Fame in a name
Poor Mario Botta. The Swiss-Italian architect, whose work will be celebrated in an exhibition of photographs by Pino Musi at the Arts Centre this week, built up an international reputation as one of a new generation of European architects re-energising modern architecture. He began building in his home canton of Ticino, and by 1980 began to work throughout Europe. By the time he made his United States debut, when he was commissioned to build the new San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in 1989, he was already much admired. This did not stop the US press from getting his name wrong, he was described variously as Mario Batto, Marion Botta, and Mario Botto, sometimes in the same story, in such august publications as The New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle.
Our own humble Artslink, published by the Arts Centre with half the resources, managed to get it right every time. Botta has designed churches in France, a bank headquarters in Basel, among other things, and these black and white pictures capture the skills that have made him famous, although clearly not famous enough for the US press. The exhibition runs until April 12 at the Arts Centre.
The violin that sings The Philharmonic have invited their share of stars over the years, but few have real showbiz sparkle. Violinist Viktoria Mullova, who will return to Hong Kong for a second time tonight and tomorrow to play Stravinsky's Violin Concerto, has it in abundance. The Times of London described her recording of Tchaikovsky and Sibelius as '10,000 of the most beautiful sounds the violin has ever made'. On stage, she wears Versace and black leather trousers. 'The dowdy way the orchestra dresses comes from the last century, because people had to dress like the public. But now the public has changed and the musicians have not . . . why should musicians look pompous?' she told Classic FM magazine last year.
And her personal life has Hollywoodesque qualities. She defected from Russia in 1981 with her then boyfriend Vakhtang Jordania, a conductor 20 years older. The West welcomed her warmly, but the relationship did not last and she took up with dashing conductor Claudio Abbado, with whom she had a son, Misha. Their relationship ended soon after and Mullova later had a second baby with a violinist. She takes the children when she tours, so look for them at the Cultural Centre Concert Hall. The other half of the programme is Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture.
The waiting's over Music educator Dr Yip Wai-hong has been waiting for this Sunday for many years. It marks the inaugural concert by the Hong Kong Children's Symphony Orchestra. The musicians, aged between eight and 16, will perform a programme that includes Rossini, Rimsky-Korsakov and Tchaikovsky, with Beijing prodigy Liu Wei playing the solo for Paganini's Violin Concerto No 1. Dr Yip will be conducting, and sharing the baton with his daughter, Philharmonic conductor Yip Wing-sie. The programme begins at 8pm at the Cultural Centre Concert Hall.
Troupe courts controversy Controversy surrounds the latest production from the American Community Theatre, an acting ensemble perhaps better known for hearty musicals and comedies. Their version of Agnes Of God, which runs at the Shouson Theatre between April 8 and 12, has already lost one producer who on re-reading the work, decided not to be involved, and some season subscribers have declared they will be boycotting the show too. For once it is the material and not what ACT have done to it that is causing the upset.
The play, which ran on Broadway and became a feature film in 1985 starring Jane Fonda and Anne Bancroft, is based on a true story of a young nun, charged with murdering her newborn child. She claims it was a virgin birth, the police are inclined to think otherwise, and the action is based on conversations between the mother superior, the nun and a court-appointed psychiatrist, who has to find out whether the young mother is batty or blessed. Even Fonda and Bancroft found this a tricky subject, so one can only hope the brave souls at ACT know what they are doing. There were enraged Catholic pickets outside the original production in Kentucky.