Would just like to point out that Forest Whitaker is a Scientologist. Thankfully, this just seems to be a sop to fundraisers and not anything that will accomplish much on a policy level. #annawintour
@Jackson West: These people are the very definition of bourgeois mediocrity. Sure, they're all technically proficient, but they're unremarkable figures who fall into two categories: either extremely conventional (Edward Norton, Sarah Jessica Parker, Ma Yoyo, Kerry Washington, Anna Wintour) or outstanding flakes (Alfre Woodward, Forest Whitaker, Teresa Heinz Kerry). What have they given us that will truly last? Oh, who cares anyway? --I just don't like people calling them "cultural figures." Maybe "society luminaries" would be a better term.
@i'm a bottle: You know what's odd? That among the fresh batch of 26 appointees to the Committee on the Arts and Humanities there is not ONE artist-artist. You know, a painter. A sculptor. An art photographer. An installation artist. A video artist. No one whose work would be displayed in galleries or museums.
I don't mind Anna Wintour; she's nec pluribus impar in her field and a staunch supporter of young American fashion designers who think outside the box. She makes sense. Yo-Yo Ma doesn't bother me either. Ed Norton I sorta get--he just produced a doc on Obama's campaign, so this is his reward. But Bryan Lourd, Kerry Washington and Sarah Jessica Parker befuddle me. These are not people who trade in, or represent, the "artistic" or "humanistic" side of filmmaking. These people are the reason why David Lynch, arguably a true American original and an artist of the utmost order, can't get funding in the U.S. for his films. I suppose they'll sing him official hosannas when he's dead..
@snugbug: You let Yo-Yo Ma off too easily. Look at his dicography since 1996. It's purely commercial tripe. There's nothing significant on it at all after that point. Compare the music he chooses to perform with the music that Rostropovich performed. Night and day there. #annawintour
11/03/09
11/03/09
11/03/09
11/03/09
I don't mind Anna Wintour; she's nec pluribus impar in her field and a staunch supporter of young American fashion designers who think outside the box. She makes sense. Yo-Yo Ma doesn't bother me either. Ed Norton I sorta get--he just produced a doc on Obama's campaign, so this is his reward. But Bryan Lourd, Kerry Washington and Sarah Jessica Parker befuddle me. These are not people who trade in, or represent, the "artistic" or "humanistic" side of filmmaking. These people are the reason why David Lynch, arguably a true American original and an artist of the utmost order, can't get funding in the U.S. for his films. I suppose they'll sing him official hosannas when he's dead..
11/04/09
11/03/09
11/03/09