Category: Philadelphia

Although I write a great deal about Vienna here, I was born in — and soon will be moving back to — Philadelphia. I don’t think it would do me any good to compare them with each other, but they must have more than my affection for them in common. In any case, I’ve written a great deal about Philadelphia in the past, and you can read that here.

I suppose that one of those traits is that each plays a unique role in history, roles which exhibit affinities: Vienna in Europe, Philadelphia in the United States. Sam Katz’s History Making Productions has followed up Philadelphia: The Great Experiment, its excellent ten-part series about Philadelphia, with In Pursuit: Philadelphia and the Making of America, an examination of Philadelphia’s place in history, from the establishment of the city in the seventeenth century to its genius loci today.

The first episode premiered last night at the National Constitution Center and begins streaming today; the others will follow shortly. Credit where credit is due: all ten episodes were directed by Andrew Ferrett and written by author and historian Nathaniel Popkin. You can read more about the series in this Philadelphia Inquirer article (gift link) by Mike Newall. The trailer for the first episode (and we still don’t have an answer to its final question) is below.

Philadelphia’s Mural Arts project keeps Philly’s streets dynamic, and on October 3 the project tipped its hat to the role the city has played in the movies with the unveiling of Marian Bailey’s “Films Shaped by a City” in the Sansom Street rear of the Film Society Center at 1412 Chestnut Street. “The mural includes many films and film related organizations that have impacted filmmaking, film presentation and film-related training in Philadelphia,” reads the description at the Mural Arts web site.

Rocky and the usual suspects receive due recognition, although “[the] exclusion of certain movies from the mural is likely to start some arguments,” Stephen Silver wrote in an article for the Inquirer. I personally was happy to see the inclusion of my favorite Philadelphia film, Elaine May’s 1976 Mikey and Nicky, which captures the desolation and frustration you could find on Philadelphia streets at the time. So hats off to the folks who put the mural together.

Finally, I am grimly amused at the announcement that the Philadelphia Museum of Art has paid a small fortune, I believe, to the Brooklyn-based marketing firm Gretel for a rebranding effort that included a new logo — “Our main objective was to ‘come down the steps’ by putting the museum in dialogue with its community, which is and always has been the city itself,” Gretel’s Ryan Moore said in a masterly demonstration of the bleedin’ obvious– but maybe the most apparent change was a new name. As Gretel’s web site has it:

Along the way, the museum’s name shifted to what much of the city had already called it: Philadelphia Art Museum. It’s simple, casual and approachable. In short: PhAM.

In true City of Brotherly Love fashion, however, Philadelphia magazine’s Victor Fiorillo yesterday suggested another possibility: “The Philadelphia Museum of Art is now the Philadelphia Art Museum or, well, PhART.” I’ll bet he wasn’t paid for it, either. Me, I hope PhART is the one that sticks.