Robert Kindred knew these books and journals were nearly impossible to find for sale, and prohibitively expensive even when they could be found. So for the sake of his business he turned to the open shelves of academic libraries. The irony is that the easy access granted him by libraries that summer was heir to the spirit of scientific inquiry in which these magnificent prints were created in the first place.
Tag: 08.24.18
Minnesota Orchestra Looks Back On Its Tour Of South Africa: ‘One Of The Great Experiences In Our Professional Lives’
“The numbers begin to paint the picture: Over 5,000 people attended concerts in Cape Town, Durban, Pretoria, Soweto and Johannesburg. Hundreds of students, ranging from elementary school to college age, joined performances, rehearsals and master classes with Minnesota Orchestra musicians. For many audience members, it was the first time with a live orchestra. For some it was the first time even hearing classical music. The reception ranged from amazement to rapturous applause.”
More Designs Released For Edinburgh’s First New Concert Hall In A Century
“The 1000-capacity auditorium will have a rooftop dome, glass-covered walkway and outdoor terraces, under Sir David Chipperfield’s vision for the £45m IMPACT Centre, which could open by 2021. The complex, which will provide a long-awaited home for the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, is also expected to become a major new Edinburgh International Festival venue.” The IMPACT Centre “is expected to be open every day, attract more than 250,000 visitors each year and generate £25 million for the economy.”
The Great Rare-Book Road-Trip Crime Spree Of 1980 (And Its Ignominious End)
A pair of thieves spent that summer driving from Texas to Maryland to Illinois, going into university libraries and cutting out lithographs and engravings from 19th-century naturalist journals and newsweeklies that they would sell piece by piece – until, at last, they were foiled by a foolhardy change of method and an air-conditioning maintenance man.
Van Gogh’s Nightmare In A French Asylum Revealed
The artist was judged by his brother and friends to be unfit to live alone after he mutilated himself, cutting off his ear and presenting it, wrapped in paper, to a young woman in a local brothel, following the collapse of a proposed artistic partnership with Paul Gauguin.
Change The World? These People Are Dangerous!
At first, you think: Rich people making a difference — so generous! Until you consider that America might not be in the fix it’s in had we not fallen for the kind of change these winners have been selling: fake change.
Reviving A Centuries-Old Tradition Of Mending Broken Ceramics With Gold
The technique known as kintsugi (“golden seams”) or kintsukuroi (“golden repair”) developed in Japan around 500 years ago, and it’s still in use, and even spreading, today. As Casey Lesser reports, “not only has kintsugi been adopted and adapted by leading contemporary artists, these days, one can take kintsugi lessons and find self-help and wellness books that use it as a metaphor for embracing flaws and imperfections.”
Video Gaming Heads To The Cloud. And That Opens New Possibilities
The cloud is the future of videogaming, and it could arrive sooner than many players expect, with important implications for investors. Once pricey hardware is no longer necessary and top-tier games can run on two year-old smartphones, even casual gamers will become candidates for the latest releases from Electronic Arts (ticker: EA) and its peers.
Why Brutalist Architecture Doesn’t Work On Social Media
When Tumblr users reblog photographs of brutalist architecture, they turn them into pieces of furniture for their own pages. On Instagram, the effect of reblogging, or posting found images on a user’s feed, is to create of visual map to the user’s identity. There’s nothing wrong with this practice per se; it’s a very democratic way to access visual culture. But the social aspect to social media has turned the cultivation of aesthetics into an exercise in personal branding.
In A New Cultural Hub, Baghdad Slowly Starts To Reclaim Its Historic Place As An Intellectual Center
“For several years now, al-Qishla, an Ottoman military barracks-turned-cultural-hub in the heart of Baghdad, has become a space where intellectuals, poets and artists come together to exchange ideas and discuss current affairs. Regular attendees say al-Qishla provides residents with a safe avenue to share views freely, as well as a sliver of hope that Baghdad – once a major international intellectual and cultural hub – may return to a shadow of its former self before successive wars gripping the country for decades, left it in decay.”