“While iconic movie props make us laugh, gasp, scream, and/or sit in absolute silence, they rarely start iconic; as a property master will tell you, the best on-screen objects go unnoticed, silently winning you over with truth. Well, call us obsessives, but we couldn’t help but notice. At a time in history when details go painfully overlooked, we slid movie history under a microscope to honor the simple joy of a perfect prop.”
How A New Mexico 140-Member Artist Collective Made $6 Million In Its First Year
Since the Santa Fe-based art collective Meow Wolf opened its permanent installation, the House of Eternal Return, in March 2016, the project has been an unmitigated success in terms of viewership and profits. Housed in a 20,000-square-foot former bowling alley, the sprawling interactive artwork welcomed 400,000 visitors in its first year—nearly four times as many as expected—and brought in $6 million in revenue for the collective’s more than 100 members.
Understanding Poetry Is Not Some Esoteric Skill – It’s Very Straightforward (If The Poetry’s Any Good)
The problem, writes Matthew Zapruder, is that “in school we are taught that poetry is inherently ‘difficult,’ and that by its very nature it somehow makes meaning by hiding meaning. … Good poets do not deliberately complicate something just to make it harder for a reader to understand. Unfortunately, young readers, and young poets too, are taught to think that this is exactly what poets do. This has, in turn, created certain habits in the writing of contemporary poetry. Bad information about poetry in, bad poetry out, a kind of poetic obscurity feedback loop.”
I Moved To Berlin To Work For SoundCloud – And Got Laid Off On My Fourth Day
“Two weeks ago I moved from Scotland to Germany to start a new job as an iOS engineer at SoundCloud. On Monday of last week I started that job. By Thursday evening I, along with 172 of my new colleagues, was officially being laid off. And then, on Friday, I received somewhere in the region of sixty emails about potential new jobs.”
Chicago’s Field Museum Brews Up Ancient Chinese Beer
“Researchers examined the inner walls of ceramic jars they thought were associated with alcohol serving and production in two [ancient] tombs … They derived evidence of mold-based saccharification, a Chinese-bred brewing technique that converts starch in rice to sugar. They also found indications of ingredients including hemp seeds.”
British Student Arrested Under Terrorism Laws For Owning ‘The Anarchist Cookbook’
Josh Walker, 26, traveled to Syrian Kurdistan to volunteer with the People’s Protection Units, a secular, social democratic group fighting ISIS. Upon returning to Britain, he was detained at the airport and later released without charge. Then police searched his apartment in Wales. “The authorities have not alleged that he was involved in any kind of terror plot; rather, they claim that because he obtained parts of the Cookbook – which is freely available in its entirety on the internet – he collected information ‘of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism.'”
Wendy Whelan Gets The Terry Gross Treatment
“I’ve been strapped in – physically strapped into pointe shoes, strapped into a leotard and tights, my hair’s been strapped up – for my whole entire life. … I was terrified to be unconstricted, and now I don’t know another way I’d rather be.” (audio)
Meet The 13-Year-Old Indonesian Prodigy Who’s Lighting Up The Jazz World
“Joey Alexander has the world at his feet: his first two albums have attracted Grammy nominations; his playing partners and musical mentors are some of the biggest names in jazz; and he has recently relocated from his native Bali in Indonesia to an apartment in downtown Manhattan.”
Believe Your Eyes? New Technology Is Making That Impossible
“At a time when distrust in journalistic institutions is swelling, technology that further muddies the ability to discern what’s real is rapidly advancing. Convincing Photoshop-esque techniques for video have arrived, and the result is simultaneously terrifying and remarkable.”
Musicians Are Being Warned Not To Talk About Influences On Their Work Our Of Fear Of Copyright Charges
A recent court judgment has worried many in the music industry that acknowledging music and musicians who influenced you could lead to charges of copyright…
Cultural Funding Study: Where The Money’s Going
The Hellicon Collective releases a new study on funding in the cultural sector: “Despite important efforts by many leading foundations, funding overall has gotten less equitable, not more. This means that cultural philanthropy is not effectively — or equitably — supporting our evolving cultural landscape.”
It’s Not ‘I Think, Therefore I Am,’ It’s ‘I Pay Attention, Therefore I Am’
For many cognitive scientists these days, “the idea that there is a substantive self is passé. When cognitive scientists aim to provide an empirical account of the self, it is simply an account of our sense of self – why it is that we think we have a self. What we don’t find is an account of a self with independent powers, responsible for directing attention and resolving conflicts of will. … So what is a substantive self?” Philosopher/cognitive scientist Carolyn Dicey Jennings offers an answer.
For These Disabled Actors, Learning Their Lines Is Only The Beginning
Reporter Erik Piepenburg goes backstage at Manhattan Theater Club’s production of Martyna Majok’s play Cost of Living and gives us “a look at how the performers navigate in ways their nondisabled peers never need to consider.”
Checking Out The Youth Theater Where Tina Fey Got Her Start
“Fey is an alum of Upper Darby Summer Stage, a recreation program at the Upper Darby Performing Arts Center that has exposed countless kids to musical theater since 1976. Founded by musician, director, and educator Harry Dietzler and administered by Upper Darby Township” – just across the city line from West Philadelphia – “Summer Stage gives practical experience to would-be actors and singers, directors, lighting designers, and set builders, who mount six children’s shows and a main-stage musical each season. They are guided by teachers, voice coaches, and directors, many of whom grew up in the program.”
SFMOMA Will Text You Art On Request
As the museum’s website describes the project, called “Send Me,” “Text 572-51 with the words ‘send me’ followed by a keyword, a color, or even an emoji and you’ll receive a related artwork image and caption via text message.” The Twitterverse is loving it.
Construction Begins On Manchester’s New Arts Hub
“The cube-shaped building, scheduled to open in 2020, will be the first major UK commission for Rem Koolhaas’s OMA architectural practice. The centre for art, theatre, dance and music events” – known as The Factory – “will form part of the new St John’s neighbourhood, to be built on the site of the former Granada TV studios in the city centre.”
UK Education Minister: Decline In Arts Studies More Than Made Up For In IT Students
“The decline in the subjects to which the noble earl refers has been more than made up for in the substantial increase in the number of pupils taking IT and the now almost 70,000 pupils taking computing.”
Alt-Right Makes Art A Target (Ah, It’s A Grand Tradition)
Art, particularly avant-gardist art, has long been the target of conservatives in all countries. Art is part of the great fraud that is being perpetrated on ordinary people: It is an extension of the media and therefore always fake news. The speech is explicit about the role of art in the hoax: “They use their singers and comedy stars and award shows to repeat their narrative over and over again.”
How New Generation Classical Musicians Are Selling Their Art
Nadia Sirota: “When I got to Juilliard in 2000, I encountered a pretty sad, fatalistic attitude: We’re teaching you something we all love and believe in but we don’t know how to get you employed.” She and her friends were energized by that depression, convinced that a) classical music couldn’t possibly be dying since it felt so intense and essential to them, and b) the only way to save it was to sell it to their uninitiated peers.
Old Library Card Catalogs Were Wondrous Things
“Waxing nostalgic about card catalogs or being an advocate for the importance of libraries is a mug’s game. You can practically feel people glancing up from their iPhones to smile tolerantly at your eccentricity. My response to this, after an initial burst of profanity, is to explain (again) why libraries are essential to narrowing the inequality gap, and why the Internet is not an adequate substitute for books or libraries.”
There’s A World Record For Most Frida Kahlos In One Place? Who Knew?
More than a thousand men, women, and children alike dressed up as the popular Mexican artist to celebrate her 110th birthday, setting what appears to be a Guinness World Record for the most Fridas in one place.
The Countertenor Pushing His Fach Into The 21st Century
Anthony Roth Costanzo has ” pushed beyond the old-music limitations of traditional countertenors, performing new works written for him by composers including Nico Muhly, Jake Heggie, Suzanne Farrin, Steven Mackey and Matthew Aucoin.” New music star Claire Chase says, “what Anthony is doing is making that tool [the countertenor voice], with its range and its versatility, viable for composers in the 21st century.”
Here’s The Story Behind The Original Ballerina Statuettes That Jeff Koons ‘Appropriated’
Sophia Kishkovsky looks into the history of Soviet ceramicist Oksana Zhnikrup and the Kiev workshop-factory where she created the figurines – to which, by the way, Koons did, in fact, purchase rights.
Lack Of Productions By Female Playwrights No Longer An Issue, Says (Male) Manager Of Major Company
Chris Campbell, literary manager of London’s Royal Court Theatre: “Diversity [in terms of] men and women has improved so drastically during my time working in theatre it is almost laughable. … I can’t remember the last time we sat down and talked about gender diversity in theatre. And that’s quite often because I’m the only man in the room.”
There’s Now A Play About DC’s Notorious ‘Peeping Rabbi’ – And His Victims Are Furious
A.J. Campbell wrote and staged Constructive Fictions at the Capital Fringe Festival without actually interviewing either Rabbi Barry Freundel – who was arrested in in 2014 for secretly filming women undressing and preparing for the mikvah at his Georgetown synagogue – or those he spied on. Said one victim, “Our pain is there for public consumption in a way that no one had any say in”; says the playwright, “I would totally love to meet with them. It didn’t occur to me.”