David Mirvish, lead producer of The Heart of Robin Hood: “In light of the great reception we are getting from audiences and the media in Toronto, we have decided not to rush in to New York this season.” (Think that’s all there is to it?)
Author: Matthew Westphal
New Zealand’s Maori War Dance Looks Even Cooler On Ice
Sports fans and viral video mavens have seen the haka, the traditional pre-battle dance that New Zealand’s national sports teams (most notably, rugby’s formidable All-Blacks) do on the field before a match. Now the clever Kiwis have figured out how to do the haka on skates. (video)
Painter Jane Wilson Dead At 90
“In the postwar era, Wilson marshaled the dominant Abstract Expressionist style – loose brushwork and wide swaths of color – to record real places, from the endless skies of her Midwestern childhood and the seascapes of Long Island’s East End to Tompkins Square Park in New York City.”
The Museum Of The Future Is Here (And It’s On Fifth Avenue)
“The Cooper Hewitt has transformed into an organization not unlike Wikipedia, Pinterest, or, for that matter, The Atlantic: Somewhere between a media and a tech firm, it is a Thing That Puts Stuff on the Internet. Or, more precisely, A Thing That Puts Things on the Internet. But to get to that point, the museum [and its leaders] … have ultimately had to shift their understanding of what a thing is in the first place.”
For The First Time, Italy Looks Abroad For Museum Directors
“Wanted: Directors for 20 of Italy’s leading museums, including the Uffizi in Florence, the Galleria Borghese in Rome and the Accademia in Venice. Strong art history background, management experience and an interest in improving visitor experience a must. Fluency in Italian a definite plus, but not a requirement.”
Are We All Born With Synaesthesia?
“The under-examined complexities of ordinary perception, some neuroscientists and developmental psychologists contend, suggest that, like the Nabokovs, we all inhabit the synaesthetic spectrum – we just need to look back in time, to when we were infants with developing brains.”
Spain Arrests Alleged Forgers Of Picasso, Matisse, Miró
“Three suspected members of an art forgery ring were arrested in the Spanish cities of Zaragoza and Tarragona … Accused of peddling drawings falsely attributed to Miró, Picasso, and Matisse, they’ve been charged with crimes against intellectual property and fraud.”
Houston Grand Opera Zooms Past Its $165M Fundraising Goal
The Inspiring Performance campaign, launched quietly in 2007 and publicly in 2012, raised $172.9 million to “fund world premieres, new productions of established operas and the company’s first staging of Richard Wagner’s The Ring of the Nibelung.”
Drowning Ulster Orchestra Gets Lifeline From Northern Ireland Assembly
“The orchestra had been facing closure but a deal was announced this week to provide funding – reportedly in the region of £400,000 – giving the body a reprieve.”
TV Critics Demonstrate, Embarrassingly, Why America Needs “Fresh Off The Boat”
At the Television Critics Association press conference for the new ABC series about an Asian-American family, the first question wasn’t about creating the show or issues of assimilation or any such thing. It was about chopsticks.