“New research has identified a neuronal circuit responsible for the brain’s ability to purge bad memories, findings that could have implications for treating PTSD and other anxiety disorders.” It’s all about the amygdala and prefrontal cortex …
Why This Bookstore Is Offering Refunds For ‘Go Set A Watchman’
Says a statement from the independent Brilliant Books in Traverse City, Michigan, “It is disappointing and frankly shameful to see our noble industry parade and celebrate this as ‘Harper Lee’s New Novel’. This is pure exploitation of both literary fans and a beloved American classic (which we hope has not been irrevocably tainted).” In a Q&A, Brilliant Books owner Peter Makin explains the decision.
‘We Rip The Band-Aid Off’ Ballet, Says Showrunner Of ‘Flesh And Bone’
Moira Walley-Beckett: “This is the first time we’ve really seen the underbelly of a ballet company. And I feel like a lot of those movies have catered to the very glossy, ephemeral optical illusion that is ballet. And we rip the Band-Aid off.”
‘Mother’s Delusions’: Shirley Jackson On Writing
“The children around our house have a saying that everything is either true, not true, or one of Mother’s delusions. … The very nicest thing about being a writer is that you can afford to indulge yourself endlessly with oddness, and nobody can really do anything about it, as long as you keep writing and kind of using it up, as it were.”
Do New York Theatergoers Really Dress Like Slobs? And Does It Matter?
Alexis Soloski: “Mostly I’m in favour of dressing down. It seems democratising to me. Less elitist. It makes theatre seem like the kind of thing anyone and everyone can go do, which is what I devoutly wish. (Well, that and cheaper, better wine at the concession stands.)”
How Performers Are Paid for Performance Art
The artists Gerard & Kelly “saw performer compensation ‘as a blind spot in how performance was entering [museum] collections’… They learned that the going rate museums paid performers in major 2010 exhibitions was about $20 an hour, which they found low and arbitrary. (This includes Marina Abramovic’s piece at the Museum of Modern Art, they said, and Tino Sehgal’s at the Guggenheim, the first performance piece that museum acquired.)” So they negotiated a wage formula for performers in their latest work, and included it in the license for any museum that wants to present it.
Orchestra That Just Fired Conductor Fires Executive Director, Too
The executive committee of the [San Luis Obispo Symphony’s] board of directors voted unanimously to terminate Feingold’s employment and he was let go Friday … Feingold’s departure comes less than three months after the ouster of former Music Director Michael Nowak, who had held that post for 31 years and was widely considered the public face of the symphony.”
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Last Story Is Finally Getting Published
“‘And as for that current dodge ‘No reference to any living character is intended’ – no use even trying that,’ Fitzgerald warns at the start of ‘Temperature,’ an 8,000-word piece dated July 1939 that is receiving its publishing debut in the current issue of the literary quarterly The Strand.
Where Can You Afford To Live As An Artist? Here’s Why New Orleans Ranks No. 1
So, what’s a poor, pragmatic artist to do? According to a new study from the personal finance website SmartAsset, they should consider moving to New Orleans. The birthplace of jazz has much more than just music: it has the best affordability-to-culture ratio out of the 187 largest cities in the United States. Also, beignets.
Once-Despised British National Library Gets Top Heritage Honor
“The institution, on Euston Road, London, now a victim of its own success with scholars and researchers complaining of students and tourists crowding the reading rooms and cafes, was opened by the Queen in June 1998 – more than 20 years after it was first approved and at £350m over the original budget, to a chorus of contempt.”
Why NYC’s Riverside Park Is A Design Masterpiece
“A masterpiece is usually thought the work of a single artistic or design intelligence. But Riverside Park (including Riverside Drive, for they are inseparable as experienced) is the work not only of Moses, but of Frederick Law Olmsted, the great landscape genius behind Central Park, and the almost unknown Clifton Lloyd, the architectural engineer whom Moses picked to realize his vision.”
Needed: A Coordinated Scientific Exploration Of Human Creativity
Getting more specific, the report lays out two “research objectives” worthy of cross-disciplinary study. The first: to “discover and describe the neurobiological correlates and conditions under which different kinds of creative experiences occur, using a carefully orchestrated, mixed-methods study design.”
The Anonymous Calatrava (Make It Stop!)
“Instead of coming up with something relevant to the place, telling a story about what came before or revealing previously overlooked visual details within a city, these structures don’t connect with any local authenticity or individuality in these cities. They’re not architecture at all, in a sense; they’re more like huge pieces of urban jewelry draped over a city’s chest, like some crazed husband throwing Bulgari at his wife, hoping it will finally make her love him.”
Are We About To See a Flood Of Cuban Music?
“I think it will be a while before we see any massive surge, not necessarily because of politics but more because of mentality. Most Cuban artists and producers do not fully understand the American market per se. Their lyrics are extremely local and the level of production is poor in most cases, due to the lack of technological knowledge and expertise.”
Lady Gaga Proves People Will Pay Top Dollar For Jazz
The Cheek to Cheek tour has received positive reviews. The two-hour show perfectly represents Gaga’s talent, while also enabling her to earn the respect of an older fan base. It also exposes Lady Gaga’s younger fans to jazz classics that typically haven’t been part of her previous shows.
Getting To Auditions Can Be Expensive. So These Aspen Students Decided To Help
“I talked to my viola section, they loved it. I went to the cellos and the violins, they loved it,” Sonnak recalled. “I said, ‘OK, there’s interest. Let’s see how we can do it.’”
David Byrne: Technology Isn’t The Only Reason Musicians Are Having A Hard Time Earning A Living
“It’s easy to blame new technologies like streaming services for the drastic reduction in musicians’ income. But on closer inspection we see that it is a bit more complicated. Even as the musical audience has grown, ways have been found to siphon off a greater percentage than ever of the money that customers and music fans pay for recorded music.”
The Difference Between Movies And Video Games
“It surely must be tempting to think that this compulsion for games and movies to feed into and off each other is a sign that they are artistically tied together, that they are both destined to lift one another to higher and better things and that they have something important in common that means they can both learn from each other. But no; games are games and movies are movies.”
UK Apologizes To Ai Weiwei, Grants Him Six-Month Visa
“On Thursday Ai disclosed that the British embassy in Beijing had turned down his request for a business visa, saying he had failed to disclose a criminal conviction. Instead it gave him a visa covering 20 days in September, when a major exhibition of Ai’s work is opening at London’s Royal Academy.”
How Netflix Is Disrupting TV
“It’s less than three years since Netflix debuted its first original series — Lilyhammer, recently cancelled after three seasons — and Netflix chief content officer Ted Sarandos said the service expects to roll out 16 scripted dramas, nine original documentaries, three documentary series, 12 comedy specials and 17 children’s series in 2015 for a total of 475 hours of original programming in the United States.”
The Problem With Cutting Theatre In Schools Is That It Cuts Audiences In Theatres
“My own fear about drama getting smaller in regular public schools like Lakeshore is that it limits the ability of kids to stumble upon it – and that affects not just future theatre professionals, but future theatre audiences.”
Will Star Rolling Stone Movie Critic Leave The Magazine?
“Two people who work at Rolling Stone parent company Wenner Media said that Peter Travers had been asked to move from a staff position to a contractor by company founder and chief Jann Wenner. Travers, a 26-year-veteran of the magazine, bristled at the suggestion and threatened to leave the publication entirely.”
Public Projects To Transform Neighborhoods (But Who Asked The Neighborhoods?)
“As Thomas Heatherwick’s projects have grown larger, and entangle private wealth with government financing, they present the public with a quandary: Should communities accept the unasked-for gift of a design perhaps more ambitious than what might result from limited public funds, developed in a public process?”
Bolshoi Ballet Won’t Renew Contract Of Director Who Suffered Acid Attack
“Sergei Filin, the Bolshoi Ballet artistic director whose sight was maimed two years ago by an acid attack organized by a disgruntled dancer, will lose his job when his contract expires next spring. Bolshoi Theatre chief Vladimir Urin announced yesterday in Moscow that he is abolishing Filin’s position and replacing it with a more management-focused director, indicating that artistic decision-making is to be taken ‘jointly’ with the theatre directorate.”
Happy Days: Northern Ireland Town Loves Its Beckett Festival
“The barber offers Beckett haircuts; a local coffee shop sells Krapp (banana and nutella) and Endgame (I didn’t investigate) sandwiches named after his plays. Events take place in theaters, churches, halls, at the Portora School, on the small islands that surround the town and in other improbable places, often kept a secret until a bus deposits audiences at the spot. All of this creates a festive and buoyant atmosphere that works strangely well with Beckett’s famously dark, difficult and often mordantly humorous oeuvre.”