“Our breakthrough moment was when we took ownership of the fact that we didn’t need to write a “social impact statement” (which might be seen as competing with our mission statement). Rather, we simply needed to articulate the problem our community is facing that we are uniquely suited to address, the best solution we believe exists for that problem, and the concrete and tangible outcomes we’re going to measure that will demonstrate our positive social impact.” – Medium
Ice Dancing Is Heavily Reliant On Heterosexual Narratives
Can an ice dance couple – both of whom are out, with one in a same-sex relationship – help break that trope? (See also the sibling Shibutanis, whom some commentators find uncomfortable for that very reason.) “When you have a team that doesn’t portray a romantic relationship for any reason, they’re forced to consider new ways to tell their story. That opens up new doors, new pathways.” – ESPN
Director Michael Greif Reimagines ‘Rent’ For Live TV
Greif staged both the original off-and-then-on-Broadway production (1996-2008) and a 2011-12 Off-Broadway revival, and he’s now directing Rent: Live, airing this Sunday on Fox. Diep Tran talks to director and cast about how they’re reconfiguring the show for a live audience of 1,500 plus a TV audience they hope will be in the millions. — American Theatre
This Really Was An Evil Plot By The Patriarchy: Art Dealers Erased Female Old Masters And Sold Their Paintings As Works By Men
Jordana Pomeroy, director of the Frost Art Museum in Miami and a specialist in the history of women artists, says that some dealers went so far as to paint over a female artist’s signature and replace it with that of a male one “so that you can ask more money for a Frans Hals than you could for a Judith Leyster. And this kind of thing went on for many, many years.” — The Art Newspaper (podcast)
Andy de Groat, Experimental Choreographer Of 1970s And ’80s, Dead At 71
“Mr. de Groat was a significant presence on the New York downtown dance scene and in Paris in the 1970s and ’80s. Introduced to audiences through his work with [Robert] Wilson, he later formed his own company and built a distinctive choreographic identity through his use of spinning, a technique he began to develop for Mr. Wilson’s work.” — The New York Times
Ten-Year Restoration Of Tutankhamen’s Tomb Is Finally Complete
“In 2009, with help from the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities, the [Getty Conservation Institute] brought in a team of environmental engineers, architects and designers to improve the tomb’s infrastructure, an Egyptologist to conduct background research, microbiologists to study the brown spots, and conservators to treat the walls. Together, they carried out the most intensive study and restoration of the tomb since [Howard Carter discovered it in 1922].” — Hyperallergic
Long-Stalled Plans For New Vancouver Art Gallery Back On Track With $40M Gift; Herzog And De Meuron Design Revealed
The project for a new building for the museum, first launched in 2008, has been revived from the Chan family, prominent Vancouver philanthropists who gave the anchor donation for what’s now the Chan Center for the Performing Arts. This new gift is the largest private one for arts and culture in the history of British Columbia. At the announcement, updated designs by Herzog & de Meuron were presented, showing a building clad in vertical glass logs and wood. — Vancouver Sun
London’s West End Sees Record Attendance, Revenue In 2018 (Thank ‘Hamilton’)
“West End theatres enjoyed record box office takings of £766 million in 2018, up 8.6% compared with the previous year. … West End theatres also had record audience attendances of 15.5 million, up 3%. However, while audiences for musicals were up, attendance for West End plays dropped by 6.5%.” — The Stage
Mellon Foundation Gives $1.25M To Increase Diversity In Academic Publishing
“The [four-year] program offers apprenticeships in acquisitions departments at six university presses: the University of Washington Press, the MIT Press, Cornell University Press, the Ohio State University Press, University of Chicago Press, and Northwestern University Press. The grant will provide for three annual cycles of editorial fellows at those presses.” — Publishers Weekly
An Attempt To Archive And Access Early Internet Art
A project called Net Art Anthology, curated by Rhizome, an affiliate of the New Museum, was an attempt to tentatively create a historical understanding of net art. Unveiled online over the course of two years, the effort involved the archiving and restoration of 100 digital artworks— often a laborious process because browsers that could display the pieces no longer existed, or other aspects of the technology had to be preserved or emulated. – The New York Times
Why You Might Want To Use Paper Maps In The Age Of GPS
A glance at the research reveals that the paper map still thrives in the digital era, and there are distinct advantages to using print maps. – CityLab
Ariana Grande And The Complications Of Cultural Appropriation
“Appropriation remains one of the hardest-to-talk-about phenomena in pop culture, which is, fundamentally, a hodgepodge of widely circulated ideas that originated in specific subcultures. One line of thought puts it in economic terms: Are marginalized creators being materially harmed and erased? But on another level, there are questions of aesthetics and tastes. Does the pop star draw upon her influences in a way that feels original? Does her work disrespect or honor those influences? Is there a double standard in how her work is received?” – The Atlantic
The Racial Reconciliation Fantasies The Oscars Love So Much? Really, It’s All Just Transactional
Critic Wesley Morris nods to The Blind Side, Crash, and The Help, but he concentrates, of course, on current contender Green Book and its Oscar-winning predecessor Driving Miss Daisy, as well as non-Oscar-contender The Upside. He points out that those films’ central (interracial) relationships are all based on employment — “pay-to-playmate transactions,” he calls them — and contrasts them to the more realistic employer-employee relations in a film that should have been an Oscar contender, Do the Right Thing. — The New York Times
The Baltimore Symphony’s Contract Extension Agreement Just Expired
For now, all the drama is in the music. But tensions continue to simmer beneath the surface. The musicians had been operating under a four-month extension of their previous one-year contract that expired Sept. 9. – Baltimore Sun
Daily Mail Flagged As Unreliable News Source By Microsoft’s New Browser
“Visitors to Mail Online who use Microsoft Edge can now see a statement asserting that ‘this website generally fails to maintain basic standards of accuracy and accountability’ and ‘has been forced to pay damages in numerous high-profile cases’. The message, which is produced by a third-party startup called NewsGuard, tells readers to proceed carefully given that ‘the site regularly publishes content that has damaged reputations, caused widespread alarm, or constituted harassment or invasion of privacy’.” — The Guardian
Humanity’s Cognitive Diversity Is Narrowing. This May Be A Big Problem
On all continents, even in the world’s remotest regions, indigenous people are swapping their distinctive ways of parsing the world for Western, globalised ones. As a result, human cognitive diversity is dwindling – and, sadly, those of us who study the mind had only just begun to appreciate it. – Aeon
Australian Ballet Cancels Season’s Major Premiere Due To Graeme Murphy’s Illness
One of the centerpieces of the company’s 2019 season was to have been Murphy’s full-length adaptation of the Oscar Wilde story “The Happy Prince.” But, due to what’s being described only as “a medical issue,” Murphy — who spent 31 years as director of Sydney Dance Company, which he led to international renown, and has since been active as a freelance choreographer — is unable to finish the piece. — Limelight (Australia)
So The Times Thinks It’s Wonderful That Yannick Nézet-Séguin Is Openly Gay. What About The Paper’s Own Role In Keeping The Closet Shut For So Long?
Joel Rozen: “Closeting rarely happens in a vacuum; it requires a hostile culture of gay suppression and mechanisms like the popular media to thrive. Rather than simply acting like the secrecy of high-profile gay men in Manhattan was a random phenomenon, a story such as Woolfe’s could just as well have addressed the music press’s past complicity in making homosexuality a secret in the first place.” — Slate
U.S. Government Shutdown Could Torpedo Tintoretto Show At National Gallery
“The exhibition of 16th-century Italian master Tintoretto — one of the most anticipated art shows of the year — is set to open March 10, along with two complementary exhibits on Venetian prints and drawings. Preparations for the shows are weeks behind schedule because of the prolonged shutdown, the longest in history.” Three other Smithsonian museums have already had to postpone exhibitions due to the shutdown. — The Washington Post
Jonas Mekas, Giant Of American Underground Film, Dead At 96
“It is rare to have consensus on the pre-eminence of any person in the arts. But few would argue that Mr. Mekas, who was often called the godfather or the guru of the New American Cinema — his name for the underground film movement of the 1950s and ’60s — was the leading champion of the kind of film that doesn’t show at the multiplex. … In addition to making his own movies and writing prolifically about the movies of others, Mr. Mekas was the founder or a co-founder of institutions that support and promote independent filmmakers” — most notably the journal Film Culture and the museum-library Anthology Film Archives. — The New York Times
Arts Council England’s Guide For Arts Orgs To A No-Deal Brexit
The new document warns that arts organisations must “evaluate the impact of goods or items being delayed at borders and consider ways to minimise reliance on these routes.” Any organization that received EU financial support should “consider its reliance on commercial or philanthropic income through visitor numbers, donations or corporate hire.” — The Art Newspaper
Poet Charles Bernstein Wins $165K Bollingen Prize
“Established in 1948 and awarded every two years, the Bollingen Prize is administered by … Yale University’s Beinecke Library and brings a cash award of $165,000. The prize recognizes either the best poetry book of the previous two years or a poet’s lifetime achievement.” With Bernstein, a professor at Penn, it’s “something of both.” — The Philadelphia Inquirer
How To Fight Fake News?
Alan Rusbridger: “My experience is that readers are surprised when journalists can say, “Can you help me? Here’s my article. Is it right? Could it be improved? What’s missing here? What should I write about next?” These are such collaborative and open questions. Rare are the examples where journalists behave like that. But [when they do], readers fall over themselves to get involved, and that leads to trust. I think it leads to better reporting.” – Vox
Researchers: Binge-Watching Popular Streaming Shows Can Warp Your World View
“Viewers who spend more time consuming commonly binge-watched online original programming are more likely to see others in the world as mean, and less likely to perceive them as altruistic,” write Boston University researchers Sarah Krongard and Mina Tsay-Vogel.
Gay Magic-Realist Novel Banned By The Nazis Appears In English For First Time
“At the Edge of Night, by Friedo Lampe, was first published in 1933. … The [Nazi] regime objected to the novel’s inclusion of homoerotic content, and its depiction of an interracial liaison between a black man and a German woman. The book was placed on their list of ‘damaging and undesirable writings’.” Yet it was praised by no less than Hermann Hesse in 1933, and it has gained admirers since the uncensored version was published in Germany in 1999. — The Guardian
Why The Sydney Opera House Has Put Dogs On Staff
No, they aren’t audience engagement personnel, at least not in the usual sense. The Opera House has a couple of very popular places to eat outdoors, and the place is right on the harbor — so there are plenty of brazen seagulls ready to steal your food. Management has finally hit on the right way to keep the greedy fowl at bay. — Time Out Sydney