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Norwegian Ballet Tackles Indigenous Topic

January 13, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: David B Torch.
Recently the Norwegian National Ballet tackled the delicate subject of a 19th century rebellion by the indigenous Sami people. The non-Sami dancers wondered if they had the right to tell the story.

Indigenous reindeer herders called the Sami have a presence in the north of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia — and the sort of history indigenous people have experienced around the world. Was the Norwegian National Ballet reckless in trying to bring a 19th century Sami rebellion to life using non-Sami dancers?

Lisa Abend wrote at the New York Times in November, “Far in the north of Norway, a test of sorts was underway. Two weeks earlier, the ballet ‘Lahppon/Lost‘ had premiered at the Opera House in Oslo. Created by a Sami artist about a Sami uprising, and danced by the Norwegian National Ballet, the work had opened to largely positive reviews. But last Friday, ‘Lahppon/Lost started a two-night run in Kautokeino, a cultural capital for the Indigenous Sami people and the very town where the rebellion it depicts took place.

“ ‘The audience was five times bigger in Oslo, but I was more nervous here,’ said the creator and co-choreographer of ‘Lahppon/Lost,’ Elle Sofe Sara, whose ancestors participated in the uprising. ‘I knew that so many descendants of the rebellion would be there, and … I was asking myself: “Have we done it in a good way?” ‘ …

“When the work premiered at the Opera House on Oct. 31, it was the first time a piece by a Sami choreographer had been presented on the main stage. It was also part of a recent wave of commissions from leading arts institutions that have recognized Norway’s long history of forced assimilation of and discrimination against the Indigenous group, which is widely considered Europe’s oldest. …

“For Ingrid Lorentzen, the Norwegian National Ballet’s artistic director, who commissioned the work, and for the company’s dancers, none of whom are Sami, the performance raised questions about whether they had the right to tell the story. …

“Said Lorentzen, ‘Are we again stepping over the voices that we are trying to create space for?’ …

“For the Sami, the Kautokeino rebellion remains a sensitive subject. During the 1852 uprising, Sami followers of a strict Christian sect attacked Norwegian authorities, including the local sheriff and priest. … In the aftermath, church and state stepped up their efforts to ‘Norwegianize’ the Indigenous group, which continued into the 1960s.

“For well over a century, the rebellion was shrouded in shame among the Sami. But a political and cultural awakening in the 1970s prompted a gradual re-evaluation, and today the causes and meaning of the Kautokeino uprising are contested, with some viewing it as an example of religious fanaticism and others considering it an early Indigenous rejection of the authorities’ ongoing suppression of Sami rights and culture.

“Among the predominantly Indigenous audience that filled the seats of Kautokeino’s Sami National Theater, several attendees confessed to pre-curtain anxiety . … ‘I was so nervous,’ said Ayla Nutti, 20. ‘I was worried they wouldn’t get it right.’

“It was precisely the uprising’s complexity that drew Sara to the story. From her research, she knew that the episode still carried a heavy emotional burden. ‘We did interviews with descendants, and some of them didn’t want to talk about it, or they would talk and then tell us to delete the conversation,’ she said. …

“The dancing in ‘Lahppon/Lost’ is intensely physical, and much of it was devised by Sara’s collaborator, the Icelandic choreographer Hlin Hjalmarsdottir. The dancers whip the ground with fury and twist their bodies with an energy that oscillates between tortured and ecstatic. Combined with video close-ups of the dancers’ faces, and striking costumes from the Danish designer Henrik Vibskov, the muscular movement gives ‘Lahppon/Lost’ a contemporary feel.

“Yet the work remains thoroughly Sami. Much of that character can be attributed to Lavre Johan Eira, who performs a Sami form of throat singing called joiking that is believed to convey the living essence of its subject. ‘Lahppon/Lost’ opens with Eira’s haunting version of a joik. …

“By all accounts — and two standing ovations — they succeeded. ‘Sometimes when you see non-Sami dancers, there is a distance between them and the Sami stories,’ said Kristin Solberg, the director of a Sami theater in Mo i Rana, Norway. ‘But these dancers embodied them and gave movement to the land. I felt like I was watching my story.’

“[Reindeer herder] Sokki found himself in tears. ‘It didn’t matter that the dancers weren’t Sami,’ he said. ‘They made the rebellion come closer. It was magic.’

“In the intimate space of the Kautokeino theater, the performers felt that magic, too. And it didn’t end with the curtain. As they stepped outside after the final show, the Northern Lights were casting swirling bands of luminescence against the night sky. ‘It’s the perfect ending,’ said [dancer] de Block. ‘We released the spirits tonight.’ ”

More at the Times, here. Lots of great little videos.

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Exploring Weightless Choreography

January 12, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Martin Nuñez-Bonilla.
Sasha Peterson and Michael Figueroa in “Slapstuck” at the Conference for Research on Choreographic Interfaces last June.

Usually it’s people with science backgrounds who go into space. But artists are curious about everything, as we know, and some wonder what their own role in space travel might be. Some dance artists who have looked seriously into the possibilities of weightless choreography are now starting to rethink the ramifications.

Chava Pearl Lansky writes at Dance Magazine, “In a performance at the Conference for Research on Choreographic Interfaces [CRCI] this past June, Sasha Peterson leaned the side of her body onto Michael Figueroa’s shoulders, sharing weight in a traditional contact-improvisational lift. But rather than disembark back to the floor, Peterson rolled down Figueroa’s back — and stayed there, her body perpendicular to his, suspended in space.

“How? The answer in this case was Velcro-covered suits, lent by choreographer David Parker, who created ‘Slapstuck.’ … Velcro is just one form of technology that dancers are using to simulate the effects of weightlessness here on Earth. But for some, the end goal is to experience a true lack of gravity by bringing dance to space.

“ ‘Dance in zero gravity completely transforms how we think about choreography and performance,’ says Sydney Skybetter, the founder of CRCI and director of the Brown Arts Institute at Brown University. ‘When you remove the floor, which is the fundamental organizing principle of terrestrial dance, bodies become three-dimensional sculptures moving through space multi-axially.’ …

“There are a number of ways to simulate dance without gravity here on Earth, and dancemakers are experimenting with several of them. Last March, Peterson, Figueroa, and fellow dance artists Laila Franklin and Kate Gow came together for CRCI’s Movement in Microgravity residency, in which they created a base dance phrase and tested it in environments with varying gravitational relationships. In addition to working with Velcro suits, the group ventured to a trampoline park, an anti-gravity yoga class, float tanks, a pool, and a spatial-orientation laboratory. …

“Some dancers are interested not in bringing codified dance steps into space, but in taking the gravity out of a gravity-based practice. In 2022, dancer, geologist, and planetary scientist C. Adeene Denton wrote an essay in this magazine about her dream of dancing on the International Space Station. She’s spent a great deal of time both watching and speaking with astronauts and has enjoyed learning about the movements in microgravity that these experts already find fun.

” ‘What they like to do in their spare time is to try to crank up the momentum and shoot themselves through different passageways, or figure out different ways that they can spin,’ she says. Denton is also fascinated by effort. Astronauts living on the ISS, for example, learn how much energy they need to exert just to stay put. In order to stay still to work or eat, they grip a railing with just one or two toes.

“When she imagines what it would be like to dance on the ISS, Denton dreams about dueting with the space station itself. ‘Astronauts there are constantly drifting and following the motion of the space station as it orbits the Earth,’ she says. ‘So, I think it could be really interesting to try to do the microgravity equivalent of standing in one place.’

“[Multidisciplinary artist Sage Ni’Ja] Whitson is now beginning research in aerial performance techniques, with a goal of continuing their research via parabolic flight — the closest thing to space travel currently available on Earth — and, eventually, actual space travel. …

“[But now] the dancers are questioning the cost of parabolic flights, where dedicated research space can cost tens of thousands of dollars, and some artists have expressed concern over the privatization of space travel by billionaires like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos. ‘Right now, space exploration is being shaped by people with some extremely problematic ideological stances,” says Skybetter.

“[Denton adds] ‘I would still love to dance in microgravity, but I think that is ultimately kind of a selfish dream that needs to be superseded by doing the kinds of good things on Earth that we can do.’ “

More at Dance Magazine, here.

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An Israeli Orchestra Universally Welcomed

January 11, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Chris Leee.
Saleem Ashkar conducted the Galilee Chamber Orchestra last November at Carnegie Hall. The orchestra has equal numbers of Arab and Jewish musicians.

Looking for a bright spot in the frightening new world order? No need to go farther that the Galilee Chamber Orchestra and the reasons why people of good will were determined to make music with equal numbers of supposedly hostile tribes.

David Patrick Stearns wrote at the Philadelphia Inquirer last fall, “On the face of it, the Galilee Chamber Orchestra could be an impossible meeting of musical minds.

“Comprising ‘equal numbers of both Jewish and Arab musicians,’ as its website notes, the orchestra has a 13-year history, and is now on a high-prestige tour with celebrated pianist Bruce Liu that includes the Kimmel Center on Nov. 19 and New York’s Carnegie Hall Nov 20.

“Based in Nazareth (known as the ‘Arab capital of Israel’), the orchestra’s common ground on this tour includes Mozart among other composers whose nationalities, from centuries past, now feel like neutral territory — while still speaking to the present.

“ ‘Classical music has become something that belongs to the world. If you go to Japan or Brazil, they feel that Mozart and Beethoven belong to them as much as anybody else.’ … said Nabeel Abboud-Ashkar, executive director of Polyphony Education, the conservatory where the orchestra is based. ‘Once you’re part of this cultural world, you instantly connect with so many people.’ …

“With that kind of mandate, it’s no surprise that the orchestra, in its last U.S. tour in 2022, was acclaimed for generating more sound than a typical chamber orchestra. This year, its 42 players draw from Polyphony students, faculty, graduates, and nearby professionals.

“Structurally, the conservatory/orchestra setup resembles Venezuela’s much larger El Sistema but also is meant to have an ethnicity mixture more like the Spain-based West-Eastern Divan Orchestra. Galilee Chamber Orchestra is firmly planted in its Jewish/Arab balance and in Israel, a country with a 20% Arab population.

“The tour program includes the Mozart Piano Concerto No. 23 with Paris-born, Montreal-raised pianist Liu, a 2021 winner of the International Chopin Piano Competition. The presence of Symphony No. 3 (‘Scotch’) by the Jewish composer Felix Mendelssohn isn’t meant to make a statement but is a piece the orchestra has wanted to do for a few years.

“Also, Abboud-Ashkar’s brother Saleem Ashkar, conductor of the tour, has considerable history with the composer, having also been the soloist in both piano concertos in a well-received, major-label recording with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra.

“More intentional is the inclusion of Nocturnal Whispers by Arab composer Nizar Elkhater, whose own Israel-based ensemble, named Abaad, seeks to fuse Western and Eastern musical styles

“The orchestra’s concerts haven’t been subject to the kinds of in-concert interruptions and demonstrations that have greeted the Israel Philharmonic and the Jerusalem Quartet in Europe and the U.S.

“But years of war, however, have strained the orchestra and conservatory in tangible ways. Planning is more provisional than ever. Concerts can be canceled on short notice, lessons planned to be in-person can suddenly switch to online, getting home from a European tour can be impeded and delayed by new conflict outbreaks in the Middle East.

“Among the musicians, tensions are heightened by constantly seesawing events, said Abboud-Ashkar. After the attack of Oct. 7, 2023, the whole operation was suddenly in unfamiliar territory, he said. …

“ ‘We feel everything that is happening around us,’ Abboud-Ashkar said in a Zoom interview from Nazareth. ‘Some people might think we’re being naive and ask … “How can you talk about collaboration and partnership being equal … with horrific things happening in Gaza?” …

‘We believe that what we’re doing has an impact. Even if it’s just making it a little better, we’re moving the needle in the right direction.’

“The main enemy may well be despair. Within the orchestra and conservatory, lack of hope for war resolution can turn into loss of musical motivation.

“ ‘On the other hand, there are cases where people show incredible empathy for others,’ said Abboud-Ashkar. ‘There’s a commitment to having this (musical) dialogue … and having more consideration for each other. When you’re in distress … you’re motivated to continue and to always find a way. You fight for your space and your values and hope there are still enough people out there who shared them. We’re going to stay together because this is what we believe in.’ ”

I am so touched by this idea of moving “the needle a little in the right direction.” That is all any of us can do, but we really must do it in order for all the little bits to add up. More at the Inquirer, here.

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Harlem’s Studio Art Museum Reopened

January 10, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photos: Isa Farfan/Hyperallergic.
A light well at the recently reopened Studio Art Museum in Harlem.

Suzanne and Erik lived in Harlem before they moved to Rhode Island. They loved their apartment, and they loved being able to enjoy so many of the things New York City has to offer. One of the attractions of Harlem itself was the Studio Art Museum, which now has an impressive new building, after being closed from 2018 to 2025.

Isa Farfan writes at the art magazine Hyperallergic, “The Studio Museum in Harlem has a new, stunning home.  The 57-year-old New York institution, dedicated to artists of African descent, [has] inaugurated its new building. …

“Founded by a group of artists and activists, the museum closed its 125th Street location in 2018 to undergo construction of a new building, the first specifically created for the arts institution. The Studio Museum originally opened at a site on Fifth Avenue before moving to its current home on 125th Street and Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard in the 1980s, the former New York Bank of Savings building. The striking 82,000-square-foot (~7,618-square-meter) new building at the same site was designed by Adjaye Associates with Cooper Robertson. …

” ‘I have truly missed having our physical space,’ Director and Chief Curator Thelma Golden told Hyperallergic. ‘In the years we’ve been closed, our visitors, friends, members, and artists have made it known how much they miss us; everywhere I go.’

“The museum is debuting a series of inaugural exhibitions, including ‘Tom Lloyd,’ a one-gallery career survey of the artist-activist’s flashing light sculptures. Works from the museum’s approximately 9,000-item collection span three galleries as part of the exhibition ‘From Now: A Collection in Context,’ which will feature a rotating display.

“Though the construction was delayed in part due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Studio Museum Curator Connie Choi told Hyperallergic that the extended timeline gave the institution a chance to look deeper within itself.

” ‘It allowed us the opportunity to do a deep dive into understanding our collection holdings, to do research, conservation, and framing,’ Choi said. ‘We’ve also done a deep dive into our institutional history in a way that we haven’t been able to do before.’

” ‘We thought very hard about how to be present while closed,’ Golden added. During its seven-year closure, the institution launched several collaborations, including the traveling exhibition ‘Black Refractions: Highlights from The Studio Museum.’ …

“Choi said she’s most excited about the Lloyd survey, noting that he was the first artist to participate in the museum’s studio program.

” ‘It’s a space of contemplation, even as the works themselves are blinking and exciting,’ Choi said. ‘We are hoping that people can slow down; they are coming off of 125th street, which is the busiest street in Harlem, into a space that allows a moment of rest and respite and contemplation of artwork.’ “

More at Hyperallergic, here. The photos of the new building really make me want to see it.

Elizabeth Catlett’s “Mother and Child” (1993) on display in “From Now: A Collection in Context” at the Studio Art Museum.


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Bob Ross Art Breaks Records

January 9, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Bob Ross Inc./AP.
The late Bob Ross encouraged millions of Americans to make and appreciate art through his show The Joy of Painting, which has aired on PBS stations since 1983.

I once got an art kit from public broadcasting painter Bob Ross for my older granddaughter, a big fan. She was happy with the kit, but she did admit later that Ross made everything look easier on television than it really was.

Now we know that many other people not only liked Ross’s art, but want to support the medium where it was presented.

Rachel Treisman writes at National Public Radio (NPR), “The first of 30 Bob Ross paintings — many of them created live on the PBS series that made him a household name — have been auctioned off to support public television.

“Ross, with his distinctive afro, soothing voice and sunny outlook, empowered millions of viewers to make and appreciate art through his show The Joy of Painting. More than 400 half-hour episodes aired on PBS (and eventually the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) from 1983 to 1994, the year before Ross died of cancer at age 52. …

“His show still airs on PBS and streams on platforms like Hulu and Twitch. It has surged in popularity in recent years, particularly as viewers searched for comfort during COVID-19 lockdowns. … But his artwork rarely goes up for sale — until recently.

“In October, the nonprofit syndicator American Public Television (APT) announced it would auction off 30 of Ross’ paintings to raise money for public broadcasters hit by federal funding cuts. It pledged to direct 100% of its net sales proceeds to APT and PBS stations nationwide. Auction house Bonhams is calling it the ‘largest single offering of Bob Ross original works ever brought to market.’ …

“The first three paintings sold in Los Angeles on Nov. 11. for a record-shattering $662,000. Bonhams says the works attracted hundreds of registrations, more than twice the usual number for that type of sale. …

“Said Robin Starr, the general manager of Bonhams Skinner, the auction house’s Massachusetts branch, ‘These successes provide a solid foundation as we look ahead to 2026 and prepare to present the next group of Bob Ross works.’

“The next trio of paintings will be auctioned in Massachusetts in late January. The rest will be sold throughout 2026 at Bonham’s salesrooms in Los Angeles, New York and Boston. …

“Congress voted in July to claw back $1.1 billion in previously allocated funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), leaving the country’s roughly 330 PBS and 244 NPR stations in a precarious position.

“CPB began shutting down at the end of September … and several local TV and radio stations have also announced layoffs and closures.

” ‘I think he would be very disappointed’ about the CPB cuts, [Joan Kowalski, president of Bob Ross, Inc.] said of Ross. … I think this would have probably been his idea.” Kowalski, whose parents founded Bob Ross Inc. together with the painter in 1985, said Ross favored positive activism over destructive or empty rhetoric. …

“The Ross auction aims to help stations pay their licensing fees to the national TV channel Create, which in turn allows them to air popular public television programs. … Bonhams says the auction proceeds will help stations — particularly smaller and rural ones — defray the cost burden of licensing fees, making Create available to more of them. …

“The 30 paintings going up for sale span Ross’ career … include vibrant landscapes, with the serene mountains, lake views and ‘happy trees’ that became his trademark.

“Ross started painting during his 20-year career in the Air Force, much of which was spent in Alaska. That experience shaped his penchant for landscapes and ability to work quickly — and, he later said, his desire not to raise his voice once out of the service.

“Once on the airwaves, Ross’ soft-spoken guidance and gentle demeanor won over millions of viewers. His advice applied to art as well as life: Mistakes are just ‘happy accidents, talent is a ‘pursued interest,’ and it’s important to ‘take a step back and look.’ …

“In August [before any talk of a public television fundraiser] Bonhams sold two of Ross’ early 1990s mountain and lake scenes as part of an online auction of American art. They fetched $114,800 and $95,750, surpassing expectations and setting a new auction world record for Ross at the time. Kowalski says that’s when her gears started turning.

” ‘And it just got me to thinking, that’s a substantial amount of money,’ she recalled. ‘And what if, what if, what if?’ “

More at NPR, here. A few days ago funder CPB announced it was shutting down. But, by hook or by crook, public tv will carry on.

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Nomadic Kids Meet Technology

January 8, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Arsalan Bukhari/EGAB.
Nomadic young people attend a computer class in a tent in the Kashmiri mountains.

Whatever we may think nowadays about technology going too far, it’s such a big part of life that it would be unfair to leave anyone who is interested out of it. And judging from today’s story, Nomadic children in Kashmir are definitely interested.

Arsalan Bukhari at the Christian Science Monitor describes recent efforts to help these young people get up to speed on computers.

“Fifteen-year-old Shabaz Ali keeps one eye on his wristwatch and the other on the dirt path winding through a meadow in his highland town, Tangmarg.

“ ‘Three, two, one. It’s 5 o’clock!’ he calls out. ‘Where’s Shabir?’

“For members of the nomadic Bakarwal communities in Indian-administered Kashmir, timekeeping means survival. Children like Shabaz earn hourly wages for shepherding animals, gathering firewood, or loading trucks with goods for sale.

“Today, Shabaz isn’t tracking time for wages. A rumble echoes through the valley. … Shabir Khatana, Shabaz’s friend who runs a shop in town, pulls up on an old red motorcycle. Shabaz snatches up Mr. Khatana’s cellphone – their shared lifeline – and dashes into the Ali family’s large tent.

“The internet connection is strongest in the back corner, so Shabaz crouches there and opens the Zoom app. Aamir Sir, a volunteer mentor from the city of Srinagar, some 55 kilometers (35 miles) away, is waiting onscreen to teach animation and video editing to Shabaz and other students. …

“For generations, education has been a distant dream for the tribal Bakarwal families who migrate with livestock between summer pastures and winter shelters. … Most Bakarwal children, especially girls, grow up herding animals, working as dishwashers, or begging on streets.

“But since mid-2024, an initiative led by urban young people across India has begun connecting Bakarwal children to digital training in animation, coding, and web design. It’s about more than education; it’s about fulfilling the children’s ambitions, developing their confidence, and in some cases, generating income for their families.

“The transformation began when Zubair Lone, who recently graduated from college in Chandigarh, saw Bakarwal children washing dishes at his sister’s wedding.

“ ‘Little children, some no older than 7, were cleaning up the wedding venue,’ he recalls. ‘When I spoke with them, they told me something that stunned me: This was continuous. Both boys and girls saw working in people’s homes as just life. … That night, I called my friends and said, “If we don’t do this, no one will.” ‘

“He reached out to nearly 18 people, forming a group committed to change through volunteer work. ‘God has given us so much in terms of money and information,’ he told them. ‘Our one or two hours a day can mean a lot for someone.’

“The group, called Sukoon Digital, now has 14 active volunteers. … They include computer science students as well as graphic designers and other professionals who run digital training sessions across nomadic settlements in Baramulla, Budgam, and Kupwara districts.

“The first week of classes, the challenge seemed overwhelming to Mr. Lone. … ‘I have to start from the very beginning,’ Mr. Lone says. …

“The concept is straightforward: Children borrow smartphones from shops, siblings, or Sukoon’s volunteer teachers, and then join Zoom sessions in which mentors guide them through designing websites, creating digital artwork, and even setting up freelancer profiles. Classes are held on weekends and evenings, after the children’s work tasks are complete.

“Seventeen-year-old Bilquees Jan used to spend her days tending sheep and decorating mud walls with floral patterns. ‘I thought I’d never do anything beyond making tea and applying henna,’ she says.

“After more than 35 Sukoon sessions on graphic design, she has begun taking freelance orders, including to create social media ads for a Srinagar-based café. Her instructor, Afifa Qadri, teaches remotely from Mumbai’s rural outskirts, sometimes on patchy networks powered by solar panels.

“ ‘There’s something incredibly powerful about watching a girl who never saw a computer start using [design tools] Canva or Figma,’ says Ms. Qadri. …

“Another success story is 19-year-old Zahid Ahmed, who creates short cartoons on YouTube featuring village jokes, stories about nomadic life, and videos promoting safety. In 12 months, Zahid says, he has earned more than $1,000 from freelance work and ad revenue. (A typical Bakarwal family’s annual income ranges between $600 and $800.) …

“While helping children earn money motivates participation, volunteers focus on the children’s sense of their own possibilities.

“ ‘The idea of a career beyond labor doesn’t exist when you live your entire life on the move,’ says Mr. Sir, the volunteer in Srinagar, who makes a living teaching social media marketing. ‘Our goal is to change that perspective – to convey that you are important and your creativity is valuable.’ “

More at the Monitor, here.

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Saving New Deal Murals

January 7, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Carol M. Highsmith/Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.
“The Wealth of the Nation,” by Seymour Fogel, 1942, located in the Wilbur J. Cohen Federal Building, Washington, DC.

I’m a huge fan of the giant New Deal murals that gave brilliant artists work to do in lean times. I suppose the art has always been in danger of being covered over or removed as post offices and other public building have been remodeled. But right now the danger seems to be coming from the federal government’s current push to rewrite history.

Gray Brechin writes at the Living New Deal website that the federal government aims to sell the “Sistine Chapel” of New Deal art.

The murals of Ben Shahn, Brechin says, “in the old Social Security Administration headquarters in Washington, DC, were a problem, a docent privately told me when I toured the building in 2012.

“The building, which faces the National Mall, was by then occupied by the Voice of America. Visitors from around the world made reservations to tour the building as had I. Some of Shahn’s murals, painted when the building opened in 1940, the guide told me, suggested to visitors that poverty and racism existed in the land of the free.

“But Shahn and other artists commissioned to embellish the building also showed how Roosevelt and Frances Perkins’ Social Security programs had not only alleviated those problems, but had distributed America’s abundance so as to give everyone, rather than a few, a richer and more secure life than they had known before the New Deal. 

“Shahn’s fresco series ‘The Meaning of Social Security,’ is the most prominent of the murals in the now renamed Wilbur J. Cohen Building. Other artworks also carry themes of security and American life, among them ‘The Security of the People’ and ‘Wealth of the Nation’ by Seymour Fogel, ‘Reconstruction and Well-Being of the Family,’ by Philip Guston and granite reliefs by Emma Lu Davis.  Some artworks were inaccessible when I toured the building.  

“With Voice of America workers abruptly evicted on March 15 of this year [2025] and the agency itself facing extinction, the public is now forbidden access to the building altogether. The current administration hopes to speedily dispose of it and three others in the vicinity by the end of the year. A buyer could demolish the building. … Planning guidelines, reviews and preservation itself matter little if at all.

“As Timothy Noah explains in the New Republic … the General Services Administration (GSA), which owns the Cohen Building has itself been gutted in the administration’s drive to, in Grover Norquist’s words, ‘drown the government in the bathtub.’

“That Shahn’s murals depict a harsh reality worried me well before the administration began editing displays and signage that cast a less than a flattering light on US history at the Smithsonian Museums, National Parks, and other federal institutions. That federal buildings could be sold wholesale also concerned me more than a decade ago when the US Postal Service began quietly disposing of historic post offices, many of them containing New Deal art. 

“One of those buildings, now in private hands, is the monumental Bronx General Post Office for which Ben Shahn and his wife Bernarda Bryson painted thirteen murals in 1937 depicting laboring Americans while Walt Whitman, painted at one end of the once-stately lobby, lectures those workers on their responsibility to democracy. Closed in 2013 and sold twice since then, the future of that structure, like the old Social Security Building, remains unclear, with development plans in the works.

“Once among America’s foremost painters, Ben Shahn’s artistic stock fell with the rise of abstract and pop art after World War II. Abstraction had little room for the kind of social realism in which Shahn and Bryson were masters.

“A recent exhibition at New York City’s Jewish Museum spanning Shahn’s career was testimony to Shahn’s lifelong concern for social justice and the issues addressed by the New Deal.

“Dr. Stephen Brown, a Jewish Museum curator, says that ‘Ben Shahn is one of the great American artists of the twentieth century who believed in the value of dissent and the essential function of art of a democratic society.’

“Himself an immigrant from Lithuania, Shahn’s two great mural cycles depicting his hopes for his adopted country are closed and off limits to the very public which paid for and ostensibly owns them. Gracing buildings that the present administration values only for the real estate beneath them, Shahn’s art and that of others … now face an uncertain future.”

Brechin adds that if anyone wants to help save the Wilbur J. Cohen Building, they may “sign and share the petition.” More at Living New Deal, here.

I have previously written about reviving hidden or forgotten New Deal murals — as in one post about Harlem, here.

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Lunar New Year Tradition Revived

January 6, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Gilles Sabrié for the Washington Post.
Members of the Xiaohexi Tongyi stilt-walking club in 2025.

According to the traditional Chinese calendar, this Lunar New Year, (also called Spring Festival) is the Year of the Horse, the Water Horse, to be exact.

Lunar New Year traditions go back hundreds of years, although in China they were forbidden during the Cultural Revolution. Nowadays the Chinese government loves them so much it has asked UNESCO to protect them as “intangible heritage.”

At the Washington Post, we learn about a newly revived aspect of the celebrations.

Last year at this time, Christian Shepherd reported, “The once-endangered folk tradition of stilt walking has staged a dramatic comeback in China, where it is being embraced by young performers eager to find community and preserve their heritage. …

“Its revival has also been helped along by Beijing’s efforts to encourage — and control — traditional art forms and spiritual practices as part of Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s push for ‘cultural confidence.’

“ ‘I have loved folk culture since I was a child,’ said Guo Wenmiao, a 20-year-old engineering undergraduate who is a big fan of the NBA and Nike kicks — and stilt walking. …

“Stilt walking is part of a folk tradition of performances, rooted in ancient Chinese belief systems such as Confucianism and Taoism, that have been used to mark festivals and celebrate local deities for hundreds of years.

“But these rituals of pilgrimage and prayer were effectively banned in China during the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s and 70s, when the first leader of the People’s Republic of China, Mao Zedong, encouraged militant student ‘red guards’ to eradicate ‘old culture’ and superstition.

“Volunteer-run cultural associations are now reviving many of these suppressed traditions and passing them on to a new generation.

“Here in the countryside of northern China, people born this century are performing folk arts that date back at least 400 years — not least to provide distraction from economic uncertainties.

“Traditional theater, music and acrobatic performances are becoming popular at local ‘temple fairs’ and during national holidays such as Lunar New Year.

“At one festival last year on the outskirts of Tianjin to mark the birthday of Mazu, the sea goddess in Chinese folklore, crowds were wowed by fire breathers, cymbal jugglers and leaping kung fu fighters. … It was the stilt walkers, however, who stood out.

“Perched on meter-high wooden platforms in colorful outfits, wearing face paint and elaborate headdresses, they acted out folk tales to rhythmic drums and clashing gongs.

“The performers are amateurs, but they know how to put on a show. In one act, Guo … played a foppish princeling who becomes obsessed with catching an evasive butterfly.

“Before the Tianjin celebration, Guo and the other members of the Xiaohexi Tongyi stilt-walking club prepared to perform in their hometown of Shengfang, a small town an hour’s drive east of Tianjin.

“They play-fought one minute and applied makeup the next. A used-car salesman smoked a cigarette and complained about business before transforming himself into a rosy-cheeked matron — a comedic cross-gender role known as the ‘foolish mother.’

“All the performers were male, between age 10 and 35, and came from a variety of backgrounds. But all of them considered dressing up in elaborate costumes and dancing on stilts a perfectly unremarkable hobby.

“ ‘Joining the troupe is something that’s ingrained in everyone’ [said] Guo Tongkai, the 23-year-old lead performer, no relation to the butterfly chaser.

“Many of the performers began stilt walking when in primary school and regard themselves as ‘disciples’ of the art form.

“ ‘It’s a tradition passed down from our ancestors,’ said Guo Tongkai, who started learning to walk on stilts at the age of 5. ‘Everyone progresses and learns together.’ ”

More at the Post, here, where you can see some amazing photos and videos. And check out a Business Insider story on the dancing stilt-like robots in Beijing, here.

Photo: CCTV Spring Festival Gala.
Dancers — robot and human — performed in Beijing for last year’s spring festival. 

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Andrew Lloyd Weber Gets Edgy

January 5, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Oscar Ouk.
Kyle Scatliffe and Eryn LeCroy star in Masquerade, an off-Broadway reinterpretation of Andrew Lloyd Weber’s Phantom of the Opera.

Everyone makes fun of the musical Cats these days, but there was a time before Andrew Llyod Weber made a musical out of TS Eliot’s poetry when Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats was just playful in an intellectually clever way. I used to play an old record of it, spoken by acclaimed British actor Robert Donat (1905-1958), at Halloween every year.

When we heard that a musical version had been a success in London, we memorized the album and went to see the show in New York. Suzanne was five, John was ten, and we loved it.

Now that people have tired of cookie-cutter Cats productions, Lloyd Weber is starting to allow experiments.

“Two years ago,” Zachary Stewart writes at TheaterMania, “I marked the abrupt closing of Bad Cinderella with an overview of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s remarkable run as the most successful living musical-theater composer, writing, ‘Those of us under the age of 44 have never known a time in which Lloyd Webber didn’t have a presence on Broadway.’

“Evita, Cats, and (most notably) The Phantom of the Opera shaped the tastes of multiple generations of theatergoers by wedding catchy tunes to spectacular stagecraft — but most importantly, by touring relentlessly. A uniform vision (one production of Cats looked much like any other) created a globally recognized brand — the McDonalds of musical theater — earning piles of cash for Lloyd Webber and his investors.

“But that uniformity also bred artistic stagnation. I was disappointed by the last Broadway revival of Cats, which was just a remounting of the original. I suspected Lloyd Webber was too set in his ways to ever mess with a product that had proved so financially lucrative. And after Phantom closed, I was certain it would return in a form significantly diminished from the lavish Hal Prince production that lived in the Majestic Theatre from 1988 to 2023. But I was wrong on both counts.

“Story of the Week will look at two thrillingly reimagined ALW musicals playing New York this season and what they say about the experimental streak of a composer we think we have all figured out.

“[Off-Broadway] revival of The Phantom of the Opera [Masquerade] takes audiences inside the musical by transforming the old ASCE Society House on West 57th Street … into the Paris Opera. We arrive as guests of a masquerade gala but are quickly sucked into the drama surrounding young soprano Christine Daaé and the mysterious ‘opera ghost’ who has been secretly giving her music lessons, which we get to witness as we chase the Phantom and Christine down to his secret lair.

“It’s intoxicating to know that you’re participating in camp while still getting goosebumps all the same. That’s certainly how I felt as I clutched my little electric candle and descended the escalator accompanied by the title song, arriving in the basement just in time to witness the phantom steer his gondola past me on an invisible lake shrouded in stage fog. The whole event is like stepping inside a 1980s gothic fantasy. …

“Director Diane Paulus and her team have scrupulously designed every detail, from Emilio Sosa’s magnificently bejeweled costumes to the elegantly scripted handwriting of the Phantom’s threatening letters.

“An army of ‘butlers’ in white lace masks usher us through the space with care and precision. There was a woman in a wheelchair in my group, and a dedicated attendant ensured that she arrived on time to every scene, always with a good view of the action. My companion had to visit the bathroom shortly after ‘Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again’ (the show is two hours, no intermission), and a butler not only got him to a conveniently located facility,. … This is a Phantom to experience with all the senses as you feel the actors sweep past you and belt in your face.

“Six different actors play the Phantom, and six play Christine as different groups enter the space in stages, replicating the flow of a haunted house while recognizing the realities of a vocally challenging score. I had the pleasure of witnessing Kyle Scatliffe, whose intensity burns through the phantom mask as he makes direct eye contact with every guest. Eryn LeCroy’s powerful voice (as Christine) is still reverberating in my skull. But Maxfield Haynes’s performance as a young phantom will likely haunt me the longest. Silent and hunched in a cage in the corner of a freak show, his outstretched hand has the power to make you feel complicit in unspeakable cruelty. …

“In addition to being an opulent live-in spectacle, Masquerade persuasively makes the case that there is more to discover in Phantom, if only the creative team has the courage to lose sight of the shore. That is certainly something a different team of theatermakers discovered last year with a highly unusual staging of Cats.

“In the summer of 2024 at the new PAC NYC, directors Zhailon Levingston and Bill Rauch presented the world premiere of this new revival of Cats that reframes the dance-tastic feline death ritual as a drag ball, the kind documented by Jennie Livingston in her 1990 documentary Paris Is Burning.

“Yes, it’s a musical about singing, dancing cats — but what if those cats were also creatures of the night, scrappy survivors with nine lives and perhaps (in the case of Macavity) sticky paws? This unlikely synthesis proved unexpectedly poignant, but it was also a total delight. … I’m thrilled that the production will be transferring to Broadway this spring.

“Unlike Masquerade, the audience remains seated throughout, but the event still feels immersive as we are transported to a converted industrial warehouse in Harlem to witness the ball of the century. Off-Broadway, viewers clacked their fans and cheered on their favorite cats like they were professional wrestlers. Certainly, some of Omari Wiles and Arturo Lyons’s choreography approaches the physical exertion one might witness at a WWE match, if the wrestlers were in heels. …

“If it works uptown, it will be in no small part due to the exhilarating performances of the actors transferring with the production, including a commanding André De Shields as Old Deuteronomy, the subtly shady Junior LaBeija as Gus, and the undeniably sexy Sydney James Harcourt as Rum Tum Tugger. … Even if you think you hate Cats, The Jellicle Ball is likely to change your mind.”

Read about Lloyd Weber experiments going on in London. TheaterMania has it all here. (PS. I wrote several Boston-area reviews for TheaterMania years ago, when it was a new enterprise.)

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Gallery Highlights Black Art Group

January 4, 2026 by suzannesmom

Art: S.M. “Sylvester” Wells, c. 1975. Collection of Jonathan Otto.
The Addison Gallery of American Art in Andover, Massachusetts, presents the work of the Florida Highwaymen, a loosely affiliated group of 26 African American landscape painters, 1950s-1980s.

My friend Nancy told me about an art show she saw last fall on a little known group of Black artists. Although I didn’t get there and can’t give you my firsthand account, I want to share what the gallery’s website has to say so you can click through and enjoy the paintings and videos.

From the Addison Gallery of American Art in Andover, Massachusetts: “This exhibition presents the work of the Florida Highwaymen, a loosely affiliated group of 26 African American landscape painters who sold their vivid and expressive tropical scenes door-to-door and out of the trunks of their cars along the coastal roads of Eastern Florida from the 1950s through the 1980s. …

“It explores the improbable story and prodigious output of the Florida Highwaymen, an amorphous group of primarily self-taught African American artists who forged often lucrative careers as landscape painters against the backdrop of racially segregated Jim Crow Florida.

“Hailing largely from the communities of Fort Pierce and Gifford along the Atlantic coast of Florida, the Highwaymen produced hundreds of thousands of expressive and shockingly vibrant landscape paintings that captured the rapidly disappearing natural beauty of their region from their emergence in the late 1950s through the early 1980s.

“Denied access to gallery representation and excluded from the mainstream art world, the enterprising Highwaymen painters adopted a model of itinerant distribution, peddling their riotous, often rapidly produced oils, almost always still wet and priced to sell at around $25, on average, wherever they could — door-to-door, in doctor’s offices, bank lobbies, and shops — or to road-tripping tourists out of the trunks of their cars parked on the side of the interstate.

“Building on a tradition of American landscape painting that traces its roots back to the nineteenth-century tropical Floridian fantasias of artists like Winslow Homer, George Inness, Martin Johnson Heade, Hermann Herzog, and Thomas Moran, the Highwaymen painters reinvigorated the form, bringing fresh energy and an unrestrained color palette to bear on otherwise conventional scenes of swaying palm trees, polychrome sunsets, and breaking waves. Their exuberant art fundamentally shaped popular perception of the Sunshine State and provides lasting documentation of Florida’s disappearing natural paradise.

“Unless otherwise noted, all works in this exhibition are drawn from the collection of Jonathan Otto (PA’75 and P’24 and P’27). …

“The term ‘Highwaymen’ was not used to describe the group of Black artists responsible for these once ubiquitous Florida landscape paintings — either by themselves or others — until writer and historian Jim Fitch discovered their work in antique shops and flea markets throughout Florida during the early 1990s. Never seeing themselves as part of a unified, artistic school, some artists retroactively given the distinction of being a Highwayman bristled at the term in large part due to its association with criminality and its misleading implication of a unified movement.

“Interest in the work of these painters grew throughout the ’90s and Gary Monroe’s 2001 book The Highwaymen: Florida’s African-American Landscape Painters introduced the work of the Highwaymen to a broader audience.

“Monroe’s publication, consequentially and controversially, specifically defined the Highwaymen as a group of twenty-six artists — twenty-five men and one woman, excluding several artists who failed to meet Monroe’s criteria for inclusion. In 2004, the twenty-six artists were inducted into the Florida Artists Hall of Fame and, since then, the paintings of the Highwaymen have skyrocketed in value and collectability, with many artists coming out of retirement to meet the newfound demand for their work.”

More at the Addison Gallery, here.

“Murray Whyte wrote at the Boston Globe in November, ‘For all the communion the show can offer with individual works, its power lies in something much larger and more powerful — in how, in a time of severe repression, a creative impulse shared across a community of the like-minded can start to look something like freedom, made by hand.’ ”⁣ More here.

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Alabama Thinks Deeply about Public TV

January 3, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Andrea Tinker/Alabama Reflector.
A public tv fan holds up a sign during the Alabama Educational Television Commission’s meeting on Nov. 18, 2025, in Birmingham, Alabama. The AETC ultimately voted to maintain PBS programming through the end of the contract.

PBS is safe in Alabama. At least until June. And if viewers have anything to say about it, it won’t end there.

Andrea Tinker wrote at the Alabama Reflector in November, “The governing body of Alabama Public Television (APT) Tuesday voted to continue its contract with the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), rejecting a proposal to end its agreement with the broadcaster.

“The commission voted 5-1 to continue the contract after a presentation from APT staff and in front of 50 people, many of whom spoke about the importance of public broadcasting in their lives. …

“Diana Isom, who attended the meeting, told the commission that PBS Kids programming had been invaluable for her son.  

“ ‘PBS is the reason my son is at a kindergarten level at three years old,’ Isom told the commission. ‘My son goes to an autism clinic; all of those kids watch PBS.’ …

“Two commissioners at October’s meeting suggested dropping PBS programming, citing the [administration] slashing the budget for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) this summer and what one member of the commission characterized as ideological objections. 

“But the proposal drew sharp criticism from around the state, including over 1,400 emails to APT. …

“ ‘I think it’s important to stand up for quality education, quality programs for our children, especially in economic times such as these, not everyone can afford cable,’ … Julie Reese, one of the protesters, said.

“In a letter sent Monday, Gov. Kay Ivey asked the commission to survey the public to see if disaffiliation with PBS had support, and then develop a plan to do so. Pete Conroy, a member of the AETC, passed a motion at the meeting to create a commission to study the issue, consisting of journalists and broadcasters. …

“APT Executive Director Wayne Reid said during the meeting if the station dropped programming it would be replaced by American Public Television, a non-profit syndicator that he said produces ‘complementary programming’ to PBS. But Reid told commissioners that if PBS programming stopped altogether, it could result in a drop in annual membership contributions of $2.4 to $2.7 million, hurting APT operations. …

“Reid said Tuesday the station received emails and phone calls and tags on social media expressing concerns about stopping PBS programs.

“ ‘I’ve been a fan of PBS since my children were little, and they’re now in their 50s. … Carol Binder, a Hoover resident who attended the meeting, said. ‘Now, I love everything on PBS. I have [PBS] Passport, and there’s hundreds and hundreds of programs, and it’s just not right for one, two or three people who don’t like the program to cut it off for everybody in the state.’ …

“Reese said she heard from other protesters that they wouldn’t continue to donate if programming was cut. ‘I just spoke to a gentleman down the corner. … He will not continue donating to APT if PBS folds, which is going to severely impact Alabama public television,’ she said.

“Following Reid’s presentation, Commissioner Bebe Williams made a motion to continue to pay the PBS contract and maintain programming which passed with only one commissioner, Les Barnett, voting no.

“Sens. Linda Coleman-Madison, D-Birmingham, and Rodger Smitherman, D-Birmingham, also spoke to the commission. …

“ ‘You may not be able to travel around the world. I have the opportunity now, but I’ve already been there with public television,’ Coleman-Madison said. ‘And the good thing about it, when I do go, I know where they’re telling me the truth or they’re giving me a snow job. It is trust. We trust public television because we know that the information we get in particular on PBS is going to be true, is going to be factual.’ …

“ ‘I think today really was a huge victory for the state of Alabama, victory for PBS and APT, although it needs constant attention and this is the beginning of a campaign and not the end,’ Conroy said after the meeting. 

“Reid said continuing the contract, which expires next June, gives APT a clear picture of what direction to go next. ‘I’m a business guy. … I don’t like to go back on contracts that we’ve signed.’ “

More at the Alabama Reflector, here. Where do you stand on public television?

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In Ukraine, DJ-ing Can Be Therapy

January 2, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: Bohdan Lozytsky.
Ukraine was veteran Dmytro Melnik works with the EnterDJ system, as part of rehabilitation from trauma. 

Several of us who for a few months helped out Ukrainian journalists with social media in English befriended Vitali, who lives with his wife and little girl in Rivne and does charitable work for displaced Ukrainian women and children. We were always relieved that Vitali had not yet been called up by the army.

That changed in December, not long after Rivne, too, began suffering from Russian bombing. We worry about him because of the obvious dangers of conflict — and the PTSD some soldiers experience when they get home. I hope he never needs an intervention like the one in today’s article.

Darcie Imbert tells Guardian readers about a worthy music therapy program — EnterDJ at the Superhumans center near Lviv.

“In Ukraine, sound carries a different weight: the cautionary blurt of sirens, Shahed drones humming overhead, the concussive thwack of air defense interception and the subsequent explosion. But as well as the sounds of war, which continue three and a half years into Russia’s full-scale invasion, music still plays, clubs remain open during the day (closing well before the midnight curfew), and electronic dance music remains an intrinsic part of many Ukrainian lives. …

“The rehabilitative power of dance music is most evident at the Superhumans center, near Lviv in the west of Ukraine. Here, the most critically war-wounded are treated with prosthetics and reconstructive surgery, and psychological support is given to children and adults affected by the war. And within the range of treatment is music therapy.

“Howard Buffett, the son of Warren Buffett and one of the center’s chief funders, suggested forming a Superhumans band, so the center teamed up with music charity Victory Beats, which was set up one year into the war to provide veterans with relaxation and a nonverbal outlet for emotional expression.

“ ‘We were working with a 25-year-old soldier with severe brain damage and limited use of his hand,’ the charity’s founder, Volodymyr Nedohoda, remembers. ‘We started with a [sound-based] relaxation session designed to calm the nervous system, but stopped almost immediately because the low frequency triggered pain. When he started to feel better, he asked for a DJ console.’

“Having witnessed the efficacy of electronic music as therapy firsthand, Nedohoda and Vlad Fisun – a DJ and former editor-in-chief of Playboy Ukraine – partnered to create the EnterDJ program, which teaches veterans the basics of mixing. All that users require is a laptop, headphones and an internet connection; some tune in from home, others show up to a dedicated space in the Superhumans center. …

“Speaking with the same stoicism that underpins most of my conversations with Ukrainians, another veteran, Oleksandr, tells me about the incident that led him to Superhumans and EnterDJ. ‘I was serving in Poltava when a missile destroyed my leg,’ he says. ‘I remember everything about it. The blast, phoning my commander to say I was alive, realizing I’d have to drive an automatic car, worrying about the blood in my car after the evacuation.’ He laughs at the absurdity, and continues. ‘In hospital, I lost nearly all my blood and had to be resuscitated. I woke up knowing my leg was gone, but thankful the rest of my body and brain were OK. That’s most important.’

“For Oleksandr, EnterDJ became a daily routine, ‘to get some good moments if the day was hard, or to celebrate if I gained something in rehabilitation.’ Within six months, he was performing alongside the Lviv Philharmonic Orchestra, using a Midi controller to layer sounds over a composition written with British composer Nigel Osborne.

“Oleksandr had started off using singing bowls in a sound therapy session. … Before being fitted with a prosthetic leg, EnterDJ ‘helped distract me from the trauma and rehabbing,’ he says, holding his kind gaze steady. … ‘We have composed ambient music for therapeutic purposes; I added electronic effects to live classical instruments. The audience relaxed deeply; some even fell asleep. So we met our goal!’ …

“Roman Cherkas, who served in the Third Tank brigade in eastern Ukraine, has gravitated towards drum’n’bass. He joined the EnterDJ program after months of surgeries, prosthetics and rehabilitation at the centre, after losing both of his lower limbs in a mortar strike. He speaks to me on a call from his home, ready with a drum’n’bass mix. ‘Right now, I still don’t feel mobile, I can’t move around normally. Music has become energy for me, life energy,’ he says. …

“After six months in the program, Roman performed in Lviv at a showcase by one of the world’s leading drum’n’bass labels, Hospital Records. He speaks slowly and thoughtfully about how music shifts his headspace. He becomes completely absorbed by it, sometimes sitting in his chair mixing for six-hour stretches. ‘I tried working with psychologists but it didn’t work for me. You have to consciously switch your brain on and imagine lifting your legs, which is very difficult. With music, it’s the opposite, it switches my mind automatically and makes me feel better.’ ”

More at the Guardian, here.

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UNESCO Protection Sought for Yodeling

January 1, 2026 by suzannesmom

Photo: AP Photo/Michael Probst.
Yodel teacher Nadja Räss yodels with students at the HSLU university music department in Lucerne, Switzerland, in October 2025.

When I was a child, we had a babysitter who was Swiss German. Her name was Frieda, and I remember her with fondness because she was kind in a funny, sharp way and had a different way of thinking about things than my parents did.

Frieda taught me a yodeling song. I got the yodeling down more or less, but I’m sure I make mincemeat of the German words, the only German I ever learned.

Here’s a story about how the art of yodeling is expanding to new enthusiasts.

Jamey Keaten wrote in November at the Associated Press, “Yodel-ay-hee … what?! Those famed yodeling calls that for centuries have echoed through the Alps, and more recently have morphed into popular song and folk music, could soon reap a response — from faraway Paris.

“Switzerland’s government is looking for a shout-out from U.N. cultural agency UNESCO, based in the French capital, to include the tradition of yodeling on its list of intangible cultural heritage. A decision is expected by year-end.

“Modern-day promoters emphasize that the yodel is far more than the mountain cries of yesteryear by falsetto-bellowing male herders in suspenders who intone alongside giant alphorn instruments atop verdant hillsides. It’s now a popular form of singing.

“Over the last century, yodeling clubs sprouted up in Switzerland, building upon the tradition and broadening its appeal — with its tones, techniques and tremolos finding their way deeper into the musical lexicon internationally in classical, jazz and folk. U.S. country crooners prominently blended yodels into their songs in the late 1920s and 30s.

“About seven years ago, the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts became the first Swiss university to teach yodeling.

“ ‘For me, actually, in Switzerland we have four languages but I think really we have five languages. We have a fifth: The yodel,’ said Nadja Räss, a professor at the university, alluding to the official German, French, Italian and Romansh languages in Switzerland. Yodeling exists in neighboring Austria, Germany and Italy, but Swiss yodeling is distinctive because of its vocal technique, she said.

“In its early days, yodeling involved chants of wordless vowel sounds, or ‘natural yodeling,’ with melodies but no lyrics. More recently, ‘yodeling song’ has included verses and a refrain.

“The Swiss government says at least 12,000 yodelers take part through about 780 groups of the Swiss Yodeling Association.

“In Switzerland, Räss said, yodeling is built on the ‘sound colors of the voice’ and features two types: one centering on the head — with a ‘u’ sound — and one emanating from deeper down in the chest — with an ‘o’ sound.

“And even within Switzerland, styles vary: Yodeling in the northern region near Appenzell is more ‘melancholic, slower,’ while in the country’s central regions, the sounds are ‘more intense and shorter,’ she said.

“What began as mostly a male activity is now drawing more women. …

“UNESCO’s government-level committee for Intangible Heritage will decide in mid-December in New Delhi. The classification aims to raise public awareness of arts, craftsmanship, rituals, knowledge and traditions that are passed down over generations. …

“The list is different from the UNESCO World Heritage List, which enshrines protections for physical sites that are considered important to humanity, like the Pyramids of Giza in Egypt.

“Last year, Japan’s famed sake — the smooth rice wine — was one of more than 60 honorees in the intangible heritage list, alongside things like the Nowruz spring festival in parts of central Asia, and the skills and knowledge of zinc roofers in Paris.

“Räss of the Lucerne university says that candidates for the intangible heritage list are asked to specify the future prospects of cultural traditions.

“ ‘We figured out some projects to bring it to the future. And one of those is that we bring the yodel to the primary school,’ said Räss, alluding to work along with the Swiss Yodeling Association and a folk music center known as the Roothus Gonten. She said 20 Swiss school teachers know how to yodel and are trying it with their classes.

“ ‘One of my life goals is that when I will die, in Switzerland every school child will be in contact with yodeling during their primary school time,’ she said.”

More at AP, here. The rest of the story: Yodeling did get UNESCO recognition!

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A Brand New Island

December 31, 2025 by suzannesmom

Photo: Arctic Images/Alamy.
Surtsey Island, off Iceland’s Vestmannaeyjar archipelago. It is rare for such longlasting islands to be created from eruptions – the last one was Anak Krakatau in 1927. 

How amazing to witness the birth of an island. People who live in Iceland have a better chance of that than most of us as Iceland is still bubbling with volcanic activity.

At the Guardian, Patrick Greenfield reports on what can be learned from an island that emerged in the 1960s. He starts with the fishermen who first noticed something unusual was going on.

“The crew of the Ísleifur II had just finished casting their nets off the coast of southern Iceland when they realized something was wrong. In the early morning gloom in November 1963, a dark mass filled the sky over the Atlantic Ocean. They rushed to the radio, thinking that another fishing vessel was burning at sea, but no boats in the area were in distress.

“Then, their trawler began to drift unexpectedly, unnerving the crew further. The cook scrambled to wake the captain, thinking they were being pulled into a whirlpool. Finally, through binoculars, they spotted columns of ash bursting from the water and realized … a volcano was erupting in the ocean below.

“By the time the sun had risen, dark ash filled the sky and a ridge was forming just below the surface of the water. By the next morning, it was 10 meters high [about 33 feet]. … An island was being born.

“Two months later, the rock was more than a kilometer long [0.6 mile]and 174 metres high [571 feet] at its peak. It was named Surtsey after the fire giant Surtr from Norse mythology. … It would be two years before it stopped erupting completely.

” ‘It is very rare to have an eruption where an island forms and is long lasting. It happens once every 3,000 to 5,000 years in this area,’ says Olga Kolbrún Vilmundardóttir, a geographer with the Natural Science Institute of Iceland. Those that do form are often quickly washed away by the ocean, she says.

“The emergence of Surtsey presented researchers with a precious scientific opportunity. They could observe how life colonizes and spreads on an island away from the human interference that has overtaken much of the Earth. …

If space is given, nature will always find ways to return, often faster and more creatively than we expect.

“The first scientists that stepped on Surtsey in 1964 could see that seeds and plant residues had been washed ashore. … Scientists had expected algae and mosses to be the first colonizers, building up a base of soil that would eventually support vascular plants. But that step was skipped completely. More plants were washed ashore in the following years, and some clung to the island’s bare volcanic rock. But after a decade, the changes seemed to stall.

“Pawel Wasowicz, director of botany at the Natural Science Institute, says: ‘People thought, what now? Around 10 species had colonized Surtsey at that point. The plant cover was really scarce. But then the birds arrived.’

“In the early 1980s, black-backed gulls started to nest on sections of the island, sheltering in one of the stormiest parts of the Atlantic Ocean. Their arrival kicked off an explosion of life. Guano carried seeds that quickly spread grasses along the island, fed in turn by the nutrients from the birds. For the first time, whole areas of bare rock became green.

“Wasowicz says … ‘Biologists thought that it was just plant species with fleshy fruits that could travel with birds. But the species on Surtsey do not have fleshy fruits. Almost all of the seeds on Surtsey were brought in the feces of the gulls.’

“One lesson from this living laboratory is that recovery after disturbance does not follow a single, predictable path, he says. Instead, it is shaped by multiple, sometimes surprising forces.

“Today, grey seals are the latest arrivals to drive changes in the island’s biodiversity. The volcanic rock has become a crucial ‘haul-out’ site where seals come ashore to rest and molt, as well as a breeding ground where they can raise their young safe from the orcas lurking nearby. …

“But the researchers warn that the colonization of Surtsey will one day go into reverse. The grey seal haul-out site is one of the areas slowly being eroded by the ocean. By the end of the century, scientists project that little will be left from that section of the island.

“Its biodiversity will probably peak, then fall over time … but the researchers say that lessons will remain.

“Surtsey demonstrates that, even in the harshest environments, resilience and renewal are possible, says Wasowicz. It offers hope and practical lessons for rehabilitating ecosystems damaged by war, pollution or exploitation. …

“Vilmundardóttir says: ‘I feel that Iceland is really contributing something important to humankind by preserving this area. On the mainland, the impact of humans is everywhere. When I am on Surtsey, I am really in nature. All you can hear are the birds.’ You see orcas along the coastline and the seals popping out and watching.’ “

More at the Guardian, here.

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Working Until 100

December 30, 2025 by suzannesmom

Photo: Chang W. Lee.
“If I die in my workshop, I will be happy,” says Seiichi Ishii, one the centenarians in Japan who are still working. Ishii has been repairing bicycles since he was 12 and doesn’t want to stop.

Where I live now, there are several centenarians. They may still do things like give a presentation on their travels or work out in an exercise class. But most of them are bowed down with infirmity. No one is still working in their old career. Japan seems different. Hikari Hida at the New York Times interviewed five centenarians there who are still working.

“Japan has about 100,000 people who have lived for a century or more,” she writes, “the most in the world, and more per capita than in any other country. … We met five remarkable centenarians who credited their longevity to eating well, Japan’s affordable health care, exercise and family support. But for these five, there is also something else: their work.

Seiichi Ishii
“As a 12-year-old, Seiichi Ishii was walking home from school one day when he came across a ‘help wanted’ sign in the window of a bicycle repair shop in the Shitamachi district of Tokyo. He had always admired the long navy jumpsuits that bike repairmen wore, and he wanted to step into one himself.

“More than 90 years after that start, Mr. Ishii is still fixing bikes at his own shop. Though the legs of the jumpsuit are too long for his shrinking body, he goes to bed every night excited about the customers who might show up the next day. …

“Mr. Ishii, 103 … remembers living through the war, when nothing was guaranteed. His income from the repairs supplements a monthly pension of 50,000 yen, or about $330. ‘You never know what will happen,’ he said. …

Fuku Amakawa
“Five or six days a week, Fuku Amakawa works the lunch shift at her family’s ramen restaurant alongside her son and daughter, using long chopsticks to swirl egg noodles in pork broth and sprinkling chopped spring onions into bowls filled with hot soup.

“ ‘I can’t believe I’ve managed to work this long without getting bored,’ she said.

“Ms. Amakawa, 102, says she has always been a bit stubborn. She put off her arranged marriage as long as she could. But after she made the leap, she opened the restaurant with her husband. Its 60th anniversary was this year.

“ ‘It is really beautiful that I can still work. Physically and emotionally, it changes the quality of my life,’ she said. …

Masafumi Matsuo
“Bright yellow rapeseed flowers, Masafumi Matsuo’s favorite, filled the fields behind his home when he was young. He loved the mild bitterness of the vegetable, which turns sweet when cooked, and which he farmed and sold. …

“Mr. Matsuo, 101, also grows eggplants, cucumbers and beans across different seasons. ‘I work to stay healthy,’ he said on a July morning, dragging a plastic stool out into the field, where he sipped water during breaks from watering his rice seedlings.

“Mr. Matsuo was born, grew up and raised three children in his town, which is nestled in the mountains of Oita, a coastal prefecture on the southwestern island of Kyushu. … [He] survived esophageal cancer and, at 99, a bout of Covid, spends his weekends playing with his year-old great-grandson, Toki. …

Tomoko Horino
“Tomoko Horino always knew there was more in store for her than staying home. Inspired by a saleswoman she had met, she wanted to sell makeup. But she was a young mother of three, and cultural norms meant it would not be considered proper for her to work.

“At 39, she ran into an old friend whose husband was recruiting saleswomen for the same makeup brand she’d fallen in love with years before. With her children older, she took the job. Ms. Horino loved seeing her customers’ faces light up as they tried a new lipstick color or foundation that she’d suggested. …

“Her husband, who worked in an office, wasn’t happy to have a wife who also worked, but the family was in a dire financial situation. All he asked was that she knock on doors where she wouldn’t be recognized. … Now widowed and living alone at 102, she makes her sales over the phone, with only occasional home visits. Keeping busy helps her fend off loneliness. …

“ ‘I love making people feel beautiful,’ Ms. Horino said.” …

Tomeyo Ono
“When Tomeyo Ono plopped onto a cushion to begin her performance, there was total silence. Then, from somewhere deep in her petite body, she started to recite the folk tale of a bull and a baby bear, with perfect enunciation.

“As she spoke, she gestured wildly with her hands, the audience hanging on every word. At the end, the room filled with applause. With a repertoire of 50 stories, Ms. Ono is a teller of minwa, or folk tales, a career she took up for fun after turning 70. …

“Now 101, she is the oldest, and loudest, member of a storytelling collective. After the 2011 tsunami washed away her home in Fukushima, she vowed to incorporate the experiences of its survivors into her work.

“ ‘I’m living to tell my stories,’ Ms. Ono said, tears rolling down her cheeks. She said she was terrified by the idea of folk tales, or memories of the tsunami, being lost.”

More at the Times, here. Outstanding video clips and photos.

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