The government appears to be meddling in free speech on university campuses – and now in national museum decisions. “This came to a head recently when it refused to reappoint Aminul Hoque, a distinguished academic at Goldsmiths, who had been on the board of the Royal Museums Greenwich since 2016. Because his work focused on issues of decolonisation, the government decided they didn’t want him as a trustee. His term of office was not renewed, and the chair of trustees resigned in protest at what the government had done. It seems as if any semblance of the arm’s-length principle, about the relationship between government and museums, has vanished. This is a tragedy.” – Apollo Magazine
Some Indoor Theatres Have Migrated Outside For Their First Reopening Season
The earliest decision-makers were not at all sure this was the direction to go. Ask then-newly installed interim director Shirley Serotsky at the Hangar Theatre in Ithaca – proposing something “completely new, hugely ambitious, and hardly cost-neutral” to the board was a challenge. “It took some convincing … But I did believe that it was the only way we were going to produce in-person theatre and have our community—our artists and also the audiences—feel comfortable and safe. And even then, who knew? It was still a gamble.” – American Theatre
TV Characters, Like Everyone During The Pandemic, Have Trouble Connecting
Both on Master of None and Solos, even when the pandemic isn’t in the script, it affects everything. New seasons feel “intriguingly defined by current events, and yet similarly handicapped by them.” It’s not easy to make TV during a global pandemic, but, says a critic, “All I want now, watching shows after 14 months of social withdrawal, is to be allowed into people’s lives again, to feel something intense and unfamiliar, to be granted even a fleeting attachment to someone I don’t know. … We’re not supposed to get through this kind of thing all by ourselves.” – The Atlantic
The 1990s Magazine That Showed, And Gripped, Lesbian Mecca San Francisco
Curve began its life as Deneuve, a lesbian magazine founded by a 23-year-old who gambled all her money on horse races, won, and used the proceeds to start the mag. There’s a new movie documenting its evolution, and how different things might be in 2021. Franco Stevens: “Once I came back from the Book Fair in Chicago, walked into my office, and there was a stack of Polaroids on my desk. Apparently, there was a ‘leather day’ at the office when I was gone, and they were all posed on my desk, scantily clad in leather attire. When some of the staff came back from festivals where clothing was optional, I’d be like, ‘Can you just keep a bra on or something?'” – The Guardian (UK)
Humans Might Not Be Cut Out For Universal Morality
Are there biological or other scientific causes for our moral beliefs? If so, how does that affect our moral beliefs and choices? It’s a bit complex: “Our evolutionary conditioning might have made it impossible for us to acquire knowledge of objective moral truths, even if they exist. The other is that our evolved psychology might make it impossible in any case for us to live according to objective moral standards.” – Nautilus
How Biden’s New, De-Trumpified Commission Of Fine Arts Could Make A Real Difference
Philip Kennicott: “The new members aren’t just visionaries with a firm command of inspiring rhetoric; they know how to read a plan, look at a model, scrutinize a drawing and make precise comments about the small questions of design, materials, spacing, proportion and light. … Rather than simply assess the impact and design of selected federal projects, most of them in the District, the CFA could become a clearinghouse for progressive design thinking throughout the federal government.” – The Washington Post
France Reveres Roland Petit. Why Doesn’t It Perform His Ballets More Often?
“Even in Petit’s home country, his works haven’t been staged with great regularity. Nor do companies seem especially interested in resuscitating any of the dozens of full-length works or shorter ballets he created over the course of a long career. It’s a curious schism: Despite the relative obscurity of much of Petit’s work, he remains much-revered in France, where he is still described as a great choreographer who is pivotal to a French ballet heritage.” – The New York Times
Charles Larson, Who Established Study Of African Literature In U.S. Academia, Dead At 83
“As a professor at American University in Washington, where he joined the faculty in 1970, Dr. Larson taught some of the first classes offered to U.S. students on African writers. At a time when the literary canon consisted almost entirely of works by British and American authors, he helped secure a place in American academia for writers including [Chinua] Achebe and Wole Soyinka.” – The Washington Post
Maybe We Shouldn’t Dismiss Magic So Quickly?
“Despite the often blood-soaked history of the use of the term ‘magic’, we must remember that Western history is filled with thinkers who have defended its honour as good natural science – a tried-and-true technology for harnessing interactions between minds and bodies, human and otherwise. And their empirical claims were never tested more than during the centuries of plague.” – Psyche
What Amazon’s Purchase Of MGM Means For The Streaming Wars
It’s an inevitable progression, and not surprising Amazon would do it first. Unlike Netflix, it has failed to reliably produce original hits. And unlike, say, NBCUniversal, its corporate model isn’t solely entertainment. It’s also a cloud computing company, massive retailer, and grocery store chain, to name a few. It had a net income of more than $21 billion last year alone. It’s easier for Amazon to dig in the couch cushions to buy MGM and its 4,000 movies and 17,000 TV shows than it is for the company to try to launch a new studio with the same heft—especially given how rocky its experience was trying to do exactly that with video games. – Wired
Dozens Of Artists Commemorate Tulsa Race Riot In A City That Used Not to Let It Be Mentioned
“For generations, the worst event in Tulsa history wasn’t spoken about in public,” said Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum in a statement. “Today, artists are helping to educate and inform people all around the world about this tragedy—and by doing so honor the memory of our neighbors who were lost.” – Artnet
After 25 Years Leading Cincinnati Ballet, Victoria Morgan To Step Down
As one of the very few women to lead a major ballet company, Morgan championed women choreographers long before the rest of the dance world turned its attention to the lack of equity for women in the field. It has not been unusual for more than half of a season’s offerings to be choreographed by women. – Cincinnati Enquirer
We’ve Had Shakespeare In The Park. Now How About Molière?
“Sitting on a bench in Prospect Park recently as flocks of maskless Brooklynites passed by, Lucie Tiberghien reflected on the long, strange journey toward the first full production of Molière in the Park, the company she conceived to bring free theater with a diverse cast and crew to her home borough. This weekend, after months of delays that radically reshaped her plans, she is on her way to fulfilling that dream, with a staged and costumed reading of Tartuffe.” – The New York Times
‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ Author Eric Carle Dead At 91
“Over the course of his career, Carle illustrated more than 70 books for kids. He didn’t get started on that path until he was nearly 40, but he found great inspiration in … insects. Spiders, lady bugs, crickets and of course, that famous caterpillar, all as colorful and friendly as Carle himself.” – NPR
Tony Awards Finally Have A Date — And A Much-Altered Telecast
“Three of the 25 competitive awards — best musical, best play and best play revival — will be presented live during a [Sept. 26] television program, broadcast on CBS, that will primarily be a starry concert of theater songs. But the bulk of the awards, honoring performers, writers, directors, choreographers and designers, will be given out just beforehand, during a ceremony that will be shown only on Paramount+, the ViacomCBS subscription streaming service.” – The New York Times
Germany To Spend Yet More Billions On COVID Relief For The Arts
“The German government on Wednesday unveiled a €2.5 billion ($3 billion) fund to kick-start the country’s pandemic-hit cultural sector. The fund will provide insurance in cases where a spike in coronavirus infections forces events to be canceled or postponed. It will also supplement event ticket sales if audience numbers have to be capped to meet social distancing rules.” – Deutsche Welle
Amazon Buys MGM For $8.45 Billion
For Amazon, snapping up MGM — which has more than 4,000 movies and 17,000 TV shows in its catalog — is a way to supercharge its Prime Video service with a slew of well-known entertainment titles. In addition, Amazon is anticipating being able to mine Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer properties like the Pink Panther, Rocky and, yes, the 007 franchises for new originals. – Variety
The Mysterious Foundation That Rescued Performing Arts Orgs From Pandemic Ruin
Here is the story — told, it must be said, rather against the wishes of its founder, who’d have preferred privacy — of the Alphadyne Foundation. – The New York Times
Louvre Gets New Director, Its First Female Boss In History
“The French president Emmanuel Macron has nominated Laurence des Cars, currently the president of the Musée d’Orsay, to helm the Louvre in a major shake-up at the world-famous Paris institution. … Des Cars will head across the Seine river to replace its current president Jean-Luc Martinez, who was unsuccessful in his campaign for a third term.” – Artnet
England’s Amateur Choirs Were Ready To Sing Again After A Year, And Then —
“Choirs had been working under the assumption that restrictions on rehearsals would be relaxed on 17 May, at the same time as shops, bars and hairdressers opened up. Instead, the guidelines” — revised the following day to limit indoor rehearsals to six people and those outdoors to 30 — “were actually more draconian than the ones in place last September and October, when infection rates were higher, and no-one had been vaccinated.” – BBC