“When [Penelope] Curtis arrived in 2015, the museum’s design had barely changed since it opened in 1969. … [One of her main projects is] to open up Gulbenkian’s ‘rather rigidly divided’ collection and shine a spotlight on its Islamic holdings.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
NPR Bosses Knew About Mike Oreskes Allegations But Kept Him On (And Newsroom Is Furious)
“NPR’s senior management was aware of multiple harassment complaints by women against its top newsroom executive during the past two years but took no action to remove him from his job until news reports about his conduct appeared on Tuesday. … Oreskes’s behavior, and the organization’s response to it, has stirred a virtual rebellion in NPR’s newsroom, particularly among female employees.”
NPR’s SVP For News Ousted After Harassment Accusations
“‘This morning I asked Mike Oreskes for his resignation because of inappropriate behavior,’ NPR CEO Jarl Mohn wrote in an email to NPR staff on Wednesday. ‘I have received his resignation, effective immediately.'”
German Arts World Has A Woman Problem, Too: Study
“Women are under-represented in decision-making positions in the German arts and earn less than men for equal work, according to a new study commissioned by the government and conducted by the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin.”
Top Posts From AJBlogs 11.01.17
After Inconclusive Hearing, Attorney General Steps In as Possible Plaintiff in Berkshire Museum Case
After hearing more than two hours of arguments today (Wednesday) from two sets of lawyers for plaintiffs, as well as a response to the plaintiffs’ motion by the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office, Judge John Agostini … read more
AJBlog: CultureGrrl Published 2017-11-01
The Stolen Medieval Manuscript That Was Returned In The Mail 50 Years Later
Here’s the story of the Luneborch Prayer Book, a beautiful 15th-century illuminated manuscript in Low German that went missing from the Peabody Library in Baltimore around 1962 – and that an unknown somebody mailed back in 2012.
Donald Bain, 82, One Of America’s Best-Selling Ghostwriters
Among the more than 100 books he (actually) authored were Margaret Truman’s Capital Crimes, the Murder, She Wrote books that were a spinoff of the TV series, and the notorious 1967 faux-memoir Coffee, Tea, or Me?, which purported to be the true-life escapades of a pair of swinging stewardesses (as they were called back then).
Sarah Polley’s 20-Year Journey To Adapt Margaret Atwood’s ‘Alias Grace’
“Today, Polley is an auteur whose movies – Away From Her, Take This Waltz, and the autobiographical Stories We Tell – form a sort of three-part meditation on female restlessness, the complexity of long-term relationships, and the slipperiness of memory and truth. But back when she first tried to option the rights to Alias Grace at age 18 – as a well-regarded young actress with no filmmaking experience – Atwood turned her down. “
How Bang On A Can Opened The Floodgates For The Alt-Classical Music
In Part II of an extended profile of the new-music powerhouse (see Part I here), Allan Kozinn gives an overview of the now-renowned composers and ensembles that Bang on a Can spawned and/or nurtured – not to mention a record label, a summer festival (popularly referred to as “Banglewood”), an educational program, and an avant-garde marching band – and considers the changes that the Bangers wrought in the entire U.S. musical ecosystem.
Re-Tooling Diaghilev’s Most Radical Ballet For 2017
“Parade was advertised as the world’s first cubist ballet – mostly in deference to Picasso’s designs, but also as a way of explaining the comic, disconnected logic of its fairground scenario and the clash of musical styles and found noise (pistol shots, sirens) in Satie’s score. … But for National Dance Company Wales (NDCW), it is Diaghilev’s relation to the Russian revolution that has provided the starting point of its show P.A.R.A.D.E.” Judith Mackrell has a look.