“He puts his ear to my chest and listens to my heart and counts the beats. ‘Sixty-two,’ he says with a satisfied smile, and I can’t imagine anything more intimate.” Bill Hayes, partner of the late neurologist and author, shares snippets from the diary of their life together that Sacks convinced him to keep.
Author: Matthew Westphal
What Will DC’s Shakespeare Theatre Do Without Founder Michael Kahn?
When Kahn announced that he’d be stepping down after two more seasons, he said that he would leave his successor a financially healthy company. Artistically? That may be a different matter, worries Peter Marks.
New Music Is Booming In L.A. – And There’s One Problem With That
More groups and composers are competing for donors. Jim Farber looks at how some organizations, large and small, and handling the challenge.
Wendy Whelan And Brian Brooks On Making Dance Together
“On paper, Mr. Brooks is the choreographer, and Ms. Whelan the dancer and his partner onstage. But, as a recent conversation revealed, the lines between creation and interpretation have become increasingly blurred.” Marina Harss shares excerpts from that conversation.
‘Spider-Man’ Art Thief And Accomplices (Including The Guy Who Threw The Picasso In The Trash) Get Prison
Vjéran Tomic – nicknamed “Spider-Man” for the athletic way he executed the theft – stole paintings by Picasso, Matisse, Modigliani, Braque and Léger from the Musée d’art moderne de la ville de Paris in 2010. He, the instigator, and the fence each got multi-year jail terms and six-figure fines plus an order to reimburse the city for the €104 million the art is worth. (The fence – who claims he threw the paintings into the garbage when his home was raided – executed a memorably self-serving piece of theater when he heard his sentence.)
Met Museum Director Makes The Case For The NEA In New York Times Op-Ed
Thomas P. Campbell: “I fear that this current call to abolish the N.E.A. is the beginning of a new assault on artistic activity. Arts and cultural programming challenges, provokes and entertains; it enhances our lives. Eliminating the N.E.A. would in essence eliminate investment by the American government in the curiosity and intelligence of its citizens.”
Portland, Maine Classical Radio Station Abruptly Switches To Country
The announcement said no more than this: “We would like to thank the fans of WBACH and classical music for listening over the years and we regret any inconvenience as a result of the changes.” WBACH’s frequency is now used to simulcast a country station just a little ways down the dial.
Michelangelo Sculpture, Unnoticed For Centuries, Goes On View At Last
It’s a seven-foot white marble nude statue of Jesus, and you’d think it would be famous by now – or stolen. But Risen Christ survived both Napoleon and the Nazis. Elisabetta Povoledo explains how.
Can Damien Hirst Win Back Pissed-Off Collectors With His New Show?
“Like previous Hirst extravaganzas, this project is being rolled out with the same hypervigilant level of control and fanfare. And hovering over the project is whether – given the precipitous drop in his prices after his all-Hirst Sotheby’s auction in 2008 – the celebrity artist can have another chapter.” Or has he (ahem) jumped the shark for good?
Boston Symphony Announces $30 Million Expansion At Tanglewood
“The new four-building complex, set to open in 2019, represents the largest building initiative at Tanglewood since the opening of Ozawa Hall more than two decades ago.”