“‘Hello, I am Mona Lisa. It’s nice to meet you,’ she says in a Chinese Central Television video taken at a show called the World Classic Multimedia Interactive Arts Exhibition in Beijing. … [T]his Mona Lisa is a digital re-creation courtesy of the Alive Gallery in Seoul, South Korea, and is traveling to China on a three-city tour, along with a collection of other walking, talking masterworks from throughout the ages.”
Tag: 08.19.09
National Ballet Of Canada’s Latest Star Recruit Backs Out
“Canadian ballet dancer Jason Reilly has elected to sit tight in Stuttgart, withdrawing a pledge to take up a post [as a principal dancer] at the National Ballet of Canada.”
Rome Opera, Hoping To Challenge La Scala, Recruits Riccardo Muti
“Riccardo Muti has agreed to lead Rome’s opera house as the Italian capital tries to raise its music profile in a country where Milan’s La Scala dominates the field, the city’s mayor said.” The maestro, who begins a five-year term as the Chicago Symphony’s music director in 2010, ended a two-decade tenure at La Scala in 2005 following a series of ferocious disputes.
This Is Taking The Eurovision Song Contest Too Far: Azerbaijan Interrogates Viewers Who Voted For Armenia
“Security forces in Azerbaijan have launched a campaign against dozens of citizens for voting for the wrong entry in this year’s Eurovision Song Contest. Authorities in the oil-rich country are apparently tracking down people who voted for Azerbaijan’s bitter enemy Armenia in the competition held in May.”
Ballet BC Announces First Stage Program Since Canceling Season
“Ballet BC is returning to the stage in September under new interim artistic director Emily Molnar for a single evening’s performance featuring dancers from the National Ballet. … [The company] previously announced it the suspension of its 2009-2010 subscription series and confirmed it would not be participating in the biggest cultural festival in the country next year, the 2010 Cultural Olympiad.”
In Chicagoland, Naperville City Council Unanimously Rejects $190M Arts Center Plan
The proposal – which includes a complex with three performances spaces (2700, 950 and 200 seats) and a parking garage, plus more than 500 condos as well as townhouses and retail stores – calls for locally-backed bonds but no taxpayer funding. Yet every single councilperson said that the financial risk to the city is too great.
‘Lost Archive’ Of Frida Kahlo Works Condemned As Forgeries
“A cache of Frida Kahlo oil paintings, diaries and archival material that is the subject of a book to be published by Princeton Architectural Press on 1 November has been denounced by scholars as a cache of fakes.”
Lawyer: Google Settlement Abuses Class-Action Process
“When the [Google books] settlement was announced last October, Google and the groups representing authors and publishers who had originally sued the company hailed the agreement as a public good.” But lately, objections to it have been snowballing, and the Justice Department has launched an antitrust probe. Now a prominent Washington lawyer, who’s also an author, “plans to file a sweeping opposition to the settlement on Wednesday.”
The Show Must Go On, But The Actors May Call In Sick
So many actors, including leads, have been missing performances of “West Side Story” on Broadway “that last week Arthur Laurents, who wrote the show and directed this revival, read his cast the riot act. His tone, I’m told, was chilling. The 91-year-old told them that professionals don’t miss performances, and that they’d better get their acts together or find another line of work. … Producers say actors today, especially kids in their 20s, think nothing of calling in sick.”
When It’s Down And Troubled, BSO’s Got A Friend
A weeklong Tanglewood festival celebrating James Taylor has been a boon to the Boston Symphony’s bottom line, and not just because tickets flew out the door. “Instead of being paid for the gig, Taylor will give the symphony $500,000, his earnings after expenses.” Taylor and “his wife, Kim, [who] was a longtime [BSO] staffer and has now been elected to serve as a trustee,” have donated more than $1 million to the BSO in the past few years.