Versailles was badly hit by storms in the past week. Some 10,000 trees were uprooted in 90-mile-an-hour winds and the palace roof and windows were damaged. Now Versailles is trying to raise money for repairs. – Versailles Storm Damage Report
Tag: 01.00
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS —
— in the digital age explained. Ease of digital copies a good excuse to revisit international laws. – Le Monde Diplomatique
AMONG THE STAID OLD MASTERS GALLERIES —
— clustered on a London street, an upstart arrived a half-dozen years ago. Jay Jopling’s Cube Gallery has brought worldwide attention to some of the most talked-about artists on the British art scene, including many of those in the “Sensation” show, which opened at the Brooklyn Museum last fall. His reaction to the Brooklyn flap? “That was great! You’d pay a million dollars to get publicity on that scale!” – ARTnews
HAS ABSTRACTION LOST ITS EDGE?
“The practice of abstractionism has failed to engage creatively with the radical change in human experience in recent decades; it has, seemingly, been unwilling to re-invent itself in relation to the systems of artistic expression and viewer expectation that have developed under the impact of the mass media.” Like their confreres elsewhere in the world, abstractionists in India are asking themselves an overwhelming question today: Does abstractionism have a future? – Art News In India
GLOBAL BLANDING
A Tokyo Gap may be indistinguishable from one in New York. But there’s still hope to recover from global blandishment. The future of international design, say designers, is local identity. – Metropolis
ONLINE ART
Suddenly a number of art sellers have made major investments to get online. Will selling art online be a success? Hard to tell since no one even really has a good idea what the conventional art market is worth. – ARTnews
WORLD DOMINATION
With Bilbao a hit and expansion planned for Venice, the Guggenheim eyes its next move. This time the focus is on South America. São Paulo, perhaps? – ARTnews
THE POLITICS OF PLAIN TALK
The ongoing debate over “linguistic transparency” – the idea that good writers must write clearly – has pitted George Orwell against Theodor Adorno. The ranks are now being divided between intellectuals who are intolerant of deliberately difficult jargon, and those who believe plain talk can endanger writers’ ability depict the complexities of the world in more radical terms. – Lingua Franca
THE DISAPPEARANCE OF A FILM
The screen version of Otto Preminger’s “Porgy and Bess” starred a Who’s Who of 1950s-era black American actors. Released against the backdrop of the insurgent civil rights movement, the film sparked considerable controversy during its initial run and eventually disappeared from the public eye. Why is that? – CultureFront 01/00