“The J. Paul Getty Trust, which has said it was fully cooperating with Italian authorities, did not disclose a series of letters and photographs that show its chief antiquities curator maintained close relationships with dealers suspected of selling art looted from Italy, according to documents and interviews.”
Tag: 09.01.05
Culture Minister: Public Will Vote Artists Into Academy
Membership in the recently propsed Academy of Scotland would include an artist voted in each year by the public. Scottish Culture Minister Patricia Ferguson: “I really want to get people involved in the process. There is an idea of making a People’s Award, with one living artist a year being voted into the academy by the public. It would be a way of involving people in the arts directly – and people do like expressing their opinion.”
A Record Edinburgh Summer
Edinburgh’s festivals have had a great summer with ticket sales up substantially. “The Edinburgh Fringe sold a record 1,335,000 tickets, up 82,000 or 7 per cent, on last year, the Fringe Society said. The total value of the tickets sold was about £11,640,000, also up by at least the same margin. The Edinburgh International Festival, with a week still to run, said yesterday its ticket takings were up 13 per cent on this time last year. The Edinburgh International Film Festival reported an increase of 12 per cent.”
A Change In Priorities For Edinburgh Festival?
Next year Brian McMaster, the longest-serving director of the Edinburgh Festival, is stepping down. “The hunt for a new boss has started a bit late. The Festival Council’s search party – chaired by Edinburgh’s Lord Provost and made up of eight people whose experience and credentials on the international cutting edge of artistic trends seems worryingly minimal – must be losing sleep over the timetable. An appointment made next May with the successful candidate taking up the post less than a year ahead of his or her first festival isn’t going to secure those prize artists with diaries filled five years ahead. And the unthinking choice of an internal appointment or of any inadequately experienced local hopefuls isn’t the solution.”
Alberta Rehabs Its Civic Performance Halls
In 1957, the cities of Calgary and Edmonton opened multi-purpose performance halls. Now they’ve been restored. “It would be hard to find someone in either city who hasn’t had some first-hand experience with the Jubes. From the start, they were supposed to be civic meeting places, as suitable for high-school convocations as for musicals, operas and ballets.”
Public TV Granted Ability To Raise Money For Katrina Relief
The FCC has granted a waiver to public broadcasters to allow them to raise money for hurricane relief. “In general, noncommercial stations are prohibited from engaging in fundraising activities on behalf of any entity other than the licensee where such activities substantially alter or suspend regular programming. However, the Commission has granted one-time waivers of its policy to permit noncommercial television stations to raise funds for local disaster relief in the wake of ‘extraordinary, widespread and catastrophic nature of the events precipitating the fundraising program’.”
Can You Help The Louisiana Philharmonic?
A plea from the AFM: “As we all know the musicians of the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra are currently, and likely will be unemployed from their orchestra for some time, due to the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. In an effort to assist these musicians, it would be extremely helpful if those orchestras who have a need for substitute, extra or other casual musicians could make such need known to the LPO musicians who may desire such employment.”
Indian Court Gives Police Broad Powers To Seize Pirated Films
Responding to Hollywood studios’ requests, an Indian court in Delhi court has “issued a warrant that empowers police to search for and seize pirated films anywhere in the city, an aggressive maneuver in the copyright wars. The type of court order involved, know as a general search and seizure warrant, is normally reserved for matters of national security, not copyright infringement.
Ozawa Throws A Party
Conductor Seiji Ozawa is throwing himself a star-studded gala concert 70th birthday party in Japan. “Top musicians will perform while US Senator Ted Kennedy and composer John Williams have sent video messages. The charity concert is being held at the Saito Kinen Festival, which Ozawa set up in 1992. Guests will include Russian cellist Mstislav Rostropovich and American jazz pianist Marcus Roberts.”
Prokofiev’s Cinderella In A Brothel? Permission Denied!
The Latvian National Opera has been prohibited by the Sergei Prokoviev estate from performing its production of the composer’s ballet Cinderella after setting the classic children’s story in a brothel. “Prokofiev’s family feels very strongly that if you are going to present a new storyline, you should employ one of the many talented new composers to write new music for you.”