“Even as the rest of the country drowns in unemployment and lessened circumstances, the period of noble abstinence for this hedonistic set is apparently over. … For better or for worse, much of the art world is feeling flush again” — just in time for Art Basel Miami Beach.
Tag: 11.20.09
Conceptual Art Meets The MetroCard
“The Waterfalls flowed in the East River. The Gates snaked through Central Park. Now New York’s latest large-scale public art project is being exhibited in an even unlikelier space: your wallet.”
Wired Campaigns For The Internet To Get A Nobel Peace Prize
They’re serious. Says one of the magazine’s editors: “The Internet can be considered the first weapon of mass construction … What happened in Iran after the latest election, and the role the Web played in spreading information that would otherwise have been censored, are only the newest examples of how the internet can become a weapon of global hope.”
One High-End Manufacturer Says The CD Is Dead
“The CD player is dead. So says Linn Products, the high-end audio specialist based in Glasgow which for 20 years has been making … CD players. The reason: its audiophile customers have moved, with alacrity, to hard drive-based systems.”
Now He’s Really A Secular Saint: Relics Of Galileo’s Body Discovered
“A tooth and two fingers of Galileo Galilei, the 17th century Italian astronomer, physicist, inventor and mathematician, have re-emerged from a lost wooden case, Florence’s authorities [have] announced.”
Oxfam Tries To Make Peace With Used Bookstores
“Oxfam has attempted to patch up its differences with secondhand booksellers.” A trade group “had said that Oxfam’s voluntary staff, donated stock and business-rate reductions allowed it to undercut rivals, forcing some secondhand booksellers out of business and taking trade away from others.”
Muhammad Ali Meets Stepin Fetchit
“Set in the mid-1960s … Fetch Clay, Make Man, by Will Power, centers on the young boxer’s friendship with Stepin Fetchit, the stage name of the actor Lincoln Perry.” The play, which “deals with creating personas,” opens in January at the McCarter Theater in Princeton. Ben Vereen will play Fetchit, with Evan Parke as Ali; Des McAnuff will direct
‘The Nutcracker‘s Stranglehold Is All But Squeezing Ballet Dry’
Sarah Kaufman says that, because U.S. companies are so utterly dependent on income from their annual Nutcracker runs, ballet in this country “suffers from a serious lack of confidence that is only growing more and more paralyzing. … Has ballet become so entwined with its Nutcracker image, so fearfully wedded to unthreatening offerings, that it has forgotten how eye-opening and ultimately nourishing creative destruction can be?”
Why Having An Epileptic Seizure Onstage Is Art
“Rita Marcalo is an artist doing what artists are supposed to do: creating work that is surprising, challenging, transgressive and exciting. … [She] is drawing attention to the fact that on YouTube (and elsewhere) it’s easy to find mobile-phone footage of people having fits – mostly taken without their consent. Curious, isn’t it, that controversy should arise when a person with epilepsy consents to being filmed?”
Should A Critic Walk Out On A Play In Anger? When And Why?
Mark Lawson: “[L]ast week, for the first time ever, I was tempted to leave a theatre in mid-performance, not through tedium or sciatica … but from moral anger.” The reason: a female character – written by a male playwright – speaking about experiencing pleasure while being raped. Lawson and commenters consider the ethics of the situation.