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'A lot of art is too much about pleasing'

It started with an email out of the blue. Artist Joncquil had Googled my website and was struck by the name. I myself had almost forgotten how I had ever come up with the name, Joy of Irony: a song by the legendary, highly underrated English noise/metal band Fudge Tunnel. Joncquil came to my site because of his expo at the time, Himmel und Joy. He had read some of my pieces and introduced himself. Maybe one day we could have coffee to talk a bit about art.

Thus it happened.

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Moniek Toebosch no longer beams

Amsterdam, 26-11-2012 - Last Saturday died Moniek Toebosch (1948-2012), the sparkling multi-artist who startled our country from the 1970s onwards with contrary performances. Some of you may remember her scandalous performance in the 1983 Holland Festival. Toebosch presented the programme 'Attacks of Extremes' live for VPRO television from Theater Carré. After half the Broadcasting Orchestra had quit in protest,... 

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Germany investing in culture? Not really.

We too retweeted it: "Germany increases culture subsidy by 100 million". And we thus fed a half-truth. That half-truth is, that Germany is a heaven for culture lovers, a haven for people fed up with the chilly austerity of the Rutte governments. Germany may seem nice, but, As Volkskrant correspondent Merlijn Schoonenboom noted in March this year, cuts are being made there at least as hard as here.

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Internet users can comment on plan to abolish CKV

Minister Bijsterveld of OCW is going to ask the country for advice. A so-called internet consultation was launched this week on her ministry's intention to abolish Cultural and Artistic Education for Havo and VWO pupils. 'The Field' can now respond, so we suggest you make your views, and especially your substantive arguments known to the ministry, via this link:

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Archives Wim Kan and Louis Davids not in dumpster

The Theatre Museum's entire collection has been saved. The archives of such luminaries as Wim Kan and Louis Davids, as well as 50,000 theatre reviews, 30,000 theatre posters, 146,000 photographs of 22,000 performances, 26,000 portrait photographs of 2,450 theatre-makers and an extensive audio and video collection will be housed at the University of Amsterdam.The move is possible now that the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science (OCW), with the ever-money-hungry State Secretary for Culture Halbe Zijlstra, is no longer seizing the reserves of the Theater Instituut Nederland (TIN).

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'Pearls' at the Leiden Cloth Hall is a boundless experience

'Pearls' is an exhibition with the limitlessness, fantasy and dreamlike vistas that come with a fairy tale. Associations with the pearl roll in all directions. Those who wander around in 'Pearls' forget for a moment everything to do with sober everyday reality. Pearls appear everywhere. The works of art accompanying this exhibition are scattered among the fixed... 

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Culture Council hands out in second round

Yet money for the National Academy of Visual Arts, money for an orchestra merger in the south of the Netherlands and 4.7 million for a knowledge institute for amateur art. The clear-cutting of the Dutch cultural sector has become a little less extreme thanks to a second advice from the Council for Culture. Besides the aforementioned positive assessment, there is also money for a knowledge institute for the creative sector 

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Tate London has 100,000 members. Fortunately not all of them are active

Martin Barden realises that an old model works, where everyone is always clamouring for new forms. As marketing boss of the Tate museums in London, he created a large network of friends. So that museum has more than 100,000 members. people who feel part of the club, and whom you need to pamper.

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The Red Kimono: a fine painting but mediocre musical theatre #HF12

It begins beautifully. Prominently displayed on stage is Breitner's painting The Red Kimono. And not a copy, but the real thing, which is further underlined by the Stedelijk Museum's large number of crates, on which the musicians of the Hexagon Ensemble are also placed. Actor and dancer Michael Schumacher casually walks up to it and looks at the painting for about a minute - the average time a museum visitor looks at a painting.

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Ibrahim Quraishi's "My private Himalya" sparkles by omitting drama

A little tent allowed to play for sea anemone on dry land, its four legs perky in the air. Actors having a cup of tea and a game of cards. It all looks very innocent. What begins as a wonderful picture novel gradually grows into a rebus of considerable length. "My private Himalaya" is akin to a walking exhibition, with a wind machine.... 

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Avdal and Shinozaki send a sultry spring breeze through Central Museum offices with "Field Works - office"

You think you are buying a ticket for Springdance, but actually you are making an appointment at the office, at the Central Museum. Once let inside the waiting room, staff walk busily past you and the doorman takes one call after another. You obediently fill in a form. As usual, you have to reveal all sorts of personal details. And then that question: what... 

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Inertia and extreme duration make "Wild Life Take Away Station" by Ibrahim Quraishi a mysterious still life

Upon entering, Wild Life Take Away Station has been going on for four hours. Two performers - Diego Agulló and Ria Higler, a young man and an old woman - stroll through the Central Museum's project studio like drowsy zombies. They are pale and muscle-naked, except for their weird slippers and wigs. The two lie sprawled across the sofa,... 

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Even hushed Ivo Dimchev makes raging impression with "I-on" during opening night Springdance Festival

As a performer, Ivo Dimchev is so fast and ferocious in his shifts between blunt bravado, childish fun, erotic impertinence and cutting loneliness that as a spectator, you normally can't get between them. Once Dimchev has his audience in his clutches, they can only follow him in bewilderment. "I-on" is again a seemingly loose collection of actions. Everything takes place around a... 

Read More "Even hushed Ivo Dimchev makes raging impression with "I-on" during opening night Springdance Festival

EYE on the IJ - a spaceship with allure

Tonight the queen may officially open the new home of the EYE Film Institute Netherlands, last night director Sandra den Hamer did it herself in advance at an opening party for relations. In doing so, she spoke of a historic moment for film culture in the Netherlands. Seen from a distance, the building, conveniently referred to as "the new film museum", is most reminiscent of a... 

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Versatile and elusive Writers Unlimited closes with tribute to Hella S Haasse and rain of awards

It is remarkable how a writer's sentences, once highlighted, can be given echoing interpretations after his death. Gustaaf Peek in particular, if he really wants to do justice to Haasse, must do something about his rather chest-thumping piety, but even a seasoned artist like Kees 't Hart may moderate the tone while quoting.

Thunder or a minor storm in the Gouda Glasses? You may say

We received a letter on legs from Wim de Groot a while ago. Now we often get letters in paws, but here something seemed to be going on. Trouble of course because sorting it out takes time and money and that wasn't there for a while. (Look out for the donor campaign we are about to launch) But still. What's wrong with it? Wim de... 

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Austerity year review 2011. Or how the PVV cry 'Arts subsidies we abolish' was widely heard

While 2010 was still the year of PVV positions on culture that were suddenly shared by other parties ("we are abolishing art subsidies"), the year 2011 fell under their implementation. What was striking was the ease with which regional and local administrators also wielded this same machete, as PVV spokesperson Bosma did not fail to testify. For instance, in the municipality of Almelo, 30 % went àff from... 

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Small selection of great suffering for Christmas week

There will definitely be no investigation into a corporatisation of the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven. According to the proposal, a council majority wants to have the opportunities to earn more money and save on expenses investigated. A political party earlier suggested that many more visitors and revenue could be brought in with a less elitist programme. At the Money Museum in Utrecht 

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Culture in the Christmas package, Orientalis stops and all of Nijmegen-West without a library

Delightful news from the world of Christmas packages. 1/3 of interviewees said they did want to find a cultural experience in the Christmas package, as they visited a cultural actvity less often than they would like: 43% because of the crisis and 35% because of lack of time. Respondents said they would go more often if they got a discount. The proposed merger of... 

Read More "Culture in the Christmas package, Orientalis stops and all of Nijmegen-West without a library

Krabbendijke loses library, North Holland 'saves' youth theatre, while Brabant 30% cuts further on arts

The cut-away Metropole Orchestra is getting some air from the minister. She is willing to use the necessary friction costs to support the transition over the next four years from the Media Budget, provided it stays there. That is, the orchestra may use its own severance payments to be independently 'on the market' from 2017. As much as it shows... 

Read More "Krabbendijke loses library, North Holland 'saves' youth theatre, while Brabant 30% cuts further on arts

Investing in culture is economically valuable, but not with us ...

A Belgian professor was good enough to compare the own revenues by venues from the US, the UK and Belgium; in all three countries, the companies raise about 42% of their budgets themselves. The innovation professor also reiterated that research shows that investing in culture contributes to economic prosperity ... a wisdom that ... 

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News from the national culture front

Positive news to start with: in The Hague, the municipality is doubling photographer/filmmaker Anton Corbijn's contribution to his youth culture fund Haagse Bluf by €75,000. Corbijn explicitly told the fund not to interfere in the subsidised cultural sector. So compensation for the cuts need not be expected. In Arnhem, the alderman is satisfied with the... 

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