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The MAXXI launches show that puts Gio Pontis architecture in the spotlight

Gio Ponti: Loving Architecture, the new exhibition on the iconic Italian architects work, has just opened at the Zaha Hadid-designedMAXXI Museum in Rome and takes the visitor on a jounrey across Pontiscareer with a firm focus on his buildings

Last year Paris: this year Rome. Forty years after the death of Gio Ponti, the great Italian architect, designer and publisher receives his second major retrospective in under 12 months this time at MAXXI, the Italian capitals Zaha Hadid-designed National Museum of 21st-Century Arts.

While the Paris show, at the Muse des Arts Dcoratifs, made a heroic attempt to encompass the full range of Pontis life and work, the new exhibition at MAXXI (which opened this week and runs till 13 April 2020) focuses squarely on his architecture, with occasional asides examining his industrial and household designs and the influence of his role as the founding editor of Domus and Stile magazines.

Curated by Mariastella Casciato and Fulvio Irace, Gio Ponti: Loving Architecture takes over the museums soaring fifth-floor gallery, and overcomes the challenge of its sloping floor with ease a testament both to MAXXIs installation team and the instantly engaging quality of the many models, drawings and plans on show.

The exhibition is divided into eight sections, examining Pontis approach to houses, nature, classicism, facades, lightness, skyscrapers, urban planning and architecture as crystal, derived from his gnomic claim that when architecture is pure, it is pure as a crystal magic, closed, exclusive, autonomous, uncontaminated, uncorrupted, absolute, definitive like a crystal.

Rome may seem an odd place to stage an exhibition about Ponti, who spent most of his life living and working in Milan, but as Casciato points out, he was an architect of national and international renown when that was still a rarity, and he knew everyone and travelled everywhere, when that was far more difficult than it is today.

With an essay-filled catalogue and a series of newly commissioned photo essays featuring some of Pontis finest buildings, including Taranto Cathedral and the Villa Planchart in Caracas, this is a full-service show as well as being an excellent excuse to visit Rome, if any excuse were needed.

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The MAXXI launches show that puts Gio Pontis architecture in the spotlight - Wallpaper*

Mark Carleton admits he doesnt know much about either cupcakes or rubber gaskets, but you can bet he knows something about the shop floors where theyre made by the hundreds or thousands. At that level, the manufacturing challenges for the two products start looking pretty similar.

Can we deliver the order by then? Do we have the materials? Will we need overtime? says Carleton, a Cambridge-trained engineer and COO of UK-based MESTEC. Carleton helped build the cloud-based MESTEC software that gives operation directors the info to make these kinds of calls.

Using Oracles Autonomous Transaction Processing Database, MESTEC cut its labor and infrastructure costs for database services in half compared to its on-premises environment.

MESTEC does this by quietly collecting data from points along the manufacturing process and tying it in with ERP and even HR data to build a clear picture of whats happening moment to moment on the shop floor. A factory will use the information to make smarter staffing decisions and pinpoint where flaws or delays are introduced.

Theres a relentless drive to improve labor productivity, Carleton says. Thats because, even as analysts tout robotic Industry 4.0 practices for repeatable products like autos and potato chips, most manufacturers need to change up their daily output depending on the orders that come in, and they rely on skilled people.

Are they going to stamp out a few pieces of aluminum or build a part that takes two man-weeks to complete? he says.

MESTECs customers make everything from pastry pies to electronic sensors and exacting marine parts, and range in size from small businesses to the likes of Siemens. All of them want to find the slack in their operations, increase output, and make commitments they can tell their customers with a straight face.

All that, and deal with a heap of regulation.

To be productive and compliant you need to be able to model your manufacturing processesyou have to define them, and you need to be able to enforce them to ensure compliance each and every time you perform a manufacturing job, says Carleton, whos early career saw him traipsing the globe installing control systems at packaging companies to monitor and drive quality improvements. This oversight includes every phase of production from knowing where raw materials came from, to making the right quality checks, to tracking material waste and energy use.

Autonomous Advantage

Thats a lot of data points being collected around the clock and analyzed in real-time for each MESTEC customer. And its customer list has more than doubled in the last two years. So Carletons small IT team moved all MESTECs data-intensive operations to Oracle Autonomous Database in May 2019. The autonomous database runs on Oracle Cloud and deploys, manages, patches, tunes, and secures itself with no human intervention while the system continues to run. Plus its built using Exadata hardware designed to run the database at peak performance. (An Always Free version of Oracles Autonomous Database is now available for anyone to sign in and try.)

Using Oracles Autonomous Transaction Processing Database, MESTEC cut its labor and infrastructure costs for database services in half compared to its on-premises environment, and found that database workloads run up to 600% faster with half as many CPUs, says Carleton. The autonomous transaction processing database did exactly what we needed in terms of providing platform as a service that just works, he says. When we moved that to the new environment with the database components in Oracle Cloud and application components in Microsoft Azure, across the board we saw performance improvements.

Its the same kind of load-and-go, ease-of-use experience that MESTEC is all about. Our cloud service has absolutely no upfront costs, Carleton says. Once a factory signs on to MESTECs cloud service, the information begins to flow, and analysis of that lets improvements begin, with labor, material, machine capacity, change-over times, logistics, and moreall continuously evaluated as production requirements change. Fifty percent improvement in labor productivity, a halving of customer complaints, 20% reduction in [work in progress]these things are real, Carleton says. These things are achievable.

But first you need the data. Many operations still run on scribbled notes and drawings passed along a busy shop floor. Big process improvements, Carleton says, are pretty hard if all you've got is pen and paper.

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Where Cupcakes And Gaskets Share The Same Secret Ingredient - Forbes

douard Manets Bunch of Asparagus (1880) is a winsome little painting of a pile of the vegetables on a bed of greens. It is one of the very greatest still lifes in art history (the brushwork on those greens!), and certainly one of Manets most alluring pictures. It is also a painting connected to the Nazis.

In 1974, artist Hans Haacke undertook the task of tracing the paintings history, charting each time it changed hands since it was made in 1880 for the French art collector Charles Ephrussi for just 800 francs. Haackes research culminated in a revelation: the painting had passed through the hands of Deutsche Bank chairman Hermann Josef Abs, who had acted as a financial adviser to Nazi officials. The painting was on long-term loan to the Wallraf-Richartz Museum in Cologne, Germany. Haacke proposed showing a work about the history of the Manet canvas at the institution, which had invited him to participate in an exhibition held in celebration of its 150th anniversary. The museum rejected his project.

That is far from the only Haacke work that has not made it on view as he planned. Some museum officials seem to be afraid of Haacke, and their fear is not misplaced. Over the past five decades, Haacke has highlighted how institutions cannot be separated from unfettered capitalism, toxic ideologies, and power imbalances around the world. At one point, this was taboo material. Now, it is commonplace, the stuff of conversations in boardrooms and activist meetings. But the one-time edginess of Haackes art may be why Americans have not had the opportunity to witness a proper Haacke survey in more than 30 years.

Thankfully, the New Museum in New York is rectifying this situation, mounting the first proper Haacke museum retrospective in the U.S. since it last had the good sense to do one, in 1986. Curated by Gary Carrion-Murayari and Massimiliano Gioni, this incisive show comes at a crucial moment. A growing mass of workers and activists are now demanding that institutions take accountability for their connections to racism, sexism, ableism, colonialism, fascism, and a host of other issues, and calling on certain board members to be removed because of their business dealings. Museums are also being accused of having misplaced priorities, undertaking renovations worth millions instead of paying workers fairly, and pushing out historically oppressed communities through expansion projects. Protestors have called on directors to be more transparent about their activities. Haacke has been awaiting this moment.

The New Museum show makes a powerful case that Haackes work is not just the stuff of Art History 101 coursesits subject matter is deeply relevant, and the art on view has a lot to teach us. Take On Social Grease (1975), a series of magnesium plates, each of them bearing the words of a philanthropist-magnate engraved into it. EXXONs support of the arts serves the arts as a social lubricant, one plate reads, quoting Robert Kingsley, a cultural manager at the oil company. Seen from afar, Kingsleys words recede into their aluminum backgroundsthe plates become Minimalist objects that seem politics-free, even inoffensive. This is ideal for the museums goals, Haacke hints. The slicker the surface, the better.

In fact, Haacke, a pioneer of what became known as institutional critique, had his roots in Minimalist art. A superb gallery in the new survey is given over to Haackes early ever-changing sculptures from the 60s. In one, Haacke lets condensation form inside a Plexiglas cube. In another, an electrical current travels down a 22-foot-long glass pipe, occasionally hissing as it slowly glides across the gallerys floor. At a glance, these works can seem banal. But Haacke is up to something fascinating. Hes creating closed-circuit loopsliteral ecosystems in which matter is transmitted between poles, almost in the same way people exchange data and ideas. Theyre more than just science experiments, in other wordstheyre conceptual works about how disparate elements influence one another.

These works arent that different from On Social Grease, reallyas his career as progressed, Haacke has simply shifted his interest from scientific systems to the System, the larger web of power relations that makes moving money (and power) around the world possible. A number of installations at the New Museum even reflect this visually, through networks of images and words. Their texts are rife with arrows, data points, and numbersa lot of reading is required.

Dont come expecting beauty. Haackes work has a hauteur to it because of its reliance on ideas over aesthetics, and he is a conceptualist at heart. His weakest works actually tend to come when he tries to create something visually engaging. More recently, Haacke has had a tendency to create overcooked statements about the state of America, dealing in well-worn tropes like torn-up stars and stripes and distressed images of white-bread suburbia. One work in this veina new installation called Make Mar-a-Lago Great Again (2019), in which Donald Trumps tweets are displayed on an upturned monitor alongside Statue of Liberty bobblehads and a golf clubis unfortunately placed front and center, in the museums lobby. It is thuddingly obvious.

Peculiarly, some of his older works feel more contemporary than his new ones. MetroMobilitan (1985) is an installation that calls out the Metropolitan Museum of Art for accepting money from Mobil, which provided funding to South African police during Apartheid. Total denial of supplies to the police and military forces of a host country is hardly consistent with an image of responsible citizen in that country, one banner included in the installation reads, quoting corporate literature. This is eerily similar to signs brought by protestors to the Whitney Museum earlier this year, when activists demanded the resignation of Warren B. Kanders, then the vice chair of museums board, following reports that he owns a defense manufacturing company that produces tear-gas canisters used against migrants and protestors around the world. (Kanders capitulated to activists in July.)

Like any activist aiming to have sway, Haacke has had to walk a fine line in terms of his own power and complicity. His practice, in one sense, exemplifies that old American Express slogan: Membership has its benefits. He is a card-carrying art-world member, with a Chelsea gallery and a long tenure as an admired professor. At the same time, he has been persistent in taking audacious risks, both political and aesthetic. If some of his work has lost its change, it may simply be because its targets have vanished into history books. His enduring presence on the scene, his zest for the next cause, is inspiring. Just a month before the show opened, the museums newly formed union voted to authorize a strike amid demands for a new wage structure. Many observers wondered if the artist would address the issue; in the end, the New Museum came to an agreement with its workers, potentially avoiding becoming Haackes latest victim.

When he is at his best, Haacke avoids any straightforward political polemics. He probes power, and aims to ascertain public opinion, which alone is often enough rile up gatekeepers. Since the 1970s, hes polled visitors about their political views in his art. At the Museum of Modern Art in 1970, he asked visitors about their thoughts regarding MoMA trustee and New York governor David Rockefellers support for Richard Nixon and his interventions in Vietnam. (The majority of the 37,000 who cast ballots decried it.) After MoMA Poll, Haacke didnt show another work at the museum for 29 years. In the New Museum shows catalogue, the curators ask for his feeling about this. Haacke responds: I am not sorry.

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Hans Haackes Art Has Long Targeted Museums. A Career Retrospective Tests Its Potency Today. - ARTnews

This a sponsored article on behalf of The View from The Shard.

With its arty light installations, illuminated landmarks, and a plethora of glowing Christmas displays, London turns those dark and dreary winter days into truly magical occasions.

Above them all, looms The Shard, Western Europe's tallest building. Not only is The Shard getting its own stunning winter makeover its top 20 stories transformed into a colourful spectacle of light designed by local school-children but the gleaming glass landmark also provides an incredible vantage point for admiring the rest of the capital's illuminations.

Step inside the high speed lift and whizz up 68 floors to the viewing gallery at The Shard's summit. Situated 800 ft in the sky, The View from The Shard boasts floor-to-ceiling windows in every direction, giving visitors breathtaking 360 degree views of the capital.

On clear days, you can see up to 40 miles over London from here, but if you want to really see the capital sparkle, you need to visit after dark. Luckily for impatient types, the sun sets pretty early at this time of year... though not so early that you can't justify a glass of bubbly from London's highest champagne bar!

Once you're feeling suitably refreshed, it's sightseeing time. Spot the pale glow of the famous dome of St Paul's Cathedral, see Tower Bridge cast its shimmer upon the inky black River Thames, and watch the towering skyscrapers of Canary Wharf glitter in the distance.

There's also the bright red glow of the London Eye to behold, though come February it'll turn hot pink to herald its new sponsors. But those aren't the only shiny new lights to admire from The View from The Shard...

Illuminated River has begun to light up London's main artery, with the first few pieces of this massive art installation on the River Thames unveiled in summer 2019. From your vertiginous vantage point, look out for the warm rainbow hues projected onto London Bridge, the moving pulse of light that creeps along the Millennium Bridge, and the Impressionist-inspired illuminations on Southwark Bridge.

Suffice to say that The View from The Shard makes for a pretty spectacular date night, then. Treat that special someone to an unforgettable evening this month (psst... you can even get special packages with champagne and photo souvenirs), or buy a gift ticket, which gives your lucky recipient the flexibility to choose the time and date that suits them best. So that's one present ticked off your Christmas list and a brilliant way for you and your loved ones to beat the January blues. We'd call that a win.

The View from The Shard, Joiner Street, SE1 9QU. Tickets start from 24 per person and must be booked online in advance. For more information and to book your space visit The View from The Shard website.

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Treat Your Loved One To London's Twinkliest Date Night This Winter - Londonist

Plans for the former Post Office on Lendal to be transformed into a branch of a chain restaurant have been submitted.

YorkMix reported last month that steakhouse chain Miller & Carter had applied for a licence to take over the building.

And a spokesman for Miller & Carter confirmed that there are currently no plans to move the war memorial inside the building honouring York post office workers who died while serving their country.

All the counters and post office fixtures will goThe planning statement says post office fixtures including the counters, lighting and booths will be removed to make way for the restaurant to be redecorated.

It adds:

The application proposals will bring the former post office building back into use and increase the vitality and viability of this part of the conservation area.

Therefore, on balance it is considered that the impacts identified are outweighed by the public benefit of bringing the building back into a viable use and the positive spin-offs to existing business premises, many of which are listed and/or contribute significantly to the conservation area.

The Post Office was built in 1884 and the branch closed in April, when services moved into WH Smith on Coney Street.

The planning application says the building was also formerly a telephone exchange understood to be one of two main telephone exchanges in the city centre. The other was in Parliament Street.

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This is what Lendal post office will look like as a steakhouse - YorkMix

Varif and his family are thrilled to share their experiences of building their dream abode in a 6 cents plot in Eranjipalam, Kozhikode. They wanted the house to have all the modern facilities and a beautiful garden in the front yard. The structure is built by leaving enough space in the front to arrange the garden and a parking space as well. The elevation features flat roof to make it space efficient. Car porch isnt built as part of the structure. Natural stones cladding the pillars in the front and the wall in the sit-out enhances the spectacular look of the exteriors.

This beautiful house built in 2400 sq ft area has a sit-out, formal and family living areas, dining space, kitchen with an adjacent work area and four bedrooms. Excellent space management is the highlight of this house. Spaces in the interiors are designed in the semi open style. Sliding glass doors are installed to separate the rooms and spaces. The interiors look incredibly vast and spacious when these doors are kept open.

The area that is legally required to be left vacant in the back of the house has been smartly turned into a beautiful courtyard. A sitting area is arranged here by installing glass pergola on MS pipes. You could sit here and enjoy the cool breeze that blows from the plot behind.

The stairway made by covering rub-wood on square pipes, is the highlight of the interiors. The wash area is arranged beneath the stairway. The stair area is designed in double height. The natural sunshine that comes in through the skylight here illuminates the interiors.

The stairway looks as if it has been hung from the structure in the cantilever style. Toughened glass is installed instead of building separate handrails. Vitrified tiles are paved on the floor.

The formal living area is arranged by ensuring enough privacy. The double heighted roof in the dining hall helps this space look vaster. The unique design of the dining table which has a bench on one side goes well with the general theme of the house.

There are two bedrooms each in both the floors. The bedrooms are designed with just the required facilities.

The kitchen cupboards are done in acrylic auto paint finish. A breakfast counter completes the kitchen area. A glass door separates the dining space and the kitchen. Roller blinds are installed here to ensure privacy.

The construction of this amazing house, including the structure and the furnishing, was completed on an elaborate budget of Rs 60 lakh.

Project Facts

Location Eranjipalam, Kozhikode

Area 2400 SFT

Plot 6 cents

Owner Varif

Designers Fayis Muhammad, Corbelarchitecture, Kozhikode

Mob 90610 88111

Pictures Badusha

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Haven of luxury on 6 cents; this Kozhikode mansion is incredible - Onmanorama

After reports of mismanagement of public parking lots surfaced, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) deputed their own employees to manage indoor parking lots across the city three months ago. This initiative of the civic body has invited appreciation from residents.

The Satish Misal parking lot in Mandai is free of cost for motorists and is one of the PMC parking lots which is being managed by the civic body employees since the past three months. Hindustan Times visited the parking lot at Mandai, on Sunday, which is being operated by six PMC employees who are stationed on the five floors of the building.

Residents are still unaware that the parking lot is free and often wait for a challan (receipt). Ravi Kale, who came to shop at Mandai with his wife, after parking his two-wheeler, stopped to asked for a challan. When he was informed by the civic staff that parking is free, he seemed surprised. Earlier, whenever I visited Mandai and parked my vehicle here, I had to pay Rs 5 or Rs 10 depending upon the space available and the day of the week. Today being a Sunday, I was sceptical about getting a parking space, but I am lucky to find one and that too free of cost.

The decision to depute PMC employees was taken by the land management department of the civic body following complaints from residents and cases of financial irregularities by private contractors.

Rajendra Muthe, deputy commissioner, who gave the go-ahead for its implementation, said, There are 142 parking lots in the city and of these, the PMC has developed 29 parking lots, which had been given to private contractors to operate for three to five years. The PMC land management department found irregularities being undertaken by contractors during inspections, which were conducted during Ganesh festival this year (September). The contractor was overcharging motorists, issuing handwritten challans (citation) and had delayed installing close circuit television (CCTV) cameras at the parking lots.

Irregularities were reported at six parking lots in Mandai, two parking lots near Peshwa Park, Hamal Panchayat, and Laxmi road and hence, we decided to depute our civic staff to operate the parking lots, added Muthe.

Vidyadhar Dalvi, a PMC employee, who has been shifted from the anti-encroachment department to the parking lot duty at Mandai, said, We have two floors for two-wheelers and three floors for the parking of four-wheelers. We can park at least 1,500 two-wheelers while each floor above holds 70 four-wheelers each. We work in two shifts from 8am to 8pm. We are six of us and each one takes care of one floor, informing each other once there is space to park, using our mobile phones.

Namdeo Gaikwad, another PMC employee, who takes care of one of the floors and is in charge of security and safety of the parked vehicles, said, Presently, the upper floors are not lit as the electrical system is old and faulty. However, a week earlier, a team from PMC had come to survey the building and informed us that tube lights and bulbs will be fixed. Similarly, they also surveyed the building for points where the CCTVs can be installed.

Nivedita Gupte, a resident who uses the parking lot at Mandai, said, The authorities should fix the tube lights at the earliest. Also, there is no working lift in the building, which if installed, can be a boon to the people using the parking service.

Sandip Choudhary, a regular visitor to Mandai, said, I wish they could keep the parking lot open until 10pm, most of the shopkeepers like me close shops by 9.30pm and hence, despite this being free, we have to go to the paid parking lot to park our vehicles post 8pm.

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Fed up with inflated costs and lack of space; free, well-managed parking lots by PMC staff delight ... - Hindustan Times

It's been a long 12 months, and before we kick 2019 to the curb, we're looking back at all of the most memorable, game-changing fashion and beauty things that went down. Follow along with us as we look back at the year in review.

Half a lifetime ago, otherwise known as Jan. 6, Timothe Chalamet arrived on the Golden Globes red carpet wearing Louis Vuitton, showbiz as usual. But wait: Chalemet and Virgil Abloh, the house's men's artistic director, had other plans in the form of a shimmery, embellished harness, worn in lieu of a suit jacket and over a tailored black shirt and trousers.

What came next was a textbook breakage of the internet: an absolute detonation of unhinged memes, blog posts, parody accounts and tweets, like this one: "Timothe Chalamet always looks like he's from 1531 and 2403 simultaneously and I respect that type of energy." So do we.

It's (somehow) (only) been 12 months since, and I'm pleased to report that the state of menswear has been...great, actually! With Chalamet and consistent contributions from the likes of Billy Porter, Harry Styles, Chadwick Boseman, A$AP Rocky, Troye Sivan and others, menswear experts now confirm something that the bedazzled harness kicked off back in January: that 2019 was a special year for men's red-carpet style, now more fun, influential and unconventional than just about any other category. And it's changing how all of us, not just glitzy, famous men, are getting dressed.

Now obviously, this wasn't the first year that men began playing above .500 on the red carpet, and we would never want to slander Pharrell Williams like that. But the standard menswear look has gone unedited for so long that, until recently, even small sartorial risks could feel seismic, likeArmie Hammer in burgundy velvet Giorgio Armani at the 2018 Oscars.

"Previously, red carpet fashion was dominated by a handful of power stylists who propagated a really specific, streamlined hunk look a man with a prestigious jaw wearing a skinny black tuxedo or maybe a blue suit," explains GQ Style Writer Rachel Tashjian in an email. "But musicians have really challenged that narrative."

TimotheChalamet andTimothe Chalamet's Harness in Louis Vuitton at the 2019 Golden Globes. Photo: Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic

They play with clothes in the truest sense of the word per Merriam-Webster, to do so for enjoyment rather than for "serious" purpose and shun the irrelevant norms of gender conformity. Tashjian suggests Young Thug in a tiered Alessandro Trincone dress on the cover of his 2016 "Jeffrey" mixtape, or Lil Uzi Vert in head-to-toe Prada, which Tashjian likens to "a gallerist who just sold her biggest painting ever and is going on a shopping spree." A$AP Rocky with his Gucci-approved babushka head scarf has enjoyed his plum seat at the top of best-dressed lists for years, with no sign of dropping down.

They're also tapping into a new kind of stylistic ownership in an arena that's long been dominated by professional intermediaries: Hollywood stylists. As some of the most powerful players in the red-carpet business, stylists not only help put outfits together, but also secure the actual pieces of clothing from the powers that be, i.e. those in celebrity relations at fashion houses. But what happens if you cut out the middleperson altogether and go straight to the top of the hierarchical pyramid the creative director yourself?

"In many cases, they establish relationships with designers, rather than trying to interpret or normalize a runway look through a stylist," says Tashjian.

Chalamet doesn't even have a stylist, instead working in direct collaboration with a coterie of designers like Haider Ackermann, who dressed Chalamet to the nines all through the Venice Film Festival, to bring his visions of red-carpet grandeur to life. Someone like Styles may still have a stylist (Harry Lambert, with whom he's worked for years and years), but that's in conjunction with his close, personal relationships with big fish (Gucci's Alessandro Michele) and small (Harris Reed, whom Styles first tapped while Reed was still a student at Central Saint Martens).

"It's a new guard, right?" says Lawrence Schlossman, brand director for Grailedandco-host of "millennial male zeitgeist" podcast "Failing Upwards.""You have designer and star, and they're coming together to put out really interesting looks that become moments within the fashion space."

Acknowledging this, fashion houses themselves are making that investment in their top creative and artistic talent to further empower their consumers, be they VIP clients or, you know, not.

Harry Styles in Gucci at the 2019 Met Gala, which he co-hosted. Photo: Theo Wargo/WireImage

"Big fashion houses have recognized for a few years now that their men's businesses cult favorites compared to womenswear had the potential to be real pop cultural phenomena," says Tashjian. For such a conglomerate like LVMH to move Kim Jones to Dior and install Abloh at Louis Vuitton in early 2018, she adds, only solidified that possibility.

And as far as what we're talking about here, the menswear fun-plosion of 2019, that timeline tracks: Jones and Abloh's first few collections for Dior and Louis Vuitton, respectively, only began arriving in earnest this year.

"That perfect storm has made menswear the pulse of cool in fashion," says Tashjian, "and has made more men pay attention to fashion and feel comfortable playing with it."

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Broadway doyen Porter has made Chalemet's higher-key contributions to the menswear red-carpet league look understated. As the capital-S Star of FX's "Pose," Porter was a staple on 2019's red-carpet circuit, and the year's unequivocal men's red-carpet captain. Porter has arrived in tuxedo-gown hybrids (Christian Siriano at the Oscars, Celestino Couture at the Tonys) and silvery satin capes with bubblegum pink linings (Randi Rahm at the Golden Globes); a 130,000-crystal-strong pinstriped suit with Rick Owens platforms (Michael Kors Couture at the Emmys) and silk jumpsuits tied with fluffy, oversized waist ribbons (Rinat Brodach at the Critics' Choice Awards).

"Billy Porter is someone who pushed boundaries in fashion more broadly, ushering in a new era of fabulousness, of dressing for the sake of wearing an incredible outfit," says Tashjian. "He plunders the golden age of getting dressed the glory days of couture, when designers had a clutch of clients who also operated like muses, and putting on clothing was like a sacred ritual performance."

He's made that ritual contemporary and accessible, as have those who take it to, like, a subtle seven rather than a 10: all-star-dresser Boseman take his Givenchy Haute Couture frock coat at the Oscars or Jason Momoa on the same red carpet in a velvet and baby pink Fendi tuxedo, complete with a matching scrunchie. Olie Arnold, Mr Porter's style director, also calls out Sivan and his Golden Globes look, an oversized navy tuxedo by Calvin Klein 205W39NYCthat felt entirely contemporary in its boxiness.

Jason Momoa in Fendi complete with a matching scrunchie at the 2019 Oscars. Photo: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images

"Part of the fun is not knowing what to expect, but I think we're going to see more and more men defying the norms," says Arnold. "Figures like Boseman, Chalamet, Porter, Sivan and others have inspired other men to push the limits and make big, bold statements."

That may be so, and fashion is already better for it. Yet classic black-tie (Tashjian's aforementioned "streamlined hunk look") will never go out of style; there will always be a sizeable contingency of people celebrities, stylists, good ol consumers who prefer more traditional tailoring. And going into 2020, that contingency will have to get used to, well, not that.

"We're definitely entering a new age of opulence, thanks to people like Billy Porter, Harry Styles and A$AP Rocky people who do this exuberant, performative dressing, but less camp, and more elegant," says Tashjian.

As for the looming awards season, which will soon enough barrel through our televisions and fill our homes with the sounds of Giuliana Rancic and Ryan Seacrest? "That, combined with the bravura of a lot of this year's movies 'Little Women,' 'The Irishman,' 'Once Upon a Time in Hollywood' means I expect to see really sophisticated looks that are more formal, maybe a little more restrained than the harness extravaganzas of the past year, but no less confident."

Schlossman reads the forecast slightly differently, with a cautious, albeit realistic projection: "Clearly, there's a precipice that somebody's going to cross and just, for lack of a better term, do too much," he says. So maybe the envelope will be pushed even more, but on the red carpet, isn't too much really just enough?

"They might reign it back in," says Schlossman, "but it seems to me like these men are relishing the opportunity to make a statement."

Homepage and top photo: Billy Porter arrives at the 2019 Golden Globes wearing aRandi Rahm suit and cape. Photo: Santiago Felipe/Getty Images

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The Big, Bold Year That Men's Red-Carpet Fashion Got Fun - Fashionista

The technology group Wrtsil, and Silverstream Technologies, the leading air lubrication solution provider, yesterday announced the signing of a Licence and Co-operation Agreement for future sales and servicing of the Silverstream System. As an authorised sales and service partner, Wrtsil intends to fully integrate Silverstreams air lubrication system within its propulsion solutions.

By offering the Silverstream System as an integral part of Wrtsils propulsion solution for newbuild vessels, compliance with the Energy Efficiency Design Index (EEDI) will be further improved. Under the agreement, the Silverstream System will also be available through Wrtsils sales channels for retrofit installations on existing vessels where Wrtsil is a primary solution provider. The integrated Silverstream System is expected to realise synergies in capital and operational savings across the propulsion chain by increasing fuel efficiency, and optimising engine loading.

This new collaborative partnership will accelerate the deployment of air lubrication systems across all vessel classes, from small bulk vessels to the largest container ships. By combining Wrtsils propulsion expertise and Silverstreams innovative engineering knowledge, access to this clean technology will be facilitated across the market.

Going forward, the collaboration agreement will enable current and future Silverstream customers to access Wrtsils global service network for the maintenance of their Silverstream System installations. Wrtsils network of service centres, workshops, and service professionals is the most extensive in the maritime industry, with 4500 field service professionals located in 70 countries around the world.

The agreement means that more ship owners will have easy access to Silverstreams proven air lubrication technology. The system has been proven to reduce fuel burn and associated emissions by 5 to 10%, depending on vessel type.

Speaking on the agreement, Lars Anderson, Director, Propulsion, Wrtsil Marine, said: At Wrtsil we are committed to fully supporting our customers as they strive to reduce operating costs and improve the environmental sustainability impact of their operations. Todays agreement enables us to facilitate the building of better vessels that meet tomorrows challenges today, and Silverstream are the ideal partners to help us realise this goal.

Noah Silberschmidt, CEO, Silverstream Technologies, added: Todays agreement with Wrtsil reinforces our position as the shipping industrys leading clean technology manufacturer. In Wrtsil we find a partner as committed as we are to achieving a cleaner, more efficient and sustainable maritime industry.

With the global sulphur cap almost upon us and decarbonisation targets on the horizon, the commercial case for proven clean technology has never been stronger. Now is the time for ship owners to take action to reduce their operational costs and their impact on the environment, and todays agreement will help unlock the power of air lubrication technology for more vessels across our sector.

The Silverstream System creates a carpet of microbubbles that coat the entire flat bottom of the vessel. This carpet reduces frictional resistance between the hull and the water, dramatically reducing fuel consumption and related emissions. The technology works in all maritime conditions, is not weather dependent, and does not constrain or negatively impact the normal operational profile of the vessel.Source: Silverstream Technologies

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Wrtsil & Silverstream to collaborate on accelerating deployment of air lubrication technology - Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide

This season can make even the grouchiest New Yorker an urban romantic, and encourages local residents and visitors alike to rediscover the museums and monuments we sometimes take for granted. Prepare for good cheer, special programming and big crowds.

Whether youre coming with your family, your friends, your lover or your good old self, youll want to plan ahead when visiting New Yorks unsurpassed arts institutions, and exploring some exquisite smaller museums outside the tourist green zone. Check online before you go: most have shortened hours on Christmas and New Years Eves, and are closed Christmas and New Years Days. (An exception: The Jewish Museum, on Fifth Avenue, is open as usual on Dec. 25 and reliably popular that day.)

Your top priority should probably be the expanded, refreshed Museum of Modern Art, which now has 30 percent additional gallery space and a far more welcoming entrance. So far the crowds have felt palpable but manageable, although weekdays are a tick more peaceful than weekends. If all goes well you wont have to queue too long at the new digital ticket counters, but you can walk right in if you pay at moma.org and show the ticket on your phone. You can save $25 a head by visiting on Friday after 5:30 p.m., but youd better prepare to wait.

Friday and Saturday evenings are an excellent time to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, with its Christmas tree festooned with antique Neapolitan ornaments as well as the Met Breuer, the museums under-trafficked satellite. Before the Met vacates the Breuer building next summer, make time now for its finespun retrospective of the Latvian-American artist Vija Celmins; then head downstairs for a drink at Flora Bar, with the smartest by-the-glass wine list on the Upper East Side.

You can explore a new neighborhood, as well as another time period, by visiting a house museum. The grande dame is the Frick Collection on Fifth Avenue, currently presenting Renaissance bronzes by Bertoldo di Giovanni and matter-of-fact painting by Manet. Were also fans of the Morris-Jumel Mansion in Harlem, which dates to 1765 and is the oldest house in Manhattan; the even older Van Cortlandt House in the Bronx, nestled in one of the citys largest parks; and the Merchants House Museum in the East Village, with one of New Yorks very few landmark residential interiors.

Have a look below at a sampling of whats on view right now, or consider following this three-hour tour through some of Midtowns finer small institutions. Dont worry, kids, its not all art: Weve allotted time for a snack.

These Women Will Blow You Away

VIJA CELMINS: TO FIX THE IMAGE IN MEMORY at the Met Breuer (through Jan. 12). The artists quietly ravishing, brilliantly installed exhibition is one big illusion of reality. Expanses of ocean waves, star-studded night skies, clouds or the moons surface, rendered in graphite, charcoal or muted tones of oil paint can take years to make and are so realistic as to be mistaken for photographs, Roberta Smith wrote in her review. 212-731-1675, metmuseum.org.

AGNES DENES: ABSOLUTES AND INTERMEDIATES at the Shed (through March 22). A photograph of Agnes Denes standing amid her 1982 public work, a two-acre wheatfield that she grew and harvested in Lower Manhattan, speaks to her pioneering spirit. Its among the items in a superbly installed survey of the visionary artists 50-year journey, exploring her focus on ecology, on the fear of present decay and the hope for future survival, Holland Cotter wrote in his review. Well be lucky this art season if we get another exhibition as tautly beautiful. 646-455-3494, theshed.org.

RACHEL HARRISON LIFE HACK at the Whitney Museum of American Art (through Jan. 12). Puzzlement can be fun, and Ms. Harrison has set it as one of the tasks for her work, Mr. Cotter wrote in his review. The artists first full-scale survey examines the past 25 years of her work with assemblage-style sculptures (the kind of accidental urban still lifes you see on New York City sidewalks on trash collection day), photography, and drawing. As you look and ponder, youll see that these works, Mr. Cotter wrote, translate into information about commerce, class, value, accident, appetite, waste, color, shape, zeitgeist even life and death. 212-570-3600, whitney.org.

BETYE SAAR: THE LEGENDS OF BLACK GIRLS WINDOW at the Museum of Modern Art (through Jan. 4). This exhibition concentrates on Betye Saars early years, tracking the experiments in printmaking and assemblage that led to her pivotal piece Black Girls Window. By filling old window frames with a constellation of images, her mystical works essentially became gateways to the mysteries of the universe, Jillian Steinhauer wrote in her review. 212-708-9400, moma.org.

ZILIA SNCHEZ: SOY ISLA (I AM AN ISLAND) at El Museo del Barrio (through March 22). Recently opened, this museum retrospective is the artists first, and it traces her journey from Cuba, where she was born in 1926, to Puerto Rico, where she has lived and worked since the 1970s. Expect to encounter stretched canvases painted with acrylics in muted color palettes, works on paper, sculptural pieces and more. 212-831-7272, elmuseo.org.

Exhibitions for Kids of All Ages

ART OF NATIVE AMERICA at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (ongoing). Dip into this gallery in the American Wing, and youll get a bit of a reprieve from the crowds. Youll also get plenty of history here and dazzling Native art. In addition to intricately engraved ancient ivories, textiles and beaded embroidery, there are Katsina figures, which were created as physical representations of immortal beings that, as the label reads, bring rain, protect, teach, heal, and carry prayers to the spirit world. This is the first significant display of Native art in the American Wing, which was established in 1924. 212-535-7710, metmuseum.org.

HOLIDAY TRAIN SHOWS at various locations. Fast-moving trains that actually run on time? It must be holiday train show time. And there are several on view across the city, including the Holiday Train Show at the New York Botanical Garden (through Jan. 26), which re-creates famous New York landmarks from leaves, bark, acorns, cinnamon sticks and other natural materials. This year the focus is on Central Park, with mini-replicas of structures like Bethesda Terrace and Belvedere Castle. Holiday Express: All Aboard to Richard Scarrys Busytown at the New-York Historical Society doubles as a celebration of the 100th birthday of the Busytown author and illustrator Richard Scarry.

JR: CHRONICLES at the Brooklyn Museum (through May 3). Can you spot Robert De Niro in the sea of 1,128 people in JRs most recent project, The Chronicles of New York City? To create the large-format mural, JR and his crew photographed and interviewed hundreds of people in the five boroughs last summer. The installation includes a range of works, tracing his career from his documentation of graffiti artists as a teenager in Paris to his more recent digitally collaged murals. 718-638-5000, brooklynmuseum.org.

THE LAST KNIGHT: THE ART, ARMOR, AND AMBITION OF MAXIMILIAN I at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (through Jan. 5). This exhibition of grand scale and heavy metal plots the relentless rise of Emperor Maximilian I of the Holy Roman Empire. Though its armed to the teeth with flashy military gear, Jason Farago wrote in his review, youll also find paintings, illustrated books and celebratory images made with the hottest new technology of the late 15th century: printmaking, which allowed the emperor to broadcast his military prowess through books and monumental woodcuts. 212-535-7710, metmuseum.org.

RAINFOREST V (VARIATION 1) at the Museum of Modern Art (through Jan. 5). The museums fourth-floor Studio space has been devoted to David Tudors strangely wonderful, interactive installation, Alastair Macaulay wrote in his critics notebook. The room is filled with mundane objects (a metal barrel, a wooden box, etc.) that hang throughout the space. Collectively they become a kind of urban jungle, suspended like Calder mobiles with the anti-utilitarian aesthetic of Duchamp ready-mades, Mr. Macaulay wrote. If that werent fun enough, each object emits a unique composition that, once you position yourself to hear, feels like a mini-concert just for you. 212-708-9400, moma.org.

T. REX: THE ULTIMATE PREDATOR at the American Museum of Natural History (through Aug. 9). This eye-opening exhibition gives an up-to-date view of everyones favorite prehistoric pugilist, and also introduces the many other tyrannosaurs that preceded T. rex, some discovered only this century in China and Mongolia, Mr. Farago wrote in his exhibition review. The show mixes 66-million-year-old teeth with the latest 3-D prints of dino bones, and also presents new models of T. rex as a baby, a juvenile and a full-grown annihilator. Wait till you see the fossilized feathers believe it! 212-769-5100, amnh.org.

Treasures From the Artists Vaults

EDITH HALPERT AND THE RISE OF AMERICAN ART at the Jewish Museum (through Feb. 9). According to Ms. Smith, Edith Gregor Halpert was a formidable, feisty and sometimes manipulative self-starter with an ecumenical eye, a passion for art and an inborn instinct for sales and promotion. The story of her influential art gallery and how she willed it into existence is the subject of this show. Nearly all of the paintings and sculptures on view were exhibited or sold by Halperts gallery, or were in her private collection, including works by the proto-Pop abstract painter Stuart Davis. 212-423-3200, thejewishmuseum.org.

HENRY CHALFANT: ART VS. TRANSIT, 1977-1987 at the Bronx Museum of the Arts (through March 8). Henry Chalfants photographs are considered the definitive document of graffiti culture in New York. Now those works are the subject of an exhibition, in which his train panoramas, some blown up to train car-size, have been assembled alongside his street photography of park jams and wall works, and a collection of archives and black books that re-create his SoHo studio, Max Lakin wrote in a preview of the show. 718-681-6000, bronxmuseum.org.

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF ALVIN BALTROP at the Bronx Museum of the Arts (through Feb. 9). Mr. Baltrops photography of the derelict shipping piers along the Hudson River not only serve as architectural studies but also reveal the semi-residential population of homeless people, teenage runaways, sexual adventurers, criminals and artists who found refuge there, Mr. Cotter wrote in his review. They also double as a monument to New York itself during the 1970s and 80s, when the city was radiating creative energy and, in the wake of the 1969 Stonewall uprising, a home base for a new gay consciousness. 718-681-6000, bronxmuseum.org.

PRIVATE LIVES PUBLIC SPACES at the Museum of Modern Art (through July 1) This thought-provoking new exhibition in the galleries outside MoMAs two main movie auditoriums features neglected footage (47 hours) from the museums collection. With little background information available, you get to play historian and detective. The movies constitute a season of programming on their own, Ben Kenigsberg wrote recently, and taken together they run the gamut from amateurism to outsider art, from arcana to valuable additions to the oeuvres of established experimental filmmakers. 212-708-9400, moma.org.

WANGECHI MUTU: THE NEWONES, WILL FREE US at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (through Jan. 12). The Kenyan-born artist Wangechi Mutus bronze statues of seated women are a striking presence outside the Met. For the first time in the museums history, it has filled the niches of its Fifth Avenue facade with commissioned works, which also reflects a small step on the museums rocky road toward diversity. Among her sources of inspiration, Nancy Princenthal wrote in a profile of the artist, is a modest Congolese prestige stool in the Mets collection that Ms. Mutu admires for its earthiness the figures knees are on the ground, rather than a pedestal and for the eroticism of her parted thighs. Generally she favors sensuality in her own work, although for the Met she opted for figures that are resolutely chaste. 212-535-7710, metmuseum.org.

SIMONE LEIGHS BRICK HOUSE at the High Line (through September 2020). At the northern end of the High Line you can glimpse New Yorks shiny future: supertall skyscrapers under construction in Hudson Yards and the shiny, climbable Vessel sculpture just beckoning for your selfies. But just south of all that is a more subdued work, equally impressive from the street level: Brick House, a 16-foot-tall bronze bust by the artist Simone Leigh. In an interview about the commission with The New York Times, Ms. Leigh said she thought the figure, a black woman with cornrows and a dome-shaped torso, would be a great opportunity to have something about black beauty right in the middle of that environment. thehighline.org.

IN PURSUIT OF FASHION: THE SANDY SCHREIER COLLECTION at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (through May 17). While you anticipate the red carpet looks at next years Met Gala (the exhibition title: About Time: Fashion and Duration) consider the Costume Institutes recently opened fall exhibition. It highlights about 80 of the 165 promised gifts from the collection of Sandy Schreier, who started amassing fashions (20th-century French and American couture and ready-to-wear gear) as a way of preserving the designs she found to be so creative. There are a range of printed gowns and jackets from Mariano Fortuny y Madrazo, Paquin Ltd. and Balenciaga; glittery headdresses and other accessories; and more. 212-535-7710, metmuseum.org.

PIERRE CARDIN: FUTURE FASHION at the Brooklyn Museum (through Jan. 5). The 97-year-old French designer, still defined by his groovy late 60s fashions, gets a swinging exhibition in Brooklyn. His New Look gave way to thigh-high boots and dresses of heat-molded synthetics, Mr. Farago wrote in his review. The show has 85 ensembles, the earliest dating from 1953 and the most recent from this decade. At its core are the space-age outfits that Mr. Cardin designed in a young, newly prosperous Paris, seen here on mannequins as well as in photographs and films of Jeanne Moreau, Mia Farrow and the cast of Star Trek, Mr. Farago wrote. Some are chic, many are risible; all of it has an exuberant view of the future that marks it as decidedly from the past. 718-638-5000, brooklynmuseum.org.

Rich Palettes and Decorative Arts

ERNST LUDWIG KIRCHNER AT NEUE GALERIE (THROUGH JAN. 13) To linger on Ernst Ludwig Kirchners lurid biography would be unfair to the mesmerizing technical genius of his style, Will Heinrich wrote in his review of this show. He went on to call this exhibition a generous and essential overview of a peripatetic and unconventional career. (Kirchner, who had an addiction to morphine, Veronal and absinthe, committed suicide in 1938, at the age of 58, after the Nazis had denounced him as degenerate.) At the Neue Galerie, we see up close how he surrounded more or less sober portrait subjects with backgrounds of flat but brilliant color, though it wasnt just a youthful revolt, Mr. Heinrich wrote. It was also an ingenious way to articulate subjective experience in an increasingly materialist modern world. neuegalerie.org.

HENRY ARNHOLDS MEISSEN PALACE: CELEBRATING A COLLECTOR at the Frick Collection (ongoing). Is this collection of ceramic ware impressive enough to make you swoon? Augustus II, King of Poland, was certainly a fan: According to the museum, Augustus was the most important porcelain collector of his time and was enamored with the works that he was said to have been afflicted by a maladie de porcelaine (porcelain fever). The pieces on view here are drawn from the collection of Henry H. Arnhold, a prominent banker and philanthropist who died in 2018. The gallery where these works reside has been turned into an 18th-century porcelain room, with the pieces grouped together by color. frick.org.

ARTISTIC LICENSE: SIX TAKES ON THE GUGGENHEIM COLLECTION at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (through Jan. 12). Displays that artists select from a museums collection are almost inevitably interesting, revealing and valuable. And thats the case with this show for which Cai Guo-Qiang, Paul Chan, Richard Prince, Julie Mehretu, Carrie Mae Weems and Jenny Holzer were invited to select six separate yet cross-talking thematic displays, one per ramp. The result is a rare, dazzling, dizzying cornucopia of objects, viewpoints and agendas, Ms. Smith wrote. 212-423-3500, guggenheim.org.

JASON MORAN at the Whitney Museum of American Art (through Jan. 5) The pianist and conceptual artist Jason Moran turns space and time sideways in his first museum survey, Giovanni Russonello wrote about the show. Here, Mr. Moran engages with the physical history of jazz in collaborations with Kara Walker, Joan Jonas and other art world figures. Its a modest, yet striking installation that is best when activated during weekend performances by renowned jazz musicians. 212-570-3600, whitney.org.

AMY SILLMAN: THE SHAPE OF SHAPE at the Museum of Modern Art (through April 12) Ms. Smith called this iteration of the Moderns Artists Choice series one of its best and among the most valuable of the newly reopened museums inaugural shows. In pulling works from the permanent collection, the New York painter Amy Sillman, who worked with the curator Michelle Kuo, sought out overlooked or excluded artists and unfamiliar works. Her effort reflects a relatively robust visual appetite and the shows dense installation encourages surprising connections. 212-708-9400, moma.org.

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Holiday Museum Guide: Where to See Art This Season - The New York Times