“As important as the technology is that powers our lives, businesses also depend on humanities-oriented communicators to articulate why the technology matters. Indeed, every technology company, and certainly every startup trying to make its imprint on the world, needs English majors. Perhaps many.”
Sure, The Book Was Better – But Is That Always True About Stage Adaptations?
“Text is only a very small part of the experience, unlike the stage adaptations of old, which were often merely an attempt to provide a substitute for the novel.”
What We Can Learn From How Teenagers Use Social Media And The Internet
“Context is everything.” (And we perform different selves in different contexts – but the internet collapses them into one.)
Is Pussy Riot’s Music Actually Any Good?
“Victims of state persecution, ambassadors for day-glo knitwear and wank fodder for beardy liberals the world over, the members of Pussy Riot have been filling both prison cells and column inches since 2012. In the process, they’ve also become one of the most famous bands on the planet. But let me ask you this – have you ever actually heard any of their music?”
‘This Is Like Finding a Vermeer’: Rare Medieval Korean Paintings Turn Up in Honolulu Museum’s Basement
A group of Korean curators was examining uncatalogued works in the vaults of the Honolulu Museum of Art when they identified two ink-on-silk paintings from the late 16th century, an era from which little Korean art survives.
George Lucas and Wife Give $25M for Chicago Children’s Arts Center
“Chicago investment executive Mellody Hobson and her husband, Star Wars creator George Lucas, are donating $25 million to the private University of Chicago Laboratory Schools to support the construction of an arts building.”
Can These Guys Crowdfund a West End Musical?
“[John] Bant and his co-producer Gavin Kalin are seeking to raise £200,000 for The Pajama Game‘s West End transfer – about 14% of its total capitalisation costs – through the online crowdfunding platform Seedrs, which allows people to invest as little as £10. They hit £40,000 within 24 hours.”
What’s a Typical Day at Ballet School For a Guy?
“Ballet is grace and perfection, but it’s also twisted ankles and stinky flats. We meet two young male ballet dancers whose passion for performance led them all the way to the State Ballet School of Berlin.” (audio)
More People Now Have Cellphones Than Have Ever Had Landlines
Today, almost everywhere has more mobile phone penetration than land-lines: The continent of Africa has dismal fixed-line penetration of 1.4 subscriptions per 100 people, but 63.5 cell subscriptions.
He’s A Little Bit Country. She’s A Little Bit Rap (Why Rap And Country Now Share Audiences)
“You’re not country only or rap only; people like both. I think that’s been there for some time, but we recognize it now, so collaborations work well, and the reverse is they help grow the interests of artists and music as a crossover.”
Why Movie Theatre Food Is So Bad
“Snacks are a cash cow for theaters, providing some 85 percent in net profits. But no one really goes after the food Americans eat in movie theaters, which is mostly bits of corn syrup, food starch, malic acid, and artificial colors, encapsulated in a sugary ether.”
Information-As-Junk-Food: Are You Obese?
“A new kind of obesity is now looming with our information, data, and media diet. We have only scratched the surface, but there is already way too much of information available, and it is way too tasty, too cheap, and too rich.”
Poll: This Year Two-Thirds Of Americans Haven’t Seen A Single Oscar-Nominated Movie
“Among those who responded to the online survey, Somali piracy thriller “Captain Phillips” was the most-watched film, at 15 percent. But 67 percent said they had yet to see any of the eleven films in the poll.”
National Book Awards Data: In 60 Years Women Writers Have Achieved Gender Parity
“In the 1950s, the finalists and winners of National Book Awards were more than 80 percent male. But notice how that percentage has steadily fallen until we reach the current decade – then women pulled slightly ahead.”
Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Profumo Affair Musical to Close After Four Months
Allan Kozinn: “The theater gods have at long last taken revenge on Andrew Lloyd Webber for the ubiquity of Cats, Phantom of the Opera and Evita. His latest musical, Stephen Ward, which opened to mixed reviews in London in December, and has had mediocre ticket sales ever since, will close on March 29.”
Why Did Andrew Lloyd Webber Take On the Profumo Affair in the First Place?
Michael Billington observes that this particular topic lacks the one element at which Lloyd Webber is genuinely brilliant. (This was a job for Kander & Ebb.)
Ancient Buddhist Cave Paintings in China Could ‘Turn to Sand’
“The network of 236 sandstone caves extend over an area of two to three kilometres in the vast, sparsely-populated autonomous Xinjiang region of China, along the ancient Silk Road. The caves were inhabited by Buddhist monks and used as temples between the third and the eighth centuries, and are lined with murals providing a rich picture of early Buddhist culture.”
Turkey Proposes Reconstructing Madrasa Next to Hagia Sophia
“The Turkish government plans to reconstruct a demolished madrasa (religious school) next to Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia Museum, a Unesco World Heritage Site since 1985. But the local branch of the International Council on Monuments and Sites (Icomos) strongly protests these plans, calling the proposed construction a ‘new fake historic monument’ that would undermine the area’s significance.”
Wait – Is This Actually Atheism?
Louise Antony: “I say ‘there is no God’ with the same confidence I say ‘there are no ghosts’ or ‘there is no magic.’ The main issue is supernaturalism – I deny that there are beings or phenomena outside the scope of natural law. That’s not to say that I think everything is within the scope of human knowledge.”
One of the Wagner Sisters Running Bayreuth to Step Down
“Eva Wagner-Pasquier, 68, great grand-daughter of Richard Wagner, will retire as co-director of the Bayreuth Festival next year. She currently runs the festival in uneasy collaboration with her much younger half-sister, Katharina Wagner, 36.”
Will This Mean a Sixth Tony for Audra McDonald?
“The five-time Tony Award winner Audra McDonald will make an unexpected return to Broadway this spring – in time to qualify for the 2014 Tonys – to play Billie Holiday in the musical play Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill.”
Top Posts From AJBlogs 02.25.14
Not Just Bad for Business
AJBlog: Audience Wanted | Published 2014-02-25
Blow the past open
AJBlog: Performance Monkey | Published 2014-02-25
Community Adopted: Grasshopper Bridge by Ed Carpenter
AJBlog: Aesthetic Grounds | Published 2014-02-25
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Colburn School Hires Former NYCity Ballet Dancer To Head New School
“Jenifer Ringer, who retired this month from New York City Ballet, has been appointed head of the Colburn Dance Academy. The Colburn School, where music, dance and drama are currently taught, is starting the new, more specialized program in the fall, in partnership with the L.A. Dance Project and its director, Benjamin Millepied.”
New $300 Million Movie Museum – Battling For The Soul Of A Story
“Even as the museum hurtles toward ground-breaking later this year, what remains unresolved is exactly what it will be: an elevated backlot tour designed to celebrate Hollywood and pack in tourists, an important institution devoted to telling the real and not-always-laudatory history of film, or a potentially awkward hybrid?”
Ballet Star Attacked And Robbed Just Before Performance
Dominic Antonucci, one of ballet’s biggest stars, “was attacked and robbed by a group as he took a walk in a park, just before the company was due to perform on stage.”