Author: Matthew Westphal

How The Broadcast Industry Convinced Americans, Gradually, To Embrace Color TV

The technology to transmit color television signals was first developed in the 1920s, and all three of the major U.S. networks had switched to color in the 1960s. But in the mid-1970s, nearly half of American households still had black-and-white sets, which didn’t disappear completely from store shelves until the 1990s. What took so long, and how was the public persuaded to make the switch? – Public Books

A New, Nationwide Initiative For Asian-American Theater

“The National Asian American Theater Company is starting a partnership with regional theaters across the country, aiming to foster inclusion of more Asian-American theater artists, technicians, administrators and community members through productions, outreach and other programming. The first partner theaters will be New York Theater Workshop, Soho Rep, Long Wharf Theater in New Haven, Conn., and Two River Theater in Red Bank, N.J.” – The New York Times

In Today’s Russia, The Government Doesn’t Always Need To Bother Censoring Cutting-Edge Art

Often, gangs of far-right nationalists will do it instead — burning books, protesting outside venues, bursting into buildings to disrupt an exhibition or performance, or even (in one instance) sending a teenager with a fake ID into a gay-themed play that’s legally barred to minors, then busting the company for admitting someone underage. A Moscow correspondent looks at the case of Teatr.doc. – The Economist

Racially-Tinged Strife At America’s Largest All-Jazz Radio Station

At WBGO in Newark, NJ, accusations that a largely white and elitist station leadership had lost touch with, and stopped paying respect to, the largely nonwhite people of its city led to rancor among the staff and, this week, the resignation of station CEO Amy Niles. But the roots of the station’s difficulties lie in the changing media landscape and in the tension between openness to WBGO’s local community and serving a listener and membership base that’s almost entirely outside Newark. – The New York Times

‘Salvator Mundi’ Is Not By Leonardo (Yes, It Is) (No, It Isn’t)

Art historian Charles Hope, in a review of three books about the world’s most expensive painting, lays out an extensive argument against the attribution of Salvator Mundi to da Vinci and suggests that the UK’s National Gallery, by including it in its 2011 Leonardo exhibition, helped (wittingly or not) pump up the work’s resale value. Both the New York dealer who had the painting at that time and the National Gallery’s then-director respond in letters, and Hope follows up with a counter-response. – London Review of Books