G R E E N G O L D  F I L M

I think that Joel Sternfeld is my favorite photographer, although I may be biased because we share a first name.  Here's how Richard B. Woodward describes Sternfeld:

Among American documentary photographers working in large-format color, the pictures set a standard for clarity, sociological breadth and sardonic humor. But what's more surprising is the imprint they seem to have made on photographers from the other camp. It is hard to look at ''American Prospect'' and not be reminded of work by Gregory Crewdson and Jeff Wall, both of whom go to elaborate lengths to fabricate images. Their tableaus, which quote from history painting and cinema, advertising and photography, use actors and studio lighting in hopes of creating the same narrative tension and mystery that Mr. Sternfeld has captured by being in the right place at the right time.

Ingmar Bergman on working toward a consistent tone in Winter Light.  The film is a real wallop and well worth watching.

I was listening to NPR this morning and they were talking about this indoor skydiving place that looks kind of insane.  This video is in Utah, but I think there's one in the Bay too. 

An interesting article from Seed Magazine about the relationship between neuroscience and art.  An excerpt (the article is written by Jonah Lehrer):

This mobile is a powerful example of how an art form can be tailored to the physiology of a specific area in the brain. Calder's composition anticipated, artistically, the physiological properties of the cells of an area called V5, which are selectively responsive to motion and its direction. Viewed from a distance, the separate pieces of the mobile appear as static spots of varying sizes. But as the pieces move in different directions, each one stimulates only the category of cell that is selectively responsive to the direction in which the spot is moving.

Semir Zeki
Neuroscientist, University College London

Jason has posted some nice pictures from his shoot here.  Take a look!

A classic moment from Orson Welles' F for Fake, the execptional documentary.

Watched My Dinner With Andre last night in an effort to see every other film with Andre in the title (and as a distraction after a disappointment in New Hampshire).  The film is really great, here's a clip.

So my research continues, as I finish up the script, into the nuances of Andre Weil's condition; Temporal Lobe Epilepsy.  I thought I'd share this quote from Clifford Pickover:

Has TLE changed the course of civilization? LaPlante and many other TLE experts speculate that the mystical religious experiences of some of the great prophets were induced by TLE — because the historical writings describe classic TLE symptoms. The religious prophets most often thought to have had epilepsy are Mohammad, Moses, and St. Paul. Dostoevsky, another famous epileptic whose works are filled with ecstatic visions of universal love (and terrible nightmares of uncanny fear and radical evil), thought it was obvious that Mohammad’s visions of God were triggered by epilepsy. "Mohammad assures us in this Koran that he had seen Paradise," Doestevsky notes. "He did not lie. He had indeed been in Paradise — during an attack of epilepsy, from which he suffered, as I do."

Well NASA is using Earth's gravity to hurl a "comet-busting" deep space probe toward a comet that will "meet" in 2010!  That should be really great!