“There’s a disease of the ‘great China novel’ that’s attacking Chinese writers. They feel they have to produce these enormous things that explain all of Chinese society and are filled with philosophy and ideas and thoughts. And they tend to believe that’s more important than story or character.”
Philadelphia Aims to Restore Six-Day-a-Week Library Service
In the aftermath of the 2008 financial disaster, the city was forced to cut 20% from the Free Library system’s budget, and all the branches ended Saturday operations. Mayor Michael Nutter’s next budget aims to restore Saturday hours to all 39 branches.
Dancing About Cardiology? Yup.
Jody Oberfelder Dance Projects’ 4Chambers “is a kind of hybrid of a dance piece and a science project, with videos about the heart – including the choreographer Ismael Houston-Jones describing his own heart attack” – and a sequence depicting cardiac arrest and CPR (which can be quite a violent process). (audio)
Teju Cole Tweets a 4,000-Word Essay
“On March 13, author Teju Cole published ‘A Piece Of The Wall’ entirely on Twitter, a first-of-its-kind essay on Arizona and immigration comprised of approximately 250 tweets that were tweeted out over the span of seven hours.” In a Q-&-A, Cole explains what he was up to and how he pulled it off.
March Madness Comes to Scrabble
Sports journalist Stefan Fatsis reports on Hasbro’s public tournament – complete with a Sweet-16 bracket – to pick a new word to be added to the Official Scrabble Players Dictionary.
Cezanne In Cyberspace – All Of The Artist’s Work To Go Online
In book form, the illustrations are all “lumped together.” With the web catalogue, users can search via almost any keyword that relates to a painting’s content, colors, exhibition history, owner, or many other attributes. This can lead to surprisingly specific explorations.
Protests As Detroit Gallery Plans To Sell Famous Banksy Mural After “Saving” It
“Artists and commentators are decrying the move by leaders of the 555 Nonprofit Gallery and Studios to profit from the work by the anonymous British graffiti artist. The 555 artists excavated the 1,500-pound piece from the crumbling Packard Plant four years ago in the name of preserving it and putting it on public display. They pledged they had no interest in selling it.”
Why Is Hollywood So Obsessed With Doppelgängers Lately?
“Our active pursuit of our own doppelgängers, though, would strike many throughout history as odd, if not suicidal: Encountering your match has long been considered a harbinger of death, or at least very bad luck. We all have a double in the world, the mythology goes, and most of us will never meet that person. But if we do, the universe only has space for one.”
Rethinking Documentaries, With A Creative Drive
“Every time you are getting ready to make a shot in a documentary film, you are asking yourself questions about your cinematographic approach. You are approaching the truth, but the image is never the truth itself.”
Wait, What If Uptalk Is Just A Normal Way For Millennials To Speak Now?
“Young women — surrounded in every other part of their lives by women who talk just like they do — are increasingly responding to mentors, teachers, and bosses who try to help them overcome these vocal habits by, as Ratner did, arguing that they shouldn’t have to change for society. Society should change for them. People should learn that asking questions and using uptalk is a sign of caring what the other person thinks, not of submissiveness.”
Why Hungary’s New Law Is So Terrible For Photographers (That Is, Everyone)
“From 15 March anyone taking photographs in Hungary is technically breaking the law if someone wanders into shot, under a new civil code that outlaws taking pictures without the permission of everyone in the photograph.”
Google’s Anti-Copyright Stance Isn’t Cool – It Hurts Artists
“It’s so absurd that Google is still presenting itself as the lovable geek who’s the friend of the young everyman. Don’t kid yourself, kids: Google is the establishment.”
Even The Bark Can Be Faked, If Location Scouts Want Something Different
“The city/county of Los Angeles is essentially Hollywood’s biggest backlot, and that brings with it certain attendant privileges and headaches. Symbolically, it means that L.A. is often asked to represent both itself and other places.”
Heirs Of Peggy Guggenheim Sue New York Foundation
“They are calling for the revocation of Peggy Guggenheim’s donation to the foundation because of the organisation’s ‘failure to comply with the conditions under which it was granted'” – not to mention the accusation that the foundation is desecrating her grave.
How Martha Graham Saved One Young Dancer’s Life (Well, Career)
Lloyd Mayor: “The work was really talking about shame and empathy and vulnerability, and they are not to be romanticized.”
Join A Choir, Become A Better Human Being?
“Singing in a choir is a transcendent experience – and there aren’t many of those in life. It instills gratitude and bliss without the contortions of yoga or hangovers of alcohol.”
Science Says: To Be Happy, Shed Your Obsession With Owning Things
Duh? “People can get caught in a negative spiral in which they have unrealistic expectations of how happy material goods will make them. When their experience falls short of those expectations, their instinct is to seek out something new to purchase, putting them in an endless loop of anticipation and disappointment that does not leave room for gratitude.”
Why Does Art Matter? Our Ideas About That Are Broken
“There’s no deeper pattern about the nature of arts organizations. Valuing art at the expense of community is a serious error, but that’s all. It’s not the tip of the iceberg, it’s a tiny iceberg.”
Minnesota Orchestra Loses A Star Principal: “I Don’t Believe Anymore”
“I am resigning now because I do not believe the current leadership has the vision to restore the Orchestra to its place among the great orchestras of the world,’’ longtime principal clarinetist Burt Hara wrote in a letter to his colleagues.
Dudamel And Gergiev – Of Art And Politics (It’s Complicated)
“Dudamel has stopped short of taking a political stand; Gergiev, to Western eyes, has taken the wrong one. How much condemnation do they deserve? And is it reasonable to expect them to take a stand at all? Do we have the same expectations of leading figures in other fields — athletes, actors, dancers, poets?”
Today’s Top AJBlog Posts 03.14.14
How You View the Pie
AJBlog: Audience Wanted | Published 2014-03-14
Can arts organizations be both art-focused and community-focused?
AJBlog: Jumper | Published 2014-03-14
Picasso Museum: Reopening With What?
AJBlog: Real Clear Arts | Published 2014-03-14
Will Gentrification Kill Music Scenes?
AJBlog: CultureCrash | Published 2014-03-13
Respecting the craft
AJBlog: The Artful Manager | Published 2014-03-13
Pavarotti estate takes action to stop illicit child duet
AJBlog: Slipped Disc | Published 2014-03-13
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Can El Sistema Navigate Venezuela’s Roiling Politics?
El Sistema was founded in 1975 by Jose Antonio Abreu, a musician and economist, and it has flourished under eight different governments while aiming to keep many impoverished kids on the straight and narrow. “Ultimately, we have no idea how Dudamel, maestro Abreu and others are functioning in El Sistema. Abreu’s way of working has always been to try and influence the politics subtly from the inside. The second he takes a public stand, he can’t do that anymore.”
The Value Of Original Cast Recordings
“What it does do is give the listener—as well as actors and directors—a snapshot of what the play sounded like when it was new. Such snapshots can serve as invaluable points of departure for the present-day performer, a benchmark against which to measure subsequent interpretative developments.”
Voice Over (Literally) Hal Douglas Dies At 89
His dramatic range, from Olympian-thunderous to comic-goofy, suited him for trailers for movies as diverse as “Philadelphia,” “Forrest Gump,” “Coneheads,” “Meet the Parents” and “Lethal Weapon.” (“Under 17 not admitted without a parent.”)
Report: $66 Billion Of Art Sold Last Year
“International art and antique market sales totaled €47.4 billion ($66 billion) last year, their highest sum since the pre-recession days of 2007, according to the European Fine Art Foundation (TEFAF)’s annual art market report, released yesterday.”