A White House official described the exchange as productive and cordial and confirmed that White House senior associate Lindsey Halligan — who was tasked with enacting Trump’s March executive order on the Smithsonian — attended. - Washington Post (Yahoo)
As organizations respond to declining revenue and higher prices, expense budgets tightened by an average of 23%. This decrease includes significant dips in both personnel and non-personnel expenses for the first time since 2021. - SMUDataArts
Over the past several decades, philanthropy has become much more bureaucratic: if you want a grant from one of these well-endowed foundations, you have to be willing to navigate a large bureaucracy while specifying all of the legible ways in which your activity will have provable impact. - Palladium
Ben Davis: “In the non-metaphorical world, slurry means an unresolved mix of liquid and solid. …. The word comes to mind with this very pervasive kind of content that’s gunking up my feed, where different content types are running together into one half-resolved substance. Where everything assumes the qualities of everything else.” - Artnet
Arizona State University reported a fall semester decline for the first time since 2020. Declines have been announced at universities in Texas, Missouri and Illinois. The state of Massachusetts is expecting about 10,000 fewer new international students this year. - NPR
Those supporting Trump’s actions say they will restore national pride, but critics in the arts and parks, as well as a number of Democrats, argue they whitewash history and do not tell people the full story. - The Hill
Arts criticism has been vanishingly difficult to break into for ages, no one’s idea of a growth industry. But publications have managed to make a dire situation worse; it’s now reached the point where long-tenured veterans are having their jobs erased in a misguided rethinking of what criticism even actually is. - The Guardian
With funding stalled in the state legislature, transit agency SEPTA instituted a 20% service cut in the city last week and will make drastic reductions in regional rail next week. Philadelphia arts organizations say many employees and at least 20% of their patrons use transit. Will they simply stop coming? - The Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)
“2025’s EIF season, themed ‘The Truth We Seek’, sold 88% of available tickets. The figure is up by 29% on last year, when EIF sold 59% of its ticket capacity, and 34% up on the 2023 festival.” - Arts Professional (UK)
The move to scale back humanities doctoral programs is either a prudent acknowledgment of the cratered job market for tenure-track professorships... or it is a cynical effort, under cover of the Trump administration’s assaults, to transfer resources away from “impractical,” unprofitable, and largely jobless fields. - The Atlantic
“The festival said (the) demand for it to end its commercial partnership with the Edinburgh-based fund manager ‘ultimately reduces the very spaces where difficult conversations, human stories, and critical ideas can be explored’.” - The Scotsman
Harvard’s Arts and Humanities division instructed department heads to collectively reduce their budgets for non-personnel spending by roughly $1.95 million as divisions across the Faculty of Arts and Sciences implement cost-cutting plans. - Harvard Crimson
Leaders have made it clear that a $1-billion payout is a no-go. Another red line for several UC officials is the federal request that the university submit to an outside monitor over an agreement. - Los Angeles Times
“Someone could make the right comment on the right day or reply to a story in the right moment and get inside the head of someone who seems completely inaccessible otherwise.” - Washington Post (MSN)
