Tag: 09.25.18

The Art World Had Its Own Alan Sokal, Back In The 1920s

“In 1924, American literary scholar and author Paul Jordan-Smith adopted a new identity: Pavel Jerdanowitch, an avant-garde Russian artist whose visceral paintings would beguile modern art critics. Parading as Jerdanowitch for the next three years, Jordan-Smith gained traction at the helm of his one-man art movement, which he called Disumbrationism. But Jordan-Smith wasn’t a brooding artist from Moscow, and Disumbrationism was less of an aesthetic than it was a practical joke intended to shame the art world.”

After 40-Odd Years, We’ll Finally Be Able To Watch Orson Welles’s Last Film

Even by his standards, the making of The Other Side of the Wind was a long and messy process; he did finally finish shooting, but he never finished fussing over the editing before he died in 1985. But, thanks to hard work from friends and colleagues and funding from Netflix, a plausible version of the movie will be available for streaming in November. Writer Craig Hubert explains the story, the satire (very meta), and the fistfight with Ernest Hemingway that started it all.

Iran’s Art Scene Has Been Booming – Could Trump’s Sanctions Stifle It?

“In 2016, a Tehran art auction attracted record sales of $7.4 million, sparking hopes that the market was buoyed by cooling relations between Iran and the West. … [Yet,] from trade sanctions to the travel ban, global power politics may be influencing the way the West views Iran. For the country’s artists, this raises questions about whether the art boom will be halted — or even reversed — by the Trump administration’s deteriorating relations with their government.”

Prominent Writers Protest Removal Of NY Review Of Books Editor

Leading Irish writers John Banville, Colm Tóibín and Roy Foster, along with some of the biggest names in English letters, including Joyce Carol Oates, Ian McEwan and Lorrie Moore, have released a joint letter in which they express dismay at what they call the “forced resignation” of the editor of the New York Review of Books under a #MeToo stormcloud.

DNA Tests Are DNA – They Don’t Tell You Your Culture

There’s an Ancestry ad where a man trades his lederhosen for a kilt. And another where a woman traces her ancestry to the matriarchal Akan people of Ghana to conclude, “When I found you in my DNA, I learned where my strength comes from.” And yet another where a man bonds with his Irish neighbor after finding out his own DNA is 15 percent Irish. But marketing campaigns for genetic-ancestry tests also tap into the idea that DNA is deterministic, that genetic differences are meaningful. They trade in the prestige of genomic science, making DNA out to be far more important in our cultural identities than it is, in order to sell more stuff.

Repositioning Theatre As Community Center

In many ways a theatre can be compared to a community center—both are public places to gather, to socialize, to learn, to be entertained. Now some theatres are intentionally taking up the mantle, fashioning themselves into civic hubs where engagement programs are designed to connect onstage programming with audiences apart from their time in a darkened theatre, and to create initiatives to address specific needs in the community.

Cosby’s Hollywood Star Will Remain

Hollywood Chamber of Commerce: “The Hollywood Walk of Fame is a historical record of entertainment figures past and present. Once installed, the stars become part of the historic fabric of the Walk of Fame, a ‘designated historic cultural landmark,’ and are intended to be permanent. The stars only commemorate the recipient’s professional accomplishments.”