Metropolitan Museum Gala: “An Evening of Many Cultures”

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City held a glittering event on the 23^rd of September 2013. Celebrating the union of a variety of cultural activities such as Native American dancing, South East Asian dancing and Chinese music, the event is the third held by the renowned establishment.

The Museum’s extensive collection of global items was perfect for hosting a unifying event that honours those who have actively contributed to a better understanding of a multicultural United States.

Illustrious guests included Earvin “Magic” Johnson and Cookie Johnson, Princess Corinna Sayn Wittgenstein, Buffy Sainte-Marie and Estrellita B. Brodsky.

Ai Weiwei Set to Join Stockholm Festival’s Panel of Judges

Artist Ai Weiwei a Chinese nonconformist was early today chosen to be one of the judges of the Stockholm Film Festival. This is despite concerns from organizers who thought he was unlikely to be allowed to show up in person.

According to festival director Git Scheynius, the controversial artist was appointed because he represents a “symbol of the repression of artists and journalists”.  The appointment came about even as his movements still remain limited by the Chinese authorities back in his homeland.

Scheynius has expresses doubt as to whether the Beijing administration would grant him authority to be present at the festival. The festival director insists that he is one of the fascinating artists in the world. He also said that Ai Weiwei cannot express himself and has been in prison for his criticism over the Chinese government. On the other hand the artist is said to be delighted with the offer because of his undying love for films and cannot wait to come.

This year the theme of the Stockholm Film Festival is liberty and the director hopes that it will bring to light the predicament of journalists and artists who are powerless to perform without the inspiration of censorship. Scheynuis said she is doing so to mount pressure on the Chinese government.

Uncertainty still remains over whether Ai Weiwei would take part, due to poor communication. He has no internet access and it is proving difficult to reach him but Scheynius remains positive that he will show up. The yearly ceremony will run from November 6-17 with more than 180 films from over 50 countries expected to take part in competition.

Breakthrough for Breaking Bad Series at 2013 Emmy’s

Things were heated up at the Emmys as different groups took home different awards. The AMC series, didn’t win a lot of honours as it was expected to. Bryan Cranston, who was tabbed for being lead actor in a drama, lost to “The Newsroom’s” Jeff Daniels. Co-star Aaron Paul, who could have won backup actor in a drama, ended up seeing “Boardwalk Empire’s” Bobby Cannavale take home the title. On a wild night of upsets at the 65th Primetime Emmy Awards, “Breaking Bad” scooped the award much to the disbelief of creator Vince Gilligan.

Emmy’s Winner’s List

“Breaking Bad’s” Anna Gunn also won an Emmy, for excelling in her lead performances. “Breaking Bad” has taken viewers to strange places in the last five seasons. In the series a chemistry teacher Walter White who is mild-mannered is turned into a meth king Heisenberg. The Emmys were indeed unpredictable. ”Modern Family” took home its fourth in a row Emmy for best comedy, and Jim Parsons won lead actor in comedy, but even those honours were unclear after a night in which shows like “Veep,” “The Big C” and “The Voice” won awards over perpetual champions. Host Neil Patrick Harris at one point said that nobody in America was winning their Emmy office pool.

Moscow’s 5th Biennale of Contemporary Art

The fifth Moscow Biennale titled ”More Light” is set to open on 20^th September- 20^th October 2013 amid excitement from all over the world. It is meant to trigger critical evaluation on diverse structures of space time; this can range from economic overproduction to harmful technologies perspectives. With light being the theme of the show it is essential to visual arts and also acts as a creative force between people when there is room for gradual and powerful attention. The attending artists are with the growing lack of time and infringement by the corporate sector as they try to interfere with space on ‘non-places’. The Biennale focuses on artists whose work majors on multifaceted ways of spending time, taking and above all giving. It also questions business and normative placements of space-time. Time and space in this context are imagined as dimensions of energy that causes us to reflect on the influence of our own energy and mutuality.

Renoir Auction Triggers Protest

Events at the Renoir auction are set to take a nasty turn as Pierre-Auguste’s great-grandson refuses to have some 143 letters, photos, plasters, drawings and personal items that belonged to his great grandfather and impressionist auctioned.

Heritage Auctions who have been in charge of organizing the sale have high expectations and hope to fetch about $3 million from what is being termed as the largest collection of Renoir mementos. Some of the things that will be auctioned include; Renoir’s spectacles, his iconic polka-dot scarf, his marital certificate and letters addressed to him by friends and colleagues such as Claude Monet, Edouard Manet and Auguste Rodin.

The whole collection belonged to Paul one of Renoir’s grandsons. In France, Jacques Renoir who was Renoir’s great-grandson condemned the auction for stripping naked his Great Grandfather’s private life. He found out that the auction had sold the family’s souvenirs, personal effects, letters and photographs including one at his death bed. In a letter addressed to Aurelie Filippetti the French Culture and Communication Minister, the Renoir Museum in the southeastern French city of Cagnes-sur-Me and the Orsay Museum in Paris, he voiced his desire to have the two museums purchase the collectables.

Film Festival Finale in Toronto

Toronto will be hosting an outstanding drama on slavery featuring drama kings Steve McQueen, Chiweetel Ejiofor, Daniel Radcliffe and Benedict Cumberbatch. Last week a man frantically called the emergency line 911 explaining that he was in a cinema lobby with a man who could not stop texting during the screening. The fall out was evident all over town with stories revealing the big shots players in the melodrama with overheated emotions and drastic actions making one spend a whole week in the fantasy world of film.

It has been over 38years since their establishments and the Tiff festival will this year host stars who will not be ring fenced or manned by five guys from the French legion. Instead many volunteers wearing orange T-shirts with game smiles will be present. Every debut is usually open to the public and cinematic icons such as Monroe Newman and Binoche among others will have their pictures displayed in the usual Cannes’s official poster of glossy black-and-white. There will be presence of huge bill boards showcasing different stars. The audience will have a chance to interact and rub shoulders with celebrity film stars at the Gala and ask questions and answers during the live events.

A Preview of Top Ten in this Years London Film Festival

The booking of the London Film Festival will this year be publically opened to BFI members on Thursday 12 September and on Friday 20^th September. It will be time to sample some of the most talented people of all time. Paul Greengrass’s ”Captain Philips” will be the opening film which places Tom Hanks behind the wheel of a US container ship taken over by Somali pirates in 2009. This film is set to hit the worldwide cinemas and is expected to charge £ 32 as the opening Gala fee. Similarly Stephen Frears film Philomena for Jeff Pope and co-writer Steve Coogan who won the Venice Best screen play award will open on 1^st November. The long awaited Gravity will be on 8^th November, This year Palme d’Or winner Blue Is The Warmest Color will be on 15^th November, The Selfish Giant will be on 25^th November while Oscar Wilde -inspired new film from Clio Bernard who is the director of the visionary semi documentary  The Arbor?

Charles Saatchi’s Online Contemporary Art Sale

Charles Saatchi has decided on a new online sale for his collection of Middle Eastern contemporary art. This is despite having a rather conversant auction at Sotheby’s, Christie’s or Phillips. The lot valued at more than £250,000 consists of 15 major works that were displayed in Unveiled: New Art from the Middle East held at the Saatchi Gallery in 2009. The sale is being managed by the Auction Room which was incorporated early this year by George Bailey the former director of Sotheby in Europe. It is directed by Janet Rady, who is a freelance expert in Middle Eastern art.

Forty art works can be currently viewed online with the estimated value being between £1,200 to £80,000 bidding has been started on half of them. Hayv Kahraman’s pair of portraits, from the Saatchi collection is one of the popular collections. Since the last time I wrote about the Art Dubai in 2009 where Saatchi paintings were valued at $10,000 each, the price tag has continued to appreciate to almost $100,000 (£62,000) at auction.

Remarkable Exposition as V&A Museum Hosts “David Bowie Is”

One of the founding and significant artists of the current times David Bowie Is has been at the V&A Museum, London. The ”David Bowie is” exhibition has been organized sequentially straddling from the time he was born to date. However in the last 20 years, one of the many Bowie’s characters known as the ”The White Duke” did not give 100% performances in showbiz. The reasons given behind these dismal performances were perhaps due to his ”secret disease”, or maybe Bowie became too ”conventional”. Towards the end of the 19^th century, David Bowie had been behind the scenes and as a matter of fact his collections at the V& A museum display are considerably minimal. The bulk of the artist’s career remains ”David Bowie is” which was initiated in the 1960s and lasted up to 50 years.

Bowie remains a very prominent artist who embodies a complete artist, a revolutionary inspiration who has diversified his scope of work. Among the things displayed at the V&A Museum exhibition include; memorabilia, together with original costumes and personal items, in the likes of musical scores, story board, and handwritten lyrics as well as some of his instruments and album artwork. Bowie has always been an inspiration to other artists all over the world he attends art shows, an avid reader of books, loves film and theatre, he really influences the modern age artists.

The V&A Museum has been granted access to the David Bowie Archive to create the first ever reflection of his exemplary work. The retrospective shows Bowie’s creativity as a musical innovator and cultural personality. Gucci and Sennheiser are sponsoring the David Bowie exhibition at the V& A museum.

On 13th August people from all over the country were able to attend the ”David Bowie is” live cinema at the museum. The V&A’s exhibition ”David Bowie is” opened much to the public’s excitement making sales of over  67,000 advance tickets, far exceeding pre-sales for any other V&A exposition in its 150 year history. ”David Bowie is” presentation will tour the world, some venues include;  Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto (Canada); Museum of Image and Sound, Sao Paulo (Brazil); Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (USA); Philharmonie de Paris/ Cité de la Musique, Paris (France); and Groninger Museum, Groningen (The Netherlands).

David Bowie born (David Robert Jones)in early 1947 first drew the world attention in 1969 with his record  ”Space Oddity” that hit the top five in UK’s singles chart. He later emerged in 1972 with ”The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars” both rock concept albums. This opened up his career success and he released other albums like ”Hunky Dory” to ”Young Americans”, from ”Heroes” to ”Let’s Dance”. On his 66^th birthday, his website released his new album titled ”The Next Day” released after a decade of silence. Despite being away, the song was received with enthusiasm and love from his audience. The exhibition ”David Bowie is” was at the V&A Museum in London and begun on the 23^rd of March 2013. The exhibition was on up until 11^th August.

Hammersmith Apollo Reinstated to Art Deco Magnificence

Hammersmith Apollo, the UK’s renowned music venue is set to re-open in complete Art Deco grandeur after several millions worth of renovation.

When the young and upcoming pop artist Selena Gomez gets on the stage on September 7, the venue will look as magnificent as it had been in 1932 when it first opened as a Gaumont Palace cinema. Robert Cromie is the brain behind this iconic design and to date the Art Deco Style building has its authentic Compton pipe organ, which will be positioned in its initial position, with a few adjustments to reinstate its sound delivery.

Hammersmith Apollo, currently owned by both US live-music promotion giant AEG Live and German ticketing vendor CTS Eventim, became a conserved Grade II listed construction in 1990. Throughout the years it has hosted outstanding concerts such as appearances by the legendary Bob Marley, and The Rolling Stones. Amongst the many appearances were Bruce Springsteen’s legendary 1975 show and other amazing 38 gigs by The Beatles between 1964 and 1965. Numerous jazz concerts by Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington and Count Basie have also been hosted here. To top it all, David Bowie’s had a final performance as Ziggy Stardust way back in 1973. At some point it hosted comedy presentations and during the time it was backed by Carling.