Category: people

Forty years ago, a young art historian published his first book, and changed the way scholars and art lovers looked at neo-Classical art. Robert Rosenblum, “who died in December at 79, went on to become the most consistently edifying art historian of his generation. With a combination of iconoclasm, faultless lucidity and wit, he smashed aesthetic prejudices the way physicists smash atoms. There ought to be a Nobel Prize for that sort of achievement.”

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow would have turned 200 this year, and celebrations are planned across the U.S., especially in Longfellow’s hometown of Portland, Maine. “With the rise of modernism toward the middle of the 20th century, Longfellow lost much of his luster… But there have been signs of a reversal over the past decade or two amid renewed respect for his poetry and a focus on other aspects of his life.”

“Heinz Berggruen, a German-born Jewish art collector who in the mid-1990’s made a powerful gesture of reconciliation by moving his modern art collection to Berlin, died outside Paris on Friday. He was 93.”

At 78, Ennio Morricone is the reigning dean of film composers, and his command of music, sound, and silence continues to dazzle both film and music buffs worldwide. Still, “it has taken a long time for America – the spiritual setting of some of his most evocative movie scores – to reckon with the Italian maestro’s justly monumental reputation.”

“Lothar-Günther Buchheim, a German author and art collector best known for his autobiographical novel ‘Das Boot,’ died on Thursday. He was 89… The Buchheim Museum, near Munich, houses his collection of art from the Brücke group of Expressionists, including works by Emil Nolde, Max Pechstein and Otto Mueller.”

“Conrad Black, is suing for almost £5m in libel damages over a critical biography that depicts the fallen press baron as an overweight teenager from a loveless home who grows up to be a ‘criminal sociopath’.”

“Sheridan Morley, the prominent British critic, biographer and broadcaster who devoted his career to chronicling and, often, celebrating plays and players, died on Friday at his home in London.”

“Detached from reality as it may at times seem, Mamet’s contrarian, matter-of-fact assurance that everything will be OK, that art will find a way to flourish, is a refreshing alternative, anyway, to the hand-wringing, punctuated by apocalyptic pronouncements, that’s so in vogue these days. If the rest of Hollywood appears to be in full-on crisis mode, frantically backpedaling as its audience shifts their preferred viewing environment to their living rooms, their preferred format to the swiftly released DVD, their preferred context to the fast-forward-enhanced home entertainment center, Mamet has been too contentedly busy to read the memo.”

“In his outdoorsy-casual ensemble – jeans, boots, navy-blue shirt over a snowy white T-shirt – Sorkin looks relaxed enough. But when he opens his mouth, he sounds exactly like the kind of overcaffeinated, hyper-articulate character who goes ping-ponging through an Aaron Sorkin show. And in that word-slinging world, rewriting a play while you are also writing a TV series is probably your idea of a really good time.”