In the face of concerns like North Korea and neo-Nazis, Mr Trump’s rift with the art world seems insignificant. But it is another indicator of the tenor of his presidency and how drastically it breaks with previous administrations of both parties. Indeed, artists have usually attended White House receptions even when they disagreed with the sitting president. Bill Clinton honoured Charlton Heston, a staunch conservative. George W. Bush hosted Barbra Streisand, an ardent Democrat.
Tag: 08.29.17
Here’s One Texas Museum That Was Ready For Hurricane Harvey
“Back in 2008, when Hurricane Ike pummeled Texas, the Galveston Arts Center sustained steep losses. … Art valued at more than $100,000 was ruined, and the storm caused upward of $1 million in damage to the historic, 19th-century bank building that houses the Arts Center. … So this time around, the team was prepared.”
When Virginia Woolf And Her Pals Dressed Up As ‘Abyssinian’ Princes And Pranked The Royal Navy
One day in the winter of 1910, Woolf, her brother, and a few others put on fake beards, makeup (blackface, unfortunately), and elaborate robes and turbans (which didn’t look particularly Ethiopian), taught themselves some pidgin Swahili (which they don’t speak in Ethiopia), and talked their way onto the Royal Navy’s newest, highest-tech warship, where they got the proverbial royal treatment.
Why Blue Is The World’s Favorite Color
Researchers have found that, all over the globe, some shade or other of blue is the most widely beloved hue. But that preference does not appear to be based in genetics or otherwise hard-wired – the reasons lie elsewhere.
‘Whitewashing’ In Hollywood Casting Is Becoming Bad For Business
“The industry excuse for whitewashing is often that bankable star names are needed to make a project commercially viable. Yet few of these examples [that have come in for criticism in the past few years] have been hits.”
It’s Two Years Before The Final Season Of “Game Of Thrones.” So An Engineer Enlisted Artificial Intelligence To Get There First
Software engineer Zack Thoutt has trained a recurrent neural network (RNN) to predict the events of The Winds of Winter. This machine-learning algorithm is modeled after the human brain—it can quickly analyze text and remember thousands of plot points.
Why ‘Gone With The Wind’ May Be The One Confederate Memorial Worth Saving
Alyssa Rosenberg: “Both types of period pieces are valuable historical artifacts, not of the events and people they portray, but of previous generations of Americans’ efforts to figure out how they feel about the Civil War. … [What’s more, the film] casts a more gimlet eye on the Confederacy than it often gets credit for.”
Howard Kaminsky, 77, Publisher Of Blockbuster Books
“Brash and witty, Mr. Kaminsky developed his reputation at Warner with best sellers like Never-Say-Diet (1980), by Richard Simmons; Megatrends (1982), by John Naisbitt; sequels to The Happy Hooker, by the former madam Xaviera Hollander; potboiler fiction by Andrew Greeley, a Roman Catholic priest; the paperback edition of Judith Krantz’s Scruples; and novels by Nelson DeMille. But his best-known deal was certainly the one that Warner made with a recently disgraced former president: Barely six weeks after [Richard] Nixon resigned in 1974, Mr. Kaminsky signed him to an estimated $2.5 million deal to write his memoirs.”
A Tsunami Of Questions After The Oregon Bach Festival Fires Its Director
“Many, many questions remain. Considering how personality-driven the festival was during Helmut Rilling’s long tenure, will a significantly sized audience be willing to show up for a festival that changes direction year to year? Will the festival hold to its Bach roots, or consider them disposable? What is the “true story” behind what appears to be a divorce?”
Edinburgh City Council To Explore Minimum Wages For Fringe Festival Performers
The report will examine which conditions could be attached as a requirement of council funding at the festival to further these aims. This could result in minimum-hour contracts (as opposed to zero-hour contracts) and the living wage introduced at all council-supported venues, which include the Assembly Rooms.