ArtsJournal: Arts, Culture, Ideas

ISSUES

Paris Mayor Approves €250 Million Plan To Green The Champs-Elysées

That doesn't just mean to make the boulevard more environmentally friendly. "Anne Hidalgo said the planned work, unveiled in 2019 by local community leaders and businesses, would turn the 1.9 km (1.2 mile) stretch of central Paris into 'an extraordinary garden'. … The eight-lane highway is used by an average of 3,000 vehicles an hour, most passing through, and...

Derelict East German Amusement Park Will Become (Another) Berlin Arts District

"Some €45 million has been raised for the project, which was first proposed in 2014 after the city, through the government-owned company Grün Berlin, took over the park's management. The former Spreepark, as the theme park is known, spans 56 riverside acres that are currently fenced off as old rides and amusement sites sit in various states of disrepair."...

How Governments Around The World Are Supporting The Arts To Survive COVID

Governments across Europe, as well as in Canada, Australia and some Asian countries, have held back the wave so far by moving fast at the beginning of the coronavirus crisis to stave off mass unemployment and prevent a financial meltdown. - The Hollywood Reporter

The Book That Predicted, And Probably Was The Blueprint For, Last Wednesday’s Coup

In a way, The Turner Diaries shows how white supremacists carried out the insurrection - and it provides a pretty clear idea of what's coming next. Historian Kathleen Belew says that even in the 1980s, supremacy groups "kept stacks of them, not just one copy but 15 copies in the book house of one white power terrorist group. They...

Yes, Things Might Look Up, But It Will Be A Long Slow Recovery For The Arts

For a broad chunk of the population, turning off that switch might not be as simple as being told it is okay to do so. Some local museum officials I’ve talked to think it might be 2023 or 24 before they return to pre-pandemic revenue levels. - Chicago Tribune

A New “Arts Worker” Movement

Built on the concept of the “arts worker” — an immense labor category representing 8.8 million Americans doing everything from designing clothing to sweeping museum floors — this movement asserts that the arts are as foundational as farming or manufacturing. And its focus is not so much public relations as it is survival, an aim reinforced daily by the financial...

France’s Cultural Venues Will Be Closed All Month

"Prime Minister Jean Castex confirmed … museums, cinemas, theaters, concert halls and gyms 'will not in the weeks to come'." Venues had opened in the late summer with safety measures but closed again on Oct. 30 as COVID's second wave swelled; planned reopenings announced for Dec. 15 and then Jan. 7 were called off as new cases...

‘Obscenities, Inanities And Treason’: A Critic On The Riot At The U.S. Capitol

Philip Kennicott: "The whole drama, the body language, the flags and the onslaught, was borrowed from other dramas — genuine displays of revolutionary fervor against autocrats, authentic acts protesting illegitimate governments. But was a charade. Not civic or selfless, but corrosive, destructive and illegal. … One moment in today's appalling mayhem was telling. As they filed through Statuary...

MD High Court Rules Rap Lyrics Can Be Used As Evidence Against Defendant

"Three weeks before trial, Montague used a jailhouse telephone to record a rap verse, which was then uploaded to Instagram. , the State of Maryland introduced the telephone recording of the lyrics as evidence of Montague's guilt, and was convicted and sentenced to a combined fifty years . Maryland's highest court … affirmed conviction, finding that...

Ex-Employees Of The California Arts Council Speak Out

"When it comes to the arts program specialists, I and several of my former colleagues found it to be a space that causes fear of retaliation, targeting and silencing, and where leadership lacks accountability." - Hyperallergic

The Fifteen-Minute City? Sweden Considers The “One-Minute City”

A plan piloted by Swedish national innovation body Vinnova and design think tank ArkDes focuses attention on what Dan Hill, Vinnova’s director of strategic design, calls the “one-minute city.” It’s a order of magnitude smaller than other recent think-local planning conceits. While Paris works with a 15-minute radius and Barcelona’s superblocks with nine-block chunks of the city, Sweden’s project operates at the single...

Australian Artists: Why Did The National Government Forget Us?

"For some, state governments stepped up and provided support. But the message to artists from the federal government was: you are not important to the national agenda, and therefore we can –and will – ignore you." - ArtsHub

Arts Organizations Turn To Stars For Fundraising

The pandemic has forced arts institutions on both sides of the Atlantic to swiftly up their online game. The New York City Ballet and the School of American Ballet usually hold a big benefit event and a backstage tour for donors after a Christmas Saturday matinee of The Nutcracker. This time Tiler Peck, principal dancer, gave an online tour...

Michael Bobbitt Is Tired Of Boards. What To Do?

Ugh. In our current structure, boards of directors for nonprofits don’t work. I’m sure there are outliers with highly functioning boards, but this is not the norm. How do we fix this? - American Theatre

The Current State Of Lockdowns Around Europe

Rules vary quite a bit between the eight countries covered here. The Netherlands, which has seen a huge surge in cases, is quite strict; Sweden, which was much laxer than most of the continent, has gotten more strict but still less so than France or Germany (which is letting some performances continue without audiences). Spain's measures vary widely by...

Our Free Newsletter

Join our 30,000 subscribers

Latest

Don't Miss

function my_excerpt_length($length){ return 200; } add_filter('excerpt_length', 'my_excerpt_length');