"One thing that doesn’t seem to drive most people to libraries? Financial hardship. In fact, the higher your income, the more regularly you avail yourself of their ... services. And while we can’t say for sure, it seems bookstores and libraries complement each other more than they compete." - The Washington Post (MSN)
"Still largely experimental, (CSO Proof concerts) might include elements of dance, lighting, theater and atmosphere to accompany a short program of classical music. The goal is to … engage audiences who might never have considered going to the symphony or even to Music Hall." - Cincinnati Business Courier
"Viewers are getting tired. Choosing from thousands of options on a dozen streaming services, it turns out, is 'overwhelming.' .. Now Disney … has decided there’s something missing from the TV experience: channels. Sorry, 'Streams,' or a collection of 'collection of lean-back viewing experiences'." - New York Magazine (MSN)
"(Management) has invited the problem at least partially by asking audiences to ... engage with their cell phones during visits. Tagging the ensemble on social media has long been encouraged. Signs at one recent performance asked patrons to bypass printed programs and instead read their program notes online." - The Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)
Speaking of his own experiences as a child in 1970s Trinidad as well as conducting children's concerts at the BBC Proms in London and in North Carolina in the 2020s, Ryan says the secret is the same. - The Guardian
According to the statistics department at the country's Ministry of Culture, the total attendance figure for more than 1,450 museums and 46,000 monuments is, at 46.8 million visitors, up 13% from 2022 and 7% from 2019. - ARTnews
France was late to American-style drag, but as at the Olympics, it’s now prominent. So: “Answering hatred with glitter is a time-honored drag tradition, and Drag Race France Live, which premiered in Paris this week, showed French drag in defiant form.” - The New York Times
The complainers, and the police, said the painting of a naked woman could be pornographic. The artist: "I don’t know what kind of pornography they’ve been looking at, but it’s definitely not my painting.” - The Guardian (UK)
True, "film festivals have become a crucial part of the industry’s infrastructure, which may work against what makes them valuable in the first place,” but still, there are perfect, brilliant surprises, even some of those movies never get a distributor. - Washington Post
The report from the Fabian Society, founded in 1884 and one of the progenitors of today's Labour Party, calls for removing the "class ceiling" by issuing every Briton a "universal library card," ensuring every child can learn an artistic practice, and giving older children a "culture pass" to arts institutions. - The Guardian
Nicholas Cullinan: “Physically, our masterplan is a huge project. But intellectually, too, it’s an enormous challenge. Yes, fixing the roof is urgent. But if you’re going to address those physical problems you should also do something exciting with the collections and the way we present them to the public.” - The Times (UK)
The rules? Be flexible. “We each have our audiences, which are different in Memphis than in Sarasota or Houston, and we each have our missions. For some theatres, it’s about the actors or the playwright. For us at Hattiloo, it’s about accessibility to all socioeconomic groups.” - American Theatre
“The couple never meant to make political movies, Sanaeeha . ‘But in Iran, everything is political.’” (The issue here? A 70-year-old woman character doesn’t wear hijab … inside her own home.) - The Guardian (UK)
The Grammy winner stumbled across 17th-century music by accident. “Much of this Baroque music was written by women who sang about the pain of lost loves who went off to sea. They sang of nostalgia, melancholy and passion. Many of them are also … long forgotten.” - El Pais
For winter and spring 2024, box office was down 30% from the previous year. So the fact that this summer was down only 10% is seen as good news. But it also raises the question of whether the U.S. film business can maintain its momentum coming into the fall and then 2025. - Variety
