“Film school can be a cruelly Darwinian place, with the push-and-pull of competition and friendship, multiple layers of contest and reward, and a rigid hierarchy in which some write and direct and others find themselves unloading trucks and picking up coffee. Students want to be clever, perfect, special, the best. Competition infuses and informs every aspect of the experience.”
Month: February 2012
The Intensely Interior Philip Glass (Either You Get It Or You Don’t)
“That time-consuming transfiguration is at the core of the Glass mythology, but drugs work differently on different metabolisms, angels appear only to the elect, and I lack the gift of spinning Glassian tedium into bliss. In fact, I start to get his music at precisely the point where his first acolytes fall away.”
How Justice Department Shutdown Of MegaUpload Could Hurt Music
“Despite the demise of Napster more than a decade ago, music fans continue to use file-sharing sites to discover and share music. In certain circles, especially more underground and fringe scenes, music blogs and sites are indispensible ways of discovering new artists, as they’re mostly ignored by mainstream magazines and websites.”
Qatar Pays Record $250 Million For A Painting
“The tiny, oil-rich nation of Qatar has purchased a Paul Cézanne painting, The Card Players, for more than $250 million. The deal, in a single stroke, sets the highest price ever paid for a work of art and upends the modern art market.”
Piracy Is The New Radio?
“Comparing piracy to radio is a smart way of looking at the issue: in the early days of the music business, when live performances and record sales were the main revenue generator for artists and publishers, radio itself was seen as a form of piracy (as sheet music was before that).”
Mixing Rodin And Breakdancing
Choreographer Russell Maliphant was moved to create his Rodin Project by his visits to the sculptor’s museum in Paris. Yet he realized that his typical fluid style didn’t capture the size and weight of Rodin’s bronzes. He found a solution to this problem at, of all places, a London street dance festival.
Liberté, Egalité, Hostilité – Do America’s Political Battles Have Their Roots In 1789?
Garry Gutting argues that “we have never gotten over the French Revolution. The revolution introduced the basic liberal idea that government must be fundamentally democratic … We all, in principle, share in the power to govern ourselves. But this idea led (or, at least, was feared to lead) to a much more radical one: that everyone should have an equal share in power.”
Where Philosophy Class Is Mandatory For High Schoolers
“A 2008 law requires Brazilian teenagers to study philosophy because it is ‘necessary for the exercise of citizenship’.” Carlos Fraenkel pays a visit to a class in Salvador.
Dorothea Tanning, 101, Last Of The Surrealist Painters
Though her own fame was overshadowed by that of her husband, Max Ernst, she had a successful career in her own right, moving from dreamlike portrayals of the female form to, by the 1950s, more abstract “prism paintings.” In her 80s, she found new acclaim as a writer.
The Soap Opera Of Clybourne Park‘s Move To Broadway
“The New York run of [the Pulitzer-winning play], which has been widely viewed as a top contender for the 2012 Tony Award for best play, was threatened this week after one of the lead producers, Scott Rudin, left the project” following an unrelated dispute with playwright Bruce Norris. Now the owner of the theater where Clybourne Park is to run has assured the cast (currently performing in Los Angeles) that the transfer will proceed.