Art & Culture | WPN World People News

Academy Award winning actor Julia Roberts will join the Alliance for Clean Cookstoves as “Global Ambassador,” and together with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton will help to bring attention to the global issue that kills nearly 2 million people annually: toxic smoke from unsafe and inefficient cookstoves.

“Music is the art of the invisible,” said Wynton Marsalis. “It gives shape and focus to our innermost inclinations, and can clearly evidence our internal lives with shocking immediacy." Marsalis was on campus to kick off a two-year performance and lecture series, speaking on a variety of topics to illuminate the relationship between American music and the American identity.

The Black Swan, The Fighter, Mad Men, Grey’s Anatomy, Nurse Jackie are among the productions that were recognized at the 15th Annual PRISM Awards at the Beverly Hills Hotel Thursday, April 28, 2011. The PRISM Awards, which are produced by the Entertainment Industries Council, Inc. (EIC) in collaboration with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) and FX, honor actors, movies, music, media and television’s top shows that accurately depict and bring attention to substance abuse and mental health issues, including prevention, treatment and recovery.

The movie MOOZ-lum is filmmaker Qasim Basir's effort to bring images of Muslims to the screen that are both nuanced and universally identifiable.

Weissman Center Director Brenda Bernier (from left) and four curators from the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia, — Natalia Laitar, Evgenia Glinka, Natalia Avetyan, and Tatiana Sayatina — examine volumes of photographs.

We'll kick off this morning with a couple of items about Oscar campaigning. Deadline has this roundup of the "final stretch" of each campaign, confirming that even though most of the ten Best Picture nominees have no real chance of winning, they're determined to stay in the hunt until the end.

The palette (oil on wood) used by artist John Singer Sargent is included in the exhibit “Tangible Things,” one part museum exhibit and one part treasure hunt.

Academy Award®-nominated actor Robert Downey Jr. will be a presenter at the 83rd Academy Awards ceremony, telecast producers Bruce Cohen and Don Mischer announced today.
Downey earned Oscar® nominations for his leading performance in “Chaplin” (1992) and his supporting role in “Tropic Thunder” (2008). He is currently filming the sequel to “Sherlock Holmes” and was recently seen in “Due Date.” His other film credits include “Iron Man” and “Iron Man 2,” “Sherlock Holmes,” “The Soloist,” “Good Night and Good Luck.,” “Wonder Boys,” “Restoration” and “Less than Zero.”

Nominations for the 83rd Academy Awards were announced today (Tuesday, January 25) by Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences President Tom Sherak and 2009 Oscar® winner Mo'Nique.