“As [director Kirill] Serebrennikov himself notes in a program interview: ‘I am doing an exotic, probably nonexisting job. Perhaps I am the only ballet stage director around.’ And so the big questions: Does having a director make a difference? And is Nureyev any good? The answers are yes and somewhat.” Roslyn Sulcas reports.
Author: Matthew Westphal
Is Culture In The Americas In Big Trouble?
That was the title of a panel discussion at Art Basel Miami Beach that “included artist Jordan Casteel, Brooklyn Museum director Anne Pasternak, Contemporary Arts Museum Houston director Bill Arning, and writer and photographer Teju Cole. While there weren’t many concrete solutions drawn, the conversation offered a clear diagnosis of the key issues facing art and culture and, at the very least, a starting point for how we can understand and address them going forward.
Spanish Medieval Art Pieces Caught Up In Catalonia Independence Fight
“Unrest has broken out at the Lleida Museum in western Catalonia after Spanish law enforcement officers entered the institution this morning. The move is the latest development in a long-running restitution saga centred on 44 religious artefacts housed at the museum, which have become a symbol of Catalonia’s bid for independence.”
Top Posts From AJBlogs 12.11.17
Janine Jansen at Carnegie Hall without veneer – or microphones breathing down her neck
What price freedom? Carnegie Hall’s Perspectives series allows its selected artist-curators to have something close to carte blanche over multiple concerts in numerous different forums. This year, the glamorous Dutch violinist Janine Jansen is one of those artists, … read more
AJBlog: Condemned to Music Published 2017-12-11
Great Expectations, Set By Museums, And Then?
I was drawn to an exhibition at the Toledo Museum of Art by its title: Glorious Splendor: Treasures of Early Christian Art. When I went to see it last month, it was not quite what I expected. Or what the title conjured. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t a good show. … read more
AJBlog: Real Clear Arts Published 2017-12-10
Robert Gard on Arts and Communities
When my good friend Maryo Gard Ewell asked me to write a reflection on the Gard Foundation/Americans for the Arts collaborative collection of Robert Gard’s writings (To Change the Face & Heart of America), … read more
AJBlog: Engaging Matters Published 2017-12-11
Iyer on Iyer
Vijay Iyer’s music occupies a fascinating terrain. It’s a world that emanates from a lifetime of improvisation and a multilayered approach to the passage of time. It’s also music that reflects its creator’s quiet defiance … read more
AJBlog: Infinite Curves Published 2017-12-11
Monday Recommendation: Discovering “Melanctha”
Dave Brubeck & Carmen McRae, Tonight Only (Columbia)
What would the Rifftides staff do without readers who keep us informed and on track? … read more
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2017-12-11
How Classical Music Molds Itself To A Given Historical Moment
When David Patrick Stearns first heard Jacqueline du Pre’s 1970 recording of the Dvořák Cello Concerto, he thought she “sounded like a freedom fighter.” Turns out he was right: she had played the work in a protest concert shortly after the 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. Stearns looks at other examples, from Wilhelm Furtwängler conducting Tchaikovsky just after Kristallnacht to Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra playing Shostakovich in the Soviet Union to Bernstein performing Mahler’s “Resurrection” Symphony after JFK’s assassination to, perhaps, James Levine leading Verdi’s Requiem last week.
‘Call Me By Your Name’ Author André Aciman Says That, At First, Elio And Oliver Never Had Sex
“I don’t usually write about sex. I’m kind of a person who wouldn’t. By the time I’m on page 50 or 60, I sense, ‘Okay, this has been a wonderful fantasy, but stop.’ Something told me not to stop. … I said, ‘No, I want them to have fun. I want them to be sexual.'”
The White American Woman Who Mastered Traditional Japanese Woodblock Printing Nearly 100 Years Ago
“Artist and printmaker Lilian May Miller constructed her personal image as consciously as she did her artwork. When she was in Japan, she wore Western clothing, often favoring Amelia Earhart-esque ties and mannish blazers. On a 1929 lecture tour in America, on the other hand, at a time when Japanese women were casting off kimonos, she wore traditional Japanese dress. She cropped her hair short, went by Jack among family and friends, and described herself as unable to work up ‘even the ghost of’ a romantic interest in men.”
William H. Gass, Postmodern Novelist And ‘Magician Of The Word’, Dead At 93
“Mr. Gass wrote just three novels, none of them bestsellers, but he was often described as one of America’s finest literary stylists – ‘a magician of the word, the writer of a prose so rich that it makes Vladi¬mir Nabokov’s seem impoverished,’ Washington Post book critic Michael Dirda wrote in 2013.”
Classical Music World Worries Over Clampdown On Trade In Rosewood
“New regulations on the international movement of rosewood have hit hard in parts of the music industry, which has long relied on rosewood as a ‘tonewood’ used in many kinds of instruments, including guitars, cellos and clarinets. The reason for the [customs] crackdown, and for Katz’s anxiety? China. Specifically, Chinese consumers’ growing demand for rosewood or ‘hongmu’ furniture.”
Why Saratoga Lost $1 Million On New York City Ballet Last Summer (And Cut This Summer’s Performances In Half)
Says Saratoga Performing Arts Center president Elizabeth Sobol, “Here is what I observed: 80 percent of the audience only buys tickets to one performance, 11 percent buys a ticket to two performances. Only 9 percent buy for two or more night. And while it’s wonderful to have this deeply passionate audience, by presenting two weeks we are doubling our expenses and cannibalizing our audience.”