Author: Matthew Westphal

Recreating Van Gogh Paintings In A Water Dish

“Ebru, a decorative paper art, hails from East and Central Asia in the 10th and 16th centuries, respectively. The technique involves sprinkling and brushing pigments onto the surface of oily water in a pan, then laying paper atop the water, effectively dyeing the paper with tendrils of color. [Garip] Ay is classically trained in the art form, and his loose, paisley-like patterns beautifully mimic the Dutch post-Impressionist’s celestial swirls.” (video)

Time Out London’s Theatre Editor Throws Shade At Critics – By Name

“I read quite a lot of theatre reviews, and while the best are all sorts of stimulating, I kind of think: we all bloody sound like each other, don’t we? I mean, there’s some textural variety: Susannah Clapp is poetic; Michael Billington does puns; Quentin Letts hates theatre. But, as a rule, it’s difficult to see exactly how theatre criticism has stylistically shifted since Tynan’s time – or before that, even: for Ben Brantley, the most powerful theatre critic in the world, it is forever 1851.”

‘Finishing His Sentences’ – Novelist Walter Mosley Remembers His Father

“Two thousand sixteen marks the 100-year anniversary of my father, Leroy Mosley’s, birth. He was and is my inspiration, the man who taught me to bob and weave in life and art. I came into being shaped by the stories about his childhood in Louisiana and the grinding poverty he endured there, the bloodletting and laughter in the Fifth Ward in Houston and the harsh enlightenment he received in the Army.”

The Next Alexander Hamilton Is More Than Ready For His Close-Up: He’s Beaten Cancer

Javier Muñoz has been Lin-Manuel Miranda’s understudy and alternate from the beginning of Hamilton‘s development, and – except for the ten weeks he spent recovering from surgery and radiation therapy – he’s been playing Hamilton on Sundays and Miranda’s days off since the show opened. Muñoz even got to perform the role for both First Couples.

Wild New Designs For The Next Generation Of Digital Pianos

“The Roland Digital Piano Design Awards were open to designers and design students from around the world. Competitors were encouraged to conceive a futuristic instrument that broke away from tradition. While the focus was on the look and structure of the piano, competitors had the option of proposing alternative digital functions and sounds as part of their concept.”

The Performance Artist Who Thinks He Can Dance (He’s Right, Sort Of)

“A few days before Ryan McNamara’s performance piece Battleground premièred at the Guggenheim, last month, his cast of nine dancers had clocked an impressive six hundred and fifty hours of rehearsal. Unfortunately, they’d practiced together for only one of them. That might have caused most choreographers to panic, but McNamara isn’t a choreographer, he’s a performance artist, and fragmentation is kind of his thing.”