Her death-defying dancers rehearse Ascension. (video)
Tag: 06.22.15
Wait, What Actually *Is* The Most Banned Book In The United States?
The American Library Association’s list is not statistically supported, says FiveThirtyEight. Sooooo what’s the deal?
Does Too Much Porn Really Numb Us To Sexual Pleasure?
“In many ways, pornography is no different to a scary movie or a bungee jump. We just view it differently because it happens to involve sex. … [One researcher] likened pornography addiction – the notion that, like a drug, the more you watch, the more, and higher doses, you crave – to the emperor who has no clothes: everyone says it’s there, but there is no actual evidence to support it.”
What It’s Like To Have An Opera Written About You
“Who has an opera made of their life? Roman gods, doomed lovers, Nixon, and now, to our great surprise, my wife Jessie and I. … In popular usage, the words ‘operatic’ and ‘tragic’ are roughly synonymous, the required minimum bet of misery much greater for opera than memoir. So how should you take it if professionals think your life was awful enough to qualify? The war was bad, I admit, but I didn’t know my war was Wagner bad.”
The Couple Who Are Finally Bringing Us The Real Dostoevsky (Eat Your Heart Out, Constance Garnett)
“When we first told [this old Russian émigré lady] we were translating The Brothers Karamazov, she said, Oh, Dostoevsky, I hope you correct his awful style. I said, No, that is precisely what we’re going to keep.” A conversation with Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky.
Do Our Theatre Reviews Have A Racial Bias Problem?
“Reading these reviews just after following reports from the Americans in the Arts and Theatre Communications Group conferences, which demonstrated a genuine desire on the part of arts institutions to address diversity and inclusion, I worry that if the arbiters of art continue to judge work based on retrograde social views, it will only slow progress in the field that, as it is, has already been too long in coming.”
MoMA Averts Strike As Employees Approve New Contract
The three-year labor agreement “was ratified by 95% of the roughly 280 MoMA employees who are members of Local 2110.”
Bill T. Jones Grapples With The Holocaust In Dance
“Taking testimony from a Holocaust survivor and turning it into a dance is an intriguing but risky proposition, especially if you’re not a Jew. How do you do justice to the words and the truths they contain while still creating something new from them? How do art and life, imagination and reality, coexist?”
A Liberal Arts Education? Not Worth A Dime (And That’s Okay)
“Even the shrinking pool of champions of liberal education try to argue for its workplace utility, pointing out that employers actually do want their employees to ‘write clearly,’ ‘argue persuasively,’ and ‘possess critical thinking skills,’ … It has not compelled anyone. … This tactic may win some battles, but it will ultimately lose the war.”
London’s Royal Opera House Has Record Year At The Box Office
“Double-digit increases in income from ticket sales – which grew 19% to £44.2 million – and fundraising (a 10% lift to £26.5 million) accounted for more than half (56%) of all earnings. Funding of £29 million from Arts Council England saw its contribution to overall income decreasing 1% to 23% of the total.”