Against all odds two major museums are placing high stakes bets on the outcome of the pending Super Bowl XLIX. Reflecting the Seahawks vs. The Patriots it seems that the Seattle Art Museum and Clark Art Institute are wagering on the outcome. The winner of the West Coast or New England team will win an all expenses included, three month loan of a major work of art. If the Patriots win "Puget Sound on the Pacific Coast" from 1870 by Albert Bierstadt will be shipped to the Clark. Should Seattle win Winslow Homer’s masterpiece, "West Point, Prout's Neck" will be headed West. It's a win win for both football fans and art lovers.

“The Giver” tells the story of a perfect world, where no one needs to make decisions because you know exactly what you are supposed to do every day. What seems innocent and friendly at first takes on a sinister atmosphere as we learn more about the rules of their world. Each chime heightens the tension as Jonas begins to question the world around him.

Ildar Abdrazakov made his Carnegie Hall debut in a program that would test any singer's mettle. The evening's pro0gram was divided into two parts. In the first, Glinka, Tchaikovsky and Mussorgky provided a pot pourri of songs and arias that often echoed the keys and tones of the Volga Boat song. Very Russian in color. Sometimes surprisingly un-Russian in brightness and lightness.

As a teenager I read the books and watched the movies banned by the Catholic Church. It served as a kind of entertainment guide. That was pretty much the motive in seeing The Interview. It pissed off North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un. That led to hacking Sony Pictures which chickened out on and then fudged its release. Curious about the threats and hype we watched it on Netflix. Yawn.

As a critic and journalist New York based Edward Rubin, known to friends and colleagues as Fast Eddy, has a finger in many pies. On the eve of the Super Bowl he reveals a deep and abiding love of sports. Much of this passion was inherited from his sporting father. Hey, who knew?

The play by Emily Mann presents a tender oral history life story of the real-life Delaney sisters of Raleigh, North Carolina, who share their observations, experiences, anecdotes and memories of two lives fully lived in the time of Jim Crow law in the South; who then moved to the North, settling in New York City first in a vibrant Harlem and then into the white suburb of Mount Vernon. It’s a remarkable journey and story of sisters who never married and reached 100 plus.

A Play of 21st Century manners, A Perfect Future tells the story of Claire and Max finding their values put to the test. When their best friends Alex and Elena announce they are having a baby, things begin to unravel in their perfect world. Claire is climbing the corporate ladder in advertising, while her husband Max is a puppeteer for PBS. With friends entering into parenthood, they begin to ask themselves who they are and where they are going so fast. And what happened to the indie-rock kids that hated everything their parents believed in?

“Birdman”, like last years’ Oscar Winner “Dallas Buyers Club” features a character I didn’t much care for, but I sure did enjoy and admire the performance of its star Matthew McConaughey, who walked off with a much deserved Oscar statuette by playing a flawed character. It’s a strong possibility that Michael Keaton, another flawed character-study, will do the same?

From rodeo rider in Texas to sniper Bradley Cooper is superb in depicting the nuances of Chris Kyle who holds the record with 160 confirmed kills as an American Sniper. After 9/11 there was a rush to take the battle to the terrorists who attacked America. As the war dragged on with staggering cost and loss of life it grew ever less acceptable to the American people. Director Clint Eastwood again polarizes a nation divided into hawks and doves. Was Kyle a hero and defender of freedom or, as Michael Moore has stated, a "coward" and sanctioned serial killer?
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Because of the Official Secrets Act it would be decades before the efforts of 10,000 at top secret Bletchley Park would be revealed. Primarily through the genius of the brilliant, tormented Alan Turning they succeeded in cracking the seemingly impossible 159 million daily variations of the Enigma code machine. Convicted of Gross Indecency Turing was alleged to take his life after a year of court imposed chemical castration.
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Parking in Boston neighborhoods is always tough. During winter blizzards it escalates from brutal to deadly. Think twice before you move someone's chair. Even in summer with no snow in site.

European paternosters are one thing. The elevators of the Old Elbtunnel in Hamburg are quite another! They are still the principal contraptions that transport cars, bicycles and pedestrians after 100 years in action up and down on the St. Pauli side. Then, through the tunnels below the Elbe River all passengers reappear on one or the other side at the Port of Hamburg.
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My feisty pal Jonas Dovydenas in an exchange of emails declared a fatwa against writing poems about elevators. That launched a tsunami of literary invention,. Even Jonas relented and joined in the fun. From December 16 through January 26 some 32 poems were posted by 25 poets. Now we ask you the readers to vote for the winners of this lively contest. This will result in a Readers Prize. The contest will also be juried for an Official Prize by Professor Mark Miller and his students at MCLA. Let the games begin.
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What's in a word? Sniper such a loaded term. Depending which side you are on. Kill or be killed. But from a distance. Not a fair fight. As if there are rules for war. Uncanny definition for such controversy. Naming is knowing.
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Janus the two faced Roman god looking forward and back in time. It's all relative compared to what?
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Barrington Stage Company, has announced casting for the 10-minute plays for the 4th Annual 10X10 New Play Festival, with performances February 12 through March 1, as part of the 2015 10X10 Upstreet Arts Festival.

Today beauty parlors are unisex. The first time I freaked and Aldo the beautician got busted as a result of my visit. That never happens in barber shops other than the occasional mafioso getting whacked.
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The technical feat of filming a boy's life for twelve years is staggering to contemplate. But what the auteur Richard Linklater is able to achieve in film is a masterpiece whose structure only enhances the experience. We spoke with him after a recent screening. He liked our comparison to Proust.

Charles Spencer was feted by Christie’s in New York on publication day and took to the podium like the Today show correspondent he was for almost a decade. He is as good a storyteller live as he is in print. Tracking down regicides is a thriller in Spencer's pen.

The Modern Spirit: The Arts of George Morrison is a five venue traveling exhibition which is on view at the Heard Museum in Phoenix, Arizona through January 12. Morrison (1919-2000) left the Chippewa people of Lake Superior to study at the Arts Student League in 1943. He enjoyed success in New York with numerous gallery and national museum exhibitions. In 1970 he returned to teach in Minnesota where he primarily lived and worked for the remainder of his life. As an abstract artist Morrison defies narrow definitions of American Indian Art. His life and work did much to expand that.
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Barollo, a new style of Italian wines is coming to America. According to Marco Barollo, ‘Wine is an alchemic formula. A magic masterpiece that changes the wine, and it is never the same from one year to another. For this reason, every year we find ourselves forced to make brave decisions and invest carefully and only choose those techniques that are proven to help us to give our wine its originality and character’.

Arriving in Paris in 1912, Marsden Hartley, then 35, met two German officers and joined them in Berlin. From 1913 to 1915, and his return to the States, Hartley created a brilliant series of works inspired by and on equal footing with Europe's leading modernists. These works are now on view at the LA County Museum of Art.
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Marta and Gianluca, 24 year old students from Umbria visit Manhattan and fall in love with the city. It was our pleasure to show them the sites, tastes and smells of Manhattan.

Arshile Gorky painted several portraits of himself with his mother. They were based on a precious photograph. She died during the Armenian Genocide. The child emigrated to America and grew up in the Boston/ Watertown Armenian community. The artist, Martin Mugar, discusses family tradition and his Armenian heritage as it relates to the early years and art education of the seminal abstract expressionist.

The 10X10 Upstreet Arts Festival returns to downtown Pittsfield for the fourth year from February 12-22, 2014, and features music, theatre, dance, film, visual art, spoken word, comedy and more, including BSC’s 10X10 New Play Festival. Directors for the 10X10 New Play Festival are BSC Artistic Director Julianne Boyd and Artistic Associate and Director of New Play Development Stephanie Yankwitt.