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Thursday, July 6




Ideas

Portrait Of The Artist As An Antisocial Loner It's a phenomenon that seems to cross all artistic genres and mediums: the live-fast, die-hard lifestyle of artists from James Dean to Lord Byron. But why is it that artists capable of communicating such profundity through their work are so frequently incapable of normal social interaction? " A new exhibition at Britain's National Gallery traces the image of the artist as rebellious loner from its Romantic roots through works by Vincent van Gogh, Edvard Munch, Edgar Degas and others." Chicago Tribune (AP) 07/06/06
Posted: 07/06/2006 6:26 am

Harnessing The Power Of Us "Call it the Age of Peer Production. From Amazon.com to MySpace to craigslist, the most successful Web companies are building business models based on user-generated content. This is perhaps the most dramatic manifestation of the second-generation Web. The tools of production, from blogging to video-sharing, are fully democratized, and the engine for growth is the spare cycles, talent, and capacity of regular folks, who are, in aggregate, creating a distributed labor force of unprecedented scale." Wired 07/05/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 9:36 am

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Visual Arts

Flattery Will Get You Everywhere The Philadelphia Museum of Art has acquired a series of nine studies by Andrew Wyeth. The studies are a gift from Wyeth's family, who were impressed enough by a private tour of the museum's Wyeth retrospective to offer up the additional works, which show "how Wyeth's thinking evolved before he arrived at the final eerie image of a place setting absent a diner" in his painting, Groundhog Day, which is part of the museum's permanent collection. Philadelphia Inquirer 07/06/06
Posted: 07/06/2006 6:57 am

Museum Acquires Van Gogh Correspondence "The Van Gogh Museum said it bought 55 letters written by Vincent van Gogh that give important information about the 19th Century painter's worldview and development of his artistic thought. The letters were written by van Gogh to fellow artist Anthon van Rappard from 1881 to 1885, when van Gogh was undergoing major transformations in his conception of art and his skill as an artist. Officials from the Amsterdam museum did not say how much the museum paid for the letters, but... a manuscript expert at Sotheby's auction house put their value in the millions." Chicago Tribune (AP) 07/06/06
Posted: 07/06/2006 6:30 am

It's Summer, And Basel's Art Awaits "Every art institution here seems so dazzlingly meticulous and thought out, with their clean, uncluttered galleries, thorough exhibitions and, often, interesting yet unobtrusive architecture. Museum shops featuring mostly (gasp) catalogs and postcards, and the sense of physical hospitality alone can amaze, as with the leather armchairs in which you can read, doze or watch people in the upstairs lobby of the Basel Kunstmuseum. It's easy to feel that museums back home have a lot to learn." The New York Times 07/06/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 8:38 pm

Expert Says Met's $50 Million Painting Is A Fake When the Metropolitan Museum bought Duccio’s Madonna and Child last year for a reported $50 million, the painting was hailed as a masterpiece. Now James Beck, a leading art historian and Professor of Art History at Columbia University in New York, believes that the painting, which the Met dates to 1300, is not by Duccio at all. “It is a fake based upon indications found in works by or associated with Duccio. It is not even a good forgery.” The Times (UK) 07/06/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 8:26 pm

Want Me To Shop? Give Me A Show! "A simple plate-glass window festooned with goods is no longer enough to stimulate the desensitized public. To compete with soulless megamalls and the Internet, shops are returning to their loyal old helpmeets: architects. The ancient Romans concentrated their stores in dense arcades, an idea that the 19th century picked up with enclosed gallerias, which in turn begat the modern indoor mall 50 years ago." Newsday 07/05/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 5:11 pm

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Music

Honolulu Symphony Rebuilds Last year several executives and board members of the Honolulu Symphony resigned after the musicians themselves audited management practices. The orchestra is still looking for a new music director, but a new manaqgement team is beginning the task of rebuilding the organization. The Star-Bulletin (Honolulu) 07/04/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 5:15 pm

Signs Of Change For BBC Orchestras The biggest sign, writes Norman Lebrecht, is that "the BBC announced Jiri Belohlavek last year as chief conductor of its flagship ensemble, times of music downloads, media convergence and multi-skilling. Broadcast orchestras are breaking out of stereotype, as the BBC Philharmonic demonstrated from Manchester with its million-download Beethoven cycle. The whispering Czech was hired for London to raise standards and restore self-belief." La Scena Musicale 07/05/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 5:03 pm

Escalating Tensions In Seattle Symphony Dispute A survey taken by musicians of the Seattle Symphony rating music director Gerard Schwarz is to be out this week. But the orchestra's executive board reportedly did an analysis of the survey's methodology. "Its report concluded that the June 1 survey was flawed in design, data collection and overall methodology, so that its 'results are highly suspect'. The board's executive committee believes the survey may also be a breach of the musicians' contract." Seattle Times 07/03/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 11:55 am

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Arts Issues

Abrupt Departure Roils Liverpool's Culture Plans Liverpool's plans for being the European capital of culture in 2008 were thrown into chaos yesterday when Robyn Archer, the director of the city's 2008 culture efforts, suddenly quit. "Last night officials denied rumours that she had been sacked as a result of growing dissatisfaction among leaders of some of Liverpool's big cultural institutions. Some complained that it had not been clear whether she was organising an international arts festival or a year-long community celebration." The Guardian (UK) 07/06/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 8:12 pm

  • Running A Festival? It's All About The Local Context "Who is best equipped to run a city's cultural jamboree? Without being unduly parochial, I'd suggest it is someone with an understanding of local needs. Robyn Archer made a big success of Adelaide in 1992, as Jim Sharman had in 1982, because she was clued in on Australian tastes. But, intriguingly, the American director, Peter Sellars, was invited to succeed Robyn in Adelaide and was eventually forced to quit. In short, it's a matter of horses for courses: festivals, in my experience, are best created by people who possess not just taste and vision but an awareness of the cultural context." The Guardian (UK) 07/06/06
    Posted: 07/05/2006 8:02 pm

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People

Mourning Lieberson The death of 52-year-old mezzo-soprano Lorraine Hunt Lieberson from cancer is hitting the music world hard. "No death in the classical-music community since Leonard Bernstein's is likely to arouse such a sense of personal grief among those who heard but never knew her. Both artists tended to reveal their innermost selves in performance, and to do so passionately in the service of great art. She did so, however, in places where you might not think to find it: modern and ancient music." Philadelphia Inquirer 07/06/06
Posted: 07/06/2006 5:42 am

  • Rumors Prove Tragically True "For the past two years, there had been reports that Lieberson had not been well. She canceled most of her engagements, and her representatives put the word out that she was suffering from a back injury. But she summoned her strength to appear in a few choice performances..." Washington Post 07/06/06
    Posted: 07/06/2006 5:15 am

Pressure Mounts On Iran To Release Philosopher "International pressure is growing on Iran to release a prominent philosopher and writer, Ramin Jahanbegloo, who was arrested two months ago on unspecified charges. is incarceration in the notorious Evin prison has left Tehran's intellectual circles concerned about his fate and their own." The Guardian (UK) 07/06/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 8:30 pm

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Theatre

Separate and Unequal The Pittsburgh theatre community has lately been focusing on how to increase and promote racial diversity within the local scene. Ideas are wide-ranging, but most in the city agree that just producing more "black theatre" isn't enough. Indeed, the larger issue may be not just how to involve more African-Americans in theatre, but how to encourage the creation of shows with truly integrated casts. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette 07/06/06
Posted: 07/06/2006 7:03 am

Gimme A Break! (Do We Really Need Intermissions?) "While we will never see a return to the time when people dined at the halfway mark of a four-act play, the more traditional midway break is time for any technical busywork (such as scene changes) and to heighten a sense of suspense, expectation or time having passed. Time to make sense of the staged world before returning to a possible changed set of circumstances." The Age (Melbourne) 07/04/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 5:19 pm

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Publishing

An Attempt To Save UK's Free Public Libraries Britain's free library service is an endangered species. "In the first six months of this year alone, 21 (1.4%) of the country's libraries have closed, five are due to close and 67 are under review for closure. So a plan to spruce up and make libraries semm more "exciting" has begun. "The idea was to make them more exciting and convenient for users as 'models of a future library service with reading at its heart'. The transformations - each costing £90,000 - are designed to turn them into national showcases demonstrating how catastrophic declines in book borrowing and visitor numbers could be reversed." The Guardian (UK) 07/06/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 8:23 pm

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Media

Homogenizing The Cable Universe There was a time when the 500-channel universe promised a niche for everyone, a channel to suit every taste. And for a while, that's what we had. But lately, it seems that nearly every cable channel is sliding towards the same middlebrow pit - a show that airs on TLC could just as easily air on Discovery, Bravo, or even the once-highbrow A&E. But dumping the niche also seems to mean drawing a bigger audience, so truly distinctive channels may be a thing of the past. Star Tribune (Cox) 07/06/06
Posted: 07/06/2006 6:47 am

It's The Creativity, Stupid Everyone hates ads, of course, but most of us would confess to occasionally taking pleasure in a particularly entertaining specimen or two. Still, if there's one sector of the advertising world that has always seemed immune to the entertainment factor, it's political ads. So when an advertising exec emerges who specializes in creating ads that people actually like to watch (and that are powerful enough to get a professional wrestler elected governor,) it's quite a story... The Christian Science Monitor 07/06/06
Posted: 07/06/2006 6:34 am

Emmy Noms Announced How fast do Hollywood trends move? This fast: the Emmy nominations were announced this morning in Los Angeles, and neither of last year's big winners - Lost and Desperate Housewives - received nods for best series. The most-nominated show is 24, with medical drama Grey's Anatomy also garnering several nominations. Chicago Tribune 07/06/06
Posted: 07/06/2006 6:18 am

  • Overhauling Emmy The Emmys will be different this year, or so everyone is hoping. A series of rule changes regarding nominees has been designed to reduce the number of repeat winners and make the event less of a Hollywood popularity contest. Washington Post 07/06/06
    Posted: 07/06/2006 6:12 am

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Dance

NYCity Ballet In Transition? It feels like a moment of transition for New Yok City Ballet, writes Robert Gottlieb. "Senior dancers past their prime are moving inexorably toward retirement—some gracefully, some with obvious reluctance. There are stirrings in the ranks of the ballet masters and mistresses which may gradually lead to needed changes in casting and coaching. Andrea Quinn, the stimulating resident music director, is leaving (her successor hasn’t been announced). One can feel an effort being made to bring back to life certain Balanchine ballets that have been in dire decline... And the results of the Diamond Project itself, although over-publicized and underwhelming, were more positive than those of any of its five predecessors." New York Observer 06/29/06
Posted: 07/05/2006 8:42 pm

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