On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Harper Lee's masterpiece of children's literature, it appears some critics are itching to provide a corrective to all the millions-sold adulation. What's the matter with liking To Kill A Mockingbird? Well.
Teen blogger Tavi Gevinson spoke this morning to a packed room of industry professionals, reporters, and marketers about the "unpredictability" of Generation Y. They wanted to know how the generation's personal qualities would make young people liable to buy things.
In her work "The Artist is Present," Marina Abramović invites any museum-goer to sit face to face with her, in silence, for as long as the museum-goer wants. So art is great and everything — wait, is that Sharon Stone?
The New Yorker pays unspoken tribute to the late Alexander McQueen: The cover illustration is reminiscent of the designer's dramatics; inside is a previously unpublished photo taken by Platon in 1996, when fashion's "enfant terrible" was just 27. [New Yorker]
''Bringing food into a situation where people are desperate is always chaotic,'' says Chris Weber of World Vision, one of the organizations tasked with distributing the wave of donated supplies. Is handing aid over to women the answer?
Who exactly are these elusive tea partiers we keep hearing so much about?
Amanda Fortini's profile of Kate and Laura Mulleavy — the Pasadena sisters behind Rodarte — examines the duo's relationship with middlebrow fashion bible Vogue. You know, the magazine that made them subsist on 1,300 calories a day for four months.
Ardent feminist ex-communist designer Miuccia Prada is handling the costumes for the Met's upcoming production of Verdi's opera Attila. But according to an anonymous source on set, Prada has balked at dressing anyone who couldn't fit into a sample size.
Michelle Obama's royal cardigan incident, Sarah Palin's glasses, Aretha Franklin's hat, and Sonia Sotomayor's judicial collar — "Oliver Cromwell meets Whistler's Mother," in the New Yorker's inimitable parlance — all make this list of 2009's memorable fashion statements. [New Yorker]
The lengthy profile of James Cameron in the latest New Yorker confirms a long-held and heretofore unjustified suspicion that James Cameron is, in fact, a complete and total ass.
"I'm not very pretty...I am what I am. I look like a dude. I wear boring jackets. I have a big nose. I have short hair. No one is going to mix me up with a Fox Business anchor." [NYer]
Richard Merkin, artist, illustrator and "professional dandy," has died at 70. Eulogized Tom Wolfe, "He was the greatest of that breed, the Artist Dandy...Like Dali, he had one of the few remaining Great Mustaches in the art world." [NYT]
Leading online shoe retailer Zappo's has cheerful employees, satisfied, loyal customers, and a C.E.O. who doesn't see himself as an irreplaceable demigod. So naturally, people wonder if it's some kind of cult. Alexandra Jacobs investigates for the new New Yorker.
A fascinating profile in the New Yorker tries to bring Amelia Earhart down to Earth.
Burberry designer Christopher Bailey — a working-class Yorkshire lad — is profiled at length by the New Yorker's Lauren Collins. Bailey is notable not only for overseeing a house that was until recently considered moribund, but for being unusually nice.
In this week's New Yorker (the Summer Fiction issue), Louis Menand asks if creative writing can or should be taught at universities. As a recent (two weeks ago!) graduate of a university creative writing program, I had to weigh in.
Richard Avedon disowned his fashion work in later life — but New York's International Center of Photography is mounting a retrospective exhibit of his fashion photography. This slideshow ought to heighten everyone's excitement. [New Yorker]
