“The discovery of 13,000-year-old rock paintings in Nottinghamshire last year rewrote ice-age history in Britain. Today, archaeologists from all over Europe are in Creswell to discuss how the finds form part of a continent-wide culture known as the Magdalenian.”
Month: April 2004
The Arthur Miller Phenomenon
At the age of 88, Arthur Miller is still cranking out work. He’s got two plays in production, and a very busy schedule. “I still love the form. It’s a great, great human adventure. Imagine having a human being stand up on a platform and mesmerize an audience and sometimes even illuminate something for them. You don’t need machinery. It’s a very primitive art. That’s the beauty of it.”
All In The Family – The Pulitzer
Franz Wright won this year’s Pulitzer Prize for poetry, but he’s not the first in his family to win one. His father – James Wright, who died in 1980, “won the Pulitzer for poetry in 1972; the two Wrights are believed to be the first father and son ever to win the award.”
Sci-Fi Museum – Beam Me Up
Paul Allen’s Science Fiction Museum in Seattle is getting close to opening. “Despite some forward-looking, hopeful exhibits, like “SETI Fiction and Fact,” which will explore the Paul Allen–funded effort to receive communications from actual ETs, SFM will essentially be, like any museum, retrospective. It will celebrate a past when geniuses could envision happier futures and it will chronicle sci-fi’s evolution into negativity, including the bleakness expressed in Planet of the Apes (the costume of Dr. Zaius will be on display).”
Music To Torture A Deity By
The soundtrack to Mel Gibson’s controversial film about Jesus’s last hours has been certified gold after selling 500,000 copies in February alone.
Nabokov: Plagiarist or Cryptomnesiac?
The allegation that Vladimir Nabokov may have lifted the plot of Lolita from another author’s work has Ron Rosenbaum fascinated. “It’s not so much a scandal as a literary mystery — a mystery about the mind of one of the great artists of our era. And second, the alleged scandal turns on the question of a literary-psychological term that was new to me, but that has now become one of my favorites: ‘cryptomnesia.'” The term mean just what it sounds like: it describes an author who has read another author’s work, but completely forgotten about it, to the extent that he appropriates the plot without ever realizing that he has done so.
The Ghetto Dream Maker
In times of political upheaval, many people take refuge in music, and in South Africa, an entire musical movement has grown out of the nation’s first tumultuous decade following the end of apartheid. The music is called kwaito, and its biggest star is a man known as Zola, who personifies all the anger, confusion, and hope of the impoverished black township residents who are wondering whatever happened to the promises of post-apartheid prosperity.
The God Culture: Heavenly Comeback Or Hellish Culture War?
“Nearly 40 years after Time magazine posed the question “Is God Dead?” signs of His resurrection are everywhere: Mel Gibson’s ‘The Passion’ is on its way to becoming the highest-grossing independent film of all time, while the apocalyptic ‘Left Behind’ novels, based on the Book of Revelations, have sold 58 million copies, a publishing jackpot… The nation’s born-again president pronounces Jesus his ‘favorite philosopher’ and trumpets America’s mission to battle evil in the world. And faith avowals are all but requisite on the campaign trail – with hell to pay for anyone who demonstrates biblical illiteracy… Is all this ferment a result of post-Sept. 11 anxiety? Or has spirituality become just another commodity in a world where consumerism has become the ultimate value?”
Taking Comfort
It was the sweltering summer of 1951 when artist Charles Comfort spent 58 days creating a 20-meter mural on the back wall of a Toronto Dominion Bank branch in Vancouver. The resulting artwork stayed in place for half a century, and became known as one of British Columbia’s most important works of public art. “When the bank branch closed in 2002 and the space was taken over by a pharmacy, the bank was determined to find a way for it to stay in the province. It wasn’t such an easy task. The size of the mural was certainly an issue. And the restoration needed to remove layers of tobacco smoke and grime was extensive. More troubling, however, was the controversial history of Comfort’s murals in Vancouver.”
Installation Art 101
Eleven Colorado high schools are taking part in “Design and Build 2004,” an annual program sponsored by the Denver-based Museum of Outdoor Arts which is designed to give students a chance to experience firsthand the challenges of designing, building, and installing a major piece of public art. The students create “technical drawings, topographical maps and conceptual statements” of their proposed installations, then consult with the museum on feasibility, cost, and other minutiae. Finally, their fully constructed works are mounted at various high-profile sites throughout the Denver metro, with all the attendant fanfare of a “professional” installation.