Category Archives: Photography

08/22/19

Hidden Venice: A Love Story In Black And White

Eugenio Novajra, 2017, The Great Beauty

“The black knot of gondolas in the canal of Mestre is more beautiful to me than a sunrise full of clouds all scarlet and gold.” John Ruskin, 1841

Just when you thought it was impossible to see Venice in a new light, La Serenissima sheds her color to reveal her bare essence, as expressed nearly two centuries ago by the Victorian art critic, John Ruskin.

Dream of Venice in Black and White, the third installment in the award-winning Dream of Venice series, continues its intimate portrait of the Adriatic Queen, this time as an homage to the city’s most precious and threatened commodity – her private worlds. Read more . . .

06/25/17

The Sultanette chases down France’s ‘enfant terrible’. Houellebecq who?

PHOTO:TheSultanette

The Sultanette takes Michel & Teddy to bed.

Clearly stated in The Male Harem bylaws: “All flattery welcome. False praise included. If you’re a liar just be a good one.” Who doesn’t love to be praised? Michel Houellebecq, it seems.

France’s persistent enfant terrible was recently described by Alexandra Wolfe in the Wall Street Journal as being “accused of misogyny, anti-Muslim bigotry and (more generally) nihilism, based in large part on the vulgar, resentful, unhappy characters in his novels.” At a surly sixty-one, he has done nothing to discourage that sentiment. Read more . . .

04/7/16
Photo: TheSultanette

Trickery! Cheating! Chicanery! It’s Tax Time!

Head over heels at The Met.

Welcome to the perilous days of April, fellow Americans, when we’re reminded that nothing is certain but death and taxes, and that cheating (not the fun, sweaty kind) is a patriotic duty. So what better inspiration than a trip to New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibit, Crime Stories: Photography and Foul Play.

Encouraged by Andy Battaglia’s Wall Street Journal review promising “shady characters, dirty deeds and their often grizzly results” I hopped an uptown subway to the Met, still a sacred monument to art in spite of its jazzy new logo. Read more . . .