The English-language staging of David Henry Hwang’s “play centred around homosexuality and the Cultural Revolution, both taboo subjects in China,” was in the middle of its second performance when “[p]olicemen arrived … and said that the show was being performed without a licence and should therefore cease.”
Tag: 11.27.09
European Organizations Focus More On American Donors
“As European cultural institutions take cues from their American brethren and rely increasingly on private donations, the perks that donors get in return for giving are growing in number and diversity. … Iconic cultural institutions like the Tate, the Mariinsky and the Louvre all have set up American or international ‘friends groups’ in the last decade….”
Original Hues Of Leonardo’s Last Supper Revealed
“The digital reconstruction is the result of painstaking analysis based on hundreds of high-definition photographs of the masterpiece. … Pixel by pixel, the researchers cloned da Vinci’s original pigments, [which had been localized in the hi-def photos,] using their virtual palette to restore areas where the color is irreparably lost.”
Playwright Castigates Critics For Reviewing While Drunk
Timberlake Wertenbaker, whose new play, “The Line,” got mixed reviews, “believes that the actors were not given a fair crack of the whip because many of the critics had spent the day being liberally wined and dined at the Evening Standard theatre awards – a four-hour affair … that involved a champagne reception followed by lunch and as much wine as they wanted to drink.”
As A Minor Mies Is Demolished, A Critic Cheers
“It was good to see the demolition crews pulling down the building by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. … If Mies’ name were not associated with this unremarkable shed, would anyone have cared about it? No. Did the building, stripped of its famous name, have the merits to stand on its own? Again, no.”
BBC Censors Diaghilev
“The BBC has pulled scenes from a forthcoming broadcast of a recent Sadler’s Wells show called In the Spirit of Diaghilev, after it emerged they would be unsuitable for a pre-watershed audience.”
When Artists Have A Creative Block
“Painters and other visual artists seem to be less prone as a group to the kind of “artist’s block” that stymied Copland, Sibelius and Ellison. One reason for this is that unlike serious composers or novelists, who are expected to break new ground each time they create a new work, an artist can frequently return to the same subject.”
The “Reality” Of TV Fame
“Long before reality television came along, fame turned some people crazy and some crazy people sought fame. The insane sometimes do horrible things to get attention…”
Canadian Book Awards Build The National Brand
“Fifteen years of heavily publicized, open-bar galas have made a name for the winner of the annual Giller Prize, but this year the charmed circle of recognizable Canadian authors magically expanded.”
Design HellHoles – The Modern Airport
“Somehow, over the last couple of decades, the elegance of air travel has been demolished. Gone is the notion that the airport is a symbol of seduction for the city that lay just beyond. Airports have become their own bloated cities, with restaurants, nail salons, enormous shopping malls and gated communities jealously guarded by first-class travellers.”