“Unlike critics, artists are not thought to be objective in writing about their art; that’s why newspapers see artists’ writing as a conflict of interest. But actual critical objectivity is neither possible nor desirable.”
Month: February 2012
Study: Does Wearing A Lab Coat Make You More Creative?
“The main conclusion that we can draw from the studies is that the influence of wearing a piece of clothing depends on both its symbolic meaning and the physical experience of wearing the clothes. There seems to be something special about the physical experience of wearing a piece of clothing.”
Artist Stopped From Killing Chickens
“Officials have banned an artist from publicly slaughtering chickens in eastern Kansas, saying the proposed art installation would amount to animal cruelty.”
Syracuse’s Library-In-A-Phone-Booth
“Mother Earth, as she prefers to be called, is the steward of the Syracuse’s first Little Free Library, which opened early this month in an abandoned telephone box near a bus stop and grocery store on Gifford Street. The Little Free Library credo is ‘take a book, leave a book.’ That’s pretty much the only rule.”
Barcelona’s Liceu Opera House Reverses Decision To Close For Two Months
Following widespread concern from opera lovers and threats of a strike from employees, the Gran Teatre del Liceu has concluded an agreement with its staff’s labor unions that (says management) will allow the house to resume virtually all of the programming that had been cancelled due to a shortage of funds.
Drama Critics Should Not Write Plays, Says Drama Critic
Lyn Gardner: “I tend to think that, while 30 years of sitting in the dark watching other people’s plays has taught me a great deal, one of the things it hasn’t taught me is how to write a good play. Writing reviews and recognising [sic] a great (or even promising) play are entirely different things, and I think it’s best to leave the latter to the professionals.”
In Today’s Art Scene, Sculpture Rocks
“It’s the most exciting area of the art world right now for collectors and viewers alike, and there’s a simple reason for that. … It’s a really experimental age for sculpture,’ partly because of digital imaging, the addition of sound, and other innovations that offer new opportunities to be creative in three dimensions.”
A Mini-Sistema For Dance In Colombia
La Compañía del Cuerpo de Indias is something like a dance equivalent of Venezuela’s Simon Bolívar Symphony Orchestra – a professional troupe drawn from El Colegio del Cuerpo, which “draws many of its students from Cartagena’s most impoverished districts. Many come from a shantytown called Nelson Mandela, home to many families displaced by years of violence that pulverised Colombia in the 1980s and 90s.”
Cinema’s Problem With Old People
“Once marginalised and therefore cut down in screen-time, older characters have had to be stereotyped, with often unbecoming results. There have been a good few kindly old grandmas, but more often the elderly have been shown as [string of nineteen unflattering adjectives]. However, with the coming of our own millennium, cinema determined to do better. It was now in pursuit of the increasingly valuable grey dollar.”
America’s First Black Female Symphonist
Florence B. Price (1887-1953), raised in Arkansas and trained in Boston and Chicago, went on “to write some 300 works and become the first black woman in the U.S. to be recognized as a symphonic composer,” with her Symphony in E minor premiered by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 1933.