COVER STORY
Beauty
Kurt Andersen and his guest, Harvard philosophy professor Elaine Scarry, look at different kinds of beauty.

Painting with Pills
For some art critics, calling a painter’s work "beautiful" is a subtle dis – a code for pleasing but shallow. Calling a work “decorative” is a total slap in the face. Fred Tomaselli’s work is decorative. It is also smart and provocative. Tomaselli’s canvases are full of beautiful arcs, ovals and swirls. And he creates those patterns with medicine – actual, colorful pills by the thousands. Produced by Trey Kay.
Go to the James Cohan Gallery website
Go to more of Tomiselli’s work

Bigger, Better Beauty
Our pop culture is obsessed with beautiful people. But the notions of beauty, sexuality and what’s supposed to be attractive may be changing. Jocelyn Gonzales talked to two photographers about their images of female bodybuilders.
Go to Andres Serrano at Paula Cooper gallery
Go to Andres Serrano’s website
Go to the Bernice Steinbaum gallery to find more on Deborah Willis
Go to the book, Picturing the Modern Amazons at Amazon

Stormy Music
The composer Lois Vierk gives her music titles taken from dramatic phenomena, like Jagged Mesa and Demon Star and Simoom, an Arabic name for a certain wind. So it seemed appropriate that when producer Jonathan Mitchell interviewed her about what she considers beautiful music, the forces of nature intervened.
Go to Lois Vierk’s website

SPECIAL GUEST
Elaine Scarry
Elaine Scarry is the author of On Beauty and Being Just. A professor of aesthetics at Harvard University, her interests are wide-ranging; she is also the author of The Body in Pain, Dreaming By the Book, and a forthcoming work on war and the social contract. Among her articles is a detailed study of the causes of the fall of TWA Flight 800.

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Commentary
Self-Satire
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Inspiration strikes
You’ve probably had a moment in your life where something about your destiny suddenly became clear, when you could almost see the cartoon lightbulb appear over your own head. Playwright David Ives remembers the scene that sentenced him to the theater for life.

Design for the Real World
Design critic Veronique Vienne tells us how pieces of reflective glass in 18th century France sparked a culture of narcissism.

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