Women and girls in film world still worse off. Cinekid talks about it
Cinekid also addresses gender balance and the imagination of boys and girls. A hotly debated issue on which the last word has not yet been said.
Amersfoort in WAR: 'Our society offers no room for deviant initiative'
A strong cultural protest storm has been brewing in Amersfoort in recent weeks. The trigger was the municipality's decision to award the home of cultural breeding place DE WAR to a property developer after a tendering procedure. DE WAR has been renting the former Warner & Jenkinson dye factory for about ten years. Artists and inventors find a workshop, knowledge and a place for...
Sell that artist, or: the eternally inhibiting modesty of the self-employed worker
There are very, very many artists and creatives who did not start out as entrepreneurs but need or want to get into business. Their number has only increased since 'the Halbe Zijlstra period'. I know them, I mentor some of them and last but not least, I am one myself. The perfect occasion to take some continuing education to me....
30th Cinekid: Versatile youth film festival must look for new director
The cheerful Dutch children's film Owl's Ball opens Cinekid, the film, television and new media festival for children and professionals. This 30th edition is the last under the leadership of director Sannette Naeyé.
Herta Müller: 'I like small things'
This week saw the publication of Nobel laureate Herta Müller's autobiography, My homeland, an apple stone. A few years ago, A Quattro Mani had an exclusive interview with the Romanian writer, when her first collection of poetry collages was published, The Skirt-chaser and its sly aunt. We spoke to her at her home in Berlin, she revealed how her poetry collages are created, and the making...
Cool Manon Lescaut at The National Opera
In front of a sold-out Stopera, De Nationale Opera presented its new production of Giacomo Puccini's Manon Lescaut on Monday 10 October. Directed by Andrea Breth, the musical director is Alexander Joel. The lead role is sung by Dutch soprano Eva-Maria Westbroek, who was loudly applauded afterwards. The bad news First but the bad news. The...
Andrzej Wajda (1926-2016) - Polish cinema has lost a father
Last Sunday, Polish film legend Andrzej Wajda died at the age of 90. His work unfolds as a dramatised history book with an un-romantic take on heroism.
The Harvest of the Month: Carrasco, Cline, Hemmerechts, Hertmans, Hofstede and Japke-d.
Back to the 11th century His previous novel Oorlog en terpentijn (War and turpentine) brought Belgian writer Stefan Hertmans world success. The book became a bestseller and was showered with praise and awards. It gave Hertmans a whole new readership. His new novel De bekeerlinge was therefore eagerly awaited. Hertmans came up with the subject for his new novel...
VVD: Cultural sector must do more for the same money. And hand in piggy bank.
OK, it is still more than former tolerant partner PVV, which managed to cram the entire draft election programme onto a single A4 sheet. But in the half-page that the VVD, the country's largest party, spends on culture, it is actually worse. Here the Wilders and Zijlstra-inspired rancorous line against anything that even smells of Dutch culture is still abundantly clear....
Ronald Wintjens: 'More face for youth dance and performance art at Dance Days'
'Not only work has disappeared, but also knowledge and craft - the whole perspective is disappearing. While the Netherlands as a dance country was renowned in the world precisely because it had the luxury to research, to build, to stimulate.' Ronald Wintjes, the brand-new director of De Nederlandse Dansdagen, worries. What about the future of dance?....
Our actors are burnt out, audiences have lost their way. Save the theatre!
This play is going to cost me a lot of friends, but it needs to get out. After all, the theatre industry is doing badly. And I can see more and more clearly where that is due to. And for once it's not Halbe Zijlstra. Or the VVD, or the population, or the Netherlands in general, or the zeitgeist. And it's not because of Netflix either...
Bigger than me. Meritorious debut about likeable loner
Among all the great titles vying for attention, debuts are often overlooked. Each month, in the series The Debut, A Quattro Mani discusses a notable debut novel of recent times. On your own two feet You are eighteen, nineteen and moving out of the house, studying. The world is at your feet, freedom beckons, your promising dreams are about...
As close as possible to Marilyn Monroe
'Happy Birthday Marilyn' is the name of the new exhibition at the Nieuwe Kerk in Amsterdam. As soon as you enter, the saint worship begins, with a metre-high image of Marilyn Monroe in the famous billowing dress. High up in the ridge of the side aisle. The tone is set: The New Church provides a stage for the icon of the 1950s, an eternally beautiful...
Maartje van Weegen brings sole movement to 'Diary of a cello'
Taking an idea from Marieke Stordiau, bassoonist in the Hexagon Ensemble, Joost Galema, journalist and programmer, writes texts that deal with tree dreams, music and time. This creates Diary of a Cello, a piece that challenges the listener to think about the connections between nature and music. The premiere of Diary of a cello took place at the Amesfoort theatre De...
'Eyes Wide Shut': Film and book battle on stage, and music wins
'Let me lament my fate in tears. And let me long for freedom.' What would my preference be: book, film or play? That question fascinated me when it turned out that Toneelgroep Maastricht had adapted Arthur Schnitzler's book Droomnovelle and Stanley Kubrick's film Eyes Wide Shut based on it into a new play. Actually, it was not a fair...
Moral or good joke: Mauritshuis shows Dutch painters from British Royal Collection
Dutchers in huis is the name of the new exhibition at the Mauritshuis, which makes you scratch your head: surely the Mauritshuis always focuses on painting from the Netherlands? This time, however, it is about Dutch masters from the British Royal Collection. Top-quality genre pieces were chosen, including such famous ones as Johannes Vermeer's The Music Lesson. Their temporary arrival at...
'D3US/X\M4CHIN4': special lightness in new work by Fernando Belfiore/Dansmakers
A wonderful performance full of hilarity, excitement and lightness, yet it sent me out into the world with a sad feeling. It seems as if the four women in D3US/X\M4CHIN4 by choreographer/director Fernando Belfiore are in the land of infinite possibilities. Anything they can do. Do they also want everything? Are they still themselves when they can do everything? How does it feel when the earth...
Ode to soul piercing sounds of György Kurtág
On 19 February 2016, György Kurtág celebrated his 90th birthday. Though frail, the Hungarian grandmaster of soul-crushing notes is still working on his first and only opera, Fin du Partie (Endgame), based on Samuel Beckett's play of the same name. The prologue was already premiered at a grand birthday festival at the Liszt Academy in Budapest, where he himself once studied. On Thursday 13 October, the...
NDT 1 in top form with season opener 'Stage One', but end disappoints
Nederlands Dans Theater 1 opens the season with Stage One. A triptych without resident choreographers Léon & Lightfoot, but with three mostly young, adventurous dance makers. Music is an important factor in all three ballets. The evening opens with Thin Skin, choreographer Marco Goecke's ode to punk icon Patti Smith. Culture Press reviewed the piece last year (€). The now flemish,...
What's behind Wim Pijbes' directed departure from the Rijks?
For now, an unusual state of affairs in the field of cultural governance. Unsatisfactory also because of the many questions it raises: Wim Pijbes rather unexpectedly announces his departure as chief director of the Rijksmuseum on 1 March 2016, opting for a director's position at a new private museum (Voorlinden) owned by billionaire Van Caldenborgh on 1 July 2016. Equally unexpectedly,...
Waiting in the bardo: the Buddhist film festival kicks off
The Golden Calfs have not even been handed out yet and the next film festival is already about to begin. On Friday 30 September, the 11th Buddhist Film Festival Europe (BFFE) will kick off at Eye in Amsterdam with a very special film. The opening film is produced in one of the smallest film countries and one of the most fascinating countries in the Far East: Bhutan. According to IMDB...
Blistering music on new CD Calliope Tsoupaki
The Greek-Dutch Calliope Tsoupaki (1963) strings one magnificent piece together with another. In 2008, she broke through for good with her impressive Lucas Passion, in which she organically incorporates Greek Orthodox chant into an otherwise modern idiom. Six years later, she scored equally high with the oratorio Oidipus at Kolonos, composed for the Nederlandse Bachvereniging. And recently she released the CD Triptychon on the...
Kristien Hemmerechts: 'I'm good at putting my feelings in the closet'
A year ago, Belgian writer Kristien Hemmerechts was diagnosed with breast cancer. While embarking on a course of surgery, radiotherapy and hormone therapy, she contained the chaos in words. Her new book Er gebeurde dit, er gebeurde dat is the beautiful result of that. A vivid account of the confusion, emotions and thoughts during those first few months, framed by older...
Alarm in Amsterdam: Dance talent flees the country
Today, Amsterdam Dance City sent a fire letter to funds and policymakers. Because things are going hard in the wrong direction with talent development. Especially independent choreographers lose out in the new subsidy plans. While these artists are already struggling to survive. Their own economic situation is hopeless and there are no good independent facilities to stage performances.
Bombyx Mori, a brilliant explosion between something and nothing
While things are rumbling in the Amsterdam dance and performance world due to a total lack of solid support for development and experimentation (see Alarm Letter), choreographer Ola Maciejewska is showing the impressive Bombyx Mori at Veem House of Performance this weekend. Maciejewska is a fine example of a talented maker who has taken refuge elsewhere because of the crumbling art climate in the Netherlands. After...
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