Crawling Back Into the Archives

Reading from the West Coast, I was struck by that phrase in Ben Brantley’s myopic blip of a review of the City Center Encores! staging of Juno last week in the New York Times. Oh you jaded, jaded New Yorkers! Not appreciating sufficiently either Encores! or performing arts archives.

Image credit: NYPL Digital Gallery Image ID #TH-57070

 

Lincoln Kirstein: Alchemist Exhibit at NYPL

Word to Joel Lobenthal of the New York Sun once again for his coverage of this exhibition, which opened last week, at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. We hope to have our own report in this space sometime soon, but in the meantime, you can read the NYPL press release. Or, even better, if you’re in the New York area, check it out for yourself! You have until the end of January.

 

Critic Gives Props to Archives

In today’s New York Sun, dance critic Joel Lobenthal concludes his review of the restored Balanchine Don Quixote film at the New York Public Library by singing the library’s praises (the only critic whom I’ve come across — so far– to explicitly do so):

The Performing Arts library’s restoration of the Balanchine-Farrell “Don Quixote” confirms its status as one of the world’s most important archives of the arts. The library is to be commended for restoring and making available this fascinating and slightly disturbing artifact.

You’ll get no argument here. Check out the rest of the piece in the Sun here (possibly the only time you may ever read that advice in this space) for some other interesting insights.