“Members of IS are definitely involved in sales,” says one scholar, “particularly now that the so-called state is rapidly unravelling.” However, there’s little independently verifiable evidence of the scale of the ISIS trade in stolen antiquities – not to mention the fact that there are plenty of fakes mixed in with the genuine artifacts.
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This Mosaic From Caligula’s Pleasure Boat Spent 45 Years As A Manhattan Coffee Table
The 2000-year-old piece was once part of an elaborate mosaic floor in one of the Roman emperor’s floating palaces on Lake Nemi south of Rome. Somehow it ended up in the Park Avenue apartment of an antiques dealer. “Last month, prosecutors seized the mosaic, saying they had evidence it had been taken from an Italian museum before World War II.”
What Do Young Ballet Dancers Need? More Interesting Ballets, Says Benjamin Millepied
“These ballet dancers are great and they’re ready and what they need is more interesting work. I feel people are playing it safe a lot. If anything, I think it’s the choreographers and the directors who need to make an effort for these dancers who have made this art form their passion, and to really be as daring or at least as relevant as some of our peers were when they were commissioning pieces a long time ago.”
An Older Queen’s Unlikely Friendship Brought Curry To The High Tables Of Britain (And Beyond)
Abdul Karim, sent to England as a gift to serve at Queen Victoria’s table, became one of her closest confidants. Though the relationship, says NPR, was “clearly maternal” on her side, the outcome of the friendship wasn’t simply that she learned some Urdu. “A spicier outcome of this friendship was the elevation of a dish already popular in England: curry.”
When Philadelphia Eliminated Arts Programs From Its Schools, Here’s How Local Foundations Stepped Up
“Most obviously, the city’s financial woes were so calamitous that, funders, most of whom already had extensive footprints in the city, had no choice but to respond en masse. Samuel Johnson’s old adage applies here: ‘When a man knows he is to be hanged, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.’ That being said, there’s far more to Philadelphia’s success than the threat of (figurative) imminent hanging.”
Amazon Moves Into Australia, Which May Not Be Prime Territory
“When Borders opened in 2002 across the street from Readings, Melbourne’s best-known independent bookseller, retail experts predicted catastrophe for the musty old shop competing with the shiny new chain store. Instead, Australians rejected Borders right into bankruptcy.” As Amazon launches its book business there, Damien Cave reports, there’s a chance it may not catch on much better than Borders did, thanks to some unique features of the Australian market.
Upright Citizens Brigade, Famed Improv Troupe, Is Leaving Its Home
The company, founded by Amy Poehler, Ian Roberts, Matt Walsh and Matt Besser and the training ground for many comedians, sketch actors and Saturday Night Live cast members, is moving from its longtime base in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood to the group of Off-Broadway theaters on the far west end of 42nd Street.
Enough With The Star Actors Playing Hamlet Already!
“If, in any given year, somewhere up and down the UK, you can see a starry production of Hamlet being staged with Big-Name Acclaimed Actors showing off their Big-Name Acclaimed Acting Chops, then the cachet of that role is reduced. No question. It’s the basic economics of scarcity: when every Tom (Hiddleston), Dick (Burton) and Jude Law has had a crack at moodily wafting on stage, like a Smiths fan in search of legitimate melancholy, then theatre’s great and good might consider that it is time to call a moratorium on more Hamlets.
Top Posts From AJBlogs 10.19.17
The Society of the Spectacle
Does one really need to see Swiss filmmaker Jean-Stéphane Bron’s The Paris Opera? … read more
AJBlog: Fresh Pencil Published 2017-10-19
What’s Growing in Albion?
The title of the new Mike Bartlett/Rupert Goold collaboration at the Almeida Theatre (until 24 November) tells you everything. “Albion” is, after all, just another name for this island, … read more
AJBlog: Plain English Published 2017-10-19
How Kazakhstan Became The Starchitects’ Fantasy Playground
“No other modern-day leader has used the myth-making power of architecture to construct a sense of national identity like Nazarbayev,” says Frank Albo, author of a new book on the Kazakh capital, Astana: Architecture, Myth and Destiny. “What you see here is a blend of postmodernism, Central Asian art, Islamic decor, Russian baroque, neoclassicism, orientalism, all melded into something that looks like Las Vegas meets Disneyland on nationalist steroids.” In a bid to cast off the shackles of the Soviet era, the president has embraced practically everything else.