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The Netherlands is not big enough for two major musical producers. That is the only conclusion that can be drawn from Albert Verlinde's departure from Stage Entertainment.
Golden Calf winner Buladó is now our Oscar entry. That will satisfy advocates of more colour in Dutch cinema. And on Sunday, check out Festus Toll's When You Hear the Divine Call, a more modest but equally telling example of new light in Dutch cinema.
'Writing this book has made me realise that I cannot prepare my children for the world in which they will be adults. I cannot teach them now what they will need later in a society that does not yet exist.'
The very corona minister Hugo de Jonge, still a Rotterdam alderman in 2017, was the one who set writer Ernest van der Kwast on a new track in his life. A path that led to his new novel Ilyas.
In the real world there is a second, virtual reality, so multiform, intricate, deep and ramified that you hardly get around to real life when you dive in, but I generally take that second world just a little less seriously.
It is not only healthier but also more effective if, in our social institutions, we start making the transition from rigid control to learning processes and training sensitivity to the signals of the autonomic nervous system, the signals of safety and danger. It is relevant to embed this socially, for instance in educational and care institutions.
This week, Outside the World, the bulky, ambitious debut novel by Karl Ove Knausgård (51), was published for the first time in Dutch translation. A book about themes such as fear and shame, feelings that torment the Norwegian writer himself.
In 1987, British cello legend Jacqueline Du Pré succumbed to multiple sclerosis, aged 42. Although she had not played concerts for 15 years, a wave of grief washed over the world. In her short career, she had achieved more than many a musician in his or her entire life.
So on 18 October 2020, something happened. VPRO's Mondo had suddenly become an upbeat broadcast. And this in these times, when lamentation and mourning over lockdowns and impending bankruptcies dominate everywhere. What was going on?
Since everyone advised him to just give it a try, he signed up with almost a thousand amateur painters to learn the ancient craft of painting in six months and under the watchful eye of Pieter Roelofs, head of Painting and Sculpture at the Rijksmuseum, among others.
A story about the rise and fall of a fledgling rock band - it is not a revolutionary new idea. But although Utopia Avenue is a more 'ordinary' novel than, say, his bestseller Cloud Atlas (2004), in the hands of David Mitchell (51) even an ordinary story never becomes ordinary.
Virus draws a clear dividing line between those who found love and those who are still looking.
The title YeonDo refers to a death ritual by which Catholic Koreans bid farewell to their loved ones. The play will have its premiere at the Jheronimus Bosch Art Center in 's Hertogenbosch on 6 November.
Alum plays classics 'unplugged' once in a while. That means no fuss, just the story and the players. With Bakchanten, 2,500 years old but never surpassed in eloquence since, they have gold in their hands.
Insayno was city poet for two days - you involuntarily think of that commercial in which a temp says at his grand farewell party, "It was two fantastic days" - and in doing so probably set a record as the shortest-serving city poet in history, with one city poem to his name ("sister of the capital"). What was the problem?
The chance of encountering a hedgehog or an (abandoned) nest with eggs in real life is unfortunately getting smaller and smaller with the shrinking area of nature and the extinction of many animal species, but the 'realness' of Helmantel's paintings still lets you enjoy these beautiful phenomena.
Strictly speaking, prioritisation is another word for wielding a saw line, but it feels different. 'Prioritisation within the applicable criteria', as stated on the site, smacks of possible arbitrariness, as nowhere is it indicated which criteria were weighted how heavily.
Those who read De opgang begin to understand more about Belgium: the country's gigantic split, the friction between the two parts of the country, and the rise and success of the Vlaams Blok. Hertmans has also come to a better understanding of how deep the cleavages and "the sorrows of Belgium" run.
Polish-Dutch Hanna Kulenty (Białystok, 1961) writes music that gets under your skin. Whether it is early works like Fourth Circle for violin and piano (1994), the opera Mother of Black-Winged Dreams about multiple personality syndrome (1995), or more recent compositions like the Viola Concerto (2015) and her Flute Concerto No.3 (2018), irrevocably you are taken on an exhilarating journey with a...
How to get young people to read again (or more)? Writer Bas Steman (49) succeeded in getting a group of adolescents to really like reading.
The performance is outstanding, a lot of time has clearly been spent on it. However, this cannot prevent the performance from slumping a bit halfway through.
The 40th edition of the Netherlands Film Festival pushes the boundaries. Corona makes everything go differently. Now in more than 100 theatres across the country, and also online. For groundbreaking work, there is the sixth instalment of the Directors' Forum.
The total of eight festivals that were given a place in the Basic Cultural Infrastructure thanks to vigorous political lobbying are in the clear. They do not benefit from the extra millions released by the Cabinet on Budget Day to rescue the Performing Arts Fund, because they are not (or no longer) covered by it.
Further postponement and downsizing of commercial theatre productions means a severe blow to the countless self-employed who have work in the smaller roles and accompaniment.
Pièce de résistance will be the brand new Reconnaissance (Rusty Mirror Madrigal) for choir, percussion and double bass. Saariaho composed it commissioned by November Music and the Donaueschinger Musiktage. The first performance was scheduled at the German festival, which, however, was also cancelled. - A stroke of luck for November Music.
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