very impressed. The last two acts were especially engaging. In the fourth performance, “Falling Angels,” the rhythmic thumping of Steven Reich’s “Drumming, Part I” had me literally on the edge of my seat. And the dancing — forgetaboutit. Unbelievable.

  The third act, the all male “Sarabande” might have been a little too in your face intense. The closing act, however, “Sechs Tanze,” sealed the deal.

  The ballet was playful, engaging, passionate and full of talent provided by the Boston Ballet. Black and White is a marvelous ballet, and we were very lucky to have it first in Boston.

  Don’t miss original Blast Magazine photography Friday!

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/excellence-as-clear-as-black-and-white/feed/ 3 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/interview-boston-ballets-heather-myers/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/interview-boston-ballets-heather-myers/#comments Tue, 10 Feb 2009 05:41:35 +0000 Gina Fraumeni http://blastmagazine.com/?p=8935 Most little girls dream of becoming the prima ballerina, for Heather Myers, one of the soloists from Boston Ballet’s “Black and White,” this dream became reality.

  Although it was not easy, Myers explained eloquently where her endeavors lead her, including when she started, and where she’s at now. Landing a gig with the Boston Ballet took talent, ambition and a pinch of luck, and the Canadian-born Myers has become one of Boston’s finest gems among many of its performers.

  Blast Magazine asked Myers some questions that plenty of arts fans ask themselves while being captivated by her performances in shows like “The Nutcracker” and “Swan Lake.”

  

  Blast: When did you start dancing?

  HM: I started taking free dance classes when I was 4.

  Blast: What made you want to get into to dancing as a profession?

  HM: The transition into a career in dance seemed to happen pretty organically over time as I became more and more serious about it and realized that making a living at it was possible.

  Blast: What did you have to do?

  HM: To become a dancer I went away to professional ballet school at a young age and then trained pretty intensively until shortly after graduating from high school. From there it was a question of extensive auditioning and determination to get my first job.

  Blast: Was it easy?

  HM: Neither the training nor the job hunt was easy but few worthwhile endeavors are.

  Blast: What do you like most about ballet?

  HM: The things I like the most about the art of dance and ballet are its ability to effect and connect with people and the instinctive expressiveness of movement and music that it taps into and develops.

  Blast: Is it your favorite dance style?

  HM: Contemporary ballet or dance such as the Black and White program are my favorite style of dance.

  Blast: What do you like most about B/W?

  HM: As a dancer, what I like most about Black and White is Kylian’s beautiful and direct portrayal of the concepts. The dances feel like an enhancement what we are as humans rather than an interpretation of a story or characters. There is an earthiness and a truth to this program (as well as humor and levity).

  Blast: What’s your favorite part of the show?

  HM: I love the whole show. It is too difficult to pick a favorite part. Seeing the company’s principal dancers doing the work of such a master choreographer is definitely worth the night out!

  Blast: What makes B/W different from other performances?

  HM: This is the U.S. premiere of this full Kylian program. One very unique thing about it is that while it is technically 5 separate pieces, they are really all part of the same presentation and strung together by intention, style and some certain props/costumes, and are enriched by being seen all together.

  It is also a program which is extremely loved by the dancers and meaningful to many of us. There is a lot of dancing for a wide range of company members and we are very lucky and happy to be dancing it: and this will almost definitely come through in our performances.

  Don’t miss Blast’s review of “Blast and White” later this week!

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/02/interview-boston-ballets-heather-myers/feed/ 1 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/02/confronting-a-holocaust-past/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/02/confronting-a-holocaust-past/#comments Tue, 10 Feb 2009 04:02:39 +0000 Kristen Gard http://blastmagazine.com/?p=8640 There is no doubt that Nazi Germany was a haunting place to live in the wake of the Holocaust. Bernhard Schlink addressed these hardships in his 1995 novel “The Reader” and through lectures in Boston last week.

  “The Reader” personalizes the Holocaust by illustrating the turmoil of a man who is in love with a woman who commits a monstrous crime.  Many Germans who lived during the Holocaust dealt with the same struggle.  Furthermore, those who were born in the next generation struggled with the guilt of these crimes.

  “I think those who commit monstrous crimes are not monsters,” commented Schlink at Boston  University.  He discussed the presence of the Holocaust in today’s world saying that, “for my generation the past is still very present.”  He continued with saying how, “future generations can learn from the Holocaust.”

  Schlink said confronting the past is important to prevent equally devastating events in the future and recognize the onset of such events in the present.  Although today’s generation, the third after the Holocaust, does not feel as much guilt as its predecessors, the past continues to have a presence in Germany.

  “Historical events are always unique and always comparable,” said Schlink.

  In The Reader the main character’s, Michael Berg, dilemma falls between love and justice.  Eight years after a love affair with an older woman, Hanna, Berg is a law student witnessing Hanna’s trial. She was a Nazi guard.  He is in a moral battle between what is lawful and what is moral.  Many people found themselves in  this situation during the Holocaust.  Although, many people do not find themselves in the extreme situation that many of the Nazi workers found themselves in – a unique historical event – moral battles transpire daily.

  Despite the necessity to confront the past Schlink clarified that, “fixation on the past is the flipside of the past.”  He demonstrates this in Berg, he is a man who does not appear to find happiness throughout his life and is fixated on his love affair with Hanna and her crimes.

  Director Stephen Daldry accurately portrays the emotional turmoil of post-Nazi Germany in his adaptation of Schlink’s novel.  The many layers of the novel are present throughout the film, which portrayed the struggles and guilt of the Holocaust and post-Holocaust German generations.  When a film student asked Schlink what he thought about the movie, which was released Jan. 9, he concisely responded, “I liked the movie.”

  Originally, Anthony Minghella had the rights of “The Reader”, starring Kate Winslet and Ralph Fiennes.  Eventually he let Daldry and David Hare make the movie.    “The Reader” was nominated for four Golden Globes.  Kate Winslet won Best Performance by an Actress In A Supporting Role in a Motion Picture.  The film has been nominated for five Oscars including Best Picture, Directing, and Adapted Screenplay.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/02/confronting-a-holocaust-past/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/music/2009/02/singing-all-the-way-to-the-bank/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/music/2009/02/singing-all-the-way-to-the-bank/#comments Mon, 02 Feb 2009 04:14:30 +0000 Jenna Nierstedt http://blastmagazine.com/?p=8058 Some may consider a cappella nothing more than a joke of modern popular culture, but the practice of singing without instrumental backup has become more popular than ever, with fans swarming toward unique versions of hit songs. The number of college a cappella groups — always an incubator for this genre — is skyrocketing nationally.

  “I understand why people make fun of it,” said Mickey Rapkin, author of the book “Pitch Perfect: The Quest for Collegiate A Cappella Glory,” in a recent interview. “It’s a group of guys sitting around singing Justin Timberlake songs without instruments. But there’s revenge. They’re laughing too, but they’re laughing all the way to the bank.”

  Boston is home to several college and semiprofessional groups, including Overboard, which consists of eight men living out the dream of rock stars, complete with gigs, fans and recording albums, when they’re not at their full-time jobs.

  But don’t compare this contemporary a cappella group and others like it to those glee clubs your grandparents knew, with four people standing around a microphone singing barbershop tunes, or the Tone Rangers full of sexually ambiguous men.

  The men of Overboard, who range in age from 23 to 31 and balance their regular lives with their singing commitments, take the hits of artists like John Mayer, All American Rejects, Rob Thomas and Fall Out Boy and recreate the original songs’ rhythm and feel using just the sound of their voices.

  “The thing I really like about a cappella is that you don’t need any equipment to do it,” said 29-year-old Nick Girard, who founded Overboard in the summer of 2006. “I don’t like to use the word organic, but it’s really such an easy, spontaneous thing to do.”

  Arranging a cappella, however, is no longer as simple as gathering individuals to sing a song. Not all songs are compatible with the style of a cappella, and writing the score or rote memorizing the compilation can take days for some groups.

  Girard said a song with a strong chord-based foundation lends itself to a cappella better than a song with the guitar and bass playing repetitive and similar notes.

  When he arranges a song for a cappella, Girard said, he generally starts by concentrating on the bass and then bringing in the sounds of the other instruments, like the guitar or piano.

  “You have to figure how many people are in your group and how many notes you need to represent to make your song sound like the real thing,” he said.

  The common sounds used in a cappella to mimic the rhythms of background music include “ooh”s for softer sounds, and “ah”s “dum”s, “do”s and “jen”s for hard sounds.

  But why bother making the human voice sound like an instrument when computer technology can manipulate sounds and certain instruments can modernize even the most classic works of music? Is a cappella even relevant today?

  “The point is to entertain other people and to entertain yourself,” Rapkin said. “Why would technology keep people from singing together? You don’t need to set up; you just need your friends.”

  Old school a cappella was primarily based on barbershop quartets singing jazz, but in the 1990s, the all-male group Rockapella seemed to reinvent the art form, channeling the theme that all sounds would be provided by the members’ “voices and appendages.”

  Today’s groups incorporate contemporary music into their repertoires and make each performance “an exercise in how…close the human voice can come to real instrumental music,” Gerard said.

  “It definitely has a certain charm to it, and it’s always well-received no matter who we sing to,” he added. “Turning popular music and being able to perform it the way we do is an interesting novelty that a lot of people haven’t seen. And there is a lot of money to be had. It’s family friendly and extremely portable.”

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/music/2009/02/singing-all-the-way-to-the-bank/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/01/college-art-group-angry-about-brandeis-university-museum-closure/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/01/college-art-group-angry-about-brandeis-university-museum-closure/#comments Thu, 29 Jan 2009 23:20:52 +0000 Blast Magazine Newsroom http://blastmagazine.com/?p=8055 The College Art Association is expressing anger and disappointment at Brandeis University over its recent decision to close the Rose Art Museum and sell off its rare works to raise money for the school.

  “Neither Brandeis University nor the Rose Art Museum is on the brink of economic collapse, nor are they unable to maintain the collections,” the Association said in a scathing indictment of the school. “Given that no clear explanation has been offered on the school’s financial exigencies, the closure of the Rose Art Museum and the sale of its collection appear to be in violation of professional museum standards and of academic transparency.”

  The CAA cites the Codes of Ethics of the American Association of Museums and the Association of Art Museum Directors, “which clearly state that works of art in museum collections are held as a public trust and that any proceeds of sales must only support the acquisition of new works.”

  “However, perceiving an entire art collection as a disposable financial asset and then dismantling that collection wholesale to cover other university expenses is deeply troubling for all college and university collections,” the CAA said in a statement Thursday.

  The closing of the museum at Brandeis will be devastating to the academic community, not only affecting our colleagues at the museum and students and faculty in the Department of Fine Arts, which offers programs in both studio art and art history, but also depriving the entire arts-loving public in New England and around the world. The teaching of art and art history in higher education is untenable without the direct study of physical works of art, and it appears the Brandeis Board of Trustees has disregarded the kind of scholarship and creativity that have been the hallmark of CAA members for nearly one hundred years.

  The College Art Association is comprised of 14,000 artists, art historians, scholars, curators, collectors, educators, art publishers, and other visual arts professionals are individual members and 2,000 universities and museums.

  The association has called upon the Brandeis University board of trustees to reverse the decision.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/01/college-art-group-angry-about-brandeis-university-museum-closure/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/01/remembering-john-updike/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/01/remembering-john-updike/#comments Thu, 29 Jan 2009 17:18:03 +0000 Steven H. Bagley http://blastmagazine.com/?p=8007 John Updike, one of the most critically acclaimed American authors of the 20th century, died in Danvers, Mass. on Jan. 26.

  Mr. Updike had been battling lung cancer. He was 76.

  The author of the “Rabbit” series and countless contributions to the New Yorker magazine was hailed throughout his career as an author whose work elevated the ordinary aspects of American life.

  In the spring of 2008, the National Endowment for the Humanities chose Mr. Updike to present the Jefferson Lecture, one of, if not the highest honor in the humanities.

  The seeds of his 54-year career were planted when he saw his mother writing at a table, the story goes. He reached huge critical acclaim with his “Rabbit” books, and in 1984, “The Witches of Eastwick” was made into a movie starring Cher, Michelle Pheiffer, Susan Sarandon and Jack Nicholson, and was filmed at the Crane Estate in Essex, Mass.

  The prolific author wrote about a novel a year throughout his career. His work ranged from tales of suburban infidelity to magic realism and science fiction. He wrote for television and the stage in addition to his novels and streams of short pieces published in the New Yorker.

  Los Angeles Times critic David L. Ulin’s obituary of Mr. Updike, published Jan. 27, casts a quietly tragic light on one of America’s most prolific writers.

  Ulin wrote that his image of Mr. Updike will forever remain “as a self-described ‘freelancer,’ who produced a nearly endless stream of book reviews, novels, stories, poems and occasional pieces — more than 60 volumes’ worth in all — because he felt he’d be forgotten if he didn’t keep his name in print.”

  Mr. Updike was born in 1932 in Reading, Pa., to author Linda Grace Hoyer Updike and math teacher Wesley Russell Updike. He leaves behind his wife Martha, four children from his first marriage, Elizabeth Pennington, David Hoyer, Michael John and Miranda, and three stepchildren.

  Mr. Updike’s work has been hailed as some of the greatest American fiction. There is no doubt in this critic’s mind that he will never be forgotten.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/entertainment/comics/literature/2009/01/remembering-john-updike/feed/ 2 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/01/cirque-le-masques-carnivale/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/01/cirque-le-masques-carnivale/#comments Fri, 23 Jan 2009 01:54:38 +0000 Gina Fraumeni http://blastmagazine.com/?p=7722 3.5 out of 4 stars

  Cirque Le Masque, a world-toured, non-animal circus gave an amazing performance on opening night at Emerson College’s Cutler Majestic Theatre, in Boston’s Theatre District. The 90 minute show ended with a standing ovation.

  Carnivale tells a story about a girl, Moira, (performed by Cara Maher) who is tired of the discordant noise from her home in a big city. She leaves the city and jaunts to Rio de Janeiro, where she eventually joins the circus. Along the way, Moira makes friends with local carnival performers in Central and South America.

  Carnivale
  $35-60
  Jan. 21-25
  The Cutler Majestic Theatre

  Through this exploration we get to see such stunning acts as dual trapeze and silk acts (by World Champion twins Serenity Smith Forchion and Elsie Smith), aerial acrobatics, dueling contortionists, a massive “German Wheel” (by former Cirque du Soleil star Andrei Roublev), all accompanied by the Cirque le Masque dancers.

  Between aerial stunts and psychedelic costumes, this show left me enchanted. The “Silk Act” particularly left us on the edge of our seats. People cried out in disbelief when one of the acrobats leaped into the air from one of the silk ropes and gracefully caught herself, roughly ten feet from the ground.

  This French-inspired show expresses a liveliness that will surprise you over and over again.

  If you don’t like audience interaction this show will definitely change your mind. There are two side characters. One acts almost as a ring master and looks like something not from this planet — rounded belly and various patterns and colors all over his body. The other is an eccentric older man. In between acts, these charming but mischievous characters that will have you in stitches.

  Cirque le Masque’s Carnivale is a stunning performance, filled with laughter, intrigue and amazement.

  

  The choreography had traces of bachata and salsa footwork. The two male dancers performing one of the silk acts in the second half of the show were reminiscent of capoeira (Brazilian “kick boxing”), as their wardrobe consisted of loose, white pants and their spirited choreography involved fast flips and impressive leg extension.

  I would have liked to see more of two things: more emphasis on the dancing and more of the actual dancing, especially at the end and especially from the main character.

  Moira suddenly shows up as a show girl in Rio, but there’s little character development before that. The dancing could have been rehearsed more, as small things like piques, other footwork and body isolation were sometimes not in sync or as accentuated as they could have been. I assume that this is probably because more of the emphasis at rehearsal was put on the difficult stunts than the dancing.

  The music could have had more Latino influence in its beat, since the story takes place in South America — but this is also a French-inspired show…

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/01/cirque-le-masques-carnivale/feed/ 5 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/01/boston-ballet-reveals-a-new-season/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/01/boston-ballet-reveals-a-new-season/#comments Tue, 20 Jan 2009 21:28:44 +0000 Liz McClendon http://blastmagazine.com/?p=7626 The Boston Ballet, one of the leading dance companies in North America, returns to the Citi Wang Theatre this February with the annual performance of “The Nutcracker.”

  The Ballet looks to have an impressive winter/spring season ahead under the leadership of the Artistic Director Mikko Nissinen.

  “Our 2009 season is a noteworthy demonstration of the broad range of styles our Company excels in, and audiences will be exposed to a rare program line-up offering a rich history lesson of the art form and cutting-edge contemporary choreography, in addition to one of the great classical story ballets,” said Nissinen.

  The season will commence with Jia Kylian’s “Black and White” program, which will make Boston Ballet the first company other than Nederlands Dans Theatre to perform the program. Including music by Mozart, Webern, Bach, and Reich, the five-part ballet plays with space, shape, and contrast to create what the Boston Globe described as a “dazzling” performance that challenges and enlightens.

  George Balanchine’s “Jewels” will follow in late February, a three-part ballet that first opened in New York in 1967. “Jewels” provides a brief history of classical dance showcasing ballet’s French origin’s, Russia’s imperial influence, and Balanchine’s own style. The work emulates the elegance of 19th century France and is set to music by Gabriel Faure, Igor Stravinsky, and Tchaikovsky.

  “The Sleeping Beauty” — an audience favorite since 2005 — will open in April. Nissinen has reunited David Walker’s sets and costumes for this version of the ballet, which originated in the Royal Ballet. Set to Tchaikovsky’s brilliant score, “The Sleeping Beauty” is a fairytale of good, evil, and true love.

  Boston Ballet’s “Ballets Russes Centennial Celebration” will conclude the spring season — a retrospective work paying tribute to the centenary of Serge Diaghilev. “Ballet Russes” became one of the most influential ballet companies in the 20th Century, known for its unparalleled technique and artistic collaborations. The program includes “The Prodigal Son,” “The Afternoon of a Faun,” “Le Spectre de la Rose,” and “Le Sacre du Printmps.” To compliment Boston Ballet’s program, “Ballet Russes 2009,” an eight day dance film festival will run May 16-23 in association with Boston University.

  Tickets for season ballets can be purchased by phone at 866.348.9738, online at www.citicenter.org, or in person at the Citi Performing Arts CenterSM box office, located at 270 Tremont Street in Boston’s Theatre District, open Monday through Saturday from 10am to 6pm. Prices for season ballets start at $25. Discounted group tickets (10 or more) are available by calling Boston Ballet’s Group Sales at 617.456.6343. Rush tickets are available. Contact the Boston Ballet box office at 617.695.6955 or visit www.bostonballet.org for details.

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/theater/2009/01/boston-ballet-reveals-a-new-season/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/01/zeisel-originals/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/01/zeisel-originals/#comments Thu, 01 Jan 2009 18:23:02 +0000 Bessie King http://blastmagazine.com/?p=6984 As a child his relationship with his grandmother was not the closest, but as he grew older and learned her history Adam Zeisel wanted to ensure his grandmother’s legacy lived through the ages. Zeisel is the grandson of Eva Zeisel, the Hungarian-born designer of curving pottery whose famous works grace museums worldwide and Crate and Barrel stores across America.

  Zeisel, a 25 year-old Northeastern University graduate, decided to start representing his grandmother’s designs and selling them exclusively through her website. After receiving advice from his father in 2006 to sell a set of goblets Eva designed for her 100^th birthday, Zeisel put the business skills he was learning in college to good use. He sold the goblets online successfully and began to imagine how he could manufacture other designs.

  “I wanted to find a niche for a woman who already had a name brand, but in smaller table top objects. I went to her studio and saw she had furniture designs that had never been made and I didn’t know she had them, after browsing through I knew the pieces would appeal to her customers and bring her into a new market,” Zeisel said.

  Always the leader, starting a t-shirt business at Northeastern and being involved with many student groups, Zeisel put together a business plan to start selling pieces through a new site, EvaZeiseloriginals.com. He consulted college professors to learn what was the best way to sell his grandmother’s designs without harming her very respected image.  His family’s name was his biggest seller.

  “I found this would be a great opportunity to have a chance to follow passion and be a leader. Its challenging because people say, ‘oh you’re her grandson’ but I enjoy the challenge,” the young entrepreneur said. “My first goal was to give Eva peace of mind and confidence that I was doing something worthwhile and with that I could pursue the marketing of the brand by using the family name to add to her legacy and not use her legacy. I didn’t want that to be the reason for why people bought, because we share a last name, but because it is her original pieces available to everyone.”

  ]]> http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/arts/art/2009/01/zeisel-originals/feed/ 0 http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/culturefashion/2008/12/most-memorable-of-2008/ http://blastmagazine.com/the-magazine/culturefashion/2008/12/most-memorable-of-2008/#comments Thu, 01 Jan 2009 01:00:20 +0000 Manuel Uribe http://blastmagazine.com/?p=6992 Complying a list of what made 2008 so special is pretty tough. You have a world view, a local view, perspectives on certain sectors of human interests, and analysis that favor a new trend. So much goes into 2008, that I wanted to do 2,008 memorable moments of 2008.

  It would have been appropriate had our publication been a scholarly review of cultural and sociological studies. But alas, it’s BLAST! So I cut it down to the list to eight of the most memorable, and (if forgotten) important moments.

  While I could list “Christmas” this, or “New Years” that; I’m not as festive for the season as most people are. But I do appreciate a look-back to what got us where we are in the first place. So on to the list and a brief explanation as to why these events were important:

  8. The Beijing Olympics
  You saw it on TV, or were one of the lucky ones to have been there. A vast majority of the global world, not the American world, tuned in to watch and support their respective country. You should find it memorable that a Communist Country opened it’s doors to the world and hosted such a prestigious event. With obvious controversy leading up to, during and follow the event, you have to admit that China handled such a momentous event with flying colors. No pun intended. Bringing together such diverse groups of people is truly one for the record books. Many of which were written that week. 

  7. The Phoenix lands on Mars
  Not exactly covered like the Olympics, the martian landing of the Phoenix on the Northern polar ice cap on mars is just as important, if not just as costly. ”Radio signals received at 4:53:44 p.m. Pacific Time (7:53:44 p.m. Eastern Time) confirmed the Phoenix Mars Lander had survived its difficult final descent and touchdown 15 minutes earlier. The signals took that long to travel from Mars to Earth at the speed of light,” NASA officials stated earlier in the year. Most don’t realize the true rocket science that goes into learning about our planetary history. So a worldwide effort of this magnitude rivals that of the Olympics, in that NASA is sending it’s athletes into space.

  6. Bank Bailout
  Many saw it coming, many even said it was already happening. But everyone can agree, it’s the most talked about debacle for Americans. Forget the billion dollar Hubble debacle, we had ourselves a far-reaching and horribly understated crisis of our foundations in finances. If we don’t learn how to control our credit, we end up licking wounds of debt and disarray. And if that wasn’t enough to mortally wound the triumph that was our mixed economy, we decided that we needed to bail out our banks. I guess we understood the hardships banks would face in a couple of months; compared to our lifetime of debt. I’m just glad our bailout money bought them a nice day at the spa. All 700 billion dollars of it.

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