“The story of Italian marble is the story of difficult motion: violent, geological, haunted by failure and ruin and lost fortunes, marred by severed fingers, crushed dreams, crushed men. Rarely has a material so inclined to stay put been wrenched so insistently out of place and carried so far from its source.”
Tag: 07.26.17
Colosseum Archaeological Park Approved By Italy’s Council Of State
“Italy’s top administrative court has also unblocked the international selection process for a new director to oversee the ancient amphitheatre and its surrounding monuments, including the Roman Forum, Palatine Hill and Domus Aurea. The decisions of 24 July overturn a challenge by the mayor of Rome through the Lazio regional administrative tribunal (TAR) on 7 June.”
Top Posts From AJBlogs 07.26.17
Fireflies Are Out …
“Veselka” cucumber conundrum soup
You can tell the temperature by the firefly rate of thorax blinking, which can be hypnotic, like the gleam of this cucumber seed in fluorescent kitchen light. Those seeds, covered in slime, scoot like baby roaches onto counter or floor when you run a spoon down the center of your split green sausage to scoop them out. … read more
AJBlog: Out There Published 2017-07-26
This is Reading — Artists Make Magic
In mid-July, I traveled to Pennsylvania to see a show. It was straight-up MAGIC. I can’t stop thinking about it. … read more
AJBlog: The Bright Ride Published 2017-07-23
How Opera America Helped Spark A New Era In American Opera
“New music is a culture that tends to romanticize risk, and I think we ought to push back on that romanticizing. For all its aesthetic innovation, new music remains a job for many people.” Perhaps the same could be said of new American opera. Debates over its future highlight a complex web of expectations concerning not only the importance of radical artistic vision but also the commercial realities and conventional operatic norms of larger institutions that cannot afford to fail in the same way that smaller organizations might.
China Blacks Out Foreign Movies And Sees Home-Grown Movies Top The Box Office
China’s government, intent on building a domestic film industry to rival Hollywood’s, typically bans imported releases during peak moviegoing periods, such as national holidays and summer vacations. The blackouts — officially called “domestic film protection periods” — have historically given a summer bump to local films.
American Theatre Enthusiastically Takes On The Made-For-Theatre Trump
“With almost as much gusto as the talkers on cable news channels, the theater world is chewing over the bombastic image and pronouncements of President Trump, albeit with even less concern about the appearance of neutrality. It’s fair to say that among the lively arts, the theater has staked a claim most quickly and aggressively as a conduit for critiques of an administration that the vast majority of artists look upon as a threat.”
The Most-Popular Playwright In America Is An Unexpected Name
Lauren Gunderson recently topped the annual list of American Theatre magazine’s ranking of the country’s most-produced playwrights. (She was second only to August Wilson, who is deceased. Shakespeare receives so many productions every year he is no longer included on the list). Her placement there was remarkable for a number of reasons. She’s one of only a handful of women to make the list, and at 35, she is relatively young to appear there. But Gunderson took the theater world by surprise primarily because she has never had a major production in New York.
Report: Nonprofits Are Stockpiling Huge Amounts Of Cash
“Nonprofits with large endowments are collecting more than twice as much money as they are spending on grants, facilities, and administrative and other costs, a new data analysis of 1,600 organizations by The Chronicle shows.”
They’re Going To Try A Biennial In 30 Cities At Once
“The first International Biennial of Contemporary Art of South America (BienalSur) launches this September across 30 cities … Although its main hub is in Buenos Aires, the show extends beyond Argentina – to Santiago, Rio de Janeiro, Havana, Paris, Berlin and Tokyo, among other cities.”