Arts news

• Make It Stop! Top French Publisher Pleads With Writers To Stop Sending Manuscripts

  14-04-2021 23:01 via feedproxy.google.com
  Successive Covid-19 lockdowns in France have given budding writers the time to finally work on that idea for a novel or to polish up an old manuscript languishing in a drawer. As a result, publishers are overwhelmed. Before the pandemic, Gallimard received around 30 manuscripts a day; now they receive around 50. – Yahoo!
  
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• Spotify Turns 15 — It Revolutionized The Music Business

  14-04-2021 22:31 via feedproxy.google.com
  How completely has streaming transformed the music world? The platform rose from 7% of the U.S. market in 2010 to a whopping 83% by the end of 2020 — and recorded-music revenues saw their fifth consecutive year of growth, topping $12.2 billion, per the RIAA. It’s no understatement to say that streaming saved the record- ed-music business, and that global market leader Spotify led the charge toward the stability and growth that the industry is enjoy- ing today. – Variety
  
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• Most People Think In Images. I Think In Sound

  14-04-2021 22:02 via feedproxy.google.com
  One of the distinctive features of my cognition is that not only do I think with sound and music; I also don’t think in images during my waking hours (although I dream vividly and visually at night). This lack of visual imagery is known as aphantasia, partial in my case. – Aeon
  
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• Revealed: The Masterful Sophistication Of The Aztec Language

  14-04-2021 21:34 via feedproxy.google.com
  New research by a British linguistic anthropologist, Gordon Whittaker, is revealing for the first time that the Aztecs’ hieroglyphic writing system was one of the most sophisticated scripts that humanity has ever produced. – The Independent (UK)
  
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• How A Gentle Little Movie By One Of Pakistan’s Favorite Directors Got Banned For Blasphemy That Isn’t There

  14-04-2021 21:01 via feedproxy.google.com
  Novelist Mohammed Hanif (A Case of Exploding Mangoes) writes about the strange case of Sarmad Khoosat’s film Zindagi Tamasha (“Circus of Life”), which has won multiple prizes at international festivals, was cleared by three Pakistani boards of censors, made the country’s official entry for the Best International Film Oscar, glommed onto as a political football by people who hadn’t seen it, protested by enormous mobs who knew nothing about it, uncleared by those sam
  
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• How Beethoven (And The Philadelphia Orchestra) Brought The US And China Together

  14-04-2021 20:25 via feedproxy.google.com
  The idea that the world’s two most powerful countries can simply “decouple” as their strategic competition grows fiercer — a concept promoted by China hawks — doesn’t match reality. In the case of classical music, as Beethoven in Beijing illustrates, the ties that bind our two countries are historically driven and deeply emotional. – Philadelphia Inquirer
  
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• On Zoom, Using Ancient Greek Theater To Process Modern Traumas

  14-04-2021 20:04 via feedproxy.google.com
  “Ancient stories, and texts that have stood the test of time, can be portals to honest and dignified grappling with present wounds and longings and callings that we aren’t able to muster in our official places now. It’s an embodiment of the good Greek word catharsis — releasing both insight and emotions that have had no place to go, and creating an energizing relief.” Krista Tippett interviews Bryan Doerries, founder and director of the project Theater of War. (aud
  
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• South African Arts Collapse During COVID

  14-04-2021 19:28 via feedproxy.google.com
  “Just as an example, when I put a post on Facebook that I was looking for someone to help clean my house, I got at least 50 replies from artists that I’ve seen on stage and people that I’ve worked with. I also know of artists who have been in the profession for many years who have had to sell their houses and live in their cars. We are losing a lot of talented performers.” – BBC
  
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• Two Years After The Notre-Dame Fire, What’s The State Of The Cathedral’s Organs?

  14-04-2021 19:02 via feedproxy.google.com
  In something of a miracle, the huge fire that ravaged the Paris landmark on April 15, 2019 did almost no serious damage to the 8,000-pipe Grand Organ; the major problem is that lead dust from the melted roof covered and coated every part of the instrument, and cleaning up a neurotoxin is no easy matter. But of the smaller Choir Organ, at the other end of the church, only the metal pipes could be saved. In a Q&A, Notre-Dame titular organist Olivier Latry talks about the progress of the repai
  
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• Scientists Map Spider Webs For Their Music

  14-04-2021 18:29 via feedproxy.google.com
  Markus Buehler’s team used laser imaging to create a 3D map of webs made by tropical tent-web spiders (Cyrtophora citricola). They identified each thread’s vibrating frequency through its size and elasticity, then converted those frequencies into ones that can be heard by humans. – New Scientist
  
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• Does Esperanto Have Any Hope Of Ever Catching On As A World Language? Not Really, No.

  14-04-2021 18:03 via feedproxy.google.com
  There are two fundamental problems with Esperanto as a genuinely global lingua franca. One is that, while it was intended to be have grammar simple and intuitive enough to be mastered quickly, Esperanto is really only intuitive for speakers of European languages; its grammar is alien to native speakers of, for instance, Chinese, Arabic, Yoruba, or Tamil. The other is that there’s a fundamental disagreement among its enthusiasts and keepers about how Esperanto should develop. – 3 Qua
  
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• How Endorsements Took Over Celebrity Culture

  14-04-2021 17:29 via feedproxy.google.com
  “The celebrity endorsement is a three-way relationship connecting the star, the product and us, and the internet has worked to draw all of its participants closer and closer together. We’re all mingling on the same platforms, our photos pinned to the same timelines. Social media influencers have narrowed the distinction between celebrities’ claims to fame and their ability to exploit that through sales: Influencers’ notoriety is itself derived from their facility at movi
  
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• Why Would Any Self-Respecting Woman Sing Schumann’s ‘Frauenliebe Und -Leben?’ In 2021? Let This One Tell You Why

  14-04-2021 17:01 via feedproxy.google.com
  Soprano Carolyn Sampson summarizes the texts of the eight songs in the cycle thus: “1. I can’t think of anything but him; 2. He’s wonderful and I am not worthy; 3. OMG – he said he loved me; 4. I am his and have the ring to prove it; 5. Girlfriends: today I leave you for him; 6. I am pregnant with mini-you; 7. I feed my baby and am fulfilled; 8. Your death is the first time you have truly hurt me.” She continues: “Isn’t it faintly ridiculous to stand be
  
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• ‘The First Great Balanchine Dancer’, Mary Ellen Moylan, Dead At 95

  14-04-2021 16:34 via feedproxy.google.com
  “Still in her teens, Ms. Moylan began to perform principal roles with the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, where Balanchine, ever more enthusiastic about her work, was the resident choreographer. … [Her] career began and largely took shape before Balanchine formed Ballet Society and, in 1948, the New York City Ballet. But her career was closely associated with his work. … And yet her death, almost a year ago, went largely unnoticed in the dance world.” – The New York
  
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• France Is Allowing Auction Houses To Keep Operating During Lockdown, But Not Galleries. Galleries Are Suing

  14-04-2021 16:02 via feedproxy.google.com
  “Late last month the president of the Conseil des Ventes, the regulatory authority for auction houses, gave notice that the government would in fact permit sale rooms to remain open with public safety restrictions in place. Allowing galleries’ main competitors to remain open evoked the ire of art dealers, … [and their] trade association brought the suit against the French state, the prime minister, and the health minister, and it was the latter who appeared in front of a judg
  
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• Video Now/Live Later — How Pacific Northwest Ballet Approached Its Commissions After COVID Shut Down This Season

  14-04-2021 15:35 via feedproxy.google.com
  “PNB opted for an all-digital 2020-21 season, honoring its commissions from Lang, Donald Byrd, Alejandro Cerrudo, Edwaard Liang and Christopher Wheeldon by filming premieres that they hope will be performed live in later seasons. For patrons, the message is ‘Stream the new dances now, see them live onstage once public health guidelines allow.'” – Dance Magazine
  
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• Univision And Televisa Sign Merger To Create Spanish-Language Media Giant

  14-04-2021 15:03 via feedproxy.google.com
  Univision, the largest producer of Spanish-language in the United States, and Televisa, Mexico’s largest media conglomerate (and one of the world’s biggest single producers of broadcast material in any language) will combine their content operations to form Televisa-Univision, which could become the dominant media force in the entire Hispanophone world. – Variety
  
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• Edinburgh International Festival Will Go On This Summer — Outdoors (Yes, In Scotland)

  14-04-2021 14:36 via feedproxy.google.com
  Last summer, COVID forced the cancellation of the flagship of the Festival City’s summer events; this year, with new cases falling in Scotland and people getting their shots, the show will go on — in three specially constructed outdoor pavilions “specially built to maximize air flow and allow social distancing.” Edinburgh’s weather being what it is, the pavilions will have roofs. – The New York Times
  
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• One Of Australia’s Most Popular Soap Operas Roiled By Accusations Of On-Set Racism

  14-04-2021 14:09 via feedproxy.google.com
  Neighbours, which has been running in Australia since 1985 and is one of the country’s most successful TV shows internationally, has had two indigenous cast members and one of Indian descent publicly describe some brazen behavior from fellow cast and crew members, including one incident where an actor compared the Indian-Australian colleague to a bobblehead doll. – The Guardian
  
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• Firsts: Chicago Art Institute Appoints New Board Chair

  14-04-2021 11:31 via feedproxy.google.com
  A 15-year trustee of the museum, Denise Gardner will be the first African-American and first woman leader of the governing body for the museum and the School of the Art Institute. It is believed that she will be the first Black woman to head the board of a major U.S. art museum, although such demographics are hard to come by. – Chicago Tribune
  
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• Subway to Studio 54: a bygone New York – in pictures

  14-04-2021 08:00
  
  Skaters, dancers, hustlers, boxers … Swiss photographer Willy Spiller prowled the streets of the Big Apple from 1977 and 1985, capturing characters from all walks of life Continue reading...
  
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• Women take the floor: an exhibition that shifts the male gaze of art history

  14-04-2021 07:51
  
  At the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, female artists throughout history are being given their due in a vital new exhibitionIn art history, women have traditionally been pigeonholed as objects of desire – beautiful creatures that enchant, entice and inspire as “the muse”. But walk into the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston at the moment, and the male gaze has been replaced with women’s work rather than just their appearance taking centre stage.It’s part of the museum&rsq
  
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• The Great British Art Tour: a girl with a pearl earring

  14-04-2021 07:00
  
  With public art collections closed we are bringing the art to you, exploring hidden gems from across the country in partnership with Art UK. Today: Woman in a Red Dress, at Polesden LaceyIn the corridor of Polesden Lacey, Surrey, hangs a small, bust-length picture of a young woman. She wears a fine, red silk dress. A pearl earring glistens in her ear, her face is framed by a gleaming white headcloth.There is intimacy in the way she is depicted. A red curtain drawn behind her creates the illusion
  
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• Big Weather: Indigenous artists reflect on climate crisis – in pictures

  14-04-2021 03:00
  
  Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ cultural knowledge and sophisticated understanding of weather systems is the cornerstone for Big Weather, an exhibition currently showing at NGV Australia’s Ian Potter Centre. Climate crisis is never far from the surface, with works from artists like Karla Dickens, Clinton Naina, Treahna Hamm and Nici Cumpston addressing the changing weather patterns and the ongoing effects of colonisation on the land and its processes. • Big Weathe
  
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• How Big Tech Has “Weaponized” Design Patents

  14-04-2021 00:01 via feedproxy.google.com
  Introduced in 1842, the US design patent law saw just 14 designs registered in its first year, including a typeface, a bathtub and a “corpse preserver”. By 1930, the patent office was issuing 3,000 design patents a year, and 6,500 by 1941, a figure that wasn’t exceeded until 1989. That number has now mushroomed to around 35,000 – good news for lawyers, but maybe less so for innovators. – The Guardian
  
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