Her mother, Denise Jefferson, directed the Ailey School from 1984 until her death in 2010. Harper didn’t just attend dance classes at the school; she practically grew up there. - The New York Times
A longtime banking professional in both the private and government sectors and the first woman to chair the board of directors in the company's history, says that City Ballet has remained in "pretty good shape" financially through the pandemic. - The New York Times
"Not long ago, it was one of countless bookstores along the wide avenue lined with arched windows and doorways. … Four years after the liberation of Mosul in 2017, Maktaba al-Sham is the first, and so far the only, bookshop to return to Najafi Street." - Atlas Obscura
"I know something about this rhetorical vagary because it involves nominally the same efforts America supposedly applies to strengthen its own communities that are “vulnerable,” “underserved,” “traditionally overlooked” — you choose the euphemism for poor." - Medium
Days after Sheffield DocFest artistic director Cintia Gil departed over "artistic differences," seven festival programmers found themselves locked out of their email accounts and scrubbed from the website. - Variety
Optimizing for engagement is at the heart of many of the criticisms of social platforms. An algorithm that’s too focused on engagement might push users toward content that might be super engaging but of low social value. - Wired
The Lithuanian-born, Polish-raised singer, known as an especially reliable artist with a beautiful lyric soprano, had an unusually wide repertoire, from Bach to Mozart to Verdi and Puccini to Wagner and Strauss to Gounod, with a particular feeling for Chopin's songs. - Gramophone
The film was shut down seven times as a result of the pandemic and now Paramount Studios, the movie’s distributor and producer, is suing its insurance company to recover the sizable losses. - Los Angeles Times
"Anyone who thinks works of art declared fake simply disappear in disgrace or are destroyed should talk to Jane Kallir, author of the catalog raisonné for Egon Schiele. She was offered the same fake Schiele watercolor for authentication 10 times by 10 different collectors." - The New York Times
Justin Davidson: "This is a landscape shaped by fear. It has been formed not only by the reasoned response to a documented threat but by an amorphous, open-ended anxiety. You can see that disquiet embedded in the architecture … a monument to overweening caution." - New York Magazine
"According to new research … violins made by Antonio Stradivari and his contemporary, Giuseppe Guarneri, were treated with proprietary blends of mineral salts, which may have forever altered their physical structures." Why were they treated? Worms. - Popular Science
Laura Collins-Hughes interviews four young performers who were just about to start living their dream when COVID shut Broadway down. (The youngest of them, now 13, spent months worrying that his voice would change or he would outgrow his role.) - The New York Times
As executive producer of The Price Is Right (2008-2019), Richards was "a manager who was more interested in being a host, who ushered out veteran on-set leaders, was the subject of HR complaints, and presided over budget cuts and loss of benefits to staffers." - The Hollywood Reporter
Mike Richards lasted a day as permanent host before revelations of past behavior and social media protests led him to resign. As more details of his work history and the rigged process to replace the late Alex Trebek became public, the studio cut him loose. - The Hollywood Reporter
