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Issue No. 14

The View from Here

As your grandmother might have said, “A fool empties his head every time he opens his mouth.” Or, in the age of Twitter, the fool engages his tiny, upcurled thumbs and taps away. Our hobby president has been on a roll…

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Hiding in Plain Sight A trove of Hitler artifacts in Argentina shows just how many Nazis escaped justice after the war

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Now You See It

Op art got a bad name almost as soon as it got a name. The year was 1964 and Time magazine—or Donald Judd (sources vary)—coined the term to refer to a brand of hard-edged abstract painting that often flirted with optical illusion. At its slickest, op art’s trippy, eye-tickling effects were psychedelic-adjacent, easily transferable to dorm-room posters and throw-pillow fabrics—abstraction’s equivalent to a Happy Meal. But some practitioners probed deeper, finding sublimity in the genre’s rhythmic, sometimes warped geometries, and none more so than Bridget Riley, the 88-year-old English painter who is the subject of a retrospective opening this week at the Hayward Gallery, in London’s Southbank Centre. READ ON

Bridget Riley’s study for Turn. A retrospective of the artist’s work opens on October 23 at London’s Hayward Gallery.

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Discover

A Daunting Task James Daunt, the bookstore buccaneer, wants to save Barnes & Noble

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French Nails at Dawn! The WAGatha Christie of the Real Housewives of British football

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Small Talk
“I love working from home. I can make my own hours, and the ankle monitor is actually pretty comfortable.”

The Playing Fields of Money

The Swiss school that charges around $130,000 a year to raise the future global elite
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Deer Dear Prec President
Erto
Erdogon …

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Working Women

In one of Sofonisba Anguissola’s multiple self-portraits, the Renaissance painter stands against a striking green background, meeting the viewer’s gaze with wide, clear eyes and an upturned mouth that seems both pensive and amused. As if to prove her bona fides, she brandishes a small book that reads Sophonisba Angusola virgo seipsam fecit 1554 (“The virgin Sofonisba Anguissola made this herself in 1554”). The artist has written her own art history. READ ON

Sofonisba Anguissola’s Self-Portrait. “A Tale of Two Women Painters,” celebrating the art of the early women artists Anguissola and Lavinia Fontana, opens at the Museo del Prado, in Madrid, on October 22.

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Discover
Small Talk

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MoMA Mia⁠—a New Museum! Following a familiar script, the Museum of Modern Art has re-invented itself yet again. But first it had to be invented

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Small Talk
“Let’s play hide-and-I-read-my-book.”

Screen Time

No space-age wizard did more to fulfill Marshall McLuhan’s vision of the global media-scape than the Korean-American artist and inventor Nam June Paik, born in 1932. Like McLuhan, whose fussy professorial manner gave his gnomic pronouncements and paradoxes a Mad Hatter air (“Diaper spelled backwards is ‘repaid,’ think about it”), Paik was a master of the earnest put-on—a playful provocateur. READ ON

Nam June Paik’s Robot K-456. A new exhibition of the artist’s work is on view at London’s Tate Modern through February 9.

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Discover

Naval Gazing On October 29, Bonhams, in London, will offer a major Marine Sale

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Steve McQueen Would Approve The 2020 Bullitt is aggressive yet somehow subtle, an understated example of automotive overstatement

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Small Talk
“Think again. Is this perhaps how it really happened?”

Pasta Putin-esca Syrian candy and North Korean kimchi: Moscow adds Stalinist spice to its cuisine

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Style
Swan Around Senlis dress There’s no reason to abandon florals just because it’s turtleneck season. Senlis, a new brand… Loaf Around Tweedy Bass Weejuns Just a few weeks ago, Chloë Sevigny admitted to us that her idea of a perfect shoe is the humble Bass Weejun. Stow Away The Quirky Tote Some of you have an air mail tote; some of you don’t. We don’t mean to incite feuds… Layer On The Muji Shirt Do we like T-shirts? We do. Button-ups? Indeed. French work jackets? You know us so well… Stay Warm Hestra Gloves We don’t mean to sound like your mother, but: “Where are your gloves?” Yes, it’s that time… Wear Incotex Pants For some of us gents at Air Mail, Incotex pants are the secret weapon of style, and no more so than in winter… Swan Around Senlis dress There’s no reason to abandon florals just because it’s turtleneck season. Senlis, a new brand… Loaf Around Tweedy Bass Weejuns Just a few weeks ago, Chloë Sevigny admitted to us that her idea of a perfect shoe is the humble Bass Weejun. Stow Away The Quirky Tote Some of you have an air mail tote; some of you don’t. We don’t mean to incite feuds… Layer On The Muji Shirt Do we like T-shirts? We do. Button-ups? Indeed. French work jackets? You know us so well… Stay Warm Hestra Gloves We don’t mean to sound like your mother, but: “Where are your gloves?” Yes, it’s that time… Wear Incotex Pants For some of us gents at Air Mail, Incotex pants are the secret weapon of style, and no more so than in winter…

Anthony Horowitz On the most intriguing—and enduring—fiction

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Gallery

Stable Genius A séjour in Deauville leads master photographer Larry Fink to explore his horsey side

Books

Edison

by Edmund Morris
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Agent Running in the Field

by John le Carré
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Big Sister, Little Sister, Red Sister

by Jung Chang
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Short List

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Joni’s Blue Period

“I sing my sorrow and I paint my joy,” Joni Mitchell said in 2000, nearly 30 years after her manager, Elliot Roberts, and her agent, David Geffen, compiled a collection of her drawings and handwritten lyrics to give to friends at Christmas. “In the early 1970s I used to carry a sketchbook around with me everywhere I went,” she writes in the introduction to Morning Glory on the Vine, the 1971 Christmas present that Mitchell has finally decided to publish, with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, on the occasion of her 75th-birthday year. READ ON

Neil Young by Joni Mitchell, circa 1971.

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Best
Lights Out Sleep Mask Light pollution is a thing, especially for those of us living in a teeming metropolis. High-quality sleep remains elusive… Katy Hessel Listen The Great Women Artists There seem to be as many podcasts about great women artists as there are great women artists… Eat Vantre When Thomas Pastuszak, the wine director of the NoMad Hotel, goes to Paris, he seeks out friend and fellow sommelier Marco Pelletier… Ride The Gazelle Here is an electric bike that looks as good as it rides and performs with as much efficiency as it has utility… Drive Land Rover Defender The Defender—that venerable workhorse of the Land Rover stable that is seen everywhere… US music producer Clarence Avant attends the world premiere of ‘The Black Godfather’ at the Paramount Theater in Hollywood, 2019. Watch The Black Godfather There might be no documentary with more headshake-inducing anecdotes than The Black Godfather. Lights Out Sleep Mask Light pollution is a thing, especially for those of us living in a teeming metropolis. High-quality sleep remains elusive… Katy Hessel Listen The Great Women Artists There seem to be as many podcasts about great women artists as there are great women artists… Eat Vantre When Thomas Pastuszak, the wine director of the NoMad Hotel, goes to Paris, he seeks out friend and fellow sommelier Marco Pelletier… Ride The Gazelle Here is an electric bike that looks as good as it rides and performs with as much efficiency as it has utility… Drive Land Rover Defender The Defender—that venerable workhorse of the Land Rover stable that is seen everywhere… US music producer Clarence Avant attends the world premiere of ‘The Black Godfather’ at the Paramount Theater in Hollywood, 2019. Watch The Black Godfather There might be no documentary with more headshake-inducing anecdotes than The Black Godfather.

Salina’s Most Wanted Gen Y chef Martina Caruso is earning international acclaim for her cuisine at Hotel Signum

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Irene Shubik The television producer who gave us Rumpole of the Bailey and The Jewel in the Crown

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Small Talk
“You kids think tea-tree oil grows on trees?? Tea trees?? Well, you’re wrong!! It’s extracted from the leaves of trees in the family Myrtaceae, bred in the plantations of New South Wales!!!”

Pierre Hardy Answers 27 of life’s most pressing questions

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Another weekend on Broadway.
Is Edited By

Graydon Carter and Alessandra Stanley

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Chris Garrett Michael Hainey George Kalogerakis Nathan King

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Angela Panichi

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John Tornow

Books Editor

Jim Kelly

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Laura Jacobs

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Ashley Baker

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Ash Carter

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Julia Vitale

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Ann Schneider

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Bob Mankoff

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Beth Kseniak



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Elena Clavarino Clementine Ford Alex Oliveira


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Isabelle Harvie-Watt

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Bridget Arsenault


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Adam Nadler

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H. Scott Jolley

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Elinor Schneider


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Bill Keenan

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Emily Davis

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Anjali Lewis

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Marc Leyer

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Madeline Spates

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Eshaan Jain

Issue No. 14
October 19, 2019
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Issue No. 14
October 19, 2019

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