On 4 March 2016, her debut CD Varmints, a mixture of new-classical, electronica and avant-pop, was released and Scottish-Canadian Anna Meredith (b. 1978) was showered with praise. 'One of the most innovative minds in modern British music,' wrote one critic. 'Vibrant and kaleidoscopic,' wrote another. 'Exceptional soundscapes of synthesisers, beats and other things' reposted a third. A fourth felt...
Grzegorz Marciniak, a music maker worth following. And I have been doing so since 2006. That's when I first saw and heard his work performed in The Hague by the then Woof collective. I made contact, it clicked. In 2007, Picca premiered. A work Marciniak wrote for yours truly (recorder solo). And also at my most recent experience, February...
There are outside opportunities to be taken advantage of. Egon Schiele's Portrait of Edith by his wife Edith will be joined by Gustav Klimt's Judith I from Vienna for a one-off at the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag. Two fascinating works, both very rarely on loan. And although the artists knew and appreciated each other, there is almost no greater difference imaginable than...
Hear about mensch and other animals. Doubt yourself silly and discover the benefits. Cross borders while putting your philosophy biases through the wringer for a while. Food for thought. To be picked up in The Hague. The eternal doubter will miss out on a discount after 16 March, by the way. In other words, on 14 April from 19h-23.30h, the Night of Philosophy for the...
The Zuiderstrandtheater in The Hague premiered Ballet Blanc on 8 March. It is the new full-length performance by The Dutch Junior Dance Division. The young dancers tour the country with a collage of fifteen short pieces. Blanc is the unifying factor in a fresh mix of classical and modern ballet, with tragedy, poignancy and humour. The juniors...
The Jugendstil curls of the famous 'salad oil poster' adorn the logo of the major Toorop exhibition at the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag. And while this choice is recognisable and appealing, there is something to be said against it. After all, the museum is so keen to show other sides of Toorop. And there are surprisingly many of them. The Gemeentemuseum has a history with...
International literary festival Winternachten wants to involve the public more in its programmes next year. 'Audiences increasingly want to have a say,' says director Ton van de Langkruis. 'That can be done in all kinds of ways, we are now brooding on that.' Winternachten attracted some 7300 visitors this year, equalling last year's attendance. Last edition's theme was 'Hello Darkness', and...
Years ago, Nederlands Dans Theater profiled itself with the slogan "challenging dance". That applies well to Straight Around. This performance by youth company NDT2 premiered at Holland Dance Festival in The Hague on 18 February. The company does not immediately make things easy for its audience with the four danced pieces, but for those who know how to empathise, there is...
Scattered through the main hall of museum Beelden aan Zee in The Hague are enormous works, mostly consisting of ribbon and used car inner tubes. There are also canvases hanging on the wall, again full of colourful ribbon embroidery. These canvases are more sculpture than painting. They are the work of South African Nicholas Hlobo. Images by the Sea, under the title Imilonji Yembali (Melodies...
A mythical aura often surrounds a museum's depot. How many works of unparalleled value does a top collection like the Mauritshuis let gather dust on its shelves? And more importantly, why? And as a museum, wouldn't it be better to sell them? In the exhibition Highlights from the Depot, the Mauritshuis answers such questions. At the same time, new questions arise,...
45th Film Festival Rotterdam, the first under new director Bero Beyer, gets off to a strong start with Beyond Sleep, after W.F. Hermans's Nooit meer slapen.
The last bit is always the most exciting. After a nice conversation with festival presenter Francis Broekhuizen, chief guest Susan Neiman suddenly joined us. It was nearing twelve, quite a bit of wine had actually already been poured into presenter and guest, but still. Suddenly you find yourself talking to a great philosopher and writer about David Bowie. This was the last session at Winternachten....
On Friday 15 January, we conducted a first experiment with the platform 'blab.im'. During festival Winternachten, we reported live, via the internet. We did so in English, because most of the viewers we had were English-speaking. We could see that. That is already the most striking difference between something like Blab.im, and ordinary television. Blab.im in the Netherlands is still...
From around 19:30 on this page and via blab: Winternachten Live from The Hague. Drop by the Theater aan het Spui, or chat along via blab.
The annual presentation of the International PEN Awards during the opening of Winternachten in The Hague is never a truly convivial affair. After all, every year at least one of the awardees is unable to receive the prize herself. Because she has been captured, because he is missing, or ill. This year, Thursday 14 January at the Theater aan het Spui, could...
Ten years after his death, Karel Appel turns out to be more timeless than you would think with only Cobra in mind. This can be seen at a large and impressive retrospective at the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag. It showcases the oeuvre of a highly versatile artist who continued to develop into an old age. An impression of the exhibition under construction. Drawings Next to...
Hello Darkness is the theme of the international literary festival Winternachten, this coming weekend in The Hague. It takes guts, in a time when everything has to be fun and cosy and we prefer not to spend our free time dealing with misery or 'heavy topics'. That is why we love Winternachten, because that festival really goes...
Since I can't put all my music musings about Bowie in the (already planned before his death) animation column in mid-March anyway, I'll just muse with the rest of the world now after B-day 10 01 2016. After all, see the cover of Heroes come up quite often in the media. That black-and-white picture where he's in some kind of puppet-like pose...
Propaganda is not just something that occurs in, say, Russia, but also in the West - more so than we ourselves realise. For example, is it widely believed today that the atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to force Japan to capitulate and thus end World War II, nothing could be further from the truth. In that respect, Germany goes...
Those working in the cultural sector should not expect much from the VVD. Lately, however, the party has been trying to show a different face. Indeed, only recently, the new culture spokesperson of the right-wing liberals tabled a motion in which the VVD actually gave back 10 million of the more than 250 million the national government took from the arts....
'KUT TONEEL' has been spray-painted over BOT's poster. Another features penises and a clown's nose. Does Firma MES' new show arouse so much aggression? In any case, the young theatre company from The Hague promises us a play about "unkind people". But that doesn't quite pan out. On the flat floor of Theater aan...
Always nice when someone sets up a committee to solve all the problems. The Dutch theatre sector did just that a few months ago. Led by former minister Guusje Ter Horst, Rinda den Besten (former Utrecht alderman), Sadik Harchaoui (Forum) and Ryclef Rienstra (VandenEnde Foundation) examined what could be better in the relationship between theatre and the...
By 1970, Karlheinz Stockhausen (1928-2007) had run out of 'intuitive' compositions in which the performer had to choose his or her own path from a series of written instructions. Like Intensity, for example, whose score consists of this text: Play the individual notes with such dedication until you feel the warmth radiating from you. Play on and keep them on as long as you can....
Composer and pianist Jeroen van Vliet - as 2014 Boy Edgar Prize winner - was commissioned to draw inspiration from Leo Cuypers' Zeelandsuite (1977) for new work. He put the band together and, in the tradition Cuypers and his men, played at various Zeeland venues. As then, everything was recorded. On CD and (award-winning) DVD this time. Last May, I was...
At Amsterdam's Brakke Grond, the Dancing on the Edge festival (DOTE) opened yesterday with an evening that immediately showed what the span is all about. The first performance, Blank, engaged directly with the audience. The second, and official opening performance, Plastic, was more about the dynamics between the performers themselves and with the soundscape. With her opening speech
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