“Pantsula took its early influences predominantly from tap dance, with traces of jive, gumboot, tribal African dance and everyday gestures like dice-rolling. … Sixty years on, [it] still thrives in townships across South Africa, but its character and style have morphed in line with the lives of the people who cultivated it.”
Tag: 10.08.18
How A Director Under House Arrest In Moscow Directs An Opera In Zurich
Kirill Serebrennikov has been confined to his home for well over a year on embezzlement charges many say are trumped-up. Zurich Opera House had engaged Serebrennikov to direct Così fan tutte two years ago and decided to go ahead, figuring that he’d be released by now. No such luck — worse, he’s not allowed to use the internet or even a telephone. Shaun Walker reports on how Serebrennikov is managing to stage the production anyway.
Fangoria Has Risen From The Dead
“The fabled horror magazine that has thrilled and terrified readers since 1979 looked dead and buried last year. But now, just in time for Halloween, Fangoria has crawled out of its own grave in the form of a new quarterly journal with photos so high-gloss that the blood looks wet.”
Two More Former Students Accuse Cleveland Orchestra Concertmaster Of Sexual Harassment
This is the third such accusation against William Preucil, who has been suspended by the orchestra while management investigates the initial claim. As with that first allegation, both of the women who have just come forward say that the incidents happened during private lessons with Preucil.
One Of Britain’s Leading Contemporary Dance Companies Is Shutting Down
“The Richard Alston Dance Company, which has played an important role in British dance, will close in spring 2020, the company announced on Monday. Since the company’s inception in 1994, it has been resident at The Place, a contemporary dance center and performance space in north London where Mr. Alston, 70, has been the artistic director, also since 1994.”
Our Admission Prices Are Not Exorbitant, Says Director Of V&A
Tristram Hunt: “They have risen. Have they risen more than cinema prices? I doubt it. Have they risen more than train prices? I very much doubt it. … If people are willing to pay hundreds and hundreds of pounds on football season tickets then seeking to have a fair price for a work of great curatorial excellence does not seem to me wrong.”
In Divided, Right-Leaning, Very Catholic Poland, Film About Child Abuse By Priests Is A Major Hit
There was controversy around the movie, titled Clergy, even before it hit cinemas: at a film festival last month, once it was clear that the film would likely win the audience award, organizers canceled that category. Even so, Clergy attracted 1.7 million viewers in its first week; that’s about 4½ percent of Poland’s entire population and the equivalent of 14.5 million in the U.S.
Sell Art Work To Fund Chicago? It’s A False Debate
“I get why the city sees a solution in selling the work. How else can a bureaucracy generate so much cash so quickly from such a modestly sized asset? But it also perpetuates a disturbing mentality that I’ve found myself writing about again and again this year: namely, that culture—particularly in underserved neighborhoods—is only a priority if and when the costs can be covered by private-sector patrons.”
Are Orchestras Culturally Specific? And So…
“Given my experiences in Mexico, my lingering question has been, “Who decided, or why do we feel, that we must upend our programming in order for people of targeted ethnicities to comprehend and enjoy classical music played by a live orchestra?” It strikes me as suspiciously odd that, for all our talk about the universality of classical music, administrators, and, certainly some musicians, when they think of specific ethnic groups, must suddenly condescend to them, patronizingly and awkwardly changing what we do to suit all the clichés.”
The near-accidental eloquence of The Mile-Long Opera by David Lang
I thought I knew what opera is. Well, the definition didn’t change. But The Mile-Long Opera, performed last week on New York’s High Line, changed the boundaries of opera, theater and artistic expression, and in ways that I couldn’t have imagined before taking the elevator up three floors and then trudging from 14th to 34th Street.