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Article: Black Oak bookstore in closes in North Berkeley

Black Oak Books Moves Out

By Riya Bhattacharjee

After more than two decades in North Berkeley, Black Oak Books, one of the city’s best-loved bookstores, is moving out. 

Article: Getty Fees and Budget Are Reassessed

NY Times article: The value of the J. Paul Getty Trust’s endowment has fallen so sharply and quickly that the Getty has taken the unusual step of abandoning its traditional budgeting formula. Full article

Article: Art Galleries in 3D

Art museums have been experimenting with new ways to present their work digitally for years. Multimedia CD-ROMs were popular in the 1990s, and the Web presents even more opportunities for museums to get their exhibits in front of the public and create new relationships with patrons. An article in today's SF Chronicle presents a San Francisco company, Virtual Gallerie, and discusses how their product makes it possible for the viewer to continue to wander the museum's galleries online, where exhibits are preserved virtually, in three dimensions, with audio and video attached to each work of art.

Thought: Signs of the Time

The Metropolitan Museum in NYC said Thursday that it would lay off more than a quarter of its merchandising staff, eliminating 74 jobs in addition to 53 already cut over the last year, see the article here. The Art Institute of Chicago raises admission 50 percent, see the article here. The Philadelphia Art Museum Cuts Staff and Salaries and Mulls Ticket Increase, here and here.

Article: Historic books fully restored after flood

As an artist who often works on paper, I am always amazed when I think about precisely how I have learned so many techniques over the years to deal with disasters on paper. My skills, which hover just above nil, make the The California Historical Society's successful rescue of more than 1,500 antique and historic book all that more impressive. This came about after a December flood damaged its building. The article is here.

Article: Outcry Over a Plan to Sell Museum’s Holdings

This New York times article about Brandeis University’s surprise decision to sell off the entire holdings of its Rose Art Museum, one of the most important collections of postwar art in New England really shows how far reaching the economic downturn is. As the authors (Randy Kennedy and Carol Vogel) point out, critics are saying that by closing its art museum and selling off the contents of the collection, Brandeis University is cannibalizing its cultural heritage to pay the bills.

Article: Google and the Future of Books

From the New York Review of Books (Volume 56, Number 2 · February 12, 2009) | Robert Darnton asks how can we navigate through the information landscape that is only beginning to come into view? In his view, the question is more urgent than ever following the recent settlement between Google and the authors and publishers who were suing it for alleged breach of copyright. Full article

Article: The Rise and Fall of Cody's bookstore

BusinessWeek has an article worth reading called The Autopsy of an Indie Bookseller. The piece reviews the history of Cody's Bookstore, a Bay Area favorite for decades.  Here, in Berkeley, we are still mourning the loss! The article includes a wonderful slideshow, which offers an opportunity to re-visit Cody's history.

Article: Another bookstore closes

Stacey's Bookstore closing down in S.F. by Matthai Kuruvila, San Francisco Chronicle Staff Writer | Published Wednesday, January 7, 2009

  

Stacey's Bookstore, the iconic San Francisco shop that called Market Street home for all of its 85 years and had carved out a niche for technical publications, announced Tuesday evening that it would close in March. Like other independent book sellers, Stacey's had been hurt over the past decade by the rise of national chains, like Barnes & Noble, and Web-based booksellers, such as Amazon.com. The store's general manager, Tom Allen, said sales had dropped 50 percent since March 2001. But the final blow was the crumbling economy, which hit hard during the holidays. Stacey's sales in the fourth quarter of 2008 plummeted 15 percent from the same period in 2007.

Article:Cartoons Without Computers? Silly Animators!

One school of animators addresses modern subject matter with old-fashioned techniques. Full article