festival de cannes 2008

the line-up for this year's cannes film festival was announced at a press conference last week, along with the prestigious members of the jury. the feature film jury will be presided by sean penn who will be accompanied by natalie portman, marjane satrapi (of persepolis fame), and mexican director alfonso cuaron, to name a few. the cinefondation and short film jury will be presided by taiwanese director hou hsiao hsien, who will be accompanied by beloved french director olivier assayas and marina hands (actress in my favorite film of 2007), alongside others.

opening the festival is fernando meirelles's blindness starring julianne moore and mark ruffalo. see the trailer:




other films premiering the competition include clint eastwood's changeling, the dardenne brothers's le silence de lorna, atom egoyan's adoration, charlie kaufman's much anticipated synecdoche, new york featuring an all-star cast led by philip seymour hoffman, james gray's two lovers featuring joaquin phoenix, gwyneth paltrow, and isabella rossellini, steven soderbergh's che, and the latest film from my beloved wim wenders, palermo shooting.

barry levinson's what just happened? starring robert de niro, bruce willis, and john turturro will close the festival. a few other films, like this summer's blockbuster indiana jones and the kingdom of the crystal skull and woody allen's vicky cristina barcelona, starring javier bardem, penelope cruz, and scarlett johansson, will screen at the festival out of competition.

driving down the block

**UPDATE: if the video doesn't work, click here

mulholland dr.

this photo, found in patrick romero's flickr, reminds me of early mornings spent driving to my high school through the hills, from hollywood through bel-air, down a famous li'l road called mulholland dr.

sunday photos

love kills


getting out

the above images were featured in the sunday ny times article through weegee's lens, about photographer jill freedman.

acquitted

this is bullshit: detectives acquitted in bell shooting.

update

i feel like i've been away from the computer so often these days that i rarely get a chance to update. i'm running around working wherever i can, and have no determined schedule these days. i will attempt to be more fastidious in updating the site.

in other news, i bought some beautiful irises this afternoon which are resting on my desk in simple vase i purchased at my new favorite home furnishing store, moon river chattel. also, this evening while working for the first time at the beautiful neighborhood winebar bacaro, i bumped into the lovely ms. lux lotus herself, lauren cerand. in other exciting news, i bumped into many familiar neighborhood faces on the way home, and felt like i was in a cheers episode in the east village.

a bientot.

to listen: how my heart behaves.

reclining figure

i found this image by jennifer moore on floraflora and loved it. it's like an schiele, except more spring-like and light-hearted.

jean jacket

one of many in the latest, long-awaited update of the great books have been written.

april march

heard this awesome tune at the fun hst show last night. it's by some group called april march. it kinda reminds me of the song in this trailer for masculine feminine that i used to be obsessed with. it also inevitably reminds me of the dance scene from band of outsiders, but that's just because it's a dance-y french song.

i love alec baldwin

so many foreign worlds

i can't stop singing this song to myself!

another "clean house"

8. ana and charles try to read one another's mind

charles: eight.
ana: no, seven. you were very close.
c: i'll go again.
a: okay.
c: four.
a: yes!
c: i knew it! i could see four apples. now: colors/
a: okay.
c: i'll start.
a: red.
c: no.
a: blue.
c: no.
a: i give up.
c: purple. we have to concentrate harder. like this. ready? you go.
a: i'm tired.
c: sorry. i'll stop.
a: why all these guessing games?
c: you know houdini?
a: the magician?
c: yes. houdini and his wife practiced reading each other's minds. so that--if one of them died--they'd be able to talk to each other--you know, after.


- from the clean house by sarah ruhl

from "the clean house"

Ana: There is a midrash that says when a baby is forty days old, inside the mother's stomach, God picks out its soul mate, and people have to spend the rest of their lives running around to find each other.

- The Clean House by Sarah Ruhl

riga, latvia

(click to enlarge)
this is my father's class photo from his junior high school in riga, latvia. he is the one in the bottom left corner. it says, in russian, Michelson, Y.

romance

Nan Goldin, Rise and Monty on the lounge chair, NYC, 198

ian baguskas/ryan mcginley

on one of the warmer afternoons last week, i ventured south of houston to view two photo shows i was eager to see: ian baguskas's show sweet water at jen bekman, and ryan mcginley's show i know where the summer goes at team gallery.

i found out about ian while working at jB and he quickly became one of my favorite artists associated with the gallery. i recently purchased one of his prints off the jb spin-off site 20x200. seeing his prints in person was lovely--the large prints do great justice to the expansive skies and delectable colors he captures on film. here are some of my favorites:


Rincon Artificial Island and Pipeline, Ventura, California, 2007


Trees, Silver Saddle Resort, California City, California, 2007


Two Structures, Death Valley, California, 2007

i remember stumbling upon a ryan mcginley photograph in an expensive magazine sometime in junior year of high school. i was avidly tearing out images that i found in print and pasting them all over my notebooks back then, and his proved to dominate my collection of torn images. this was around the same time i began to like juergen teller's work i think. the mcginley show was simple, sweet, and naughty at the same time. nude girls dancing amid fireworks, naked boys flailing through roadside fields--all in good fun. the images remind me of summer, but not summer per se--summer in the sense of the idleness associated with those few, hot months, when there's nothing of importance to be done and the bulk of one's days are spent languorously lazing around with friends. as for the people he depicts, they remind me of overgrown children--playful, innocent, naked. here are a few of my favorite images from the show:





Coley (Injured)

sweet water @ jen bekman thru april 26th [6 spring street, nyc]
i know where the summer goes @ team gallery thru may 3rd [83 grand street, nyc]

dinner on the farm

last weekend, i had the pleasure of dining at blue hill stone barns, in tarrytown, ny with four friends. i bring this up because i've just spent some time researching what an internship at on the farm of the stone barns center for food & agriculture would consist of. according to their website, it means working with tools and heavy lifting of 50 lbs objects. in my imagination, i pictured myself being placed in the gardening section--picking ripe rasberries and overseeing the growth of summer's favorite heirloom tomatoes. unfortunately, all of those positions apparently require "horticultural experience"--whatever that means. as i sullenly scrolled down the page, bereft of my gardening dreams, i spotted a position offering as a livestock intern and oh-so briefly contemplated the prospect of me, in muddy overalls, being overtaken by a fatty, soon-to-be piece of bacon on a hot, summer day. ii can't imagine being face to face with one of those monsters and having to listen to their horrible squeals (who even came up with oink oink--its not even close.) even now, as i shiver thinking about it, i recall being at a festive pig-slaughtering event in the eastern part of the czech republic, and looking down at a big bloody bucket filled with pebble-sized balls of coagulating pig's blood:



now that you're all sick to your stomachs, i can switch the topic of conversation to the contents of our delicious meal at blue hill. actually, i can't bear to recall each individual dish we consumed, but i'll give you a sampling:
we started off with a complimentary glass of champagne, topped off with a bit of elderflower liqueur, then we had a local riesling, blood orange margaritas, and an italian red wine. we had three amuses i think: an apple-celery juice, an amazing baby-bite sized burger with beets instead of meat, and a slice of house cured coppa. then we had some cauliflower soup with caviar and oysters, a greenhouse greens salad with a poached egg, gnocchi with sweet potatoes and parmesan, ravioli with mustard greens, shiitake mushrooms, and ricotta cheese, and some other things i can't remember. after, we had berkshire pig over fromage blanc spaetzle, grass-fed lamb, and some kind of venison. to top it all off, chef dan barber himself came out to our table, congratulated the birthday girl, and chatted us up about his memories of working at la brea bakery in l.a. and being inspired by the menu at michael's. thanks to that visit, he decided to bring us out a special 3-course surprise desert, that was so good and so weird i can't even bring myself to try to write about it.

ans westra

the photos below are by new zealand-based dutch photographer, ans westra. they are from a series entitled the pleasure garden. i stumbled upon them weeks ago and intended to put them up, but my intentions were sidetracked. enjoy them and be sure to go here and peruse the other 35 images from this series.

for clancy

dear clancy,

i am sorry that you have been lying on your metaphorical death bed with a horrible illness for the last week. and furthermore, i am sorry that i failed to entertain you by posting eye candy and dumb links and passing thoughts on my blog. instead of excuses, i will just bombard you with a quickfire round of posts.

love,
marina