“On 22 September, three dealers who operate the Metropolitan Fine Arts and Antiques store in New York were arrested for selling ivory works of art without a license – a felony in a state under a law passed in 2014 to limit the ivory trade. Officials with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation raided the shop and found 126 objects totaling $4.5m – including two pairs of elephant tusks, one of which was seven feet long.”
How Do You Make Emergency Drills Less Annoying? Turn Them Into Choreography
“Emergency evacuation drills, though necessary, are a pain: they seem to always happen when we least expect it and interrupt us when we’re at our most productive. At SIGNAL gallery, the procedure becomes a delight, with artist Madeline Hollander transforming what we’ve all rehearsed with irritation into a mesmerizing performance.”
The Eureka, The 19th-Century Proto-Computer That Generated Latin Poetry
“In July 1845, British curiosity-seekers headed to London’s Egyptian Hall to try out the novelty of the summer. For the price of one shilling, they could stand in front of a wooden bureau, pull a lever, and look behind a panel where six drums, bristling with metal spokes, revolved. At the end of its ‘grinding,’ what it produced was not a numeric computation or a row of fruit symbols, but something quite different: a polished line of Latin poetry.”
Albright-Knox Gallery In Buffalo Raises $100 Million In 12 Weeks
The feat was “spurred in large part by a $42.5 million pledge from billionaire bond-trader and Western New York native Jeffrey Gundlach. … [His] gift was designed to flush out millions in matching donations from Western New York foundations, corporations and individuals as well as state, county and city government. It did just that.”
Skyscrapers In LA’s Hot New Arts District? We’re Dubious
“Even the anti-development activists who see every tall building in Los Angeles as a giveaway to moneyed interests or a threat to the existing character of the city may find something to admire here. We’d be wise to hold on to some skepticism, though.”
A 12-Step Program To Erasing Black Artists
This is what can happen if you’re really bad at organizing an event and then not paying attention when things hurtle out of control…
William Eddins To Step Down From Edmonton Symphony At End Of This Season
“Eddins, who lives in Minneapolis, Minn. and spends about 14 weeks of the year in Edmonton, joined the ESO in 2005. Under his tenure, the orchestra worked with cellist Yo-Yo Ma and soprano Renée Fleming, started a late-night series of performances, and played unconventional works by Czech composer Bohuslav Martinů and weirdo genius Frank Zappa, among others.”
Why Writing About Science Seems Like Little More Than PR
“Think about it. For every article singing the praises of new science, how often do you see one that is critical? Not often. Unless you’re talking about eugenics or fission bombs, a new scientific result or technology is almost always treated as an unequivocally good thing.”
In The Shadows Of Hollywood, Does Abuse Of Young Actors Thrive?
“If the event resembles a harmless and burlesque version of the better-known award shows, there also has been a darker side to it at times. A handful of people who were actively involved with the show or attended it have been found by authorities to have troubling backgrounds with minors, including two men who were convicted of committing sex crimes against children.”
Monty Python’s Terry Jones Diagnosed With Dementia
“Jones, who is from Colwyn Bay in north Wales, was a member of the legendary comedy troupe with Terry Gilliam, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Michael Palin and the late Graham Chapman. He directed Monty Python’s Life of Brian and The Meaning of Life and co-directed Monty Python and the Holy Grail with Gilliam.”
The Intimate Details Of Theatre Poster Design
“I wanted something that you would look at, and without having it hit you heavily, you would understand it came from the ’20s and ’30s. We wanted to show a certain modernity that had style.”
The 32-Year-Old ‘Fixer’ Of Pop Songs
“His is a story of why endurance and persistence are essential in the music business – even if your career seems only to consist of blind alleys at the start.”
Images Of Los Angeles That Go Far Beyond The Postcards
“In the photographs of Anthony Hernandez, there are no swaying palm trees or cinematic sunsets. Instead, for half a century, this born-and-bred Angeleno has trained his unblinking lens on another L.A. — a city of the aged, of the working class, of the destitute.”
Baby Boomers Are Returning To The Movies, Reshaping Cinema Again
“More than the actual films though, it is the surrounding experience at the cinema that is pulling this generation through the doors. ‘Event cinema’, such as live-streamed ballet and opera, ‘is particularly valued’ by older people.”
Fort Worth Symphony Cancels All Concerts Through Early November
“The musicians, who are represented by the American Federation of Musicians Local 72-147, lambasted management’s decision to cancel concerts scheduled for more than a month away.”
Is This Quiet Rule Change A Death Knell For Canadian TV And Movies – And Actors?
“I began thinking about the ship of Theseus. The vessel in question was an ancient Greek ship kept afloat for generations by the replacement of any rotting plank and it is famous as a philosophical paradox: If every plank has been replaced, is it still the same ship?”
The First U.S. Dancer To Train In Cuba This Millennium
“I love the culture here. … The kids here enter into the school to become ballet dancers. They’re not doing it for a hobby so therefore the training is really, really intense.”
Bug-Infested Zombie Partisans, Or, What T.V. Tells Us About Our Politics
“When you talk about the Democrats and the Republicans and Trump and Clinton and Bernie Sanders, inevitably, conversations blow up, and people become enraged. If you’re talking about Game of Thrones, you can use it essentially as a language that everybody speaks, that you discuss those same things, and not end all your friendships.”
Award-Winning Inuit Artist Found Dead At 46
“Nunavut Premier Peter Taptuna offered his condolences to Pootoogook’s family Friday afternoon on Twitter. And Nunavut MP Hunter Tootoo tweeted that Canada has ‘lost great artist & great woman.'”
Tristan Und Isolde Is The Ultimate Opera
“As well as enlarging – or perhaps subverting – the subject matter of opera, Tristan und Isolde also marked a turning point in the history of music. The opening chord in the prelude, the so-called Tristan chord, is seen by some as the beginning of modern music, introducing chromaticism, dissonance and, according to the composer Arnold Schoenberg, even atonality.”
Does Free Admission To Museum Change Who Comes (Or What They Do?)
“Many of those museums that have altered their admissions models have noticed a shift in visitor patterns. Attendance doubled after fees were waived to England’s national collections in 2001, said the director of London’s Natural History Museum to The Guardian. When the Dallas Museum of Art nixed its $10 admission fee, its annual attendance swelled from 498,000 to 668,000, and the institution saw a 29 percent increase in minority visitors, Fortune reported.”
The Trial Of George W. Bush And An Audience’s Verdict
“Don’t worry if you didn’t know the 43rd president was on trial. This was an off-Broadway verdict, the conclusion to a new play called The Trial of an American President. The trial was fiction, but the vote, from nine members of the audience chosen to be the jury, was very real.”
Coding Is Not “Fun.” It’s An Expression Of Values And Ethics
“The machine does what you say, not what you mean. More and more ‘decisions’ are being entrusted to software, including life-or-death ones: think self-driving cars; think semi-autonomous weapons; think Facebook and Google making inferences about your marital, psychological or physical status, before selling it to the highest bidder. Yet it’s rarely in the interests of companies and governments to encourage us to probe what’s going on beneath these processes.”
Monty Python’s Terry Jones Diagnosed With Dementia
“The 74-year-old is suffering from primary progressive aphasia, which affects his ability to communicate. As well as appearing in the BBC TV shows and films, Jones also directed the features The Life Of Brian and Monty Python’s The Meaning Of Life, and co-directed Monty Python And The Holy Grail with Terry Gilliam.”