From top left, clockwise: “Prayer,” “Trillions,” “Revelations,” “Armegeddon,” by Jill Greenberg
April 2006 | Mindful Living
Taking Candy from a Baby
What possessed commercially-acclaimed photographer and celebrity portraitist Jill Greenberg to turn her lens on weeping toddlers? Fear for her own young children’s future. “I love the raw emotion of children, because it comes close to the anger and helplessness I feel about our current political and social situation,” explains the artist.
Greenberg’s politically-charged exhibit, End Times, opens this month at The Paul Kopeikin Gallery. Featuring impeccably executed, larger-than- life portraits of babies in various degrees of distress, the series is slick, confrontational and near gut-wrenchingly beautiful.
“I manipulate my subjects to evoke an emotion to illustrate my personal beliefs,” Greenberg asserts unapologetically. In this case that means “merely giv[ing the child] a lollipop and then taking it away, et voila—pain and agony.” Greenberg then digitally manipulates the images so that the crying children seem to glow with otherworldly anguish. Titles like “Shock and Awe” and “Revelation” put each infant’s grief in a calculated cultural context.
Manipulative? No doubt. But hauntingly effective.
End Times exhibits April 22-May 20, at The Paul Kopeikin Gallery, 6150 Wilshire Blvd. (just west of Fairfax). Opening night reception 4/22, 6-9 pm. Call 323.937.0765 or visit paulkopeikingallery.com or Jill Greenberg’s website: manipulator.com. —Eliza Thomas
Screening Your Sunscreen
Male hornyhead turbot, a species of fish found in SoCal waters, are undergoing sex changes—but despite this sea creature’s provocative moniker, the transformation is no courageous personal choice. Recently a University of California-Riverside scientist reported that oxybenzone—an estrogen-mimicking chemical used in sunscreen to protect skin from ultraviolet light—is feminizing male fish such as turbot and English sole. These bottom-dwellers feed off the ocean floor near coastal sewage outfalls where oxybenzone, which survives the sewage-treatment process, settles.
As if you needed yet another reason to rethink your relationship to sunshine, consider this: If oxybenzone can change the sex of fish, what mischief might it be doing once it hits our bloodstreams? Experts currently recommend 10-15 minutes of daily all-over sun exposure (in the mornings and afternoons, when the sun’s rays are less direct), to maintain healthy vitamin D levels. But what should you do if you’re planning an entire day outdoors? Both types of conventional sunscreens—those that absorb and those that block—pose cancer risks. And many of the best-selling brands contain chemicals that are yet to be closely studied. The best way to protect yourself is to layer on a lotion that contains vitamin C, followed by pure vitamin E oil. Then, after your 15 minutes of pure bliss, smear on the sunscreen—but be sure to stick to a natural brand. Or pitch an umbrella and soak up the shade.
To compare the safety of different sunscreen brands, visit the Environmental Working Group’s Skin Deep website at: ewg.org. —Jolia Einstein
A Commune Your Grandmother Would Be Proud Of
Forget stale-smelling cafeterias and Jell-O salad—a savvy group of 80-somethings in Davis has a new vision for “senior living.” And it looks a lot like a commune.
The 12 founding residents of Glacier Circle are pioneering the country’s first elderly co-housing development—a community built by and for older people. Consisting of eight town houses grouped around a courtyard, the community will soon feature a “common house,” with a large shared kitchen and dining area, a living area and a studio apartment that will be rented to a skilled nurse.
Glacier Circle is designed to allow residents to look out for and support each other, a surprisingly uncommon experience for elderly people today. Decisions are made in weekly consensus-based meetings, and residents also gather just to hang out—for book club, for instance, or the slightly headier “dream group.”
With a mass of boomers nearing retirement, it’s not surprising that communities like Glacier Circle are popping up with increasing frequency. According to The New York Times, there are currently about a dozen in the development stage, including ElderSpirit, a 37-person community in Abingdon, Virginia, founded by a former nun.
Though the co-housing concept originated in Denmark, it’s better known in the United States as a hippie phenomenon of the ’70s—which, if we’ve done our math right, means that some aging boomers may know exactly what they’re getting into. —Andi McDaniel
Zap Bio-Zips Your Trip
Forget hybrids. The coming attraction on the Road of Tomorrow is the Tri-brid—an advanced automobile that runs on a computer-monitored combination of gas, electricity and alcohol. ZAP, the upstart Sebastopol firm that pioneered the American introduction of electric bikes, scooters and cars, has teamed up with the engineering wonks at Obvio!, a Brazilian autoworks, to introduce two innovative Brazilian-made cars. The cars will be built in a factory near Rio de Janeiro and should be available for US sales by 2007.
As the song goes, “There’s an awful lot of coffee in Brazil,” but there are also great stretches of sugar plantations, and Brazilians long ago mastered the art of turning sugar cane into biofuel. Motoring from Rio to Sao Paolo used to mean sending a lot of cruzeiros to Saudi Arabia, but no longer. Today, most of Brazil’s vehicles are powered by locally grown, nonpolluting, renewable fuel. It’s meant windfall profits for the sugar industry, which has seen the price of its prime commodity reach a seven-year peak.
The Brazilians are pleased with the track record of its US distributor. Since its founding in 1994, ZAP has delivered more than 90,000 alternative-powered vehicles in 75 countries around the world. For more info: Zapworld.com. —Gar Smith
Supplements and Surgery—A Deadly Combination
While some may consider plastic surgery the antithesis of a holistic lifestyle, a recent study published in the official medical journal of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons found that approximately 55 percent of plastic surgery patients, compared to 24 percent of the general public, take herbal supplements. Surprised? The study also reported that 35 percent of plastic surgery patients engage in homeopathic practices, compared to only 6 percent of the general population.
When you think twice, it’s really not surprising that those on the prowl for the fountain of eternal youth and beauty would tap every possible wellspring. What is alarming, however, is the danger these generally harmless supplements pose to those undergoing a surgical procedure. Many patients simply don’t mention their supplement regimens to their surgeon because they assume it’s irrelevant. However, many common supplements such as chondroitin, ephedra, echinacea, glucosamine, ginkgo biloba, goldenseal, milk thistle, ginseng, kava and even garlic may cause serious—and sometimes deadly—side effects during and after surgery. So, if you’re thinking about going under the knife, come clean to your doc about everything you’re taking. Only then will he or she be able to recommend an appropriate discontinuation period prior to surgery. —JE
And If You’d Like To Speak With a Representative, Too Bad
Ever been on hold for 30 minutes while a preternaturally pleasant female voice promises you over and over that your call is important to her? Of course you have. Sadly, getting lost in an automated corporate phone system has become a quintessential American experience.
But according to Paul M. English, the brains (and heart) behind the Get Human campaign, it doesn’t have to be that way. Not if you have access to his consumer-friendly “cheat sheet”—a directory of codes for breaking through a company’s phone system to speak with an actual human being.
It started as a rant. English had maintained a personal blog for years, and one day decided to air his frustrations about certain companies’ “customer service” practices—and to share codes he’d discovered for reaching an operator through their phone systems. Word spread rapidly, and soon visitors to English’s blog were contributing their own secret codes. Since then, English has launched GetHuman.com, which now offers codes for nearly 400 companies. The site also enables visitors to rate their experiences with companies and to put in a good word for those companies that rate highly.
It’s no wonder automated customer service has become the industry norm—it’s a major cost-saver, just like out-sourcing (i.e. that customer service rep in New Delhi). But at what point does customer inconvenience factor into the equation? If Paul English has his way, the buzz around the Get Human campaign won’t just allow consumers to vent their frustrations—it’ll also send a message to businesses, to examine the “true cost” of driving customers crazy. —AM
Hollywood Speaks Truth to Power
Folks who characterized the 78th Academy Awards ceremonies as “the Gay Oscars” missed the point, says Hollywood film historian Ed Rampell, author of Progressive Hollywood: A People’s Film History of the US. What the awards demonstrated, Rampell says, is that the US film industry has just made the biggest “left-turn” since the Great Depression. “Not since the 1940s, when the pro-union The Grapes of Wrath and the antifascist The Great Dictator were Best Picture nominees, have so many left-tilting studio features, indies and documentaries been in Academy Award contention,” Rampell argues.
According to Rampell, “Tinsel-town’s first period of conscience” produced populist and anti-Nazi films like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and Casablanca. A second-wave of conscious cinema broke in the ’60s and ’70s with “power-to-the-people pictures like Arlo Guthrie’s antiwar Alice’s Restaurant and Melvin Van Peebles’ Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.”
This year, the mega-blockbuster King Kong went bust, snagging only a few Oscars in some technical categories. Meanwhile, small-budget indie films stomped all over the big ape on Oscar night. George Clooney’s Good Night and Good Luck, a salute to fearless media journalism, was made for $7 million and has earned $30 million. Best Picture, Crash, “a nitty-gritty look at racism in LA” was made for $6.5 million and has netted more than $83 million. Steven Spielberg’s Munich, an unflinching portrayal of “terrorism and the Arab-Israeli conflict,” cost $70 million and has grossed more than $100 million worldwide. Brokeback Mountain, produced for $14 million, has rounded up $73 million in ticket sales.
And the list doesn’t end there. North Country focused on “America’s first workplace sexual-harassment lawsuit,” The Constant Gardener dealt with “an activist challenging big pharmaceutical companies in Africa” and Syriana offered a chilling “Middle East thriller that critiques US foreign policy.”
What does Rampell see in the future? “Once again, progressives behind and in front of the cameras are creating compelling, politically aware works”—and, with audiences showing up to buy tickets, the film community “is sitting up and paying attention.” In short: “Escapism is out and thought-provoking topicality is in.” The trend is expected to continue with such coming attractions as Michael Moore’s Sicko and Sean Penn’s All the King’s Men. —GS
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