“One interesting factor that emerged for researchers was that the top two venues of 2012” – the Louvre in Paris and the Metropolitan Museum in New York – “had unveiled much-anticipated gallery spaces devoted to Islamic art during the year.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
Are Museums Now Trapped In The Exhibition-Industrial Complex?
Blake Gopnik: “In Tokyo, 758,266 people rush to see the treasures of Holland’s Mauritshuis museum; in New York, 605,586 people view the photos of Cindy Sherman, by Cindy Sherman … these are just a few of the staggering attendance figures for recent exhibitions. Could there be any better sign of the health of our museums? Unless we’re seeing symptoms of florid illness.”
Saving Alt-Weeklies (If Not Alt-Weekly Papers)
“The alternative weekly of yesterday is toast. Or, at least it should be if the alt-weekly business is going to survive. As print media collectively emerges from an existential crisis that has forever altered the business model, alt-weeklies are coming out on the other side as more than just newspapers.” And which ones are doing it best? Not the big ones.
Belarus Free Theatre Campaigns Against Capital Punishment – In English
This summer in London and Edinburgh, the 21st century’s most famous refusenik theatre company is presenting its first production in a foreign (to them) language – Trash Cuisine, which argues that the execution of criminals by the state just fosters more violence in the wider culture.
Bollywood Superstar Gives Up Appeal, Will Go To Prison
“Indian film actor Sanjay Dutt will stop fighting his conviction on weapons charges and serve out his term in jail, he announced on Thursday. Last week, India’s Supreme Court rejected the hit actor’s final appeal. He had been convicted of owning an assault rifle supplied by the same gangsters who carried out the Mumbai 1993 bombings.”
In La Scala’s Shadow, Rome Opera Transforms Itself
First, the Teatro dell’Opera engaged Riccardo Muti as its “honorary director for life”. “But the opera house has gone further, starting a school for young musicians and dancers, developing programs for younger audiences and planning to expand use of its summertime venue, the spectacular Baths of Caracalla.”
Homosexuality In American Popular Media, Then And Now
“From All in the Family to Modern Family, a lot has changed over the past few decades about the way gay people and their relationships are portrayed in the media. The Post‘s Krissah Thompson stops by to explain.”
The Decline And Fall Of The Large-Cast American Play
“It’s easy to forget that the latter-day dominance of the small-cast play is a fairly recent development in theatrical history. Large casts used to be the rule, not the exception. Indeed, most of the best-known American plays of the 20th century called for performing forces that would now be seen by penny-pinching producers as insanely extravagant.”
Steinway Pianos Sells Its Venerable Manhattan Showroom
“Steinway Hall, the 88-year-old building down the block and across the street from Carnegie Hall where generations of famous and not-so-famous pianists have tried out pianos, is being sold, the piano company and the buyer said on Tuesday.”
Mayhem Notwithstanding, Bolshoi Manages To Celebrate Rite Of Spring
“Despite the turmoil following the attack in mid-January on Bolshoi ballet artistic director Sergei Filin, the theater has continued without hesitation to follow the age-old precept ‘the show must go on.’ And this week it … opens a four-week-long festival, ‘Century of The Rite Of Spring – Century of Modernism’, dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the first performance of the ballet.”