The 63 recipients of unrestricted $50,000 grants are spread across ten disciplines: architecture and design, craft, dance, film, media, music, theater and performance, traditional arts, visual art, and writing. - United States Artists
Born in Los Angeles on Aug. 10, 1956, Peter Robbins got his start as a child performer and, beginning at age 9, brought to life beloved Peanuts character Charlie Brown. - The Hollywood Reporter
He had only the rudiments of Indian classical training and played in an unorthodox manner, using up to seven drums instead of the conventional two. He spent a long career working with musicians from John McLaughlin to Miles Davis to Ornette Coleman to Herbie Mann. - The New York Times
In her own telephone conversation with The Daily Beast, Nina Totenberg—a towering presence at NPR who has been there since 1975—responded to NPR's public editor Kelly McBride, the justices, and general criticism of her story. - The Daily Beast
"(She) rose from the slums of Rio de Janeiro and became one of Brazil's most popular singers of all time by fusing the traditional samba with bossa nova, Afro-Cuban, pop, soul, jazz and even punk sounds." - MSN (The Washington Post)
Godie was a "weathered blond woman wearing a rabbit fur coat and men’s orthopedic slip-ons as she hawked her art on Michigan Avenue." The short-tempered artist, whose work ended up in solo shows and museums, lived mostly on the streets. - The New York Times
The “West Side Story” songwriter’s assets totaled approximately $75 million, according to papers accompanying his 2017 will filed in Manhattan Surrogate’s court last month. - New York Post
Dakota Johnson is now a producer. She says, "It’s not about control. It’s about contribution. It’s about collaboration. ... It’s about really reaching for an idea and sticking to it and maintaining the integrity of whatever story is trying to be told." - Los Angeles Times
The fashion legend was "most of all his own project, Pygmalion as well as his subject, maybe with a little bit of Icarus thrown in. He embodied the transformative power of fashion, not only the domain of socialites and hobby shoppers, but an avenue for invention." - The Cut
"I’m a firm believer that often terror is trying to tell us of a force far greater than despair. In this way, I look at fear not as cowardice but as a call forward, a summons to fight for what we hold dear." - The New York Times
"It has been unsettling, if not entirely unwelcome, to find herself courted in recent months by art world pundits and curiosity seekers. … 'I am not going to make a big deal of being more than what I am,' she said. 'Or less.'" - The New York Times
He was the first African-American to be a music director on Broadway (On the Town, 1945) and the first to conduct an orchestra in the American South (Louisville Orchestra, 1953). He earned respect from critics and musicians, but nevertheless had to make his career in Europe. - The New York Times
The South African government objected to the sale, which was scheduled to take place later this month, arguing that several items on the block, including the key to Mandela’s prison cell, had been illegally exported from the country. - Artnet
He'll receive the honor (the first since COVID arrived) at the traditional Kennedy Center tribute, this year on April 24 — joining a comic pantheon that includes Richard Pryor, Jonathan Winters, Whoopi Goldberg, Lily Tomlin, Lorne Michaels, Eddie Murphy, Tina Fey, Carol Burnett, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus. - MSN (The Washington Post)
Phillippe Gaulier has been teaching clowns for about half a century, but his stature has grown in recent years, becoming an influential and divisive figure of considerable mystique, the Dumbledore of round red noses. - The New York Times
