Can art help us understand natural physical phenomena? A competition at the Massachusetts Institute of technology suggests it can. “The Weird Fields contest, part of the undergraduate course ‘Introduction to Electricity and Magnetism,’ — encourages students to use a special computer program that converts mathematical formulas into visual representations of electromagnetic fields. The resulting swirls, loops, circles and squares, while not necessarily corresponding exactly to those occurring in nature, offer a creative way to understand some of the most abstract concepts in physics.”
Month: April 2005
Is Scottish Government Intent On Killing Arts Council?
Is a current review of Scottish arts policy currently underway just a front for killing off the Scottish Arts Council? A Government memo would suggest that it might be. “The secret memo confirms the suspicions of cultural policy insiders who believe the Executive has always had an agenda to scrap the arts organisation, which has been widely tipped for abolition in the forthcoming shake-up.”
The Advertising Jingle Is Dead (Long Live The “Audio Logo”)
“Advertisers have become more sophisticated in their choice of music to convey mood and appeal to consumers. Tunes are still being used to sell soap and establish brand identity, but they are far subtler than the voices we used to hear (cue Barry Manilow) singing, ‘You deserve a break today, so get up and get away to McDonaaaaald’s!’ The jingle as we know it – an often inane, repetitive melody that drills itself into your head – has been declared almost dead.”
Minnesota Legislators Freeze Out Arts Requests
Is the appetite of government to fund arts capital projects fading? “Minnesota arts groups were all but frozen out of the $945 million bonding bill passed by the Legislature this week, a halting step in what has been an awkward minuet between ambitious artists and a sometimes-skeptical state government.”
Heinz Kerry Makes Surprise Gift To Warhol Museum
Theresa Heinz Kerry (wife of 2004 presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry) surprised the staff and management of Pittsburgh’s Andy Warhol Museum with a $4 million endowment gift this weekend. The donation will go a long way toward helping the museum, “Pittsburgh’s lively, provocative hub of contemporary art and popular culture,” achieve its overall endowment goal of $35 million.
What’s Wrong With Humana?
What ails Louisville’s venerable Humana Theatre Festival? Michael Phillips thinks it might be something as simple as a lack of competition for contemporary American drama. “The festival would [also] benefit from writers with a sense of honest, vital political engagement with our country today. This year the protestations amounted to a soapbox derby of speechifying, not entirely uninteresting but not persuasively dramatic.”
The Rise Of Black British Jazz
The era of globalization has done wonders for jazz, broadening its language and bringing new ideas to a genre that had become the province, mainly, of academic-minded American practitioners with very narrow musical values. “One of the new paradigms comes from a circle of mostly black London-based musicians… So what do these new players have? The first answer is a British Afro-Caribbean identity. The second is a movement. They have come together around several guiding ideas: swing, blues feeling, the historical relationship of reggae and jazz, and a commitment to improving stereotypes of Afro-Caribbeans and black Britain in general. The third answer is summed up in a term that’s become fairly widespread among these musicians, as well as the English press: black British jazz.”
Bridging Broadway’s Gender Gap
The Monty Python-inspired musical, Spamalot, is more than just the latest Broadway smash. It’s an actual piece of legitimate musical theatre that has succeeded in attracting a traditionally elusive demographic on Broadway: men.
Dancing & Motherhood: Not Necessarily Opposing Values
Ballet is notorious for its devotion to (some would say obsession with) the “perfect” female form. So pregnancy must mean the end of the line, at least temporarily for a ballerina, right? Wrong. “Today dancing during pregnancy and after childbirth, once a privilege of only the grandest stars, is unexceptional. But the fact remains that for dancers who become pregnant, the body is an instrument of art as well as of motherhood, and those roles can sometimes clash.”
An Arrest In The Munch “Scream” Theft
Norwegian police say they’ve taken a man in custody for the theft of two Munch paintings from an Oslo Museum. “A man in his 30s was arrested Friday afternoon … and charged with participating in the armed theft of the Munch Museum on Aug. 24, 2004,” Oslo police said in a statement.