Soviet Film Classics Now Available For Free On YouTube

“The Moscow film company behind some of the greatest classics of Soviet cinema on Wednesday said it had agreed to make dozens of its best-known movies freely available on YouTube. The agreement between Mosfilm and YouTube means that an initial batch of 50 films that still have legendary status in Russia but are little known outside will for the first time find a wide foreign audience.”

It’s Not Easy Making Ballet To Pop Songs, Says Calgary Ballet Director

Jean Grand-Maitre: “They’re easier to make relevant. But … [when] you’re working with a song by Elton John, say, like ‘Rocket Man,’ that people have heard for decades and have their own images of what they ‘see’ to it, then the real challenge is how to take this music and make people ‘see’ it in a different way.”

Ideas On The Rise? (The New Intellectualism)

“So why this blossoming interest in intellectualism? According to philosopher and School of Life co-founder Mark Vernon: “We live in a period when we’ve never been materially richer, but we appear to be over-consuming ourselves and the planet.Out of the sense of impending crisis comes the desire to ask again what it is to be human, and how we might live.”

Univ. Of Sydney To Auction Picasso Portrait Of Marie-Therese

“A fabulously vibrant Picasso painting of his young lover Marie-Thérèse Walter that has not been seen in public for 60 years is to be auctioned in London. Christie’s said it was selling Jeune fille endormie on behalf of the University of Sydney, which will put the £10m-plus it is expected to make towards scientific and medical research.”