- The Art Of Internet Porn Thomas Ruff's nudes are not what one generally expects from a serious artist. He starts with the crass, hardcore images of internet porn, then molds and blurrs colors and shapes, creating works which retain the raw sexuality of the 'net, but with little of its horrifying starkness. It's a dicey art form, Ruff admits, but his work is starting to win admirers all over the world, and inherent in his success is the question of where the lines between art and reality lie these days. The New York Times 05/18/03
- Innovative In The Sense Of Stupid Dave Barry is America's preeminent humor columnist, and for some time now, he has been fascinated by the predilection of British art museums for "paying large sums of money for works of art that can only be described as extremely innovative (I am using 'innovative' in the sense of 'stupid')." Having previously questioned the legitimacy of Martin Creed's flickering lights, Barry is now doubled over by the news that artist Ceal Floyer has won a major award for a bag of trash. "To judge from the photograph in the Times, it is a standard black plastic garbage bag, just like the ones you put your garbage in, except of course that you have to pay people to haul your garbage bags away, whereas Ms. Floyer got $47,000 for hers." Miami Herald 05/18/03
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Classical Music - Chronicle Of The End "Welcome to the death of music, or that genre of it we define as classical. For more than a century it has captured the hearts and minds of millions, inspired the building of great concert halls in hundreds of cities, sustained thousands of musicians and created a discography that seemed timeless and enduring in its appeal. Well, timeless and enduring until now. For, despite private patronage and lashings of public funds, concert performance and ticket sales are in free fall. Little wonder the latest attempts by Sir Brian McMaster, director of the Edinburgh Festival, to halt and reverse the decline in concert going are being anxiously watched round the world. For there is a growing fear that the decline in classical concert attendance now looks unstoppable." The Scotsman 05/17/03
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The Online Museum - One-Stop Shopping An online archive of 100,000 images of artworks is the self-sufficient collaborative project that allows visitors to compare images side-by side. The digital archive offers "the opportunity to compare far-flung works while staying in one place and would be valuable to art teachers, students and scholars. As much as you want somebody to study your collection, those works get their meaning from context, and context is provided by other works in other collections." The New York Times 05/22/03
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Better Than A Photograph, But Confusing As Hell England's National Gallery is unveiling a new machine which will allow visitors to make instant prints of any of thousands of paintings in the museum's collection,in multiple sizes. The technology is not photographic, but digital, and the images produced are much more faithful to the original colors and textures of the works than a photographic print could ever be. And that's what makes it so disconcerting, says James Fenton. "The fact of the matter is that, the more you study the history of art, the more you are likely to use photographs. Even when you... make a conscious effort to memorise a painting as it is when seen in natural light, there will be other paintings and other artists' work that get stored in your mind through acquaintance with photographs." The Guardian (UK) 05/17/03
