“Hrdlicka’s sculptures, drawings and paintings are known as much for their artistic subtlety as their controversial themes. His religious works, in particular, drew protest from believers who considered them blasphemous.” Perhaps his best-known piece is Memorial Against War and Fascism, a “cast iron sculpture of a prostrate figure covered by barbed wire [located outdoors] in downtown Vienna.”
Tag: 12.06.09
Actors Fund Plans Low-Income Housing Across US
“The Actors Fund, a human services organization that helps people who work in the performing arts and entertainment industries, is planning to build hundreds of low-income housing units in urban centers across the country over the next few years. … The projects will include low-income housing, assisted-living and nursing-home facilities.”
In Christmas Verse, Poet Laureate Is Overtly Political
“Based on the traditional Twelve Days of Christmas, [Carol Ann] Duffy’s 12 stanzas begin with an emotional critique of the war in Afghanistan and close with a passionate plea to the world leaders who congregate in Copenhagen tomorrow to discuss climate change.”
Malcolm Wells, Gentle Architecture’s Advocate, Dies at 83
“Malcolm Wells, an iconoclastic architect who tirelessly advocated environmentally responsible design and who promoted the idea of earth-sheltered architecture — that is, buildings at least partly underground –” championed “what he called gentle architecture, something that would, as he put it, ‘leave the land no worse than you found it.'”
Sony Set To Make $2 Billion In International Box Office
Sony will surpass $2 billion in international boxoffice during the coming weekend as the studio marks its biggest worldwide haul ever at $3.36 billion and counting.
Some Positive Changes For Art Basel Miami Beach
“One bright spot of the worldwide recession: It seems to have restored rigor to the trade show, which ends Sunday. Crowds have been appreciably thinner this year, but gallerists exhibiting everywhere from Basel proper to Scope, Art Miami, NADA and Pulse are reporting strong sales — and they’re smiling a lot more than they did last year, when the economy took a nosedive right before the fair opened.”
50 Years Of Chicago’s Second City
“Second City, which celebrates a splashy, star-studded 50th anniversary next weekend, always has danced a delicate pirouette between light and dark, polish and heart, business and art, slickness and spontaneity, expansion and retraction, function and dysfunction, maternal nurturing and patriarchal practicality.”
NY Rock Hall To Close
The year-old New York City annex to Cleveland’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum will shut down Jan. 3.
Voices Of Video Games Complain Their Pay Is Lagging
“Enthusiasm for the new medium has been tempered by a growing unease among many performers that their pay for voice work in video games isn’t keeping pace with the industry’s breakneck growth.”
Paris Museums On Strike
“It all started a week ago at the Pompidou Centre. Spearheading the national strike, all of the seven cultural industries’ trade unions called for the governmental decision not to renew 50% of jobs in administration to be scrapped. When, on Thursday, staff at the Louvre and Versailles joined the movement, the strike reached a new pace.”