IDFA special (3): Dutch winner A Strange Love Affair With Ego is intimate and groundbreaking
A Strange Love Affair With Ego by Ester Gould was awarded best Dutch documentary at IDFA. An intimate and groundbreaking reflection on our need to be seen.
women
Mrs Cornelys' scandalous salon
Mrs Cornelys' Entertainments. Under that remarkable title, baroque company New Dutch Academy presented a concert in a theatrical setting. The Hague's Korzo Theatre turned into a society evening. Visiting a much-discussed lady from 18th-century London. It was a feast for the eyes and ears. New Dutch Academy has a changing line-up in addition to some permanent members. The Academy keeps itself - the name...
IDFA-special (1): 28ste International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam opent met intrigerende familiegeschiedenis
IDFA 2015 opent sterk met intrigerende familiegeschiedenis A Family Affair, maar het belangrijkste programma-onderdeel is Benjamin Barber: Jihad vs. McWorld.
Isabelle Beernaert flikt het hem weer in Under My Skin
Als bij een voorpremière de parkeerplaats van het Zuiderstrandtheater vol staat weet je dat er binnen iets spannends gebeurt. En dat klopt: Isabelle Beernaert en haar ensemble presenteren de nieuwe productie Under My Skin. Dans als een Instagram-account: populair, fotogeniek en kortstondig. Vrouw Eigenlijk is het dans als een Pinterest-account. Want dat schijnt vooral voor vrouwen te zijn. En er is veel…
In the theatre, all fear disappears
I hesitated for a while whether to report on the theatre workshop offered to Syrian refugees by Koon Theatre on Monday 9 November, as part of Dancing on the Edge. During the workshop, the refugees prepared a short presentation to be shown in Stadsschouwburg Utrecht on Friday 13 November, prior to the theatre performance Above Zero. The reason...
Everything is temporary, however beautiful - exhibition Iris Le Rütte at Beelden aan Zee
Last spring, while looking at Catinka Kersten's newly installed sculpture on the patio of museum Beelden aan Zee, Iris Le Rütte's sculpture Daphne caught my eye. A woman who instead of a head and arms stretched branches to the sky. It is a scene from Ovid's Metamorphoses: the nymph Daphne, on the...
Young choreographers triumph in NDT2's 'Shearing the Wolves'
In the wings of Nederlands Dans Theater, the new generation of dance makers is ready. Medhi Walerski and Johan Inger are both former dancers of the company and have previously created pieces there. In NDT2's Shearing the Wolves programme, they each surprise with a world premiere full of intense, pure dance. In comparison, an older work by house choreographers Sol Léon and...
Vluchtelingenromans verdienen een tweede leven. Juist nu
Al maanden gaat het nieuws over weinig anders dan vluchtelingen en asielzoekers, en raken voor- en tegenstanders van hun opvang steeds meer gepolariseerd. Een situatie die sterk doet denken aan de thematiek in de roman De ontelbaren van Elvis Peeters uit 2006. De sfeer in de landen waar vluchtelingen – ‘gelukzoekers’ volgens sommigen – hun toevlucht zoeken, wordt steeds grimmiger. Ook in ons…
John Adams Scheherazade.2 disappoints - despite phenomenal Leila Josefowicz
Even leek het er vrijdag 16 oktober op dat Leila Josefowicz een toegift zou geven, maar die bleef uit. Het publiek in het uitverkochte Concertgebouw had haar minutenlang toegejuicht voor haar fenomenale vertolking van Scheherazade.2, het tweede vioolconcert (of derde, als je Dharma at Big Sur voor zessnarige elektrische viool en orkest meerekent) van John Adams, die zelf het Koninklijk Concertgebouworkest…
Inequality and exploitation: from Genesis to today
At the Gala van het Nederlands Theater, she won the Colombina 2015 for best female contributing role, in Genesis. From this week, Antoinette Jelgersma, actress with the Nationale Toneel, plays in Ronald Schimmelpfennig's The Golden Dragon. From biblical history to life anno now - but there are more similarities than you might think. Jelgersma sits relaxed
Calliope Tsoupaki on Mariken in the garden of lust: 'I was surprised by that 16th-century text!'
On 7 October, the first try-out of Calliope Tsoupaki's opera Mariken in de tuin der Lusten will go on at Theater aan de Schie in Schiedam. Sunday 11 October is the world premiere at the Koninklijke Schouwburg in The Hague. At the invitation of Opera2Day, Tsoupaki immersed herself in Mariken van Nieumeghen, heroine of the miracle play of the same name that took place exactly five hundred years ago in...
Dutch Film Special (4): Gooische Vrouwen, 458 refugees and frikandellennostalgia
Dutch Film Festival 2015 opens with road comedy J. Kessels and honorary award for Gooische Vrouwen 2
Soviet design - does it exist?
The first thing I think of when I think of Soviet design are the magnificent posters showing muscular men with bared bodies and sturdy women in wide skirts harvesting immense fields of grain, or enthusiastically operating heavy machinery in huge factory halls. So the first question that the Moscow Design Museum asks in its press release is right on target: why do we know so little about design...
Eline Vere's wrong choices
Who has not read the book before, in Dutch at secondary school? Eline Vere, Louis Couperus' debut novel, is one of the classics of Dutch literature and was on the reading list for a long time. The novel, which appeared in 1888 as a serial in daily newspaper Het Vaderland, tells the story of Eline Vere, a 23-year-old woman from a well-to-do family, who longs...
Amsterdam Prize 2015, local celebration of artists with international allure
At the Amsterdam Compagnietheater last night, the Amsterdam Prize of the Amsterdam Fund for the Arts was awarded. A 020 party, then, where 'tout art and culture' festively dressed up to put their own cultural gems in the limelight. The biblical torrential rain outside by no means stopped AFK director Clayde Menzo from sketching a sunny future picture of Amsterdam's cultural life in 2020. Old...
Sex rightly splashes off the canvas in 'Love': yes/no
Utility and necessity of explicit sex in 'Love' and other cinema films.
'Also nice. A hot chick with a kalashnikov.' Amateurs and pros in Haags Gemeentemuseum
The annual Summer Expo at Gemeentemuseum Den Haag is open to submissions from amateurs. But in the end, as many as 70% of the entrants turn out to have attended an art school, and even 80% of the selected entries were made by professional artists. With two guests, I visit the Summer Exhibition. Museum visitor Rob van Berlo picks his favourites. Gallery owner Nena Milinkovic I ask the same,...
Orlando Festival is broad and varied - with one blind spot: the female composer
Thursday 20 August sees the start of the annual Orlando Festival again in Kerkrade. Established in 1982 by cellist Stefan Metz, this event has been luring young musicians to Rolduc Abbey for over three decades to train in musical practice. Named after the then renowned Orlando Quartet, the festival traditionally pays close attention to strings, but other instruments are not forgotten either....
Bas van den Bosch: 'Even today, it is often said that men express their feelings poorly.'
Klem is the moving story of 11-year-old Paul, whose mother dies just after he refuses to lie with her for a while and runs out of the room. This makes him think he is guilty of her death. Interview with author Bas van den Bosch about his second novel. We are raffling off three copies! Klem The concise novel Klem has similarities with...
World Press Photo wants to start selling photos. To help photographers.
Een betere plek om persfoto’s te vertonen dan een kerk is er eigenlijk niet. Tenminste, zolang het zo’n Nederlandse kerk als die in Naarden is. Witgepleisterde muren, geen afleidende beelden en schilderingen. En dan toch die gewijde sfeer die een beetje hoort bij wat al die winnaars van World Press Photo 2015 uitbeelden: verschrikkelijke verhalen, glorieuze overwinningen en mysteries die…
Wonderfeel successful despite summer storm
Drie dagen klassieke muziek tussen de bomen en de koeien. Festival Wonderfeel presenteerde afgelopen weekend van 24 tot en met 26 juli, onder de rook van ’s-Graveland, een uniek klassiek muziekfestival. Topmusici uit binnen- en buitenland gaven tientallen concerten. Er werden lezingen gegeven en zoals dat hoort op een festival, viel er ook veel te eten, te drinken en te…
'Young people have become prudish.' Ronald Giphart on his novel 'Harem'
It is a lovely summer book: Harem, the new novel by Ronald Giphart. And for the first time in years, a good dose of sex appears in a book by the Utrecht-based writer. 'Just the other day at a reading I was announced by a librarian: "Ladies and gentlemen, here is the man who knows all about sex!" Interview so with...
Greece special (2): snail, sex and skateboard - new Greek cinema holds up a subversive mirror
In the midst of all the Greek calamity, something beautiful has blossomed: a new inspired cinema that makes us blink.
Greek special (1): Our Greek is still called Zorba
Following the euro crisis, Culture Press focuses on Greece in a series of articles. In the first part, George Vermij looks at how film has influenced our image of the Mediterranean country. Is there not a more striking image of Greece than Antony Quinn as Zorba dancing the Sirtaki and finding resignation despite the harsh setbacks life offers? The...
12 signs of hope at graduation exhibition KABK
Last week, graduates of the Royal Academy of Art (KABK) in The Hague showed their graduation projects in an exhibition. An exhibition that every year is far too big to see everything in one week. But this year, above all, an exhibition that provoked: to think, to wonder, to smile and to come back again and again.
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