Featured Articles

Urban Boarding Schools Offer Twist on the Elite

by Eleanor J. Bader

Local

Think boarding school and your thoughts will likely take you to a country setting where large trees, manicured grounds, and ivy-covered buildings greet a largely upper-crust student body. Since the first private boarding schools were established in the U.S. in the 1700s, this reality has prevailed.

An Afternoon with Enrique

by Gabriel Thompson

Express

Ed.’s note: There’s No José Here is a behind-the-scenes account of Mexican immigrants in New York City, focusing on a 34-year-old livery cab driver named Enrique. From the floors of hidden sweatshops in Bedford-Stuyvesant to the impoverished rural villages of Mexico, the book traces the journey of Enrique and his family as they continue a seemingly endless search for economic opportunity and stability.

In Conversation

Jasper Johns with John Yau

by John Yau

Art

On the occasion of his exhibition, Jasper Johns: an Allegory of Paint, 1955-1965 which will be on view at the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. from January 28 to April 29, 2007, the artist welcomed the Rail’s art editor John Yau to his home to talk about various subjects. Before the interview took place, Johns asked Yau not to ask him about the philosophy of the exhibition because he didn’t know what it was.

In Conversation

Katy Siegel and David Reed with Phong Bui

by Phong Bui

Art

Just a few days before installing the exhibit High Times, Hard Times: New York Paintings 1967–1975, which features over 40 significant works by 30 artists and will be on view at the National Academy Museum from February 15 until April 22, 2007, curator Katy Siegel welcomed David Reed, who serves as the exhibit’s advisor, and the Rail’s Publisher Phong Bui to her home in Boerum Hill to discuss the work and artists included in this broad survey of experimental abstract painting.

In Conversation

Bill Jensen with Chris Martin

by Chris Martin

Art

The Brooklyn Rail’s Chris Martin went to visit Bill Jensen in the Williamsburg studio complex he shares with the painter Margrit Lewczuk, their son Russell, and their dog Lucy. Two old manufacturing buildings are joined in a small courtyard with a big fig tree. The place feels like an old Italian villa in the middle of Brooklyn. Jensen has a major show of new paintings opening at Cheim & Read Gallery on February 15.

ArtSeen

Staying Alive in a Dying City Christopher Shinn with Mark Armstrong

by Mark Armstrong

Theater

Christopher Shinn was born in Hartford, Connecticut and lives in New York. His first play Four premiered at London’s Royal Court Theatre in 1998 and put Shinn on the map when he was 23.

Addicted to Sound: An Interview with Michael Gira

by Jim Knipfel

Music

Michael Gira sat across the table at a quiet Brooklyn bar on a rainy Wednesday night. The conversation had settled on a mutual hero, Werner Herzog.

PERVERSE AUTEURS VS THE SELF-AGGRANDIZING WANK The 10 Best Films of 2006

by David N. Meyer

Film

Noir as high school, high school as noir. The life or death impenetrable social horror of the hierarchies of jocks, babes, geeks and one cool loner get inverted through a prism of classic noir tropes: the femme fatale, the mysterious boss, the thug with a heart of gold and, of course, the letterman bully who rules the parking lot after study hall.

Mondongo

by Amiri Baraka

Fiction

From the just-released collection, Tales of the Out & the Gone (Akashic Books).

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