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Thursday, May 13




Ideas

Fake Intellectuals Running Amok In U.S. Gov't! "At least 28 high-ranking government officials, including three managers responsible for emergency operations at nuclear facilities, have fake degrees from so-called diploma mills, according to a government report issued Tuesday... The investigation, which was prompted by a request from Senate Governmental Affairs Committee Chair Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), found that these schools -- which charge a flat fee for a degree -- received at least $170,000 in government tuition-reimbursement funds. The GAO noted that although it was able to identify 28 high-level employees from eight different agencies who had degree-mill diplomas, 'this number is believed to be an understatement.'" Wired 05/13/04
Posted: 05/13/2004 5:44 am

Visual Arts

Architectural Frustration A combination of budget constraints and public outcry have made the Art Gallery of Ontario's expansion a shadow of what it was intended to be, says Frank Gehry, and though he's committed to seeing the project through, he's disgusted with what he sees as a Canadian unwillingness to take chances. "The thought of walking off the job at the AGO has crossed his mind. As somebody with profound childhood memories of Toronto, who first experienced art at the AGO, Gehry wants the building to be spectacular. But he shakes his head at his architectural ambition for Toronto." The Globe & Mail (Canada) 05/13/04
Posted: 05/13/2004 6:53 am

  • Gehry Does Hockey Is there anything that Frank Gehry isn't designing? Hot on the heels of his newest eye-catching building on the MIT campus, the über-architect of the moment has designed the trophy for the World Cup of Hockey, to be held late this summer in Minnesota. "The trophy is essentially a thin metal cup, made from copper and nickel, contained within a thicker, outer column of subtly swirling, clear plastic. It has the effect of a vase chilled inside a column of carved ice." The Globe & Mail (Canada) 05/13/04
    Posted: 05/13/2004 6:50 am

MoMA's Art Sale The Museum of Modern Art has sold more than $100 million of artwork from its collection "during the past five years, more than eight times the Metropolitan Museum of Art's proceeds of $9.23 million in the past five years. Unlike the Met, which typically sells second-tier works, MoMA, throughout its history, has unloaded important objects that would have been treasured icons at almost any other museum, and that collectors have eagerly acquired. Alfred Barr Jr., the founding director, believed that the collection should "metabolically" shed older works as it acquired new ones." The Wall Street Journal 05/13/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 10:12 pm

A Smart Building For Geniuses Frank Gehry's new Stata Center at MIT "occupies historic, even mystical ground. It sits on the site of the former Building 20, a boxy wooden structure that was thrown up in 1943 and became known as the Magical Incubator for the breakthroughs that took place inside, including the invention of radar and Mr. Chomsky's pioneering work in linguistics. This building is on the precise site of one of the major flourishings of innovation in the 20th century." The New York Times 05/13/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 9:11 pm

Hughes: Reconsidering deKooning Robert Hughes is unimpressed by Wilem deKooning's reputation. "De Kooning has been written about, mainly by Americans, in terms that might seem over-the-top for Rubens. More tempests than Lear and Moby-Dick put together. Hysterical weather reports from some outer galactic fringe, accessible only to Hubble telescopes and art historians - such as John Mekert, who wrote the catalogue for the 1984 retrospective: 'The creative force of eros has merged with the flux of a shapeless magma of light and unbound matter drifting towards congealment into form.' Yikes!" The Guardian (UK) 05/13/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 8:52 pm

Kramer: A Clinic In Dumbing Down The Brooklyn Museum is trying to better connect itself with its Brooklyn community. Hilton Kramer takes offence: "All of this is a ghastly reminder, if we need one, that when arts institutions invoke "the community" rather than the public at large as their primary constituency, you can be certain that something crucial—like, say, artistic standards—is being sacrificed on the altar of identity politics, in this case the politics of race and class. What follows from this descent into political accommodation is a surrender of the institution to a mind-set guaranteed to render it innocuous, if not something worse." New York Observer 05/12/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 4:36 pm

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Music

Is Communication The Key In Pittsburgh? The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra's new CEO, Lawrence Tamburri, has spent his first several months on the job attempting to improve the orchestra's climate of communication. From brown bag lunches with PSO musicians to private gladhanding sessions with the city's cultural and financial elite, Tamburri has reportedly done much in a short time to raise the PSO's profile and improve its image in the eyes of the community. But there could be a downside to the good word of mouth: a perception is beginning to develop that the PSO's financial problems are in the past, which could not be further from the truth. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette 05/13/04
Posted: 05/13/2004 7:06 am

FBI Investigating Axelrod's NJSO Deal "The FBI is investigating the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra's high-profile purchase last year of Stradivarius violins and other rare instruments from Herbert Axelrod, the philanthropist who fled to Cuba in April after his indictment on federal tax fraud charges... At issue in the NJSO deal is whether Axelrod inflated the value of the stringed instruments... to make himself eligible for a large tax write-off. Axelrod, 76, claimed the strings were worth $50 million, a figure that has since been roundly questioned by violin dealers and appraisers. Axelrod ultimately agreed to sell the collection to the New Jersey orchestra for $18 million." Newark Star-Ledger 05/13/04
Posted: 05/13/2004 6:30 am

Maybe A Set Of Handcuffs Would Help? Why can't classical musicians hold on to their priceless instruments? "In January, violinist Gidon Kremer left his $3-million Guarneri del Gesu violin on an Amtrak train. In 1999, New York police helped Yo-Yo Ma recover his $2.5-million Stradivarius cello after he left it in a New York taxi. And two years later, cellist Lynn Harrell also left his $4-million Stradivarius in a taxi, when he got out at his New York apartment." Throw in the recent theft of L.A. Phil cellist Peter Stumpf's $3.5 million cello, which he left overnight on his front doorstep, and the question has to be asked: are we really supposed to feel sympathy for such forgetful musicians? Los Angeles Times 05/13/04
Posted: 05/13/2004 6:25 am

It's A Bird! It's A Plane! It's... a musical landscape? A fleet of hot air balloons hovering over the UK city of Birmingham awakened residents this week with a specially designed "musical landscape... Although the music devised by sleep psychologists was designed to stimulate sweet dreams, balloon pilots watched residents run out into the street to observe the fleet hovering just a few hundred feet above them. The early morning stunt marked the launch of Birmingham’s bid for a share in a £15 million Arts Council fund for promoting cultural events, backed by Fierce!, an international festival of live art." The Scotsman (UK) 05/13/04
Posted: 05/13/2004 6:17 am

When Things Look Dark, Innovate How real is the threat to orchestral music that critics and pundits are always writing about? Real but not dire, says Henry Fogel, former Chicago Symphony chief and current head of the American Symphony Orchestra League. Fogel points out that, of the various art forms used as popular entertainment, only concert music has remained unchanged in its presentation since the days of Brahms and Beethoven. That's a problem, since modern audiences have come to expect innovative presentation in theaters and museums, and orchestras are perceived as stodgy and boring as a result. Fogel also cites the lack of music education in schools as a factor in the form's decline, calling the current system of American arts education "a disaster." Rocky Mountain News (Denver) 05/13/04
Posted: 05/13/2004 6:06 am

Orchestra Prez: We're Fine, Thanks For Not Asking The president of the Charleston (SC) Symphony Orchestra is upset with a local critic who has been speculating in print that the CSO is "reportedly on the verge of collapse." Ted Halkyard would like to know who, exactly, is reporting such a rumor to the critic, since the critic himself never contacted the orchestra to inquire into its financial situation. Halkyard insists that the CSO is regaining its financial footing after a cash crisis in the summer of 2003 threatened its future. Charleston Post & Courier 05/13/04
Posted: 05/13/2004 5:54 am

Hockey Opera Sells Out Prague "With subjects such as television reality shows providing fodder for contemporary opera, why not sports? Martin Smolka’s Nagano, an opera in three periods plus overtime, relates the Czechs’ victory at the Nagano Winter Olympics in 1998, having come near but never achieving the gold four times in 50 years." Financial Times 05/11/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 9:04 pm

Cut-Rate Opera Doesn't Fly Why did Raymond Gubbay's Savoy Opera fail so quickly? "Gubbay was selling the Savoy Opera as unexceptional everyday West End fare, without the 'snobbery' and 'elitism' that supposedly put "ordinary" folk off. But what came across, I think, was an unfortunate impression of mediocrity. And Joe Public never wants to pay good money for that. Precisely the opposite, in fact." The Telegraph (UK) 05/13/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 8:22 pm

A Bad Night At The ENO Richard Dorment vows never again to set foot in the English National Opera. "When the curtain finally fell, I did something I've never done in a lifetime of opera going – joined in booing the director Phyllida Lloyd when she came on stage to take her bow. The sound came out involuntarily, an expression of pure hatred directed at a person who had so wantonly done violence to a beloved work of art. Had I a rotten tomato to hand, it would have given me great pleasure to throw it." The Telegraph (UK) 05/13/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 8:13 pm

Arts Issues

An Arts Budget Cut For New York New York mayor Michael Bloomberg has proposed his $46.9 billion executive budget. The Department of Cultural Affairs would get $104.03 million. That's $10 million more than the mayor had proposed in January for his FY05 preliminary budget; but it's $15.7 million less than cultural funding for the present fiscal year. Backstage 05/12/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 6:14 pm

People

I, Márquez - Diplomat "Mexican opposition politicians are appealing to Latin America's best-known writer, Gabriel García Márquez, to mediate in the diplomatic crisis that has taken their country's traditionally good relations with Cuba to the brink of collapse." The Guardian (UK) 05/13/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 8:56 pm

Theatre

So Restricting It To A Single Street Isn't Exclusionary? Tony organizers are angrily rejecting claims by New York Times editor Daniel Okrent that the awards are exclusionary and "artistically meaningless." The Tonys are designed to reward the best performances on Broadway, they say, and the fact that Okrent seems to believe that Broadway itself is exclusionary doesn't have anything to do with the awards. BBC 05/13/04
Posted: 05/13/2004 5:32 am

  • Previously: NYT Editor: The Tonys Are A Sham! Why does anyone pay attention to the Tony Awards, asks Daniel Okrent? They are, he says "an artistically meaningless, blatantly commercial, shamefully exclusionary and culturally corrosive award competition. The awards are a real estate promotion, restricted as they are to shows put on in the 31 houses owned or controlled by the Shuberts, the Nederlanders and Jujamcyn, plus another nine thrown in by accident of geography or affinity to the idea of the Big Musical. Like the theaters, the voters themselves are to a large degree controlled by the Big Three and the touring company operators." The New York Times 05/09/04

A West End Crisis Is London's West End in decline? Last year 100,000 fewer people attended the theatre. "Cameron Mackintosh's profits fell by nearly 30% to £6.4m last year. The theatre impresario's empire also saw sales fall by 10% during the 2002-03 financial year as foreign visitors stayed away and the company's money-spinning musicals, Les Misérables and The Phantom of the Opera, began to show their age." The Guardian (UK) 05/13/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 8:40 pm

What's Missing At This Year's Tonys There are curious omissions in this year's Tony nominations. "Not for the first time in a theatre culture that is at least as much about commerce as it is about art, the list of omissions has a drama all its own." The Telegraph (UK) 05/13/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 8:29 pm

Publishing

NYT Gets New Culture Editor Steve Erlanger leaves his job as cultural editor of the New York Times. And to replace him? Jon Landsman, about whom editor Bill Keller writer: "Jon will be the first to tell you that he does not bring to the job a thick portfolio of cultural expertise, but he more than compensates for that with a deep and wide-ranging curiosity, a gift for managing big undertakings." Poynter 05/12/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 9:23 pm

The Examined Literary Life Is it true that the literary life is "swamped by its epiphenomena, that books' blurbs and author photographs have become more important than their content, that the industry is overrun by middlemen and women whom writers had to pay for, that bookstores resemble supermarkets whose fruit and vegetables had mutated and lost their flavour in favour of external appearance?" The Guardian (UK) 05/08/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 8:02 pm

Media

Moore, Miramax Cut A Deal Filmmaker Michael Moore, who claimed recently that Disney CEO Michael Eisner had canceled a deal for Disney-owned Miramax to distribute Moore's latest documentary, Fahrenheit 911, has struck a distribution deal with Miramax chiefs Harvey and Bob Weinstein. Under the terms of the agreement, the Weinsteins, who have already sunk $6 million into Fahrenheit 911, will distribute the film through a third party. The deal is similar to one the Weinsteins struck with Disney in releasing director Kevin Smith's religious satire, Dogma, in 1999. BBC 05/13/04
Posted: 05/13/2004 5:24 am

Movie Industry Rejects Smoking Ratings The Motion Picture Association of America has rejected a suggestion to give movies an adult rating if they feature people smoking. "The industry is facing political pressure, following research last year which suggested teenagers who watched smoking on screen were more likely to take up the habit. A further report in March, issued by the University of California, suggested smoking should be treated in the same way as swearing." BBC 05/12/04
Posted: 05/12/2004 4:32 pm


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