The building is Modern Art – transparent walls, exposed pipes, garish colors. Extremely controversial when it opened in 1977 because it certainly didn’t fit, it has slowly gained acceptance in the neighborhood because it sure does draw a crowd – over 25,000 visitors a day. Blame or praise the architects Renzo Piano of Italy and Richard Rogers of England. Sometimes referred to as the Pompidou (the name of the President of France who commissioned it), it is also often called the Beaubourg, after the district where it is located. It contains over 55,000 works by over 5,000 artists and most of them you can preview online at www.cnac-gp.fr (though the navigation is in French it is almost self explanatory.)

Original appearance Aug 16, 2005, © 2005 and updated / Some of the current exhibits in 2006-7: Le Mouvements des images - art and cinema Apr. 5, 2006-Jan. 29, 2007; Yves Klein - conceptual art Oct. 5, 2006- Feb. 5, 2007; Hiroshi Sugimoto - film and photography Oct. 25, 2006-Feb. 12, 2007 / Pompidou, Centre Georges-Pompidou, Art Museum / RUE BEAUBOURG, 75004 / 01 44 78 12 33 / CIP 142, OO 17, RD 16, YP 30/8-16

No names, just outlines. The truth as refracted by my personality and my experience. No further claim of truth can, or perhaps ever should be declared. It is as close as one can come in an imperfect world. Some will be identifiable with a fair degree of certainty. Most will not. Some will be dealt with on numerous occasions. Many will not. Too short for depth, but hopefully an occasional insight. They will be a mixed bag. Some views will appear to be flat out wrong – a refraction that no one else ever saw. And some will actually be wrong. To err is human, and nearer the end than the beginning, we all are human. An example:

Sketches …./…. Loved Ones

She was loved by virtually all her acquaintances and, sadly, hated by most of her loved ones. She wasn’t a bad woman, and certainly not evil. She was flawed and she was strong. Too beautiful, too brilliant and way to smart for her own good. Intelligence, perception and certainty – a witch’s brew. A diadem, and then the other side of midnight. Certainly she was certain that she alone was right for four score years, and in the last few months she was badly broken. Broken and alone. Deserted by even her acquaintances.

Original appearance May 24, 2007, © 2007 / SK 001

It all started about 20 years ago now. Christmas season, 1986. A customer, actually a teacher, walked into her favorite little bookstore D-Pit, nestled in the Sierra Nevada just outside of Yosemite. She told the proprietor about a book she was sure he would love. He did, he carried it, he sold a few and he was hooked. The book, The Ultimate Alphabet by Mike Wilkes, reached the Top Ten that season in the US and was #1 in the UK. It consisted of 26 intricate paintings, one for each letter of the alphabet, and a list of 12,000 objects. The list contained every animal known to man and some only imagined; every symbol, every instrument and every gadget conceivable. You simply had to determine if that item was present in the painting or not. Very simple, very complex. If you were the closest to ‘right,’ and within the rules, you won $50,000. David Pitt spent the next year trying to win the contest; and the following 19 years, in fits and starts, working on A Common Denominator.

To whet your interest just a tad I can tell you that COMMON DENOMINATOR is the middle of a three game series all built around similar base grids but of considerably varying difficulty, complexity and categories. The first is CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE a devilishly complex internet contest designed for a portal with a very large prize as a motivation. This was completed almost simultaneously with the dot.com bust, and put on hold awaiting the revival. It’s close to time. The third is VERTICALIZE the French version with an expanded interactive nature. I suppose I should also mention a hybrid version that we fondly call GBU – it’s good, it’s bad and it’s ugly – maybe you could call them instant personalized postcards, coming some day soon. They’re also called YOU IN A BOX. But those are all another story. COMMON DENOMINATOR, in its present form, has elements of all four.

David Pitt, now a Cowboy in Paris and the main contributor to Tricolors.com, is the inventor and creator of all of them. Dominique Bourreau is the President and prime-mover for all of them. Albert Szulman is the manager and a major contributor to the original financing.

Original appearance May 24, 2007, © 2007 / PRO 595 / CIP 3 / GMS

THEMATIC – That is the core that is golden.
ADAPTABILITY, FLEXIBILITY, SCALABILITY – Those are the attributes that can deliver the spectrum.
DEMOGRAPHICS – Women, casual gamers, intelligent, hard core, male, teenage, 15-55, plus the seniors 55-75, and the children 5-15, from the brain to the train and all stops in between. ADAPTABILITY.
EVENT DRIVEN – From the company picnic all the way up to the quadrennial events; the Olympics, the Football World Cup. Maybe a Centennial now and then, and often the annuals. Trade shows and festivals. Local, national, international. FLEXIBILITY.
BUSINESS & ENTERPRISE – From a Company to a Conglomerate; from a product to a line, to a brand, to a franchise; from a Mom & Pop to a Multinational. The business is selling, and that can be the theme. Cross platform to trans Atlantic. SCALABILITY.
INDIVIDUALS – We can start with your mother and go all the way to Bill Gates. We can multiply to the French or the Tahitians; the liberals or the conservatives; the religious or not. All customers, all contacts, and all categories.
GEOMETRIC – There are some horizontals and a vertical. We progress from the given to a hidden, one letter at a time, with the clue as the glue. The mathematical beauty of the mind and, lest we forget, the possibility of exponential progression. THEMATIC – Everything is a network and a group. The theme is the name of the game: Common Denominator – the GOLDEN THEME.
THINK: ‘THEMES IN A GRID’ OR “YOU IN A BOX”

Original appearance May 24, 2007, © 2007 / PRO 596 / CIP 3 / GMS

The title alone says it succinctly. “A Cowboy in Paris” is heartland values. We want to hark back to the days when a cowboy stood for American independence, individuality, pride, and quietly doing the right thing. The Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, Tom Mix variety, not the darker demons of today. Heartland values are evident in the introductory essay. Heartland values pervade the series.

They are my values, but much more important, they are the standards of a fairly large percentage of regular Americans. These are the business people, ranchers, farmers, waitresses and shop owners of every town between Los Angeles and New York; between Boston and Seattle. These folks read a lot, think a lot, even feel a lot (and, dare I say, buy a lot) – just like everyone else – but they are under represented in most of the media. Strongly under represented. Let’s bring it a little more into balance. Let’s speak to them.

We want to be leaning towards the patriotic without waving the flag. Tilted towards the positive without the Pollyanna. Occasionally utilizing the colloquial, while deemphasizing highfalutin vocabulary. Covering the classy but never venerating a class. Magnificent settings with down-home style.

France, one paragraph at a time. Sometimes we even utilize the title “Paris by Paragraph” – bite sized morsels, as succulent as France itself (remember, it is almost everyone’s dream). Currently the series is equally balanced between people, places and things. All graded and nicely tied up in neat little knots of the good, the bad and the ugly. But always emphasizing the good, the better and the best. One paragraph, or five, at a time.

Original appearance May 24, 2007, © 2007 / PRO 597 / General / ORG / EUS

While Modern Art is not my thing, to those who love it Picasso (1881-1973) was a genius. To escape inheritance taxes his family donated most of his work to the state and the Museum opened in the Marais in 1985. Over 200 paintings and almost as many sculptures comprise the heart of this collection that is arranged chronologically and covers all his periods – blue, pink, cubist, classical and surrealist. It is housed on Rue de Thorigny in the Hôtel Salé. This mansion was built in 1656 by Aubert de Fontenay, a ‘salty’ old sort who grew his fortune on the salt tax. The selection starts with a Self Portrait, 1901, and ends with an Old Man Seated, 1971. Picasso’s own personal private art collection is also here and includes works by Cézanne, Miro, Renoir & Matisse.

Original appearance Aug13, 2005, © 2005 / Picasso, Musée Picasso, Art Museum / HÔTEL SALÉ, 5 RUE DE THORIGNY, 75004 / 01 42 71 25 21 R / CIP 141, OO 16, RD 13, YP 30/8-13

The French almost always, talk almost everything to death. It is a form of procrastination and, in the end, the solution. Poof! Voila! Done! Gone! And they do it all so subtly over a glass of wine, or two, or three, or however many it takes. And if it doesn’t take – they start all over again tomorrow. The French all talk, no action; the Italians all love, no peace; the Spanish slumber – together all pomp, no poop. Southern sun or maybe it is just tropical bliss. Read the latitudes: Berlin 52 30N, London 51 36N, Brussels 50 51N, Paris 48 50N, (Rome 41 54N, Madrid 40 30N). The left maligned? A Royal exit? He promised change and it looks like he might deliver. The first few days are promising. Sarko may be a little more than talk. France may actually be inching northward. Change may be coming. New alignments and perhaps a new Europe. The Atlantic shrunk and a few less words. Viva la France.

592 – To Talk to Death / used May 22, 2007 / CIP 2, pg 10, © 2007 / Good / EUS / Original appearance May 22, 2007, © 2007

To Talk to Death. Same name, different game. Okay Mr. Reaper, let’s talk. I know we are supposed to quake and shake whenever we look into your eyes. But of course we can’t look into your eyes, because there is nothing there. Just sunken holes. So let’s just change your name. How about dropping the Grim Reaper and just calling you the Sweet Sleeper. Ah, that’s better. It’s all in the name. The image changes. Repose, peace, the other side. So where is the substance? On which side? Fear or serenity? It doesn’t matter because then some will just say that opposites aren’t! That good and evil are the same, that near is far, or maybe that the ultimate hot and the ultimate cold are but a Planck length apart. But let’s not quibble – that’s for the philosophers and the physicists to decide. We’ll just settle for something in the middle. How about Mr. Transit? Super! Now all we have to worry about are those who will question the ‘Mr.’ part. It’s all in the name.

Original appearance May 22, 2007, © 2007 / CIP 3 593 / SHE

Of course we could just change a letter. Drop a ‘t’, and add an ‘f’. ‘To talk to death’ becomes ‘to talk of death’. The crux of the matter. Whether ‘tis best to “Rage, rage against the dying of the light” with Dylan Thomas; or pass peacefully with Percy Bysshe Shelley: “How wonderful is death. Death and his brother sleep.” Two poets. Two points of view. To some degree, for mere mortals like us, the choice may be simply a matter of age and experience; but both poets, and perhaps one could say most poets, die young. To be continued.

Original appearance May 22, 2007, © 2007 / CIP 3 594 / SHE

Through the magic of time manipulation welcome to the world of yesterday that I write tomorrow. More precisely what I wrote forward, presented backwards, so you can read it forward, as I wrote it originally. Alice would look through the glass darkly and smile. Back To The Future was right. Go push a button, point a pixel, falsify a photo, fax a file, add an attachment… Technology is at very minimum a two edged sword. Trust and truth are sometimes the twin deceased. It is a crazy world we live in.

590 – Manipulation … Time Travel and Travail / used May 22, 2007 / CIP 2, pg 10, © 2007 / Mixed / SHE / Original appearance May 22, 2007