“Kusama’s enormous popularity stems not just from the transformative experience of her photogenic art or its digital reach, but from her compelling personal narrative as well [as her] cultural brand as Pop Art’s eccentric auntie. … But it is also the result of a supporting structure that brings together [psychiatric] hospital, studio, fabricators, and galleries to surround her like an exoskeleton.” – ARTnews
Tag: 07.21.20
John Williams at 88
“Williams is a courtly, soft-voiced, inveterately self-effacing man of eighty-eight. He is well aware of the extraordinary worldwide impact of his “Star Wars” music—not to mention his scores for “Jaws,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “E.T.,” the “Indiana Jones” movies, the “Harry Potter” movies, the “Jurassic Park” movies, and dozens of other blockbusters—but he makes no extravagant claims for his music, even if he allows that some of it could be considered “quite good.” – The New Yorker
BalletX Is Turning Its Next Season Into A Film Festival
The plan just announced by artistic director Christine Cox is for “a new series launching Sept. 10 celebrating the company’s 15th anniversary with world premieres by 15 choreographers. She sees the season in terms of a subscription-based film festival with nine shorts and six features. The shorts will be dance films presented on a new virtual platform hosted on the company’s website called BalletX Beyond. The features are intended to be performed live in the spring or summer, depending on public health concerns, but they, too, may be turned into films, if necessary.” – The Philadelphia Inquirer
Cord-Cutting Really Is Starting To Strangle Cable TV. So What Are The Cable Networks Doing?
“The decline of cable isn’t a new story, but what has started to take hold is a change in narrative inside the industry. Rather than try to prop up what they all know to be a decaying linear business, cable executives are instead focusing on their still-healthy intellectual properties and the brands behind them. Some of those cable brands are even aiming to carve out a space in the streaming world.” – Variety
Arts Center In Sydney Is Saved From Liquidation — But At The Expense Of Some Artists
“Carriageworks has a clear path towards recovery after creditors voted unopposed on Tuesday for a proposal to rescue the arts company with the support of philanthropists and the New South Wales government, but not everyone is happy with the deal.” The problem: many of those creditors are small arts organizations and individual artists, who may get only about a third of the fees owed them. – The Guardian
NPR’s Broken Business Model
For decades, the P in NPR stood for “public,” as in publicly supported, noncommercial radio and digital news. Yet with its growing dependence on corporate advertising, NPR has found itself on equally troubled footing as its for-profit competitors, all of them reliant on the same pool of advertising dollars that have dried up during the coronavirus pandemic. – Washington Post
Ailey School Director Denise Jefferson Dead At 65
“Handpicked by Alvin Ailey himself to run the school in 1984, she led that enterprise for the past 26 years, mentoring numerous students, including many who later joined with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, the Martha Graham Dance Company, the Mark Morris Dance Group, the Hubbard Street Dance Chicago and others.”