“‘Classical’ and ‘contemporary’ are old-school binary. They are market-driven categorisations that have become less and less applicable since musique concrète, since the AACM, since the cassette tape, since the internet, since globalisation. Now is the age of cross-pollination. Maybe now is the age of no terms at all.”
Tag: 06.27.17
Someone’s Always Announcing The Death Of The Short Story. Don’t Believe Them
“While bitter experience has shown poetry exactly where it stands in the marketplace, and the novel has shrugged off multiple reports of its death and maintained pre-eminence, the short story is continually characterised as the neglected form that will be great again. The funny thing is, when you explore its history you find the perception of a distant golden age, an undistinguished present and a return to glory has always been around: the short story has a problem with reality.”
Even After ‘Moonlight’ Won Best Picture, It’s Still Hard To Get Queer-Themed Movies Made
“Moonlight grossed $65 million worldwide on a $1.5 million production budget, but the consensus still seems to be that financiers don’t see an audience for these films beyond the LGBTQ community. When they don’t see an audience, they don’t see a profit.” Vanity Fair talks to half a dozen LGBTQ filmmakers about the struggles they continue to face.
Scientific Publishing Is A HUGE Business (But Does It Harm Science?)
The core of Elsevier’s operation is in scientific journals, the weekly or monthly publications in which scientists share their results. Despite the narrow audience, scientific publishing is a remarkably big business. With total global revenues of more than £19bn, it weighs in somewhere between the recording and the film industries in size, but it is far more profitable.
The Sci-Fi Worlds That Filled The Muslim World Long Ago
“Western readers often overlook the Muslim world’s speculative fiction. I use the term quite broadly, to capture any story that imagines the implications of real or imagined cultural or scientific advances. Some of the first forays into the genre were the utopias dreamt up during the cultural flowering of the Golden Age.”
Millennials Are The Greatest Generation, At Least In Library-Going Terms
Yep. They’re more likely than Gen-X and Boomers – and way more likely than the Silent Generation – to visit the library. Maybe this is why? “Due in large part to libraries’ egalitarian nature, their events, teach-ins, and classes are free and open, making them natural hubs for underemployed millennials seeking skills to break out of their parents’ homes.” Also, of course, the books are free.
Should Theater Reviews Be Held Accountable From A Social Justice Viewpoint?
Howard Sherman on the (latest) Hedy Weiss controversy: “Many theatres are trying to address systemic racism in their practices, just as progressive activists are working vigorously to address that deep racial and ethnic inequality in society at large. So for artists committed to those goals who find their creative work viewed through a frequently dismissive perspective when it comes to social justice, who see a lack of empathy when it comes to racial topics, which I believe Weiss has displayed, it is unquestionably not just troubling, but painful.”
As Pride Month Ends, A Question: What Makes A Dance Queer?
Some answers arose in New York, where Explode! Queer Dance hosted a four-day academic and artistic festival. The goals were ambitious: “Explode! set out to tackle inextricable challenges of strengthening ties among queer dance artists and dismantling racism, sexism, classism, transphobia and white supremacy. A tall order, but why aim for less?”
Ai Weiwei Says Artists – And Everyone – Should Be (Part Of) The Change They Wish To See
Ai: “It’s not a strategy, it’s life itself. It’s like if you go in a room, you look for the light, for the window. You turn on light, you open the window.”
After A Long Legal Battle, An Austrian Court Has Ruled In Favor Of Franz West’s Children
In the hospital, West signed a document creating a foundation a few days before he died. “Those on the family’s side say that individuals with a financial stake in the estate, including Gagosian dealer Ealan Wingate, who was at the hospital during West’s final days, ‘wanted to make sure with the foundation that the heirs would not be in conflict’ with the gallery’s interests, Kerres says. As a result, ‘the lawyer did a rushed job, just writing something by hand and forgetting major parts of an agreement.'”