Posted May 28, 2009

Art theft and forgery books are full of intrigue and appeal to a wide array of readers including history buffs, art enthusiasts and fans of true crime. Recently there have been several books devoted to the topic of art theft. Vanished Smile: The Mysterious Theft of Mona Lisa by R.A. Scotti covers the 1911 theft of Mona Lisa from the Louvre. It took two years for the piece to be recovered, and even Pablo Picasso was suspected by some. As Booklist notes, this account is as much about the theft as about the beloved painting: “Scotti’s avid, exciting true-life mystery yields intriguing disclosures and reaffirms Mona Lisa’s unique powers.” For a different take on the Mona Lisa theft, take a look at The Crimes of Paris: A True Story of Murder, Theft and Detection.

Also check out the account of the 1990 theft of three Rembrandts and a Vermeer from the Gardner Museum in Boston in The Gardner Heist: A True Story of the World’s Largest Unsolved Art Theft by Ulrich Boser, which Kirkus notes “is an enjoyable true-crime tale accessible to lovers of art and whodunits alike.” Carried out by thieves dressed as cops, the theft remains unsolved, but readers will find Boser’s research fascinating. Myles J. Conner, the infamous art thief, is not beyond suspicion even though he was in jail at the time of the robbery. In his own recently published memoir The Art of the Heist: Confessions of a Master Art Thief, Rock ’n’ Roller and Prodigal Son, Connor denies involvement in the Gardner caper but is not shy about recounting his extraordinary exploits as one of the world’s most successful art thieves.

For those interested in art forgery we recommend three historical accounts of legendary forger Han van Meegeren, a mediocre artist who sold a fake Vermeer to Hermann Goering: “In compelling prose, Dolnick details the doctored canvases, phony paint and fake bills of sale Van Meegeren painstakingly created to achieve his grand deceit,” notes Kirkus of the recently published The Forger’s Spell: a True Story of Vermeer, Nazis and the Greatest Art Hoax of the Twentieth Century by Edward Dolnick. Other historical accounts include The Man who Made Vermeers by Jonathan Lopez and I Was Vermeer by Frank Wynne.

Lastly, we’d like to remind all you art fans out there that the Modern Wing of the Art Institute recently opened. Designed by architect Renzo Piano, the new Modern Wing will house 20th and 21st century art. Please note that although we find reading about these art capers fascinating, we don’t recommend leaving the building with anything that doesn’t belong to you.

Crime of the Century

Posted May 21, 2009

On May 21, 1924 Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, two brilliant and wealthy University of Chicago graduate students, carried out their plan to commit the “perfect crime.” They kidnapped 14-year-old Bobby Franks, killed him and left his body in a drainpipe in a wooded area south of Chicago. They then sent a ransom note to the boy’s family, but Franks’ body was discovered before his family paid the ransom, and Leopold and Loeb were found out once the police discovered a pair of eyeglasses belonging to Leopold at the crime scene.

Once charged, the teenage killers hired Clarence Darrow as their attorney. He took on their case in part because he was against the death penalty and believed this high-profile case would serve as a platform to argue against it. Leopold and Loeb pled guilty to avoid a jury trial that would most likely have ended in a death sentence. Darrow was successful in pleading their case to the sentencing judge and the two were sentenced to life imprisonment.

You can read more about the murder plot that was dubbed the “Crime of the Century” by picking up Simon Baatz’s For the Thrill of It: Leopold, Loeb and the Murder that Shocked Chicago or Leopold and Loeb: The Crime of the Century by Hal Higdon. There is also a documentary produced as part of the award-winning Chicago Stories series, Leopold & Loeb: Love and Murder in Chicago. This story so captured the attention and imagination of the public that several feature films were made based on the infamous duo and their “perfect crime,” including Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope starring Jimmy Stewart and Compulsion with Orson Welles playing a character based on Darrow.

Bonnie and Clyde

Posted May 19, 2009

It was 75 years ago on May 23, 1934 when legendary outlaws Bonnie and Clyde were gunned down – a scene unforgettably captured in the 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway. (For more on the movie, be sure to read Mark Harris’s Pictures at a Revolution: Five Movies and the Birth of the New Hollywood.) Their real-life story combines romance and crime in a way that has fascinated people for decades. The duo has inspired musicians as diverse as Serge Gainsbourg and Jay-Z. And countless writers, journalists and historians have taken up the story, including Clyde’s sister-in-law Blanche Barrow, who penned a memoir during the time she served in prison (My Life with Bonnie & Clyde).

Just in time for this sad anniversary, here are the latest treatments of the legend:

Bonnie and Clyde: the Lives Behind the Legend by Paul Schneider
Go down together: the True, Untold Story of Bonnie and Clyde by Jeff Guinn
Bonnie and Clyde: a Biography by Nate Hendley

D.I.Y. Film Fest: Cannes Winners

Posted May 14, 2009

The Cannes Film Festival opened yesterday with all its promised glitter and glamour, and this year’s program features several films from renowned directors. Isabel Coixet, director of last year’s lauded Elegy, based on a book by Philip Roth, has an entry. So does Jane Campion, whose film The Piano took home the 1993 Palm D’Or, and Quentin Tarantino is hoping to reclaim the glory of his win for Pulp Fiction with a new film. This is just a small sampling of the talent that will be present at this year’s festivities.

If you are interested in reading fiction with the Cannes Film Festival as a setting, there are two newer books of note. Five-Forty Five to Cannes by Tess Uriza Holthe is a collection of linked stories about a group of passengers aboard a train to Cannes. Booklist notes, “Absorbing and graceful, often surprising and sometimes tragic, Uriza Holthe’s brilliant collection of stories takes readers on a speeding train ride through the fascinating lives of her nuanced characters.” The Winner Stands Alone by Paolo Coelho takes place over a single day of the event and is a “scintillating parable about shallowness, greed and celebrity worship,” according to Publishers Weekly.

But really, Cannes is all about films, so in celebration of its opening, we’d like to highlight some of our favorite past winners of the prestigious Palme D’Or:

The Third Man (1949)
Tihe Wages of Fear (1953)
Marty (1955)
La Dolce Vita (1960)
The Umbrellas of Cherboug (1964)
Blow-Up (1967)
The Conversation (1974)
Taxi Driver (1976)
The Ballad of Narayama (1983)
sex, lies and videotape (1989)
Pulp Fiction (1994)
Dancer in the Dark (2000)
The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006)
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (2007)

Get Caught Reading

Posted May 12, 2009

May is “Get Caught Reading” month. Launched in 1999 this nationwide campaign strives to remind people how much fun they can have reading. In honor of this celebration of the written word we decided to broaden our “Caught Reading on the CTA” series by taking a peek at what folks are reading not just on the CTA, but on their lunch breaks, in coffee houses, at bookshops, walking down the street (yes, we see you walking and reading) and anywhere else books are being read. Starting with our morning commute we spotted a nice array of titles including: the graphic novel which was recently adapted for the big screen, The Watchmen; a thriller by Stephen Coonts that Publishers Weekly described as having a long fuse with a detonation that is worth the wait, Final Flight; and a book about Chicago’s Organized Crime unit, Pay, Quit or Die. Check out what else your fellow Chicagoans are perusing.

Angels & Demons by Dan Brown
Cheever: A Life by Blake Bailey
Franny & Zooey by J.D. Salinger
Hella Nation: Looking for Happy Meals in Kandahar, Rocking the Side Pipe, Wingnut’s War Against the GAP and other Adventures with the Totally Lost Tribes of America by Evan Wright
Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie
The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals by Michael Pollan
Thomas Paine: Enlightenment, Revolution and the Birth of Modern Nations by Craig Nelson
Trump: Think Like a Billionaire by Donald J. Trump

James Beard Foundation Book Awards

Posted May 7, 2009

The James Beard Foundation Book Awards were presented on Monday, and Chicago’s own Grant Achatz took home an award for his debut cookbook, Alinea, named after his renowned Chicago restaurant. Publishers Weekly notes, “this cookbook is documentation of Achatz’s genius: precise, detailed, exhaustive.” Many may lack the courage to try out Achatz’s ambitious recipes, which require skill and some serious cookware, but will nevertheless enjoy the stunning photography and reading about the creative techniques that make Achatz arguably the world’s best at molecular gastronomy. Another winner of note is Michael Pollan for his work In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto. Pollan offers simple advice: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” Please join us on Monday, May 18 at the Harold Washington Library Center for an event with Michael Pollan and Chicago journalist Bill Curtis. They will discuss his work, and a book signing will follow the program. There were many other worthy winners this year; check out some of the nominees and winners of the 2009 James Beard Foundation Book Awards:

American Cooking:
Arthur Schwartz’s Jewish Home Cooking: Yiddish Recipes Revisited by Arthur Schwartz
Cooking Up A Storm by Sam Stern, with Susan Stern
Screen Doors and Sweet Tea: Recipes and Tales from a Southern Cook by Martha Hall Foose (Winner)

Baking:
BakeWise: The Hows and Whys of Successful Baking with Over 200 Magnificent Recipes by Shirley O. Corriher (Winner)
Baking for All Occasions: A Treasury of Recipes for Everyday Celebrations by Flo Braker
The Art and Soul of Baking by La Table with Cindy Mushet

General Cooking:
How to Cook Everything (10th Anniversary Edition) by Mark Bittman (Winner)
Martha Stewart’s Cooking School: Lessons and Recipes for the Home Cook by Martha Stewart
The Bon Appetit Fast Easy Fresh Cookbook by Barbara Fairchild

Reference and Scholarship:
Milk: The Surprising Story of Milk Through the Ages by Anne Mendelson
The Flavor Bible: The Essential Guide to Culinary Creativity by Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg (Winner)
The Science of Good Food: The Ultimate Reference on How Cooking Works by Andrew Schloss with A. Philip Handel

Writing and Literature:
In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto by Michael Pollan (Winner)
Raising Steaks: The Life and Times of American Beef by Betty Fussell
Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A Sweet-Sour Memoir of Eating in China by Fuchsia Dunlop

Happy Birthday, Batman

Posted May 5, 2009

Batman is 70 years old, though you sure wouldn’t know it from his ever-increasing popularity. (Do we even need to mention the recent revamped movie franchise, Batman Begins and The Dark Knight?) The caped crusader made his humble debut in Detective Comics in May 1939, so he started life in the pulps, thanks to creator Bob Kane. And Frank Miller gets a lion’s share of the credit for re-popularizing the character with his Dark Knight stories that tapped into Batman’s darker, noirish side and are aimed at a decidedly adult audience. (For examples, check out Miller’s Batman: the Dark Knight returns and Batman: Year One.)

Likewise, acclaimed writer Alan Moore (The Watchmen) also tried his hand at the Batman mythology with Batman: the Killing Joke, featuring that most popular Batman villain, the Joker. The Joker also starred in an acclaimed recent graphic novel by Brian Azzarello (Joker) and was the subject of a recent collection, The Joker: the Greatest Stories Ever Told. Of course, there are plenty of Batman stories aimed at a younger, teen audience (stories which adults may also enjoy), including Batman: the Man who Laughs, Trinity [Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman] and Batman: Hush.

Aside from Batman stories, there’s plenty to ponder about all things Batman. Feeling reflective? Try Batman and Philosophy: the Dark Knight of the Soul. Interested in pop culture history? Try Bat-man: the Complete History by Les Daniels or Bat-manga!: the secret history of Batman in Japan. Need a chuckle? Consider Boy Wonder: My Life in Tights, a memoir by Burt Ward, who played Batman’s sidekick Robin on the campy 1960s television series.