“Ken Simons has had his hands on Picasso paintings, moved Tracey Emin’s bed and manoeuvred an Antony Gormley sculpture though a third-floor window. For him, a famous painting or sculpture isn’t just a precious creation to be admired – it’s a practical puzzle. Will it fit through the door? How can it be carried? Which trolley is best to wheel it through the gallery? And, in the case of some outlandish modern sculptures – how does it fit together?”
Author: Matthew Westphal
What’s The Hot New Source For TV Material? Podcasts
“A podcast offers up intellectual property in a particularly appealing format – compared with a book or even a script, it’s a stronger proof of concept of how a show or movie would actually play out. ‘It’s one step closer to seeing it onscreen,’ [Matt] Tarses said. ‘You already know what it sounds like.'” (Tarses is the creator of Alex, Inc., an ABC series about a podcaster, based on Alex Blumberg’s podcast about launching his podcasting company, Gimlet Media. How meta can you get?)
Stockhausen’s Impossibly Massive Opera Cycle ‘LICHT’ Gets A Half-Size Version (Which Makes It Just-Barely-Possibly Massive)
The seven-day, 26-hour avant-garde behemoth requires not only vocal and instrumental soloists, choir, orchestra, ballet dancers, and electronics, but four helicopters as well. (Yes, the notorious “Helicopter Quartet” is from LICHT.) The Dutch, being practical folk, have now devised a smaller-scale adaptation: aus LICHT, which runs a mere 15 hours of music over three days. Reporter Simon Cummings finds out how they did it (and convinced the famously controlling Stockhausen Foundation to cooperate).
The Antiquarian Book Dealer Who Became ‘France’s Bernie Madoff’
Gérard Lhéritier, the son and grandson of plumbers, built himself into the biggest, and flashiest, seller of old manuscripts and books in France, a businessman whose (heavily publicized) prize piece of inventory was the Marquis de Sade’s original manuscript of 120 Days of Sodom. (Naturally, Esquire uses that fact as the hook for this article.) Now Lhéritier, his assets seized, stands accused orchestrating France’s largest-ever Ponzi scheme, using a Wall Street-style device to bilk thousands of shareholders of more than $1 billion.
The Egyptian Artist Who Was Really An Israeli Spying For Mossad
“In the early 1950s, a Mossad agent named Shlomo Cohen-Abravanel was sent to Egypt, under the cover-story that he was a French abstract painter named Charduval. Abravanel’s fake artist persona was so successful that he scored a small solo exhibition at Cairo’s Museum of Modern Art, while the actual Abravanel went on to design the Mossad’s official emblem.”
Houston Symphony Music Director Andrés Orozco-Estrada Named Chief Conductor Of Vienna Symphony
The 40-year-old Colombian-Austrian, who’s also chief conductor of the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, succeeds Philippe Jordan (who’s also music director of the Paris Opera) at the start of the 2020-21 season. (At that point, Jordan will cross the street to become music director of the Vienna State Opera.)
Think West End Ticket Prices Are Too High? Here’s Why They Cost So Much
“Every year London’s commercial theatres are accused of profiteering, as ticket prices rocket and the industry boasts of record-breaking revenues. But analysing the high costs involved, ticketing expert Richard Howle shows where your money goes – and why musicals remain a risky investment, often taking years to recoup.”
Here’s The African-American Museum That Charleston, And America, Need
Michael Kimmelman writes about the long-planned International African American Museum, to be located at the wharf on Charleston’s waterfront where close to half of all African slaves brought to the U.S. arrived.
More Commonwealth Authors Demand (Again) That Americans Be Kicked Out Of Man Booker Prize
“Three years since the Man Booker began allowing any author writing in English and published in the UK to enter, 99% of Folio Academy members who responded to the question have said that the Booker should change its rules again, with most responses citing the new ubiquity of US authors in the prize’s longlists.”
Lots Of Bad Public Art Has Made Macedonia’s Capital A Giant Monument To Kitsch
“Quick quiz. Which of the following makes sense?
a) Three pirate ships on a river in a landlocked country in the Balkans;
b) A 47-foot-high bronze statue of an ancient warrior that is Alexander the Great and is also not Alexander the Great; or
c) A house dedicated to Mother Teresa, a saint known for her modesty, done up in an opulent style that can best be described as Miami meets the Flintstones.
Answer: None, unless you are in Skopje, Macedonia.”