Australia’s major performing arts companies are lobbying the government to refund the GST paid on all their tickets since the new tax went into effect earlier this year, on the grounds that they should all be granted exempt status as “charitable institutions.” – The Age (Melbourne) 09/06/00
Tag: 09.06.00
MARKET TIMING
Summer vacation is over and in France publishers are ready. In this 2-3-week period at the beginning of September 557 new books are due to be published to coincide with the annual back-to-work. “Editors, booksellers and critics agree that the market cannot absorb the flood of new books, that many are doomed to sink even before they appear. But the tradition goes on: since 1991, the wave of fiction has grown by 50 percent, with a new record being set this year.” – New York Times
THE “CHORUS EFFECT” —
— in publishing is a well-known phenomenon, when a rash of books on the same theme are released at the same time. This month’s coincidence? “Veteran writers who are bombarding the bookshops with tomes on how British culture is going down the tubes.” – The Guardian
PRIZED POETRY
A new prize for poetry, worth $80,000 (CDN) annually is created in Canada. “The Griffin Poetry Prize will rank as one of the most valuable literary awards to originate in Canada and certainly the Canadian English-Canadian prize with the most international scope.” – The Globe and Mail (Canada)
THE BOLSHOI THEATRE’S DECLINE –
– culminating in the Russian president’s recent sacking of its artistic director, mirrors Russia’s countrywide troubles. “The famed opera and ballet company increasingly has become another monument to a bygone era, when the resources of an all-powerful state were poured into the arts.” – CNN
DANCE THIS
Where are the new choreographers coming from? “Ballet has recently drawn on modern-dance choreographers for the new works it needs to sell a season. But some new ballet choreographers are developing from within companies like Dance Theater of Harlem.” – New York Times
MORRIS MAJOR
London’s Soho Theatre, founded in 1968, was one of the city’s first fringe venues and launched the careers of several famous playwrights. But by the early 1990s, the company had lost its way, not to mention its audience – until Abigail Morris took the helm as artistic director. “In just eight years the Soho has gone from bust to boom, and Morris, whose only previous experience was running a feminist theatre company in the late 1980s, has become a major player in Britain’s new-play culture.” – The Guardian