A pair of British professors write about the AIR Network, a program they set up with colleagues to work with residents of Mukuru, a poor neighborhood in the Kenyan capital, using theatre, photography, drawing, and storytelling, to find ways to improve local air quality — and to push politicians to help. – The Conversation
Tag: 03.04.19
Why Did Hollywood Make Classical Music The Theme Music Of The Bad Guys?
For Hollywood, classical music has become the trademark of villains. On screen, orchestral melodies accompany the meditations of mad geniuses and pouting serial killers. Norman Bates practices the Moonlight sonata in Psycho II. Sociopath Lou Ford relaxes to Richard Strauss throughout The Killer Inside Me. Alex Forrest, in Fatal Attraction, plots her revenge while listening to Madama Butterfly. – American Scholar
Sound And The Optimal Work Place (Too Much, Too Little…)
Gone are the sound-absorbing dropped ceilings and acoustical tile, cubicle dividers, wall-to-wall carpets, and upholstered chairs. In their place are reflective high ceilings with exposed H.V.A.C., hardwood surfaces, mesh chairs, and lots and lots of glass. The goal is a buzz, similar to the free-flowing coffee and beer that many provide to their clients. A common citation in the literature that promotes co-working is a 2012 study from the Journal of Consumer Research that concludes the right amount of ambient noise—seventy decibels, roughly the level of a household appliance like a vacuum cleaner, or about the volume you might typically use for a radio or TV—“enhances performance on creative tasks.” – The New Yorker
‘Thought Experiments In F# Minor’ — A Virtual Interactive Tour Of Walt Disney Concert Hall, Led By A Cat-Woman
“Created by Canadian artists Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller, with original music by Ellen Reid and curation by Yuval Sharon, the tour reveals little of the Concert Hall’s history, instead zig-zagging between philosophical musings such as on Schroedinger’s Cat (the theoretical paradox of a cat inside a box being both alive and dead), footage of intimate performances from the Philharmonic, and whimsical vignettes.” Writer Matt Stromberg gives it a try. – Hyperallergic
Undisturbed Mayan Ritual Cave Discovered At Chichén Itzá
“Archaeologists hunting for a sacred well beneath the ancient Maya city of Chichén Itzá on Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula have accidentally discovered a trove of more than 150 ritual objects — untouched for more than a thousand years — in a series of cave chambers that may hold clues to the rise and fall of the ancient Maya.” – National Geographic
A ‘Restrained Homage To Over-The-Top Art’: The Museum Of The International Baroque
Justin Davidson: “There’s a certain slyly subversive quality to the displays of manuscripts, ceiling frescoes, foods, scientific instruments, silverware, home furnishings, and scenes of Monteverdi opera and Shakespeare performed in Spanish. Here [in Puebla, Mexico], a formerly colonized people have placed the colonists’ culture on display, as if to acknowledge with a hint of surprise that Europe such an advanced civilization in the 17th and 18th century.” – New York Magazine
The Most Important Job On The Internet Right Now Is Comment Moderator (And It’s Awful Work)
“It’s where free speech, community interests, censorship, harassment, spam, and overt criminality all butt up against each other. It has to account for a wide variety of always-evolving cultural norms and acceptable behaviors. As someone who has done the job, I can tell you that it can be a grim and disturbing task. And yet the big tech platforms seem to place little value on it: The pay is poor, workers are often contractors, and it’s frequently described as something that’s best left to the machines.” – BuzzFeed
There Will Finally Be A Ballet Emoji (And No, It Won’t Look Like This)
A placeholder image that went viral last month had bunheads worldwide worried. But it’s merely a placeholder for engineers. – Pointe
How They Made That Amazing Opening Dance Sequence In Gaspar Noé’s ‘Climax’
“Shot in a single-take, the [five-minute] dance routine is more than just choreographed steps. It shows off the dancers’ individual styles which include voguing, an improvisational dance form that mixes exaggerated model poses with mime-like movement; waacking, characterized by rapid arm movements; and krumping, an aggressive and emotional dance born on the streets of South L.A.” Choreographer Nina McNeely talks to a reporter about the strange ways the sequence came together. – Los Angeles Times
Marcia Dale Weary, Whose Small-Town Pennsylvania School Produced Generations Of Ballet Stars, Dead At 82
In 1955, she founded what would become the Central Pennsylvania Youth Ballet in an old barn in Carlisle, about half an hour west of Harrisburg. “CPYB is [now] known as one of the most prestigious ballet schools in the nation, with alumni holding positions in ballet companies such as New York City Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, Boston Ballet, Pacific Northwest Ballet and Pennsylvania Ballet.” – PennLive