At a site in Limmen National Park in the Northern Territory are 17 paintings, stenciled on rock, that are far smaller than usual for such art, featuring detailed renderings of humans, kangaroos, turtles, boomerangs, and geometric figures. Researchers, working with the Marra people native to the area, think the painters may have used the same beeswax figures they used to make toys. – Artnet
Tag: 06.02.20
How Did Shanghai Become China’s Literary Hotbed?
Believe it or not, writes Dr. Jin Lee, it was a by-product of the First Opium War, after which Shanghai turned from a little river town into a huge, prosperous international port city. – Literary Hub
Is This The First-Ever Virtual Ballet Competition?
“After weeks of planning, registration is now underway for the UBC Virtual Competition Experience, which will run from June 12–14. The competition is two-fold: Participants will submit videos to be played during the livestream and judged, and they will have the chance to participate in master classes via Zoom, and receive comments and corrections in real time.” – Pointe Magazine
Pacific Standard Magazine, Now Shuttered, Acquired By Grist
“Grist, a 20-year-old nonprofit online magazine that focuses on climate and environmental coverage, has taking full ownership of all the assets of what’s left of Pacific Standard, an award-winning magazine that closed in 2019.” – Axios
A New Online Dance Work For The Age Of Coronavirus And George Floyd
“Short as it is, [Jamar Roberts’s] video, Cooped, released last week, is one of the most powerful artistic responses yet to the Covid-19 crisis. And as that crisis changes shape, as the anxiety over disease and confinement is compounded by violence and protest, the resonance of the work only expands.” – The New York Times
What Art Will Come Out Of These Difficult Times?
What then can we expect of the contemporary artistic community by way of helping us digest this experience of physical confinement and anxiety? Some have already shared their creations during confinement through social media. – The Art Newspaper
A Plan To Insure Media Production In Canada
“Without the availability of insurance policies to cover future COVID-19 risks, most production in Canada will not resume. A government-backstopped insurance program will provide confidence to the marketplace, encouraging insurers to offer COVID-19 coverage, allowing producers to purchase policies, and ultimately allowing Canada’s production sector to re-open, once it is safe to do so.” – Variety
Face Masks Have Become Banners In America’s Culture Wars
Amanda Hess: “The mask is a public health device, but it has also revealed itself as a mask in the more traditional sense: a tool in a social ritual, a fetish object that signifies a person’s politics, gender expression and relationship to truth itself.” – The New York Times
Royal Shakespeare Co. Cancels All Scheduled Performances For 2020 (“Scheduled” Is The Key Word)
Due to the ongoing coronavirus epidemic and social distancing rules, the company is postponing everything through the end of the year that had been announced for its Stratford-upon-Avon headquarters and its annual residency at the Barbican in London as well as its West End production of Matilda the Musical. However, the RSC is “actively exploring” a potential reopening of its main Stratford theatre in the fall, safety measures permitting, with productions that were canceled this spring or new projects. – Variety
Berlin’s First Post-Lockdown Opera Will Be ‘Rheingold’ On A Parking Deck
No, this isn’t some Regieoper conceit. This performance will take place on an actual parking deck — the one at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, where, starting next Friday (June 12), music director Donald Runnicles will conduct Wagner’s Das Rheingold in the 90-minute chamber-opera arrangement by Jonathan Dove. – OperaWire