The first monograph of one of today’s most influential interior designers, with dazzling residences designed for Sean Combs, Lenny Kravitz, and Mexican novelist Laura Esquivel. Suspending Reality draws on over sixty of Benjamin Noriega-Ortiz’s projects, designed over his firm’s twenty-year history, to provide both a long-awaited peek into the creative mind of a celebrity designer, and a generous dose of advice for those inspired to decorate show-stopping rooms of their own. Lively chapters cover everything from how to evaluate an empty room or use a client’s Pinterest page to generate a storyboard, to how to create a sense of procession in an entryway or hall, and specific tips for lighting with a mix of incandescent, LED, and even florescent lights. This comprehensive book includes projects from Noriega-Ortiz’s own famed all-white Manhattan apartment—in a stunning chapter on all-white rooms—to luxury spaces in the Dakota, Mark Seliger’s former factory loft on New York’s West Side Highway, a Paris piéd-a-terre, a modern house in Venice, California, Lenny Kravitz’s Mediterranean-style mansion, and a beach house in Quogue whose kitchen cabinets are studded with Swarovski crystals. Learn the stories behind iconic designs for the Mondrian hotels around the country, inspired by Jean Cocteau and the Garden of Eden, find transformative tricks for mirrors, or simply daydream about the luminous glass and metal roof over the Like Water for Chocolate author’s study and writing room. Noriega-Ortiz explains how he captures the unusual sense of openness, light, and positivity in his projects—whether with works by Cindy Sherman and Louise Bourgeois, or furniture from West Elm—through his use of color, materials, and spatial sleight of hand. An ethereal curtain creates unexpected mystery, a bold splash of color invigorates the senses, and a seat upholstered in a tactile material like Mongolian lamb beckons to be touched. Each space is tempered by a whimsical element meant to pull us out of everyday life and to inject a moment of fantasy and delight, to defy expectations and create the kind of comfort that suspends reality.
emotional ROOMS the sensual interiors of benjamin noriega-ortiz Named by House Beautiful as one of "America's Most Brilliant Decorators" for ten consecutive years, Benjamin Noriega-Ortiz is recognized as one of the most stylish and influential of today's interior designers. His sensuous, glamorous, and ethereal work captures an unusual sense of openness and light through the use of color, materials, architecture, and the unexpected integration of fashion. Noriega-Ortiz has traveled the world to design spaces for such clients as rock superstar Lenny Kravitz, bestselling author Laura Esquivel, and celebrity photographer Mark Seliger. Now, with Emotional Rooms, he shares his process with anyone who may not have access to a high-end designer but wants a home or workspace that is at once beautiful and true to themselves. Noriega-Ortiz brings together in this book not only photographs of his interiors but personal images that will inspire and evoke the designer within us all. With stunning full-color photographs and clear, concise essays, he guides readers through the essential principles of design -- color, architecture, furniture, and lighting -- and gives advice on how homeowners can prevent common mistakes. He shows them how to break the rules, ignore trends and labels, stop pleasing others, and decorate their homes to reflect their own true desires. For those influenced by passing fads and fashions, Noriega-Ortiz's essential advice is: Emotion is always a better guide than intellect when it comes to creating a richly satisfying environment. Home truly is where the heart is, and this famous designer has what it takes to help readers put the heart back into their homes.
It took just one riddle to turn this wedding into a disaster. When a young Philistine woman married an Israelite man named Samson, everything seemed to be well. Until, on the night of the wedding feast, the newly married Samson challenged his bride’s Philistine guests to a battle of wits. Now in desperation, the guests threatened the new bride with her life if she failed to retrieve the answer to the wedding’s riddle from the groom. Would she deceive her husband to save her life, or would love find a way for all to remain alive and at peace with one another? The Wedding’s Riddle is an epic and emotional retelling of a Bible story in the book of Judges. Find out what happens to the relationship between Samson and his bride, along with who will be the victor of this contest between the Israelites and the Philistines.
Origins of Cuban Music and Dance: Changüí is the first in-depth study of changüí, a style of music and dance in Guantánamo, Cuba. Changüí is analogous to blues in the United States and is a crucible of Cuban Creole culture. Benjamin Lapidus describes changüí and its relationship to the roots of son, Cuba's national genre and the style of music that contributed to the development of salsa, in Eastern Cuba. He also highlights the connections between Afro-Haitian music and Cuban popular music through changüí, connections with the Caribbean that have been largely overlooked in the past. After an initial historical discussion about the region of Guantánamo and the inter-connectedness of its various musical styles with a focus on changüí, Lapidus discusses the technical aspects of the genre as practiced within the region and beyond. He considers the socio-historical importance of its lyrics, presenting numerous musical transcriptions that explain how the music is structured, as well as providing background stories to songs. In a chapter unique to this book and a first in Cuban musicology and ethnography, Lapidus describes years of festivals and musical competitions to show how local musical identity takes shape, particularly when encountering national narratives of music history. The volume concludes with a comparison between changüí and son, as well as a bibliography, discography, and videography.
Naked and Alone is a comparative analysis of early modern captivity narratives that chronicle the harrowing experiences of a few Iberians and one Hessian in the New World during the century of exploration and colonization. Included among them are the tales of Jerónimo de Aguilar and Gonzalo Guerrero, Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca , Juan Ortiz, Hans Stade, and Francisco Núñez de Pineda y Bascuñán. After years of captivity that stripped the unfortunate men of their cultural identity, they eventually reunited with their countrymen to relate and record tales that rivaled the heroic epics. The authors thus provided most Europeans with a first glimpse into exotic New World societies considered strange and perhaps even diabolical by the colonizers. At the same time, most contemporaries used the narratives as justification for imperial prerogatives although the captives themselves came away with a deeper understanding of and appreciation for their Indian captors. Although considered by some early historians as reliable texts, the captivity narratives are rejected by this author as historically accurate depictions of the experiences—faulty memories, contemporary myth, and the authors’ subjectivity greatly impeded the veracity. He instead argues that the texts are cultural artifacts that offer useful insight to the mentalities of the age. In order to construct a histoire des mentalities, the author incorporates anthropological perspectives of myth and employs textual/contextual analysis to unlock the deeper meanings often obscured by the literary imagery. What results is an interpretation that aids understanding of sixteenth-century peoples and societies, and of the post-colonial American cultures most directly influenced by them.
New social movements have emerged in Bolivia over the “price of fire”—access to basic elements of survival like water, gas, land, coca, employment, and other resources. Though these movements helped pave the way to the presidency for indigenous coca-grower Evo Morales in 2005, they have made it clear that their fight for self-determination doesn’t end at the ballot box. From the first moments of Spanish colonization to today’s headlines, The Price of Fire offers a gripping account of clashes in Bolivia between corporate and people’s power, contextualizing them regionally, culturally, and historically. Benjamin Dangl has worked as an independent journalist throughout Latin America, writing for publications such as Z Magazine, The Nation, and The Progressive. He is the editor of TowardFreedom.com, a progressive perspective on world events, and UpsideDownWorld.org, an online magazine covering activism and politics in Latin America. Benjamin won a 2007 Project Censored Award for his coverage of US military operations in Paraguay. “Price of Fire is not yet another bleak ‘tell-all’ account of globalization, its pages are filled with stories of resistance, struggle and, above all, hope.”—Teo Ballvé, editor of the NACLA Report on the Americas and co-editor of Dispatches from Latin America “Ben Dangl takes the reader on an unforgettable and inspiring journey through Bolivia and neighboring countries, providing a window on the revolutionary struggles of the poor and dispossessed, and particularly on the resurgence of indigenous resistance and leadership.”—Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, author of Blood on the Border: A Memoir of the Contra War “Most Americans know nothing of Bolivia, an ignorance that only plays into the hands of empire. Ben Dangl’s book is both informative and inspiring, a cure for the apathy that grows from that ignorance. A must-read for those already interested in solidarity with Latin America and indigenous people.”—Tom Hayden, author of The Zapatista Reader and Street Wars “Ben Dangl has found himself under the skin of the Bolivian freedom struggle: he accurately represents its constraints, its opportunities, and its hopes.”—Vijay Prashad, author of The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the Third World “With great empathy and lucid prose, Dangl captures the exemplary courage that has put Latin America in the vanguard of the new internationalism and has made it one of the few bright spots on an otherwise dismal global landscape.”—Greg Grandin, author of Empire’s Workshop "Price of Fire by Ben Dangl informs, outrages, and builds hope. People’s movements for societal betterment in South America are an inspiration for human rights activists worldwide and Dangl gives us a full serving of encouragement and hope. He documents how historical imperialism, dominated my US corporate/government capital interests, is being successfully challenged by indigenous activists. Price of Fire is the story of cultural resistance from the street to international geo-political alliances. I highly recommend this book for working people, students, and radical democrats to hear the voices of South American people and their chronicle of grassroots democratic empowerment."—Peter Phillips, Professor Sociology, Sonoma State University, Director Project Censored, and co-editor with Dennis Loo of Impeach the President: The Case Against Bush and Cheney
A wonderful look at the stories of a family trying to make it in the United States. It chronicles a Dominican man who immigrates to America during the post-World War II era, and subsequently shares most of the twentieth century's second half working to achieve his family's American Dream. In the words of the author, "This story is one of perseverance, which exemplifies the American dream, and love, which is the magic behind spirituality. It can be recognized in many families who have had forefathers that sacrificed much to bear the fruits they enjoy today. It is a tale that needs to be told to remind us of where we come from." The story is set to the backdrop of events of American Major League Baseball, a major reason for the connection of generations and cultures. It recounts the history of Baseball in the United States for the last half of the twentieth century, in a way that reflects the principles of that period. The writer takes the reader though his observations of those Baseball seasons, and how they helped shape his perspective on family and teamwork. Filled with personal anecdotal stories, poingant stories, and opinions, the story attempts to make the reader laugh, cry, and think.
The postrevolutionary reconstruction of the Mexican government did not easily or immediately reach all corners of the country. At every level, political intermediaries negotiated, resisted, appropriated, or ignored the dictates of the central government. National policy reverberated through Mexico s local and political networks in countless different ways and resulted in a myriad of regional arrangements. It is this process of diffusion, politicking, and conflict that Benjamin T. Smith examines in Pistoleros and Popular Movements. Oaxaca s urban social movements and the tension between federal, state, and local governments illuminate the multivalent contradictions, fragmentations, and crises of the state-building effort at the regional level. A better understanding of these local transformations yields a more realistic overall view of the national project of state building. Smith places Oaxaca within this larger framework of postrevolutionary Mexico by comparing the region to other states and linking local politics to state and national developments. Drawing on an impressive range of regional case studies, this volume is a comprehensive and engaging study of postrevolutionary Oaxaca s role in the formation of modern Mexico.
The 1910 Revolution is still tangibly present in Mexico in the festivals that celebrate its victories, on the monuments to its heroes, and, most important, in the stories and memories of the Mexican people. Yet there has never been general agreement on what the revolution meant, what its objectives were, and whether they have been accomplished. This pathfinding book shows how Mexicans from 1910 through the 1950s interpreted the revolution, tried to make sense of it, and, through collective memory, myth-making, and history writing, invented an idea called "la Revolución." In part one, Thomas Benjamin follows the historical development of different and often opposing revolutionary traditions and the state's efforts to forge them into one unified and unifying narrative. In part two, he examines ways of remembering the past and making it relevant to the present through fiestas, monuments, and official history. This research clarifies how the revolution has served to authorize and legitimize political factions and particular regimes to the present day. Beyond the Mexican case, it demonstrates how history is used to serve the needs of the present.
The debate over restricting the number of Mexican immigrants to the United States began early in the twentieth century, a time when U.S.-Mexican relations were still tenuous following the Mexican Revolution and when heated conflicts over mineral rights, primarily oil, were raging between the two nations. Though Mexico had economic reasons for curbing emigration, the racist tone of the quota debate taking place in the United States offended Mexicans’ national pride and played a large part in obstructing mutual support for immigration restriction between the United States and Mexico. Risking Immeasurable Harm explains how the prospect of immigration restriction affects diplomatic relations by analyzing U.S. efforts to place a quota on immigration from Mexico during the late 1920s and early 1930s. The controversial quota raised important questions about how domestic immigration policy debates had international consequences, primarily how the racist justifications for immigration restriction threatened to undermine U.S. relations with Mexico. Benjamin C. Montoya follows the quota debate from its origin in 1924, spurred by the passage of the Immigration Act, to its conclusion in 1932. He examines congressional policy debate and the U.S. State Department’s steady opposition to the quota scheme. Despite the concerns of American diplomats, in 1930 the Senate passed the Harris Bill, which singled out Mexico among all other Latin American nations for immigration restriction. The lingering effects of the quota debates continued to strain diplomatic relations between the United States and Mexico beyond the Great Depression. Relevant to current debates about immigration and the role of restrictions in inter-American diplomacy, Risking Immeasurable Harm demonstrates the correlation of immigration restriction and diplomacy, the ways racism can affect diplomatic relations, and how domestic immigration policy can have international consequences.
Grassroots social movements played a major role electing left-leaning governments throughout Latin America. Subsequent relations between these states and "the streets" remain troubled. Contextualizing recent developments historically, Dangl untangles the contradictions of state-focused social change, providing lessons for activists everywhere.
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