“This Is A Generic Presidential Campaign Ad,” assembled entirely from stock footage by the stock-footage company Dissolve, lays out all the messaging elements for (the generic) Candidate (slogan: “For an American America”). (video)
America Spends A Lot On Military Bands. Should It?
“The value that the military bands offer is far greater than a small percentage point reduction on a budget line. The historic precedent for Pentagon funding for these programs stretches back to the United States’ founding.”
Donor Sues Museum To Get Her Money Back
Dr. Helga Wall-Apelt, who donated millions for a gallery for Asian art at the Ringling Museum in Sarasota, is suing the museum for breach of contract. She claims the Ringling failed to build the gallery within a reasonable time, failed to display the Asian art she donated for the wing, and failed to hire a curator for the collection.
Harlequin Romances Is Starting A Literary Fiction Imprint
“The publisher … is launching an imprint called Park Row Books, dedicated to ‘thought-provoking and voice-driven novels’ that have ‘mainstream appeal.’ The first books are scheduled for the summer of 2017.”
What Carlos Acosta Is Up To (A Lot), Now That He’s Back In Cuba
He’s founded a company, Acosta Danza, with hald of the dancers trained in classical ballet and the other half in modern dance. (He wants to add in hip-hop and flamenco.) He’s working to keep cultural exchange and resources flowing between the island and Britain. And his biggest dream is to revive the legendary National Art Schools of Havana, built during the ’60s but then abandoned.
What’s Ailing The Met Opera? We Need To Change The Way We Talk About It
“The arts world has to let go of these popular, though incorrect clichés. First, paid capacity is a terrible way to gauge success—it does not provide real numbers that are actually tied to the budget. That four-year old study from the NEA needs to be put to rest, and we need a more updated, nuanced study of arts attendance in this country. And “Baumol’s cost disease” is an idea that has been vastly overplayed when talking about the arts… to the degree that Baumol himself is pushing back on how it’s being used.”
That Time Igor Stravinsky And The Boston Symphony Caused A National Scandal
“He did compose a weird arrangement of the national anthem, and the Boston police really did ban him from performing it — sparking a national uproar and a tense showdown that played out live on the radio. Depending on how you read it, it’s a story of ego and hubris, or patriotism and generosity.”
NPR’s Podcast Strategy To Grow Its Audience
“The demographic that went up the most in the first quarter of 2016 was the 18 to 24 year-olds [average quarter hour listening was up 20% according to Nielsen]. To be fair, it’s not a huge audience. But I point it out because it’s the direction we want to go. It didn’t come at the expense of any of our journalism either.”
Ukrainian Opera Star Killed By Sniper In Separatist War
Baritone Vasyl Slipak, 41, “had left his native Ukraine in the 1990s to settle in France, where he regularly sang at the Paris Opera. But after war erupted in 2014, he decided to return home and join a volunteer battalion to fight Russian-backed separatists on the country’s eastern front.”
Iranian Cartoonist Who Drew Government Ministers As Goats And Monkeys Is Finally Released From Evin Prison
“When a cartoon in which [Atena Farghadani] depicted government officials as farm animals appeared on [Facebook] in 2014, it led to her receiving a prison sentence of more than 12 years. During her ordeal Farghadani was beaten, strip-searched, went on hunger strike and – despite being only 29 – suffered a heart attack.”
The Art Critic’s Mythic Longrunning July 4th Party, Killed Off By Social Media
“In the 1980s, Peter Schjeldahl and his wife purchased many acres of mountainous land in the town of Bovina, a little more than three hours north of Midtown Manhattan. For more than a quarter-century, the property served as the site of a Fourth of July celebration that has maintained a singular place in New York’s social history, drawing friends, and friends of friends, from the city — artists, writers, musicians, academics, gallery owners, movie stars — and a considerable segment of the surrounding population of Delaware County.”
What’s The Problem With J.K. Rowling’s New North American Wizarding School?
“All I could think is that it was written with a colonial lens. This was the story of an outsider in America ‘fixing’ what was already there. Rather than integrating Native Americans into her world, they are reduced to background set pieces.”
More Administration Shuffling And Reshuffling At New York Live Arts
“New York Live Arts, which has seen quite a bit of administrative turnover since it was born five and a half years ago with the merger of the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company and Dance Theater Workshop, has announced more changes to its programming staff.”
Why Is Spring Happening Earlier In Cities?
City lights. And that’s bad. “When plants bloom earlier than usual, it can spell disaster for ecological systems—in which timing is key.”
Michael Cimino Wrote And Directed ‘The Deer Hunter’ Before Coming Up Short Against The Old West
“Heaven’s Gate, a frontier epic about the settlement of the West that was shot mainly at a studio-constructed town in Glacier National Park in Montana, outraged executives at UA. Cimino’s insistence on authenticity, in the end, deflated the production and sank the troubled studio. In addition, its running time of 219 minutes exasperated theater owners.”
How Did The First Live Stream Of A Broadway Musical Go?
“You do lose some of the vibrancy, some of the majesty and all of the camaraderie of being there in the theater, which is true whether it’s a live or a taped broadcast.”
If Apple Buys Tidal, What Happens To The Streaming Industry?
“That is a short-term solution, a bit like hailing a taxi for half a mile at the start of a marathon.”
Did Gay Talese Get Completely Played By A Source?
“Morgan Entrekin, the chief executive and publisher of Grove Atlantic, said the company would move forward with the publication and the promotion of the book, and might add a new author’s note.”
The U.S. Painters With Secret (More Like Ignored) Lives
“When women did well in contests, they went to pick up their medals and were told they must be mistaken – the winner couldn’t possibly be female. On the rare occasion that women artists were exhibited alongside their male counterparts, critics tended to concede that they were shocked by the quality.”
Why Does The Movies’ Gender Pay Gap Exist?
Unclear. “Statistics for 2015 released by the Motion Picture Association of America show that movie-going, as a whole, breaks down pretty much exactly 50/50 across the genders. If anything, there’s a slight skew towards women.”
Oscars, Or At Least The Academy, Not #SoWhite Anymore
So what’s next? “In these socially conscious times, Hollywood awards have become a tool for change despite, or perhaps as a reaction to, their red-carpet frivolity.”
Getting To The San Francisco Ballet From A ‘Paycheck To Paycheck’ Kentucky Family
“One month into the program, he was in class, practicing jumps. He went up for a jump, and the whole room — even people in the room across the hall — heard a sound like a gunshot.”
London’s National Gallery Hopes Nothing Will Change With Brexit
“The gallery has been here for nearly 200 years and it has survived many seismic changes including world wars and other skirmishes – so we are going to continue business as usual, shining as a beacon of excellence and a place of contemplation.”
The UK Saw 1500 ‘Ghost Tommies’ Commemorating The Battle Of The Somme
“Each carried a card with the name of the soldier they represented and his age – if known – when he died.”
Rome Celebrates An Extensively-Cleaned Colosseum
“Buoyed by the brighter look of the Colosseum’s restoration, which was officially unveiled on Friday, Italy’s culture minister, Dario Franceschini, announced that 18 million euros ($20 million) have been found to replace, by the end of 2018, the arena’s long vanished floor with one that could support modern-day entertainment, although monument-rocking rock concerts have been ruled out.”