Today’s Stories
The Weird Pilots That Didn’t Make It To TV
TV networks spend about $100 million a year in developing pilots for series. Only a small number get to the schedule. Even fewer become ratings successes. So there’s an awful lot of very weird failed pilots out there… – Tedium
The Exploding Market For NFT Art
Most people still do not really understand it, but with the influx of cryptocapital into the NFT art market, all eyes are now glued to the possibilities of NFT art. “This whole mainstream sweep happened sooner than we anticipated,” says Jonathan Perkins, the co-founder of SuperRare, which launched in 2018. In its first year, it averaged about $8,000 a month in sales. By the second year, $100,000 a month. Last month — around the time it announced a series-A investment from the likes of Samsung, Ashton Kutcher, Mark Cuban, and Marc Benioff — $30 million a month. – New York Magazine
Fake News As A Virus
What’s different today is the speed, scope and scale of misinformation, enabled by technology. Online media has given voice to previously marginalised groups, including peddlers of untruth, and has supercharged the tools of deception at their disposal. The transmission of falsehoods now spans a viral cycle in which AI, professional trolls and our own content-sharing activities help to proliferate and amplify misleading claims. These new developments have come on the heels of rising inequality, falling civic engagement and fraying social cohesion – trends that render us more susceptible to demagoguery. Just as alarming, a growing body of research over the past decade is casting doubt on our ability – even our willingness – to resist misinformation in the face of corrective evidence. – Aeon
Where Dance Is Online
Somehow, despite the continued strain and strife, many dance companies have successfully adapted to the evolving digital stage — reimagining Nutcracker seasons, digitizing never-before-seen archival videos and launching their own streaming services. – Washington Post
Head Of New York Theatre Workshop To Step Down After 34 Years
James C. Nicola, the artistic director of New York Theater Workshop, announced on Friday that he will step down in June 2022. At that point, he will have spent 34 years — nearly half his life — at the off-Broadway theater, which spawned the once-in-a-lifetime hit musical “Rent” and grew under his leadership into a steady home for provocative fare by the likes of Caryl Churchill, the Five Lesbian Brothers and the director Ivo van Hove. – The New York Times
How Cellphones Power Popular Music In Africa
“While I was doing the recording, it became really apparent that the cellphone was such a prominent actor in that transaction,” says Christopher Kirkley. When he sat down with an artist, children nearby would pull out their cellphones and do the same. Contrary to Western notions, music from the region has been digitised at a high rate because of the use of cellphones. – New Frame
‘Navy Twerking’: Why All Australia Is Arguing About A Dance Clip
“A video of dancers twerking in hotpants at [the dedication of a new Australian warship] … went viral when it emerged on Wednesday. But the music video-style choreography — featuring thumps, thrusts and butt shakes — also came under attack. Conservative lawmakers led the chorus of those calling it ‘inappropriate’. Tabloids splashed headlines slamming military standards. But others found offence elsewhere — projecting shame onto the dancers, and labelling their routine as too ‘sexualised’. That in turn sparked backlash over the policing of women’s bodies.” (And that’s not even all of it.) “So how exactly did this ‘navy twerking’ saga unfold?” Here’s a step-by-step (ahem) timeline. – BBC
The Forgotten Land Artist
Nancy Holt was always serious. Her journals show how other artists loved talking through ideas with her. She was very close to Michael Heizer, Richard Serra and Joan Jonas. She exchanged concrete poetry by post with Carl Andre and Sol LeWitt. But when I ask Le Feuvre if the men saw her as a peer, she answers: “Yes, but.” They valued her input . But she wasn’t exhibiting in the same places they were. Similarly, it’s not that critics were dismissive of her work. They just didn’t mention her at all. – The Guardian
Now We Know This Wax Bust Is Definitely Not A Leonardo. How Do We Know? Sperm Whales
Back in 1909, a couple of very prominent German art historians decided, for various reasons, that a wax figurine of the goddess Flora that one of them had picked up at a London antique store simply had to be a genuine Leonardo da Vinci, and announced this with great fanfare. The London Times responded that no, the bust was actually sculpted by one Richard Cockle Lucas in 1860. “In the next two years, more than 730 heated articles were written debating the attribution. There were debates on the floor of the Prussian parliament. Two scholars challenged each other to a duel. … The debate got less aggressive over the decades, but never died down. Even modern technology hasn’t been able to settle the issue conclusively, because wax, as it happens, is a complicated medium to date.” But a new study has at least conclusively ruled out Leonardo, and here’s how. – The History Blog
Calculation: San Francisco Says Arts Venues Can Reopen. But Are Audiences Ready To Return?
How rigorously will patrons expect to be protected from the dangers of the COVID-19 virus? Have entertainment habits atrophied during a hiatus of more than a year, or has the shutdown only made the hunger for the arts even keener? – San Francisco Chronicle
A Dance Critic On How The Pandemic Has Changed Her Work
Deborah Jowitt: “Inevitable distractions occur when filming (or viewing) dances in this climate. Dog walkers may intrude. A pet cat may decide on a star appearance. Are those two dancers barefoot on gravel? Was getting wet necessary or an artistic choice? Watching performers dancing in their apartments encourages thoughts we should probably suppress. Wow, a really tiny space (wonder how much it rents for). Nice wood floor. Check that stove. Wait a second, what was that picture on the wall? Yet their artistic choices have delighted me, as well.” – Dance Magazine
Will NFTs Empower Artists?
As blockchain technology evolves, transaction speed increases, and transaction fees decrease (all of which are slowly, but surely happening) and more content becomes uniquely identifiable using NFTs, the need for central authorities (aka gatekeepers) will diminish and possibly disappear altogether. Why? Because the creator class will be able to do it by themselves. The concept of an open, honest, one-to-one relationship between creator and community isn’t new, but the technology to do it at scale is. – Shelly Palmer
How The 1918 Flu Pandemic Changed America’s Public Libraries
“Public libraries in the United States started to proliferate in the late 1800s and early 1900s, often founded by women’s clubs and other social groups seeking to benefit their communities. Their early focus was on classic literature, which was thought to improve and transform the reader. However, thanks in part to librarianship during the [1918] pandemic, a shift occurred after World War I towards ‘useful information’, … [which] made libraries partners in many public awareness campaigns, from public health to nuclear safety, in the coming decades.” – JSTOR Daily
Venice’s Gondola Tradition Is Endangered
The anthropologist Elisa Bellato has called this an ‘identity crisis’ for the artistic manufacture of the gondola. While the boat made with cheaper materials may be indistinguishable to the untrained eye, its authenticity – not to mention quality and craftsmanship – has been lost. Bellato suggests that this modern gondola is more of a simulacrum than a true specimen, emptied of the values and knowledge accumulated over centuries. – Apollo
Key Arts Figure In Belarus Freed From Prison After International Campaign
“Tatsiana Hatsura-Yavorska, the director of the Watch Docs Film Festival in Belarus, has been released from prison and had charges against her dropped following an international outcry from film festivals and human rights organizations. [She] was arrested in Minsk on April 5, allegedly for her role in organizing an underground photo exhibition celebrating Belarusian health workers.” – The Hollywood Reporter
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Through Assassination, Official Harassment, And Right-Wing-Media Smears, A Theatre In A West Bank Refugee Camp Keeps Running
The Freedom Theatre, founded in the Jenin camp in 2006, has as dual missions “to build back Palestinian identity destroyed by years of brutal occupation and tour the often unheard, first-hand experiences of Palestinians to the international community.” Ten years ago, the company’s co-founder and leader, Juliano Mer-Khamis, was murdered just outside the camp. Director Zoe Lafferty, who has worked several times with the company, writes about how tenaciously it has kept at its work in the face of enormous obstacles. – The Stage
Singapore’s First Independent Arts Complex Is Closing, And The Arts Community There Is Worried
“The Substation was founded as Singapore’s first independent arts centre in 1990 by theatre doyen Kuo Pao Kun. The careers of some of Singapore’s most renowned artists … were launched here. The arts venue has always been at the forefront of efforts to push the official boundaries that limit public expression.” The closure was supposed to be temporary (its building is being renovated) but was declared permanent without warning last month, and the city-state’s arts community is rife with rumor, recrimination and fear about the decision. – South China Morning Post (Hong Kong)
Wouldn’t It Have Made More Sense For Netflix To Just Buy Sony Pictures Outright?
Last week the video-rental-service-turned-streaming-giant paid an estimated $1 billion for five-year exclusive U.S. rights to Sony’s theatrical releases and right of first refusal for the studio’s direct-to-streaming productions. If Netflix is going to spend that kind of money, shouldn’t it have just bought Sony outright? It’s what many people expected, and all the other major Hollywood studios have been gobbled up by other corporate giants. Josef Adalian explains why a purchase might have made sense for Netflix five or six years ago but not now. – Vulture
Key Missing Link In History Of Alphabet Identified
“Archaeologists digging in the ancient Canaanite settlement of Lachish have unearthed a 3,500-year-old pottery shard inscribed with what they believe is the oldest text found in Israel that was written using an alphabetic script. Earlier Canaanite texts are known, but they were written using hieroglyphs or cuneiform characters.” – Haaretz (Israel)
French Court Rules Art Galleries Must Remain Closed (Never Mind The Auction Houses)
Gallerists, angry that their competitors at auction houses were allowed to continue operating during France’s ongoing pandemic lockdown, and arguing that online sales don’t work for their business (collectors want to see the art they’re buying in person), sued the French state, the prime minister, and the health minister. France’s Council of State has dismissed the suit, ruling that public health concerns justify keeping the galleries closed. – Artnet
Gustavo Dudamel Is Paris Opera’s Next Music Director
The world’s oldest opera company (founded in 1669 by Louis XIV) has signed one of the very few living conductors to become a celebrity in popular culture. The 40-year-old Venezuelan, the most famous product of El Sistema, begins a six-year term in his new job on August 1; he will also remain music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic for at least five more seasons. – The New York Times
New Stats: HipHop, Rap Now Account For 22 Percent Of Listening In UK
When BPI started recording data like this in the 1990s, rap music only counted for 3.6% of the singles market. In 2020, it was 22%. – BBC
TV Viewing Down? Networks Protest Nielsen Data
Through the trade group Video Advertising Bureau, the networks are perplexed by Nielsen statistics that show the percentage of Americans who watched their televisions at least some time during the week declined from 92% in 2019 to 87% so far this year. – Toronto Star (AP)
Louis Menand On The Pragmatism Of Lionel Trilling
As Menand puts it in his new book, The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War, “Trilling thought that people’s literary preferences tell us something about the kind of human beings they wish to be and about the way they wish other human beings to be—that is, something about their morality and their politics.” – The Point
We Live In The Age Of The Ghostwriter
“In the age of texting and emailing, the world is full of Cyranos: Getting quick, surreptitious help writing high-stakes messages has never been easier, whether that means enlisting friends to consult on a flirty note in a dating app or turning to a co-worker for assistance on a sensitive email to your boss. Although this sort of collaboration is widespread, people still generally assume that the messages they receive were composed by the sender alone.” – The Atlantic