Film festival around WWI, the first war with cameras on the battlefield
World War I film festival at De Cacaofabriek, Heerlen.
World War II
Less is more: it can be done!
Yes, it can be done! Less is more! I heaved the last sigh on Wednesday 13 May in response to the production Benvenuto Cellini by Hector Berlioz, which Monty Python director Terry Gilliam made for the National Opera. Immediately the same evening, I was caught off guard at the premiere of The Peach of Immortality by Rieks Swarte at the Toneelschuur in Haarlem. It concerns a...
#Reinbertbio one year on: biographer looks back
There was once a celebrity (pianist, composer and conductor Reinbert de Leeuw), a biographer (Thea Derks) and a riot. De Leeuw was against the publication of his biography Reinbert de Leeuw: man or melody and made no secret of it. In the TV programme Zomergasten (Summer guests), he even dismissed the dissertation-like standard work as an almost endearing puff piece. Meanwhile...
Safely out of hiding, but then?
The opera Poland in Plan Zuid will premiere at the Liberal Jewish Community in Amsterdam on Sunday 19 April. Composer Caroline Ansink and librettist Olaf Mulder based their work on Daniël Vermeulen's (pseudonym) memories of going into hiding in Brabant and his subsequent reunion with his mother in Amsterdam in 1945. Three questions for Caroline Ansink. Why...
Why you should go to Snorder (while you still can)
The theatre project 'Snorder' once began as the soap opera that closed the long evenings at the festival Hollandse Nieuwe. A festival for new playwrights, first in theatre Cosmic, later in MC. Both Amsterdam theatres no longer exist in the meantime, neither does Hollandse Nieuwe. But director John Leerdam and his crew have now been given the space for a revival at de Balie....
'All-rounder' Boy Edgar staggeringly portrayed
Boy Edgar was the most famous big band leader of his time, but at the same time a busy doctor and an alcoholic. A biography on this ADHD'ing all-rounder was published for the first time. An impressive, sometimes disconcerting book marred only occasionally by factual inaccuracies. By day he was, among other things, a renowned neurologist, a revolutionary abortionist and the first general practitioner in the Bijlmermeer. 's...
World art trade grows 7% to 51 billion euros
The crisis is over. Especially if you are in the fine art business. In 2014, the global art market grew by 7% from the peak year of 2013. In total, the art trade turned over a value of 51 billion euros last year, making that market almost as big as the economy of Uzbekistan. The internationally authoritative website artnet reported that today
It's the tone, idiot! 4 Reasons why 'Heart' is a show you should go see
The play 'Heart' is one for your bucket list. In other words, the play 'Heart', created by Matzer Theatre Productions as an adaptation of Lisette Lewin's book 'Heart of Barbed Wire', is a play you really must have seen. Why? I'll give you 4 reasons why. 1: The book is no longer for sale Lisette Lewin wrote a book in 1992 that...
Carrots, potatoes and a dash of lard on Writers Unlimited
How do you get back home mentally after a war? David van Reybrouck in conversation with Stefan Hertmans and Ian Buruma Carrots, potatoes, maybe some celery and a dash of lard, this was the monotonous winter diet of the underclass in rural Flanders in the late nineteenth century. But, outlines professor and guest speaker Louise O. Fresco in her opening column, these days it is the...
Gaudeamus organises seminar on music criticism
Tonight begins the international Gaudeamus Music Week, in which five composers under 30 compete for the coveted Gaudeamus Music Prize. The jury, consisting of Vanessa Lann, Oscar Bianchi and Wim Henderickx selected them from eighty entrants from all over the world. It is the fourth edition in Utrecht of the competition, which started in 1951 in Bilthoven; the new TivoliVredenburg serves as the festival centre....
Melle Daamen on @culturepress: 6 reasons why the arts debate in the Netherlands is so laborious.
I published two articles in NRC Handelsblad last year. The first (6 July 2013) was critical of government policy. There was little reaction to this. The second article (7 December 2013) was critical of the arts sector: it needs to make its own sharp choices. That did cause a stir, although I am convinced that many colleagues largely agree with the content...
World premiere of deceased Ten Holt
Tonight, Feb 14 honours the North Netherlands Orchestra at the Oosterpoort in Groningen Simeon ten Holt, who died in 2012, with the world premiere of his orchestral work Centri-fuga, which he completed in 1979. It has never been performed to this day and will be christened tonight by conductor David Porcelijn. After the interval, Ten Holt's magnum opus will also be heard Canto ostinato for four pianos, performed by Sandra and Jeroen van Veen, Fred Oldenburg and Irene Russo. Earlier this week, other pianists also performed it at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw.
Tristan und Isolde at Reisopera, something special happens here
A Brünhilde who does not burst into flames but endures the Götterdämmerung with a baby in her arms, a Senta who does not jump off a cliff but is shot by Erik together with the Holländer. No one really looks surprised anymore. And Isoldes who do not die in the Liebestod are no exception, but Tristan who rises from the dead, as it were, by Isolde's notes reaching into heaven, stands diagonally behind her and sings along soundlessly?
Exhibit B confronts with probing glimpses @hollandfestival
A sociable group of ladies who came in laughing and chatting, leave the room bewildered and tearful. Upset, embarrassed, this is how I see all visitors coming out. What is hard to describe in words is written on their faces. Exhibit ...
Chilean IK generation seeks revolutionary art at @hollandfestival
Holland Festival
Six actors, four years in a bunker. One is dead. Those are the details we have to make do with in Tratando de hacer una obra que cambie el mundo. According to this title, the actors are trying to create a play that will change the world. The characters have locked themselves away in an underground bunker and receive occasional provisions via a packet.
Exhibition Sketches of Beauty sheds new light on metre-long sketch designs for 'Gouda Glasses'
The stained-glass windows of the Sint-Janskerk in Gouda, known as the Gouda Glasses for short, are famous abroad. Domestically, the colourful splendour and artistic value of the sometimes 20-metre-high windows is less well known. Even less known are the paper sketches for these windows, which have recently been restored. The exhibition 'Sketches of beauty', opened by Queen Beatrix, closes...
According to US film magazine, our Oscar entry does not stand a chance
It is not very often that Dutch films attract the attention of the film trade magazine Screen International. Now that the web edition ScreenDaily happens to publish two reviews in a row, it is nice to quote something from them. Among Us Screen editor-in-chief Mike Goodridge saw Dutch Oscar contender Sonny Boy and Marco van Geffen's debut film Among Us (international title Among Us) and came...
Gergiev comes to Rotterdam with a top orchestra and top repertoire, but audiences are used to that from him
Russian conductor Valeri Gergjev was back in Rotterdam for a while, for one concert. He conducted his own orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO), in de Doelen. The famous orchestra played repertoire that we in our country know inside out: Gustav Mahler's 1st symphony and Dmitri Shostakovich's 1st piano concerto. A now historic combination: because the Netherlands has become fused...
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