Legendary Makeup and Costume Designer Van Smith passed away last week. Here is the NYTimes article about him.

Did you hear that Bret Easton Ellis is working on a horror-tinged soap opera for Showtime, called "The Canyons"?

How about a couple of surreal pieces from Mihai Criste:

Essence of Creation

Mathafisic Autum

And lastly...

Orhan Pamuk held his Nobel Lecture on December 7, 2006, at the Swedish Academy, in Stockholm. You can click here to either read a transcript or watch a video of him giving the entire lecture, titled "My Father's Suitcase." I very much enjoyed what Pamuk had to say, not only because I am a fan of his work, but because of the way he made such a public speech so very beautifully personal. Here is a particularly powerful excerpt:

"As you know, the question we writers are asked most often, the favourite question, is; why do you write? I write because I have an innate need to write! I write because I can't do normal work like other people. I write because I want to read books like the ones I write. I write because I am angry at all of you, angry at everyone. I write because I love sitting in a room all day writing. I write because I can only partake in real life by changing it. I write because I want others, all of us, the whole world, to know what sort of life we lived, and continue to live, in Istanbul, in Turkey. I write because I love the smell of paper, pen, and ink. I write because I believe in literature, in the art of the novel, more than I believe in anything else. I write because it is a habit, a passion. I write because I am afraid of being forgotten. I write because I like the glory and interest that writing brings. I write to be alone. Perhaps I write because I hope to understand why I am so very, very angry at all of you, so very, very angry at everyone. I write because I like to be read. I write because once I have begun a novel, an essay, a page, I want to finish it. I write because everyone expects me to write. I write because I have a childish belief in the immortality of libraries, and in the way my books sit on the shelf. I write because it is exciting to turn all of life's beauties and riches into words. I write not to tell a story, but to compose a story. I write because I wish to escape from the foreboding that there is a place I must go but – just as in a dream – I can't quite get there. I write because I have never managed to be happy. I write to be happy."