Tomorrow Is Public Domain Day – Here Is Some Of The Art Of 1925 That’s Now Available

These works include books such as F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway, Ernest Hemingway’s In Our Time, and Franz Kafka’s The Trial (in the original German), silent films featuring Harold Lloyd and Buster Keaton, and music ranging from the jazz standard Sweet Georgia Brown to songs by Gertrude “Ma” Rainey, W.C. Handy, and Fats Waller. – Center for the Study of the Public Domain

A Woman Comedian Made Jokes About Overconfident Men. No Big Deal? It Was Where She Performs.

“Yang Li … is a comedian in China, where homes and offices still hold fast to traditional gender roles and where a nascent #MeToo movement has been met with considerable political and social opposition. One of her lines in particular has set off fierce online debate: ‘How can he look so average and still have so much confidence?’ A lot of men didn’t find it funny. And that, said many of Ms. Yang’s defenders, is exactly the point.” – The New York Times

The (Largely Untapped) Potential Of Reaching People With Physical Disabilities

“There is simply a lack of awareness of the need and a misunderstanding of the public benefit that could result from reaching out to this population, not to mention the financial benefit that might be gleaned from this untapped market. But fiscal considerations aside, there is simply no good reason why a person with a physical disability must also be culturally disadvantaged.” – Equal Entry

How The COVID Relief Bill Will Help Performing Arts Venues

“The bill gives priority to those who have lost at least 90% of their revenue between April and December 2019 and the same period this year; they can apply for funding in the first two weeks that grants become available. Second priority goes to those who have lost at least 70% of their revenue in the same period; they can apply in the second two weeks. Administrators can allocate up to 80% of the funds during those first four weeks; after that, anyone can apply. Individual grants are capped at the lesser of 45% of an organization’s 2019 revenue or $10 million.” – San Francisco Chronicle

Big Entertainment Versus Big Tech – The COVID Relief Bill And Its Copyright Bomb

“Passage of the measure is one of the clearest public signs yet of longstanding tensions between the tech and entertainment industries and who’s winning the battle for control. Big Entertainment (Disney et al) has benefited enormously from technology in producing content and getting it to consumers in new ways, but Big Tech (Google et al) has also given consumers (and upstart content producers) the means of accessing that content on their own terms, which Big E sees as a threat.” – Post Alley

Despite New COVID Outbreak, Sydney Goes Ahead With Indoor Performances

What’s more, at two of the major ones — Rent and The Merry Widow at the Sydney Opera House — masks will not be mandatory. Audiences will be at 75% of capacity, with checkerboard seating and other distancing measures; masks are “strongly recommended.” Rules are similar for the presentations at the Sydney Festival’s main outdoor stage. Most other theatre companies in the city are performing as well, though they’re making the audience mask up. – The Guardian

Arts Institutions Lost Their Box Office Income This Year. Now They’re Struggling For Contributions, Too.

“Despite an outpouring of contributions when the virus first struck, individual giving to arts organizations fell by 14 percent in North America during the first nine months of the year, [and the] average size of gifts from the most active, loyal patrons fell by 38 percent. … [The arts] are facing competition from pressing causes including hunger, health care and social justice.” – The New York Times

What To Look Forward To In The Arts In A Biden Administration

Proposed actions include an expansion of existing workforce hiring programs to include artists and creative workers, launching a program of federal arts commissions, developing an ArtistCorps within AmeriCorps, continuing CARES Act policies that extended benefits to the self-employed, and the creation of a new leadership position to coordinate federal arts policy. – Forbes