“In a lawsuit filed this week in New York State Supreme Court, Manhattan collector Stuart Pivar, a one-time friend of Andy Warhol, says he was swindled out of a 1920 cast of the sculpture [Mademoiselle Pogany II] by John H. McFadden, a Philadelphia lawyer, arts patron, and scion of a prominent Main Line family.” As Pivar puts it, “Philadelphia lawyer hornswoggles savvy New York collector out of $100 million. That’s my story.” – The Philadelphia Inquirer
Blog
Fabio Luisi Resigns As Music Director Of Florence’s Maggio Musicale
Luisi, music director of the Zurich Opera House and former principal conductor of the Metropolitan Opera, only took up the post (one created for him) at the Tuscan music festival-cum-opera house in April of last year. He’s leaving, one year into a five-year contract term, as a result of one of the political power struggles that seem to afflict Italian cultural institutions regularly. – Musical America
Four Members Of All-Female Afghan Orchestra Disappear During European Tour
“Zohra, a 35-member orchestra, performed at a concert on July 13 at the Pohoda Festival in the [Slovakian] town of Trencin … Four members went missing from their hotel on July 14, police said.” – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
This Year’s Kennedy Center Honorees
This year’s class of honorees, the 42nd annual since 1978, is eclectic as usual. – NPR
Elon Musk Wants To Implant Computers Inside People’s Brains
The company is developing a device to implant inside the brain that supposedly will allow people to control computers and other devices with their minds. At the announcement, Musk said the company is on track to begin testing the implants in human patients as soon as next year. – The Atlantic
Prospect Magazine’s List Of The World’s 50 Top Thinkers
“The urge to rank and measure might itself seem anti-intellectual—more Top Trumps than top scholarship. But the aim is not to chase a chimera still less to deliver the results of some supposedly objective IQ test. Rather it is simply to honour the minds engaging most fruitfully with the questions of the moment.” – Prospect
Netflix Reports It Lost Subscribers In Q2; Stock Dives
The company on Wednesday reported a loss of 126,000 domestic paid subscribers compared with analysts’ expectations for a 352,000 gain. Netflix also missed its own forecast for global subscriber growth by 2.3 million. Its shares plunged more than 11% Thursday. – CNBC
Portland Opera General Director Steps Down
Christopher Mattaliano, who was hired as general director in 2003, will instead become an artistic consultant for the opera company, starting with the upcoming 2019-20 season. Effective immediately, Sue Dixon, Portland Opera’s current director of external affairs, will step in as interim general director. – Portland Mercury
Cultural Appropriation And The Erasing Of Culture
“There is no pride in using Indigenous peoples as props in a settler fantasy; there is no pride in racist caricatures; and there is no pride in cultural appropriation. Because my culture is not a costume. My culture is alive in the here and now. It is memory, flesh, and fire. It is the strength of all my relations.” – Hyperallergic
When An Ex-Undocumented-Immigrant Actor Plays A Guard Holding Refugee Children In A Border Jail
In George Brant’s solo play Tender Age, actor Carlo Albán (whose parents brought him from Ecuador to the U.S. as a child) plays a Latino Texan who takes a job as a guard in a Brownsville Walmart-turned-detention center for children who’ve fled Central America. Peter Marks travels to the O’Neill Theater Center to see the play in development. – The Washington Post