Performing Arts

Selon la perspective suivie dans cet ouvrage, le spectateur est actuellement en train d'acquérir de nouvelles capacités de suivi et d'absorption de l'image en mouvement. Depuis une quinzaine d'années, les créateurs de l'iconosphère avancent sur le chemin de la complexification et de la multiplication des moyens narratifs visuels. Cette démarche est préparée non seulement par des expérimentations artistiques historiques mais avant tout par l'accoutumance des populations urbanisées à l'immersion dans l'iconographie dynamique, par la prolifération des sources d'information imagée, par les pratiques interactives tels le zapping télévisuel, la consultation d'Internet, l'imagerie de la téléphonie mobile, ainsi que par la médiatisation iconique de la conduite de véhicules et d'engins. Ces nouvelles manières de consommer l'image et le son dynamisent les nouvelles créations multi-supports et feront bientôt disparaître la salle obscure à projection plate et unique ainsi que les appareils mono-écraniques.
Nous proposons dans cet ouvrage une étude bilingue franco-anglaise quasi-exhaustive du phénomène, ancrée dans l'épistémologie des sciences cognitives, apportant des éclaircissements théoriques conjugués aux analyses des oeuvres récentes et anciennes, et étayée par les considérations et les témoignages d'artistes.
According to this study, the spectator is currently acquiring new capacities to follow and to assimilate the moving image. In the last fifteen years, designers in the iconosphere have continued to make progress with the development and expansion of the media of visual narration. This advance is not only the result of past artistic experiments, but is above all rooted in such phenomena as the adaptation of urban populations to dynamic iconography, the proliferation of visual information, the emergence of interactive practices, such as channel surfing, the Internet search, mobile phone interfaces, as well as the visual interfaces for operating vehicles and other machines. These new ways of consuming images and sounds have fueled an expansion of new multi-screen designs that will gradually make the dark theater projection and the single-screen device obsolete.
This bilingual French-English study offers a semi-comprehensive investigation of these phenomena, anchored in the epistemology of cognitive science, providing theoretical explanations combined with analyses of recent and historical works and accompanied by the reflections and testimonies of artists.

THE INSPIRATION FOR THE MAJOR MOTION PICTURE A COMPLETE UNKNOWN. One of the music world's pre-eminent critics takes a fresh and much-needed look at the day Dylan "went electric" at the Newport Folk Festival.

On the evening of July 25, 1965, Bob Dylan took the stage at Newport Folk Festival, backed by an electric band, and roared into his new rock hit, Like a Rolling Stone. The audience of committed folk purists and political activists who had hailed him as their acoustic prophet reacted with a mix of shock, booing, and scattered cheers. It was the shot heard round the world--Dylan's declaration of musical independence, the end of the folk revival, and the birth of rock as the voice of a generation--and one of the defining moments in twentieth-century music.

In Dylan Goes Electric!, Elijah Wald explores the cultural, political and historical context of this seminal event that embodies the transformative decade that was the sixties. Wald delves deep into the folk revival, the rise of rock, and the tensions between traditional and groundbreaking music to provide new insights into Dylan's artistic evolution, his special affinity to blues, his complex relationship to the folk establishment and his sometime mentor Pete Seeger, and the ways he reshaped popular music forever. Breaking new ground on a story we think we know, Dylan Goes Electric! is a thoughtful, sharp appraisal of the controversial event at Newport and a nuanced, provocative, analysis of why it matters.

"In this tour de force, Elijah Wald complicates the stick-figure myth of generational succession at Newport by doing justice to what he rightly calls Bob Dylan's 'declaration of independence' . . . This is one of the very best accounts I've read of musicians fighting for their honor." -- Todd Gitlin, author of The Sixties and Occupy Nation

A remarkable number of Wisconsin towns and cities were home to an opera house in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Some were freestanding structures built by local benefactors, industrialists, and capitalists. Others were located within a city hall building and financed by local tax dollars with the support of government officials who believed in the value of the arts for their community

In Encore! The Renaissance of Wisconsin Opera Houses, Brian Leahy Doyle chronicles the histories of ten Wisconsin opera houses and theaters, from their construction to their heydays as live performance spaces and through the periods when many of these stages went dark. But what makes these stories so compelling is that all but one of the featured theaters has been restored to its original splendor. Just as the beginnings of these theaters were often the result of the efforts of local citizens, Doyle discovers that their restoration is due to the commitment of dedicated and passionate people. More than one of these revived theaters has spurred the revitalization of its surrounding downtown business district as well.

Encore! is the second book in the Places along the Way series. Richly illustrated with historic and contemporary photos, the Places along the Way series links Wisconsin's past with its present, exploring the state's history through its architecture.

The man who brought the kavorka to the Seinfeld show through one of the most remarkable and beloved television characters ever invented, Kramer, shares the extraordinary life of a comedy genius--the way he came into himself as an artist, the ups and downs as a human being, the road he has traveled in search of understanding.

"The hair, so essential, symbolizes the irrational that was and is and always will be the underlying feature not only of Kramer but of comedy itself. This seemingly senseless spirit has been coursing through me since childhood. I've been under its almighty influence since the day I came into this world. I felt it all within myself, especially the physical comedy, the body movements, so freakish and undignified, where I bumped into things, knocked stuff down, messed up situations, and often ended up on my ass.

"This book is a hymn to the irrational, the senseless spirit that breaks the whole into pieces, a reflection on the seemingly absurd difficulties that intrude upon us all. It's Harpo Marx turning us about, shaking up my plans, throwing me for a loop. Upset and turmoil is with us all the time. It's at the basis of comedy. It's the pratfall we all take. It's the unavoidable mistake we didn't expect. It's everywhere I go. It's in the way that I am, both light and dark, good and not-so-good. It's my life."

--Michael Richards, from Entrances and Exits