J. Seward Johnson Jr. makes three-dimensional sculptural versions of famous Impressionist paintings. “The experience sounds risible, more the stuff of amusement parks than sculpture parks or museums. But there’s an uncanny quality to seeing a familiar painting expanded into real space, and being able to walk through the picture plane is positively weird. It heightens the physicality of the motifs in the composition and thereby underlines the artifice and skill that went into transforming them into a painting. Also, I have to confess, wandering around in the three-dimensional paintings is really a lot of fun. And with no restrictions on photographing or touching the works, who can doubt the show is going to be a riot for grown-ups and an absolute paradise for children?”
Blog
The Iraq Museum Lie – How Did It Happen?
First reports from Iraq said the National Museum had been looted of 170,000 artifacts. That was wildly off the mark. It was untrue. “What happened? The source of the lie, Donny George, director general of research and study of the Iraqi State Board of Antiquities, now says (Washington Post, June 9) that he originally told the media that “there were 170,000 pieces in the entire museum collection. Not 170,000 pieces stolen. No, no, no. That would be every single object we have! Of course, George saw the story of the stolen 170,000 museum pieces go around the world and said nothing – indeed, two weeks later, he was in London calling the looting “the crime of the century.’ Why?”
Joyce In Bloom
“There are many puzzles attached to James Joyce’s Ulysses, not the least of which is its reputation of being unreadable. It might be the greatest novel in the English language, so it goes, but who can read it? For those who can, there is no puzzle: Joyce’s account of one day in the life of his antihero, Leopold Bloom, is as spellbinding as the entire history of Odysseus’s journeys during the Trojan wars in Homer’s Odyssey, on which it is loosely modelled.”
Ashes To Art (Hi, Uncle Charlie)
Miss that special someone? Now you can keep them around, even after they’re dead. A Seattle artist is “making urns from human ashes, following a formula Josiah Spode invented in 1797, producing fine English china glaze by adding calcinated cow bone to the company’s clay mixture. Friends and relatives of various deceased gave him the ashes he’s using in his human urn sculptures. Each comes in an edition of two, one piece for the commissioning parties and one for him.”
Thieves Hit Rothschild Collection
“On Tuesday night, in what is believed to have been the latest in a long line of highly organised ‘stolen to order’ art heists, a gang of thieves escaped with a haul of precious items worth hundreds of thousands of pounds from Waddesdon Manor, home of the world-famous Rothschild Collection. Thames Valley police confirmed that a gang of five men, disguised in boiler suits and balaclavas, broke into the National Trust-owned stately home near Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, and made off with more than 100 gold boxes and a number of other valuable pieces including several works of art.”
Reforming Saddam’s Literary Reputation
Saddam wasn’t just a dictator, of course, he was a best-selling author whose books were greeted with rapturous reviews. Of course now that he’s out of power, the critics have reformed their judgment of Saddam’s literary efforts. “Ali Abdel-Amir, a writer, has pronounced his former leader?s novels ‘shallow’. The female characters are ‘always unfaithful and were either Kurds or Iranians’, he said.”
Art Returned To Iraq Museum In Trunk Of A Car
The Iraq Museum has had one of its most valuable artworks returned. “The sacred Vase of Warka, a centrepiece of the Iraqi National Museum collection and feared to have been lost for ever after being looted, was returned yesterday. Three unidentified men brought it to the museum in the boot of a car.”
Is Theatre Inherently Political?
If playwrights speak to the human condition, can their work be anything less than political? Do we inherently trust playwrights who are overtly political? A group of prominent playwrights gathers to discuss the issue.
Aussie TV/Filmmakers Wary Of US/Aus Free Trade Deal
The US/Australia free trade deal was made primarily for agriculture. But Australia’s film and TV industry is upset because it fears American products will overwhelm the home-grown industry. “The Australian film and television industry is small by world standards and protected by a raft of local media content rules. Some 55% of commercial television primetime viewing must be Australian made. At upwards of $250,000 an hour for quality drama, that’s no small investment. In contrast, top rating US shows can be bought in for as little as a tenth of the cost of the homegrown version.”
Glennon: Is Rock Music Dying?
“Though it gives me no joy whatsoever to say it, I’ve become certain that rock is in its last days. And I’ve started to believe that the subgenre that appears on the surface to offer rock its best hope for a full recovery is actually nothing more than a sign that death is nearer than anyone had thought. I’ve begun to believe that the far-reaching and seemingly endlessly expansive subgenre of rock-based experimental music is simply a function of the sickly old art form examining its life, noting the many things it might have been (in addition and, often, in opposition to the many things it actually has been), exploring each of them to the extent it’s capable, sighing at the thought of some missed opportunities, perhaps even registering slight pangs of regret for what it did instead (prog-rock, perhaps, or death metal, and, of course, Steely Dan).”