“Hong Kong’s top art show attracted more galleries this year — and none dropped out — a sign Asia’s art market can weather the financial slump, the organizer said. Andy Hei, antique-furniture dealer and organizer of the Hong Kong International Arts and Antiques Fair, said the region’s market saw worse during the 1998 Asian crisis and the 2003 SARS virus outbreak.”
Tag: 10.03.08
Grab The Popcorn: Bad Economic Times = Great Movies
“Film buffs may see a silver lining in America’s current financial crisis: After all, the Great Depression produced some of the best movies in Hollywood history. … While it’s always risky connecting politics and popular culture, the linkage in 1930s movies is obvious. Bread lines, juvenile delinquency, gangsterism, populism, nativism — all these and more were staples on the screen.”
Tango – I Think It’s Turning Japanese
“An Argentine tango themed on the Tale of Genji, a Japanese novel written 1,000 years ago, will be performed this month in Tokyo and Nagoya.” (The tangueros are Argentine and Polish, with a Noh dancer playing the Buddha; the instruments include both bandoneon and shamisen.)
Is the Real David Sedaris the One We See in His Books?
“It’s me, that guy, but it’s a question of editing out parts of myself… I wouldn’t write about doing something decent. I think the real me is in my diary and that’s under lock and key… I don’t think what I write is fiction, I really don’t. But there’s a reason I’m not a reporter – I couldn’t trust myself with facts.”
Michel Houellebecq and Bernard-Henri Lévy Just Hate Being Famous
“In a surprise joint venture, they have produced a book [Public Enemies] of confessional letters to each other, raging at the vitriol heaped on them as the ‘whipping boys of our era in France’.” (BHL: “Why so much hatred?” MH: “If there is anyone in France right now with excuses for being paranoid, it is me.”)
At Least One Contemporary Art Event Goes All Out for Beauty
“While the Shanghai Biennale… [is] looking at urban growth and migration and their social and cultural consequences, and the Yokohama Triennial has… [chosen] to highlight the performative time-based aspects of current art practice, the Singapore Biennale has opted for the theme of ‘Wonder’.”
Exploring ‘Experimental Philosophy’
The entire discipline of philosophy is being shaken up by a group of professors who “think that by studying human minds, using empirical techniques, and drawing on the insights of modern psychological science, they can get a better sense of where intuitions come from, and whether or when they should be granted credence.”