Too familiar, and too grim. On the upside: "Until the pandemic, the industry had been enjoying a sustained boom, fueled by a rebound in the popularity of musicals and by New York’s gargantuan growth as a tourist destination. And this downturn might not last long." - The New York Times
The shockwave of the series, and later the book, "Ways of Seeing reframed the conversation about how art is interpreted, focusing on the nature of ownership and the language of appreciation as well as the ways in which advertising appropriates the motifs of painting." - The Economist
Percussionist Sheriff Drumman "hand-crafted the metal that made the setup possible, cutting, shaping and bending each slab before adding the eye-catching details and the bright “#SheriffDrumman” sign hoisted high above." - Los Angeles Times
"The directors’ branch has been known to be an exclusive club that has snubbed" newcomers like Ava DuVernay and Shaka King. "Crowding the race this year are such big names as Joel Coen for The Tragedy of Macbeth and Steven Spielberg for West Side Story." - Variety
Basically, it's easier for the writers and creators of tales: "It is a tried and tested, tragic narrative formula that efficiently releases them into the wider world, as well as exposing them to danger." - The Guardian (UK)
To think - and to daydream. "These moments of quiet and emptiness throughout the day are nothing I really considered before. ... But leaving these small moments of my day unfilled changed how I walk through time." - The New York Times
Take the Olney Theatre Center, for instance: "On December 22, we were almost $100,000 above our goal for Beauty and the Beast. ... On December 23 we had to cancel the rest of the run," the managing director says. "Within a week we had lost $300,000." - DC Metro Theater Arts
Why is the BBC protecting Eric Gill's Prospero and Ariel? "Gill’s work ornaments a key national building. What, in his case, justifies continued public display of a piece whose revised but still monumental message is 'made by a famous child abuser'?" - The Guardian (UK)
Or at least, we'll learn that we repeat our mistakes. Take the pandemic, for instance. We need to study the now, one historian says - the problems of this pandemic "are 21st-century problems and demand 21st-century approaches." - Wired
Harrison, in his writings, "provided a theoretical structure for the Black performing arts, linking works by writers like August Wilson to a deeply rooted structure of African ritual and myth." - The New York Times
Her fire and energy could not be contained. "Spector kept working and collaborating throughout her life ... but you get the feeling that, even if she’d spent the years slumped on a beanbag watching daytime soaps, her influence wouldn’t – couldn’t – have stopped spreading." - The Guardian (UK)
Sara Ahmed: "The work of revolution comes from what you learn by trying to build more just worlds alongside other people. ... It is a fundamentally life-affirming task to build institutions that are not dependent on the diminishment of the life-capacities of others." - The Paris Review
"An anonymous activist group filmed a brief sex scene at Greece’s most visited historical site, the Acropolis, as a political statement on LGBTQIA+ rights—and the government is vowing to track them down ... for 'offending' the monument." - Vice
