It’s a zoo out there. “Approximately 8500 animal lovers nationwide contribute to the care and feeding of Brookfield Zoo’s animals by ‘adopting’ them,” says the zoo’s newsletter Preview (Summer). Among the “parents” and “adoptees” have been “NBC’s David Letterman (giant cockroach), former Illinois Governor Jim Thompson (timber rattlesnake), WBBM TV’s weatherman Harry Volkman (Affie Elephant)…an Illinois State University sorority (python), a Barry Manilow fan club in Country Club Hills (turtle, falconet, and guinea pigs), and the United Motorcyclists of Illinois (six animals)….Hinsdale resident Phyllis Janik wrote a blues lyric about her adoptee, the naked mole-rat queen.”
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“High-rolling lobbyists Jim Fletcher and Mike Hasten are packing a powerful one-two punch for Illinois’ biggest utilities,” reports the Citizens Utility Board in CUB News (Spring). “Fletcher, former Deputy Governor in Jim Thompson’s administration, and Hasten, former ICC Chairman, are partners in the ex-governor’s new law firm, Winston and Strawn. Fletcher is Com Ed’s main man in Springfield, while Hasten is representing the company in its franchise negotiations with the City of Chicago. Recently they both were hired by Illinois Bell to sail its “deregulation” ship through the legislature.”
“It’s possible…to see the Van Gogh auction [March 10 at Leslie Hindman Auctioneers] as an upscale version of ‘The Price Is Right,’ ” writes David McCracken in the New Art Examiner (May). “More or less applause is elicited for the supposed monetary value of the object to be bid upon (‘a new car! a new bedroom set! a floral still life!’) and simultaneously ratifies the act of pricing itself. The glamor derives as much from the auction’s familiarity–its resemblance to other, more important auctions; other Van Goghs; other, more stupendous sums of money–as from its own temporary cast of characters; everyone knows how this game is played. And, like other studio audiences, those at the Van Gogh auction cheered themselves as insiders nearer the locus of fame.”
