newyorker--2020-03-09--The Dark Revelations of Gerhard Richter

The Dark Revelations of Gerhard Richter

“ Birkenau.
” The dread name—of the main death facilities at Auschwitz—entitles four large abstract paintings and four full-sized digital reproductions of them in the last gallery of “ Painting After All , ” a peculiarly solemn Gerhard Richter retrospective at the Met Breuer .
The works are based on four clandestine photographs that were smuggled out of the concentration camp in 1944 .
Two , taken from the shadowed exit of a gas chamber , show naked corpses strewn on the ground and smoke rising from bodies afire in a trench beyond them .
Men in uniform stand at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Richter first saw the images in the fifties .
He encountered them again in 2008 and kept the worst of them hanging in his studio in Cologne .
In 2014 , he projected them onto canvas and traced them .
As he worked , they became illegible .
The finished paintings exemplify Richter ’ s frequent style of densely layered , dragged pigments .
They are unusually harsh in aspect , with clashing red and green , sickly whites , and grim blacks .
But you ’ d hardly guess , by looking @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s “ Birkenau ” is a provocation—who dares take history ’ s ultimate obscenity as a theme , or even an allusion , for art ?
—but one that makes biographical sense .
Born in Dresden in 1932 , Richter is haunted , like many of his German contemporaries , by memories and associations from the Third Reich and the Second World War .
Previously indirect in his references to the horror , he has reason to focus on it now , for a show that comes late in his life , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ one of his six-decade career as a chameleon stylist and visual philosopher of painting .
( He ’ s eighty-eight and , not well enough to travel , did not attend the opening . )
The shock of “ Birkenau ” retroactively exposes a thread of sorrow and guilt through an art of invariably subtle , at times teasing , ambiguities .
His photographic images transposed to canvas and painterly techniques that exploit chance have often seemed deliberately arbitrary , as if to forswear feeling .
He brings to everything an attitude of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on many of us , over the years , that plenty of emotion , like banked fire , underlies his restless ways .
Heretofore , Richter ’ s only overt reference to the Holocaust was a suite of touching illustrations for an edition of “ The Diary of Anne Frank , ” picturing Frank ’ s face in a range of styles , which he made in 1957 , while he was unhappily apprenticed as a Socialist Realist painter in East Germany .
( The illustrations are not in the show . )
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ permitted visits to exhibitions in the West , he fled via East Berlin in 1961 , shortly before the Wall went up .
He was soon in Düsseldorf , in the thick of an avant-garde that was both piqued and excited by Pop art and the traditions of Dada .
“ Capitalist Realism , ” he and some new friends , including the brilliant Sigmar Polke , termed their response , which , among other things , degraded the glossiness of advertising material to matte grunge .
Richter took to painting copies of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to emphasize the change of medium .
Among a number of these in the show are paintings from family snapshots that touch on Richter ’ s and Germany ’ s dire past .
One , “ Uncle Rudi ” ( 1965 ) , is of a relative—in uniform and smiling goofily—who died fighting in the war .
Another , “ Aunt Marianne ” ( painted in 1965 and rendered as a luminous digital print in 2018 ) , shows a woman cradling baby Gerhard in her arms ; she was adjudged schizophrenic , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Nazi eugenics program .
Keeping company with those poignancies is “ Mr .
Heyde ” ( 1965 ) , taken from a news photograph of the concentration-camp psychiatrist Werner Heyde being arrested , in 1959 , after fourteen years of maintaining a false identity .
( He hanged himself in prison in 1964 . )
Richter wouldn ’ t have expected viewers to recognize those subjects readily , and he was at no pains to explain them .
Their meaning stayed personal , with roots in his boyhood , when he was enlisted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Youth and his father served in the Wehrmacht .
Not until “ Birkenau ” would he palpate the wound again .
It feels heavy-handed of me ( though on this occasion Richter quite asks for it ) to be zeroing in on some specific content of his art , which always shades subjects with undecidable intention .
That goes for early images of tabloid sensations , such as yearbook-style portraits of eight nurses who were murdered on a single night in Chicago , in 1966 , and forty-eight deadpan copies of photographs of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ served , perhaps , as marmoreal father figures for a largely fatherless generation .
( It ’ s estimated that more than four million German men died in the war . )
Uncertainty clings , as well , to later works , including jittery cityscapes that may be bombed ruins or simply indistinct views of an intact metropolis ; landscapes that could be either sarcastic or sincere revisitations to German Romanticism ( I vote for wistful ) ; funereal paintings of candles and skulls ; and ravishing photo-realist pictures , true to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ including members of his family .
One of these last , from 1988 , portraying his daughter Betty from behind , seems to me the single most beautiful painting made by anyone in the last half century .
It is not in the present show .
Nor is “ October 18 , 1977 , ” Richter ’ s famous series drawn from photographs of the Baader-Meinhof terrorist gang , in life and , as suicides in prison , death .
Those darkling images will always tug at our general assessments of Richter .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ subject that was charged , at the time , with conflicting political passions , I believe that the work asserts an artist ’ s license to transcend partisan judgment , independent of opinions that may even include his own .
Irony blankets Richter ’ s career .
He is a darling of the contemporary art market , with his works selling at auction for tens of millions of dollars .
But his longtime best friend , and a co-curator of this show , is the critic Benjamin H. D. Buchloh , a hard-bitten @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but anti-aesthetic , political theory .
In a notorious interview , in 1986 , Buchloh insisted on interpreting Richter ’ s art as historical critique skewering the bourgeois decadence of painting , and Richter placidly declared his wholehearted allegiance to Western painting ’ s grand tradition .
Richter said , “ The reason I don ’ t argue in ‘ socio-political terms ’ is that I want to produce a picture and not an ideology.
” He declines to claim any subversive intent , even for his occasional work in odd formats , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and the use of transparent glass in place of canvas—two predilections that came together in his successful commission , in 2007 , of an immense stained-glass window for Cologne Cathedral , proving that the experiments had been exploratory rather than tendentious .
I like to imagine Buchloh as a negative conscience perched on Richter ’ s shoulder , amusingly scandalized as the artist hews again and yet again to ancient values of meaningfulness and pleasure .
While never forsaking representation—as seen at the Met Breuer in portraits of his third wife , Sabine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which radiate Titianesque color—Richter took up chromatic abstraction in the seventies , overlaying brushed , slathered , and scraped swaths of paint .
I remember hating those on my first sight of them , circa 1980 .
They seemed to me sloppy travesties of Abstract Expressionism , and pointless : inferior coals to the Newcastle of Willem de Kooning .
Gradually , I caught their drift as pragmatic explorations of painterly phenomena : ur-paintings .
Not only condoning but soliciting accident , Richter attends to the multifarious effects of layered paint that has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
He appraises the results with an exercise of taste , deciding what to keep and what to efface .
In this , his true predecessor is Jackson Pollock , who , dripping paint , collaborated with chance and monitored the results .
At last I saw , as I still see , Richter ’ s abstractions as miraculously , often staggeringly , beautiful , with an air of having come into being through a will of their own , happening to—rather than issuing from—their creator .
They provide the chief pleasures of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ brazen of his subjects—there are none of his early borrowings from pornography , for example—and the most seductive of his color-photograph transformations , including floral still-lifes .
The selection favors eerie minor keys , as seems appropriate for being a retrospective bathed in the terrible resonance of “ Birkenau.
” ♦

“Birkenau.” The dread name—of the main death facilities at Auschwitz—entitles four large abstract paintings and four full-sized digital reproductions of them in the last gallery of “Painting After All,” a peculiarly solemn Gerhard Richter retrospective at the Met Breuer. The works are based on four clandestine photographs that were smuggled out of the concentration camp in 1944. Two, taken from the shadowed exit of a gas chamber, show naked corpses strewn on the ground and smoke rising from bodies afire in a trench beyond them. Men in uniform stand at ease—two appear to chat—amid the shambles. Richter first saw the images in the fifties. He encountered them again in 2008 and kept the worst of them hanging in his studio in Cologne. In 2014, he projected them onto canvas and traced them. As he worked, they became illegible. The finished paintings exemplify Richter’s frequent style of densely layered, dragged pigments. They are unusually harsh in aspect, with clashing red and green, sickly whites, and grim blacks. But you’d hardly guess, by looking, their awful inspiration.
“S. with Child,” from 1995. © Gerhard Richter 2019 (08102019)
Richter’s “Birkenau” is a provocation—who dares take history’s ultimate obscenity as a theme, or even an allusion, for art?—but one that makes biographical sense. Born in Dresden in 1932, Richter is haunted, like many of his German contemporaries, by memories and associations from the Third Reich and the Second World War. Previously indirect in his references to the horror, he has reason to focus on it now, for a show that comes late in his life, and which he says might be the last one of his six-decade career as a chameleon stylist and visual philosopher of painting. (He’s eighty-eight and, not well enough to travel, did not attend the opening.) The shock of “Birkenau” retroactively exposes a thread of sorrow and guilt through an art of invariably subtle, at times teasing, ambiguities. His photographic images transposed to canvas and painterly techniques that exploit chance have often seemed deliberately arbitrary, as if to forswear feeling. He brings to everything an attitude of radical skepticism. But it has dawned on many of us, over the years, that plenty of emotion, like banked fire, underlies his restless ways.
Heretofore, Richter’s only overt reference to the Holocaust was a suite of touching illustrations for an edition of “The Diary of Anne Frank,” picturing Frank’s face in a range of styles, which he made in 1957, while he was unhappily apprenticed as a Socialist Realist painter in East Germany. (The illustrations are not in the show.) Having glimpsed free-world art when he was permitted visits to exhibitions in the West, he fled via East Berlin in 1961, shortly before the Wall went up. He was soon in Düsseldorf, in the thick of an avant-garde that was both piqued and excited by Pop art and the traditions of Dada. “Capitalist Realism,” he and some new friends, including the brilliant Sigmar Polke, termed their response, which, among other things, degraded the glossiness of advertising material to matte grunge. Richter took to painting copies of banal black-and-white photographs, smearing the paint to emphasize the change of medium. Among a number of these in the show are paintings from family snapshots that touch on Richter’s and Germany’s dire past.
“Uncle Rudi,” from 1965. © Gerhard Richter 2019 (08102019)
One, “Uncle Rudi” (1965), is of a relative—in uniform and smiling goofily—who died fighting in the war. Another, “Aunt Marianne” (painted in 1965 and rendered as a luminous digital print in 2018), shows a woman cradling baby Gerhard in her arms; she was adjudged schizophrenic, imprisoned, and then killed in a Nazi eugenics program. Keeping company with those poignancies is “Mr. Heyde” (1965), taken from a news photograph of the concentration-camp psychiatrist Werner Heyde being arrested, in 1959, after fourteen years of maintaining a false identity. (He hanged himself in prison in 1964.) Richter wouldn’t have expected viewers to recognize those subjects readily, and he was at no pains to explain them. Their meaning stayed personal, with roots in his boyhood, when he was enlisted in the junior auxiliary of the Hitler Youth and his father served in the Wehrmacht. Not until “Birkenau” would he palpate the wound again.
It feels heavy-handed of me (though on this occasion Richter quite asks for it) to be zeroing in on some specific content of his art, which always shades subjects with undecidable intention. That goes for early images of tabloid sensations, such as yearbook-style portraits of eight nurses who were murdered on a single night in Chicago, in 1966, and forty-eight deadpan copies of photographs of famous artists and intellectuals. The latter served, perhaps, as marmoreal father figures for a largely fatherless generation. (It’s estimated that more than four million German men died in the war.) Uncertainty clings, as well, to later works, including jittery cityscapes that may be bombed ruins or simply indistinct views of an intact metropolis; landscapes that could be either sarcastic or sincere revisitations to German Romanticism (I vote for wistful); funereal paintings of candles and skulls; and ravishing photo-realist pictures, true to the hues of color film, of subjects including members of his family. One of these last, from 1988, portraying his daughter Betty from behind, seems to me the single most beautiful painting made by anyone in the last half century. It is not in the present show. Nor is “October 18, 1977,” Richter’s famous series drawn from photographs of the Baader-Meinhof terrorist gang, in life and, as suicides in prison, death. Those darkling images will always tug at our general assessments of Richter. Whatever his reason for taking on a subject that was charged, at the time, with conflicting political passions, I believe that the work asserts an artist’s license to transcend partisan judgment, independent of opinions that may even include his own.
Irony blankets Richter’s career. He is a darling of the contemporary art market, with his works selling at auction for tens of millions of dollars. But his longtime best friend, and a co-curator of this show, is the critic Benjamin H. D. Buchloh, a hard-bitten apostle of Frankfurt School anti-capitalist, all but anti-aesthetic, political theory. In a notorious interview, in 1986, Buchloh insisted on interpreting Richter’s art as historical critique skewering the bourgeois decadence of painting, and Richter placidly declared his wholehearted allegiance to Western painting’s grand tradition. Richter said, “The reason I don’t argue in ‘socio-political terms’ is that I want to produce a picture and not an ideology.” He declines to claim any subversive intent, even for his occasional work in odd formats, such as stark charts of random colors and the use of transparent glass in place of canvas—two predilections that came together in his successful commission, in 2007, of an immense stained-glass window for Cologne Cathedral, proving that the experiments had been exploratory rather than tendentious. I like to imagine Buchloh as a negative conscience perched on Richter’s shoulder, amusingly scandalized as the artist hews again and yet again to ancient values of meaningfulness and pleasure.
“Betty,” from 1977. © Gerhard Richter 2019 (08102019)
While never forsaking representation—as seen at the Met Breuer in portraits of his third wife, Sabine Moritz, and their three children, which radiate Titianesque color—Richter took up chromatic abstraction in the seventies, overlaying brushed, slathered, and scraped swaths of paint. I remember hating those on my first sight of them, circa 1980. They seemed to me sloppy travesties of Abstract Expressionism, and pointless: inferior coals to the Newcastle of Willem de Kooning. Gradually, I caught their drift as pragmatic explorations of painterly phenomena: ur-paintings. Not only condoning but soliciting accident, Richter attends to the multifarious effects of layered paint that has been repeatedly smashed and dragged, wet-in-wet. He appraises the results with an exercise of taste, deciding what to keep and what to efface. In this, his true predecessor is Jackson Pollock, who, dripping paint, collaborated with chance and monitored the results.
At last I saw, as I still see, Richter’s abstractions as miraculously, often staggeringly, beautiful, with an air of having come into being through a will of their own, happening to—rather than issuing from—their creator. They provide the chief pleasures of the show, which excludes the more brazen of his subjects—there are none of his early borrowings from pornography, for example—and the most seductive of his color-photograph transformations, including floral still-lifes. The selection favors eerie minor keys, as seems appropriate for being a retrospective bathed in the terrible resonance of “Birkenau.” ♦


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newyorker--2020-03-09--Trump in the Time of the Coronavirus

Trump in the Time of the Coronavirus

The first official act of the Trump Administration was the Inauguration—and , within hours , a lie delivered from the White House press room about how this had been “ the largest audience to ever witness an Inauguration , period , both in person and around the globe.
” That episode seems so long ago , and many thousands of lies ago .
But as the world now faces a pandemic , it has never been more essential to recall that norm-setting performance and to admit what has been demonstrated on a daily basis about the public official who carries @ @ @ @ @ @ @ American citizens : Donald Trump is incapable of truth , heedless of science , and hostage to the demands of his insatiable ego .
Recall , since the start of the coronavirus crisis , the litany of bogus assurances , “ hunches , ” misinformation , magical thinking , drive-by political shootings , and self-stroking : “ We have it under control .
It ’ s going to be just fine.
” “ By April , you know , in theory , when it gets a little warmer , it miraculously goes away.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ decision on testing that turned out to be detrimental to what we ’ re doing .
.
.
” “ We ’ re going very substantially down , not up .
.
.
.
We have it so well under control .
I mean , we really have done a very good job.
” “ As of right now and yesterday , anybody that needs a test [ can have one ] , that ’ s the thing , and the tests are all perfect , like the letter was perfect—the transcription was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have the people come off [ the Grand Princess cruise ship , off the coast of California ] .
I would like to have the people stay .
.
.
.
Because I like the numbers being where they are.
” Physicians and public-health officials told me , as they have told many other journalists , that they are dispirited by the President ’ s public pronouncements , saying that he has added to the danger of the crisis by minimizing its scale and the need for rigorous precautions .
Has there ever @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Mina , an epidemiologist at Harvard ’ s T. H. Chan School of Public Health and a physician at Brigham and Women ’ s Hospital , told me , “ We need the President to put the well-being of the American people before his reëlection .
And that requires open discussion and accurate information so that we can , along the way , condition people to what ’ s coming next , not to pretend that this is not a serious threat and they should just continue life as usual .
His interest @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the truth and people ’ s best interests.
” Trump , Mina went on to say , “ sees downplaying the threat as a way to look good .
He can say all the words he wants , but that won ’ t change the biology of this virus , which will spread unabated unless we take the proper steps.
” Marc Lipsitch , a professor of epidemiology at Harvard ’ s School of Public Health , told me , “ It is just false and unproductive to say that things are under @ @ @ @ @ @ @ say that anyone should go to work with a ‘ minor ’ case of the virus .
.
.
.
One thing you can say is that federalism is our friend .
There are top-notch people in state and local health departments .
They are very capable and put out good information.
” Trump ’ s misstatements and understatements in recent weeks are consistent with his general attitude toward empiricism .
Which is to say , he has never shown much regard for fact .
In the past , Trump has said that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” and that “ vaccines can be very dangerous.
” Disinformation and misinformation are rampant in his mental universe .
Trump recently gave the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Rush Limbaugh , who said , last month , “ The coronavirus is the common cold , folks.
” One of Trump ’ s ardent supporters in the Senate , Tom Cotton , of Arkansas , is among those who have suggested publicly that “ we at least need to ask the question ” of whether the virus was a bioweapon deliberately created in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Wuhan–a theory rehashed in places like the Washington Times .
It would be colossally wrong and distracting to blame Donald Trump for too much .
No President can single-handedly stave off something of this order , and the instinct to avoid general panic is not without reason .
But Trump ’ s overweening self-confidence , his carelessness with language , and his suspicion of government professionals—another facet of his fear of “ the deep state ” —exacerbates public anxiety and contributes to the chaotic national response to this crisis .
When he has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has too often chosen the paths of obfuscation , misdirection , and falsehood .
Only Trump would put Mike Pence in charge of the coronavirus crisis when , as the governor of Indiana , Pence initially bungled the public-health response to an outbreak of H.I.V .
in his state .
Time and again during this crisis , Trump has questioned the science put in front of him .
He has , in his familiar way , contradicted the experts in his Administration .
The result is unnerving both for the experts and the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases , is one of the officials who have tried to navigate doing their jobs properly and , at the same time , dealing with a completely unpredictable President .
Fauci has openly , if subtly , clashed with Trump , telling him that it will likely take more than a year , not “ a few months , ” to develop a vaccine .
“ You should never destroy your own credibility .
And you don ’ t want to go to war with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ But you got to walk the fine balance of making sure you tell the truth.
” Fauci , who is seventy-nine , is a veteran of many major public-health challenges : AIDS , Zika , Ebola , and more .
Of the coronavirus , he said , “ I think that is going to be one of those things we look back on and say , ‘ Boy , that was bad.
’ ” Public-health officials worry that the consequences of living with a President and a general disinformation universe that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dire consequences .
He is serving no one well .
When you see a Trump supporter at a rally telling a reporter for CNN that she doesn ’ t believe that coronavirus exists , that it is an invention of the political opposition , there are reasons for that thinking .
And such disbelief in the facts might well lead such a person to inadvertently make bad decisions about her health and her family ’ s health .
Though there was much to criticize about China ’ s initial reaction to the outbreak @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Michael Mina , of Harvard , said that China has succeeded in slowing the spread by taking extraordinary measures , including travel shutdowns and quarantines of whole cities .
“ Without a clear signal of concern from the White House , people will continue going to big events and say to themselves that this virus might only hurt people over the age of eighty , not me and my family , ” Mina said .
“ They won ’ t change their behavior in a way to help slow down this virus.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics , said that twenty to sixty per cent of adults will “ eventually get this before it ’ s all over , but they won ’ t necessarily be symptomatic.
” The strain on hospitals and public-health workers is bound to be tremendous .
My colleague Ben Wallace-Wells attended a conference last week at Harvard ’ s School of Public Health and said that the capacity of even the best hospitals to deal with a pandemic was a matter of central concern to everyone there .
When @ @ @ @ @ @ @ crisis , he said , “ You mean beyond a deus ex machina ?
” Lipsitch said he wasn ’ t being facetious .
He said that there was a ten or twenty per cent chance that “ everyone ’ s calculations are wrong because of some unknown factor.
” But , short of that , what would put an end to it is either a vaccine , which is at least a year or more away , or natural immunity from having had the infection .
“ That ’ s the way @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said .
“ It doesn ’ t mean that everyone has to get it , but enough so that new cases can no longer lead to long chains of transmission .
”

The first official act of the Trump Administration was the Inauguration—and, within hours, a lie delivered from the White House press room about how this had been “the largest audience to ever witness an Inauguration, period, both in person and around the globe.” That episode seems so long ago, and many thousands of lies ago. But as the world now faces a pandemic, it has never been more essential to recall that norm-setting performance and to admit what has been demonstrated on a daily basis about the public official who carries ultimate responsibility for the public safety of American citizens: Donald Trump is incapable of truth, heedless of science, and hostage to the demands of his insatiable ego.
Recall, since the start of the coronavirus crisis, the litany of bogus assurances, “hunches,” misinformation, magical thinking, drive-by political shootings, and self-stroking:
“We have it under control. It’s going to be just fine.”
“By April, you know, in theory, when it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away.”
“The Obama Administration made a decision on testing that turned out to be detrimental to what we’re doing . . . ”
“We’re going very substantially down, not up. . . . We have it so well under control. I mean, we really have done a very good job.”
“As of right now and yesterday, anybody that needs a test [can have one], that’s the thing, and the tests are all perfect, like the letter was perfect—the transcription was perfect.”
“They would like to have the people come off [the Grand Princess cruise ship, off the coast of California]. I would like to have the people stay. . . . Because I like the numbers being where they are.”
Physicians and public-health officials told me, as they have told many other journalists, that they are dispirited by the President’s public pronouncements, saying that he has added to the danger of the crisis by minimizing its scale and the need for rigorous precautions. Has there ever been a less serious President?
Michael Mina, an epidemiologist at Harvard’s T. H. Chan School of Public Health and a physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, told me, “We need the President to put the well-being of the American people before his reëlection. And that requires open discussion and accurate information so that we can, along the way, condition people to what’s coming next, not to pretend that this is not a serious threat and they should just continue life as usual. His interest in being reëlected is in conflict with the truth and people’s best interests.”
Trump, Mina went on to say, “sees downplaying the threat as a way to look good. He can say all the words he wants, but that won’t change the biology of this virus, which will spread unabated unless we take the proper steps.”
Marc Lipsitch, a professor of epidemiology at Harvard’s School of Public Health, told me, “It is just false and unproductive to say that things are under control, and it is false to say that anyone should go to work with a ‘minor’ case of the virus. . . . One thing you can say is that federalism is our friend. There are top-notch people in state and local health departments. They are very capable and put out good information.”
Trump’s misstatements and understatements in recent weeks are consistent with his general attitude toward empiricism. Which is to say, he has never shown much regard for fact. In the past, Trump has said that climate change is a Chinese “hoax” and that “vaccines can be very dangerous.” Disinformation and misinformation are rampant in his mental universe. Trump recently gave the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Rush Limbaugh, who said, last month, “The coronavirus is the common cold, folks.” One of Trump’s ardent supporters in the Senate, Tom Cotton, of Arkansas, is among those who have suggested publicly that “we at least need to ask the question” of whether the virus was a bioweapon deliberately created in a Chinese laboratory outside the city of Wuhan—a theory rehashed in places like the Washington Times.
It would be colossally wrong and distracting to blame Donald Trump for too much. No President can single-handedly stave off something of this order, and the instinct to avoid general panic is not without reason. But Trump’s overweening self-confidence, his carelessness with language, and his suspicion of government professionals—another facet of his fear of “the deep state”—exacerbates public anxiety and contributes to the chaotic national response to this crisis. When he has taken the opportunity to speak, he has too often chosen the paths of obfuscation, misdirection, and falsehood. Only Trump would put Mike Pence in charge of the coronavirus crisis when, as the governor of Indiana, Pence initially bungled the public-health response to an outbreak of H.I.V. in his state.
Time and again during this crisis, Trump has questioned the science put in front of him. He has, in his familiar way, contradicted the experts in his Administration. The result is unnerving both for the experts and the public. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, is one of the officials who have tried to navigate doing their jobs properly and, at the same time, dealing with a completely unpredictable President. Fauci has openly, if subtly, clashed with Trump, telling him that it will likely take more than a year, not “a few months,” to develop a vaccine. “You should never destroy your own credibility. And you don’t want to go to war with a President,” Fauci told Politico. “But you got to walk the fine balance of making sure you tell the truth.” Fauci, who is seventy-nine, is a veteran of many major public-health challenges: AIDS, Zika, Ebola, and more. Of the coronavirus, he said, “I think that is going to be one of those things we look back on and say, ‘Boy, that was bad.’ ”
Public-health officials worry that the consequences of living with a President and a general disinformation universe that undermine facts and science could have increasingly dire consequences. He is serving no one well. When you see a Trump supporter at a rally telling a reporter for CNN that she doesn’t believe that coronavirus exists, that it is an invention of the political opposition, there are reasons for that thinking. And such disbelief in the facts might well lead such a person to inadvertently make bad decisions about her health and her family’s health.
Though there was much to criticize about China’s initial reaction to the outbreak of the virus, in Wuhan, Michael Mina, of Harvard, said that China has succeeded in slowing the spread by taking extraordinary measures, including travel shutdowns and quarantines of whole cities. “Without a clear signal of concern from the White House, people will continue going to big events and say to themselves that this virus might only hurt people over the age of eighty, not me and my family,” Mina said. “They won’t change their behavior in a way to help slow down this virus.”
Lipsitch, who also runs Harvard’s Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics, said that twenty to sixty per cent of adults will “eventually get this before it’s all over, but they won’t necessarily be symptomatic.” The strain on hospitals and public-health workers is bound to be tremendous. My colleague Ben Wallace-Wells attended a conference last week at Harvard’s School of Public Health and said that the capacity of even the best hospitals to deal with a pandemic was a matter of central concern to everyone there.


newyorker--2020-03-09--“First Cow,” Reviewed: Kelly Reichardt’s Fatalistic Portrait of Early American Entrepreneurs

There are plenty of movies about business , but few that consider it primally , with a view of the lemonade stand , actual or idealized , with which commerce begins .
Kelly Reichardt ’ s new film , “ First Cow , ” does exactly that , and turns the exertions of its firsthand , bootstrap entrepreneurs into exciting and suspenseful drama .
Paradoxically , the film undercuts its suspense from the start , because Reichardt has a clear idea of where business leads : she begins the movie with an Ozymandias scene ( as in Shelley ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) set in current-day Oregon , in which a woman ( Alia Shawkat ) , wandering through the woods with her dog , finds and excavates from just below the topsoil two ancient skeletons lying side by side .
The rest of the movie is , in effect , a flashback , to eighteen-twenties Oregon .
There , two itinerant laborers—Otis ( Cookie ) Figowitz ( played by John Magaro ) , indentured under cruel conditions to trappers , and King Lu ( Orion Lee ) , an immigrant from China—meet in dire @ @ @ @ @ @ @ shack together and eke out a subsistence living while nonetheless dreaming big .
Their idea is to get to San Francisco and open a hotel there ; but King Lu embodies the reality principle , discerning the high cost of travel , the vast investment needed , the difficulty of the city ’ s competition .
Cookie—a talented chef who , in his youth , had been indentured and apprenticed to a Boston baker—is a dreamer in other ways , too .
He provides pleasant albeit modest victuals for himself and King Lu @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , a commodity that ’ s impossible to come by at their outpost .
There is—as the title suggests—one cow in the area ; its arrival , by barge , was something of a local spectacle .
It belongs to a local grandee , the so-called Chief Factor ( Toby Jones ) .
King Lu convinces Cookie , who knows how to milk a cow , to join him on a nocturnal raid on the farm to steal some milk .
Under King Lu ’ s guidance and with his salesmanship , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they bring batter and a pan to the muddy local town square and sell Cookie ’ s fresh-made “ oily cakes.
” The treats , with their “ secret ” recipe ( of course , including stolen milk ) , are the very exemplar of the cliché of a product “ selling like hotcakes.
” Lines form for their cakes ; the last one of the day gives rise to bidding wars .
Cookie and King Lu are making money , which they stash in their “ bank ” —a hole in a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ about their nocturnal missions .
They ’ ve gotten away with their filching so far , but he fears that their luck will run out .
When the Chief Factor , an Anglophile epicurean , tastes a cake and discerns its secret ingredient , the two entrepreneurs find themselves ensnared in an inescapable web of deceit .
Reichardt ’ s scenes of the two men on their expeditions to steal milk have a basic and powerful tension : Will they or won ’ t they get away with it ?
The rigors the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their upstanding plans for the money once they ’ ve got it , give the audience an extreme rooting interest in them .
If they succeed , then the movie gives honest and beleaguered working men a necessary glimmer of hope , a way out and even up .
Plus , the movie implies that the Chief Factor from whom they ’ re stealing is a bigger thief , one who succeeds only through privilege , ruthlessness , and impunity .
Yet Reichardt approaches these scenes with a double dose of principled cinematic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and isolated gestures and compositions , a sort of cinematic theme and variations in which the variations don ’ t vary much except as the plot dictates .
Moreover , the pleasure of watching Cookie and King Lu carry out their scheme is undercut by the willful air of hopelessness that runs through the film .
Reichart seems almost embarrassed to allow her audience to root for them .
Writing the script with Jon Raymond ( in an adaptation of his novel “ The Half-Life ” ) , Reichardt endows King Lu with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ notable aphorism , he asserts that history hasn ’ t yet reached Oregon ) to go with his perspicacious and hard-nosed business sense .
He does the practical reckoning to determine whether and what kind of San Francisco is feasible , and how much money they ’ d need both to get there and to go into business .
He also offers terse , insightful reflections about the fur trade to explain why he doesn ’ t export pelts to China .
King Lu is a prototype of the latter-day business philosopher .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ , when history reaches Oregon , as the discerning entrepreneur and shrewd free marketeer who issues lofty pronouncements that get published as a book and burnish his public image as a thinker and leader—even as his unbridled ambition steers his business into ruin .
Reichardt ’ s sympathies lie more firmly with Cookie , the artisan whose aspirations are tempered with prudence ; her sympathy is blended with pity for him as an intelligent and capable person whose practical efforts appear doomed to failure in the absence of self-destructive recklessness—or depraved ruthlessness .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ the inherent corruption of business and trade , however small or local—and it overleaps these specifics as if illustrating abstractions about the canker at the root of capitalism .
The movie ’ s vision of the Chief Factor , who wields a vague authority over the locale , lines up to illustrate the thesis .
A frontier mock-up of a British grandee , the Factor is determined to import not just livestock and its practical benefits ( the bull and the calf died on the journey ) but also the sort of cultural @ @ @ @ @ @ @ achieve—and show off—in land he considers rude and savage .
Here , Reichardt ’ s inspiration is observational , her curiosity is ardent , and her method is discerning .
He ’ s married to a Native American woman whose extended family lives with them ; notably , when they speak together , their dialogue isn ’ t subtitled .
The Factor ’ s wife ( played by Lily Gladstone , whose performance was the revelation of Reichardt ’ s previous film , “ Certain Women ” ) translates their dialogue , in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ him , and , implicitly , for viewers .
( In the role of her father , Totillicum , Gary Farmer gives a performance of fine irony and bluff humor . )
Reichardt emphasizes the isolation of Anglophone settlers from the indigenous people whose land they ’ re inhabiting , and aptly portrays the discourse and the arts of the Chinook people as aspects of grand culture in and of themselves—which , of course , the Factor and his Europhile guests don ’ t notice and wouldn ’ t believe .
In short @ @ @ @ @ @ @ movie divided against itself .
Reichardt ’ s keen and spare sensibility simultaneously stokes suspense while shying away from it , leans toward perception while rushing toward judgment .
Her abstemious repertory of images and tightly focussed drama suggest that she took greater pleasure in conveying her premise than in the also vital cinematic pleasure discovering her characters .
The movie ’ s proportions and contours give rise to yet another familiar , altogether too common , failing of movies of overt political import : impersonality .
The spare quasi-objectivity of the images @ @ @ @ @ @ @ than states of mind , reflect a repudiation of the heterogenous , a lack of interest in aspects of character and behavior that don ’ t line up in the same direction or lead to the predetermined outcome .
The long nights in the cabin , the inevitable tale-spinning , reminiscences , confessions—the characters of King Lu and of Cookie , although not completely silenced , are truncated and diminished , relegated to their function as the bearers of Reichardt ’ s deterministic design .
There ’ s a minor subplot that ultimately @ @ @ @ @ @ @ akin to that of “ Parasite , ” in which the rich pit the poor against each other in a struggle for survival—but Reichardt is content to drop it in at arm ’ s length and leave it totally undeveloped and unconsidered .
“ First Cow ” gathers elements of extraordinary experience , analytical insight , and historical perspective , but renders them narrow , didactic , faux-objective ; its empathy and curiosity are too severely rationed .

There are plenty of movies about business, but few that consider it primally, with a view of the lemonade stand, actual or idealized, with which commerce begins. Kelly Reichardt’s new film, “First Cow,” does exactly that, and turns the exertions of its firsthand, bootstrap entrepreneurs into exciting and suspenseful drama. Paradoxically, the film undercuts its suspense from the start, because Reichardt has a clear idea of where business leads: she begins the movie with an Ozymandias scene (as in Shelley’s poem, illustrating the vanity of ambition) set in current-day Oregon, in which a woman (Alia Shawkat), wandering through the woods with her dog, finds and excavates from just below the topsoil two ancient skeletons lying side by side.
The rest of the movie is, in effect, a flashback, to eighteen-twenties Oregon. There, two itinerant laborers—Otis (Cookie) Figowitz (played by John Magaro), indentured under cruel conditions to trappers, and King Lu (Orion Lee), an immigrant from China—meet in dire circumstances and team up to share a shack together and eke out a subsistence living while nonetheless dreaming big. Their idea is to get to San Francisco and open a hotel there; but King Lu embodies the reality principle, discerning the high cost of travel, the vast investment needed, the difficulty of the city’s competition. Cookie—a talented chef who, in his youth, had been indentured and apprenticed to a Boston baker—is a dreamer in other ways, too. He provides pleasant albeit modest victuals for himself and King Lu but dreams of biscuits made with milk, a commodity that’s impossible to come by at their outpost. There is—as the title suggests—one cow in the area; its arrival, by barge, was something of a local spectacle. It belongs to a local grandee, the so-called Chief Factor (Toby Jones). King Lu convinces Cookie, who knows how to milk a cow, to join him on a nocturnal raid on the farm to steal some milk.
Under King Lu’s guidance and with his salesmanship, the pair turn their pleasure into business: they bring batter and a pan to the muddy local town square and sell Cookie’s fresh-made “oily cakes.” The treats, with their “secret” recipe (of course, including stolen milk), are the very exemplar of the cliché of a product “selling like hotcakes.” Lines form for their cakes; the last one of the day gives rise to bidding wars. Cookie and King Lu are making money, which they stash in their “bank”—a hole in a tree. But Cookie is increasingly uneasy about their nocturnal missions. They’ve gotten away with their filching so far, but he fears that their luck will run out. When the Chief Factor, an Anglophile epicurean, tastes a cake and discerns its secret ingredient, the two entrepreneurs find themselves ensnared in an inescapable web of deceit.
Reichardt’s scenes of the two men on their expeditions to steal milk have a basic and powerful tension: Will they or won’t they get away with it? The rigors the pair endured before teaming up, and their upstanding plans for the money once they’ve got it, give the audience an extreme rooting interest in them. If they succeed, then the movie gives honest and beleaguered working men a necessary glimmer of hope, a way out and even up. Plus, the movie implies that the Chief Factor from whom they’re stealing is a bigger thief, one who succeeds only through privilege, ruthlessness, and impunity. Yet Reichardt approaches these scenes with a double dose of principled cinematic inhibition. They are built of spare and isolated gestures and compositions, a sort of cinematic theme and variations in which the variations don’t vary much except as the plot dictates. Moreover, the pleasure of watching Cookie and King Lu carry out their scheme is undercut by the willful air of hopelessness that runs through the film. Reichart seems almost embarrassed to allow her audience to root for them.
Writing the script with Jon Raymond (in an adaptation of his novel “The Half-Life”), Reichardt endows King Lu with a gnomically philosophical sensibility (in one notable aphorism, he asserts that history hasn’t yet reached Oregon) to go with his perspicacious and hard-nosed business sense. He does the practical reckoning to determine whether and what kind of San Francisco is feasible, and how much money they’d need both to get there and to go into business. He also offers terse, insightful reflections about the fur trade to explain why he doesn’t export pelts to China. King Lu is a prototype of the latter-day business philosopher. It’s easy to imagine him, when history reaches Oregon, as the discerning entrepreneur and shrewd free marketeer who issues lofty pronouncements that get published as a book and burnish his public image as a thinker and leader—even as his unbridled ambition steers his business into ruin.
Reichardt’s sympathies lie more firmly with Cookie, the artisan whose aspirations are tempered with prudence; her sympathy is blended with pity for him as an intelligent and capable person whose practical efforts appear doomed to failure in the absence of self-destructive recklessness—or depraved ruthlessness. The story she’s telling asserts the inherent corruption of business and trade, however small or local—and it overleaps these specifics as if illustrating abstractions about the canker at the root of capitalism. The movie’s vision of the Chief Factor, who wields a vague authority over the locale, lines up to illustrate the thesis.
A frontier mock-up of a British grandee, the Factor is determined to import not just livestock and its practical benefits (the bull and the calf died on the journey) but also the sort of cultural refinement that he and his circle can achieve—and show off—in land he considers rude and savage. Here, Reichardt’s inspiration is observational, her curiosity is ardent, and her method is discerning. He’s married to a Native American woman whose extended family lives with them; notably, when they speak together, their dialogue isn’t subtitled. The Factor’s wife (played by Lily Gladstone, whose performance was the revelation of Reichardt’s previous film, “Certain Women”) translates their dialogue, in a Chinook language, into English for him, and, implicitly, for viewers. (In the role of her father, Totillicum, Gary Farmer gives a performance of fine irony and bluff humor.) Reichardt emphasizes the isolation of Anglophone settlers from the indigenous people whose land they’re inhabiting, and aptly portrays the discourse and the arts of the Chinook people as aspects of grand culture in and of themselves—which, of course, the Factor and his Europhile guests don’t notice and wouldn’t believe.
In short, “First Cow” is a movie divided against itself. Reichardt’s keen and spare sensibility simultaneously stokes suspense while shying away from it, leans toward perception while rushing toward judgment. Her abstemious repertory of images and tightly focussed drama suggest that she took greater pleasure in conveying her premise than in the also vital cinematic pleasure discovering her characters. The movie’s proportions and contours give rise to yet another familiar, altogether too common, failing of movies of overt political import: impersonality. The spare quasi-objectivity of the images, which appear to declare facts rather than states of mind, reflect a repudiation of the heterogenous, a lack of interest in aspects of character and behavior that don’t line up in the same direction or lead to the predetermined outcome. The long nights in the cabin, the inevitable tale-spinning, reminiscences, confessions—the characters of King Lu and of Cookie, although not completely silenced, are truncated and diminished, relegated to their function as the bearers of Reichardt’s deterministic design. There’s a minor subplot that ultimately plays a large role in the film—one akin to that of “Parasite,” in which the rich pit the poor against each other in a struggle for survival—but Reichardt is content to drop it in at arm’s length and leave it totally undeveloped and unconsidered. “First Cow” gathers elements of extraordinary experience, analytical insight, and historical perspective, but renders them narrow, didactic, faux-objective; its empathy and curiosity are too severely rationed.


newyorker--2020-03-09--Betsy DeVos Says She Was Planning to Close All Schools Anyway

WASHINGTON ( The Borowitz Report ) —As an increasing number of schools and universities closed down because of the coronavirus outbreak , the Education Secretary , Betsy DeVos , revealed on Monday that she had been planning for years to close every school in the country anyway .
Speaking to reporters in Washington , DeVos said , “ When I took over as Education Secretary , I came with a simple mission : to shut down all of the nation ’ s schools .
It turns out that I was just ahead of my time.
” Noting that schools are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and history , DeVos said , “ I have long believed that schools are where all the bad things happen.
” Deciding to “ wipe out the scourge of education once and for all , ” DeVos said that , within days of taking office , she drew up an ambitious plan called No School Left Open .
In a reassuring message to the nation ’ s parents and students , DeVos said , “ Amid the current crisis , many of you are wondering how we will close every American school overnight @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is the job Betsy DeVos was born to do .
”

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—As an increasing number of schools and universities closed down because of the coronavirus outbreak, the Education Secretary, Betsy DeVos, revealed on Monday that she had been planning for years to close every school in the country anyway.
Speaking to reporters in Washington, DeVos said, “When I took over as Education Secretary, I came with a simple mission: to shut down all of the nation’s schools. It turns out that I was just ahead of my time.”
Noting that schools are where students learn math, science, and history, DeVos said, “I have long believed that schools are where all the bad things happen.”
Deciding to “wipe out the scourge of education once and for all,” DeVos said that, within days of taking office, she drew up an ambitious plan called No School Left Open.
In a reassuring message to the nation’s parents and students, DeVos said, “Amid the current crisis, many of you are wondering how we will close every American school overnight. Let me just say that this is the job Betsy DeVos was born to do.”


newyorker--2020-03-09--And Then There Were Two: Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden

A little more than a week ago , Bernie Sanders seemed to be the front-runner for the Democratic nomination for President .
Then came some prominent withdrawals from the race and , on Super Tuesday , the resurgence of Joe Biden ’ s campaign .
( Representative Tulsi Gabbard , of Hawaii , remains in the race but has no chance of winning the nomination . )
But the narrowing of the field only highlights the gulf between the Party ’ s moderate center and its energized left .
David Remnick talks with Amy Davidson Sorkin , a political columnist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ possibility of a contested Convention .
Then Remnick interviews Michael Kazin , a historian and the co-editor of Dissent magazine .
Kazin points out that Sanders is struggling against a headwind : even voters sympathetic to democratic socialism may vote for a pragmatist if they think that Biden is more likely to beat the incumbent President in November .
But Sanders seems unlikely to moderate his message .
“ There is a problem , ” Kazin tells Remnick .
“ A divided party—a party that ’ s divided at the Convention—never has won @ @ @ @ @

Photograph by Frederic J. Brown / AFP / Getty
A little more than a week ago, Bernie Sanders seemed to be the front-runner for the Democratic nomination for President. Then came some prominent withdrawals from the race and, on Super Tuesday, the resurgence of Joe Biden’s campaign. (Representative Tulsi Gabbard, of Hawaii, remains in the race but has no chance of winning the nomination.) But the narrowing of the field only highlights the gulf between the Party’s moderate center and its energized left. David Remnick talks with Amy Davidson Sorkin, a political columnist for The New Yorker, about the possibility of a contested Convention. Then Remnick interviews Michael Kazin, a historian and the co-editor of Dissent magazine. Kazin points out that Sanders is struggling against a headwind: even voters sympathetic to democratic socialism may vote for a pragmatist if they think that Biden is more likely to beat the incumbent President in November. But Sanders seems unlikely to moderate his message. “There is a problem,” Kazin tells Remnick. “A divided party—a party that’s divided at the Convention—never has won in American politics.”


newyorker--2020-03-09--My Definition of “Unplugging”

My Definition of “Unplugging”

Having my phone in my pocket instead of in my hand .
Leaving home with a fully charged phone but no backup charger .
When I only check Instagram on my laptop , so I can ’ t even see the DMs—brave !
In select conversations with men with beautiful eyes .
When I don ’ t use Google Maps to walk to a grocery store that I go to every day .
The two minutes after I almost get hit by a car while walking to said grocery store .
( O.K.
, this time I brought my phone—everyone @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hour after I actually do get hit by a different car , but only because the E.M.T .
has beautiful eyes .
When my phone is doing a system update .
When my phone is charging and there ’ s truly no way ( socially acceptable or not ) to be sitting next to it .
Right after the hot doctor ( why didn ’ t I pursue medicine ? )
tells me I need to stay off my leg for eight weeks and I really , really need to be more careful @ @ @ @ @ @ @ street , and right before he says , “ Are you listening ?
Can you please put your phone away ?
” In physical therapy , when the therapist tells me I ’ m not allowed to use my phone .
Even if I need it to call my insurance and ask if they ’ d cover truly anyone else .
When the pain in my leg becomes so unbearable that I must use both hands for constant clenching , so I can only watch TV but can ’ t text .
Which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ real tragedy .
Healing from my grave injury and returning to using my phone sixteen hours per day , but this time , feeling guilty about it .
Unplugging—not worth it !

Having my phone in my pocket instead of in my hand.
Sleeping.
Trying to pop a pimple.
Leaving home with a fully charged phone but no backup charger.
When I only check Instagram on my laptop, so I can’t even see the DMs—brave!
In select conversations with men with beautiful eyes.
When I don’t use Google Maps to walk to a grocery store that I go to every day.
The two minutes after I almost get hit by a car while walking to said grocery store. (O.K., this time I brought my phone—everyone needs a cheat day!)
The hour after I actually do get hit by a different car, but only because the E.M.T. has beautiful eyes.
When my phone is doing a system update.
When my phone is charging and there’s truly no way (socially acceptable or not) to be sitting next to it.
Right after the hot doctor (why didn’t I pursue medicine?) tells me I need to stay off my leg for eight weeks and I really, really need to be more careful about texting in the middle of the street, and right before he says, “Are you listening? Can you please put your phone away?”
In physical therapy, when the therapist tells me I’m not allowed to use my phone. Even if I need it to call my insurance and ask if they’d cover truly anyone else.
When the pain in my leg becomes so unbearable that I must use both hands for constant clenching, so I can only watch TV but can’t text. Which is, in many ways, the real tragedy.
Healing from my grave injury and returning to using my phone sixteen hours per day, but this time, feeling guilty about it. Unplugging—not worth it!


newyorker--2020-03-09--Things Your Roomie Could, in Theory, Be Doing in There

Preparing for her induction into the Guinness Book of Records for Most Consecutive Wet Coughs During an Eight-Hour Overnight Period .
Participating in an offsite focus group testing a beta version of some yet unreleased noise-cancelling headphones with her loudest and most abrasive Spotify playlist .
Staying up late to deplete the rest of the battery life in several different electric toothbrushes and get her money ’ s worth before buying replacements .
Preparing for her second induction into the Guinness Book of Records , for Most Repulsive-Sounding Wet Coughs During an Eight-Hour Overnight Period .
Elevating her nascent but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the apartment ’ s drinking glasses and coffee mugs into a new piece .
Diving even further into her fledgling art career by finishing up her life-size sculpture of you with the authentic scents of your rapidly and mysteriously depleting shower gel , mouthwash , and leave-in conditioner .
Warming up with her fitness-oriented guest by doing increasingly speedy burpees atop the squeakiest spring in her mattress until audible exhaustion .
Crafting the perfect party outfit featuring clothes that have an uncanny resemblance to missing articles from your own closet .
Writing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fungus-husbandry experiment she ’ s conducting directly to the left of the kitchen sink .
Going head to head with your other roommate in a cutthroat competition of who can fill your day-to-day with more petty inconveniences .
It ’ s a close race .

Preparing for her induction into the Guinness Book of Records for Most Consecutive Wet Coughs During an Eight-Hour Overnight Period.
Participating in an offsite focus group testing a beta version of some yet unreleased noise-cancelling headphones with her loudest and most abrasive Spotify playlist.
Staying up late to deplete the rest of the battery life in several different electric toothbrushes and get her money’s worth before buying replacements.
Preparing for her second induction into the Guinness Book of Records, for Most Repulsive-Sounding Wet Coughs During an Eight-Hour Overnight Period.
Elevating her nascent but promising mixed-media-sculpture career by incorporating a majority of the apartment’s drinking glasses and coffee mugs into a new piece.
Diving even further into her fledgling art career by finishing up her life-size sculpture of you with the authentic scents of your rapidly and mysteriously depleting shower gel, mouthwash, and leave-in conditioner.
Warming up with her fitness-oriented guest by doing increasingly speedy burpees atop the squeakiest spring in her mattress until audible exhaustion.
Crafting the perfect party outfit featuring clothes that have an uncanny resemblance to missing articles from your own closet.
Writing up the lab report for the weeklong fungus-husbandry experiment she’s conducting directly to the left of the kitchen sink.
Going head to head with your other roommate in a cutthroat competition of who can fill your day-to-day with more petty inconveniences. It’s a close race.


newyorker--2020-03-09--How Much of the World Will Be Quarantined by the Coronavirus?

China was the first country to forcibly restrict the personal movements , public events , and business activities of its people—eleven million in Wuhan , the megacity and global epicenter of the COVID-19 coronavirus .
On January 23rd , soldiers wearing black masks deployed along barricades at the train station .
The government requisitioned stadiums , exhibition halls , and other large venues as quarantine centers ; the rows of beds set up inside looked more like military barracks than hospital wards .
To contain the largest outbreak in Asia , Chinese health and security officials went door-to-door—checking for people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ widened to more than a dozen other cities in Hubei Province , constraining the daily lives of sixty million people .
It ’ s the largest quarantine in human history .
On Sunday , Italy locked down its northern regions—including Venice and Milan , the country ’ s economic heartland , and home to sixteen million people—for at least a month to contain the largest outbreak in Europe .
Nationwide , all public gatherings , including weddings and funerals , were banned .
In an unprecedented emergency decree , Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Italy faced “ a national emergency.
” Local leaders—some given little advance warning and others who learned on television—complained that the plan was incoherent and enforcement unfeasible .
But the government said it had little choice .
In just twenty-four hours , Italy recorded fourteen hundred new infections .
One of them was Nicola Zingaretti , the leader of the governing coalition ’ s Democratic Party , who is based in Rome , far from the COVID-19 front line in Italy .
“ Well , it ’ s arrived , ” he said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ nationwide had already been closed .
The Vatican , the headquarters of the world ’ s 1.2 billion Catholics , was , too .
After this piece ’ s publication , Conte announced a nationwide lockdown to go into effect on Tuesday morning ; it will apply to roughly sixty million people .
In just ten weeks , the number of reported cases of the COVID-19 coronavirus has soared to more than a hundred and ten thousand in a hundred countries .
In the United States , thirty-four states now have cases .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ , reported over the weekend , is the rector of Georgetown ’ s historic Christ Church , who led four services for five hundred and fifty people a week ago ; he handed out communion at one of them and spent part of the service reminding the congregation about hand sanitizers .
After he was hospitalized on Thursday , the church e-mailed alerts to parishioners and cancelled services yesterday .
The great unknown is whether the kinds of restrictions imposed in China and Italy are harbingers of a global phenomenon , including in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ continents are scrambling to figure out how to stem community contagion , which is now widespread but hard to trace backward to contain the infection rates .
Will parts of the world be quarantined in enclaves until a vaccine is found , tested , approved and available—at least a year away ?
“ We have to be realistic .
I don ’ t think it would be as draconian as nobody in or nobody out .
But , if we continue to get cases like this , particularly at the community level , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mitigation , ’ where we have to essentially do social distancing , ” Dr. Anthony Fauci , head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases , said on Fox News Sunday .
“ You don ’ t want to alarm people , but , given the spread we ’ ve seen , you know , anything is possible .
And that ’ s the reason why we ’ ve got to be prepared to take whatever action is appropriate to contain and mitigate the outbreak.
” At the same time , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out of the COVID-19 crisis , Wendy E. Parmet , the director of the Center for Health Policy and Law at Northeastern University , told me .
“ There are reasons to be skeptical of the efficacy of quarantine for respiratory diseases like coronavirus.
” Quarantines can be a useful tool when done well .
They can lower infection rates “ a bit ” and buy time , she said .
But they have been done historically in discriminatory and haphazard ways that provide “ a seductive illusion of containment.
” The best @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the long-stranded Grand Princess cruise ship , which has more than twenty passengers who have tested positive for COVID-19 .
It is finally due to dock in Oakland on Monday ; passengers will be quarantined for two weeks in California , Texas , and Georgia .
Meanwhile , Parmet said , the disease has spread widely and rapidly across most of the United States .
There are three distinct responses to health emergencies that have been misused interchangeably amid the coronavirus crisis , Lauren Sauer , of the Johns Hopkins Office of Critical @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Social distancing , a term that has just entered the modern lexicon , is voluntarily keeping a few feet away from other people or opting not to go to mass gatherings based on the recommendation of public-health officials .
It is the least restrictive—and the strategy that U.S. officials have largely recommended so far , especially for vulnerable sectors of society .
A quarantine , a practice first recorded in the Book of Leviticus in the Old Testament , is invoked because of probable exposure to an illness .
People are removed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of time—voluntarily or by legal order—to see if the disease develops .
The word quarantine dates to the Black Death plague ’ s spread along the Mediterranean in the fourteenth century , when governments imposed isolation for forty days—or quaranta in Italian .
The Black Death killed some twenty-five million people , about a third of the European population at the time .
Italy and China have mandated quarantines in response to COVID-19 .
In the United States , Senator Ted Cruz , of Texas , and Representative Paul Gosar , of Arizona @ @ @ @ @ @ @ self-quarantining for fourteen days , because they interacted and shook hands with an unidentified person at the Conservative Political Action Conference last month who subsequently tested positive for the new virus .
The most restrictive measure is isolation after a person has symptoms or is confirmed to have a disease by a lab test .
“ In quarantine , you ’ re waiting to see if you develop the sickness , ” Sauer said .
“ If you ’ re in isolation , you are sick and waiting until the illness resolves.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ vastly different ways to the COVID-19 epidemic .
One increasingly common practice has been quarantining passengers returning from so-called hot zones , or countries with numerous coronavirus cases , including China , Italy , Iran , South Korea , and Japan .
But , with more than a hundred countries now hit , the requirements needed to effectively quarantine the volume of passengers from so many places could overwhelm systems .
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that Israel , which has more than three dozen cases , is considering a move @ @ @ @ @ @ @ flying in from anywhere in the world to go into quarantine .
The consequences and enforcement mechanisms have been inconsistent , however .
In one of the toughest measures , the Czech government decreed that any of its sixteen thousand citizens in Italy have to self-quarantine for fourteen days when they return—or face a hundred-and-thirty-thousand-dollar fine .
The quarantines in China were misguided and too much , too late , Parmet told me .
They have been done in ways that could jeopardize lives , because healthy and ill people are stuck together @ @ @ @ @ @ @ these massive-scale quarantines , you are pushing deeply into potential human-rights violations , ” Sauer said .
“ We have to be careful about everything we condone , whether active or passive .
This is the time when social norms can change , and personal liberties are at risk.
” By their nature , quarantines encourage xenophobia , division , and the muscular exercise of state power .
“ There are also long-term political consequences , ” she added .
“ The intangible consequences pushing toward authoritarian rule concerns me a lot.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was too little , too late , Parmet said .
“ We really wasted time .
It ’ s mind-boggling that the United States could be at the bottom of the developed world in terms of getting testing kits out and issuing policies that mitigate the disease .
We need a much more robust strategy to manage community transmission.
” In the meantime , Parmet said , no one should have illusions about keeping out the world ’ s novel coronavirus .
This post was updated after Conte announced the nationwide lockdown .

China was the first country to forcibly restrict the personal movements, public events, and business activities of its people—eleven million in Wuhan, the megacity and global epicenter of the COVID-19 coronavirus. On January 23rd, soldiers wearing black masks deployed along barricades at the train station. The government requisitioned stadiums, exhibition halls, and other large venues as quarantine centers; the rows of beds set up inside looked more like military barracks than hospital wards. To contain the largest outbreak in Asia, Chinese health and security officials went door-to-door—checking for people with symptoms. The lockdown was later widened to more than a dozen other cities in Hubei Province, constraining the daily lives of sixty million people. It’s the largest quarantine in human history.
On Sunday, Italy locked down its northern regions—including Venice and Milan, the country’s economic heartland, and home to sixteen million people—for at least a month to contain the largest outbreak in Europe. Nationwide, all public gatherings, including weddings and funerals, were banned. In an unprecedented emergency decree, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte told a news conference—convened at 2 A.M.—that Italy faced “a national emergency.” Local leaders—some given little advance warning and others who learned on television—complained that the plan was incoherent and enforcement unfeasible. But the government said it had little choice. In just twenty-four hours, Italy recorded fourteen hundred new infections. One of them was Nicola Zingaretti, the leader of the governing coalition’s Democratic Party, who is based in Rome, far from the COVID-19 front line in Italy. “Well, it’s arrived,” he said, in a Facebook video. Schools nationwide had already been closed. The Vatican, the headquarters of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics, was, too. On Monday, Conte announced a nationwide lockdown to go into effect on Tuesday morning; it will apply to roughly sixty million people.
In just ten weeks, the number of reported cases of the COVID-19 coronavirus has soared to more than a hundred and ten thousand in a hundred countries. In the United States, thirty-four states now have cases. The first case in Washington, D.C., reported over the weekend, is the rector of Georgetown’s historic Christ Church, who led four services for five hundred and fifty people a week ago; he handed out communion at one of them and spent part of the service reminding the congregation about hand sanitizers. After he was hospitalized on Thursday, the church e-mailed alerts to parishioners and cancelled services yesterday.
The great unknown is whether the kinds of restrictions imposed in China and Italy are harbingers of a global phenomenon, including in the United States. Governments on six continents are scrambling to figure out how to stem community contagion, which is now widespread but hard to trace backward to contain the infection rates. Will parts of the world be quarantined in enclaves until a vaccine is found, tested, approved and available—at least a year away?
“We have to be realistic. I don’t think it would be as draconian as nobody in or nobody out. But, if we continue to get cases like this, particularly at the community level, there will be what we call ‘mitigation,’ where we have to essentially do social distancing,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said on Fox News Sunday. “You don’t want to alarm people, but, given the spread we’ve seen, you know, anything is possible. And that’s the reason why we’ve got to be prepared to take whatever action is appropriate to contain and mitigate the outbreak.”
At the same time, no country can simply quarantine its way out of the COVID-19 crisis, Wendy E. Parmet, the director of the Center for Health Policy and Law at Northeastern University, told me. “There are reasons to be skeptical of the efficacy of quarantine for respiratory diseases like coronavirus.” Quarantines can be a useful tool when done well. They can lower infection rates “a bit” and buy time, she said. But they have been done historically in discriminatory and haphazard ways that provide “a seductive illusion of containment.” The best example is the disproportionate U.S. focus on the long-stranded Grand Princess cruise ship, which has more than twenty passengers who have tested positive for COVID-19. It is finally due to dock in Oakland on Monday; passengers will be quarantined for two weeks in California, Texas, and Georgia. Meanwhile, Parmet said, the disease has spread widely and rapidly across most of the United States.
There are three distinct responses to health emergencies that have been misused interchangeably amid the coronavirus crisis, Lauren Sauer, of the Johns Hopkins Office of Critical Event Preparedness and Response, told me. Social distancing, a term that has just entered the modern lexicon, is voluntarily keeping a few feet away from other people or opting not to go to mass gatherings based on the recommendation of public-health officials. It is the least restrictive—and the strategy that U.S. officials have largely recommended so far, especially for vulnerable sectors of society.
A quarantine, a practice first recorded in the Book of Leviticus, in the Old Testament, is invoked because of probable exposure to an illness. People are removed from the general public for a period of time—voluntarily or by legal order—to see if the disease develops. The word quarantine dates to the Black Death’s spread along the Mediterranean in the fourteenth century, when governments imposed isolation for forty days—or quaranta in Italian. The Black Death killed some twenty-five million people, about a third of the European population at the time. Italy and China have mandated quarantines in response to COVID-19. In the United States, Senator Ted Cruz, of Texas, and Representative Paul Gosar, of Arizona, announced on Sunday that they are self-quarantining for fourteen days, because they interacted and shook hands with an unidentified person at the Conservative Political Action Conference last month who subsequently tested positive for the new virus.
The most restrictive measure is isolation after a person has symptoms or is confirmed to have a disease by a lab test. “In quarantine, you’re waiting to see if you develop the sickness,” Sauer said. “If you’re in isolation, you are sick and waiting until the illness resolves.”
So far, countries are reacting in vastly different ways to the COVID-19 epidemic. One increasingly common practice has been quarantining passengers returning from so-called hot zones, or countries with numerous coronavirus cases, including China, Italy, Iran, South Korea, and Japan. But, with more than a hundred countries now hit, the requirements needed to effectively quarantine the volume of passengers from so many places could overwhelm systems. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that Israel, which has more than three dozen cases, is considering a move that would force both Israelis and foreigners flying in from anywhere in the world to go into quarantine. The consequences and enforcement mechanisms have been inconsistent, however. In one of the toughest measures, the Czech government decreed that any of its sixteen thousand citizens in Italy have to self-quarantine for fourteen days when they return—or face a hundred-and-thirty-thousand-dollar fine.
The quarantines in China were misguided and too much, too late, Parmet told me. They have been done in ways that could jeopardize lives, because healthy and ill people are stuck together in vast geographic regions. “In these massive-scale quarantines, you are pushing deeply into potential human-rights violations,” Sauer said. “We have to be careful about everything we condone, whether active or passive. This is the time when social norms can change, and personal liberties are at risk.” By their nature, quarantines encourage xenophobia, division, and the muscular exercise of state power. “There are also long-term political consequences,” she added. “The intangible consequences pushing toward authoritarian rule concerns me a lot.”


newyorker--2020-03-09--Daily Cartoon: Monday, March 9th

Daily Cartoon: Monday, March 9th

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The material on this site may not be reproduced , @ @ @ @ @ or otherwise used , except with the prior written permission of Condé Nast .

“I’m still trying to catch up on that hour of panic I lost this weekend.”


newyorker--2020-03-09--Rem Koolhaas’s Journey to the Countryside

One morning last week , the Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas was slowly turning in place in the center of the Guggenheim Museum ’ s rotunda , his face tilted up toward the sun-flooded glass roof .
Suspended above his bald head was a miniature yellow submarine with a long needle at one end , like a bayonet .
The device , Koolhaas explained , was something Australians developed to exterminate starfish .
“ Because of global warming , they are proliferating to the extent that they need to be killed , to protect the great barrier reef , ” Koolhaas @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with poison.
” He smiled slyly .
“ Organic poison.
” Koolhaas , who has designed monumental , iconoclastic buildings—the Seattle Central Library , Portugal ’ s Casa da Música , Beijing ’ s CCTV headquarters , among many others—became a lodestar for urbanites in 1978 , when he published a euphoric history of Manhattan and Coney Island called “ Delirious New York.
” His new exhibition at the Guggenheim , “ Countryside , the Future , ” tells a story that stretches from ancient Rome and China to the environmental , existential @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was deeply researched by various employees of AMO , the think tank within Koolhaas ’ s Office of Metropolitan Architecture ( OMA ) .
But the juxtaposition of eclectic exhibits had the feel of Koolhaas free-associating .
“ This has nothing to do with architecture or art , ” he told me , as we headed up the Guggenheim ’ s entry ramp .
“ We wanted to put the countryside back on the agenda , and also show that the countryside is a terrain , or domain , where you can have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is seventy-five and was wearing a version of country attire ( black turtleneck , brown slacks , black sneakers ) , loped up the ramps at a decidedly urban pace .
“ The Romans and Chinese simultaneously developed a similar idea of countryside—otium and xiaoyao , ” he said .
“ The countryside was where you went to think , an environment where you could unfold private ambitions .
There was an inherent respect for nature.
” Further into the show , films and photographs illustrated some of the extreme ways in which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , had used the countryside as a canvas for their ideologies and political ambitions .
“ Hitler fetishized the countryside , ” Koolhaas said .
An archival German documentary played on a screen , showing the Autobahn as a way for Germans to experience the pastoral .
There was a section on Mao ’ s Great Leap Forward ( and subsequent Cultural Revolution ) , which collectivized Chinese agriculture and sent educated young people into the countryside , and one about Atlantropa , a scheme devised by a German , in 1929 , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to Africa , build three mega-dams , and irrigate the Sahara .
The plan was seized upon ( and implemented in miniature ) decades later by Muammar Qaddafi , who hated cities ; a glass case featuring books about the countryside included Qaddafi ’ s collection of short stories , “ The Village , the Earth , the Suicide of the Astronaut.
” During the second half of the twentieth century , the efficiency of agricultural production in Europe and the United States dramatically increased , and new terrain was cleared so that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ They had a necessary mission , ” Koolhaas said .
“ There was a famine after the war.
” As more land was developed , people migrated en masse to cities .
In the past three decades , an expectation developed that one kind of civilization— “ metropolitan , capital-oriented , agnostic , western , ” as Koolhaas writes in the show ’ s companion text—would reign as the model for global development .
Cultural ideas of the countryside as a zone of escape , innovation , and ambition have devolved with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in part , by the pursuits of an over four-trillion-dollar wellness-and-leisure industry .
At one point , Koolhaas nodded at a collage in the exhibit featuring a vacant pool deck .
“ The empty deck chair as a last emblem of Western civilization , ” he said .
Meanwhile , the countryside had become the “ ignored realm , ” where , Koolhaas believes , the most radical changes and ideas are developing .
People now use more than seventy per cent of the earth ’ s ice-free land , according to a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change , much of it to serve the interests of urbanites .
But a quarter of that land suffers from “ human-induced degradation ” —industrial agriculture , urban sprawl , logging , mining—now exacerbated by the climate crisis , with intensifying floods , drought , heat waves , sea-level rise , and permafrost thaw .
Soil is eroding , drying out , and blowing into the atmosphere at a rate as much as a hundred times higher than it is forming .
Stressors on the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could lead to millions of refugees , increased conflict , and mass migrations .
The upper half of the show features “ a number of zooms , ” Koolhaas said , into efforts—experiments , new technologies , and community transformations—meant to address these problems .
As Troy Conrad Therrien—the Guggenheim curator for architecture and digital initiatives—writes in an essay for the companion book , “ ‘ Food , Security ’ could have been an alternate title to much of this exhibition.
” The show , a curious use of the Guggenheim ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ far from thoughts of global collapse .
A hay bale hung from the ceiling , and cardboard-cutout robots of countryside figures ( an ancient sheepherder , Stalin ) whizzed up and down the ramps .
Did they speak ?
“ They speak metaphorically , ” Koolhaas said .
Other “ zooms , ” revealing the countryside ’ s present and future , showed plans for high-speed Chinese-built rail connecting solar-and-wind-powered African villages interspersed among protected wildlife refuges ; the villages had already leapfrogged Western models of development through the use of mobile phones @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
There was a section on buffer zones ( between protected wildernesses and towns ) , where , it turned out , mountain gorillas seemingly preferred to dwell , habituating themselves to selfie-snapping tourists ; another on Japanese communities of elderly farmers who are aided by A.I.-powered suits ; others on futuristic farming in the Netherlands .
In one bay , a crowd was gathered around an enormous , boxy , motorized aluminum camera , which was moving over a table of succulents , like a scanner .
It was a PhenoMate , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ measures the efficiency of each leaf ’ s photosynthesis.
” Later , we found a young agricultural researcher named Lenora Ditzler , whom Koolhaas introduced as “ an ecofeminist farmer.
” A display showed a large colorful grid—an example of Ditzler ’ s research into “ pixel farming , ” where individual crops , such as cabbage , leek , potato , wheat , and clover , are planted , interspersed , in two-by-two plots .
The idea builds on indigenous agricultural techniques—practiced by the Mayans and other groups—in which varying crops @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , helping build nutrients in the soil and naturally protecting each other against pests and disease .
In essence , it ’ s managing your farm as an ecosystem , Ditzler said .
Using huge sets of data—what Ditzler called “ a statistical nightmare ” —scientists are trying to build a body of knowledge about which plants should be planted together .
“ If you have a big drought , and all the potatoes die , there will be four other things that can survive , ” Ditzler said , citing a theoretical @ @ @ @ @ @ @ things that can cope with different stressors together and everything won ’ t be wiped out.
” Continuing the ascent , we ran into Samir Bantal , the director of AMO , who has led the “ Countryside ” project with Koolhaas .
Young , bald , and bearded , he wore a baggy black button-down , baggy black pants , and gray sneakers .
According to AMO ’ s research , “ cities only cover two per cent of the earth ’ s surface , ” Bantal said , standing next to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s skeleton , in a section on the thawing-permafrost catastrophe in Siberia .
“ What would urbanism mean if the countryside was part of that equation ?
Should the ninety-eight per cent always serve the two per cent ?
Or is there another model ?
” AMO researchers have worked with collaborators all over the world—students and professors at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing , the University of Nairobi , and Wageningen University in the Netherlands—to create a mosaic of ideas and solutions “ to connect things that seem to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ There are huge groups of people and different cultures who coexist here , ” he said , pointing at a map of Siberia , “ but what connects them is this enormous crisis ” of a warming world .

One morning last week, the Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas was slowly turning in place in the center of the Guggenheim Museum’s rotunda, his face tilted up toward the sun-flooded glass roof. Suspended above his bald head was a miniature yellow submarine with a long needle at one end, like a bayonet. The device, Koolhaas explained, was something Australians developed to exterminate starfish. “Because of global warming, they are proliferating to the extent that they need to be killed, to protect the great barrier reef,” Koolhaas said. “The sub injects them with poison.” He smiled slyly. “Organic poison.”
Koolhaas, who has designed monumental, iconoclastic buildings—the Seattle Central Library, Portugal’s Casa da Música, Beijing’s CCTV headquarters, among many others—became a lodestar for urbanites in 1978, when he published a euphoric history of Manhattan and Coney Island called “Delirious New York.” His new exhibition at the Guggenheim, “Countryside, the Future,” tells a story that stretches from ancient Rome and China to the environmental, existential crisis of the present. The show was deeply researched by various employees of AMO, the think tank within Koolhaas’s Office of Metropolitan Architecture (OMA). But the juxtaposition of eclectic exhibits had the feel of Koolhaas free-associating. “This has nothing to do with architecture or art,” he told me, as we headed up the Guggenheim’s entry ramp. “We wanted to put the countryside back on the agenda, and also show that the countryside is a terrain, or domain, where you can have a fulfilling life.”
Koolhaas, who is seventy-five and was wearing a version of country attire (black turtleneck, brown slacks, black sneakers), loped up the ramps at a decidedly urban pace. “The Romans and Chinese simultaneously developed a similar idea of countryside—otium and xiaoyao,” he said. “The countryside was where you went to think, an environment where you could unfold private ambitions. There was an inherent respect for nature.” Further into the show, films and photographs illustrated some of the extreme ways in which twentieth-century governments, both democratic and autocratic, had used the countryside as a canvas for their ideologies and political ambitions. “Hitler fetishized the countryside,” Koolhaas said. An archival German documentary played on a screen, showing the Autobahn as a way for Germans to experience the pastoral. There was a section on Mao’s Great Leap Forward (and subsequent Cultural Revolution), which collectivized Chinese agriculture and sent educated young people into the countryside, and one about Atlantropa, a scheme devised by a German, in 1929, to drain the Mediterranean, suture Europe to Africa, build three mega-dams, and irrigate the Sahara. The plan was seized upon (and implemented in miniature) decades later by Muammar Qaddafi, who hated cities; a glass case featuring books about the countryside included Qaddafi’s collection of short stories, “The Village, the Earth, the Suicide of the Astronaut.”
During the second half of the twentieth century, the efficiency of agricultural production in Europe and the United States dramatically increased, and new terrain was cleared so that even more food could be grown. “They had a necessary mission,” Koolhaas said. “There was a famine after the war.” As more land was developed, people migrated en masse to cities. In the past three decades, an expectation developed that one kind of civilization—“metropolitan, capital-oriented, agnostic, western,” as Koolhaas writes in the show’s companion text—would reign as the model for global development. Cultural ideas of the countryside as a zone of escape, innovation, and ambition have devolved with time, and were eventually replaced, in part, by the pursuits of an over four-trillion-dollar wellness-and-leisure industry. At one point, Koolhaas nodded at a collage in the exhibit featuring a vacant pool deck. “The empty deck chair as a last emblem of Western civilization,” he said.
Meanwhile, the countryside had become the “ignored realm,” where, Koolhaas believes, the most radical changes and ideas are developing. People now use more than seventy per cent of the earth’s ice-free land, according to a special report, published in August, by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, much of it to serve the interests of urbanites. But a quarter of that land suffers from “human-induced degradation”—industrial agriculture, urban sprawl, logging, mining—now exacerbated by the climate crisis, with intensifying floods, drought, heat waves, sea-level rise, and permafrost thaw. Soil is eroding, drying out, and blowing into the atmosphere at a rate as much as a hundred times higher than it is forming. Stressors on the world’s six main breadbasket regions could lead to millions of refugees, increased conflict, and mass migrations. The upper half of the show features “a number of zooms,” Koolhaas said, into efforts—experiments, new technologies, and community transformations—meant to address these problems. As Troy Conrad Therrien—the Guggenheim curator for architecture and digital initiatives—writes in an essay for the companion book, “ ‘Food, Security’ could have been an alternate title to much of this exhibition.”
A PhenoMate, which, Koolhaas said, “measures the efficiency of each leaf’s photosynthesis,” scans a table of succulents. Photograph by Laurian Ghinitoiu / Courtesy AMO
The show, a curious use of the Guggenheim’s quarter-mile of spiralling ramps, often feels far from thoughts of global collapse. A hay bale hung from the ceiling, and cardboard-cutout robots of countryside figures (an ancient sheepherder, Stalin) whizzed up and down the ramps. Did they speak? “They speak metaphorically,” Koolhaas said. Other “zooms,” revealing the countryside’s present and future, showed plans for high-speed Chinese-built rail connecting solar-and-wind-powered African villages interspersed among protected wildlife refuges; the villages had already leapfrogged Western models of development through the use of mobile phones, drones, and other digital technology. There was a section on buffer zones (between protected wildernesses and towns), where, it turned out, mountain gorillas seemingly preferred to dwell, habituating themselves to selfie-snapping tourists; another on Japanese communities of elderly farmers who are aided by A.I.-powered suits; others on futuristic farming in the Netherlands. In one bay, a crowd was gathered around an enormous, boxy, motorized aluminum camera, which was moving over a table of succulents, like a scanner. It was a PhenoMate, a device, Koolhaas said, which “measures the efficiency of each leaf’s photosynthesis.”
Later, we found a young agricultural researcher named Lenora Ditzler, whom Koolhaas introduced as “an ecofeminist farmer.” A display showed a large colorful grid—an example of Ditzler’s research into “pixel farming,” where individual crops, such as cabbage, leek, potato, wheat, and clover, are planted, interspersed, in two-by-two plots. The idea builds on indigenous agricultural techniques—practiced by the Mayans and other groups—in which varying crops are planted directly next to one another, helping build nutrients in the soil and naturally protecting each other against pests and disease. In essence, it’s managing your farm as an ecosystem, Ditzler said. Using huge sets of data—what Ditzler called “a statistical nightmare”—scientists are trying to build a body of knowledge about which plants should be planted together. “If you have a big drought, and all the potatoes die, there will be four other things that can survive,” Ditzler said, citing a theoretical outcome. “So, you put things that can cope with different stressors together and everything won’t be wiped out.”
Rem Koolhaas’s new show tells a story that stretches from ancient Rome and China to the environmental, existential crisis of the present. Photograph by Laurian Ghinitoiu / Courtesy AMO
Continuing the ascent, we ran into Samir Bantal, the director of AMO, who has led the “Countryside” project with Koolhaas. Young, bald, and bearded, he wore a baggy black button-down, baggy black pants, and gray sneakers. According to AMO’s research, “cities only cover two per cent of the earth’s surface,” Bantal said, standing next to a replica of a wooly mammoth’s skeleton, in a section on the thawing-permafrost catastrophe in Siberia. “What would urbanism mean if the countryside was part of that equation? Should the ninety-eight per cent always serve the two per cent? Or is there another model?” AMO researchers have worked with collaborators all over the world—students and professors at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, the University of Nairobi, and Wageningen University in the Netherlands—to create a mosaic of ideas and solutions “to connect things that seem to be unconnected,” he continued. “There are huge groups of people and different cultures who coexist here,” he said, pointing at a map of Siberia, “but what connects them is this enormous crisis” of a warming world.


newyorker--2020-03-09--Cruise-Ship Passengers Demand to Be Housed at Mar-a-Lago

OAKLAND ( The Borowitz Report ) —Irate passengers who have been stranded onboard the Grand Princess cruise ship are demanding to be housed at Mar-a-Lago , the passengers confirmed on Monday .
Frustrated by the Trump Administration ’ s delay in devising a plan to enable them to disembark , the nearly three thousand coronavirus-exposed passengers said that it was “ only fair ” that Trump welcome them to his Palm Beach home .
“ Donald Trump keeps on saying that he ’ s not worried about coronavirus , ” the passengers ’ spokesman said .
“ Then he shouldn @ @ @ @ @ @ @ us living with him.
” The passengers said that they were looking forward to the Mar-a-Lago life style , which includes golf , swimming , and listening in on national-security secrets in the main dining room .
At the White House , Trump said that , if the Grand Princess passengers are transferred to Mar-a-Lago , they should stay as far away from him as possible , “ like Melania does when she ’ s down there.
” The coronavirus crisis deepened on Sunday after a man who showed signs of lethargy , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ turned out to be the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development , Ben Carson .

OAKLAND (The Borowitz Report)—Irate passengers who have been stranded onboard the Grand Princess cruise ship are demanding to be housed at Mar-a-Lago, the passengers confirmed on Monday.
Frustrated by the Trump Administration’s delay in devising a plan to enable them to disembark, the nearly three thousand coronavirus-exposed passengers said that it was “only fair” that Trump welcome them to his Palm Beach home.
“Donald Trump keeps on saying that he’s not worried about coronavirus,” the passengers’ spokesman said. “Then he shouldn’t object to three thousand of us living with him.”
The passengers said that they were looking forward to the Mar-a-Lago life style, which includes golf, swimming, and listening in on national-security secrets in the main dining room.
At the White House, Trump said that, if the Grand Princess passengers are transferred to Mar-a-Lago, they should stay as far away from him as possible, “like Melania does when she’s down there.”
The coronavirus crisis deepened on Sunday after a man who showed signs of lethargy, drooping eyelids, and other flu-like symptoms turned out to be the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Ben Carson.


newyorker--2020-03-10--Matthew Klam Reads “The Liver”

Matthew Klam Reads “The Liver”

Matthew Klam reads his story from the March 16 , 2020 , issue of the magazine .
Klam is the @ @ @ @ @ Sam the Cat and Other Stories ” and the novel “ Who Is Rich ?
@ @ @ @ @ in 2017 .

Photograph by Dana Flor
Matthew Klam reads his story from the March 16, 2020, issue of the magazine. Klam is the author of the collection “Sam the Cat and Other Stories” and the novel “Who Is Rich?,” which was published in 2017.