“Two foundations set up by the late Lord Beaverbrook are claiming ownership of two paintings at a New Brunswick art gallery named in his honour, saying they’re too valuable to remain there. The Montreal-based Canadian Beaverbrook Foundation and its British counterpart have an appraisal report from Sotheby’s auction house that suggests two unnamed works among the 200 in the Beaverbrook Art Gallery in Fredericton should be displayed elsewhere.” But representatives of the gallery don’t want to give up the paintings, which they say were a gift to the province, and accuse the Beaverbrook estate of trying to reclaim the paintings because the family is in financial trouble.
Tag: 03.24.04
Martin Boosts Canadian TV Budget
The Canadian government has pledged to increase its contribution to the Canadian Television Fund by $38 million a year, news which is being hailed by independent documentarians and producers nationwide. Cuts to the fund in recent years contributed to a dismal year for the industry in 2003, and new Prime Minister Paul Martin made a point of calling for the restoration of previous funding levels. But some other Canadian arts groups are none too pleased with the PM’s priorities, as major arts organizations will see little in the way of similar funding increases.
Power to the People
Those “customer reviews” on Amazon.com may seem like a harmless way for readers to have their say about the books they purchase, but to book publishers, they represent a very real expansion of the traditional critical press. In fact, the most prolific of Amazon’s amateur reviewers now receive upwards of 60 free books every month from publishers hoping for a favorable nod. As the culture of online media continues to evolve, and the notion of “expert” commentary and analysis becomes ever more blurred, these unpaid book critics are starting to have a palpable effect on the industry they cover.
Is Public TV Sucking Up To The Pentagon?
“Perennially cash-strapped public television producers and filmmakers would ordinarily be thrilled that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting recently unveiled a long-awaited initiative to fund $20 million worth of documentaries on post-Sept. 11 terrorist attack themes. Instead, a recent forum in New York where the organization’s executives explained more precisely what kinds of programs they are seeking for ‘America at a Crossroads’ turned into a shouting and name-calling session.” At issue is the perception of filmmakers that the CPB is soliciting propaganda films promoting the Bush administration’s view of the world.
Tsing Loh Gets The Last Bleeping Word
Public radio commentator Sandra Tsing Loh, who was unexpectedly fired from Santa Monica station KCRW last month after uttering an expletive in a prerecorded commentary, has landed across town at Los Angeles’s KPCC. The hiring is something of a coup for KPCC, which is owned by Minnesota Public Radio, and which has been aggressively competing for a share of KCRW’s L.A. audience since its purchase. KCRW had offered to rehire Loh after a wave of bad publicity, but she declined to return.
Gehry Strikes Back
Ever since Frank Gehry unveiled his design for the reinvented Art Gallery of Ontario, the plans have been under attack from community groups and preservationists concerned about cost overruns and the detruction of the existing AGO. Gehry is not known as a fiery figure, but the piling on appears to have gotten his hackles up. He hotly disputes the notion, advanced by a prominent columnist, that his projects frequently come in massively over budget, inviting the writer to produce numbers to back up his claim. And as to the charge that his plans would wipe out a popular sculpture atrium added to the AGO in 1993, Gehry claims that his design will leave a large part of the atrium intact, and that the overall expansion will enhance the space.
My Father, The Architect
A new documentary by filmmaker Nathaniel Kahn is being called “a fierce yet tender reckoning with [architect] Louis Kahn’s complicated legacy. The film explores not just the gift and gravitas of the man’s global span of buildings, but also his mystery as a father.” The younger Kahn’s film is a direct and unapologetic effort to reconcile his father’s global reputation as a designer who gave his all to the world with the private scandal of a man who kept three different families in various corners of the world. It could have been a fruitless effort, but then, the younger Kahn met a Bangladesh architect who managed to put it all in perspective…
What’s Wrong With Germany?
If it is true, as Jimmy Carter once asserted, that nations can find themselves in a state of collective malaise, there is no doubt that Germany in 2004 would qualify as downright sickly, at least as far as its own residents are concerned. Strangely, when viewed from an objective standpoint, Germany doesn’t seem to be any worse off economically, culturally, or politically, than most other European nations, but England and France “do not seem to be in quite the despairing mood that Germany is in. Is the difference perhaps, as some have been saying, Germans just enjoy complaining? Or does it run deeper?”
Standoff in San Francisco
San Francisco Opera, which is looking to rebound from a nearly $4 million deficit in 2003, may be staring down the barrel of a strike by the company’s chorus, dancers, and production staff, an action which could cancel the SFO’s summer season. The company previously reached an agreement for a 5% pay cut with its orchestra musicians, and says that it cannot afford more than a 2% raise for the members of the chorus, who are paid less than the pit musicians and are not guaranteed work. But the union representing the chorus insists that the current arrangement is unfair, and wants the singers’ work weeks to be guaranteed, and for their salaries to be pegged to 90% of the orchestra’s scale.
Inside Zaha Hadid
“The cult of obscurity that surrounded architect Zaha Hadid hardly distinguished her from her colleagues in the architectural avant-garde—or, for that matter, in the artistic or literary ones. For decades, architects like Hadid and their champions in the academy have discussed architecture in writing where jargon operates as a kind of code, keeping amateurs confused and thus, for the most part, comfortably out of the way. But Hadid took that disdain a step further: She walled off her work visually, too.”