Two Boston-area theatres are cutting back operations because of a “difficult economy.” “Merrimack Repertory Theatre in Lowell, one of the longest-running theaters north of Boston, this week announced a multistep restructuring in an attempt to stay solvent. The Wang Center, meanwhile, said yesterday that it would cancel its production of “True West” early next year.”
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MoMA – Ah, But The Art!
“The new museum wasn’t the only thing being built: The collections were, too. The MoMA has acquired hundreds of works since the exodus. The words “New Acquisition” appear on label after label. While museums that ignored the 20th century lament that it’s too late now to catch up — the art isn’t available and its cost would be prohibitive — the MoMA has received from its supporters a windfall that would make up an entire 20th-century department in any other institution. And these new additions match the quality of the existing holdings — which is staggering. Very few things are less than the finest of their kind.”
Detroit Symphony Won’t Renew Perlman Contract
After four years, the Detroit Symphony has decided not to renew Itzhak Perlman’s contract as the orchestra’s principal guest conductor. “Though Perlman, one of the world’s most famous violinists, will no longer hold an official post, his relationship with the DSO — which has blossomed from a risky experiment into a rousing artistic and marketing success — will continue.”
Is Barnes-To-Philly Saga Almost Done?
“Within days – possibly by Thanksgiving – a Montgomery County Orphans’ Court judge will rule on whether the Barnes Foundation can move its multibillion-dollar art collection from Lower Merion to a site along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. The ruling will culminate more than two years of legal wrangling since the Barnes board of directors, saying the foundation was nearly broke, petitioned for the right to move its gallery to a more-accessible location downtown.”
Museum Tension – Collect Or Promote?
Outgoing Getty Museum director Deborah Gribbon’s statement that “museums best serve the public by collecting, exhibiting and interpreting works of art of the highest quality” has “pricked up ears in the art world. It was widely viewed as an indictment that the Getty is not serious enough about acquiring masterpieces, despite its fabulous wealth left by its namesake patron after his death in 1976. Gribbon’s resignation cuts to an ongoing struggle for museums: How should precious money be spent in an expensive enterprise: on art or on programs promoting the arts?”
Art Basel Miami Commits To Miami
Art Basel Miami Beach has re-upped its commitment and will stay in Miami indefinitely. ”We are certainly pleased that the show has garnered the international reputation that it has and that it was generally acclaimed as the most important contemporary art fair in North America after its first incarnation.”
Music Downloaders An Advertiser’s Dream
“The debate over the legitimacy of file-sharing networks rages on as the music industry continues its threats to close the services down for good. Meanwhile the millions of downloaders are proving both an advertiser’s dream come true and a branding nightmare.”
Toews Wins GG Fiction Award
Miriam Toews has won the Canadian Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction for her novel A Complicated Kindness, a “victory that surprised many, since Alice Munro’s collection Runaway won the Giller Prize last week and received a rave review from U.S. novelist Jonathan Franzen in the Sunday New York Times.”
Movie Industry Targets Movie Pirates
Having learned from the recording industry in their fight against piracy, the American film industry has filed its first lawsuits, targeting hundreds of movie downloaders. “The future of our industry, and of the hundreds of thousands of jobs it supports, must be protected from this kind of outright theft using all available means. ‘The lawsuits were filed in federal courts across the country by Disney, Warner Bros., MGM, Universal, Fox, Paramount and Sony.”
MoMA – New Envelope For Great Collection
“The new Modern is an elegant envelope for an unsurpassed collection of 20th Century art shimmering against expanses of pristine white.” But “anyone expecting a museum in the theatrical, exuberant vein of the Guggenheim extravaganza that Frank Gehry bestowed on Bilbao will be disappointed. MoMA is not thrilling, dazzling or emotive. It seduces with a murmur. There are no panels crammed with historical background, no interactive gizmos, no flashy displays, not even a peach-hued wall — nothing to distract from the stark potency of the work.”