“This diagram, created by WordTips, breaks down the world’s 100 most-spoken languages by their roots (e.g., Indo-European for English and Spanish, or Sino-Tibetan for Mandarin) and by the number of native speakers and total speakers. The resulting chart helps reveal some interesting insights.” – Digg
Attendance Isn’t A Good Enough Metric, So This Museum Is Trying To Measure Its Social Impact
“Working with a group of social scientists, the [Oakland Museum of California] devised an innovative plan to take stock of both its ability to connect with visitors and to foster connections between visitors themselves. The idea came after previous data collection efforts revealed a more thorough snapshot of the institution’s audience, which is one of the most diverse in the country.” – Artnet
Researchers May Just Have Located Nefertiti’s Secret Burial Place Inside Tutankhamun’s Tomb
“A radar survey around the tomb of Tutankhamun in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings has revealed possible evidence of further hidden chambers behind its walls. The findings … resurrect a controversial theory that the young king’s burial place hides the existence of a larger tomb, which could contain the mysterious Egyptian queen Nefertiti.” – Nature
Salt Lake City’s Arts Funding Rewards Largest Organizations At Expense Of Small. Should The Formula Change?
That system sometimes “reward[s] bad behavior. We reward those who keep spending without regard” and sometimes “penalize organizations that take thoughtful, correct and prudent cuts to their budget and then they get less as a result.” – Salt Lake Tribune
Martin Filler: The Fascist Implications Of Trump’s Architectural Plans
This effective ban on modern architecture commissioned by the US government is horrifyingly reminiscent of Hitler’s insistence that public buildings in the Third Reich hew to the Classical tradition (though usually a stripped-down version of it) and that modern design, except for some industrial uses, was strengst verboten (strictly forbidden). – New York Review of Books
How A Co-Founder Of Black Lives Matter Uses Dance For Change
“I’m trying to have a bigger conversation about social conditions, and sometimes I’m having that conversation in a really pensive, sort of introspective kind of performance. And then sometimes it’s really extroverted—like, let’s get up and dance together.” – Artsnet
EU Will Demand UK Return Parthenon Marbles To Greece As Part Of Brexit Deal
The European Union will demand that Britain gives a collection of ancient marble sculptures back to Greece as part of a post-Brexit trade deal. Greece has long argued that the Parthenon Marbles — also called the Elgin Marbles — were unlawfully removed from the Parthenon temple in Athens in the early 19th century by the British diplomat Lord Elgin. – Business Insider
Seattle Arts Philanthropist Virginia Wright, 91
The Wrights became known as “the Medicis of Seattle,” especially renowned for their marvelous art collection. – Seattle Times
How My Fake College Essay Went Insanely Viral And Nearly Cost Me My Day Job
How The Arts Could Reform Business Education
It’s not the liberal arts vs. corporate education. And it’s not soft skills vs. hard skills. It’s both a dichotomy and a lexicon we must eliminate. First, the dichotomy: the education needed for today and the future is one that blends the two instead of treating them as separate and distinct. Second, the lexicon: terminology like soft vs. hard skills inherently undermines the importance of the poorly named “soft” skills while the words “liberal” and “arts” are a poor brand name for an otherwise powerful and relevant pedagogy. – Forbes
Which Presidential Candidate Would Be Best For The Arts?
“The question … is far more complicated that it first appears. (What does ‘best’ mean? What does ‘the arts’ mean?)” There isn’t all that much evidence to look at, but Chris Jones surveys what’s there. – Chicago Tribune
Amar Ramasar Is Not Leaving Broadway’s ‘West Side Story’. Neither Are The Protesters Who Want Him Fired
Ramasar, who was sacked from, and later rehired by, New York City Ballet following his role in the nude photo-sharing scandal at the company, is playing Bernardo in the new production by Ivo van Hove. Protesters at the theatre most nights, and their fellows on social media, want West Side Story‘s producers to fire Ramasar and for audience members to boo him; the producers say they’re not going to discipline him for an incident that happened somewhere else two years ago. Neither side seems inclined to budge. – The New York Times
Louvre Cancels Show Of Bulgarian Icons After Bulgarian Government And Church Object
Curators intended the June exhibition, titled “Art and Cultures in Bulgaria between the 16th and 18th Centuries,” to examine the influence that Islamic art had on Bulgarian Orthodox religious art during that period, when Bulgaria was under the control of the Ottoman Empire. This approach did not go over well in present-day Bulgaria. – ARTnews
Radical Empathy
For many, many people going to a concert hall or a museum is a foreign, anxiety-producing prospect. If we want new communities to take advantage of what we have to offer, we need to develop the capacity to imagine what doing so might be like for them. We need empathy. And since the experiences of the arts can be so unfamiliar the empathy must be extreme. – Doug Borwick