To understand why they persist, it helps to see them not as acts of deception, but as predictable behaviours of systems built to be fluent. - Psyche

Roughly speaking, globalization flattens space and pares away cultural particularity; neoliberalism flattens value, reducing everything to its going rate on the market; the internet, and especially social media, flatten transactions and relationships into their barest, most instrumentalized form. - Commonweal

The central insight that these disparate thinkers took from Kant is that the world isn’t simply a thing, or a collection of things, given to us to perceive. Rather, our minds help create the reality we experience. - The New Yorker

Although many have outward-facing aspects, a hobby is ultimately a form of self-cultivation, pursued for reasons of personal satisfaction. Our society values publicity and productivity: perhaps that’s one reason that hobbies seem like they’re in decline. - The New Yorker

After the architects’ convention in 1900, public officials turned to specialists to address questions of aesthetic and space planning that had previously been matters of politics and patronage. Over the decade that followed, most public-building projects in D.C. came under a system of formal design review. - The Atlantic

AI’s automating powers are indiscriminate. They are affecting blue-collar manufacturing jobs and white-collar office jobs. Many who spent years, and thousands of dollars, developing specialized skills now need to live with the fact that AI can do their job faster and often better. It is a terrifying reality. - The Walrus

“(Mayor Brandon) Johnson’s proposed budget allocates just north of $62 million for (the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events) for next year. That’s a 15% decrease from the nearly $73 million allocated in last year’s budget.” - WBEZ (Chicago)

… in effect, “no comment.” Of 21 organizations WBEZ and the Chicago Sun-Times approached, only seven completed the survey. One answered part of it, three sent statements, and ten declined to participate or simply didn’t respond. - WBEZ (Chicago)

Common Crawl has opened a back door for AI companies to train their models with paywalled articles from major news websites. And the foundation appears to be lying to publishers about this—as well as masking the actual contents of its archives. - The Atlantic

The former Logan Theatre, a 1923 movie palace on Broad Street in North Philadelphia which has been empty since 1992, will undergo a $10 million dollar renovation. The venue will include a 2,650-seat theater for plays and musicals, a 200-seat restaurant with live jazz, and a 4,000-square-foot gift shop. - The Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)

Harvard administrators have released a statement saying that grade inflation has crossed a catastrophic threshold. Many Harvard undergrads treated the statement as a catastrophe in itself. (Yes, tears were shed.) Yet, writes Ian Bogost, there are pressures on both students and instructors which just about guarantee grade inflation. - The Atlantic (MSN)

Without warning, a note appeared on the website of the Newark School for the Arts that it is “closed until further notice.” Founded in 1968, the school's mission was to provide training in the performing and visual arts to students of all ages and financial backgrounds. - The Violin Channel

The New York-born, Houston-trained conductor is currently general music director of the Komische Oper Berlin and just completed a term leading Valencia’s Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía. Gaffigan succeeds Patrick Summers, who departs at the end of this season. - CultureMap Houston

Her term will run for three additional years, going through the end of the 2028-29 season. - ArtsATL

“At the Superhumans Centre, near Lviv, … the most critically war-wounded are treated with prosthetics and reconstructive surgery, and psychological support is given to children and adults affected by the war. And within the range of treatment is music therapy” — including "the EnterDJ programme, which teaches veterans the basics of mixing." - The Guardian

Michael Bobbitt comes to OPERA America from the Mass Cultural Council in Boston, MA, where he served as Executive Director since 2021. - BroadwayWorld

“The perception that opera is only for posh people, with which I fundamentally disagree, has taken a grip on a lot of decision-makers,” Thangam Debbonaire says. “But even if we do win them over, we have to accept that constraints on public finances aren’t going away any time soon.” - The Times (UK)

Music streamer Spotify saw third quarter operating profits grow a cool 28%, as its paying subscribers hit 281 million. - Deadline

Back in 1930, Gaetano visited Athens with the Italian Navy. And at the Acropolis—the Greek capital’s hilltop covered in ancient architecture—he picked up a small piece of carved marble near the base of the Parthenon, a temple built for the goddess Athena in the fifth century B.C.E. - Smithsonian

“DIA staff are seeking to unionize with AFSCME Cultural Workers United (AFSCME Michigan), a division of the national AFSCME union that represents workers at cultural institutions including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Art Institute of Chicago, and Philadelphia Museum of Art (sic).” - ARTnews

“This is not quite everyday delinquency … but it is a type of delinquency that we do not generally associate with the upper echelons of organized crime,” Laure Beccuau told France Info Radio. - ARTnews

Trump’s aggressive moves to accumulate political power — deploying National Guard troops, invoking massive tariffs —have prompted protests and lawsuits as well as plaudits. But he is also asserting his power through what might be called an imperial aesthetic: surrounding his presidency with visual cues designed to project personal command and grandeur. - Washington...

“The 25,000-square-foot facility, to be known as the Grainger Center for Conservation and Science, will contain conservation laboratories, offices and a study center as well as a gallery offering conservation-related exhibitions and opportunities to watch conservators at work.” Construction will begin early next year. - WBEZ (Chicago)

“A divided San Francisco Arts Commission on Monday approved a plan to at least temporarily remove the Vaillancourt Fountain from Embarcadero Plaza, a final sign-off that means the massive artwork could be dismantled as soon as early next year.” - San Francisco Chronicle (Yahoo!)

“’Vibe coding,’ an emerging software development that turns natural language into computer code using artificial intelligence, … was coined ... to describe how artificial intelligence can enable someone to create a new app while being able to ‘forget that the code even exists’.” - The Guardian

2024’s total figure of 836,199 was its biggest volume performance since 2009 and, so far in 2025, we have seen 628,431 books pass through the tills, an increase of 6.7% against the first 42 weeks of last year. - The Bookseller

The librarian is a seeker and keeper of truth, and that makes her a dangerous figure in the eyes of those who fear the fullest, most comprehensive, and most uncomfortable truths emerging. - LitHub

“How to End a Story: Collected Diaries by Helen Garner charts the Australian writer's life from her early career in bohemian Melbourne to raising her daughter in the 1970s and her disintegrating marriage in the 1990s.” The jury’s vote was unanimous, with one judge calling it “a remarkable, addictive book.” - BBC (Yahoo!)

“Laurent Mauvignier Tuesday won France's top literary award, the Goncourt, for his family saga spanning the 20th century and recounting the story of his grandmother accused of collaborating during World War II. Just one round of voting sufficed for the jury to select La Maison Vide.” - AFP (Yahoo!)

Editor Roger Angell called the three stories “interesting and wholly original” but said “they seem to work in very different ways on different readers.” At least he allowed that “I’m not at all sure that we aren’t making a mistake.” That must have stung Sexton, always unsure of herself when writing prose. - Literary...

“By the accounts of many industry insiders, Ellison has been leveraging his family’s extraordinary wealth and access to President Trump to prepare for a buying spree. With the help of his father, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison (the world’s second-richest person), the Silicon Valley scion wants to take on Netflix, Amazon and Apple.” - Variety

“That’s the question on the minds of Hollywood and Wall Street after the company put itself up for sale, citing ‘unsolicited interest’ from ‘multiple parties.’” - TheWrap (Yahoo!)

“The way that consumption habits have shifted over the last five years is almost more drastic than it was in the previous 50 years. You have a pre-TikTok and post-TikTok split in the way that consumption was felt and experienced by people." - The Guardian

The rules require Netflix, Prime Video and the other global streamers with more than one million Australian subscribers to spend 10% of their total Australian expenditure – or 7.5% of their revenues – on local originals. - Deadline

“Multiple theatrical executives … conveyed a sense of grave concern, if not panic, over the possibility of a studio that grossed more than $4 billion worldwide this year and provided many of the box office hits of the past six months being assimilated into another company and having its output dramatically curtailed.” - TheWrap...

“The Cleveland State University-Ideastream deal over WCSB 89.3 could be invalidated because the college did not follow Ohio public meetings law, an expert on public meetings laws said.” - Cleveland.com

“As moving machines like drones and self-driving cars become more integrated into our daily lives, the tech companies behind them are realizing they need experts who understand motion through space and time, and how the nuances of that motion affect the way we feel about their products. Translation: They need dance artists.” - Dance...

Josephine Flos was rehearsing the opening of “Figure,” a new dance piece created by the fashion designer Lisa Konno in collaboration with the choreographer Peter Leung, that tries to answer a simple question: What if choreography starts with the costumes? - The New York Times

“The Ballet National de Marseille has also taken a bold new direction under the leadership of the experimental collective (LA)Horde, producing edgy performances drawing on internet-native styles like jumpstyle and TikTok choreography. Dancers and choreographers are relocating to the city, too.” - Dance Magazine

Two of New York’s most prominent dance philanthropists are donating $15 million to the Joyce Theater, a leading dance stage in Manhattan, helping to assure the theater’s long-term financial stability at a time when dance organizations are struggling with declining financial support and audiences. - The New York Times

AISOMA is a Google AI-powered choreography tool that acts as a creative catalyst by generating new, original dance rooted in my choreographic language. - Google

“A new Dance Hall of Fame has been established to honor the significant contributions to the discipline of dance. Included in the freshman class of inductees are Alvin Ailey, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Stephen ‘tWitch’ Boss, Misty Copeland, Bob Fosse, Martha Graham, Gene Kelly, Kenny Ortega, Jerome Robbins and Twyla Tharp.” - Broadway News

Composer Stephen Schwartz and book writer Joseph Stein spent months on a pre-Broadway tour in 1976 trying to fix the show. It didn’t work, although one song, “Meadowlark,” became a hit. Since a revival in 2002, productions have been trying to address the piece's problems, and now there's a high-profile staging Off-Broadway. - TheaterMania

The Romantic ideal of a singular creative genius remaking the rules of his era doesn’t really match William Shakespeare, who was (for a theater guy) fairly conventional. Christopher Marlowe is a better fit, and he transformed more than he gets credit for, but mythmaking distorts his image as well. - The Atlantic (Yahoo!)

“There’s an inherent theatricality to church, and a furtive spirituality to theater. In form, they’re similar: Everybody crowds into a room, usually sits facing the same direction, and focuses on a central action — at least for a while.” - The New York Times

“In a city where the so-called Theater Row has more ‘For Lease’ signs than marquees, New Theater Hollywood feels improbable. Yet since opening in early 2024, it has already become something of a small cult phenomenon.” - Los Angeles Times (MSN)

Cyndi Lauper isn’t thrilled, actually, about Working Girl. "Unfortunately, this story is just as relevant for women as it was when it came out in 1988. … In fact, since the rollback of Roe v. Wade, times may even be worse for women.” - American Theatre

Eight years ago at the Marin Theatre near San Francisco, Thomas Bradshaw’s play Thomas and Sally sparked in-person protests, an open letter with 1,800 signatures, and a police confrontation. Now, under new leaders, the company hopes to repair some of the damage with Suzan-Lori Parks’s play Sally & Tom. - San Francisco Chronicle (Yahoo!)

“It was tough on me, but I’m not going to answer any questions about it because I dealt with it. It nearly broke me, and that’s all I’m going to say. You probably know my heart, so you probably know. … Anybody that knows me knows how I believe.” - The Hollywood Reporter

She received nominations for Best Supporting Actress for Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, Wild at Heart, and Rambling Rose; she performed in the latter two (and several other films) alongside her daughter, Laura Dern. Ladd appeared in a dozen or so other movies as well as scores of television shows. - The Hollywood Reporter

Wicomb, who was born just after apartheid was formalized, said, “I was transported from the vulgarity of apartheid by books — books opened up different worlds, and brought freedom from an oppressive social order.” - The New York Times

“She invited friends — and later hungry museumgoers — to join her for the ordinary-seeming meal, and she documented some of the feasts in journals and Polaroids.” - The New York Times

John McWhorter: "Mispronouncing someone’s name certainly can be a form of ridicule or dismissal. … But malice is not the only possible explanation for these flubs. As a matter of pure linguistics, it would be surprising if people didn’t have trouble with the name Mamdani.” - The New York Times

“A ‘once in a century’ discovery of a cache of long-lost letters has revealed how the English poet WH Auden developed a deep and lasting friendship with a Viennese sex worker and car mechanic after the latter burgled the author’s home and was put on trial.” - The Guardian