The Wedding, about a closeted Muslim man about to marry a woman, is the first feature film from gay Egyptian-American filmmaker Sam Abbas’s production company, ArabQ. The movie, which debuts in New York next month, would almost certainly not get past censors in the Arab world, but it is being seen there in small, invitation-only showings.
Tag: 11.08.18
We Have Some Popular Misconceptions About How The Mind Works
Here’s the problem: the theory of mind we call carry around with us and use every day has no basis in what neuroscience—Nobel Prize winning neuroscience–tell us about how the brain works. Neuroscience has revealed that the theory is quite as much of a dead end as Ptolemaic astronomy. It’s been around for such a longtime only because it was the predictive device natural selection came up with, in spite of being fundamentally mistaken about how things were really arranged.
Why Are There So Many Pointless Jobs?
In 1930, John Maynard Keynes predicted that, by the end of the century, technology would have become so far advanced that developed economies would have a 15-hour workweek. So how did we get to our current state, almost two decades into the 21st century? It turns out that Keynes was only half right—technology has advanced spectacularly, but we are far from a 15-hour workweek.
New Biennial Will Be Devoted To Indigenous Art
The Winnipeg Indigenous Biennial, to be hosted by the Winnipeg Art Gallery beginning in 2020, will focus at first on contemporary work by indigenous artists in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand; organizers plan for it to become, over the years, a showplace and launching pad for indigenous art and artists from all over the world.
Once Great Works Of Art Are Sold, They’re Gone. Disappeared.
Should there be some legislation against the risk that a buyer will effectively or literally destroy a work of art? Particularly one which could be designated a “world treasure”, on a list of the sort that Unesco releases on protected monuments? One that would oblige private owners to make the works accessible within reasonable terms and require them to maintain the work, which could be considered a matter of international interest?
Oscar-Winning Film Composer Francis Lai Dead At 86
“[He] began his musical career as an accordion player and as an accompanist to the renowned French chanteuse Edith Piaf. He was primarily a songwriter before being introduced to filmmaker Claude Lelouch, who invited Mr. Lai to compose a score for A Man and a Woman — and for another 35 films on which they worked together.” In the U.S., his best-known work by far is the music for the 1970 Ryan O’Neal-Ali MacGraw movie Love Story.
Bruckner’s Hometown Wants To Cut All Funding For Its Orchestra And Opera House
The mayor of the Austrian city of Linz, which is heavily in debt, has declared that the city will no longer pay its €14 million subsidy to the Landestheater (provincial theater) and the Brucknerorchester Linz, in residence there. The governor of the province of Upper Austria, which owns the theater and controls the orchestra, is fighting back hard. (in German; Google Translate version here)
Does Philadelphia Really Need Another Building For Contemporary Art?
In its two years of existence so far, Philadelphia Contemporary has run a very successful program of exhibitions and performances without any single building or address. (Director Harry Philbrick works out of cafés.) Now the organization has announced not only that it’s getting itself a building, but that it has hired the architect of Houston’s new Menil Drawing Center. The problem? No site and no money. Inga Saffron is skeptical.
The EU’s New Copyright Rules Would Kill The Internet
Right now, ContentID only filters videos’ soundtracks. Article 13 would expand the filter to consider text, music, video, still photos, software code, game mods, 3D printing files, and anything else that might be copyrighted. ContentID currently allows only a small set of trusted rightsholders to add to its blacklist; Article 13 would let all 2,000,000,000+ internet users add to these blacklists. ContentID reserves the right to cancel a rightsholder’s access to its blacklists for abusing the system — falsely claiming copyright through carelessness or malice, for example — while Article 13 would require perpetual access for rightsholders, even anonymous parties claiming to be rightsholders. Article 13 would give them the power to block anything and everything from being posted to the Internet.
Why Can’t Los Angeles Support Its Own Film Festival?
What does it mean that Los Angeles, home to Hollywood and the American film industry itself, has lost what was once its most important festival? And what is it about the city that proves so inhospitable to such events?