The 50th anniversary edition of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band didn’t make the cut, though the endlessly re-released Gould Goldberg Variations did. (This version includes every single take the pianist did.) The Goldbergs are up against a 25-disc set of Leonard Bernstein conducting Leonard Bernstein, excerpts from an archive of old Somali music that was buried in the desert during the long civil war, 1970’s Afro-pop and jazz from what’s now Burkina Faso, and songs by a zither-playing gospel-blues preacher. (For a complete list of nominees, click here.)
Author: Matthew Westphal
The Guggenheim Bilbao, 20 Years On
“Despite a slight dip in attendance after the 2008 financial crisis, the museum has welcomed more than 20 million visitors – two-thirds of them from abroad – since it opened on 19 October 1997. In a city of around 350,000 people, the original feasibility study calculated that 400,000 visitors a year were needed to justify the initial expense (estimated at $228m by the economist Beatriz Plaza) and ongoing subsidy (currently around €9m a year).”
Philly’s Oldest Alternative Art Space Is Selling Its Building
“‘We are going to switch from being building-based to being project-based,’ [Painted Bride] executive director Laurel Raczka said Monday. … The organization is not having any particularly stressful financial problems at this time, Raczka said. Rather, the decision to free itself from the building is driven by a desire to serve the city’s younger artists and audiences in a way that makes sense.”
The Strange Case Of The Arab Whodunnit: Noir Fiction Sees A Revival In The Mideast
“Away from caliphate building and sectarianism, a neo-noir revolution has been creeping across the Middle East, allowing artists and writers to act as ombudsmen in the current political climate. Jonathan [Guyer] meets the writers who are latching onto the adventure, despair and paranoia prevalent in genre fiction to tell stories that transcend the present.” (audio)
Dance Works Showing Bare Breasts Defunded By Israel’s Culture Ministry
“The Culture Ministry and the Jerusalem municipality will not support three performances in Jerusalem International Dance Week, which begins Tuesday, because they feature partial nudity.” (The performances are not being cancelled.)
Top Posts From AJBlogs 11.28.17
Education and Engagement
Education and engagement are increasingly being paired in job titles and descriptions. There is some sense to that, but the differences – with respect to fundamental focus – are significant. … read more
AJBlog: Engaging Matters Published 2017-11-28
Machine-Made Art
For as long as there have been machines, I suppose, the question has been asked: Can Machines Make Art? … It’s an interesting question, but there is a supplementary question that I find even more interesting: How Much Do We Care About Machine-Made Art? … read more
AJBlog: Infinite Curves Published 2017-11-28
Dan’s Plans, Redrafted: Revelations in Metropolitan Museum’s FY17 Annual Report
A close look at the financials in the Met’s recently published Annual Report for fiscal 2017 (ended June 30) suggests that it’s premature to add “Turnaround King” to [CEO Kenneth] Weiss’s titles. The realization of the museum’s “Financial Transformation Plan” still has a long, bumpy way to go. … read more
AJBlog: CultureGrrl Published 2017-11-28
This Woman Is The Reason There’s A Video Archive Of 4,000 Broadway And Off-Broadway Productions
How Betty Corwin, now 97, corralled and cajoled producers, unions, and librarians to create, and run for 31 years, the Theatre on Film and Tape Archive at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.
Artist Stephen Knapp, Known For His ‘Lightpaintings’, Dead At 70
“[He] used specially treated pieces of glass that he mounted on walls and in metal braces to refract and reflect dazzling beams of color.” As he once told an interviewer, “Instead of using paint to capture light, I’m actually painting with light, taking it a giant step forward.”
Is The Museum Of The Bible Propaganda For The Truth Of Protestant Scripture? Only If You Don’t Look Closely
Sure, Hobby Lobby president Steve Green, the museum’s major funder, is an evangelical activist. Yet, writes Will Saletan, if you pay attention to the wall texts and exhibits, you’ll find that they allow for both ambiguity and ambivalence, not to mention the Bible’s borrowings from other religions.
Fake News In America (This Isn’t The First Time It’s Been This Bad)
Slate resident Interrogator Isaac Chotiner talks to Kevin Young, author of Bunk: The Rise of Hoaxes, Humbug, Plagiarists, Phonies, Post-Facts, and Fake News, about “what inspired his book idea (it wasn’t Trump), whether con men ever believe their own nonsense, and why people are willing to believe some hoaxes more than others.”