“Merz was the lone woman among a loose coterie of men who came to be grouped in late-1960s Italy under the banner of Arte Povera — ‘poor art’ — a term [denoting use of] humble, raw materials. … Recent exhibitions have made it clear that she was the most versatile and inventive member of the group.” – ARTnews
Author: Matthew Westphal
Social Workers Are Joining The Staffs Of Some U.S. Public Libraries
With public libraries open to the entire public, librarians in recent years have been seeing needs for services that their MLS programs didn’t train them to provide — from aiding job seekers to assisting growing numbers of people experiencing homelessness to treating drug overdoses. So some library systems have begun hiring resident social workers, who say that the lack of any stigma around going to a library makes it easier for people who need their help to ask for it. – NPR
L.A. Theatre Fires Director Five Days Before Play’s Opening, Cast Quits, Production Is Cancelled, And Questions Of Race And Privilege Remain
“On the day before the California premiere of Antoinette Nwandu’s Pass Over, a play about the harsh realities facing black men in America, Echo [Theater Company] staff on July 12 sent an email to patrons and posted a notice on its website: ‘Pass Over is not going to open due to internal artistic differences that cannot be reconciled.'” Reporter Makeda Easter looks into the mess. – Los Angeles Times
Two Sotheby’s Shareholders Sue To Block Sale Of Auction House To Private Owner
“The investors filed lawsuits this week in federal court in Manhattan claiming incomplete and misleading disclosures about … the planned $2.7 billion purchase of the auction house by French telecom titan and art collector Patrick Drahi’s BidFair USA.” – Bloomberg
Allan Ulrich, Longtime San Francisco Chronicle Arts Critic, Dead At 78
“[His] erudite, acerbic and elegantly crafted writing about dance and classical music filled the pages of The Chronicle and countless other local and national periodicals for more than 40 years.” – The San Francisco Chronicle
‘Radical Hospitality’ — Why Seattle’s Intiman Theatre Has Made All Its Tickets Free
“The initiative, artistic director Jen Zeyl explained, is about more than the standard theater problem of getting ‘butts in seats.’ (Though, of course, there’s that.) It’s about getting the butts one wants in seats — not just the people who can afford to take the $25+ crap shoot known as a theater ticket, but the people who can’t: the woman at the corner store, high-school sophomore, the guy asking for spare change on the sidewalk.” – The Seattle Times
UK Parliament To Start Inquiry Into National Lottery And Money It Distributes To Arts
The inquiry follows a long-term decline in lottery ticket sales as well as a report that the company which operates the Lottery diverted £39 million that was supposed to go to the arts and other charitable causes into its own marketing budget. – Arts Professional
Louvre Moves Into Luxury Cruise Business
“The Louvre Museum has partnered with French luxury cruise company Ponant to organize two culture cruises in 2020: one across the Persian Gulf, and one of the Mediterranean and the Adriatic, which will draw to an end in Venice.” (Controversy notwithstanding.) – Designboom
Propwatch: the hammock in ‘The Night of the Iguana’
Williams’s stage direction describes it as a canvas hammock, but in Rae Smith’s design it is all rope – knotted, unstable, full of holes, an anchorite’s flail, a nest and a cage. Williams’s characters know how all of those things feel. – David Jays
‘Russian Ark’ Director Closes His Film Foundation, Citing Hostility From Putin’s Government
Alexander Sokurov (Russian Ark, Faust, Father and Son, Mother and Son) set up the Primer Intonatsii (Example of Intonation) foundation in 2013 to aid young Russian filmmakers. But the organization has had trouble getting and maintaining funding and suffered what Sokurov called “unfriendliness and aggressiveness,” including an embezzlement investigation, from Russia’s Ministry of Culture. (Yes, Sokurov is a critic of Vladimir Putin.) – The Hollywood Reporter