Arts news

• Trustees / Lighthouse / South East

  23-12-2019 16:30
  We are looking for individuals with a passion for contemporary culture to join the board at Lighthouse.
  We are keen for the Board to reflect the diversity of the communities we serve, so there is a...
  
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• AI Has Plunged Publishing Into Chaos

  17-08-2026 18:40 via wsj.com
  The spectacular implosions of big book deals over suspected AI use—and fears about who might be next—are forcing a reckoning over the nature of authorship, the relationship between writers and publishers and the industry’s long-term survival.  – The Wall Street Journal
  
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• Warning: Screen Time Is Having An Impact On Kids’ Cognitive Abilities

  17-08-2026 18:21 via theguardian.com
  “Our children are less cognitively capable than we were at their age. For nearly two centuries, the west experienced steady generational progress. Each new cohort of children grew up, on average, healthier, happier, and better educated than the last. Until now.” – The Guardian
  
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• AI News Sites Are Now Reporting (And Breaking) News

  17-08-2026 18:01 via wired.com
  
  RuntimeWire has been operating since May, publishing nearly 2,000 stories that it sources by crawling the internet, including court databases, web forums, traditional and new media, company filings, social feeds, and more. – Wired
  
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• How AI Will Damage Children’s Brain Development

  17-08-2026 17:43 via theatlantic.com
  
  During the most foundational period of brain development, social interaction of the sort that AI can now emulate isn’t entertainment for the developing brain. It’s nutrition. Once you see it that way, the right parallel snaps into focus. A more apt comparison than social media is food—more precisely, processed food. – The Atlantic
  
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• Our Ability To Search The Internet Is Dying

  17-08-2026 17:20 via thewalrus.ca
  
  Search can no longer pretend to be a neutral gateway to a stable body of knowledge. While the web has always been organized around intermediaries that shape what survives online and who sees it, the internet’s archival function is today breaking down under relentless pressure from stakeholders with very different—and often conflicting—priorities. – The Walrus
  
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• The Anti-AI ‘Hand-Designed’ Trend Is Big, But Also Filled With Grift

  17-08-2026 17:00 via fastcompany.com
  “Most telling is Claude’s branding, incorporating hand-drawn illustrations and details that attempt to tell the world, ‘Hey, we’re the more human AI.’” – Fast Company
  
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• Confirmed: Amazon Is Scanning And Then Ripping Up Rare Books

  17-08-2026 16:30 via 404media.co
  
  Wow, OK, way to be just obviously evil. “The printed book is destroyed in the process. The logo of the Amazon team that works at this warehouse, called VGT3, is a dinosaur, brandishing its teeth and with a book in its hands.” – 404 Media
  
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• Once Again, Police Are Claiming Classical Music Soothes Crowds Of Rowdy Youth

  17-08-2026 16:00 via yahoo.com
  In one British McDonald’s, a hot spot for fighting and generally antisocial behavior, “measures were brought in including a playlist of classical music in the evenings.” – BBC (Yahoo)
  
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• The Current Guy Uses AI To Claim Ballroom Approval From A Long-Dead Leader

  17-08-2026 15:45 via salon.com
  
  The 47th president shared “a series of seemingly AI-generated images … and a short video in which Trump and Washington stroll through the still-unbuilt ballroom. ‘Thank you, George, for some of your brilliant ideas on this great Military Complex/Ballroom!’ Trump captioned the 10-second video.” – Salon
  
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• Art Spiegelman Doesn’t See A Way Out Of The U.S. Political Mess

  17-08-2026 15:30 via theguardian.com
  The man who created Maus has some worries: “The media are struggling with how to convey the stakes in this post-truth era, he explains, the courts are packed with Trump appointees, democratic norms have been destroyed, and there is no effective opposition.” – The Guardian (UK)
  
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• Kristen Bell Joins The Savannah Bananas For One Surprise Night

  17-08-2026 15:15 via today.com
  “Bell … performed a medley with Savannah Bananas player Derek Klena, who’s also a Tony-nominated Broadway star. With songs from Bell’s hit film Frozen, the musical Wicked and more, the two sang their hearts out in front of a packed house of shocked fans.” – Today Show
  
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• It’s Not Just US Booksellers Noticing A Gaping Maw Coming For Used Books

  17-08-2026 15:00 via bbc.com
  
  The booksellers are wondering how they’re supposed to feel. Tey’re “are “uncomfortable with the idea of books being destroyed – even if they admit not every title needs to be saved.” – BBC
  
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• The Dream Of A ‘Red State Hollywood’ Usually Founders On A Couple Of Things

  17-08-2026 14:45 via nytimes.com
  “No one wants more uncertainty, and certainly no one wants this chaos. And let’s face it, no one really wants to move from Beverly Hills to Nashville.” – The New York Times
  
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• Maybe Celebrities Shouldn’t Be Recording Personal Videos For People Who Pay?

  17-08-2026 14:30 via cbc.ca
  
  A Heated Rivalry actor had to “pause” his account on Cameo after possibly revealing that they’re filming two seasons of the hit show at once. – CBC
  
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• Founding Literary Publications As One’s Home Is Shelled To Rubble

  17-08-2026 14:15 via lithub.com
  
  “I began asking myself: what will remain of this experience if it is not written down?”  – LitHub
  
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• Portland’s Newest Dance Group Performs To Tens Of Thousands Of People

  17-08-2026 14:00 via orartswatch.org
  
  That’s because the Firewerks are dancing in the Moda Center, the home of the new WNBA team the Portland Fire. “I don’t think any of us really knew what we were walking into. We were just excited about this new dance opportunity in Portland,” says one Firewerk. – Oregon ArtsWatch
  
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• Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Gets To Tell Your Family’s Story?

  17-08-2026 13:45 via nytimes.com
  “The trauma of the Holocaust has lived beneath the surface of daily life for decades, too painful to confront. But now second- and third-generation family members are getting access to archives of collaboration. In some cases, it’s opening old wounds.” – The New York Times
  
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• Roku’s New 24 Hour Slop Channel Is An Abomination

  17-08-2026 13:30 via slate.com
  For instance: “There’s a seven-minute … tale of a mountain biker who rushes straight from a race to support his wife who’s giving birth, only to get killed by the very ambulance carrying her—all narrated from the POV of his bike.” – Slate
  
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• As Some Paintings Are Found, Art Thieves Hit A Sicilian Museum

  17-08-2026 13:15 via npr.org
  
  In the morning, good news about an art theft from March. Then came the evening. “Thieves got past the alarm system at Messina’s Museo Interdisciplinare Regionale (MuMe), and broke open a security case. They soon left with four wooden panels.” – NPR
  
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• Zale Perry, Early Acquatic Star For Hollywood And Equally Early Acid Tripper, Has Died At 93

  17-08-2026 13:00 via nytimes.com
  Perry was “a depth-defying scuba diver and underwater stuntwoman whose reverence for the oceanic world was deepened by tripping out on LSD in a research study that included Cary Grant, Jack Nicholson and Dennis Hopper.” – The New York Times
  
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• American Classical Music at 250, Take Six — The Ford Foundation’s Misguided Philanthropy

  17-08-2026 04:34 via artsjournal.com
  
  Since filing a New York Times piece on the perilous state of American classical music 250 years since the nation’s
  
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• Format confusion

  16-08-2026 22:45 via artsjournal.com
  Good Morning,Nobody in the format business seems to know what people want, which hasn’t stopped some from betting big. Disney’s plan for Generation Alpha runs through vertical microdramas — shortform clips engineered for a phone held upright (Variety). Netflix, which spent years insisting games were the natural extension of its storytelling, is closing gaming studios (Los Angeles Times).
  The demand side keeps answering a different question. Four of Tana French’s novels ma
  
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• Not Only Is The Rumpus Alive, But It’s Launching A Spanish-Language Literary Magazine

  16-08-2026 22:00 via lithub.com
  
  From the editors: “Rather than translating existing work from The Rumpus, El Alboroto will commission and publish original Spanish-language writing spanning cultural criticism, personal essays, interviews, fiction, poetry and comics.” – LitHub
  
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• At Edinburgh Fringe, Not One But Three “Heated Rivalry” Musical Parodies

  12-08-2026 21:02 via nytimes.com
  “When a show becomes a meme, the meme becomes the story, eclipsing the show itself. This phenomenon is here to stay. Thankfully, we’ll always have satire.” – The New York Times
  
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• Are We Close To Locating Where Consciousness Lives In The Brain?

  12-08-2026 20:31 via noemamag.com
  
  Most discussions of AI and consciousness ask whether machines can experience anything. But maybe the real mystery is: If consciousness is not fundamentally related to higher cognition, then what kind of phenomenon is it? – Noema
  
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• The New Performing Arts Center In Morocco’s Capital Is One Of Zaha Hadid’s Last Projects

  12-08-2026 20:04 via nytimes.com
  The Royal Theatre of Rabat, which includes an 1,800-seat main auditorium, a 520-seat performance space, and a 7,000-seat outdoor amphitheater, was largely completed in 2021 but only opened this year. It’s planned as an international platform for Moroccan, Arabic and African music, dance and theater — and Western pop. – The New York Times
  
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• Publishing Industry Sold $32.5 Billion Worth Of Books In 2025

  12-08-2026 19:44 via publishersweekly.com
  Looking at trends in the trade category, which includes religion books, sale rose 2.7% overall to $21.7 billion. The increase was led by religious presses, whose sales rose 9.3%, to $2.2 billion. Adult fiction sales had the second biggest sales increase, with revenue up 3.9%, to $7.1 billion. – Publishers Weekly
  
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• Anthony Hopkins, Composer

  12-08-2026 19:31 via yahoo.com
  The renowned actor has played piano his whole life, and formally written music for at least 30 years, but it might still surprise many to learn that later this month Hopkins will release his debut album, “Life Is a Dream,” on Decca Classics. – Los Angeles Times (Yahoo)
  
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• Modern Classical Concert Dress Is Evolving

  12-08-2026 19:15 via 3quarksdaily.com
  
  It’s a vital, creative and adaptive evolution, a way of preserving an important cultural heritage in a world of cheap noise where the piano recital might otherwise fade from view or become hopelessly marginalized. – 3 Quarks Daily
  
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