• Home
  • Memo
    • Past Memo Archives
    • Podcast (iTunes)
    • RSS Feed
  • Roy H. Williams
    • Private Consulting
    • Public Speaking
    • Pendulum_Free_PDF
    • Sundown in Muskogee
    • Destinae, the Free the Beagle trilogy
    • People Stories
    • Stuff Roy Said
      • The Other Kind of Advertising
        • Business Personality Disorder PDF Download
        • The 10 Most Common Mistakes in Marketing
          • How to Build a Bridge to Millennials_PDF
          • The Secret of Customer Loyalty and Not Having to Discount
          • Roy’s Politics
    • Steinbeck’s Unfinished Quixote
  • Wizard of Ads Partners
  • Archives
  • More…
    • Steinbeck, Quixote and Me_Cervantes Society
    • Rabbit Hole
    • American Small Business Institute
    • How to Get and Hold Attention downloadable PDF
    • Wizard Academy
    • What’s the deal with
      Don Quixote?
    • Quixote Wasn’t Crazy
      • Privacy Policy
      • Will You Donate A Penny A Wedding to Bring Joy to People in Love?

The Monday Morning Memo

The photographer, Brassai, was famous for his photos of Paris at night in the 1930s. When you think of nighttime photos, think “limited illumination.”
In this Brassai photo of Pablo Picasso, some very interesting choices were made to enhance the artistic composition of the image:

1. Note the interesting shape of the wood stove and the shadow it throws on the wall.
2. Picasso, illuminated, is positioned in front of the stove’s dark shadow for maximum contrast, causing the eye to notice the relatively small figure of Picasso immediately. Had Brassai not done this, Picasso would have been adrift in an ocean of background.
3. By capturing the full, vertical height of the stove, Brassai abandons the up-close, journalistic look into Picasso’s face that would have been the choice of virtually every other shooter. The Result? This photo is not just about Picasso, but the moment and the place, as well.

Email Newsletter

Sign up to receive the Monday Morning Memo in your inbox!

Download the PDF "Dictionary of the Cognoscenti of Wizard Academy"

Random Quote:

“

‘Superman did not become Superman. Superman was born Superman. When Superman wakes up in the morning, he’s Superman. His alter ego is Clark Kent. His outfit with the big red S, that’s the blanket he was wrapped in as a baby when the Kents found him. Those are his clothes. What Kent wears – the glasses, the business suit – that’s the costume. That’s the costume Superman wears to blend in with us. Clark Kent is how Superman views us. And what are the characteristics of Clark Kent? He’s weak. He’s unsure of himself. He’s a coward. Clark Kent is Superman’s critique on the whole human race.’

So says Bill, the eponymous villain of Quentin Tarantino’s revenge epic Kill Bill, at the film’s climax.

[5,500 words later] …When Clark wakes up in the morning, he’s neither the symbol nor the secret identity. He’s the boy who grew up in Smallville, the son of Jonathan and Martha, the friend and colleague and sometimes husband of Lois Lane, a  journalist for a great metropolitan newspaper, an immigrant, a child of adoption who yearns for a family he never met, a person who accepts the responsibility his power implies, who tries to reciprocate the love he received to the world that took him in. Clark Kent is not a critique of the human race. He is part of the human race. In all the ways that matter, including and especially his weaknesses, he is human. He is one of us. As he says in Lois & Clark: ‘Superman is what I can do. Clark is who I am.’

Yes, I know. I just spent six thousand words refuting one fictional character’s argument about another fictional character. I should probably go outside.

“

- Evan Puschak (The Nerdwriter,) Escape into Meaning, p.163 and p. 184

The Wizard Trilogy

The Wizard Trilogy

More Information

  • Privacy Policy
  • Wizard Academy
  • Wizard Academy Press

Contact Us

512.295.5700
corrine@wizardofads.com

Address

16221 Crystal Hills Drive
Austin, TX 78737
512.295.5700

The MondayMorningMemo© of Roy H. Williams, The Wizard of Ads®