Historically, the purpose of monuments, says Ken Lum of Monument Lab in Philadelphia, “has been to activate or even sustain a certain narrative of memory which people of influence have deemed worthy or important to maintain. They are mnemonic devices.” And, traditionally, they’ve usually been large sculptures of men. (If they were of women, those women were usually fictional or allegorical figures rather than actual people.) But that has changed over the past few decades, with the standard-bearer being Maya Lin’s Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Now that a whole slew of old-style monuments is being removed, Carolina Miranda looks at what might be replacing them. – Los Angeles Times
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Refugee Who Wrote Award-Winning Memoir Via Texts Sent From Internment Camp Granted Asylum
“Behrouz Boochani, the Kurdish Iranian exile and journalist who became the voice of those incarcerated on Manus Island” — an island off the coast of Papua New Guinea where Australia maintains a camp for refugees who try to reach the country by sea — “has had his refugee status formally recognised by New Zealand, and granted a visa to live there.” – The Guardian
Every Artwork At The Whitney Is Being Covered With Plywood
Online, that is. “Every day at sunset, Artist — an anonymous conceptualist who legally changed their name to question the biases built into the phrase ‘American Artist’ — will replace every image of an artwork on the Whitney Museum’s website with a picture of plywood, effectively boarding up the pages. The site’s unassuming white background will be turned black, obscuring all text in the process. Titled Looted, the work calls into question what is being stolen and through what means.” – Artnet
New Project Aims To Get More Black Theater Professionals Backstage As Well As Onstage
“Career opportunity on Broadway doesn’t begin at the box office, but in the front office. And that’s where T. Oliver Reid, Warren Adams and their fellow advocates have set their sights in a campaign to massively increase black employment in the theater business. Their effort — under the banner of a new organization, the Black Theatre Coalition — is already making an impact.” – The Washington Post
TikTok Will Spend $200 Million On Creators (How And On Which Creators? Good Question)
“TikTok is launching a program to fund its most popular creators directly for their videos — with an initial $200 million earmarked for the U.S. … How much individual creators will be eligible to earn — and what specific criteria those payments will be based on — isn’t fully clear.” But you can apply starting in August. – Variety
Kennedy Center Will Reopen Its Large Theaters Next January
Pandemic permitting, the Center and its resident companies, the National Symphony Orchestra and Washington National Opera, plan to present performances for full audiences n its three large venues early in the New Year, with a few socially distanced, small-scale or outdoor performances before then. The big Broadway touring shows won’t be back until May. – The Washington Post
Andrew Lloyd Webber Tries Putting On A Socially Distanced West End Show
It was a one-time pilot project, performed in front of 640 people spread out through the Palladium, one of London’s biggest theatres. The program: one singer, Beverley Knight, doing two half-hour sets separated by an intermission. Alex Marshall reports on how it went. (ALW’s reaction on seeing the “full” house: “I’ve got to say this is a rather sad sight.”) – The New York Times
Misty Copeland On How Protests Are Waking Up The Dance World
“It’s the first time in my position that I feel like I’m truly being heard,” she explains of how she’s using her voice to raise awareness, later adding, “This has been my life’s work as a dancer: speaking about racism in the world, and in ballet, speaking about the lack of diversity. And to have my company, to have the ballet world listening, and to have different panels to speak about this—in a way that I have before, but again, for the first time, people are really seeing it. And I think that’s what’s different about this time, is that I feel like we have true allies and people from other communities and races that we’ve not had before.” – The Root
Why Pandemic Literature Doesn’t Work (So Far)
No one has had time to truly refine their ideas about personal life in a state of widespread isolation and existential dread, and literature, even when political, is a fundamentally personal realm. It relies on the ability to channel inner experience outward, and because no inner experience of the coronavirus pandemic could plausibly be described as complete, prose that renders it static and comprehensible rings false. – The Atlantic
Marciano Foundation Settles With Laid-off Union-Organizing Workers
The workers — public-facing staffers who watched over galleries and answered questions about art — had announced plans to unionize with AFSCME in early November over concerns related to wages and working conditions. Days later, they were all laid off via email. The Marciano also announced it would shut down its galleries due to low attendance. A month later, the museum made the closure permanent. – Los Angeles Times