“A chance find by a peat cutter last summer in County Tipperary, southern Ireland, turned out to be a psalter, which has been dated to around 800 AD. The discovery has been described as the Irish equivalent of the Dead Sea Scrolls.”
Tag: 12.18.06
The Art Of Outlandish Sales Prices
Almost every other week there are stories about new record sales prices for art. But “how reliable are these ‘reported’ or ‘undisclosed’ prices? None of the interested parties is prepared to talk, so the information is based on rumour and reports published in other newspapers. The truth is we don’t really know.”
Protest Fizzles Over Idomeneo
A controversial production of Idomeneo in Berlin went off with little incident Monday. A powerful male voice called out “stop it!” and “boo!” as the heads of Islam’s founder, along with those of Jesus, Buddha and Poseidon, the Greek god of the seas, came tumbling out of a sack hefted by Idomeneo. But several voices from the other side of the hall yelled, “continue, continue,” their cheers clashing with the voice of the critic, and the cast and orchestra received prolonged applause.”
Ratings Grab: All Christmas, All The Time
“As of last week, 399 stations from Maine to Hawaii were playing Christmas tunes around the clock to bring in listeners and advertising dollars. Portland has two stations competing for holiday listeners, and some cities have as many as five or six.”
S African Theatre Producer Killed
South African theater impresario Taliep Pietersen, producer of some of the country’s most successful musicals, was shot dead during a robbery at his home outside Cape Town, police said on Sunday.
Literary Bookstores Reopen In Kashmir
Kashmir’s few literary bookshops closed down a couple of years after a Muslim armed revolt against Indian rule broke out in the region at the end of 1989. Now they have reopened, and “the works of Shakespeare, Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy jostle for space with Salman Rushdie and Dan Brown bestsellers in Srinagar’s few bookshops.”
Orhan Pamuk: On Being A Writer
“A writer is someone who spends years patiently trying to discover the second being inside him, and the world that makes him who he is. When I speak of writing, the image that comes first to my mind is not a novel, a poem, or a literary tradition; it is the person who shuts himself up in a room, sits down at a table, and, alone, turns inward.”
Aussie Court: Scalpers Can Use eBay
An Australian court has ruled that concert promoters can’t block eBay from selling scalped tickets. A promoter “had included a provision on the back of each 2007 ticket stating that the ticket would be canceled “and the holder refused entry” if it were resold for profit, or scalped. Online auctioneer eBay Inc. challenged the provision in court, saying it was misleading and deceptive.”
My Fair Fair
The Basel Miami Beach art fair was fun, writes Peter Schjeldahl; it is an example of the fairism that at the core of the current art market. But “one day, perhaps soon, someone in a convivial group of money guys at a bar will say, ‘I just got back from [name of art fair]. It was fantastic!’ Another will drawl, ‘You still into that?’ In the ensuing embarrassed silence, the bubble won’t burst; it will vanish.”
Just Who Is James Wood?
In the new year, James Wood takes over running the Getty. “In hiring him, the Getty has put itself in the hands of an old-school museum man, one known for turning the Art Institute of Chicago around, for hiring shrewdly and for building consensus rather than racing ahead of the crowd.”