“I have far too many examples of workshops in which my peers have expressed aversion to writers engaging with issues of social justice or race… In my experience of having attended a prestigious MFA program in creative writing and having finished coursework in a prestigious PhD program in creative writing, the majority of fiction writers feel that a writer should only be concerned with aesthetics and form, i.e., the territory of true, high art. Sadly, not only is this common in fiction workshops in general, but among writers of color in fiction workshops.”
Archives for January 2016
Berkeley Art Museum Steps Up With A Big New Home
“As much as anything else, the 83,000-square-foot, $112 million fusion of museum and movie house is a bid by UC Berkeley to put its museum on the arts map as a revived, vital West Coast cultural force.”
When Robert Pinsky Wrote A Video Game
Mindwheel, a text-based game from the 1980s, “is a playful mishmash of sci-fi tropes, Pop surrealism, and allusions both high and low … The player traverse[s] the minds and memories of four deceased individuals – loosely based on major historical figures – using what the game calls a ‘neuro-electronic matrix.’ The goal is to retrieve the titular mindwheel, which ‘contains the secret of the world’s best values.'”
Study: New York’s Arts Community Is Not As Diverse As The City
The survey found that New York City’s cultural work force is 61.8 percent white, 35.4 percent minority groups, and 53.1 percent female, while the city’s residents are 33 percent white and 52 percent female, according to the 2010 U.S. census.
Art Institute Of Chicago Gets A New Director
James Rondeau, the highly regarded chair of the museum’s department of modern and contemporary art, will take over as president and Eloise W. Martin director Feb. 16, after a Thursday morning vote affirming his appointment by the institution’s board.
This Woman Is To Peter Brook What Jeanne-Claude Was To Christo
Well, except for the spouse part. “Trusted lieutenant, enforcer, co-writer, co-creator: however Marie-Hélène Estienne is described, she has been at Brook’s side for the last 40 years. For the past 20, he has barely made work without her. … Calling her unsung doesn’t quite do it: she might be the most famous theatremaker no one has ever heard of.”
What Jaap Van Zweden Did In Dallas
The city’s arts community has entered “its 2.0 phase,” says Catherine Cuellar, an official at the Communities Foundation of Texas and former CEO of the Dallas Arts District. The arrival of such energetic figures as van Zweden, 55, credited with transforming the Dallas orchestra into one of the best in the country, and Anderson, 59, who devised ambitious programming and reinstated free general admission at the DMA, proves the arts community has turned a corner, Cuellar said.
Kamasi Washington’s Giant Step
“With his popular, political, uncategorizable jazz, the young saxophonist has become something his genre rarely produces anymore: a celebrity.”
Wooster Group Project Runs Aground In LA After Pinter Estate Says Critics Can’t Review It
The highly anticipated new production of Harold Pinter’s “The Room” by The Wooster Group has run into difficulties after the licensing company for the play said that critics may not review the show when it has its world premiere in Los Angeles next month.
Police Break Down Door After Neighbors Mistake Man Trying To Sing Opera With Screaming
“Police officers were surprised early Tuesday morning when they kicked in the door of an Amsterdam man they thought was in trouble and shouting, only to discover he was actually trying to sing along with an opera recording.”
The Useless Agony Of Going Offline
“After seventy-two hours without my handheld devices, I didn’t miss my smartphone or access to Facebook. I missed learning new things.”
From The Inside: The Many Flaws Of El Sistema
“It’s not really an educational system, because…if you do something 22 or more hours a week, at some point, you’ll start getting good at it, that’s all.” Extreme working conditions were the norm.
All Those Newer Disney Movies With A Strong, Non-Passive Princess Heroine? Turns Out They Have A Problem
“The plot of The Little Mermaid, of course, involves Ariel literally losing her voice – but in the five Disney princess movies that followed, the women speak even less. On average in those films, men have three times as many lines as women.”
Ellen Page: So Now I’m Typecast To Only Play Gay?
“There’s still that double standard. I look at all the things I’ve done in movies: I’ve drugged a guy, tortured someone, become a roller-derby star overnight. But now I’m gay, I can’t play a straight person?”
The Real-Life Model For ‘The Little Mermaid”s Ursula The Sea Witch? Divine
“Although the sea witch is singular among Disney villains, there is a person behind this character. She is [sic] a real-life Ursula with a crimson mouth, eyebrows sharp as switchblades and a homicidal gleam in her eye. She is Divine.” Yes, John Waters’s Divine.
Canada’s Arts Scene Rattled By Plunging Canadian Dollar
“Talent, royalty fees and sets for some of Canada’s biggest productions often come from south of the border and are contracted in U.S. dollars. But with the Canadian dollar dipping below 70 cents last week, those contracts are now looking a lot more expensive than when they were initially negotiated.”
Submit Like A Man: Female Playwright Will Spend A Year Resubmitting Scripts Under A Male Pseudonym
Mya Kagan: “Over the past few years, I have been increasingly disheartened by the statistics on women in theatre and TV. The exact number varies from study to study, but they all come in around 20 percent. … With all these numbers reminding me that my industry sees and treats me as inferior to my male counterpart, I started wondering … would I have been more successful if people straight-up thought I was a dude?”
Submit Like A Man: How I (Female Playwright) Determined My Male Persona
Mya Kagan: “As a playwright, I am basically a professional character developer, so before I could do anything, I had to get my head around who this person was.”
Fort Worth Symphony Reportedly Decides Not To Implement Musician Salary Cuts
“Last week, musicians voted to authorize a strike and also rejected what management had called its final offer. A news release issued by the FWSO on Friday said the final offer would be implemented on Monday. … According to the [musicians’ union], the concessionary terms, including a more than 8 percent pay cut, have not been forced on musicians.” Management won’t comment.
Trailer With Matisse, Chagall, Miró Works Inside Stolen In L.A.
The 24-foot-long, rectangular 2005 Haulmark trailer disappeared Nov. 20 from an industrial park near Nordhoff Street and Alabama Avenue … [LAPD] art investigators said the trailer and roughly $250,000 in precious cargo, including art works by Matisse, Chagall, Miró, Haring and Neiman, were stolen. (Wait – all that was worth only $250,000?)
Thornton Dial, 87, ‘Outsider’ Artist Who Found Extraordinary Late-Life Success
“A sharecropper’s son who for decades spent his spare time soldering scrap metal, animal bones and other found objects into representations of black life in America, … Mr. Dial was untrained as an artist but by the end of his life saw his sculptures and paintings housed at … the most prestigious museums of the United States.”
Judge Finds Against Pacific Northwest Ballet In Dispute With Transit Agency
“A King County Superior Court judge has ruled that Sound Transit may pay fair-market value for a ballet school in the route of the planned East Link light rail in Bellevue and not the higher replacement value the school sought.”
La Scala’s Ballet Company Gets A New Director
Following the October departure of Makhar Vaziev for the Bolshoi Ballet, the Milan opera house has selected Mauro Bigonzetti to head the troupe. Bigonzetti was artistic director (1997-2008) and subsequently principal choreographer of Aterballetto, which concentrates on contemporary repertoire and was Italy’s first ballet company independent of an opera house. (in Italian; Google Translate version here)
Ai Weiwei Yanks His Copenhagen Shows To Protest Denmark’s New Asylum-Seeker Law
“Ai, China’s most prominent contemporary artist, went on social media to decry Denmark’s ‘shameless’ bill that among other things allows authorities to confiscate valuables from migrants and delays family reunifications for refugees for up to three years. The artist announced that as a direct result of the bill he will pull his exhibitions from ARoS Aarhus Art Museum and the Copenhagen gallery Faurschou Foundation.”
They Covered Up Some Nude Statues For Iranian President’s Visit To Rome – And Many Italians Object
Many started tweeting nude statues in protest; some called it an insult to the nation’s honor; one argued that the Iranians should strip statues if Italy’s prime minister visits; another called it “Italy’s shambolic appeasement of Islamism.” But perhaps it was just good manners? President Rouhani said as much, and thanked his hosts.