HubArts.com

ICA announces Foster Prize finalists

Like the Academy Awards, the ICA's Foster Prize is enlarging its list of nominees this year for reasons not entirely transparent. The Oscars jumped the Best Picture field from five to ten nominees. The Institute of Contemporary Arts/Boston announced this week that there are nine Foster Prize nominees this year, up from the usual four. "The Foster  Prize exhibition is an exciting opportunity for audiences in Boston and beyond to appreciate the artistic innovation happening here in our community," Jill Medvedow, director of the ICA said in the statement announcing the nominees. "This year's exhibition more than doubles the number of local artists participating in the program, bringing increased focus to the impressive work being created in Boston's vibrant art scene."

Properly called  the 2010 James and Audrey Foster Prize, the ICA's biennial award and exhibition program for Boston-area artiststhis year includes a wide range of work in sculpture and installation, film and video, painting, drawing and photography. The finalists will participate in an exhibition at the ICA that opens Sept. 22, 2010, and continues through Jan. 30, 2011. The winner of the $25,000 prize will be announced in January 2011. The Fosters are contemporary art devotees; James Foster is an ICA Trustee and Chairman, President and CEO of Charles River Laboratories.

And...drum roll please...the nominees are:  Robert de St. Phalle, Eirik Johnson, Fred Liang, Rebecca Meyers, Matthew Rich, Daniela Rivera, Evelyn Rydz, Amie Siegel and Steve Tourlentes. Their bios follow after the jump. And Greg Cook has some samples of their work here.

(Image: Peter Vanderwarker via ICA.)

Northeastern gets all electroacoustic

I'm always wary of words that sound like oxymorons: Electroacoustic? Really? But it sounds like the Northeastern Department of Music has something cool going on with the Music Tech Spring 2010 Concert Series, a set of four shows mixing electronic and acoustic sources and curated by the Northeastern University Music Technology program and Georg Hajdu, Visiting Professor of Music. The festivities begin Jan. 23 at the Fenway Center with a program features the music of Canadian composer Gilles Gobeil (pictured) plus one I'm really looking forward to: "Slinky," for acoustic guitar and electronics, written and performed by Northeastern's Mike Frengel. Subsequent shows are Feb. 13 at the Fenway Center, March 16 at the Goethe Institute and March 31 back at the Fenway Center. Bonus: All the shows are FREE. Details on all the shows are here. (Full disclosure: my wife works at Northeastern's library.)

Calling all robot artists

You know what I mean. Boston's "low brow destination," the Space 242 gallery in the South End, has issued an open call for "artwork depicting robots including paintings, drawings, comics, photographs, sculpture, multi-media." The work will be considered for the gallery's exhibit "I...YOU...WE...ROBOT! A Visual Homage To Our Inner Geeks," running Jan. 29 through Feb. 19. Kinda quick turnaround times on this, but you can email info (at) space242.com for a submission form. (Picture from here.)

Morning reading: WGBH v. WBUR and more

If I was making up the front page today, I would have been tempted to put Alex Beam's hi-larious "radio wars" column on the front instead of the BU opera resume embarrassment. I was kind of disappointed he didn't find an opening to bring up Chris Lydon's former BUR salary, but nothing is perfect. ... Also in G is my theater column, "Theater company scripts say 'trim' and 'team up.'" I made a rookie mistake - I pitched a column idea that required eleventy-hundred phone  calls to do right. But it came out pretty good. ... Names and the Herald both do right by our local SYTYCD winner. ... Globe critic Sebastian Smee and blogger Greg Cook are still talking about localism, yokelism and other -isms. ... And Ryan has another hot tip, complete with a free listen.

Morning readings: Davis curator, dueling Christmas Revels reviews and more

Greg tells us about the new curator at the Davis Museum. The Leger is still missing however. ... Apropos of our Sunday rant in the Globe about movie shoots here, in January the Boston Public Library is showing a series of movies shot here. ... Creativity is discovered in the Berkshires. ... The Globe notes that the Christmas Revels is awfully nice in a season of naughty, while the Phoenix says its one of the best Christmas Revels ever. Guess which link the Revels folks sent us. BTW, the Revels is holding 39th anniversary sale Wednesday & Thursday for our performances this Thursday & Friday. The $52 tix for Thursday and Friday performances will sell for $39. Use Coupon Code REVELS39 when ordering online at the Harvard Box Office. The Coupon Code discount will also be honored by the Harvard Box Office by phone at 617-496-2222 ... Why not treat yourself for Christmas with a HubArts ad? Just click on POST FLYER over the on the top right...

Yo-Yo to the Ma-x

The CD is slowly dying even with the classical audience, as Jeremy Eichler wrote in the Globe yesterday, but, um, holy crap! Look at this! Sony pinged me the other day looking for some PR for "Yo-Yo Ma: 30 Years Outside the Box," a massive collection of music from the world-renowned cellist who calls Cambridge home. Usually I ignore such requests, but this thing is the classical music equivalent of the alien ship hovering over Manhattan in "V." The set includes 90 CDs – every original album Ma has recorded to date, plus two bonus discs with the first release of John Williams’ Suite from Memoirs of a Geisha for Cello and Orchestra. It's all been remastered with "DSD technology," whatever that is, and the numbered, limited-edition set comes in a velvet-lined box and features a 312-page book. The perfect Christmas gift for the classical music fan on your list, eh? Ready to hear how much it costs? Better sit down. The set lists for $632.99, but shop around: Amazon.com offers a link to one vendor  selling it for $499.40, while Borders.com wants $754.99. In fact, Ma's own web site started selling the first 200 numbered editions in late September, for $789. And there are higher prices out there. I've emailed to ask how many sold.

Morning reading: BMAs, NH arts center and (groan) journalism

Check out all the Boston Music Awards winners at Boston.com as neither On The Download nor RSL have anything up yet. For my southern NH posse, I have a story in Globe North today about plans moving forward for a new arts center in pastoral downtown Newfields. ... My old friend Ted Bale reviews STREB at the ICA in Dance Magazine. ... Amanda Palmer gets a nice write up on the Huffington Post. ... I've been thinking a lot about this piece about millennials and how they relate to brands. There's a million dollars in there somewhere. ... On the downside, this is a really depressing and really accurate assessment of the state of the journalism market.

Blog news: Congrats NEJAR! And well said, RSL!

Congratulations to Greg Cook and The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research! Greg sent out an email late last night announcing that he and his blog has won a $30,000 grant from Creative Capital and the Warhol Foundation’s Arts Writers Grant Program. The ad-free NEJAR is one of just three blogs awarded the Arts Writers Grant this year "and notably the only one of these blogs that currently exists," Greg notes. The grant "will allow the team at The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research to heat our headquarters and eat this winter." Feel free to celebrate by clicking POST  FLYER over there on the right to help HubArts do the same when we sober up. No, we're happy for you Greg, really we are. Hic.

... and while we're at it, high-five to Ryan Spaulding of Ryan's Smashing Life, who is quoted in the Globe this morning righteously refusing to comply with the Federal Trade Commission's outrageous new rules that bloggers must disclose freebies when reviewing products. This insane piece of government meddling doesn't apply to the mainstream media, not newspapers or magazines or TV, but somehow Ryan and Greg and I are supposedly required to include an FTC-penned disclaimer when reviewing, if we were sent a review copy of the CD or handed press tix to the play, as is standard practice. I understand they're trying to stop astroturf marketing - advertising masquerading as editorial content via social media - but there's no way this rule passes constitutional muster, at least until they require Oprah and "The Today Show" and the fashion and food mags to do the same. Nuh uh.

Tuesday is the day for WGBH switch

WGBH FM 89.7 goes all news and talk tomorrow, following final approval of its purchase of WCRB FM 99.5 from Nassau Broadcasting. WGBH's new schedule is here; new daytime talk shows for Emily Rooney and Callie Crossley will take over the noon and 1 p.m slots beginning in January. Most important around HubArts HQ, jazz with "Eric in the Evening" will continue Mon-Thurs.

Meanwhile, the station they're now branding as "All Classical 99.5" picks up WGBH's classical programming load. The new, non-commercial 99.5 schedule is here, although expect that to continue getting tweaked. The deal has been a big topic of discussion here and elsewhere, as some WGBH classical fans worry about WCRB's signal strength, while others expect an improvement in WCRB's "dumbed-down" programming. Let us know what you think tomorrow.

Morning reading (and looking): Pixies pix! Will Dailey!

If you were excited about the Pixies shows at the Wang, Brad Searles has an excellent picture set. If you need new wallpaper or fodder for an art project, he's got a pretty open Creative Commons license on them, too, but it's noncommercial only, so I can't show you one here. (via UHub) ... Meanwhile Ryan's Smashing Life has an interview with Will Dailey, who's up for three Boston Music Awards this week. "For a lot of people the last 8 years has been heart breaking more than anything. That is what 'Peace of Mind' represents to me."