Commissioners repeatedly expressed skepticism about core elements of the redesign proposed by the artist Hiroshi Sugimoto, with one warning the end result could make the Sculpture Garden look like an “Olive Garden.” – The Cultural Landscape Foundation
Tag: 12.06.20
America’s Iconic Hotel Atriums
“We don’t build them much anymore, but Americans invented, perfected and exported this unique building style to the world (where it continues to prosper). Birthed in brash excess, atrium hotels were first seen as too gaudy by the modernist architectural establishment and as too profligate by penny-pinching chain hoteliers. To varying observers, they suggest everything from Disney to dystopia. But in their heyday, these buildings promised — and delivered — a spectacle like no other.” – Bloomberg
Why The Most Interesting British Philosophers Were Born Before WWI
This mix of genius, the dark history of the mid-20th century and wonderful anecdotes and gossip about intellectual life in Oxford and Cambridge make for a good read. There are some fine philosophers around today but the smart money would still bet that the next major biography of a philosopher will be about someone born before the First World War. – The Critic
Inside The Collapse Of The Baltimore Museum Of Art’s Big Deaccessioning Plan
Peggy McGlone and Sebastian Smee report on how director Christopher Bedford’s plan to raise $65 million to fund diversity-equity-and-inclusion projects by selling paintings by Andy Warhol, Brice Marden and Clyfford Still was conceived, approved, attacked, and withdrawn. “There’s one thing the Baltimore episode made clear: Even the most noble of causes, including paying the mostly minority guards a living wage and improving access for the community, can’t be funded by monetizing the collection.” – The Washington Post
Painter Buys $65,000 Worth Of Work Of Struggling Artists
Guy Stanley Philoche, 43, has dedicated himself to seeking out artists from around the world who are unable to make ends meet and has so far purchased more than 150 artworks for up to $500 each. His own pieces sell for up to $120,000, according to Cavalier Galleries. – CNN
San Francisco Pays Artists To Promote Community Health
“A partnership between the San Francisco mayor’s office, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, the Office of Economic and Workforce Development, and the San Francisco Parks Alliance, the program launched last month. It employs 30 performing artists to encourage mask wearing and other best practices and 30 visual artists to paint murals about public health on boarded-up storefronts.” – San Francisco Chronicle
A Forgotten Literary Star, And Anti-Fascist Activist, Is Finally Getting Her Due In Spain
The writer María Teresa Léon was a good buddy of Lorca, married to poet Rafael Alberti, and took part in rescuing art from the Prado as Franco bombed Madrid. Then she, and Alberti and many other anti-fascist writers, fled to live in exile in France and Italy – and her writing and her power were remembered less and less as the male writers’ fame grew. Now her memoir is being republished, with a new introduction and a new appreciation. – The Observer (UK)
The Artist Trying Damn Hard To Save Other Artists
Guy Stanley Philoche figured his fellow artists shouldn’t suffer so much because of COVID-19 and the associated shutdowns. “The art world is my community and I needed to help my community. … People say New York is dead, but it’s far from that. There’s an artist somewhere writing the next greatest album. There’s a kid right now in his studio painting the next Mona Lisa. There’s probably a dancer right now choreographing the next epic ballet. People forgot about the artists in these industries.” So the painter has spent $65,000 to help others. – CNN
We Know Who Wrote Citizen Kane
Sorry, Netflix viewers, and sorry, Gary Oldman: It wasn’t Mank. “Robert L. Carringer examined seven drafts of the screenplay in great detail and concluded that the writing Mankiewicz had done in Victorville, Calif., during the period depicted in the film ‘elaborated the plot logic and laid down the overall story contours,’ but that Welles, principally, transformed the script ‘from a solid basis for a story into an authentic plan for a masterpiece.'” – The New York Times
Oh, An All-Streaming World Is What You Want? Think Again
It’s not going to be great, friends. “If the movie theater experience, as a cultural force, winds up withering on the vine, then it’s likely that movies as we’ve known them will also wither on the vine. Pauline Kael said it best in the ’70s, when she was writing — witheringly — about the phenomenon of TV-movies. She said that what you make for television isn’t a movie. What you make for television is a TV show.” – Variety