Last year two 20-somethings decided to sell books on the streets of New Orleans. But the city said they needed a permit. But it wasn’t possible to get a permit. “It turned out New Orleans had permits for street vendors selling food, flowers, razor blades, shoelaces, candles, and pencils—but not books. And anything that wasn’t explicitly permitted was forbidden.” So the pair fought the ban and ended up in the state Supreme Court – where they won…
Tag: 06.20.03
Dutch Government Returns Art
The Dutch government has finally begun returning art that hed been stolen by Nazis. “For a long period, between the end of that war and 1997, a veil of secrecy had been drawn over the so-called “NK collection”, works of art that had been recuperated but had remained unclaimed when the date for submitting an application for restitution passed.”
Finding Fellini
A new documentary about Fellini spends time with the director just before he died. “Fellini was a huge narcissist, hugely generous in other ways, a contradictory man. There are a lot of nasty things we can say about Fellini because he had a diva personality, but he really was a genius. He’s someone who stayed true to his vision, and didn’t compromise one bit . And I have great respect for that.”
Venice – One Great Big Mess
“Launched more than a century ago, the Venice Biennale should bring together the world’s best new art in a series of national pavilions. In recent years, it has been the Biennale director who has gathered together the most dynamic selection in the old shipworks and the rope factory of the Venetian republic. This year, however, the new director, Francesco Bonami, abandoned any attempt at curating the event himself or presenting a coherent vision of the state of art today.” The result? A mess.
Not So Simple, Is It, Orrin?
“Earlier this week, Utah’s Sen. Orrin Hatch was caught using unlicensed software on his website. While his staff scrambled to fix that problem, Web surfers discovered his site had a link to a pornographic website… To be fair, the dirty link isn’t Hatch’s fault. A lot of expired domain names are being snapped up by porno sites.” Still, the two incidents are being gleefully cited by privacy advocates as further evidence that Hatch’s sweeping pronouncements about destroying the computers of illegal downloaders were ill-conceived and hypocritical.
On Being John Adams
John Adams is the most-performed living composer. “A sophisticated media handler, he has the tongue of a liberal intellectual and the laid-back aura of a hippie-turned-family man. He neither starves in a garret – orchestras are falling over themselves to play his scores – nor inhabits an ivory tower. Adams has kept in touch with what audiences like to hear. His music is the most beautiful, witty and technically assured of anyone writing for orchestra and opera house today. Listen to Nixon in China (1987), his first work to reach a wide audience, and the chances are you will respond to its subtly distilled rhythm and verve.”
Judge Prevents Newspaper From Printing Early Harry Review
A judge in Canada has ruled that the Montreal Gazette could not publish a review or details of the new Harry Potter book before the book is officially released this weekend. “It is clear to me that the information was confidential … its inadvertent or surreptitious disclosure does not necessarily remove its confidential nature.”
China Arrest Museum Official For Stealing Art
China has arrested a museum official in Chengde, a city north of Beijing, for “stealing some of the precious antiquities he was supposed to be guarding. It is the biggest such theft reported in half a century of Communist rule.” The official is accused of “stealing 158 relics during 12 years, substituting fake artifacts or doctoring inventories to conceal his crimes.”
Israel’s Ongoing Culture Cuts
Israel’s culture budget has been cut nine times in two years. “Economic uncertainty hovers over the nation’s cultural institutes and has grown larger with a new cut in the budget that was passed last week. Announcements about the size of cuts in the culture budget were contradictory. Millions of shekels were added to the budget and were then subtracted with a stroke of the pen.”
Kids’ Books – Into A Sea Of Difficulty
The odds against the author of a kids’ book are enormous. “Those of us who review children’s books jettison books we dislike, unwilling to waste time and limited space on squashing reviews because we know that it’s our recommendations that are most useful. Information about children’s books – genuine, independent, informed and balanced – is hard to find. The job of children’s bookseller may not feature in many careers advisers’ files, but it’s one that benefits from a vast panoply of skills – interpersonal to intellectual – that create the right environment for perfect retailing: a successful sale is of a product that won’t come back to a customer who will.”