“Every identity comes with inherent biases, assumptions, and privileges to varying degrees. A helpful exercise is to take an identity and think of the immediate mental image that comes to mind when you invoke it. Let’s take ‘conductor.’ … You probably wouldn’t initially think of someone like Lidiya Yankovskaya, the only female music director of a multi-million dollar opera company in the United States. Or of someone like Francisco J. Núñez, founder and director of one of the world’s most accomplished youth choruses, who also happens to be a MacArthur Fellow.” – NewMusicBox
How Did The Internet Get To Be The Internet We Have Now?
It’s a question worth asking. To imagine a better version of our mediated world, we need to acknowledge these alternatives and to embrace their multiplicity—and often to retrace our steps to roads not taken in the past. – Public Books
Setting ‘Taming Of The Shrew’ In A Matriarchal Society
Now there‘s a way to deal with the play’s violence-against-women problem, and two current productions are trying it: one at the Sherman Theatre in Cardiff and the other at the RSC in Stratford. Reporter Natasha Tripney talks with the directors and actors involved. – The Guardian
Should Scientists “Own” Laws Of Nature They Discover?
It was 1923, and Francesco Ruffini was going to rescue science. The Italian senator’s plan was simple: Give scientists an ownership stake in their discoveries—a sort of patent on the laws of nature they discovered. The idea has re-emerged in the US Senate. – Slate
Artist Zehra Doğan Freed After More Than Two Years In Turkish Prison
The Turkish-Kurdish painter and journalist was jailed for a watercolor she made depicting a Kurdish town destroyed by the Turkish military. The charge: “spreading terrorist propaganda.” (The painting was made from an official military photograph.) Her cause was taken up by artists in the West, with Banksy putting up a mural in New York counting the days she was imprisoned. – Hyperallergic
Probability Theory Ain’t So Simple
We can’t resolve disagreements about how much the information we possess supports a hypothesis just by gathering more information. Instead, we can make progress only by way of philosophical reflection on the space of possibilities, the information we have, and how strongly it supports some possibilities over others. – Aeon
How AI Is Evolving As An Artist
“We have two streams of data: inspiration and aesthetics. The machine explores the space in between them. We’re giving artists more control of the process and pulling back on the autonomy.” The result is an assemblage of fairly trippy prints. Some show a face that’s blurred or swirling. Others look vaguely skeleton-like and macabre. – Fast Company
When Fan Culture, Troll Culture, Believe They Know Better Than Artists (And Want To Change Art)
Online communities build campaigns around “correcting” what they see as artistic errors. “A depressingly large number of these campaigns are defined by grievances against women and minorities, and by fury at Hollywood for attempting to make long-standing franchises sustainable by amplifying their inclusiveness.” – The Daily Beast
A First Report On The Acoustics Of Philadelphia’s Newest Concert Hall
Peter Dobrin on the 270-seat hall in the Rhoden Arts Center at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts: “New halls take a while to settle in, and this one, which employs an extensive sound system of speakers both on stage and overhead, seems more complicated than most. On first hearing, though, it sounded awfully dry.” – The Philadelphia Inquirer
France Drops One Rape Charge Against Director Luc Besson But Starts Another
“Prosecutors dropped the rape investigation into allegations by the actor Sand Van Roy who told police in May that she had been repeatedly raped by Besson, 59, during an on-off relationship. … But the Paris prosecutor’s office said a new preliminary investigation was launched on 21 February after a different, unnamed woman reported an allegation of sexual assault.” – The Guardian (AFP)
Climate Gentrification Is Already Happening
Welcome to the age of “climate gentrification,” when the effects of climate change cause residents in one area to relocate to another area that is not experiencing those problems, which drives up property prices. – The Daily Beast
Should Actors Be Asked About The Social Media Followings When They Audition?
Actors are increasingly being asked how many Instagram or Twitter followers they have when attending auditions for West End shows, films and adverts, even for non-speaking roles. An online poll on The Stage revealed 87% of 402 respondents did not think this practice is fair. – The Stage
Oscar Ratings Up From Last Year’s Record Low
That initial rating means that Sunday’s show rose 14 percent from 2018, per the earliest-available numbers. This year’s Oscars ran 3 hours and 21 minutes. These metered market ratings cut off at 15-minute increments, meaning the 21.6 covers 8 p.m. ET to 11:15 p.m. ET. So they do not include the Best Picture presentation, in this case. – The Wrap
After 40 Years, Seattle Weekly Is No More
“A series of ownership changes — including Village Voice Media and Voice Media Group — left Seattle Weekly on shaky financial footing by the time Sound Publishing acquired it in 2013.” – Crosscut
Propwatch: the feather boa in ‘Follies’
Solange LaFitte is mooching backstage at the dilapidated New York theatre. Everyone has arrived at the Weismann follies reunion party. And something sticks out of an old props basket – a shabby feather boa. Solange fishes it out, sizes it up. It’s grey – soft-toned down or just deeply-embedded grime? – David Jays
New York Review of Books Chooses New Top Co-Editors
Rea Hederman, the publisher of the intellectual journal, announced Monday that Emily Greenhouse, 32, and Gabriel Winslow-Yost, 33, have been named co-editors, and that Daniel Mendelsohn, a longtime contributor to the Review, will assume the newly created role of editor at large. – The New York Times
The Murky World Of Literary Plagiarism
With new accusations of plagiarism for novelist AJ Flinn and Danny Boyle’s film Yesterday, it’s time to revisit what can – and cannot – be proven in literary theft. True, “it has long been claimed that there are somewhere between three and 36 basic plots in all forms of storytelling,” but that can’t account for specific details. Still … “legal action is very tricky in cases which don’t concern actual language copying but rely on copying of themes, plots or structure.” – The Guardian (UK)
The Newest ‘Complete’ Schubert Symphony No. 8, This One Finished By Artificial Intelligence
Not that the AI could do it alone: It “analysed the timbre, pitch and meter of the first and second movements, using this data to generate melodies replicating Schubert’s style. Huawei then employed Emmy-winning composer Lucas Cantor to arrange those melodies into a hypothetical completed Symphony No 8.” – Irish Examiner
Kids, Atlanta Symphony Make A “Cultural Symphony”
A collaboration between students, dancers, choreographer and musicians in the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra.