“[Her] professionalism and perseverance in the 1970s helped a generation of women infiltrate the boys club of television news … She broke ground on topics like sex abuse in the workplace and in prison. She also reported on a diet pill that was linked to lung disease; … racism in law enforcement; and publicly funded programs that provided horrific care for disabled children.” — The New York Times
Tag: 01.07.19
NY’s Prototype Festival Shows How Hard It Is To Reinvent Opera
Anne Midgette: “Most of them could be called opera, but most of them have little to do with what you might see in an opera house. Opera houses are looking for ways to connect with new audiences; the Prototype festival shows just how far they need to change the template to really try to do it.” – Washington Post
Opera Roles Are Classified By Voice Types. Also Gender Types. Is This A Problem?
“Imagine a soprano who has just changed her voice type from mezzo-soprano to soprano. She’s immediately at a disadvantage if she lists every role that she’s performed on her resume, because it will immediately cause the review panel to question the legitimacy of her soprano-ness. The next inevitable step is that they’ll question her ability to sing the role for which she’s currently auditioning. This isn’t a gender issue any longer, but rather an issue of the current classification system’s inability to handle change.” – NewMusicBox
The Design Of A Book’s Interior Is As Important, And As Tricky, As That Of Its Cover
As print designer Jordan Wannemacher says, “You have to have a really strong grid, you have to consider the practical physical nature of the package (is there enough room for your hands to hold the pages on the margins? will the type of binding make elements close to the gutter disappear?), you have to design anywhere from 20-200+ unique elements while ensuring they are all cohesive and unified.” — Spine
US Is Now Out Of UNESCO For Second Time
As of New Year’s Day, the United States, along with Israel, officially left the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization. The trigger for this withdrawal, which was announced 15 months ago, was UNESCO giving World Heritage Site status to the ancient West Bank city of Hebron — as a Palestinian city. (The Reagan administration withdrew the US from the organization in 1984; George W. Bush brought the country back in in 2002.) — The Architect’s Newspaper
Is It Possible To Teach Creative Writing With Value-Neutral Language?
Helen Betya Rubinstein: “I am convinced that we can teach creative writing without the language of failure or success, criticism or praise. … Even praise, like any other drug, will eventually poison art. Like criticism, it makes us forget what art is for.” — Literary Hub
This Florida Mall Aims To Become An Art Destination
“A few malls have art, a very few have good art, but almost none have the button-pushers and immersive installations that the Aventura Mall features. Artists on view include pioneers or buzzy contemporary players like Louise Bourgeois, Wendell Castle, Lawrence Weiner, Julian Opie, and Daniel Arsham.” — Architectural Digest
This One Nifty Chart Shows The Danger Facing Netflix
The problem: “most viewership on Netflix gravitates toward audience favorites that first aired on other networks, which Netflix itself doesn’t own” — which means it could lose the right to stream them. — Vox
There Are Two Golden Tractor Tires On The Grand Staircase At The Paris Opera
The gilded pieces of farm equipment, perched like two glowing wreaths, are part of an installation titled Les Saturnelles by artist Claude Lévêque. Some irked onlookers are comparing the piece to Jeff Koons’s widely reviled Bouquet de Tulipes and Paul McCarthy’s notorious sculpture Tree. — The Art Newspaper
How Ballet’s Leg Lifts Extended To 180 Degrees (And Sometimes Beyond)
To the end of the 19th century, no matter how virtuosic a ballet dancer could be, the leg was not to be lifted above the hip. Emma Sandall recounts how that changed, from Diaghilev through Balanchine to the pathbreaking hyperextension of Sylvie Guillem. — Dance Magazine