arts·meme enters the terrible twos 2
May
24
2010
“You should be blogging,” my brother Mark first said to me sometime around 2005. I succumbed on May 24, 2008 when arts·meme went live — with Mark’s excellent tech support. Then he started saying, “You should be tweeting.” Okay, enough is enough! Inspired by a Los Angeles Philharmonic concert under the baton of Esa-Pekka Salonen, I ...
Lionel Popkin, elephantine
We all know it's a jungle out there. Especially now, with oil gushing into the Louisiana Wetlands, we're sincerely grateful to choreographer Lionel Popkin for inverting the familiar man-destroys-nature theme. Popkin transforms a downtown Los Angeles performance space into an urban jungle of lush mystery in his marvelously inventive "There is an Elephant In This ...
Pina Bausch films at Dance Camera West
Kudos to hardworking impresario Lynette Kessler on the launch of the ninth annual installment of Dance Camera West, the month-long series celebrating the best-of-the-best of the filmed dance experience. Here is Dance Camera's West's full schedule. I'm particularly drawn to Lynette's June 12 symposium on German choreographer Pina Bausch, a great force in dance who died ...
George Segal @ Skirball Cultural Center 1
May
19
2010
Now on view at the Skirball Cultural Center, where they run top-notch exhibitions, is “The Expulsion,” an installed tableau of Adam and Eve driven from Garden of Eden created in 1986 by George Segal. The artist, a major player in early pop art, passed away in 2000. A recent gift to Skirball, the mise-en-scene features two ...
Norman Lloyd remembers
“Music to my ears,” cooed veteran stage and film actor Norman Lloyd in response to the fervent applause that greeted his appearance at Hollywood Heritage’s wonderful “Night at the Barn” lecture series held at the DeMille-Lasky barn. The 95-year-old Lloyd credits his lifelong love of tennis with helping him outlive his former collaborators Orson Welles, ...
Even in 1924 Peter Pan wouldn’t grow up 2
May
16
2010
So come with me, where dreams are born, and time is never planned. Just think of happy things, and your heart will fly on wings, forever, in Never Never Land! — J.M. Barrie I’m very excited to see PETER PAN (1924), the delicious silent film offering of the Los Angeles Conservancy’s annual summer film fest, ...
And the mini Oscar goes to LACMA film
May
14
2010
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced today a $12,500 grant in support of LACMA’s film program for 2010-11 season. While this check will hardly float the program, it bears significance and good will on a symbolic level. The Academy is Hollywood, Inc. And so I would like to humbly thank the Academy ...
Go ahead, Clint, make our day
May
11
2010
The subject is the long-term funding of LACMA’s film program, which is still not secured. In a February 17 curtain talk with Richard Schickel held in tandem with the museum’s respectful retrospective of his oeuvre, Clint Eastwood said: “I want to thank everyone for coming out here and supporting LACMA. I must confess I wasn’t as familiar ...
L.A. Music Center co-commissions revival of Merce Cunningham work
May
10
2010
It gave me pause to learn that the Los Angeles Music Center had co-commissioned the revival of Roaratorio, a major work dating from 1986 that Merce Cunningham Dance Company will soon present in L.A. That’s really cool. I had to read it twice. Choreographer Neil Greenberg, who performed in the piece while a Cunningham dancer, ...
The eyes have it …
Indian dancers dance with their eyes. They train them too. That’s evident in this image of the great Indian classical dancer Uday Shankar (Ravi Shanker was his little brother and Jack Cole was his student). Modern-dance choreographer Yvonne Rainer wisely reminds us that the mind is a muscle. So, too, are the eyes. The pedagogy ...