Tag: 02.20.04

The Artist As Multi-National Supplier

“Once upon a time, young artists started their careers with a single gallery in their home country. Scoring international representation was a consecration that occurred only once the artist had an established reputation and a proven market. But that old model has been pulverised. Today, both in Europe and America, artists only a few years out of school commonly have some combination of several European galleries, dealers on both US coasts, and perhaps something more exotic, like representation in Japan or Latin America. Yet in the same way that a college degree has devolved from being a symbol of high achievement to a minimum requirement for decent employment, having multiple international galleries is now just an early step toward art world success.”

The Marvelous McGuires

William and Nadine McGuire moved to Minnesota about 15 years ago, and have emerged as leading donors to the arts in the Twin Cities. “The McGuires’ burst of generosity just since July has left observers giddy: $10 million to the University of Minnesota, $10 million to the Guthrie Theater and $1 million to the Children’s Theatre Company. Other recent Twin Cities giving by the McGuires and their family foundation, for which details were not revealed, bring their total giving to more than $40 million, William McGuire said Thursday.”

In RoadTrip: Osmo Loosens Up

Sam Bergman on tour in Europe with the Minnesota Orchestra: “It rarely occurs to musicians that conductors must feel the same pressures that we do, and in considerably greater measure. But if the expectations were high for this orchestra on this tour, they were stratospheric for Osmo, who is being asked to prove his reputation on a global stage with an American orchestra, in the very first year of his tenure with us. Now, Osmo is not the type of conductor who buckles in the face of pressure, and he’s been more or less rock solid on the podium throughout the trip. But where his demeanor in the early rehearsals was fairly stern and even a bit domineering, we now see him cracking jokes and trading quips with the musicians during the evening touch-ups.”

Magazines Suffer Big Sales Drop

Magazine newstand sales are down substantially in the past year. In the last six months, “according to official figures released Monday by the Audit Bureau of Circulations, out of the 472 magazines it tracks, 319 reported newsstand declines and their combined newsstand sales fell 5.9 percent (3.3 million copies), not counting new titles reporting sales for the first time.”

When Roddy Dissed James…

Last month Irish writer Roddy Doyle dismissed James Joyce’s Ulysses as overlong and over-rated. “Not everyone leaped on Mr. Doyle, however, or leaped to Joyce’s defense. A number of writers in more serious papers defended Mr. Doyle’s right to bash an icon, and some Irish newspaper writers even conceded that they had always found Joyce rather a hard slog.” As an admirer of both James and Doyle, John Rockwell is conflicted…

Death of The Pop Album

For decades, the pop music album has been considered a work of art in its own right, at its best mixing songs into a coherent and interesting whole. But more and more critics are suggesting that the album as an artform is dead. “To say the least, the idea of what constitutes a proper album is unravelling, and the artists, as always, are causing a lot of that change themselves.”

Barenboim To Quit Chicago Symphony

Conductor Daniel Barenboim has told Chicago Symphony officials he’ll leave the orchestra after 17 years as music director. “Barenboim, 61, cited the toll of travel between Chicago and his home base in Berlin and the increasing “non-artistic” demands being made on music directors of U.S. orchestras to expand audiences as key factors in his decision.”

Surveying the WTC Memorial Proposals

Maybe you didn’t like the proposal chosen for the World Trade Center monument. Well, take a look at the proposals that didn’t make it: “All 5,201 of the entries that the jury sifted through went on display at www.wtcsitememorial.org yesterday. Visitors to the site who signed on to second-guess the jury — “How could they have overlooked that?” — probably left with a new respect for the jurors’ devotion and patience in going through the entire lot without pay. Visitors may also have left with a sense that the world cared, no matter how clumsy or inartful the expression.”