• Article

    Bringing opera to new audiences in Charlotte

    Published January 23, 2012 by

    Madama Butterfly. Photo Credit: Opera Omaha Nearly 4,000 people will have a chance to enjoy their first-ever opera performance in Charlotte this week - for free. In effort to bring opera to new audiences, last fall Knight Foundation announced it would reserve all the seats to Opera Carolina’s Jan. 28 performance of Madama Butterfly and distribute the tickets to members of the greater Charlotte community who had never before attended an opera. Tickets were distributed earlier this month on a first-come, first-served basis to those that had registered online in December. Due to an overwhelming response to the request for tickets, an extra free performance was added on Jan. 24 to accommodate more first-time opera-goers.
  • Article

    Take it or leave it: “Tool is Loot”

    Published January 23, 2012 by

    One of the casualties of Tigertail's (a Knight Arts grantee) "Tool is Loot" is that it didn't connect with the audience. At times interesting and bizarre, funny and absurd, emotional yet dry, the performance poses a vexing question for even the most patient viewer: what's the point? [caption id="attachment_31726" align="aligncenter"...
  • Article

    Bakehouse Art Complex call for Artists

    Published January 23, 2012 by

    In honor of its 40th anniversary in 2012, Jordan Vineyard & Winery has created the 4 on 4 Art Competition, a four-city initiative that challenges local artists to create a commemorative work of art that blends the elegance of Jordan Wines with the flavor or each city. The competition kicks...
  • Article

    The Frost French connection

    Published January 20, 2012 by

    The Frost Art Museum at FIU (a Knight Arts grantee) put together an interesting exhibit in its "Tour de France/Florida." In collaboration with the Consulate General of France and the France Florida Foundation for the Arts,...
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    Inside the new Merce Cunningham app

    Published January 20, 2012 by

    By Melissa Harris, Aperture Foundation Choreographer Merce Cunningham was adventurous, interested in working with new technology, and always thinking and acting ahead of his time. Toward the end of 1989, as part of his choreographic process, he began to use a computer program developed for him, then called LifeForms. His...
  • Article

    This weekend go digital with Detroit Symphony Orchestra

    Published January 20, 2012 by

    This weekend, innovation in the arts continues in Detroit. On Sunday, starting at 3:00 p.m, the Detroit Symphony Orchestra will present a live digital simulcast of its performance, French Masters: Franck, Saint-Saëns and Debussy. The simulcast is free to all online users who register. Dennis Scholl, vice president/arts at Knight Foundation, blogged about the upcoming performance, writing the digital simulcasts are “one of our more exciting Detroit projects. The energy is amazing and you feel like you are there.”
  • Article

    Go live with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra

    Published January 19, 2012 by

    One of our more exciting Detroit projects has been to fund Live From Orchestra Hall: The digital live simulcast of performances by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. The energy is amazing and you feel like you are there. The next simulcast, French Masters: Franck, Saint-Saëns and Debussy, is Sunday, Jan 22...
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    UNC workshop to search for ways to increase accountability journalism

    Published January 19, 2012 by

    The Old Well at UNC Chapel Hill. Photo courtesy Flickr user kf4lnq. If you’re interested in identifying ways to increase local accountability journalism, you may want to tune into a discussion taking place in North Carolina on Friday. Beginning at 9 a.m., the UNC Center for Media Law and Policy is holding a day-long workshop, which will be livestreamed to the public. As a backdrop for its discussion, the workshop will examine the FCC’s 2011 report on community information needs, which identified the loss of newsroom positions in recent years as “a threat to the quality of civic information available in communities around the nation.” Tomorrow’s workshop will be held three parts. In the morning, a round table discussion will identify gaps in accountability journalism in North Carolina. Next, representatives of Internet, cable and satellite television and mobile broadband service providers will discuss whether and how they could help to fill those gaps.
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    Gantt Center celebrates King Day

    Published January 19, 2012 by

    This past weekend, people all over the country celebrated the life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts + Culture (a Knight arts grantee) also offered several days of activities to commemorate this significant American leader. Monday’s day-long free admission with...
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    Why PRX, Knight created an accelerator for public media

    Published January 19, 2012 by

    The following is written by Jake Shapiro, CEO of Public Radio Exchange. It is cross-posted from PBS MediaShift. We announced PRX's partnership with the Knight Foundation to create the Public Media Accelerator about a month ago. Since then, it's become clear that the accelerator concept is new to many people in the non-profit and public media worlds, even as tech folks fret that accelerators have jumped the shark. Our tagline for the Public Media Accelerator is "seeking mission-driven entrepreneurs changing media for good." We're in a time of remarkable technology innovation, and our goal is to channel the forces driving that growth towards public service media. The two forces, the tech sector and public media, need each other: The tech sector will gain from public media's high-quality content, commitment to community, and public service mission; and public media will gain from technology's network efficiencies, professional and social connections, and radical new distribution paths.  
  • Article

    Jake Yeager and Edward Brady at Napoleon

    Published January 19, 2012 by

    Napoleon is the tiny, but powerful gallery (see also: the Napoleon Complex) located on the second floor of the building housing Knight Arts grantee Vox Populi, Marginal Utility and Grizzly Grizzly, among others. The one-room gallery keeps the shows predictably concise and, as is the case with its current show,...