It’s not all doom and gloom. Many of our larger arts festivals are achieving record turnouts and box office highs, as ArtsHub discovered while surveying recent sales figures of a few prominent players. - ArtsHub
Supporters of the Law and Justice party, which lost the recent elections and had thoroughly politicized state media while in power, have stormed and occupied TV Poland's news building, forcing the news staff to squeeze into space (including bathrooms) in the network's entertainment building and go under police protection. - BBC
"The director and producer of a banned Malaysian film that explores the afterlife were charged Wednesday with offending the religious feelings of others in a rare criminal prosecution of filmmakers, slammed by critics as an attack on freedom of expression." - AP
"Members of the Musicians’ Union and Equity will walk out on February 1. … Members of both unions have voted in favour of strikes after they accused the ENO management of planning to make chorus, orchestra and music staff redundant and re-employ them for only six months a year." - The Independent (UK)
Picasso's Tête (Head) and Chagall's L’homme en prière (Man at Prayer), whose estimated worth totals $900,000, were stolen from a Tel Aviv collector in 2010. They were discovered in Antwerp after police were tipped off that someone in Belgium was offering them for sale. - CNN
The 75-year-old co-owner of the gallery Sikkema Jenkins & Co., which represents Kara Walker, Vik Muniz, and Jeffrey Gibson, among others, Sikkema was found dead in an apartment he owned in Rio de Janeiro with multiple stab wounds to his body. - Artnet
"Leaders of major cultural institutions, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Carnegie Hall, sent a letter to Mayor Eric Adams urging him to reconsider millions of dollars in proposed budget cuts to their organizations, (arguing that he) should be investing in cultural institutions to spur tourism and create jobs." - Gothamist
"In a surprise announcement, Charlotte St. Martin ... said she would be stepping down from her current role next month. As the leader of the league, a trade association representing producers and theater owners ..., Martin has held one of the most pivotal positions in the theater industry." - The New York Times
Modelling, in general, is now routine. We model everything, from elections to economics, from the climate to the coronavirus. Like model cars, model airplanes, and model trains, mathematical models aren’t the real thing—they’re simplified representations that get the salient parts right. - The New Yorker
Humanities professors, for their part, have already begun enlisting Swift as a silent partner. The organizer for the first international academic “Swiftposium,” to be held in February with the backing of seven Australian and New Zealand universities, began as a “half-serious tweet.” - LA Review of Books
Trigger sounds might be triggering only when they’re made by your spouse, or when you’re already upset. The reason, according to new research, is that misophonia is about more than just the irritating sounds. - Psyche
Clayton established herself as an innovator in the 1970s and ’80s, sparring with instrumentalists in avant-garde settings and using electronics to alter and extend her vocal palette well before the practice became common. - The New York Times
Each language seemingly compels us to talk in a certain way and to see things from a particular perspective. But is this just an illusion? Does each language really embody a different worldview, or even dictate specific patterns of thought to its speakers? - Aeon
The current undersecretary for culture in the Giorgia Meloni government has been indicted for the alleged theft of a painting by Rutilio Manetti, a renowned 17th-century artist. - El Pais
"The more straight-faced, incendiary boo of displeasure has been all but silenced, bar lone tuts or harrumphs. But for centuries, theatregoing etiquette allowed for heckles and hisses alongside cheers and whistles, all permissible within the great debating chamber of drama." - The Guardian
