Year: 2008

Those Nazi Bastards

This past 3-day weekend, Carol and I watched two movies. Both are about WWII — the fictional tragic romance Atonement, and The Counterfeiters, based on a true story. In this scene, the forger Salomon Sorowitsch uses his artistic talents to curry favor and improve his condition in the Mauthausen concentration camp.

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In this regard Sorowitsch paralleled Dina Gottliebova Babbitt, who survived Auschwitz by painting portraits for the Nazis, most notably the infamous Josef Mengele. Babbitt was later an artist at the Disney studio. Babbitt is still alive, and she’s trying to regain ownership of her Auschwitz paintings. In that effort she is being helped by two comic book artists — Neal Adams and Joe Kubert.

I knew an artist who escaped the Nazis. He was my drawing teacher in college. His name was Arno Maris.

Arno Maris

Arno had been a champion gymnast in his native Holland. He wasn’t a tall man, but he was powerfully built. As I recall Arno telling me the story, after the Nazis had occupied the Netherlands, he took a row boat and, in the darkness of night, headed out into the open ocean, with no idea what would become of him. As luck would have it, he was picked up by a Merchant Marine ship, and he lived to tell the tale.

“Those Nazi bastards,” Arno would say, with great emphasis. In my mind right now I can still hear Arno talking to me, in that unmistakable Dutch accent of his, calling me “Dock-less.” Arno Maris was an excellent art instructor, and a wonderful man.

K3 10 Jaar Show

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Why the “K3 onslaught,” as Eric calls it? Because this month is their 10th anniversary, and they’re celebrating with a series of shows.

K3 10 Jaar show 2008

So what I’m doing is jumping on the bandwagon. And here’s the bandwagon.

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How do I keep up with with K3’s concert schedule? I use the RSS feed you’ll find by clicking here. Then click the picture below to enlarge it, and keep in mind that the ladies have been at this for ten years, and they’re busier than ever.

Kathleen Aerts and Karen Damen

I’d like to think this was taken after a show, but it looks to me as though they’re just setting up for a rehearsal. Poor Kathleen! She’s the youngest member in the band, and if she looks this beat, I assume Karen and Kristel must sometimes feel the same way. How much longer can they keep up what is obviously a very grueling schedule? Even Petula Clark had to take some time off every so often in her younger years to attend to family and personal matters.

Another side of K3

If you go through the conveniently categorized K3 posts, it’s obvious there are two different acts — one primarily for kids, and another for their parents. Here’s an example of the latter. According to Google, “Een Rustige Ouwe Dag” translates into “A Quiet Old Day.” A while ago I linked to another take of this video on YouTube, but the audio cuts out in places. This copy is OK. Does it sound to you as though they’re singing “Tom Hanks”?

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This is how the studio version sounds. Very nice.

[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2008/OCT/K3EenRustigeOudeDag.mp3]

I’ve always been fascinated by what works and doesn’t work in popular music, but somewhere along the way, after getting out of the radio business, I stopped keeping up with much of anything new. A few bands caught my attention, including REM and Green Day (Eric can’t stand Green Day!), but for the most part I continued to enjoy the old stuff. Carol got me listening to Steve Earle and Lucina Williams, along with a local singer-songwriter here in Massachusetts named Lori McKenna, who’s had some national success.

Not that I feel the need to justify my appreciation of K3, but as a popular music act, I think they have it. The fact that I don’t understand Flemish is inconsequential.

Catchy songs and production values, with cute costumes and dances, aren’t enough. Thirty seconds of Wir3 performing a K3 song is proof of that. Karen Damen, Kathleen Aerts and Kristel Verbeke are why K3 has been successful for ten years, and seem to be more popular than ever.

Krugman wins Nobel for Economics

What a welcome bit of news. Princeton economist Paul Krugman has won the Nobel Prize. Krugman is one of the most pointed critics of the George W. Bush administration, and I read both his NYTimes column and blog regularly.

With this award comes, I hope, a move away from the ideas of Milton Friedman, who won the Nobel in 1976. That recognition quickly led to the development of the “trickle down” policies that were implemented by Ronald Reagan starting in 1981. The worldwide economic mess we’re in right now is proof that Friedman was wrong about laissez-faire economic policies in the 1920’s not being one of the causes of the Great Depression.