Playwright, professor, and Performance artist Anna Deveare Smith grounds her avant-garde theater in the infinitely strange world of reality. "I look for the poem that the person is," Smith says of the real-people inspirations for her dramatic characters. Instead of creating intricate backgrounds for

Collage, Huge, Layered, Open-ended, Political, Polychromatic, Sincere, Social protest, Solo performance

According to photographer Cindy Sherman, "The male half of society has structured the whole language of how women see and think about themselves." In "Untitled Film Stills" (1977-1980), Sherman featured herself in various guises that resemble stock characters from Hollywood melodramas, providing a Po

Cartoonish, Composed, Conceptual photography, Death, Deconstructive, Feminine, Grotesque, In-your-face, Layered, Mythic, Political, Women's literature

The work of Philip K. Dick represents some of the most influential writing to come out of the 1950s and 1960s. His explorations into the tenuous nature of reality have influenced thinkers across disciplines and genres. Recognizing that reality is a construct -- he disturbingly called it a "consensual

Agitated, Cyberpunk fiction, Dark, Distorted, Dystopic, Fantastic, Layered, Machinistic, Noir / pulp fiction, Religious, Trippy

"I began writing in March of 1978, prodded by a seminal idea: I felt like poisoning a monk." This dark inspiration led Umberto Eco to begin his career as novelist at the somewhat tardy age of 46. Already established as one of the world's leading semioticians, a lecturer in constant demand, and a thin

Dense, Layered, Lush, Mathematical, Postmodern fiction, Semiotics