Richard Chang wonders why magazines like ARTnews focus so much on the price of art. “Sure, folks are curious about money, and any journalist worth his or her salt should be following the buck to a certain degree. Plus, we are entering the auction season, which emanates out of New York, London and Paris. But don’t articles like these reinforce a small, ultrasuccessful cadre, ignoring the majority of skilled and passionate painters, sculptors, installation, video and performance artists?”
Tag: 05.16.04
It’s Moore V. Eisner
“However it was cooked up, the confrontation between Disney and Michael Moore looks like a ready-made scenario for one of his films, since it casts him, once again, as a populist Paladin going into battle against a corporate enemy. It hardly hurts his cause that the company in question, in spite of its widely beloved, universally recognized brand name, is currently headed by Michael Eisner, one of the least beloved of modern chief executives.”
Seattle Public Library – Setting A New Standard
Next week, Seattle’s new public library – designed by Rem Koolhaas – opens, and Herbert Muschamp is ecstatic: “In more than 30 years of writing about architecture, this is the most exciting new building it has been my honor to review. I could go on piling up superlatives like cars in a multiple collision, but take my word: there’s going to be a whole lot of rubbernecking going on.”
Semiotically Speaking
“Shout the word semiotics across a room today, and the room will very likely shout back at you, ‘What do you mean, semiotics?’ It is a good question and at the same time, according to semiotics, a uselessly subjective question, for semiotics is the study of meaning itself — or rather how images and words (like semiotics, for example) come to mean anything at all. Put another way, semiotics is about how we derive meaning from context. Brown University semiotics program produced a crop of creators that, if they don’t exactly dominate the cultural mainstream, certainly have grown famous sparring with it.”
Cannes’s Upbeat Opening
“Cannes 2004 may be only a few days old, but already, it seems, the winds are blowing in a different direction than Cannes 2003 — one of the more roundly criticized in many years. Last year’s Cannes was faulted, largely by American journalists, for slights to Hollywood and for too many lousy art films on the schedule — something the programmers, especially festival head Thierry Fremaux, seem to have taken to heart. Brad Pitt, Orlando Bloom and director Wolfgang Petersen of the multimillion dollar epic “Troy” have already provided much of the Hollywood star power critics said was missing in 2003.”
Are Britain’s Libraries In Danger?
A new report in the UK argues that, “although the use of museums and archives in Britain has doubled in Britain during the life of this government, there is an urgent and imminent library crisis. ‘If we do not address the fundamental structural problem of the library service,’ says the report, not mincing its words, ‘there may be no libraries in 10 or 15 years’ time’.”
Chandelier Falls In West End Theatre, 15 Hurt
A chandelier crashed to the seats in a West End theatre Saturday night. “Audience members ran for safety as plaster started to fall during When Harry Met Sally at the Theatre Royal Haymarket on Saturday. The show’s star, Luke Perry, leapt off the stage to help people to safety.”
Barnes – Museum Or School?
“Ever since trustees appointed by Lincoln University gained control of the foundation’s board, the debate on how the Barnes should operate now and in the future has been skewed, either through ignorance or deliberately. The public, the media and the art community have long perceived the foundation to be a museum. On the other hand, the foundation’s indenture of trust, which governs its operation, is quite specific that it’s a school. Lower Merion Township agrees, because residential zoning along Latches Lane allows schools but not museums.”
Art For Art’s Sake (And More)
How to support the arts and solve funding problems? The answer is not just to talk about about the economic benefits and social goods that can accrue. “Put another way, the Medicis weren’t asking Michelangelo why this was good for business. Unfortunately, that was the almost exclusive approach of summit participants, perhaps because so few artists and other creative types were in evidence. Modern Medicis should take note.”
An On-Air Chill
The almost-anything-goes world of shock-jock radio has turned upside down since Janet Jackson’s infamous “wardrobe malfunction” during the Super Bowl halftime show. Since that fleeting glimpse of Jackson’s mostly obscured anatomy, the Federal Communications Commission has issued more than $1.5 million in fines. Moreover, with the U.S. House of Representatives recently passing a bill allowing fines of $500,000 for each instance of radio ‘indecency,’ with the White House voicing support and the U.S. Senate considering even more draconian measures, the climate for provocative speech on America’s radio airwaves has changed dramatically and swiftly.”