Mattel Introduces A New, Less Intimidating Version Of Scrabble
"The new double-sided Scrabble board will still feature the original game. ... But the new game on the flip side will include helper cards,...
Conductor Edo De Waart Suddenly Announces His Retirement
Said the 82-year-old this morning, "I woke up at 5:30 yesterday morning to get ready for rehearsal and I thought, what am I even...
Not For The First Time, People Look To The Arts To Revive Downtown L.A.
The pandemic and the shift toward remote working have hit Los Angeles as hard as they have other cities. That includes performing and visual...
Finally, Some Good News For Orlando Museum of Art: A Major Gift Of Artworks
"(The donation) of more than 300 pieces, including works by Robert Mapplethorpe and Keith Haring, greatly diversifies the permanent holdings. The gift also opens...
Oakland Symphony Names Music Director To Succeed Late Michael Morgan
Kedrick Armstrong, a 29-year-old "Black queer kid from Georgetown, South Carolina," starts the job immediately, but his first concert will be next October's season...
Does Science Fiction Help Define The Future?
Science fiction prides itself on being visionary, but like any literary genre, it just ends up examining whatever issues the author is working through...
What An Acting Ensemble Brings To The Work
“That era of celebrating acting ensembles—it’s rare, and it’s rare to find opportunities to try to do that. But in some ways, those are...
In Chechnya, A New Ban On Dance Music That’s Too Slow Or Too Fast
The Russian republic of Chechnya has banned dance music it deems either too fast or too slow, in an attempt to quash a “polluting” western influence...
At Paris’ Pasteur Institute, The Music Rocks
The Pasteur Institute has made advancements in another field — the musical arts — as some of its scientists have formed bands and other...
The Art Of Good Audio-Describing
Audio describers need to locate the gaps and silences in a show, so that their descriptions are woven around music and dialogue. It is...
When Language Gets In The Way Of Trying To Think
Why are we so afraid to use words freely, to offend with impunity? Whence arose this fetish for the ‘purity’ of the text? I...
Three Rare Aztec Manuscripts, Including A History Of Tenochtitlan, Discovered And Acquired By Mexico
The San Andrés Tetepilco codices — three late 16th-early 17th century manuscripts, one of which recounts the history of the Aztec capital (on the...
Why It’s Difficult For Chatbots To Have Meaningful Conversations
The heart of the problem is that chatbots are designed to identify the quickest path to an answer, which rarely involves reading everything. It...
The Unorthodox Collective Who Choreographs For Madonna’s Tour, The Cannes Film Festival, And Marseilles’s...
"Don’t expect the august perch to change (La)Horde’s approach. The collective’s three millennial co-founders share a generational view forged by 1990s video stores and...
Workers Restoring San Francisco’s Castro Theatre Find 100-Year-Old Missing Arch
As with excavations near Egyptian pyramids, sometimes the team finds something they never expected. In the case of the Castro, it was an entire...
Another Bay Area Theater Company Faces A Fundraising Emergency
Berkeley's Aurora Theatre Company, which just learned that a play it commissioned and incubated (Jonathan Spector's Eureka Day) is opening on Broadway in November,...
Movie Theatres’ Architecture Is Saving Some Of Them From Bankruptcy
Skyrocketing construction costs and these oddball building characteristics have prompted many property owners to cut theaters’ rent just to keep the spaces occupied. - The...
Court Orders Museum Where Artist Set Up Ladies-Only Lounge To Admit “Persons Who Do...
Artist Kirsha Kaechele, who created the installation at Tasmania's Museum of Old and New Art (and is married to its founder/funder), argues that the...
Huge Increase In Attempts To Ban Books In 2023. There Were 4240 Titles Targeted
By comparison, the number of book titles challenged annually from 2000 to 2020 was fairly stable and never exceeded 400 targets in a given...
It’s True: Former Director Of Uffizi Galleries Is Running For Mayor Of Florence
Though Eike Schmidt describes himself as "a democrat and antifascist" and "more of an Aristotelian centrist than a representative of the right," he is...
Portland (Oregon) Art Museum To Spend $111 Million On Renovation And Expansion
The project, which will add 95,000 square feet of new or upgraded public and gallery space and is expected to be complete late next...
Right-Wing Rage Against Public Libraries Is Getting Nastier. Librarians Are Scared.
American Library Association President Emily Drabinski: "Everywhere I go, the story is the same: library workers are afraid. They have a lot of anxiety....
Chicago’s Cultural Institutions Are Seeing A Wave Of Unionization
It started in 2022 with the Art Institute of Chicago and the Newberry Library; it has continued with, among others, the Field Museum, Museum...
Despite Financial Mess, San Francisco Symphony Could Be A Great Opportunity For The Right...
"Reframe the task and it could become very attractive for a particular kind of musician. The key is to take a cue from the...
Cost Of Quebec City Museum’s Expansion Has Doubled
"Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Québec’s Espace Riopelle addition has started — but the budget has almost doubled. The original budget was $42.5 million,...
