For the first time in the history of the prestigious John Moores Painting Prize, the winner and runner-up announcements will be broadcast live.Ironically, though I've been invited to see this in the real world, I begin work again next week which includes the usual late Thursday so will miss the prize giving either way. But I'm planning on popping in afterwards. If they'll let me in late.
This exciting online event will take place on Thursday 16 September 2010 at :www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/johnmooresliveThe announcement will take place at 6.30pm but the broadcast will begin earlier.
Those tuning in will be amongst the very first to find out who has scooped UK’s biggest painting prize, along with artists, guests, critics, and associates attending the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool for the private view and prize ceremony.
The John Moores Painting Prize 2010 live broadcast will give viewers a unique opportunity to see behind the scenes at one of the biggest events on the art calendar on the eve of Liverpool Biennial’s launch. Just add canapés and friends to throw your own ‘private view’ from the comfort of your home!
45 shortlisted artists from 3000 entrants are to be included in the exhibition, each with a chance of winning the £25,000 first prize or 4 runner-up prizes of £2,500 each. The paintings will be on display at the Walker Art Gallery from 18 September 2010 to 3 January 2011.
The long-running competition forms a key strand of the Liverpool Biennial and is always a hot topic conversation amongst art lovers visiting the city for the festival, both online and offline.
Join in with the discussion on Twitter using the #JM2010 hashtag. ‘Tweets’ will form part of a stream of conversation published on the broadcast page in the run up to and during the live broadcast. You can follow John Moores Painting Prize 2010 on Twitter at:
www.twitter.com/JohnMoores2010
to see this in the real world
Liverpool Life It might not have escaped your notice, but the Liverpool Biennial 2010 begins next week which coincides with the opening of the John Moores Painting Prize exhibition at the Walker Art Gallery. The presentation of said prizes to the winning paintings is next Thursday and for the first time they're to be live streamed across the internet. Here is their press release:
"Einsteinium..."
Science "I'd like to take you now on wings of song, as it were, to try and help you forget, perhaps, for a while, your drab, wretched lives."
"I hope you've all been taking notes, because there'll be a short quiz next period."
"I hope you've all been taking notes, because there'll be a short quiz next period."
like, much
Music Zooey doesn't say, like, much, but when she does speak she, like, totally captures why she's, like, so, like, amazing:
"I rarely do movies. I’ve done like one movie a year for the past couple years. I used to do a lot more, but I’ve just been a lot more choosy lately, so that I do have more time. I’ve been touring a lot, recording a lot, and writing a lot. I just do the movies I really, really want to do, and don’t overwork myself in that area. That way, I can concentrate on one thing at a time. I used to write all the time when I was working, and go home and stay up really late. I’ve just been spending more time doing music lately."Or in other words, because she's careful or at least sparing in the kinds of films she chooses, she's able to retain a certain mystique or impregnability even in a triumph like The Happening. Which I've finally decided is a masterpiece of directorial vision. Make of that statement what you will.
He was right.
Politics This isn't the most well best thought through comment I've left anywhere (in fact it's rather rambling) but I was prompted to write this on the The Guardian website at this bizarre story:
My journalism tutor in one of his speeches -- he was very big on speeches -- said that within a couple of years of entering the profession he realised that ultimately it didn't matter who was in power because ultimately nobody is perfect which means that the situation will never be perfect.
Sometimes things would be better than usual, sometimes worse. But never perfect.
He was right.
Pick up the average history book, or a very good history book for that matter because there are some of those, and try to find a moment in the country or indeed the world's history when everything was ok. When no one felt hard done by and everyone was happy.
It hasn't happened yet. It may do. I'm an optimist so I think it may do. But not yet.
If Labour are in power, Tories are unhappy. If the Tories are in power Labour tell them that they're doing it wrong. The Lib Dems, as ever, are stuck between the both of them unable to do right from wrong even when they're actually in government for a change in the way that they could only ever be in government under the present political conditions.
If the present government imploded and another general election was called by Christmas and by some chance Labour got back in, can even their own supporters suggest that the country would be fixed, that everything would be sorted out? Well, no, of course not.
I know that in fact having an ideology gives us something to strive for and having something to fight against reminds us that we can be passionate about about something which matters which isn't the continuation of the species and through procreation or saving the environment.
But looking at this list of comments, I wonder whether people realise that nothing of anything we say about politics really matters. In the end.
reruns of old Pugwash cartoons
TV I'm back. Hadley Freeman reviews this morning's debut episode of Daybreak, ITV1's new morning showdown featuring new signings Adrian and Christine so I don't have to:
There's also an over-abundance of staff. Apart from the fact that the likes of the sport could just as well be read out by Chiles as the separate sports presenter and the news by Bleakley, the correspondents idea is an obvious attempt to replicate the guests who'd appear on The One Show talking about scrabble or duck billed platipusses or whatever. But here there's too little interaction, not enough time for the more freewheeling conversational style which suited this pair so well on the other side.
Essentially, if anything, it seems an attempt to resurrect the formula of TV-AM in the Anne 'n' Nick era which presumably means before too long, converting for modern currency, we'll be seeing Christian O'Connell roaming the beaches making fun of pensioners, the CG animated Sammy Stoat for the kids, and the show being replaced with reruns of old Pugwash cartoons and the Ashley Twins filmography when the production staff walk out on strike with Garroway being labelled a scab for crossing the picket line.
"What a strange thing Daybreak is looking set to be. An odd mashup of GMTV, The One Show, That's Life and, suddenly, Newsnight. No one is claiming that GMTV was a hothouse of intellectual thought, but, really, what on earth can one make of Daybreak – a news programme that shows clips of racing mobility scooters, a funnily shaped carrot and a bulldog on a skateboard and asks viewers to vote for the one they'd like to hear about in more detail. This segment is called Daybreakers, which I'm guessing is a pun of some sort, but one not easily grasped. Better to have called it "Like watching YouTube with an immature 10-year-old."The main problem at this early stage is an over-abundance of format, the desperate need to give things like phone polls and news headlines ear-catching names and the big signings, with the exception of the interview slot, largely reduced to cueing in the next bit of the schedule be it the news, the adverts, the phone in quiz, the adverts, the sport news, the adverts, the funny animal stories, the rotating banana bowl and John Stapleton standing in a football stadium to illustrate a lot of people.
There's also an over-abundance of staff. Apart from the fact that the likes of the sport could just as well be read out by Chiles as the separate sports presenter and the news by Bleakley, the correspondents idea is an obvious attempt to replicate the guests who'd appear on The One Show talking about scrabble or duck billed platipusses or whatever. But here there's too little interaction, not enough time for the more freewheeling conversational style which suited this pair so well on the other side.
Essentially, if anything, it seems an attempt to resurrect the formula of TV-AM in the Anne 'n' Nick era which presumably means before too long, converting for modern currency, we'll be seeing Christian O'Connell roaming the beaches making fun of pensioners, the CG animated Sammy Stoat for the kids, and the show being replaced with reruns of old Pugwash cartoons and the Ashley Twins filmography when the production staff walk out on strike with Garroway being labelled a scab for crossing the picket line.
from the grave ...
Film I'll be back soon. Meanwhile, it's good to know that Robert Altman's still directing films from the grave ...
"An archaeologist"
TV Right, stop whatever you're doing for ten minutes and watch this. It's the animated prequel to the next audio series of Doctor Who spin-off Professor Bernice Summerfield. And I'd make it full screen:
Some back story for the uninitiated: created by new series writer Paul Cornell (Father's Day, Human Nature) and voiced by Lisa Bowerman, Summerfield's adventures began in the pages of the original Doctor Who novels published in the late 90s when the was "terminally" off air (she was the companion in the original novel version of Human Nature), and was a companion of the Seventh (McCoy) Doctor. After splitting with the character she continued in her own series of books which then transferred to audio drama cd for the Big Finish company and were instrumental in getting them to the license to produce original stories featuring the classic Doctors.
The audio adventures for Bernice have run for over ten years; I haven't heard most of them, but the style is rather closer to the British comic book tradition, very 2000 AD. An archaeologist, she's somewhat an forerunner to River Song though she's only rarely been reunited with the Doctor and always seemingly in the right order. She's shifted away from her day job in recent years and this short film is an attempt to draw her back in that direction, smartly referencing Lara Croft to a degree and producing the kind of chase which couldn't be accomplished as well in audio. Smart.
Her nemesis it seems is now Irving Braxiatel, her one time boss, owner of private museum, the Braxiatel Collection (mentioned briefly in the classic series Paris set story City of Death). Brax is a timelord and loomed large in the spin-off Whoniverse having been a major character in both the Bernice plays and the Gallifrey series (about Romana II's presidency) oscillating between malevolence and benevolence and is voiced by Miles Richardson, Ian's son (and sounds exactly like his father when he's playing the older version). Oh and he's the Doctor's brother. Best mention that too.
Some back story for the uninitiated: created by new series writer Paul Cornell (Father's Day, Human Nature) and voiced by Lisa Bowerman, Summerfield's adventures began in the pages of the original Doctor Who novels published in the late 90s when the was "terminally" off air (she was the companion in the original novel version of Human Nature), and was a companion of the Seventh (McCoy) Doctor. After splitting with the character she continued in her own series of books which then transferred to audio drama cd for the Big Finish company and were instrumental in getting them to the license to produce original stories featuring the classic Doctors.
The audio adventures for Bernice have run for over ten years; I haven't heard most of them, but the style is rather closer to the British comic book tradition, very 2000 AD. An archaeologist, she's somewhat an forerunner to River Song though she's only rarely been reunited with the Doctor and always seemingly in the right order. She's shifted away from her day job in recent years and this short film is an attempt to draw her back in that direction, smartly referencing Lara Croft to a degree and producing the kind of chase which couldn't be accomplished as well in audio. Smart.
Her nemesis it seems is now Irving Braxiatel, her one time boss, owner of private museum, the Braxiatel Collection (mentioned briefly in the classic series Paris set story City of Death). Brax is a timelord and loomed large in the spin-off Whoniverse having been a major character in both the Bernice plays and the Gallifrey series (about Romana II's presidency) oscillating between malevolence and benevolence and is voiced by Miles Richardson, Ian's son (and sounds exactly like his father when he's playing the older version). Oh and he's the Doctor's brother. Best mention that too.
a direct translation from the original Swedish
Film On to the Swedish film sequel, The Girl Who Played with Fire. Leaving aside the sexual content which some viewers might still find disturbing, with the exception of one particularly titillating scene, here's what I thought went right, or at least what I thought directly after watching it this afternoon:
#1: Naomi Rapace who plays "goth" computer hacker Lisbeth is still a star in the making and this film is probably more entertaining because it’s her story right the way through, even if that story is a Swedish version of The Fugitive. The sense of danger which accompanies her presence in most scenes raises the film beyond its more obvious tv origins. As the revelations about Lisbeth’s past tumble out, it makes her performance across the two films even more impressive since it was all implicit in performance in The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.
#2: The title makes better sense this time (because it’s a direct translation from the original Swedish) and there’s a scene were we can see the visceral nature of fire as the camera lingers on a blaze, it’s given the symbolic importance that a director like Vincent Ward or Cédric Klapisch would be pleased with. Of course, in a crime thriller such symbolism recedes in importance, but this is a “film” which is happier in its own skin as a noir b-movie (useful coincidences and emphatic intercutting included) unlike the first piece which took material which seemed better suited to this style and approached it like, well, a truly evil Midsummer Murders.
#3: It’s just the right length as a "film" and it's less obvious as to where the extra material had been cut out for the running time. The shift from the first to the second episode of the original television version is less obvious and my guess is that what we have here is the lions share of the second with much of the time spent by a young journalist in researching his article and the police side of an investigation were both casualties. It also ends rather abruptly in a nice 70s manner, which suggests it has lost a wrap up scene.
#4: It's much better structured at least in terms of character. By keeping the two leads apart for the whole film, it makes each of them seem as prominent as the other, though obviously Blomkvist spends most of his time filling in back story and explaining some of Lisbeth’s actions so actually on this occasion Lisbeth keeps most of her narrative agency. The Empire Strikes Back looms large for various reasons. It also just about passes The Bechdel Test unless there’s a special sub-clause rooted in the queer theory branch of film studies.
#5: It's better structured its story development, with most information hard fought for and with a sense of peril. Over and over again when the investigation reaches a stand-still, Lisbeth mostly leaves the comfort of cyberspace and has to physically follow the trail of information geographically. It shares plenty of elements with the Sandra Bullock headliner The Net, though Lisbeth is far more pro-active in hitting against the force that done wrong her.
#6: It’ll be interesting to see how the film translates as a US remake, since it’s difficult to see Daniel Craig spending quite so much time sitting around looking at files and chatting with witnesses. I can see at least one character whose participation will be reduced to give Craig one decent action sequence since that’s what the audience will be expecting; the Swedish versions are still generally perceived to be art house, whereas the US version is very much a Hollywood genre production.
I appreciate that this is another lazy list and not some fully formed film criticism, but unlike Philip French who as ever manages to spoil the first three quarters of the run time in the space of a paragraph (and mention EM Forster), I’ve decided that it’s the kind of work which needs to be experienced with as little foreknowledge as possible. I’ve probably given too much away already. Reading through the comments and reviews elsewhere, there’s as wide a spectrum of opinion for this as Inception from the very kind to the downright hostile. Though the praise for Naomi Rapace is pretty universal.
The next film is out in November followed presumably by another blu-ray. After that, the smart marketing idea would be for a release of the longer Swedish Millenium television series with English subtitles either for broadcast on BBC Four or the home market or both. Certainly they’re the version I’ll be waiting for, to see if the lesions in narrative of the first film are explained and what the extra hours runtime in the second is filled with. Like the six-hour version of Das Boot, the two can exist separately; but I suspect that once I’ve seen the longer version, these cinema editions will seem less important somehow.
you still had to visit a shop
Music Following on from the news of the downing of Blockbuster USA, here's something I really didn't know. At some point in the early nineties they attempted the Spotify model of music distribution, though rather than having unlimited music on your desktop, you still had to visit a shop:
"In 1992, the suits at Blockbuster Inc. realized music was another viable form of entertainment people liked to spend money on. Thus, they bought up two already existing retail music chains—Sound Warehouse and Music Plus—and founded Blockbuster Music. The gimmick at Blockbuster Music was you could listen to any album in the store before you bought it. Actually, the way I remember it, you could listen to every album in the store if you had the time, even if you didn’t buy squat. Each BM location had a lengthy bar set up in the outlet’s center; you picked out one or three or eight CDs, brought them up to the sullen teenage employee “tending” the bar, plopped your ass on a stool, put on the headphones, and let the collected works of John Fogerty or any given Sparks bootleg wash over you like so much warm gin. There were no predetermined time limits, you weren’t really pressured to buy what you were listening to (at least I never was), and the space was large enough to comfortably accommodate plenty of greasy music nerds with questionable hygiene.Unsurprisingly the chain was sold off not long afterwards. People weren't buying the music as well.
"what YouTube was originally set up for"
Memes 0 Views: The Best of the Bottom of the Barrel is tumblr blog which collects together videos with zero or next to no views. It should be horrible, but instead demonstrates the fleeting and random nature of web fame and that anyone could be Paul "Yosemite Bear" Vasquez or like, whoever.
It's also a reminder of what YouTube was originally set up for, which contrary to popular belief wasn't watching Orm & Cheep at one o'clock in the morning but to allow ordinary people to upload slithers of their lives, or the version of their lives they want the world to see.
Clips like this:
Of course, once they've been posted on 0 Views their non-obscurity is assured [via].
It's also a reminder of what YouTube was originally set up for, which contrary to popular belief wasn't watching Orm & Cheep at one o'clock in the morning but to allow ordinary people to upload slithers of their lives, or the version of their lives they want the world to see.
Clips like this:
Of course, once they've been posted on 0 Views their non-obscurity is assured [via].
"you know this Dr Pam, I don't know too much about her"
Showbiz I'm not really a fan of these kinds of stories, but I am a fan of misunderstandings. The Guardian reports that Katie Price pulled out of an interview with Dr Pamela Connelly at the Edinburgh Festival today. They don't add much detail as to why, but they don't really have after including the following three paragraphs in an interview with Price last Monday which was presumably the point of the interview last Monday given that The Guardian is sponsoring the event:
It is in this context, then, that she will give a live televised interview to Dr Pamela Stephenson Connolly at the Edinburgh television festival later this month. Connolly's Shrink Rap series of celebrity encounters are notionally psychotherapeutic, and more searching than the OK! interviews with which Price is more familiar, so I'm curious to know why she has agreed to it. But it transpires that Price is under the impression that her interviewer will be someone else altogether – an agony aunt called Dr Pam from a commercial radio station.Oh dear. Was it after the interview? When the interview was published? Or was it when she reached Edinburgh? At what point did Katie change her mind and will we see it in an ITV2 documentary?
"Now, you know this Dr Pam, I don't know too much about her, did she used to do Heart? Was she the agony aunt from that? She's got long blond hair? Yeah, I used to listen to her on Heart, she's got an American accent? Yeah I used to like listening to her, she was quite reasonable." I ask if she has laid down any advance parameters or rules for the encounter.
"No, I never do that, never," she says flatly. "I don't mind anyone asking me any questions, I've got nothing to hide. I like it to be as real as it is, that's what I call an interview. I'm not someone who's like right, you can't ask this, that, this, that, this, that. It's got to be a real interview. I've literally got nothing to hide. You can ask any question you like."
smug-ass
Film This FARK post about the death of the US flavour of Blockbuster Video predictably allows visitors to swap stories about the service they've received:
"I was in there recently, and asked the guy behind the counter if they had "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo". He told me, "We don't carry adult films, sir", with this smug-ass look on his face. Rather than argue the point, I went and tracked it down myself-- it had been placed in a weird spot, not in alphabetical order amongst the Blu-rays-- and then wandered back up front and rented it.Which is a tad harsh, but I see the point. You'd think someone wearing a puka-shell necklace would have heard of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (sorry). Further down the section, someone suggests that when Blockbuster finally goes, it might inspire a resurgence in family/indie rental shops. Let's hope so. I miss Lark Lane Video. Not that I'd cancel my Lovefilm subscription of course. I'd be interested to hear from anyone who still uses UK Blockbuster and what our service is like.
I expected some sort of reaction when he saw the title, but dude didn't miss a beat. It was like he'd forgotten all about the conversation we'd had about five minutes prior. Also, he was wearing a Puka-shell necklace, and anyone wearing Puka-shell necklaces should be immediately castrated."
"it’s kind of a different story"
TV I love Misfits, E4's comedy drama about special humans in orange boiler suits so when I heard that the creator, Howard Overman, had been commissioned to adapt Douglas's Dirk Gently books, I was optimistic. Then I read this quote he's given to SFX Magazine:
“What I did was take the character, Dirk Gently, and his detection method, and write a new story. It has elements from the book, obviously, in it, but it’s kind of a different story. Because if you’ve ever read the book, the story in there isn’t really adaptable for TV. Especially not on the budget we’ve been made to do it on, because it involves an alien planet and all sorts of weird and wacky ideas."Let's review that sentence again:
"the story in there isn’t really adaptable for TV. Especially not on the budget we’ve been made to do it on, because it involves an alien planet and all sorts of weird and wacky ideas."Harumph. Oh well, we'll see. But aren't the "all sorts of weird and wacky ideas" in Douglas's writing the point? I bet the Electric Monk was the first thing to go ...
extreme embarrassment pressure
Politics I don't if, as Gawker suggests this is the worst on camera interview ever (especially with Jon Snow v. Zac Goldsmith still so recent) but the sight of the presenter trying to keep it together under extreme embarrassment pressure as a mayoral candidate offers another method for running down in the interview time is pretty special. I expect in the British version, the BBC would have been polite enough to allow the guitarist onto the set with Oona King.
"One help point"
Travel Diamond Geezer visits Berney Arms, what may be the remotest station in the country:
"One modern station name sign and one old, the latter reminiscent of an era when a steam train might have pulled alongside [photo]. One tiny wooden shelter, of a size to protect only two waiting passengers from driving rain, containing a map of the local area (mostly empty) and a telephone number to call 'to advertise here'. One help point, consisting of a button and loudspeaker on a stick, plugged in goodness knows where. A cycle rack, with space for only two bikes, although goodness knows who'd be able to ride out this far to use it."The building of the station was a condition of the landover selling the property to the railways.
theatre on television
TV Never mind Mark Thompson's speech at the Edinburgh TV Festival. BBC Four controller Richard Klein said something really quite interesting too:
"Klein said he as yet to "crack" how to put more theatre on television but said it is a challenge he is determined to win."The fact that he's even mentioning it is a step in the right direction [previously]
or some such.
TV I've been desperate for the BBC to go on the offensive and fight its corner aginst the likes of the Murdoch media and the Daily Mail criticising how the license fee is spent as though they're defending the rights of the viewer/listener as though there isn't a conflict of interests.
This robust defence from Top Gear producer Andy Wilman, in which he explains why its not a waste of money to stop the identity of The Stig and "the wonderment created about what he might think" being revealed, will do nicely:
This robust defence from Top Gear producer Andy Wilman, in which he explains why its not a waste of money to stop the identity of The Stig and "the wonderment created about what he might think" being revealed, will do nicely:
"The fact is, the “waste of licence payer’s money” argument gets trotted out many times as a way of attacking the BBC, but the reality is this: the BBC is a massive organisation. It’s naïve to think it can only ever spend money on cameras, tape for the cameras, Daleks or anything else that contributes directly to what ends up on screen. The BBC also has the right to spend money on protecting the intellectual property it created, because the truth is that all that stuff – the Stig, the Tardis, the Blue Peter dog – does belong to the licence payer, and not to some opportunists who think they can come along and take a slice when they feel like it."More please. Expect article in the Mail along the lines of "Top Gear chief wastes tax payer's money attacking The Mail" or some such. Either way, they'll be after him. Now can we have injunction against the tabloids spoiling the next series of Doctor Who?
"characters" with "stories"
TV Waves of nostalgia as Steve Berry unpicks the Top Ten Big Brother housemates no-one remembers:
"In a last-ditch attempt to save herself from eviction, Justine lounged around the house in a bikini, danced raunchily with other girls and declared she’d once had a threesome. Not enough. Regional telly presenting beckoned, but not for long. She now works in sales."
Wait, what?
TV Reading this 1987 Paramount Memo which reveals the actors who auditioned for Star Trek: The Next Generation is predictably entertaining. Don't know then. Don't know them. Don't know them. Wait, what?
This isn't as unlikely as it seems. She was in the US at the time, appearing in Amazon Women on the Moon, The Equaliser and Dear John USA and so actually was looking for a career boost. It's impossible to imagine now what she might have been like, but hopefully she'd be less marooned than poor old Genevieve Bujold was in Voyager:
In some cases, casting is everything.
"BeverlyThere isn't a "Jenny Augutter" listed at the imdb, so it can't be a typo. Jenny Agutter auditioned for Beverley Crusher.
Anne Twomey
Jenny Augutter
Cheryl [Gates] McFadden
This isn't as unlikely as it seems. She was in the US at the time, appearing in Amazon Women on the Moon, The Equaliser and Dear John USA and so actually was looking for a career boost. It's impossible to imagine now what she might have been like, but hopefully she'd be less marooned than poor old Genevieve Bujold was in Voyager:
In some cases, casting is everything.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)