“Ballet Teresa Carreño in Caracas … is the last ballet company remaining in the country, a hallowed institution that was already on its last legs due to politicization, lack of resources, absence of artistic direction, and now the COVID-19 pandemic. The absence of an artistic director sits at the core of BTC’s challenges. … After being a leader in contemporary practices and innovation during the 1980s and 1990s in Latin America, it now faces an uncertain future.” – Pulitzer Center
How The Arts Were Weakened
For most artists, the shift has been devastating. Ask almost any you know, especially if they’re under age 40. But to understand why the arts economy sucks for artists now, you have to understand how we got here. – Oregon Arts Watch
How Movie Audiences Are Different
The movie audience is a singular and enigmatic organism. It can’t really be compared to the audience for live events such as theater, music and opera. – Washington Post
Is Paris Supplanting London As The Visual Art Capital?
Part of the recent surge comes down to Brexit jitters. Since the UK voted to leave the European Union in 2016, industry players speculated that Paris would benefit where London lost. – ARTnews
Massive New National Museum Of Norway, Home Of ‘The Scream’, Has Opening Date
“Initially slated to debut in 2020, the museum in Oslo — officially called the National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design — will now open on June 11, 2022. The [complex], which has been in the works for seven years, brings the collections of three of Norway’s most important art institutions — the former Kunstindustrimuseet, the Museum of Contemporary Art, and the National Gallery — under one roof.” Here’s a first look inside the building, designed by German architects Kleihues + Schuwerk. – Artnet
McGraw-Hill Sold By One Private Equity Firm To Another At 88% Profit
“Eight years after it bought McGraw-Hill Education for $2.4 billion, Apollo Global Management has reached an agreement to sell the company to another private equity firm, Platinum Equity, for $4.5 billion. The proposed purchase comes about a year after MH and Cengage called off their merger following opposition from the Justice Department.” – Publishers Weekly
Cincinnati Symphony Music Director Louis Langrée To Step Down In 2024
“It’s difficult because I am very happy here. And this orchestra has made me a better conductor. But I can’t just think of myself. I also have to think of the orchestra and its future. I’m convinced that when things are calmer at the end of this pandemic, it will be the time for the orchestra to open a new chapter of its history, which means a new direction and a new face.” – The Cincinnati Enquirer
New Yorker Union Members And Condé Nast Agree On Contract
“After a protracted battle that nearly led to a workers strike, the staffers at three Condé Nast publications — The New Yorker, Ars Technica and Pitchfork — have come to an agreement on their first union contracts. … In the end, the unions got what they wanted. They secured salary floors of $55,000 a year upon the contracts’ ratification and an increase to $60,000 by 2023. There will be guaranteed annual raises of 2% to 2.5% and all units have organized compensation structures.” – CNN
Seattle Art Museum To Ditch “Greatest Hits” Narrative To Be More Inclusive
“The way the [American] galleries are organised now is a greatest-hits presentation very much focused on masterworks” by white artists from the 1600s to 2000s, she notes, including oil paintings, works on paper, sculptures and the decorative arts. “It’s very traditional and focused on a march through history that is ahistorical.” – The Art Newspaper
New Press Aims At The Trump Market
All Seasons is staking out territory that some mainstream publishers are wary to venture into, by courting former Trump officials who staunchly supported the president through the bitter end of his administration. – The New York Times
Is Twitch The Future Of Music Streaming (That Pays)?
Twitch, which is owned by Amazon, attracts an average of 30 million visitors a day, and its users watched more than one trillion minutes of content last year, according to the company. – The New York Times
Andrew Lloyd Webber’s New ‘Cinderella’ Could Start Performances Despite Extension Of UK Shutdown
Declaring “Come to the theatre and arrest us,” Lord Lloyd Webber vowed last week to reopen all his West End venues at full audience capacity on June 21, “come hell or high water.” At the beginning of this week, with caseloads of the Delta variant of COVID rising, Boris Johnson postponed the lifting of theatre restrictions from the 21st until at least July 19. Even so, Johnson and Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden have offered to make Cinderella part of a pilot scheme of public performances in the next few weeks — but Lloyd Webber doesn’t want to participate if the plan doesn’t involve the entire industry. – The Daily Mail (UK)
More Evidence That Jane Austen Was Probably Anti-Slavery
“Austen’s personal values — namely, whether she supported slavery — have been debated by literary enthusiasts and experts who read her work like a cipher. A new discovery [reveals that her] brother Henry was sent as a delegate to the World Anti-Slavery Convention in 1840.” What’s more, one of Austen’s letters “mentions her love of the work of Thomas Clarkson, an abolitionist author.” – CNN
How “In The Heights” Made NYC’s Streets Dance
The last time I felt such a sense of release watching dancers spill onto the streets in a movie was in “Fame.” – The New York Times
Why NYC Was Such A Creative Time For Music In The 1980s
“It was still a gritty city, before gentrification really took over. Artists could afford to live in the city – they didn’t have to scramble to make rent, so they could concentrate on their work. You could afford to experiment.” – The Guardian
Will Paris Supplant London As Europe’s Art Capital?
It could indeed happen. Christie’s is owned by François Pinault, CEO of luxury-goods conglomerate Kering (which includes, among others Yves Saint-Laurent and Gucci) and major art collector; French media magnate Patrick Drahi purchased Sotheby’s two years ago; mega-collector and LVMH chairman Bernard Arnault (a rival to Jeff Bezos for the title of world’s richest man) is based in the city as well. New museums and commercial galleries keep opening in the French capital — which is, of course, home to the world’s most visited museum, the Louvre. And then there’s Brexit. – ARTnews
Fire Destroys One Of US’s Leading Organ Makers
Sparks from a malfunctioning fan appear to have ignited sawdust at the factory of Dobson Pipe Organ Builders in Lake City, Iowa on Tuesday afternoon, starting a fire that consumed almost everything but part of the exterior walls. Among the instruments Dobson is best known for are the organs at the Kimmel Center in Philadelphia, the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles, and Merton College, Oxford; the now-incinerated instrument under construction had been for the historic St. James’, King Street in Sydney. – Des Moines Register
Justice Dept. Drops Trump Administration’s Case Against John Bolton And His Book
“The Justice Department has closed its year-old criminal investigation into former Trump national security adviser John Bolton and dropped a related lawsuit connected to the publication of his book about the ex-President’s diplomatic bungling. The … criminal investigation had scrutinized whether Bolton’s book illegally revealed national security information, while the lawsuit had sought to grab royalties from Bolton for publishing his book without the administration’s full approval.” – CNN
CNN Is Selling News Clips As NFTs
In an initiative called the Vault by CNN, “the WarnerMedia-owned cable news channel … will ‘mint’ NFTs on the Flow blockchain of memorable moments from CNN’s 41-year history. It will then sell them to the public as digital collectibles.” Yes, TV coverage of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the inauguration of Donald Trump, or the death of Anna Nicole Smith could be yours. – The Hollywood Reporter
Why This SF Symphony Cellist Is Eager To Perform In-Person Again
Whether you’re singing along with “Messiah” or rocking with Metallica, the common auditory input of the rhythm and melody, plus the visual input of musicians and conductor, causes our brains to “entrain” or synchronize to this shared sensory awareness. – San Francisco Chronicle
What Was Said
In May and June the Community Engagement Network hosted Conversations addressing the topic Benchmarking Equity. While we did not take the advisability of benchmarking as a given, the premise of the discussions was that without some form of accountability, statements committing to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion can easily be as toothless as “thoughts and prayers” about gun violence. – Doug Borwick
‘Choking On Sanctimony And Lacking In Compassion’: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Slams Social Media’s Social Justice Warriors
“The assumption of good faith is dead. What matters is not goodness but the appearance of goodness. We are no longer human beings. We are now angels jostling to out-angel one another. God help us. It is obscene.” – The Guardian