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Is This Ancient Stone Carving In Turkey The World’s Oldest Calendar?

“Sweatman believes illustrations of snakes coming out of the bodies of birds and foxes on the pillars represent a meteor shower.” - Hyperallergic

Laguna Beach’s Legendary Pageant Of The Masters Is About So Much More Than Arrested Development

Art, theatre, spectacle: "As we watched life-sized replicas of Alfred Hitchcock movie posters, and actors recreating a scene from The Birds, the narrator invoked this quote from Head: 'What a costume designer does is a cross between magic and camouflage.’” - LAist

In Mexico City, Women Feature Behind And On Stage

“At Hera, women were not only performing on stage but working behind the scenes as producers, engineers and more. It’s something Itzel González, festival promoter, and Ximena Sariñana, Mexican singer-songwriter, co-creator and director of the Hera committee wanted to highlight with the event.” - Seattle Times (AP)

Why We Love A Movie Star In A White T-Shirt

“As a costume designer, I see the white T-shirt as the ultimate blank canvas. I’ve cut up white tees to define a character’s unique style; I’ve used their simplicity to accentuate the silhouette of a suit. … Will I find a way to create an iconic moment?” - The New York Times

Congrats, Your Film Has Been Accepted To The Venice Film Festival

Now all you have to do is that little detail of finishing the film before its festival premiere. “It’s all a normal part of the process when postproduction and festival calendars overlap” - normal, but intensely stressful. - The New York Times

Alert, That Victorian-Era Book You’re Holding May Be Poisoning You

Wait, don’t lick that bright green cover - which probably contains arsenic. “Since the project launched five years ago, Tedone's team has cataloged more than 300 books containing the pigment, a figure that's likely just a drop in the ink pot.” - NPR

Wooing Young Festival-Goers With A TikTok Stage

More than TikTok, the stage at the Reading Festival in Britain celebrates podcast stars, YouTube stars, and more. One 20-something: “Everybody watches TikTok … so to then actually see some people, and to take a break from live music - it's great times.” - BBC

The Dangers In Making A Subversive Movie In Saudi Arabia

“Saudi Arabian director Ali Kalthami was born in 1983, the year the country’s cinemas were shut down. Growing up a committed cinephile and guerrilla film-maker, he was on tenterhooks, waiting for the ban to be lifted. But when it finally happened, in 2018, he was daunted.” - The Guardian (UK)

What Emmy-Nominated Actor Anna Sawai Gained From Being In Season One Of Shogun

Sawai says that while filming, “I didn’t understand the intensity of what I was mentally going through, and how much it had affected me, but it speaks volumes now. I want to approach all my projects the way I approach Mariko.” Alert: Spoilers in the article. - The New York Times

Surrendering To The Surprises Of The Criterion Channel’s New Live Stream

“The summer setting is a great vibe for my viewing experiment. The plot plays out slowly, and the warm setting is calming. Of course, it’s intercut with family members hitting each other and screaming, ‘Calm down! You want a cigarette?’ Like I said, ‘Frenchness.’” - Washington Post

The Director Of A Popular Family Balloon Exhibit Posted Anti-Palestinian Comments On Social Media

“'I prefer a thousand crying Arab mothers to one Jewish mother because these are my people,’ Kalimian wrote in Hebrew in response to a commenter in the once-public Facebook post, referring to Arabs as ‘the sons of death,’ an expression for people who deserve to die.” - Hyperallergic

What The Right-Wing Does To Librarians, And How They’re Prepared To Respond

“Amanda Jones is a Louisiana middle-school librarian who sleeps with a shotgun under her bed and carries a pistol when she travels the back roads” thanks to right-wing attacks on books - and now her. - Los Angeles Times (MSN)

The Pompidou Wants, And Now Needs, A Global Reach

The Pompidou is closing for five years, starting in 2025 because, well, “If we don’t take immediate measures, the building will collapse: There are pieces of metal falling off of it every day.” But Brussels, Seoul, Málaga, and other places are stepping up. - The New York Times

Unexpectedly, And Beautifully, The Onion Has Saved Itself From A Content Farm Death Spiral

Is something going right for a beloved media product? This doesn’t sound like 2024 - and yet. The Onion, which many people had long given up for dead, has been bought, revived, stripped of terrible ad content, given a new platform - and a print subscription. - The Verge

The Many Balloon Artists Who Rallied To Create The DNC Balloon Drop

The DNC balloon designer was fighting for his life at the hospital, but “a team of 55 balloon artists from 18 states — and five from Canada — gathered in Chicago last week on their own dime, blowing up and tying thousands of balloons in DeLorenzo’s honor.” - Washington Post (MSN)

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