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Think NEA Funding Is Safe? It Still Needs Defending

The Heritage Foundation is still promoting its 1997 report authored by “distinguished fellow” Laurence Jarvik, titled “Ten Good Reasons to Eliminate Funding for the National Endowment for the Arts,” as the definitive source on “why there is no need for the federal government to be spending your money on these programs.” It remains a go-to reference in debates today, and its language has sunk into the ground water of conservative argument about the NEA—which is, after all, the job of a conservative think tank. – Artnet

Is It Possible To Take The Ethnic Stereotypes Out Of ‘La Bayadère’? Ángel Corella Is Trying

This Imperial Russian tale of an Indian temple dancer may be the most egregious collection of outdated orientalist caricatures in the entire ballet canon. But it remains popular, and many dancers love it themselves. In developing his new version of the work for Pennsylvania Ballet, Corella has engaged Final Bow for Yellowface co-founder Phil Chan and a Kathak specialist from Swarthmore College. – The Philadelphia Inquirer

‘Post-Traumatic Literature’ Is What We Really Need To Get At The Truth(s) Of #MeToo

Lili Loofbourow: “We don’t have much of a vocabulary for what happens in a victim’s life after the painful past has been excavated. … What is the situation of survivors who saw the injury proven and exposed — and maybe even punished — and saw, also, that nothing much changed? I am curious about their vision of things. I want to know how they think things should be. In nonfiction, we have [Chanel Miller’s] Know My Name. In fiction, we have books like Miriam Toews’s Women Talking and Rachel Cline’s The Question Authority.” – The New York Review of Books

Iran To Imprison Director Who Just Won Golden Bear At Berlin Film Festival

“Mohammad Rasoulof’s [one-year] sentence came from three films he made that authorities found to be ‘propaganda against the system,’ his lawyer [said]. … Rasoulof [received] the Berlin Film Festival’s top prize for his film There Is No Evil. The film tells four stories loosely connected to the use of the death penalty in Iran and dealing with personal freedom under tyranny.” – Yahoo! (AP)

Patricia Barretto, CEO Of Chicago’s Harris Theater, Dead At 45

After a career spent largely in Toronto, most recently running the city’s Opera Atelier, Barretto came to the Harris as a marketer in 2015 and became CEO in 2017. One of her “singular achievements … was her ability to marry the needs (and the calendar) of the Harris’ fleet of resident companies, part of the original mission of the initially troubled theater, with her wish to expand the so-called Harris Theater Presents series of high-profile but risky [international touring] presentations.” – Chicago Tribune

Sheri Greenawald, Longtime Leader Of San Francisco Opera’s Young Artist Programs, To Retire

“Greenawald’s position has put her in charge of both phases of the San Francisco Opera’s training wing, which attracts young opera singers from around the world. Each summer, around 30 artists show up for [the] Merola [Opera Program], an intensive 11-week residency. Then a handful of them go on to become Adler Fellows, getting instruction and coaching and taking smaller roles on the main stage of the War Memorial Opera House.” – San Francisco Chronicle

Portlanders Hate The City’s Arts Tax. So Do Portland’s Major Arts Organizations

The $35 annual levy passed in a 2012 referendum by 62% to 38%; now its unpopularity is a running joke in town. Regular taxpayers don’t like it because it was badly designed and implemented, but why don’t the likes of Portland Center Stage, Oregon Ballet Theatre, the Portland Art Museum, Portland Opera and the Oregon Symphony? For a start, it turns out they’re now getting less funding from the city than they were before the tax was there. – Willamette Week (Portland)

Henry Cobb, Architect Who ‘Designed Modern Boston’ And Longtime Business Partner Of I.M. Pei, Dead At 93

Co-founder of the firm Pei Cobb Freed & Partners, Cobb did have well-known buildings in other cities: Place Ville-Marie (Montreal), Fountain Place (Dallas), the U.S. Bank Tower (Los Angeles), Torre Espacio (Madrid), the International African American Museum (opening next year in Charleston). But he made his biggest mark in his hometown, with the Moakley Courthouse, Harbor Towers, One Dalton, and, most famously, the John Hancock Tower. – The Boston Globe

Louvre Reopens Following Coronavirus Strike

“Since Sunday, the Louvre’s staff had been refusing to work, fearful they might catch the coronavirus from someone among the museum’s more than 30,000 daily visitors. … The museum’s management, its doctor and staff representatives met throughout Tuesday to consider measures to protect workers from the virus, and employees voted Wednesday morning to accept them.” – The New York Times