Portal:The arts
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T H E A R T S P O R T A L
An artist's palette
The arts or creative arts are a vast range of human practices of creative expression, storytelling, and cultural participation. The arts encompasses multiple diverse and plural modes of thinking, doing, and being, in an extremely broad range of media. Both dynamic and a characteristically constant feature of human life, they have developed into innovative, stylized, and sometimes intricate forms. This is often achieved through sustained and deliberate study, training, and/or theorizing within a particular tradition, across generations, and even between civilizations. The arts are a vehicle through which human beings cultivate distinct social, cultural, and individual identities while transmitting values, impressions, judgements, ideas, visions, spiritual meanings, patterns of life, and experiences across time and space.
Prominent examples of the arts include: visual arts (including architecture, ceramics, drawing, filmmaking, painting, photography, and sculpting), literary arts (including fiction, drama, poetry, and prose), and performing arts (including dance, music, and theatre). They can employ skill and imagination to produce objects and performances, convey insights and experiences, and construct new environments and spaces.
The arts can refer to common, popular, or everyday practices as well as more sophisticated, systematic, or institutionalized ones. They can be discrete and self-contained or combine and interweave with other art forms, such as the combination of artwork with the written word in comics. They can also develop or contribute to some particular aspect of a more complex art form, as in cinematography. By definition, the arts themselves are open to being continually redefined. The practice of modern art, for example, is a testament to the shifting boundaries, improvisation and experimentation, reflexive nature, and self-criticism or questioning that art and its conditions of production, reception, and possibility can undergo.
As both a means of developing capacities of attention and sensitivity and as ends in themselves, the arts can simultaneously be a form of response to the world and a way that our responses and what we deem worthwhile goals or pursuits are transformed. From prehistoric cave paintings to ancient and contemporary forms of ritual to modern-day films, art has served to register, embody, and preserve our ever-shifting relationships to each other and to the world. (Full article...)
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Pride and Prejudice is a six-episode 1995 British television drama, adapted by Andrew Davies from Jane Austen's 1813 novel of the same name. Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth starred as Elizabeth Bennet and Fitzwilliam Darcy, respectively. Produced by Sue Birtwistle and directed by Simon Langton, the serial was a BBC production with additional funding from the American A&E Network. BBC1 originally broadcast the 55-minute episodes from 24 September to 29 October 1995. The A&E Network aired the series in double episodes on three consecutive nights beginning 14 January 1996.
Critically acclaimed and a popular success, Pride and Prejudice was honoured with several awards, including a BAFTA Television Award for Jennifer Ehle for "Best Actress" and an Emmy for "Outstanding Individual Achievement in Costume Design for a Miniseries or a Special". The role of Mr Darcy elevated Colin Firth to stardom. A scene showing Firth in a wet shirt was recognised as "one of the most unforgettable moments in British TV history". The New York Times called the adaptation "a witty mix of love stories and social conniving, cleverly wrapped in the ambitions and illusions of a provincial gentry". The series inspired author Helen Fielding to write the popular Bridget Jones novels, and their screen adaptations subsequently featured Firth as Bridget's love interest, Mark Darcy. (Full article...) -
"A Canterlot Wedding" is the title of the twenty-fifth and twenty-sixth episodes of the second season of the animated television series My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. The fifty-first and fifty-second episodes overall, they were directed by James Wootton and written by Meghan McCarthy. "A Canterlot Wedding" premiered as an hour-long event on The Hub on April 21, 2012. In these episodes, Twilight Sparkle (Tara Strong) learns her brother, Shining Armor (Andrew Francis), will be marrying Princess Cadance (Britt McKillip). The news excites Twilight, but she becomes concerned about the marriage when she notices Cadance is not behaving like the friendly, caring individual she remembers her to be.
"A Canterlot Wedding" was series developer Lauren Faust's final involvement in the show. The episodes are a direct reference to the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton. They deal with themes that have been considered serious and complex for a children's television series; scholars believe that they involve feminism-related themes. Before the premiere of "A Canterlot Wedding", The Hub began a major marketing campaign that included interactive content on the network's website, promotional events, and a print advertisement in The New York Times in the form of a ceremonial wedding announcement. The episodes' debuts attracted almost one million combined viewers, and critics praised their ambition, music, and visual sequences. (Full article...) -
Tosca is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. It premiered at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome on 14 January 1900. The work, based on Victorien Sardou's 1887 French-language dramatic play, La Tosca, is a melodramatic piece set in Rome in June 1800, with the Kingdom of Naples's control of Rome threatened by Napoleon's invasion of Italy. It contains depictions of torture, murder, and suicide, as well as some of Puccini's best-known lyrical arias.
Puccini saw Sardou's play when it was touring Italy in 1889 and, after some vacillation, obtained the rights to turn the work into an opera in 1895. Turning the wordy French play into a succinct Italian opera took four years, during which the composer repeatedly argued with his librettists and publisher. Tosca premiered at a time of unrest in Rome, and its first performance was delayed for a day for fear of disturbances. Despite indifferent reviews from the critics, the opera was an immediate success with the public. (Full article...) -
A scene from Trial by Jury as illustrated in the magazine Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News of 1 May 1875
Trial by Jury is a comic opera in one act, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It was first produced on 25 March 1875, at London's Royalty Theatre, where it initially ran for 131 performances and was considered a hit, receiving critical praise and outrunning its popular companion piece, Jacques Offenbach's La Périchole. The story concerns a "breach of promise of marriage" lawsuit in which the judge and legal system are the objects of lighthearted satire. Gilbert based the libretto of Trial by Jury on an operetta parody that he had written in 1868.
The opera premiered more than three years after Gilbert and Sullivan's only previous collaboration, Thespis, an 1871–72 Christmas season entertainment. In the intervening years, both the author and the composer were busy with separate projects. Beginning in 1873, Gilbert tried several times to get the opera produced before the impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte suggested that he collaborate on it with Sullivan. Sullivan was pleased with the piece and promptly wrote the music. (Full article...) -
The double, superimposed colonnade on the south front of West Wycombe. It has a Tuscan order ground floor and Corinthian upper floor with a central projecting pediment, very unusual in English architecture. (Marked M on plan below)
West Wycombe Park is a country house built between 1740 and 1800 near the village of West Wycombe in Buckinghamshire, England. It was conceived as a pleasure palace for the 18th-century libertine and dilettante Sir Francis Dashwood, 2nd Baronet. The house is a long rectangle with four façades that are columned and pedimented, three theatrically so. The house encapsulates the entire progression of British 18th-century architecture from early idiosyncratic Palladian to the Neoclassical, although anomalies in its design make it architecturally unique. The mansion is set within an 18th-century landscaped park containing many small temples and follies, which act as satellites to the greater temple, the house.
The house, a Grade I listed building, was given to the National Trust in 1943 by Sir John Dashwood, 10th Baronet (1896–1966), an action strongly resented by his heir. Dashwood retained ownership of the surrounding estate and the contents of the house, most of which he sold; after his death, the house was restored at the expense of his son, the 11th Baronet. Today, while the structure is owned by the National Trust, the house is still the home of the Dashwood family. The house is open to the public during the summer months and is a venue for civil weddings and corporate entertainment, which help to fund its maintenance and upkeep. (Full article...) -
"Triangle" is the third episode of the sixth season of the American science fiction television series The X-Files. It premiered on the Fox network on November 22, 1998. Written and directed by series creator Chris Carter, "Triangle" is a "Monster-of-the-Week" episode, a stand-alone plot which is unconnected to the overarching mythology of The X-Files. "Triangle" earned a Nielsen household rating of 10.8, being watched by 18.20 million viewers in its initial broadcast. The episode generally received positive reviews with many critics commenting on the episode's directing style.
The show centers on FBI special agents Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) who work on cases linked to the paranormal, called X-Files. Mulder is a believer in the paranormal, the skeptical Scully has been assigned to debunk his work and the two have developed a close friendship. In this episode, Mulder races to a luxury passenger liner which has mysteriously appeared in the Bermuda Triangle. Once there, he realizes he has traveled back in time to September 3, 1939—the outbreak of World War II. German soldiers have boarded the ship in search of "Thor's Hammer", something that could ensure victory in the coming conflict. Scully, after being informed of Mulder's disappearance by The Lone Gunmen, rushes through the J. Edgar Hoover Building, looking for someone who can help find her missing partner. (Full article...) -
Corinna of Tanagra, c. 1893, by Frederic Leighton
Corinna or Korinna (Ancient Greek: Κόριννα, romanized: Korinna) was an ancient Greek lyric poet from Tanagra in Boeotia. Although ancient sources portray her as a contemporary of Pindar (born c. 518 BC), not all modern scholars accept the accuracy of this tradition. When she lived has been the subject of much debate since the early twentieth century, proposed dates ranging from the beginning of the fifth century to the late third century BC.
Corinna's works survive only in fragments: three substantial sections of poems are preserved on second-century AD papyri from Egypt; several shorter pieces survive in quotations by ancient grammarians. They focus on local Boeotian legends, and are distinctive for their mythological innovations. Corinna's poetry often reworks well-known myths to include details not known from any other sources. Though respected in her hometown, Tanagra, and popular in ancient Rome, modern critics have often regarded her as parochial and dull; her poetry is nonetheless of interest as she is one of the few female poets from ancient Greece whose work survives. (Full article...) -
Hoodwinked! is a 2005 American animated mystery comedy film. It retells the folktale "Little Red Riding Hood" as a police procedural, using backstories to show multiple characters' points of view. It was produced independently by Blue Yonder Films with Kanbar Entertainment, directed and written by Cory Edwards (in his directorial debut) (who also the voice of Twitchy) along with Todd Edwards, and Tony Leech, and produced by Katie Hooten, Maurice Kanbar, David K. Lovegren, Sue Bea Montgomery, and Preston Stutzman. The film features the voices of Anne Hathaway, Glenn Close, Jim Belushi, Patrick Warburton, Anthony Anderson, David Ogden Stiers, Xzibit, Chazz Palminteri, and Andy Dick.
Hoodwinked! was among the earliest computer-animated films to be completely independently funded. Working apart from a major studio allowed the filmmakers greater creative control, but also restrained them economically. Due to the film's low budget, its animation was produced in the Philippines with a stylized design inspired by stop motion films. The Weinstein Company did not sign on as the film's distributor until near the end of production, and while the company had several roles recast with higher-profile actors, it otherwise made few changes to the film. Structurally, the film was inspired by non-linear crime dramas, such as Rashomon and Pulp Fiction. It was released shortly after the first two installments in the successful Shrek series, which accentuated the fairy tale parody genre of which Hoodwinked! is a part. Hoodwinked!, however, intentionally deviated from the Shrek series in its style of humor and in certain plot elements. This was in part based on Cory Edwards' concerns over exposing children to the high level of cynicism often found in the genre. (Full article...) -
Brother Jonathan: or, the New Englanders is an 1825 historical novel by American writer John Neal. The title refers to Brother Jonathan, a popular personification of New England and the broader United States. The story follows protagonist Walter Harwood as he and the nation around him both come of age through the American Revolution. The novel explores cross-cultural relationships and highlights cultural diversity within the Thirteen Colonies, stressing egalitarianism and challenging the conception of a unified American nation. It features mixed-race Anglo-Indigenous characters and depicts them as the inheritors of North America. The book's sexual themes drew negative reactions from contemporary critics. These themes were explicit for the period, addressing female sexual virtue and male guilt for sexual misdeeds.
Literature scholars have praised Brother Jonathan's extensive and early use of realism in depicting American culture and speech. Using phonetic transcriptions, the dialogue documents a wide range of regional accents and colloquialisms. Included in the dialogue is a likely-accurate depiction of American Indian English, and what may be American literature's earliest attempt to express a wide range of emotion using children's natural speech patterns. Neal's characterizations of American character and speech were praised in the UK but derided in the US. The author nevertheless considered them central to developing an American literature distinct from British precedent. (Full article...) -
The May Pamphlet is a collection of six anarchist essays written and published by Paul Goodman in 1945. Goodman discusses the problems of living in a society that represses individual instinct through coercion. He suggests that individuals resist such conditions by reclaiming their natural instincts and initiative, and by "drawing the line", an ideological delineation beyond which an individual should refuse to conform or cooperate with social convention. While themes from The May Pamphlet—decentralization, peace, social psychology, youth liberation—would recur throughout his works, Goodman's later social criticism focused on practical applications rather than theoretical concerns.
The pamphlet was originally published piecemeal in small, New York anarchist journals and was first compiled as a set among literary essays in Art and Social Nature (1946). The essays were not well known before Goodman's 1960 book Growing Up Absurd led to a resurgence of interest in his oeuvre, including the pamphlet's republication in Drawing the Line (1962). The May Pamphlet was Goodman's principal contribution to anarchist theory and a primary influence on Colin Ward, who later dedicated Anarchy in Action to Goodman's memory. (Full article...) -
Manhunter is a 1986 American thriller film directed and written by Michael Mann. Based on the 1981 novel Red Dragon by Thomas Harris, it stars William Petersen as FBI profiler Will Graham. Also featured are Tom Noonan as serial killer Francis Dollarhyde, Dennis Farina as Graham's FBI superior Jack Crawford, and Brian Cox as incarcerated killer Hannibal Lecktor. The film focuses on Graham coming out of retirement to lend his talents to an investigation on Dollarhyde, a killer known as the Tooth Fairy. In doing so, he must confront the demons of his past and meet with Lecktor, who nearly killed Graham.
Manhunter focuses on the forensic work carried out by the FBI to track down killers and shows the long-term effects that cases like this have on profilers such as Graham, highlighting the similarities between him and his quarry. The film features heavily stylized use of color to convey this sense of duality, and the nature of the characters' similarity has been explored in academic readings of the film. It was the first film adaptation of Harris' Hannibal Lecter novels, as well as the first adaptation of Red Dragon, which later became the basis for a film of the same name in 2002. (Full article...) -
Manos Arriba (English: Hands Up) is an extended play (EP) by American singer Rosanna Tavarez released by her own record label Patacon Productions in March 2008. Tavarez adopted the stage name Chana while pursuing a music career in Latin alternative music and used it for the EP. Chana rose to prominence in 2001 as a member of the girl group Eden's Crush. Following their disbandment, she worked as a host on music television shows and decided to record Spanish-language music after meeting producer Marthin Chan. She had previously rejected working with Latin music producers because she did not want to pursue a career in conventional Latin pop.
A pop EP, Manos Arriba includes influences from other genres such as reggae, ska, power pop, and disco. The lyrics were based on Chana's past relationships and break-ups. She wrote and produced all five songs with Chan, and recorded them in Los Angeles, including at his personal recording studio, over roughly two years. Chana was inspired by studying Afro-Dominican dance and music. Music journalists believed the EP was not directly rooted in specifically Latin genres or topics and contrasted the style with her work with Eden's Crush. (Full article...) -
The Connecticut Tercentenary half dollar, sometimes called the Connecticut half dollar, is a commemorative 50-cent piece struck by the United States Bureau of the Mint in 1935. The coin was designed by Henry Kreis and commemorates the 300th anniversary of the founding of Connecticut. Its obverse depicts the Charter Oak, where according to legend Connecticut's charter was hidden to save it from being confiscated by the English governor-general. An eagle appears on the coin's reverse side.
The Connecticut Tercentenary Commission wanted a half dollar issued, with proceeds from its sale to further its projects. A bill passed through Congress without dissent and became law on June 21, 1934, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed it, providing for 25,000 half dollars. Kreis's design was a Public Works Administration project and technically in violation of the new law, which said the federal government was not to pay for its design. Nevertheless, the design was approved by the Commission of Fine Arts, and then by the Treasury Department. (Full article...) -
"Pilot" is the first episode of the television series Supernatural. It premiered on The WB on September 13, 2005, and was written by series creator Eric Kripke and directed by David Nutter. The Supernatural pilot introduced the characters of Sam (Jared Padalecki) and Dean Winchester (Jensen Ackles), brothers who travel throughout the country hunting supernatural creatures, as they battled a ghostly Woman in White (Sarah Shahi) while searching for their missing father (Jeffrey Dean Morgan).
Kripke was developing the concept for ten years before it was greenlit as a television series. Before it could be filmed, the script underwent numerous revisions. The episode was produced in Los Angeles, though future episodes were filmed in Vancouver, British Columbia, to save money. The episode established the series' tradition of a rock-music soundtrack, and included background music scored by Kripke's friend Christopher Lennertz. It received mixed reviews, with critics praising the horror elements but having varying opinions of the lead actors' performances. (Full article...) -
Maya (stylised as ΛΛ Λ Y Λ) is the third studio album by British rapper M.I.A., released on 7 July 2010 on her own label, N.E.E.T. Recordings, through XL Recordings and Interscope Records. Songwriting and production for the album were primarily handled by M.I.A., Blaqstarr and Rusko. M.I.A.'s long-time associates Diplo, Switch and her brother Sugu Arulpragasam also worked on the album, which was mainly composed and recorded at M.I.A.'s house in Los Angeles. The album's tracks centre on the theme of information politics and are intended to evoke what M.I.A. called a "digital ruckus"; with the album, elements of industrial music were incorporated into M.I.A.'s sound for the first time. A deluxe edition was released simultaneously, featuring four bonus tracks.
Critics' opinions of the album were generally favourable although divided, with both its musical style and lyrical content each attracting praise and criticism. In its first week of release, the album entered the UK Albums Chart at number 21, becoming her highest-charting album in the UK. It also became her highest-charting album in the US, reaching number nine on the Billboard 200, and debuted in the top 10 in Finland, Norway, Greece and Canada. M.I.A. promoted the album by releasing a series of tracks online, including "XXXO", "It Takes a Muscle" and "Born Free", the latter of which was accompanied by a short film-music video, which generated controversy due to its graphic imagery. She also performed at music festivals in the US and Europe to coincide with the album's release. During her promotion of the album, she became embroiled in a dispute with Lynn Hirschberg of The New York Times. (Full article...)
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Credit: Photo: Thomas Wolf
The Hohenzollern Bridge crossing the Rhine in Cologne, Germany, with the Cologne Cathedral in the background. The bridge is a tied-arch railway bridge, as well as a pedestrian bridge. Originally built in 1911, it survived numerous Allied bombings in World War II, only to be destroyed by German engineers as the war drew to a close. Reconstruction began soon after and the bridge was opened to pedestrian traffic in 1948 then completely opened in 1959.
Did you know...
- ... that the Chase Promenade (pictured) hosted a month long Museum of Modern Ice exhibit of abstract art on a 95 by 12 feet (29.0 by 3.7 m) wall of ice called Paintings Below Zero?
- ... that Christopher Smart's Hymns for the Amusement of Children were finished by the author while in debtors prison and that he died before he ever received notice that the work was a success?
- ... that critical reception to Hogarth's Sigismunda mourning over the Heart of Guiscardo was so harsh the artist was forced to remove the painting from exhibition?
In this month
- 9 June 1904 – The London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Hans Richter, plays its first concert
- 18 June 1964 – Italian painter Giorgio Morandi, whose still lifes and landscapes were noted for their tonal subtlety, dies in Bologna at the age of 73
- 20 June 1703 – The Love Suicides at Sonezaki by Chikamatsu Monzaemon, often considered the greatest Japanese dramatist, receives its first performance
- 24 June 1924 – Efua Sutherland, a foundational figure in modern Ghanaian drama, is born in the Cape Coast region of Ghana
- 29 June 1861 – Elizabeth Barrett Browning (pictured), one of the most prominent poets of the Victorian era, dies in Florence at the age of 55
News
- August 5: DaBaby Levitating remix losing US radio audiences after the rapper's comments on HIV/AIDS
- June 11: Taylor Swift's Evermore records biggest sales week of the year as it returns to No 1 on album chart
- May 27: Olivia Rodrigo's song good 4 u debuts at No 1 on US Billboard Hot 100 chart
- May 25: 'Rock and roll never dies': Italy wins Eurovision after 30 years
- February 10: Disney to shut down Blue Sky Studios, animation studio behind 'Ice Age'
Featured biography
Henry Moore was a British artist and sculptor. Born into a poor mining family in the Yorkshire town of Castleford, he became well-known for his large-scale abstract cast bronze and carved marble sculptures; substantially supported by the British art establishment, Moore helped to introduce a particular form of modernism into Britain. His ability to satisfy large-scale commissions made him exceptionally wealthy towards the end of his life. However, he lived frugally and most of his wealth went to endow the Henry Moore Foundation, which continues to support education and promotion of the arts. His signature form is a pierced reclining figure, first influenced by a Toltec-Maya sculpture known as "Chac Mool", which he had seen as a plaster cast in Paris in 1925. Early versions are pierced conventionally as a bent arm reconnects with the body. Later, more abstract versions, are pierced directly through the body in order to explore the concave and convex shapes. These more extreme piercings developed in parallel with Barbara Hepworth's sculptures. Hepworth first pierced a torso after misreading a review of one of Henry Moore's early shows. (Full article...)
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