As the great illustrator Saul Steinber once put it, “It would be difficult to write about Véra without mentioning Vladimir. But it would impossible to write about Vladimir without mentioning Véra.” Miranda Popkey looks at how and Véra remains so fascinating, despite her strenuous attempts to erase herself.
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The Fine Lines Of Translation (What Did That Mean?)
Good translators approach their work in all sorts of different ways. They have egos as big as successful people in any other arena, but the ones I respect are keenly aware of the difference between creativity and appropriation. They might see their work as akin to a curator’s, a librarian’s or a publisher’s. To such people works of art are entrusted — and part of that trust is that they do not alter the objects in their care with inappropriate intrusions of their own personality. There is no little art in mounting the successful museum show, but one would be rightly appalled to find the curator touching up the Rembrandts.
Why Does It Take So Long For Memorials To Get Built In D.C.?
“It took more than three years for the leaders behind a proposed Desert Storm memorial to secure the plot of federal land they want to build their project. The World War I memorial has a site and a winner of a national design competition, but its officials are still tweaking and adjusting their plans to get clearance to build. And then there’s the cautionary tale of the 20 years it will have taken the Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial to move from authorization to opening in 2021.” Peggy McGlone looks into the challenges and obstacles.
Athens Was A Wreck. Now It’s Become One Of Europe’s Most Dynamic Cultural Capitals
There are places we live and places we visit, and then there are the other places. Places we return to, where we put down roots, but not strong enough roots to hold us — places that change us, that we haunt and are haunted by. Nowhere embodies this for me more than Athens, a city I’ve watched shift and evolve, endure crisis and chaos and economic collapse, and yet emerge from the wreckage as one of the continent’s most vibrant and significant cultural capitals, more popular than ever as a tourist destination. (Last year Athens welcomed a record 5 million visitors, double the 2012 figure.)
When This Dealer Alerted Poland That He Had Some Nazi-Looted Art, Poland Tried To Prosecute *Him*. Now He’s Suing Poland
“As the old saying goes, no good deed goes unpunished.” David D’Arcy recounts the aggravating story of Russian-born American art dealer Alexander Khochinsky, who reported to Poland that his father, a World War II veteran, had left him an 18th-century portrait that had belonged to Poland’s National Museum in Poznan, was stolen by German troops in 1943, and then seized (and kept) by Soviet troops as the Nazis retreated.
It Used To Be ‘The Quentin Tarantino Of Opera Houses’ – What Happened To English National Opera?
“ENO is now a shell of the great and pioneering company it was when Peter Jonas was general director in the 1980s. Under Jonas, director of productions David Pountney and music director Mark Elder, ENO developed enormous self-confidence, great visual elan and an in-your-face aesthetic that combined high camp with raw violence.” Now the company lurches from crisis to crisis, runs fewer performances of duller productions, and rents out its house for half the year. Stephen Moss has a few suggestions for making ENO great again – including getting rid of its ‘white elephant’ of a theatre.
‘Rips, Tears, And Falls’ – The Nasty Injuries That Can End – Or Not – A Ballet Dancer’s Career
Lauren Post caught her foot in the hem of her costume and tore a knee ligament onstage. Michele Wiles was being lifter high over her partner’s head when he lost balanced and they crashed – onstage. Natalia Makarova famously has a piece of scenery crash onto her mid-performance. And there’s that dreaded pop! of the Achilles tendon rupturing. Sarah Kaufman tells tales of bodily disaster and recovery.
‘Ethnographic Choreography’ – Allison Orr Makes Dances On Sanitation Workers, Power Linemen, Cooks
“Using the movements of everyday workers, she crafts large-scale extravaganzas that have included more than 75 performers (and sometimes trucks), audiences of 2,000, and a deep research process that may involve her learning how to scale a power-line distribution pole or riding with a sanitation worker at 4 am. She recently spoke to Dance Magazine about her unique creative process.”
The First Feminist Comedy Club Is Now Open On Sunset Boulevard
“On Los Angeles’s Sunset Boulevard, a street bursting with comedy clubs and live acts, lies a small theater devoted to a new kind of entertainment: inclusive comedy. The Ruby is a self-described comedy theater and school ‘openly founded on the ideals of intersectional feminism.'” But is it funny? Rina Raphael pays a visit.
Theatre Producer Disrupts Taylor Mac’s ’24-Decade History Of Popular Music’ With ‘Feminist’ Outburst
Producer and curator Becky Burchall yelled several times at Taylor Mac during the performance at the Barbican in London and also tweeted out, “wondering why these men dressed as women are continuing to speak for the experience of women??” After taking a severe drubbing on social media, Burchall apologized the following morning, blaming “too much wine & not enough thought.”