1. Why Government Is Bailing Out Of The Arts In America state governments are getting out of the arts business. State after state is slashing arts funding. Why now? ArtsJournal editor Douglas McLennan suggests that in trying to recover from the culture wars of the early 1990s, arts leaders may have unintentionally pursued an endgame strategy. "As the current arts-funding crisis suggests—the survival strategy might have topped itself out and ultimately killed public arts funding." Newsweek 05/29/03
   
   
2. The Case Of The Conductor Who Stabbed Himself Onstage "David Tilling, of Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, thrust the baton through his hand while rehearsing Land of Hope and Glory, by Elgar. He finished conducting the piece but then collapsed. Some of his bandsmen feared he was having a heart attack. A few may even have been aware of a disturbing precedent: at a concert in a Parisian church in 1687, the composer Jean-Baptiste Lully stabbed himself in the foot while conducting. Gangrene set in and killed him..." The Guardian (UK) 05/27/03
   
   

3. Artist Thrown In Jail Over Bush Comment A Bay Area artist upset about George Bush's war on Iraq got into a heated political argument in an Emeryville furniture store. When he mentioned the words "kill Bush" it was the "wrong move in a place filled with American flags and run by military veterans who support the president. Store employees called police, who alerted the Secret Service. Hours after entering the furniture store to buy cubicle partitions for a fellow artist's project, Barry Schwartz was sitting in a small room in the Emeryville police station, being interrogated by two Secret Service agents." He spent the next two days in jail. San Francisco Chronicle 05/26/03
   
   

4. The Five Best Regional Theatres In America? Time magazine has ranked what it considers the five best regional theatres in America. Chicago's Goodman Theatre topped the list, followed by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland; the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, Mass.; the Guthrie in Minneapolis, and the South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa, Calif. The Star-Tribune (Minneapolis) 05/25/03
   
   

5. The ArtWorld's Best-Sellers Who are the best-selling living artists in the world right now? Jasper Johns clocks in at No. 1. "Johns' artworks have sold for more than £92m over the last three decades, the survey by magazine Artreview showed." BBC 05/27/03