FINDING HILLYWOOD
No, that's not a typo. It is "Hillywood." Which is a thriving creative movie-making center set in the hills of Rwanda--hills, as this inspiring documentary shows, whose astonishing beauty stands in...
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Everything I Ever Needed to Know I Learned From Huckleberry Finn and Hal...
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: "A book of mine where a sound heart and a deformed conscience come into collision and conscience suffers defeat." -Mark Twain Recently, in Concord, New Hampshire, I saw...
View ArticleClans, Cults and Tribes: From Family to Deaf Culture
The Berkeley Repertory Theatre, dedicated to provocation, has produced an excellent version of Nina Raine's Tribes. It might appear to be a play about an "issue," deafness in this instance. But it is a...
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Stage Door: Bullets Over Broadway, Violet, Lady Day at Emerson's Bar & Grill
Is art worth killing for? Woody Allen's new Broadway musical Bullets Over Broadway, an entertaining romp, thinks so. Based on his 1994 movie, with zippy direction by Susan Stroman, the musical comedy...
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My Vinyl Offer
We raised our twin daughters on Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie, Ella Jenkins, Tom Paxton, and assorted other folk singers who recorded children's albums. They enjoyed them as toddlers and adolescents, but...
View ArticleInternational Touring
I have to admit it: in my 30 year arts management career I have been ambivalent about the value of international touring. While many of my peers disagree strenuously with me, for every benefit of...
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Absent in Antibes: Art Travels Better Than Artist!
Plagued with visa obstacles and high inflation, young and emerging Iranian artists find it easier to have their art travel to the art markets of the world than their persons. Pegah Lari's art has found...
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The Land Art Road Trip
The art world is headed in the wrong direction; we want to fix that. Last fall, our art gallery took thirty artists on a month-long traveling artists' residency through the American Southwest. That...
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Jackson Pollock's Milestone Painting Mural Featured at the Getty (PHOTOS)
Mural, 1943. Jackson Pollock (American, 1912-1956). Oil and casein on canvas. The University of Iowa Museum of Art, Gift of Peggy Guggenheim. Photo courtesy of the Getty Museum. On the afternoon of...
View ArticleIn Support of New Plays... on Broadway
My friends are never very excited about new plays. What is The Realistic Joneses and why did celebrities want to be in it? Is Casa Valentina an atmospheric production where they treat us like we're in...
View Article'The Cripple of Inishmaan:' Daniel Radcliffe Stares at Cows
Life is full of surprises. Little surprises. And not so little surprises. Even on Inishmaan, where Cripple Billy spends his days staring at cows and the biggest news involves the fate of farm animals,...
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Marla Mase's Half-Life: In the Act of Becoming Herself
Photo by Hisao Kishimoto Words are a big thing for Marla Mase. For her, music counterbalances and complements the vignettes that swirl around in her head. The brief accounts of fear, the blues,...
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20 Years of Honoring Mid-Career Avant-Garde Artists
What's it like to be an avant-garde artist in a country where free expression can flourish, and not be able to earn a decent living? To be an artist who is trying to express honest, creative feelings...
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Apple Is No Longer Picasso, or Dylan
The sensible Joe Nocera is concerned: Apple has lost its creative mojo. Instead of trying to put new dents in the universe, Apple is involved in never-ending litigation, squabbling with competitors...
View ArticleTheater: Violet Is Beautiful; Bullets Fires Blanks; James Franco's Broadway...
VIOLET *** out of **** BULLETS OVER BROADWAY ** out of **** OF MICE AND MEN ** out of **** VIOLET *** out of **** AMERICAN AIRLINES THEATRE AT ROUNDABOUT Oh ye of little faith! Worshipping your false...
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Bound to Do It: Curating Erotic and Fetish Photos
"So, wanna curate a booth with me at Photo Independent?" Of course I said yes. I love curating. And saying yes comes easily to me when it involves art. Then came the kicker: My friend asking, noted...
View ArticleWhy Poetry Matters
Poetry is how we say to the world, and to each other, "I am here." Some of my most beloved poets -- Walt Whitman, Langston Hughes, Billy Collins and Naomi Shihab Nye -- talk about poetry as a way to...
View ArticleAcross Race, Generation: Pete Seeger and Ending Poverty
A good song can only do good, and I am proud of the songs I have sung." - Pete Seeger Pete Seeger knew the power of song. Through it, he influenced generations of people across the country and world....
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Can Anything Save Comic Sans, the World's 'Most Hated Font'?
Co-authored by Dr. Agnieszka Bachfischer A new font called Comic Neue, by Sydney-born designer Craig Rozynski, has been trending online in the past few weeks. The font was developed, in the designer's...
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Castanha: One Brazilian Beauty to Watch in NYC
There is one particular person responsible for my love of Brazilian cinema. While I sit and watch movies, day after day, never tiring of it, I've discovered it's way more fun to bring other viewers...
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