Supplemento al numero odierno de la Repubblica Sped. abb. postale art. 1 legge 46/04 del 27/02/2004 — Roma

MONDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2009 Copyright © 2009

Spend They Must

You hear about the saving, the hoarding and the cutting back, the people who are eyeing every single cent. But there are those who are eyeing this season’s over-the-knee boot or handbag, because in the midst of it all, some are still shopping. They’re just LENS doing it in a different way: stealthily. “People are saying, ‘It’s that time of year; I want to buy something, but I feel a little weird,’ ” Eve Gold- berg, an owner of a dia- mond dealer in Manhattan, told The Times. “Often they tell me, ‘I don’t want to be out there making an announcement with a big bag that says Harry Winston.’ ” Ms. Goldberg’s company opened a salon that caters to clients who want to shop discreetly, and it is one of many. There are exclusive soi- rees in apartments, invitation-only shopping events in hotel suites and private showrooms. While the very rich may be cutting back on the public display of wealth, they have no prob- lem spending more on their private spaces. Kitchens by the high-end British designer Clive Christian have been popular. Jacqueline Weeman, business manager for the New York Betrayed by the Text showroom that opened over the summer, said it generated $5 million in sales in its first few months, The Times reported. “It’s a much more intimate purchase,” Ms. Weeman told The Times. “You can be as osten- By LAURA M. HOLSON Like others before him, Tiger Woods tatious as you want in the home,” Ms. Weeman HERE IS A question that has has found that the digital trail left by told The Times. text messages can be incriminating. And home is the best place for the stealth crossed the mind recently of any- shopper, because many are turning to the Web. T one who has sent a cellphone text , who bought a Ralph Rucci message while cheating on a spouse: torneys on how to use electronic evi- ensemble from Ricky’s Exceptional Treasures, a luxury resale store on eBay, told The Times: What was I thinking? dence — text messages, browsing his- “In this economy, the people I know are mak- Text messages are the new lipstick on tory and social networks — in proving ing adjustments. Their transactions tend to be the collar, the mislaid credit card bill. In- a case. And the Supreme between themselves and the seller.” Exclusivity combined with secrecy may stantaneous and seemingly casual, they Court agreed on December 15 to decide be the latest retail strategy; it’s a whole other can be confirmation of a clandestine af- whether a police department in Ontario, genre beyond the snobbish salesperson. The fair, a record of the not-so-discreet who California, violated the constitutional German brand VonRosen asks customers to apply for membership by describing why they sometimes forget that everything digital privacy rights of an employee when it would like to shop there. David Von Rosen, leaves a footprint. inspected personal text messages sent founder of the label, told The Times that he and received on a government pager. received 10,000 requests since starting the site This became painfully obvious this a year ago, and has let only 1,500 people have month when a woman who claims to have “How does someone make up an ex- access. had an affair with Tiger Woods told a ce- cuse when what is happening is right Other private-sale sites — many invitation there, written in black and white?’’ only and many only pretending to be — like lebrity publication that he had sent her Gilt, Rue La La and Ideeli are thriving. The flirty text messages, some of which were asked Mitchell Karpf, a Miami divorce sites sell deeply discounted designer clothing published. He follows other politicians HANS DERYK/REUTERS ; TOP, TONY CENICOLA/THE NEW YORK TIMES lawyer who is also chairman of the bar and accessories. Some sites post specific times when sales start and can sell out within hours. who showed a lack of understanding might be suspected but not confirmed, association’s family law section. “By the It’s a rush, online and in the brain, and any about texts, including Kwame Kilpatrick, nowadays text messages provide proof. time someone shows up with a handful of guilt of shopping is eclipsed by having found an a former Detroit mayor who went to pris- Divorce lawyers say they have seen an texts, there is no going back.’’ amazing bargain. And when there’s always a bargain to be found, there’s always some shop- on after his steamy text messages to an increase in cases in the past year where Although most e-mail users have come ping to do. aide were revealed, and Republican Sen- a wronged spouse has offered text to understand that messages remain on “It’s heroin,” Paco Underhill, author of “Why ator John Ensign of Nevada, whose affair their computers even if deleted, text mes- We Buy: The Science of Shopping,” told The messages to show that a partner has Times. “The more you do it and the more ways with a former employee was confirmed strayed. sages are often regarded as more ephem- you do it, the harder it is to stop.” by an incriminating text message. The American Bar Association began ANITA PATIL Unlike earlier eras when a dalliance offering seminars this fall for marital at- Contin ued on Page IV For comments, write to [email protected].

A PLANET IN FLUX TO OUR READERS As Bolivia’s glaciers melt, SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY NEW YORK ARTS This is the last issue of the impoverished city of El Surgeons who cut Abandoned storefronts the International Week- Alto could become the first VII VII ly this year. Publication major urban casualty of out mental issues. transformed by art. climate change. PAGE V will resume January 11.

ADVERTISEMENT

Repubblica NewYork II MONDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2009

OPINION & COMMENTARY EDITORIALS OF THE TIMES NATO and Afghanistan

Afghanistan is not and should not be pouring of European support for the just the United States’ fight. Al Qaeda United States and offers of assistance has used its sanctuaries in Afghani- in Afghanistan under the common stan and Pakistan to plot and launch defense clause of the NATO treaty. attacks on European cities. We wel- The Bush administration arrogantly come the news that some of America’s spurned that offer, and then proceed- 42 military partners in Afghanistan ed to alienate Europeans with its di- plan to send more troops. sastrous war in Iraq. Trans-Atlantic Still, NATO’s announcement that an cooperation on Afghanistan still has additional 7,000 troops will be going not recovered. falls short of what is needed, and has The challenge for President Obama too many casualty-limiting caveats and European leaders is to overcome attached. that unhappy recent history before it That isn’t good for Afghanistan or does more damage to the war effort NATO, which has never fully taken in Afghanistan and to the NATO alli- responsibility for this mission. And it ance. Germany’s chancellor, Angela is unfair to the American people, who Merkel, and France’s president, Ni- are being asked to make dispropor- colas Sarkozy, have repeatedly stated tionate sacrifices for what is, emphati- that their countries have a stake in the cally, a common fight. future of Afghanistan and the future When more closely parsed, the of NATO. But both are wary of push- NATO numbers look even less im- ing their voters too far, too fast. (Both ADAM FERGUSON FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES pressive. Almost 2,000 will come from have essentially postponed their deci- Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, left, and President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan at a news conference. countries outside the alliance (includ- sions on further troop contributions ing Australia, South Korea, Sweden until late next month.) and aspiring NATO members, Geor- Democratically elected leaders can- MAUREEN DOWD gia, Ukraine, Macedonia and Monte- not ignore public skepticism, but they negro). And more than half of the new should not surrender to it when they NATO troops will come from just three know better. Mrs. Merkel and Mr. member states: Britain, whose force Sarkozy must educate their voters to A Game That’s Not So Great will go up to 10,000; Italy, which will go the harsh reality that Europe will also to roughly 4,000; and Poland, which pay a high price if the Taliban and Al will total 2,800. Qaeda get to retake Afghanistan and KIRKUK, Iraq mber 8 at the presidential palace in official while Maliki was an elected So far, neither France, which has further destabilize Pakistan. Puppets just aren’t what they used Kabul, Hamid Karzai surprised the leader. When the prime minister 3,750 troops there, nor Germany, with There is a lot Europe can do in ad- to be. usually unflappable Gates when he finally agreed to reschedule the roughly 4,300, has agreed to send any dition to sending more troops. Af- Or maybe a trillion dollars doesn’t contradicted President Obama’s meeting for 7:50 a.m. December 11, additional troops. ghanistan also needs more skilled buy the same felicitous level of obse- plans to leave the country. Mocking Gates’s aides gleefully noted that, Meanwhile, the Netherlands, with civilian advisers to work with Presi- quiousness it once did. his American backers, the Afghan given Maliki’s preference for sleep- roughly 2,200, will withdraw its forces dent Hamid Karzai’s new cabinet ap- Visiting Afghanistan and Iraq in peacock observed: “For another 15 ing late, it was a diplomatic triumph, in the course of 2010; Canada, with pointees. And it urgently needs help an attempt to shore up our wobbly to 20 years, Afghanistan will not be even if the Iraqi had on pajamas un- 2,800, will be leaving by 2011. That reconstructing its dysfunctional na- wards, Bob Gates could not seem to able to sustain a force of that nature der his suit. means as American troop levels rise tional police force. NATO had it right get the respect due the man running and capability with its own resourc- After four days of preaching a from 68,000 to 98,000 by next summer, in 2001. Defeating Al Qaeda is a matter the world’s best military, a force that es.” message of love — Gates said it was allied troop levels are not likely to go of common defense. President Obama has been protecting and propping up Gates and Obama may have want- “a myth” that America likes war much higher than the present 38,000. is right to insist that the allies do more. our two occupied territories for most ed to “light a fire,” as Gates put it, and called it the first time in military Immediately after the September 11 Now Europe’s leaders need to demand of this decade. under the corrupt Afghan president history that an occupying force was attacks there was a spontaneous out- more of themselves. At a joint press conference on Dec- and warn that the cash machine is in Afghanistan “on behalf of the Af- closing, but Karzai called their bluff. ghans rather than to conquer” — he He knows, as do the leaders in Iraq finally got some respect. LETTERS TO THE INTERNATIONAL WEEKLY and Pakistan, that America is stuck “You look very young — you look bailing them out with billions every much older on TV,” Major General year, even when they dawdle, disap- Turhan Abdul Rahman, the leather- serted into Asahi Shimbun of Novem- In English there is the phrase “tem- point and deceive. clad Kirkuk provincial director of ‘Weird Science’ ber 22. Dawkins suggests we have a porary bypass,” which is elegant and Gates and his generals in Afghan- police, told the manicured Gates. If “belief” gene; that is, we are “hard- might seem serious. We know that istan talked a lot on his visit about former Defense Secretary Donald To the Editor: wired” from birth to believe things, any temporary solution might last “partnering” with and “mentoring” Rumsfeld had been insulted by our Isn’t the answer to “the Singularity” especially at a young age. much longer than planned or desired. the Afghan Army and police. But inglorious puppets, he would have (Lens, December 13), the point when He argues that children who be- There’s another English expression, given the stone-age nature of the been furious. But the disciplined, computers become self-aware and lieved without question parental pro- “Mickey Mouse,” which means poorly country, it’s more basic. Americans analytical, pragmatic, introverted super intelligent and can act on their nouncements such as “if you eat that executed — that’s not what our “gam- have to teach the vast majority of Gates is no Rummy (nor does he call own, simply to pull the plugs out? red berry, you will die” or “that animal bis” are. Afghan recruits to read and write his predecessor). His form of ego is NIALL O’CONNOR is dangerous” had a greater chance of GEORGE LACOMBE before they can get to security train- not to show ego. When a much-antic- Maidenhead, England surviving to reproduce than skeptical Campinas, Brazil ing. It’s hard to arrest people if you ipated trip to see an Army Stryker children who had to see for themselves can’t read them their rights and take brigade in Kandahar was canceled if the berry was poisonous. Unlike a To the Editor: names. because of fog, he dryly told us: “As ‘The God Gene’ gene causing people to believe in gods, Congratulations for having recog- It seems late to realize this, but Clint Eastwood said, ‘A man’s got to which may or may not confer a sur- nized the talent of Marcelo Tas, a jour- Gates told reporters he had only know his limitations.’ ” To the Editor: vival advantage, a gene that causes nalist who is widely admired in Brazil. recently learned the “eye-opener” The Cold Warrior who helped per- In “The God Delusion,” Richard children to believe what their parents His column in the International Week- that the Taliban were able to attract suade the Reluctant Warrior to do Dawkins presents a hypothesis more tell them should confer such an advan- ly makes his fellow Brazilians proud. so many fighters because they paid the Afghan surge has sometimes plausible than “a God Gene,” the cover tage. He further argues that when the ANA PAULA more. Generals in Afghanistan said been on the wrong side of history — story in the International Weekly in- notion of gods first appeared, the nec- Rio de Janeiro, Brazil the Taliban dole out $250 to $300 a with the Soviet Union, the Iran-con- essary “machinery” needed to believe month, while the Afghan Army paid tra scandal and the 1989 desertion of in them was already in place. Thus, no about $120. So Gates has made sure Afghanistan. “god gene” is necessary to believe in ‘Meeting Inertia With Inertia’ that recruits get a raise to $240. But unlike Rummy and others gods, just a gene predisposing people The American solution is always from the Bush administration, he to believe without question. To the Editor: to throw more money at a problem; doesn’t seem driven to make up for STEVEN SABOTTA Roger Cohen’s Intelligence column now we’re in a bidding war with the past disappointments by manipu- Direttore responsabile: Ezio Mauro Japan last week regarding Iran was interest- Taliban, which doesn’t bode well for lating present history. “Where I do Vicedirettori: Mauro Bene, Gregorio Botta, Dario Cresto-Dina, ing, but it fell short. Leaving the Ira- the democracy façade. think I bring something unusual is, Massimo Giannini, Angelo Rinaldi nian people alone, powerless against Gates promised that America I think I have uncommon common Caporedattore centrale: Fabio Bogo ‘The Improvised Nation’ the dictatorship, against the threat of would not leave until the Afghan and sense, whether it’s growing up in Caporedattore vicario: repression or prison, that’s not how Iraqi forces stand up — even when Kansas or just my life experience,” Massimo Vincenzi Gruppo Editoriale l’Espresso S.p.A. you build the future. There are ways, he gets stood up, as he did by Nuri he told me, sitting in The Silver Bul- • To the Editor: other than confrontation, that would Kamal al-Maliki on December 10. let, a secure Airstream trailer. Presidente: Carlo De Benedetti Marcelo Tas, or would it be now, accelerate the downfall of this regime The Iraqi prime minister can- Asked about the Democratic law- Amministratore delegato: Marcelo Times? Congratulations on that the West has allowed to grow in celled a planned meeting with makers who felt the president had Monica Mondardini Divisione la Repubblica your Intelligence column in the Inter- its midst. Gates because he was in a scorch- been rolled by the generals, Gates via Cristoforo Colombo 90 - 00147 Roma national Weekly, published in Folha de It is certain that direct assistance ing closed-door six-hour meeting snapped: “That’s ridiculous.” Direttore generale: Carlo Ottino Sao Paulo on December 6. At the com- to the Iranian people by all appropri- with Iraqi lawmakers, being taken So how does Gates make a deci- Responsabile trattamento dati pany where I work, “gambiarras” are ate means could promote the rise of a to task for his failure to stop five sion that will determine his reputa- (d. lgs. 30/6/2003 n. 196): Ezio Mauro Reg. Trib. di Roma n. 16064 del affectionately called “gambis” and are fairer and less repressive regime. The bombings that ripped into govern- tion and that of the young president 13/10/1975 totally incorporated in the current vo- West knows how to do this very dis- ment buildings earlier that week, he serves? Tipografia: Rotocolor, cabulary. “Do a ‘gambi’ there, man”; creetly when it decides to do it. But you killing 127 people and wounding “Anybody who reads history has v. C. Colombo 90 RM “I did a ‘gambi.’ ” still need the political and financial hundreds more. to approach these things with some Stampa: Rotocolor, v. C. Cavallari 186/192 Roma; Rotocolor, v. N. Sauro will to pursue it. The defense secretary’s aides humility because you can’t know,” 15 - Paderno Dugnano MI ; Finegil Send comments to RIMEY-MAURIVARD tried to spin the snub, noting that he said. “Nobody knows what the Editoriale c/o Citem Soc. Coop. arl, [email protected]. France their guy was merely an appointed last chapter ever looks like.” v. G.F. Lucchini - Mantova Pubblicità: A. Manzoni & C., via Nervesa 21 - Milano - 02.57494801 • THE NEW YORK TIMES IS PUBLISHED WEEKLY IN THE FOLLOWING NEWSPAPERS: CLARÍN, ARGENTINA ✂ DER STANDARD, AUSTRIA ✂ LARAZÓN, BOLIVIA ✂ FOLHA, BRAZIL ✂ LASEGUNDA, CHILE ✂ EL ESPECTADOR, COLOMBIA Supplemento a cura di: Alix Van Buren, LISTIN DIARIO, DOMINICAN REPUBLIC ✂ LE FIGARO, FRANCE ✂ 24 SAATI, GEORGIA ✂ SÜDDEUTSCHE ZEITUNG, GERMANY ✂ ELEFTHEROTYPIA, GREECE ✂ PRENSA LIBRE, GUATEMALA ✂ THEASIAN AGE,INDIA ✂ LAREPUBBLICA, ITALY Francesco Malgaroli ASAHI SHIMBUN, JAPAN ✂ EL NORTE, MURAL AND REFORMA, MEXICO ✂ LA PRENSA, PANAMA ✂ MANILA BULLETIN, PHILIPPINES ✂ ROMANIA LIBERA, ROMANIA ✂ NOVAYA GAZETA, ✂ DELO, SLOVENIA EL PAÍS, SPAIN ✂ UNITED DAILY NEWS, TAIWAN ✂ SABAH, TURKEY ✂ THE OBSERVER, UNITED KINGDOM ✂ THE KOREA TIMES, UNITED STATES ✂ NOVOYE RUSSKOYE SLOVO, UNITED STATES ✂ EL OBSERVADOR, URUGUAY

Repubblica NewYork the explorer’ s watch

The Oyster Perpetual Explorer II is the ultimate reference chosen by professionals with a spirit of adventure. Successor to the original Explorer that fi rst conquered Mount Everest in 1953, the Explorer II, thanks to its third hand, keeps one oriented night and day. Additionally, it is completely airtight, dust proof and scratch resistant. Highly valued by mountaineers and speleologists, the Explorer II has proven its durability and reliability on countless expeditions. Something any kind of explorer can count on. Visit ROLEX.COM. And explore more. the explorer ii

Repubblica NewYork IV MONDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2009

WORLD TRENDS For a Role on Reality T V, Michelle Obama recently appeared on Jay Just Point, Click and Send Leno’s comedy show. Jacqueline Kennedy gave By BRIAN STELTER rector for “The Biggest Loser” and minimum There are better ways to be selected other shows. Broadly speaking, she information for a reality TV show than by crashing said, this means people with outgo- a White House state dinner or concoct- ing personalities whom viewers can with maximum ing a hoax for television news. relate to. politeness. A growing number of Web sites now Ms. Thomas was in Detroit and Chi- play the role of middleman, connect- cago recently to recruit families for ing aspiring contestants with casting “Losing It With Jillian,” a weight loss directors. And as the reality genre has show with the trainer Jillian Michaels thrived, so has a small industry of on- of “The Biggest Loser.” Beforehand, line talent scouts that serve it — sites she posted an ad on RealityWanted like RealityWanted, Talent6 and Got- asking — in all capital letters — “Are Cast, where people can find casting you ready to change you and your JUSTIN LUBIN calls for TV shows and submit their loved one’s lives? NBC’s Jillian Mi- résumés, often for a monthly fee. chaels is coming to your home!” Doz- “The lengths that people will go to ens of people applied online. When Overexposure Hits the White House just to get on these shows is pretty ri- Potential contestants “think we’re diculous,” said Roz Taylor-Jordan of going to pay more attention if they’re Cast Iron Productions, who is casting on these sites, and it’s true,” Ms. When Barack Obama became They are more or less related by season five of “America’s Got Talent.” Thomas said. president, he promised a “new era affiliation with the crashers, be- She looks favorably on the casting Eliminating people who are desper- of openness.” After almost a year cause Bravo, the ring leader of the sites. “We can’t be everywhere all the ate or mentally unstable is one of the of media coverage that seemed camera crew, is a division of NBC time, so the more people I have mining hardest parts of the job, Ms. Thomas to be all-Obama, all-the-time Universal. for me, the better,” she said. said. The middleman sites do not con- that concluded in Mr. Williams and the president are From the perspective of an aspir- duct background checks, so it falls to DAVID a reality-program already burger-and-fries buddies, ing contestant, the sites make fame the production company to ferret out couple crashing a having gone out for fast food last look just a few clicks CARR state dinner at the spring with a camera crew. President away. “Jerry Seinfeld is White House, I’d be Reagan was the first sitting presi- hand-selecting couples ESSAY O.K. with a little less dent to dine as a customer at a public for his brand new NBC exposure. restaurant, but the restaurant was comedy series about When Michaele and Tareq Salahi the exclusive Le Cirque; no cameras married life,” says a no- waltzed uninvited into the White allowed. tice posted prominently House for a state dinner last month, “When he ran, the Obamas were on RealityWanted. “We their camera crew from Bravo’s pitched as kind of a reality show need couples who bicker forthcoming reality show “The Real CBS PHOTO ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES to the public. We’d hear about his about NOTHING!” The Housewives of D.C.” was left wait- The president can’t be blamed for dinners with Michelle and we felt site lets people “apply ing outside, but it’s not as if their a few idiots trying to game their way like we knew them,” said Michael now” to that show and presence would have been much of a into his presence, but his shared love Hirschorn, a former executive at others, like “The Bach- breach of current protocol. of the camera leaves him vulnerable VH1 who runs Ish Entertainment, elorette.” After all, like much of daily life to suggestions that he is too busy which produces reality program- Richard Heene, who there, their visit was recorded and appearing as the president and not ming. “But now that he is in office, admitted to lying to au- uploaded on the White House Flickr busy enough being one. The White there is a danger of the mystique thorities about his son TRAE PATTON/NBC feed, the always-on streaming House, something of an imperial going away. The problem with social being carried away in The trainer Jillian Michaels of “The Biggest window into “the people’s house,” a palace under President Bush, has media and constant video is that it a helium balloon, was a Loser” will be on a new nickname that has never been more become the most camera-infested flows like water and reduces every- member of RealityWant- show that is currently seeking contestants. apt. place since “Big Brother.” Oprah thing to the same level.” ed, one of countless peo- Considering the White House’s Winfrey was there recently with a The clamor, media and otherwise, ple looking for fame — or hulking, media-rich Web site, its camera crew in tow, chatting with that the Obamas have created in perhaps just employment — from the people with problems. Facebook page, photo galleries and the first couple and taking in the Washington of course brings to reality TV boom. In a down economy, Reality TV executives are often criti- podcasts on iTunes, the presidency Christmas decorations. mind another handsome young some publicity seekers on these Web cized for picking provocative cast mem- seems less threatened by the incur- She and the first lady shared the couple with beautiful children who sites are really just job seekers. bers. But there is more to the selection sion of a reality show than running cover of her magazine back in April, riveted the nation. It was, after all, “At the end of the day,” said Lisa process than finding people “who are an administration that is in danger not to be confused with the Vogue Jacqueline Kennedy who first intro- Berger, an executive vice president at going to jump off the screen,” said of becoming one. cover Michelle Obama did back in duced the televised version of the E!, a cable TV network, “these people Dave Noll, the president for television In an effort to remain connected March. Mrs. Obama will also be White House to citizens, giving CBS want two things: they want fame and of Notional, the company that produces to the social media world that was so starring in an episode of the cook- News a tour. they want money.” “Chopped” for the Food Network and much a part of his electoral victory, ing show “Iron Chef” this January But the peek was carefully Casting directors say they lean on “Don’t Sweat It” for HGTV. When cast- the Obama administration may be and has already done a live shot for scripted, following her maxim of Craigslist, Facebook, sites like Real- ing, “you’re really making a business guilty of a very contemporary com- Jay Leno, a talk show host, from the “minimum information given with ityWanted and InfoList, and their own decision,” Mr. Noll said, noting that re- mon offense: Oversharing. White House. maximum politeness.” To watch the databases of contestants. lationships with talent sometimes last “In the context of a president that The gate-crashers weren’t so tour more than four decades later on Talent6 charges its members $35 for years. you see all the time and hear from much invading the Obamas’ privacy YouTube, it looks less like the dawn- a month. RealityWanted has a tiered Perhaps because the decisions are all the time, how important does the as trying to grab some of the abun- ing of a new media age than a quaint pricing system: access is free, but for so important, the matchmaker Web speech at West Point, the most im- dant media limelight already there. reminder of a bygone era when $4 or $8 a month, people can get extras sites are not universally accepted in portant speech of his presidency, be- It’s not as if they were the only me- distance between the press and the like instant alerts about casting calls. Hollywood. Some executives say they come?” asks Lawrence O’Donnell, dia-connected people in attendance: presidency was vast. Some big shows — like “America’s make it too easy for people to apply. a producer and writer on the tele- Brian Williams, the anchor of “NBC Mrs. Kennedy may have been Got Talent” — which draws 100,000 ap- “In theory, you hope you’d find great vision show “The West Wing,” a Nightly News,” and Jeffrey Immelt glamorous and done her share of plicants a year — don’t need to recruit people from these Web sites,” said political drama, and an analyst on of General Electric, which just an- image management, but she had a so aggressively, but for other shows, Randy Bernstein, a co-owner of the MSNBC. “It becomes like weather nounced it was selling majority own- chaste relationship with the camera these sites play an important role. agency Casting Duo. “But I’m still old- reports, just another of many mes- ership of NBC Universal, were at the and the public. “I want to live my life, “They cater to what we’re looking fashioned, and I believe in recruiting sages from the president.” same state dinner. not record it,” she said. for,” said Jodi Thomas, a casting di- and hand-picking talent.”

Kwame Kilpatrick, the former In the Era of Texting, Betrayal Detroit mayor, reacted in court in 2008. Sexually explicit texts Leaves a Fateful Digital Trail were evidence in his perjury case.

in a text on their cellphone,’’ said Marc and confronted the pair about their af- From Page I Rotenberg, executive director of the fair at a Christmas dinner soon after. eral — type, hit “send’’ and off it goes Electronic Privacy Information Cen- In a recent survey of 2,300 adults into the ether. But messages can re- ter, a research group in Washington. about social networking, the Pew main on the sender’s and receiver’s In Mr. Woods’s case, Jaimee Grubbs, Internet and American Life Project phones, and even if they are deleted, who has worked as a cocktail waitress found that 12 percent said they had communications companies store in Las Vegas, came forward with text shared information online that they them for anywhere from days to a few and voice messages that she said were later regretted posting. Lee Rainie, weeks. from him. The texts surfaced after he BILL PUGLIANO/GETTY IMAGES director of the Pew project, contends At the root of the issue is privacy — crashed his car on November 26; a reduce his presence in its advertising. tended that the woman was a friend, it is evidence of an overall cultural or rather the increasing lack of it in steady stream of reports about marital Others, like Kwame Kilpatrick, the but he paid the state $130 for the mes- shift in which people have become in- our show-and-tell digital culture. Text infidelities have followed. Since then, former mayor of Detroit, were found sages from his phone. creasingly careless about revealing messages are considered private, more than a dozen other women have out because they used government- Doug Hampton, a longtime friend personal information. much as telephone calls are, legal ex- said they have slept with Mr. Woods. issued mobile phones and pagers. Mr. and employee of Senator Ensign’s, “It is one thing to write a personal perts say. But if a cheating spouse’s Mr. Woods announced on December Kilpatrick lied under oath about hav- said recently on the television news note to someone who shares it with her cellphone is part of a family calling 11 that he would take an “indefinite ing an affair with an aide, but his text show “Nightline,” that he was alarmed two best friends,” said Mr. Rainie. “It plan or regularly left unlocked, a sus- break’’ from the PGA Tour to work on messages revealed the truth. Nevada’s after he had borrowed Mr. Ensign’s is another thing to text your undying picious partner could make a case for his marriage. The global consulting gi- governor, Jim Gibbons, was accused cellphone in late 2007 to call his wife, affection and become a laughingstock. sifting through the in-box. ant Accenture ended its endorsement last spring by his wife in divorce docu- Cynthia Hampton, and found her listed What feels intimate and anonymous at “People who have something really contract with him on December 13, a ments of sending more than 800 text as “Aunt Judy.” Mr. Hampton said he the time, perhaps, really isn’t. It can be private to say probably shouldn’t do it day after Gillette announced it would messages to a mistress in 2007. He con- found an incriminating text message shared widely.’’

Repubblica NewYork MONDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2009 V

A PLANET IN FLUX Melting Glaciers Could Deal a Fatal Blow to a Bolivian City

By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL Farmers like Mario EL ALTO, Bolivia — When the tap Ariquipa Laso and his across from her mud-walled home wife, Margarita Limachi dried up in September, Celia Cruz Álvarez, below, fear for stopped making soups and scaled the future as glaciers back washing for her family of five. She began daily pilgrimages to bet- that provide water and ter-off neighborhoods, hoping to find electricity melt. water there. Though she has lived here for a de- cade and her husband, a construction worker, makes a decent wage, money cannot buy water. “I’m thinking of moving back to change and you have huge social prob- the countryside; what else can I do?” lems,” said Dirk Hoffmann, head of the said Ms. Cruz, 33, wearing traditional climate change program at the Uni- braids and a long tiered skirt as she versidad Mayor de San Andrés in La surveyed a courtyard dotted with pig- Paz. “What’s at stake is conflict — you lets, bags of potatoes and an ancient wouldn’t talk about civil war exactly. red Datsun. “Two years ago this was But it will be unrest.” never a problem. But if there’s not wa- In fact, when taps dried up in Ms. ter, you can’t live.” Cruz’s neighborhood, the Solidarity The glaciers that have long provided District of El Alto, rich La Paz resi- water and electricity to this part of Bo- dents still had water. In a nation that livia are melting and disappearing, has rallied behind socialist rhetoric victims of global warming, most sci- and indigenous rights, there were entists say. complaints. “The sense of injustice If the water problems are not solved, is palpable,” said Edwin Chuquimia El Alto, a poor sister city of La Paz, Vélez, an official in El Alto formerly in could perhaps be the first large urban charge of water. casualty of climate change. A World In Khapi, a village two hours’ drive Bank report concluded last year that from La Paz, people regard the Illi- climate change would eliminate many mani glacier as “our God, our great glaciers in the Andes within 20 years, protector,” said Mario Ariquipa Laso, Lake threatening the existence of nearly 100 CHACALTAYA 55, a wizened farmer. Ten years ago, it Titicaca GLACIER million people. La Paz provided a steady, gentle stream dur- For the nearly 200 nations trying to BOLIVIA ing dry months to keep crops watered. negotiate a climate accord in Copen- El Alto ILLIMANI Today, with Illimani in retreat, water hagen, the question of how to address GLACIER “just pours” off the glacier, a yellowish the needs of dozens of countries like Kms. 32 Huaricana mix. “A lot of us think about not hav- Bolivia is a central focus of the talks ing kids anymore,” said Margarita Li- and a major obstacle to a treaty. Kms. 320 machi Álvarez, 46. “Without water or World leaders have long agreed food, how would we survive?” BRAZIL that rich nations must provide money PERU In the last few years, Bolivian lives and technology to help developing na- have been buffeted by an almost bibli- tions adapt to problems that, to a large Area of detail cal array of extreme weather events, extent, have been created by smoke- many of which scientists believe are stacks and tailpipes far away. But BOLIVIA probably linked to climate change. the specifics of that transfer — which This year brought scorching tem- countries will pay, how much and for peratures and intense sun. A drought what kinds of projects — remain con- ANDES killed 7,000 farm animals and sickened tentious. nearly 100,000. PARAGUAY On December 11, the European CHILE Developed countries agree that they Union made an initial pledge to pay Pacific Ocean ARGENTINA have an obligation to help relieve such $3.5 billion annually for three years THE NEW YORK TIMES PHOTOGRAPHS BY ÁNGEL FRANCO/THE NEW YORK TIMES stresses, but many remain hesitant to help poor countries cope — though your island is under water?” more rapidly than we can respond landlocked country, where per capita to release funds, in part because poor economists project the total cost to be Scientists say that money and engi- to them, and a reservoir takes five to income is around $1,000. Urban water countries have few concrete plans to $100 billion or more. neering could solve La Paz-El Alto’s seven years to build. I’m not sure we supplies are also taxed by population address climate problems. But with With its recent climate-induced water problems, with projects includ- have that long,” said Edson Ramírez, growth as well as checkered manage- little cash or expertise, it is hard to catastrophes, Bolivia has become an ing a well-designed reservoir. The a Bolivian glaciologist who has docu- ment, in part because there is little plan a giant new reservoir or a system angry voice for poor nations. glaciers that ring the cities have es- mented and projected the glaciers’ money to manage anything, but also to transfer water through the country. “We have a big problem and even sentially provided natural low-main- retreat for two decades. because the government nationalized Bolivia’s poor, said Edwin Torrez So- money won’t completely solve it,” said tenance storage, collecting water in The retreat has outpaced his wildest the water company a few years ago, ria, an engineer with Agua Sustent- Pablo Solón, Bolivia’s ambassador the short rainy season and releasing dreams. He had predicted that one gla- having declared water a human right. able, who works with villages near the to the United Nations. “What do you it for water and electricity in the long cier, Chacaltaya, would last until 2020. El Alto still does not employ a full-time Illimani glacier, “aren’t responsible do when your glacier disappears or dry one. With warmer temperatures It disappeared this year. water technician. for what’s happening to the glacier but and changing rainfall, they no longer But global warming alone cannot “These are populations at the they suffer the most, and unfortunate- Jean Friedman-Rudovsky contrib- do so. be blamed for the longstanding woes brink of surviving anyway, and then ly the government doesn’t have much uted reporting from El Alto, Bolivia. “The effects are appearing much of this exotic but desperately poor you have the extra stress of climate of a plan.”

Brad Zizmor, far The Rooftop Garden Climbs Down a Wall left, had edible walls installed on the deck of By KEN BELSON ing fewer delivery trucks. Dickson D. Despommier, the direc- his Manhattan ROCHESTER, New York — In most “The traditional metal fabrication tor of the Vertical Farm Project at Co- ways, the Barthelmes Manufacturing industry is shrinking, and green is an lumbia University in New York, envi- apartment. Company is a typical sheet metal fab- emerging area,” said Larry Lehning, sions entire skyscrapers turned into ricator. Five days a week, machines the chief executive at Barthelmes, indoor farms capable of growing 100 here stamp out thousands of comput- whose sales of green products have different crops. er cases, electrical patch panels and doubled this year and make up 15 per- All of these solutions, though, re- other items for companies like United cent of the company’s revenue. Edible quire large investments and consid- Technologies. walls — descendants of espalier, or erable technology. Edible walls, by Yet a growing part of the company’s contrast, can be built for a fraction business is being devoted to some- of the cost, do not need computers thing decidedly unindustrial: edible or greenhouses and require far less walls — metal panels filled with soil maintenance. and seeds and hung vertically. Reviving the ancient The leader in this niche area is They may sound like a piece of Wil- Green Living Technologies, another lie Wonka’s chocolate factory. In fact, espalier for the age of company in Rochester that has built they are the latest development in urban farming. edible walls here, in New York City, green roof technology. Like green Los Angeles, Detroit and elsewhere. roofs, edible walls include a thick layer “Instead of bringing food to the city, of vegetation on the outside of build- we’re bringing the whole farm,” said MARILYNN K. YEE/THE NEW YORK TIMES ings to provide insulation and reduce George Irwin, the chief executive and Mr. Irwin, who has an online col- of Mr. Irwin’s partners, which recom- heating and electricity costs. trees grown against walls that were founder of the company. “What we’re umn as the Green Wall editor, holds mends plants to grow and then culti- But unlike green roofs — and their popular during the Middle Ages in implementing is back to basics.” two-day seminars where landscape vates them for two to five months at its vertical cousins, green walls — edible Europe — are just one small attempt Uninterested in being a manufac- designers pay $800 to learn how to in- nursery on Long Island. walls also produce fruit, vegetables to grow food in cities. For instance, turer, Mr. Irwin has contracted with stall products made by Green Living In early November, Ms. Katzander and herbs in far less space than typi- Valcent Products builds greenhouses Barthelmes and other companies for Technologies. installed three panels for Brad Zizmor, cal gardens. That’s why advocates of filled with hundreds of trays of hydro- stainless steel and aluminum panels One of the nearly 500 resellers is who has a backyard deck at his first- urban farming have embraced them ponic vegetables stacked on conveyor and other products. Kari Elwell Katzander, a landscape floor apartment in Manhattan. as a way to lower food costs, increase belts. Sky Vegetables hopes to build The panels have intersecting slats designer in New York City. She comes “What’s nice is you can be sur- nutritional quality and cut fuel con- commercial farms on the flat roofs of inside that create 24 cells for seeds to up with designs for her customers and rounded by the food you’re eating,” sumption and carbon emissions by us- hospitals, schools and food banks. be planted. then calls Plant Connection, another Mr. Zizmor said.

Repubblica NewYork VI MONDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2009

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY FINDINGS Falsely From Heat, a New Blue Convicted

Blue is sometimes not an easy color to make. By a Sniff Blue pigments of the past have often been expensive (ultramarine blue was made from the gemstone lapis lazuli, ground up), poisonous Of a Dog (cobalt blue is a possible carcinogen and Prussian blue can leach cyanide) or apt to fade. By JOHN SCHWARTZ So it was a pleasant surprise to HOUSTON — A dog’s sniff helped chemists at Oregon State University put Curvis Bickham in jail for eight when they created a new, durable and months. Now that the case against brilliantly blue pigment by accident. him has been dropped, he wants to The researchers were trying to tell the world that the investigative make compounds with novel elec- technique that justified his arrest just tronic properties, mixing manganese plain stinks. oxide, which is black, with other The police told Mr. Bickham they chemicals and heating them to high had tied him to a triple homicide temperatures. through a dog-scent lineup, in which Then Mas Subramanian, a profes- dogs choose a suspect’s smell out sor of material sciences, noticed that of a group. The dogs are exposed to one of the samples that a graduate the scent from items found at crime student had just taken out of the fur- scene, and are then walked by a series nace was blue. “I was shocked, actu- of containers with samples swabbed ally,” Dr. Subramanian said. from a suspect and from others not In the intense heat, almost 1,000 de- involved in the crime. If the dog finds BILL CLOUGH/VICTORIA ADVOCATE, VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS grees Celsius, the ingredients formed a can with a matching scent, it signals Bloodhounds are frequently used in police work, and Ronald Curtis, a crystal structure in which the man- — stiffening, barking or giving some left, was jailed after a scent lineup. He was innocent. ganese ions absorbed red and green other alert its handler recognizes. wavelengths of light and reflected Dogs’ noses have long proved use- only blue. When cooled, the manga- ful to track people, and the police rely own estimate in court testimony per- Pikett’s dogs, was released from jail nese-containing oxide remained in on them to detect drugs and explo- formed thousands of scent lineups nine months after being accused of this alternate structure. sives, and to find the bodies of victims since the 1990s. His lawyer said the a string of burglaries. Store videos The pigments have proven safe of crime and disaster. A 2004 report techniques were effective. showed that the burglar did not re- and durable, Dr. Subramanian said. by the F.B.I. states that use of scent Thomas Lintner, the chief of the semble him. “Nobody was listening,” KENNETH CHANG dogs, properly conducted, “has be- Federal Bureau of Investigation lab- Mr. Curtis said. come a proven tool that can establish oratory’s evidence response team Both he and Mr. Bickham are filing a connection to the crime.” unit, said the agency used scents civil lawsuits over their treatment in Scent lineups, however, are differ- only to follow a trail to a suspect or to federal court. ent. Critics say that the possibilities a place associated with him, and not The first person to file such a suit, of cross-contamination of scent are to identify one person out of several. in January, was Michael Buchanek, great, and that the procedures are The 2004 F.B.I. report warned that a retired captain with the Victoria rarely well controlled. Nonetheless, dog scent work “should not be used County, Texas, Sheriff’s Department although some courts have rejected as primary evidence,” but only to cor- and a client of Mr. Easley. After Dep- evidence from them, the technique roborate other evidence. uty Pikett’s dogs identified him, Mr. has been used in many states, includ- In several of the cases that were Buchanek said the police “just kept ing Alaska, , New York and DANIEL KRAMER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES based on Deputy Pikett’s dogs, how- telling me, ‘the dogs don’t lie — we Texas, said Lawrence J. Myers, an neighbor. Deputy Pikett, the lawyer ever, the scent lineups appear to know you did it.’ ” associate professor of animal behav- said, “devised an unreliable dog trick have provided the primary evidence, After months of uncertainty, DNA ior at the Auburn University College to justify local police agencies’ suspi- even when contradictory evidence evidence implicated another man of Veterinary Medicine. cions’’ for producing search warrants was readily available. Mr. Bickham who later confessed to the crime. In particular, the methods of the and arrests. spent eight months in jail after being As Mr. Easley examined the case, MAS SUBRAMANIAN dog handler in Mr. Bickham’s case, Deputy Pikett, who declined to be identified in a scent lineup by Deputy he sought the opinion of animal inves- Chemists created a new blue and in a half-dozen others that are interviewed, works in the town of Pikett’s dogs, until another man con- tigation experts who reviewed Depu- pigment by accident. the basis of lawsuits, have come un- Richmond, southwest of Houston, but fessed to the killings. In an interview, ty Pikett’s work and responded with der fierce attack. he has served as a busy consultant to Mr. Bickham scoffed at the accusa- incredulity. Robert Coote, the head of The handler, Deputy Keith A. Pikett law enforcement agencies around the tion that he had taken part in three a British canine police unit, reviewed of the Fort Bend County, Texas, Sher- state, using his home-trained blood- murders, noting that he has been videos of Deputy Pikett’s scent lineup Clues to Bird Migration iff’s Department, is “a charlatan,’’ hounds — he has given them names hobbled by bone spurs and diabetes in the Buchanek case and said, “If it said Rex Easley, a lawyer in Victoria, that include Columbo, Quincy and and is partially blind. was not for the fact that this is a seri- To study birds, scientists in Sweden Texas, who represents a man falsely Clue — to sniff out crime. A native Ronald Curtis, another Houston ous matter, I could have been watch- have attached tags that gather GPS accused by the police of murdering a of Buffalo, New York, he has by his man jailed on the basis of Deputy ing a comedy.” data and transmit it to a satellite. They have gained valuable informa- tion about how raptors cope with mi- grating across the Sahara, between Sweden and West Africa. Roine Strandberg and Raymond H. Working to Save Species, Perhaps by Moving Them G. Klaassen of Lund University and colleagues tracked 90 trans-Sahara flights by juvenile and adult ospreys, By ANNE RAVER is rarely found in fossils. “It may have honey buzzards and other raptors. As CHICAGO — Pitcher’s thistle, been one of those rare and unusual reported in Biology Letters, the mean whose fuzzy leaves and creamy pink For botanists, assisted species we think about saving with distance traveled, from one edge of puffs once thrived in the sand dunes approaches like assisted migration,” the desert to the other, was about along several of the Great Lakes, was migration is a hotly Dr. McLachlan said. Now, the beech 1,600 kilometers . driven by development, drought and debated issue. is so abundant in Eastern forests, The researchers found that in 40 weevils into virtual extinction from he said, it is shading out “almost all percent of the flights, there was evi- the shores of Lake Michigan decades other species.” dence of odd behavior — the birds ago. While the debate proceeds, scien- slowed down, stopped for an hour But in the 1990s, seeds collected tists at the botanic garden are build- or more, changed course or turned from different parts of the thistle’s might end up trying to move species ing the seed collection and assessing around. range were grown at the Chicago in a restoration context, in assem- the adaptability of different popu- Deaths also occurred, particularly Botanic Garden and planted with the blages of species,’’ said Pati Vitt, a lations of species. Dr. Vitt and Dr. among juveniles. Adult mortality was help of the Morton Arboretum along conservation scientist and curator of SALLY RYAN FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES Havens recently showed off the new only about 2 percent, the research- the lake, in Illinois State Beach Park, the Dixon National Tallgrass Prairie Plants like black-eyed Susans Rice Science Center, which has labo- ers said, but adults faced a different north of Chicago near the Wisconsin Seed Bank at the botanic garden. are growing in what had been a ratories and a 39-square-meter seed problem: those that were delayed by state line. The plants from Indiana’s The garden is seeking permits to vacant lot in Chicago. vault with floor-to-ceiling stainless weather had less breeding success dunes to the south are doing well; the test the concept with the thistle, by steel shelves. than those who made it to the nest on plants that had come from the north pushing it into new, colder territory When temperatures in the giant time. are failing. along the shores of Lake Ontario. “It help if we want to keep those species humidity-controlled freezer stabi- HENRY FOUNTAIN With those mixed results in mind, may be the best test case for mov- alive.” lized at minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit scientists from the botanic garden ing an individual species outside its Other scientists argue that tinker- at the end of September, they moved are sending teams out across the range,” Dr. Vitt said. ing with the complexity of habitats collections of 800 Midwestern spe- Midwest and West to the Rocky But assisted migration, as it is is courting disaster — and huge ex- cies — some made up of 300,000 seeds Mountains and Great Basin to col- called, is a controversial issue. On one pense. — from their old home in four large lect seeds from different populations side are those like the botanic garden “Even given our best science, freezers, hardly different from the of 1,500 prairie species by 2010, and scientists, who argue that the risks we’re not good at predicting which kind a large family might use to store from 3,000 species by 2020. are better than doing nothing. species will be invasive,” said Jason home-grown produce and a side of The goal is to preserve the species “We recognize that climate change S. McLachlan, a biologist at the Uni- beef. and, depending on changes in cli- is likely to be very rapid and that versity of Notre Dame in Indiana who “The first time I walked in here, I mate, perhaps even help species that seeds only disperse a few hundred has studied postglacial population started to cry,” Dr. Vitt said. “I know generally grow near one another to yards, half a mile at most, natural- spread. “And it’s going to be especial- what having this will allow us to do migrate to a new range. ly,” said Kayri Havens, the botanic ly complex as climates change.” in the future. It’s the most important “In 50 to 100 years, because habi- garden’s director of plant science The American beech, for example, conservation work the garden can be CHRIS GASH tats or climates are so altered, we and conservation. “They’ll need our was so rare during the ice age that it doing.”

Repubblica NewYork MONDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2009 VII

NEW YORK ARTS Mature Artist Finds His Way Back to MoMA

By DEBORAH SONTAG Sixteen years ago the Museum of Modern Art granted a little-known Mexican artist his first solo show in the United States. Then 31, peripa- tetic and without a studio, the artist, Gabriel Orozco, who belonged to a new generation rebelling against the expensive manufactured art objects of the 1980s, endeavored to produce as fresh and serendipitous a museum exhibition as possible. Rejecting the pristine gallery used LIBRADO ROMERO/THE NEW YORK TIMES by MoMA’s Project Series for emerg- ing artists, Mr. Orozco chose instead “Mobile Matrix” by Gabriel Orozco the museum’s nooks and crannies: is a whale skeleton decorated with a space between escalators for a the graphite of 6,000 pencils. scroll of phone numbers, a corner Below, “Black Kites.” of the sculpture garden for a ham- mock between trees. What many re- member best about that small show sion, he is nonetheless was a whimsical piece not even in far more rooted, some the museum itself: “Home Run,” an say far more conven- arrangement of fresh oranges in the tional, than the young BIBLIOTECA VASCONCELOS, MEXICO CITY; apartment and office windows across artist sleeping at his LEFT, MUSEUM OF ART 54th Street. girlfriend’s New York Mr. Orozco’s return to the museum, University dorm room why we make objects. (1997), a human skull etched with a Still, Mr. Orozco likes to disappoint; for a 20-year survey of his work that during his first MoMA I was not even against checkerboard design, to the monu- it is almost a credo of his. “I want to opened December 13, is quite differ- show. painting itself when I mental whale sculpture. That sculp- disappoint the expectations of the one ent. It is as concrete as the first show Now Mr. Orozco is stopped doing it. I was ture was commissioned in 2006 for the who waits to be amazed,” he has said. was ephemeral, as planned as it was a husband, father and against the way that new megalibrary in Mexico City built Midcareer retrospectives, by sum- improvised and as splashy as it was international art star. people were painting by former President Vicente Fox, and ming up an artist, can be premature quiet, with a mammoth, elaborately He was crowned “the because I thought it some Mexicans criticized Mr. Orozco and, for some, creatively paralyzing. produced art object at its center: “Mo- leading conceptual and was very boring.” for providing a centerpiece for it, said For an artist like Mr. Orozco, who said bile Matrix,” a whale skeleton exca- installation artist of In regard to the Cuauhtémoc Medina, an art critic, cu- he “gets bored easily” and continually vated from the sands of Baja Califor- his generation” by The New Yorker in retrospective he said: “It’s very im- rator and historian, in an phone inter- aspires to reinvent himself, one chal- nia, fitted onto a metal armature and 2001. Although some believe that suc- portant to look back, like a scientist view from Mexico. lenge of success is to remain free of intricately inscribed with graphite cess has eroded his idealism, he seems who studies his experiments and The MoMA retrospective also in- encumbrances. rings and circles by a team of 20 people quite comfortable with the monumen- sees what worked and what didn’t. cludes, from the last few years, some “I don’t like a big enterprise of peo- who used up 6,000 mechanical pencil talization that a midcareer retrospec- And then, of course, it’s important geometric abstract paintings, which ple working for me,” he said. “I don’t leads creating it. tive at MoMA implies. to forget. And I am very good at that, some admirers of the artist do not want to be a master. I want to be a kid. At 47 Mr. Orozco is no longer the “I was never an idealist,” he said in forgetting.” like, considering the very idea of Mr. To keep making art, you have to put wanderer who found poetry in puddles an interview at the museum. “I was not In “Gabriel Orozco,” the pieces dis- Orozco painting — much less prettily, yourself in the position of a beginner. and dignity in debris, dung and dryer against the market. I was trying to un- played range from slight, ready-made with tempera and gold leaf — to be a You have to be excited by a stone on lint. Still experimenting with new ma- derstand the market. I was not against items like “Empty Shoebox” (1993) betrayal of his early abandonment of the sidewalk or, like a child, the flight terials and varying modes of expres- the object. I was trying to understand through the singular “Black Kites” the form. of a bird.”

Luring Artists How to Gain Notoriety To Enliven With Only Three Letters

Empty Stores By COREY KILGANNON The man in the hooded sweatshirt was not recognizable, but the three By DIANE CARDWELL letters he was rendering as a 5-meter At the end of a dark passageway mural on the wall of a Hell’s Kitchen at the Port Authority Bus Terminal building certainly were: B.N.E. in Midtown Manhattan, almost 50 This mischievous monogram, artworks have suddenly parked in posted by marker, spray can, roller a bright, spare gallery. On a grim and especially stickers, has be- stretch of the Flatbush Avenue Exten- come part of the landscape of New JOSHUA BRIGHT FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES sion in Brooklyn, pastel portraits and York and cities worldwide, thrill- The graffiti artist B.N.E., interactive sculptures are squeezed ing graffiti admirers and roiling whose identity is unknown, between a McDonald’s and an Ap- public officials. Its saturation has is staging a show sponsored plebee’s restaurant. In the window of provoked one of the more enduring by an advertising agency. a former dentist’s office in Queens, a Internet mysteries: What and who clutch of faceless mannequins cradle NICOLE BENGIVENO/THE NEW YORK TIMES is B.N.E.? various forms of roadkill. Property managers are cheaply renting out empty storefronts to painters After a thorough interrogation of hibition of his work that opened De- The art may vary in style and shock as temporary studio space. Kenny Scharf works on his art in Brooklyn. the suspect … well, he would not re- cember 10, sponsored by Mother, a value, but the settings are essentially ally comment. In what he said was Manhattan advertising agency. the same — spaces donated or leased his first interview with a journalist, “B.N.E. has single-handedly cre- cheaply by building owners unable to where commerce and construction a series of pop-up tenants, including the man said he was responsible ated a globally recognized and val- rent or develop them. have stalled. fashion designers and artists working for this three-lettered puzzle, but ued brand in the new social econo- As the recession drags on and store- The demand among landlords is so in a range of media. refused to divulge his name, age or my,” Mother officials said in a news fronts across New York remain empty, high that Chashama, a group that has For neighborhoods, windows filled many details about his background release. commercial landlords are turning to been working for almost 15 years to with stencils or weavings rather than and method. He also refused to have But Peter F. Vallone Jr., of Queens, an unlikely new class of tenants: art- find vacant real estate for visual and brown paper and “for rent” signs have his face photographed or to say what chairman of the City Council’s Pub- ists, who in flusher times tend to get performing artists, no longer has to been a marked improvement. B.N.E. stands for. His initials, per- lic Safety Committee, condemned pushed out rather than lured in. go looking. Its founder, Anita Durst, “The lights are always on, the artists haps? the show. “This is an unrepentant On terms that are cut-rate and said she got calls every day from land- come and go late at night, and it’s even “Let’s just say it has a meaning criminal who has cost honest tax- usually temporary — a few weeks or lords asking her to find art projects for had more of an impact in activating that’s personal to me,” he said, ac- payers a lot of money, and he’s prof- months — the artist gets a gallery or them. Some even offer to cover basic the street than we anticipated,” said knowledging the conjecture on- ited from it,” he said. studio, and the landlord gets a vibrant expenses like electricity. Andrew M. Manshel of the Greater Ja- line: Breaking and Entering, Bomb The interview was arranged by attraction that may deter crime and Chashama was enlisted to find art- maica Development Corporation. Nuclear Explosion. “At this point, Bucky Turco, the editor of Animal, draw the next wave of paying tenants. ists for the former dentist’s office and The locals enjoy the shows. Passers- it means whatever you need it to an online magazine. He is helping “Any sort of activity is better than no another vacant space by the Greater by and workers say they like having mean.” B.N.E. produce the show, which activity,” said Jed Walentas, a Brook- Jamaica Development Corporation, something different to look at and a The stickers are affixed to mail- features metal plates and canvases lyn developer whose company, Two one of several business groups work- chance to talk with the artists. On boxes, phone booths, parking me- with the B.N.E. tag stamped over Trees Management, routinely lends ing to bring artists and landlords to- 161st Street in Queens one afternoon, ters and streetlights, mostly in New images of Mickey Mouse, Bart Simp- space in Brooklyn for art projects. “As gether. two barbers from the block said they York and Japan, but also in Bangkok, son, Spider-Man and Bugs Bunny. long as it’s short enough and it’s flex- At the Port Authority terminal, appreciated how accessible the artists Prague, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur. “I don’t see other graffiti writers ible, then there’s no real cost..” where a 230-square-meter retail space had been. He goes through 10,000 stickers a as my competition anymore,” B.N.E. These “pop-up galleries,” as they at West 41st Street and Eighth Avenue “The first time they were there, they month. said. “Now I’m going up against the are known in Britain, where the phe- has gone unrented while a develop- welcomed anybody, it was free and on One recent weekend, B.N.E. was Tommy Hilfigers, Starbucks, Pepsi. nomenon is well established, are in- ment deal remains in limbo, execu- the way out they gave you a little wine, not spray-painting surreptitiously, You have these billion-dollar compa- creasingly taking hold in New York tives have relied on the Fashion Center they had food,” said one barber from but creating a sanctioned mural nies, and I’ve got to look at their lo- as development advocates and land- Business Improvement District and the Haircutter shop, who gave his on a concrete wall in a temporarily gos every day. Why can’t I put mine lords struggle to keep up appearances the Times Square Alliance to bring in name as Junior. “It’s great.” vacant building. It is part of an ex- up?”

Repubblica NewYork VIII MONDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2009

ARTS & STYLES Arriving at ‘Nine’ Studying Stradivari’s Secret By HENRY FOUNTAIN in the top coat — that stiffened the In a finding that is sure to add to wood just so. Via the Italian Route one of the longest-running debates Earlier studies had found traces of in music, a detailed analysis of the minerals and proteins in the wood. varnish on five instruments made One group found evidence of volca- By RACHEL DONADIO ter the scene, and she was absolutely by Antonio Stradivari reveals that nic ash; another suggested that bac- ROME — On a crisp morning in Jan- enthralled when I told her Sophia was he coated the wood with a rather teria or fungi played a role. uary a powder-blue Alfa Romeo road- playing my mom,” he said. ordinary mix of oil and resin. Those In a study published in The Strad ster pulled into Piazza del Popolo with In “Nine,” Guido’s film is called “Ita- looking to the varnish as the secret magazine, Stewart Pollens, a former Daniel Day-Lewis at the wheel and lia,” about Italy as “a myth, a woman, to the master Italian violin maker’s conservator of musical instruments Sophia Loren in the passenger seat. a dream,” as he puts it. Filming “Nine” renown, the study suggests, had best at the Metropolitan Museum of Art He wore sunglasses. She had a large gave everyone a chance to live out fan- look elsewhere. in New York, found evidence of pro- diamond cross plunged into her dé- tasies of the Dolce Vita era. “It’s a very basic recipe,” said colletage. Both smiled knowingly. An Mr. Marshall, whose 2002 film ver- Jean-Philippe Échard, a chemist Italian question came to mind: Were sion of the Broadway musical “Chica- at the Musée de la Musique in Par- they lovers? Or mother and son? go” won six Oscars, said he was drawn is, who, with other researchers in It turned out that Mr. Day-Lew- to the period’s look. “It was so chic and France and Germany, analyzed tiny is was playing Guido Contini, the such a great time,” Mr. Marshall, 49, samples of wood and varnish from blocked film director at the center of said on the set in January at the histor- DAVID JAMES/THE WEINSTEIN COMPANY the museum’s Stradivarius collec- “Nine,” Rob Marshall’s film based on ic Cinecittà film production hub here. Kate Hudson, center, and other tion, four violins and a viola d’amore the Broadway musical “Nine,” in turn “People dressed for dinner. I was born dating from 1692 to 1724. based on Fellini’s “8›.” And Ms. Lo- a little too late.” dancers in “Nine,” a film based Their study, published online by ren was indeed playing his mother — The production, filmed mostly at on the Broadway musical. a German chemistry journal, Ang- or a vision of his late mother — in one Shepperton Studios outside London, ewandte Chemie International Edi- PHILIPPE WOJAZER/REUTERS of the many dream sequences in the spent a month in Italy. At Cinecittà tion, found that a drying oil, linseed Research revealed that Stradivari film, which opens widely in the United they were able to use Studio No. 5, by Maury Yeston) work on screen. He or walnut, was used as a first coat used a mix of oil and resin. States on Christmas and around the where Fellini used to work. “I would used dream sequences and flashbacks to seal the wood. That was followed world in January and February. have shot the whole thing there,” Mr. for song-and-dance numbers in the by a coat of oil and pine, fir or larch Ms. Loren is far from the only lead- Marshall said in a recent telephone in- “Cabaret” vein. “The numbers were resin, with red pigments added in teins and gums, although, like the ing lady comforting or bedeviling terview. But “it was a question of dol- fantasies in his mind, and conceptu- all but the earliest instrument. The European group, he suggested the Mr. Day-Lewis’s Guido in the film. lars and cents.” Production and labor ally I chose to place all of them on the recipe was probably little different varnish was largely oil and resin. Beyond the Mother, the film includes costs are very high in Italy, and Cine- unfinished set of his soundstage,” Mr. from that used in the town of Cremo- But studies of Stradivari’s varnish other Italian archetypes: the Wife (a città is not thriving. Marshall said. na. “The ingredients were simple, have been hampered by the lack of soulful Marion Cotillard); the Mis- In spite of the hassles, nothing quite As in Fellini’s “8›,” “Nine” is about so probably the skill was in his hand samples. tress (a smoldering Pénelope Cruz); compares to Italy, he added. He said a director struggling to come up with and eye,” Mr. Échard said. Mr. Échard said Stradivari took the Whore (an unbound Fergie); the he, Mr. Day-Lewis and others involved an idea for his still scriptless film, who In the centuries since Stradivari’s a painterly approach to finishing Muse (a goddesslike Nicole Kidman); in the production traveled there be- escapes to a spa to take the waters and death, musicians, critics and luthiers his instruments. The pigmented and lesser-known members of the Ital- fore starting filming in England. “We get away from producers nagging him — makers of stringed instruments — top coat, he said, may have been ap- ian pantheon: the Confidante (a ma- needed to feel it,” he said. “It’s a dif- about money, actresses complaining have debated what gives many of his plied the way Rembrandt or Titian tronly Judi Dench) and the Journalist ferent feeling. There’s a freedom and a about the size of their roles and jour- 600 known instruments their bril- applied glazes to soften flesh tones. (a perky Kate Hudson). joy. It’s about food, clothing, style. It’s nalists asking irritating questions. liant tone. Perhaps it was the wood Perhaps that, Mr. Échard suggested So what was it like working with that about life. That’s why I love Italy.” The spa scenes were filmed in An- he used or the patterns he developed. half-jokingly, is what makes some of sort of cast? “Where do you begin?” In “Nine,” as in “Chicago,” Mr. zio at a former casino Fellini used in Or perhaps, some suggested, there Stradivari’s violins special. Mr. Day-Lewis said, laughing. “It was Marshall’s challenge was to make “Amarcord” (1973). Mr. Marshall said was a secret ingredient in his var- “Maybe a player, when seeing a just pure pleasure to be there every stage numbers (from the 1982 musi- he didn’t know the site’s history until nish — egg or animal-hide proteins beautiful instrument, he plays bet- day.” As for his drive in the roadster, cal by Arthur Kopit, from the Italian he started shooting. When he learned in the base coat, and amber, myrrh ter,” he said. “Maybe this is the se- “I told my mom about it the evening af- by Mario Fratti, with music and lyrics of it, he said, “it felt like kismet.” or some other more exotic substance cret.”

Repubblica NewYork