Some artists would like to see tougher Swiss laws covering music downloads; others say musicians need to make it easier for fans to have some free music
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The Swiss Federal Council has ruled that the country’s laws concerning illegal downloads are adequate and additional legislation is not needed. The decision follows requests by artists’ groups for further protection. France in recent years has tightened its legislation and in some cases people who have illegally downloaded music, for example, have been banned from using the Internet.
Switzerland’s IP (intellectual property) laws allow Internet downloading for private consumption, but not for sharing. Anyone who uses popular download systems that essentially re-share is acting illegally; fines in Switzerland can run to CHF600, reports TSR (Fr).
Roland Petit, 2009
ZURICH / GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Two notable foreigners have died in Switzerland. Roland Petit, notable French choreographer whose erotic “Carmen” in 1949 had a major impact on the ballet world, died Sunday 10 July, age 87, in Geneva, where he had lived for more than 10 years according to the New York Times. The arts section of the paper carries a lengthy obituary.
The BBC reports that he is credited with having created more than 100 ballets in his career. He is survived by his wife, the dancer Zizi Jeannemaire, who played his Carmen, and their daughter, Valentine Petit.
Sri Lankan political candidate and Swiss citizen Aminath ‘Ainthu’ Arif died in hospital in Zurich shortly before she was scheduled to have a major skin grafting surgery, after being anesthetized and treated for a month in Sri Lanka following a barbecue fire. The fire broke out at her home in Machangoalhi Meraanage in Sri Lanka.
A man also died of his injuries from the fire and a third victim is being treated in Sri Lanka.
She is survived by three children, reports Haveeru.
La lecture by Pablo Picasso, sold at Sotheby's auction for £12.2 million 8 February: Marie-Thérèse Walter as his model
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – All eyes were on Marie-Thérèse Walter, Pablo Picasso’s young lover, in 1932, and again 8 February 2011 in London
The artist’s rendering of his mistress in January 1932 in a painting called La Lecture was one of the hits of his first retrospective, at the Kunsthaus in Zurich from September to November 1932.
Tuesday night an anonymous private owner sold it at a Sotheby’s auction in London for £25.2 million, about twice the estimated sales price, after furious telephone bidding.
The 1932 Zurich show featured several paintings with his then-hidden mistress as the model. He had met Walter five years earlier, when she was just 17, on the streets of Paris.
The young woman’s long blond hair and athletic form were mostly folded into contemporary forms that effectively hid her identity, with one exception which caught the eye of his wife, Olga.
In La Lecture, the model appears more forcefully as an individual, and the wife began to realize there was a mistress.
Zurich’s 1932 retrospective was the first for Picasso, and the first time a living painter had a major show in a museum, as opposed to a gallery.
La ceinture jaune: Marie'Thérèse Walter, Pablo Picasso, 1932 (courtesy, Zurich Kunsthaus), one of several paintings of the artist's mistress that were part of his 1932 show
The year was a crucial one for Picasso, who painted many of his best-known works then and, as CBC puts it, “cemented his reputation”, notably through the Zurich show, which he himself curated.
Zurich’s Kunsthaus repeated, on a smaller scale, the 1932 show as part of its centennial building celebrations in a show that closed 30 January 2011. Several paintings with Walter as the model were included, but not La Lecture.
Review, GenevaLunch, Zurich Picasso show in 2010-2011
(videos) Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Four men, three women, and an international mix, both of schools and dancers who took top prizes at the Prix de Lausanne dance competition, marked the closing of one of the top events in the world of dance education.
The week-long finals for the Prix de Lausanne drew to a close in Lausanne with a gala performance Sunday night 6 February. The competition began with 280 contestants, of which 74 made it through the selection process and came to Lausanne.
The winners announced Sunday, with the sponsors of their awards following their names, are:
(120) Ms Mayara Magri, Brazil / Petite Danse School of Ballet, Rio de Janeiro, Fondation Leenaards
(415) Mr Sung Woo Han, S Korea / Korea National University of Arts, Seoul, Beau-Rivage Palace
(408) Mr Zhang Zhiyao, China / Beijing Dance Academy, Adveq
(305) Ms Patricia Zhou, Canada / Kirov Academy of Ballet, Washington DC, Julius Bär
(204) Mr Shizuru Kato, Japan / AcriHorimoto Ballet Academy, Saitama, Oak Foundation
(426) Mr Derrin Watters, USA / Houston Ballet’s Ben Stevenson Academy, Fondation Coromandel
(112) Ms Yuko Horisawa, Japon / Reiko Yamamoto Ballet School, Ota, Fondations Pittet et Juchum
Contemporary dance prizewinner
(426) Mr Derrin Watters, USA / Houston Ballet’s Ben Stevenson Academy, Fondation Nestlé pour l’Art
Best Swiss candidate prizewinner
(407) Mr Benoît Favre, Switzerland / Tanz Akademie Zurich, Fondation Leenaards
Audience favourite
(120) MS Mayara Magri
Brazilian Mayara Magri’s videoblog, filmed during the finals week, and video of a week at the competition
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Musician Elton John won’t be appearing at the Arena in Geneva Thursday evening: the singer has the flu. The concert, where he was to appear with Ray Cooper, is postponed to 26 May, Opus One announced Thursday afternoon. An earlier concert, in December, was postponed until today due to sickness.
Tickets for December or 3 February are valid for May, says the organizer, but if ticket-holders are unable to attend they have until 3 March to be reimbursed.
Enea's new Tree Museum, Zurich (click on images to view larger)
Tree Museum, photo Martin Ruetschi
Update 4 June / Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Zurich will soon add a new museum to its already eclectic and rich collection of these. One of the world’s top landscape architects, Enzo Enea, will open a tree museum in Raperswil-Jona, canton St Gallen, 14 June. The trees are a collection from those he has moved or adopted over the years while creating new gardens for people, and the youngest is 50 years old. About 120 trees will be on display at any given time. The tree museum is part of a 7.5 hectare park whose magnificent blooms will be on display for the public starting 14 June.
Zurich museums include, besides the famed Kunsthaus art museum, the Migros art museum with a notable contemporary art collection, the Rietberg collections/exhibits which host top international shows such as the just-closed “Mexico: Teotihuacan, The Mysterious City of Pyramid”, and which is worth visiting even just to see the grounds of this magnificent home which played host to composer Richard Wagner for nine years. It was here he offered his new composition “Tristan and Isolde”, written for Mathilde Wesendonck, his hostess, with whom he had an intimate relationship.
Links to other sites: Enea tree museum (Baummuseum), Luminaire on Enea
- Opening hours for the tree museum, Monday-Friday 09:00-18:30 and Saturday 10:00-17:00
- Address: Buechstrasse 12 / 8645 Rapperswil-Jona
- Telephone: +41 55 225 5555
Cristian Emanuel Amuchastegui, first place, 2010 Prix de Lausanne dance competition (photo: ©2010, Jean-Bernard Sieber)
Click on images to view larger
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Cristian Emanuel Amuchastegui, age 18, won the top prize at the 2010 Prix de Lausanne dance competition. He is from Argentina and has been studying at the Houston Ballet’s Ben Stevenson Academy in Texas, USA.
Amuchastegui also won the coveted prize as the audience’s favourite, selected with a poll taken during the final performances.
His prize is a year at the dance school of his choice, from among a host of top companies that are partners of the Prix de Lausanne.
The other top winners
Dancers who place in the top six spots, including the best contemporary dance winner, all receive scholarships at top partner schools/dance companies:
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The Prix de Lausanne opened in Lausanne Tuesday evening with an announcement that tickets for the final selection performance Sunday are sold out.
The international dance competition, which has grown in stature in recent years but also in popularity as a hometown event, began with its usual flourish. Eighty-one handsome young dancers, ages 15-18, from 20 countries were selected from a record 226 applicants from 36 countries.
They are surrounded for the week by nervous tension, excitement and a crowd of enthusiastic followers. Given hometown crowds who can’t be in Lausanne for the competition, the Prix de Lausanne blog and particularly the collection of videoblogs are already proving popular.
This is the first year that more boys than girls have been selected. Japan has the largest single contingent, 16 students, with China following with 14 students.
Several of the selections are open to the public, for CHF10 (children 7-15 free) and CHF20 for Saturday’s events. The finals can be watched live (streamed) Sunday starting at 15:00.
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – “Inside Switzerland”, which was started in 2007 as a glossy Swiss-wide magazine providing news and features in English, has ceased publication of both the quarterly print magazine and its online newsletter. The magazine was published by Schweizer and Davies Media in Zurich, which was founded by Jennifer Davies and Sabine Schweizer.
Davies is an arts presenter on World Radio Switzerland.
Editor-in-chief Schweizer notes in her letter to readers that the publication “has not been able to withstand current financial pressures.”
The quarterly print publication sold for CHF35 for four issues before it folded.
2010 Paleo poster, artist: Philippe Comte
Nyon, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Paleo 2010 has presented its new face to the world, and with the poster by artist Philippe Comte comes a new and much more functional website. The music festival, which in July 2009 pulled in 233,000 fans during its six days, has heavy web traffic and the new site should make life easier for the next festival’s fans.
Comte, 21, is a student at the University of Art & Design (HES-SO) in Geneva.
Click on image to view larger
Title: La Batie, performance arts festival
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: The largest performance arts festival in Geneva kicks off 15-days filled with theater, music, dance, mixed media and film. Special programming for younger audiences.
Date: 28 Aug 2009
Fetes de Geneve, photo: Sean Ecker
Fetes de Geneve, photo: Sean Ecker
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - More than 500,000 people turned out for the musical big-bangs end to the 63rd edition of Geneva’s colourful Fetes de Geneve.
The fireworks and music display, reportedly the largest in the city’s history, started at 22:00 and lasted for almost an hour.
It was a treat! Various pyrotechnical companies competed to show off their best displays. Several of the fireworks episodes had oriental themes, such as palm trees. The city increased the number of launch pads to a total of 15 around the end of Lake Geneva this year. After the fireworks display, the city was in pedestrian gridlock.
Unbridled energy with La Pulquería at Paleo 09 © Paleo Festival 2009
Paleo Festival Nyon, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The crowd at Paleo couldn’t keep up with La Pulqueria Friday 24 July. The energy level on the stage was reminiscent of the Large Hadron Collider at Cern – well, when it works – and lead singer Huracán Romántica exhorted the crowd in very passable French to dance, to DANCE. He even went into the crowd and gave people liberal shots of tequila from a bottle in an effort to get them fired up.
Title: Zurich festival
Location: Zurich
Link out: Click here
Description: A celebration of the arts: opera, music, dance and more.
Start Date: 19 Jun 2009
End Date: 12 Jul 2009
Title: Fest’Hivers
Location: Montbenon, Lausanne
Link out: Click here
Description: Multicultural warming up arts festival!
Start Date: 06 Feb 2009
End Date: 07 Feb 2009
Geneva, Switzerland (TDG, Fre) – City counselor Christian Ferrazino Tuesday ordered "mosquito" ultrasound emitters to be removed immediately from the Palais Eynard at the Bastions park in the centre of Geneva and by Wednesday they were gone. The devices had been placed on the walls of the building to discourage young people from gathering there. Mosquitos are a British invention that produce a very high pitched sound that can be heard only by people under age 25. According to youths interviewed by the Tribune the noise, which appeared intermittently at night, was "horrible." [Editor's note: the mosquito device was one of the winners of the 2006 Ig Nobel prizes. See Editor's Notepad for more on Mosquitos and elephants.]
Update, 11:15 – Le Matin, Fre – A "soft" version of the Mosquito, sold by the same company, has been a huge hit with teenagers. It won an award in 2006 as the most downloaded cell phone sound, reports Le Matin.
