Military and aviation officials say they don’t know who may have launched a mysterious object spotted in the sky late Monday off the Southern California coast, but said that whatever the projectile was, it did not pose a threat to national security.

A KCBS news helicopter spotted what appeared to be a missile traveling through the sky northwest of Catalina Island, about 35 miles west of Los Angeles.

Video posted online by the television station showed a luminous point hurtling through the sky followed by a long contrail.

Officials with the Defense Department, the Navy and the Air Force said did not have any details on the object or its launch site. Pentagon officials said that initial indications were that the military was not involved.

“We are aware of the unexplained contrail reported off the coast of Southern California yesterday evening,” according to a statement from the North American Aerospace Defense Command and the U.S. Northern Command, which operates the U.S. and Canadian missile warning system. “At this time, we are unable to provide specific details but we are working to determine the exact nature of this event.”

“We can confirm that there is no indication of any threat to our nation and we will provide more information as it becomes available,” the statement said.

The Federal Aviation Administration didn’t approve any commercial space launches in the area Monday, said spokesman Ian Gregor.

“We’re looking into this,” he said.

Updated at 9:55 a.m.: Naval Base Ventura County spokeswoman Teri Reid said the contrail seen off the Southern California coast Monday did not originate at Naval Air Station Point Mugu.

“It didn’t happen here,” she said. “There was no firing on the range yesterday.”

Nor was it Vandenberg Air Force Base, whose last launch was putting a satellite into orbit on Friday.
Mystery ‘missile’ launch near L.A. no threat to national security, government officials say

The green-screen scene featuring the now world-famous main characters — a trio of young fugitive wizards named Harry, Ron and Hermione — required actors Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson to hurl themselves onto some off-camera mats to escape danger at the Ministry of Magic. It was an oddly slapstick finish for such a monumental franchise — but that didn’t sap the emotion of the moment.

“I admit it, I did cry like a little girl,” Radcliffe said, recalling the day. “There was a feeling that I had, that we all had, that it was the end of something very special.”

It’s doubtful that pop culture will ever see a phenomenon quite like this sprawling tale that for a decade cast a spell on the page, the screen and beyond. The fantasy epic begins its Hollywood fade-out Nov. 19 with the release of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — Part 1″ and finishes next summer with the eighth film, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — Part 2.”

Both movies are poised to be global blockbusters — and may even earn the franchise its first nominations in marquee Academy Award categories — but the numbers posted by their predecessor films are extraordinary already. The six Warner Bros. movies released to date have pulled in $5.7 billion at theaters worldwide; home video adds an additional $1.3 billion. The seven novels from which they sprang, written by J.K. Rowling, account for 400 million books sold in 69 languages.

Then there’s a jaw-dropping $7 billion in retail products, a recently opened amusement attraction in Orlando, touring exhibits of props and costumes and plans for a permanent exhibit outside London.

Still, the true impact of the books and films may not be fully recognized for a decade or two. With ever-rising ticket prices, box-office records don’t stand for long, but no franchise has delivered anything close to eight films in 10 years.

P

roducer David Heyman and his team were able to keep their cast intact — including the young lead stars who started as adolescents and grew into young adults with millions in the bank, and no scandals. The movies arrived even as the audience for Rowling’s books grew, creating a unique synergistic effect. The “Potter” movies have earned Warner Bros. more than $1 billion in profit — and the admiration of industry rivals.

“The books and movies fed each other brilliantly to become these commercial tidal waves,” said veteran literary agent Ron Bernstein, of International Creative Management, who has no connection to the books or films.

Former Walt Disney Studios Chairman Dick Cook, who launched his own mega-franchise with “Pirates of the Caribbean,” agreed that “Harry Potter” has been a breed apart.

“It has unequivocally been the best-managed franchise that we’ve ever seen, top to bottom,” he said. “The movies have been terrific and Warner Bros. managed to position each one as a worldwide event. Each movie has been unique and built on the last one and the anticipation has never been better. They’ve honored the source material and done everything right.”

And, unlike, say, “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, the “Potter” movies adapted a living, breathing literary sensation whose ending was unknown. Rowling would visit the set and sometimes whisper to actors hints of their characters’ destiny, but screenwriter Steve Kloves, who penned seven of the eight scripts, said no one really knew how everything would conclude.

The entire exercise, he said, was a “10-year tightrope walk … and something that will be never be done again for the simple reason that you won’t see another Jo Rowling come along.”

Lucky break

The rags-to-riches story of Rowling seems as unreal as the world of dragons and goblins she created. Joanne Kathleen Rowling (“J.K.” was manufactured by a publishing executive who thought a gender-neutral author name might sell more books to boys) was a single mom in Edinburgh, getting by with the help of welfare, when she finished “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone,” her first novel.

In late 1997, a copy of the book found its way to Heyman’s London office but ended up on a shelf for low-priority leads. A curious secretary took it home for the weekend. Her enthusiasm prompted Heyman to get past what he has called “that rubbish title,” and the story captured his imagination.

“The funny thing is with all of the magic, all of the wizardry, what really makes the ‘Harry Potter’ stories work are the characters,” he said. “The fantastical elements and the action are wonderful, but the characters are what people remember.”

Heyman sent the book to his friend and fellow Brit Lionel Wigram, a production executive at Warner Bros., to gauge the studio’s interest. Wigram said some in Burbank questioned the viability of the creaky fantasy-adventure genre and viewed the tale of a magical boarding school called Hogwarts as too British for the American heartland. “Don’t spend too much on it,” was the word from the home office, Wigram recalled.

Warner Bros. secured the rights for four “Harry Potter” novels for about $2 million. At that point, only the first book was on shelves in England and none had reached America. Warner Bros. tried to get a financial partner on the project, reaching out to studios including Steven Spielberg’s DreamWorks, which passed.

The end nears for ‘Harry Potter’ on film

A terrorist attack apparently aimed at two Jewish centers in Chicago was thwarted when two packages the size of bread boxes containing explosives were intercepted in Europe and the Middle East, President Obama and counterterrorism officials announced Friday.

The packages, which had originated from Yemen, were found on cargo planes after a tip from an official in Saudi Arabia. The targets were a synagogue and another Jewish center on the North Side of Chicago, a U.S. official said.

As they launched a terrorism investigation on three continents, authorities said suspicion fell in particular on Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen, which has been linked to the attempted bombing of a Detroit-bound U.S. airliner on Christmas Day. The explosive material found in the two packages is the same as that used in the failed airliner attack, according to a U.S. official.

Authorities discovered the packages late Thursday in UPS cargo planes that had flown from Yemen to an airport in East Midlands, England; and Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

An initial examination of the packages found that “they do apparently contain explosive materials,” Obama said in an announcement from the White House on Friday afternoon. Officials said it was still uncertain whether the devices were operational or whether they were to be picked up and activated by someone in Chicago. One official said federal law enforcement authorities believe the latter scenario to be the most likely.

The events “underscore the necessity of remaining vigilant against terrorism,” the president said. He warned that authorities believe Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the Yemen-based group, “continues to plan attacks against our homeland, our citizens and our friends and allies.”

A federal law enforcement official said the cargo packages resembled the kind of smaller but deadly attacks recently urged by Anwar Awlaki, the American-born radical Muslim cleric thought to be living in Yemen. Awlaki sent e-mail to U.S. Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan encouraging him to militant activity before the November attacks at Ft. Hood, Texas, in which Hasan is suspected of killing 13 fellow soldiers. The cleric is also suspected of being behind the Christmas Day airliner plot allegedly carried out by Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.

“He is pushing the less sensational,” the official said, asking not to be identified because the investigation is continuing. “There appears to be a good amount of debate within Al Qaeda, and Al Awlaki is pushing for more hits, but on a smaller scale. He also believes that even when attacks are scrubbed or foiled, they nonetheless are successful if it terrorizes the United States.”

Federal authorities searched cargo planes at airports along the Eastern seaboard on Friday as well as a delivery truck in Brooklyn, N.Y., but found no explosives.

An Emirates Airline passenger jet carrying cargo from Yemen was escorted from the Canadian border to New York City by two military jets, in what U.S. officials described as a precautionary measure. A package aboard the passenger plane appeared similar to those found in England and Dubai, officials said, but was found not be contain explosives.

John Brennan, Obama’s counterterrorism advisor, said the explosives “were in a form that was designed to try to carry out some type of attack.”

A federal law enforcement official said initial reviews of the two suspicious cargo packages showed that the one found in England apparently contained a printer or ink toner cartridge with “some kind of white powder” and syringes and wires. He said the package uncovered in Dubai apparently contained cellphone components and a timer. He cautioned that both were still being evaluated and that no firm conclusions had been made.

Obama said that Brennan had spoken with the president of Yemen, who had pledged full cooperation in the investigation.

According to officials, the White House called a 1 a.m. meeting Friday to evaluate the cargo package intelligence, which included video participation with Homeland Security officials. They said the White House decided it was “good enough intelligence” to alert allies in Europe to start checking cargo packages coming from Yemen and bound for the U.S.

At 3 a.m., they said, the U.S. ordered every package from Yemen headed for the U.S. to be pulled off planes and inspected.

Homeland Security officials took a series of steps to enhance security, including heightened cargo screening and additional safety measures at U.S. airports. “Passengers should continue to expect an unpredictable mix of security layers that include explosives trace detection, advanced imaging technology, canine teams and pat downs, among others,” Homeland Security officials said.

A Jewish Federation of Greater Chicago spokeswoman said the group was “taking appropriate precautions” and was “advising our local synagogues to do likewise.” One of the targets was a Jewish congregation that meets at a Unitarian church, according to a U.S. official.

Oren Segal, director of the Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism in Washington, said Rahm Emanuel has been the focus of some attention on extremist blogs since long before he resigned as White House chief of staff to run for Chicago mayor. Segal said that vitriol on message boards peaked when Obama named Emanuel his top aide in early 2009.

The two incidents highlight a known vulnerability in the air cargo industry, one that has been the subject of extensive discussion between the Transportation Security Administration and the industry for several years.

The federal government has mandated in recent years that all cargo on passenger aircraft be screened, a goal that was achieved only this August. But the issue of parcels aboard cargo-only aircraft has been far more difficult to resolve. As far back as March 2009, the industry warned Congress it would not be able to meet the August deadline that 100% of cargo would be screened.

A TSA official acknowledged Friday that not all cargo inbound from abroad is screened and that the cargo that does get screened is handled differently than passenger luggage, which is subject to X-ray. That means that the two suspicious packages may not have been subject to screening when they were originally loaded in Yemen.

paul.richter@latimes.com

richard.serrano@latimes.com

bbennett@tribune.com

Christi Parsons in the Washington bureau and Times staff writer Ralph Vartabedian in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

Explosives found in two U.S.-bound packages, thwarting terrorist attack

So the paper startled some readers last weekend when it ran a rare front-page editorial, one that took aim at the state’s Republican governor. The piece urged Rick Perry to reverse his “unacceptable and undeserved silence” to debate his Democratic opponent and to meet with newspaper editorial boards, as he has in years past.

Publisher Nelson Clyde said he’s disturbed by a trend in the current midterm election in which some politicians hide out or speak only through a few friendly news outlets. “For me, from a journalist’s point of view, I think this is really going to polarize us and the media further,” Clyde said in an interview. “It’s a regrettable circumstance.”

Regrettable, but maybe the new normal. Politico has declared this the “Year of the Missing Candidate,” with politicians disdaining debates, appearing rarely in public, declining to release public schedules to reporters and shunning interviews with all but the most compliant journalists.

Many Americans may believe the media are biased. Politicians are wielding that notion, still not true most of the time, to excuse their pronounced absence from the public arena. The ref’s being banished from the ring, while the boxers tell us they wouldn’t think of throwing a sucker punch.

Candidate Barack Obama alienated the national press corps during portions of the 2008 campaign, making himself scarce for questions and shrinking away when reporters pulled out their tape recorders. During one notable period of more than a month before election day, he took few questions and held no formal news conferences.

But Obama’s campaign plane seems like a cozy welcome wagon compared to the chilly vehicles plying the trail in Campaign 2010. The duck-and-dodge has been primarily, but not exclusively, a tactic among Republicans, according to Politico and several other news outlets. But more than one Democrat has gone to lengths to minimize unscripted moments too.

It would be nice to think we’re passing through a brief era of absentee candidates. But don’t count on it. The profusion of news outlets, many calibrated to a particular ideology, enable candidates to shop for preferred messengers. Or they can take to the Internet to cut out media intermediaries altogether.

In Wisconsin, reporters from many media outlets have complained about trying to cover U.S. Senate candidate Ron Johnson, who won’t put out his daily schedule. The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported Thursday that a campaign spokeswoman said the Republican Johnson would take his message, “directly to the people.” It’s a little better with incumbent Russ Feingold, the Democrat, who doesn’t give out an advance schedule either, but will at least confirm dates after they have been set.

In Delaware, “tea party” favorite Christine O’Donnell has made herself so invisible in the U.S. Senate race that she faced questions about whether she had gone into hiding. A CNN reporter chased after her in one report this week, but O’Donnell slipped out the back door after an event. As an SUV whisked her into the night she promised to answer questions. Some day.

In Colorado, Senate hopeful Ken Buck went nine consecutive days without a public event. But the Republican promised to show his face more this month, now that a crucial fundraising period has passed.

Marco Rubio, the frontrunner for U.S. Senate from Florida, launched a bus tour this week but one group was noticeably not on board: the media. Reporters can chase the bus if they like. But the Republican candidate has a substantial lead. So he’s following a time-honored tradition in both parties of sitting on his advantage and avoiding pesky reporters, who present considerable risk and little potential reward.

In the tight Nevada senate race, reporters can’t get much love from either incumbent Harry Reid, the Democrat, or GOP challenger Sharron Angle. Reid has a history of spouting malaprops, while “tea partyer” Angle has preferred to speak through friendly outlets like Fox News. Veteran political reporter Jon Ralston of the Las Vegas Sun told Politico the scant access to the candidates was “unprecedented.”

All this has not stopped the media from needling, cajoling and pleading for more face time. And shame can still bear its rewards. Witness the fallout from an incident last March in the California gubernatorial race.

The episode began with Republican candidate Meg Whitman inviting reporters to an event at the Port of Oakland. The journalists waited a couple of hours in a holding pen at a Union Pacific rail yard. When the time finally came for questions at the “open press” event, Whitman staffers instead shooed away the reporters. Video of the Whitman’s uneasy silence aired widely on Bay Area television. The candidate called reporters to apologize. She has gotten more accessible since then.

Whitman opponent Jerry Brown could be held up as Exhibit One by nervous campaign managers who want to minimize contact with the media. During an unscripted moment last month, the attorney general managed to raise the adulterous past of Democratic icon Bill Clinton. Caught on a jogging path by a reporter one weekend in June, Brown uncorked a doozy — comparing Whitman to Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels.

Those are the kinds of remarks that have candidates apologizing and back-pedaling for days, instead of delivering the message their campaigns want to harp on.

Longtime Republican political strategist Dan Schnur said he doesn’t see any slowing of the trend toward candidates hiding out or facing only friendly media. News outlets will likely enable the process, he said, by hunkering down into increasingly isolated ideological corners.

And the perception of a biased media will give politicians the excuse to shut out even the many reporters who still try to be honest arbiters.

The result will be candidates able to remain, more and more, “on message.” And a public that knows less and less about who the politicians really are.

james.rainey@latimes.com

Twitter: latimesrainey
On the Media: Candidates are MIA during 2010 elections campaign

Thousands of activists from groups that support the Democratic Party gathered for a march and rally on the National Mall on Saturday in a bid to rejuvenate the enthusiasm of more liberal voters and stave off an expected GOP comeback in next month’s midterm elections.

Organizers said the rally included more than 400 groups representing black, gay and lesbian, labor, environmental and civil rights activists who gathered at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial for the “One Nation Working Together” rally. People from all 50 states attended the rally demanding improvements on jobs, justice and education.

“We bailed out the banks, we bailed out the insurance companies, now it’s time to bail out the American people. We need to re-build the infrastructure and provide jobs, and savings for the American people,” Rev. Al Sharpton, civil rights activist, told the crowd.

After months of planning, the first groups of supporters arrived Saturday and festivities stretched well into afternoon. About 50 speakers and entertainers spoke at the rally including civil rights activists Rev. Jesse Jackson and Harry Belafonte, NAACP President Benjamin T. Jealous, and AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka.

“For the past two years President Obama has had to put up with the word no. Forty people, 40 people in the United States Senate have held down the working man of America. Forty Republicans have decided to say no.” liberal television and radio show host Ed Shultz said.

The progressive groups also focused on energizing democrats during the election season in which republicans and Tea Party activist continue gain momentum. It remains an open question of whether or not group organizers and activist can re-ignite democratic enthusiasm by November.

Laurie Christmas, traveled by bus from Toledo, Ohio to attended the rally. Christmas carried a sign that read “Health care. Not war fare,” on one side and a plea for green energy on the other. Christmas said she was excited to be surround by progressive thinkers but said she still has doubts about sparking progressive enthusiasm for the upcoming elections.

“Where are all the people who represented Obama in 2008,” Christmas asked as she pointed down the Mall. “There should be more people here.”

Cara MacDonald , a 21-year-old political science student from the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, Va, sported her “I love pro-choice boys” T-shirt and said that even though democrats maybe frustrated this election, she does not believe they will shy away from the polls this November.

“It’s hard when people are riding the anti-Obama train,” MacDonald said. “But when democrats get people out to the polls, democrats win.”

The rally in part is a response to conservative commentator Glenn Beck’s “Restoring Honor” rally in August that drew thousands to hear a call to return to American values of liberty and faith. However, organizers said the “One Nation” rally had been planned since April.

A request to stop the One Nation rally was rejected by a Washington D.C. judge on Friday, according to Denise Gray-Felder, spokeswomen for. The request was filed by National Events, one of the companies that helped organized the Beck rally.

Beck has criticized the liberal response, in part because he said it includes members of socialist groups.
Terry Cardwell, 56 of Rome, N.Y., said she viewed the Beck rally as a “white revival,” and on Saturday she carried a sign that read, “Fear of diversity makes a bitter cup of tea.”

“I’m here to support what we started in 2008,” Cardwell said. “We can’t go back to what we’ve already had.”

jordan.steffen@latimes.com

Civil rights, labor groups rally on National Mall

Now it looks as if Phoenix is backing away from his “I’m retired” pronouncement.

Several producers have said in recent days that they have been approached by Phoenix’s talent agents about their client’s return to movie roles. Though no deals have been announced, the preliminary conversations suggest that Phoenix could be in front of cameras soon — and not just as a guest next week on “Late Show With David Letterman,” the scene of Phoenix’s infamous monosyllabic appearance in February 2009.

Over the last several weeks, Phoenix has been offered parts in the upcoming movies “The Raven,” “The Sitter” and “The Avengers,” according to someone who works closely with the actor, but he turned them down because they weren’t the right fit. Like the producers, the person asked not to be named so as not to jeopardize future work with Phoenix.

Separately, two women who worked in prominent positions on “I’m Still Here” who had sued director Casey Affleck, alleging sexual harassment and intentional infliction of emotional distress have settled their lawsuits against the filmmakers, a spokeswoman for Affleck and a lawyer for the women said Monday.

Throughout the making of the film and in the run-up to its release Friday, Hollywood debated whether the movie was an authentic documentary about an artist at a professional crossroads or a contrived piece of performance art. Critics and audiences have argued over the endeavor’s authenticity, but both Phoenix and Affleck have insisted that it was not a prank.

Phoenix, who appears disheveled, bloated, cavorting with prostitutes and snorting what appears to be cocaine in “I’m Still Here,” has gotten himself back in physical shape. In contrast to his yeti-like appearance in the film, Phoenix showed up last week at the Venice Film Festival well-groomed, slimmer and wearing a closely tailored suit — looking like a movie star, in other words. Several executives who had been interested in casting Phoenix said that they had little doubt he would work again.

Phoenix’s talent agent, WME’s Patrick Whitesell, has been open to discussions about roles for the actor, according to one executive who asked not to be named. The talent agency, which never completely stopped pitching Phoenix during his apparent stint as a rapper, declined to comment.

“I’m Still Here” opened to mediocre box-office business of $97,000 in 19 locations Friday. It goes into wider release this weekend in about 110 locations and will be available through distributor Magnolia Pictures’ video-on-demand outlets Sept. 24.

Studios had not given up on Phoenix even during the filming of “I’m Still Here,” which purports to trace Phoenix’s attempts to get people to take his career switch seriously. “This is me changing my life in front of your eyes,” Phoenix says to some friends at one point in the film. “I want to leave something special on earth.”

In one scene in the movie, Ben Stiller shows up during the casting of Focus Features’ offbeat love story “Greenberg” to see if Phoenix would be interested in a starring role. (The meeting does not go well, with Phoenix insulting Stiller and his blockbuster comedy “There’s Something About Mary.”) And there had been interest in casting the actor in at least one other art house movie, and likely more, in the latter half of 2009 and the early part of 2010. But nothing came of the talks, executives said.

Phoenix’s last feature film role was in 2008’s “Two Lovers,” a drama with Gwyneth Paltrow that started filming in late 2007. It was during the promotion of the movie, which was released in U.S. theaters in February 2009, that Phoenix appeared on Letterman’s talk show, where his unkempt appearance and disjointed mumblings turned the interview into a YouTube blockbuster.

In the film, Phoenix describes the appearance as a fiasco. “I’m so stupid,” he says. “I’m just going to be a joke forever.”

Phoenix skipped the film’s screenings at the Toronto International Film Festival in recent days, as did Affleck (although both attended the world premiere in Venice). The director said in a statement read aloud by Toronto co-director Cameron Bailey on Friday that the film had been subjected to a “misguided and surprisingly reductive debate in the press.” Affleck declined to be interviewed.

In July, two key crew members on “I’m Still Here” filed lawsuits against Affleck and his company, Flemmy Productions, accusing the director of sexual harassment and inflicting emotional distress.

Producer Amanda White alleged that Affleck breached his verbal agreement to pay her $50,000 after months of work on the film, also describing in detail how she was “forced to endure uninvited and unwelcome sexual advances in the workplace.” Among White’s claims: that Affleck hired transvestite prostitutes “for his personal gratification” during filming, referred to women as “cows,” manhandled her when she rejected his sexual advances and instructed a camera operator to flash his genitals at her on several occasions. She was seeking a $2-million settlement.

In a separate action, cinematographer Magdalena Gorka sued Affleck and Flemmy, claiming she was subjected to a “near daily barrage of sexual comments, innuendo and unwelcome advances” by crew members, encouraged by Affleck. In that suit, Gorka described awaking one night to find the director in bed with his arm around her “caressing her back, his face was within inches of hers and his breath reek[ing] of alcohol.” She was seeking $2.5 million in damages.

In a motion filed with the court in July, an attorney for Affleck, Martin Singer, said White “concocted this fabricated sexual harassment lawsuit over a year after she failed in her devious attempt [to] extort a better production deal.” Brian Procel, the attorney representing both Gorka and White, declined to comment for this story. Singer did not respond to requests for comment.

In a statement released Monday by Affleck’s spokeswoman, the parties said the lawsuits “have been resolved to the mutual satisfaction of the parties” and are being dismissed.

steve.zeitchik@latimes.com

john.horn@latimes.com

Zeitchik reported from Toronto; Horn reported from Los Angeles.

Times staff writer Chris Lee contributed reporting to this report.

Joaquin Phoenix is still here (and may be available for film roles)

“Chefs-d’Oeuvre?”

The question — “Masterpieces?” — posed by the inaugural exhibition at the Centre Pompidou-Metz is a matter of many opinions.

Four months after the quirky museum with a swooping white fiberglass and Teflon roof, designed by Shigeru Ban of Japan and Jean de Gastines of France, opened its doors in this little-known town 175 miles east of Paris, visitors continue to ask if the strikingly modern building near the majestic old train station resembles a Chinese straw hat, a hut for the Smurfs or a manta ray in flight.

The masterpieces query is a weightier matter and it comes with lots of historical baggage. Composed of about 800 works, the sprawling show is a think piece about the ever-changing meaning of a term coined in the Middle Ages to judge the work of craftsmen in the European guild system but often dismissed as quaintly irrelevant these days.

“I have no definitive definition of a masterpiece,” Laurent Le Bon, director of the Metz museum and curator of the exhibition, states in a publication accompanying the show, “but, in my view, it is a work that permits diverse interpretations, indeed contradictions.”

Critical reactions to the show include proclamations that it’s the most impressive assembly of 20th century art in all of Europe and accusations that it’s so confusing and anti-hierarchical as to be meaningless. In art historical circles, the exhibition has revived a debate about the concept of masterpieces. Interviews with curators indicate that there’s hardly a consensus on the subject, with some saying it’s a valuable way of measuring quality and others pointing out the flaws of any such system.

The Pompidou Center, a Parisian cultural powerhouse that houses the French National Museum of Modern Art, built the satellite in Metz to share its 60,000-piece collection with a city of about 200,000 people. But visitors expecting the Pompidou’s greatest hits are in for a surprise. What they get is an eclectic array of paintings, sculptures, photographs, videos, installations, architectural models, furniture and printed material.

An introductory section on the ground floor tracks the evolution of masterpieces “from Middle Ages to revolutionary genius” in works lent by various institutions. But the bulk of the show ending Oct. 25, which continues on three upper floors, is drawn from the Pompidou’s 20th century and 21st century holdings. The final display, “Masterpieces ad infinatum,” grapples with notions of uniqueness in an age of endless reproductions.

As the exhibition unfolds, major works by such stalwarts as Henri Matisse, Joan Miro, Pablo Picasso, Louise Bourgeois and Bruce Nauman share gallery space with examples by relatively little known European figures and a few sculptures from Africa, Asia and Oceana. The works on view rarely conform to conventional ideas about masterpieces as paragons of beauty or tours de force of skill and they aren’t necessarily the best examples of the artists’ output.

But pieces such as Bourgeois’ enormous installation “Precious Liquids” sum up essential themes — in her case, conflict between the artist and her father and bodily liquids that symbolize pleasure and pain. Other works mark zeitgeist moments that have influenced ideas about what a masterpiece might be.

Marcel Duchamp, who famously said that a masterpiece is created by the viewer, not the artist, is represented by his first “readymade,” a bicycle wheel mounted on a wood stool in 1913. Georgio De Chirico’s 1914 painting “Premonitory Portrait of Guillaume Apollinaire” is a Surrealist tribute to a leading avant-garde poet and critic, portrayed as a classical statue wearing sunglasses.

Alain Jacquet’s 1964 painting “Le Dejeuner sur l’Herbe” is part of his “Camouflages” series based on widely distributed reproductions of masterpieces from bygone times. His version of Edouard Manet’s celebrated Impressionist work recasts the luncheon on the grass as a poolside picnic obscured by a silk-screen pattern.

The most recently made pieces have yet to pass the test of time. A stunningly detailed photograph of commercial goods packed into a 99 Cents Only Store is a seminal image by Andreas Gursky. But it was made in 1999 by a German artist whose reputation and work continue to grow.

Experts’ views

Once upon a time, a masterpiece was a creation that met rigid standards of artistry and craftsmanship. These days, the term usually refers to the best work of an artist’s career or an example of outstanding creativity or skill, but there’s little agreement on the meaning and relevance of the term, particularly in modern and contemporary art.

Consider what a few Southern California authorities have to say in interviews and e-mail exchanges:

Douglas Fogle

Chief Curator and Deputy Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs, Hammer Museum

That word has so many heavy connotations with connoisseurship and a certain attitude about art history, that one masterpiece comes after the other. There are great works, absolutely. In contemporary art, there are seminal or building-block works that changed everything. You can point to a Rauschenberg combine painting. “Monogram” is a great work in that way. You can point to Jackson Pollock’s first drip paintings.

It’s a masterpiece, whatever that means

Thirty-three men stuck a half mile underground are now the longest-trapped miners in recent history as a huge drill is the early stages of digging a planned escape route.

The men were trapped Aug. 5 when a landslide blocked the shaft down into the San Jose copper and gold mine in northern Chile’s Atacama Desert. Last year, three miners survived 25 days trapped in a flooded mine in southern China, and the Chileans surpassed that mark Tuesday.

While doubts and extreme challenges remain, experts said the rescuers have the tools to get the job done — though the government still says it will take three to four months to reach the miners.

“The drill operators have the best equipment available internationally,” said Dave Feickert, director of KiaOra, a mine safety consulting firm in New Zealand that has worked extensively with China’s government to improve dangerous mines there.

“This doesn’t mean it will be easy,” he added. “They are likely to run into some technical problems that may slow them down.”

The 31-ton drill made a shallow, preliminary test hole Tuesday in the solid rock it must bore through, the first step in the weeklong digging of a “pilot hole” to guide the way for the rescue. Later the drill will be outfitted with larger bits to gradually expand the hole and make it big enough so the men can be pulled out one by one.

Before rescuers dug small bore holes down to the miners’ emergency shelter, the men survived 17 days without contact with the outside world by rationing a 48-hour supply of food and digging for water in the ground.

Aside from their rescue, a union leader has expressed concern for the men’s livelihoods.

San Esteban, the company that operates the mine, has said it has no money to pay their wages and absorb lawsuits, and is not even participating in the rescue. State-run mining company Codelco has taken over.

Union leader Evelyn Olmos called on the government to pay the workers’ wages starting in September, plus cover the roughly 100 other people at the mine who are now out of work and 170 more who work elsewhere for San Esteban. Its license has been suspended by the government.

“We want the government to pay our salaries in full until our comrades are freed and then pay our severances,” said Olmos.

Mining Minister Laurence Golborne said the government was prohibited by labor laws from assuming responsibility for the salaries. He said it was up to the mining company and would have to be worked out in Chilean courts.

Golborne noted the extraordinary circumstances of the mine collapse but pointed out there are many other Chileans who lack a job and said the government cannot be responsible for all of them.

Union leaders and others blame the government in part for the San Jose accident because the mine had been cited for safety violations in the past but was allowed to continue operating.

In 2007, executives were charged with involuntary manslaughter in the death of a miner. The worker’s family settled and the mine was closed until it could comply with safety rules, said Sen. Baldo Prokurica, who has long called for tougher regulations.

The next year, the mine reopened even though the company apparently had not complied with all the regulations, he said, adding that the circumstances surrounding the reopening are being investigated.

Workers at the current rescue operation are using the three existing bore holes to deliver food, water, air and medicine to the 33 miners, who are trapped about 2,300 feet underground in a shelter large enough to walk around in.

In an eight-minute video released by the government, the second made by the trapped miners, about a dozen of the men send greetings to their families and say they are feeling better since receiving the sustenance and supplies, including special clothes to keep them dry in the hot, humid mine.

The government last week said that five of the miners were suffering from depression, but Golborne said Sunday from the mine site that those men were doing better, had received antidepressants and were getting counseling.

Helping raise their spirits, the men spoke for about three minutes each to a family member on Sunday after a telephone line was lowered down one of the three existing 6-inch bore holes.

The men, while showing courage that has inspired people throughout Chile and the world, could not help but break down when speaking about their loved ones on the latest video.

“I’m sending my greetings to Angelica. I love you so much, darling,” said 30-year-old Osman Araya, as his voice choked and he began to cry. “Tell my mother, I love you guys so much. I’ll never leave you. I will fight to the end to be with you.”

The video showed the men mostly upbeat, joking on camera and talking about their absolute certainty that they would get out alive.

Experts say maintaining high morale among the men is essential. They will play a key role in winning their own rescue: The drilling technique that must be used means that up to 4,000 tons of rock and debris will fall down into a large mine shaft near the shelter — but far enough away from the men that they will not be in any danger.

Officials have said that it is essential the men be at their best physically and mentally because their own work clearing the rocks will be vital to keeping their eventual escape route from becoming plugged.
Drilling begins as Chile miners become longest-trapped in recent history