Pietro Aretino, in Titian's first portrait of him

St Bartholomew (using Aretino as a model) displaying his flayed skin (a self-portrait by Michelangelo) in The Last Judgment.

Der Tod des Dichters Pietro Aretino by Anselm Feuerbach.

Pietro Aretino (20 April 1492 – 21 October 1556) was an Italian author, playwright, poet and satirist who wielded immense influence on contemporary art and politics and invented modern literate pornography.^[1]

Life[link]

Born out of wedlock in Arezzo (Aretino, "from Arezzo"), very casually educated then banished from his native city, Aretino spent a formative decade in Perugia, before being sent, highly recommended, to Rome. There Agostino Chigi, the rich banker and patron of Raphael, took him under his wing.

When Hanno the elephant, pet of Pope Leo X, died in 1516, Aretino penned a satirical pamphlet entitled "The Last Will and Testament of the Elephant Hanno." The fictitious will cleverly mocked the leading political and religious figures of Rome at the time, including Pope Leo X himself. The pamphlet was such a success that it started Aretino's career and established him as a famous satirist, ultimately known as "the Scourge of Princes."

Aretino prospered, living from hand to mouth as a hanger-on in the literate circle of his patron, sharpening his satirical talents on the gossip of politics and the Papal Curia, and turning the coarse Roman pasquinade into a rapier weapon of satire, until his sixteen ribald Sonetti Lussuriosi (Lust Sonnets) written to accompany Giulio Romano's exquisitely beautiful but utterly pornographic series of drawings engraved by Marcantonio Raimondi under the title I Modi finally caused such outrage that he had to temporarily flee Rome. In 2007, Michael Nyman set eight of the poems to music. They proved no less controversial: at a 2008 performance at Cadogan Hall, the programs were withdrawn on allegations of obscenity.^[2]

After Leo's death in 1521, his patron was Cardinal Giulio de' Medici, whose competitors for the papal throne felt the sting of Aretino's scurrilous lash. The installation of the prudish Fleming Adrian VI ("la tedesca tigna" in Pietro's words) instead encouraged Aretino to seek new patrons away from Rome, mainly with Federico II Gonzaga in Mantua, and with the condottiero Giovanni de' Medici ("Giovanni delle Bande Nere"). The election of his old Medici patron as Pope Clement VII sent him briefly back to Rome, but death threats and an attempted assassination from one of the victims of his pen, Bishop Giovanni Giberti, in July 1525, set him wandering through northern Italy in the service of various noblemen, distinguished by his wit, audacity and brilliant and facile talents, until he settled permanently in 1527, in Venice, the anti-Papal city of Italy, "seat of all vices" Aretino noted with gusto.

Portrait of Pietro Aretino, by Titian, 1545 (Palazzo Pitti)

"In a letter to Giovanni de Medici written in 1524 Aretino encloses a satirical poem saying that due to a sudden aberration he has fallen in love with a female cook and temporarily switched from boys to girls..." (My Dear Boy)

From the security of Venice Aretino "kept all that was famous in Italy in a kind of state of siege," in Jakob Burckhardt's estimation. Francis I of France and Charles V pensioned him at the same time, each hoping for some damage to the other. "The rest of his relations with the great is mere beggary and vulgar extortion," according to Burckhardt.

"His literary talent, his clear and sparkling style, his varied observation of men and things, would have made him a considerable writer under any circumstances, destitute as he was of the power of conceiving a genuine work of art, such as a true dramatic comedy; and to the coarsest as well as the most refined malice he added a grotesque wit so brilliant that in some cases it does not fall short of that of Rabelais."

—Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, 1855.

Apart from both sacred and profane texts— a satire of high-flown Renaissance neo-Platonic dialogues is set in a brothel— and comedies such as La cortigiana and La talenta, Aretino is remembered above all for his letters, full of literary flattery that could turn to blackmail. They circulated widely in manuscript and he collected them and published them at intervals winning as many enemies as it did fame, and earned him the dangerous nickname Ariosto gave him: flagello dei principi ("scourge of princes"). The first English translations of some of Aretino's racier material have been coming onto the market recently.

La cortigiana is a brilliant parody of Castiglione’s Il Cortegiano, and features the adventures of a Sienese gentleman, Messer Maco, who travels to Rome to become a cardinal. He would also like to win himself a mistress, but when he falls in love with a girl he sees in a window, he realizes that only as a courtier would he be able to win her. In mockery of Castiglione's advice on how to become the perfect courtier, a charlatan proceeds to teach Messer Maco how to behave as a courtier: he must learn how to deceive and flatter, and sit hours in front of the mirror.

Aretino was a close friend of Titian, who painted his portrait (illustrations) at least three times. The early portrait is a psychological study of alarming modernity. Clement VII made Aretino a Knight of Rhodes, and Julius III named him a Knight of St. Peter, but the chain he wears for his 1545 portrait may have merely been jewelry. In his strictly-for-publication letters to patrons Aretino would often add a verbal portrait to Titian's painted one.

He is said to have died of suffocation from "laughing too much."^[3]

Works[link]

Poetry[link]

• Sonetti lussuriosi
• Dubbi amorosi
• Lettere
• Ragionamenti
• Orlandino

Comedy[link]

• Fraza
• La cortigiana
• Il marescalco
• La talanta
• Lo ipocrito
• Il filosofo

Tragedy[link]

• Orazia

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Cleugh, James, 1965. The Divine Aretino Pietro of Arezzo, 1492–1556, A Biography
• Hutton, Edward, 1922. Pietro Aretino: The scourge of princes.
• Robert Greene, The 48 Laws of Power, Viking Penguin, 1998, ISBN 0-14-028019-7
• Norton, Rictor (ed.) My Dear Boy: Gay Love Letters through the Centuries. Leyland Publications, San Francisco. 1998
• Luba Freedman, Pietro Aretino, Titian's Portraits Through Aretino's Lens, Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995, ISBN 978-0-271-01339-8.
• Peter Brand, Charles Peter Brand, Lino Pertile, The Cambridge History of Italian Literature, Cambridge University Press, 1999, ISBN 978-0-521-66622-0.
• Elise Boillet, "L'Aretin et les papes de son temps," in Florence Alazard et Frank La Brasca (eds), La papauté à la Renaissance (Paris, Editions Honoré Champion, 2007) (Travaux du Centre d'Études Supérieures de la Renaissance de Tours, 12), 324-363.

Sources[link]

• Encyclopædia Britannica

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Pietro Aretino

• All the works of Pietro Aretino.
• Brief biography of Pietro Aretino
• Another Titian portrait of Aretino, at the Frick Collection
• I Modi - Illustrations by various artists based on Aretino's erotic sonnets

Édouard-Henri Avril (21 May 1843–1928) was a French painter and commercial artist. Under the pseudonym Paul Avril, he was an illustrator of erotic literature.^[1]

Born in Algiers, Avril studied art in various Paris salons. From 1874 to 1878 he was at the École des Beaux Arts in Paris. Having been commissioned to illustrate Théophile Gautier's novel Fortunio, he adopted the pseudonym Paul Avril. His reputation was soon established and he received many commissions to illustrate both major authors and the so-called "galante literature" of the day, a form of erotica. These books were typically sold in small editions on a subscription basis, organised by collectors.

Avril illustrated such works as Gustave Flaubert's Salammbô, Gautier's Le Roi Caundale, John Cleland's Fanny Hill, Jean Baptiste Louvet de Couvray's Adventures of the Chevalier de Faublas, Mario Uchard's Mon Oncle Barbassou (scenes in a harem), Jules Michelet's The Madam, Hector France's Musk, Hashish and Blood, the writings of Pietro Aretino, and the anonymous lesbian novel Gamiani. His major work was designs for De Figuris Veneris: A Manual of Classical Erotica by the German scholar Friedrich Karl Forberg.

Avril died at Le Raincy in 1928.^[2]

Gallery[link]

References[link]

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (August 2011)

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Édouard Henri Avril

• Avril's Gallery of Classical Erotica
• A Checklist of Works Illustrated by Paul Avril (46 items)

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (March 2011)

Nyman in 2010

Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE (born 23 March 1944 in Stratford, London) is a British composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano. His operas include The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Letters, Riddles and Writs, Noises, Sounds & Sweet Airs, Facing Goya, Man and Boy: Dada, Love Counts, and Sparkie: Cage and Beyond, and he has written six concerti, four string quartets, and many other chamber works, many for his Michael Nyman Band, with and without whom he tours as a performing pianist. Nyman stated that he prefers to write opera rather than other sorts of music.^[1]

Biography[link]

Nyman was born in Stratford, London. He was educated at the Sir George Monoux Grammar School, Walthamstow. He studied at King's College, London under Alan Bush.,^[2] and was accepted at the Royal Academy of Music in September, 1961, and studied with Bush and Thurston Dart, focusing on piano and seventeenth-century baroque music. He won the Howard Carr Memorial Prize for composition in July 1964.^[3]

In 1969, he provided the libretto of Harrison Birtwistle's opera Down by the Greenwood Side and directed the short film Love Love Love (based on, and identical length to, the Beatles' "All You Need Is Love"^[4]) before settling into music criticism, where he is generally acknowledged to have been the first to apply the term "minimalism" to music (in a 1968 article in The Spectator magazine about the English composer Cornelius Cardew). He wrote introductions for George Frideric Handel's Concerti Grossi, Op. 6 and conducted the most important interview with George Brecht in 1976.

Nyman drew frequently on early music sources in his scores for Greenaway's films: Henry Purcell in The Draughtsman's Contract and The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover (which included Memorial and Miserere Paraphrase), Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber in A Zed and Two Noughts, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in Drowning by Numbers, and John Dowland in Prospero's Books, largely at the request of the director.

Nyman says he discovered his aesthetic playing the aria, "Madamina, il catalogo è questo" from Mozart's Don Giovanni on his piano in the style of Jerry Lee Lewis, which "dictated the dynamic, articulation and texture of everything I've subsequently done."^[5]

Nyman at the 2009 Venice Film Festival

He has scored numerous films, the majority of them European art films, including several of those directed by Peter Greenaway. His few forays into Hollywood have been Gattaca, Ravenous (with musician Damon Albarn), and The End of the Affair. He wrote settings to various texts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart for "Letters, Riddles and Writs", part of Not Mozart. He has also produced a soundtrack for the silent film Man with the Movie Camera. Nyman's popularity increased after he wrote the score to Jane Campion's award-winning 1993 film The Piano. The album became a classical music best-seller. He was nominated for both a British Academy Award and a Golden Globe.

Among Nyman's other works are the opera Noises, Sounds & Sweet Airs (1987), for soprano, alto, tenor and instrumental ensemble (based on Nyman's score for the ballet La Princesse de Milan); Ariel Songs (1990) for soprano and band; MGV (Musique à Grande Vitesse) (1993) for band and orchestra; concertos for saxophone, piano (based on The Piano score), violin, harpsichord, trombone, and saxophone & cello recorded by John Harle and Julian Lloyd Webber; the opera The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat (1986), based on a case-study by Oliver Sacks; and four string quartets. In 2000, he produced a new opera on the subject of cloning on a libretto by Victoria Hardie titled Facing Goya, an expansion of their one-act opera Vital Statistics. The lead, a widowed art banker, is written for contralto and the role was first created by Hilary Summers. His newest operas are Man and Boy: Dada (2003) and Love Counts (2005), both on libretti by Michael Hastings.

He has also composed the music for the children's television series Titch which is based on the books written and illustrated by Pat Hutchins.

Many of Nyman's works are written for his own ensemble, the Michael Nyman Band, a group formed for a 1976 production of Carlo Goldoni's Il Campiello. Originally made up of old instruments such as rebecs and shawms alongside more modern instruments like the saxophone in order to produce as loud a sound as possible without amplification, it later switched to a fully amplified line-up of string quartet, three saxophones, trumpet, horn, bass trombone, bass guitar and piano. This line up has been variously altered and augmented for some works.

Nyman also published an influential book in 1974 on experimental music called Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond (Catalan, Spanish and French translations), which explored the influence of John Cage on classical composers.

In the 1970s, Nyman was a member of the Portsmouth Sinfonia – the self-described World's Worst Orchestra – playing on their recordings and in their concerts. He was the featured pianist on the orchestra's recording of Bridge Over Troubled Water on the Martin Lewis-produced 20 Classic Rock Classics album on which the Sinfonia gave their unique interpretations of the pop and rock repertoire of the 1950s–1970s. Nyman created a similar group called Foster's Social Orchestra, which specialised in the work of Stephen Foster. One of their pieces appeared in the film Ravenous and an additional work, not used in the film, appeared on the soundtrack album.

He has also recorded pop music with the Flying Lizards; a version of his Bird List from the soundtrack to Peter Greenaway's The Falls (1980) appears on their album Fourth Wall as "Hands 2 Take."

On 7 July 2007 Nyman performed at Live Earth in Japan. On 2008 Nyman realised, in collaboration with the cultural association Volumina, Sublime, an artist's book that unified his music with his passion for photography.

In a collaboration with friends Max Pugh and Marc Silver, Nyman is now beginning to exhibit his films and photography. Nyman’s video works are filmed with a hand-held camera, often before and after concerts and as part of his international travels, featuring everyday moments. Some works are left relatively unedited whilst others undergo split screens and visual repetition.^{[original research?]} Soundtracks to some of the video works use location sounds, whilst others recycle existing scores from his archive or a combination of both.

In October 2009, Nyman released The Glare, a collaborative collection of songs with David McAlmont, which cast his work in a new light. The album – recorded with the Michael Nyman Band – finds McAlmont putting lyrics based on contemporary news stories to 11 pieces of Nyman music drawn from different phases of his career.

"David did the research and chose most of the musical pieces," Nyman explains. "I suggested a few pieces,too but I really didn't do very much, although I think it's a true collaboration. You can identify who was responsible for what, but both aspects create a perfect synergy in which neither element can exist without the other."^{[cite this quote]}

Although the album was recorded in just two days, there was a huge amount of preparation and rewriting before they entered the studio. "They're third generation songs and when you listen to them, you ask 'Is it Nyman?' 'Is it soul?' 'Is it rock'n'roll?' It's all and none of them," the composer says. "I think we've created a new musical language. I'm no good at writing pop cliché – when I try, it invariably comes out sounding quite different."^{[cite this quote]}

The project has a long gestation for the pair first met in 2004 at a exhibition opening and talked about working together. Nothing came of it for almost five years until they got together again via Facebook, met up for lunch – and the idea for The Glare was born.

"I was surprised and delighted by what we've came up with," Nyman says. "So much so, that when I now play these pieces solo, it sounds like something's missing and the music needs David's voice and approach. That's a remarkable thing, because I've been playing these pieces for years. Of all the many collaborations I've been involved in, none has ever given me more pleasure and I'm desperate to take it on the road and play these."^{[cite this quote]}

Personal life[link]

He was married to Aet Nyman and has two daughters, Molly and Martha. His first string quartet quotes "Unchained Melody" in homage to Aet, who appears in Greenaway's The Falls, for which he also composed music. Molly is a composer in her own right; in collaboration with Harry Escott she has written several film scores including for The Road to Guantanamo by her father's frequent collaborator, Michael Winterbottom. Martha is a development researcher for the BBC.

Career highlights[link]

• 1961–67 – Studies at the Royal Academy of Music and King's College London.
• 1968–78 – Works as music critic (becoming first person to apply the word "minimalist" to music).
• 1976 – Founds the Campiello Band (now the Michael Nyman Band) and embarks on eleven-film collaboration with Peter Greenaway.
• 1981 – Releases first Michael Nyman Band album.
• 1993 – Soundtrack for The Piano wins an Ivor Novello Award, Golden Globe, BAFTA and American Film Institute award and goes on to sell over three million copies.
• 2002–2005 – Composer-in-Residence at Badisches Staatstheater in Karlsruhe, Germany, who performed three Nyman operas and more tunes for his daughters.
• 2007 – Performed on 7 July from Kyoto, Japan as part of the Live Earth global environmental awareness musical event.

Honours[link]

Nyman was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2008 Birthday Honours.^[6]

Nyman was awarded an honorary doctorate (DLitt) from The University of Warwick on 30 January 2007. At the ceremony The University of Warwick Brass Society and Chamber Choir, conducted by Paul McGrath, premiered a specially composed procession and recession fanfare composed by Nyman.^[7]

Works[link]

• 1963 – Introduction and Allegro Concertato for Wind Quartet (lost)
• 1963 – Divertimento for Flute, Oboe and Clarinet
• 1965 – Canzona for Flute
• 1974 – Bell Set No. 1 (multiple metal percussion)
• 1976 – 1–100 (4–6 pianos)
• 1976 – (First) Waltz in D (variable)
• 1976 – (Second) Waltz in F (variable)
• 1977 – In Re Don Giovanni (ensemble)
• 1978 – The Otherwise Very Beautiful Blue Danube Waltz (multiple pianos)
• 1979 – "The Masterwork" Award Winning Fish-Knife (ensemble)
• 1980 – A Neat Slice of Time (choir)
• 1981 – Think Slow, Act Fast (ensemble)
• 1981 – Five Orchestral Pieces for Opus Tree (band*) (based on Anton Webern's Five Orchestral Pieces, Op. 10)
• 1981 – M-Work (band)
• 1981 – 2 Violins
• 1982 – Four Saxes (Real Slow Drag) (saxophone quartet)
• 1983 – A Handsome, Smooth, Sweet, Smart, Clear Stroke: Or Else Play Not At All

(orchestra)

• 1983 – Time's Up (chamber ensemble)
• 1983 – I'll Stake My Cremona to a Jew's Trump (electric violin and viola, both players also simultaneously singing)
• 1983 – Love is Certainly, at Least Alphabetically Speaking (soprano and band)
• 1984 – The Abbess of Andouillets (choir)
• 1985 – Nose-List Song (soprano and orchestra) [this and the above three works are from an unfinished opera setting of Laurence Sterne's The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, which Nyman has repeatedly cited as his all-time favourite book]
• 1985 – Childs Play (2 violins; harpsichord)
• 1985 – String Quartet No. 1
• 1986 – Taking a Line for a Second Walk (for orchestra (Basic Black) or piano duet)
• 1986 – The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat (opera; libretto by Christopher Rawlence; adapted from the Oliver Sacks case study by Nyman, Rawlence, and Michael Morris^{[disambiguation needed ]})
• 1986 – And Do They Do (modern dance, 1986)
• 1987 – Vital Statistics (opera; libretto by Victoria Hardie)
• 1988 – String Quartet No. 2
• 1989 – Out of the Ruins (choir)
• 1989 – La Traversée de Paris (soprano and band)
• 1989 – The Fall of Icarus (band)
• 1989 – L'Orgie Parisienne Arthur Rimbaud setting (soprano or mezzo soprano and orchestra)
• 1989 – La Sept (band)
• 1990 – Shaping the Curve (soprano saxophone, string quartet or piano)
• 1990 – Six Celan Songs (contralto and orchestra)
• 1990 – Polish Love Song (soprano and piano)
• 1990 – String Quartet No. 3
• 1990 – The Kiss and Other Movements
• 1991 – The Michael Nyman Songbook A collection of songs based on texts by Paul Celan, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, William Shakespeare, and Arthur Rimbaud and recorded with vocalist Ute Lemper.
• 1991 – Where the Bee Dances (soprano saxophone and orchestra)
• 1991 – Fluegelhorn and Piano
• 1992 – Time Will Pronounce (violin, cello, and piano)
• 1992 – For John Cage (brass ensemble)
• 1992 – Self-Laudatory Hymn of Inanna and Her Omnipotence (alto and string orchestra or countertenor and viol consort)
• 1992 – The Convertibility of Lute Strings (solo harpsichord)
• 1992 – Anne de Lucy Songs (soprano and piano)
• 1992 – Le Mari de la Coiffeuse (The Hairdresser's Husband)
• 1992 – The Upside-Down Violin (orchestra/ensemble)
• 1993 – MGV: Musique à grande vitesse (band and orchestra)
• 1993 – The Piano Concerto (piano and orchestra)
• 1993 – Noises, Sounds & Sweet Airs (1993; opera-ballet setting William Shakespeare's The Tempest)
• 1993 – Yamamoto Perpetuo (violin solo)
• 1993 – Songs for Tony (saxophone quartet)
• 1994 – To Morrow (soprano or soprano saxophone, organ)
• 1994 – 3 Quartets (ensemble)
• 1994 – Concerto for Trombone (trombone, orchestra, and steel filing cabinets)
• 1995 – String Quartet No. 4
• 1995 – Tango for Tim (In memoriam Tim Suster) (harpsichord)
• 1995 – The Waltz Song (unison voices)
• 1995 – Viola and Piano
• 1995 – Grounded (mezzo-soprano, saxophones, violin, piano)
• 1995 – HRT [High Rise Terminal] (chamber ensemble)
• 1995 – Concerto for Harpsichord and Strings
• 1995 – Double Concerto for Saxophone and Cello (saxophone, cello, and orchestra)
• 1996 – After Extra Time (ensemble)
• 1996 – Enemy Zero (game music)
• 1997 – Enemy Zero – Original Soundtrack
• 1997 – Strong on Oaks, Strong on the Causes of Oaks (orchestra)
• 1997 – The Promise (piano)
• 1997 – Gattaca
• 1998 – Titch (worked on the main opening/closing piano theme).
• 1998 – Cycle of Disquietude (Coisas, Vozes, Lettras) (soprano, mezzo-soprano, and band)
• 1998 – Orfeu (band)
• 1998 – De Granada A La Luna (band)
• 1999 – The Commissar Vanishes (band)
• 1999 – The End of the Affair
• 2000 – Facing Goya (opera; libretto by Victoria Hardie)
• 2001 – a dance he little thinks of (orchestra)
• 2003 – Violin Concerto (violin and orchestra)
• 2003 – Man and Boy: Dada (opera; libretto by Michael Hastings)
• 2005 – Love Counts (opera; libretto by Michael Hastings)
• 2006 – gdm for Marimba and Orchestra (concerto)
• 2006 – Acts of Beauty' (song cycle)
• 2007 – A Handshake in the Dark (choral piece with orchestra; text by Jamal Jumá [world premiere 8 March 2007, Barbican, London, performed by the BBC Symphony Chorus and Orchestra, John Storgards conducting])
• 2007 – Interlude in C (expansion of a theme from The Libertine for Accent07 touring ensemble)
• 2007 – Eight Lust Songs song cycle
• 2008 – Yamamoto Perpetuo for Solo Flute (arranged by Andy Findon)
• 2009 – Sparkie: Cage and Beyond opera with Carsten Nicolai
• 2009 – The Musicologist Scores (band)
• 2010 – 2Graves
• 2010 – Vertov Sounds

*originally recorded by Nyman, Ned Sublette, Susan Krongold, Barbara Benary, Jon Gibson, Richard Cohen^{[disambiguation needed ]}, Virgil Blackwell, Peter Zummo, and Peter Gordon at The Kitchen, and intended for Peter Greenaway's short film, The Tree.

Nyman's music re-used[link]

• Nyman's "The Heart Asks Pleasure First" (from The Piano) is the music on which Italian rock noir band Belladonna's song "Let There Be Light" is based. Released in December 2010, the track features Michael Nyman himself on piano.^[8]
• Nyman's "The Heart Asks Pleasure First" (from The Piano) was used as backing music for one of the bank advertisements for Lloyds TSB broadcast on television. It has also been featured in episodes of 20/20.
• Music from Ravenous has been used at least once on WFYI's Across Indiana, in a segment titled "On the Trail of John Hunt Morgan", produced by Scott Andrew Hutchins.
• Nyman's soundtrack for Carrington is mostly based on his own String Quartet No. 3.
• A Cock and Bull Story contains music from The Draughtsman's Contract, as well as Nyman's arrangements of classical music used in Stanley Kubrick's Barry Lyndon (it does not use any music from Nyman's Tristram Shandy opera).
• Nyman's music for Peter Greenaway's films has been used in the Japanese television program Iron Chef.
• Popular "Chasing Sheep is Best Left to Shepherds" (from The Draughtsman's Contract) constituted the main theme of Spanish TV program Queremos Saber, presented by Mercedes Milà in the nineties.
• Nyman features in '9 Songs' (Michael Winterbottom, 2004) playing at the Hackney Empire on his 60th birthday.
• Nyman's MGV: Musique à grande vitesse was used in November 2006 for a new one-act ballet for the Royal Ballet in London, DGV (danse à grande vitesse) by Christopher Wheeldon.
• Nyman's "The Heart Asks Pleasure First" was covered by the Finnish symphonic metal band Nightwish. Nyman had refused to release the song initially; the band was later granted permission and the song was released in February 29 2012 as part of the single The Crow, the Owl and the Dove from their album Imaginaerum.
• Time Lapse was used in Sky's 2008 'Heroes' advert
• Selections from Nyman's catalogue formed part of the soundtrack for James Marsh's 2008 documentary, Man on Wire, a film about Philippe Petit, a Frenchman, who in 1974 illegally strung a tightrope between the top of the WTC buildings and danced between them for 45 minutes, thus committing the "artistic crime of the 20th century".
• Nyman's piece "Car Crash" from A Zed & Two Noughts was used for once on the final episode of a Greek series called 'To Kafe Tis Xaras'

Recordings[link]

• Man and Boy: Dada – MN Records 102
• The Very Best of Michael Nyman: Film Music 1980-2001 – Virgin EMI CDVED957
• String Quartets 1–3 – Decca 4730912
• Decay Music EMI CVE964 2004

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Michael Nyman

• Michael Nyman official site
• Michael Nyman's homepage at Chester Music
• Michael Nyman at the Internet Movie Database
• Michael Nyman at the British Film Institute's Screenonline
• The Power of the Cadence: Michael Nyman in conversation with Robert Davidson
• 'The Case Against Nyman Revisited' Recent article on Michael Nyman's use of pre-existing music
• Michael Nyman à grande vitesse, review article in The Oxonian Review
• Michael Nyman judged The Film of the Month competition in June 2009 on the independent filmmakers networking site Shooting People
• An Evening with Michael Nyman, BAFTA event video

Listening[link]

• Michael Nyman audio at Internet Archive

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (February 2009)

Isabella Rossellini
Rossellini on location at Tempelhof Airport in Berlin to shoot some scenes for the film The Innocent, 1992
Born	Isabella Fiorella Elettra Giovanna Rossellini (1952-06-18) 18 June 1952 (age 60) Rome, Italy
Occupation	Actress, filmmaker, author, model, philanthropist
Years active	1976–present
Spouse	Martin Scorsese (1979–1982) Jonathan Wiedemann (1983–1986)
Partner	David Lynch (1986–1991) Gary Oldman (1994–1996)
Parents	Roberto Rossellini (deceased) Ingrid Bergman (deceased)

Isabella Fiorella Elettra Giovanna Rossellini (born 18 June 1952) is an Italian actress, filmmaker, author, philanthropist, and model. Rossellini is noted for her 14-year tenure as a Lancôme model, and for her roles in films such as Blue Velvet and Death Becomes Her.

Background and early life[link]

Rossellini is a daughter of Swedish actress Ingrid Bergman and Italian director Roberto Rossellini. She has three siblings from her mother: her twin sister Isotta Ingrid Rossellini, who is an adjunct professor of Italian literature; a brother, Robertino Ingmar Rossellini;^[1] and a half-sister, Pia Lindström, who formerly worked on television and is from her mother's first marriage with Petter Lindström. She has four other siblings from her father's two other marriages: Romano (died at age 9), Renzo, Gil, and Raffaella.^[2]

Rossellini was born in Rome, and raised there, as well as in Santa Marinella and Paris. She underwent an operation for appendicitis at the age of five.^[3] At 13, she was diagnosed with scoliosis.^{[citation needed]} In order to correct it, she had to undergo an 18 month ordeal of painful stretchings, body casts, surgery on her spine using pieces of one of her shin bones (used to add supports for the individual vertebrae without risking foreign body rejection issues), and a recovery from that surgery.^{[citation needed]} Consequently, she has permanent incision scars on her back and shin.

At 19, she went to New York, where she attended Finch College, while working as a translator and a RAI television reporter.^{[citation needed]} She also appeared intermittently on L'altra Domenica ("The Other Sunday"), a TV show featuring Roberto Benigni. However, she did not decide to stay full time in New York until her marriage to Martin Scorsese (1979–1982).

Rossellini with David Lynch at the Cannes Film Festival

Career[link]

Modeling[link]

At the age of 28, her modeling career began, when she was photographed by Bruce Weber for British Vogue and by Bill King for American Vogue. During her career, she has also worked with many other renowned photographers, including Richard Avedon, Steven Meisel, Helmut Newton, Peter Lindbergh, Norman Parkinson, Eve Arnold, Francesco Scavullo, Annie Leibovitz, Denis Piel, and Robert Mapplethorpe. Her image has appeared on such magazines as Marie Claire, Harper's Bazaar, Vanity Fair, and ELLE. In March 1988, an exhibition dedicated to photographs of her, called Portrait of a Woman, was held at the Musee d'Art Moderne in Paris.

Rossellini's modeling career led her into the world of cosmetics, when she became the exclusive spokesmodel for the international cosmetics brand Lancôme in 1982, replacing Nancy Dutiel in the United States and Carol Alt in Europe. At Lancôme, in 1990, she was involved in product development for the fragrance Trésor. In 1996, she was removed as the face of Lancôme for being "too old", since she was in her 40s at the time.

In October 1992, Rossellini modelled for Madonna's controversial book Sex. Rossellini also appeared in Madonna's music video for her successful Top 5 hit song "Erotica" released that autumn.

In 1995, Rossellini worked with the Coty Group and developed her own brand of cosmetics, Isabella Rossellini's Manifesto. She is signed to Trump Model Management.^{[citation needed]}

Film and television[link]

At the 2005 Torino Film Festival.

Rossellini made her film debut with a brief appearance as a nun opposite her mother in the 1976 film A Matter of Time. Her first role was the 1979 film Il Prato. She did not become successful with acting until after her mother's death in 1982, when she was cast in her first American film, White Nights (1985). She is probably best known for her pivotal role as the tortured nightclub singer Dorothy Vallens in David Lynch's Blue Velvet, in which she also did her own singing. Some other notable film roles include her work in Cousins, Death Becomes Her, Immortal Beloved, and Fearless.

In 2003, Rossellini had a recurring role on the television series, Alias. In that same year, she also appeared in the Canadian film The Saddest Music in the World directed by Guy Maddin. In 2004, she played the High Priestess Thar in the Sci Fi Channel miniseries Legend of Earthsea. In addition, she acted in an Off-Broadway production of The Stendhal Syndrome. She became an ambassador for the Silversea Cruise Line, which has her appearing in print ads and on their website.^[4]

In 2006, Rossellini appeared in several television documentaries. First, she narrated a two-hour television special on Italy for the Discovery Channel's Discovery Atlas series. In addition, on an episode of the Sundance Channel series Iconoclasts, which also featured the Segway PT inventor Dean Kamen, she told about her past and current activities.^[5] In 2007, Rossellini guest starred on two episodes of the television show 30 Rock, playing Alec Baldwin's character's ex-wife.^{[episode needed]} She also appeared on an episode of the TV series Friends in 1996 as herself.^{[episode needed]}

In 2008, Rossellini toured the festival circuit, including the Sundance Film Festival, with a series of short films entitled Green Porno, which she wrote and co-directed with Jody Shapiro. Each Green Porno film is two minutes long, and has Rossellini reenacting the mating rituals of various animals.

Rossellini was announced as the President of the Jury for the 61st Berlin International Film Festival in 2011.^[6]

She played the role of Gabriella Guglielmi-Valentino in Silent Life, released in 2012.

Awards[link]

Rossellini received a 1987 Independent Spirit Award for Best Female Lead for her role in Blue Velvet. In 1997, she received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Performance by an Actress in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for TV for her role in Crime of the Century and an Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series for her work on the television series Chicago Hope. Also in 1997, Rossellini was awarded The George Eastman Award.^[7] In 1998, she received an Honourable Mention at the 48th Berlin International Film Festival for her role in the film Left Luggage.^[8]

Activism[link]

Rossellini is involved in conservation efforts. She is a board member of the Wildlife Conservation Network,^[9] and president and director of the Howard Gilman Foundation, a leading institution focused on the preservation of wildlife, arts, photography and dance.^[10][11] She received $100,000 from Disney to help with her conservation efforts in those two organizations.^[12] She has also helped with the Central Park Conservancy,^[13] and is a major benefactor of the Bellport-Brookhaven Historical Society of Bellport, Long Island, where she is a part-time resident.^[14]

Rossellini is involved in training guide dogs for the blind.^[15][16] She is a former trustee of the George Eastman House and a 1997 George Eastman Award honoree for her support of film preservation.^[17] She is also a National Ambassador for the U.S. Fund for UNICEF.^[18]

Writing[link]

Rossellini has written three books - her self-described fictional memoir, Some of Me (1997), Looking at Me (on pictures and photographers, 2002), and In the name of the Father, the Daughter and the Holy Spirits: Remembering Roberto Rossellini (2006), accompanied by the Guy Maddin-directed short film My Dad Is 100 Years Old (both the film and the book are tributes to her father). In the film, she played almost every role, including David Selznick, Alfred Hitchcock, and her mother Ingrid Bergman.

In 2008, Rossellini wrote a number of television shorts on the Sundance Channel called Green Porno. The short segments (about 2 minutes each) are written, hosted and acted out by Rossellini. She has written a book to accompany the third season - a multimedia experiment that contains a companion DVD, both of which serve as additional information for the series' third season.^[19]

Personal life[link]

Rossellini holds dual United States and Italian citizenship.^[4][20]

She was married to Martin Scorsese from 1979 to 1982.^{[citation needed]} After her marriage to Scorsese ended, she married Jon Wiedemann (1983–1986), a Harvard-educated model from Texas (now a Microsoft executive).^{[citation needed]} Later, she dated David Lynch, Gary Oldman, and Gregory Mosher.^{[citation needed]}

She has a daughter, Elettra Rossellini Wiedemann (born 1983), and an adopted son, Roberto (born 1992).^{[citation needed]}

Credits[link]

Further reading[link]

• "Isabella Rossellini: Biography" (Flash). Iconoclasts. Sundance Channel L.L.C.. http://www.iconoclaststv.com/. Retrieved 2007-01-29. 
• Rossellini, Isabella (1997). Some of Me. New York: Random House. ISBN 0-679-45252-4. 
• Rossellini, Isabella (2002). Looking at Me (on pictures and photographers). Munich: Schirmer Art. ISBN 3-8296-0057-7. 
• Rossellini, Isabella (2006). In the Name of the Father, the Daughter and the Holy Spirits, Remembering Roberto Rossellini. London: Haus Publishing. ISBN 1-904950-91-4. 

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Isabella Rossellini

• The Babelgum Metropolis Art Prize, of which Isabella Rossellini is the head judge.
• Isabella Rossellini at the Internet Movie Database
• Isabella Rossellini at the TCM Movie Database
• Isabella Rossellini at the Fashion Model Directory
• Isabella Rossellini at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Interview with Isabella Rossellini before the release of The Saddest Music in the World.
• Interview with Isabella Rossellini after 14 years with Lancôme
• Interview with Isabella Rossellini about her career and her parent's legacy