In Thursday’s (12/22) New York Times, Daniel J. Wakin writes, “Rapist Santas in the brutalist opera ‘Die Soldaten.’ The Royal Shakespeare Company performing in a life-size reproduction of its theater. A five-story crane continuously plucking at 30 tons of salvaged clothing. A three-dimensional re-creation of Leonardo’s ‘Last Supper.’ In the last five years audiences have experienced all of these images inside a vast hangar of a hall on the Upper East Side. It is the Park Avenue Armory, which has arrived as the most important new cultural institution in New York City. … the armory has recently unveiled art installations, staged dramas, presented operas and concerts and served as an outpost of the Whitney Biennial. Now it has taken another major step on the road to being a major player on the arts scene by announcing on Wednesday the appointment its first artistic director, Alex Poots, who runs the Manchester International Festival in England. … ‘It’s a remarkable space,’ said Joseph Polisi, the president of the Juilliard School, noting it allows a rare melding of the visual arts, music, dance and theater. ‘It would really add a major dimension to the performing arts palate of New York City.’ ”
Posted December 22, 2011
