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Revolutionary model turned uncompromising painter
PHILADELPHIA, PA.- Its hard to believe that Suzanne Valadon: Model, Painter, Rebel at the Barnes Foundation is the first American museum show for this sensational French painter. Born in Bessines-sur-Gartempe and raised in Paris by a single mother, Valadon (1865-1938) began drawing at the age of 9. After a few unsuccessful career attempts, which she later claimed included a circus act, Valadon began modeling for artists in her teens. Gustav Wertheimer made her a siren, floating naked from the wave to entrap sailors with a kiss. Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, who painted her hung over, nicknamed her Suzanna a reference to a biblical parable about voyeurism and lust that she liked so much she dropped her actual birth name, Marie-ClÃ©mentine. At 18 she gave birth to a son, whom her friend Miguel Utrillo later endowed with a surname, though ... More

Vinyl is selling so well that it's getting hard to sell vinyl
NEW YORK, NY.- Within the Indianapolis office of Joyful Noise Recordings, a specialty label that caters to vinyl-loving fans of underground rock, is a corner that employees call the lathe cave. There sits a Presto 6N record lathe, a 1940s-vintage machine the size of a microwave that makes records by cutting a groove into a blank vinyl platter. Unlike most standard records, which are pressed by the hundreds or thousands, each lathe-cut disc must be created individually. Its incredibly laborious, said Karl Hofstetter, the labels founder. If a song is three minutes long, it takes three minutes to make every one. This ancient technology scuffed and dinged, the lathe looks like something from a World War II submarine is a key part of Joyful Noises strategy to survive the very surge of vinyl popularity the label has helped fuel. Left for dead ... More

Wes Anderson turns his unique eye on France
PARIS.- The master of ultra-ironic hipster filmmaking, Wes Anderson doubles down on his one-of-a-kind style with the release this week of "The French Dispatch", an ode to journalists and his adopted country. The Texan director's latest film crams in some major star power, with Timothee Chalamet and Benicio del Toro joining Anderson regulars such as Owen Wilson, Tilda Swinton and, of course, Bill Murray. Based around a group of US magazine writers in the fictional French town of Ennui-sur-Blase, it takes the unique style he has built through films like "The Grand Budapest Hotel", "Fantastic Mr Fox" and "The Royal Tenenbaums" to even more surreal limits. Anderson, who has lived in France for many years, filmed his latest movie in the southern city of Angouleme before the coronavirus pandemic, which delayed its release by more than a year. ... More

She's making history in opera. Can she help ensure its future?
SAN FRANCISCO, CA.- The curtain had just fallen on San Francisco Operas production of Beethovens Fidelio, and the mood was celebratory. Cast members embraced, the audience gave a prolonged ovation and shouts of Bravo! echoed through War Memorial Opera House. But as she exited the theater after the performance Oct. 14, the companys music director, Eun Sun Kim, was subdued. She was already considering areas she wanted to work on, including how to reshape the opening of the second act to better capture a sense of despair and ways to avoid being distracted by technical cues. An artist is never satisfied, she said, smiling, as she walked across the granite floors. The stakes are high for Kim, who in August became the first woman to hold the post of music director at one of the countrys largest opera companies. Born in South ... More

Jerry Pinkney, acclaimed children's book illustrator, dies at 81
NEW YORK, NY.- Jerry Pinkney, whose evocative illustrations won acclaim in bringing more than 100 childrens books to life, many with Black characters or images of Black history and culture, died Wednesday in Sleepy Hollow, New York. He was 81. His daughter-in-law Andrea Davis Pinkney said his death, at Phelps Hospital, was caused by a heart attack. He lived nearby in Croton-on-Hudson, New York. Pinkney was one of the most revered illustrators in the genre. His accolades include the Randolph Caldecott Medal, awarded for the years most distinguished American picture book for children; he received his in 2010 for The Lion & the Mouse, a treatment of the Aesop fable. That book was representative of his commitment to reflecting Black themes and culture in his work whenever possible: He made sure that his richly detailed illustrations ... More

Alabama's next poet laureate writes searingly about race
NEW YORK, NY.- The poet Ashley M. Jones wants far more than financial reparations to compensate for centuries of slavery and its legacies though she would take a check. To her, true reparations require an enormous cultural evolution. You think money can ever repay what you stole? she asks in her third poetry collection, Reparations Now!, which was published in September. Give me land, give me all the blood you ripped out of our backs, our veins. Give me the songs you said were yours but you know came out of our lips first, she writes shortly after. Give me back Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X and Medgar Evers. Give me back the beauty of my hair. The swell of my hips. The big of my lips. Give me back the whole Atlantic Ocean. Give me a never-ending blue. And a mule. Jones, a native of Birmingham, was recently named Alabamas ... More

Bernard Haitink, conductor who let music speak for itself, dies at 92
NEW YORK, NY.- Bernard Haitink, an unaffected maestro who led Amsterdams Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra for 27 years and was known for presenting powerful readings of the symphonies of Mahler, Bruckner and Beethoven conducting orchestras on both sides of the Atlantic, died Thursday at his home in London. He was 92. His death was announced by his management agency, Askonas Holt. Along with the Concertgebouw, Haitink had long associations in Britain with the Royal Opera, Covent Garden, the London Philharmonic Orchestra and the Glyndebourne Festival. He was also a prolific recording artist, putting on disc the complete symphonies of nearly a dozen canonical composers sometimes twice. Haitink let the music emerge from the orchestra, often transcendently, without imposing a heavy-handed interpretation that a star conductor ... More

Cleaning bones: Maya community honors the dead
POMUCH.- Antonio Canche lovingly brushed a relative's skull in a cemetery in the Mexican jungle -- part of the Maya community's ancestral bone cleaning tradition to honor the dead. This year, the ritual, usually held in late October before Mexico's Day of the Dead festival, is taking place for the first time since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Indigenous Maya residents of Pomuch in Mexico's southeastern state of Campeche carefully open graves and take out the bones of their relatives. After they are cleaned, the burial shroud is changed for a new one and the remains are returned to their resting place, said Canche. Canche, 74, spent the whole day cleaning the remains of his in-laws, his parents and an uncle. "For me it means joy and enthusiasm to do it," he said. Between songs and anecdotes, the families watched over the remains for a few hours to give them some sun and fresh air. ... More

The Bruce Museum appoints Margarita Karasoulas as Curator of Art
GREENWICH, CONN.- The Bruce Museum, a community-based, world-class institution that promotes the understanding and appreciation of art and science to enrich the lives of all people, announces the appointment of Margarita Karasoulas as Curator of Art. Coming from the Brooklyn Museum, where she has served as Assistant Curator of American Art since 2017, Karasoulas will assume her duties with the Bruce on November 29, 2021. In this new role, Karasoulas will be responsible for organizing exhibitions of major historic and contemporary artists, building the permanent collection, and collaborating with curators, designers, program staff, and Museum and Board leaders to create new paradigms supporting the Bruces mission to present exhibitions in thoughtful, imaginative, and surprising ways. Karasoulas will be immediately engaged ... More

Alan Lapidus, architect of hotels and casinos, dies at 85
NEW YORK, NY.- Alan Lapidus, a New York architect with a playful and pragmatic style who designed large hotels and casinos, died Oct. 15 at his home in Naples, Maine. He was 85. The cause was prostate cancer, his son, Adam Lapidus, said. Lapidus legacy included the towering Crowne Plaza Times Square Manhattan, which was designed to evoke a bedazzled Wurlitzer jukebox; the now-demolished Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey; the Caesars Palace hotel and casino complex in Las Vegas; and the Hilton Hotel at Disney World in Orlando, Florida. Before opening his own studio in 1976, Lapidus worked for 13 years for his father, Morris, a formidable designer of flamboyant postmodern hotels in Miami Beach the Fontainebleau, the Eden Roc and Americana among them which won commercial success along with a ... More

The curious, astounding collection of the magician Ricky Jay
LOS ANGELES, CA.- Long ago, in the groovy haze of time, the master conjurer Ricky Jay attended a party at the Las Vegas estate of the extravagant entertainers Siegfried and Roy. Wandering among the menagerie of caged animals and strutting peacocks, he spotted a fellow magician in a white leisure suit with gold trim. As the two friends chatted, a Siberian tiger in a nearby cage sent a firehose-worthy stream of urine arcing through the air. The deluge drenched the leisure-suited magician and abruptly ended the conversation. Years later, Jay returned to Las Vegas and invited his friend to lunch. As they shook hands, Jay said: I dont think Ive seen you since the tiger peed on you. To which the friend responded: You remember that? Jay so loved this anecdote that You Remember That? became the working title of the memoir ... More