David Patrick Stearns: “Only a minute or two long, but repeated 840 times, Vexations is alternately called minimalist, Dada-ist, or Outsider Art when it resurfaces every few years. … [Igor] Levit’s late May performance, streamed from Berlin, is perhaps the highest-profile outing for this ghostly wisp of a piece that was posthumously discovered among the composer’s personal effects. Considering that [it] could easily have been dismissed as some discarded sketch, Vexations has achieved a degree of cultural clout that is, to say the least, highly unexpected.” – WQXR (New York City)
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The Crazy-House World That Is YouTube
The more dark, wiggy videos you consume, the darker and wiggier your playlist becomes, until you inhabit a so-called “filter bubble,” while Google makes ad money off of your addictive radicalization. – Columbia Journalism Review
When Irony Died And Then Came Back To Life: An Oral History Of The Onion’s 9/11 Issue
“[It] wasn’t the funniest issue they ever did, but it would turn out to be incredibly successful because it reflected so many of the emotions that people were feeling after the attacks. The sorrow, the anger, the utter helplessness — all of this was captured by one headline or another, giving most everyone in the audience something to identify with. … Now, nearly 20 years later, the issue is widely considered to be an important part of comedy history — even an important part of the broader cultural history surrounding 9/11.” – Mel
Lucas Museum Hires Its Leadership Team
That five of the six new hires are people of color, and that all are women, is in line with Sandra Jackson-Dumont’s vision as the museum’s self-described “chief diversity officer.” – Los Angeles Times
Nicholson Baker Surfs YouTube’s Recommendation Algorithms And Winds Up In Some Ugly Places
“We’re told that after the 2016 elections Google made adjustments to YouTube’s recommendation algorithm, so as not to lead impressionable gun-owning zealots frictionlessly down tunnels of paranoia. … Even so, it remains true today that the more dark, wiggy videos you consume, the darker and wiggier your playlist becomes, until you inhabit a so-called ‘filter bubble,’ while Google makes ad money off of your addictive radicalization.” – Columbia Journalism Review
Jeff Haydon Named New Director Of Ravinia
He currently serves as the CEO of New York’s Caramoor Center for Music and Arts, a position he has held since 2012. He also served as executive director of the Ojai Music Festival, and according to Friday’s statement, has previously worked with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Fort Wayne Philharmonic, and the Aspen Music Festival. – Chicago Sun-Times
Kevin Rafferty, Co-Director Of ‘The Atomic Cafe’, Dead At 73
Along with his brother Pierce and colleague Jayne Loader, “[he] gathered archival material that had been created to ease Americans into the nuclear age and turned it into The Atomic Cafe, an acclaimed, darkly comic documentary film released in 1982.” Also notable among his six directing credits are Blood in the Face (1991, about far-right groups such as the Ku Klux Klan), The Last Cigarette (about the worldwide marketing of American tobacco products), and Harvard Beats Yale 29-29. – The New York Times
How Awe Motivates Scientific Discovery
All clear cases of awe have the following two components: an experience of vastness, and a need for cognitive accommodation of this vastness. You might feel awe for things that are physically large, but also for ideas that are conceptually vast. – Aeon
Immersive, Live, Virtual-Reality Theater Is Here (So How Is It?)
“The show, The Under Presents: Tempest, is a technological first: a live, scripted, participatory play that you attend, from home, using a virtual reality headset. After buying a $14.99 ticket (an in-app purchase inside an esoteric virtual reality game, The Under Presents), and powering up at a set time, you arrive in a virtual theater lobby, with your avatar clad in a black cloak and glowing mask. You can’t speak, but you can gesture. A live actor … leads you and six or seven other audience members to a firepit in the Hollywood Hills, then to Prospero’s island, then back to the firepit for marshmallows and a dance party. … Live actors and live audience members meeting in a shared space at precisely timed intervals. [It] sounds like theater. Sometimes, it even feels like theater. Is this a brave new world for live performance? Or just another app?” – The New York Times
Blockbuster King Tut Show In London May Violate Egypt’s Antiquities Laws
Tutankhamun: Treasures of the Golden Pharaoh, a touring show conceived by “swashbuckling” Egyptian archaeologist Zahi Hawass and U.S. management and events company IMG, was pulling in big crowds at London’s Saatchi Gallery before the COVID lockdown. But new reporting suggests that the contract between IMG and Egypt’s Ministry of Antiquities to provide artifacts for the show may be illegal. – ARTnews