Issues

With local authority funding for culture now more than £236m lower than in 2010, and museums alone having lost £109m in annual funding over the past decade, the Government’s promise of £250m for culture over the next five years will at best put a sticking plaster on a patient with a life-threatening injury. – Arts Professional

“Everyone agrees that competition is the enemy of art. And yet, on the whole, there is also an agreement to conspire in the notion that it isn’t. This paradox, this doublethink, usually works fine, since it opens up the space in which the extra-artistic functions of prizes can be fulfilled.” Charlotte Higgins analyzes how this doublethink works — and how the decision of this year’s Booker jury to flout the prize’s rules messed it up. – The Guardian

The bulk of the new fund is being directed towards “major infrastructure and maintenance work at local and regional museums” and capital and technology upgrades at public libraries. – Arts Professional

There’s a difference between the two, for sure. But a Marvel movie is marvelous art, and high art helps us appreciate it. – The Hollywood Reporter

Scary: “A Japanese man was arrested for reportedly stalking a pop star and attacking and groping her at her home, according to Japanese news organization NHK. Allegedly, this man found the woman’s home by studying photos she posted on social media, observing a train station reflected in her eyes, finding that train station using Google Street View, waiting for her at the train station, and following her home.” – The Verge

One student recorded the burning of author Jennine Capó Crucet’s novel, which Georgia Southern had chosen as a campus read: “These people decide to burn her book because ‘it’s bad and that race is bad to talk about,'” she tweeted. Other outlets reported that “a group of apparently angry students had gathered outside” the author’s original hotel, so the college moved her to a different one. (The college’s response has been, shall we say, a bit tepid.) – Remezcla

In 2014, 60 percent had a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared with 39 percent of all workers. The average cost of an arts education in 2010–11 was $40,000 per year after grants and scholarships. Perhaps unsurprisingly, in 2014, 35 percent of recent art-school graduates said debt had a “major impact” on their educational and career decisions. – Artsy

Mary and Tom Beck emigrated to Canada in the 1950s from Europe. “When Tom got to England, not being an English-speaking person, the school didn’t know what to do with him. They took him at any opportunity to the symphony. Music is a universal language. It doesn’t matter your language skill set and I think that was where he became really exposed. It really made a lasting impression on him.” – The Globe and Mail (Canada)

Productivity in London’s creative industries has grown much more rapidly than in the rest of the UK, at 2.7% per year compared to 0.4%, calculations based on DCMS data from 2011 to 2017 show. – Arts Professional

The tax will apply to tourists who arrive by coach, cruise ship, water taxi, plane or train. They will be able to pay the charge online with a credit card or from machines “installed in strategic points” around Venice, officials said. The council did not say what penalties would apply to tourists who fail to pay the charge, although in February authorities suggested they would be hit with a fine of up to €450. – The Telegraph (UK)

“I didn’t realize it at first, but the fight over the library was rolled up into a bigger one about the library building, and an even bigger fight than that, about the county government, what it should pay for, and how and whether people should be taxed at all. The library fight was, itself, a fight over the future of rural America, what it meant to choose to live in a county like mine, what my neighbors were willing to do for one another, what they were willing to sacrifice to foster a sense of community here. The answer was, for the most part, not very much.” – The New York Times

“The website issued a statement on Twitter today saying it had taken the articles [about the battle of the loos] down after receiving what it described as ‘strong responses’ from readers, adding they had ‘only polarised the debate further’.” Sareah Ditum, who wrote one of the essays, called the move “gross editorial cowardice.” – Press Gazette (UK)

Whatever the reasons for its decision, AAU received significant blowback not only from the Canadian institutions but from some of its U.S. members, who argued that it seemed tone-deaf for an association whose core enterprise — scientific research and education — is an increasingly global one. The seeming parallel to the inward-lookingness of the Trump administration didn’t help. – Inside Higher Ed

The gold standard and the pop-up worth getting on line early to score tickets for is probably “Saved by the Max.” After its launch last year, Eater Los Angeles described it as a “near-complete recreation of the ’90s Saturday morning staple Saved by the Bell‘s diner.” It feels like it has items from every episode and Easter eggs to inside jokes for both die-hard and casual fans lurking in there somewhere. A $40 ticket gave Chicago and West Hollywood fans an appetizer, an entree, and all the fandom they could handle. – Fast Company

They’ve been moving into abandoned East German factories along the Spree River. “Although the area’s landscape may look post-apocalyptic, with its giant weeds and empty power plants, strangely, the future here can seem positively Arcadian: Real estate is still cheap enough that artists are able to buy, rather than rent, their spaces. Here, four artists discuss how their work is shaped by the Spree.” – T — The New York Times Style Magazine

What is a comfort zone, anyway? And how are the claims about Franco and his acting school exemplary of a certain kind of boundary-ignoring harassment that, yes, Harvey Weinstein also engaged in? – The Atlantic

Russian oligarchs have sat on the board of the Guggenheim and given money to the Kennedy Center. They’ve funded the New Museum and historic parks in the U.S. At least, they’ve done all that until (& sometimes after) their companies are sanctioned by the U.S. This “soft power” money is approved by the Kremlin and appreciated by strapped arts institutions. “The Russian giving, and the strained relations between the countries, has created something of a minefield for American cultural organizations.” – The New York Times

Just a few nights after Anne-Sophie Mutter stopped a concert to tell a woman in the front row to stop filming, actor Joshua Henry, star of a new Off Broadway musical called The Wrong Man, tried to get a man in onstage seating to quit filming. The man paid no attention. So Henry “reached into the seats, deftly grabbed the phone out of the man’s hand, wagged it disapprovingly, and tossed it under a riser — all mid-song, without skipping a beat. ‘I knew I had to do something,’ he explained later.” – The New York Times

There’s evidence it did. In some respects. But the answer is a bit more complicated. – BBC

Robert Hewison: “ACE’s response to its lacklustre level of achievement has been to invent three “outcomes” so inoffensive that no one would disagree with them: “creative people” – more emphasis will be put on helping individual artists – “cultural communities” – encouraging local collaboration – and “a creative and cultural country”. Are we striving for an uncreative and philistine country? Surely not.” – Arts Professional

“The sprawling science, tech and business museum on the city’s South Side will become the Kenneth C. Griffin Museum of Science and Industry after the museum’s board voted to accept Griffin’s $125 million donation, … one of the largest cash donations ever to a local cultural institution.” – Chicago Tribune

“Music industry figures have said a no-deal Brexit would make touring ‘simply unviable for many artists’, after new government guidelines for cultural, heritage and sporting professionals touring Europe signalled … [that] touring parties would face extra issues with documentation, travel and the transport and sale of goods as they take their work to individual EU member states.” – The Guardian

Provincial cuts to the Ontario Arts Council will leave small magazines struggling to pay writers and illustrators, silencing important minority and marginalized voices, and putting the magazines’ survival in jeopardy, New Democrat MPP Jill Andrew says. – Toronto Star

“Over the next few weeks voters will face a deluge of information aimed at swaying them for or against a quarter-cent sales tax hike in Mecklenburg County. The controversial measure would bring an additional $50 million annually to fund the arts, education and parks in the region.” – Charlotte Agenda