[Rick Mullin]

Hi Michael,

One should always pay to use art. Until it hurts a little. I have a few books out, and have made it a policy to actually acquire the work (or some of it) from the artist. I am not swimming in money--I just think artists should be paid something if we are going to use their work to make our books beautiful. Of course, if you go for the big names, you pay for the rights. Usually (as I learned on one occasion) this involves payments to an estate, a museum, and maybe a chauffeur.

Rick

[Rick Mullin]

Of course there is always the Derek Walcott option....

[Gail White]

Drat, Michael, I was hoping for a story of how you had been vilely slandered. Congratulations on the book, anyway.

[Ned Balbo]

Mike, I ran across this, too, & wondered whether a portion of the image, cropped (maybe the central one?) would serve your purpose. It's not contemporary either, however, so there's that against it....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brothel... _anagoria.JPG

[Michael Juster]

That's pretty good too!

A sudden abundance of riches!

[Michael Cantor]

I assume that Sleaze and Slander will contain references to both good old political corruption and equally traditional dirty sex - at the very least - and preferably both. All of the suggestions (including mine) seem to cover one or the other, but not the two combined. Ideally, I think you should look for a broader portrait of Sin. I wonder if Hieronymous Bosch could be helpful. Or go Hollywood - instead of portraying sin itself, give us a reaction shot - a group of civilians, shocked shitless by whatever it is they're looking at. Of course, I have no idea where or whether any of this exists - but it's fun thinking about it.