Or not. Ann Powers, NPR’s music critic, published this piece about the singer Lana Del Rey, and Del Rey tweeted some of her displeasure on Twitter, and then her stans – super fans – started to attack Powers. “The slap-back backfired — not only did Del Rey get called out, but her tweets drew people to a story that many might have missed — in part because it was so uncalled-for, but also because it revealed a fundamental misunderstanding of criticism.” – Los Angeles Times
Author: ArtsJournal2
Francisco Toledo, The Mexican Artist Who Just Died At 79, Embodied The Soul Of Oaxaca
Toledo’s art met social activism at every turn. For instance, “in December 2014, from his studio in Oaxaca, Mexico, he made a series of kites adorned with portraits of the ’43,’ or the 43 college students who were missing — disappeared allegedly by criminal and state forces in the neighboring state of Guerrero that year.” – The New York Times
Hey Amazon, Goodreads Is A Terrible, Neglected Trashfire
Goodreads is essentially a good listmaking app, a place where readers go to, well, make lists. Is it a community of readers? Um. “Goodreads lingers in the dustbin of the early aughts, doomed to the hideous beige design and uninspiring organization of a strip mall doctor’s office.” Amazon, what gives? – OneZero
Ask Male Actors (Not Just Women) How They’re Working And Parenting
Bryce Dallas Howard is a little fed up with watching actresses constantly being asked about parenting, and actors never getting asked. “It’s dangerous, because the assumption is a father doesn’t need to balance it because someone else is.” – Los Angeles Times
How 18th-Century Gentlemen Got Dressed [VIDEO]
Hint: They didn’t do it for themselves. – Aeon
How To Attract Young Audiences To Theatre, And Keep Them
A case study comes via Portland Center Stage in Oregon, where the theatre had a funded chance to experiment to see what works … and what doesn’t. Turns out, exterior bus advertising and billboards really work: “All those surveyed mentioned that if they can’t avoid advertising, they tend to pay attention.” – American Theatre
Rio De Janeiro’s Mayor Tries To Censor A Marvel Book With A Gay Kiss, But The Court Blocks Him
Predictable results of the homophobic censorship attempt (which was headed off by the judge as an issue of freedom of expression): “Copies of the comic book, Avengers: The Children’s Crusade, quickly sold out after the mayor’s intervention. The illustration that upset that mayor was also printed on the front page of Brazilian newspaper Folha de São Paulo.” – BBC
The Dances That Shook The World
What freaked out Elizabethan England? A dance from (gasp!) Italy, of course, where “a man clasped his female partner tightly around the waist with his left hand, took hold of the busk (the rigid point on the corset below her bosom) with his right, and lifted her high into the air so that his thigh was under her bottom.” Scandalizing! – BBC History Magazine
Amazon Is Opening A Physical Bookstore Right Across The Street From Ann Patchett’s Nashville Indie
But, an opinion writer says, Nashville needs to remember what’s important. “Independent bookstores don’t operate according to the normal rules of capitalism. They aren’t trying to beat each other. They aren’t even trying to beat Amazon. They’re creating communities — cozy places to beat the heat or come in from the cold.” (Amazon? Is not cozy.) – The New York Times
Do Our Brains Know The Difference Between Print Books And Audiobooks?
No. “The subject’s brains were creating meaning from the words in the same way, regardless if they were listening or reading. In fact, the brain maps for both auditory and visual input they created from the data looked nearly identical.” – Discover