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Studying The Arts To Death In the 80s and 90s, culture advocates have authored more and more studies to measure the "impact" of the arts on society. What does the money buy? How many does it employ? What kinds of social "goods" are being achieved? "There is now a mass of primary data claiming to measure the impact of cultural policy." But "the rise of statistics has paralleled an extension of government control over the arts, and the tendency to value culture for its 'impact' rather than its intrinsic value." Surely this can't be good for the service of art... Spiked-Culture 01/06/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 11:44 pm
Holiday Surge Boosts Smithsonian Smithsonian Museum attendance was down 16 percent in 2002, continuing a post 9/11 slump. But, says the museum, things might be getting better - attendance increased by 53 percent in November and December compared with the same months a year earlier. Washington Post 01/07/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 11:24 pm
Great Ideas Chasing A Flawed Concept Ada Louise Huxtable has studied plans proposed for the World Trade Center site. "The conceptual daring and advanced technology of these schemes - the sheer drama of their bold images - brings cutting-edge creativity to New York, where it is long overdue. Buildings like these have already changed skylines from London to Hong Kong. This is the architecture of the 21st century, and about as good as it gets. That's the good news. The bad news is that these provocative and beautiful presentations have also given us a stunning demonstration of how to do the wrong thing right." Wall Street Journal 01/07/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 10:56 pm
Architecture's Wrong Turns And Faulty Values Philip Langdon is angry about the current championing of architecture that puts people and context in subordinate roles. "Unfortunately, the spirit of the ’60s is returning in building design; the tragedy of architectural arrogance is now being replayed as farce. Across North America, a rash of anti-social architecture is erupting. Public participation in design decision-making has blocked some of the worst ideas, but alienating buildings are rising in significant numbers. Indeed, advocates of 'progressive' architecture proclaim many as instant landmarks, and portray their designers as stars." American Enterprise 01/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 6:10 pm
La Scala Proposes Controversial Expansion In the midst of a major (and controversial) renovation, Milan's La Scala proposes a big expansion, including a series of new theatre spaces. "It is an odd time to propose an expansion, with budget deficits at the major opera houses and shrinking public funding for culture in Italy. And indeed, the motives behind the project may not be purely artistic. Local observers believe that La Scala is collaborating with real estate developers who seek to enrich themselves at the ultimate expense of taxpayers." Andante 01/06/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 11:50 pm
Why Are We Stuck With Poor Old Washed-Up CD's? "To the new generation of music artists and engineers, 'CD-quality sound' is an ironic joke. In recording studios, today's musicians produce their works digitally at resolutions far beyond the grainy old CD standard. To make the sounds listenable on antiquarian CD players, the final mix is retrofitted to compact disc specs by stripping it of billions of bits' worth of musical detail and dynamics. It's like filming a movie in IMAX and then broadcasting it only to black-and-white TV sets. It doesn't have to be this way." Slate 01/06/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 11:31 pm
Record Concert Tour Year Nets $2.1 Billion The pop music concert industry sold a record number of tickets in 2002, taking in $2.1 billion. "This was the fourth straight year concert receipts reached record levels in America. There were $1.75 billion in sales in 2001. Paul McCartney had the top-grossing tour, pulling in $103 million, with average ticket prices at $130. Chicago Sun-Times 01/06/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 6:48 pm
Battle Of The Arts Center Chiefs A week ago Kennedy Center chief Michael Kaiser wrote a piece in the Washington Post warning of the current perilous state of the arts in America. This week, Lincoln Center chief Reynold Levy responds, citing healthy signs of arts activity all over America, and concluding by urging Kaiser to "leave the predictions of Cassandra and the wailings of Jeremiah backstage." Washington Post 01/04/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 11:57 pm
- Previously: Why The Performing Arts Are In Danger Kennedy Center president Michael Kaiser warns that the performing arts are in danger, and issues a five-point call to action. "We have been scared into thinking small. And small thinking begets smaller revenue that begets even smaller institutions and reduced public excitement and involvement. No wonder so many arts organizations are announcing record deficits." Washington Post 12/28/02
Art Asking To Be Sued A new exhibition in New York shows artists who have purposely sampled and copied other artists' work. "All of the pieces either have run afoul of copyright owners in the past or could be expected to in the future." It makes the point that current copyright laws are overly restrictive of artists who use other artists work in their own. The New York Times 01/07/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 11:12 pm
US Arts Funding Declines In 2002 A study by the National Assembly of Arts Agencies reports that for the second year in a row, state arts funding across America declined in 2002. This follows ten years of funding increases. "According to the study, 62% of the decline can be blamed on two states: California and Massachusetts. The study reports that, nationwide, legislative appropriations for fiscal 2003, including state appropriations, fell from $408.6 million to $353.9 million. California and Massachusetts had a combined loss of $33.9 million, making them the two states hardest hit by the faltering economy." Los Angeles Times 01/04/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 6:40 pm
- Colorado - Worst State For Arts Funding After recent cuts in state funding, Colorado has fallen to last in the US among the states. "Arts funding in the state dropped from $1.86 million in fiscal 2001-02 to $1.04 million for 2002-03, according to the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies. That represents about 25 cents per resident. The national average is $1.22, down from $1.42 in 2001-02." The Daily Camera 01/03/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 6:22 pm
Solzhenitsyn Suffers Stroke? Heart Attack? Alexander Solzhenitsyn, 84, has been in a Moscow hospital since the end of December. He is said to have "spent the past few days there and was 'already feeling better'. Conflicting reports from Russian news agencies had suggested the writer was suffering from - variously - a stroke, hypertension or angina." BBC 01/06/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 11:38 pm
The Mahler Man - First Amateur To Conduct The Vienna Phil Gilbert Kaplan has netted a number of firsts in his conducting career. "As well as being the first amateur to conduct the Vienna Philharmonic, Kaplan is also the conductor with the smallest repertoire in history.' Mahler 2nd. "Now 61, he made his conducting debut at the age of 40 with Mahler Two" and he's conducted it 100 times. Now "he is in Vienna for four days to make a recording of the work for Deutsche Grammophon with the orchestra that Mahler himself conducted." The Guardian (UK) 01/07/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 8:35 pm
The Auteur's Soap Commercials (Gotta Pay The Rent) What did art filmmaker Ingmar Bergman do in the 1950s when he was short of cash? He made soap commercials. "He had eight children to feed, a long-running strike had paralysed the Swedish film industry, and theatres were closed for the summer. He needed to work. It was inevitable that film historians would track down the missing films..." The Guardian (UK) 01/06/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 8:33 pm
Trio Of Hits Shakes Up Broadway If last year was the year of the revival on Broadway, this year three shows have shaken up the cynic's view of how business is conducted. "Chances are being taken, rules are being broken and — as a result — attention is being paid." Toronto Star 01/07/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 11:20 pm
After 20 Years - 'Midnight's Children' Comes To The Stage Some 20 years ago, Salman Rushdie's sweeping novel "Midnight's Children" was an international bestseller. Decades later, "after abortive adaptations by the BBC and a leading West End producer, it has taken the combined efforts of Rushdie, the Royal Shakespeare Company and two American universities to end the wait, with a stage version of 'Midnight’s Children' that previews in London next week." The Times (UK) 01/07/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 8:53 pm
London's Sick Theatre District Who wants to go to London's West End theatre district anymore? "Whether you travel by car or train, it is a nightmare to get there, and when you arrive the place is squalid. The streets are filthy and poorly lit, there are horribly persistent beggars everywhere, and the place is overrun by groups of marauding yoof, out on the booze and aggressive and foul-mouthed with it. Drug-dealing takes place more or less openly, and the atmosphere is deeply depressing when it isn't downright threatening. Of a policeman on the beat there is hardly ever a sign." The Telegraph (UK) 01/07/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 8:49 pm
Movies By Day, Stage By Night "The transition from theatre to film and TV is an art that stage actors in Canada, and particularly Toronto, are becoming more adept at handling. As film and TV production work increases and the economic forecast for creating theatre gets less promising, seeking work opportunities outside theatre is no longer thought of as selling out. Actors dropping out of a play to do a film is becoming the unwritten law of the Toronto theatre jungle." The Globe & Mail (Canada) 01/06/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 7:04 pm
Plagiarism Bad. Very Bad. Isn't It? At a "professor-packed" session of the American Historical Association's meeting in Chicago over the weekend, plagiarism was the hot topic. "Almost everybody thinks that something ought to be done about it, but almost nobody agrees with anybody else about just what that something ought to be. And - oh, yes - there's also that annoying bugaboo of defining just what truly constitutes plagiarism." Chicago Tribune 01/06/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 6:52 pm
Updating The Contemporary In Adult Contemporary Adult Contemporary radio - those endless loops of Elton and Phil Collins and Micahel Bolton and... a 2001 survey of Canadian radio revealed that 23 percent of all listening time on the radio was devoted to this format. But those familiar songs that have been played over and over again for the past decade - "just when it seemed these radio-friendly legacies would never go away - all right, 16 or 17 years after it seemed they wouldn't go away - it seems like now they just might..."National Post 01/06/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 11:03 pm
All Things Familiar - That Public Radio Sound Why do the voices on National Public Radio sound so much alike? "If you listen to a lot of NPR, you realize how similar it all sounds: no matter who is talking, or what they're talking about. There's a simple reason for the homogeneity...Washington Monthly 01/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 6:18 pm
Blocking Your Digital Future The movie industry is close to telling cable TV operators to block recording of movies. The technology is aleady in place. "Hollywood's new strategy is likely to affect everyone from computer-adept users of online music services to the average couch potato. The digital future, hailed as more convenient and of higher quality than the scratchy, fuzzy analog past, is coming with multiple strings attached."The New York Times 01/06/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 6:14 pm
American TV Losing Dominance Overseas The dominance of American TV is waning, though still a major force in countries like Australia. "In the US, television executives have attributed the worldwide decline of US programs to several factors, not least their cost. Industry executives say the American studios priced themselves out of the market just as competition began to heat up abroad from newly privatised commercial broadcasters and cable and satellite networks."The Age (Melbourne) 01/07/03
Posted: 01/06/2003 6:04 pm
Will Denver Sports Mogul Take Over Colorado Ballet? The dance company is out of a home after this season. The mogul - Stan Kroenke, owner of the Avalanche, Nuggets, Mammoth, and assorted sports palaces and theatres, needs attractions to fill his Paramount Theatre. "Under the proposal, Kroenke Sports Enterprises will take over the ballet and move it to the Paramount Theatre, which Kroenke has under a 25-year lease. Ballet and sports aren't that far apart. Both require physical skills and stamina." Denver Post 01/06/03
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