Opinion
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Ruth Bader Ginsberg Loved Opera
Our Very Own Brunnhilde
By: - Sep 20th, 2020Justice of the Supreme Court Ruth Bader Ginsberg, who died this week while still sitting on the bench, was a hero to American women. She believed above all that women could bring about a better world. She loved Beethoven’s "Fidelio," the story of Leonore, who disguises herself as a man to rescue her husband from prison. She related to the opera's story as a woman and a feminist.
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Brooklyn Museum Deaccessions 12 Works
AAMD Sanctions Corona Emergency Measures
By: - Sep 17th, 2020While Trump's billionaire golf buddies are begging for a bailout the arts in America are left twisting in the wind. Closed for months museums are depleting reserve funds to survive. That has meant furloughs, pay cuts and staff reductions. As a desparate measure, in a lapse from guidelines for deaccessioning, the Brooklyn Museum is selling twelve works to raise $40 million. It recalls when the Berkshire Museum gutted its collection to raise $50 million. This is never a good idea but we discuss crucial differences.
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Art New England
Letter from the Publisher
By: - Sep 15th, 2020We are planning a return to print with a January/February 2021 issue of Art New England. In the interim, we are working on enhancing ANE’s website and adding a few exciting new features, including a “rolling” Artist Directory (updated every two weeks); and a “rolling” Destination: New England section dedicated to the entire region.
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Stepping Back from Your Own Mind
Becoming Observer and Observed
By: - Sep 15th, 2020In a moment of upset when we are raging against that “thing” we thought so awful, shouting such hurtful words at the one standing before us, imagine how horrified we would be if we could step back to watch ourselves! Wouldn’t we wish we could find that patience, that wisdom,, to know that awfulness diminishes over time?
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More on Alex Ross, Wagnerism
Ross Captures The Meister's Voice
By: - Sep 14th, 2020Alex Ross’s depiction of Wagner in America, in his new work "Wagnerism," is focused at the start on the author Willa Cather. Ross finds Cather and Thomas Mann the most musically educated and sophisticated of the many literary figures who infused their work with the ideas of the Meister. The boundless scope of a work, its inclusion of ancient myth made present, and leitmotifs bound together to organize a story, are key elements of the Wagner style.
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MFA Reopens on September 23
The Director Welcomes Us Back
By: - Sep 11th, 2020The MFA will open over the next month or so in phases. First, and with great pleasure, we reopen the Art of the Americas Wing, reinvigorated with some new additions and enhanced interpretation. “Women Take the Floor,” on the Wing’s third level, has new works to see, presenting a refreshed narrative worth another look, and “Black Histories, Black Futures,” the groundbreaking display curated by Boston teens, remains on view in the Level 1 Rotunda, Sharf Visitor Center, and Hemicycle.
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Iris Love
Unforgettable
By: - Sep 11th, 2020The doorbell rang. I was in bed. It was about 9pm and I was a little hung-over from the birthday party I’d hosted the night before. Who could it be? Wearing nothing but a t-shirt and underwear, I opened the door just enough to see who it was. OMG. It was Iris Love, dressed in her full Scottish clan regalia of plaid tartan kilt, white shirt, knee socks, and jacket with kilt pins and clan badges.
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How George Seybolt Changed the MFA
Board President Initiated Business Concepts from 1968 to 1972
By: - Sep 11th, 2020George Crossan Seybolt (1915-1993) was president and chairman of the William Underwood Company, best known for its canned Deviled Ham. He was recruited to the board of trustees by the director, Perry T. Rathbone. When be became president of the board there was constant conflict. Seybolt mico managed the museum and ousted Rathbone over the Raphael incident. His personal appointment for director, Merrill Rueppel, proved to be a disaster. He was fired after a Globe exposé. Seybolt went on to be a museum lobbyist and visionary. It's what we discussed in 1977.
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More on Wagnerism by Alex Ross
George Eliot Absorbs Wagner
By: - Sep 10th, 2020When Wagner’s music crossed the English Channel, it attracted the attention of novelist and critic, George Eliot, who always took a great interest in music. Early on, she identified Wagner’s achievement as a path to the future, writing, “…anyone who finds deficiencies in opera as it has existed hitherto...” must admit that Wagner “…has pointed out the directions in which lyric drama must develop itself, if it is to be developed at all.”
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Racial Injustice Themes in Pop Culture
Arts for Social Justice in America
By: - Sep 08th, 2020Historians a century from now may decide that this part of the 21st century was a political horror show. So it only makes sense that the real world of racial injustice and our racist history is bleeding over into pop culture. We can now partake of film, video, books and music where these historical themes are blended with horror and heroic stories.
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What Joe Thompson Means to Northern Berkshire County
The Daunting Legacy of MASS MoCA
By: - Aug 22nd, 2020Joe Thompson graduated from Williams College in 1981. As founding director of MASS MoCA he has been here ever since. Stepping down in October he will sever ties next summer. Between now and then he will plan the next move. Other than some loose ends his remarkable work here is complete. Magnificently so.
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Tending to the Garden
Cutting Back Perennials
By: - Aug 16th, 2020I have begun cutting back the perennials in the meditation garden that have passed for the season. Bleeding hearts, ligularia, lilies, with hostas not far behind. It is the way of things, the time of season. The butterfly bushes have presented their seed pods, and I’ve collected them for drying.
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Good Dog Foundation Provides Helping Dogs
Berkshires Benefit from Canines
By: - Aug 03rd, 2020The Good Dog Foundation: Helping Humans Heal For more than 30,000 years dogs have been providing companionship and loyalty to humans. No wonder they are called ‘man’s best friend.’ Residents of the Berkshires benefit from the Good Dog Foundation. It provides Certified Therapy Dog visits to Fairview Hospital in Great Barrington and Crossroads Center for Enrichment in Pittsfield.
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Photographer Joseph Podlesnik
About Provisional Painting
By: - Jul 11th, 2020In photography and painting perspective has often been the main visual tool that connects the human presence to the here and now which becomes place. The image created by the handheld camera establishes ipso facto a tight bond via the picture plane on the back of the camera to the environment. If it is parallel to the subject matter or at an angle to it, the way the eye is moved by the image can be quite different.
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Streaming from Aix-en-Provence
Saariaho, Sellars, Rattle and Kožená
By: - Jul 07th, 2020Aix en Provence is offering a digital festival to those of us who can't enter France. Their selection of recitals, conversations and opera performances is intriguing and invites.
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Belief and Stillness
Interconnectedness of All Things
By: - Jul 07th, 2020Anyone who has attended one of my lectures has heard me talk about our connection to everything and everyone everywhere. In order for us to be in this moment together – – my writing, your reading – – everything that has happened since the beginning of time everywhere had to happen precisely as it did. Otherwise, we would not be together today.
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Northeastern University Restricts Access to AAMARP
African American Master Artists in Residency Program Founded in 1978
By: - Jul 06th, 2020During the pandemic Northeastern University has restricted access to artists in its historic African American Master Artists in Residency Program. It was founded in 1978 by Dana C. Chandler, Jr. Speaking out against the university for its actions against AAMRP is Dana Chandler III the son of the founder,
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Lawrence Brownlee from Home on Being Black
A Formidable Tenor Speaks Openly About race
By: - Jun 29th, 2020Lawrence Brownlee sang a two-part concert at the Park Avenue Armory in 2017. In the Officer's Room he performed the bel canto arias we have come to associate with him. He is entirely comfortable. And he is sure that Bellini would welcome him, black or not, in any role. He moved to the Veteran's Room for the second part of the program. There he performed pop songs, gospel and folk. He was less comfortable in the more relaxed atmosphere. Now with downtime he discusses race.
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ATCA Statement of Action
Critics Support Anti-Racist Organization
By: - Jun 27th, 2020While Broadway and American Theatre are closed from now until whenever It is a time of reflection, accountability and change. The American Theatre Critics Association acknowledges but does not codone and pledges to end instance of racism by some of our members. Moving forward ATCA will strive to be an anti-racist organization that embraces diversity and inclusion.
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Daniel Chester French and Minute Man's Model
All in the Family
By: - Jun 25th, 2020Isaac Davis, Captain of the Acton troops was the model for the Minute Man. He was the first officer killed on April 19, 1775. The statute is placed on the ground on which he died.
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The American Robot: A Cultural History
Book by Dustin A. Abnet
By: - Jun 24th, 2020Robots are with us, in fact, for the future and in decades of industry and popular culture. Dustin A. Abnet, assistant professor of American studies at Cal State Fullerton, takes us on a serious tour of robots in American industry and culture in his new book, The American Robot: A Cultural History.
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Woodie King Jr. Looks for Leroy Jones
Rapping with Artists on Zoom
By: - Jun 18th, 2020Woodie King Jr.'s Rapping with Artist Series continues with a discussion of Larry Muhammed's acclaimed "Looking for Leroy." Director Petronia Paley and the playwright join King in a lively discussion of the play, one of the best Zoom theatrical pieces,
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Water and Stillness
Go With the Flow
By: - Jun 11th, 2020Forgiveness is a gift we give ourselves. It is not for the sake of those we forgive; it is for our own sake. We take our anger and disappointment out of our backpack and toss it away. We stop carrying it with us, get unstuck from the past, and bring ourselves into the present.
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Spa Journeys for Astral Travelers
What A Trip
By: - Jun 10th, 2020Canyon Ranch may be just down the road for Berkshireites, but in the time of Covid, it's as inaccessible as the moon. Jessica Robinson suggests how to satisfy a spa yearning safely.
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Tuesdays with Woodie King on Theatre
Founder of New Federal Theatre Raps with Talent
By: - Jun 09th, 2020New Federal Theatre is fifty years young and going strong. Even in this time of lock down, its founder, Woodie King Jr. persists. On Tuesdays at 3 during June he is discussing theatre with various artists. Not only are these captivating afternoons a superb introduction to aspirants in theatre and the performing arts, they show King at his best, drawing out talent and showing the path for others to follow.
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