"Winning a prize is an undeniably thrilling, magical thing. It is, in essence, the world’s way of telling you that you’ve done something noteworthy and valuable. It’s your moment to shine. But on the whole, do prizes do any good." - The New York Times

"My first conversation with captioned glasses did feel like something out of the movies. I kept shaking my head in wonder at the captions floating in the air before me. 'This is so cool,' I kept saying." - The Atlantic

Maureen Down isn't having it. "Without humanities, humanity and humaneness, we won’t be imbuing society with wisdom, just creating owner’s manuals. That would be a floccinaucinihilipilification." - The New York Times

Where do real memories end and generative AI begin? It’s a question for the AI era, where our holy photos merge with holey memories, where new pixels are generated whole cloth by artificial intelligence. - Wired

If a secret really is something I tell only myself, is there something here that is mine and mine alone, that survives as my true ‘self’, more basic than the many roles I play out socially? - Aeon

Reporting for this story, I spoke with multiple people who are essentially funemployed, or at least one meaning of it, who sit around at work all day with very little to do. What was most surprising was that many did not exactly love the situation and felt somewhat conflicted. - Vox

Many people are sick of buying and throwing away everything from clothes to phones. But repairing things with computer chips can be illegal. So, "there's this cultural shift, and then there is the policy work that has to be done. ... They have to go hand in hand." - NPR

Professor Meredith Clark "says preserving Black Twitter will allow for a more accurate and complex retelling of the history of the internet. But it's not a simple task." - NPR

There’s a lot of potential for workers to step outside of the box with the assistance of generative AI, whether it’s improving their daily workflows, or developing long-term projects and goals. - BBC

"In the chest-thumping nationalism that has dominated the country's tightly controlled official and public discourses, the Chinese military occupies a sacred, central place – and any perceived slight can lead to serious consequences." The current crackdown is drawing some comparisons with the Cultural Revolution of the 1970s. - CNN

As we expected, ambassadors and others across the bank began working together, making measurements, targeting data cleanups, and eliminating root causes of error. Then, somewhat organically, ambassadors and regular employees began using methods and tools provided in the training in new ways. - Harvard Business Review

If the mark of 21st-century politics is the ascendancy of culture and identity over economics and class, it could be said to have been born here in Turkey, home to one of the longest-running culture wars of them all. - The New York Times

Let's not downplay the true connections people find online. "I could introduce you to dozens (if not hundreds) of other people who have met many of the most important people they know — their best friends, their partners, their chosen families, their communities — because of Tori Amos." - HuffPost

"We remain guests, respectful of the amount we can never know, hoping to take away something of lasting value for all." - The Observer (UK)

Dion has not performed since before the pandemic because of her condition. "Stiff Person Syndrome is a progressive neurological and autoimmune disorder that affects the brain and the spinal cord. Symptoms include muscle rigidity or spasming. ... There is no cure." - Variety

"The former home of composer George Frideric Handel has reopened to the public following a two-year renovation project costing £3 million. The property is now known as the ‘Handel Hendrix House’ (HHH), as the adjoining flat was occupied by US rock guitarist Jimi Hendrix in 1968." - The Strad

His departure this summer comes four years ahead of what had been the end of his contract as music director of the Opéra national de Paris. His resignation statement says, in those words, he's stepping down "in order to spend more time with my family." Okay. - Yahoo! (Los Angeles Times)

In an often-cited letter to his father, he wrote that his piano concertos offered a happy medium between the easy and the difficult. There are passages, he said, that only the connoisseur can fully appreciate, “yet the common listener will find them satisfying as well, although without knowing why.” - The New Yorker

"If he finds a buyer, he will be prohibited from being Darren Bader the contemporary artist, and that identity will be taken over by the buyer. ... If the buyer wants to keep making trademark Bader works, they’re welcome to take a crack at it." - The New York Times

"If you owned a valuable painting you'd keep it inside, in correct lighting and temperatures but outside art is open to all the elements - whatever the weather - along with grime, plant life and dog wee." - BBC

Artist and illustrator Emine Yilmaz Ozsoy's "designs have been featured in outlets such as Chicago Magazine and NPR, and she won an American Illustration award in 2021." - Hyperallergic

Kagan’s dissent was not mild, either—it reads as strenuously as a vintage art-critical piece by, say, Clement Greenberg, slamming Harold Rosenberg—thus producing an image of two liberal Justices going hammer and tongs over brow-furrowing matters of aesthetics and the marketplace. - The New Yorker

It must be said that no work of art interrogates anyone or anything. This linguistic tic is endemic to the art scene and unproductively cliché. The action of questioning in a focused, rigorous, probing, and relentless manner is something that humans do, not inanimate objects. - Hyperallergic

The exhibit was first established in 1978, in collaboration with Indigenous representatives. A description of the exhibit on the museum’s website says visitors could see “authentic reconstructed dwellings.”  But the museum said despite that collaboration, the exhibit failed to avoid insensitive depictions of Native American culture. - Colorado Public Radio

"I like to imagine that I would survive, thrive even, conveniently forgetting that my life of indoor pursuits, reading, writing, and streaming drama box sets whilst ordering pizza, has probably not provided me with the skills I’d need." - LitHub

Gabrielle Zevin, author of Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, isn't sure. And it's a bit weird for her. "Even though is not her first book, or even her first to be a best seller, many readers are coming to her work for the first time." - The New York Times

In 1936, Hughes and artist Elmer W. Brown put together and shopped around The Sweet and Sour Animal Book. No publisher acquired the book, but the original verses and pictures have been reunited for a museum show in Cleveland. - The New York Times

"Volunteers have been transporting the books and other precious documents, which became submerged in water and mud in flooded libraries in the worst-affected areas, to Cesena, where the items will be placed on shelves in temperatures of -25C (-13F) in industrial-size freezers provided by (frozen-food company) Orogel." - The Guardian

"A company called Open Road Integrated Media is trying to (give) a second life to older books. It does that by using machine learning to make those titles more visible online and ... by republishing books that were largely forgotten or had fallen out of print." - The New York Times

The U.S. is the biggest English-language publishing market it the world, yet it’s one of the few large countries without an industrywide conference. - Publishers Weekly

Regardless of the movie's critical reception, the music is pretty good. "With the help of a renowned dance company, an 86-person orchestra and a well-traveled percussionist, the new movie manages to elevate the cherished compositions into musical numbers that are aurally sumptuous and visually spectacular." - Los Angeles Times

That's right, this is four decades on from the time the national radio network let a six-year-old entirely spoil Return of the Jedi. - NPR

Anatomy of a Fall director Justine Triet is the third woman ever to win the prize. The courtroom drama, which stars German actress Sandra Hüller, also the star of the runner-up film at Cannes, tells the story of a writer accused of her husband's murder. - BBC

"Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Alison Mackenzie signaled on Thursday that she'll dismiss the suit, finding claims that the movie depicts sexual acts are a 'gross mischaracterization' of the scene. She said in a tentative ruling that the claims 'arise from protected activity' under the First Amendment." - The Hollywood Reporter

It’s one of the best years in recent memory for Cannes, which seemed revitalized as it finally shook off the hangover of the pandemic. It’s anybody’s guess which film will take the Palme. - Toronto Star

Even when braced for it, the institute’s findings are staggering: In the 101 top-grossing G-rated films from 1990 to 2005, just 28 percent of speaking characters were female. Even in crowd scenes — even in animated crowd scenes — male characters vastly outnumber female ones. - The New York Times

"The factors driving the Bananas' online success are obvious. In-game clips of players swinging flaming baseball bats, pitching from atop stilts, and performing choreographed dance routines are tailor-made for social media. To reduce the team's popularity solely to its viral antics, however, is dishonest." - The Guardian

"Whether the company's open call for corps members marks a change in relationship with the San Francisco Ballet School is still uncertain." The company is completing a major change in leadership: Tamara Rojo is just finishing her first season as artistic director following Helgi Tomasson's 37-year tenure. - San Francisco Chronicle

Catherine and Ti have devised a coding language by which sequences of human movements are translated into what they call choreographic hashes—code that determines the appearance of a piece of digital art. - Decrypt

In a work titled Corps Extrêmes ("Extreme Bodies"), which choreographer Rachid Ouramdane calls "halfway between a documentary and an art piece," involves highliner Nathan Paulin, eight acrobats from Compagnie XY and the Swiss free climber Nina Caprez. - The Guardian

"Far too often, women in ballet have been disbelieved, gaslighted, judged, or blamed for the harms inflicted on them by their abusers. Kourlas continues this trend, but attaches these behaviors to words like 'feminism' and 'freedom' in a way that diminishes them." - Dance Magazine

Mira Nadon, who's 21: "That's exciting for me to have some responsibility and feel like I can do something to help ... the culture in our company." - CBS

It is certainly not a popular theory, but it’s quite possible that, at this moment, America’s cultural venues may be larger than needed. Now companies must grapple with sustaining their homes at a critical time when audiences may not be attending in the same way they were 50 years ago, 25 years ago, or...

Ennosuke Ichikawa IV — scion of an eminent kabuki family, the force behind an updated style called super-kabuki, and a popular television star — was found unconscious near his now-dead parents. All had overdosed on psychotropic drugs, and Ichikawa IV, caught in a sexual harassment scandal, had written a suicide note. - The Guardian

"About 94% of (Actors Equity) members who voted backed the deal with the Society of London Theatre, which will see them get 16.7% pay rises over the next two years. Some members including understudies could be in line for up to a 43% rise in payments." - London Evening Standard

The nature of celebrity has changed. Social media has made us as interested in people’s kitchens as we are in their performances on TV. We want to know the whole story about them, we want to go on a journey with them and invest in their lives not just their talents. - The Stage

"The award marks an astonishing turnaround for Pasadena Playhouse, which was on the verge of shutting down in 2010, when it laid off most of its staff, canceled the remainder of its season and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection." - Yahoo! (Los Angeles Times)

"The promising numbers are both comparable to pre-pandemic totals, if still falling short. … This season's figures reflect a drop of 16.83% for attendance and 13.76% for grosses from" the 2018-19 season, the last one unaffected by COVID. "They're also, unsurprisingly, a giant leap from last season's numbers." - Playbill

"Lee was an acclaimed sideman and session player with a rich acoustic bass sound. His sensitive approach and versatility — he could be gentle or intense, depending on the song — made him a favorite of producers." - Washington Post

Haebler was a pianist who "drew particular acclaim for her performances and recordings of the works of Mozart, impressing critics while still in her 20s with elegant interpretations that set her apart from other musicians of her day." - The New York Times

Okay, it was a New York Post reporter, but still … "The confrontation … at professor Shellyne Rodriguez's apartment building on Tuesday came after the newspaper published a story about an earlier episode in which Rodriguez had cursed at anti-abortion activists at Hunter College," which has fired her after this incident. - AP

I had asked the chatbot to make the choice for me, and it had said that I should prioritize “valuable experiences” that contribute to my “overall well-being.” This instruction was welcome, as it was beautiful outside and, more importantly, not even noon on Monday, so I dutifully did as I was told.  - Vice

"Justice Timothy Fancourt said a trial in January will have to determine whether The Sun had carried out unlawful information gathering that included tapping his landline and bugging his car and breaking into his home." - AP

"(He was a) shocking and influential avant-garde artist who defied sexual and religious taboos in such short films as Scorpio Rising and Fireworks and dished the most lurid movie star gossip in his underground classic Hollywood Babylon." - AP