A key reason why it’s now more complicated to promote an album than, say, a theatrically released film, is the ephemeral, immaterial nature of contemporary music consumption. By comparison, most films that see a theatrical release maintain a predictable, streamlined promotional schedule. - The New Yorker
The rhythms that resonate in wedding halls, concert stages and apartment blocks are falling silent, as the Pakistani government pursues a wave of expulsions that has already forced out a million Afghans since last year. - The New York Times
“Is listening to a book while doing the dishes, walking the dog or drifting off to sleep really as valuable as sitting down to read it? For authors, the publishing trade and those encouraging reading and literacy, the answer is increasingly yes.” - The Guardian
Fundamentally, the state of the humanities and liberal arts reveals a widening conflict over the “value” of higher education – with increasingly corporatized universities favoring market-driven metrics for evaluation, and proponents of humanistic education stressing that its worth to both individuals and society at large cannot be measured that way. - The Guardian
The "starchitect" was a figment of media attention, drummed up to answer our interest in celebrity, and our exaggerated expectations of what might be achieved without the help of other people. It belongs to a deluded, more decadent age. - Dezeen
The Republican-run Alabama Public Library Service Board voted to withhold roughly $22,000 in state funding from the Fairhope Public Library, citing the library’s failure to comply with the board’s rules requiring books deemed “sexually explicit” be relocated to the adult section. - The Daily Beast
“Trolling and tackiness, often crossbred with left-coded pop songs and hot memes, have served to wish a new zeitgeist into existence. Consume only the output of MAGA’s multi-front media efforts, and you may come to feel that the country is coalescing into pep-rally unity on Trump’s behalf.” - The Atlantic (MSN)
“The country’s premier showcase for independent film is also in a time of profound transition after decades of relative stability. The festival is … forging forward without its founder, Robert Redford, who died in September. Next year, it must find its footing in another mountain town, Boulder, Colorado.” - AP
Leider’s career arc was an unusual one. He helped turn Artforum into a go-to source for serious, no-nonsense art criticism, serving as its editor starting in 1962. Then, in 1971, Leider left the publication — and the eye of the mainstream art world in the US, becoming a professor first at UCal-Irvine and then in Israel. - ARTnews
Daniel H. Weiss talks about leading the museum (“I believe very strongly in shared governance”) and sorting out the pressing priorities: re-examining the rebrand, erasing the budget deficit, looking at the museum’s physical facilities, and getting everyone’s focus back on the art. - The Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)
“The move not to produce this year is meant to allow the organization to continue to rethink its future after a period of radical change. Leadership is still deciding whether Williamstown will skip only this summer or move into producing the flagship festival on a biennial basis.” - The Washington Post (MSN)
Paul Dien, the chief marketing officer who oversaw that rebrand, has resigned. New director/CEO Daniel Weiss has set up a task force of staffers and board members to evaluate the rebranding and examine “what works, what doesn’t work, to do some analytical work around that.” - The Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)
The company is laying off 22 of its 284 administrative staffers, reducing pay for 35 of its top executives (including general director Peter Gelb and music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin), and dropping one production from next season’s schedule. - The Guardian
The greeting’s first known appearance in print happened 200 years ago this week in a Connecticut newspaper, but its roots go back at least two centuries further, probably more. - BBC
The intensity of the workout was necessary to take her out of her head, so that she could write from a different place—“an embodied place, because writing is not just intellectual; it’s emotional connection, sensual connection,” she explained. “We exist in the world.” - The Atlantic
