The workers — public-facing staffers who watched over galleries and answered questions about art — had announced plans to unionize with AFSCME in early November over concerns related to wages and working conditions. Days later, they were all laid off via email. The Marciano also announced it would shut down its galleries due to low attendance. A month later, the museum made the closure permanent. – Los Angeles Times
Tag: 07.22.20
What NBC’s ‘World Of Dance’ Gets Right
Sarah Kaufman: “The throughline of WOD is: Show us something we’ve never seen before. As a dance critic, I want to see that, too, whenever I’m in the theater. What new revelation jumps out in a premiere, or in a reinterpretation of a classic work? What fresh response is there to the music, the setting, the story? Part of ‘new’ involves sheer novelty, but part of it is also framing — how the choreographer and the dancer set up a moment for the best impact.” – The Washington Post
Stop Calling This Composer And Polymath ‘The Black Mozart’
His name is Joseph Boulogne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges. “Presumably intended as a compliment, this erasure of Boulogne’s name not only subjugates him to an arbitrary white standard, but also diminishes his truly unique place in Western classical music history.” – The New York Times
The Brain Science Of Being In Love
“We put over 100 people who were madly in love into a brain scanner using fMRI. We noticed those who had fallen in love in the first eight months had a lot of activity in brain regions linked with intense feelings of romantic love. Those who had been madly in love for a longer period of time—from eight to 17 months—showed additional activity in a brain region linked with feelings of deep attachment. That vividly showed us the brain can easily fall happily and madly in love rapidly, but feelings of deep attachment take time.” – Nautilus
Which Roles Can The Arts Fill Beyond COVID?
“While we never mind insisting that art can change the world, we get fuzzy when pressed on the details of how. In pursuing “usefulness,” the past decades have witnessed an increasing instrumentalization of art, one which, in most instances, falls short of our transformative aspirations. Perhaps, in an age of “utility” and “impacts,” the more radical vision is not the instrumentalization of art, but the aestheticization of the world.” – The Philanthropist
Quebec Government To Investigate Firing Of Museum Director
Her departure has unleashed a tempest in the art circles of Canada, where the Montreal museum is viewed as something of a national treasure; the debate over why Nathalie Bondil was let go has led to such confusion and rancor that the government has stepped in to investigate. – The New York Times
Kick The Cars Off 7th Avenue And Turn It Into An Outdoor Arts Center, Says Carnegie Hall Chief
Clive Gillinson: “What would it mean to close Seventh Avenue from 47th to 57th streets to vehicular traffic, creating a pedestrian mall for the arts, anchored by Carnegie Hall to the north and the TKTS Broadway ticket booth to the South. This space could be lined with restaurants, sidewalk cafes, jazz clubs, art galleries and the like, serving as a central area for people to gather — not only those headed to performances in the theater district and concert venues such as Carnegie Hall, Radio City Music Hall and Jazz at Lincoln Center, but city visitors staying in the many hotels close by.” – Gothamist
‘Serial’ Bought By New York Times, Which Signs Partnership Deal With ‘This American Life’
“As part of the Times, Serial Productions will independently commission and edit its own stories, which ‘will now be amplified by the Times,’ the company said.” (The price was reportedly $25 million.) “In addition, the Times said it had entered into an ‘ongoing creative and strategic alliance’ … that will let This American Life continue to collaborate on long-form audio stories with Serial Productions as well as partner with the Times on marketing and ad sales.” – Variety
Twelve Ways The Pandemic Will (Okay, Might) Change The Classical Music Business
“1. The old song ‘Rip it up and start again’ applies to sardine-seating business models not only for airlines but also theatres. …
5. International touring productions will be reimagined via boots-on-the-ground co-productions with locally sourced talent.
6. Audience sizes will be between 50-70% smaller, and multi-day performance runs will become the norm.” – Ludwig Van
A Third Of U.S. Museum Directors Fear That COVID Could Shut Down Their Institutions For Good
“In a survey released Wednesday of 760 museum directors, 33% of them said there was either a ‘significant risk’ of closing permanently by next fall or that they didn’t know if their institutions would survive. … The institutions surveyed ranged from aquariums to botanical gardens to science centers. More than 40% of them were history museums, historic houses and historical societies, while art museums represented less than 25%.” – NPR