Politics vs Art

How suscipious are we for what art can offer? What is the role of art in public imagination and democratic participation? Who has the real power--politics or art? Or are these notions more than two mutually exclusive terms?

Sculptor Antony Gormley, film-maker Penny Woolcock, Matthew Taylor--chief executive of the Royal Society of Arts in England, and Rushanara Ali--associate director of the Young Foundation discuss the aforementioned questions in a panel chaired by Madeleine Bunting--associate editor of the Guardian.

Hear the debate.

Tales from the City: Dubai

"Tales from the City: Dubai" - Mark Rappolt's article in Art Review (issue 11) that puts forward a 'seemingly' critical of the flourishing art market in the Emirates made me smile... "[...] As a gang of Indian labourers dragged and shoved a sculpture across the beach, a gaggle of (mainly) Western art critics were listening to (mainly) Western artists describing what they do. This was convened as part of a Global Art Forum, held in a crenellated pavilion complete with AstroTurf lawn. At the opening of the fair itself (of the 40 galleries exhibiting, only one was local), an Emirati stood in front of a Damien Hirst butterfly piece and complained that the whole thing wasn't shocking enough."

Visual communication: redesign of NYC subway map

Eddie Jabbour's redesign of NYC subway map:
"The subway lines run parallel to one another, making the map easier to read, if slightly inaccurate. Each line is marked with a circle bearing the route’s letter or number, instead of oblong station markers. The map does not have a single line representing all the trains in a “cluster” route, like the 1, 2 & 3 trains in Manhattan. It uses the identical type font throughout, and words travel left to right, rather than diagonally. The lines bend only in 45-degree and 90-degree angles, to create a gridlike pattern."
(Source: infosthetics.com)