Author: Douglas McLennan

A BRANDING THING

The Australian Art Orchestra has made a deal with the Sydney Opera House. “The partnership means that, over the next three years, the Sydney Opera House will produce a series of events and opportunities for the Art Orchestra. The Australian Art Orchestra will retain its name, but will be known as `The Sydney Opera House presents the Australian Art Orchestra’.” – The Age (Melbourne)

REACHING OUT: Sydney Opera House’s “branding opportunity” with the Melbourne orchestra is an attempt by the Opera House to further establish itself as a fully functional performing arts centre.” – Sydney Morning Herald

BACKING OUT ON BACH

Deutsche Grammophon and its parent company, Universal, take the prize for chutzpah after finking out on John Eliot Gardiner in the middle of his massive cantata cycle – the Bach Pilgrimage, as it was called. The British conductor and his musicians have been spending the year dragging themselves through Europe and the United States, trying to perform all 198 of Bach’s surviving cantatas, each one on the particular day of the liturgical year for which it was written – some 90 concerts in 15 countries, all in ‘interesting’ churches. The plan was that DGG would record them all and release one a week. But last July the record company decided it was all a tad pricey and pulled out, leaving the already cash-strapped Gardiner and his merry band of musicians scrambling for funds.” – National Post (Canada)

DON’T FORGET THE LITTLE GUYS

Just when it looked like MP3.com had settled its legal woes with recording companies, independent labels have taken the company to court. “Although MP3.com has entered into settlement agreements with the five major record labels, they have chosen to ignore their infringing actions with respect to independent labels.” – Wired

NEW ARTS CENTER FOR MIAMI

The Miami-Dade County Commission has approved a $255 million contract to build a performing arts center first proposed 21 years ago. The center is scheduled to open in 2004 and will be home to five resident companies – the Concert Association of Florida, the New World Symphony, the Florida Grand Opera, the Miami City Ballet and the Florida Philharmonic. – Miami Herald 12/20/00

POOR SUBSTITUTES

A couple of embarrassing art switcheroos have recently been pulled off. “First, a $7 million Monet went missing from the National Museum in Poznan, Poland, and a badly painted copy on cardboard was left in its stead. Then, monks at St Josaphat’s Monastery in Lattingtown, Long Island, found themselves short of two rare 16th- and 17th-century English tapestry chairs – the earlier of which Henry VIII once reputedly sat on. – New Statesman

‘GREAT’ IS NOT SO GREAT

The British Museum’s new Great Court portico has been getting raves from the critics. Except this one: “It is an inexcusable eyesore. At first glance it is so alien that to mistake it for some form of plastic substitute can be forgiven; at second glance, so clumsily are its blocks cut, so chipped their corners, so fudged and filled the junctions of the blocks and column drums that the material must be stone, the masons’ craft and workmanship unacceptably flawed. The fault is beyond remedy and chucking buckets of slurry at it – which might help in the open air – is not an option.” – London Evening Standard

HOW’RE THINGS IN HAVANA?

“The art crowd from New York, L.A., San Francisco, New Orleans, and the rest of the planet, has descended like locusts for the seventh Havana Bienal. Drooling over disintegrating facades and tail-finned vehicular carapaces, they’re oblivious to local anxieties of grinding to an irreplaceable halt. Amid palms, surf, deprivations, and faded billboards in praise of Socialismo, the permanent revolution has become an eternal fiesta. The people party and clean their wounds with antifreeze on this entropic island that seems both more spirited and more hopeless than any Soviet satellite state ever was. You get the feeling that they humor Fidel’s oppressions as if he were their dotty uncle. But in the artworld, a weird delusion of normalcy holds sway.” – Village Voice