A story in an Italian magazine purporting to be by Nobel Prize-winning author Gabriel García Márquez on how he is dying of cancer, moved a publisher to contact Marquez’s agent to get reprint rights. The note back was incisive: “García Márquez is ashamed that this rubbish might be considered as a text written by him. It has gone around the world and I have no means of righting this usurpation of his name. It seems to proceed from a Colombian actor whom I hope I will never run into or I will insult him as he deserves.” – Sydney Morning Herald
Tag: 07.14.00
CRAFT OF THE PERFECT ASSISTANT
- No matter what he has done in the rest of his career as a musician, Robert Craft will always be known as the man who was Igor Stravinsky’s assistant. Is that okay with him? Absolutely. “He [Stravinsky] started composing the music he did, with the techniques he was using, because I was able to teach him these things.” – The Telegraph (UK)
BUILDING ON ART
Shanghai is in the midst of a massive rebuilding effort trying to regain its center as the intellectual capital of China. And what about art? “A prickly individualism means Shanghai artists never banded together like those in Beijing, so what ‘art scene’ there is lies on the fringes of a more generalized underground. – Artnet
WHY DOES ART COST WHAT IT COSTS?
“Art has always been a cyclical market. This is hardly surprising: the products may be beautiful, but can rarely be considered essential and are often driven by fickle taste. According to art-sales-index.com, the value of paintings sold peaked in 1990 at $4.5 billion dollars. From there, economies around Europe and America shrank by less than one percent, but art sales collapsed to less than $1.5 billion in less than two years.” So what’s driving today’s prices? – The Art Newspaper
VIRTUAL TATE
The Tate Modern takes to the internet with a commissioned piece that sets up a parallel Tate website universe. “Follow a link to the Tate Britain – a branch of the museum dedicated to 500 years of British art – and instead of grand Turner seascapes and Hogarth portraits, you’ll see close-ups of canvases collaged with mud, scabby skin, and baggy eyes.” – Wired
TAX DISPUTE
The British Museum threatens to institute a £1 admission charge to compensate for taxes it loses on its operations. The British government threatens to reduce the museum’s support if admission is charged. – The Art Newspaper
THE MAD CONDUCTOR
A French orchestra conductor has been charged with allegedly indoctrinating members of a doomsday cult, many of whom died in a bizarre group killing five years ago. – New Jersey Online (AP)
FOLLOW THE STARS
Britain has produced a couple of generations of excellent cellists. Why? Some attribute it to Jacqueline du Pre, whose charismatic presence inspired many to take up the instrument. “That’s how it works – there were masses of people who took up the flute when James Galway sprang to fame. You may find that there will be young violinists who took up the violin when Nigel Kennedy’s “Four Seasons” came out.” – The Guardian (UK)
ANYONE SELLING TICKETS?
A former usher at La Scala is investigated. Why? The man amassed a £3 million fortune that he says he earned through shrewd investments. Others say he had a thriving bribe business going, finding seats for people even for performances that were sold out; also that he worked a loan sharking operation out of the opera house. – BBC Music Magazine
UNTANGLING THE AURALS
Some of the more complicated scores of the 20th Century are difficult to understand by just hearing them. Now an attempt to add multi-media to untangle the aurals. “When you look at a string quartet score you can see what each instrument is playing. That allows you to look at the structure of the piece in more detail. We’re trying to create a modern score, a score that can communicate very quickly to people what’s happening in the piece.” – New York Times