Arts news

• Turning The Edinburgh Fringe Virtual

  05-08-2020 14:35 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “For the first time in its 73-year history, the Edinburgh Fringe will not take place as an official live event in 2020. But this has not deterred companies and venues from developing creative online solutions. They speak to David Pollock about adapting to the pandemic, crowdfunding and the appetite for change in the sector.” – The Stage
  
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• The Guardian view on living more creatively: a daily dose of art | Editorial

  09-01-2026 18:51 via theguardian.com
  It can make us healthier, happier and live longer. Engaging in culture should be encouraged like good diet and exerciseThe second Friday in January has been dubbed “Quitter’s Day”, when we are most likely to give up our new year resolutions. Instead of denying ourselves pleasures, suggests a new batch of books, a more successful route may be adding to them – nourishing our minds and souls by making creativity as much a daily habit as eating vegetables and exercising. Rath
  
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• Did Leonardo da Vinci paint a nude Mona Lisa? I may have just solved this centuries-old mystery

  09-01-2026 16:43 via theguardian.com
  It is one of the most tantalising – and entertaining – puzzles in art, stretching from the Louvre to the Loire via, well, Norfolk. And our critic thinks he has just worked it outIncreased security after the recent heist has made the queues at the Louvre even slower, yet on this rainswept, very wintry morning, no one grumbles. After all, the Mona Lisa is waiting inside for all these tourists who have come from the world over. Leonardo da Vinci’s woman – swathed in dark clo
  
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• Anonymous painting bought at auction on ‘hunch’ identified as two-in-one Rubens

  09-01-2026 14:53 via theguardian.com
  Study of man often featured in works by the Flemish master reveals hidden painting of woman beneath model’s beardIs it a bald elderly man with a big bushy beard and a wine-addled stare? Or a friendly young woman with flowing locks and a crown of braids?To Belgian art dealer Klaas Muller, an answer to that question mattered less than the fact that this particular take on the duck-rabbit optical illusion was painted by one Peter Paul Rubens. Continue reading...
  
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• Hawaiian headwear, Beuys’ bathtub and Nan Goldin’s photo diaries – the week in art

  09-01-2026 13:00 via theguardian.com
  Jewels of island life go on display, Beuys introduces heroism to washtime and Nan Goldin’s classic The Ballad of Sexual Dependency reveals itself – all in your weekly dispatchHawai‘i
  Some of the most spectacular masterpieces in the British Museum, including feathered war helmets and glaring gods collected by Captain Cook, make this exhibition created in collaboration with Hawaii community leaders and artists entrancing.• The British Museum, London, from 15 January to 25 Ma
  
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• Marie Goodenough obituary

  09-01-2026 11:49 via theguardian.com
  My mother, Marie Goodenough, who has died aged 90, was a prolific painter but primarily considered herself a sculptor, mainly working in wood but also using papier-mache, fibreglass and metal. She had an original and humorous outlook; the sculpture Boris Godunov, purchased by the Andrew Duncan Clinic in Edinburgh, was a play on words, and Newspaperman, made from copies of the Scotsman, was a tribute to the art critic Edward Gage and exhibited in the Royal Glasgow Institute.Born in York, Marie wa
  
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• Kenneth Turan: I Lost My Library In The LA Fires. Should I Start Collecting Again?

  08-01-2026 19:15 via theatlantic.com
  My entire collection of something like 4,000 volumes, acquired one by one over all those decades, had turned to smoke and ash in the Palisades Fire. The question before me was not just about this particular book, but about whether it made sense, in my late 70s, to begin collecting all over again. – The Atlantic
  
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• Kurt Vonnegut Estate Joins Lawsuit Against Utah For Banning Books In Schools

  08-01-2026 19:03 via publishersweekly.com
  The estate of the author of Slaughterhouse-Five (one of the banned books) joins three (living) novelists and two anonymous high school students as plaintiffs, represented by the ACLU of Utah, in a complaint challenging the state’s “sensitive material review” law. – Publishers Weekly
  
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• Renee Nicole Good Merch Pops Up On Amazon And Etsy

  08-01-2026 18:44 via fastcompany.com
  Less than 24 hours after the horrifying shooting of a woman by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent in Minneapolis, merchandise related to the slain U.S. citizen is already proliferating on e-commerce shopping sites, including on Amazon and Etsy. – Fast Company
  
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• Renee Nicole Good Was A Poet. Here’s Some Of Her Work

  08-01-2026 18:31 via lithub.com
  The bio from a now-private Instagram account belonging to Good describes her as a “Poet and writer and wife and mom and shitty guitar strummer from Colorado; experiencing Minneapolis, MN.”  – LitHub
  
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• The Mythology Of The Friend Group

  08-01-2026 18:15 via theatlantic.com
  If friend groups seem ubiquitous, so does a quiet underclass of people like me, bemoaning their lack of them. – The Atlantic
  
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• French Researchers Have Used AI To Write A Molière Play

  08-01-2026 18:01 via nytimes.com
  Mind you, this script wasn’t just spit out by a bot after one prompt. The French AI collective Obvious spent two years developing the script with the Théâtre Molière Sorbonne: training the software on the playwright’s structure and themes, then producing new drafts after feedback from scholars and actors. – The New York Times
  
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• AI-Created Novel Loses Publication Prize After Being Voted Winner In Reader’s Choice

  08-01-2026 17:44 via automaton-media.com
  Contest-winning AI novel loses physical publication and manga adaptation after guidelines were updated to ban AI-generated works. – Automation
  
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• Are We Living In An Age Of Bad Painting?

  08-01-2026 17:31 via theartnewspaper.com
  Walking through Frieze London’s carpeted aisles in October, a long-developed hunch was confirmed emphatically: we are amid a deluge of bad painting. – The Art Newspaper
  
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• So How Are Libraries Going To Get Their Books Now?

  08-01-2026 17:15 via npr.org
  The company faced several challenges in recent years, including a data breach in 2022 – after the company was acquired by a private investment group in 2021 – that put it in what independent library consultant Marshall Breeding called “a weak financial position.” – NPR
  
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• Broadway Production Will Rework “The Fantasticks” As Gay Love Story

  08-01-2026 17:06 via deadline.com
  “In the re-envisioned Fantasticks, the central romantic pair – traditionally Matt and Luisa – are now Matt and Lewis, reinterpreting the story’s ‘allegory of love, longing, and reconciliation through a gay lens,’ according to producers. The show’s original pair of fathers, who secretly orchestrate the clandestine love affair between their children, are now mothers.” – Deadline
  
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• Béla Fleck Talks About Why He Canceled His Kennedy Center Concerts

  08-01-2026 16:34 via msn.com
  “As this thing became more and more charged, it wasn’t any longer something where I’m under the radar playing this gig. I am actually taking a position by playing at the Kennedy Center now. By not canceling, I’m taking a position, and I don’t want to take that position.” – The Washington Post (MSN)
  
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• Thoughts While Not Thinking

  08-01-2026 16:13 via artsjournal.com
  <a href="https://www.artsjournal.com/herman/2026/01/thoughts-while-not-thinking.html" title='Thoughts While Not Thinking‘ rel=”nofollow”><img width="150" height="150" src="https://www.artsjournal.com/herman/wp/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/P1310432-cropped-400-150×150.jpg" class="webfeedsFeaturedVisual wp-post-image" alt="Untitled © by Gerard Bellaart" link_thumbnail="1" decoding="async" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/herman/wp/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/P
  
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• Bruce Crawford, Ad Exec Who Led Metropolitan Opera And Lincoln Center, Has Died At 96

  08-01-2026 16:02 via nytimes.com
  In his primary career, he ran agencies BBDO Worldwide and Omnicon. As the Met’s general manager, he erased the company’s big deficits and stabilized operations; he also served twice as board chairman. As chair of Lincoln Center, he established peace among feuding resident organizations and set big projects in motion. – The New York Times
  
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• Did Someone Just Figure Out How To Decode The Voynich Manuscript?

  08-01-2026 15:30 via livescience.com
  Not exactly, no, but science journalist Michael Greshko may have taken a big step toward that goal. No one had yet figured out a workable approach to even attempt reading the famously indecipherable 15th-century codex, but Greshko has demonstrated that a medieval-style cipher using cards and dice is plausible. – Live Science
  
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• What’s The Ultimate Goal Behind The Trump Administration’s Attacks On The Smithsonian? To Finally Win The Culture Wars

  08-01-2026 15:05 via theguardian.com
  Charlotte Higgins: “’The goal,’ as one senior employee of the Smithsonian told me, ‘is to reframe the entire culture of the United States from the foundation up.’” – The Guardian
  
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• Fungi: Anarchist Designers review – a perverse plunge into mushroom mayhem, from stinkhorns to zombie-makers

  08-01-2026 15:03 via theguardian.com
  Nieuwe Instituut, Rotterdam
  They have poisoned emperors, taken over insect brains and survived atomic bombs. This Dantean journey through fungal hell is riveting – though frogs may disagreeSylvia Plath’s poem Mushrooms is a sinister paean to the natural world. Her observations on fungi are freighted with foreboding, noting how “very / Whitely, discreetly, / Very quietly” they “Take hold on the loam, / Acquire the air”. The poem ends: “We shall by morning
  
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• Smithsonian Faces New Ultimatum From Trump Administration

  08-01-2026 14:33 via nytimes.com
  “After a monthslong lull in tensions, the Smithsonian is facing an ultimatum from the White House to comply next week with a demand” to produce a very long list of internal documents for “a comprehensive review of the institution’s content and plans — or risk potential cuts to its budget.” – The New York Times
  
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• Another Former Student At Richmond Ballet Sues For Abuse

  08-01-2026 14:01 via wtvr.com
  “A former Richmond Ballet student is suing the performance organization for $11.5 million, alleging sexual, emotional and psychological abuse at the hands of staff members during her eight years (there). The 85-page complaint … is the third lawsuit filed by a former student … in the past five years.” – WTVR (Richmond)
  
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• Trump’s assault on the Smithsonian: ‘The goal is to reframe the entire culture of the US’

  08-01-2026 06:00 via theguardian.com
  The president has vowed to kill off ‘woke’ in his second term in office, and the venerable cultural institution a few blocks from the White House is in his sightsOn 30 May last year, Kim Sajet was working in her office in the grandly porticoed National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC. The gallery is one of the most important branches of the Smithsonian Institution, the complex of national museums that, for almost 200 years, has told the story of the nation. The director’s sui
  
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• “Ur Kind of Music?”

  08-01-2026 05:44 via artsjournal.com
  I cannot think of a better conversationalist about music, and about the state of things musical today, than the conductor Kenneth Woods. Ken is an American based in the UK, where he conducts the English Symphony Orchestra in Worcester and resides in Wales. He programs bravely and insightfully. He presides
  
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• How Hard Is The Training To Become A Peking Opera Star? This Hard.

  07-01-2026 21:02 via apnews.com
  Zhang Wanting spent an entire semester practicing standing on one foot on a three-inch chair handle while lifting her other leg backward and leaning forward with an arched back. And that was maybe the easiest of the tricks she had to learn just with the chair, leaving aside all the other skills necessary. – AP
  
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• Insider Art Market Predictions For 2026

  07-01-2026 20:27 via artnews.com
  If nothing else, the new year will likely reveal whether the art world’s pivot to the Gulf, and auction houses’ deepening emphasis on luxury categories, were good choices. – ARTnews
  
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• New Vision For Your Car: An AI Companion

  07-01-2026 20:15 via fastcompany.com
  Across the show floor, the car emerged less as a machine and more as a companion as automakers and tech companies showcased vehicles that can adapt to drivers and passengers in real time — from tracking heart rates and emotions to alerting if a baby or young child is accidentally left in the car. – Fast Company
  
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• America’s Only Weather Museum May Have To Close Down

  07-01-2026 20:05 via artnews.com
  “The National Weather Museum and Science Center in Norman, Oklahoma, the only US museum dedicated to weather artifacts, said late last month that it is at risk of closing. The nonprofit, launched in the early 2000s, has relied completely on donations, grants, and partnerships for funding, and receives no federal funding.” – ARTnews
  
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