Since a still-famous, superbly dressed theatre deity declared me unfit for a future in his theatre in 1991 because of my shabby wardrobe, things have never really worked out between me and fashion, although these days my wife guards me from making too big a mistake. Not a very good starting point for a report on a fashion exhibition in Schiedam, but go ahead....
In 2016, the Holland Festival, De Nationale Opera, the Royal Conservatoire and the Stockhausenstiftung joined forces to stage the German avant-gardist's magnum opus at Amsterdam's Gashouder. Light far surpasses Wagner's Ring des Nibelungen in ambition and scale. Against the four full-length operas of his older colleague, Stockhausen places 'Sieben...
Playing the piano without hands is quite difficult. With one hand it is already almost impossible, although Paul Wittgenstein came a long way. The pianist - and elder brother of the famous philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein - lost his right arm in the First World War trenches. He set about training his left arm with some dogged determination and was able to...
Iemand die bij een uitgeverij werkt, genereert daarmee voor zichzelf een inkomen van 42.379,79 euro. Dat is iets meer dan het gemiddelde inkomen van mensen in de boekhandel, die het slechts met een gemiddelde van 31.000 euro per persoon moeten stellen. Dit inkomen wordt grotendeels gegenereerd door auteurs en vertalers. Die verdienen – gemiddeld – 1540,55 euro. Per persoon. Per…
The paper book will never disappear. Of that, both Robbert Hak (Storytel) and Maarten Richel (New Book Collective) are convinced. And both are working on new ways to market books. 'The publishing world will become much more hybrid. The book, in all its different forms, should be present in as many places as possible.' 'Consumers are using...
Toen op 12 maart van dit jaar de longlist van de Man Booker International Prize bekend werd gemaakt vielen twee dingen op. Ten eerste natuurlijk dat onze eigen Tommy Wieringa een plekje op deze lijst van in het Engels-vertaalde fictie had veroverd. Nog opvallender was het dat elf van de dertien titels verschenen waren bij kleine, onafhankelijke uitgevers. Die ontwikkeling…
Nathan Mooij heeft iets met ogen. Niet vreemd voor een fotograaf, maar zijn specialisme leidt wel tot bijzondere dingen. Vanuit het nogal clichématige idee dat ogen de spiegel van de ziel zijn, is hij gaan uitzoeken wat, hoe en waarom dat precies zo werkt. Er is namelijk iets aan de hand met onze rechter- en linker hersenhelft en hoe die…
Het begon allemaal met een tweet. Leoni Jansen, zangeres, stapte na een optreden in Winsum in de auto, en keek nog even om zich heen. Ze zag dat de sterrenlucht, ver van de grote lichten in de Randstad, mooi was. ‘Net aan de terugreis begonnen uit Winsum, mist laag bij de grond, heldere hemel. Op rechts denk ik Castor en…
Linda Huijsmans and Wijbrand Schaap catch you up in a good half hour on the backgrounds of the larger Culture Press News of the past few weeks. It's a bit more about the nude/nude situation in the arts, but of course it's also about money, that million that was drilled through the nose of performing artists by a row in the board of the Social...
‘Hoeveel werkelijkheden kunnen we aan? Voor mij is dat het thema van 2018. Die dames van Noord Korea die aan ’t juichen waren, bijvoorbeeld. Maar het zat ook in Halbe Zijlstra die had gelogen over de datsja van Poetin.’ Greg Nottrot, theatermaker uit Utrecht, had zich voor dit jaar voorgenomen een eindejaarsvoorstelling te maken die de tijdgeest goed zou vatten.…
Two private museums in the Netherlands have made human flesh the subject of an exhibition this autumn. In Bergen (NH) it is about Bare, and in Delden (Ov) it is about nude. But where one exhibition (at Museum Kranenburg in Bergen) seems to be mainly an ode to the free-spirited 1970s and what happened afterwards, Museum No Hero in Delden puts...
Once upon a time, someone was the first. The first to walk upright, to use his front legs for something other than walking. But who was that, and what did the first human focus on? Frank Westerman takes on that question in his latest book. In a fascinating journey that starts in Leiden, and ends in Flores, or maybe actually in the Mediterranean....
1On 6 September 2018, Chokri Ben Chika left his sense of humour behind in Belgium. He trekked to the Amsterdam Stadsschouwburg with a filled jerry can and committed a criminal offence. He threatened a Rabo Hall filled to the brim with an indistinguishable fake weapon. He said he admired the anonymous Tunisian who, with his self-immolation ...
Less supply of subsidised art is good for the country. Antoinette Laan, culture spokeswoman for the governing VVD party, has thought so for at least eight years. Back in 2011, then still as alderman in Rotterdam, she stated that she did not understand why art institutions were open on weekdays. After all: everyone was at work then and so couldn't come and have a look anyway. Listen here...
Speaking of bubbles. In the middle of Den Bosch, on the parade square, there are three mega-play blocks you can enter. They are mini theatres, brainchildren of designer Theun Mosk. In one of them, you come across a very large plastic bubble in which young, mostly naked, people move. The audience stands on either side of the bubble feeling uncomfortable. Partly because the naked young people...
We hebben geluid van de opening. Een speech, gesprekken met drie van de vier gidsen en veel fijn geluid van een druk festivalplein in Den Bosch. Luister mee, en kom vooral zelf kijken. Met je gezin, op avontuur of als parelduiker. Of alles tegelijk. Er is water voor iedereen, en airco waar nodig.
What does Billy Wilder have to do with Mad Men and Breaking Bad? Or with a football team in a cave? Everything, it turns out. The filmmaker, who died in 2002, appears to be far, far more important to our visual culture than someone like Alfred Hitchcock. At least: it is beginning to look very much like that. Eye, the striking film theatre and museum in Amsterdam, is from now until...
Of course, we have Chriet Titulaer. But it kind of ends there. And to say we took those very seriously, back in the day? No. The future, and fantasising about it, is not really a thing in the Netherlands, at least not with the big publishers and broadcasters. A writer dealing with science fiction will never join a big...
The Holland Festival presents Hyena, in which Mollena Lee Williams-Haas recounts how she kicked her alcohol addiction. Her husband Georg Friedrich Haas wrote the music to accompany her blood-curdling account. She is accompanied by Klangforum Wien and conductor Bas Wiegers, who also performed the world premiere two years ago. Hyena can be heard once at Muziekgebouw aan het IJ on Wednesday 13 June....
The miracle happened right at the first location. On a bare piece of dune in front of beach café Oscars there are rocking benches. From one of those benches I looked, swaying, over a slope of marram grass, then a couple of terraces and beyond that the sea. As it was a weekday, but summer warm, some bathers had already settled into beach chairs. Crowded it was...
'You simply cannot, as a big company, just bring journalistic theatre.' So says Jeroen de Man, who now directs the watery spectacle performance Ondine at the National Theatre. 'A bit of diversity is just fine.' So not everything in The Hague has to be as socially relevant as The Nation of Othello. Sometimes it can also just be about the...
Alí Calderón has written quite a body of work, but I didn't hear much of it during my stay at Poetry International. However, the poem 'Democracia Mexicana' did come along three times. A formidable poem, as it ends with a rotting baby corpse, so not for the soft-hearted among us. Democracia Mexicana is Calderon's hit poem. Like pop singers can make a hit...
Welcome to the culture press podcast. Episode I don't know how many. Today, once again, I am keeping my mouth shut, because the floor belongs to the new poets of the Netherlands. I saw and heard them on Thursday, 31 May 2018, during poetry international. The evening was dominated by the presentation of the Cees Buddingh Prize. The prize for the best Dutch poetry debut of 2018....
The lectern. The lectern. The paper holder, if possible with its own light, which, shining upwards, draws stern shadows of the reading glasses on the poet's face. It is the kind of necessary evil that every poetry or literature festival has to deal with. Only the powerpoint is missing to make it a boring seed onion conference. Poetry International Festival Rotterdam has in...
Als je Lenny Oosterwijk voor het eerst ziet, denk je niet: ha, een galeriehouder. Op de een of andere manier verwacht je daar een meer chique uitstraling bij. Maar de man die in 2011 in Rotterdam Noord Galerie Untitled oprichtte komt uit een andere hoek. Hij is fotograaf en art director en werkte een tijd bij het meest gestolen tijdschrift…
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