Far from being a dyed-in-the-wool slice of historic Caledonian kitsch, tartan design is very much alive and well in the 21st Century – as evidenced by the stream of new examples recorded each year at the Scottish Register of Tartans. And the range of inspirations is as diverse as the designs. – BBC
Ted Gioia On Finding Creative Success Outside The System
“For many of us in the creative economy, too much energy is spent on working the system. My response has been to operate in contexts where that isn’t such a time drain. I don’t work the system anymore, except as a last resort: I aim instead to bypass it. The better I have gotten at circumventing gatekeepers, the more successful my writing career has been. There’s a lesson in that, no?” – Arts Fuse
Police Bust Massive Hollywood Ponzi Scheme
Zachary Horwitz collected $690 million from investors for movie deals authorities say were fictitious. The HBO and Netflix contracts he used to convince Russell and others that his business was legitimate were forgeries, the government says. – Los Angeles Times
Oscars Ratings Plunge 58 Percent From Last Year’s Record Low
Among adults 18 to 49, the demographic that many advertisers pay a premium to reach, the Oscars suffered an even steeper 64 percent decline, according to preliminary data from Nielsen released on Monday. Nielsen’s final numbers are expected on Tuesday and will include out-of-home viewing and some streaming statistics. – The New York Times
How A 1967 Recording By The Who Predicted Where Pop Music Would End Up
The contradictory impulses about pop’s progress and possibilities at its heart make The Who Sell Out sound like a perfect snapshot of music at a moment of flux: poised between pop and the more serious business of rock, between pirate radio and prog. Meanwhile, what it has to say about music and advertising seems eerily prescient and thoroughly modern: a blast from the past that foretells the future. – The Guardian
Workers Discover Two Hidden Frescoes In The Uffizi
According to the museum, an unknown person “protected” the Cosimo II artwork before it was plastered over. “Maybe this unknown savior wanted it to be preserved for the future generations,” the spokesperson said. “Obviously our researchers are already trying to figure out the story behind this.” – Artnet
Former English National Ballet Principal On Trial For Alleged Sexual Abuse Of Students
“Yat-Sen Chang, 49, has been charged with 12 counts of sexual assault and two counts of assault by penetration against a female aged 16 or over. The alleged offences are said to have taken place at the English National Ballet and Young Dancers Academy in London between December 2009 and March 2016. Chang, who lives in the German port city of Kiel, has denied all the charges.” – The Guardian
Dallas Opera Launches Its Own Streaming Channel
“We view it as a second stage,” said Ian Derrer, the Dallas Opera’s general director and CEO. “And it has accessible on-ramps for many more people globally.” – Dallas Morning News
Is This Guy Really At The Center Of The Century’s Greatest Art-Forgery Scandal?
Over the past seven years, “this scandal — now known as ‘the Ruffini affair’ — has engulfed figures ranging from curators at the Louvre to leading auction-house executives. It has also given rise to an endless litany of conflicting and sometimes changing opinions, both technical and connoisseurial. … Now, he has decided to tell his side of the story.” – Artnet
“Not The Civil Service”: Cameron Mackintosh Defends Cutting “Phantom” Orchestra In Half
“I’ve had a terrible year trying to keep on as many people as I can, but our job is to try to put a show on that can run and be brilliant,” he said. “Am I sorry? I’m sorry they’re upset, but I do find it odd why musicians would want to keep doing the same thing year after year. I believe we should not be holding jobs for actors or musicians ad infinitum. This is not the Civil Service, we’re creating art.” – Broadway World
Does ‘The King And I’ Need To Be Decolonized? Yes (And It’s Largely Anna’s Fault). Can It Be? Maybe.
Not everything in Anna Leonowens’s memoirs about her time at the Siamese court is a lie, but quite a lot is untrue, especially about Anna’s own mixed-race, plebeian origins. (For instance, she’d never even been to Britain when she went to Bangkok.) Thence come many of the problems in the musical, like the white-savior narrative. David Henry Hwang’s rewrite of the book of Flower Drum Song preserved the Rodgers and Hammerstein songs in a more sensitive context that’s workable for the stage today, and writer Sravya Tadapalli suggests one potential scenario for The King and I that could do the same. – American Theatre
Actors On One Of Germany’s Most Popular TV Shows Made Sarcastic Videos About The COVID Lockdown. Bad Idea.
“A website called #allesdichtmachen (‘close it all down’) was launched on Thursday night, featuring 53 to-camera clips in which high-profile actors [from the long-running series Tatort] sarcastically boast of the lengths they have gone to restrict their social contacts and appeal to the government to lock down the country even harder.” Mein Gott, did they get dragged. One television host who’s been working as a paramedic summed up the general reaction, tweeting that the stars can “shove their irony up their ventilators.” – The Guardian
Fired Montreal Museum Of Fine Arts Director Lands New Job In Paris
Last July, after a tenure that had been widely viewed (at least from outside) as a major success, Nathalie Bondil was dismissed from the Montreal museum amid allegations that she created a “toxic” work environment. Now she’s returning to France to become director of exhibitions and collections at the Institut du Monde Arabe. – ARTnews
Baltimore Symphony President To Depart, Ending Turbulent Tenure
“Peter Kjome capped a roller-coaster five years as president and CEO of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra” — a period that included a financial near-collapse, a lockout-turned-strike, and, ultimately, a new contract that improved relations between musicians and management — “by announcing Monday that he will leave the organization when his contract expires in January 2022. Combined with the departure of music director Marin Alsop in August, that means the BSO will embark on its first season of live post-pandemic concerts with a complete turnover of leadership.” – The Baltimore Sun
Italy Begins Reopening Theaters And Museums
“After six months of rotating on-again, off-again closures, restaurants, bars, museums and cinemas opened to the public in most of the country under a gradual reopening plan that is seen as too cautious for some, too hasty for others.” – AP
China Censors News Of Chloé Zhao’s Best Director Oscar Win
The Chinese government imposed a virtual news blackout, and censors moved to tamp down or scrub out discussion of the award on social media. – The New York Times
How TikTok Has Made “Vibe” A Multimedia Haiku
What a haiku is to language, a vibe is to sensory perception: a concise assemblage of image, sound, and movement. (#Aesthetic is sometimes used to mark vibes, but that term is predominantly visual.) A vibe can be positive, negative, beautiful, ugly, or just unique. It can even become a quality in itself: if something is vibey, it gives off an intense vibe or is particularly amenable to vibes. – The New Yorker
Anthony Hopkins Sure Didn’t Expect To Win, Either
The actor didn’t appear on video for his Best Actor win, leaving the Oscars production with a big letdown of an ending. A Los Angeles Times article explained that “while at 83 years old Hopkins became the oldest winner of an acting Oscar in any category, it wasn’t worth the risk of being exposed to the coronavirus to travel to the British Film Institute in London to accept it.” He later posted a sweet video to his Instagram from his home in Wales. After praising Chadwick Boseman, he said, “I really did not expect this.” – The New York Times