Arts news

• 'Notorious heterosexual' Lucian Freud's letters suggest he had affair with Stephen Spender

  07-06-2015 23:03
  
  With 14 acknowledged children, perhaps 40 more unconfirmed, and more female lovers than is decent to count, Lucian Freud was as close to being a “notorious heterosexual” as it is possible to get.
  
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• The Bizarre Story Of A Painting Stolen, Given, Googled – And Returned To A Bushwick Gallery

  07-06-2015 23:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Is it going to change anything at the gallery? ‘No, we’re just gonna keep showing work that people want really bad, and maybe go on a Home Depot run for a better lock,’ Harding said.”
  
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• The Story Of Technology Is Actually The Story Of Textiles

  07-06-2015 22:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “‘Smart textiles’ originally developed for spacesuits use microencapsulated materials that melt when they get hot, keeping wearers comfortable by absorbing body heat; when temperatures fall, the materials solidify and warm the body.”
  
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• Challenge: Stay True To Your Source While Making An Entirely New Thing For Your Art Form

  07-06-2015 21:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Together, the memoir and the musical argue for the fact that plot and character are just a part of what affects us when we experience art. Our response is also determined by form, genre, setting—not only by the story but by the way the story is told.”
  
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• Broadway And The Tonys Need Kids (But Not For Every Production)

  07-06-2015 21:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “The Tony Awards really need kids. If the Theater Wing could find a way to give kids a routing interest by getting more of them in to see these wildly overpriced productions (I know, it does try to), then the Nielsen numbers would follow. Kids ought to be part of the television show’s focus — […]
  
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• Making Ballet (Explicitly) Queer

  07-06-2015 21:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Queerness specifically in ballet is a funny thing; ballet does have a history of having a lot of gay men perform it, and you can read into certain ballets’ narratives about gay men. There’s a lot of coding there. So it’s not like there hasn’t been any queerness in ballet, but related to the representation […]
  
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• Writing A Non-‘Imitation Game’ Opera About Alan Turing And His Work

  07-06-2015 20:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “The story of Turing is pieced together through seven episodic sections which span chronologically from his cycling obsession though to his death by poisoning, and the lingering question of whether or not it was suicide.”
  
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• Drive-In Theatres (Remember Them?) Began 82 Years Ago In New Jersey

  07-06-2015 20:15 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “The nation’s first drive-in theater could hold 500 cars and promised ‘motorists and their guests will see and hear talking pictures while they smoke, talk, or partake of refreshments without annoying others in the audience.'”
  
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• The Poky Little Puppy Problem, Or, Why So Many Terrible Children’s Books Are Such Classics

  07-06-2015 20:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “The problem is that young children have terrible taste and enjoy garbage. Another problem, which compounds the first problem, is that they want to hear the same books hundreds of times in a row. So for all the joys that storytime can offer, it frequently entails a kind of dismal self-abnegation that’s too excruciating even […]
  
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• Can Apple Solve The Money Problem With Streaming Music Services?

  07-06-2015 19:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Taking on the likes of Spotify and Pandora, the Cupertino, Calif., tech giant is expected to announce a $10-a-month streaming service and revamped Internet radio feature at its developer conference in San Francisco on Monday.”
  
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• Ruth Feldman, The Famous Quiz Show Kid, Dead at 80

  07-06-2015 19:15 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “The question was reasonably obscure — What was the last opera in Wagner’s “Ring” cycle? — but Ruthie Duskin knew the answer. ‘The Dusk of the Gods,’ she intoned into the microphone. A fellow panelist leapt to correct her. ‘It’s Gott-dam … Gott-dam,’ he stammered, as the producers of the live radio broadcast winced. ‘He […]
  
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• What It’s Like To Be A Young, Queer, HIV-Positive Artist Of Color Today

  07-06-2015 19:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “LaBeija’s photos flip the script, offering up her experiences for our consumption on her specific terms, and requiring us to look her in the eyes while we do so. LaBeija is still young. Some of the influences in her work — David LaChapelle, Cindy Sherman — lie a little close to the surface. But through […]
  
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• The NY Phil’s Next Emerging Composer: Anna Thorvaldsdattir

  07-06-2015 18:45 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  Alan Gilbert, the orchestra’s music director, praised what he described as her unique, expressive voice. ‘Her uncompromising approach to building soundscapes creates a visceral, pictorial aesthetic.'”
  
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• Texas Is A Deeply Latina/Latino State, But How Does That Affect Its Theatre?

  07-06-2015 18:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Despite the Encuentro’s diverse programming, which featured 15 plays from the four corners and Puerto Rico, no Texas-based theatre companies were represented. On the surface, this could suggest that Texas is not producing the quantity or the quality of Latina/o theatre as other parts of the United States. But those of us working to historicize […]
  
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• The Hottest Battles Of The Tony Awards

  07-06-2015 18:01 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  Who will triumph tonight?
  
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• Why Writers Should Keep A ‘Writing Diary’

  07-06-2015 18:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Surveying this at the end of a project provides a fascinating vision of the evolution of a book – though I invariably find that it’s a catalogue of complaints (‘horrible day,’ ‘appalling day,’ ‘realised that most of what I wrote last week was rubbish’), relieved only rarely by moments of insight and sweaty euphoria: ‘Think […]
  
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• Government-Sponsored Special Departments For Trolling

  07-06-2015 17:45 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “The Columbian Chemicals hoax was not some simple prank by a bored sadist. It was a highly coordinated disinformation campaign, involving dozens of fake accounts that posted hundreds of tweets for hours, targeting a list of figures precisely chosen to generate maximum attention. The perpetrators didn’t just doctor screenshots from CNN; they also created fully […]
  
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• Broadway Casts Get Stuck At LaGuardia And Have A Sing-Off [VIDEO]

  07-06-2015 17:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “To pass the time, the actors performed impromptu renditions of ‘The Circle of Life’ and ‘Arabian Nights, and [Tony winner James Monroe] Iglehart dropped an impressive freestyle to the tune of Black Star’s ‘Lions of Hip-Hop.'”
  
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• From Zero To Hero (AKA, How ‘Bridesmaids’ Got Director Paul Feig Out Of Movie Jail)

  07-06-2015 17:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “It’s about as dramatic a career turnaround as possible for a Hollywood filmmaker, but escaping his five-year stint in movie jail was far from the only time Feig’s found himself standing at the precipice of a professional chasm. It’s happened, in truth, with some frequency.”
  
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• When You Nostalgia-Watch – And Then Figure Out The Villains Are Actually The Good Ones

  07-06-2015 16:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Leona Barrett, Lean On Me. … She’s a parent/activist who seems genuinely committed to getting the best possible outcome for all the children of Paterson. She’s also absolutely right: keeping every entrance and exit chained and locked is an unconscionable fire hazard and Clark never should have done it.”
  
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• Pre-collections: Fashion's new favourite thing

  07-06-2015 16:05
  
  The pre-collections are fashion’s new favourite thing – dubbed “Cruise” or “Resort” and “pre-Fall,” they consist of clothes that, until recently, were shunted out to buyers as commercial filler and nothing more. Pre-collections were the anodyne stuff that brands ran up to ensure shop rails were never left empty. As the moniker suggests, they were a warm-up act for the main catwalk showcase – generally, the press were shielded from them at all costs.
  
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• Painting: Doomed By Cliché And A Lack Of Feeling?

  07-06-2015 13:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “The problem is optical: two parties, critics and artists, look past each other with incompatible expectations.”
  
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• Ronnie Gilbert Of The Weavers Has Died At 88

  07-06-2015 13:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “‘We sang songs of hope in that strange time after World War II, when already the world was preparing for Cold War,’ Ms. Gilbert recalled in ‘The Weavers: Wasn’t That a Time,’ a 1982 documentary about the group. ‘We still had the feeling that if we could sing loud enough and strong enough and hopefully […]
  
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• Barbara Hepworth… back in focus

  07-06-2015 12:00
  
  We associate Barbara Hepworth with St Ives and Yorkshire, but often forget she was a driving force in international modern art. On the eve of a major Tate retrospective Tim Adams tells the dramatic story of this fascinating artist through key pieces spanning 40 yearsIt has been nearly 50 years since there has been a full retrospective of Barbara Hepworth’s sculpture and drawings in London. In the time since then, arguably Britain’s greatest woman artist has been claimed both by her native Yo
  
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• Agnes Martin review – beauty and steeliness

  07-06-2015 08:59
  
  Tate Modern, London
  This major Agnes Martin retrospective contains some gems, but overemphasis on her less original work disguises her worthAt first sight, the American abstract expressionist Agnes Martin, who died in 2004 aged 92, and the British painter of cats and mournful women, Gwen John (1876-1939), would seem to have little in common. But as I walked through the first major retrospective of Martin’s work at Tate Modern last week – in life, no such exhibition ever came her way for the
  
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