“The old gives way to the new. But that also marks a clear transformation in culinary programming from emphasizing the development of proficiency to encouraging consumption, and the fade-out of the shared cultural exploration Food Network once chaperoned.” - Salon

The Aztec empire did not fall because it lacked capability. It collapsed because it accumulated too many adversaries who resented its dominance. This is a historical episode the US president, Donald Trump, should take notice of as his rift with traditional US allies deepens. - The Conversation

A great human artist, we’d like to believe, amplifies and defends the exceptionalist spirit of our species but, in an echo of the anxieties that haunted early photography, a demonised version of AI threatens to steal away our souls. - Aeon

Perceptual psychologists have long studied what happens when people stare at uniform fields of colour without visual edges or contrasts. Sometimes, experiencing this kind of sensory deprivation can result in something known as the Ganzfeld effect: a response to a uniform field that causes the brain’s pattern recognition to work harder. - Psyche

 A machine will never possess the level of interpersonal skills needed to manage a team, to engage in civil discourse with individuals from different cultures and backgrounds, or to resolve messy human conflicts that resist logic. Judgment will never be AI’s strength. - US News

Neuroplasticity therefore reframes the brain as neither rigid nor infinitely malleable, but as a living system shaped by experience, effort and time. - The Conversation

Portland’s mayor and city council “will decide eventually what to do with the city-owned performing arts center after a series of public meetings. But in the meantime, its fate is being analyzed by three city-appointed groups that are not meeting publicly.” - Oregon ArtsWatch

“In a statement the board said it had been ‘unable to achieve a sustainable financial position’ and was entering liquidation.” - BBC

“The English classroom is increasingly a kind of special place where it’s still possible to converse without the screen. AI only seems to make it more imperative to make sure that students are having a direct experience with the text.” - Yale Daily News

At a small liberal-arts college, where a cohort may number fewer than 500 people, admissions officers can also take a stronger hand in assembling a group of students who match the institution’s culture and its vibe while also having very different backgrounds. - The Atlantic

Over the past 15 to 20 years, declining numbers of college-age Americans and a seemingly endless rise in tuition have brought about a shift in power. Students are now treated like customers who rarely have to hear information that upsets them — because schools need their money to survive. - The New York Times

Kevin Couch, formerly the director of programming for ATG Entertainment, a British theater company, is the latest in a string of resignations and show cancellations since President Trump purged the center’s board and made himself chairman last year. - The New York Times

The “uniquely American” model of funding opera meant that the National Opera had to leave, thanks to “a new mandate set forth by the Kennedy Center that every performance break even through only ticket sales and corporate sponsorships.” - The New York Times

“In the music business and beyond, all eyes will be on Bad Bunny, the Puerto Rican superstar who dominates streaming with a distinctive style that mixes the rhythms and slang of his beloved island with contemporary reggaeton and trap.” - The New York Times

Young wrote: "My music will never be available on Amazon, as long as it is owned by Bezos. … I think the message I am sending is important and clear. Thanks for buying music locally and from independent digital services.” - Rolling Stone

“The Detroit Opera will showcase some of funk maestro George Clinton ‘s and P-Funk’s greatest hits this weekend, performed by violins, cellos, horns and other instruments tuned more for arias or sonatas than for tunes like ‘Flash Light,’ ‘(Not Just) Knee Deep’ and ‘One Nation Under a Groove.’” - AP

“Initially, the Philharmonic and Carnegie Hall will collaborate for five seasons, with Dudamel leading the orchestra in an annual concert opera, beginning (this coming) November with a two-night run of Puccini’s Tosca.” The cast will include Marina Rebeka as Tosca, Jonas Kaufmann as Cavaradossi and Ludovic Tézier as Scarpia.” - The New York Times

The companies, including Universal Music Publishing Group, Concord Music Group, and ABKCO Music, are seeking more than $3 billion in potential statutory damages over alleged infringement of more than 20,000 songs. - Music Business Worldwide

To fulfill its mission as a museum for the nation, “the Hirshhorn has decided to loan scores of artworks from its large collection to smaller museums in all 50 states.” - The New York Times

“Against the backdrop of the Trump administration’s targeting of DEI policy at universities and cultural institutions and expanding ICE raids, the layoffs are causing a community-wide crisis of confidence that good faith is guiding leadership at one of Boston’s leading art institutions.” - Boston Art Review

“The second-level promenade of the Embarcadero Center is one of the more scenic, beautifully landscaped, well-maintained spaces in San Francisco. … Yet despite its charms, the Embarcadero Center is also one of San Francisco's most-underutilized spaces. … (It) can and should be our High Line — only better.” - San Francisco Chronicle (MSN)

“It feels more important than ever to invite multiple voices into the museum space. There isn’t one perfect solution for all visitors, but we strive to offer a variety of access points—whether it’s traditional labels, guided gallery conversations or prompts to spark reflection and dialogue.” - The Art Newspaper

As some other American museums struggle, the Institute is doing very well under Rondeau’s leadership (notwithstanding the medication-and-alcohol-fueled disrobing during a commercial flight last April). He’s now pushing for an expansion, saying the museum needs more display space. - WBEZ (Chicago)

“The MFA faces ‘an unsustainable deficit that we have committed to resolve,’ (an) email to employees stated. … The institution said in a statement to WBUR it plans to reduce 6.3% of its workforce. More than 30 museum positions will be affected.” - WBUR (Boston)

“The labor group’s staff union (WGSU), which includes attorneys, research analysts and other positions, claims that ‘management has dismissed staff’s needs and engaged in bad faith surface bargaining with no intent to reach a fair contract.’” - Los Angeles Times (MSN)

“I hadn’t investigated this term in depth, but I understood it to mean ‘a short story that is meandering, plotless, and slight — full of middle-class people discussing their relentlessly banal problems.’ … But they were also good!” Those characteristics were deliberately shaped by the different preferences of two key editors. - Woman of...

The occasion is a moment to ask how a novel that mourns addiction and venerates humility and patience became a glib cultural punch line, routinely subjected to the word “performative” in its most damning sense. - The New Yorker

Greg Ketter became a social media phenomenon over the weekend, when MS Now aired a video of him pacing half a block away from where Alex J. Pretti had been murdered by agents an hour earlier, cursing the 50-100 armed ICE agents keeping the crowd back. - Publishers Weekly

“Constellations – also jokingly dubbed ‘Not Writers’ Week’ – is being put on by “a loose coalition” of writers and publishers and the support of not-for-profit Writers SA, with dozens of free events to be staged from 28 February to 5 March.” - The Guardian

Moby-Dick, by Herman Melville, published in 1851. Let’s consider it. Is there another book at once so good and so bad, so thrilling and so boring, so authentic to the currents of the soul and so hideously contrived, so stunningly patrolled by dreamlike visions and so crushed by its own intellectual baggage? - The...

Whether you want to watch SCTV, Schitt’s Creek, After Hours, or the many Christopher Guest mockumentaries that she made great, it’s out there. (And for physical media, your library probably has DVDs or Blu-Rays as well.) - Vulture

“A horror about mythical Welsh fairies had filming relocated to north Yorkshire after crew found out about strict non-smoking rules on sets in Wales.” The government did suggest specialized, adapted e-cigarettes might work, but the film's director wasn’t interested. - BBC

“While Sundance can surprise as well as delight, attendees often seem happy just to be there. … While the applause tends to be overgenerous, this sense of excitement is crucial to the Sundance gestalt. It also helped lift the gloom.” - The New York Times

“The sweetest, spiciest and most shocking Sundance stories are ones you don’t hear at Q&As inside the Eccles or Egyptian. … Who better to rewind the times than a group of filmmakers who had their lives changed by what went down during America’s most consequential gathering of independent film insiders?” - The Hollywood Reporter

His painting are being sold to benefit public television. The latest, Change of Seasons (1990) led the sale, bringing in $787,900, more than 13 times its $60,000 high estimate. - Artnet

What if NPR decides radio is no longer worth the hassle and puts all its efforts into streaming audio and podcasts? What if it drops the national linear feed altogether or simply lets on-air programming age out with over-the-air listeners? - Editor & Publisher

“Before I started my dancing, I wasn’t really close to my culture. I was really into the Western stuff. … Then as I got into dancing, I kind of learned how beautiful my culture is and how important and meaningful it is to me.” - The New York Times

Sokhoeun Sok came to the US in 2005 to teach traditional Khmer dance and is now a naturalized citizen. For now, she “is focusing on what she can control: each bend of the wrist, extension of the arm and kick of the heel” executed by her students. - The New York Times

For such a large city, L.A. has been a difficult environment for classical dance; before this company, no ballet troupe there had lasted for more than nine years. Artistic director Melissa Barak and executive director Julia Rivera talk with a reporter about how Los Angeles Ballet has lasted and where it’s headed. - Pointe...

The Switzerland-based ballet competition, known for launching the careers of many star dancers, takes place next week. Here executive and artistic director Kathryn Bradney explains to a reporter how the 90-odd contestants are selected, how the weeklong event is structured, and how the important part comes the day afterward. - Pointe Magazine

When CBS Sunday Morning visited, its crew found young dance students silently meditating. Two former students say, however, that they were allowed limited contact with family, berated by teachers, physically pushed to the point of injury, and forbidden to seek medical attention. - CBS News

It’s part of an effort by the Royal Winnipeg, Canada’s oldest professional ballet company, to foster meaningful reconciliation with the country’s Indigenous people — echoing a broader national goal that has been pursued for decades. - The New York Times

“The worst moment has a name here — le flop. It's the part everyone dreads, when you can feel your red nose begin to droop as the dead air fills the room. But it's also where the real work begins.” - NPR

“There’s so much political resonance with the text — we’ve heard so many amazing, divergent responses in terms of how the piece speaks to today’s slippery political reality — but we didn’t want to play into that too much.” - Culturebot

On Broadway, musicals generally have not recouped their costs in recent years. But The Outsiders is different. - The New York Times

“At Palo Alto Players, the initiative is part of a broader effort to lower barriers to getting to the theater — one (Managing Director Elizabeth) Santana credits with putting the company in ‘a state of growth,’ a rarity in a Bay Area theater scene reeling from closed companies and abridged lineups.” - San Francisco Chronicle...

“TheatreWorks Silicon Valley is partnering with the city of Palo Alto on a new venue at a familiar location. The municipality and the Tony-winning theater company announced plans to redevelop (its) existing theater … and build a new one next to it, forming a performing arts complex of 40,000 square feet.” - San Francisco...

The dinner theater/circus arts hybrid's founder says that attendance never really recovered from COVID, but that, this past fall, there began a fatal decline in sales which he attributed to an uncertain economy and fear of ICE. - WBEZ (Chicago)

“Though Big Hollywood roles didn't follow Home Alone's success, O'Hara would find her groove with the crew of improv pros brought together by Guest for a series of mockumentaries that began with 1996's Waiting for Guffman.” - CBC

“Lemon was arrested by federal agents in Los Angeles, where he had been covering the Grammy Awards, his attorney said. It is unclear what charge or charges Lemon is facing in the Jan. 18 protest. The arrest came after a magistrate judge last week rejected prosecutors’ initial bid to charge the journalist.” - AP

Over the course of his 38-year reign, he aged from a famously handsome monarch into an overweight, volatile despot. Various explanations, from syphilis to scurvy to psychopathy, have been proposed over the centuries, yet these diagnoses often tell us more about the preoccupations of the time than about Henry himself. - History Today

The dissident artist, who in 2011 had his passport confiscated and spent 81 days in prison, left when his documents were returned in 2015 and has lived in Europe since. Last month he took the risk of re-detention to visit — and things went smoothly. What had he missed most while away? Speaking Chinese....

The claim that Emilia Bassano Lanier was Shakespeare’s “Dark Lady” is now familiar; even the argument that she — a published poet under her own name — was the real writer of Shakespeare’s works has been made before. Historian Irene Coslet is now arguing that Bassano Lanier was both Jewish and Black. - The...

Maria Manetti Shrem’s influence is everywhere - as is her name, alongside that of her late husband. A short list: The new UC Davis fashion institute, “the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, San Francisco Opera, SFFilm, KQED.” - San Francisco Chronicle (Yahoo)