'Mogadishu' fits into zeitgeist of moral confusion
Once upon a time, subsidised theatre was a left-wing hobby. Now, two years on, subsidised theatre has effortlessly conformed to the prevailing, much more right-wing trend.
ACTUAL
All about politics, policy, society and how those things relate to culture and art.
'Jeremiah Runnels expelled for stunt': hoax by Brussen&Co
UPDATE 17:45 Thanks to Dimitri van der Werf (in the comments) The composer in question does have to leave the country, but not because of this stunt, but because he did not fulfil his reporting obligation, which he
'Oh, it's being torn apart a bit' #wu13
At 1 strip or 1,000 words blogger and columnist Peter Breedveld spoke with three influential illustrators, Barbara Stok, Peter van Dongen and Thé Tjong-Khing using projected images from their beautiful work. The relaxed conversation was a breath of fresh air among the other ferocious debating violence at the festival.
Blogging vs demons #wu13
"We don't use social media because it's cool," says Tunisian internet activist Sami Ben Gharbia. "But in a dictatorship, it is the only way to inform people about what is really going on. To fight the demons in society. I am not a techny Became because it's fun. I just needed useful knowledge about internet codes, to improve my civic activism possible."
Hassnae Bouazza's Thousand Shades of Arabia on #wu13
John de Mol is doing good business in the Arab world. He acts rather dismissively about this, according to Hassnae Bouazza. According to her, the television producer talks publicly mostly about the many restrictions on his formats because of Islam and the sentimentalism of TV in the Middle East in general. That De Mol's success number The Voice of Arabia during the final in
'For me, only the text exists' - Alberto Manguel & Hans Goedkoop on black pages #wu13
With a jam-packed programme like Writers Unlimited 2013, it sometimes happens that, even as a professional journalist, despite everything, you end up dropping in somewhere too late, and then just catching a glimpse of something really great. In this case, after the tour de force of Amos Oz and Adriaan van Dis, was that Kenyan Ngwatilo Mawiyoo's spoken word performance. Mea culpa for that.
Does it luckily still involve sex on #wu13
How many male genitalia Yasmine Allas had weighed in her hand. For a while, that was the question during Writers Unlimited's most shameless programme to date. This latenight talk show addressed the question of how shameless writers actually dare to be these days. Kristien Hemmerechts, always good for a few firm statements, met her peers in
A lot of Oz & a little Van Dis on impossible dreams and ideals #wu13
During the kick-off of Winternacht 1, publicist Bas Heijne brought the two literary giants Amos Oz and Adriaan van Dis closer together. What remains of their former idealism? Oz's barrage of wonderful one-liners proved difficult to tame and made for a hilarious but somewhat unbalanced conversation.
Heartfelt plea against Arab shame culture #wu13
Lebanese writer Hanaan Al-Shaykh (Beirut, Lebanon, 1945) opened Wrtiters Unlimited on Thursday 17 January with a blazing argument against Arab culture of shame. This, according to the writer whose books The story of Zahra, Women between sky and sand, Beirut blues and Only in London have been translated into Dutch, so deep in
'Readers need to be approached in a different way'
Writers Unlimited Special - One of the important guests at Writers Unlimited is Roland Colastica. This Curaçao author made his debut in 2012 with the children's book 'Fireworks in my head'. The book was enthusiastically received, and has since grown into a modest bestseller. Major strength of the story is its colourful and rhythmic style, but just as important is
Theatres take matters into their own hands
As the government has killed the entire circuit of production houses and further education, seven theatres have jumped into the gap. They are joining forces to enable a number of 'young' makers to develop their work after all. By offering a number of performances in advance
Inktspot award 2012 for 'naive citizen'
No offensive prominent, well-known world citizen or tricky topic, but ordinary people play the leading role in the print that was awarded this year's Inkstspot Prize. The prize for the best political cartoon published in the national and regional press in the past year goes to
Arthur Japin makes theatre out of his novel Vaslav
'Everseller' author Arthur Japin is to make a stage adaptation of his novel Vaslav, about the legendary Russian dancer Nijinksi. He is making the adaptation at the request of theatre patron Joop van den Ende, who is a big fan of the book. The theatre production goes into
'Anti-Greek' facade banner Theatre Frog destroyed after protests
We received this via Facebook: "During the night of Friday 11 to Saturday 12 January at 1.30am, a group of about seven young men destroyed a large canvas hanging on the facade of Theatre Kikker on the Ganzenmarkt in Utrecht. The canvas, which
David Bowie back from among the stars
Some artists age beautifully. Johnny Cash aged beautifully, Bruce Springsteen remains young in an absurd way and all members of the Rolling Stones turned into convincing zombies after their unnoticed deaths in the seventies
Legislation follows at an appropriate distance from technological developments
What does a dissertation on a forgotten Victorian novelist have in common with a rushrelease from multinational Sony?
Rotterdam Theatre: more music, more visitors
Everywhere, arts attendance is falling dramatically, except, for now, in Rotterdam. There, the Rotterdamnse Schouwburg managed to keep the number of paying visitors the same, or even increase slightly to over 147,500, in its first real cultural disaster year 2012. In its own press release, the management (currently in the hands of Jan Zoet) attributes this to sharper programming and revivals of successful productions, and an increase in the number of concerts:
2012 cinema year: attendance stable, Skyfall and Intouchables top the list
Perhaps the biggest surprise of the 2012 cinema year was that two completely different films were the biggest crowd-pleasers. First, the new James Bond Skyfall, of course, with almost 2 million visits. But that the number two (1.2 million) is a
A world of strange wonders where nothing is right making everything right
Einstein on the beach: a five-hour minimalist opera with no plot, no intermission. An opera with an almost mythical status, with images that have become theatre icons, but which hardly anyone has actually seen.
Culture Press ratings: thick 300,000 minutes of attention
With paper, you never know ('0.3% of newspaper readers read the reviews on the art page'), and with TV it's always a bit of estimating and extrapolating too, but the internet is rock hard. We know how many times you read one of our pieces, and how long you lingered at our videos. Well: we were already proud last year, now we are well over 200,000
Disbanded Tilburg dance innovators go into fitness for parkinson's patients
Sat another note in the post. One of many, these weeks. About a club that had only just been set up by the government. With the accompanying millions, which because of the PVV's vindictiveness have now been dumped in the local ditch. Its creators have already found a new purpose for themselves a few months ago: to improve the well-being of Parkinson's patients. But Dance House Station South is now thus a thing of the past. We quote:
Rejected for a missed rule overturn?
Unrest in poetry land. By a error 'ambiguity' in the website of the National Turing Poem Contest several hundred poems disappeared from the competition probably for the wrong reasons. Alexis de Roode, herself a multiple prize winner, raised the issue on facebook.
Well-timed gift from Bussemaker
Rijksmuseum Twente can probably stay open now that culture minister Jet Bussemaker (PvdA) has promised the chamber to halve the planned 50% cut in operations. Moreover, she is going to fight hard to keep the Cultural and Artistic Formation subject in secondary education as a compulsory examination subject 'left or right',
Dutch opening Film Festival Rotterdam 2013, which this year also embraces television
Fifteen years after Peter Delpeuts Felice, Felice the International Film Festival Rotterdam gets another Dutch opening. The 42nd edition of this leading event will kick off on 23 January with the world premiere of The resurrection of an asshole by Guido van Driel, festival director Rutger Wolfson announced this afternoon.
Another necro. Sort of: Theatre Institute Netherlands to continue as TIN Foundation
We are just reporting the press release in full. For your information. Every now and then, more news like this comes along. We don't post them all, because that would make the world very bleak. The world as many people knew it, and which they thought was the pride of the Netherlands, is coming to a squeaking halt to make room for. Well. We will report on that in the years to come. Of what comes in its place.
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