About 450 institutes are reliant at least in part on state subsidies, from theatres and opera houses to nightclubs and galleries. They're attempting to force a rethink over the €130m cuts. At around 12 to 13% of the current annual budget, they have been described even by those proposing them as “brutal”. - The Guardian
"Beautiful brick early 20th-century town halls were once venues for council meetings, award nights and country dances. But in recent decades many have been under-used or left entirely empty." Now municipalities are offering them to strapped arts organizations, often without rental fees. - The Guardian
Spiegelworld, an entertainment and circus company based in Las Vegas, bought the entire town in 2022 for $2.5m. This isolated plot of land, roughly an hour’s drive from Vegas and the same distance from the nearest grocery store, is now known as Spiegelworld’s “global headquarters” or, more simply, the “circus town”. - The Guardian
Visual artists in the UK take home a median annual salary of only £12,500 a year, a 40% decrease since 2010, a new survey commissioned by the Design & Artists Copyright Society (DACS) has found. - The Art Newspaper
"For many years, Google’s sprawling empire has faced little legal scrutiny, allowing the company to freely build up its search engine, browser, operating systems, and line of hardware products that all intersect to bolster one another.” But all empires must fall. - The Verge
Well, this is a cheery article. “There are fewer than two months—and honestly, about one month with the holidays—to shore up your institutions to make them as strong and solid for the community as possible.” - Book Riot
Ronan Farrow’s new article argues that we’re all at risk of being hacked - by our own government. “When it happens in a democracy … , it creates a sense of disorientation: ‘Could this happen to me? Here? Really?!’ And yet it can, and it does.” - The New Yorker
“Small communities roll out the red carpet for filmmakers, but there’s not always a happy Hollywood ending.” Take this devastating fire on the set of HBO’s I Know This Much Is True. - Los Angeles Times
"Black America tracing itself to Egypt makes as much historical sense as would Czechs deciding to … favor tartans as an expression of being European. … The abiding fondness for the Egypt idea tends to sideline the astonishing history of the empires that enslaved Americans actually emerged from." - The New York Times
In contrast to the seeming clarity of colonialism (however much it elides that process’s own complications), current discussions of decolonisation can seem amorphous and slippery. This is not surprising since so many different people and groups are using the concept, at times at cross purposes. - Aeon
The city argues that its new method of funding organizations creates a more equitable process to sustain the city’s myriad creative centers. But many of Portland’s smaller arts organizations say the shift in who decides their funding has led to the exact opposite result, leaving them less money for the following year than expected. - Willamette Week
"This is a troubling turn of events, particularly for the arts, where nonprofit organizations are prominent players in the form of museums, alternative art spaces, galleries, and even some publications, not to mention institutions of higher education. If it passes, will this bill muffle artistic expression? My guess is yes." - Hyperallergic
This legislation would allow the Secretary of the Treasury to designate section 501(c) nonprofits as “terrorist supporting organizations” at the Secretary’s discretion, without requiring the Secretary to share their full evidence or reasoning with accused nonprofits. - Non-Profit Quarterly
In many ways the cultural legacy of the first Trump administration was more visible in backlash and protest. But it’s possible the second time around, the impact will be an affirmative one. - The New York Times
"Overall, Berlin is slashing its cultural funding budget by around €120 million ($127 million), or about 12%. The budget for 2025 will now be around €1.2 billion. For weeks now, theatres (and other organizations) have been warning of insolvency, restrictions in operations and job losses." - DPA (Yahoo!)
