A public art specialist working on a brochure for a historical walking tour for a town in Florida discovers some of the town’s racist history. Should he include it in the brochure? The town leaders aren’t so sure. “Glenn Weiss said he wants to clarify and showcase black history, not to ignite racial hostilities but to acknowledge an important part of the past.”
Tag: 10.18.03
Hermitage To Go Dutch
The Hermitage Museum plans to open a branch in Amsterdam next year. “Located in a 17th-century canal-side building, the Hermitage Amsterdam will be much more than a boutique satellite operation; once finished, it will be larger than the city’s Stedelijk Museum.”
Thieves Who Appreciate Good Contemporary Art
Thieves have stolen nine works from Sergei Bugayev’s house outside St. Petersburg. “The missing works, valued at $250,000 by experts at the Russian Museum in St Petersburg, include works by Bugayev himself, who is also known as ‘Africa’, and by other leading local artists, such as Timur Novikov. The thieves destroyed about 140 other works of art, as well as rare antique furniture and books, the charred remains of which were found in the house’s back yard. ‘The mastermind behind this crime knows contemporary art, Bugayev told The Art Newspaper, “They took the best works’.”
Booker Winner Begins To Repay Debts
Booker winner Peter Finlay has made good on beginning to repay those he says he swindled. “The colourful author of the comic novel Vernon God Little, which won the £50,000 prize from under the nose of Monica Ali’s highly fancied Brick Lane, has paid the first £3,000 instalment of the £42,000 he has agreed to repay Robert Lenton.”
The Drama Of Prague
.Even at its darkest moment, when the euphoria of the Prague Spring was crushed by the Soviet invasion of 1968, Czech culture threatened resurgence. ‘A secret streamlet trickles on beneath the heavy crust of inertia, slowly and inconspicuously undercutting it,’ Václav Havel wrote in his famous 1975 open letter to communist president Gustav Husak, which resulted in Havel’s arrest. When the trickle became a torrent at the end of the 1980s, theatre played a vital role.”
The Fashion Of Art
Does an Armani fashion exhibit belong in the British Academy? “Prejudice, fear and suspicion still surround the status of fashion within many galleries. This sometimes takes the form of fashion being tolerated as a form of entertainment which will pull in the crowds, with no acknowledgement of the serious contribution it also makes to the educational role of the museum. More than anything else, however, it is fashion’s slippery nature that helps to perpetuate the prejudice.”
Getty: No To Taking Over Barnes
Last Sunday, LA Times art critic Christopher Knight suggested that the Getty step in to rescue the Barnes Collection in suburban Philadelphia so it wouldn’t be moved to downtown Philly. But Getty president Barry Munitz flatly turns down the idea. “It can’t generate enough revenue, and why squabble incessantly with the neighborhood when you can have a new facility in the company of other great cultural institutions along that corridor? This keeps the collection intact and keeps the hanging pattern intact, and it will have the educational philosophy still at the core.”
Opera House In A Laptop
Canada’s first real opera house is under construction in Toronto. For now, though, it exists in software. “In a opera house, sound is sacred. The worst nightmare is to pour the concrete, build the place, and then find out the acoustics are poor. So computer software has been heavily pressed into service to establish what kind of sound every person in the hall will hear – before the hall is built. This is something that has only become possible in the past four years, and Toronto’s opera house will be the first to receive the benefit.”
Getting Ahold Of A Strad
There are only 500-600 Stradivari violins left. To play at in the top ranks of soloists, you want to have one of them. “Say you are a gifted young musician and you need an illustrious instrument to develop your musicianship, career and reputation. To buy one you have to be able to command the fees that only a career on the international circuit can provide. And for that you need a fine instrument. You are stymied.”
Just When You Think You’re Burned Out On Book Fairs
It’s easy to get burned out on book festivals after awhile. The self-promotion! The over-indulgence of bad books! But: “Generally speaking, you also need to read well in order to navigate and to function efficiently inside the world of electronic media. TV doesn’t tell you how to understand TV. No medium has yet arisen that can challenge print as a medium of cultivating intelligence. And novels have a role to play in this regard, as well, because the language of a good novel is prose used to its maximum effect.”