Outsider

She wobbled onto the red carpet in impossible shoes at the Council of Fashion Designers of America Fashion Awards on Monday. She was followed by a menacing tangle of black dress and sported an electric blue bob that made her look like the bride of Aquaman. Given the unruly spectacle of nearly every Lady Gaga entrance, some observers wonder: Does the pop star deserve the CFDA’s Icon Award? In the past, the CFDA has bestowed the honor upon trendsetters such as Sarah Jessica Parker, Kate Moss, and Nicole Kidman.

Thousands upon thousands of devoted Thais feted their 84-year-old monarch Friday on his first trip outside the capital in almost three years, a period marked by his ailing health and national political turmoil The elaborate tribute to King Bhumibol Adulyadej in the old capital of Ayutthaya was a celebration of values and unity overshadowed in recent years by the turmoil. Bhumibol, the world's longest reigning monarch, actively worked for decades on behalf of the country's poor but has almost disappeared from public life since he was hospitalized in September 2009 for what the...

After nearly a week marching across western India to honor the ideals of Mohandas K. Gandhi, foreigners and locals gathered in a circle for evening conversation. One outsider ranted about trash Indian marchers had been dropping along the road. An Indian educated in the United States stepped forward. "When this harping on garbage dumped on public places is done by foreigners, it rankles," the man said. He then railed against carbon emissions by Americans that disproportionately foul the planet.

A day after leaving China, a blind legal activist ventured outside near where he's living in New York City. Chen Guangcheng spent a sunny Sunday sitting in a wheelchair in the shade as children played nearby. U.S. Rep. Chris Smith, chair of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, tells AP Television News that Chen is a "courageous man. " "He's very gentle and very tough at the same time," the New Jersey Republican says. "His cause, which is defending women from the crime of forced abortion, has not had enough focus in the world community.

LONDON - At a white-walled gallery in one of London's priciest quarters, a small army of stenciled rats and smiley faced storm troopers is awaiting an invasion. The chic Andipa Gallery is expecting a stampede of art buyers to its latest exhibition of works by Banksy, the pseudonymous "guerrilla artist" whose satirical images have gone from street-corner graffiti to coveted artworks that sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars. Gallery owner Acoris Andipa says Banksy's rise from hip outsider to art-world star has been rapid, as he discovered when he held a preview in the exclusive Swiss...

ROME -- Italy named Mario Draghi as the central bank's governor yesterday, moving to contain the fallout from a takeover scandal that prompted his predecessor to resign last week. A managing director at global investment bank Goldman Sachs Group Inc. , Draghi will be the first Bank of Italy governor in almost half a century to come from outside its ranks. His nomination won praise from across the political spectrum in Italy, as well as from the European Central Bank, of which he will also become a member.

NEW YORK -- Was Martín Ramírez one of the greatest outsider artists of the 20th century, or was he simply one of the great artists of modern times? That is the question posed by a fabulous exhibition of drawings by the self-taught artist at the American Folk Art Museum here . There is no question that the drawings Ramírez made while locked up in California state mental hospitals from 1931 until his death in 1963 are formally beautiful. Using pencils and crayons on rough, often patched-together sheets ranging from legal size to more than 10 feet across,...

He's best known for inhabiting a haunted and reluctant hero-king. But he's also been a trailblazing thinker, a vigilante family man with a dark past, a Russian mobster, a swoon-worthy traveling salesman, and one of the last men alive on earth, determined to make sure he and a boy survive. Starring in these movies - the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, "A Dangerous Method," "A History of Violence," "Eastern Promises," "A Walk on the Moon," and "The Road" - actor Viggo Mortensen assumes the shape of outsiders.

About five years is all that it takes for physics to morph from the concrete to the abstract. In ninth grade, students roll balls down incline planes to demonstrate Newton's laws governing motion. By freshman year of college, those same young people are grappling with the insane-seeming mathematical implications of modern physics, with light acting as particle and wave simultaneously and with particles popping into existence and evaporating just as quickly. The more physicists discover about our universe, the more esoteric it gets, and this tendency has bolstered...

Like an old vinyl record, there's a hole at the center of "Jandek on Corwood," and it's the subject of the movie himself. The spooky fringe musician who calls himself Jandek is an outsider, even by the forgiving standards of outsider art. His name and whereabouts are unknown. The only photos of him are blurry and dated. He avoids press inquiries. All we have is his music: since 1978, 37 albums of atonal, whispery death blues, described by one listener as sounding like "something frightening left on your answering machine" and distributed by a mysterious entity called Corwood...

" More college presidents hail from outside academia " (Page A1, May 14) was a fascinating article. Like many organizations, academic institutions are not generally prone to engage in self-reflection. Indeed, my experience has been that those within the so-called academic village write the rules on who can enter the village, and reinforce those requirements of academic standards that, in some cases, perpetuate the myth of value or importance of many programs. Academic excellence comes from questioning the norms, not reinforcing irrelevance.

A Somerville man was stabbed in the neck in front of King Arthur's Lounge in Chelsea early this morning in a fight with a man who later fled the scene, police said. The stabbing victim was asked to leave the lounge about 12:20 a.m. and was escorted out front where he encountered another man, Chelsea Police Chief Brian Kyes said in a telephone interview. "There was an altercation and the suspect pulled out a knife and stabbed the victim twice in the neck area," Kyes said.

Michael Alexander has heard it all before: People with business backgrounds do not understand academia and are ill-equipped to lead colleges and universities. He has a ready rejoinder to such talk: "Balderdash. " Before he became president of Lasell College in Newton in 2007, he worked in entertainment and as chief executive of a technology firm. He never finished his doctorate, which means two-thirds of his full-time faculty outrank him academically. A growing number of colleges seem to share his faith in the value of outsider presidents, PhD or no PhD. Twenty percent of...

Twenty percent of college presidents in the United States now come from fields outside academia, up from 13 percent just six years ago, according to a new national survey by the American Council on Education. The following New England college presidents have brought private or public sector experience to their current roles. Michael Alexander (Lasell College) Alexander was managing partner and founder of Echo Bridge Entertainment.

A gruesome discovery in Worcester overnight began when a motorist reported seeing a baby alone outside a home. Shortly before midnight, police responded to a report of an infant in a car seat in the road in front of 326 Lovell St. The baby, who police said appeared not to be injured, was taken to a hospital for evaluation. In the search for the child's parents, police said they discovered three people inside the home, one man and two women. The man was unresponsive and was later declared dead, according to police.

WASHINGTON - The Pentagon office with responsibilities for assisting US military and civilian overseas voters is issuing a new ballot-request form this year that forces civilian voters to make an all-or-none declaration either that they plan to return to the United States or have no intent of ever doing so - a choice that expatriate groups say is confusing, unfair, carries potential tax ramifications, and could depress voting in ways that could make...

BRUNSWICK, Maine - The Store at Spindleworks is the sort of craft boutique common in many New England towns. Displays feature the handiwork of local weavers, potters, artists, poets, and musicians. The only difference here is that all the artisans happen to have disabilities. Celebrating its 30th anniversary this year, nonprofit Spindleworks serves 35 to 40 artists ranging in age from 20 to 76 in its weekday programs. Some come every day, while others attend once or twice a week.

Total Chaos: The Art and Aesthetics of Hip-Hop , Edited by Jeff Chang, Basic Civitas, 382 pp., illustrated,, paperback, $18.95 With hip-hop approaching 30 years of age, the effort to document its history has entered its second stage. Following an initial wave of mainstream histories like "The Vibe History of Hip-Hop," the intellectuals are casing the scene, looking to explain, quantify, and categorize the tidal wave that hit popular culture in the late 1970s and has yet to recede.

The growing availability of news media and cellphones in reclusive North Korea likely forced it to admit within hours that its long-range rocket launch last month was a failure, the U.S. human rights envoy to the country said Thursday. The envoy, Robert King, was speaking at the launch of a U.S. government-funded study that says North Koreans now have unprecedented exposure to foreign media, giving them a more positive impression of the outside world. North Korea allowed foreign journalists extensive access to the country to report on the centennial of the nation's founder in...