Shutter Madness
On photographer Garry Winogrand and the unedited archive of more than half a million exposures he left behind.
Arts
The Tragedy of Britney Spears
A profile of Spears at her nadir.
Decades after ’80s Art Stardom, Painter Mark Kostabi Is Still Hustling
Then there’s Mark Kostabi, the former New York gossip column fixture and self-professed “con artist” who everybody remembers but nobody talks about. Christie’s and Sotheby’s have no comment. Neither does the MoMA, the Guggenheim, or the Met, despite the curious fact that they all have Kostabis in their permanent collections. As for quotes from some highfalutin critics expounding on the semiotics of cone hats, cash registers, and the Sony Walkman in Kostabi’s work? Not a chance.
Death in the Snow
In 2001, a young Japanese woman walked into the North Dakota woods and froze to death. Had she come in search of the $1 million dollars buried nearby in the film Fargo?
The Excessive Vision of Donatella Versace
How to run a fashion empire.
Perfectly Boring
On William Eggleston’s The Red Ceiling and an unsolved murder.
"I Refuse to Cater to the Bullshit of Innocence"
An interview with Maurice Sendak.
The Male Glance
How the way we’re taught to look at female-centric TV, books and movies is ruining our ability to see good art.
Show the Monster
A profile of director Guillermo del Toro.
In the Maestro’s Thrall
Inside the disturbing “cult” of young acolytes that catapulted conductor James Levine’s career.
Things Fall Apart
A feat of elegant design wowed elite architects and promised to bring education to poor children in Nigeria. Then it collapsed.
Laurie Metcalf Was Hiding in Plain Sight
“A unicorn, a monster, a phoenix, a machine, a heavyweight fighter, an astronaut, a superhero, a thoroughbred, a home-run hitter, a waitress juggling ‘16 entrees, 42 starters, 16 desserts,’ a jazz virtuoso, LeBron James, Magellan, Snuffleupagus. The actress Laurie Metcalf has been compared to all of these things.”
The Zankou Chicken Murders
The creator of the California-based food chain kills his mother, sister and, finally, himself.
From Hollywood to Anaheim, he had opened a chain of fast-food rotisserie chicken restaurants that dazzled the food critics and turned customers into a cult. Poets wrote about his Zankou chicken. Musicians sang about his Zankou chicken. Now that he was dying, his dream of building an empire, 100 Zankous across the land, a Zankou in every major city, would be his four sons’ to pursue. In the days before, he had pulled them aside one by one -- Dikran, Steve, Ara, Vartkes -- and told them he had no regrets. He was 56 years old, that was true, but life had not cheated him. He did not tell them he had just one more piece of business left to do.
Interview: Ursula K. Le Guin
“There’s always room for another story. There’s always room for another tune.”
The Man Who Made Black Panther Cool
Why was Christopher Priest nearly written out of comics history?
Does Beto O’Rourke Stand a Chance Against Ted Cruz?
Riding along with the El Paso congressman.
The Killer-Nanny Novel That Conquered France
Leïla Slimani’s best-seller explores the dark relationship of a mother and her babysitter.
Best Article Arts Business Media
Bravo L’Artiste
A review of several books on Rupert Murdoch first criticizes the authors for not grasping the many sides of their subject, then offers a thesis of its own. He’s “not so much a man, or a cultural force, as a portrait of the modern world.”
"I love you, I’m here for you, and I’ll always be here for you. But I can’t save you."
Philip Seymour Hoffman’s widow on addiction, loss, and recovery.
All We Read Is Freaks
Teaching Emily Dickinson at Santa Fe Community College in Gainesville, Florida.
What Do We Do with the Art of Monstrous Men?
The real question is this: can I love the art but hate the artist? Can you? When I say we, I mean I. I mean you.
Shades of Greene
On Graham Greene, the master of “ethical ambivalence.”
Disneyland with the Death Penalty
On the sanitized wonderland that is Singapore.
Is It Too Late to Save the World?
The role of a writer in 2017.
Runaway Money
When she died in 1952, author Margaret Wise Brown left the rights to Goodnight Moon to a nine-year-old neighbor named Albert Clarke. The book became a classic. Clarke, living entirely off the royalties, became a deadbeat.
