Listening on transistor radios and Walkmans, many Dubliners who had long been intimidated by the book found that they not only understood it but enjoyed it and recognised themselves in it. – Irish Times
Buy A Painting By This Dog And Get Free Weed
In D.C., you see, it is legal to possess marijuana but not to sell it; there is, however, no law against giving it away. So the enterprising proprietors of District Derp gallery got the idea to sell paintings by Sudo — their four-year-old mini-husky, who’s been trained to paint with a specially constructed brush — and offer purchasers, as a bonus gift, an amount of cannabis equal in value to the price of the artwork. – Business Insider
Book Sales Were Down 35 Percent In April
Categories of books that sold best last month were fiction, cookbooks, and children’s books, but compared with April 2019, sales were largely down at the indies contacted. Most saw declines of more than 35% compared to the same period in the prior year. For many, online sales continue to be a lifeline, especially direct-to-home orders fulfilled by Ingram. – Publishers Weekly
The Medieval Book That Suggested How The World Looked
Asking a Medieval person to imagine the world and their place on it would demand a radically different sort of cognitive map than one a modern person might rely on. This affects pragmatic matters (of navigation and so forth), but also what could be termed poetic ones as well. Philosopher Bertrand Westphal writes in Geocriticism: Real and Fictional Spaces that the “perception of space and the representation of space do not involve the same things,” and this is a crucial point. – Nautilus
Can Slapstick Comedy Work On Zoom? Bill Irwin’s About To Find Out
“‘Oh, I hope it holds together,’ he fretted the other morning, between rewrites and rehearsals of In-Zoom, his new 10-minute play. Performed by Irwin in New York and Christopher Fitzgerald, in North Carolina, it will have its livestream premiere Thursday evening on the website of [San Diego’s] Old Globe [theater].” The Tony- and MacArthur award-winning clown talks to Laura Collins-Hughes about how he’s putting it together. – The New York Times
Denver Arts Funders Rush To Help, But The Scale Of Damage Is Overwhelming
Colorado’s funders have been stepping up to prop up the arts with emergency money. But it’s clear that the need far outstrips the resources. What happens next? – Westword
Opening Of Berlin’s Humboldt Forum Postponed For The Umpteenth Time
As if the cost overruns, scheduling snafus and controversy over its holdings weren’t enough (not to mention last month’s tar fire), the opening of the city’s $700 million ethnographic museum has now been put off from September to an undetermined date because the coronavirus epidemic has stopped foreign construction workers from returning to finish the building. (The restaurant and gift shop might open sometime this year, though.) – Artnet
UK Festivals Say They Could Be Wiped Out
The Association of Independent Festivals (AIF), which represents 65 festivals in the UK, including Gloucestershire’s 2000trees, London’s Meltdown and Sheffield’s Tramlines, reports 92% of its members saying they face costs that could ruin their businesses as a result of cancelled events, with the vast majority (98.5%) not covered by insurance for cancellation related to Covid-19. – The Guardian
Some Bookstores Are Starting To Reopen. How’s It Working?
As some states allow a handful of businesses to reopen and other regions charge ahead full throttle, it is an experiment for bookstore owners and other retailers attempting to strike a balance between staying afloat and keeping workers and customers safe. – The New York Times
Twitter Tells Its Employees They Can Work From Home Forever
The company will “never probably be the same” in the structure of its work. “People who were reticent to work remotely will find that they really thrive that way. Managers who didn’t think they could manage teams that were remote will have a different perspective. I do think we won’t go back.” – BuzzfeedNews
Why Do We Miss Cannes So Much?, Ask New York Times Movie Writers
A.O. Scott, in conversation with Manohla Dargis and Kyle Buchanan:
“For 11 or 12 days, the festival becomes a cinematic universe in its own right. When you’re inside it, the rest of the world seems unreal. From outside, it looks like a strange snow globe full of movie stars. But it matters because, behind all the frantic photo calls and yacht parties and swanny red carpet marches is an almost religious devotion to cinema, an ardor for the art that isn’t snobbish or cynical.” – The New York Times
How Jerry Saltz Acquired His (Very Strange, Very Strong) Appetites
A compelling sort-of mini-memoir, in which Jerry proceeds from describing his (barely developed) way of cooking and his (odd and specific) consumption of coffee to recounting his (nearly nonexistent) upbringing, his (inventively checkered) young adulthood and how he basically willed himself into a career as an art critic. – New York Magazine
Does It Make Sense For Amazon To Buy AMC?
“Everybody thinks about it one way. They think, Okay, Amazon is going to buy movies or produce movies. AT&T or Comcast is going to start skipping theater distribution and go straight to your TV set. It makes sense, right? But there are opportunities to go the other way. And that is, I think, if Amazon owned AMC, it might release the first four episodes of season three of Jack Ryan in the theater.” – New York Magazine
Philanthropists Are Trying To Take The Baltimore Sun Non-Profit
“The Baltimore Sun is owned by Tribune Publishing. Alden Global Capital, a New York-based hedge fund infamous for purchasing, then gutting, newspapers across the US, owns a 32% stake in Tribune Publishing.” The campaign, called “Save Our Sun” and led by the Goldseker and Abell Foundations, “mirrors that of The Salt Lake Tribune, which transitioned to non-profit status in 2019.” – The Guardian
Carolyn Reidy, CEO Of Simon & Schuster, Dies Suddenly At 71
“Reidy was known for her warm and candid manner, for sending handwritten letters to authors and for her alertness to the bottom line. She confronted many crises and upheavals at Simon & Schuster, whether the rise of e-books, the financial crash of 2008 that happened within months of her becoming CEO or the current coronavirus pandemic.” – AP
Live Classical Concerts Gingerly Return To London
They’ll take place in an empty venue, though — the Wigmore Hall, where such artists as Stephen Hough, Angela Hewitt, Iestyn Davies, Mark Padmore and Mitsuko Uchida will perform for BBC Radio 3. “Twenty hour-long concerts featuring soloists or duos will take place at 1pm each weekday throughout June and will be livestreamed on [Wigmore’s] website and broadcast on Radio 3 and BBC Sounds.” – The Guardian
Slowly, Carefully, Berlin Starts Reopening Its Museums To Public
“Berlin State Museums, an umbrella group overseeing 17 museums in the city, … decided to start small, reopening just four of the institutions under its control on Tuesday. Christine Haak, the organization’s deputy director general, said in a phone interview that she wanted to observe how visitors behave in the spaces before deciding about the rest.” – The New York Times
Zoom Etiquette: What Your Bookshelf Says About You
The bookshelf has become the background of choice on Zoom calls from home. These aren’t random choices. The books and objects on your shelves say things about you. And now the game of figuring out what you’re saying… – The New York Times (Video)
Romeo + Juliet | Lockdown Theatre Club 9
Hester Lees-Jeffries explores what exactly makes Baz Luhrmann’s adaptation of Shakespeare so striking (not least Catherine Martin’s design). – David Jays
The Daily Zoom Call Of New York’s Arts Leaders…
More than just a logistical feat, the phone call has become a singular measurement of how worried, desperate and vulnerable cultural organizations have become since the virus hit. And just as notable, how much they are actually acting these days like the “arts community” to which they often aspire. – The New York Times
It remains unclear when Broadway might reopen. Many industry officials believe it will be considerably later than Labor Day. The practical effect of Tuesday’s announcement is that box offices and authorized ticket sellers should now refund or exchange tickets for shows through Sept. 6. – The New York Times
Italy’s First Post-Lockdown Opera Performances Will Be At A Roman Horse Track
In July, the Rome Opera will stage Verdi’s Rigoletto, conducted by Daniele Gatti, in the Piazza di Siena, a venue on the grounds of the Villa Borghese normally used for equestrian events. Audience numbers will be capped at 1,000 (in a facility that normally holds several times that number), with all social distancing regulations followed. – Wanted in Rome