“Avatar: The Last Airbender … first ran from 2005 to 2008 on Nickelodeon, and swiftly made a name for itself as a politically resonant, emotionally sophisticated work — one with a sprawling but meticulously plotted mythos that destined the show for cult-classic status. Last summer, after Game of Thrones flubbed its finale, fans and critics held up Avatar as a counterexample: a fantasy series that knew what it wanted to be from the beginning.” – The New Yorker
Blog
The Frustrations Of How To Think About “Hamilton” In 2020
How can one story simultaneously broadcast a contemptible message of myopic reverence for America’s Founding Fathers to some, while others take from it an equally powerful repudiation of everything those founders represent? Unraveling this question requires understanding Hamilton as the messy, mutable product of two masters: its creator, Lin-Manuel Miranda, and the constantly roiling cultural context in which it’s been viewed, especially in 2020. – Vox
Silicon Valley Gets A New Professional Dance Company
“San Jose Dance Theatre [has] announced that it [is] launching a professional ballet company, as well as a trainee program and a new pre-professional training division. This is good news for San Jose, which saw Silicon Valley Ballet shut down in 2016.” – Pointe Magazine
So You Want To Direct Our Play (We Have A Few Changes…)
Congratulations! Your MFA in directing is about to be put to good use, effectively proving your father wrong about your job prospects. Your firm grasp of Schopenhauer’s aesthetic theory, not to mention your dissertation on the dramatic relevance of Aristotle’s Poetics, will give you the edge you need to pour into your cast of laypeople like the eager, empty vessels they are. – McSweeney’s
For The Second Time In Two Years, Fire Shatters A Brazilian Museum
“In September 2018, a devastating fire ravaged Brazil’s National Museum [in Rio de Janeiro]. Now, yet another Brazilian cultural institution — the Federal University of Minas Gerais’ Natural History Museum and Botanical Garden (MHNJB) in Belo Horizonte — has fallen victim to an inferno.” This is, in fact, the sixth museum fire in the country in the past decade. – Smithsonian Magazine
Time For A Rethink In How The Arts Are Delivered
Of course, Zoom is not the answer to saving the arts for the digital generation, but it does pose the question: Why don’t we have better alternatives? For many institutions, fear that improving the virtual performance would threaten the health of the physical one has kept them in a state of pseudo-Internet denial. But the international health crisis has forced organizations to confront a generational sea change that has been brewing across the arts since Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone. – The American Scholar
Two Radical Publishers Celebrate 50 Years
“Our sales go up with political and economic turmoil and down during times of prosperity,” says Jake Stevens of Verso. “It’s really amazing to see all the different types of books that we experimented with as a publishing company, and the varied directions our publishing vision has traveled,” says Jisu Kim of Feminist Press, “but also how much we still stick to our foundational editorial pillars.” – Publishers Weekly
Sides Line Up After Students Demand Removal Of A WPA Mural
“An alumnus has filed a suit to save a fresco at the University of Kentucky that depicts enslaved people; a Black artist whose work is shown with it also wants the mural to stay.” – The New York Times
America’s Largest Arts Funder Is Pivoting To Social Justice Causes. Its President Explains Why
Elizabeth Alexander of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation: “We were going to do it anyway, [but in] this moment … it seems very clear … that we all need to be thinking very sharply about how the work that we do contributes to a more just society.” But that doesn’t mean Mellon will stop funding the arts: “The way that we’re interpreting social justice is very broad. It’s very important to Mellon in all of our grant-making to say, ‘Who haven’t we reached? Who haven’t we supported?” – Artnet
Earl Cameron, Pathbreaking Black Actor In British Cinema, Dead At 102
A native of Bermuda who settled in the UK after World War II, he performed — “against the odds,” he once said — to perform in 40 feature films as well as numerous TV movies and series. “His big screen roles ranged from James Bond’s secret service minder Pinder in Thunderball (1965) to the dictatorial president in Sydney Pollack’s thriller The Interpreter (2005).” – The Guardian