ArtsJournal Classic (Text)

“Last September, after nearly 30 years as the company’s artistic director, [Naharin] handed the reins to Gili Navot, a former dancer with the company, while he assumed the position of house choreographer. In that role, Mr. Naharin will continue to create new work, while Ms. Navot will be responsible for the daily decision-making and long-term […]

“In the early 1920s, a secret file scandalized white women reformers in the United States. It was known as the Secret Dance File, its contents too shocking (and titillating) to print or even send in the mail. … The file contained frank descriptions of Pueblo dances that depicted and parodied sexual acts … [and] it […]

As a dancer with hemiplegia cerebral palsy, Jerron Herman has never been far from the physical therapy room — or an occupational therapist or some kind of medical interventionist. ‘I’m almost always in deep conversation with that kind of practitioner,’ says Herman, who performs with Heidi Latsky Dance. It’s part of keeping his body ready […]

“A versatile choreographer whose work includes flamenco, hip-hop, classical ballet and contemporary dance pieces, … Ms. Lopez Ochoa will accept the award, which comes with a $25,000 cash prize, on June 15 at the Jacob’s Pillow season-opening gala.” – The New York Times

Part of postmodern dance’s power lay in the fact that, for all of its foreignness, it was also familiar. Here were movements taken from the street or home and performed by able but merely human bodies in intimate settings — namely at downtown galleries, lofts or the freewheeling Judson Memorial Church in Greenwich Village, either […]

What can be done for the non-New Yorks, the non-San Franciscos, the non-Seattles? “Left to their own fate, state and local policymakers often end up shoveling money at companies in the hope of attracting future investment. It isn’t working. For today’s left-behind communities to bounce back, the federal government has to act.” – The Atlantic

The poor and middle-class can’t escape screens, and the data they hoover up both mindlessly and with (scary) intention. But the rich can, and do. – The New York Times

Spoiler alert, perhaps obviously. But really, whom are the Kree meant to represent? It’s unclear, or variable, perhaps, but for sure: “The Kree become a scapegoat, an oppressive empire that oppresses the oppressed.” – Los Angeles Review of Books

Because AI might ‘think’ differently to how humans think, and because of the general tendency to get swept up in its allure, its use could well change how we approach tasks and make decisions. The seductive allure that tends to surround AI in fact represents one of its dangers. Those working in the field despair […]

As the population surges into young old age and old old age, the number of books wrestling with that question has grown from a trickle to a tsunami. Apart from the science journals and science-fiction novels debating whether is it possible or desirable to prolong the lifespan by fifty or a hundred years, or (might […]

Today, she apologized for much of the interview wherein she blamed the parents of the men who say Michael Jackson abused them when they were kids, and saying such things as “You can say ‘molested,’ but those children, as you heard say, they were thrilled to be there. … They both married and they both […]

Of course it’s not because that intimate scene has two men in it. No, no, of course not. It’s … the swearing. And the drugs. “According to one source close to the production, filmmakers and Paramount are in discussions about the love scene, which has the F-word several times and includes brief rear nudity, and […]

“The Cultural Infrastructure Plan sets out … why it’s important to support the capital’s venues and studios; how they are at risk; what can be done to protect them; and what resources the Mayor’s office is investing. The document covers the buildings, structures and places where culture is both consumed (defined as experiencing, participating in […]

“Make Online has been created by [Talawa] Theatre Company for artists across the UK, and is described as an online community that will give black British artists ‘ownership and agency of their careers’. It is available for black artists at all stages of their careers to develop networks with their peers and the wider industry […]

The American Museum of Natural History in New York has a 1939 diorama purporting to show a diplomatic meeting between governor Peter Stuyvesant of New Amsterdam (today’s Manhattan) and some Lenape Indians, and — not everything in it is wrong (Stuyvesant really did have a pegleg), but in 2019, you can’t call it accurate. So […]

The more German history you know – no, not only about the Nazis, but yes also about the Nazis – the more you’ll understand how very, very much cultural work this movie is doing. The movie “explores the trauma of our world by embedding [a] fable in a historical past which holds terrifying prospects for […]

At least, according to Richard Grant, a 2019 Best Supporting Actor nominee who eventually made the movie with Melissa McCarthy (nominated for Best Actress in 2019) as lead instead. The issue? Moore wanted to wear a fake nose and a fat suit. – The Guardian (UK)

Apple’s main focus — at least for now — will be helping other people sell streaming video subscriptions and taking a cut of the transaction. Apple may also sell its own shows, at least as part of a bundle of other services. But for now, Apple’s original shows and movies should be considered very expensive […]

Fox employees knew that when Disney wrapped up its $71.3 billion acquisition of much of 21st Century Fox’s film and television assets, thousands of jobs would be eliminated. But, as they found out on Thursday, there is a difference between anticipating a painful future and watching that feared reality come to pass. The ax fell […]

Justin Peters: “Listening to the show is sort of like crashing an intense, intimate dinner party in which the only courses are whiskey and weed. … The Joe Rogan Experience has become one of the internet’s foremost vectors for anti-wokeness. With its mellow, welcoming vibe, its pretense of common sense, and its general reluctance to […]

They are supposed to perform in Chicago on Tuesday, but they say they “will join striking Chicago Symphony Orchestra musicians on the picket line if the labor conflict hasn’t been settled by then.” (They already sent a letter of support, but this is a bit more direct.) – Chicago Tribune

Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla became the music director for the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra in 2016. She says, “British orchestras, the CBSO included, don’t have an easy life. They work very hard, very fast. They don’t have the government support you get in, say, Germany or Austria or elsewhere. Or the rehearsal time.” – The Observer […]

“We are living in a time when production has mostly superseded content in every area you can think of. It’s very archaic to be holding on to what is the actual content and how to keep it meaningful.” – Washington Post

In the 1950s and ’60s, especially, session musicians could make or break a hit. And session musicians were in high demand, as producers like Phil Spector became obsessed with production techniques such as the Wall of Sound, forcing as many musicians as possible into a studio and having each of them contribute a small part […]

The little Bach-bot “promises to take any two-bar melody you type in and turn it into a Bach, or Bachlike, chorale in four parts, played by charming little music-box figures of bewigged 18th-century musicians.” Yet, writes Anne Midgette, “it may only add to the doodle’s charm that what it actually proves is the opposite of […]

“The daughter of a diplomat, born in Copenhagen in 1949 and raised in Buenos Aires, de Guébriant was introduced in 1975 to the artist’s daughter and archivist, Marguerite Duthuit, and became her assistant, working closely with her on Matisse catalogues and exhibitions. When Duthuit died in 1982, De Guebriant succeeded her as the only official […]

“I’m not creative all the time, I’m just not. Each role depletes me in some way, and I know that I do my best work when I’ve had time to remain fallow.” – The New York Times

While Lévy’s ideas are unremarkable, his ability to claim public attention is striking. His lengthy career is a reminder that cultivating a controversial persona to build fame and fortune is hardly a technique invented by reality TV or social media.  – Quartz

In addition to performing as a solo pianist and bandleader, “he applied his vast knowledge of music to transcribing early jazz works from recordings, most notably in his 1982 book Ferdinand ‘Jelly Roll’ Morton: The Collected Piano Music, which helped fuel a rediscovery of Morton (1890-1941), who had fallen out of favor but is now […]

Alaa Al-Aswany (The Yacoubian Building) is accused in the suit of “insulting the president, the Armed Forces, and judicial institutions” in a set of articles he wrote for the Arabic service of Deutsche Welle, Germany’s equivalent of the BBC World Service. Al-Aswany, who currently lives in New York, responded that the lawsuit is “a clear […]

Just ask Sarah Bernhardt, or her greatest rival. “Technological advantages like the steam locomotive and gas lighting made it possible for acting companies and star performers to reach larger and more varied audiences than they ever had before. At the same time, actors and the playwrights who wrote for them began to move from productions […]

Playwright Chisa Hutchinson got involved with theatre because of a “badass” theatre teacher who let her write her own monologues for acting class, because outside of A Raisin in the Sun there just wasn’t much available for her to perform. This same teacher brought her to see August Wilson debate Robert Brustein at Town Hall […]

Peter Brook posited that any empty space in which one actor walks as someone else watched could be a theatre. The next year, Samuel Beckett wrote a play with no actors. And onward the idea has gone, from Punchdrunk shows, to Enda Walsh’s Rooms and the Royal Court’s Dismantle This Room, in which 15 audience […]

Oluwaseyi Omooba, who had been cast as Celie, a queer character, in the revival by the Curve Theatre in Leicester and the Birmingham Hippodrome in England, wrote on the social media site five years ago, “I do not believe you can be born gay and I do not believe homosexuality is right, though the law […]

There is of course a long history of interaction between the British and Irish theatres, and this looks certain to continue into the future — however Britain’s relationship with the EU (and thus with Ireland) evolves in the years ahead. – Clyde Fitch Report

Junya Ishigami + Associates allegedly sent an email to a student interested in interning in their Tokyo office laying out the conditions for internship: “No pay, a six-day working week and office hours that run from 11am until midnight. The placements were described as lasting between two and three months (‘or more’), with interns required […]

Well, indeed: “‘There has been a whole parallel universe that existed that people had not tapped into,’ said Valerie Cassel Oliver, curator of modern and contemporary art at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond.” For some of the artists, the attention can feel like a bit of a mixed blessing, but the advantages […]

The move comes after Britain’s National Portrait Gallery and Tate (all of them) said the same thing. “The Guggenheim announced its decision on Friday in a brief statement that did not mention the opioid crisis or Mr. Sackler’s past on the museum’s board. A museum spokeswoman declined on Friday night to explain its rationale for […]

“This high-profile intercontinental spread has made Heatherwick all but ubiquitous. It has also earned him a heavy dose of suspicion mixed with contempt, both from critics and the public. His name is often used as something of a synonym for everything that’s wrong with contemporary urban design.” – CityLab

There’s a digital renaissance underway in the Eternal City and it is helping to shed a light on the past – quite literally. From video projections cast upon ancient walls and multimedia light shows to virtual reconstructions revealed through 3D visors, technology is being used to help tell the story of Rome in a more […]

Mitchell Kaplan founded Books & Books in 1982, a time when Miami was seen as a place of drug running, diet culture, and political unrest – and certainly not literary culture. But, well, “thirty-seven years, an international book fair and eight additional locations later, Kaplan is celebrated as the man who turned Miami into a […]

Charlotte Perkins Gilman has become a go-to feminist author with her clear, understandable, and terrifying short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper,” forgotten after her death but rediscovered in the 1970s. But she wrote a lot of nonfiction as well. In that writing, “she accused non-white immigrants of ‘diluting’ the racial purity of America and advocated for […]

What’s the Whiting Award – and who are these people? (It’s a $50,000 award for early-career writers, so no surprise you don’t know most of them yet.) – NPR

And writing about trauma doesn’t bestow some kind of catharsis on authors, or so says T. Kira Madden, author of Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls. “My love for magic, still, is all about mechanics. Construction. Physics. My knowledge of how tricks are done does not deaden the awe and admiration I feel—it deepens […]

“Chaucer was able to transform English poetry the way he did precisely because of his internationalism, not his nationalism. Like all educated men of his day, he was multilingual. He devoured late-antique philosophy, Latin translations of Arabic scientific treatises, and French love poems. His unusually good knowledge of Italian – and his travels to Italy […]