The contrast with the prestigious art fair even a decade ago was striking, with only 61 exhibitors this year, two thirds of them French. On Monday, the First Lady Brigitte Macron toured the stands for three hours, perhaps a salve for the dealers. But no significant historical work or masterpiece was unveiled.
Author: Douglas McLennan
Critical Opinion Increasingly Matters Less In The Era Of Social Media
“We’re not paid to be soothsayers; we’re paid to give our honest opinions on a particular time and day, based on our own long experience of writing about and loving theatre.” But “the new age of social media now means more than ever that critics are increasingly a reduced part of the equation.”
Stripping Away The Trappings Of Art – Why It’s Important
Art is naive. There’s something painfully innocent about the attempt to forge a meaningful statement out of nothing; to stand up in front of people and sing or play or speak with all your heart, knowing you may look foolish, knowing you may spectacularly fail. Our big institutions, the mighty choruses and orchestras and theaters that offer Verdi Requiems and King Lears, generally insulate us and themselves from this kind of failure
Internet Of Things Is Powering The Next Broadcasting Revolution
The monetization opportunities IoT offers broadcasters are many, but the most obvious is the various forms of data they will have access to, such as demographic, location, behavioral and user preferences, coming from a wide range of devices and systems. Broadcasters will be able to put together detailed consumer profiles and use them to deliver real-time, personalized content across multiple screens and devices.
Big New Classical Music Streaming Service Launches
Called Primephonic, the platform claims to have nearly all classical music ever recorded, with over 1 million tracks available at the push of a button.
Still Plenty Of Festivals, But Here Are Those That Died (Or Are About To)
Luckily, 2018 avoided a total repeat of last year’s Fyre Festival debacle (phew), but several festivals did go up in flames. Retire your flower crowns, rompers, and drug stashes for the winter and let’s pour one out for all the festivals we lost this year — some gone for good, others on hiatus, and a few on death watch.
Native Americans Propose Changing Names In Yellowstone
Massacres like this were a major part of what some historians call a forgotten genocide during the colonization and settlement of the American West. The perpetrators of these massacres were sometimes honored with mountains, valleys and towns.
Which Schools Have The Most Alumni On Broadway?
As part of Playbill’s Back to School week (#BwayBacktoSchool), we have combined past Schools of the Stars features that track where members of the casts for each Broadway show went to college, along with a bit of added research, to present the ten colleges currently most represented on Broadway (plus a few honorable mentions).
Warning: EU Copyright Proposal Would Substantially Censor The Internet
Link taxes are a bad idea. In an era of fake news, anything that limits the ability of internet users to link to reliable news sources deals a terrible blow to our already weakened public discourse. Copyright filters are an even worse idea. Not only will these both overblock and underblock, they’ll also be ripe for abuse.
Battersea Arts Centre’s Fascinating Restoration After A Fire
“We call it scratch architecture,” says architect Steve Tompkins, referring to the process of scratch theatre pioneered at BAC, where ideas are tested out live in the early stages of development, with audience feedback used to evolve the performance. “It’s not about a perfectly authored finished product, which is a difficult idea for architects to stomach,” he adds. “But we wondered if we could do a parallel process by insinuating ourselves into the productions. What would it mean for us to relinquish tyrannical control over the project?”