Arts & Culture

Good News for Lovers of Italian Mysteries.

In an earlier post I've praised the international bestselling novels of Andrea Camilleri. I didn't know then that Italian television (RAI) has been producing them for broadcast since 1999.

These Italian-language programs are now available on DVD with English subtitles under the name Detective Montalbano. They are great fun and will thrill all lovers of Italian mysteries. The library has just bought the first six sets (three discs per set).

I must warn you that each episode is more enjoyable, more addictive than the last.

I think this is because we get to know the appealing characters better each time and look forward to meeting them all again.

Italian actor, Luca Zigaretti, is unforgetable as the brilliant, unpredictable, impulsive Salvo Montalbano. His team of detectives all have their own quirks, weaknesses and strengths. Appearances by Montalbano's resourceful, intuitive girlfriend, Livia, are always a treat.

If you're interested in the language and culture of Southern Italy take these programs as a kind of Italian-immersion. They are filmed in the Sicilian town of Ragusa with it's Baroque buildings, sunbleached squares and rugged surroundings. The art direction of the costumes and interiors is first-rate.

This well-edited broadcast-annoucement by MHz Worldview is the best online introduction I've found to these fiendishly-intricate, humorous, sentimental mysteries. Take a chance on Detective Montalbano!

 

 

Canadian Artist Doris McCarthy dies at 100 years

Doris McCarthy, the grande dame of Canadian art, died November 25 2010 at the age of 100.  Both a teacher and an artist she lived and worked the bulk of her life in Scarborough. Towards the end of her life she donated her home in the Bluffs, "Fool's Paradise", and a significant endowment, to Ontario Heritage, to continue her legacy as an artist's retreat.

 

 

She was a student of Arthur Lismer and her landscapes fall within the Group of Seven and Emily Carr tradition of Canadian outdoor painting. A recent exhibit of her work not only showed the Arctic paintings she started doing in the 1970s and onwards but also her rarely exhibited abstracts.

 

Some of the educational aspects of YouTube are the historical interviews that are often uploaded and below are a couple with Doris McCarthy in her own words talking about her process as an artist.

 

 

I find it moving to hear an artist speak about their own art in their own voice. It brings them alive in a way simply reading books or seeing their art in galleries does not.

 

 

There is also an artistic connection between Doris McCarthy and the Toronto Public Library. McCarthy  painted the wall murals in the children's department of the Dufferin St Clair Library while George Reid painted other murals in the adult areas. After being painted over in the 1960s, many of the murals were restored in 2008 as part of a branch retrofit with support from the local community.