We have all heard of (and probably loved) the adorable animated movies about a bear, Winnie-the-Pooh. I can definitely remember sitting in front of my TV for hours watching him have adventures with Tigger and Piglet, and I’m sure all of you can too. That’s why this bit of news sort of freaked me out.
In the mid-1920s, A.A. Milne wrote the books when he was inspired by trips to the London Zoo with his son to see Winnipeg, the celebrity bear who inhabited the zoo after being brought there during World War 1. His son loved the animal, so much so that he named his own teddy bear Winnie.
Sadly, Winnipeg died in the 1930s. However, when she passed away, her body was donated to the Royal College of Surgeons’ Odontological Museum, and she has remained in that collection ever since. Her body even survived a bombing in 1941 that destroyed most of the collection.
Recently, her skull has been put on display for the first time at the Hunterian Museum in London. The Hunterian’s director, Sam Alberti, believes that this will be of particular interest for visitors from all walks of life–especially those who grew up with the messages of family and friendship after reading the books and watching the movies. It is in a display about items added to the 18th century collection, and Mr. Alberti hopes that it will serve as an entry point for people who others wouldn’t go into the museum. On top of all that, apparently Winnipeg’s skull offered an interesting case study: she had pretty severe gum disease. This, Mr. Alberti says, was probably because of the honey on the sticky buns she was being fed by the visitor’s of the zoo out of love. This drew an interesting parallel with the real-life bear and the animated movies. It’s interesting to see the inspiration behind an artist’s work. I think it really helps the audience connect with the works even more than they originally did.
This honestly sort of creeped me out a little, even though when asked if the exhibition ran the risk of scaring children, Alberti said that it is a happy message. They certainly didn’t want the message to be “Come to the museum and see Winnie-the-Pooh”, because that certainly isn’t what it is. It’s a skull nonetheless, but it gives the children the message that Winnipeg, the bear who inspired their favorite fluffy, cute, animated character, “has had this afterlife”.
Adele Adkins
Adele is back and she’s saying more than just “Hello.” The British superstar’s new single managed to sell 1.1 million copies in its first week in addition to its music video obtaining 100 million views on YouTube. But at this stage in the game, posting good results just seems second nature to Adele. Her previous album “21,” is the 20th best selling album in history with 30 million copies sold worldwide.
Successful sophomore album “21”
Adele’s new album “25,” offers a different perspective from her last record; instead of the gloomy post-breakup feeling “21” elicits, “25” “is about what to hold on to from the past and what to let go.” Adele was keen on making this album perfect, as she’s taken her sweet time (4 ½ years) to release it. Writing partner and notorious hitmaker Ryan Tedder, lead singer of OneRepublic, said she’s thrown out about 20 potential hit songs away because they just weren’t right for the album. These songs might make their way into other artists’ discographies, and most likely will not have the same success than if Adele had opted to sing it.
A major part of her success has been her soul, passion, and emotions
Adele won 6 Grammy’s in 2014
shining through every song she sings; the power and intense feeling packed into every melody magnifies and highlights whatever sentiment she hopes to convey. I love Adele for this reason, because she makes music for the sake of making music. Many times in pop culture celebrities like to pull ridiculous stunts or say something completely absurd to stay relevant in the news. But Adele’s not in it for the fame. In fact, she’s turned down a ton of major endorsement deals strictly because she didn’t feel like doing them. When confronted why she continually elects not to immerse herself more in the spotlight, Adele said “If I wanted to just be famous, like be a celebrity, then I wouldn’t do music… Commercials, being the face of brands, being in movies, being the face of a car, designing watches, food ranges, buildings, airlines, book deals. I’ve been offered everything.…[but] I want to do one thing. I want to make something. I don’t want to be the face of anything.” The 27 year old is really living up to her words, because the only thing she’s the face of is success in music.
“25”
No one knows what to expect from “25” because a lot has changed for her personally since 2011 when the last album was released. She now has a son. She now has a loving boyfriend. She has virtually disappeared from the public eye. She has even said that she cries to her own music, but I think she has enough tissues in the form paper money to wipe away the tears. But all kidding aside, Adele’s personal growth is truly remarkable. No matter what this album has in store for the music world, I look forward to experiencing firsthand.
“25” comes out November 20th.
Recently, there have been news about women in Hollywood – actresses and directors alike. While there has been more of a focus on how much an actress is paid compared to a actor, the article At Doc NYC, Women’s (Film) Work written by Mike Hale, focuses on women directors.
Doc NYC is “the largest festival of documentary films in the country” and this year it so happens that the opening and closing night and centerpiece documentaries were all directed or co-directed by women. Women only make up 18% of first-time television directors, almost 10% of studio films directors, and just below 5% of box-office hits directors. For independent films and documentaries, the percentage is higher however. At this year’s Doc NYC, the percentage is 37.5 percent of women directors which is a huge improvement.
Some of the documentaries that will be shown this year are about the lives of powerful and influential women such as: Janis Joplin, Mary Louise Wilson, Elizabeth Streb, and more.
In this article, the director of the Janis Joplin documentary, Amy Berg, brings up a very interesting point. She says, “I think women look at women so differently than men look at women, obviously, I feel like for this personal and intimate a story, it helped that I was a female”. Another female director said she may feel more empathy and understand the female actress more, but a male director can direct a documentary or movie about a female protagonist just as well. For example, “Amy”, the film about Amy Winehouse is well directed by a man. Another director said that a woman director “brings more compassion to their filmmaking than a male director does”. These conflicting views makes me think of some questions. Since most directors are male, and they can’t connect well to female characters, is that why many of the female characters we see today on screen are highly sexualized and one-dimensional? Also, would having more female directors mean more films and movies portraying women as strong leaders and change Hollywood’s portrayal of women? I don’t have a definite answer.
I definitely agree that a woman director would understand an actress more and connect better, but that’s not to say that a male director cannot do an equally good job at directing a film with a strong female protagonist. There just has to be an increasing trend of male directors choosing to add more female characters into their films and portray them in a different light. Although there are conflicting views about the ability a woman director and a male director has when directing films about strong female characters, the article does assert one claim that there should be more women directors.
By choosing to direct and film female subjects who are strong and have dimension, this can influence the way Hollywood portrays women in movies. Many movies we see today mainly consist of male characters, and if there is a female character, she is sometimes highly sexualized.
By making independent films and documentaries about these strong female characters, hopefully it will make its way to the rest of Hollywood.
By the way, Doc NYC is from November 12-19 in Manhattan theaters
Lynda Zycherman, MoMa’s sculpture conservator, is preparing the newest addition to the museum’s collections. Some might brush this news of as of nothing out of the ordinary, but that’s no where near the case. This new “Picasso Sculpture” portrays some of the most, “breathtaking inventiveness in bronze, wood, clay, plaster, sheet metal and stones through six decades” according to Roberta Smith in her Article, “Drinking in the Beauty of Picasso’s Sculptures at MoMa.”
In this Article, Zycherman seems to have a deep appreciation of what the conservators do. She mentions that part of their jobs is to do investigative work on the art pieces, discovering new knowledge about them that could be disclosed to the public. Zycherman goes on to describe the intimacy of this work, and just how much goes into discovering new things; even comparing it to “CSI” work.
Something that surprised me was that Zycherman mentioned that “much of our nonverbal response to art is really to the artist’s use of materials.” I’ve never actually thought of art that way but now I’m realizing its more of a subconscious reaction. These subliminal thoughts affect the way we think about art pieces, even when we think we are looking at the artwork with an open mind; so many things can be overlooked.
“Glass of Absinthe” is my personal favorite out of the collection of Picasso pieces. Its meaning is so abstract that Is up to the person to figure it out for themselves. The sculpture features a broken glass of alcohol with a flat/bent spoon sitting on its rim. On this spoon lays a mysterious sugar cube. At first sight the upper part of this piece’s color and texture fools most to believe that it is made out of exposed unpainted bronze. But as Zycherman refutes, it was painted with a brown paint and sand mixture.
So the next time you look at a sculpture, look twice about what its made off so you don’t overlook the beauty of the sculpture.
The very first term of the article “History of Black Dance: 20 Century Black American Dance” bothered me a bit because it was not well-defined to me. What is Black Culture? In Africa, I’m sure each region had its own culture. In America, all African-Americans were bonded by the struggles resulting from their skin color and the gospel hymns sung over a century, from the time of the Civil War to the Civil Rights movement. With freedom to express themselves, Black Culture spawned the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s with dances like the Charleston, Jitterbug, and Lindyhop.
Now, Black Dance seems to refer to more racial diversity in a typically white dance world. “All black musicals disappeared from Broadway in the 1920s when white musicals started to employ more black performers and black dance was incorporated into their programme.” Stars like Josephine Baker, Florence Mills, Buddy Bradley and Arthur Mitchell broke the racial barrier by performing in previously all white arts (musicals, Broadway, American Ballet). This is a step toward including a more accurate representation of a racially-rich America in art.
Katherine Dunham and Pearl Primus elevated black dance to be revered as much as white dance. But to do this, they traced black dance to its roots and traditions. This seems to show that Black Dance stems from Africa.
Should art be a melting pot where all cultures mix together or a salad bowl where each style maintains its identity as separate? On one hand, we can make all art racially mixed. On the other hand, we can respect and revere the art of other cultures the same as we do to white American art while preserving the cultural origins and identity. Both approaches are sound. Which one do you think will be most fair? Do we preserve Black Culture, or assimilate it?
Dance to me is a way to express. The movements, music, everything conveys an emotion. Yet we don’t know why and/or where these emotions stem from
The article, “History of Black Dance: 20th-Century Black American Dance“, explores the origins and story behind the choreography as well as the dancers. Dance is a culture and its history told in movements. Especially inspiring is black dance and the story it tells. Many don’t realize that the stem of historic dance trends often stem from Harlem. The oppression and constriction that blacks faced back then did not stop them from expressing themselves. Whether it was enjoy themselves or to get themselves ready to overthrow their masters, the form of dance was a type of freedom that everyone has. Dancers like Josephine Baker, Florence Mills, and Buddy Bradley are only a few black dancers who are an inspiration to many. They stood behind their restraints and achieved so much.
In the article Choreographer Kyle Abraham discusses “The Watershed” and “When The Wolves Came In”, Quinn Peterson shares the interview with Mr.Abraham. Kylie Abhraham brings up a great point that, “when you put a Black body on the stage, there’s already an inherent story that’s going to be told. And when you put that Black body on stage with any other dancer, the story shifts based on the history that whoever is watching it has already experienced.” As a artists who has achieved a lot, its amazing to see his point of view from the history to the story of dance and its meaning.
These articles allowed me to view a different side to dance and not only the movements but also the story behind each performer. With this background in my mind, watching the video performance gave me a different feeling. It made me view the performance as not just dance but also a story.
When I was nine years old my mom took me to see my first dance performance, The Nutcracker. Since that day, every year around Christmas time we go to any theatre we can find and watch the show in awe as if we have never seen it before. To me, dance is one of the most beautiful forms of expression. There is so much emotion and passion behind it, you can’t help but to submerge yourself in the allure of it.
I was surprised while reading the history of dance in the black community. I have learned that slaves used songs to cope with their harsh conditions, but I have never heard of slaves using dance to build up their stamina to prepare themselves for uprisings against their white masters. Dance has been a part of their culture and a way to get by for centuries. I think it is amazing that choreographers, such as Kyle Abraham, include the traditions of their ancestors in dances today. For example, “The Watershed”, one of the performances he choreographed, is inspired by the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, the 1960s, and the Civil Rights Movement. He considered the gains and losses that African-Americans have had over the years and how they view them today to create a story and convey those feelings through the choreography.
In another one of his works, titled, “When the Wolves Came In”, he used a unique subject and related it to the message of the dance. Abraham came across a local news story in his hometown of Pittsburgh about a boy that fell into a pit of Africa dogs in the zoo and was mauled to death. Instead of building a higher fence or placing the dogs in a different part of the zoo, they killed them. The incident grabbed Abraham’s attention, and he connected it to our views about “perception, race and identity”. He was able to link modern human behavior with the history of maltreatment that African-Americans had to endure.
When we think of art, dance is not usually the first thing we think of. However, throughout history it has been a vital means of expressing ourselves. It is important to consider dance just as significant as any other artistic expression because it usually has a story and meaning behind it.
The Harlem Renaissance
The Harlem Renaissance was a staple of my high school education. In virtually every history class I was enrolled in, the class discussed its effects on society and the major people involved in the movement. However, while the curriculum provided a general overview of the golden era, a large majority of the names mentioned were either writers or musicians, never dancers. Some of the best kept secrets mentioned in History of Black Dance: 20th-Century Black American Dance weren’t even listed in my textbook. Reading about such heavily influential people like Buddy Bradley, Pearl Primus, and all of the other performers listed, made me realize that just because they weren’t Langston Hughes or Louis Armstrong, doesn’t mean they weren’t a vital part of the Harlem Renaissance.
Kyle Abraham
Even in and after this period of intense cultural flourishment, the black community continued to face a ton of societal hardships. Choreographer Kyle Abraham incorporates elements of this history in his works “The Watershed” and “When The Wolves Came In,” linking the Civil Rights Movement to both. In addition to a such a powerful historical allusion, the artistic vision offers a very interesting glimpse into the mind of the choreographer. Abraham states: “when you put [a] Black body on stage with any other dancer, the story shifts based on the history that whoever is watching it has already experienced…if you’re seeing a Black body and a white body, a Black man and a Black woman, and Black man and a white man – all of those things have their own kind of politic to them.” To get a better understanding of what Abraham was trying to execute, I went to YouTube to see a clip of his choreography.
The dancing was intense. Acrobatic moves, flowing motions, and rigid shifts in position really drew me in. But Abraham’s point of the “black body” enhancing the performance is clearly shown. The doubling and synchronicity of a black man and a white man certainly kicked up the intensity a great deal. Likewise, when a black woman was alone on stage in front of a projected image that said “WHITES ONLY,” the emotion that resulted was undeniably powerful. It was at both of these moments in the routine that had my peak attention compared to the other scenes I saw, so Abraham certainly succeeded in his terms of what he wanted to depict.
With all of this new information, I am very excited to see what Thursday’s performance has to offer!
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