AJ Four Ways: Text Only (by date) | headlines only
DANCE
IDEAS
- Post-Assad, Syria’s Powerhouse TV Industry Has New Freedoms And New Challenges
“While Egypt is known for its movies and Lebanon for its pop singers and composers, Syria’s TV series” — especially the high-profile dramas aired during Ramadan — “have for decades been seen as the gold standard in the region.” Naturally, the fall of the long Assad family dictatorship has led to some changes. – AP
- Britain’s Ballet Black At 25
Founding Artistic Director Cassa Pancho: “There was nowhere in this country for Black classical dancers to be hired. It was suggested to me that they go and dance with Dance Theatre of Harlem – as if every Black person trained in ballet can only go to one place!” – Bachtrack
- Tilly-The-AI Actor Gets Her Own Universe
AI talent studio Xicoia, which created Norwood, has announced plans for a “rapid expansion” for the digitized actor. The developments include a digital universe dubbed the “Tillyverse,” where ”Tilly and a new generation of AI characters will live, collaborate and build careers.” – Los Angeles Times
- The AI-Written College Essay And The Decline Of Thinking
Surely the most dismal prospect is that we will lose sight of our own forms of thinking and understanding if those terms are assimilated to the capacities of AI. – Public Books
- This Little Company Brings The Ephemerality Of Theater To A Whole New Level
Every month, in an American Legion hall or women’s center (anywhere but a theater) in Los Angeles, Public Assembly presents three 12-minute plays that it has developed over the previous four weeks from pitches submitted from the audience at the previous month’s show, which is advertised only by word-of-mouth. – Los Angeles Times (Yahoo!)
ISSUES
- Painting Unseen For 65 Years Authenticated As Rembrandt
The artwork, Vision of Zacharias in the Temple, has been in private hands since 1961, a year after art historians declared it not to be by Rembrandt. After two years of examination with state-of-the-art equipment, experts at Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum have now reversed that earlier assessment. – AP
- Indianapolis Museum Of Art Has Closed Its High-Tech Immersive Art Space
The museum opened the 30,000-square-foot space, called the Lume, in 2021 with a 150-projector installation emblazoning images of Van Gogh’s paintings across the walls and floor. – The Indianapolis Star (Yahoo!)
- The Louvre Scandals And A French President’s Legacy
France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, is at risk of losing what could be a legacy-defining cultural project: a $1 billion-plus refurbishment of the Louvre, which would include moving the Mona Lisa, the museum’s most famous painting, to its own room and building a new entrance. – The New York Times
- Native Artist Hand-Stitches ‘Bead Bomb’ Projects Onto Utility Poles In LA
”At the edge of a Home Depot parking lot where federal immigration agents have violently detained vendors and others,” a utility pole “carries a band of color with a fluorescent sheath … made up of 10,000 pony beads spelling a message in block letters: ‘FUCK ICE.’” – Los Angeles Public Press
- The Vatican Has Removed ‘A Chalky White Film Of Salt’ Coating The Last Judgement
That is to say, people’s sweat had gotten all over Michelangelo’s masterpiece, and now it’s being cleaned off while the sweat accumulates on a screen. – Associated Press
MEDIA
- Should AI Be Used In Grantmaking? If So, How?
Arts-minded folks are likely to hate the idea, but there are pressures which could push toward it: increasing application volumes, limited staff capacity, and mounting expectations for speed and consistency in decision-making (not least from board members). Could grantmakers use AI responsibly? – SMU DataArts
- Chicago Launches Plan To Create Loop Arts District
“The district will be supported by nearly 90 Loop arts organizations that will develop the neighborhood as an arts and culture destination. … (It) is also envisioned as a way to stitch together attractions such as Millennium Park and the Chicago Riverwalk.” – Chicago Sun-Times
- Too Many Basket Weavers?
Ontario is one of the provinces to see the highest economic impact from the sector, according to the report. – The Conversation
- Turmoil At This Year’s Berlinale Has Some Wondering If Germany Can Run Big Cultural Events
Some “wonder if the German government’s views on permissible speech, shaped by its sense of responsibility for the Holocaust and desire to stop antisemitism, make it impossible to run top-tier cultural events in the country.” – The New York Times
- Mamdani Picks A New Culture Commissioner For NYC
An experienced curator with a community-forward approach, she has held several key positions at Creative Time, the High Line, and elsewhere. She has even worked at the DCLA from 2014 to 2019. – Hyperallergic
MUSIC
- The AI-Written College Essay And The Decline Of Thinking
Surely the most dismal prospect is that we will lose sight of our own forms of thinking and understanding if those terms are assimilated to the capacities of AI. – Public Books
- Poet Threatens To Sue Arts Council England After Defunding
A poet is threatening Arts Council England (ACE) with legal action after a magazine it funds withdrew her work from publication based on her “social media presence”, which she believes refers to gender-critical posts. – The Guardian
- Firefighters Rescue Rare Books From A Library On The Cliff Edge After Landslide
“Firefighters drilled through the wall of a building behind the structure and entering for minutes at a time, strapped the bookcases together and hauled them backwards to reach the books.” – The Guardian (UK)
- Ode To A Great Editor
During my own editing stint, I came to understand writers as prisoners of their own minds, pressed up against the bars of the words they have already committed to the page. Writers suffer from a cognitive impairment that limits their ability to see flaws in their prose. – The Atlantic
- Congressional Republicans Propose National Book Banning
House Resolution 7661 transforms grassroots library battles into national policy, giving censors sweeping powers to purge school and public collections. Democracy’s reading rooms become political battlegrounds as cultural wars scale up. — Literary Hub
PEOPLE
- Post-Assad, Syria’s Powerhouse TV Industry Has New Freedoms And New Challenges
“While Egypt is known for its movies and Lebanon for its pop singers and composers, Syria’s TV series” — especially the high-profile dramas aired during Ramadan — “have for decades been seen as the gold standard in the region.” Naturally, the fall of the long Assad family dictatorship has led to some changes. – AP
- Britain’s Ballet Black At 25
Founding Artistic Director Cassa Pancho: “There was nowhere in this country for Black classical dancers to be hired. It was suggested to me that they go and dance with Dance Theatre of Harlem – as if every Black person trained in ballet can only go to one place!” – Bachtrack
- Tilly-The-AI Actor Gets Her Own Universe
AI talent studio Xicoia, which created Norwood, has announced plans for a “rapid expansion” for the digitized actor. The developments include a digital universe dubbed the “Tillyverse,” where ”Tilly and a new generation of AI characters will live, collaborate and build careers.” – Los Angeles Times
- The AI-Written College Essay And The Decline Of Thinking
Surely the most dismal prospect is that we will lose sight of our own forms of thinking and understanding if those terms are assimilated to the capacities of AI. – Public Books
- This Little Company Brings The Ephemerality Of Theater To A Whole New Level
Every month, in an American Legion hall or women’s center (anywhere but a theater) in Los Angeles, Public Assembly presents three 12-minute plays that it has developed over the previous four weeks from pitches submitted from the audience at the previous month’s show, which is advertised only by word-of-mouth. – Los Angeles Times (Yahoo!)
PEOPLE
- Post-Assad, Syria’s Powerhouse TV Industry Has New Freedoms And New Challenges
“While Egypt is known for its movies and Lebanon for its pop singers and composers, Syria’s TV series” — especially the high-profile dramas aired during Ramadan — “have for decades been seen as the gold standard in the region.” Naturally, the fall of the long Assad family dictatorship has led to some changes. – AP
- Britain’s Ballet Black At 25
Founding Artistic Director Cassa Pancho: “There was nowhere in this country for Black classical dancers to be hired. It was suggested to me that they go and dance with Dance Theatre of Harlem – as if every Black person trained in ballet can only go to one place!” – Bachtrack
- Tilly-The-AI Actor Gets Her Own Universe
AI talent studio Xicoia, which created Norwood, has announced plans for a “rapid expansion” for the digitized actor. The developments include a digital universe dubbed the “Tillyverse,” where ”Tilly and a new generation of AI characters will live, collaborate and build careers.” – Los Angeles Times
- The AI-Written College Essay And The Decline Of Thinking
Surely the most dismal prospect is that we will lose sight of our own forms of thinking and understanding if those terms are assimilated to the capacities of AI. – Public Books
- This Little Company Brings The Ephemerality Of Theater To A Whole New Level
Every month, in an American Legion hall or women’s center (anywhere but a theater) in Los Angeles, Public Assembly presents three 12-minute plays that it has developed over the previous four weeks from pitches submitted from the audience at the previous month’s show, which is advertised only by word-of-mouth. – Los Angeles Times (Yahoo!)
THEATRE
VISUAL
- There Are No Psychopaths?
While it has been researched across hundreds of empirical studies – especially since the explosion of research in the late-1990s – there is still remarkably little evidence that corroborates popularised claims about the diagnosis. – Aeon
- A Conspiracy Theory That A Jim Carrey Doppelganger Picked Up His Honorary Cesar Is Making The Rounds In France
This is where we are with the internet now: The man in charge of the Césars (the “French Oscars”) had to say, ““From the outset, he was extremely touched by the Academy’s invitation. … He worked on his speech in French for months.”- The Guardian (UK)
- In A Time Of Lies, Sudden Wars, And AI Hallucinations, We Desperately Need Live Performance
“The performing arts, with their warm embrace of subjectivity, might not seem the most likely corrective amid this crisis. But they have much to teach us about the notion of truth.” – The New York Times
- “Moral Self-Defense” And The Uses of Public Shaming
“There are plenty of self-serving, self-aggrandizing, morally objectionable reasons for why people participate in public shaming. Nevertheless, the concept of moral self-defence reminds us that our self-respect, our social identities, and our status in our communities are vital.” – Psyche
- The Qualities Of Ethics Required For Good Government
In a world increasingly defined by distance, between citizen and state, between policy and experience, between law and justice, Rammohun Roy offers a reminder that good government is not only a matter of laws or statistics. It is a matter of presence. – Aeon
