cityArts February 8, 2012 by CityArts NYC

Feb. 8—Feb. 21, 2012 • Volume 4, Issue 2

Damien Hirst’s Spotland and Carrie Pollack’s Mechanical Garden Page 6 Glass and Pärt at Carnegie Hall Page 9 New york’s Review of Culture • CityArtsNYC.com

The City Arts Interview: Dr. Muhammad Page 15

ART vS. CONTROvERSy EvERyONE’S ‘PORGy AND BESS’ PAGE 10 By ARMOND WHITE

Juilliard

INSIDE

Joseph W. Polisi, President

Fri, Feb 24 at 8 Abigail Adams Smith Auditorium 417 East 61st St, NY

Monica Huggett leads Juilliard415

The Evolution of the Concerto Grosso Monica Huggett, Leader/Violin US Premiere by Alessandro STRADELLA Concerto Grosso in D Major for two violins, lute and strings and works by Georg MUFFAT, Luigi BOCCHERINI, Unico Wilhelm van WASSENAER A co-presentation of Juilliard and Salon/Sanctuary Concerts Tickets $25 ($15 senior/student) online: salonsanctuaryconcerts.org or call (212) 866-0468

Mon, Feb 27 at 8 Peter Jay Sharp Theater at Juilliard

Jeffrey Milarsky Conducts the Juilliard Orchestra 4 World Premieres by Juilliard Composers MICHAEL LEE Contrasting Visions Winner, Arthur Friedman Prize STEFAN CWIK Terpsichore MICHAEL IPPOLITO Nocturne JARED MILLER Cartoon Music FREE tickets at box office 2/13

Wed, Feb 29 at 8 Peter Jay Sharp Theater

Gerry Mulligan Tribute Guest Saxophonist Gary Smulyan and the JUILLIARD JAZZ ORCHESTRA James Burton III, Conductor

The music of Gerry Mulligan FREE tickets at box office 2/15

Fri, Mar 2 at 8 • Avery Fisher Hall

Alan Gilbert Conducts the Juilliard Orchestra

Fabiola Kim, Violin RAVEL Le tombeau de Couperin ROUSE Violin Concerto STRAVINSKY Le Sacre du Printemps Tickets $30, $15 online: LincolnCenter.org or CenterCharge (212) 721-6500 FREE student and senior tickets, TDF, accepted only at the Avery Fisher Hall Box Office

Thurs, Mar 15 at 8 Paul Hall at Juilliard

Ensemble ACJW

L. MOZART, ALBRECHTSBERGER, CRUMB, W.A. MOZART, BARTÓK FREE tickets at box office 3/1

Mon, Mar 19 at 8 Paul Hall

perform original student compositions FREE tickets at box office 3/5

Thurs, Mar 22 at 8 Alice Tully Hall JUILLIARD VOCAL ARTS HONORS

Kyle Bielfield Tenor

Takaoki Onishi

2 CityArts | February 8–February 21, 2012

P.12

Baritone

Lachlan Glen and Nozomi Marusawa, Pianists FREE tickets at box office 3/8

REMINDERS ONLY TWO PERFORMANCES TONIGHT & SATURDAY AT 8 Peter Jay Sharp Theater G L U C K ’s

Armide I N C O N C E RT

Jane Glover, Conductor Fabrizio Melano, Director Produced by the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program in partnership with The Juilliard School Tickets $30 at the box office or online: events.juilliard.edu call CenterCharge (212) 721-6500

Next Fri at 8 Peter Jay Sharp Theater

AXIOM Jeffrey Milarsky, Conductor RIHM Jagden und Formen FREE tickets at box office

J U I L L I A R D 155 W. 65th St. • Box Office M-F, 11AM-6PM • (212) 769-7406

events.juilliard.edu

P.4

Juilliard Jazz Ensembles

GALLERIES Howard Buchwald at Nancy Hoffman Gallery P. 4 Andrew Lenaghan at George Adams Gallery P. 4 Gordon Moore at Betty Cuningham Gallery P. 5 Carrie Pollack at MINUS SPACE P. 6 Damien Hirst at Gagosian Gallery P. 6 MUSEUMS Emanuel Leutze’s “Washington Crossing the Delaware” P. 7 FILM Armond White on Chronicle P. 8 JAZZ Tim Berne presents Snakeoil P. 8 CLASSICAL Clarinet Month P. 9 Jubilee concert honors Philip Glass and Arvo Pärt P. 9 Theater Art vs. Controversy: Everyone’s Porgy and Bess P. 10 Porgy Reborn P. 11 DANCE The Takeover: When guest stars rule P. 11 ON GAMING The elusive joys of Rayman Origins P. 12 POP Solo dance videos go viral P. 12 AUCTIONS A preview of upcoming events P. 14 INTERVIEW Dr. Kahlil Gibran Muhammad P. 15

EDITOR Armond White awhite@manhattanmedia.com

PUBLISHER Kate Walsh kwalsh@manhattanmedia.com

MANAGING EDITOR Mark Peikert mpeikert@manhattanmedia.com

Account Executives Ceil Ainsworth, Mike Suscavage

SENIOR MUSIC CRITIC Jay Nordlinger

MANHATTAN MEDIA

SENIOR DANCE CRITIC Joel Lobenthal

PRESIDENT/CEO Tom Allon tallon@manhattanmedia.com

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS: Caroline Birenbaum, John Demetry, Valerie Gladstone, John Goodrich, Amanda Gordon, Steve Haske, Ben Kessler, Howard Mandel, Maureen Mullarkey, Mario Naves, Gregory Solman, Melissa Stern, Nicholas Wells

CFO/COO Joanne Harras jharras@manhattanmedia.com Group Publisher Alex Schweitzer aschweitzer@manhattanmedia.com

DESIGN/PRODUCTION

NEWSPAPER GROUP PUBLISHER Gerry Gavin ggavin@manhattanmedia.com

PRODUCTION/creative director Ed Johnson ejohnson@manhattanmedia.com

director of interaCtive markeTing & digital strategy Jay Gissen jgissen@manhattanmedia.com

advertising design Quarn Corley

Controller Shawn Scott Accounts Manager Kathy Pollyea

WWW.CITYARTSNYC.COM Send all press releases to cityarts@manhattanmedia.com CityArts is a division of Manhattan Media, publishers of New York Family magazine, AVENUE magazine, Our Town, West Side Spirit, Our Town Downtown, City Hall, Chelsea Clinton News, The Westsider and The Blackboard Awards. © 2012 Manhattan Media, LLC | 79 Madison Avenue, 16th Floor, New York, NY 10016 212.268.8600 | FAX: 212.268.0577 | www.manhattanmedia.com

LIGHT BULB ARMOND WHITE

Ella and Louis, 1958. © Polygram Records

istory interacts with our contemporary art experiences. That’s what keeps New York’s cultural scene lively and enriches our appreciation. At the Carnegie Hall concert for Philip Glass’ 75th birthday, the premiere of a new work (Glass’ Symphony No. 9, reviewed by Judy Gelman Myers) was also a reminder of his impact on the course of serious music. Howard Mandel traces its influence even in new work by jazz lone wolf Tim Berne. These events—signs of New York’s variety—parallel the opening of the Broadway production entitled The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess, where the past is revived with new urgency and intelligence. Every number resonates with memories of previous interpretations, even as the current cast brings fresh emotion and intensity to their characterizations. Joseph Smith’s opera definition tells us why. Historical resonance is essential to bringing thinking back for sophisticated art appreciation. We always respond to new experiences with curiosity about fresh meanings but also with an understanding of the artistic heritage being extended. At CityArts, the balance of the new and the vintage is a journalis-

tic requirement and a necessity for art lovers. It’s a matter of “memory and visual echoes” as Jim Long writes in his Carrie Pollock review. This awareness affects the way we value art experience, as seen in Joel Lobenthal’s survey of the star system being practiced by different dance companies and Ben Kessler’s deep look at the phenomenon of solo dance pieces in current music videos. Even an art form as young as the music video has traditions that affect the way new work is made and can be understood. This also holds true for gaming, as Steve Haske illustrates in writing about Rayman Origins—an example of the unique pleasure to be had from interactive art. About the cover: The 1958 Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong recording of Porgy and Bess’ songs exemplifies the best interaction. It’s impossible to watch a new production without also hearing how Ella and Louis made the landmark show part of their individual artistry. Claiming Porgy and Bess as their own—as Audra McDonald and Norm Lewis do—Ella and Louis confirmed an authentic expression of American ambition. We salute it as one of the great cultural artifacts.

Harkness Dance Festival Stripped/Dressed Curated by Doug Varone 5 weeks, 5 distinct styles, 15 evenings of intimate performances in 92Y’s historic Buttenwieser Hall.

Fri & Sat, 8 pm; Sun, 3 pm; $15 GET YOUR TICKETS TODAY!

Lar Lubovitch Dance Company FEB 17-19 Peggy Baker Dance Projects FEB 24 -26 Doug Elkins Choreography, Etc. MAR 2- 4 Monica Bill Barnes & Company MAR 9-11 Susan Marshall & Company MAR 16 -18

Order online and save 50% on service fees at 92Y.org/HarknessFestival or call 212.415.5500. MEDIA PARTNER

92Y Harkness Dance Center receives support from the Harkness Foundation for Dance; the Goldhirsh Foundation in memory of Wendy and Bernard Goldhirsh; Jody and John Arnhold; the Mertz Gilmore Foundation; the NYC Department of Youth and Community Development and the NYC Council; the NY State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the NY State Legislature; Judith K. and James Dimon; The Mary Duke Biddle Foundation; and the Capezio/ Ballet Makers Dance Foundation, Inc., among others.

92nd Street Y Harkness Dance Center Lexington Avenue at 92nd Street An agency of UJA-Federation

February 8–February 21, 2012 | CityArts 3

GALLERIES

EXHIBITION OPENINGS

Lovely Challenges

James Cohan Gallery: Yinka Shonibare MBE: “Addio del Passato.” Opens Feb. 16, 533 W. 26th St., 212-714-9500, jamescohan.com.

Buchwald and Lenaghan go for clarity

LAST CHANCE EXHIBITS

hile looking at Andrew Lenaghan’s paintings at George Adams Gallery, I overhead a visitor exclaim, “New York has never looked so lovely.” Really? There’s much to commend in the work, not least its crisp light and keen sense of place. But “lovely”? That’s such a mild adjective for pictures whose verisimilitude is inseparable from a pointed and, at

4 CityArts | February 8–February 21, 2012

Luise Ross Gallery: “From Iceland.” Opens Feb. 9, 511 W. 25th St., 212-343-2161, luiserossgallery.com. Hasted Kraeutler: Kim Dong Yoo. Opens Feb. 9, 537 W. 24th St., 212-627-0006, hastedkraeutler.com.

By Mario Naves he paintings of Howard Buchwald, on display at Nancy Hoffman Gallery, are as much a call to arms as an exhibition of art. Listen to Buchwald tell it: “Painting is not in the service of some purpose, objective, image or idea residing outside, prior to and independent of the specific work.” Momentarily commiserating with the aesthetically challenged, he does admit to “understand[ing] the anxiety that direct looking and feeling still produce.” But any “attempt to overcome this feeling by supplanting what is right there...is largely beside the point.” Don’t come to Buchwald, then, with high-flown theoretical flourishes or pressing sociological agendas. Codifying art by any means other than direct visual engagement stifles its integrity—why don a straitjacket when you’re given free agency? A fixture of the New York art world, Buchwald believes in the eye above all. His rigorously choreographed arrays of wriggling, rubbery lines and declarative, eye-rattling colors couldn’t kowtow to extra-aesthetic imperative if they wanted to. The rhythms are too headstrong, the compositions too unpredictable, the sense of purpose too fiercely independent. The pictures have the graphic clarity of superhero comics—you know, KA-POW!— and recall the New York School in their scale and ambition, though Buchwald’s firm sense of humor is entirely his own. The black line muscling its way through “Mapped (Large Red)” (2010) would steal the show if it weren’t for the acidic tonalities of “In or Out” (2008), a monumental canvas whose title is both plain-as-day descriptive and a challenge to the viewer.

DC Moore Gallery: Janet Fish: “Recent Paintings.” Opens Feb. 9, 535 W. 22nd St., 2122476-2111, dcmooregallery.com.

Alexandre Gallery: Lois Dodd: “New Panel Paintings.” Ends Feb. 18, 41 E. 57th St., 212-7552828, alexandregallery.com. Claire Oliver: Jennifer Poon: “Strange Blooms.” Ends Feb. 11, 513 W. 26th St., 212-929-5949, claireoliver.com. Postmasters: Monica Cook: “Volley.” Ends Feb. 11, 459 W. 19th St., 212-727-3323, postmastersart.com. Tanya Bonakdar Gallery: Thomas Scheibitz: “A Panoramic VIEW of Basic Events.” Ends Feb. 18, 521 W. 21st St., 212-414-4144, tanyabonakdargallery.com. Museums

(Above) Andrew Lenaghan, “McGuinness Blvd/Clay Street,” 2011, oil on panel, 24 x 32 inches. (Left) Howard Buchwald, “Float,” 2012, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 90 inches. Courtesy of the artist and George Adams Gallery, New York.

moments, bristly animism. Lenaghan has long been drawn to areas of Brooklyn that, when not mundane, are distinctly unlovely—a graffiti-laden building in Greenpoint, anonymous industrial structures in Williamsburg and the stained and mottled roadway bordering the Bedford Avenue Armory. Family is also a mainstay— in one painting, children watch Dora the Explorer; in another, a woman stands by the mirror in an unkempt bedroom. Geometry, as it informs the city’s infrastructure, our homes and backyards, is important, too. In their details, the picturesque and domestic are rendered with a skittering line that accumulates—sometimes tenuously, always convincingly—into solid form. The cobblestone

walkway at the bottom right of “New Stadium, Atlantic Avenue” (2011) is a particularly telling marker of Lenaghan’s pictorial abilities; the way in which errant mark-making and fidelity to observation are navigated is emblematic of his bracing and flinty intellect.

Howard Buchwald Through March 10, Nancy Hoffman Gallery, 520 W. 27th St., 212-966-6676, www.nancyhoffmangallery.com.

Andrew Lenaghan: Recent Paintings Through Feb. 18, George Adams Gallery, 525 W. 26th St., 212-564-8480, www.georgeadamsgallery.com.

Brooklyn Museum: “Newspaper Fiction: The New York Journalism of Djuna Barnes, 1913–1919.” Ends Aug. 19. “Question Bridge: Black Males.” Ends June 3. 200 Eastern Pkwy, Brooklyn, 718-638-5000, brooklynmuseum.org. International Center of Photography: “Weegee: Murder Is My Business.” Opens Jan. 20. “Perspectives 2012.” Ends Sept. 2. “Magnum Contact Sheets.” Ends May 6. “The Loving Story: Photographs by Grey Villet.” Ends May 6, 1122 6th Ave., 212-857-0000, icp.org. Metropolitan Museum of Art: “New American Wing Galleries for Paintings, Sculpture & Decorative Arts.” Opens Jan. 16. “Breaking the Color Barrier in Major League Baseball.” Opens Jan. 18, 1000 5th Ave., 212-535-7710, metmuseum.org. The Morgan Library & Museum: “Rembrandt’s World: Dutch Drawings from the Clement C. Moore Collection.” Opens Jan. 20, 225 Madison Ave., 212-685-0008, themorgan.org. Museum of Modern Art: “Foreclosed: Rehousing the American Dream.” “Print/Out.” Opens Feb. 19. “Millenium Magazines.” Opens Feb. 20. “9 Scripts from a Nation at War.” Ends. Aug 6. “Sanja Ivekovi: Sweet Violence.” Ends March 26, 11 W. 53rd St., 212-708-9400, moma.org. National Academy Museum: “The Annual: 2012.” Ends April 29, 1083 5th Ave., 212-3694880, nationalacademy.org. Whitney Museum of American Art: “Real/ Surreal.” Ends Feb. 12. “Aleksandra Mir: The Seduction of Galileo Galilei.” Ends. Feb. 19, 945 Madison Ave., 212-570-3600, whitney.org.

Traditions of Newness Gordon Moore put in context By John Goodrich

uncovered through an embracing discipline of rhythm. This exhibition features such moments frequently enough to make a memorable show. If you’re into this kind of pictorial expression, you may feel in these works the echoes of Mondrian and Matisse (and Matisse’s experience, in turn, of the distant

Gordon Moore: Paintings & PhotoEmulsion Drawings Through Feb. 11, Betty Cuningham Gallery, 541 W. 25th St., 212-242-2772, www.bettycuninghamgallery.com. LaPlacaCohen 212-675-4106

the renaissance portrait from donatello to bellini

Publication: CITY ARTS Insertion date: JANUARY 18, 2012

Through March 18

metmuseum.org

The exhibition is made possible by the William Randolph Hearst Foundation, the Diane W. and James E. Burke Fund, the Gail and Parker Gilbert Fund, and The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation. The exhibition was organized by Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. It is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities.

February 8–February 21, 2012 | CityArts 5

Antonio del Pollaiuolo, Portrait of a Lady (detail), ca. 1460–65, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie, and Domenico Ghirlandaio, Portrait of an Old Man and a Boy (detail), ca. 1490, Musée du Louvre, Paris.

MET-0113-Renaissance_CityArts_7.341x8.5_Jan18_v2.indd 1

1/12/12 6:00 PM

7.341 X 8.5, 4C NEWS

here would postmodernism be without paradoxes of context? After all, even works as dissimilar as Jasper Johns’ flag and Jeff Koons’ chrome bunny both recontextualize the familiar to challenge our perceptions of them. At Betty Cuningham, Gordon Moore’s exhibition of abstracted paintings and photo-emulsion drawings poses similar questions about processes of cognition, but through entirely different means. The artist pursues his investigations with remarkably delicate observations of his subject’s appearance, then arranges these perceptions in dynamic compositions. The results are quite startling—a unique blending of the usually divergent concerns of postmodernism and traditional art. Moore draws upon a number of contemporary trends: a focusing on the abject; a combining of multiple media, including photography; a juxtaposition of coarse and tidy textures. These come together in austere designs, dominated by brushy or vacant grays and laced by a few winding lines and sections of denser texture and subdued color. A number of his works include faint photographic images of the armatures of an unbent coat hanger or broken umbrella, their linear gestures extended by the artist’s own hand-rendered forms and shadows. Larger prismatic structures, airy but abstract, emerge among the intersections of the “real” and the manufactured. Moore’s modeling of the light-revealed objects is so subtle as to make one question which is truer: his eye or the camera’s? And which is more naturally spacious, the layered skeins of paint in the background or the jazzy polygon, flattened by its synthetically striped pattern but casting a faint fauxshadow? Even his darting lines thicken and narrow, giving the impression of twisted ribbons. These moments might be merely clever, but the artist arrives at them with authority; his designs are—forgive the dreaded word—composed. That is, his images are filled with surprising formal events, coordinating accelerations of contour and concentrations of detail. In “Facet” (2011), for instance, the obtuseness of the dominant form, spacious in its interior but cordoned by those tense ribbons, narrows to barely contact a smaller but somewhat darker

shape; in response, a small array of stripes flares into the larger form’s interior. In many of Moore’s works, the massive encounters the small, the compact opposes the buoyant in particular times and ways. There’s just enough naturalistic modeling to suggest the sculptural weight of elements, but their characters are most profoundly

rumble of Giotto). These are qualities of little interest to Johns and Koons, on the visual evidence of their work. Moore, however, reminds us that great traditions and postmodernism can be made to actually talk to each other—or at least wave as they pass.

Mechanical Garden Pollack’s error makes art By Jim Long

Carrie Pollack, “Blanket 1,” 2011, Pigment ink on linen, 36 x 26 in. Courtesy MINUS SPACE.

arrie Pollack is a poet of impermanence. Her subject is memory and the visual echoes that surround us everywhere. On daily walks with her camera, she records deteriorating poster debris, the sky at a particular moment—the usual stuff to which we ordinarily pay little attention—then subjects the imagery to computer processing and prints the final result on unsized artist’s linen. Her experiments engage oldschool photo collage, familiar from the days of dada, early pop and new realism in France. Surprisingly, new-school charm wins in these thoughtful covers of oldie classics. The notion that we know it already fades as what should be static imagery comes to life through the artist’s careful attention to the process of presentation, a process not without elements of comic unpredictability. Time and again the fabric jams in her printer, requiring readjustment. The artist’s attempts to precisely reposition the material and resume printing inevitably produces over-printed stripes of varying width across the image, technology’s equivalent of the expressionist’s drip. In her exploitation of these and other quirky “errors,” Pollack has discovered the

Spotland Journey through Hirst’s dotty past By Kate Prengel

amien Hirst is tapping into a simple fact: We all like smooth surfaces and bright colors. Since 1986, the bad boy British artist, notorious for his installations of floating animals in cases of formaldehyde, has produced about 1,500 spot paintings, white canvases covered in colorful circles. (He has an army of assistants to help him.) Right now, Gagosian Gallery is running a multi-city exhibit of all those spots in galleries from New York to London. There are three Gagosian locations in New York alone, which means you can immerse yourself in Spotland for the whole weekend without leaving town. And for me, at least, walking into the galleries was like walking into another coun-

6 CityArts | February 8–February 21, 2012

try. There seemed to be light everywhere, reflecting off of the powder-white canvases and the endless pastel spots. It was dazzling. The canvases themselves are totally flat and impenetrable; stare as I might at the dots, they wouldn’t give anything back to me. But this only reinforced my sense of foreign travel. After a while, like a tourist with a phrasebook, I picked up some hackneyed spot vocabulary and started to compare the canvases: here’s one with only four dots; here’s one where the dots are so tiny you’ll think you’re looking at computer code. I began to see unreal patterns in the white space between the dots. And by the time I walked into my second Gagosian location, I felt like an old hand, like a tourist going from one Spanish city to another. But then, what, exactly, does this trip leave you with? Some of the paintings are, it’s true, more interesting than others. The Gagosian Madison Avenue show includes Hirst’s first

garden in the machine. Exhibiting the works involves further subversion. Rather than delivering a prepared show, the artist arrives at the gallery with a roll of images and wooden stretchers of various sizes. The work is then stretched according to an intuitive process, often with the images off-center or out of alignment. Pollack’s humor, elements of performance/intervention and interest in technology link her aesthetic to artists such as Karin Sander. A modest-sized piece, “New Sky 1” (2011), is simply a barely inflected photo of a blank sky printed on linen. It hangs off by itself, but don’t miss it. With Witness, her first solo exhibition, Pollack has taken on imagery weighted with the avant-garde past. Dada’s torn paper drawings will shortly be a century old, and Arp’s hastily scribbled poetry was delivered to his printer with the instruction that the printer supply any words he might find illegible. Their attack of established culture and society proposed thorough disorder. Pollack’s process and allusive poetry are a gentler, reductive rebellion, announcing neither anti-art nor avant-garde but rather a refined awareness of image and support adapting to current concerns.

Carrie Pollack: Witness Through Feb. 25, MINUS SPACE, 111 Front St., Ste. 226, Brooklyn, 347-525-4628, www.minusspace.com.

spot painting, made back in 1986. The piece is wonderfully messy, dots splattering out of their neat circles and filling up almost all the white space on the canvas; the thing looks like a child’s playground. And in the same gallery, “Untitled with Black Dot” (1988) looks like a beloved old toy—the bright paint is scratched and the background is dirty, but it’s still here for us. For the most part, though, Hirst’s spots fade into one another. The differences between paintings are only interesting while you are immersed in the show; leave and you are left with nothing. I wish that I could contradict the endless array of critics who call Hirst a cynical moneymaker, but Gagosian makes it hard. Outside the Madison Avenue location, they’ve set up a pop-up store selling mugs, T-shirts and key chains with little dots on them: A souvenir from your visit to Spotland.

Damien Hirst: The Complete Spot Paintings 1986–2011 Through Feb. 18, Gagosian Gallery, 980 Madison Ave., 555 W. 24th St., 522 W. 21st St., www.gagosian.com.

MUSEUMS Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze, “Washington Crossing the Delaware,” 1851, Oil on canvas.

Lois Dodd NEW PANEL PAINTINGS

Jen Casad DRAWINGS

History Lesson: Leutze By JIM LONG

rom time to time over years of visiting The Metropolitan Museum of Art, I would find myself in front of Emanuel Leutze’s iconic “Washington Crossing the Delaware.” About 12 and a half feet high and 21 feet long, the huge rectangle was simply and plainly framed, hanging at just below knee height, if memory serves. “It’s about the ice,” I would think each time I saw it; acres and acres of the stuff, wonderfully observed and presented in loosely brushed color and impasto white varnished to cast a glitter over the surface. Pyramids of men and perhaps a woman of various nations and stations, rearing horses and standing cannon all crossing a frozen river of glory in boats without names. In the lead is a standing figure representing Washington, the center of a triangular composition along with a Scot, an African, Western sharpshooters, a trapper, what appears to be a pair of twins (one perhaps a woman), a Native American and future president James Monroe, a Noah’s Ark of intrepid democratic warriors in breaking dawn light headed to victory over a force of Hessian soldiers. The painting has recently been cleaned as part of the reorganization of The Met’s American collection and is now cradled in a 3,000-pound gold-leaf frame surmounted by a shield and eagle and bristling with rifles and bayonets. The work is hung too high on the wall, making it difficult for the eye to adjust to its perspective and, I would think, especially difficult for children or seated viewers. The painting has a curious story. Leutze’s

father was a German political activist who had to escape the country with his family. Leutze grew up in Philadelphia and returned to Germany during the revolutions of 1848. His epic 1849 work was conceived to lift the flagging spirits of the ’48ers, as they have come to be called. It’s called “Sturm Und Drang,” inspired by the 1776 play of that title by Freidrich Klinger about the American Revolution and a German lad, frustrated by life under despotism, who crossed the sea to become a soldier in Washington’s army. Leutze’s work is solidly in the tradition of German romanticism, which absorbed the Sturm und Drang (storm and stress) movement and produced paintings such as Caspar Wolf’s massive glaciers and the sea battles and avalanches of de Loutherbourg, as well as influencing American painters like Albert Bierstadt, Frederic Church and Thomas Cole, who hang with Leutze in the gallery. The source of Leutze’s icescape was the Rhine, not the Delaware, and according to experts, the formations in the painting are uncharacteristic of Delaware River ice, which forms as slabs. Yet, ultimately the work is too big to fail, and even though it was badly damaged in Leutze’s studio after it was finished, the insurance company that took ownership exhibited it to great success. Leutze began a second version that was sent to New York in 1851, where it found 50,000 viewers and is to this day the most popular painting in The Met’s collection. In our century, the work is more likely to be visited by groups of schoolchildren than by weary revolutionaries, but it remains an overthe-top monument to Leutze’s great goodwill and solidarity. The original ended up in Bremen, where it was destroyed by the British in a bombing raid during World War II.

A l e x a n d r e Ga l l e r y Fuller Building 41 East 57th Street at Madison www.alexandregallery.com

Manhattan School of Music Seventh Annual

KURT MASUR CONDUCTING SEMINAR FEB 17 / FRI / 7:30 PM

FEB 13 – 17 / MON–FRI

Borden Auditorium

Concluding Concert

Free Open Rehearsals

MSM SYMPHONY with Kurt Masur and Selected Seminar Conductors

MON / FEB 13 / 9:30 AM TUES / FEB 14 / 7 PM WED / FEB 15 / 9:30 AM THURS / FEB 16 / 7 PM FRI / FEB 17 / 9:30 AM

All-BEETHOVEN Program Overture to Egmont, op. 84 Symphony No. 6 in F Major, op. 68 Symphony No. 7 in A Major, op. 92 $20 Adults | $12 Seniors and Students

Manhattan School of Music

hOW WAShINGTON ICON CROSSED ThE POND

Through February 18

February 8–February 21, 2012 | CityArts 7

FILM

Theory vs. Practice A dazzling allegory in Chronicle By Armond White “Ever hear of Plato’s allegory of the cave?” one teenager asks another in Chronicle. This philosophy quiz was unexpected in the midst of a thrill ride movie, but Chronicle is so surprisingly interesting I wondered if its makers ever saw The Conformist (1970), where Bernardo Bertolucci visualized Plato’s allegory. When it’s good, Chronicle is less a thrill ride than a deliberation on movie thrills and contemporary youth market tastes. In Chronicle, debut director Josh Trank uses all of the high school adolescent clichés polished into queer angst (camera geek Dane DeHaan as Andrew, who documents his mother’s illness and his father’s abuse); Obama stargazing (look-alike Michael B. Jordan as student council prez Steve Montgomery); and hunk sensitivity (Alex Russell as Andrew’s very responsible cousin Matt). It’s commercial formula with a brash spin; Andrew’s snooping camera represents a poor kid’s attempt at both the self-consciousness

of the social media age and Hollywood’s latest cheap trend: using subjective realism as a premise for the horror and supernatural genres. This goes back to The Blair Witch Project and Cloverfield, trite exploitations of the hand-held, real-time camera gimmick, but Trank distances himself from both with state-of-the-art panache. Videography by Matthew Jensen makes spectacle the movie’s real subject. Chronicle’s sharp, ultra-clear, subtle imagery is more compelling than what happens to Andrew, Steve and cousin Matt’s friendship after they develop telekinetic superpowers upon encountering a meteorite. Chronicle alludes to the metaphoric hormonal urges of DePalma’s classics Carrie and The Fury—in fact, it’s loaded with pop references. Screenwriter Max Landis throws in plot concepts and gimmicks (like Obama and the cousin’s pursuit of a female video blogger) without ever achieving the concentration on moral quandary and mythology that distinguished last year’s TrollHunter, the Scandinavian upgrade of the witness-tohorror stunt premise. Landis and Trank only play around with

JAZZ

Lone Wolf Compositions Tim Berne presents ‘Snakeoil’ By Howard Mandel

im Berne is the saxophonist as lone wolf—a rangy and determinedly individualistic composer/improviser who has for 30-plus years lived far from the jazz mainstream and skirted the edges of the avant-garde. He’s been a presence in aficionado venues in New York, North America and beyond, and has just embarked on an 11-city U.S. tour, with a promising quartet performance at the Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art Feb. 17, to be followed by nine March gigs in Europe. With a new album—Snakeoil, his 41st as a leader—issued by the prestigious and welldistributed label ECM, Berne may be poised for a breakthrough. But that’s seldom how

8 CityArts | February 8–February 21, 2012

things work now, however worthy the sound. Most careers in the jazz arts gain stature gradually. Few saxophonist-composerimproviser-bandleaders attain anything like culture-wide name recognition, much less make their way into the national soundtrack. An artist who demonstrates creative originality and determined productivity will attract a coterie of collaborators and protégés and perhaps a cultish following. What their music has to offer a general audience will be discovered eventually, if at all. Berne also has a sound of his own as an instrumentalist and composer. His music has many dimensions: solemn, beseeching, sometimes expressing deep tenderness, sometimes urgent to the point of rage. Pieces often contain both minutely detailed episodes and open-ended, “free” parts. They are typically long (on Snakeoil they run from

that potential (also tossing in Let the Right One In allusions). But when the three friends discover an ability to fly and play football in the sky, the metaphor for prowess and transcendence blends digital video effects and genuine cinematic spectacle into the damnedest thing since the skydiving scenes in Point Break. From there, Chronicle’s play with spectacle and imagination is almost a fascinating version of Plato’s allegory. Beyond its gimmicky premise, Chronicle’s visual excitement raises the important issue of how we use and respond to media. When the camera appears to follow Andrew’s P.O.V. or capture his different adventures and humiliations—from spelunking to flying to sex—Trank seems to be exercising cinematic form. Like Andrew, he attempts to figure out what to do with this amazing digital video technique. (Is it accidental that neurasthenic DeHaan resembles a cross between Jonathan Caouette and Todd Haynes?) The Blair Witch Project, Cloverfield and the Paranormal Activity movies have degraded cinematic form, but when the hand-held, real-time stunt isn’t trite, the matter of aesthetic purpose and artistic responsibility must be pondered, as here. Do modern audiences know about Godard’s theory on editing as a political act or, having been raised on television and Internet excess,

seven and a half to more than 14 minutes) and develop unpredictably, true to their own unique forms. If Berne seems to be instinctively resistant to being tied down, he welcomes the contributions of bandmates. Early on, trumpeter Herb Robertson was his most significant countervoice; more recently, pianist Craig Taborn, whose solo album Avenging Angel (also on ECM) made many critics’ Top 10 lists in 2011, influenced Berne’s direction. “Craig is the master of making simple grooves sound like the end of the world—in a good way,” Berne said in a recent telephone interview. One distinctive element of Snakeoil is that Berne’s alto sax several times takes off jaggedly over repeated patterns, akin to contemporary music’s minimalism. “I don’t listen to minimalist composers much, but I like getting a lot out of a little,” he explained. “I like repetition, the trance element. When Philip Glass repeats the same three notes for 20 minutes, you either get bored or transported—the attitude you have toward it really changes the effect. I like the feel of phrasing that I can push, where something happens the more I play it. We

is cutting and camerawork just ignored in favor of dialog-based “content”? Masterpieces like Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch, Bertolucci’s The Conformist, DePalma’s The Fury and Spielberg’s War Horse and The Adventures of Tintin make aesthetic issues part of their stories—the Blair Witch hoaxes don’t. Trank’s fumbling allegory questions responsibility: The boys realize that their ability to move things and do damage carries an onus (their noses bleed) and cousin Matt comes up with rules that Andrew defies when enraged. Lacking consistent follow-through (Landis never explains the source of the boys’ powers), Chronicle deteriorates into a destructionof-Seattle finale, eventually trashing Trank’s subtle references to Nirvana’s cheerleadersin-hell music video “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” That Plato question is smart-assed. Chronicle superficially touches on philosophy as it superficially questions violence while exploiting Hollywood’s violent trends. Smart-alecky Landis invokes the apex predator theory as if to explain Andrew’s anxiety before defining it in dramatic terms. Chronicle’s frustrating misuse of dazzling cinematic technique raises the question of the era: Do youth audiences know what cinematic form is for?

Follow Armond White on Twitter @3xchair.

have one piece that in concert can keep repeating at the end for five minutes or more. I love that.” Even so, Berne’s ensemble—also called Snakeoil—is not pattern-bound. On the record, clarinetist Oscar Noriega shadows Berne’s alto but then stretches out on his own. There’s no bassist in Snakeoil; pianist Matt Mitchell solos and comps in an un-swinging, classical-referent idiom while drummer Ches Smith focuses on dynamics and percussion timbres as much as rhythmic drive. Yet, like every good jazz group, the band constructs and sustains admirable rapport. And the overall picture is the point. Rather than starting with a display of dazzling sax virtuosity, Snakeoil begins with a quiet, time-free piano introduction. Berne himself doesn’t play a note for three minutes. “I’m not big on hitting audiences with the hook right up front,” he said. “I don’t want to see the end of the movie at the beginning.” Does such reserve puzzle listeners? “They’re either there or not,” the lone wolf shrugged. He ventures towards us. Are we ready for him?

Reach the author at jazzmandel@gmail.com.

CLASSICAL

It’s Clarinet Month WILLIAMSON, MCGILL, MEYER AND ShIFRIN BLOW uP By JAy NORDLINGER

ay what you will about piano playing, conducting, violin playing and, especially, composing: This is a very good age for clarinet playing, even a great one. We have Alessandro Carbonare, Martin Fröst, Kari Kriikku and Julian Bliss, among others. Four of those others played in New York during the month of January. Call it clarinet month, almost a celebration. Two of the clarinetists appeared in concertos with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. The two used to be co-principals in that orchestra. But then one of them, Stephen Williamson, jumped to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Williamson played the Mozart concerto, arguably the greatest clarinet piece of them all (and one of Mozart’s greatest pieces, which is saying something). Under Maestro Fabio Luisi, the first movement began very fast, and there was not much grace. In fact, the music had a nasty edge, which is not this music at all. Moreover, the orchestra was spotty at so fast a tempo. The soloist, on the other hand, was clean and graceful. Was the speedy tempo of his choosing? Probably. The second movement, Adagio, was appropriately heavenly, with Williamson giving tenors and other singers a lesson in how to sing a Mozart aria. I think his overholding of

the last note was a little showy, however. Like the opening Allegro, the closing Allegro was taken at a breakneck tempo. The licorice stick could handle it, the orchestra not really. Incidentally, Williamson squeaked once or twice—but I always say, “Life is not a studio recording.” And Williamson is a supreme player. The other clarinetist on the afternoon, Anthony McGill, played the Copland concerto, written for Benny Goodman. It is in two movements, the first slow, the second fast. They are linked by a nifty cadenza. From McGill and Luisi, the first movement was mannered and stilted. The notes were placed just so, rather than flowing naturally. It must be said, though, that a wrong concept was executed beautifully. Things perked up with the cadenza, in which McGill showed superb judgment. And the second movement really swung. That is, the American clarinetist swung while the Italian conductor did his best. Sabine Meyer brought her clarinet trio— billed as Sabine Meyer’s Trio di Clarone—to the 92nd Street Y. Meyer gained worldwide fame in the early 1980s when Herbert von Karajan tried to install her in the Berlin Philharmonic. The old boys balked. Meyer walked, enjoying a rich solo career. She knows the other members of her trio very well: One is her husband, Reiner Wehle, and the other is her brother, Wolfgang Meyer. The men are outstanding in their own right. But I personally couldn’t take my ears off

Platinum Premiere JuBILEE CONCERT hONORS GLASS AND PÄRT By JUDy GELMAN MyERS

arnegie Hall hosted the best birthday party ever as the American Composers Orchestra presented the Philip Glass 75th Birthday Concert in the Isaac Stern Auditorium Jan. 31. Thousands of composers, musicians and music lovers broke into a roar when Glass was introduced, giving him no less than four curtain calls at concert’s end. The American Composers Orchestra is the only orchestra in the world dedicated

to promulgating the music of American composers. They commissioned Glass’ first orchestral work, as well as works by John Adams and Lukas Foss, among hundreds of others. For this concert, ACO conductor laureate Dennis Russell Davies paired Glass’ Symphony No. 9 (U.S. premiere) with Arvo Pärt’s Lamentate for orchestra and solo piano (New York premiere), brilliantly executed by Maki Namekawa. Both Glass and Pärt have been dubbed “minimalist.” While both composers decry the term, they employ some of the same compositional tools. Both require the audience to tune into tiny modulations in order

Sabine Meyer’s Trio di Clarone. Sabine, one of the most intelligent and elegant musicians around. She simply has the gift of “knowing,” and of doing. So does David Shifrin, who played the next afternoon in Alice Tully Hall. He was joined by the pianist Wu Han and the cellist David Finckel, who are married to each other, and who are the artistic directors of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. They succeeded Shifrin himself. Brits like to say of Queen Elizabeth II, “She never puts a foot wrong.” I say something similar of Shifrin. He is usually impeccable, but at the same time he’s not cautious or prim. He tackles music with relish. He does not have one sound, but dozens, as all good clarinetists do: He picks the one most suited

to the note or phrase at hand. And he has an uncanny sense of the “stream” of music, its momentum. I will give you two details from this concert: He took such a long breath in a Brahms trio, I thought, “Who does he think he is, Dmitri Hvorostovsky [the Russian baritone, who is suspected of having a third lung]?” And there is a Bruch piece that begins with a merry, quick tune, played by the piano. Shifrin had a look on his face that said, “I can’t wait to get it.” In a final bit of clarinet news, Ricardo Morales has joined the New York Philharmonic as principal this season. Previously he was with the Met Orchestra and then the Philadelphia. He, too, is a master, a star. Yes, we are in a lucky age for the clarinet.

to grasp the music’s greater purpose; both employ non-Western modes; both employ repetition to signal its opposite: change. Indeed, change itself is the event that happens in this music. It may or may not be beautiful, but it is significant. Musical resolution is not considered the inevitable outcome, it’s just one more change, which appears in two guises: a shift, often abrupt and without closure, from one pattern to the next or a shift within a pattern. More subtle, the second has greater effect. There are obvious differences between the two composers. Pärt abandoned avantgarde techniques to study Gregorian chant and medieval polyphony before emerging with his own haunting, otherworldly voice. He composed Lamentate after seeing Anish Kapoor’s statue “Marsyas,” which captured

for him the myth’s tragic element: No one can escape death and suffering. When Lamentate begins, you feel something great happening somewhere in the world. As it draws to a close, you’re sharing the human experience of the world’s end. What is remarkable is that Pärt tunes you into the infinite with the sparest of sounds, the most delicate juxtapositions. Glass collaborated with poet Allen Ginsberg, pop icon David Bowie and theater iconoclast Robert Wilson. His ninth symphony, which he describes as “big and unrelenting,” is full of syncopated rhythms, a fortified horn section and a second movement that begins with the lyric simplicity of a pop love song. Not quite “Happy Birthday to You,” but close enough to make for a very happy evening. February 8–February 21, 2012 | CityArts 9

THEATER

Art vs. Controversy EVERYONE’S ‘PORGY AND BESS’ By ARMOND WHITE

tephen Sondheim failed to set the agenda for Broadway camp followers when he decried the new production The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess. Instead, his argument that the DuBose and Dorothy Heyward and George and Ira Gershwin collaboration was inviolable wound up setting the stage for its 21st-century reception, proving why the show matters. Since its premiere in 1935, Porgy and Bess—as opera, musical theater, album or film—makes a relentless claim on American cultural values. Its story of black American ghetto dwellers as envisioned by white and Jewish American artists reveals the contradictions of American social and artistic history like few other works of art. Conceived as a “folk opera,” a hybrid term that mediated its authors’ ambitions and the class snobbery they opposed, Porgy and Bess was created in contradistinction to blues and jazz and Negro spirituals while alluding to them all. And all of it must always be rethought. The current Broadway production from the American Repertory Theater (ART), directed by Diane Paulus with a new book by Suzan-Lori Parks, stars Norm Lewis and Audra McDonald in modern interpretations of the title cripple and his wanton woman. The characters’ psychology is emphasized—but within the complexity of the material, which shows its richness.

Committed actress McDonald, romantic Lewis and thoughtful Paulus and Parks contribute to the legacy of Porgy and Bess interpretations. Their intention is not to change the show but to bring it forward; their success is in not succumbing to obvious contemporary political attitudes. This Porgy and Bess—only partly emphasizing the Gershwin score—finds a loophole in political correctness by taking refuge in art. In more politically principled times, Porgy and Bess was understood as either an expression of sympathetic imagination or an insult to a group’s self-identification (contradictions still attached to Otto Preminger’s gorgeous 1959 film version that to this day is regretted by its conscientious star, Sidney Poitier). But only a shallow appreciation of the show would condemn it for white folks’ patronizing or black folks’ humiliation. Paulus, Parks and ART cannily follow the show’s pop heritage. This scaled-down production (trimmed from four hours to two and a half, presenting Catfish Row as a theatrical idea— more factory than community—not a political reality) suggests an intelligent, choreographed concert version to which McDonald, Lewis and the other players bring compelling presence. Performed this way, Porgy and Bess’ narrative reveals the same triangular dynamic as Bizet’s Carmen transferred to American circumstances, a way of better understanding the same social conditions that the Gershwins surely knew also plagued the underclass of New York’s Lower East Side and were universal to the human experi-

IN MORE POLITICALLy PRINCIPLED TIMES, PORGy AND BESS WAS UNDERSTOOD AS EITHER AN ExPRESSION OF SyMPATHETIC IMAGINATION OR AN INSULT TO A GROUP’S SELFIDENTIFICATION

10 CityArts | February 8–February 21, 2012

Andra McDonald and Norm Lewis in Porgy and Bess. Photo: Michael J. Lutch

ence: impotence, rapacity, superstition. Now, the Gershwins’ initial cultural appropriation has been newly appropriated. Every time an artist puts a new spin on the show, its beauty and depth become more apparent as generations realize new ways to approach the material and bring out its truths. This is the wonder of the great 1958 Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong concept album and the various renditions recorded by Nina Simone, Sarah Vaughan, Leontyne Price and William Warfield, Ray Charles and even such stand-alone interpretations as Billy Stewart’s “Summertime” and Billie Holiday’s astonishing, late, “I Loves You, Porgy,” so subtly, eccentrically personalized it obliterates all other versions (and certainly informs McDonald’s characterization). Out of the show’s Negritude origin, modern artists reshape it, providing their own

view on its stereotypes while also addressing its “classic status.” Porgy and Bess was never kitsch but music of magnificent, stylized sorrow, beauty and desperation. If the Gershwins couldn’t give this black story the fullest politics, they gave it their fullest artistry—a sign of respect that Ella, Louis, Billie and others return, thus making the songs a vehicle of African-American triumph over the would-be oppressive institutions of opera and theater and the national songbook. Sondheim’s defense on behalf of authorship was an elitist protest that ignored the reality of how interpretations happen through time. There should be no controversy. Translating Porgy and Bess into personal art is one of the greatest, most meaningful traditions of American pop culture.

Follow Armond White on Twitter @3xchair.

DANCE

The Takeover WhEN GuEST STARS RuLE DANCE By JOEL LOBENTHAL

t sometimes seems today as if every ballet company in the world is fronted by a representative sampling of about a dozen perpetual guest stars. Each has a company that they at least nominally call home, but they are continuously orbiting out on their own. Sometimes they need no more firmament or context than their own reflected glitter, which is what brings five of ballet’s busiest men to City Center later this month for the Kings of the Dance. Reigning this year are David Hallberg (ABT and the Bolshoi), Marcelo Gomes (ABT), Ivan Vasiliev (Mikhailovsky Ballet in St. Petersburg, Russia), Guillaume Coté (National Ballet of Canada) and Denis Matvienko (Mariinsky). The current roster dominance of guest stars certainly robs performance opportunities from a company’s full-time mem-

bers. It also works against the possibility of establishing a homogenous company style, which at one time was the overriding artistic ambition of the world’s major companies. On the other hand, it quells within the host company what is one of the worst occupational hazards: complacency. Largely trained in the state-supported ballet academies of Europe and the former Soviet Union, the guesting globe-trotters almost invariably manifest stage-readiness and confidence, a certain worldliness and glamour. Companies can benefit from their knowledge, professionalism and experience. But the guest-star treadmill as a rule is not a range or artistry widening exercise. Principal dancers get the most solo stage time, so administrations tend to pick people who are likely to appeal to the widest demographic. Guest stars are on stage in more places than “mere” principal dancers, and they tend to market easily comprehended physical and performance

temperament. It’s easy for them to get into bad habits, become self-indulgent or rely on special effects. The stamina needed to survive their itineraries mark them as superhuman, but of course they

IT’S A SHORT CAREER, AND PLANNING A COMFORTABLE RETIREMENT IS NOTHING TO BE ASHAMED OF, BUT I WOULD APPRECIATE A BIT MORE FRANkNESS ABOUT IT. are not. Jet lag and fatigue are ever-present impediments to quality. When the Berlin Ballet’s Polina Semionova—a prominent ballerina in the guest tribe—made her ABT debut as Kitri in a Saturday matinee of Don Quixote last May, her performance was less stellar than it

Not Necessarily So ‘PORGY’ REBORN By JOSEPH SMITH

Broadway production calls itself The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess. There is no such thing. In a musical, the words may have as much importance as the music; thus, for instance, Girl Crazy is “by” the Gershwins, plural. But Porgy and Bess is an opera. (Music and singing are continuous, although “numbers” such as arias, ensembles and choruses stand out by virtue of their tunefulness and closed forms.) In opera, since music rather than words dominates the drama, the work is “by” its composer. (For instance, La Traviata is by Verdi, not Verdi and Piave; anyone who dislikes Strauss will hardly enjoy Der Rosenkavalier, despite its inspired Hofmannsthal libretto.) Even if Ira Gershwin’s contribution to the text had been as large as DuBose Heyward’s—which it is not—Porgy and Bess would be by George Gershwin. The primacy of the music distinguishes

opera from musical in every respect. An opera composer, for instance, always orchestrates the work himself, because tone color is an essential element. (Gershwin orchestrated Porgy, but never his musicals.) In opera, vocal range will often compromise intelligibility—this is the price we pay for the emotive power of the vocal extremes. (In “My Man’s Gone Now,” for instance, we miss much of the text, but Serena’s passionate wailing is more eloquent than words.) Most operas are sung throughout, and since singing is slower than speech, the amount of text is limited, necessitating a certain oversimplification and crudeness in the text. The librettist must rely on the composer to supply nuance, poetry, subtext and emotional complexity. Generally, opera is a big medium. If Gershwin’s opera were principally about Porgy and Bess, it would not require its many supporting roles and huge chorus. In fact, the piece is as much about the relationship of each individual to the community of

might have been. For me, her schedule loomed as the likely culprit, all the more so when I later read in the New York Times that she had left the theater after her debut and gone directly to the airport to catch a flight to La Scala in Milan for her next gig. (She missed the flight.) It’s a short career, and planning a comfortable retirement is nothing to be ashamed of, but I would appreciate a bit more frankness about it. When Hallberg joined the Bolshoi, what you probably didn’t hear (I didn’t) amid the press hoopla was the salient fact that, as well as artistic satisfaction, pecuniary rewards had to have been a major factor in his decision. Certainly, Kings of the Dance has been lucrative for the kings as well as for impresario Sergei Danilian. But Kings aims for a degree of creative accomplishment as well by commissioning new works for the reigning monarchs; this month, there will be no less than eight New York premieres shown.

Read more by Joel Lobenthal at Lobenthal.com.

Audra McDonald, NaTasha Yvette Williams and ensemble in Porgy and Bess. Photo: Michael J. Lutch

Catfish Row as about the title characters. Porgy’s largeness (and, alas, expense!) is not a matter of extrinsic spectacle but an essential factor, as proved not only by the sheer number of choruses but also by their musical complexity and richness. Thus, an “intimate” Porgy is an oxymoron. Those who acknowledge Porgy and Bess to be an opera will understand that its dramaturgy is inseparable from its music; the composer is the “auteur.” A good example would be its ending: Porgy sets off to New York in his goat cart to rescue Bess. The music that rings down the curtain doesn’t address what may happen to Porgy, but

what Porgy is feeling. The music of “Oh, Lawd, I’m on My Way” tells us that Porgy’s quest exalts and ennobles him and that Catfish Row is inspired by him. As an audience, we can like or dislike the ending but, since it is a musical climax, it is integral to the work. We should not allow the present production to say that it is merely casting off “tradition.” At issue is not how the work has been performed but what it is—a coherent musical work. A cut-down, reorchestrated production retaining only a fraction of the music is neither “the Gershwins’” nor George Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess. February 8–February 21, 2012 | CityArts 11

ON GAMING

Back to Gaming Basics ThE ELuSIVE JOYS OF RAYMAN ORIGINS By STEvE HASkE

hen was the last time you had real fun playing a game? I’m not talking about the pleasure you get from playing Pac-Man or Madden or Words with Friends. Those are all perfectly fine games, of course, but like so many titles today, they’re missing an element that’s rarely found in the medium: pure, adulterated joy. Through the years, Nintendo has been pretty consistent in offering this kind of almost indescribable elation. Super Mario Bros. obviously comes to mind first, dating from the NES to the present-day Super Mario Galaxy titles. That joyous feeling is hard to put my finger on. I could sit here and analyze the simplicity of design or how the bright, colorful whimsy naturally leaves one beaming, but that’d kind of be missing the point. With joy, it’s more about moments— maybe you’ve quickly completed a tricky

series of jumps through a challenging platforming section or have collected a powerup and are soaring over a level as Mario audibly whoops in delight. Whatever the case, it just feels good. But aside from Donkey Kong Country Returns—the best non-Mario Nintendo platformer of this console generation—it’s been years since I’ve felt as much genuine joy with a game as I have while playing Rayman Origins recently. The intro is all you need. When Rayman and his layabout friends accidentally annoy an underground, gibberish-spouting Hell-grandma by snoring too loudly above ground, it’s hard not to laugh at the fury of goofy, bizarre monsters she unleashes. Rayman Origins’ ridiculous personality is overwhelmingly infectious. Items may sing at you as you collect them. The exaggerated slapstick and weird art direction feel like a bit like a European Looney Tunes. You won’t necessarily understand how your score works. I don’t even know what sort of creature my favorite character is. He kind of resembles a drunk frog (I

POP

Dancing With Myself SOLO VIDEOS GO VIRAL By BEN kESSLER

oo often, music videos exist solely to maximize a performer’s impact on consumer culture, a branding exercise. But there’s a small subgenre of solo dance performance videos—typified by the recent viral hits “Lonely Boy” and “Call Your Girlfriend”—that inverts consumerist logic, expressing instead the impact of popular culture upon the individual within “normal” society. This subgenre can be traced back to director Spike Jonze’s groundbreaking, millennial Fatboy Slim clips “Praise You” and “Weapon of Choice,” wherein Jonze (and his muse Christopher Walken) wittily combined youth culture anarchy and popcult grace. Jonze, in turn, may have drawn inspiration from Denis

12 CityArts | February 8–February 21, 2012

Lavant’s unforgettable solo dance at the end of Claire Denis’ film Beau Travail (1999). Against the house track “Rhythm of the Night,” Lavant depicted in wild, scary choreography the suffering of a repressed man succumbing to his inner demons. Switching in an instant from ramrod military posture to fully horizontal prostration, he described his character’s torment as a kind of crucifixion. Though related to tragic plot events adapted from Melville’s Billy Budd, Lavant’s dance—a suicide note communicated in movement—conveyed the ironic triumph of deviance over normality. At a much lower level of physical articulation, we have The Black Keys’ “Lonely Boy,” in which actor Derrick T. Tuggle performs a quasi-parodic dance routine in unadorned office space. Tuggle’s palsied renditions of the twist and various disco moves complement the banal, derivative song. He quite

A scene from Rayman Origins.

don’t know his name, either). Co-op trolling by slapping friends silly is maybe the most enjoyment you can have in Rayman Origins. Wonderfully, there’s no particular incentive to do so—screwing around is just hilarious. This is the kind of game where few will be able to resist the urge to stop acting their age at least once— and I have yet to meet someone who doesn’t have a grin plastered on their face within five minutes of playing because of it.

literally goes through the motions specified by the uninspired lyrics, looking at his watch as the singer complains about a girl who keeps him waiting, etc. It’s unclear whether the joke is on The Black Keys or on the viewer, but Tuggle’s spirited literalism certainly appealed to fanboy culture’s love of “faithful” remakes and rehashes, with 7 million YouTube views and counting. Back in December, Robyn’s video “Call Your Girlfriend” inspired its own viral remake in connection with the singer’s Saturday Night Live appearance. SNL writer Taran Killam’s workplace re-enactment of Robyn’s solo dance coup was a rare embarrassment-free moment for the show. Neither withering satire nor fawning celebrity tribute, Killam’s disco moment was an amusing testament to the original video’s infectious sense of drama. Set on a soundstage without scenery (as bare as the hallway in “Lonely Boy”), “Call Your Girlfriend” serves as a clarion call to imaginative projection. Seemingly in one take, Robyn—an untrained dancer—struts, slides and somersaults through director Max Vitali’s widescreen frame. The expansive image puts Robyn’s solo dance in per-

Plus, the soundtrack has stubby bassoon and “Foggy Mountain Breakdown”-style banjo. That’s got to be worth something. Rayman Origins is available now for PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii. Donkey Kong Country Returns and Super Mario Galaxy 1 and 2 are available now for the Wii.

Steve Haske is a Portland, Ore.-based freelance journalist. Follow him on Twitter @afraidtomerge

spective. What’s most important here is not the performer’s individual talent or ego but the emotions she works to evoke, which are bigger than she is. And when the soundstage lighting shifts dramatically, suddenly conjuring a dance club, Robyn and Vitali capture how feelings set free by pop culture transform our perceptions, thus transfiguring the everyday world. These one-person flash mobs flaunt the incongruity of amateur dance in quotidian space. They confront an apparently uncaring society with flamboyant spectacles of deviant feeling, perhaps none more effectively than last year’s “Überlin,” the R.E.M. video directed by Sam Taylor-Wood. Solo performer Aaron Johnson’s dance through the streets of London keeps swerving around masculine norms. When imitating a Banksy-like squirrel graffito or cartwheeling on the pavement, he’s closer to Lavant (yes, him again) in the “Modern Love” sequence of Leos Carax’s Mauvais Sang (1986). Suspended in air like a trapeze artist, with a streetlamp wedged between his legs, Johnson offers iconoclasm that translates as sexy heroism. That’s a triumph worthy of Lavant and Jonze.

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February 8–February 21, 2012 | CityArts 13

AUCTIONS

Going, Going Auctions By Caroline Birenbaum African Americana at Auction Swann introduced thematic auctions of African Americana way back in 1996 and added separate sales of fine art by AfricanAmerican artists in 2007. They now conduct at least two major auctions of AfricanAmerican fine art each year, along with an annual winter sale of Printed & Manuscript African Americana. This season, Chicago auctioneer Leslie Hindman jumps in with an auction of Works by African-American Artists. Swann’s Feb. 16 auction of AfricanAmerican fine art contains a wide array of prints, drawings, photographs, paintings and sculptures by both familiar and seldom seen artists, with pieces ranging from the 1860s to the first decade of the 21st century. Highlights among the works on paper include Charles White’s large charcoal drawing, “J’Accuse! Number 10,” which appeared in a cropped version on the cover of Ebony magazine’s August 1966 special issue on “The Negro Woman”; “Fish Fry,” a pen-and-ink drawing by Jacob Lawrence; a complete set of Kara Walker’s “Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated),” consisting of 15 offset lithographs and screen prints; and significant pieces from the estate of drummer Max Roach, including a set of four color screen prints by David Hammons and Bruce Talamon designed for use as album covers and Romare Bearden’s oil monotype, “A Portrait of Max: In Sounds, Rhythms, Colors and Silences.” Of special note among many splendid paintings are two landscapes by 19th-century Cincinnati artist Robert Scott Duncanson; Samuel Countee’s “My Guitar,” which was a favorite at the 1936 Texas Centennial Exhibition; a biomorphic abstraction by Charles Alston; a large figurative Haitian scene on masonite by Ellis Wilson; Alma Thomas’ colorful depiction of the August 1963 march on Washington; and “Eastern Star,” a very large, vivid abstract acrylic on canvas by William T. Williams, the first painting by the New York artist and teacher

14 CityArts | February 8–February 21, 2012

to come to auction. Swann’s March 1 auction of Printed & Manuscript African Americana offers important documents and ephemeral material relating to the history of slavery, racism and civil rights. The B. H. Munday Family’s Slave Bible contains seven pages inscribed with the names, birth and death dates of this Essex County, Va., family’s slaves, significant information for African-American genealogists. An archive related to Pan-Africanist Marcus Garvey includes photographs, essays and broadsides. Military items include the only known copy of a World War II recruitment poster of Pearl Harbor hero Dorie Miller and an album of 77 personal photographs depicting the Tuskegee Airmen while stationed in Italy. Among featured civil rights items are the June 20, 1963, preliminary printing of what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964, with a handwritten note by New York Rep. Emanuel Celler to NAACP Washington Bureau Director Clarence Mitchell: “To Clarence—An indefatigable worker for Civil Rights, here is my home work sheet, Emanuel Celler,” and an original copy of the tally of votes for the Act; and two inscribed copies of Martin Luther King Jr.’s Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story, dedicated to A. Philip Randolph and Illinois Sen. Paul H. Douglas. Swann: Feb. 16, 2:30 p.m. Previews Feb. 11 & 13–16. March 1, 10:30 a.m. & 2:30 p.m. Previews Feb. 25 & 27–29. www.swanngalleries.com. Leslie Hindman’s inaugural auction of Works by African-American Artists March 1 features Duncanson’s “The Apennines, Italy,” Hughie Lee-Smith’s “Acropolis II” and an abstract acrylic and gouache by Thomas. Hindman will also offer a “selling exhibition” of works by African-American artists that will run concurrently with the auction preview. Leslie Hindman, March 1, 7 p.m. Previews Feb. 25 & 27–March 1, www.lesliehindman.com.

Paul Evans Studio, wall hanging, polychromed and bronzed torch-cut steel, 1960s. Estimate $18,000– $24,000. At auction at Rago Feb. 26. Photo courtesy Rago.

Out-of-Town Visitor Rago, the Lambertville, N.J., auctioneer, holds its first preview in Manhattan, exhibiting highlights from its Feb. 25–26 auction of 20th- and 21st-Century Design. Featured examples include a carved table from the Arden utopian community; a three-panel screen by Donald Deskey; fine furniture from the New Hope, Pa., area, including carved wood chairs by Phil Powell, a bench by George Nakashima and a large wrought metal wall hanging by Paul

Evans from the collection of the original owner; French furniture by Dominique, Royère and André Sornay; and an assortment of decorative smalls from all over the world, such as a rare sterling and enamel tea caddy by Ramsden & Carr and contemporary glass by Kyohei Fujita. Rago, Feb. 25 & 26, 11 a.m. New York previews at The Apthorp, Feb. 11 & 12, noon–5 p.m. Call 609-397-9374 for an open house appointment. www.ragoarts.com.

THE CITyARTS INTERvIEW

Dr. kahlil Gibran Muhammad D

r. Kahlil Gibran Muhammad, formerly an assistant professor of history at Indiana University, was named director of Harlem’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture at a press conference Nov. 17, 2010. On the flight home that day, Muhammad glanced over to see his seatmate unfold the New York Times’ Arts and Leisure section and there he was, smiling back at himself from the front page. “Talk about a learning curve,” says the 38-year-old great-grandson of Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad and author of The Condemnation of Blackness, who has succeeded longtime Schomburg leader Howard Dodson. “I couldn’t hide in my 8-by8-foot faculty office anymore.” By the following July, Muhammad was back in New York City, submerged in a crash course on the Schomburg’s massive holdings and confronting the reality that libraries are scrambling to reinvent themselves in a world where information can be conjured up by a finger stroke on a hand-held computer screen. [Elena Oumano] CityArts: What are you doing to reach out to young people? Khalil Gibran Muhammad: We’re not focused strictly on literacy; we’re also interested in historical and cultural literacy, and that kills two birds with one stone. We want young people to read more, consume and take advantage of the arts, and we want them to have a context and deeper understanding of where these ideas come from, how they evolved and why they’re relevant today. We’ve developed partnerships with other leaders of educational institutions in this community who address this need for consciousness and critical engagement and develop young people’s sense of having a stake in these debates and institutions. Our Saturday Junior Scholars Program focuses on the African Diaspora, AfricanAmerican history, performing arts, visual arts, scholarship and journalism and teaches how to reengineer ideas from the past to express yourself in the present so you can become inspired, critically engaged and take on the world through the lens of an understanding that everything that meets the eye isn’t a reflection of reality, that there

are often many layers to peel away. The prospect of Def Jam founders Russell Simmons and Rick Rubin leaving their papers to the Schomburg has come up. We’re figuring out how to sell preservation to the hip-hop generation. We have John Coltrane’s sheet music, which makes sense as paper evidence of growth in composition. But it’s different with beat box machines and digital sampling. One, it’s more material than written down and two, for the founders of hip-hop in particular, because things weren’t written down in that traditional way, we have to meet them where they are and focus on the AV preservation part of it. That’s new. Part of the conversation I’ll have with these artists is also about scraps of paper that get translated into published music, because that’s part of the process. Many of them don’t think of it that way. It’s fascinating, because you’d think this is an obvious meeting of the minds, a mutual interest, but it’s also challenging because cultural institutions like the Schomburg don’t have the same resonance they did for earlier generations. It’s like the black church: Everyone of any significance, except for a small minority of converted Muslims, went through the black church. Whether they got their vocal training or political skills, the black church was at the center of everything. The Schomburg was a cultural, secular equivalent—particularly for people in New York and people who engage in the arts. That’s no longer true. The church has lost its foothold and so have cultural institutions like the Schomburg. The Schomburg was founded during the Harlem Renaissance. Is there a need for another Harlem Renaissance? We’re in the midst of a renaissance, in terms of literary and cultural production. African Americans and black folk from various parts of the world are producing a tremendous amount of work, and our challenge is to support the cultural work of this community, whether it’s small, grassroots theaters, authors or artists. We see a cultural intimacy that didn’t exist on this scale in earlier generations, but there’s a lack of appreciation for the social and economic context that still undergirds the reality of segregated lives.

Dr. Kahlil Gilbran Muhammad, director of Harlem’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Photo courtesy of NYPL

Most black children attend overwhelmingly segregated schools; blacks and whites still don’t live together in major cities. Economic inequality has grown worse rather than better. We’re trying to address that cultural sensibility, that sense of being part of something bigger through engaged programming. Our new programs Stage for Debate and Talks at the Schomburg bring these issues together. Stage returns to the performance of engaging ideas instead of panels or moderated discussions, where people are mostly polite and not necessarily rigorously engaging each other. We want to take two people with published records who oppose each other’s points of view on important issues, like racial identity. This is not about personality or demagogy but issues such as what are the basic operating assumptions about who black people are in the 21st century, which underlies a lot of today’s literary

production. That raises the literacy of young people in that they can embrace complexity because that’s exactly the world we live in. We’re planning a major innovative hiphop exhibition for 2013 that won’t be just a celebration but a take on hip-hop as a historical phenomenon—what was the context, how has it evolved? What are the contours of its reach and influence? What were the foundation’s successes and mistakes? We want to be a platform for those conversations and document them. When we look back, we don’t want to run into people anywhere in New York City who say, “I’ve never been to the Schomburg Center.” Not only is it about celebrating the legacy of so many giants and lesser-known folk, it’s also about investing in this institution and making sure that the work black people have done then and now continues to be celebrated and be a central thread in the fabric of the American story. February 8–February 21, 2012 | CityArts 15

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16 CityArts | February 8–February 21, 2012

Box Office

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