It started with a standing ovation. "At this point, allegedly, the gentleman swatted Academy award-winning Kidman with his program, prompting Urban to accuse the man of assaulting his wife. Quick as a flash, Urban summoned his burly security to escort the couple and Kidman’s mum out of the audience, while Opera House security were sent in to retrieve the...
In fact, he was a very promising art student, excelling at plants in particular, but a professor who worried that he couldn't support himself as an artist suggested he go into botany — and the rest is history. His career came full circle: one of the 300 uses he came up with for peanuts was to make inexpensive paints....
Hungary, Poland, and now Slovenia are assembling and executing a “playbook” to shift cultural institutions to the right. Often, the rhetoric around this has blended fears of anti-communism with populist, nationalist, anti-immigrant, and, in some cases, anti-LGBTQ rhetoric. In the process, political memory has become a flashpoint in Europe’s so-called culture war. - Artnet
"As they announce plans for the spring and summer — mostly digital, garnished with a little outdoors and in-person — many New York dance presenters spoke in recent interviews about what they've been up to and how the pandemic has changed their business. … Even without box-office revenue, most have continued paying artists, sometimes with no expectation of any...
Awards don’t help us quantify these qualities, but for a composer who burst onto the operatic scene so spectacularly with X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X at the New York City Opera in 1986, it’s an acknowledgement of his eminence in a world, classical music, that has usually struggled to deal honestly with Black musicians and Black...
"Many workers regarded it as a positive step this summer when numerous leading institutions released detailed diversity, equity, and inclusion issues (DEI) plans. But more than six months later, employees are still waiting for progress reports. Artnet News surveyed more than a dozen museums across the country, none of which agreed to share the full amount of money they...
"The mobs that descended on Washington, D.C., last month have intellectual roots in many places, going back to the bloody beginnings of this country. But they also have roots in specific areas of modern culture, including Facebook, BuzzFeed, and the increasingly online world of comedy. All the forces that incubated the rioters are still there, unchanged, chugging along as...
"The museum tells a chronological story of Black music starting in the 1600s through present day and framed around major cultural movements including the music and instruments brought by African slaves, the emergence of blues through the Great Migration, the Harlem Renaissance and the civil rights movement. … And while there are museums around the country that focus on...
"A Bosnian-born guitarist and accordionist, brought the traditional ballads of her Sephardic ancestors and the melodies of the Ladino language to American audiences through performances and recordings." - The Washington Post
"Paramount has a screenplay for a new movie, according to court papers. But Alan Schwartz, Trustee of the Truman Capote Literary Trust, has been shopping a television series, and has gotten seven-figure offers from multiple interested buyers. Early last year, both sides pursued settlement with the idea that Paramount would be involved in the TV production, but in May,...
"The J. Paul Getty Trust initiated the fund, to be officially announced Tuesday, and the California Community Foundation is administering it. Struggling arts organizations with an annual operating budget of under $10 million prior to the pandemic are eligible to apply for unrestricted funds that can go toward programming or operating expenses such as rent, utilities and staff compensation...
"The Frick Collection will open in the Breuer building as the Frick Madison on March 18, the museum announced on Tuesday, beginning a two-year stay in the Brutalist space while its 1914 Gilded Age mansion on Fifth Avenue undergoes renovation." - The New York Times
Social distancing is easier outdoors and there's more air circulation, not to mention the fact that, as one director puts it, "Outdoor arts is more accessible because it's in democratic open spaces." So companies across the UK are getting ready to perform outside their buildings, many for the first time, as soon as weather and health regulations permit. -...
"Louis Aliot, the right-wing mayor of Perpignan, a city in the south of France, will let four museums begin welcoming visitors once more, effectively disobeying countrywide COVID-19 safety guidelines that are keeping museums throughout the country shuttered." - ARTnews
Rereading “Hamlet” after the storming of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, I was struck by how fears of insurrection permeate the play. Every age sees itself in Shakespeare’s tragedy, but little did I expect to be reminded of the recent uprising and its poisonous politics when returning to this most philosophical of revenge dramas. - Los Angeles Times
