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Thursday, March 20




Visual Arts

Boston Museum of Fine Arts Cancels Catalog At its peak, Boston's Museum of Fine Arts shops catalog generated $3.5 million a year. "In this age of the museum mall, cultural institutions have come to increasingly rely on income from exhibit-related products. The MFA's gift magazine is designed to compete with the Pottery Barn, L. L. Bean, and Sundance catalogs. MFA officials say the museum's stores continue to do well, but the catalog has struggled." In 2001 the museum's retail enterprises were spun off into a private company...and lost $2.9 million in its first year. So the museum is canceling this spring's catalog. Boston Globe 03/20/03
Posted: 03/20/2003 6:54 am

Albertina Museum Gets A Redo Vienna's Albertina Museum has just reopened after a $100 million facelift to rave reviews. "Although this tradition-bound Viennese institution houses one of the world's premier collections of graphic art, spanning artists from Michelangelo to Egon Schiele, it has never generated much public interest." The New York Times 03/20/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 9:45 pm

Aussie Police Recover Thousands Of Stolen Artifacts In Raid In a series of raids, Australian police have recovered thousands of items stolen from the Australian Museum. "The items include precious skulls, bones, rare species in jars of formaldehyde and even a stuffed gorilla." A former museum worker is being questioned, and thousands of items have been returned to the museum. They were stolen from the museum between 1996 and 1998.
Sydney Morning Herald 03/20/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 9:15 pm

Gagosian Vs. The IRS New York Larry Gagosian is jousting with the Internal Revenue Service on two front. He's is under investigation for his dealings with tax cheat Sam Waksal. And he's suing the IRS over tax claims the government is making over three painting. New York Post 03/19/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 9:11 pm

  • IRS After Gagosian "In a civil lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, prosecutors accused Gagosian, the Gagosian Gallery and three other men of failing to pay taxes on the 1990 sale of 58 works of art that earned $17 million in taxable gains." NJ.com (AP) 03/19/03
    Posted: 03/19/2003 9:03 pm

"Saving" Art In Britain - Is This A New Definition Of Save? Yet another important painting in Britain is apparently "in danger" of being sold abroad. And another campaign is mounted to raise money to "save" it. "This rhetorical flourish is becoming commonplace in Britain. Our public galleries are so strapped for cash that barely a week goes by without an appeal being launched to 'save' some work for the nation, or some top aesthete bending the knee before Lottery paymasters for lolly to keep something beautiful from leaving this country. This rhetoric may be to an extent justified by the parlous state of public funding for the arts, but it does raise suspicions that the principles underlying these claims are sometimes questionable." The Guardian (UK) 03/20/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 7:35 pm

Music

FileTraders - Throw 'Em In Jail, Says Congressman A Texas Republican Congressman suggests that the way to stop college students from downloading music is to put them in jail. "What these kids don't realize is that every time they pull up music and movies and make a copy, they are committing a felony under the United States code. If you were to prosecute someone and give them three years, I think this would act as a deterrent." Wired 03/19/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 9:54 pm

The One-Hour "Carmen" The Welsh National Opera is producing a radical version of "Carmen." It's short - clocking in at about an hour long. "Its short span is not the only unusual thing about this production, which is currently on tour. It is also radically cheap - tickets cost £5 and £10 - and played at unfamiliar times. Performances are at 2.30pm and 6.15pm: the afternoon show is designed to allow visiting parties of kids to be back at the school gates by home-time, and the early-evening performance is aimed at an after-work crowd." Will this really tempt people to get the opera habit? The Guardian (UK) 03/20/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 7:47 pm

Has English National Opera Chronically Lost Money? Management of the English National Opera have claimed that the company has lost millions of pounds over the past decade - "on average, £1m to £2m for nearly 10 years." The losses have been the company's justification for wanting layoffs and financial assistance from the government. But "analysis of the accounts show that between 1994 and 2000 the company was in surplus in every year but one, before falling back into the red. Last year, its worst since 1997 when it had to be bailed out with £9.2m from the Arts Council, it lost less than £600,000." The Guardian (UK) 03/19/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 7:28 pm

The Revolution Will Be Webcast Last week, one of the Dixie Chicks casually mentioned that she was rather ashamed of President Bush sharing her home state, and a furor erupted that has the Chicks' music being pulled from radio stations nationwide. With that kind of wild-eyed nationalism infecting the U.S., it's no wonder that protest songs are hardly in vogue among big stars at the moment. But they do exist - on the web. "From hip hop artists Chuck D and the Beastie Boys to veteran singer/songwriters such as John Mellencamp and Billy Bragg, a general distaste for political fare on commercial radio has lead them to the Web, where songs they've written to protest the looming war with Iraq are readily available for free." Toronto Star 03/19/03

Happy Ending After All in Colorado Less than a week after the beleaguered Colorado Springs Symphony dissolved itself in bankruptcy court, the musicians of the old CSSO joined with their old music director and a new board leadership of their choosing to form the new Colorado Springs Philharmonic. The executive director of the Phil will be Susan Greene, who had been dismissed from the same position at the CSSO a year ago, sparking angry questions from the musicians. Denver Post 03/18/03

Baltimore Symphony Facing Money Woes "Like a persistent virus, the economic downturn continues to infect musical organizations across the country. No immediate cure is in sight... The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra's projected deficit for the current fiscal year has gone from $515,000, estimated last November, to $806,000 as of this month. Underlining the troubling financial picture is the fact that BSO management has unexpectedly opened up negotiations with the musicians, even though their contract, approved three years ago, doesn't expire until 2005. Neither side will provide details of these discussions, but it's clear that the orchestra is looking into every option, including possible financial concessions from the players, to stop the flow of red ink." Baltimore Sun 03/18/03

Cleveland Losing Three Principal Players Major orchestras don't lose their principal musicians very often. After all, these are the plum jobs of the music industry, high-salaried and high-profile. But this year, the Cleveland Orchestra will lose no fewer than three of its principal players, and the scramble for their jobs is on. Two of the three principals are retiring, and the other, who had moved up from second chair, is returning to his old position after not being tenured at the principal position. The Plain Dealer (Cleveland) 03/18/03

Arts Issues

Canadian Media Chain To Hire National Arts Journalism Team CanWest, which owns 11 big-city newspapers and 16 TV stations across Canada, is hiring a new team of national arts journalists to be based around the country. The team will be used on TV and in print, and the company says it wants to create some stars. But "the creation of the arts team has CanWest's current arts editors, reporters and reviewers worried. They fear that the company's long-term plan is to reduce local reporting and criticism and that, over time, coverage of film festivals, concerts and events will diminish." CanWest's track record on arts coverage is terrible; when it acquired the National Post two years ago, it dismantled the paper's first-rate arts and culture section. "CanWest continues to treat its newspaper customers as though they were buying dog food -- bigger box, less food. What do the dogs know?" The Globe & Mail (Canada) 03/20/03
Posted: 03/20/2003 7:49 am

Sponsors Pull Out Of Programs About Iraq War The World Affairs Council of Philadelphia has seen a big spike in attendance for its programs as tensions over George Bush's war with Iraq have heated up. But corporations, "which contribute a third of the council's budget through sponsorships and memberships, are paying about half what they once did to sponsor events. Some are not sponsoring them at all" prefering not to be associated with such a controversial topic. Philadelphia Inquirer 03/20/03
Posted: 03/20/2003 7:30 am

Sydney Opera House Clean Again Cleaners have removed most of the paint on the Sydney Opera house. On Tuesday, anti-war protesters painted "No War" in large red letters on the side of the top peak of the opera house. "The cleaners, from graffiti removal company Techni-Clean, initially used five to six litres of a special white wax to cover the paint, stopping it from drying. Yesterday they blasted off the wax - and the pavement paint underneath - with high-pressure hot water hoses." Sydney Morning Herald 03/20/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 9:22 pm

Maryland: Play The Slots, Support The Arts Maryland arts groups were looking forward to a modest increase in state arts funding. But that increase could turn out to be cuts of five to 17 percent if the legislature doesn't go along with Gov Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.'s proposal to "legalize slot machines at the state's racetracks and use tax money generated by them as a revenue source." Baltimore Sun 03/19/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 4:36 pm

Dumping On The Dixie Chicks When one of the Dixie Chicks said last week she was ashamed of George Bush, the blowback was immediate. "Country stations nationwide, responding to listeners, banned the group from their airwaves. One, in Portland, Ore., was encouraging listeners to burn Dixie Chicks concert tickets in public. By early this week, airplay for the group's latest hit (ironically named "Travelin' Soldier") was travelin' speedily downward. What to make of all this? The press is suggesting that the general public is finally 'fed up' with the nattering nabobs of negativism known as artists. In fact, this is a story that could only have happened in the country music world. That's because country music is the embodiment of patriotism." OpinionJournal.com 03/20/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 4:30 pm

People

The Decline And Fall Of Wim Wenders Has director Wim Wenders hit bottom? Last week he was fired by his own production company. And "looking back over the past decade and then some, the director's exile from his own business operation seems less an aberration and more the latest bad news in what - the 'Buena Vista' movie aside - has been a relentless decline as a cinematic force." The Guardian (UK) 03/20/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 7:41 pm

Theatre

Making Magic - And Making A Living "Once supported by kings, queens, vaudeville and Ed Sullivan, magicians have turned to corporate America. The trade show or the convention floor has taken the place of the old variety theaters and variety arts shows. Where else can magicians pick up a regular paycheck? Of course, the weird thing is, nobody’s ever coming there because they want to see you. You’re only there because some events planner booked you. That’s why Magical Nights can pay top-notch magicians a pittance." New York Press 03/18/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 5:01 pm

Publishing

Pasternak's House In Jeopardy "One of Russian literature's most famous houses, where the writer Boris Pasternak lived and composed his best work, including Dr Zhivago, will soon be 'ruined' by the construction of an estate of holiday homes opposite it, according to his relatives." The Guardian (UK) 03/20/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 7:32 pm

Media

Oscars Should Cancel? Should the Oscars go on as scheduled? Jack Mathews thinks not. "To go on with the Oscar telecast now would be wrongheaded in more ways than the average Joan Rivers red carpet interview. The awards show has great professional and financial importance to the participants, but it's a cultural bagatelle to the rest of us - a good reason for a high-carb party and some jocular elbowing over the relative merits of our favorite movies, and nothing more." New York Daily News 03/20/03
Posted: 03/20/2003 8:40 am

  • War Makes For Oscar Changes With Gerge Bush's Iraq war, there are some entertainment programming changes in America. The Academy Awards "announced Tuesday that it will eliminate this year's red carpet festivities, citing concerns among many attendees about how such a celebration would look in light of world events. In addition to television, that decision has repercussions for other industries, such as publishing and fashion, which build glitzy events around the Academy Awards." Los Angeles Times 03/20/03
    Posted: 03/20/2003 8:01 am

  • Changed Tone For Oscars Oscar handlers are changing their prep for Sunday's Oscars. "No Lara Flynn Boyle tutu moments. No hordes of snapping photographers. No embarrassing faux pas from perennial gadfly Joan Rivers. And for the fashion world, millions of dollars in lost publicity. 'This is a huge disappointment for the industry. The Oscars are the emotional crescendo of the fashion and glamour season - the No. 1 most important showcase for the latest fashion and jewelry. Now it's no bigger than the SAG awards'." New York Post 03/20/03
    Posted: 03/20/2003 7:54 am

Oprah Show On Iraq War Reflects Badly On The Rest Of Mainstream American TV Tuesday, after George Bush declared war on Iraq, Oprah Winfrey used her TV show to ask "why do so many hate the United States?" The show "presented a distinct alternative to the perspective presented by every mainstream American broadcaster in the last few months." In normal circumstances, "the perspectives she presented would not be truly notable, but in the contemporary context, they were amazing. The problem is that the program said more about the rest of American television than it did about Oprah Winfrey." The Globe & Mail (Canada) 03/20/03
Posted: 03/20/2003 7:44 am

Short Wonders - Short Films Come Into Their Own Where are the great British films? They're shorts, and these are some of the most interesting films being made today. "Short films are traditionally dismissed in industry circles as mere calling cards for young directors hoping to make full-length features. But there is a growing appreciation of shorts as an art form in their own right." The Times (UK) 03/20/03
Posted: 03/19/2003 9:37 pm


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