Washington National Opera opened its 2019-20 season at the Kennedy Center on Saturday night with a performance of Giuseppe Verdis Otello signaling that the company, under the leadership of Artistic Director Francesca Zambello and General Director Timothy OLeary, goes from strength to strength as it embarks upon its 64th season.

Verdi esteemed no writer more highly than Shakespeare, and the extent of the bards influence upon the composer extends well beyond the three operas (Macbeth, Otello, and Falstaff) that are directly based on Shakespeare plays. It is no surprise, therefore, that Verdi couldnt resist an invitation from his publisher to collaborate with the young librettist, Arrigo Boito, on an opera based on Othelloeven if it meant interrupting a comfortable retirement. The overtly operatic qualities of Shakespeares play (George Bernard Shaw went so far as to refer to the source work as a play written by Shakespeare in the style of Italian opera) are maximized by Boito and Verdi in what is widely regarded as one of the crowning glories of Verdis storied career.

The success of any production of this opera rests largely upon the shoulders of the three singers portraying Otello, Iago, and Desdemonaeach of them given music of exceptional range that demands great versatility from the artists. Desdemona is the most conventionally Italianate of these characters, with music in which Verdi himself said that the melodic line never ceases from beginning to end.

But it is not quite so simple, as Verdi still demands very different types of singing from his female leadfrom the gentle lyricism of Acts I and IV to the demanding dramatic work of Act III. The soprano Leah Crocetto negotiated these shifts with admirable facility and shone most brilliantly in the wrenching Act III scene with Otello where the full power of her clarion upper register reflected her increasing desperation and her impassioned but ultimately futile declarations of innocence. While one might have hoped for a more understated rendering of the Willow Song, Crocettos stunning Ave Maria in Act IV (ably supported with responsive playing from the WNO Orchestra string section) was a masterclass in subtlety and control and proved to be a true showstopperthe only moment in Saturdays performance when the continuous flow of Verdis music was interrupted by audience applause.

Iago is at the other extremea character who infrequently sings in the true sense of the word but, as Verdi described it, more often declaims in a constantly shifting style matching his protean capacity for duplicity and manipulation. In his WNO debut, the baritone George Gagnidze was a commanding presence both musically and dramatically, whose performance helps one understand why Verdi and Boito initially planned to call their opera Iago. From the frantic energy of the Act I drinking song, to his shattering interpretation of the iconic Credo, to the calculated guile of his conversations with Otello, Gagnidze was everything that one could have hoped for in this most complex of Shakespearean villains.

Otello closes November 16, 2019. Details and tickets

The music of the title character makes the most varied demands upon the singerrequiring both the easy lyricism of a bel canto lover in the fleeting moments of tenderness with Desdemona and the stentorian tones of a warrior hero. The tenor Russell Thomas has steely, ringing high notes in abundance, and, while never actually losing control of his voice, he went about as far as he could in an effort to suggest the extent of Otellos undoing at the hands of Iago. The approach was risky, bold, and largely successful. Thomass depiction of Otellos emotional outbursts came across as uniformly intense, but, with more nuance and variety, he might have traced a more progressive journey from suspicion to madness.

Among the smaller roles, the tenor Zach Borichevsky had a strong turn as Cassio, and the mezzo-soprano Deborah Nansteel brought pathos and power to the role of Emilia, stepping out of the shadows to command the stage in the final moments of Act IV.

The Italian conductor Daniele Callegari, returning to WNO for the first time since leading Un Ballo in Maschera in 2010, maintained a taut sense of pacing throughout the evening while allowing adequate breathing space for the operas relatively few moments of lyrical repose. Revelling in the infinite colors of Verdis orchestration, Callegari elicited sensitive and detailed playing from the WNO Orchestra with especially fine contributions from the winds and brass. The WNO Chorus, prepared by Chorus Master Stephen Gathman, rose to the considerable challenges of the score, singing with fine diction and rhythmic energy.

The staging, a co-production of English National Opera, Royal Swedish Opera, and the Teatro Real Madrid, directed by David Alden, paled in comparison with the musical strengths of the production. With a single large set piece framing both interior and exterior scenes in and around a dilapidated structure washed in gray, the staging was both visually bland and, at times, logically inconsistent.

The bonfire kindled outside the castle in Act I was re-ignited in Act IV, but now in Desdemonas bedchambera sparsely furnished space with no bed. The fire in Acts I and IV was one of the more graceful and effective lighting choices in a production otherwise bathed in whitish-gray hues, the monotony of which further blurred the distinction between interior and exterior spaces. Costumes and props were vaguely suggestive of the first quarter of the 20th century, but details were imprecise. The use of an icon of the Madonna as a symbol of Otellos idealized vision of Desdemonaplaced next to her in Act II, desperately clutched by Otello at the beginning of Act III, then lifted over his head as he is poised to strike Desdemona, then finally used as a dartboard by Cassiowas a clumsy and gratuitous choice.

In her welcome letter to the audience, Zambello noted that it had long been her wish to bring Otello to WNO but that she waited to line up all of the right elements to present the work here in DC. Overall, Saturday nights production suggested that Zambellos patience has paid offas she has indeed brought together many, if perhaps not all, of the pieces to do justice to Verdi and Boitos masterful treatment of Shakespeare.

Otello, an opera in four acts. Music by Giuseppe Verdi. Libretto by Arrigo Boito. Based on the play by William Shakespeare. Conductor: Daniele Callegari. Director: David Alden. Washington National Opera Orchestra, Washington National Opera Chorus, Washington National Opera Childrens Chorus. Cast:Leah Crocetto (Desdemona), Russell Thomas (Othello), Iago (George Gagnidze), Deborah Nansteel (Emilia), Zach Borichevsky (Cassio), Alexander McKissick (Roderigo), Hunter Enoch (Montano/Herald), Wei Wu (Lodovico), Claudia Agero, Mario (Solo Dancer).Set and Costume Designer: Jon Morrell. Lighting Designer: Andrew Cutbush. Choreographer: Maxine Braham. Fight Coordinator: Casey Kaleba. Cover Conductor & Diction Coach: Giovanni Reggioli. Assistant Conductors: Michael Baitzer & Matthew Lobaugh. Chorus Master: Steven Gathman. Assistant Director: David Toro. Stage Manager: Lynn Krynicki. Produced by Washington National Opera .Reviewed by Richard Giarusso.

Related

The rest is here:
Review: Otello from Washington National Opera - DC Theatre Scene

The 14th Season of Project Shaw continues October 28 at 7 PM with a reading of George Bernard Shaws Arms and the Man at the Leonard Nimoy Thalia Theater at Symphony Space.

Evan Yionoulis, who also serves as the stage narrator, directs a cast that features Arnie Burton, Ben Davis, Alison Fraser, Talene Monahon, Max Gordon Moore, Amelia Pedlow, and Bradford Cover.

The plot follows a hunted soldier who, seeking refuge in a young ladys boudoir, starts in motion a series of unlikely comedic events. His unusual philosophies about love, war, and life in general open up a world of thought shed never previously entertained.

Its a superbly crafted romantic comedy from top to bottom with every strongly delineated character given a very specific point of view. Its Shaw, so big thoughts and issues are explored, but always in a human and accessible way, with it all coming together in a streamlined and inevitable balance of adventure and romance. For this event were honored to partner with Evan Yionoulis, said Gingold Theatrical Group Artistic Director David Staller in an earlier statement.

Tickets are $40. Special reserved VIP seating is available for $55 by emailing info@gingoldgroup.org.

See What Your Favorite Stars Are Up to Away From Broadway With Playbill Universe

The Project Shaw series continued Jan. 24 with a reading of George Bernard Shaw's Androcles and the Lion at the Players Club featuring an all-critic cast including Roma Torre, Michael Riedel, Michael Musto and more. Read the Playbill.com story.

(Updated October 28, 2019)

The rest is here:
Arnie Burton, Ben Davis, Alison Fraser Part of October 28 Arms and the Man Reading - Playbill.com

MEDIA CONTACT

Available for logged-in reporters only

Research Results

LIFE

Social and Behavioral Sciences

Newswise BUFFALO, N.Y. What can reading 26,000 books tell researchers about how language environment affects language behavior? Brendan T. Johns, an assistant professor of communicative disorders and sciences in the University at Buffalos College of Arts and Sciences, has some answers that are helping to inform questions ranging from how we use and process language to better understanding the development of Alzheimers disease.

But lets be clear: Johns didnt read all of those books. Hes an expert in computational cognitive science who has published a computational modeling study that suggests our experience and interaction with specific learning environments, like the characteristics of what we read, leads to differences in language behavior that were once attributed to differences in cognition.

Previously in linguistics it was assumed a lot of our ability to use language was instinctual and that our environmental experience lacked the depth necessary to fully acquire the necessary skills, says Johns. The models that were developing today have us questioning those earlier conclusions. Environment does appear to be shaping behavior.

Johns findings, with his co-author, Randall K. Jamieson, a professor in the University of Manitobas Department of Psychology, appear in the journal Behavior Research Methods.

Advances in natural language processing and computational resources allow researchers like Johns and Jamieson to examine once intractable questions.

The models, called distributional models, serve as analogies to the human language learning process. The 26,000 books that support the analysis of this research come from 3,000 different authors (about 2,000 from the U.S. and roughly 500 from the U.K.) who used over 1.3 billion total words.

George Bernard Shaw is often credited with saying Britain and America are two countries separated by a common language. But the languages are not identical, and in order to establish and represent potential cultural differences, the researchers considered where each of the 26,000 books was located in both time (when the author was born) and place (where the book was published).

With that information established, the researchers analyzed data from 10 different studies involving more than 1,000 participants, using multiple psycholinguistic tasks.

The question this paper tries to answer is, If we train a model with similar materials that someone in the U.K. might have read versus what someone in the U.S. might have read, will they become more like these people? says Johns. We found that the environment people are embedded in seems to shape their behavior.

The culture-specific books in this study explain much of the variance in the data, according to Johns.

Its a huge benefit to have a culture-specific corpus, and an even greater benefit to have a time-specific corpus, says Johns. The differences we find in language environment and behavior as a function of time and place is what we call the selective reading hypothesis.

Using these machine-learning approaches demonstrates the richly informative nature of these environments, and Johns has been working toward building machine-learning frameworks to optimize education. This latest paper shows how you can take a persons language behavior and estimate the types of materials theyve read.

We want to take someones past experience with language and develop a model of what that person knows, says Johns. That lets us identify which information can maximize that persons learning potential.

But Johns also studies clinical populations, and his work with Alzheimers patients has him thinking about how to apply his models to potentially help people at risk of developing the disease.

He says some people show slight memory loss without other indications of cognitive decline. These patients with mild cognitive impairment have a 10-15% chance of being diagnosed with Alzheimers in any given year, compared to 2% of the general population over age 65.

Were finding that people who go on to develop Alzheimers across time are showing specific types of language loss and production where they seem to be losing long-distance semantic associations between words, as well as low-frequency words, he says. Can we develop tasks and stimuli that will allow that group to retain their language ability for longer, or develop a more personalized assessment to understand what type of information theyre losing in their cognitive system?

This research program has the potential to inform these important questions.

SEE ORIGINAL STUDY

See the rest here:
What 26,000 books reveal when it comes to learning language - Newswise

The opening date for the new Bernard Shaw has been announced. The iconic Dublin venue in Portobello will close on November 2nd before moving toCross Guns Bridge.

The new site was formerly the Porterhouse on Whitworth Road and is close to Phibsboro, Glasnevin and Drumcondra.

The venue will officially launch on November 15th.

It's after the Bernard Shaw was forced to leave its south side location, to make way for a new hotel.

The imminent closure caused widespread outrage at the continued demolition of unique social venues.

Bodytonic has revealed that they wereoriginally to open a new venue calledRacket.

"Racket wasnt to be massively dislike the Shaw, but as things happened it makes sense for the new space to be the Shaw", a statement explains on their website.

Bosses also say that Eatyard and the Big Blue Bus will also be moving to the new venue.

"Anyways the new spacehas it all a beer garden, a space for Eatyard & the Big Blue Bus, space for a gallery & murals and best of all its even on the canal. Well also be running somelate night events &theyll beunder the nameRacket its going to pretty slick.

"The newspace is open right now, but will close for a little make-over from November 3rd. Our official opening party isNovember 15th".

You can find out more about the new venue here.

See original here:
The Bernard Shaw To Reopen On The Northside Next Month - 98FM

There was dismay at the news of the impending closure of the Bernard Shaw pub and event space on Dublin's South Richmond Street.

The Bernard Shaw has become an institution, a trendy yet old-fashioned pub that's loved by young and old Dubliners.

There was a collective sigh of relief when it was revealed that the beloved pub was to be reborn on the northside, but it remained unclear what the future held forEatyard, the street food and festival venue located next to the Shaw.

But as the time comes for Bodytonic to shut up shop on South Richmond Street they have some good news to share - Eatyard has found a new home in Dublin 9 where they will be opening with a host of tasty new and familiar vendors next month.

Eatyard will turn off the lights at South Richmond Street on Sunday, October 27 after a tasty three years serving some of the best street food in Dublin.

The brand new location opens on November 15 at Crossguns Bridge, beside the Royal Canal and on the Phibsborough/ Glasnevin border.

The Eatyard story so far has been a melting pot for talent, new foods and cooking up some of the best events.

Some of the tasty treats that lit up the yard and Instagram include Box Burger, drool-worthy Dublin Doughnut Company, Olea's fresh flatbreads, Milk Bars charcoal ice-cream, Handsome Burgers loaded fries.

So whos going to be cooking at the new spot? Fans of The Big Blue Bus will be delighted to learn that theyll be parking up outside the new Bernard Shaw site serving up their much loved pizza.

Raw & vegan heroes My Goodness will join them for their first Dublin outpost. Well known for ferments, bright and tasty food in Corks English Market, they look set to be a very popular addition as they bring their feel-good food to the yard.

Vegans will be well looked after as The Saucy Cow also joins. Theyve made a name for themselves with all vegan comfort foods at pop-ups and markets around Dublin.

California Style Mexican Food Truck La Cocina Cuevas andtheir excellent tacos are also part of the lineup.

And one of Eatyard's favourites Buttercream Dream will back serving up sweet vegan treats.

Eatyard will run the same days and times Thursday - Saturday 12 - 10 and Sunday 12 - 8 and of course it wouldnt be the same without being cosied up beside The Bernard Shaw, which is moving North too - with organisers teasing that more details on that will be announced in the coming weeks.

Eatyard will still be rocking all the fun food events youve come to know and love along with some new additions also set to be revealed in the near future.

Sign up to our amazing newsletter!:

Continue reading here:
Bodytonic reveal new location and vendors for Eatyard - Buzz.ie

BUFFALO, N.Y. What can reading 26,000 books tell researchers about how language environment affects language behavior?

Brendan T. Johns, an assistant professor of communicative disorders and sciences in the University at Buffalos College of Arts and Sciences, has some answers that are helping to inform questions ranging from how we use and process language to better understanding the development of Alzheimers disease.

But lets be clear: Johns didnt read all of those books. Hes an expert in computational cognitive science who has published a computational modeling study that suggests our experience and interaction with specific learning environments, like the characteristics of what we read, leads to differences in language behavior that were once attributed to differences in cognition.

Previously in linguistics it was assumed a lot of our ability to use language was instinctual and that our environmental experience lacked the depth necessary to fully acquire the necessary skills, says Johns. The models that were developing today have us questioning those earlier conclusions. Environment does appear to be shaping behavior.

Johns findings, with his co-author, Randall K. Jamieson, a professor in the University of Manitobas Department of Psychology, appear in the journal Behavior Research Methods.

Advances in natural language processing and computational resources allow researchers like Johns and Jamieson to examine once intractable questions.

The models, called distributional models, serve as analogies to the human language learning process. The 26,000 books that support the analysis of this research come from 3,000 different authors (about 2,000 from the U.S. and roughly 500 from the U.K.) who used over 1.3 billion total words.

George Bernard Shaw is often credited with saying Britain and America are two countries separated by a common language. But the languages are not identical, and in order to establish and represent potential cultural differences, the researchers considered where each of the 26,000 books was located in both time (when the author was born) and place (where the book was published).

With that information established, the researchers analyzed data from 10 different studies involving more than 1,000 participants, using multiple psycholinguistic tasks.

The question this paper tries to answer is, If we train a model with similar materials that someone in the U.K. might have read versus what someone in the U.S. might have read, will they become more like these people? says Johns. We found that the environment people are embedded in seems to shape their behavior.

The culture-specific books in this study explain much of the variance in the data, according to Johns.

Its a huge benefit to have a culture-specific corpus, and an even greater benefit to have a time-specific corpus, says Johns. The differences we find in language environment and behavior as a function of time and place is what we call the selective reading hypothesis.

Using these machine-learning approaches demonstrates the richly informative nature of these environments, and Johns has been working toward building machine-learning frameworks to optimize education.

This latest paper shows how you can take a persons language behavior and estimate the types of materials theyve read.

We want to take someones past experience with language and develop a model of what that person knows, says Johns. That lets us identify which information can maximize that persons learning potential.

But Johns also studies clinical populations, and his work with Alzheimers patients has him thinking about how to apply his models to potentially help people at risk of developing the disease.

He says some people show slight memory loss without other indications of cognitive decline. These patients with mild cognitive impairment have a 10-15% chance of being diagnosed with Alzheimers in any given year, compared to 2% of the general population over age 65.

Were finding that people who go on to develop Alzheimers across time are showing specific types of language loss and production where they seem to be losing long-distance semantic associations between words, as well as low-frequency words, he says.

Can we develop tasks and stimuli that will allow that group to retain their language ability for longer, or develop a more personalized assessment to understand what type of information theyre losing in their cognitive system?

This research program has the potential to inform these important questions.

Link:
What 26000 books reveal when it comes to learning language - UB News Center

Edith Nesbit is a biographers dream. Mrs Bland, as she was known for most of her life (a misnomer if ever there was one), was one of the great childrens writers, responsible for The Railway Children, the Bastable series (which included The Wouldbegoods) and the Psammead series, in which a bad-tempered sand fairy livens up the novels Five Children and It, The Phoenix and the Carpet and The Story of the Amulet.

Its not just that Nesbits books are brilliant: her life is also brilliant material for one. She was in person at once quite awe-inspiring and a bit of a nightmare, able to weather tragedy and yet a queen of melodrama, a self-supporting writer who opposed womens suffrage. Vibrantly attractive and adored by her many proteges and readers, she was what they called in those days advanced a committed socialist (she and her husband Hubert Bland were among the earliest members of the Fabian Society) who wore free-flowing clothes, gave charitably and wrote ferociously against poverty, and let her children play barefoot in the garden. Her home at Well Hall, in Eltham, was a lively hub for young writers, artists and Fabians; a place, HG Wells recalled, to which one rushed down from town at the week-end to snatch ones bed before anyone else got it. She was generous with her time, her money and her husband.

Nesbit put her success down to being one of those people who feel that they are children in a grown-up world; her stories certainly read as if written for equals. In the Psammead novels, there is a delightful mix of the recognisable Camden Town, the British Museum and the magical; it is as if by grounding her fiction firmly in a real world, Nesbit makes the fantasy seem all the more tantalisingly possible. In her readable and thorough biography, Eleanor Fitzsimons presents a real life of high drama and storytelling.

Nesbits own childhood was largely happy but nomadic. Her father, a distinguished chemist and teacher, died in 1862 when Edith was three, and from then the family moved around in reduced circumstances, taking regular trips abroad to cope with the ill health of an older sister, Mary, who died young. In 1880, the 21-year-old Edith married Bland, then a bank clerk. He was tall and athletic, powerful seeming. The description left by George Bernard Shaw, a close friend of the couple during their early marriage, makes Bland sound like a bully; nevertheless he was popular with women. He had already impregnated one fiancee by the time they met. Nesbit herself was seven months pregnant when they married; their son, Paul, was born that summer. Two more children, Iris and Fabian, followed. Bland was never good with money; Nesbit supported the family by writing and by decorating greetings cards.

It seems little surprise that her novels tend to feature hardworking mothers battling in the background to keep the family afloat. Fitzsimons makes this connection and her book is interesting in showing how Nesbits lifelong socialist principles found expression in her childrens books. Yet perhaps the biographer is too insistent on drawing links between the life and the fiction. It is true that Nesbits characters are often semi-orphans, but then any childrens writer worth their salt knows that absent, or at least supremely negligent, parents are a prerequisite for a decent adventure. Fitzsimons does not always allow for the complex workings of fantasy, craft and imagination in the fiction elements that are just as relevant, one suspects, in Nesbits approach to life.

The household was apparently always embroiled in scenes; its hard to tell what was for show and what was suffering. Shortly after Iriss birth, Nesbit discovered that Blands relationship with his previous fiancee was still going on (she had no idea about Edith). On his nights away from home, Nesbits friend, Alice Hoatson, kept her company. When a devastated Nesbit suffered a stillbirth, it was Hoatson who had to prise the dead baby from her arms; before long she had moved in permanently. They told people she had joined them because she was seriously ill; in fact she was heavily pregnant. Nesbit agreed to raise the child, a girl named Rosamund, as her own. It is unclear when she discovered that Bland was the babys father. Rosamund would later claim that Nesbit only found out six months after the birth and would have thrown the pair out if Bland hadnt threatened to leave with them. Others assumed that Nesbit had always known and may even have engineered the affair to get her husband away from a lover she disliked. She had her own intense romantic friendships Shaw being one yet Fitzsimons concludes that these were probably platonic. After all, she notes drily, Bland held women to a high moral standard.

She suspects his views were also behind Nesbits stance on female suffrage. (Blands opinion: Votes for Women? Votes for children! Votes for dogs!) She once delivered a speech titled Natural Disabilities of Women to an appalled audience of the Fabian Womens Group, which had invited her to speak on women and work. And yet work she did, writing more than 40 books. Its one of the odd contradictions that Fitzsimons wisely does not attempt to resolve: that this bright, talented woman would cling to deeply traditional ideas about her place and vulnerabilities, and was apparently in thrall to a bullish hypocrite. Or perhaps she was engaged in a bold experiment in living. Another way of understanding the menage a trois between Bland, Nesbit and Hoatson (who would have a second child with Bland, a son they pretended was Nesbits) is as a fruitful and longlasting collaboration between the two women. Nesbit was already an acclaimed poet by the time her childrens stories, often serialised in the Strand magazine, began to improve the familys fortunes. The first Bastable book, The Story of the Treasure Seekers, appeared in 1899. The still-precarious family finances depended on Bland and Nesbit (they sometimes collaborated) churning out articles, stories and novels. Hoatsons management of the home and children freed Nesbit to create. She generally set the tone. Her moods could plunge the whole household into gloom just as she enlivened everything when she was happy. Most agreed that Nesbit and Bland thrived on all the drama.

But in 1900, the family came to grief when 15-year-old Fabian died after an operation to remove his adenoids. The whole episode puts the grown-ups in a bad light. Nesbit seems to have forgotten that the doctor was even coming: she had to be roused from her bed when he arrived at 11am to perform the procedure. Its possible that Fabian hadnt been warned not to eat beforehand an omission that may have caused his death. Nesbit was, Fitzsimons writes, demented with grief. She threw herself into work and her popularity grew. Take a book by E Nesbit into any family of boys and girls, a contemporary noted, and they fall upon it like wolves.

Sarah Watlings Noble Savages: The Olivier Sisters is published by Cape. The Life and Loves of E Nesbit is published by Duckworth (20). To order a copy go to guardianbookshop.com or call 020-3176 3837. Free UK p&p over 15, online orders only. Phone orders min p&p of 1.99.

Originally posted here:
The Life and Loves of E Nesbit review melodrama and menage a trois - The Guardian

In a follow up to our feature on street art last week, artist Emma Blake discusses the culture of street art in Dublin, and what she believes the city needs to do to help creatives.

At the moment in Dublin, for creatives, the future looks bleak. With each creative space that closes down, more and more artists are finding it hard to see a future in Dublin and deciding to leave for places like Berlin that encourages and appreciates creativity.

Most recently, and probably the one that hit the hardest, was theannouncement that The Bernard Shaw was set to close, after months of fighting behind the scenes to stay put. The Bernard Shaw is where I painted at my first ever graffiti jam. Its where so many graff writers and street artists, as well as DJs and bands, got their first opportunities.

They actively promote sustainability and environmental issues offering a free pint to people who collect rubbish from the canal and bring it in, or if they bring in an eco brick theyve made, they were one of the first to ban plastic straws, have compost bins in Eatyard and provide reusable plastic glasses for people bringing drinks to the outside areas.

There has been regular graffiti and street art jams in The Bernard Shaw since it opened in 2006, and they also lent their front walls to street artists looking to paint, both just-for-fun pieces and pieces about certain issues they wanted to make a statement about. This is where I painted the Not Asking For It piece this time last year, after a 17 year olds underwear was brought into question in a rape trial in Cork.

It is also where Aches painted the portrait of Savita Halappanavar in the run up to the Repeal Referendum and Jess Tobin (Novice) painted a piece in the run up to the marriage equality referendum. The Shaw has also hosted First Fortnight Mental Health Festival jams, International Womens Day jams and most recently The Minaw Collective painted a huge piece raising awareness of environmental issues.

Its nearly a year now since The Tivoli Theatre closed down. This was a huge hit for nightlife in Dublin; it was a greatvenue for gigs and club nights. However, it was also a big hit for street art culture in the city. The annualAll City Jam was held there every year for 11 years, with the last one happening in 2018. There was no All City Jam this year, as there is nowhere in the city centre big enough to host that amount of artists.

The jam saw 40 Irish and international street artists and graff writers transform the car park and outside walls of the Tivoli Theatre with new artwork every summer. The Tivoli Theatre was then sold and knocked down to make way for holiday apartments. However, the walls surrounding the premises are still standing. I can still see the piece I painted at the 2018 jam when I walk by the site.

If developers were smart, they wouldkeep thewalls that surround their premises, which were once the walls of the Tivoli Theatre car park. The Tivoli Theatre has been knocked down, but all of the surrounding car park walls, with a lot of the street art from the last All City Jam in 2018, are still standing.

They should recognise this opportunity, keep all of thesewalls, and once the building has finished, continue hosting the annual All City Jam there. They would be foolish not to see the draw for tourists this would have to their apartments, over other accommodation options.

If you look at photos people post of their trips abroad, street art is one of the main features. People love getting photos in front of the different street art around a city. Street art has become a major part of cities around the world.

It is a huge draw for tourists, revealing a citys personality and culture to them. Dublin City Council should really recognise this and encourage it, instead of ordering murals to be painted over and turning Dublin into a culture-less city full of nothing but hotels.

Building owners commission or give permission for street art to be painted on their walls or building, the council then order the street art to be removed as it hasnt been given planning permission, but they never give planning permission for pieces when people do apply.

A lot of the time the reason for this is that it is in a protected area the whole of the city centre seems to be when it comes to street art, however, these areas all have billboards and other advertisements plastered all over them, so why are they given permission, but art isnt?

If you look at Belfast, where they dont need to get permission from the council to paint, the city centre has loads of really amazing street art pieces. It brings the city to life, and attracts a lot of tourists, with arts organisations like Seedhead Arts running regular packed out street art tours of the city centre.

As well as artists regularly painting in Belfast throughout the year, they also have an annual street art festival, Hit The North.

Dublin is one of the few main cities in the world that doesnt have its own annual street art festival. If you look at cities all over the world, so many of them now have annual street art festivals, in the UK alone there is Upfest (Bristol), Meeting of Styles (London), Bring The Paint (Leicester), Yardworks (Glasgow), Nuart (Aberdeen), Rochdale Uprising (Manchester), Cheltenham Paint Festival, Blackburn Open Walls and loads more. I wont go listing the street art festivals in the rest of Europe or the world, because there are too many, but you get the point.

Every major city, and so many not-so-major cities, have an annual street art festival. But here in Dublin were Bally-go-backwards, still fighting with the council for street art to be appreciated and recognised as a worthy art-form that deserves space and permission to exist in the city.

Dublin is being left behind. But there are so many amazingly talented artists in the city, there is scope for street art to become a major focal point in the city, but only if the council ease up on the stringent planning permission laws, start protecting cultural hubs (the very few we have left), and also look into Dublin getting an annual street art festival, similar to the festivals in so many cities around the world.

This will need to happen soon if we dont want to lose our creatives to cities that do appreciate and encourage creativity.

I know of too many now who have left or are now planning on leaving as a result of creative spaces closing down, no walls to paint and ridiculously high rents another issue we should take a leaf out of Berlins book to deal with. They have just frozen rents for 5 years to prevent what is happening here at the moment.

One artist weve already lost to Berlin is El Viz, who recently stuck posters around the city of his portrayal of Dublin at the moment.

Another we are soon to lose to Berlin is Will St. Leger, one of Dublins veteran street artists, who in his own words fought hard to stay in Ireland during the recession. Will and Maser painted this piece outside The Bernard Shaw in 2009.

Many more are going to leave if you continue down the track were going, I know Im starting to consider it. There is overwhelming support for street art in the city, so why should we have a grey city because a small percentage of people dont like street art?

Go here to see the original:
Opinion: Artist Emma Blake on the future of Dublin's creative scene - Dublin Gazette

AUTHORISM, noun:a word, phrase or name created by an author, which passes into common usage.

USAGE:The works of Shakespeare include hundreds of authorisms, including words now commonly used but unheard before his time, like bump, hurry, and critical.

Authorism is actually a neologism, a new word coinage. It was invented or at least first used in this sense -- by the language scholar Paul Dickson for the express purpose of giving a name to his book on words invented by authors, Authorism: Words Wrought by Writers, published in 2014 on the occasion of William Shakespeares 450th birthday. (The word had been used in the past to relate to the state of being a writer, as when Horace Walpole, in the late 18th century, discussed a writer too satisfied with his authorism.)

Shakespeare was the uncrowned king of authorisms. His written vocabulary, Dickson tells us, consisted of 17,245 words, many of which he simply made up for his plays. These included terms that are so essential to our everyday conversation -- like bump, road, hurry, critical and bedazzled that one wonders how English coped without them before Shakespeare dreamt them up. Scholars have tripped over each other in the effort to count Shakespeares authorisms: some put the total at 500, others come up with the extraordinary number of 1,700. Aside from individual words, Shakespeares authorisms include famous phrases that have come into common use since his day, like brave new world, alls well that ends well, setting your teeth on edge, and being cruel only to be kind. No wonder George Bernard Shaw created an authorism to describe excessive worship of Shakespeare: bardolatry.

If Shakespeare coined the most authorisms, the poet John Milton offers the most competition, with this tally clocking in at 630 new words, including such familiar words and phrases as earth-shaking, lovelorn, fragrance, by hook or crook, and pandemonium. Mind you, not everything Milton came up with stood the test of time, or that of necessity: few later generations found much use for many of Miltons authorisms such as ensanguined, emblazonry and horrent!

The early litterateurs had the opportunity to establish themselves in a language that was still growing. Geoffrey Chaucer, Ben Jonson, John Donne, and Sir Thomas Moore also are credited with several authorisms each. Chaucer gave the English such essentials as bagpipe and universe, while Moore contributed anticipate and fact. Ben Johnson is said to have invented 558 words, John Donne 342. English grew beautifully in their care.

Later writers had to contend with the fact that so many words had already been invented that there was less need for neologisms. Still, Charles Dickens came up with many original terms and phrases, gleaned, it is suggested, from expressions he had heard around the poorer quarters and criminal classes of London. Mark Twain, Dickson tells us, didnt take credit for any authorisms at all, but did claim that he popularized the language of the Mississippi River and words derived from the Gold Rushes of Nevada and California (for example, hardpan, strike it rich and bonanza). It is said that Twains talent for creative usage gave new meanings to existing words -- like hard-boiled, which he is credited for turning into a synonym for tough.

By the 20th century one would imagine the scope for totally new authorisms declined. The popular American writer Sinclair Lewis tried hard to create authorisms that might stick, but none of his invented words -- from Kiplingo for Rudyards bombastic prose to teetotalitarian for advocates of Prohibition to philanthrobber for a robber baron who dabbled in philanthropypassed into popular usage, let alone endured. George Orwells 1984 (a date derived from reversing the last two digits of the year it was written, 1948) takes the prize, though, for imparting chilling new meanings to commonly-used words and combining some ordinary words into sinister new phrases. These ranged from Big Brother as a term to describe a totalitarian dictator, to the more specific doublethink and newspeak which anticipate the post-truth and fake news of our times.

First Published:Oct 25, 2019 19:36 IST

See more here:
Shashi Tharoors Word Of The Week: Authorism - Hindustan Times

The temporary installation of a work by street artist and illustrator Joe Caslin in the Courtyard gallery at the National Gallery creates a stunning contrast to Magnus Modus: Joseph Walshs towering wooden sculpture.

Seen to best effect at night, Caslins photographic muraldealing with themes of apathy and wellbeing among young men overlooks Walshs ethereal tower of swirling wood.

The placement of two modern albeit contrasting works clearly indicates how contemporary pieces can feel right at home in a historic institution occupied by some of the greatest artists in history.

Vue, the National Contemporary Art Fair, which will run at the Royal Hibernian Academy (RHA) at Ely Place, Dublin, from November 7th-10th, will showcase the latest work from Irelands contemporary artists through the galleries that represent them.

Jack Hickey, whose work centres on photo-realism, and the social void between people of different sexes and classes, and who won the 2017 Hennessy prize, will be represented by The Doorway Gallery.

The Cork native became one of the youngest painters to have his work included in the permanent collection of the National Gallery for his portrait of the former State pathologist Dr Marie Cassidy.

His latest work, Runaway, depicting a womans eye in a rear-view car mirror (just like his portrait of Dr Cassidy which hangs in the National Gallery), is so true to life, that on first observation you would be forgiven for thinking you were looking at a photograph.

Quirky and thought provoking pieces by Stephen Johnson, from a body of work entitled Elements of War, navigate the grim topic of armed conflict through everyday objects. Hes represented by Gormleys Fine Art.

Johnson has gained a reputation as one of Irelands most promising young artists having won a series of awards since his graduation from University of Ulster in 2011.

His work can be found in many corporate and private collections throughout the world, including a portrait which hangs in the great hall of Queens University in Belfast.

Sligo-based artist Clea Van Der Grijns, whose film Jump won Best Experimental Film at this years New York Film Festival, will be exhibiting her monoprint photo-etching work at the exhibition, along with Deborah Strumble and Diana Copperwhite, represented by Limerick-based Parallel Editions.

Cork Printmakers are the first print studio outside the capital to exhibit at Vue. The 12 artists involved will be producing a limited edition boxset portfolio of their collective work. Most, such as award-winning Sarah Roseingrave who prints on glass,use traditional technologies, with a common theme of landscapes and Cork mythology running through their work.

What appears to be a vividly coloured mythological scene in Hide and Seek in the Devils Garden by German-based artist and author Michael Hutter is, upon closer inspection, a fusion of fantasy and the macabre. The artist is represented by Gallery X, which, like Hutter, specialises in works ranging from the sublime to the grotesque.

Atelier Maser, representing muralists turned canvas painters, will feature post-street art pieces by the creator of the Repeal the Eighthmural, in addition toworks by the well-known Dublin street artist Achesbest known for his U Are Alive mural on Camden Street and the Savita Halappanavar mural, which was painted at the Bernard Shaw Pub on South Richmond Street.

The Drawing on Don Quixote display at the Olivier Cornet gallery space explores the meaning of notoriety through some of the characters in the novel by Cervantes, often hailed as the first modern novel of our time.

One painting in a series by Miriam McConnon represents the character of Sancho Panza on a banknote as an historical Spanish hero, while Dulcinea In Lace depicts the character as both a duchess bride and a farm girl, woven in a lace embroidery.

The current opioid crisis and class action lawsuits against pharmaceutical giants who have manufactured the drug OxyContin in the United States are mirrored in works by Aoife Shanahan.

Pharmacist-turned fine art photographer Shanahanwill make her debut at Vue with a series of OxyContin encoded photograms designed to show the destructive capabilities of the ongoing crisis. After working as a community pharmacist, she studied art in Boston and Belfast, and her work, showcased by Green On Red Gallery, is driven by a camera-less approach and a deep interest in darkroom work and analogue processes.

The fair showcases contemporary works from 22 Irish galleries and runs from November 7th-10th. Admission is free. See vueartfair.ie rhagallery.ie and nationalgallery.ie

Excerpt from:
Take a new Vue of Irish art at the RHA - The Irish Times