Stanley Meisler
was
a foreign correspondent for the Los Angeles
Times based in Nairobi covering Sub-Saharan Africa from 1967 to 1973; in
Mexico City covering Latin America from 1973 to 1976; in Madrid covering
Spain and Portugal from 1976 to 1978; in Toronto covering Canada and Latin
America from 1978 to 1983; in Paris covering France, Spain and Portugal from 1983 to
1988; in New York City covering the United Nations from 1991 to 1996;
and was a foreign affairs writer in Washington DC from 1988 to 1998. Meisler
continues to contribute occasionally to the Los Angeles Times.
Andy Warhol in 'Headlines' at Washington's National Gallery
The National Gallery of Art zooms in on the Pop artist's appetite for gaudy
tabloid newspapers and their influence on his work. Andy Warhol, the guru of Pop art, reveled in a lifelong obsession with
newspapers, especially tabloids and their garish headlines. As a teenager, he
saved pages with photos of his favorite Hollywood stars. Throughout his life he
packed hundreds of newspapers into boxes he called "time capsules" to whet the
fancy of the future. He collected scores of fraying clippings about himself in
34 scrapbooks. But most important, he used newspapers, especially the front
pages, to model and inform some of the most important works of his fine art. It
is hard to imagine Warhol the artist without his headlines...
photo gallery ART LOS ANGELES TIMES October 9, 2011
Marc Chagall among friends in Philadelphia In a twist, the city's Museum of Art combines his earlier works with his
'School of Paris' contemporaries to reveal the artist in a communal phase. Marc Chagall was an enormously popular 20th century painter, revered by the
public for his rooftop fiddlers, biblical lore, upside down lovers and fanciful
visions of Jewish shtetl life in the old Russian empire. Art historians and
critics, however, have always had difficulty placing him among the many currents
of modern art; to them, he often seemed unique, special, one of a kind. Some
also found him repetitive and sentimental. But Chagall was not always a loner.
In an innovative exhibition, the Philadelphia Museum of Art has decided to
concentrate on his younger years when, far from unique, he and a band of mainly
East European, mainly Jewish artists honed their craft in Paris... ART April 24, 2011
Book review: 'Jerusalem, Jerusalem: How the Ancient City Ignited Our Modern
World' by James Carroll Examining the violent histories of Judaism,
Christianity and Islam. James Carroll's latest book is very ambitious. Invoking history,
anthropology, social psychology, geography and theology, the author, a former
Catholic priest, delves into the stories of the violence unleashed by the
organized religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam throughout their
existence. He anchors the book by describing how each has used the city of
Jerusalem, holy to all three, as a symbol or metaphor or touchstone. The book's
title and subtitle, "Jerusalem, Jerusalem: How the Ancient City Ignited Our
Modern World," suggest that Carroll intends to demonstrate that the tumultuous
past of these religions is vital in understanding why Jerusalem and, of course,
Israel and the Palestinian territories have become a hotbed of political,
nationalist and religious conflict and violence. But Carroll, a newspaper
columnist, prolific novelist and the author of the popular "Constantine's
Sword," a history of 2,000 years of Christianity's anti-Semitism, has something
else in mind... BOOK REVIEW April 17, 2011 Jerusalem, Jerusalem: How the Ancient City Ignited Our Modern World
by James Carroll (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
A Fresh Look at Paul Gauguin The French artist spun myths about himself and his exotic travels to
boost sales. A new show in Washington, D.C., examines these tales and his work. Many artists and historians look on the painter Paul Gauguin as one of the
founders of modern art. His work in the 19th century brimmed with innovation. He
tried to paint with his mind rather than his eyes. He colored grass red and
figures of Christ yellow. He played with perspective. His obsession with
primitive peoples engaged and influenced Picasso. Yet, as Gauguin specialist
Belinda Thomson points out, the innovations that excited everyone 100 years ago
"are not necessarily those that have the strongest appeal" in the 21st century.
Old innovations do not surprise anyone; they turn into clichés instead.
Gauguin's paintings must be regarded differently now. They must be examined,
Thomson says, for "their beauty and complexity"... ART March 13, 2011
True to the Peace Corps The corps' celebrity and size may have diminished, but its longevity is a
testament to its importance. In some ways, the Peace Corps, which celebrates its 50th anniversary
Tuesday, is a shadow of what it once was. It had so much pizzazz in the early
days that newspapers proclaimed the names of new volunteers as if they had just
won Guggenheim fellowships. Now, the number of volunteers — 8,655 — is about
half of what it was at its highest in 1966, and not everyone knows the Peace
Corps still exists. The first director — the irrepressible, inspiring Sargent
Shriver, who put the program together in six months — made the cover of Time in
1963. The current director — Aaron Williams, a former volunteer with decades of
experience in international development — barely gets his name in the papers. At
a panel discussion at George Washington University a couple of years ago,
Christiane Amanpour, then chief foreign correspondent of CNN, listed factors
that had contributed to American worldwide popularity in the past. "There was a
Peace Corps," she said. Yet the Peace Corps, despite its loss of celebrity and
size, has improved a great deal during its 50 years... COMMENTARY February 25, 2011
Book review: 'The Shah' by Abbas Milani A comprehensive new
biography of the ousted Iranian leader finds him 'a tragic figure.' It was uncanny to read the closing chapters of this splendidly detailed
biography of the last shah of Iran while tumultuous and jubilant crowds in Egypt
drove Hosni Mubarak from power. The parallels were so close they seemed to come
out of some fanciful fiction. Like Mubarak, the shah—in power for 37 years—was
blinded by a megalomania and a thirst for power that isolated him from the needs
and demands of his people. Like Mubarak, the shah, spurning the advice of
others, refused to initiate reforms until it was too late to satisfy his
critics. Like Mubarak, the shah, who fled Iran in 1979, had maintained a facade
of strength and stability that lulled the United States into believing that the
iron-clad strength of its Middle Eastern ally was in no danger of cracking. But
the biographer Abbas Milani, the head of the Iranian studies program at Stanford
University, is not trying to depict the life and downfall of the shah as a model
for political upheavals in the Middle East... BOOK REVIEW February 20, 2011 The Shah
by Abbas Milani (Palgrave Macmillan)
