“For almost two decades, self-taught artist Nek Chand worked in secret. In the cover of night, he’d sneak away to a clearing deep in a forest owned by the government on the outskirts of the Indian city of Chandigarh. It was there that he built his very own shangri-la: a garden filled with glittering sculptures of gods, goddesses, and other mystical beings.” Here’s the decades-long story of Chand’s Rock Garden.
Author: Matthew Westphal
Cecil Taylor’s ‘Challenging’ Avant-Garde Jazz Was More Accessible Than (Some) People Think
“Consider the reaction of another listener: Jimmy Carter. In 1978, the president, not renowned as an especially sophisticated jazz listener, hosted a jazz festival at the White House. Most of the bill was reasonably mainstream, if widely varying in style – Sonny Rollins, Stan Getz, Clark Terry, Chick Corea – but it also included Taylor, who must have been hard-pressed to fit his expansive music into the requisite five-minute slot. The music was far from plain, but the man from Plains was agog. … ‘The president took the pianist’s two hands in his own, looking at them with wonderment and awe. ‘I’ve never seen anyone play the piano that way,’ he marveled.'” (includes sound clips)
Quebec Gives Millions In Extra Funding To Province’s Three Main Orchestras
“[The Montreal Symphony will] receive a supplemental grant of $7.5 million over five years in addition to the $8.8 million it gets annually from the province … The Orchestre Métropolitain [du Grand Montréal] can look forward to an extra $2.5 million over five years – one-third of the money awarded to the OSM, but a formidable sum if viewed as a proportion of its modest budget of about $5 million … The Orchestre symphonique de Québec will get $3 million.”
Choreographer William Forsythe’s Double Homecoming
“After more than 45 years working in Europe, changing the face of dance, he has returned to his native America. … More significantly, since he left his own company in 2015, he has turned his attention back to the ballet studio. After a journey that took him to the outermost shores of contemporary movement, where he has reimagined the classical vocabulary, turning it around, taking it apart and examining it from every angle, he is back working with pointe shoes and traditional forms.”
Geffen Playhouse Begins New Playwrights’ Residency, ‘The Writers’ Room’
“The Writers’ Room will be led by Rachel Wiegardt-Egel, the [Los Angeles theater’s] newly named manager of New Play Development. A group of playwrights will each receive one-year residences beginning in September. There they can give each other feedback on plays, receive dramaturgical support, work with a director and actors, and read their plays to the public.”
Smithsonian To Open Satellite Museum In London
“The Smithsonian Institution has confirmed that it will work with the Victoria and Albert Museum to set up a joint gallery and exhibition programme in East London, on the former Olympic site. Yesterday (9 April) the Smithsonian’s regents (trustees) gave formal approval for their first base outside the US.”
Juilliard Selects Its Next Director Of Dance
“Alicia Graf Mack, an educator and former performer with Dance Theater of Harlem and Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, will become the director of the dance division at Juilliard … She will begin in July, when Damian Woetzel, the former New York City Ballet principal, takes over as Juilliard’s president.”
Choreographer Donald McKayle, First Black Man To Direct A Broadway Musical, Dead At 87
“He performed with modern-dance pioneers Martha Graham and José Limón while still in his teens. At 21, he formed his own dance company, whose members included such renowned figures as Alvin Ailey, Arthur Mitchell and Eliot Feld. [He] also choreographed several early works that have become acknowledged as modern-dance classics.” In 1974 he directed and choreographed Raisin, a musical adaptation of Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, for which he received two Tony nominations; he received further nominations for choreography for Doctor Jazz (1975) and Sophisticated Ladies (1981).
Patti LuPone Says YouTube Personalities Are Stealing Work From ‘Legitimate’ Stage Actors
“The business is horrible, it’s been horrible forever and it’s worse now because of Twitter and Facebook and YouTube, so legitimate actors that have trained in the profession have a harder time getting hired than personalities on YouTube, or on Twitter.” And what’s more, movie stars “should come to the stage with the right intention. And they should be stage-worthy, not try to come to the stage for credibility.”
Women Performers Have Been At The Heart Of The Circus For 250 Years, And They’re Still Breaking Paths Today
“It has been 250 years since ‘modern’ circus was born with Philip Astley’s invention of the equestrian ring in London in 1768. … What is often overlooked about that first event is that Patty Astley, a talented equestrian, was right there alongside her husband in the creation of modern circus. As part of her act, she rode around the ring with her hands and arms covered in bees. The history of circus is replete with powerful, talented female performers and artists. But they have often been overlooked in favour of their male counterparts.”