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How Do You Manage Creativity? A number of big media companies have been ousting top executives and replacing them with money guys. "This trooping of grey faces into the unruly media world marks a distinct change of mood. Talk of 'vision', 'synergy' or 'new paradigms' is out; the daily grind of evaluating and improving operating performance is paramount. Show business doesn't attract leaders who know how to listen properly or leave people alone. But when you manage creative people, you must intrude carefully."
The Economist 01/17/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 4:02 pm
Mickey Mouse, From Behind Bars So how does Mickey Mouse feel now that the US Supreme Court has refused to spring him into the public domain? Jesse Walker asked him: So yeah, they created me. But they don't want to let other people build on me when they make their own creations, the way they did when I was born. And now I'm locked up for another stinking 20 years! Do you have any idea what it's like to have to greet kids at Disneyland every single day, always smiling, never slipping off for a cigarette? Reason 01/17/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 3:14 pm
Phillips Collection Begins Addition Washington DC's Phillips Collection is about to begin a $25 million, 30,000-square-foot expansion that will increase the cramped museum's space by nearly 50 percent. It will also create quarters for a new Center for Studies in Modern Art." Washington Post 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 3:11 pm
They're Big - Are They Practical? There are similarities between all the proposals for replacing the World Trade Center. "Surprisingly, the appetite for gigantism that inspired the original WTC - impractical, inefficient, and ultimately hubristic - still runs strong. Of course this partly reflects a popular sentiment that yearns for restoration. 'Rebuild the towers exactly as they were to show the terrorists they haven't won,' was a frequent person-on-the-street response in the months after the attack." San Jose Mercury-News 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 3:01 pm
Art In Vacant Places San Jose realtors trying to fill vacant storefronts in downtown were tired of looking at empty windows. So they came up with the idea of getting artists to show their work there. "People walk by and some of them like something and some of them hate it, but at least they're talking about art." San Jose Mercury-News 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 2:55 pm
A Brilliant New Plan For An Arts Library "Here's a good cause for the New Year: a design by Enríque Norten/TEN Arquitectos for the proposed Brooklyn Library for the Visual and Performing Arts. Sleek, curvaceous, colorful and alive, this is New York's first full-fledged masterwork for the information age. More than any other recent New York project, Norten's design captures the spirit of the contemporary city." The New York Times 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 2:01 pm
Art In Groups Art made by teams is popular again. "The collective impulse has never died out in American art; and now it is surfacing again, for the most part outside New York. In cities like Milwaukee, Providence, R. I., St. Louis and Philadelphia, as well as several in Canada, an old countercultural model, often much changed, is being revived, in some cases by artists barely out of their teens. Many of the new art collectives are virtual: they reside on the Internet, that intrinsically collective medium. They are fluid in size, and members may not even know the identity of other members." The New York Times 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 1:54 pm
Picasso In Dispute Heir Claims Looted Painting "Last month, Thomas C. Bennigson, heir of the Holocaust survivor who lost control of a Picasso painting during World War II, sued Marilynn Alsdorf for $10 million, after negotiations between the parties broke down. The case has sparked claims and counterclaims regarding the painting's history, the nature of property law and the moral obligation of art collectors and dealers. And it has pitted Alsdorf against one of the most prominent art recovery organizations in the world, the London-based Art Loss Register, which first reported that the Picasso had been looted." Chicago Tribune 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 10:41 am
- Previously: Grandson Sues to Get Looted Picasso Back A 1922 Picasso painting valued at $10 million is under dispute in the US - the grandson of the woman who had owned the painting before the Nazis stole it in World War II is suing the Illinois woman whose family bought the painting and is now trying to sell it. San Francisco Chronicle 12/27/02
The Myths Of Dying Orchestras Yeah, there are gloomy stories about symphony orchestras these days. But "as we enter this new age of musical anxiety, let's not lose sight of the many signs of health in the orchestra world - the surprisingly widespread commitment to developing new repertoire, the sense of ownership listeners feel, the renewed awareness of the value of arts education. We've been down this road many times before: expansion, contraction, repeat. So let's equip ourselves for the coming neurotic convulsions by shooting down some oft-recited but mistaken beliefs." Philadelphia Inquirer 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 2:24 pm
Preserving A Voice In The International Machine "The extent to which musicians from a particular ethnicity involve themselves with Western producers and Western tastes has sometimes led to hysterical fear, fear in the musical realm akin to that of the anti-globalization forces in the political and economic realms. The fear is of the obliteration of the world's indigenous peoples, languages, economic and political independence, culture and, yes, music. All that will remain will be a faceless, gray, corporate anonymity, McDonald's meets Orwell in the land of synth-pop. Except, at least in music, it hasn't worked that way at all."
The New York Times 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 2:15 pm
UK Music Licenses Rile Musicians The British government says it is trying to simplify the process for allowing live music to be played in pubs. So why are musicians and club owners fighting the idea and saying it will result in fewer places where live music can be heard? The Telegraph (UK) 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 1:34 pm
Opera Companies Go Back To The Tried And True In response to a tighter economy, more and more opera companies are turing away from adventurous fare and returning to audience favorites. "You have to consider what the public wants, because they have every opportunity to choose not to go. This isn't a court theater – this is populist entertainment. We're trying to appeal to a broad general public." Dallas Morning News 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 1:24 pm
Chicago Symphony - Looking For Mr. Right The Chicago Symphony is looking for a new Chief Executive. "Desirable as it would be to land the top administrative post at one of the world's great orchestras, the playing field of available candidates is surprisingly narrow. If you look at other major organizations like ours around the world, there just aren't many people who really have the qualifications, experience and leadership abilities to do something like this." Chicago Tribune 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 10:57 am
Colorado Springs Orchestra Refuses Conductor's Resignation When the Colorado Springs Symphony filed for bankruptcy last week, Lawrence Leighton-Smith, the group's music director, quit, as he had said he would. But the orchestra says it won't accept his resignation, and that he is obligated to stay on by terms of his contract. Meanwhile, the orchestra has refused to distribute parts to its players for next weekend's concerts while musicians have refused to sign a cost-cutting agreement. Kind of difficult to have a concert without music scores. Denver Post 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 10:20 am
Music Companies Need To Reinvent So far, recording companies' main strategy to fight digital copying is to sue file trading companies and try to develop copy protection. But this is the wrong track. "In the past they have sold a physical product, like a CD. In the shift to an electronic, globalised world, why spend money putting digital information on a CD when almost everybody has access to these digital bits through broadband networks? The goal should not be to sell one million CDs but have one billion people download and pay one cent every time they listen.
What they would be better off doing is enticing the customer to become a loyal evangelist of their product rather than p---ing them off by cutting off their free product." The Age (Melbourne) 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 9:56 am
Down Year For Denver Arts Falling attendance, a downturn in funding, program cutbacks and layoffs. Last year marked a downturn in the financial fortunes of Denver arts groups. Rocky Mountain News (Denver) 01/18/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 2:48 pm
- Denver's Capital Campaigns Go Underground "Although arts groups openly discussed their multimillion-dollar drives at this time last year, now fund-raisers are guarding their plans like children hoarding Halloween candy. Others are either scaling back their plans or holding off altogether." Rocky Mountain News 01/18/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 2:45 pm
Mikhail Baryshnikov Talks About His New Arts Center "There should be a kind of discovery of the unexpected here [New York]. After all, this city is the most cosmopolitan of American cities and should be able to attract and display emerging talent. Otherwise, we lose creative artists to countries that are able to fund the arts more generously, and with each loss the inner life of our city is poorer. Just like a person, a city without an artistic life is a pretty dismal thing." The New York Times 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 1:57 pm
Theatre Share How can small theatres afford to mount shows that are beyond their financial resources? Joint productions. "The deal works like this: Great Lakes and St. Louis Rep split the upfront costs of the show, about $330,000. That covers the designers' fees, the cost of sets and costumes, the director's salary and wages for the cast and stage managers to rehearse four weeks. Then each theater pays for the run of the show at its own theater." The Plain Dealer (Cleveland) 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 2:32 pm
Broadway In Moscow? Will big Broadway American musicals find an audience in Moscow? Results so far have been mixed. "These shows represent the risky yet enticing prospect of introducing blockbuster American musicals to the land of Stanislavski and Meyerhold. But the results have been so different that no one can really say whether it has been a good idea or not." The New York Times 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 2:07 pm
What Books Sold In 2002 There were some changes in the types of books that made the bestseller lists in 2002. Of 120,000 books published last year, 421 books made the bestseller lists, "down a bit from the record set in 2001, when 433 books made a first landing. The previous high was 385 books, back in 2000. The only weekly list that had more players in 2002 was hardcover nonfiction, where a record 90 books made an appearance, breaking the record of 83 books set in 2001. There were 126 hardcover fiction first appearances last year, down just one from the record 127 in 2001." Publishers Weekly 01/13/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 3:49 pm
Even Literary Books Have To Make Money Now Why is Random House cutting up one of its most-praised divisions? The literary world is apalled. "Despite the many core strengths of the Random House Trade Group, they have been the only Random House, Inc. publishing division to consistently fall short of their profit targets. To ensure its publishing continuity, it has become imperative to improve the Random House Trade Group's financial success." Publishers Weekly 01/20/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 3:37 pm
Martha Graham Is Back "Nearly three years after financial difficulties and litigation sidelined it, the ensemble re-emerges on Tuesday, when 24 company members and 4 students will resurrect 17 of Graham's ballets — from the all-woman 'Chronicle' and 'Heretic,' created in the 1920's and 30's, to 'Phaedra,' Graham's 1962 exercise in lust and lies, and the ubiquitous 'Appalachian Spring' — in a two-week run at the Joyce Theater." The New York Times 01/19/03
Posted: 01/19/2003 2:10 pm | 
