Stories

U.S. Court Of Appeals Rules That Iowa’s School-Library-Book-Banning Law May Stand

“In a blow to the freedom to read in the United States, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit ruled that a controversial 2023 Iowa law … can go into effect, reversing a lower court decision and sending the case back for a third hearing.” - Publishing Perspectives

Big Hollywood Studios Aren’t Much In The Lineup At Cannes This Year

There will be famous actors in the competition, certainly, but they’re in indie-studio productions. Indeed, artistic director Thierry Fremaux said openly, “The United States will be present. Studios less (so). When the studios are less present in Cannes, they are less present full stop.” - The Hollywood Reporter

LACMA Spent $724 Million On Its New Building. Here’s How That Money Got Spent.

For 25 years, people have been arguing about whether that this project was a good idea or a terrible one. Here’s a look at each side, at why the building has cost so much, and why director Michael Govan considers the whole thing so important. - Los Angeles Times (Yahoo!)

Disney Is Preparing To Lay Off 1,000 Staffers: Report

The Walt Disney Co. “is expected to lay off as many as 1,000 employees through role eliminations in the coming months, Variety has learned. Many of the cuts are expected to come from the media giant’s marketing department.” - Variety

Trump Administration Abandons Appeal, Gives Up Attempt To Dismantle Institute Of Museum And Library Services

“A federal court granted the administration’s request to withdraw its appeal of a federal judge’s earlier ruling that struck down Trump’s attempt last year to dismantle the agency” by executive order. However, the fiscal 2027 budget which White House is submitting to Congress includes no funding for IMLS. - Publishers Weekly

The Artist Behind The Banana On The Wall And The Golden Toilet Is Now Hearing Confessions

Maurizio Cattelan has set up a hotline where folks from anywhere can “confess their sins.” Those the artist/father-confessor considers most in need of repentance will be invited to confess to him in real time during an April 23 live-stream. “In a world of sin, absolution has never been so close,” he says. - Euronews

In The Bay Area, Earlier Curtain Times Are Catching On

From ACT in San Francisco to Berkeley Rep to Stanford Live, producers and presenters are moving starting times from 8:00 to 7:30, 7:00 or even 6:30. So far, there have been lots of favorable comments and very few complaints. - San Francisco Chronicle (Yahoo!)

Spain’s Culture Minister Refuses Transfer Of Guernica For Basque Loan

The Basque government is already familiar with the Reina Sofía’s condition report—which deems the painting too fragile to travel—and that it is instead requesting a feasibility report from independent technicians on how a transfer to the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao could be carried out safely. - ARTnews

HarperCollins’ Canadian Side-Hustle. Be Wary.

There is every reason to be wary when a foreign-owned corporation stakes a claim to defending Canada’s cultural sovereignty, but the case of HarperCollins calls for particular skepticism. - The Walrus

LACMA Reinvented: Inside LA’s New Museum

No L.A. institution has taken as risky a leap in this century as the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. With the opening of the $724-million David Geffen Galleries, LACMA has effectively erased and reinvented itself, trading a fragmented campus core for a sinuous, hovering concrete megastructure. - Los Angeles Times

Nathan Lane On Being Half-Outed By Oprah On Live TV

“In those days, you might as well say: ‘And by the way, I love cock,’” he said about his 1996 interview to promote The Birdcage. “But I wasn’t ready; I wasn’t brave enough. I was a character actor. I wasn’t thinking I was going to become a leading man.” - The Guardian

Eco-Dystopian Novels From Africa And Asia Push The Form

Speculative and futuristic visions of environmental calamity are being imagined globally through environmental fiction. Eco-dystopian novels can help people process their fears or mourn the loss of a more stable climate. - The Conversation

Wrestling For The Soul Of The Machine

This is a war over whether technology will merely optimise calculations or eliminate a quintessentially human element such calculations can’t capture. But beneath these debates, the question still lurks: what makes us so special? And can it be computed? - Aeon

As Canadian Universities Scale Back Music Programs, The Impacts Are Felt In Cities

Research on cultural ecosystems suggests that institutional collaboration is crucial to sustain vibrant arts production. This is especially the case as music and the arts face increasing pressure from shifting funding models and post-pandemic austerity. - The Conversation

The Market For Non-Fiction Reporting In Books Is Contracting

These developments suggest a rough future for a certain kind of writing: nonfiction that’s based on reportage more than on personal experience or celebrity—a.k.a. long fact, literary nonfiction, or narrative nonfiction. - The New Republic

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