Everyone loves a good first, from races to teams to a step on the moon, but when it comes to theater, being the first to offer a brand new work is not without risks.
It’s doubtful that a mystic Carmelite nun was the inspiration for scientists at the German company Merck when they developed 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine, also known as ecstasy and molly, in 1912.
Climb the stairs to the second level of the Law Building at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and you encounter two silent, black-and-white films, projected on the wall near the entrance to Tamara de Lempicka, the first major museum retrospective of the Art Deco pioneer and one of the 20th century’s most underappreciated artists.
Handel’s Theodora was the least-performed oratorio during the composer’s lifetime, yet he considered it one of his most important and finest creations.
“I think about how a traditional painting is compressed unto itself,” Nathaniel Donnett explained. “The object, ground, surface, texture, subject or non-subject, and the process of applying a substance that could be considered as paint.”
A few years have passed since live performance returned to stages across Texas after the pandemic, and we at Arts and Culture have been thinking about how easily its siren song called us back.