Dolla Merrillees’ resignation comes in the wake of revelations that the black-tie dinner hosted by the museum in February was a massive loss maker, costing $388,000 to stage, and requiring the museum to chip in $215,209.50 from its own budget. The fundraiser raised $78,000, of which a mere $1050 was raised from supporters on the night.
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New Technology Could Finally Make Lightweight Braille Books And E-Readers Workable
“Harvard researchers … [have] crafted reprogrammable braille that could eliminate the need for unique pages without the bulk of a display. The concept is straightforward. The team compressed a thin, curved elastic shell using forces on each end, and then made indents with a basic stylus (similar to how you print a conventional braille book). Once you remove the compression, the shell ‘remembers’ the indents. You can erase them just by stretching the shell. … There’s no lattice holding it up, and it works with everything from conventional paper to super-thin graphene.”
Patrick Williams, Grammy-Winning Jazz-Band Leader And Emmy-Winning Composer, Dead At 74
“Williams was among the most versatile composers of his generation, earning an Oscar nomination (for adapting opera in Breaking Away, 1979), four Emmys (for dramatic music including Lou Grant, 1980) and two Grammys (for arrangements including his classic jazz album Threshold, 1974) during more than 50 years of music-making in New York and Los Angeles.”
Police Recover Renoir And Rubens Stolen By Con Man Dressed As Rabbi
“The paintings had been stolen in an elaborate scam involving at least eight different con artists, the police confirmed. At least one had posed as a Jewish rabbi with diplomatic immunity and offered the respective gallery owners €26 million for the paintings before stealing them. The theft took place at a rented office in Monza, above the Albanian embassy … on April 20th, 2017.”
Cambodian Classical Dance Revival Takes A Surprising Turn: An All-Gay-Male Troupe
The resurrection of an art form nearly wiped out by the Khmer Rouge has spread from Phnom Penh to Northern California to South Philadelphia. Now a young Cambodian-American has returned to his parents’ homeland to teach other gay men in a genre traditionally danced only by women – and to choreograph new works in the style.
Filmmaker Theo Angelopoulos’s Archives Destroyed In Greek Wildfires
“‘My husband’s books, his letters from celebrities, all the texts that authors had dedicated to him’ were destroyed in the fire, Phoebe Angelopoulou told local television. … The filmmaker, who won the prestigious Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1998 for Eternity and a Day, often spent summers with his family at the house in Mati, east of the capital.”
Robert Lepage Cancels Second Controversial Production
Earlier this month, the Canadian director’s piece SLĀV, which featured African-American slave songs performed by white singers, was cut from the Montreal Jazz Festival after protests. Now Lepage has called off Kanata, a show about the relationship between European settlers in Canada and First Nations peoples which he created for Ariane Mnouchkine’s Théâtre du Soleil in Paris. Indigenous Canadian artists had objected to work about them being made without their participation, and the controversy led several North American co-producers to back out of the project.
Court Rules Owner Of $13 Million Giotto Can’t Ship It Out Of UK
“[The London High Court] found that Arts Council England (ACE) was justified in rejecting an application to export [the painting] from Britain to Switzerland. The artwork was brought to Britain by Kathleen Simonis, who purchased it in Florence for about £3,500 in 1990, when it was thought to be an unremarkable 19th-century panel painting. Restoration work led to its subsequent upgrading to one of the most important painters of [the 14th-century Florentine] school.”
Fyre Festival Organizer Pleads Guilty To Second Fraudulent Ticket Scheme
“Billy McFarland, whose efforts at running the disastrous Fyre Festival led to wire fraud charges last year, pleaded guilty on Thursday to a new set of federal charges related to a fraudulent ticket-selling scam that authorities said he operated while out on bail in the first case.”
Some World Music Artists Are Skipping WOMAD Because Trying To Get UK Visas Is So Awful
“Acts from 128 countries are due to attend this year’s festival. But [organiser Chris] Smith said some had accepted the invitation to perform, only to withdraw after looking into the visa process. He blamed the situation on the 2016 decision to leave the European Union, which sent a message out that the UK was closed to foreigners.”