“Fifty-five cultural institutions and 28 schools will benefit from grants ranging from $60,000 to $2 million,” with much of the money designated for buildings or infrastructure. “In previous years, the discretionary budget has been divided into small grants ... across sectors like the arts, public housing, social services and parks.” - The New York Times
From the start of the second Trump administration, the entire Smithsonian had been a target of those on the MAGA right who are preoccupied with expunging what they understand to be “wokeness” from prominent institutions. - The Atlantic
“Bunch has been cast by many of his admirers as something of a resistance figure — one of the only high-profile leaders standing up to Trump by single-handedly preventing the president from rewriting American history itself.” - The Atlantic
“The Court’s order did not affirmatively require the Board to reschedule programming that had previously been cancelled or to seek new programming,” the lawyers wrote in the filing. - AP News
When the Trump administration removed from the site panels telling the history of the enslaved people who lived with the Washingtons there, the city of Philadelphia sued. A lower-court federal judge ordered the panels restored; a three-judge panel of the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals has reversed that order. - The Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)
Through policies and schemes, previously unheard-of opportunities for people of his background began to open up, without which he would not have become the success he is considered today. The situation today for aspiring artists from a similar background is much starker. - The Conversation
Oakland currently allots its entire arts community only $300,000 in grants — in contrast to the combined $29 million that Grants for the Arts and the San Francisco Arts Commission apportioned across the bay last fiscal year. - San Francisco Chronicle
“The Republican-chaired House Appropriations Committee … advanced a proposal that could defund the Department’s Assistance for Arts Education program, … which was established in 2015 to fund primary and secondary arts education with an emphasis on ‘disadvantaged students’ and children with disabilities.” - Hyperallergic
The Highmark Mann opened five decades ago as the Robin Hood Dell West, the local summer retreat for the Philadelphia Orchestra, and it has evolved into a bona fide arts center that feels both sylvan and city. - Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)
“Congress has made clear that the National Mall is … not a personal sandbox for each President to renovate however he likes,” argues the lawsuit. “To that end, Congress has decreed that no new ‘commemorative work’ shall be located within ‘the great cross-axis of the Mall’.” - USA Today
“Judge Christopher R. Cooper of Federal District Court in Washington asked for a status report from the Kennedy Center that would include plans for ‘public access and ongoing programming, activities and operations’ should the center stay open past July 4, which the president proposed as a closing date.” - The New York Times
There will always be idealistic, ink-stained people who want to devote their lives to scholarly pursuits—their role to inspire young people to love ideas as they do. But this transfer, more than anything else in the academy, has been increasingly blocked by A.I. in the classroom. - The New Yorker
Philadelphia, as the cradle of American independence, was supposed to be the center of attention 50 years ago. From the beginning, deliberations involved arguably the most important architect of the late 20th century, Louis I. Kahn. - Architecture and the City
