“The phone call always was an invasive form of communication, so perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that as soon as a plausible substitute presented itself we grabbed it.”
Some Rules For Brainstorming From Some Experts (If You Want To Accomplish Anything)
“We invited 50 leaders in the design community—typically some of the most opinionated, creative, and analytical types in business—to share how or if they brainstorm. Here are some of their responses, including a characteristically honest one from the legendary and outspoken creative director George Lois.”
How Did Argentine Dancers Get To Be So Great?
“Around the world, there are prominent Argentine doctors, scientists, international-law experts, conductors, musicians. This is especially striking in the world of dance. Ballet was more or less a twentieth-century import to Argentina, brought by travelling troupes like Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes, but its roots have dug their way down deep.”
My Relationship With Critics
Jack Reuler has worked in theatre in Minnesota and says critics have been an important part of the the community there. “Like with any body of people, some are wonderful and some are assholes and many are in between. Similarly, the real test of a critic is not how well or how often they rave or how viciously they eviscerate, but how they write about the 90 percent of the shows that fall between those extremes.”
Why Sergei Polunin Made A Movie – And Why He Thinks Dancers Need More Movies
“I thought of building a better system, like the movie industry. I talked to David, and he asked, “Do you have an agent?” When I told him no, he said, “How do you guys get work if you don’t have an agent?” Then I talked to Ralph Fiennes and found out he has huge support; he has managers and agents and a company. Dancers don’t have that, and I realized that’s the key. That’s what we need to create, because that creates the industry.”
Procrastination: A Philosophical Meditation
“Idleness is difficult to find in a pure state. Indeed, in a certain sense, it eludes us because, at its most radical, idleness tends to devour its devotees (again, Oblomov and Bartleby). But procrastination is a different business altogether: It is not only more available, but also more dynamic, just as the procrastinator is a more dramatic figure than the idler, who is as ascetic and immobile as a pillar saint.”
Fierce Grief: Pulse Nightclub, Activism, And The Ways That Gay Folks Mourn
“If there is a distinctive power to queer grief, it lies in the styles of mourning that have emerged from queer cultures over time. These styles set the shape and tone of the activism that comes out of grief – and activism, of course, is itself a type of mourning. To address Polgreen’s question, we must examine how queerness behaves when it is at a loss. How a community grieves can tell us a lot about who they are.”
With Contract Expired, Pittsburgh Symphony Musicians And Management Agree To Talk-And-Play
“The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra’s musicians and management have agreed to continue the private negotiations about the musicians’ expiring contract. The pact was already extended by two weeks on Sept. 4 and was set to expire at midnight tonight.”
Narrative Architecture – How The New African American Museum Facade Tells Stories
David Adjaye calls this concept “narrative construction.” It’s a mode of architectural storytelling embodied in the museum’s façade, a three-tiered, trapezoidal structure inspired by the staggered crown of an early 20th century Yoruban sculpture that Adjaye encountered in a book from his personal library. (The same sculpture is currently a centerpiece of the museum’s fourth floor Culture Galleries.) Adjaye calls it “the Corona.” Its edges, he says, also mirror the rake of the neighboring Washington Monument.
Jurgen Habermas, Guide To The Enlightenment
“Even at his ripe age — he is now 87 — Habermas’s passion remains undiminished. As a public intellectual, however, he may seem an unlikely hero. We live in an age when what some of us still fondly call ‘the public sphere’ has grown thick with personalities who prefer the TED Talk to the printed word and the tweet to the rigors of rational argument. For Habermas, it’s clear that without the constant exercise of public deliberation, democracy will collapse, and this means that citizens must be ready to submit their arguments to the acid bath of rational criticism.”
Remembering Edward Albee
Reputations, he knew, were built up only to be torn down: “A lot of playwrights become confused by this and they start doing imitations of what they’ve done before, or they try to do something entirely different, in which case they get accused by the same critics of not doing what they used to do so well.”
The Seattle Symphony Is Making Commissions A Major Part Of Its Plan
“This isn’t a random undertaking. We follow a systematic approach and work with young composers constantly.”
Hollywood Is Still So White, But Why?
Manohla Dargis: “How could it be otherwise given that the history of American cinema is also the history of American racism?”
Does Hollywood Control The Future Of Fine Art?
“UTA — known for representing Hollywood talent like Johnny Depp and Lena Dunham — has signed a handful of artists such as Rashid Johnson, Ai Wei Wei, Sam Taylor-Johnson, and Judy Chicago. Roth and company can help pair them with, say, a show runner if they’d like to adapt something into a movie or TV show. Or the agency could feasibly assist with projects in the vein of Jay-Z’s “Picasso Baby,’ a still-surreal blending of creative worlds that involved the rapper, Pace Gallery, Marina Ambramovich, and Salon 94’s Jeanne Greenberg.’
The Crisis Team Working Relentlessly After The Quake To Rescue Italian Heritage
“At least 296 people died in the violent shaking on Aug 24. Many more were left homeless and injured. But those few, fraught and devastating minutes also placed at risk thousands of books, dossiers and folders amassed since past earthquakes destroyed this town in 1639 and 1703. There were also countless pieces of art and artifacts in churches and museums across the earthquake zone, which touches towns in four Italian regions.”
The Life Of The Country’s First Latina Prima Ballerina
“Cisneros was a pigeon-toed swan. Her left hip was too tight and her left foot was pigeon-toed — potential career-enders because ballet is grounded in outward rotation. She overcame what could have become a disability through a brutal work ethic.”
How Did The Limited Miniseries Become The Coolest Category On TV?
“The dawn of Netflix shows like Orange is the New Black proved that shows could be successful outside of the normal network calendar, and networks like Showtime, Starz, AMC, and even Lifetime began investing in one-off, “event series” to take advantage and make their usual downtime profitable.”
Charmian Carr, Who Played Liesl In Sound Of Music, Dies At 73
“She fully embraced audiences’ reverence for the musical, frequently appearing at singalong performances at the Hollywood Bowl. ‘I tell people that they should consider singalong ‘Sound Of Music’ like going to a therapist,’ she said before a 2005 appearance.”
And The Winners Are …
Basically, The People v. O.J. Simpson cleaned up at the Emmys. Did anyone else win? Check the list.
Understanding The New Audience: Five Stories From This Week’s AJ – Attention Span Theatre
This Week: How free museum admission changes audience and behavior… Legislation to battle the ticket bots… Is YouTube making it tougher for live performers?… Detroit Symphony starts an amateur orchestra to get closer to its audience… Theatre for short attention spans.
Five ArtsTrending Stories From This Week’s AJ: Are The Arts Falling Into A Measurement Trap?
This Week: The remarkable new National Mall museum that doesn’t look like the rest… An arts council’s risky change in standards… What scientists have learned about the accomplishments of gifted children… Will algorithms take over the book business?… Seven things scientists have learned about creativity.
Who Will Win – And Who Should Win – The Emmys Tonight
“This year’s Emmys broke new ground up and down the ballot,” but that doesn’t mean the winners will be any different.
Don’t Underestimate A Famous Cast’s Understudies
“On any one night in the West End, there will be numerous understudies on stage, because actors in long-running productions quite rightly have holidays as part of their contracts, and nobody can help it if they get ill. For the understudies themselves, who are often likely to have smaller roles in the production the rest of the time – it’s a chance to step up from out of the chorus to play a main role and test themselves.”
You Want Good Women Characters? Try Books, Not Hollywood
“These new literary protagonists are bright spots in a Hollywood landscape where representation of women has been pretty bleak. Female leads, when they make it on-screen at all (less than 30 percent of the time), run a high risk of being over-sexualized, one-dimensional, and/or formulaic.”
A Singer Emerges From Below The Earth
“She was giddy on an evening in late August when she was about to shoot her first video, for ‘Try a Little Tenderness.’ In a few weeks, her record would be released (on Assouline Records). ‘Weee, buddy!’ she said, laughing in Mr. Assouline’s apartment, where she was getting ready. ‘Us country people — we get up and dance.'”