Must cut/paste link.

I saw an Avedon exhibit in Ft. Worth this winter. His portraits are really striking.

Mattila is a soprano, and she played Salomé

Ah, so that explains the severed head.

Mattila by someone who's not Avedon

I saw the Avedon retrospective in Boston, MA in 1995 at the BFA, which was just wonderful. But even better, here is my...

...personal Mattila anecdote:

i took the MET backstage tour when Mattila was in NYC singing Salome during the Spring 2004 season. The big fuss that season was that Mattila was possibly the first Salome who would performe the Dance of the Seven Veils naked beneath. (Salomes' throughout the history of opera have always choosen to wear a full body-stocking, or to not even remove the last veil completely).

Anyway...When you take the MET tours, you get to see the stage, scenery, and dressing-rooms prepared for that nights' preformance. Lucky for us, that night was a production of Strauss's Salome, and the principle soprano's dressing-room had been prepared with all the things that Mattila wanted and needed for her performance later that night.

So, lying on the make-up counter was the normal assortment of make-up, tissues, bottled water, etc...

However, the docent quickly told us all how unusual this tour was because usually the tourists get to see the elaborate costumes, and wigs, and props of the sopranos prepared on a mannequin, waiting for her arrival. But that night, there would be nothing of the sort.

We all started to look around for the Salome costume in question, and finally located it: on the dresser a tiny, folded, silky-silver dress. And on top of that silky-silver dress was a tiny, folded, nude-colored thong.

Yes, that's right. I SAW KARITA MATTILA'S THONG! O_o

(a load better than imagining King Herod only in his briefs am i rite or what?)

Alex Ross: "I still don't have naked pictures of Karita Mattila"

just ask la scala di seta, sir