“Gina Gibney runs two enormous dance spaces in New York City: Together they contain 23 studios, five performance spaces, a gallery, a conference room, a media lab and more. Gibney is now probably the largest dance center in the country. … The new branding calls for it to simply be called Gibney (as opposed to Gibney Dance), to reflect its range of public programs, affordable work space and commitment to social justice issues. … Gibney also houses the Gibney Dance Company, which was founded in 1991.”
Blog
Dancing With Death: The Murky Ethics Of Filming People In Life-Threatening Danger
“The Deminer” – a documentary about a Kurdish Peshmerga officer who disarms mines – “makes for nervous viewing. Each of the four detonations we see ratchets up the sense of inevitability. It’s not quite a snuff movie, though haunted by a similar balefulness. What moral responsibilities do documentary-makers have when their subject is a danger to himself?”
Music As Political Activism – Can It Ever Really Work?
“Part of classical music’s conceit (as well as other genres’), even among many contemporary audiences, is the notion of a universal beauty in music, and there’s nothing fundamentally wrong with that … Classical music isn’t alone in this regard (although it does carry the most Enlightenment baggage). … What a conceit can’t do is provide the foundation for concrete political change.”
One Of World’s Biggest Gallerists Proposes ‘Tax’ On Large Galleries At Art Fairs
“David Zwirner, whose namesake art gallery is one of the world’s largest, said he was prepared to pay more for space rental at art fairs if the extra money could help smaller galleries take part as well.”
Documenta Names Its Third Director In Less Than A Year
“On 1 November [Sabine] Schormann will replace Wolfgang Orthmayr, a producer of musicals who was appointed interim managing director in April. His beleaguered predecessor, Annette Kulenkampff, left her post before her contract ended as the result of a budget deficit of €5.4m following the 2017 edition.”
‘Toxic Culture’ Of Harassment Rampant In Professional Music World: Study
“Musicians from across the industry took part in a survey by membership organisation the Incorporated Society of Musicians. … Of the 600 musicians who took part in the survey, 47% said they had experienced discrimination, including sexual harassment and other inappropriate behaviour, in the course of their work.”
Metro LA’s Two Biggest Public TV Stations To Merge
“Independent broadcaster KCETLink Media Group (KCET), based in Burbank, and PBS SoCal (KOCE) in Costa Mesa, unveiled Wednesday a plan for ‘a merger of equals.’ They aim to become a powerful new hub for original public media content and innovation that serves 18-plus million people in Southern California.”
Mezzo-Soprano Huguette Tourangeau Dead At 79
A winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council auditions in 1964, the Canadian mezzo had a career at the Met and many North American companies, but she was best known as Joan Sutherland’s co-star on a series of opera recordings conducted by Richard Bonynge, including (among others) Norma, Maria Stuarda, Lucia di Lammermoor, and Les Contes d’Hoffmann.
Controversial Statue Of Stephen Foster In Pittsburgh Comes Down
“The move followed an October decision by the Pittsburgh Art Commission, which found that the statue should be removed within six months and hosted in a private, ‘properly contextualized’ location. Many residents have held that the sculpture – showing a shoeless African-American banjo player seated at the famed composer’s feet – is condescending or outright racist. Speakers at commission meetings last year largely agreed.”
States Are Using Preservation Laws To Block The Removal Of Confederate Monuments
“Once a community decision has been made about a controversial monument, officials often have to deal with public preservation laws designed to impede the removal of historic monuments. Efforts to remove statues in places like Baltimore and Memphis have proven no more straightforward than what happened in Demopolis, Alabama.”