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Television News

Over the past two weeks I have been quite the news junky. I’ve hardly been able to peel myself away from the major news sites on the internet. On several occasions this week I’ve read a couple of different newspapers (which is rare, I hardly ever read newspapers). I’ve listened to a lot of NPR and I’ve inevitably watched a lot of television.When I woke up last Monday morning the first thing I did was run to the television to see how bad the damage from hurricane Katrina was. After watching a few minutes, and seeing only the first trickle of footage coming from down south, I turned to the internet to read about it. And I repeated this scenario several times throughout the week.

Being exposed to newspapers, television, internet news-sites and even blogs all covering the same event has gotten me thinking about how the different media have covered the event. Each media seems to come with its own set of strengths and weaknesses.

Although television is capable of delivering pictures that clearly more emotional and easier to relate to than the other media, I find it to be one of the worst media for delivering news. This is not entirely the fault of the newscaster and journalists themselves, but rather a fundamental flaws in the media itself.

And here’s a few reasons why:

News does not happen 24 hours a day.

Cable TV news networks stream news to us constantly, often even when there really isn’t much of a story.

One inherent flaw of television news is that the networks must retain viewers, so they are reluctant to ever say “tune in tonight, when we’ll have more for you on this, but for now there’s nothing going on.” Normally what happens is, they find something that looks spectacular on television (like live footage of a house on fire or someone being rescued by helicopter) and treat it with the same gravity as they did the previous story.

There is no commentary, there is only debate. And there’s not much debate, there’s mostly yelling.

Jon Stewart appeared on Crossfire last year and asked for the commentators to “please stop, you’re hurting the country.” I really couldn’t agree more. Shows like this always have the same premise: Put on a conservative and a liberal and have them yell about an issue.

The things said are rarely informative, and nothing is ever accomplished. It’s not news. It’s not even insightful commentary. It’s crap.

There is rarely a summary of the day.

The nightly network news is an exception, but rarely do you ever see cable news back up and tell us what happened today. Or better yet, what happened over the past few months, years, decades that led up to this point.

During the coverage of the Iraq War, the networks would mention that the United States once supported Saddam Hussein. But I never caught why (of course it had to do with Hussein fighting against Iran, the United States at the time figured he was the lesser of two evils, but I didn’t learn that from TV news). What led Saddam to power? When? What was the chain of events that led up to where we are now? Why are there photos of Rumsfeld shaking hands with Hussein? Take time away from covering the Raelians and “debate” shows and back up and give us a summary.

The “News Scroll” Chyrons.

I’m sure they seemed like a good idea at the time. And they can be helpful, for example when a local station announces school closings or weather warnings or when a sports station announces scores for games not being televised. But as an informer of news, they are worthless. FoxNews seems to be the worst offender, throwing up headlines like “Roberts Hearings to Begin Monday” and “Victims to Get $2K Debit Cards”. They say little and explain nothing.

No “letters to the editor” or “corrections section”

Every Thursday on NPR, letters are read on air and corrections are made. Normally, they are minor but it is nice that they corrected it. Same goes for newspapers and magazines. I also find it comforting to see letters to the editor published, especially when the letter does not cast the printing newspaper in good light.

I’m sure that it happens, but I’ve never caught TV news mentioning mistakes they’ve made, or allowing criticism on air. And I know they make some mistakes worth criticizing.

There’s no “putting things into context”, in either time or space.

Much of the TV News coverage of the Katrina aftermath was utterly confused. Often times I had no idea which part of the city the news cast was in. Rarely was it explained to me when the footage I was watching was actually shot. I’ve seen the same footage on different times of the day on different days.

Television is simply not well suited for graphics, I understand that. Television is just plain better when it involves you emotionally. Viewers want to see the harrowing footage of fires and helicopters blowing shingles off of roofs. Viewers get bored when you show a map of the city and actually explain where the footage was taken, where the reporters are reporting from, where the water came from, which parts of the levees broke and so on. Is the Garden District flooded? Show a graphic explaining which parts of New Orleans are under water.

Having been there just a handful of times, I’m only vaguely familiar with New Orleans, and this week I’ve relied heavily on newspapers and internet to help me navigate the jarring shifts from the French Quarter to the Super Dome to the Garden District and suddenly over to Biloxi.

Television graphics are woefully inadequate when it comes to anything in-depth. TImelines, for example, are often laid out in newspapers, the internet, and magazines. And timelines work great at showing events happening, in context, in chronological order. Watching the news on television left me thoroughly confused as to when things happened and where.

And there-in lies the big problem with Television News. So much of news, at least the important parts, is tedious details and information. Television doesn’t do this well. Television is great at offering spectacle and images and grabbing us emotionally, but fails us all with what some would say is the boring details.

How to Enjoy the Holidays

There are enough mechanical santas chanting electronic “ho ho hos” and enough stupid “antler hats” to insight you to a level of violence that would insure you a prominent spot on the six o’clock news. You’ve had it up to here with the electronic, rushed-through-production versions of Rockin’ Round The Christmas Tree that play at every grocery store you visit.

Ever year the noise seems to get worse and the holidays seem a bit less enjoyable. So what’s a body to do? How is it really possible to not only survive, but actually enjoy the holidays? With all the excess commercialism and Clay Aiken’s new christmas album, it seams near impossible. But all hope is not lost. There are five steps one can take to make this Holiday Season rather enjoyable.

1. Get some Vince Guaraldi. Turn off the TV and play Guaraldi in the evening. Remember, you’re not at a Led Zepplin concert, play it at a reasonable, soft volume. This should cleanse your palette of Grandma Got Ran Over By a Reindeer.

2. Drink Egg Nog. If you’re not a member of the Church of Latter Day Saints, put rum in it.

3. See that girl in the Christmas tree t-shirt and a santa hat?...don’t talk to her.

4. Remember that Christmas comes every year. It’s not critical that this year be the “best Christmas ever”. If anyone calls you a scrooge for having this philosophy, don’t worry about it. They’re an idiot.

5. Do not, under any circumstances, enter one of the following: Wal-Mart, Saks Fifth Avenue, Border’s Books, Kroger, Target, Publix, a building that could be referred to as a mall, any shop that is only open at christmas, any store that spells shop with an e, Toy R Us, any shopping center, any grocery store, or any other place that you risk hearing Celine Dion belt out Merry Xmas (War is Over).

If you follow these five simple rules, you will undoubtedly enjoy the holidays.

Merry Christmas.

Chuck Close: Process and Collaboration at the KMA

The KMA has been woefully uninspiring for a great many months. The last great exhibit was a collection of Polaroids (of course, that was an awesome show. One of the best I’ve seen there). There have been many great shows in the past, but not lately. This one, happily, ends that trend.

Chuck Close: Process and Collaboration focuses on Close’s experiments and investigations into the art of printmaking. His first print was in 1972, and since then he’s become an important proponent of printmaking as a fine art.

The exhibit contains pieces spanning the last 35 years of Close’s career. It contains many of his self portraits that were made over this time, which interestingly document his aging. Close’s experiments over a wide variety of media are also shown. Mezzotints, lithographs, torn-paper collages, woodblocks, and silk screens are all present, as are a variety of images using a range of techniques, from small eight inch prints done with etching to the gargantuan eight foot tall heads done with silkscreen.

There is a certain understated discomfort in standing in front of an eight foot tall head staring directly at you, just as there is always a delight in standing close and looking at the abstracted brushstrokes or pencil lines that one can back away from and realize they add up to a photo-realistic portrait. The museum was filled with people standing ten inches away from a print, peering at the blobs of color, then backing up ten yards and squinting their eyes to see the blobs of color blur into a surprisingly realistic image. You can’t not do that at a Chuck Close exhibit. If you’ve ever seen one of Close’s paintings or prints reproduced in a magazine or book, you owe it to yourself to come see one in real life.

The fascinating part of the exhibit though, is not the prints themselves, but the process displayed. Several woodblocks are shown adjacent to the print they produced. There are linoleum cuts on display. As are copper etching plates. There are “unfinished” prints, missing a few color plates, next to the “finished” print. All on display to show the process, and the way the final piece was produced.

That the exhibit reads more as an educational experience rather than an “art show” experience is not at all a bad thing. This show can be one of great enjoyment to fans of Close, or fans of printmaking, or even of any non-art lover who’s interested in the process.

That is the best part of Chuck Close: Process and Collaboration. Seeing the step by step by step progressions of each piece, and the step by step progression of the artist over the past 35 years. You don’t have to be a Chuck Close fan to enjoy that. And I dare say, you don’t even have to like art to enjoy seeing the process.

The Big Orange

For the first time ever (I think) the University of Tennessee is hosting a football game on Sunday instead of Saturday this weekend. It’s the season starter.

There’s a parking lot on Henley Street that was filled with orange draped RVs on Friday, three days before the game. I wondered what was going on inside them. How far had they driven on Friday? What is it that makes people paint their RVs orange and white and spend the entire weekend in a parking lot awaiting the big showdown on Sunday night?

That level of devotion is beyond mere fandom. It’s at a high-fevered and adrenaline soaked level of fandom that can only be called an alternative lifestyle. It’s at the level where furniture and lampshade purchases may be made with the Vols in mind. Indeed, entire rooms in one’s house may be tributes to the lifestyle. Dens bedecked in orange banners and white bean bag chairs are surely lurking inside otherwise normally decorated homes throughout East Tennessee.

For me, the Tennessee Volunteers’ season starter means that traffic will be too bad Sunday evening to bother leaving the house. Perhaps it’ll mean that there will be some quiet anthropologically based thinking about the absurdity of the phenomenon, and of course the yearly disgust at the over use of orange.

It’s fall again, and as a Knoxvillian, the Big Orange crowds showing up on a weekly basis is akin to the leaves falling. It’s in my mind like an impersonal force of nature, inevitable as the spring rains and the summer heat. It’s a vain pursuit to complain. I would like to see a local weatherman predict how severe this week’s crowd will be, but only for the inherent humor that would come from it. The following home games will be held on Saturdays. I look forward to stepping out on my front lawn and looking out toward the Stadium with its giant lights blocking out the night stars and thinking “Ah, autumn at last.”