lifestyle TUESDAY, MARCH 17, 2015 FEATURES Italian designer duo slam Elton John in IVF babies row talian designers Dolce and Gabbana yes- expected better from a singer he once terday accused Elton John of being admired. “I didn’t expect this, coming from Iauthoritarian, ignorant and hypocritical someone whom I considered, and I stress in a row over IVF babies, escalating a spat ‘considered’, an intelligent person like Elton that has embroiled some of the world’s John. “I mean, you preach understanding, biggest stars. John, 67, stirred up a social tolerance and then you attack others? “Only media storm on Sunday when he called for because someone has a different opinion? a boycott of the designer label in reaction Is this a democratic or enlightened way of to comments in which Domenico Dolce thinking? This is ignorance, because he referred to babies conceived through IVF as ignores the fact that others might have a “synthetic”. different opinion and that theirs is as wor- In comments endorsed on social media thy of respect as his.” by celebrities including Victoria Beckham, He said he had not tried to contact the Ricky Martin, Courtney Love and Martina pop star. “That would be useless! It’s an Navratilova, the gay star accused the Italian authoritarian way of seeing the world: duo of “wagging your judgmental little fin- agree with me or, if you don’t, I’ll attack gers at IVF.” In a typically scathing post on you.” Gabbana added: “Domenico has his Instagram, he added: “Your archaic thinking ideas, he made some choices. Elton John is out of step with the times, just like your made different choices. Different choices, fashions. I shall never wear Dolce and different lives. Equal respect. What I see, Gabbana ever again. particularly online, is a lot of gay people #BoycottDolceGabbana.” The designers, who are homophobic: gay people who will who are also gay and were in a long-term attack other gay people who express ideas relationship with each other until a few that are different from theirs.” Fans of the British comedy group Monty Python perform their skills during the International Silly Walk Day on January 7, 2015 in Brno, Czech years ago, said it was the veteran British John has two young sons with his hus- Republic. — AFP photo rocker who was being judgmental. band David Furnish who were conceived Dolce said his comment that IVF was through IVF and born thanks to a surrogacy not for him should not have been interpret- arrangement. In the interview which ed as disapproval of anyone else’s choices. caused the storm, Gabbana said he would ‘World’s most beautiful “I’m Sicilian and I grew up in a traditional have a child tomorrow if he could, while family, made up of a mother, a father and Dolce explained why he did not feel he children,” he said in a statement. could go down that road. “This is the reality in which I grew up, “You are born and you have a father and but it does not imply that I don’t under- a mother,” he told Panorama magazine. “Or boulevard’ turns 150 stand different ones. I was talking about my at least that’s the way it should be, and personal view, without judging other peo- that’s why I’m not convinced by children n 1857, bushy-whiskered Emperor Franz Joseph complete with ripped Greek heroes and an impos- Ringstrasse but at the same time the masses had to ple’s choices and decisions.” from chemistry, synthetic babies, uteruses proclaimed that his rapidly growing imperial ing Diana statue. fight to survive, both Jews and non-Jews,” she told His business partner Gabbana revealed for rent, semen chosen from a catalogue.” capital Vienna needed a radical makeover befit- Others include the hallowed Burgtheater, the AFP. Most of the bricks for the Ringstrasse’s build- that he had been so infuriated by John’s Beckham weighed into the row yesterday I ting Austro-Hungary’s wealth, might and techno- mighty Natural History Museum and its twin the ings were made in vast factories where workers, statement that he had posted the com- by tweeting: “Sending love to Elton David logical prowess. This year, the centrepiece of the Museum of Art History, the Neue Burg extension to most of them Czech, would work in horrendous ments #fascist and #boycotteltonjohn on Zachary Elijah & all the beautiful IVF mammoth urban engineering project that ensued- the Hofburg palace and the Votivkirche church-all conditions for 15 hours a day, seven days a week, the Instagram page. babies.” Gay Latino star Ricky Martin, who the resplendent, five-kilometer (three-mile) in different styles, but still fitting together. “It is fan- paid in company tokens, not money. People living has five-year-old twins, on Sunday accused “Ringstrasse” boulevard ringing old Vienna-turns tastic, like a museum of architecture,” said Rainald in “catastrophic” conditions, and the lower middle This is ignorance the Italian duo of fuelling bigotry. “@dol- 150. Franz, art and architecture historian at the Museum classes left behind by the Industrial Revolution, Speaking to Italian daily Corriere della cegabbana ur voices R 2powerful 2B With its dizzying mix of palaces, museums and of Applied Arts (MAK), giving AFP a neck-cranking became “highly receptive” to anti-Semitism, sowing Sera’s web edition, Gabbana said he had spreading so much h8,” he tweeted. —AFP public buildings in a chocolate box of different tour on a public tram conveniently going round the seeds for the rise of the Nazis and the styles, the “Ring” is the “most beautiful boulevard in most of the Ring. “The aim was to say to the world Holocaust, Kohlbauer-Fritz said. the world”, the tourist board says. The Austrian cap- this is an international metropolis.” ital is marking this with special exhibitions, show- Hitler connection ing how this street beloved of tourist and architec- Superficial splendor The man behind that genocide first visited ture aficionados-including Hitler has played a cen- Indeed, the Ringstrasse became the main stage Vienna in around 1906 as a teenager, and was tral role in the city’s happiest and darkest days. for Vienna’s golden era, the boulevard’s glittering blown away by the Ringstrasse. “For hours and cafes a haven for the intellectual elite of the day hours I could stand in wonderment... The whole ‘Like a museum’ like composer Gustav Mahler, the father of psycho- Ringstrasse had a magic effect upon me, as if it Following Franz Joseph’s decree, the city walls analysis Sigmund Freud or artist Gustav Klimt. And were a scene from the Thousand And One Nights,” that had kept out two marauding Turkish armies- filling the gaps between the public buildings were Hitler later recalled in “Mein Kampf”. He later lived but not Napoleon-were torn down, opening up the plush palaces erected by a new, confident and in Vienna between 1908 and 1913, during which claustrophobic centre. Inspired by Baron ostentatious class of Viennese grown rich from the time he failed to get into the Academy of Fine Arts, Haussmann’s renovation of Paris and by Ludwig I’s vast empire’s rapid industrialization, many of them stayed in a homeless shelter and sold respectable transformation of his Bavarian capital Munich, Jews. paintings of the many buildings on the Ring. Vienna summoned the finest architects of the day- These included for example the Ephrussis, the And when the failed artist returned in triumph Gottfried Semper, Theophil Hansen and Heinrich banking family made famous by Edmund de Waal’s on March 12, 1938 as Nazi dictator, he knew the von Ferstel. bestselling 2010 family memoir “The Hare with best place to make a triumphant entrance and The theme chosen was “historicism”, giving the Amber Eyes”. Their former home still stands today- announce the “annexation” of his native country designers free rein to give it all they had with inhabited by Casinos Austria and next to a into the Reich-the Ringstrasse and the balcony of designs inspired by bygone epochs in architecture- McDonald’s. But according to Gabriele Kohlbauer- the Neue Burg palace. The same night, with the and with no expense spared either financially, or in Fritz, curator of an upcoming exhibition- streets of Vienna ringing with shouts of “Heil This file picture dated 23 June 2007 shows Italian fashion designers Domenico Dolce scale. So what sprang up were the soaring ”Ringstrasse: A Jewish Boulevard”-at Vienna’s Hitler”! recounts de Waal in “The Hare with Amber and Stefano Gabbana acknowledging applause after presenting their Dolce & “Flemish-Gothic” city hall, a “neo-Renaissance” uni- Jewish Museum, this splendor was a facade, and Eyes”, the first brown shirts barge into and ransack Gabbana 2008 spring/summer men’s collection at Milan’s fashion week. — AFP versity, a “neo-Romantic” opera house and the not just for the city’s Jews. the Ephrussi Palace. It was a foretaste of the “neo-Classical” parliament, a Hellenist’s wet dream “On the one hand there was this wonderful tragedy to come. — AFP NIVEA collects four awards from the esteemed Eccentric millionaire arrested hours product of the Year 2015 Gulf Edition awards obert Durst, an eccentric millionaire from one many people who’ve investigated him have of America’s wealthiest families, was arrested dropped the ball, but I think that luck may be run- uilding on its strong product Hoven continues: “Out of love for on a murder warrant just before Sunday’s ning out,” said Former Galveston County District innovation and consumer skin; this motto is the engine that- R finale of a serial documentary about his links to Court Judge Susan Criss, who presided over the Bcarefocus across all its prod- powers our development of innova- three sensational killings.