Felice Frankel, “first an artist in residence and now a research scientist at M.I.T., and now also a senior research fellow at the Institute for Innovative Computing at Harvard, … helps researchers use cameras, microscopes and other tools to display the beauty of science. With her help, scientists have turned dull images of things like yeast in a dish or the surface of a CD into photographs so striking that they appear often on covers of scientific journals and magazines.”
Author: Laura Collins Hughes
And The Tony Goes To … Wait, That Closed Already
The Tony Awards are Broadway’s best-coordinated marketing effort, but this year some of the most celebrated product is already past its sell-by date. “Of the winners of the four top awards, two — ‘Journey’s End,’ winner of the best play revival, and ‘The Coast of Utopia,’ a record breaker for most awards won by a play, with seven — have already closed and have no current plans to tour. Another — ‘Company,’ winner of best musical revival — has been in critical condition at the box office for weeks.”
Banksy Prints Stolen From Brighton Gallery
“A total of 10 items valued at about £10,000 – nine of them by Banksy – were stolen on 20 and 24 May. Sussex Police said it appeared the Artrepublic gallery, in Bond Street, Brighton, had been ‘purposely targeted for the Banksy works’.”
Cordelia, Does Your Dad Have Any History Of Stroke?
A professor of old-age psychiatry gives his take on Ian McKellen’s King Lear: “When Lear punched Kent, I found myself thinking: ‘This old man is the terror of the nursing home.’ That is a type of character I know very well. … It’s dangerous to make psychiatric diagnoses from plays, but I thought Ian McKellen’s performance was consistent with a vascular condition rather than Alzheimer’s.”
Philly Museum Visits Will Get Pricier
“The Philadelphia Museum of Art is hiking admission across all categories by an average of 25 percent. … The new fees mean that since 1997 regular adult admission has doubled; for seniors in the past decade it has tripled. At the same time, the museum has expanded free admission for children and extended the pay-what-you-wish policy….”
For One Public Radio Station, Classical = Cash Cow
“A bunch of European composers who haven’t had a hit in decades have been very, very good to radio station WETA. Since dropping news and talk programming for classical music in January, the Arlington public station has seen its fortunes soar. Ratings have more than doubled since the switchover from BBC and NPR reports to Bach and Brahms concertos. And perhaps just as important to WETA (90.9 FM), pledge contributions from listeners have been gushing.”
Art Basel’s Director Prepares For Departure
“Art Basel Director Samuel Keller, who steps down this year as head of the world’s biggest contemporary fair, has some advice for his successor. ‘Change continuously with the art world,’ Keller, 41, said in a telephone interview from the Swiss city. ‘Listen to the galleries who have what it takes to make an art fair.'”
A $4M Gift Later, Segerstrom Hall Is Far From Paid For
“The Orange County Performing Arts Center has announced a $4-million donation from one of its board members and his wife — the first report of progress since October on its campaign to pay off the debt on the new Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall. The gift … brings the amount raised to $164 million — but it doesn’t represent any widening of the donor pool for the campaign, which still has about $76 million to go toward its goal of $240 million.”
What Joyce Estate’s Overreaching Says About Copyright
“On Friday, a San Jose federal judge awarded attorney fees to a Stanford University English professor whose suit against the estate of James Joyce was settled recently. The awarding of fees in an out-of-court settlement, while not typical, is not unprecedented…. But Carol Loeb Shloss’ suit against the Joyce estate sheds light on an ironic, and maybe inevitable, trend in intellectual property: As copyright becomes harder to defend, many copyright holders are becoming less realistic about the limitations of their ownership.”
Classical Music Critic’s Job Disappears At NY Mag
“New York magazine’s longtime classical music critic, Peter G. Davis, will be leaving the publication. Mr. Davis, who had been at New York for 26 years, said yesterday he was asked to sign an ‘agreement of separation’ because the magazine decided it no longer needed a full-time classical music critic.” (seventh item)