"(The donation) of more than 300 pieces, including works by Robert Mapplethorpe and Keith Haring, greatly diversifies the permanent holdings. The gift also opens a relationship with a New York City museum, sparks new educational opportunities and offers the beleaguered institution a morale-boosting sign of support." - Orlando Sentinel (MSN)
Kedrick Armstrong, a 29-year-old "Black queer kid from Georgetown, South Carolina," starts the job immediately, but his first concert will be next October's season opener. In this Q&A, he compares conducting to cooking his favorite dish, shrimp and grits. - The Oaklandside
Science fiction prides itself on being visionary, but like any literary genre, it just ends up examining whatever issues the author is working through in the present. We just do it more allegorically. - Nautilus
“That era of celebrating acting ensembles—it’s rare, and it’s rare to find opportunities to try to do that. But in some ways, those are my favorite plays. Those are Chekhov plays, those are some of my favorite Ibsen plays. Those are what August Wilson was doing.” - American Theatre
The Russian republic of Chechnya has banned dance music it deems either too fast or too slow, in an attempt to quash a “polluting” western influence on the conservative majority-Muslim region. - The Guardian
The Pasteur Institute has made advancements in another field — the musical arts — as some of its scientists have formed bands and other acts involving colleagues as well as students who have studied there. That cohort has honed its musical passion and ability at an on-site studio they call the music lab. - The New York Times
Audio describers need to locate the gaps and silences in a show, so that their descriptions are woven around music and dialogue. It is a fine art timing the description to avoid distracting the user. - ArtsHub
Why are we so afraid to use words freely, to offend with impunity? Whence arose this fetish for the ‘purity’ of the text? I trace the origins of this obsession with textual purity to the triumph of linguistic philosophy in the early 20th century. - Psyche
The San Andrés Tetepilco codices — three late 16th-early 17th century manuscripts, one of which recounts the history of the Aztec capital (on the site of present-day Mexico City) from 1300 to 1611 — had been in private hands for generations before word reached the National Institute of Anthropology and History. - Artnet
The heart of the problem is that chatbots are designed to identify the quickest path to an answer, which rarely involves reading everything. It is simply never a wild guess to predict that the heroine of a 19th-century romance will get the guy. - Nautilus
"Don’t expect the august perch to change (La)Horde’s approach. The collective’s three millennial co-founders share a generational view forged by 1990s video stores and 2000s Queer nightlife, and fed by a plugged-diet supercharged by social media." - Variety
As with excavations near Egyptian pyramids, sometimes the team finds something they never expected. In the case of the Castro, it was an entire theatrical arch (known as a proscenium) that frames the stage. “It was hidden since the 1950s or '60s, when they went to wide-format Panavision movies." - San Francisco Standard
Berkeley's Aurora Theatre Company, which just learned that a play it commissioned and incubated (Jonathan Spector's Eureka Day) is opening on Broadway in November, says it needs to raise $500,000 as soon as possible or it can't produce any shows next season. - San Francisco Chronicle (MSN)
Skyrocketing construction costs and these oddball building characteristics have prompted many property owners to cut theaters’ rent just to keep the spaces occupied. - The Wall Street Journal
Artist Kirsha Kaechele, who created the installation at Tasmania's Museum of Old and New Art (and is married to its founder/funder), argues that the experience of men denied entry is part of the artwork. But one of those men sued, alleging discrimination, and a state tribunal agreed with him. - The Guardian
