Vitro Nasu

“Interesting lists offer us not so much new rankings but new dimensions for evaluation. The lists that fill much of the Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon, lady in waiting to the Empress Sadako (also called Teishi) during the Hiean, are wonders. Each list evokes memories and sensations rather than judgments and thereby disagreements.”

Here is a refreshing essay on listmania at the end of year from 3quarksdaily.

Spike Chihuahua Lee

I have compiled a list of Lees for amusement.

Ang Lee and Spike Lee
The two were classmates at NYU in the early days. Ang Lee was
Spike’s assistant, cameraman, and dumplings chef.

Picke one: Ang or Spike. The site is old and the reality is Ang Lee got singled out more than any other directors in 2005. Spike made a film with Alex Tse about racial tension in San Francisco. Who has seen Sucker Free City?

Spike and Spike

Bruce Lee was honored in Bosnia this year.

Bruce Lee as stamps, all from Antigua, Tanzania and Gambia.

Bruce Lee’s mother was called Grace Lee.
Grace Lee is everywhere.
Do you know Grace Lee among your friends?
“With wit and charm, THE GRACE LEE PROJECT puts a hilarious spin on the eternal question, “What’s in a name”?

You must know someone who went to see Brokeback Mountains, even Richard Hell reviewed Ang Lee’s latest film.

Here are randam links nothing to do with the list of Lees.
The Wild Man – an interview with Christopher Dolye, the garbage mouth.

Three sad and beautiful films I saw and loved this year are,
“Time Out’ 2002 film by Laurent Cantet – “Nobody Knows” and “The Constant Gardner”.

“Nobody Knows” director Kore eda is now making his first (jidai geki ) Samurai film with Tadanobu Asano.

Happy Birthday!
Louise Bourgeois is 94 years old today. Her rap was a big hit among my friends when we celebrated her birthday last year.

Passionate Louise (via)

From Cut in Two:
A Conversation Between Louise Bourgeois and Cheryl Kaplan.
“Bourgeois’ sculptures and installations use hooks, guillotines and sculptural incisions as flaying devices related to a disruptive past. Bourgeois uses events she saw as a young girl during and after WWI when large numbers of men returned from battle as amputees. Body parts are frequently the subject of her work. ”

The Walters Art Museum and the Contemporary Museum in Baltimore will present Louise Bourgeois: Femme, an exploration of the artist Louise Bourgeois’ fascination with the female form through a groundbreaking “intervention,” on view Feb. 11 through May 21, 2006 at both museums.

Louise as beast
(image via)

Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.

More night image is here as The life of Jesus in Christmas lights.(Good Grief blog, via Riley Dog).

Kimono design for Chinese Geishas

This image is dedicated to Gong-Li.

Lonely and desperate

Log on and use this password

Spam gets deleted

Dog by Ed Ruscha

Oof oof and various cheeses

Ed Ruscha is 68 years old today (Dec 16) and this image made a first entry in Vitro Nasu.

He found it at the movies (villagevoice 2004)

Have you seen Ed in a film called “Choose Me”? Oof oof.

US Ed Ruscha

Update: Ed Ruscha is at Whitney now- “The Emperor at New Course” by late Theresa Duncan.

Sunset Boulvard
Photo by David Strick.

Richard Pryor; a Groundbreaking, Anguished Comedian

More links from Greencine on Richard Pryor, here.

A Pryor Love by Hilton Als (from New Yorker Archive)

EugeneMcCarthy:
Candidacy Inspired Antiwar Movement

Memoirs of Cactus Geishas
Andy as Sayuri and Glenn Geisha

A few days not spending time on the net and spending time cleaning up my files and came back with these two funny guys. The photos were copied from a site that most likely no longer exists.
The one on the left used to remind me of Andy Warhol and the right Glenn Gould. Both Andy and Glenn were twisted Geishas playing with the public’s minds in the last Century.

Two Characters in search of a reality One character in samurai costume has a blond wig. See these startling images, and read about this new campy Samurai film from Japan. The Japanese behave and think differently and they continue to evolve uniquely.

More strange images of old Japanese films, here in another language.

Marketing of Geisha, here.
and Geisha gone wild.
Chinese Geisha Reunion, here (or at sidebar menu under freepress)

Girl-in-kimono melon (also from sidebar menu under Melondrama)

Here is another photo from my old file, a test shot for my brand new digital camera at the a mall pre War in Iraq Christmas time 2001.
(Christmas sounds like kurushimi mas in Japanese – meaning “I am suffering”. )

Look at this image while shopping online.

Saving gas is one advantage and another one is not having to look for your car in the parking lot.

Update: Andy Warhol believed in Santa (from Guardian).

Our cable is not working. Hopefully it will get fixed tomorrow.
We’ll see.
Slow Progress

We will win this war with the help of our team.
Our competent team marching toward its goal.
The blind leading the blind.

The White Album with a sample of her magical writing. “We tell ourselves stories in order to live” is the first sentence of this collection of essays written by Joan Didion.
“The White Album” includes her essays on Doris Lessing and Georgia O’Keefe.
Joan Didion

“I WILL BE HER WITNESS.
That would translate sere su testigo, and will not appear in your travelers’ phrasebook because it is not a useful phrase for the prudent traveler.’ Another beginning sentences from her novel “A Book of Common Prayer”.

Having lost her loved ones and having won an award for the brave book
Joan is still writing and today we celebrate her birthday.
(see her chart).
Joan shares a birthday with other funny writers and personality,
Calvin Trillin, Margaret Cho and Hanif Kureishi.

Joan is the wise seer with fragile exterior and migraine headaches,
Hanif Kureishi is our energetic bad boy growing old, who still manages to dislodge and confront us with taboos and dangerous subjects.

“The Black Album” is the second novel by Hanif Kureishi.
The novel takes its title from popstar Prince and nothing to do with Joan’s ‘The White Album”.
Hanif has a wonderful web site with his short stories and his essays.
There is a poignant essay about his father who was a failed writer, tells his readers the origin of how or why he wrote and became the writer as we know him today.
Zadie Smith represents the hybrid author from London today and here in US we do not get news on Kureishi who broke ground in Thatcher’s England in the 90’s with his powerful films and novels.

With Rachel Hanif Kureishi

“But mostly the cinema is collaborative. It’s very boring being a writer. I go into a room every day. I shut the door. I stay in there and that’s it. I come out after a couple of hours with a headache. So working with Stephen Frears or working with Udayan Prasad who directed My Son the Fanatic, or working with the other directors in the theatre or the cinema enables me to collaborate with other imaginations. Then the actors come in and take their part. When Rachel Griffiths came in to My Son the Fanatic (1997) she made it a very different kind of film” (from Senses of Cinema)
My son the fanatic is getting another look today.
Q&A with Hanif Kureishi on My son the fanatic here.

Mother Superior and getting old – an article from Village Voice.

More lengthy one from Australia – See photo of Daniel Craig, yes that new James Bond was in this controversial film.