Four years ago, Pittsburgh’s Three Rivers Arts Festival decided that it needed more than just art to draw in the public, and launched a carefully tailored music component designed to dovetail with its existing visual art base. So far, it’s been a winning scenario for everyone involved: since the performances, which take place in the midst of the art fair, are free, crowds are far bigger than they would be at a stand-alone show with an admission charge; and the guest performers bring in people who otherwise might not think to attend an art fest.
Month: April 2005
Chicago’s Art War
This weekend, Chicago’s annual art fair kicks off. And so does Chicago’s other annual art fair. Oh, and the other one, too. In fact, the heated competition between two established fairs and one new upstart is garnering international attention, as lawsuits are filed, dates are juggled, and trash is talked. It’s a full-fledged art war, and while no one seems to be sure whether such a thing is actually good for art, it’s damned entertaining to watch.
Boston Theatre Shuns Touring Shows, Hopes For Profit
“Reeling from box-office losses, a downturn in theater attendance across the country, and unprecedented competition from Clear Channel Entertainment, [Boston’s] Wang Center for the Performing Arts will revamp its mission and programs next season… Instead of relying on touring Broadway musicals to anchor its season, the nonprofit Wang will produce or coproduce its own shows, with an emphasis on ‘event musicals’ and family entertainment.”
Browsing A Globe’s Worth Of Street Art
“Not everybody can stroll the streets of Melbourne, Baghdad or Vilnius, Lithuania, looking for street art, but one website lets everybody do so virtually, by bringing international images of spray paintings, stickers, stencils and more to the masses. Known as the Wooster Collective, the New York City-based site houses an array of graffiti and street art from around the world. Artists and camera-happy passersby send in photos of their works and sightings, and site creators put them up in blog-style postings that ensure the pictures take center stage.”
Sounds An Awful Lot Like Public Access TV
Technophiles have been saying for months now that “podcasting” – the do-it-yourself method of creating downloadable audio shows – will eclipse traditional radio, and a low-rated San Francisco station apparently believes the hype. KYCY-AM will shortly be converting its format from all-talk to do-it-yourself, giving a traditional broadcast outlet to podcasters across the globe. The station manager calls the “open source radio” idea a low-risk format, though it likely won’t bring in big advertising dollars at first.
Philly Orch To Record Again
The Philadelphia Orchestra has signed with the Finnish recording label Ondine, giving it a commercial recording agreement for the first time in nearly a decade, and making it the only ensemble in the so-called “Big Five” of American orchestras to have such a contract. In signing on to the deal, the orchestra’s musicians agreed to buck the national, union-negotiated recording agreements previously adhered to by all U.S. orchestras, and forego upfront payments in favor of a revenue sharing agreement, a provision of the deal which is already very controversial among other professional orchestras.
Rethinking The Message Of Rap From The Inside
“Violence and vulgarity are hardly unique to rap. The mainstream is full of gore and borderline porn. But these tendencies are undiluted in rap, which is why many young African-Americans and Latinos who grew up embracing hip hop as a grassroots, multimedia art form now deplore rap as a cynical “neominstrelsy” being mass-marketed not just nationally but globally. This global twist is new.”
A Screen Sex Taboo Falls
“When, if ever, will an erotic film not marketed as pornography show a man and a woman enjoying spontaneous, passionate full-frontal sex? With the appearance of Michael Winterbottom’s “9 Songs,” the answer is now.”
August Wilson Completes His 100 Years
Twenty years in the writing, playwright August Wilson’s 10-play tour through 100 years of American history gets its capstone this week with a production of “Radio Golf” at the Yale Repertory Theatre.
The New Mind-Reading Machines
Are we really on the verge of inventing machines that will bee able to tell what you’re thinking? “So far, it has only been used to identify visual patterns a subject can see or has chosen to focus on. But the researchers speculate the approach might be extended to probe a person’s awareness, focus of attention, memory and movement intention. In the meantime, it could help doctors work out if patients apparently in a coma are actually conscious.”