Author: Douglas McLennan

OWNING UP

Hollywood’s top prize for directors has long been the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ D.W. Griffith Award. But when this year’s award went to director Steven Spielberg, it was stripped of its namesake, because of Griffith’s racist views. “The decision to remove Griffith’s name has churned up a maelstrom of mixed emotions in the liberal, artistic community of Hollywood that still recognizes its debt to the director’s pioneering work. Is it possible to honor the achievements of a ground-breaking artist, they ask, while still deploring that person’s political views?” – Washington Post 03/16/00

WATCHING THE MUSIC GO ‘ROUND

Vinylvideo is “a revolutionary system for screening short artist-made films on a television set. Each film is stored on a 12-inch vinyl record that spins at 45 rpm on a standard audio turntable. An electronic box connects the turntable to a TV and converts the audio signal for video playback.” – New York Times 03/16/00

BOMBAY CALLING

Media tycoon Rupert Murdoch will spend $100 million to set up a film studio near Bombay and wire the metropolis with a fibre optic network. In his relentless pursuit to expanding his multi-media empire, he has already acquired a string of popular news and entertainment television channels in India. – The Age (Melbourne) (AP) 03/16/00

CITIZEN BLUMENTHAL

W. Michael Blumenthal, curator of Berlin’s Jewish Museum and former U.S. Treasury Secretary, will be made an honorary citizen of Oranienburg, the small German town where he was born. Blumenthal, whose family fled to the U.S. in 1939, became an American citizen in 1952. Oranienburg’s mayor said the aim of the honor was “to show there was no place for anti-Semitism there.” – Die Welt

LOVE UNDER THE FATWA

Author Salman Rushdie has found a reason to stop hiding from the death warrant that was issued against him ten years ago: love. Rushdie, who is still married, has a new 29 year-old girlfriend with whom he has been publicly cavorting. He has also reportedly started working out and had cosmetic surgery performed on his “drooping eyelids.” – Sydney Morning Herald

SHARE THE WEALTH

But not for another 15 years. Britain agrees to grant artists a share of the resale price when their work is resold, bringing it into line with other European countries. London’s art sellers predict disaster. – The Independent (UK)

  • JOB (IN)SECURITY: Now that Britain has accepted European Union proposals to impose a levy on art sales, employees at the UK’s biggest auction houses are worried about losing revenues – not to mention their jobs. – The Guardian

  • A WATERED DOWN AGREEMENT: European Commission is unhappy with the deal. – BBC

YOUR AD HERE

We can’t simply have a Rose Bowl or a Chicago Stadium anymore. They have to be the RotoRooter Rose Bowl and the Wonder Bread Center. And now an airline has got its name plastered all over a Broadway theater. What’s next, actors trotting around stage with “Joe’s Sandwich Shop” stitched across their backs? – Chicago Tribune

ART STASH

  • The Rubell Family Collection of contemporary art, with more than 1,000 works by Jeff Koons, Chris Ofili (of “Sensation” fame), Cindy Sherman, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and others, is housed in one of the art world’s unlikeliest of galleries: Miami’s former Drug Enforcement Agency contraband warehouse. The Rubells’ masterpieces hang in “a big yellowish cinderblock fortress with a security cage for an entryway.” An ironic sign of the times?  – NPR [Real audio clip]

GENERAL STINGINESS AND A FAILURE OF IMAGINATION

“There is pitifully little well placed modern sculpture in London, or in most British cities. There are pieces hidden away in parks and buildings, but nobody is commissioning the really big public pieces by the most important contemporary sculptors – and if they did they’d be stuck in a quagmire of planning problems.” So the best artists have been seeking commissions outside the country. – The Guardian