“Clearing the way for a new artistic director to program the Dallas Theater Center’s anticipated 2009 move to downtown’s Dallas Center for the Performing Arts, Richard Hamburger announced Tuesday that he will leave the group next spring after 15 years.”
Tag: 08.15.06
Edinburgh Fest Tussles With Israeli Movie
The Edinburgh International Film Festival has got itself some controversy after planning to show and Israeli movie, then reportedly canceling and returning some Israeli funding…
Stop! Why Wikis Work
“Wikipedia and its contributors are excruciatingly self-aware. Wikipedia has developed many charming quirks and in-jokes in its five short years of existence, nearly all self-reflexive, including a habit of obsessively linking to its own articles. But, far more interesting, it has also collectively developed a robust sensibility about what is permissible in its own pages. Nearly every Wikipedia user has occasionally come across a little tag at the top of an article: ‘Stop!’ it says, ‘The neutrality of this article is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page.’ This little tag, I’m convinced, is the secret to Wikipedia’s success.”
Grass: My Writing Is Being Attacked
Writer Gunther Grass says his accomplishments as a writer are being denigrated after he admitted being in the Nazi SS during World War II. “What I’m experiencing is an attempt to make me persona non grata, to cast doubt about everything I did in my life after that. And that later life was marked by shame.”
Dopey – Americans Know Pop But Not News
If a new poll is accurate, Americans know much more about pop trivia than they do about the news, civics or classic literature. One example: “About 77 per cent of Americans can name at least two of the dwarfs from the fairy tale Snow White, but only about 24 per cent can name two U.S. Supreme Court justices.”
Miami Artists Caught In Real Estate Squeeze
“As Miami’s cultural community continues to grow and with boomtown rents continuously on the rise, artists and presenters are having a difficult time finding the right space or, in some cases, any space at all to show their work.”
A Landmark Of Human Thought?
A Russian mathematician solves one of the great proofs an then disappears. “Mathematicians have been waiting for this result for more than 100 years, ever since the French polymath Henri Poincaré posed the problem in 1904. And they acknowledge that it may be another 100 years before its full implications for math and physics are understood. For now, they say, it is just beautiful, like art or a challenging new opera.”
Movies Lose Out In Baghdad
Baghdad’s movie theatres have fallen on hard times. “Most of the city’s once-popular movie theaters have shut down for lack of business. Those that remain open save money by replaying the same films. As with art and music and theater in Baghdad, going to movies is a cultural luxury losing out to the daily killing.”
Classics In Translation
The Loeb Library has recently published its 500th volume in translation. “Just as scholars once feared, there has been a steady decline in hard-core classical philology—and thanks in part to that, the Loeb Library has lately thrived.”
Locals Rescue Traveling Orchestra That Had To Abandon Instruments
An Italian Baroque orchestra had to fly to Canada without their instruments over the weekend because of increased airline security. “Scouring the city and calling out to performers across B.C., Festival Vancouver promoters found baroque-era replacements — made of 18th-century wood and strung with catgut rather than modern steel for a ‘warmer’ tone — for all 16 of the missed instruments for the musicians from Turin.”