A Whole New Way To Be Shallow We've all heard about the way Apple's iTunes music download service is revolutionizing the industry. But could it revolutionize our social interactions as well? "Thanks to the ability of Apple's iTunes to share music collections over local networks, it is now possible to judge someone's taste in music -- or lack of it -- in a way that previously required a certain level of intimacy. The ability to examine the music collections of co-workers, neighbors or fellow students is akin to peering into their souls: Someone who appears cool and interesting from the outside is revealed as a cultural nincompoop through the poor sap's terrible taste in music." Wired 11/12/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 5:38 am
Vonnegut: Careful Of Those Hermaphroditic Semi-Colons Kurt Vonnegut has advice for the artist-afflicted: "I realize that some of you may have come in hopes of hearing tips on how to become a professional writer. I say to you, 'If you really want to hurt your parents, and you don’t have the nerve to be a homosexual, the least you can do is go into the arts. But do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites, standing for absolutely nothing. All they do is show you’ve been to college'.” In These Times 11/03
Posted: 11/11/2003 9:32 pm
Cleveland Picks Up A Krasner "The Cleveland Museum of Art closed a major gap in its collection last night by bidding $1.9 million at auction at Christie's in New York for a mural-sized painting by American Abstract Expressionist Lee Krasner. The price is a record for the artist, who died in 1984 at age 76." The Plain Dealer (Cleveland) 11/12/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 6:46 am
Judge Halts Riopelle Auction A Quebec judge has issued a temporary injunction blocking a planned auction of several dozen works by the late artist Jean-Paul Riopelle, which was to be held tonight. In making the ruling, the judge granted a major victory to Riopelle's three children, who claim that the hastily organized auction of so many works at once will diminish the artist's legacy unnecessarily. "Left in the lurch are art collectors who were said to be flying in from around the world for the sale at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel - and Riopelle's estate, which says it urgently needs to hold the auction to pay off mounting debts." Montreal Gazette 11/12/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 6:29 am
- Previously: Legacy And Profit: The Riopelle Battle "Jean-Paul Riopelle's three children fear some of their father's key works of art will be sold at the same fire-sale prices that purchased his beloved vintage cars... Yseult, Sylvie and Yann, the three children of the noted abstract artist, are asking the [Quebec Superior Court] for an injunction to stop what they describe as an unnecessary, amateurish auction. They say if so many Riopelles are sold at once on short notice, the value of Riopelle's art will diminish." Montreal Gazette 11/11/03
All For One, One For All In Winnipeg "Winnipeg artists are collectively playing the numbers game. In the past, the city established a reputation for producing individual artists of singular talent -- Ivan Eyre, Don Reichert, Wanda Koop, William Eakin and Eleanor Bond are all painters and photographers whose careers have been solo affairs. But recently, with the meteoric success of the seven-member Royal Art Lodge as an example, Winnipeg artists have been banding together to form associations in which their collective identity is as important as their individual one." The Globe & Mail (Canada) 11/12/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 6:16 am
Disney - Half As Spectacular As Bilbao? David Littlejohn is not very generous in his praise for Frank Gehry's new Disney Hall. "The result is about half as spectacular as Mr. Gehry's 1997 Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, with which it will inevitably be compared. Bilbao has a far more impressive location, equal excitement from all directions, and more dramatic interior spaces that visibly reflect its exterior." Still, "it is one of the most agreeable modern concert halls I have been in (though one heard complaints about steep stairs and tight legroom), reminiscent of Alvar Aalto's classic halls, and Mr. Gehry's most humane interior space." OpinionJournal.com 11/12/03
Posted: 11/11/2003 10:14 pm
Major Archaeological Find In Vietnam Archaeologists say they have discovered a 1,300-year-old citadel in Vietnam. "This is the biggest and most important archaeological find in Vietnam's archaeological history." Yahoo! (AP) 11/11/03
Posted: 11/11/2003 7:55 pm
Iraqi Artifacts Returned Hundreds of artifacts have been returned to the Baghdad Museum. Two important pieces were found in a field and returned. "It is another bright day in the life of the Iraqi museum. We have two masterpieces not only of the Iraqi museum, but also masterpieces of the mankind. So, it is a great day today" Yahoo! (AP) 11/11/03
Posted: 11/11/2003 7:49 pm
Serota: Why Spend Millions On "Saving Art? Perhaps it's a mistake for the UK to spend millions of pounds trying to "save" art from being exported from the country. "Sir Nicholas Serota said it was not necessarily better to buy pieces to display in the UK rather than abroad just because they were already here. Speaking at an acquisitions conference, he suggested more should be spent on 20th Century and contemporary art." BBC 11/11/03
Posted: 11/11/2003 7:31 pm
SPONSOR
From One Generation To The Next Some of the world's most distinguished artists gathered at Lincoln Center on November 10 to celebrate the completion of the inaugural year of the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative. www.rolexmentorprotege.com
A Productive Use For File-Sharing While music fans and the recording industry continue to bicker and sue each other over the legality of file-swapping, America's top non-classical music school is working to advance the idea that there is a place for the peer-to-peer network, and it doesn't have to have anything to do with illegal downloads. "The Berklee Shares program at the Berklee College of Music offers 80 different online lessons for download -- and sharing -- on topics like writing music, producing, engineering, remixing and performing... Anyone can use and trade the material provided she or he agrees to the terms set by the school: Users may not alter or sell the material, and must credit the original source." Wired 11/12/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 5:43 am
One Strad Sells, One Doesn't The Stradivarius violin which was up for auction at Sotheby's in London this week has sold for nearly $1.3 million, but the Stradivarius cello which was also on the block failed to draw a high enough bid, and went unsold. Another Strad violin had failed to sell at another London auction earlier in the week. No word on who, exactly, purchased the fiddle that did sell. BBC 11/11/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 5:34 am
- Previously: Two Strads For Sale Two Stradivarius instruments, a violin valued at $1.3 million and a cello estimated to be worth over $800,000, hit the auction block this week in London. As usual, there is little chance that either instrument will be purchased directly by anyone who can play them, as most of the world's high-end instruments are now bought and sold by collectors, who may choose to lend them out to performers, or not. Earlier this week, another million-dollar Strad violin failed to sell at auction when no one met the asking price. BBC 11/11/03
Art Carney, 85 Actor Art Carney, forever famous as The Honeymooers' Ed Norton, has died at the age of 85. "I love Ed Norton and what he did for my career. But the truth is that we couldn't have been more different. Norton was the total extrovert, there was no way you could put down his infectious good humor. Me? I'm a loner and a worrier." The New York Times 11/12/03
Posted: 11/11/2003 9:52 pm
Understanding Orwell In the 100th anniversary of George Orwell's birth, there is still much disagreement over the man and his work. "Few would assert that Orwell the man is personally guilty of all the obtuseness that he is invoked to vindicate. Equally untenable is the position that Orwell was not responsible for his life and work. He did things, he wrote things, that can't be explained away as objects of misinterpretation." MobyLives 11/11/03
Posted: 11/11/2003 10:30 pm
Madonna, The Literary Experience "For once even Madonna seems uncertain how her new vocation as scribe and teacher fits into or builds on her pop identity. The awkwardness is palpable in Madonna's second children's book, Mr. Peabody's Apples, a cautionary tale about 'the power of words' based on a kabbalah fable. Madonna has always demonstrated great faith in the power of word of mouth, but she's never been what you might call articulate—methinks 'Express Yourself' was not about writing sonnets. But Apples tests the power of words carefully chosen: not in the text, which is dull, uninspiring, and poorly punctuated, but in the marketing that surrounds it." Village Voice 11/11/03
Posted: 11/11/2003 9:22 pm
You Mean, American TV Isn't Always Original? No one can copyright a concept, which is why so many American TV shows can legally be nothing but mock-ups of already successful foreign programs. But a Canadian television network appears to think that CBS crossed the line this fall when it released Cold Case, a new cop show which bears several striking resemblances to a 6-year-old CTV program called Cold Squad. Both shows center around similar-looking female detectives who fight criminals and their own sexist co-workers in roughly equal measures as they attempt to uncover new leads in stalled cases. Oh, and the writer who came up with Cold Case did so right after attending a writing seminar in Canada. The Globe & Mail (Canada) 11/12/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 6:18 am
Yeah, Those Bong Close-Ups Are Always A Bad Sign Film festival organizers may be as enthusiastic about film as a person can be, but they still have only 24 hours in their day, and that's just not enough time to watch every minute of every movie that comes across their desks. So how do the honchos decide which films make the cut? It's all about those first few minutes, says one festival organizer, and "if any video from the teetering stack in her living room begins with images of a gun, a bong, a pimp or a whore, she hits the eject button." Chicago Tribune 11/12/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 6:06 am
Cleaning Up The Red Tape "The music industry announced a 'one-stop' international license for online radio broadcasters Tuesday, hoping the removal of red tape will encourage the rise of legitimate Web music services. Previously, online radio broadcasters, or webcasters, had to secure approval from an alphabet soup of national collection agencies... Webcasters have argued that until the number of licensing fees is reduced, the nascent broadcasting sector will never gain the critical commercial mass of its over-the-air cousins." Wired 11/11/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 5:52 am
The Big Get Bigger Universal Music has announced plans to acquire Dreamworks Records, in yet another music industry consolidation seen to represent the desperation of many companies in the struggling recording business. "The music business is currently going through major changes as it struggles to counter falling sales and the impact of unofficial online music sales. Last week, Sony Music - the second-largest music company - said it was planning to merge with Bertelsmann. EMI and Warner Music have also been in talks about a possible merger." BBC 11/11/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 5:28 am
MTV's Stolen Data MTV's Music Awards - televised from the UK - were a big success last week. But some of the shine was taken off the occasion after an MTV computer containing important data for the production was stolen. "Dozens of local firms who acted as suppliers for MTV face delays in being paid because e-mail records of what they are due have gone." The Scotsman 11/11/03
Posted: 11/11/2003 9:39 pm
Moonves: CBS Didn't Cave On Reagan Pic CBS chairman Les Moonves denies that his network caved in to political pressure when it canceled a Reagan bio-pic. "It was a moral decision, not an economic or political one. The series did not present a balanced view of former President Reagan and his wife Nancy, Mr Moonves stated." BBC 11/11/03
Posted: 11/11/2003 7:27 pm
Insult And Injury At ABT A major sponsor of the American Ballet Theater has pulled its financial support, and transferred its fiscal loyalties to New York City Ballet, saying that mismanagement at ABT forced the move. The Movado Watch Company has sponsored ABT productions for nearly two decades, to the tune of more than $400,000 per year, but the company's chairman said in a letter that he was taken aback by the ABT management's unwillingness to listen to criticism from its board. The sponsorship loss is being seen as a potentially crippling blow to ABT, which has struggled mightily in recent years. The New York Times 11/12/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 6:38 am
$3 Million To Boston Ballet Boston Ballet, which has been struggling both artistically and financially in recent years, got a major boost this week, when it was revealed that a so-far-unnamed donor had left the company a $3 million bequest. The gift will double the size of Boston Ballet's endowment, and the company hopes that it will encourage other donors to be similarly generous. Boston Globe 11/12/03
Posted: 11/12/2003 5:55 am
