AJ Four Ways: Text Only (by date) | headlines only
DANCE
IDEAS
- The Dictator’s Paint Job Didn’t Hold
Good Morning,
For decades, Julio Escámez’s monumental mural in Chile was thought destroyed — Pinochet ordered it eliminated after the coup. Then conservators discovered it had only been painted over, and now it’s coming back into the light (Artnet). Worth remembering on a day when the wannabe censors are busy: both houses of Congress now have bills that would enable nationwide book bans in public schools (Publishers Weekly), and German broadcaster ZDF pulled an anti-fascist song by Igor Levit and Danger Dan — not on government orders, but out of caution (The Hollywood Reporter).
Meanwhile, follow the money and you get a snapshot of Hollywood’s values: Netflix disclosed it paid $587 million — cash — for Ben Affleck’s AI visual-effects startup (The Hollywood Reporter), while Disney is cutting several hundred creative jobs, with Pixar among the hardest hit (Deadline).
And a New York Times reporter joined ABT’s “Swan Lake” as a supernumerary, filing a dispatch from inside the sweat-and-velvet musk of the Met stage (The New York Times).
All of our stories below.
- Monumental Chilean Mural Painted Over By Pinochet Is Being Uncovered
Beginning and End, a 452-square-foot mural painted by Julio Escámez, was unveiled in 1972 by the Allende-aligned government of the city of Chillán, 250 miles south of Santiago. After Pinochet’s coup, he ordered the mural destroyed, and it was thought lost; in 2021, conservators discovered that it had been only painted over. – Artnet
- Disney Cutting Hundreds Of Creative Jobs
Disney is cutting several hundred positions, with Pixar and National Geographic among the divisions most affected by the move. – Deadline
- Many Theatregoers No Longer Know The Difference Between Previews And Post-Opening Night
“The distinction between a preview and an official opening night, once a universally understood boundary, has become increasingly blurred. In an era dominated by instant social media reaction, some no longer seem to realise there is a difference at all.” – WhatsOnStage (UK)
- Ten New Stadiums That Will Change The Form
ISSUES
- Monumental Chilean Mural Painted Over By Pinochet Is Being Uncovered
Beginning and End, a 452-square-foot mural painted by Julio Escámez, was unveiled in 1972 by the Allende-aligned government of the city of Chillán, 250 miles south of Santiago. After Pinochet’s coup, he ordered the mural destroyed, and it was thought lost; in 2021, conservators discovered that it had been only painted over. – Artnet
- Ten New Stadiums That Will Change The Form
- How do We Define American Architecture?
Chicago, where the skyscraper was born, stood between the Western frontier of violence, timber, and gold and the banking capitals of the East Coast. It was at the center of a bridgeable world and the resources that flowed through it, requiring a degree of capital consolidation the likes of which had never been seen before. – The Nation
- Clothing Fashion Turned Over To Algorithms
It monitors customers’ social media activity and internet searches, factors in Hailey Bieber’s latest outfits and spits out 300 styles a month made cheaply in China. After it reached $460 million in sales in 2025, one of its founders boasted to The Wall Street Journal, “We’re more like a data company than a fashion company.” – The New York Times
- Auction House Sales Reports Show A Fundamental Change In The Art Business
This year, the houses devoted nearly as much space to private sales, lending, financial services, luxury goods, hospitality, and advisory work as they did to paintings and sculptures. Read together, they suggest that the biggest transformation in the auction business isn’t the recovery itself. It’s the transformation of the auction houses’ businesses. – ARTnews
MEDIA
- Revisiting The Tortured History Of America’s Culture Wars
“One of the sad things about this story is that we did not emerge with a more active, permanent activist constituency for the arts in America. We got complacent and people were exhausted. – The Guardian
- Data: A Widening Gap In Financial Health Of Arts In American Cities
We found that as federal relief funding waned, the gap between the strongest- and weakest-performing cities widened sharply. – SMU Data Arts
- UK’s Culture Secretary Will Stay On Under New Prime Minister
“Despite new Prime Minister Andy Burnham undergoing an extensive cabinet reshuffle, incumbent culture minister Lisa Nandy is set to remain in post. Nandy, who has been a member of Parliament since 2010 …, was appointed secretary of state for culture, media and sport by previous Prime Minister Keir Starmer in July 2024.” – Variety
- What Touched Off The Culture Wars
Frohnmayer’s dilemma was that he believed in artistic freedom and didn’t think Congress should dictate what the N.E.A. funded, but he also felt obliged, as a political appointee, to avoid funding work that Congress and the President found offensive. The result was flip-flopping. – The New Yorker
- Cleveland Comes Out On Top For Public Funding Of The Arts
The report ranked Cleveland No. 1 revenue growth among arts organizations from 2019 to 2024 in a cohort of 10 U.S. cities. The others were Atlanta, Des Moines, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Sacramento and Seattle. – Ideastream
MUSIC
- How $50 Million Could Make An Impact On American Literary Arts
Stabilizing a modest number of impactful, sustainable nonprofit literary organizations via large, annual gifts puts them in the best position to do what they do best—which is find great books to publish, support translations, and dream up new ways to reach readers—rather than having to spend so much time drumming up funding. – Publishing Perspectives
- Both Houses Of Congress Introduce Bill Allowing Nationwide Book Bans In Public Schools
“Senate Bill 4925, a partisan effort to control materials in public schools, … was introduced June 24 by Republican Senators. … Like its companion legislation, House Bill 7661, SB 4925 would amend the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 to prohibit the use of federal funding for ‘sexually oriented material’ in public schools.” – Publishers Weekly
- Here Are The Books All Students In Texas Schools Will Be Required To Read
“(The state) is doing something unusual, attempting to create a common canon of books that all students statewide will be required to read. The list was approved last month by the Republican-led Texas State Board of Education and is in the process of being finalized. It will take effect starting in 2030.” – The New York Times
- When Is It Okay To Let A Language Die?
Preserve this language (or species or building or mine) or else surrender to indifference, cynicism, and nihilism. But is that ever the choice we face? – The New Yorker
- How Publishers Fight For Sweet, Sweet ‘Odyssey’ Money
New covers – foil-stamped! Or colorfully graphic-novel-esque! – famous translators, deckled edges, and marketing moves try to set apart various versions of The Odyssey for the surprisingly robust market. – The New York Times
PEOPLE
- The Dictator’s Paint Job Didn’t Hold
Good Morning,
For decades, Julio Escámez’s monumental mural in Chile was thought destroyed — Pinochet ordered it eliminated after the coup. Then conservators discovered it had only been painted over, and now it’s coming back into the light (Artnet). Worth remembering on a day when the wannabe censors are busy: both houses of Congress now have bills that would enable nationwide book bans in public schools (Publishers Weekly), and German broadcaster ZDF pulled an anti-fascist song by Igor Levit and Danger Dan — not on government orders, but out of caution (The Hollywood Reporter).
Meanwhile, follow the money and you get a snapshot of Hollywood’s values: Netflix disclosed it paid $587 million — cash — for Ben Affleck’s AI visual-effects startup (The Hollywood Reporter), while Disney is cutting several hundred creative jobs, with Pixar among the hardest hit (Deadline).
And a New York Times reporter joined ABT’s “Swan Lake” as a supernumerary, filing a dispatch from inside the sweat-and-velvet musk of the Met stage (The New York Times).
All of our stories below.
- Monumental Chilean Mural Painted Over By Pinochet Is Being Uncovered
Beginning and End, a 452-square-foot mural painted by Julio Escámez, was unveiled in 1972 by the Allende-aligned government of the city of Chillán, 250 miles south of Santiago. After Pinochet’s coup, he ordered the mural destroyed, and it was thought lost; in 2021, conservators discovered that it had been only painted over. – Artnet
- Disney Cutting Hundreds Of Creative Jobs
Disney is cutting several hundred positions, with Pixar and National Geographic among the divisions most affected by the move. – Deadline
- Many Theatregoers No Longer Know The Difference Between Previews And Post-Opening Night
“The distinction between a preview and an official opening night, once a universally understood boundary, has become increasingly blurred. In an era dominated by instant social media reaction, some no longer seem to realise there is a difference at all.” – WhatsOnStage (UK)
- Ten New Stadiums That Will Change The Form
PEOPLE
- The Dictator’s Paint Job Didn’t Hold
Good Morning,
For decades, Julio Escámez’s monumental mural in Chile was thought destroyed — Pinochet ordered it eliminated after the coup. Then conservators discovered it had only been painted over, and now it’s coming back into the light (Artnet). Worth remembering on a day when the wannabe censors are busy: both houses of Congress now have bills that would enable nationwide book bans in public schools (Publishers Weekly), and German broadcaster ZDF pulled an anti-fascist song by Igor Levit and Danger Dan — not on government orders, but out of caution (The Hollywood Reporter).
Meanwhile, follow the money and you get a snapshot of Hollywood’s values: Netflix disclosed it paid $587 million — cash — for Ben Affleck’s AI visual-effects startup (The Hollywood Reporter), while Disney is cutting several hundred creative jobs, with Pixar among the hardest hit (Deadline).
And a New York Times reporter joined ABT’s “Swan Lake” as a supernumerary, filing a dispatch from inside the sweat-and-velvet musk of the Met stage (The New York Times).
All of our stories below.
- Monumental Chilean Mural Painted Over By Pinochet Is Being Uncovered
Beginning and End, a 452-square-foot mural painted by Julio Escámez, was unveiled in 1972 by the Allende-aligned government of the city of Chillán, 250 miles south of Santiago. After Pinochet’s coup, he ordered the mural destroyed, and it was thought lost; in 2021, conservators discovered that it had been only painted over. – Artnet
- Disney Cutting Hundreds Of Creative Jobs
Disney is cutting several hundred positions, with Pixar and National Geographic among the divisions most affected by the move. – Deadline
- Many Theatregoers No Longer Know The Difference Between Previews And Post-Opening Night
“The distinction between a preview and an official opening night, once a universally understood boundary, has become increasingly blurred. In an era dominated by instant social media reaction, some no longer seem to realise there is a difference at all.” – WhatsOnStage (UK)
- Ten New Stadiums That Will Change The Form
THEATRE
VISUAL
- The Power Of Coffee Houses To Change History
It was debated whether coffeehouses were truly a place of creativity or frivolous laziness. Many resolved to leave the coffeehouse behind, as if it were a vice, and then failed to kick the habit. – Aeon
- Why Costco Is Thriving As The Antithesis Of Amazon
While most retailers today assume that consumers want ever greater assortment, Costco’s popularity speaks to a countervailing desire for less choice. Indeed, the pre-selection of items for sale in their warehouses is part of the value proposition. – The Walrus
- A Short History Of Being Burned Out
Burnout’s meaning shifted from literal to figurative over time. It began as a description of candles burning out or fuel being used up, then shifted to a barn burning down and a worker’s energy or body being depleted in the rebuilding. Eventually it came to simply describe a worker’s exhaustion. – The Conversation
- Why Is Everything Weird? Blame The Uni-Context
How do all other norms—our morals, our ethics, our sense of what is good for us and for others—change when we continually imagine ourselves to be living in a universal room with everybody else? – Derek Thompson
- How Indigenous Communities In Brazil Are Dealing With Threats From The Internet
Using Nhandeflix, “users can find Guarani cultural productions like Roda Cutia (a Guarani children’s song), Bicicletas de Nhanderú (a documentary about a Guarani-Mbya town in southern Brazil), … and Como a noite apareceu (a fictional film based on a Guarani legend).” – El País English