Przybilla Leaving Atlanta Museum

The curator of contemporary art at Atlanta’s High Museum has resigned in order to study for her Ph.D. at nearby Emory University. Carrie Przybilla had been at the High Museum since 1988, and was responsible for the acquisition of an importantg collection of Ellsworth Kelly paintings, which will have their own gallery in the new building being constructed for the High. The museum will conduct a national search for a new curator.

You Notice No One Seemed To Care About The Viola

“An 18th-century Italian-made violin reported missing earlier this week was found in an alleyway near the Manhattan bar where its owner had left it, police said. Odin Rathnam, the first-chair violinist for the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra, had been in New York for a meeting and left the violin, along with a borrowed viola, at Yogi’s bar on the Upper West Side. The violin, valued at about $95,000, was made by Bartolomeo Calvaros of Bergamo, Italy, between 1750 and 1755; the viola belonged to a friend.” A bar patron actually claims to have hocked the fiddle at a local pawn shop for $600, but doesn’t have a good explanation for how it ended up back in the alley.

Kazaa Gets Sued In Oz, Adds New Lawyers

The makers of the Kazaa file-sharing software have made some big changes to the team of lawyers defending them from charges of aiding and abetting piracy. The shakeup in the legal team occurred after the Australian recording industry launched a lawsuit against the company. The new lawsuit charges that Kazaa’s very existence constitutes a breach of fair trade practices, and that the company engages in “misleading and deceptive conduct.”

Art Or Advertising – Hmnnn….

“As fine art’s conceptual leanings are increasingly difficult to distinguish from the facile surfaces of advertising, this ironic fusion of art and commerce is perhaps an inevitable progression.
Yet, despite the irony, fine art is faced with a very real problem presented by a rapidly evolving technological world, which means, in effect, a rapidly changing commercial world. What actually distinguishes “fine” art from the advertising techniques that it parodies and appropriates?”

The London That Never Was (Or Will Be)

“The game of what-ifs in architecture is addictive. The organisers of a new Hayward Gallery touring exhibition had the brilliant idea of exploring the never-never land of building, drawing on the collections of the Royal Institute of British Architects and the Victoria and Albert museum. So many of these visions are a great deal more exciting than the buildings we actually got.”

The Arthur Miller Phenomenon

At the age of 88, Arthur Miller is still cranking out work. He’s got two plays in production, and a very busy schedule. “I still love the form. It’s a great, great human adventure. Imagine having a human being stand up on a platform and mesmerize an audience and sometimes even illuminate something for them. You don’t need machinery. It’s a very primitive art. That’s the beauty of it.”