The Red Carpet

Celebrity seems even more prominently in the news at the moment, fuelled by the Oscars and a cornucopia of other awards ceremonies with their attendant red carpets and flashing cameras.

This has also added to the rich vein of research for centre director Dr Richard Howells, who continues to be in demand as a guest speaker on this glittering topic.

This week, he gave a paper on: “Celebrities, Saints and Sinners: The Photograph as Holy Relic” to the History of Art Departmental Research Seminar at the University of Oxford. MA CCI students will remember his illustrated talk on a similar topic next door at the Courtauld Institute of Art at the end of last year.

At Oxford he added some new examples and sources, and the post-paper discussion included some fascinating exchanges on the existence (or not) of celebrity “charisma” –was this something celebrities naturally had, or was this aura bestowed upon them by photography, the cultural industries and the phenomenon of fandom?

The debate continued over drinks and dinner….

Movie star tantrums

On Wednesday afternoon, CMCI lecturer Harvey G. Cohen appeared on BBC Radio Wales to comment upon the recent release of a recording of movie star Christian “The Dark Knight” Bale cursing out his director of photography on the set of his new film “Terminator Salvation” for almost four minutes, using the f-word an average of every 6 seconds. Cohen discussed some examples of tantrum-like behaviour of movie stars and directors in the past (such as Katherine Hepburn, James Mason and Otto Preminger) to give the sordid Bale recording some historical context. “What I didn’t have time to say in the broadcast is that Bale is in some ways just plain unlucky because movie stars in past decades probably went on similar crazed rants, but they weren’t preserved for posterity,” according to Cohen. “However, today, on a major studio movie set, cameras and tape recorders are always rolling to capture behind-the-scenes material for DVD special features, so it seems that today’s film idols have to be more circumspect in their diva behavior than the stars of previous generations.”

You can listen to the BBC Radio Wales broadcast at this link for the next 6 days (the segment lasts from 38.30-44.30): http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00h9ddn

You can hear the full Christian Bale rant at this address (beware: very offensive language and verbal abuse):
http://www.tmz.com/category/christian-bale/

The Pleasure of Patronage

Our friends at the Royal Academy are kindly keeping in touch with details of their architecture programme events, especially when they think these will interest MA CCI students. The latest is on a hot topic in the cultural and creative industries: patronage.

They tell us: “The role of a patron in contemporary society, albeit different, is as important now as it was in Palladio’s time. Patronage involves the ability to participate collaboratively in the making of places and the shaping of our living environment. Exhibition co-curator Guido Beltramini discusses Palladio’s relationship with his clients, while Yuli Toh of Toh Shimazaki Architects and Roger Zogolovitch of AZ Urban Studio discuss the possibilities of patronage today.”

It takes place on Monday 9 February 2009 at the Geological Society, Piccadilly, W1; 6.30–8 pm; £7/£4* (this includes a drink!).
For information or to book telephone 020 7300 5839 or visit http://www.royalacademy.org.uk/architecture/ to download a booking form.

Cultural Studies and Radical Politics

Lost in CCI readers might be interested in attending an ‘encounter’ with Stuart Hall, the distinguished cultural theorist, to be held on 6 February, Fyvie Hall, University of Westminster, 309 Regent Street, London W1.

Also participating in the event are Doreen Massey, Francoise Verges, Larry Grossberg, Isaac Julien, Angela McRobbie, Martin Jacques, Bill Schwarz and Jonathan Rutherford. A roundtable discussion runs from 10.30 to 4pm, and at 5:00 pm Stuart Hall will give a lecture entitled ‘Cultural Studies and Radical Politics’.

For more information see http://www.wmin.ac.uk/sshl/page-100

If you would like to attend, please RSVP to Charlotte Regan at charlotte.regan@my.westminster.ac.uk.

The cultural sector and the economic crisis

“How can the cultural sector survive the financial crisis?” is the question raised by Helmut K. Anheier here.

Thanks to Andy Pratt at LSE for alerting us to this article.

Paper ‘Democratic Culture: opening the arts to everyone’ by James Holden

A paper entitled Democratic Culture: opening the arts to everyone, published by Demos in December 2008, is available to download at http://www.demos.co.uk/publications/democraticculture

More info:

“This report looks at what ‘culture’ means today, and challenges audiences, critics and cultural professionals to change their attitudes in order to allow greater access and participation.

“We can all now make YouTube videos and buy musical instruments, but this upsurge in ‘homemade’ culture should not blind us to the fact that access to publicly funded culture is still very limited, with only 4 per cent of the population enjoying the arts regularly. There is a thin line between defending quality and erecting barricades against outsiders, and it is not always clear where that line is. Sometimes ‘maintaining standards’ just means preserving status.

“The report asks what a ‘democratic culture’ in the arts would look like, and finds the current system wanting in terms of legislative frameworks, representation, transparency, equality, and universalism. Culture should be something that we all own and make, not something given, offered or delivered by one section of ‘us’ to another.”

The paper’s author, John Holden, is a Demos Associate and a Visiting Professor at City University.