rolexartsweekend.docVIP

ROLEX ARTS WEEKEND BRIAN ENO, ANISH KAPOOR, and PETER SELLARS in conversation with Paul Holdengr?ber November 13, 2011 LIVE from the New York Public Library /live Celeste Bartos Forum PAUL HOLDENGR?BER: Thank you very much to Rolex for this absolutely inebriating experience of these last three days. It has been tremendous. I’m so relieved that I knew who was coming onstage next. It’s been an extraordinary experience. I feel like I’m in the richest possible candy store ever. My name is Paul Holdengr?ber, and I’m the Director of LIVE from the New York Public Library. As all of you know my goal here at the library is simply to make the lions roar, to make a heavy institution levitate, and when possible to make it dance. And what better way than this afternoon and this evening? I encourage all of you who have tickets to come this evening, and for you who don’t, have passion, come on standby and try your luck. (laughter) It really has been inebriating. We’ve had Gilberto Gil and Jessye Norman and Tracy Smith and Hans Magnus Enzensberger. And last night Osvaldo Golijov with José Van Dam. All of them are here in this audience and we also have Jessye Norman and Gilberto Gil doing a jam session and who knows where it might lead and it all will have started here at the New York Public Library. And tonight dance performance followed by Ben Frost in the Reading Room. It’s just magnificent to be breaking all the rules of silence in the Reading Room. I love it. (laughter) We did this a few years back with Maira Kalman when she did an opera in the Reading Room based on The Elements of Style. And probably broke every rule of grammar and certainly many rules at the Library. I would like to thank one last time, maybe I will do it again later on. Rebecca Irwin, the director of the Rolex Mentorship Protégé Arts Initiative. Rebecca, thank you so much. (applause) And I promise to go quickly, because I still want to show you two little clips before bringing the guests onstage.