Tag: 04.11.20

It Takes A Lot Of Work To Cancel A Big Arts Festival

“It’s bizarre to be this busy and not presenting music,” said an official at one festival; “We’ve had to unravel a pretty huge ball of yarn while transitioning to working remotely,” said another. Not only are there the issues of contacting patrons (individually, in some cases), testing the cancellation clauses of contracts, and dealing with lost income, there are problems like airlines giving (in place of refunds) travel credits to the ticket holder, not the festival who paid for the ticket. – The Post and Courier (Charleston)

If Travel Is Shut Down Do You Need Travel Books? Lonely Planet Shuts Down

“I was fearing bad news about a big travel firm this week: perhaps an airline, holiday company or cruise line. But I never expected to hear that the world’s leading travel-guide firm is proposing to shut its two main hubs: the original HQ in Melbourne, and the London office where much Lonely Planet content, including the magazine, is created.” – The Independent (UK)

Is There Anything More Useless In A Time Of Crisis Than The Humanities? Maybe Not…

“Even in good times, the humanistic academy is mocked as a wheel turning nothing; in an emergency, when doctors, delivery personnel, and other essential workers are scrambling to keep society intact, no one has patience with the wheel’s demand to keep turning. What is the role of Aristotle, or the person who studies him, in a crisis?” – The New Yorker

The Ceramics Sculpture Studio That Starts With Making Garden Pots

Now it’s pretty much stopping with the garden pots as well as the artists can’t mentor young proteges in the studio. But the already created ceramics are serving a purpose: “We hope that by arranging contact-free delivery and collection we can help people get on with their gardening at home during this strange spring. … That’s a nice transfer from the work of people making pots to something that can entertain people at home.” (And the youth get paid, too.) – The Guardian (UK)

To Heck With Streaming Everything; It’s Time To Read Montaigne

Well, why not? The original essayist might be the way to go. “On Solitude is one of Montaigne’s many small masterpieces. It’s an essay, typically short and, as always, disarmingly conversational. It discusses, without any hint of didacticism, the merits of being alone. Montaigne insists throughout his essays that he’s writing only to further his own understanding of life; that he’s totally unqualified, and we can ignore him if we like.” But let’s ignore our screens instead. – The Irish Times

Note To Fundraisers: Get The Unions On Board Before You Make A Plan Not To Pay Performers

The charity Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS was planning a stream of a November 2019 (remember those halcyon days?) concert that celebrated the 25th anniversary of Disney on Broadway. Problem: While SAG-AFTRA and Actors’ Equity were on board, the American Federation of Musicians was not. The union’s president: “Especially now, with zero employment in the entertainment sector, the content producers should care enough about the welfare of those who originally performed the show to see to it that they are fairly compensated when their work is recorded and streamed throughout the world.” – The New York Times

Baritone Ludovic Tezier Warns That The Virus ‘Will Have The Skin Of The Arts’ If Governments Don’t Step In

The opera singer says that the lyric arts are particularly at risk with the shutdown, and he addresses President Macron directly in his column. “I speak on behalf of troubadours and acrobats who go on the road, often far from their own, and whose only possibility of building their life rests on the intangibility of the next contract. There are very few wealthy people in this laborious little world, very few whose calendar goes beyond the next ten months. The life of artists is a daily struggle.” – Le Monde