Art and Media: August 2003 Archives
I watched the DVD of La Femme Nikita, the film by Luc Besson this evening. What a friggin' good movie. I saw the film years ago and have never forgotten it. The filming of the violence is frightenly graphic and the use of color is superb, especially the blue in the pharmacy. She is a really beautiful sociopath without a conscience. I also love Victor, the cleaner, who show up to turn a bad situation into a bloody mess.
Shakespeare's Macbeth was performed from July 18 through August 10 2003 on the Boston Common. My son, Oliver Poole, played Macduff's son, who is slaughtered along with his mother, by Macbeth's thugs. These murders set the stage for the final confrontation between Macbeth and Macduff. The entire production was well concieved and staged by Steve Mahler and the Commonwealth Shakespeare Company. Jay O. Sanders plays Macbeth, and, because he is so physically big, he is a very commanding and convincing Macbeth. I have seen the play 5 times and it keeps getting better. Several years ago, I saw Jay Sanders in "The Taming of the Shrew" at the Delacorte in NYC. He was great in that show too.
Through David Gurteen Knowledge Letter I found a series of thirty webcasts from the Tate on various subjects. Webcasting opens up Tate's events to visitors who are not based in London, enabling them to experience and participate in online presentations.
The one that caught my interest was Theodore Zeldin's talk called "The Camera at Work". The Camera at Work series explores historical, sociological and aesthetic issues related to the photographic representation of work. It coincides with Tate Modern’s major exhibition Cruel and Tender
They present a superb series of talks by artists, curators and social critics.
