Janice Law's Blog, page 15

Sketch from a tv production of Rigoletto with Zelijko Lucic as...

Sketch from  a tv production of Rigoletto with Zelijko Lucic as the jester

Big Snowall very atmospheric but three feet deep thanks to Nemo

Big Snow

all very atmospheric but three feet deep thanks to Nemo

Final image of Macbeth letter scene aria

Final image of Macbeth letter scene aria

I recently heard the young Ukrainian soprano Liudmyla...

I recently heard the young Ukrainian soprano Liudmyla Monastyrska sing at the Richard Tucker Gala. She did the letter scene from Verdi’s Macbeth and poor Macbeth would not have had a chance. A great voice in a great performance

Junk vs Real Science

The recent ending of that cult fave, Fringe, has gotten me thinking about the very different appeal of real and junk science. Sure, people watch Nova and Nature on PBS, but fiction is still dominated by magic glossed with mysterious technology.

Why are we so taken with what is clearly bogus when real science reveals many wonders? The reason, I think, is that junk science, close relative to magic, gives us the powers we would like to have, instead of informing us of the limits of human power.

Fringe, with its travels to the alternate universe, weird maladies, and strange cures, ends with time being reset. And is that not one of humanities deepest desires: to redo history, redeem the world, and recover the loved ones? 

Hideous Sets

What is it with TV sports talk shows and studio analysis?

With the money at their disposal and with what, from the house and garden shows, seems to be an army of decorators and designers, one would expect that the desks and sets for sports shows would be top of the line.

No way. Busy backgrounds of sports posters and sometime video screens. Desks as big as small ocean liners with graphs and screens affixed to the front add up to a huge, unedited jumble of stuff, amid which the anchors and analysts, rightly aghast at being upstaged by their intrusive decor, shout guy things back and forth and generally behave as if they have been overloaded with caffeine and shorted on sense.

Finished painting. Quite different in color from the earlier...

Finished painting. Quite different in color from the earlier photo of the same subject

Preliminary sketch of tree hydrangea under snow. Trick will be...

Preliminary sketch of tree hydrangea under snow. Trick will be to get the small birds the right size.

Conservation of Hypocrisy

One human failing is eternal: a predilection for cant and hypocrisy. Oh, we feel superior to the Victorians who tended to tread lightly in sexual matters. We are blunt about sex but coy about economics. Thus underpaid workers, have metamorphosed into ‘associates’ or ‘sales associates’ or given fancy names like ‘barista’ while many new and brutal corporate ploys are simply part of the “business model.”

The resulting lack of candor can be irritating. Spend five or ten minutes navigating a company’s phone tree and you do not feel convinced when the recorded Ms. Smiley Voice tells you that ‘your call is important to us.’ Similarly, Mega-banks voluminous ‘privacy policy’ statement does little more than obscure the fact that your data will go to every last tentacle of their octopus-like corporate structure and will be sold to the highest bidder as soon as the occasion arises. 

Finished Nature Morte

Finished Nature Morte