“It’s not about the bottom line, according to [director Dean] Sobel. It’s about value, and charging gives a museum an intrinsic worth. Nearly all museums charge, even though ticket revenue tends to be a small percentage of income.”
Tag: 02.19.12
Let’s Hear It For Democracy … Via The E-Book?
“The power to create great books and the power to distribute great books is transferring to the author. Just a few years ago, publishers controlled the printing press and they controlled access to retail distribution. So if you couldn’t get your book printed and you couldn’t get it distributed, you’d never reach readers. But today, the printing press is completely democratized.”
Bronze Boy (With A Bit Of Cheek) To Decorate Trafalgar Square
“With his curls and wry smile, this golden boy in his little shorts and braces peers down from his bronze steed, one arm raised delicately. He looks almost classical. But look again. Those shorts could be leather. He might also be down the disco.”
We Mean It: Kindle Singles Will Save Journalism (And Maybe Fiction, Too)
“Singles justify both an e-reader purchase and a low-commitment investment in reading something; they aren’t aspirational like the high-designed special editions that might save real books, but there is a version of wantable scarcity that comes with such a custom, niche-y, one-off something.”
Will Islamic Fundamentalism Put An End To Belly Dancing In Egypt?
One Canadian dancer thinks so.
English National Opera Called ‘Pro-Terrorist’ Because Of ‘Klinghoffer’
“Jewish groups have accused ENO of ‘giving a voice to terrorism’ and have threatened to mount protests after the company’s decision to stage the rarely-performed work, which the opera company itself says will ‘shock.'”
You Think Hollywood Loves Itself, But What You See Is Actually Self-Loathing
“The Oscar nominees may not be just a demonstration of a sudden burst of nostalgia. They may be a demonstration of the self-contempt of an industry that is finally tired of itself and of the movies that have defined it for two decades. This doesn’t mean that they will retreat from teenage blockbusters. It just means that they are using the Oscars to stage a small protest against the sorts of movies they feel we the audience sadistically forces them to make.”
Without Distractions, No Opportunity For Art
“For me, now, things do get done; books are finished, and other projects are started that are also finished. They take the time they take, and the breaks are as important as the continuities. Only a fool would think that someone should be able to bear boredom and frustration for long hours at a time and that this would be an achievement.”
The Backlash To Frank Gehry – And His Response
“According to the art critic Hal Foster, Gehry’s Walt Disney concert hall in Los Angeles is a ‘media logo’ and his style of architecture is a ‘winning formula’ for ‘any corporate entity that desires to be perceived, through an instant icon, as a global player’. Someone started selling T-shirts saying ‘Fuck Frank Gehry’ (and he bought some).”
Holocaust Movies: Always A Good Oscars Bet
J. Hoberman: “In the 52 years since Shelley Winters won a supporting actress Oscar for The Diary of Anne Frank, there have been 20 nominated features — including foreign-language and documentary films — that treated the Holocaust from the perspective of its victims. Only two have gone home unrewarded.”