“You can never be comprehensive in some absolute way. So, in a way, we’ve gone in the opposite direction and decided we’re not even going to attempt to do that. Instead, we are going to engage again and again and again. The way we are looking at it is that, rather than thinking of this display—which sprawls across almost 170,000 square feet and consists of almost 2,500 works of art—as somehow permanent or even quasi-permanent, we think of it as a point in time that over a two-to-three-year period will virtually entirely change again.” – Artnet
Tag: 12.23.19
Anatomy Of The Classic Art World Scandal
Overreaction is crucial: the work must prompt commentators to proclaim the end of art, to evoke the cliché of the emperor’s new clothes. – The Art Newspaper
How Are MFA Programs Teaching Young Playwrights To Earn A Living? Writing For TV
“At the top schools, administrators are fielding recruiting calls from television producers and managers, adding TV classes, and competing with high-paying shows for writers they can hire as adjuncts. While these programs say they don’t want their students to leave theater altogether, TV offers them a way to make a real living, the kind of financial stability that has ramifications not just for individual artists, but for the programs themselves.” – The New York Times
How Big Data Has (Is) Transforming The Music Industry
Analysts claim it’s not only possible to see who’s blowing up now, but more importantly, who’s going to be blowing up next. Chartmetric says it can shortlist which of the 1.7 million artists it tracks will have a big career break within the next week. Pandora-owned Next Big Sound reports its patented algorithm can predict which of the nearly 1 million artists it tracks are most likely to hit the Billboard 200 chart for the first time within the next year. – Wired
‘The Gift Of The Magi’: A History Of O. Henry’s Short Story (And Its Troubled Author)
“The mixture of sadness and sentimentality in ‘Gift of the Magi’ befits a man whose life was marked by repeated human tragedies. … The diseases of alcoholism and tuberculosis would haunt [the author]” — and his family — “throughout his life.” – Smithsonian Magazine
Hollywood’s Seven Most Influential Flops Of The 2010s
“In 2010, Hollywood was drunk on the success of Avatar and decided 3D tech was the wave of the future. … Large ensemble Garry Marshall rom-coms like Valentine’s Day were still winners, as were Harrison Ford non-franchise thrillers and Nicholas Sparks movies with indistinguishable posters. None of these things are true anymore. Conventional wisdom around movies can turn on a dime, especially in such a volatile, transitional entertainment era. And nothing changes Hollywood’s tune quite like a big fat flop.” – Fast Company
The Remix Decade: Culture Invited Us To Reconsider What We (Think) We Know
“In television, film, literature, and other media over the past ten years, artists have presented information as though it is gospel, then reframed it in ways that force us to reconsider our assumptions. These cultural works challenged us to realize that there’s always something more to learn from every story, even the ones we think we know.” – New York Magazine
What’s Behind Historians’ Arguments Over The New York Times 1619 Project
“Underlying each of the disagreements in the letter is not just a matter of historical fact but a conflict about whether Americans, from the Founders to the present day, are committed to the ideals they claim to revere. … Americans need to believe that, as Martin Luther King Jr. said, the arc of history bends toward justice. And they are rarely kind to those who question whether it does.” Adam Serwer looks into the reasons historians felt strongly enough to write the letter and the reasons that a number of historians asked to sign it declined, as well as which criticisms the project’s leader accepts. – The Atlantic
Telling Quotes From Great Arts Figures Who Passed In 2019
“At their best, the artists who died this year could make us see the world in new ways — even as they made us laugh and cry. Here is a tribute to some of them, in their own words.” – The New York Times
Vienna Philharmonic Makes (Some) Progress With Its Women Problem
The august, tradition-bound orchestra, founded 177 years ago when Vienna was the capital of a now-vanished empire, would not allow women even to audition until 1997, despite years of criticism, especially from the U.S. (It was happy to employ the services of a female harpist for 26 years before that, though it would not confer membership on her.) Now the 145-member orchestra, which has very low turnover, includes 15 women, with four more in the process of joining. – The New York Times