A Regional Museum Gets An Expansion Right The Delaware Art Museum reopens after a major expansion. "The museum has been closed for three years for a complicated renovation and expansion that not only increases its capacity by two-thirds, but also dramatically reorients the building on its 11-acre site. One of the region's premier smaller museums, it generally specializes in American art and illustration, including major collections of work by illustrator Howard Pyle and realist painter John Sloan." Philadelphia Inquirer 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 8:20 am
A Museum Director Who Makes Way Over Scale (But Why?) How do museums set salaries for their directors? That's what Tacoma News-Tribune reporter Jen Graves wants to know after noting that the small Museum of Glass: International Center for Contemporary Art has paid its director $282,000 in salary and $34,000 in benefits. The median museum director salary in the Western United States is $188,000. "At the Philadelphia Museum of Art, an operation roughly 10 times the size of MoG and with $280 million in net assets, the director makes $267,245." So what has the glass museum got for its money from its departing director? The News-Tribune (Tacoma) 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 8:07 am
Killing A Memorial By Committee Any chance of making something meaningful of the Ground Zero memorial in Lower Manhattan is all but faded. "As the wrangling over the nearby Freedom Tower has shown, nothing here goes smoothly. The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation is quietly pushing to wrap up plans for the memorial by mid-July. But after two and a half years of tinkering, the city is likely to end up with a memorial geared to tourists with short attention spans rather than to the serious contemplation of human loss. Worse, the constant revisions continue to gobble up space for the living, threatening to transform the site into a theme park haunted by death." The New York Times 06/19/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 11:48 pm
China At The Center... (Again?) Every so often one can feel a perceptible shift in the center of the artworld. "And it is, so the received wisdom has it, about to happen all over again; for there is a country that can - and does - boast 3,000 years of culture, dizzying rates of economic growth and a long-suppressed determination to engage the outside world in its inexorable rise as a global power. Little wonder that all eyes were on China..." Financial Times 06/17/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 11:05 pm
In Chicago - Dueling Contemporaries The Chicago Art Institute is building an enormous addition that will result in the largest museum of contemporary art in Chicago. So where does that leave the city's Museum of Contemporary Art? Chicago Tribune 06/19/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 8:52 pm
Brit Returns Nazi-Looted Sculpture To Greece A British citizen has returned an ancient statue to the government of Greece. "Following the fate of so many antiquities during the Nazi occupation, the kouros is believed to have been looted when the Germans bombarded the island in November 1943. After winding up in the possession of a private collector in Switzerland, James Ede's antiquities firm acquired it earlier this year." The Guardian (UK) 06/19/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 8:36 pm
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Glasgow - Capital Of Music? The UK's capital of pop music? Not London, but Glasgow, a city that is extraordinarily supportive of its bands. "Pick any Glasgow band and you're likely to find that at least one member has an art-school past. The recent rise of Glasgow-based bands has moved Time magazine to declare the city one of the 'hottest' in Europe for its thriving, supportive music scene and proliferation of decent venues..." The Telegraph (UK) 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 8:33 am
Does Cleveland Orchestra Deserve A Different Conductor? The Cleveland Orchestra is playing better than ever. "Being bowled over by these musicians is nothing new, and we should never take them collectively for granted. But an orchestra and music director should be regarded as a synergistic partnership. In the case of Franz Welser-MÖst, who recently ended his third season at Severance Hall as music director, the artistic chasm has widened to the point where even critics from out of town are noting the inequality. Why do so many Welser-MÖst performances with the Cleveland Orchestra leave more than a few listeners frustrated and ambivalent? How long can an orchestra go on with a music director who seems unwilling, or unable, to bring distinctive personality to the music he leads?" The Plain Dealer (Cleveland) 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 12:34 am
Philly's Concert Bargains High ticket prices are a big problem in the classical music business. But one organization in Philadelphia offers top stars at bottom prices. "Other cities may have more concerts and higher-concept programs, but few have such a smart selection for so little money. No decent seat at a Krystian Zimerman or Mitsuko Uchida concert in most places is available for less than $50. Play your cards right with subscription offers, and it's $19 here. Other concerts, such as contralto Ewa Podles, are as low as $16 - if you subscribe to everything." Philadelphia Inquirer 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 12:10 am
A New Way Of Training Musicians In Minn. The St. Paul Chamber Orchestra and the University of Minnesota have teamed up to take a different approach to training musicians. "We're trying to address the fact that orchestra jobs are changing dramatically in the 21st century. The demands that are being placed on members of orchestras, the breadth of musical skills, the scope of interpersonal skills they have to bring, the score of entrepreneurial skills they need, are vastly different from the expectations of 25 to 30 years ago." The Star-Tribune (Mpls) 06/19/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 11:38 pm
Can Music Change The World? That's the hope of Bob Geldof and his amazing international music fest. But is this kind of concert activism of any use? "He is in danger of becoming one of the leaders of Compassion Lite, where people in the West, especially young people in the West, get to announce their compassion very cheaply, for the price of a wristband or a concert ticket or a plastic cup, without any meaningful demand on them to change their lives or look into their hearts." The Telegraph (UK) 06/19/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 9:20 pm
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Scotland to Set Up Club To Honor Artists Scotland is setting up a new academy to honor artists. "An 'Academy of Scotland' is to be established to honour the most distinguished artists in Scottish culture. Under early plans, a select group of the best and brightest across the artistic spectrum will receive the new award, designed to reward excellence. The recipients are likely to receive their titles as 'Member of the Academy of Scotland' in a yearly ceremony held on St Andrew's Day." Glasgow Herald 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 8:28 am
Will Ireland Make Artists Pay Taxes? For the past 35 years, Ireland has exempted artists from paying taxes. "But Celtic Tiger Ireland is now being accused of reverting to its old philistine ways as the government consults in secret on whether to scrap the scheme. Detractors claim that tax-avoiding British writers are taking advantage, and that an elite of millionaire popstars is using it to get rich. The Arts Council is outraged, arguing that Ireland faces losing 'one of the most enlightened pieces of legislation ever introduced for the arts in any country'." The Guardian (UK) 06/18/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 8:44 pm
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Rzewski - Composer As Iconoclast Composer Frederic Rzewski is "one of the most prominent living American composers and a prodigiously talented pianist, he is also an old-fashioned iconoclast. He's blunt-speaking, cantankerous -- focused on his art and intent on creating it with as much independence as possible from the institutions and bureaucracies that have congealed around it." Boston Globe 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 8:44 am
Sonny Rollins Reinvents (Again) Saxist Sonny Rollins is 74, and remaking his life since his wife of 47 years died in December. "There are some career decisions that I'm facing, that my wife would usually help me with. I can't divulge what it is, but there's one big one that some people would say `How could you turn that down?' But you know, I turned down a lot of things in my career and I think that's sort of been the subtext of my life — not doing everything that people want you to do for money." Toronto Star 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 8:17 am
Les Paul At 90 "Over the years Les Paul has had a profound influence on music, creating enough inventions to fill a museum. A five-time Grammy winner, he's in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the National Inventors Hall of Fame, the Songwriters Hall of Fame. There's a Gibson guitar named for him, because he invented it - the Les Paul solid-body electric guitar. He's got a legion of guitar-playing disciples." Philadelphia Inquirer 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 12:14 am
Thomas Krens: Back On Track Thomas Krens's career, which "seemed to have hit the buffers at the start of the year, when the supremely generous chairman of his trustees, Peter B Lewis, resigned in disgust at his director's manic, expansionist policies, is back on track. He has come up with the one thing that cannot but command the attention of his severest critics: an unmistakable blockbuster work of art. Krens has been instrumental in the installation of Richard Serra's The Matter of Time: several hundred tons of raw steel in a sequence of rippling twisted curves." The Observer (UK) 06/19/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 11:35 pm
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Town Considers Censoring Comedians An English town considers censoring comedians who perform blue material. "Councillors in Newcastle upon Tyne are to be asked to consider banning performers whose acts are branded offensive, racist, sexist or homophobic. It followed calls from the public sector union Unison to ban the comedian Roy Chubby Brown from playing the City Hall, where he has appeared regularly for 20 years." The Guardian (UK) 06/18/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 11:09 pm
Is Boston A Theatre Town? It was a good year for theatre in Boston - two new theatres, a couple of Tony-nominated plays... But is Boston a great theatre town? Depends on how you mean it... Boston Globe 06/19/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 9:14 pm
Moral Center - Teens Go For Broadway Fare "Musicals attracting large mother-daughter audiences have long been a staple on Broadway but have been on the rise in the last decade. Interestingly, the most popular shows have themes that explore some aspect of prejudice — not exactly light, youth-oriented fare." Los Angeles Times 06/19/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 9:06 am
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Do Writing Workshops Kill Good Writing? "In the workshop, the students critique each other's writing and as the comments are bandied about, a "consensus" develops about what does and doesn't "work" in a story. The writer then meshes the "popular" opinions of the group into his or her work, slowly removing the unpopular parts, until the work is readable and accessible to all. More often than not, this process destroys the writer's initial vision, leaving behind a work that is void of passion and anything that is different, new, or creative. Many of world's greatest novels would have never made it through the workshop process." MobyLives 06/20/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 9:09 am
Do Book Review Sections Still Matter? "Scott Pack, whose day job as buying manager at Waterstone's gives him considerable powers over the relationship between writers and readers, has recently been hired as a columnist for Bookseller magazine and in his first outing took a swipe at the broadsheets' books pages, asking, essentially, what is the point? 'They should inspire reading. They should excite, stimulate, agitate and empower readers to discover new books.' But they're not... The Observer (UK) 06/19/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 11:27 pm
The University That Dumped Rare Books "The Octagon library at Queen Mary, University of London, in Mile End, east London, is in the process of refurbishment and decided that it would have to dispose of its surplus books. These have now been dumped in skips outside the library, to the outrage of staff and students who were clambering through them yesterday to find what they described as literary gems." The Guardian (UK) 06/18/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 9:12 pm
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Book, 'im Danno - American TV Overrun By Police Shows Why are Americans so fascinated with police shows on TV? "Last season, a third of the Top 40 shows on television were procedurals, loosely defined as programs that depict a crime each week and solve it. Most of the other top-rated programs were reality shows or comedies, with only six dramas having nothing to do with crime making the list." Dallas Morning News 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 8:40 am
Pubic Broadcasting Fights Back Last week a US Congressional committee voted to cut money for public broadcasting by 25 percent. This week, public TV and radio is fighting back. "Faced with their biggest budget battle in a decade, public broadcasters are waging local campaigns through the Internet and on-air advertising to oppose legislation that, some claim, would weaken their ability to produce local programming and cripple their sister stations in rural areas of the country." Los Angeles Times 06/20/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 7:59 am
Networks Look Outside The Building US TV networks are increasingly turning to outside producers for their shows. "No one in Hollywood expects the networks to stop favoring their own. But at a time when some conglomerates like Viacom are reassessing the benefits of bigness - and when a hyper-competitive ratings race makes closing off any possible advantage foolhardy - most network and studio heads have come to realize that an overreliance on their own fare can lead to creative and financial trouble." The New York Times 06/20/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 7:55 am
Is HBO Losing Its Lustre? "Through the end of May, HBO's average prime-time viewership was down to 900,000 from 1.2 million for the same period in 2004. The weekly "Deadwood" audience has dropped by 2 million and "Carnivale" was canceled, while "Six Feet Under" and "Entourage" both started new seasons with smaller audiences than the year before..." Yahoo! (AP) 06/19/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 12:42 am
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Fokine, Romantic "In the shadow of the 1905 Russian Revolution, the tardy Romantic Michel Fokine rejected the ballet spectacle of Marius Petipa, with its numbers and entries, for a new kind of ballet that would "restore dancing its soul," he wrote in a manifesto. "We must abandon fixed signs and devise others based on the laws of natural expression." He made the dreamy mind the protagonist of three of his most enduring works..." Newsday 06/20/05
Posted: 06/20/2005 9:14 am
A New Leader For English National Ballet The troubled English National Ballet is close to getting a new director. "Harold King, 56, is viewed as a possible saviour of a company that had to be bailed out last summer by the Arts Council with a £2.3 million rescue package and which is said to be still struggling financially." The Times (UK) 06/18/05
Posted: 06/19/2005 11:18 pm
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