Yearly Archives: 2021
Broadway’s Master Hair Maker Packs It In
From “The Elephant Man” to “Chicago,” “Cats” to “Thoroughly Modern Millie,” Huntley was the designer behind the wigs and often-elaborate locks that helped define...
The Professional Dancer Who Also Runs A Dairy Farm
Jean-Daniel Bouchard said although his twin passions may seem like something of a contradiction — farming can be gruelling physical labour and involves plenty of financial mathematics, versus...
Amanda Gorman Has Quickly Become A Superstar Poet
Her inaugural poem made her a superstar. And while her rise may seem swift and meteoric, Sharon Marcus, an English and comparative literature professor...
Reimagining “Live” Performance During COVID: Will Any Of It Stick?
By emptying stages and dancefloors, the pandemic has generated an urgent need to reimagine the live music experience - both for artists and the...
SF School Board Chief Explains Why Lincoln And Washington Names Were Removed From Schools
"There’s this idea that because we’re removing the names we’re somehow removing the stories in what we’re learning, and that in fact is not...
The Man Who Realized Attention Was A Precious Commodity
His epiphany was this: One of the most finite resources in the world is human attention. To describe its scarcity, he latched onto what...
Can a New LACMA Rise from the Rubble? Quaffing Michael Govan’s Kool-Aid
The doubts engendered in me by the shifting ground (related to the proximity to the La Brea Tar Pits) under the cranes being used...
David Stull Discusses Acquiring Opus 3
The president of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music speaks about the school's historic acquisition of Opus 3 Artists. - Aaron Dworkin
How Did Arts And Culture Respond To Trump?
The internet is healing, I would say now, but we should all know better: a garbage vortex of such scale doesn’t just disappear, but...
The Purpose Of Playing
The philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche once described play as ‘ecoming and dissolution, building and destruction without moral implication, in eternal innocence’ – as an act...
Minnesota Orchestra Posts A Record Deficit
On Thursday morning, the orchestra released its operating results for the fiscal year ending Aug. 31, 2020. The big news: a deficit of $11.7...
Charles McGee, Dean Of Detroit Artists, 96
McGee, the prodigious dean of Detroit’s visual arts scene whose works can be seen everywhere from the Detroit Institute of Arts to the Broadway...
Hachette Pushes Out The Last Of The Mainstream MAGA Publishers
Kate Hartson, a fit 67-year-old who once ran a small press specializing in dogs, had all the trappings of a liberal book editor, including...
The Women Who Created The Blues
For popular music fans, "rock created the music publications we read today. R&B created rock. Blues created R&B. And Mamie Smith made the blues...
Elton John Says Brexit Negotiators Screwed Up, And Screwed Over Musicians
Elton John says his tours can absorb the costs and the paperwork, so theoretically Brexit's horribly negotiated touring musician deals (note: what deals?) don't...
A Group Of D&D Teenagers, With The Help Of The Kennedy Center, Give An...
In Springfield, Oregon, if you see people wandering around with choose your own adventure-style art books in their hands, don't be surprised: "Three writers,...
Often, The Art Was Taken By Force, So This Activist Says He Can Take...
Mwazulu Diyabanza is a Congolese activist who would prefer France's museums were open so he could get some attention for taking African objects from...
The Best Time To Correct False, Er, Fake News Is Not In Advance
Warning people off doesn't work: "We hear a lot about inoculating people against fake news or 'prebunking' it, but new research shows that the best...
Cindy Nemser, Who Founded The Feminist Art Journal, 83
Nemser started calling out sexism in the art and art history worlds half a century ago. "Her serious criticism and scholarship belied a whimsical...
The Action Star Revival Had Largely Left Black Actresses Behind
Nothing against the (many) kick-ass, and asskicking, Black actresses of the science fiction universes, but for something closer to reality? Enter Queen Latifah. -...
How The Novel Became Women’s Work
At least in the 18th century. "Wherever they were writing, these women had dared to move out of the conventional female role of service...
Young Poets Think Amanda Gorman Is Giving Them Cultural Cachet – And Access
One youth poet laureate: "She was given the platform to really pull people in and witness the magic of it, and I think that...
Pro Tip: Not All Of Those Suddenly On The Market ‘Seldom Seen’ Artist’s Works...
Five Florine Stettheimer works showed up in 2020. But there was a bit of an issue: "Only two turned out to have been actually...
You Want Robots To Move Well?
Hire some choreographers. "Choreo-roboticists (that is, roboticists who work choreographically) believe that incorporating dancerly gestures into machinic behaviors will make robots seem less like...
OK, Sure, Disease Is Not A Metaphor, But COVID-19’s Impact Sure Feels Fire-Like
Philip Kennicott: "Inflammation isn’t just an actual symptom of the disease. It seems to be part of its etiology, its moral and social origins...
