Abbey Lincoln, a singer whose dramatic vocal command and tersely poetic songs made her a singular figure in jazz, died on Saturday in Manhattan. She was 80 and lived on the Upper West Side.Her death was announced by her brother David Wooldridge. Ms. Lincoln’s career encompassed outspoken civil rights advocacy in the 1960s and fearless introspection in more recent years, and for a time in the 1960s she acted in films, including one with Sidney Poitier. (The New York Times: “Abbey Lincoln, Bold and Introspective Jazz Singer, Dies at 80” by Nate Chinen, August 14, 2010)

About photographer Roberto Polillo:

From 1962 (when I was 16) to 1974 I was lucky to photograph the most important jazz musicians of the time. These images have been almost hidden for many years, but recently I have made an outing… A selection of these images have been recently shown in personal exhibitions in Milano, Roma, Torino, Siena, Napoli, Genova, Verona and other places, and collected in a big photographic book, “Swing, Bop & Free” , which also cointains texts by my father Arrigo , who was a well known jazz critic and historician. (more)

Wikimedia Commons: “Destruction of Leviathan”, 1865 engraving by Gustave Doré.

The J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles paid Sotheby’s in London GBP 29.7 million ($45 million) on Wednesday for a sweeping, hazy view of 19th-century Rome by British master J.M.W. Turner.

The sale broke the auction record for Turner four years after the artist’s Venetian seascape “Giudecca, La Donna della Salute and San Giorgio” sold for $35 million at Christie’s.

The Getty beat out five other bidders for “Modern Rome – Campo Vaccino.” The auction house had priced the painting sell for between $18 million and $27 million.

Turner, a Romantic artist known for painting wispy clouds and roiling waves, painted “Modern Rome” in 1839, a decade after he visited the city for a final time. Eschewing any telltale signs of modernization, Turner presents an ethereal view of the Italian capital as seen from atop Capitoline Hill. Women in blue and yellow skirts herd goats in the rocky foreground as the city’s ruins fan across the sun-drenched expanse below. The Coliseum, painted in cappuccino colors, even appears to glow. (more)

Previously on Skandalon

Poster design by Mark Weaver inspired by the book Moby Dick by Herman Melville (1851). The poster was designed for the Kitsune Noir Poster Club.

Follow the link to read an interview with Cody Hoyt about his creative process.

Previously on Skandalon : Mark Weaver, Kitsune Noir

Previously on Skandalon.

“Emmanuel Frémiet (December 6, 1824 – 10 September 1910) was a French sculptor. […] In the meanwhile he had exhibited his masterly “Gorilla Carrying off a Woman” which won him a medal of honour at the Salon of 1887. Although praised in its time, this work now evokes ridicule from some observers for its depiction of a gorilla abducting a nude woman, presumably with the intention of raping her - something not totally alien to actual gorilla behaviour, but orangutans, especially, have been recorded attempting to abduct female humans. Accordingly, this act has caught the public’s imagination, as witnessed by the repeated popularity of the King Kong theme.” (Wikipedia)

Previously on Skandalon.

“The Loeb Classical Library is a series of books, today published by the Harvard University Press, which presents important works of ancient Greek and Latin Literature in a way designed to make the text accessible to the broadest possible audience, by presenting the original Greek or Latin text on each left-hand leaf, and a fairly literal translation on the facing page.The series was conceived and initially funded by James Loeb. The first volumes were edited by T. E. Page, W. H. D. Rouse, and Edward Capps, and published by William Heinemann and company in 1912, already in their distinctive green (for Greek text) and red (for Latin) hardcover bindings.” (Wikipedia).

“This feature about Philip Dick’s “Valis” experience was published in Weirdo comic #17 from summer, 1986. It is an interesting graphic interpretation of a series of events which happened to Dick in March of 1974. He spent the remaining years of his life trying to figure out what happened in those fateful months. You will find all 8 pages of this story here. The file sizes are rather large (120-140K each) so that the text was readable and the detail visible. Enjoy The Religious Experience of Philip K. Dick. In typical Dick fashion, you will find that it raises more questions than it answers.”

Also available as a Scribd document HERE (it seems to be neither printable nor downloadable).