Category: issues

So says Tory shadow culture minister Ed Vaizey. “There will always be people who claim ‘Labour good, Tory bad’, even in the face of the most incontrovertible evidence to the contrary. It is intensely frustrating when those you are talking to choose to hear only what they want to hear. Sometimes, I guess, you just can’t teach an artistic director new tricks.”

“Stein, 55, headed Laguna Playhouse for 17 years, resigning somewhat abruptly in June 2007. He is credited with transforming the theater venue from an amateur company into one of the West Coast’s more successful professional resident companies.”

“China’s flamboyant Olympics opening ceremony on Friday has lost some of its lustre, following an official’s revelation of lip-synching at the over-the-top event.”

“The bass player with Toronto indie group Holy F— says it’s not right that his band has been held up by the Conservative government as an example of misplaced arts funding.”

“I struggle to find evidence of beauty in contemporary art. If I go to an exhibition I pretend to understand, like many others. But, honestly, I don’t understand.” The comments follow a number of attacks on modern architecture by ministers including Bondi and the prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, that has left the arts world aghast.

Only 46 percent of teens surveyed by Harris Interactive showed any interest in watching the Olympics. And if teens are indeed abstaining, it’s not because they think that the Olympics are a crass, greedy commercial enterprise — in fact, 71 percent of those polled “were likely to agree that the games are about more than merely medals and marketing,” according to Harris Interactive. So why won’t they watch? Because it’s not convenient for them.

“Edinburgh has shed its decorum and become as raucous, filthy, drunken and commercialised as everywhere else. When people talk of the Festival they mean the Fringe – which this year consists of more than 30,000 performances of 2,000 shows – leaving the ‘official’ or ‘International’ programme of high culture as isolated and marginal as an atoll in the Pacific. The Fringe may be supremely democratic, a uniquely free market. Yet it is also a monster devouring its own children.”

“The 2,008 percussionists with illuminated drums, the 29 separate sets of fireworks, the 14,000 musicians, acrobats and trapeze artists performing pageants representing 5,000 years of Chinese history, the dramatic lighting of the Olympic torch by a gymnast suspended from a wire. Of course, the lighting of that flame in Beijing may precede the passing of political power from West to East. On the other hand, it might not.”

“Unfortunately, many critics have made themselves redundant for three reasons: incessant “quote-whoring”, or providing copy ready-made for promotion, thus cheapening their role; boosting unworthy local material; and failing to relate to commercial or broad audiences. All this is not to say critics should write for kids. But critics may need to broaden their reach by writing with young people in mind rather than writing at them.”

“The Orange County Performing Arts Center suffered $13 million in losses during its recently concluded fiscal year because of crises in the bond market. The center is heavily invested in bonds, which are financing the nonprofit institution’s $240 million expansion, completed in September 2006.”