"The Virtual Museum of the Spanish Civil War, ... which bills itself as the 'first museum dedicated to this central event of 20th-century history', tackles topics that were long taboo under Franco and which remain problematic" — which is to say extremely controversial — "for many today." - The Guardian
"Organizations are now accepting the fact that they will need an online presence, but ... they (also) want to be able to focus on their live performance activities. Where will that leave the internet initiatives created during the shutdown? Will they flourish or be starved of resources?" - San Francisco Classical Voice
"You may have already forgotten about it, but Vault by CNN launched in the summer of 2021 as a marketplace for its own NFTs (non-fungible tokens) that would 'offer collectors the opportunity to own a piece of history.'" Well, it did last 15 times longer than CNN+ did ... - The Verge
Among the institutions damaged by missile fire, reported Ukraine's culture minister, are the Kyiv Art Gallery, Taras Shevchenko Kyiv National University, the National Philharmonic, the National Research and Restoration Center, and the National Natural Science Museum. - ARTnews
Don’t worry about superintelligent A.I.s trying to enslave us; worry about ignorant and venal A.I.s designed to squeeze every penny of online ad revenue out of us. And worry about police agencies that gullibly think A.I.s can anticipate crimes before they occur. - Slate
Spotify metrics we studied — including acousticness, danceability, duration, energy, explicitness, instrumentalness, liveness, speechiness (a measure of the presence of spoken words in a song), tempo and release year — were not strong predictors of the song’s popularity. - The Conversation
To maintain their positions, the normals conform to social conventions, even as they aspire to higher status. Individuals’ decisions about when to switch from one convention to a new one drive cultural changes. - Wall Street Journal
Launched in September, the campaign urges Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly to submit an official request for the return of the stone and 16 other artifacts removed from the country by illegal or unethical means. The document has already amassed more than 2,500 signatures. - Artnet
Lansbury was the winner of five Tony Awards for her starring performances on the New York stage, from “Mame” in 1966 to “Blithe Spirit” in 2009, when she was 83, a testament to her extraordinary stamina. Yet she appeared on Broadway only from time to time over a seven-decade career. - The New York Times
Ahead of Toronto’s municipal election in late October, plaques like those normally found in an art museum have sprung up across the city, in an exercise in guerrilla criticism that laments a city in decline – and skewers its mayor, John Tory, for what it describes as the policies of austerity and complacency. - The Guardian
How refreshing it was to see the Booker prize take another turn last month – putting the short in shortlist, as it were – with a record-breakingly succinct nominee: Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan is just 116 pages. The Spectator
The gallerist Anne Pfeffer and her husband Herbert, stand accused of concealing hundreds of works stolen from the daughters of Jacqueline Picasso and the art dealer Aimé Maeght. - The Art Newspaper
Rivka Galchen looks into the development of acoustical engineering as a craft (which goes all the way back to Chichén Itzá and Hagia Sophia) and how Christopher Blair and Paul Scarbrough of the firm Akustiks approached the challenge of a venue that had seemed acoustically cursed. - The New Yorker
"Although ballrooms were once the territory of the elite and considered off-limits for common people, in the upheaval of the 19th century, new types of dance steps were born. ... Here's how some of the most famous moves got their start — and were passed on to modern dancers." - National Geographic
