Madrid

Once in those early years he’d gone into a Starbucks, seen the human forms cowled over white paper  read more »

Once in those early years he’d gone into a Starbucks, seen the human forms cowled over white p  read more »

Last night, roughly 100 people attended the unofficial Tribeca Film Festival screening of Sketches of Frank Gehry, director Sydney Pollack's documentary on the famous architect (who also happens to be his friend, too).

Every seat was taken in the DOLBY screening room (formerly the MGM room). But a handful of invited guests snagged director's chairs that were placed along the sides of the small theater.

Regis Philbin, Ken Burns, and Morley Safer were amongst the notable names in the crowd--which was comprised mostly of film industry types.

Mr. Pollack addressed the audience prior to the start of the 82-minute film by saying, "one thing I've never learned is how to introduce a film."  read more »

Nevertheless, Mr. Pollack began by discussing his first visit to Guggenheim Bilbao several years ago. Unfortunately, it occurred under less than ideal circumstances.

We've never known elements of the New York City construction industry to be profiteers. Heaven forfend! But now, McGraw Hill Construction reports, structural engineers and, of course, steel manufacturers are crying foul over the mounting campaign by makers of structural concrete to paint steel as a dangerous building material--using the fall of the World Trade Center and the fire at the Windsor Tower in Madrid as their examples.

Introducing the Concrete Alliance, a trade group with a Safety Message:

The promotional group is supported by New York City-area concrete contractors and construction unions. This fall, the alliance plans to launch an initiative that would offer a "safety seal of approval" to owners of concrete-framed buildings, which they could use for marketing purposes. ... The alliance now is pushing concrete office towers, a building type long dominated in New York City by structural steel.

Most engineers quoted in the article claimed that it is the structure, and not the structural material, that makes the difference. But it is likely the skyscraper safety movement and the resulting P.R. war that will determine which of the two materials comes to dominate.

- Tom McGeveran

How long does it take before New York's Olympics supporters start talking about a rematch next time around? Maybe 60 seconds. "It probably makes New York that much stronger for the 2016 bid," said gold medal-winning decathlete Dan O'Brien (Atlanta 1996), just after London was announced as the winner of the 2012 summer games. "Because it goes to London, we'll probably have that much more strength to bring it to North America."

Of course, the same could have been said had Paris or Madrid won, and the idea of awarding the games to an English-speaking country twice in a row can't be too appetizing to the rest of the world.

And fingers are already pointing at Daniel Doctoroff, for stubbornly sticking to the stillborn West Side Olympics stadium plan until it became too late to rescue the City's bid.

And while, in recent days, talk of 2016 had been forbidden as a jinx, now, it's a free for all. At 7 a.m., about a half hour after New York lost on the second round of voting, David Oats launched his website to bring the Olympics to Queens in 2016. He and his Queens Olympics Committee had been pushing to move the main stadium to Flushing Meadows for more than three years before the Mayor finally relented. Maybe they know something we don't.  read more »

- Matthew Schuerman

All decent people sympathize with the people of Madrid, but New Yorkers can speak with knowledge.  read more »

It's been said of the Spanish painter Francisco Goya y Lucientes (1746-1828), whose work is currentl  read more »

I was traveling in Spain,on a trip to study Goya, when the terrorists struck New  read more »