Cigarettes will be part of unusual VMFA exhibit by Chinese artist

A half-million cigarettes shaped into a 40-by-15 foot carpet depicting the coat of a tiger is being created at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts by a Chinese artist fascinated by Virginia's historical connection to tobacco.

The work, being assembled by hand in VMFA's parking deck, is the third installment of Chinese contemporary artist Xu Bing's "Tobacco Project," which explores the production and culture of tobacco through the artist's eyes.

"He was interested in Richmond because of its rich connection to tobacco," said John Ravenal, the museum's curator of modern and contemporary art. "He was fascinated" with the region's tobacco farms, warehouses and factories, some of which he toured.

"He loves agriculture and industry, and he spent time on a farm himself as a young person as part of (China's) cultural revolution," Ravenal said.

Xu Bing's interest in tobacco extends to the texture of the leaf itself, as well as the "visuals" associated with the product's packaging and advertising, Ravenal said. "A lot of aspects of the exhibition are a celebration of the culture of tobacco," he added.

To gain further inspiration, Xu Bing, who also is vice president of the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, conducted research at the Library of Virginia and the Valentine Richmond History Center.

Xu Bing, 56, launched his Tobacco Project more than 10 years ago at Duke University, where he was an artist in residence. From there, he traveled to Shanghai to create the second installment of the trilogy.

He is collaborating with six former graduate students from Virginia Commonwealth University's School of Arts to make the tiger skin carpet and other works, which include a 440-pound block of compressed tobacco embossed with the text, "Light as smoke."

Other items include books of poetry printed on cigarette paper and matchbooks, and a 40-foot-long reproduction of an ancient Chinese landscape painting on a scroll that will have a 40-foot-long cigarette burned down the length of it, Ravenal said.

Xu Bing is using tobacco as a subject and art medium to explore its historical and contemporary impact on human culture and trade. The exhibit will include positive and negative aspects, including Xu Bing's personal connection to a country where 50 percent of the men smoke and his father's death of lung cancer at 64.

"He has his own kind of tragic connection," Ravenal said.

The largest piece of the Richmond exhibition will contain 500,000 "1st Class" cigarettes, a discount brand. The museum, through its exhibition budget of privately donated funds, purchased the cigarettes – about 35,000 packs – at roughly wholesale price from a source in North Carolina, Ravenal said.

"One of our former trustees comes from a tobacco family, and she has a connection with someone who was high up in the tobacco industry," Ravenal said.

The former VCU grad students assembling the carpet, which should be completed by late August, are gluing "handfuls" of cigarettes at a time to the carpet base. The orange-and-white tiger image is being created by the placement of the cigarettes: the filter end is positioned upright for the color orange, the ignited end for the color white.

Xu Bing, who spent two weeks here in February planning and making templates, will return to Richmond several days before the exhibition opens Sept. 10 to "kind of fine-tune the installation," Ravenal said.

Menthol cigarettes make quitting smoking more difficult, new study finds

A new study, coming amid an ongoing controversy over the possible ban of menthol cigarettes, concludes that the mint-flavored cigarettes are harder to quit than regular smokes.
The findings, released today by researchers at The Cancer Institute of New Jersey, found menthol smokers had far more trouble kicking the habit – especially among minorities.
While the reasons are still subject to debate, Jonathan Foulds, a professor of public health sciences and psychiatry at the Penn State College of Medicine, believes an anesthetic effect in menthol cigarettes allows smokers to inhale more nicotine. His theory is that groups with less money reach out for their fix in the most economic way possible.
"It’s clear that people smoke their cigarettes differently, based on their socioeconomic situation," he said. "Menthol makes the poison go down smoother."
The study, published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, examined the entire national smoking population, and focused in on specific subgroups, such as those trying to quit.
Menthol smokers showed lower quit rates, and the relationship was noted among whites, blacks and Puerto Ricans, according to the research. But it was more telling among minorities.
"We defined our denominator or study population five different ways, considering things like quit attempts and the use of other tobacco products," said the report’s author Cristine Delnevo, director of the Center for Tobacco Surveillance and Evaluation Research for The Cancer Institute at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. "The association was robust and consistent, as well as more pronounced among blacks and Puerto Ricans."
Menthol was found to be generally more common among younger smokers and females. But the most pronounced effect of the lower quit rate was on minorities. More than 70 percent of black smokers in the U.S. were menthol smokers, and even more in New Jersey, where the rate was about 80 percent.
About 21 percent of white smokers smoked menthols.
One of the newest revelations about menthol smoking by race was the Puerto Rican population, which at more than 60 percent of smokers, was significantly higher than other Latino groups, such as Mexicans at 20 percent.
The study also concluded menthol smoking decreased independently of race with increased education, income and age.
The new study, partly funded by an FDA grant, comes amid a controversy over the minty smokes. Other flavored cigarettes were banned in 2009 by the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, which focused on the targeting of younger populations by added flavor choices. The FDA is considering a full ban on menthol cigarettes since the group’s Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee recommended in March that a "removal of menthol cigarettes from the marketplace would benefit public health in the United States."
Lorillard, maker of the Newport brand, declined comment on the study until it could be reviewed. However, the company rebuts the alleged dangers of menthol, and has opposed any menthol ban. It also filed suit in February against the advisory committee, alleging conflicts of interest among some of its members. The company also runs a website that strenuously lays out its position on the topic — and predicts a possible black-market backlash if the roughly 30 percent of cigarettes in the country are outlawed.
"Lorillard believes that the scientific evidence does not show that menthol in cigarettes is harmful, and that Americans have a right to make a personal choice to use any legal product," the website says. "Prohibition of menthol cigarettes would lead to the illegal sale of more dangerous cigarettes through an unprecedented underground market."
Tobacco health experts say marketing of the various menthol brands has been targeted at African-Americans. Researchers at the Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program at the University of California found in a 2004 review of tobacco companies’ records shows an "African Americanization" of menthol cigarettes by the tobacco industry. Delnevo agrees.
"It is clear the industry has been marketing menthol to African-Americans for at least 40 years," Delnovo said.

Charlotte a test market for smokeless tobacco lozenges

Bite-size dissolvable orbs that look like breath mints and melt in your mouth are the tobacco industry’s latest attempt to fight falling U.S. cigarette sales.
Charlotte is one of two test markets for Winston-Salem-based Reynolds American Inc.’s newest products: dissolvable, smokeless tobacco lozenges that come as orbs, sticks or strips.
The products all contain less nicotine than cigarettes, between 0.5 and 3 milligrams instead of 12 to 15. Reynolds spokesman David Howard said they meet a “societal expectation.”

“There’s no secondhand smoke, no spitting and no cigarette butt litter,” Howard said.
Health officials still worry about the risks of smokeless options. Smokeless tobacco users may not get lung cancer, health experts say, but they risk mouth cancer, gum disease and tooth loss. Prenatal dangers for pregnant women also still exist.
“There are no safe tobacco products,” said Dr. Matt Carpenter, a clinical psychologist and associate professor at the Medical University of South Carolina who’s researching the effect of smokeless products on smoking habits.
Huntersville resident Joey Hodge, who’s smoked for almost five years, sees the appeal of smokeless products that won’t be as tough on his lungs or make him smell like smoke, but the 20-year-old isn’t sold on Reynolds’ newest offering.
“They were definitely not the greatest thing I’ve ever tasted,” Hodge said. Plus, he added, the products “really didn’t do much” to satisfy his nicotine craving.
Hodge’s reaction isn’t the sort tobacco makers are hoping for. As cigarette sales slide because of the health risks and social stigma, tobacco companies are counting on smokers like Hodge to fuel the new smokeless market. The dissolvable products sell for about $2 for a 12-pack - comparable, Reynolds says, to its other smokeless products.
“They can enjoy tobacco pleasure without bothering others and without having to leave the workplace, or the restaurant or the bar,” Howard said.
Analysts say new laws banning cigarettes in public places, like the ban on smoking in restaurants and bars that took effect in North Carolina last January, are among the factors driving a steep decline in cigarette sales.
“In recent years you’ve seen smoking banned in most states in most bars and restaurants. That kind of takes away the fun,” said Phil Gorham, industry analyst for investment firm Morningstar.
In its second quarter earnings report last month, Reynolds reported the number of cigarettes sold in the U.S. fell 4.4 percent. Gorham said companies like Reynolds can combat falling sales by increasing prices in the short term, but they’ll eventually need to diversify revenues.
While American sales of cigarettes drop 3 percent to 4 percent every year, the market for smokeless products grew 3 percent in 2009 and 7 percent in 2010, said Mary Gotaas, tobacco industry analyst for researcher IBISWorld. This year, smokeless sales are expected to jump 8 percent, Gotaas said.
While Reynolds is testing its new dissolvables, Richmond, Va.-based rival Philip Morris has its own product in the works: a dissolvable tobacco stick.
The growth of smokeless products worries some public health advocates who think the new products appeal to children. During the first round of testing, the orbs’ packaging resembled Tic Tacs, creating concern that children might confuse them with candy, said Dr. John Spangler, professor of family health and community medicine at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center.
For this round of testing, there’s larger packaging and new warnings. Packages now say “This product contains nicotine and is for adult tobacco consumers only” and “There is no safe tobacco product,” in addition to one of four required FDA warnings.
The Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee of the FDA is holding hearings exploring the implications of smokeless products. Right now, all tobacco products must be age-restricted and kept behind the counter, just like cigarettes.
Warning labels on smokeless tobacco products must cover at least 30 percent of the packaging and every product must carry one of four messages: “Smokeless tobacco is addictive,” “This product can cause mouth cancer,” “This product can cause gum disease and tooth loss,” or “This product is not a safe alternative to cigarettes.”
Howard said there’s no expectation that smokeless dissolvables will be regulated less strictly than other tobacco products. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, one of 12 senators who called for the hearings, called dissolvables the latest way for tobacco companies to stay “one step ahead of the sheriff.”
One issue on the committee’s agenda: the potential use of smokeless tobacco products as quitting aids. Gotaas said that appeal is one of the factors driving smokeless sales.
Dean Torrance of Charlotte, a smoker for 20 years, has tried, and failed, to quit. She said smokeless products may be just what she needs.
“I would like to be able to do smokeless to get me to stop,” Torrance said.
Doctors say there are safer ways to quit smoking. Both Spangler and Carpenter recommend their patients use tested and proven medications, such as nicotine replacement pills and patches, instead of other tobacco products with unknown consequences that could keep them addicted.
Said Carpenter: “The very best thing that anybody can do for their health, if they’re a smoker, is to quit all tobacco products completely.”

Medical marijuana petitions rejected

Backers of a push to legalize medical marijuana in Ohio must head out and collect at least 1,000 more valid signatures after an initial batch of petitions didn't pass muster with the state, the Toledo Blade reports.

The Ohio Coalition for Medical Compassion submitted 2,143 signatures in order to get the language for the constitutional amendment before Attorney General Mike DeWine, but little more than 500 were valid. Should the group get 1,000 signatures, it must then have the petition language certified and then collect at least 385,245 more valid signatures to make the November 2012 ballot, the paper reported.
The so-called Ohio Alternative Treatment Amendment would decriminalize marijuana possession, delivery and cultivation when used for medical reasons and set standards for patient possession.

British American Tobacco Says World Coming Out Of Recession

British American Tobacco PLC (BATS.LN) Wednesday said the world is coming out of recession, as the second-biggest tobacco group by revenue recorded a rise in profit and sales driven by robust demand in emerging markets, and the rate of volume decline slowed.

BAT, which competes with U.S.-based global market leader Philip Morris International Inc. (PM) and U.K. peer Imperial Tobacco Group PLC (IMT.LN), is focused on building its position in developing economies such as Eastern Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Asia to offset a weaker performance in developed markets like Western Europe where smokers are struggling with tough economic conditions.

Consumers in mature markets are cutting back on spending in the light of government austerity measures, and switching to low-cost brands. The company has clawed back margin erosion caused by weak volumes and excise tax hikes through raising prices.

The London, England-based maker of Dunhill, Kent, Pall Mall and Lucky Strike said first-half cigarette volumes fell 1% to 344 billion, compared with a 3% drop in the same period a year ago and a 2.4% fall in the first quarter.

Explaining the deceleration, Michael Prideaux, director of corporate and regulatory affairs, said, "On an industry basis, the world is gradually coming out of recession. On a company basis, it is the ability to grow market share."

Prideaux added the share gains are well-spread, including Germany, Russia and Argentina. "We are doing pretty well all round. We look at our top 40 markets and we grew share in 26 of them."

The company improved its position in Spain, where falling demand due to economic woes led to a price war, even though it only has a small market share in the country.

Effects of chewing wild tobacco during pregnancy

A University of Queensland PhD scholar is examining the health effects of chewing wild tobacco plants by Central Australian Aboriginal women during pregnancy.

According to Angela Ratsch, over 30 percent of Aboriginal women who give birth at Alice Springs Hospital regularly chew wild tobacco or 'pituri', which is found growing across regional and rural areas of Australia.

The chewing of Australian wild tobacco plants by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations is common in the central regions of Australia, where it is chewed in order to extract the nicotine content.

It is also a common practice amongst developing nations and indigenous populations throughout the world, with more women chewing tobacco than smoking it.

In Canada, approximately 58 percent of Inuit women chew during pregnancy, while in Cambodia, midwives recommend the use of chewing tobacco for pregnant women to reduce symptoms of morning sickness.

Ms Ratsch said little research had been done on the effects of chewing wild tobacco during pregnancy.

“Cigarette smoking has been clearly linked as an independent factor to low birth weight and premature birth, but it is unknown whether the outcome of chewing ‘pituri' is also a contributing factor,” she said.

“Babies born to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mothers who smoke are more than 250 grams lighter than those born to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mothers who do not smoke.”

Statistics show that the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander maternal mortality ratio is almost three times higher than for Australian non-Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women.

Similarly, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander infant mortality rates are two to three times higher than for non-Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander infants, with the highest rate in the Northern Territory (15.6 per 1000 live births).

Ms Ratsch's research looks at the chemical properties of chewing tobacco in pregnant women and their unborn babies.

It builds on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander knowledge of native plants and practices to determine whether a relationship exists between the chewing of pituri during pregnancy and poor maternal and neonatal health outcomes.

The research is being undertaken by UQ pharmacy and midwifery researchers, and midwives in collaboration with Aboriginal health workers and Aboriginal liaison officers in Central Australia and key Aboriginal Women's Organisations; Ngaanyatjarra Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Women's Council and Alukura Central Australian Aboriginal Congress.

R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company Provides 3,000 Pieces of Art to Arts Council

The Arts Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County will be the beneficiary of about 3,000 pieces of artwork from the corporate collection of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company. The artwork is valued at approximately $700,000.

"After more than 100 years of purchasing art to enhance the work environment of our employees, we have far more art than we can display," said Mark Peters, chief financial officer of R.J. Reynolds. "We were faced with the decision of whether to continue to store pieces indefinitely, or get them back into the community where they can be enjoyed by others. The arts transform our community, and we're delighted to play a role in that transformation."

The Reynolds American Foundation, Reynolds American Inc., its operating companies and employees have a long history of support for the arts in Winston-Salem and Forsyth County. Year after year, the corporation and its employees have made substantial contributions to annual Arts Council campaigns, donating millions of dollars and thousands of volunteer hours. The Milton Rhodes Center for the Arts, which opened last September in downtown Winston-Salem, has a large community events space named "Reynolds Place" in recognition of that support.

Many of the works being provided to the council by R.J. Reynolds are by local and North Carolina artists. They include oils, watercolors, sculpture, pottery, ceramics and textiles.

The Arts Council plans to sell most of the pieces of art to community members, individual collectors, museums or other organizations. The proceeds of the sales will be used to fund Arts Council programs and funded groups.

"This is significant and very meaningful for several reasons," said Milton Rhodes, president and CEO of the Arts Council. "Fundraising is extremely difficult in this economic environment, so the generosity of R.J. Reynolds will benefit ultimately a host of local arts organizations and individual artists who receive grants from The Arts Council.

"Also, many of the works are by local artists who are of interest to people in the community," Rhodes said. "Rather than being in storage, they will be in hands of those who appreciate and enjoy them."

The Arts Council is looking toward an event at the Rhodes Center in February 2012, when art will be displayed and sold. "Because of the large number of pieces, the logistics of all this are daunting," said Rhodes. "We want to be as fair and transparent as possible, and we'd like to offer pieces at affordable prices for the community, while maximizing the value of this opportunity and its benefit to the arts community we serve."

The Arts Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County was established in 1949 and was the first locally established arts council in the United States. The Arts Council enriches the quality of life for people in Winston-Salem and neighboring communities by raising funds for the arts, advocating for the arts, sponsoring events in conjunction with other arts organizations, providing educational opportunities, strengthening cultural resources, developing social capital, and aiding economic development. In 2010, The Arts Council awarded more than $1.825 million in grants to 42 arts and cultural organizations and 19 individual artists.