The Twitterverse worked itself into a bit of a lather a couple of weekends ago, when Sunday Times columnist Sathnam Sanghera decried the people who sit down and play the pianos that have been left in train stations, writing “Can we please get back to good old British reserve in general?” In response, reporter Amy Walker went to St. Pancras Station in London and talked to some of the people who took a turn at the keyboards there that day.
Tag: 11.04.18
Isabella Stewart Gardner Heist: Whitey Bulger Gave Stolen Art To IRA, Says Investigator
“Following a network of leads, many from underworld contacts, [former Scotland Yard detective Charles] Hill is convinced that the Gardner treasures are still stashed in the Republic of Ireland. ‘Even if Bulger did not order the robbery originally, he would have muscled in and taken control of the haul soon after it took place. … Whitey felt he owed one to his friends in the Republic. I believe he offered them the paintings.”
LA Times Critics Reflect On How The Arts Changed Since The Great Recession
“Tough times are not always bad times, and so many factors are involved in the evolution of the arts that cause and effect are simply not quantifiable. Technology. Entrepreneurship. Audiences. The economy. You name it. All play ever-changing parts. Institutions die and new ones are born. Look around downtown L.A. and elsewhere. Young musicians have begun their own ensembles. To be an outlier is to be in. Composers have found the players they need. New music and new opera are thriving throughout the country like never before. What matters in the end is not money but priorities.”
We Seem To Be In Love With Miniatures. Why?
What can possibly be the appeal? The answer lies in our desire for mastery and elucidation. The ability to enhance a life by bringing scaled-down order and illumination to an otherwise chaotic world – a world over which we may otherwise feel we have little control – cannot be overvalued. The fascination of holding in our hands something completely realised at an impossibly reduced scale is a wholly fulfilling one, and the satisfactions of inquisitive observation will never tire. At its simplest, the miniature shows us how to see, learn and appreciate more with less.
Seeing Is Believing? With AI, Not Anymore
“Why did Stalin airbrush those people out of those photographs?” he asked. “Why go to the trouble? It’s because there is something very, very powerful about the visual image. If you change the image, you change history. We’re incredibly visual beings. We rely on vision—and, historically, it’s been very reliable. And so photos and videos still have this incredible resonance. How much longer will that be true?”
Britain’s Rachel Dolezal? Or Not? Director With White Parents Given Grant For Minority Theatre Artists
Anthony Ekundayo Lennon has always acknowledged that his parents and grandparents are white, but says that his skin coloring (which his brothers share) has led to his being treated, and discriminated against, as black or mixed-race for his entire life, including his work in theatre. Lennon applied, as a “mixed-heritage individual,” for and won an Arts Council England grant to work a a black-led London theatre company. The company, Talawa, willingly sponsors Lennon, but other black actors and directors are publicly objecting.
Conductor Antonio Pappano Was Set To Leave London’s Royal Opera House — Here’s Why He Changed His Mind
“I was due to leave Covent Garden in two years’ time … Once I realised the company would be rudderless, musically speaking, I had no choice. I couldn’t walk away having given so much blood, sweat and tears for so long, only to see all our collective efforts wither.” He will not remain as the Royal Opera House’s music director through at least 2022-23.
How Architectural Digest Documented Conspicuous Wealth
Si Newhouse had apprehended the seismic shift then afoot in the upper-income levels of American taste—away from the discreet cultivation of East Coast grandees like the Rockefellers and Mellons (which I’ve called stealth wealth), and toward the unabashed display of new money that characterized the Reagan Revolution, especially on the West Coast and across the Sun Belt, where the operative attitude was “If you’ve got it, flaunt it.” And no magazine reflected that change more accurately than Architectural Digest.
Soaring Prices For Antiquities Raise New Looting Fears
A bidding war at Christie’s last week sent the price of a 3,000-year-old stone relief from $7 million to more than $28 million, setting a world record for ancient Assyrian artworks and raising fears among some archaeologists that soaring prices will fuel the market for looted antiquities as well as legally acquired ones.
Kenya Barris Of ‘Black-ish’ Fame Has Plans For Netflix
Barris left ABC after it wouldn’t air an episode of black-ish that was about NFL players kneeling during the Pledge of Allegiance – but he left, in what both sides describe as an amicable split, for a lucrative deal at Netflix. What’s he going to do with the new opportunity? He doesn’t say much, but he will tease: “I can say this. … I want to reboot what a family show is.”