“Pending final approval from Berlin city authorities, which organisers said was ‘in the works’, staff plan to erect 900 concrete wall slabs, each 3.60 metres (about 12 feet) tall, for the 6.6 million euro ($7.7 million) event. Visitors to the parallel world will have to apply online for entrance ‘visas’ … Set on a city block on Unter den Linden boulevard, the time-capsule project is due to launch on October 12 and end with a ritualistic tearing down of the wall on November 9, the day of the historic event in 1989.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
Watching Michelle Dorrance Choreograph Tap Steps On ABT
“‘Don’t look at the mirror, look at your feet,’ Michelle Dorrance corrects. Smiling at the counterintuitive suggestion, Gillian Murphy, Devon Teuscher and Christine Shevchenko — American Ballet Theatre principals accustomed to projecting up and out to opera house balconies — look down at their pointe shoes as they shuffle into a line of tight fifth positions. As polyrhythmic strains of music fill ABT’s studios, the trio flashes through small, quicksilver position changes while Teuscher quietly counts a steady 4/4 beat that isn’t yet audible in the music.”
‘Ugly, Garish Out-Of-Town Container Sheds’ – Finalists For The 2018 Carbuncle Cup
The shortlist for this year’s edition of British architecture’s booby prize includes a “Vegas heads to Plymouth by way of New York” student housing complex, an “absolutely terrifying” redesign of a traffic gateway, and the “grotesque” rooftop extension added to a historic hotel.
Supreme Court Of Philippines Upholds Artist’s Conviction For ‘Offending Religious Feelings’ – Then Gov’t Asks To Overturn It
“The pendulum keeps swinging for the case of the Filipino activist artist and organiser Carlos Celdran, who was convicted for ‘offending religious feelings’ for a 2010 protest in support of reproductive rights. A ruling on 1 August by the Philippines Supreme Court upheld a 2013 conviction … for violating Article 133 of the Revised Penal Code … But on 15 August Celdran received the backing of the Solicitor General Jose Calida, whose office petitioned the Supreme Court to reverse the conviction … and to declare Article 133 unconstitutional.”
Props To The Lexicographers: How Aretha Franklin Got A Citation In the OED
Ben Zimmer recounts how he traced the origin of the slang word “props” to Aretha’s version of the hit “Respect” (not Otis Redding’s original) – and convinced the gatekeepers of The Oxford English Dictionary to give the Queen of Soul her due.
Reviving A Centuries-Old Tradition Of Mending Broken Ceramics With Gold
The technique known as kintsugi (“golden seams”) or kintsukuroi (“golden repair”) developed in Japan around 500 years ago, and it’s still in use, and even spreading, today. As Casey Lesser reports, “not only has kintsugi been adopted and adapted by leading contemporary artists, these days, one can take kintsugi lessons and find self-help and wellness books that use it as a metaphor for embracing flaws and imperfections.”
Scottish Ballet’s Growing Program For Parkinson’s Patients
“Classes are already running at Dance Base in Edinburgh and Scottish Ballet in Glasgow and a £295,000 grant from the Paul Hamlyn Foundation will help the programme expand to Greenock, Kilmarnock, Dundee, Aberdeen and Inverness. Research has shown that dance can help people with the degenerative disease physically, mentally and socially.”
What Made Sigmund Freud Co-Write A Hatchet-Job Biography Of Woodrow Wilson?
For that we can credit (if that’s the word) one William C. Bullitt, friend and former patient of the Herr Doktor and a journalist, author, off-and-on diplomat, lecturer and inveterate schemer whom Ben Yagoda, in this article, likens to a real-life Zelig.
Hyperpolyglots: The Mysterious Brains Of The People Who Can Speak A Dozen Or More Languages
Judith Thurman (who speaks only three languages and came to grief with Vietnamese) meets with several of these savants to find out what (including any special neurological features) makes them tick.
The Untranslatable Japanese Phrase That Keeps The Entire Country Running
Yoroshiku onegaishimasu. “It’s a crucial term in Japan heard every single day in thousands of contexts. But it’s really hard to come up with a simple, easily translatable definition. And some foreigners might find it completely baffling.”