Dada stands as one of the strangest art movements of the 20th century, rising from humble beginnings to embrace grotesquery as a reflection of the violence and desperation of the era. “When we look at the remains of Dada, we see the 20th century with its skin peeled off. Surrealism was to reject Dada in favour of something supposedly less gestural. Yet Dada spoke the truth.”
Tag: 11.08.05
Bigger Budget For Australia’s New Gallery
Australia’s federal cabinet has approved a AUS$20 million increase in the budget for the soon-to-be-built National Portrait Gallery, bringing the total budget for the project to AUS$74 million (US$54 million) just as the shortlist of architects vying to design the gallery is announced.
Musical Education or Indentured Servitude?
“The last bars of Ravel’s Bolero had just died away to applause, but when conductor Volker Hartung tried to return to the stage for an encore, dozens of police officers blocked his way. To the shock of spectators, Hartung was led from the concert hall in handcuffs. The German maestro spent the next two nights in jail as investigators questioned him for allegedly violating French labor law in a case that suggests the European dream of free movement of goods and services remains a long way off… Ever since that February 2005 night at Strasbourg’s Palais de la Musique, Hartung and his orchestra have been embroiled in a costly and time-consuming legal mess… French and German unions say Hartung is exploiting young musicians from Eastern Europe and Russia, and the German union went so far as to call work in Hartung’s orchestra ‘a kind of modern slavery.'”