Recent Articles Tagged WithBrooklyn Cultural Institutions

Brooklyn Book Fest Participants Reflect Borough’s Literary Tradition

By Nicole Brydson

Marty Markowitz finally divulged this year’s list of participants in the 4th Annual Brooklyn Book Festival at Thursday night’s Literary Mingle at Borough Hall. The festival, scheduled for September 13, boasts a list of notable authors and participants that reflects the borough’s talented literary population. Brooklyn The Borough is excited to cover another gathering of Brooklyn’s bookish stars. The full list after the jump.

New York Magazine’s Jody Quon Opens Exhibit At Photo Fest

By Nicole Brydson

“The title of the show comes from [the movie] Juno,” said New York Magazine Photo Editor Jody Quon, standing in the middle of St. Ann’s Warehouse in Dumbo on Wednesday night. The opening night of the New York Photo Festival was already underway.

“It’s that moment when [Ellen Page’s character] tells her father that she’s pregnant and he says, ‘I thought you were the kind of girl who knew when to say when,’ and that’s when she says, ‘I don’t really know what type of girl I am.’ So that’s the whole loop.”

For Some, Merchant of Venice Still About Stereotypes

By Nicole Brydson

“The frank depiction of anti-Semitism on the part of ostensibly sympathetic characters can make watching it an unsettling experience for modern audiences. Here the play’s religious overtones are almost entirely obliterated,” New York Times Theater critic Charles Isherwood wrote of Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, which runs at the Brooklyn Academy of Music through Sunday.

Auction This! Art Seeks Dollars for More Art

By Nicole Brydson

Just because the gross domestic product shrank at a rate of 6.1 percent recently, doesn’t mean you can’t still invest in something good. As the economy tanks, there is no shortage of auctions kicking up dollars for the arts in Brooklyn.

Library Now Closed on Sundays; Kids Read Internet Instead

By Nicole Brydson

Back in November I attended the Brooklyn Public Library’s annual fund raising gala and talked to the library’s benefactors and patrons about how potential budget cuts might adversely effect the library’s operations.
I hadn’t heard anything about it until yesterday, when a friend told me that he tried to go to the library on a recent Sunday and found it closed. I emailed library’s spokesperson to confirm, that yes, the central branch is now closed on Sundays.

A Beirut Walks Into A Bar

By Nicole Brydson

“It’s awesome to play at this theater and have people up front,” said Beirut frontman Zach Condon (above, right) to a second sold out crowd at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Opera House last Saturday. “It’s better.”
Not everyone in the seated audience agreed as hordes of fans rushed to the stage to get just a little bit closer to the folksy wunderkind, whose orchestra arrived halfway through the performance armed with glockenspiels. The two shows kicked off the Sounds Like Brooklyn festival last Friday, and the $20 tickets were fetching a hefty price on Craigslist.
After the first performance, we hear Zach and the band headed over to No. 7 bar for a drink, nearby on Greene Avenue, to find that the whitewashed walls weren’t the only stark contrast in the room full of show-goers.

Library (Not) Fine

By Nicole Brydson

“It’s not like libraries are over-funded!” said Soledad O’Brien, master of ceremonies for the 12th annual fundraising gala for the Brooklyn Public Library on Thursday. “It’s not like, ‘Trim the fat off those libraries!’ Those are cuts that are going to be very much felt.”