America, Lost In The Wilderness "If there can be said to be a theme running throughout the history of American art, music, and literature, it might well be the allure, the danger, and the quiet beauty of the wilderness. "Scads of crucial American stories and images feast on the idea of wilderness, of a place apart from the so-called civilized world, of a pristine region that can rejuvenate a jaded soul." So it's little wonder that, when wilderness and the environment become political issues, there are considerable artistic and literary overtones to the debate. Chicago Tribune 05/15/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 10:31 am
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Art Auctions: The New Generation "Even before last week's sales of contemporary art at Christie's and Sotheby's in New York, the catalogs for those events indicated that art made during the last four decades has become attractive to potential buyers. And the sale results confirm the emergence of a cohort of youngish collectors eager to buy recent art at prices that continue to rise, sometimes to levels that astonish dealers. Concomitantly, interest in art that has yet to prove its historical staying power appears to be driving the market." Philadelphia Inquirer 05/15/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 10:57 am
- Good Night For A Hot House A 1983 work by Jean-Michel Basquiat sold at auction for $1.5 million this week, leading the way to a more than satisfactory $23.6 million night for the newly trendy boutique auction house of Phillips, de Pury & Company. Located in New York's Chelsea neighborhood, Phillips has emerged as one of the city's art hot spots of the moment, drawing a decidedly image-conscious crowd to bid on the trendiest of contemporary art. The New York Times 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 10:56 am
Can Architecture And Naïveté Point The Way Forward For Palestinians? Architect Doug Suisman doesn't really know much about Mideast politics, and doesn't pretend to know how Israelis and Palestinians can ever be made to live in peace side by side. But Suisman's idealistic design for a post-war Palestine, commissioned by the Rand Corporation, is raising eyebrows in geopolitical circles for its breadth of vision and pie-in-the-sky hopes for a thoroughly modern state. "Rand, where the analysis is meant to be astringent, not romantic, has now bet heavily on naïveté. It has presented Mr. Suisman's idea of Palestine to the White House, the European Union, the World Bank and others, as well as to the Palestinians and Israelis. The idea has captured the attention, and imagination, of at least some Palestinian policymakers." The New York Times 05/15/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 10:01 am
32 Pollocks Unearthed In New York "A trove of 32 previously unknown works by abstract art icon Jackson Pollock has been discovered by a family friend, who said Friday he would like them to tour internationally and be studied by art historians. Alex Matter, a filmmaker who knew Pollock from childhood, said the collection was among the possessions of his late parents, who were long associated with Pollock and his wife, Lee Krasner. About two years ago Matter stumbled upon the artworks, wrapped in brown paper since 1958 and stored for almost three decades in a warehouse in East Hampton, Long Island." Washington Post (Reuters) 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 9:27 am
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Is Maazel Cheating, Or Just Using What He's Got? Multitasking is essential in today's classical music world, where music directors are expected to be fundraisers and cheerleaders as well as conductors, and composers can't even get a foot in the door without a finely honed set of self-marketing skills. But recently, composer/conductor Loren Maazel has been raising eyebrows with his own version of the musical multitask: spending his own money to get his own opera produced by one of the top companies in the world. "The London papers report that the Maazel project has caused bitter infighting at all levels of the company... Gifted composers would line up to write a commissioned work for Covent Garden. But Mr. Maazel has bought his way to the top without having paid his dues as a composer." The New York Times 05/15/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 10:07 am
Competing For A Place At The Table The competition among young up-and-coming classical singers is intense, occasionally brutal, and fiercely New York-centric. So what's a young singer supposed to do to get a bit of attention? One increasingly popular route to success is to take part in the dozens of high-profile competitions held around the world. "For those who are prepared and mature enough to handle the pressure, and who are granted a bit of luck, competitions can indeed launch a career. Young singers receive coaching from famous musicians while making valuable contacts. [But] to be sure, competitions are notoriously unpredictable." La Scena Musicale 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 9:47 am
Growing A Better Breed Of Conductor Ask any orchestra musician to name the biggest problem in their industry, and you'll likely hear, "not enough good conductors." But like the weather, everyone talks about the lack of conducting talent on the international scene, but nobody does anything about it. Except maybe Leonard Slatkin, whose five-year-old National Conducting Institute brings together talented young baton-twirlers to learn not only the finer musical points of the job, but also the diplomatic skills necessary to succeed in orchestral music's most difficult and multi-faceted profession. Baltimore Sun 05/15/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 9:36 am
Edmonton Symphony Back In The Spotlight Less than five years ago, it didn't seem too big of a stretch to suggest that the future of the Canadian orchestra was no future at all, with the cash-strapped and internally roiling Edmonton Symphony serving as the poster child for all that was wrong with the industry. These days, Edmonton has a dynamic new music director (who, incidentally, refuses to allow anyone to call him "Maestro",) a much-improved bottom line, and a growing national profile, highlighted this week by a visit to Canada's capital city. Toronto Star 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 9:15 am
Bringing The Mideast Together (For An Hour Or So) "For Tamar Muskal, an Israeli-American composer, the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians goes beyond politics. It is music, it is poetry, it is the lone voice, speaking of pain and dreams... Ms. Muskal, who is Jewish and grew up in Israel, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor, said that at 39 she realized that pain is pain, no matter who does the suffering." Her latest composition attempts to reconcile the pain of both Israelis and Palestinians in a single work, combining music and texts from two cultures locked in seemingly permanent conflict. The New York Times 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 8:42 am
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An Operatic Power Player Goes Home "Matthew Epstein, who left Lyric Opera of Chicago last month after a 25-year association, has returned to his former home base at Columbia Artists Management Inc. in New York. He agreed to a five-year contract as director of the company's various vocal divisions. Currently celebrating its 75th anniversary, CAMI is one of world's most prestigious artist management firms." Chicago Sun-Times 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 9:01 am
Malcolm X, Reconsidered A new exhibit at the New York Public Library is prompting a scholarly reexamination of the life and work of civil rights leader Malcolm X. The artifacts and writings from the life of the controversial activist provide a more complete look at the life of a highly complex thinker than has ever previously been available to the public, and "the exhibition also represents an end to a wrenching public struggle over their ownership of Malcolm X's personal effects. After almost being auctioned in 2002, most of the items were reclaimed by the family, which deposited them with the [library] in 2003." The New York Times 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 8:30 am
Art Is In The Heir You won't usually find Alice Walton's name listed among America's more prominent art collectors, but the WalMart heiress has spent the last 15 years amassing an impressive array of American art. "Slowly and methodically, Ms. Walton has paid top dollar at auction and through dealers for the best paintings, drawings and sculptures she can find by artists like Winslow Homer, Edward Hopper, George Bellows, Marsden Hartley and Charles Willson Peale. The goal, the family foundation says, is to start a museum in Bentonville, Ark., where her father, Sam Walton, opened his first retail store in 1951." The New York Times 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 8:10 am
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A Mammoth New Theatre For The District Washington, D.C.'s Woolly Mammoth theatre has been around for a quarter century without ever managing to settle down. Until now. "After playing for 25 years in churches, reconditioned auto repair shops, borrowed lodgings and places with stage ceilings only 12 feet high, the adventurous theater company today has almost everything its heart could desire. Just in time for tonight's official opening" at its new home in downtown D.C. Washington Post 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 9:23 am
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Clearing The Bases Baseball writing is far more than a literary niche - more like a self-contained genre populated by both specialists and one-time visitors, all determined to capture the simple beauty of America's game on paper. Of course, it's not as easy as that, as scores of mediocre baseball tomes have proven over the decades. Not everyone can be Ring Lardner, or even W.P. Kinsella, but that's never stopped anyone (no, seriously, anyone) with a ball cap and a pen from trying. Denver Post 05/15/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 10:35 am
Plimpton's Paris Moves Downtown The Paris Review, George Plimpton's little-read but much-admired literary journal, hasn't actually been based in Paris for decades. In fact, the small but devoted staff of the Review did their work in a small Manhattan office just one floor beneath Plimpton's East Side apartment. But following Plimpton's death last year, the editors found it inconceivable to continue putting out the magazine from a now-Plimptonless office, and chose to move again. No, they're not headed back to Paris - lower Manhattan's TriBeCa neighborhood will have to do. The New York Times 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 8:37 am
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Woody's Walk of Fame Woody Allen has been the man of the hour thus far at Cannes, and his latest film is generating more buzz than anything else on the screening list. But all the attention still won't net Allen the festival's coveted Palme d'Or - his film is being screened out of competition. Still, the French adulation for a filmmaker who is better known for his personal quirks than his movies in America appears to be well justified this time around, as Match Point is being hailed as Allen's best work in decades. Washington Post 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 9:19 am
Already-Did-It-Yourself Video Those old homemade film reels squirreled away in a box in your attic may just have some value beyond your immediate family. "In Toronto, [two film historians] founded Home Made Movies, a database dedicated to helping people catalogue and preserve the tiny fragments of film, scattered in attics, basements, flea markets and second-hand stores, that they believe serve as significant documents of our informal, domestic social history. Alongside them, an international groundswell with the same priorities has emerged." Toronto Star 05/14/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 9:08 am
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Boston Sheds Some Russians, Gains Some Skill This weekend marked the close of Boston Ballet's third season under artistic director Mikko Nissinen, and the change in the quality of the company's performance over that time has been striking. "Without the kind of wholesale purge that could have left the Ballet reeling, [Nissinen] has slowly changed the company's personnel both behind the scenes and onstage. The coaching staff he's brought in -- especially Spanish-born Trinidad Vives -- is first-rate. Those additions have largely replaced the Russian teachers and coaches whose attitude was that their dance heritage alone made them superior." Boston Globe 05/15/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 10:24 am
Selling The Dance Dance executives across the country bemoan the modern-day public's lack of interest in the form, and despair of ever again convincing large numbers of ticket-buyers to attend a traditional ballet not concerned with nutcrackers and sugar plum fairies. But Kennedy Center chief Michael Kaiser insists that the marketing of dance is not rocket science. The key is to trust the public's intelligence, create a marketable identity for your company, and never to overestimate your own popularity. The New York Times 05/15/05
Posted: 05/15/2005 10:13 am
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