Once upon a time, artists competed for Olympic medals. “The animating idea was to award the prizes to work directly inspired by sport — a limitation that may have helped lead to their eventual demise. How many statues of muscle-bound athletes, how many paeans to the glory of manly competition, can the world really be expected to celebrate?”
Author: Laura Collins Hughes
Business And Social-Networking Lessons Of The Dead
“Today, everybody is intensely interested in understanding how communities form across distances, because that’s what happens online.” It’s also what long happened among Deadheads. That’s only one reason academics are fascinated by the Grateful Dead, who also “famously permitted fans to tape their shows,” yet “did not hesitate to sue those who violated their copyrights.”
Oxford Professor Of Poetry Race Begins Anew
After last year’s ugly contest between Ruth Padel and Derek Walcott, Oxford University “opened nominations today to find a new candidate for the 300-year-old position, seen as the most prestigious in poetry behind that of the poet laureate.”
Fresno Museum’s Property Auction Draws Hundreds
“More than 600 lots containing items such as office furniture, science exhibits and lighting fixtures” — and some art, too — “were sold in a sometimes dramatic auction held beneath a large tent on the former museum’s grounds. The museum’s art collection will be sold later.” Unless, of course, a legal challenge to the sale prevails.
10 Branches, 25% Of BPL Staff May Be On Chopping Block
“Amy E. Ryan, the [Boston Public Library’s] president, said yesterday that because of steep budget cuts the only alternative to closings would be slashing hours at 18 library branches, with the smallest facilities open only one to three days a week.” The BPL has 26 neighborhood branches.
The Curious Dullness Of Season Announcements
“[I]t’s relatively rare that a[n] orchestra’s season announcement generates genuine excitement. They’re received, often, with the mien of a greedy child: what are you giving us, and how good is it, and are you playing my favorite piece?”
Is Performance Capture Acting Or Animation?
“[U]nlike the great majority of best picture nominees, the ‘Avatar’ actors have not nabbed a single major critic’s award, or guild prize. The snubs reflect the apparent ambivalence of the film community — especially actors — to ‘Avatar’ and its revolutionary use of ‘performance capture’….”
Seattle’s ACT Tries A New Model: ‘Like A Gym Membership’
“In addition to its traditional season subscriptions and individual ticket sales, ACT launched a membership program. For $25 a month, members can see anything at ACT, as often as they like.”
The Enduring Greatness Of Django Reinhardt
“The legacy of Django Reinhardt enjoys a currency that those of comparable jazz icons do not. In recent months, the centennials of both Lester Young and Art Tatum came and went almost unnoticed, but Reinhardt,” whose centennial was last month, “is omnipresent–more so than during his lifetime.”
Eight Years In The Making, A Wrinkle In Time For The Stage
South Coast Rep “associate artistic director John Glore became intrigued with the story of a pair of children who travel through time to save their father, after his then-9-year-old daughter made a shoe box diorama of a scene in which Meg finds her father imprisoned in a cell by the dreaded ‘it.'”