Sure, there’s more craft beer and more restaurants than there were 10 or 15 years ago – and there are also a lot of Millennials who left Columbus for the city, and then returned because Columbus is a lot more affordable. But they missed theatre, and so they made theatre. – American Theatre
Author: ArtsJournal2
Is There A Good Way To Contextualize ‘Turandot’ For 2019?
The Canadian Opera Company is trying to figure that out, but it’s complex. The pseudo-Asian characters Ping, Pang, and Pong have been renamed in Toronto, but tenor Julius Ahn, who sings Pang (now named Bob) has some questions. “”Why can’t we be funny? Why can’t we be silly? Why can’t we be complex? Why can’t we be lighthearted? Why can’t we be mean? Can’t Asians be crass onstage? For me, art itself needs to be inclusive.” – CBC
Kehinde Wiley’s New Statue In Times Square Directly Takes On Confederate Idols
Who could say it better than Philip Kennicott? “The old-fashioned, ceremonial unveiling of a statue is mostly extinct as a cultural spectacle. New art works are generally introduced quietly, amid white wine, canapés and polite chatter at exhibition openings. Now and then, perhaps a new museum may open with a ribbon-cutting. But Kehinde Wiley, the man who painted the portrait of Barack Obama that now hangs in the National Portrait Gallery, tried to reinvent the unveiling Friday afternoon in Times Square, complete with a brass band, gawking crowds, speeches by a phalanx of political notables and, finally, a few tugs on a shimmery silver cloth draped over his latest work, a monumentally scaled bronze equestrian statue.” – The Washington Post
Women And Museums: It’s Not Just About Not Being Naked
True, the Guerrilla Girls famously asked if women had to be naked to get into the Met (the percentages are not great), but the unseen labor of women artists and women museum professionals is a much larger story. That is to say, the larger, and flatter, the artwork, the better the chance a woman artist might have of getting a show. – Hyperallergic
Is It Time To Get Rid Of Remedial Math?
College students actually do just fine without it, or so Cal State says. This probably won’t shock a lot of humanities majors, but an administrator says, “The traditional pathway, where we had one route through developmental math for all students, as if they were all going on to take an algebra-based major, was not functional.” You don’t say. – LAist
As Banned Books Week Comes To An End, One Might Wonder If Books Are Really Still Banned
The answer is yes. Yes, they sure are. And it’s not just Harry Potter or And Tango Makes Three. “Our government doesn’t actually ban books, does it? Sure it does! The federal government, and state and local governments, do it all the time. The New Jim Crow. The Color Purple. Excel for Dummies. In the incarceration capital of the world, books are often withheld from prisons because of their content, though sometimes for capricious and inexplicable reasons. When this kind of censorship becomes public prison officials often back down because it’s embarrassing. But still it happens.” – Inside Higher Ed
Popular Crowdfunding Site Kickstarter Doubles Down On Anti-Union Stance After Its Artists Ask It To Be Better
Kickstarter, where thousands of artists and writers and circus performers and musicians and etc. have gotten millions of dollars of funding, fired two union organizers a couple of weeks ago. Creators including Neil Gaiman, Molly Crabapple, and a bunch of comics and other magazines got together to ask Kickstarter to be better. The company’s response was not exactly warm to the creators. – Current Affairs
The Whistleblower Sure Can Write
We don’t know who he is, or at least many of us don’t, but one instructor says it’s time for writing students to take lessons from his clear prose. He has great topic sentences! He knows how to use active verbs! – The New York Times
The Wild, Weird, Sometimes Gorgeous Designs Of Emergency Cash In Germany At The End Of WWI
As the end of WWI led to economic crises, many German towns and villages issued their own emergency cash, or “notgeld.” The designs range widely from local legends, including fairytales, to sharply pointed political printing. – The Guardian (UK)
What’s Going On Behind The Scenes At This Hip Evangelical Culture Magazine?
A post about race and racism from The Relevant‘s former managing editor went viral, and the fallout “has already led to a ‘sabbatical’ for Relevant Media Group’s founder and CEO, an outpouring of solidarity from other ex-employees, and a sprawling online conversation about race, gender, and office politics in Christian organizations.” – Slate