New Times Magazine Redesign

December 4, 2015

Charlie Savage's
'power wars'

1New York Times Magazine

Shot by Alec Cutter
Aleccutter.com

2 www.nytimes.com

3New York Times Magazine

Rwanda

1994
Survivor of Hutu death camp.

Shot by James Nachtwey

4 www.nytimes.com

5New York Times Magazine

Bosnia

1993
Ethnic cleansing in Mostar. Croat
militiaman fires on his Moslem
neighbors.

Shot by James Nachtwey

6 www.nytimes.com

7New York Times Magazine

Contributors

December 4, 2015 Table Editor in Chief Jake Silverstein
of contents Deputy Editor Bill Wasik
Managing Editor
10 A Hanukkah Treat By Andrew Scrivani Design Director Jessica Lustig
Director of Photography Erika Sommer
14 As Aging Population Grows, By John Markoff Features Editor
So Do Robotic Health Aides Digital Deputy Editor Gail Bichler
Story Editors Kathy Ryan
22 Charlie Savage’s ‘Power Wars’ By Gideon Rose Ilena Silverman
Associate Editor Charles Homans
27 Art World Mystery By Scott Reyburn Art Director Nitsuh Abebe
Deputy Art Director Michael Benoist
34 Parents May Pass Down More Than Designers Sheila Glaser
Associate Photo Editors Claire Gutierrez
Just Genes, Study Suggests By Carl Zimmer Luke Mitchell
Photo Assistant Dean Robinson
37 Thinking Chowder? By Karsten Moran Copy Chief Willy Staley
Copy Editors Sasha Weiss
Contributing Writers: Jeannie Choi
Tamar Adler, Scott Anderson, Ronen Bergman, Daniel Bergner, Taffy Brodesser-Akner, Chip Brown, Head of Research Jazmine Hughes
Teju Cole, Sara Corbett, Adam Davidson, Benoit Denizet-Lewis, Robert Draper, Josh Eells, Rachel Research Editors Matt Willey
Kaadzi Ghansah, Vanessa Grigoriadis, Suzy Hansen, Virginia Heffernan, Robin Marantz Henig, Jason Sfetko
Amanda Hess, Jeff Himmelman, Jack Hitt, Wil S. Hylton, Julia Ioffe, Maggie Jones, Jennifer Kahn, Jay Production Chief Frank Augugliaro
Caspian Kang, Francis Lam, Brook Larmer, Gideon Lewis-Kraus, Wyatt Mason, Charles McGrath, Production Editors Ben Grandgenett
Luke Mogelson, Jon Mooallem, Peggy Orenstein, Ruth Padawer, Troy Patterson, Nathaniel Rich, Editorial Assistant Stacey Baker
Stephen Rodrick, David Samuels, Lisa Sanders, Mattathias Schwartz, Samantha M. Shapiro, Russell Chief National Correspondent Amy Kellner
Shorto, Charles Siebert, Michael Sokolove, John Jeremiah Sullivan, Melanie Thernstrom, Clive Chief Political Correspondent David La Spina
Thompson, Kim Tingley, Paul Tough, Judith Warner, Elizabeth Weil, Jonah Weiner Staff Writers Christine Walsh
Karen Hanley
Contributing Artist: Christoph Niemann Writer at Large Rob Hoerburger
Harvey Dickson
8 www.nytimes.com Daniel Fromson
Margaret Prebula
Andrew Willett
Nandi Rodrigo
Nana Asfour
Renee Michael

Lia Miller
Mark Van de Walle

Anick Pleven
Patty Rush

Hilary Shanahan
Liz Gerecitano Brinn

Mark Leibovich
Jim Rutenberg
Sam Anderson
Emily Bazelon
Susan Dominus
Maureen Dowd
Nikole Hannah-Jones
Wesley Morris
Jenna Wortham

C. J. Chivers

WSASHNTTOADDEOGNMOMYRNOAYAEO’UCTCEURHH

PsssaaiBacstgnslopntatlyefiadouTmndpoimosttlymrhAadyoywrupuemaihwoieannoll-dtrpae,ksycyieabprnceggiuscaitssaoelhakfllhde.sourehtek-”u.“ryesytopimaStwmtWsreIroooItbusmctpigecteonkaauoau.puaaadeealyhitacyttnTrystnerrrucoczwahccnh-hreoegh’roeacouiasehth.eivituenwflrneornmsb,lgT.earyr,igusfdstoeaaAsehebloyma,saknty-fcnntyaxooluotouMyaodkoukdo’octtutrmitnrsan’eoun,hnmsueaeeuebd-irgargyiasorc,Sscalhpxaoenoetscs.yntag“zpie”csctdattushoFhethaorleehinIitr.eduoroewtcyezmtcds’eiersroneirntsmadgsaewrsuytowwya,iicaodutovinhlysihhmo,seitu..kiha.tcf.eYatYhocohuur

OHw, wWwH.AaTlkAasRelEtzLeIErpFluITs.cISo!m

9New York Times Magazine

cinnamon sugar for an altogether get
sweeter experience.
healthy

fast

Follow these healthy
steps to improve you!

A Hanukkah Treat
(No, Not Latkes)
With a Sweet
Reminder of Sicily

Latkes may be ubiquitous at What the two dishes have in common is the nubby soft bits of rice encased in a crisp fried
Hanukkah here in the United shell, which can be as texturally thrilling as the brittle strands of potato in a latke.For this recipe,
States, but almost anything deep- I merged the two dishes into one. I kept the spherical form and molten cheese character of an
fried is fair game, from Israeli arancini, but nixed the meat ragù in favor of the sweet raisin filling of the fritters. The exterior is
jelly doughnuts to Spanish cheese crunchy, the insides soft and creamy, with a Parmesan savoriness that gives way to a sweet and
fritters to whatever other tidbits heady burst of brandy-soaked raisins when you hit the center.
one feels like browning in a good
amount of bubbling oil. Though A bonus: Unlike latkes, which are at their best when made just before serving, arancini can
they are not so common today, take some advance preparations. You can cook the rice a day ahead, and roll the rice balls up to
sweet rice fritters studded four hours before frying. And, although they are at their gooiest served within minutes of frying,
with raisins and pine nuts were they still taste great an hour or two later. Of course, you don’t need to celebrate Hanukkah to
what Italian Jews set on their make them. These golden nuggets of deliciousness will be happily devoured whenever you’re
holiday table. ready to fry.

I found this out from the second A Hanukkah Treat (No, Not Latkes)
volume of Edda Servi Machlin’s With a Sweet Reminder of Sicily
wonderful book “The Classic Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times
Cuisine of the Italian Jews,” which December 4, 2015
I was flipping through looking for
new Hanukkah ideas. Ms. Machlin
has been the source of many of
our family’s holiday staples, like
the lemon pot roast my mother
has been making for as long as
I can remember and the spicy
anchovy-laden roasted peppers she
sometimes serves with it.

The rice fritters are vaguely
reminiscent of arancini, the classic
Sicilian fried rice balls, except
they are pancake flat rather than
orange round (arancia is Italian
for orange). In place of the savory
cheese and meat ragù that oozes
from the center of a hot arancini,
the rice fritters are filled with those
raisins and pine nuts, scented
with lemon zest, and dusted with

10 www.nytimes.com

11New York Times Magazine

Somalia

1992
Lifting a dead son to carry him to a
mass grave during the famine.

Shot by James Nachtwey

12 www.nytimes.com

13New York Times Magazine

14 www.nytimes.com As againg
population grows,
so do robotic
health aides

— The ranks of older offsets the cognitive decline Dr. Naira Tandy Trower is experimenting
and frail adults are associated with aging. “We have Hovakimyan of the with a four-foot-tall rolling robot
growing rapidly in the story after story of reconnection University of Illinois he calls Robby. With cameras,
developed world, raising alarms with families through Skype,” with a small drone radar, microphone, speaker,
about how society is going to she added. that may eventually a tablet interface and a movable
help them take care of themselves be able to carry out tray, Robby may someday be able
in their own homes.Naira For all the promising ideas, household tasks, to serve as a mobile companion and
Hovakimyan has an idea: drones. however, skeptics also note that like retrieving a even perform some light chores.
The University of Illinois many ideas are “technologies bottle of medicine,
roboticist recently received a looking for a solution” that for older adults. Mr. Trower said the robot,
$1.5 million grant from the inevitably fail the test of Daniel Acker for now a prototype in his Hoaloha
National Science Foundation practicality.“We all get really The New York Times Robotics laboratory, would be able
to explore the idea of designing excited on the upside, and then to monitor the health of its human
small autonomous drones to we go through this trough of He said companion and assist with tasks
perform simple household disillusionment,” said Laurie that the like keeping track of medicines. Its
chores, like retrieving a bottle of Orlov, a business analyst who science- screen could also be used for video
medicine from another room. Dr. began the Aging in Place fiction conferences with physicians and
Hovakimyan acknowledged that Technology Watch blog in 2008. future of other health care providers. He
the idea might seem off-putting elder-care said that the science-fiction future
to many, but she believes that Even so, examples of robotic robots of elder-care robots is closer than
drones will not only be safe, but and artificial-intelligence- is closer many people believe. “Rather than
will become an everyday fixture in derived technologies that will be than many seeing the train in the distance,
elder care within a decade or two. commercially available in the next people we’re seeing the light shining in
“I’m convinced that within 20 decade include intelligent walkers, believe. our face right now,” he said.
years drones will be today’s smart pendants that track falls Toyota Motor Corp. said last
cellphones,” she said. Her and “wandering,” room and home month that it would spend $1
research is just one example of sensors that monitor health billion to establish a new research
many approaches being studied status, balancing aids, virtual laboratory adjacent to Stanford
to use technology to help aging and robotic electronic University to focus on artificial
people. Even though fully companions, and even drones. intelligence, underscoring the
functioning robot caregivers may company’s view that it should
be a long way off, roboticists and In her lab, Dr. Hovakimyan be added to cars to make human
physicians predict that a new wave has begun experimenting with drivers safer rather than to
of advances in computerized, small and large drones. She refers replace them. The hope is that
robotic and Internet-connected to them as “Bibbidi Bobbidi such technologies will make it
technologies will be available in Bots,” borrowing a phrase from possible for aging people to drive
coming years to help older adults the “Cinderella” movie, to make safely longer.
stay at home longer. “Loneliness them seem less intimidating. Last
is at epidemic levels among elders month, in the Nicer Robotics “Driver assistance will turn
in the U.S. today,” said Juliet laboratory at the University cars into elder-care robots in a
Holt Klinger, senior director of of Illinois, researchers began very positive sense,” said Rodney
dementia care and programs at experimenting with an Oculus
Brookdale Senior Living, one of Rift virtual reality viewer to show
the nation’s largest providers of people how it might feel to be close
assisted living and home care. to a small drone. She believes that
Brookdale is using a variety of drones could ultimately be used
Internet-connected services to to perform all manner of household
help aging clients stay more closely chores, like reaching under a
connected with family and friends. table to grab an object, cleaning
Ms. Holt Klinger said there was chandeliers and weeding the lawn.
growing evidence that staying
connected, even electronically, Many others are trying to devise
solutions, as well. In a crowded
four-room laboratory in South
Seattle, the former Microsoft
software designer and executive

15New York Times Magazine

Brooks, a pioneering roboticist The Intel China project uses people to go out and get more
and a former director of the M.I.T. so-called machine-learning friends, so the idea here was to
Computer Science and Artificial techniques, charting patterns provide a meaningful and frequent
Intelligence Laboratory. “In the of behavior for caregivers. “Your dose of social engagement,” said
United States, when you can’t daily patterns are a vital sign,” Dr. Kaye, the Oregon Health &
drive any longer, you’ve lost your Mr. Dishman said. In addition to Science neurologist, who helped
independence.” The need for smart-home sensors and mobile organize the study.
such technology will grow sharply, robots, there are a variety of
given the broad demographic shifts other efforts to add stationary Internet, tablet and smartphone
sweeping through the world’s robots to provide everything from systems such as grandPad,
population. An aging population coaching to communications to a simplified tablet for older adults,
will place enormous burdens on companionship. and CareAngel, a telephone system
the world’s health care system by to help younger family members
2050, according to demographers. Catalia Health, a San stay connected, are emerging
Already, for the first time in Francisco-based design company, to help with care and staving off
history, 14 percent of the world’s has introduced the Mabu personal isolation. The ultimate test for all
population is older than 65, health care companion, an these ideas will be whether people
a sharp contrast with the 9.1 interactive robot about the size of will want to use them. At the Aging
percent of the population that is a coffeepot. The system, which has 2.0 Conference last month in San
less than 5 years old. a cartoonish form, listens and Francisco, which focused on new
speaks and holds a touch-tablet elder-care technologies, Cynthia
Globally, the number of people interface. It is designed to act Breazeal, an M.I.T. Media Lab
60 and over is expected to more both as a health care coach and to roboticist, showed off Jibo, an
than double by 2050 and triple provide a way to stay in touch with Internet-connected tabletop robot
by 2100. The number of people doctor’s offices and pharmacies. with a round swiveling screen that
80 and above is expected to “My approach is, ‘Here are the portrays a friendly robotic face.
double by 2050 and increase challenges we see in health care.
more than sevenfold by the end What is the right technology?’” The concept did not thrill
of the century. said Cory Kidd, chief executive everyone in the large lunchtime
of the start-up firm. “Robots audience. During a question-and-
Despite a patchwork of happen to be great for helping answer session at the end of the
research and some commercial with behavior.” presentation, a 91-year-old woman
products, the United States said, “If Jibo were my last friend,
appears to be lagging Japan and A more profound question I would be very depressed.”
Europe in developing solutions. is whether robots or virtual
“In both Japan and Europe, assistants, in tandem with Internet As Aging Population Grows,
it seems that government is communications, can help forestall So Do Robotic Health Aides
more attuned to the potential of the effects of aging, like dementia. By John Markoff
technology for aging populations,” Isolation is one of the most vexing December 4, 2015
said Jeffrey A. Kaye, a neurologist problems for older adults, and
at Oregon Health & Science there is evidence that human
University who focuses on contact can postpone intellectual
technologies for the aging. decline.

China reached out more than A study published last summer
a decade ago to Eric Dishman, an in the journal Alzheimer’s &
Intel scientist who has focused on Dementia found that a group of
developing technologies to assist both healthy and mildly cognitively
older adults. “Now I have a team in impaired people in their 70s and
China working with third parties, 80s who engaged in face-to-face
collaborating on their Age Friendly daily online conversations for
City Initiative,” Mr. Dishman said. six weeks showed significant
That has led to the installation of improvements in cognitive skills
sensors in homes to monitor as compared with a control group.
many as 100,000 people. “It is not possible to simply tell

16 www.nytimes.com

Travel Beautifully.
Safe travel across the country
for less than $250.

New York Airlines

17New York Times Magazine

Afghanistan

1996
Mourning a brother killed by a
Taliban rocket.

18 www.nytimes.com Shot by James Nachtwey

19New York Times Magazine

20 www.nytimes.com

Shot by Katerina Pavlickova

21New York Times Magazine

22 www.nytimes.com

hen Paris was attacked democracy and national security. The answer, sophisticated version of Richard
last month, politicians One senses that whether or not he says, lies Nixon’s reasoning that “when the
and pundits fell all over Savage agrees with their specific in appreciat- president does it, that means that it
themselves rushing to positions, he respects the honest ing that legal is not illegal.” Here as elsewhere,
proclaim what Washington should people “in the arena,” as Theodore criticisms in its later years the administration
do next in the war on terror. The Roose­velt put it, who try to find the of the Bush abandoned or reined in some of
vast majority of them would have least bad course in a fallen world. administra- its most controversial policies
done better to keep quiet and The villains, meanwhile, are not tion’s war on and rationales, but observers on
read Charlie Savage’s new book, only the actual bad guys but also terror both sides of the aisle expected
“Power Wars,” instead. It offers those officials who don’t grasp dramatic changes with the arrival
a master class in how to think the full intellectual, moral and of a Democratic administration in
seriously about crucial aspects of practical responsibilities of their 2009. Why those changes never
the subject. positions. For example, Savage happened is the underlying theme
A Pulitzer Prize winner, has nothing but icy contempt for of Savage’s book.
a reporter for The New York an intelligence court judge who
Times and the author of an earlier makes a dodgy ruling accompanied The answer, he says, lies in
book on the George W. Bush by procedural irregularities and appreciating that legal criticisms of
administration, Savage provides doesn’t even bother to writean the Bush administration’s war on
a comprehensive, authoritative opinion explaining his reasoning. terror actually came in two flavors.
history of the legal side of national And his portrait of cynical politicians Some critics opposed Bush’s
security policy making during the who demagogue counterterrorism policies on civil liberties grounds,
Obama years. That might sound policy is scathing. while others opposed them for
dry and forbidding, especially in procedural reasons. The key
a book so dense and long (almost There have been debates about members of Obama’s legal team
700 ­pages of text). But anyone the laws of war for centuries, but were drawn from the second camp,
truly interested in foreign policy over the last couple of decades the and that made all the difference.
or national security should find it scope and complexity of national
essential and enthralling, thanks security law have exploded as Take the question of so-called
to the author’s intelligence, terrorism has thrust the United warrantless wiretapping. To
objectivity, legwork and literary States into an omnipresent simplify: Was the main problem
skill. Savage has the instincts of a conflict with malevolent stateless the wiretapping part (that is,
journalist but the soul of a wonk. actors operating in the shadows. blanket surveillance involving
He understands that policy making Democratic governments naturally an inherently inappropriate
is about choice, and for every issue want to do whatever they can to violation of citizens’ rights), or
discussed — from detention and protect their citizens, Savage notes, the warrantless part (that the bulk
interrogation of terrorist suspects, but they also want to avoid breaking data collection was implemented
to surveillance and targeting, to the law — and so it becomes crucial without appropriate legal
the White House’s tussles with to decide just what counterterrorism sanction)? If you take the
Congress over war powers — tools are legally permissible. first approach, the Obama
he methodically describes the administration’s continuation of
problems administration officials The George W. Bush the programs has been disgraceful.
faced, the options they considered administration entered office If you take the second, the Obama
and why they decided as they did. already determined to eliminate team’s success in putting them
Readers come away understanding what it saw as excessive post-­ on firmer legal ground with
not just what happened but why Watergate restrictions on stronger oversight is a significant
— and the legitimate grounds for presidential authority, and accomplishment.Savage walks
agreeing or disagreeing with the the 9/11 attacks only strengthened the reader through dozens
choices made. that conviction. So the of these debates with a sure
The heroes of the book administration initially dealt hand, translating arcane legal
are well-­intentioned officials with the legal dilemmas of reasoning into plain English.
struggling to balance the counterterrorism by having His summary of the fight over
competing demands of legality, sympathetic government lawyers whether the government is
authorize the aggressive policies allowed todeliberately kill a
it wanted, using a somewhat more United States citizen without a

23New York Times Magazine

trial — an issue raised by the case seemed likely to be remembered Demonstrators dressed
of Anwar al-Awlaki, a major figure as less a transformative post-9/11 as detainees protest the
in Al Qaeda’s Yemeni affiliate president than a transitional one U.S. military detention
— is a model of lucidity. And his — the bridge to a national security facilit in Guantánamo
explanation of why it has proved so legal policy destination that would Bay, Cuba, in front
difficult to close down the prison be determined by his successor, of the U.S. Supreme
at Guantánamo Bay despite the future Congresses and the world as Court in 2013.
president’s own obvious passion it is rather than as one might want
for the issue is convincing, if it to be.” Evan Vucci/
depressing. Associated Press
At one point, Savage quotes
Many detainees couldn’t a disappointed critic (Naz K.
be released outright (because Modirzadeh, the director of the
they posed a real security risk), Harvard Law School program
couldn’t be tried in civilian courts on international law and armed
(because the evidence against conflict) who accuses the Obama
them was inadmissible), couldn’t administration’s lawyers of
be transferred to prisons in the having “traded in strict fealty to
United States (because Congress international law for potential
wouldn’t allow it) and couldn’t be influence on executive decision-
sent back to their home countries making,” contributing not to law
(because those countries couldn’t but to a “law-like discourse” that
hold them securely). So in Gitmo legitimized practices “that do
they stay, to nobody’s satisfaction. not, ultimately, seem bound by
(At one point, King Abdullah of international law — at least not by
Saudi Arabia proposed tracking any conception of international
released Yemeni detainees by law recognizable to international
implanting them with electronic lawyers, especially those outside
chips, like horses or falcons. of the U.S.”
John Brennan, then Obama’s
senior counterterrorism adviser, Such critiques will fall by the
replied, “Horses don’t have good wayside, Savage notes, if over
lawyers.”) time a consensus develops that
the administration’s compromises
The Obama administration, represent a sensible fusing of
Savage concludes, proved less principle and practicality. But if
able or willing to change course the administration’s new norms
than anybody expected — in part are not ultimately embraced, the
because it decided, in practice, critique will hold up. Either way,
that many alternative policy Savage’s superb book should
approaches to the war on terror stand as an indispensable guide to
were worse. “Instead of rethinking the debate.
basic premises of the national
security state, then, Obama Charlie Savage’s ‘Power Wars’
accepted them but sought to By Gideon Rose
find a stronger legal framework December 1, 2015
for carrying out its policy
prescriptions.” The administration POWER WARS
was also less successful than Inside Obama’s Post-9/11 Presidency
it had hoped to be in coming By Charlie Savage
up with definitive answers to Illustrated. 769 pp.
problems, as opposed to merely Little, Brown & Company. $30.
defensible, provisional ones. As
a result, Savage writes, “Obama

24 www.nytimes.com

25New York Times Magazine

Nike.com

26 www.nytimes.com

An Art World Mystery Mr. Greenhalgh says the subject when he made “La Principessa,” while he was working at
Worthy of Leonardo was not an Italian noblewoman, the supermarket in the late 1970s.
but a check-out girl named Alison
LONDON — For people who buy, who worked at a supermarket in “To draw her he says he bought an old land deed that
sell or collect old art, the hope of Bolton outside Manchester in had been written on vellum, and finding the ‘good’ side
unearthing a new work by a big northwest England. to be too ink-stained to use, turned it over and drew on
name is a motivating dream. And the rough side instead, as Leonardo would never have
names don’t come much bigger That sensational claim emerged done,” Mr. Januszczak wrote in The Sunday Times.
than that of Leonardo da Vinci. on Nov. 29 in an article in The
Sunday Times by the art critic Mr. Greenhalgh was unavailable to comment.
For eight years, the Canadian Waldemar Januszczak, who is “It’s ludicrous and absurd,” Mr. Silverman said in a
collector Peter Silverman, who part of a consortium that has telephone interview. “It’s shameless that an art historian
lives in Paris, has been trying just published a memoir by Mr. should stoop to that level to promote his book.” Mr.
to convince the art world that a Greenhalgh, “A Forger’s Tale.” Silverman said he would pay Mr. Greenhalgh 10,000
drawing of an aristocratic young Mr. Greenhalgh, who in 2007 pounds, about $15,000, if he could reproduce “La
woman he bought for around was sentenced to four years and Bella Principessa” on vellum in front of a committee of
$20,000 is a long-lost masterpiece eight months in prison on forgery- experts. “And he goes back to jail where he belongs if
by Leonardo, potentially worth related charges, was responsible he doesn’t,” he said. The story of “La Bella Principessa”
as much as $150 million. Now for a number of well-documented and its attribution started in January 1998, when Kate
the controversy surrounding the fakes, including a Gauguin Ganz, an art dealer in New York, bought a head-and-
drawing, “La Bella Principessa,” sculpture of a faun bought by the shoulders study of an aristocratic young woman, seen in
has taken a new turn. Shaun Art Institute of Chicago and an profile and dressed in the Italian Renaissance manner,
Greenhalgh, the notorious British Egyptian alabaster sculpture of a for $21,850 with fees at Christie’s in New York.
art forger who is thought to princess purchased by the Bolton Executed in pen, ink, chalk and watercolor on vellum,
have created fakes that spanned Museum. Now he has added it was cataloged by Christie’s as “early 19th century,
centuries of art history, has “La Bella Principessa” to the list. possibly German.”Nine years later, in January 2007, Ms.
declared it to be his work. Ganz sold the drawing, which she described as “based
Mr. Januszczak says Mr. on a number of paintings by Leonardo da Vinci and may
Greenhalgh was about 20 years old have been made by a German artist studying in Italy,” to
Mr. Silverman for the original purchase price, minus a
dealer’s discount.

In June 2008, Lumière Technology, a company in
Paris that specializes in digital scanning, announced
that its analysis had determined that the portrait was by
Leonardo. The work was subsequently valued at £100
million by the London art dealer Dickinson, who offered
it for sale to selected clients. Timothy Clifford, a director
of the National Galleries of Scotland from 1984 to 2006
who joined Dickinson as an adviser in 2007, declared
the drawing a genuine Leonardo in an article in The
Times of London in October 2009.The attribution has
also been endorsed by a half-dozen Leonardo scholars.
Martin Kemp, an emeritus professor in art history at
Oxford University who began researching the work
in 2005, was an early convert, identifying the sitter as
Bianca Giovanna Sforza, the illegitimate daughter of
Ludovico Sforza, the duke of Milan from 1494 to 1499.
Research by Mr. Kemp and Pascal Cotte, a co-founder of
Lumière, suggested that the drawing had been removed
from a Sforza family album, now in the National Library
in Warsaw, made to celebrate the 1496 marriage of
Bianca to the Milanese military commander Galeazzo
Sanseverino. Those developments prompted the owner
of the drawing when Christie’s sold it to Ms. Ganz,

27New York Times Magazine

Jeanne Marchig, the widow of “inconsistencies” — the lack of A 19th-century
the artist and restorer Giannino any documentation or copies, the Italian Renaissance
Marchig, to sue Christie’s for presence of just three stitch-holes style drawing worth
breaches of fiduciary duty and of in the side of the vellum sheet ( the tens of thousands; or
warranty, as well as negligence Sforza volume in Warsaw has five) a modern fake worth
and negligent misrepresentation, and what she saw as anatomically hardly anything at all.
claiming they should have known it incorrect quality of the drawing
was a Leonardo. itself. Her conclusion was that “the
present attribution to Leonardo
The suit was rejected by must be deemed unreliable.” The
a United States appeals court drawing itself is at the Geneva
in 2011 on the grounds that Freeport storage warehouse and
the statute of limitations had is not for sale, Mr. Silverman said,
expired. In a separate suit against who added that in 2012 he had
Christie’s, concerning the loss of been offered $60 million for it but
the drawing’s frame, Ms. Marchig had rejected the offer. “I want the
stated that the drawing had been drawing to be shown all over the
in her husband’s collection by world so that people can decide
1955, long before Mr. Greenhalgh for themselves,” he said. “But the
is supposed to have made it. experts who won’t accept it have
As a Leonardo, “La Bella refused to see it. Bureaucrats don’t
Principessa” has yet to win over like to take a chance. They’re
the art establishment. The work afraid of controversy.”
has not been shown in any major
national museum, and it was By various accounts, then,
not included in the landmark it would seem that “La Bella
exhibition “Leonardo da Vinci: Principessa” is either a real
Painter at the Court of Milan” at Leonardo worth tens of millions;
the National Gallery in London a 19th-century Italian Renaissance
from November 2011 to February style drawing worth tens of
2012. That show did, however, thousands; or a modern fake worth
include a recently rediscovered hardly anything at all.
Leonardo, “Christ as Salvator
Mundi,” circa 1499, which was But adding characters like
bought in 2013 by the Russian Shaun Greenhalgh and Alison from
collector Dmitry E. Rybolovlev for the supermarket into the mix will
$127.5 million from Yves Bouvier, liven up the debate — and make it
a Swiss businessman and art dealer. ever more difficult to discern what
Mr. Rybolovlev sued Mr. Bouvier the scientifically minded Leonardo
after discovering that he had paid would have recognized as the truth.
the sellers, the New York dealers
Alexander Parish and Robert An Art World Mystery Worthy of Leonardo
Simon, between $75 million and By Scott Reyburn
$80 million for the work. December 4, 2015

Last Tuesday, meanwhile, Experts disagree over whether the drawing
Kasia Pisarek, an independent known as ‘‘La Bella Principessa’’ is by
art historian who specializes in Leonardo.
attribution, became the latest Credit: Pascal Cotte/Lumière Technology
scholar to make a case against
a Leonardo “Principessa.” In a
paper presented at a conference
in London, she ran down a
checklist of what she termed

28 www.nytimes.com

29New York Times Magazine

BMW.COM

30 www.nytimes.com

31New York Times Magazine

32 www.nytimes.com

33New York Times Magazine

34 www.nytimes.com

Parents
May Pass
Down More
Than Just
Genes,

study suggests

In 2013, an obese man went to Hvidovre Hospital in
Denmark to have his stomach stapled. All in all, it was ordinary
bariatric surgery — with one big exception.

A week before the operation, the man provided a sperm
sample to Danish scientists. A week after the procedure, he
did so again. A year later, he donated a third sample.

Scientists were investigating a tantalizing but controversial
hypothesis: that a man’s experiences can alter his sperm, and
that those changes in turn may alter his children.

That idea runs counter to standard thinking about heredity:
that parents pass down only genes to their children. People
inherit genes that predispose them to obesity, or stress, or
cancer — or they don’t. Whether one’s parents actually were
obese or constantly anxious doesn’t rewrite those genes.

Yet a number of animal experiments in recent years have
challenged conventional thinking on heredity, suggesting that
something more is at work.

In 2010, for example, Dr. Romain Barres of the University
of Copenhagen and his colleagues fed male rats a high-fat diet
and then mated them with females. Compared with male rats
fed a regular diet, those on the high-fat diet fathered offspring
that tended to gain more weight, develop more fat and have
more rouble regulating insulin levels.

35New York Times Magazine

Eating high-fat food is just one of First, they collected sperm from Dr. Barres
several experiences a father can have 10 obese Danish men and 13 lean and his
that can change his offspring. Stress is ones. They found numerous epigenetic colleagues
another. differences. One type of epigenetic identified
factor they looked at involved molecular more than
Male rats exposed to stressful caps that are placed on DNA in a 3,900 genes
experiences — like smelling the odor process called methylation. Dr. Barres that were
of a fox — will father pups that have a and his colleagues found more than methylated
dampened response to stress. 9,000 genes in which the methylation differently
pattern differed between lean and a year after
To find the link between a father’s obese men. surgery.
experiences and his offspring’s biology,
scientists have taken a close look at Then the scientists recruited six
sperm. A sperm cell delivers DNA to obese men getting bariatric surgery to
an egg, of course. But those genes are see how losing weight changed these
regulated by swarms of molecules, methylation patterns. In a report
so-called epigenetic factors. published on Thursday in the journal
Cell Metabolism, Dr. Barres and his
These molecules can respond to colleagues identified more than 3,900
environmental influences by silencing genes that were methylated differently
some genes and activating others as a year after surgery.
needed. Some studies suggest the
changes in epigenetic factors can be Among the genes that are
handed down to offspring via sperm. epigenetically altered are those that
affect such behaviors as appetite
When Dr. Tracy L. Bale, a control. But the new study does not
neuroscientist at the University of show whether those changes have any
Pennsylvania, and her colleagues effect on a father’s children, Dr. Barres
looked at the sperm of stressed male said. “I don’t want to speculate whether
rats, for example, they found unusual it’s positive or negative in the following
levels of epigenetic molecules called generation,” he said.
microRNAs.
Dr. Barres and his colleagues are
They created a cocktail of now expanding on the study by
microRNAs and injected them into comparing epigenetic patterns in the
embryos from mellow fathers. As Dr. sperm of obese fathers with the patterns
Bale and her colleagues reported in the blood cells of their offspring.
recently, the embryos developed into
rats with altered stress responses. “We’re going to try to see if there’s
something transmitted all the way
The notion that environmental down,” Dr. Barres said.
responses might influence human
health in similar ways has huge Other scientists had mixed views
implications. But scientists have only about the study. On one hand, they
started to investigate the epigenetics agreed that the researchers used
of fatherhood. As is often the case sophisticated methods to survey
when scientists turn from animal epigenetic differences in the sperm.
experiments to humans, the results But they were wary of drawing broad
have been provocative but hardly conclusions.
clear-cut.
Dr. John M. Greally, an epigenetics
In 2013, Adelheid Soubry, a expert at the Albert Einstein College
molecular epidemiologist at KU of Medicine, said it was possible that
Leuven University in Belgium, and genetic differences between the men
her colleagues studied 79 newborn were mostly to blame for the differences
children. seen in their sperm. He also shared a
concern with Dr. Bale and Dr. Soubry
They found epigenetic differences that the study involved too few men.
between children with obese fathers
and those with lean ones. The differences in such a small
sample might have occurred randomly.
Are changes like these actually
caused by men’s obesity? Dr. Barres “Honestly, I think a lot of what
and his colleagues set out to investigate they have is noise,” Dr. Greally said
that potential link in two ways.

36 www.nytimes.com

That doesn’t mean that Dr. Greally thinks the Danish
scientists are wrong, but rather that pinning down the
epigenetic effects that fathers pass to their children will take
much more work.
“I’d say, let’s do a study of hundreds of people,” Dr. Greally
said. “It’s doable. It just requires that we’re bold about doing
these things.”

But the new
study does not
show whether
those changes
have any effect
on a father’s
children.

Parents May Pass Down More Than
Just Genes, Study Suggests
By Carl Zimmer
December 3, 2015

37New York Times Magazine

Design Beautifully.
Interior Design Studio

Parents May Pass Down More Than Just
Genes, Study Suggests
By Carl Zimmer
December 3, 2015

38 www.nytimes.com

thinking Publishing a new recipe for cupboard was a jar of small piquillo
chowder seems like asking for peppers from Spain, so that wish
chowder? trouble, since everyone has was easily granted. It’s a pantry
a different idea about what makes staple I heartily recommend. Into
Try an Iberian-Inspired Soup a true chowder. the soup went the sweet red strips.
Just before serving, I gave it a
But on a recent drizzly, almost- fistful of chopped cilantro and a
cool day, I found myself fantasizing good squeeze of lime. It was not
about a soup chock-full of potatoes chowder at all, but awfully good.
and some sort of fish. It would be
more Portuguese or Spanish than What resulted
New England, inspired by some of was warming,
the salt cod and potato stews I have homey and
encountered along the Iberian very tasty.
Peninsula. It probably wouldn’t
really qualify as a chowder anyway, Thinking Chowder?
and wouldn’t appeal to outspoken Try an Iberian-Inspired Soup
purists. I didn’t plan to use milk or By Karsten Moran
butter, nor would there be oyster December 4, 2015
crackers in the picture. No, this
soup would have chorizo, onions, 39New York Times Magazine
leeks and potatoes. As for fish, I
planned to use something smoked.

What resulted was warming,
homey and very tasty. The only
ingredient I had to leave the
house for was a chunk of smoked
sablefish. Really, almost any kind
of smoked fish could be used:
whitefish, sturgeon, haddock, even
eel or smoked mussels.I started
out by sweating onions in olive oil,
always a good beginning, with
a bay leaf for good measure.
Then came the diced chorizo, its
familiar aroma wafting through
the kitchen. I could have added
potatoes and water and called
it dinner right then. I’m glad to
have persevered, though, because
the smoked sable gave the soup
unbelievable instant umami.
Now, umami is not a word I would
normally choose — it’s overused,
sometimes merely to describe
big flavor. For me to invoke it, a
food has to be shockingly, deeply
flavorful, and this was. Just a few
minutes of simmering imbued the
broth with a vaguely dashi-like
flavor and aroma.

But the other element I wanted
was roasted pepper. Happily, in the

40 www.nytimes.com

41New York Times Magazine

42 www.nytimes.com