“Try offering your child ‘a piece of fruit’, and then when he accepts, handing him a chili pepper.”
Are We Wrong About Who We Are In The Universe?
“For a long time, we’ve had this preconception that life is here on Earth, but the universe is dead. But maybe we should be thinking of this as a living universe. We may be relative latecomers to the game.”
Should Artists Get Royalties When Their Work Is Resold? Here’s California As A Cautionary Tale
“As the only droit de suite in the US, the California statute has served as a test case. It should also serve as a cautionary tale for politicians considering the new Equity for Visual Artists bill, who would do well to learn from its mistakes.”
Why Doesn’t Dance Get The Serious Scholarly Attention That The Other Arts Do?
“Where is the equivalent to Adorno on Stravinsky and Schoenberg? Where the monographs to match those on Cubism, or the modern novel? If the link between the “Demoiselles d’Avignon” and temporality in fiction is worth examining, why not between that same painting and Nijinsky’s Sacre du Printemps?”
More Forged Abstract Expressionist Paintings Found in Queens House
“When it was discovered that one artist painted the more than 60 works peddled as Abstract Expressionist originals by the Long Island dealer Glafira Rosales, the revelation seemed incredible.” Turns out there’s more where those came from.
Craig Lucas, Climbing Back From the Bottom
The playwright and screenwriter (Reckless, Prelude to a Kiss, Longtime Companion, Marry Me a Little, The Light in the Piazza) talks about drinking with his mother, running out of money and work even after he became famous, overcoming addiction, and what Philip Seymour Hoffman literally chased him down to say.
The Limitations of Eve Ensler’s Dance-Based Activism
“Last year, when I first heard about One Billion Rising, the day of action Ensler had declared to ‘break the silence’ about violence against women, I did not immediately think (as 999,999,999 other women evidently did), ‘Oh hooray, the famous vagina lady is doing something about violence!’ Instead I thought, ‘They’re going to tell us to dance, aren’t they.'”
Here’s the Internet’s Most Internet Sentence
Matthew J.X. Malady did the research so we don’t have to. (Spoiler: One of the runners-up was “Like us on Facebook.”)
How 5.5 Million People helped Harry Manx Get His Stolen Guitar Back
His rare guitar went missing at Chicago’s O’Hare airport. So he wrote a post about it on Facebook and…
Where Do New Ideas Come From? Here’s How The Brain Makes Them
“How does our thinking leap beyond our existing knowledge to make new ideas? The answer is that we blend multiple ideas that are already in our minds, and these blends contain new ideas that didn’t exist before.”
UK Actors Union Asks Arts Council England To Tackle Growing Artists-Working-For-Free Issue
“Our members have told us that low and no pay work is a growing problem… and action must be taken, including by ACE, before the culture of working for free becomes so endemic that many artists are forced out of the profession.”
Is Music A Real Language?
“How the brain processes musical discourse is not well-understood. Is music a language? If not, how can we still use it to communicate?”
Guggenheim Responds: Our Security Guards Make More Than $10/hour
“The security officers employed by the Guggenheim, who comprise the majority of our front line security team, are paid competitively with their peers at other museums with comparable operating budgets and substantially more than the $10 quoted. As well, our Guggenheim security officers receive a benefits package that we offer to all our full time employees.”
The Oscar Ballots (What The Voters REALLY Think)
“‘Gravity’? I’ve seen better things at planetariums,” while Julia Roberts “was horrendous” and Meryl Streep gave “a bottom-drawer performance” in “August: Osage County.”
More Than 800 Migrant Workers Have Died In Construction Of Qatar’s World Cup Stadia. Architect Zaha Hadid Makes A Statement:
“I have nothing to do with the workers,” said Hadid. “I think that’s an issue the government – if there’s a problem – should pick up. Hopefully, these things will be resolved.”
Frank Gehry Rebuffs Request To Change Design Of National Mall’s Eisenhower Memorial
The project “received yet another setback last week when its architect, Frank Gehry, rebuffed calls from the Commission of Fine Arts to revise his designs.”
“Fifty Shades” Passes 100 Million Books Sold
“Vintage Books announced Wednesday that sales for E L James’ sexually explicit trilogy have reached 100 million copies and have spent 100 weeks on The New York Times’ paperback best-seller list.”
Why Do So Many Foreigners Win Oscar’s Best Director?
“Over the last 20 years, 11 winners of the best director Academy Award — arguably second in prestige to best picture at Tinseltown’s biggest annual show — have been from outside the United States.”
Federal Court Orders YouTube To Take Down ‘Innocence of Muslims’
It was the video that launched a thousand riots (and, just maybe, in part, the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi). The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has ordered Google to remove all copies of the anti-Muslim potboiler from YouTube – on copyright grounds. (And it’s on copyright grounds that Google will appeal.)
‘Innocence of Muslims’ Got Yanked Because of Copyright? What Was the Court Thinking?
Eugene Volokh explains the ruling point by point.
U.S. Congress Considers Bill on Artists’ Resale Royalties
“The American Royalties Too Act (ART for short) recommends that artists should receive a flat 5% of the resale price for works sold at auction for more than $5,000.”
Artist Will Take Work From New York City Ballet’s Floor to Its Stage
JR, the French street artist whose installation on the floor of City Ballet’s home theater went viral, will choreograph a new piece for the company (with the help of ballet master Peter Martins).
Santa Monica Finally Decides to Save Paul Conrad Sculpture
The city council voted on Tuesday to use public funds and private donations to repair his 1991 anti-nuclear outdoor sculpture Chain Reaction, which critics had contended was physically unstable and a danger to the public.
Top Posts From AJBlogs 02.26.14
The Sadness of the Corcoran’s Final Throes
AJBlog: Real Clear Arts | Published 2014-02-26
Unfair Advantage? New Artists Royalties Bill Still Exempts Dealers
AJBlog: CultureGrrl | Published 2014-02-27
Celebrating Eric Dolphy, and the Threat of Spotify
AJBlog: CultureCrash | Published 2014-02-26
Maestro to audience: Turn on your phones, tweet and take pictures
AJBlog: Slipped Disc | Published 2014-02-26
Serge Dorny in line for a 1.5 million Euro payoff?
AJBlog: Slipped Disc | Published 2014-02-26
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Five Artists Withdraw From Sydney Biennale After Protest
“The artists’ decision to withdraw follows a call by 28 artists for the Sydney Biennale to withdraw from a funding arrangement with Transfield, which runs off-shore detention facilities for the Australian Government’s internment of asylum seekers.”