Emin To Represent Uk At Venice Tracey Emin has been chosen to represent the UK in the next Venice Biennale. "She will be the second woman to produce a solo show for the UK at the Venice Biennale, following Rachel Whiteread in 1997. Andrea Rose, commissioner for the British Pavilion, said the exhibition would allow Emin's work to be viewed 'in an international context and at a distance from the YBA [Young British Artists] generation with which she came to prominence'." BBC 08/25/06
Posted: 08/25/2006 6:57 am
Architecture Prize Or Game Show Contest? There are six buildings competing for this year's Stirling Prize for architecture. "Today, the prize is as much a live TV show on the big night, staged against the backdrop of a black-tie dinner with wine and all the trimmings at a top celebrity venue, as it is a judgment on the state of contemporary British architecture." The Guardian (UK) 08/25/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 10:52 pm
How Digital Prints Change Photography New digital prints of Walker Evans photographs raise some artistic issues. "A new detail revealed by an enlarged digital print becomes a visual fact that, however subtly, affects the balance of the entire picture. Photography is a seamless medium: a whole, continuous image put together at once, which the eye unconsciously distinguishes from a drawn image that is made inch by inch, or pixel by pixel, in the case of a digital image." The New York Times 08/25/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 10:38 pm
The Zen Of Dada "As late as 1920, Marcel Duchamp said he didn't know what Dada was. The accounts of the original participants in Zurich are conflicting; there is even uncertainty about where the name came from. The most plausible version is that Ball and Huelsenbeck found the French word for 'hobbyhorse' accidentally in a French–German dictionary while looking for something else. Another possibility is that it came from the name of a popular hair-strengthening tonic. Whatever its origin, the word, which in several Slavic languages sounds like an emphatic declaration of agreement ("yes, yes"), quickly became as popular as a brand name: a one-word manifesto guaranteed either to amuse or to irritate." New York Review of Books 08/10/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 9:02 pm
San Diego Musum Returns Painting To Mexico The San Diego Museum has returned a painting in its collection to Mexico. The painting, 'Expulsion From the Garden of Eden,' painted in 1728 by an unknown artist, was cut from a frame and stolen in 2000 from a church in San Juan Tepemasalco, in the Mexican state of Hidalgo. "Many questions remain unanswered as to how the painting ended up at the museum. No arrests have been made despite a two-year investigation into how the artwork was smuggled into the United States. San Diego Union-Tribune 08/24/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 8:23 pm
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An Audacious Attempt To Reinvent The Music Business "To all appearances, Nettwerk is just a midsize music management company with an indie record label on the side. Many of the artists on its client roster – which includes Avril Lavigne, Dido, Sarah McLachlan, and Stereophonics – are mainstream acts. But McBride, the company's cofounder and creative force, is quietly carrying out a plan to reinvent the music industry, including legalizing file-sharing and giving artists control over their own intellectual property." Wired 08/25/06
Posted: 08/25/2006 8:12 am
Report: Music Downloading Will Be Slow To Replace Disk Sales The music business is going more and more online. "Despite the growth, Screen Digest predicts that the overall European music market will continue to lose value until 2010 at the earliest - when sales of downloaded music will have grown enough to offset the losses." BBC 08/24/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 4:58 pm
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Lessons For Rebuilding New Orleans Those planning an approach to rebuilding New Orleans neighborhoods might take some lessons from a planned community in Denver. "It appears that people will accept modern design in an apartment or a loft or when affordability is the main consideration (since undecorated construction costs less). But when it comes to houses, most people prefer something more old-fashioned. A successfully rebuilt New Orleans—whoever plans it—is likely to be a similar mix, of edgy and traditional, of downtown plate glass and neighborhood picket fences." Slate 08/24/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 8:53 pm
MacArthur "Geniuses" Go For Non-Profits The foundation famous for its "genius" awards is giving money to up and coming non-profits. "The Creative and Effective Institutions Awards range from $250,000 to $500,000. The winners all have annual budgets of $2.5 million or less, and, though small, they are considered comers in their fields. The awards are an extension, of sorts, of the foundation's famous five-year, $500,000 grants for creative individuals, but those "genius" grants have no strings attached. The grants to the non-profits were sized to meet specific needs or purposes." Chicago Tribune 08/24/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 9:00 am
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Trumpeter Maynard Ferguson, 78 "He pleased far more crowds than critics. John S. Wilson, reviewing Mr. Ferguson’s big band at the 1959 Newport Jazz Festival for The New York Times, called it 'screaming' and 'strident.' Yet that same year the readers of Down Beat magazine voted the band the world’s second-best, outranked only by Count Basie’s." The New York Times 08/25/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 10:43 pm
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Canadian Play Wins Edinburgh Fringe "Goodness, a play by Canadian Michael Redhill, has won the Best of Edinburgh award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The prize means the play by the Toronto-based experimental theatre company Volcano will be produced in New York." CBC 08/25/06
Posted: 08/25/2006 7:00 am
Was V&A Serious About Theatre? New questions have been raised about the Victoria & Albert's intentions for the Theatre Museum in London. "Serious doubts were raised by the Theatre Museum’s ruling committee over whether the Victoria and Albert Museum made a genuine attempt to consult the theatre industry over the institution’s future." TheStage 08/24/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 11:14 pm
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Coupland: The Mediocrity Of CanLit Douglas Coupland has launched a withering attack on CanLit. "There is a grimness around CanLit — the same sort of grimness that occurs when beautiful young adults are forbidden to leave home and are forced to tend to aging and dying family members, when they are forbidden to lead their own lives." Toronto Star 08/25/06
Posted: 08/25/2006 8:26 am
Free Books, Read Aloud A number of new collectives are recording public-domain books and releasing them on the internet. "At its worst a free audiobook can sound like a teenager reading aloud in high school English class. At its best it can offer excellent sound quality and skilled narration infused with a passion for the text. In between is a world of competent readings, sometimes spiced with affected accents, mumbled words and distant car horns and reflecting all manner of literary interpretations." The New York Times 08/25/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 10:47 pm
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How To Fix The Emmys Emmy-bashing is high sport. "So why should viewers care? After all, like every entertainment award, the Emmys are as much a commercial creature as an artistic one. The broadcast and cable networks support them because they generate free publicity and Emmy-boasting promotions. Yet for all their flaws, the Emmys are still the medium's most important public recognition of good work — and that should matter to any viewer who wants to see good work encouraged." USAToday 08/25/06
Posted: 08/25/2006 8:21 am
Instantaneous Buzz (So What Do You Do?) "Movie studios once felt confident they had at least two weekends to sell as many movie tickets as possible before toxic buzz would undermine their multimillion-dollar marketing campaigns. Hollywood executives now say that the proliferation of movie-related e-mail, Internet blogs and text messaging has reduced that window to mere hours, as the quick decline of last weekend's heavily promoted 'Snakes on a Plane' proved." Los Angeles Times 08/25/06
Posted: 08/25/2006 7:22 am
NY Man Arrested For Broadcasting Hizbollah Channel American police have arrested a man for broadcasting a Hizbollah channel that the US Treasury Department has classified as a terrorist ntity. "Javed Iqbal, 42, was arrested on Wednesday on allegations that his Brooklyn-based company HDTV Ltd. was providing New York-area satellite customers with the Hizbollah-operated channel, federal prosecutors said in a statement on Thursday." Yahoo! (Reuters) 08/24/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 8:43 pm
AOL To Offer Movies AOL will begin selling movies online, in a deal with major studios. "The partnerships, announced Thursday, represent AOL's latest efforts to become the destination for online video as the company tries to offset revenues it expects to lose from a recent decision to drop subscription fees for many high-speed customers." Yahoo! (AP) 08/24/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 8:39 pm
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Colorado Ballet Secures Live Music The company has made an agreement with musicians that will provide live orchestral accompaniment for the dance company's first three productions in the upcoming season. "Last season, a decision to eliminate live accompaniment for performances of "Cinderella" resulted in an increased commitment by both sides to avoid such cut-backs in the future." Rocky Mountain News 08/25/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 11:07 pm
TV Dance Show Sells Out A Tour "Fox got good ratings with its summer dance competition 'So You Think You Can Dance,' and the viewer enthusiasm didn't end with last week's finale. The 10 finalists are going on tour, and all 37 dates, which went on sale last Saturday, sold out in just a few hours." Los Angeles Times 08/24/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 6:54 am
A Summer DanceSchool To Die For When Thomas Melone's daughter couldn't find a dance partner, Melone invited an ABT star to make an appearance. Then he built a beautiful dance studio/school in Martha's Vineyard and recuited stars of the dance world to come run it in the summer. The result: a dance program to die for... The New York Times 08/24/06
Posted: 08/24/2006 6:47 am
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