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Dance
Viengsay Valdés Steps Into Alicia Alonso’s Formidable Shoes At National Ballet Of Cuba
Her dancers, she tells Marina Harss, “are very excited. I want to give them confidence, a sense of security and, above all, justice. I think there are dancers who haven’t had an opportunity to prove themselves. … They’re so young, so impatient, and if you don’t motivate them, they lose their drive. You have to know how to lead them, how to be just. There are roles for everyone. That way, the company will feel loved and cherished.” – Dance Magazine
Stella Abrera To Retire From ABT
“Ms. Abrera, 41, joined Ballet Theater in 1996. Five years later she was promoted from the corps de ballet to the rank of soloist. A serious injury in 2008 made further advancement difficult, but she fought her way back to health and was made a principal dancer in 2015. Ms. Abrera, who was promoted on the same day as Misty Copeland, became the company’s first Filipino-American principal.” – The New York Times
Considering The Legacy Of Legendary Ballerina Alicia Alonso
Neda Ulaby on the woman who shaped the course of ballet in the US and also, famously, in Cuba: “To this day, says American Ballet Theatre’s Kevin McKenzie, young ballet dancers who want to learn extraordinary techniques should do one thing – watch videos of Alicia Alonso.” – NPR
A 90-Foot Tall Mural Of A Ballet Dancer Is Possibly A Tool To Inspire Others
In Columbus, Ohio, ballerina Rachael Parini was the inspiration for a 90-foot billboard that advertises the BalletMet company, but it means more than that to her – it means that young dancers of color might be inspired to try, and stick with, ballet. – 10TV (Ohio)
Backup Dancers Are Leaping To The Forefront With The Power Of Smart Social Media
Backup dancers aren’t very “backup” anymore; instead, like the 16-year-old who began touring with Janet Jackson at age 12 and is now a major social media influencer, they’re at the center of the conversation. That’s thanks to Instagram. “Internet popularity can be a dancer’s entree to choreographing and starring in her own viral videos, traveling the world as a guest artist and teacher, and inking lucrative brand deals and endorsements.” – The Washington Post
Ideas
Why We’re Attracted To Things That Creep Us Out
“There are different types of creepiness, and the array of things that creep us out ranges from dolls that are too lifelike to clowns in places where clowns should not be… The basic premise is that those who in some way fall outside of the norm put us on our guard because they are unpredictable, and it is unclear whether they pose a threat or not.” – Aeon
The (Click)bait And Switch Of Modern Curiosity
“It’s that disconnect between long- and short-term interests that makes frothy articles so frustrating. The feeling of curiosity promised you’d learn something and, admittedly, you did — now you know French citizens’ favorite macaron flavor — but you’re disappointed because your new knowledge doesn’t contribute to your long-term interests. You’ve been clickbaited by your own brain.” – The New York Times
Can Computers Really Learn How To Understand What They Read?
Maybe. They’re doing a lot better at reading comprehension exams, for instance. On a new “benchmark designed to measure machines’ real understanding of natural language — or to expose their lack thereof — the machines had jumped from a D-plus to a B-minus in just six months. ‘That was definitely the ‘oh, crap’ moment,’ Bowman recalled.” – Quanta
The Coded Emotional Appeal Of ‘The Matrix’
Seriously, why would anyone go to the movie in theatres 11 times? Sometimes you need distance to figure something like that out. “In The Matrix, I realized, I had found a message about my own life, the life of a closeted gay Mormon boy. It was something I had strained all those times to hear, and now it shot across the screen in letters lit by retrospect: You too will be free.” – The Atlantic
How To Go Offline (Briefly, For The Sake Of Getting Offline Things Accomplished)
Jia Tolentino, New Yorker writer and extremely online person, follows the advice of a computer scientist. First thing to do: Give up everything optional on your phone and computer for 30 days. “It just makes you bare to the fact of being alive and the sort of existential dread and wonder of it. It was a doozy.” – Slate
Issues
The Goofy Appeal Of Renaissance Faires
“Part of the appeal is the sheer human spectacle provided by costumed attendees (or playtrons, in Renfaire-ese). Though the village is ostensibly set in the 16th century, it most accurately represents an era that might be called the Age of Ribaldry.” – CityLab
While Many Arts Institutions Are Giving Up Oil Money, This Major Music Festival Is Raking It In
At this past summer’s Salzburg Festival, director Peter Sellars turned Mozart’s opera Idomeneo into a warning about climate change. Not even three months later, the Festival announced a big sponsorship deal with Russian fossil fuel colossus Gazprom and Austrian oil firm OMV. – The New York Times
Australia Changes The Way It Funds Major Performing Arts Companies
“A meeting of Australia’s arts and cultural ministers in Adelaide … has seen a major overhaul of the way the Major Performing Arts sector is funded through the Australia Council for the Arts, and contemporary circus company Circa – whose Artistic Director Yaron Lifschitz once described the system as a ‘protectorate of the privileged’ – welcomed into the fold of Major Performing Arts companies.” – Limelight (Australia)
Liberating Stereotypes Of Indigenous Americans From Children’s Tales
“From the dull art of crafting Thanksgiving turkeys out of handprints to the bad politics of making headdresses out of turkey feathers, the point of contact between Indians and non-Indians begins and ends (for the most part) in grade school. It could be said that the primary place where Natives continue to exist for most Americans is in childhood imagination.” – The New York Times
San Francisco To Make Its Busiest Street Car-Free
“It can’t be overlooked that San Francisco has some heavyweight car-free peers. Once, pedestrianized urban cores were largely the domain of enlightened mid-sized cities in northern Europe. But now Paris and Barcelona have expanded the concept, and Toronto is mulling a car blockade for multiple downtown corridors. London charges a pricy fee for vehicles entering its busy streets, and New York City will follow with its own congestion pricing scheme in 2021.” – CityLab
Media
How Unionizing Has Helped Hollywood Assistants
“The recent outcry online over the low wages, high stress and professional instability that assistants face — given a voice through the hashtag #PayUpHollywood — has served to highlight the significance of writers’ assistants and script coordinators’ successful unionization efforts.” – Variety
The Oscars Have Become More Politicized. More Troubled
“The Academy’s response to any criticism no matter how facile or valid—including accusations of radical leftism, elitism, racism, sexism, and general mustiness—has been to make vague, grand mission statements while frantically ushering some younger, less white, and less male Academy members into the ranks. The result has been generally non-transformative.” – The Daily Beast
Meet The Newest Head Writer At ‘Jeopardy!’
Way back in the ’90s, Michele Loud applied to be a researcher for the show just a few weeks after she flunked the test to be a contestant; a year later, out of the blue, they called her in. Twenty-six years on, she’s now one of two staffers running the writers’ room. Here she explains how categories get chosen and clues get written as well as the extra jobs each staffer has during taping. – Vulture
Malaysia Is The Latest Country To Ban ‘Abominable’ Over Map Scene
The basic problem? A dashed line (one that violates international law as decided by a court at The Hague in 2016). “Malaysia’s censorship board initially agreed to permit Abominable to premiere on November 7, if the image of the map was removed from the version screening in their country. However, Universal Studios, which is distributing the film everywhere but China (Pearl Studio is Abominable’s Chinese distributor) has refused to make the cut.” – Vulture
In Europe, TV Producers Debate How To Handle Streaming
Group up? Spend more money on new, fresh content? Somehow find, and fund, top talent? Everything is up in the air with all kinds of streaming services debuting and European producers wondering what, exactly, to do. – Variety
Music
The Throat-Singing Mongolian Rock Band That Has Taken Worldwide Music Charts By Storm
Their first two videos, for Wolf Totem, and Yuve Yuve Yu (or How Strange, How Strange) have amassed more than 45m views on YouTube over the last year, while their debut album, The Gereg, opened at No 1 on Billboard’s Top New Artist chart and No 2 on the magazine’s Indie Label chart. – The Guardian
Managers Of Paris’s New Concert Hall Try To Fine Its Architect €170 Million, And Architect Counter-Sues
In 2006, when plans for the Philharmonie de Paris were announced, the venue, with a flashy, futuristic design by starchitect Jean Nouvel, was supposed to open in 2013 at a cost of €173 million. By the time it actually opened in 2015, the building’s cost was €386 million. So authorities sent the architect a bill for €170 million in penalties for late delivery and overruns. Now Ateliers Jean Nouvel has gone to court, arguing that the bill is “totally disproportionate, not only in the absolute, but also relative to the sums that were actually received.” – Yahoo! (AFP)
While Many Arts Institutions Are Giving Up Oil Money, This Major Music Festival Is Raking It In
At this past summer’s Salzburg Festival, director Peter Sellars turned Mozart’s opera Idomeneo into a warning about climate change. Not even three months later, the Festival announced a big sponsorship deal with Russian fossil fuel colossus Gazprom and Austrian oil firm OMV. – The New York Times
Humans Say: Music is Not An Algorithm
“The current streaming culture we find ourselves in marks music and wide open spaces of exploration into nothing more than a commodity, and because of this, we’re increasingly driven away from music’s way of connecting us all, that deep resonating force that helps us experience and process the weird wonder that is life.” I Care If You Listen
Reversal: WNYC Decides Not To Cancel “New Sounds”
“It has become clear to me that John and Caryn Havlik’s work is distinct, inimitable, and intrinsically New York—and that this beloved team must stay with us. A show like New Sounds can only be produced by public radio, and specifically at NYPR,” station CEO Goli Sheikholeslami wrote in her email. – Gothamist
People
Conductor Raymond Leppard, 92
He was part of a generation of musicians who, aided by the burgeoning recording industry, helped revive Baroque music in concert halls after World War II. That group included Nikolaus Harnoncourt of Austria and Neville Marriner of Britain. – The New York Times
Huang Yong Ping, One Of China’s Most Daring Modern Artists, Dead At 65
“In his sly installations and sculptural work, Huang often melded techniques derived from the history of Chinese art and international avant-garde movements alike. His ability to deftly combine seemingly opposed methods of art-making made him one of the foremost artists in an emergent group of Chinese artists during the late 1980s … [and] allowed him to address taboo subjects in China and beyond with audacity and wit.” – ARTnews
Klaus Friedeberger, Abstract Painter Who Found Inspiration In The Australian Outback, Has Died At 97
Friedeberger was inspired by his time as a European refugee in Australia during WWII. “Whereas many abstract painters of the 60s were working on a large scale with fields of unmodulated colour that emphasised the flatness of the surface of the painting, Friedeberger eventually eschewed colour altogether. Working unfashionably on an easel, he made small, modest monochromatic paintings of abstracted forms that advanced, receded or hovered in space within the confines of a square canvas, never quite abandoning the illusion of pictorial space.” – The Guardian (UK)
Fiery Music Critic And Biographer Nick Tosches Has Died At 69
Tosches, who had a taste for rock and country (and their far fringes) “and his fellow music writers Richard Meltzer and Lester Bangs were labeled ‘the Noise Boys’ for their wild, energetic prose” in the 1960s and 1970s. He also wrote many biographies, including a famous, perhaps infamous, one of Dean Martin. He said of that 1992 book, “Life is a racket. … Writing is a racket. Sincerity is a racket. Everything’s a racket.” – The New York Times
Abstract Expressionist Painter Ed Clark Has Died At 93
Clark was “an African-American expressionist painter who used a broom and bold colors to capture the natural world and to convey emotions about the racial injustice of the 1960s, earning him international acclaim.” Clark, who lived in Detroit, was known for his experimentation with shaped canvases, bold colors, and a seven-decade career. – The New York Times
Theatre
A Frightening History Of America’s Theatre Fires
William Paul Gerhard, an engineer with the British Fire Prevention Committee, stated in a report that by May 1897 there had been 1,115 recorded theater fires in Europe and America (since records had been kept); there were 460 theater fires across America and Europe just from 1800 to 1877. Gerhard claimed that the average life of a theater in the United States was only about thirteen years due to fire. – Lapham’s Quarterly
‘Angels’ In East Texas: How Tony Kushner’s Play Tore Apart, And Then Changed, A Small Southern Town
In 1999, a small college in Kilgore, TX — in an area where, at the time, gay men were routinely beaten and sometimes murdered — staged Angels in America, angry protests from local fundamentalists led to a showdown that attracted national media attention. Wes Ferguson, who edited the college paper at the time and whose sensationalist headline on a preview story ignited the fury, recounts how it went down and talks to some of the key participants about how they, and the town, were changed by the furor 20 years ago. – Texas Monthly
111 New Plays Are Premiering In America’s Bigger Theatres This Year. Here’s A Statistical Analysis
Who is being produced on our stages? What kinds of characters are appearing on our stages? And what do these plays look like in terms of form and thematic content? – Howlround
Studies: Acting Changes Actors’ Brains
“Until recently, this debate over whether actors literally lose themselves in their roles was largely a matter of conjecture. However, a pair of research papers in psychology published this year has provided some concrete evidence, and results suggest that actors’ sense of self is changed profoundly by their characters.” – Aeon
What Are Theatre Reviews For?
Or, more specifically, whom are they for? “Doing it just for an audience ties criticism to weird stuff about selling a show, which I’m sort of uncomfortable with. But if critics are reviewing just for the maker, then is it really inaccessible to an audience who are maybe not so involved in theatre?” – HowlRound
Visual
This Cathedral Is Building Itself A Separate Caravaggio/Rubens Wing
Next year, St. John’s Co-Cathedral in the Maltese capital, Valletta, will open a €4 million annex as a home for Caravaggio’s 1607 St. Jerome Writing and the world’s largest complete set of tapestries, which is based on a 29-piece original by Rubens depicting scenes from the life of Christ. – The Art Newspaper
Leonardo Da Vinci’s Design For The World’s Longest Bridge Would Have Worked, Say MIT Scientists
In 1502, Leonardo submitted to the Ottoman sultan a design for a bridge over the Golden Horn in Istanbul that would have been, at the time, by far the world’s longest, and tall enough for ships to pass underneath. The skeptical sultan rejected Leonardo’s plan, but a team at MIT has modeled it out and says that, with materials and technology available at the time, the bridge would have held up. – Ars Technica
US Army To Create New “Monuments Men” Unit To Try To Save Artifacts
The Army is forming a new unit with a similar mandate to be composed of commissioned officers of the Army Reserves who are museum directors or curators, archivists, conservators and archaeologists in addition to new recruits with those qualifications. They will be based at the Army Civil Affairs and Psychological Operations Command at Fort Bragg, N.C. – The New York Times
A Star Architect Who Recycles And Rebuilds For Those In Need
Shigeru Ban, a designer of houses and visitors’ centers and condominiums and towers, is perhaps more famous as a designer of emergency shelters, for people suffering from earthquakes and floods, for people escaping violence and genocide. For them, he has employed a signature material — recycled paper tubes of variable length and thickness. – The New York Times
Glass Blowing Generates Significant Amounts Of Greenhouse Gasses. What To Do?
While the glass art industry blows oxygen and life into intricate glass chandeliers, vases, bowls and complex sculptures, it also consumes hefty amounts of natural gas and propane while filling the air literally with tons of carbon dioxide. Other issues, like heavy metal pollution and low levels of recycling, add to the industry’s sustainability concerns. – Crosscut
Words
Why Should Anyone Be Upset That The Booker Prize Chose Two Winners?
“If the judges felt that they needed the world to know about these two novels, shouldn’t that be a cause for celebration? It seems to me that the work of these two fine writers is being overlooked as commentators express their disappointment that there wasn’t a knock-out in the final round. Do we really long for a champion that much?” – Irish Times
How Condé Nast (Who Was A Real Person) Invented The Glossy Magazine
“The equation of upscale readers and upscale brands with profit, projecting an aspirational image of the ideal consumer through both editorial and ads so that vulnerable readers would chase it, made Nast’s fortune many times over. His company established the template of the editor as a heroic, godlike figure casting down commandments from a print Mount Olympus, a status that continued after Nast’s death through the twentieth century.” Then, of course, came the internet and social media. – The New Republic
Reading As An Active Sport (No Really)
“The main contention of What We Talk About When We Talk About Books – that reading print can be a sociable, active, and even seditious activity – is so sensible that it seems incredible that this long-form, evidence-based case hasn’t been made before. Why does it matter? Perhaps not only because we should think about whether our fantasies about the printed word are true, but also because we should ask why these particular fantasies have become so dominant.” – Times Literary Supplement
Economists Make The Case For Studying Humanities
As humanities majors slump to the lowest level in decades, calls are coming from surprising places for a revival. Some prominent economists are making the case for why it still makes a lot of sense to major (or at least take classes) in humanities alongside more technical fields. – Washington Post
Freelance Journalists In California Freak Out That New Uber Law Would Apply To Them
If a freelance journalist writes for a magazine, newspaper or other entity whose central mission is to disseminate the news, the law says, that journalist is capped at writing 35 “submissions” per year per “putative employer.” At a time when paid freelance stories can be written for a low end of $25 and high end of $1 per word, some meet that cap in a month just to make end’s meet. – The Hollywood Reporter