Category: issues

“Before its official closing in 1992, St. Liborius was declared a City Landmark in 1975 and recognized as a National Historic Place four years later. Today, it exists as a shell of a church, where the stained glass windows shine vibrant light on skate ramps instead of pews.” — Atlas Obscura

An analysis of the situation in the English city of Bath, which steadily reduced its arts grants over a decade before ending them entirely last year, shows that such local funding leveraged three times as much money from other sources — and that those sources cut their giving in tandem with the cuts from the local council. — Arts Professional

You may be surprised to learn that those big, prominent nonprofits soliciting your holiday donations, and maybe a place in your will, are very profitable for the administrators (and in some cases, the artists) in charge. How did that happen? Mostly because executive salaries are set by boards of directors, and these boards, especially at prestigious institutions, are comprised of the richest people those same administrators can round up, folks to whom a half-million dollars sounds like, if not pocket change, nothing more than a reasonable salary. – Chicago Reader

Why? It’s one on a list of German institutions that, the conservative Israeli government says, are promoting anti-Israeli activity or sentiment. But “Tamar Zandberg, leader of the left-wing Meretz party, which sits in the opposition, decried what she called Mr. Netanyahu’s ‘obsession’ with pursuing and censoring ideological opponents all the way to the Jewish Museum in Berlin.” – The New York Times

The Fox News host has lost advertisers en masse after “recent on-air comments that described mass immigration as making the country ‘poorer and dirtier and more divided.'” – Los Angeles Times

The writer she praised in an interview that caused protests both against her and against The New York Times for running the interview (or not better editing it) is David Icke, who, among other things, “has posited that a cabal of a child-sacrificing, bloodthirsty lizard people, many of whom are Jewish, are secretly running the world.” – The New York Times

Nigeria, among others, would really like to know. “In 1897, British troops stole some 4,000 sculptures after invading the Kingdom of Benin (now southwestern Nigeria). Over a century later, surviving bronzes are on display at museums in the United Kingdom, Germany, Austria and the United States, but not in Nigeria, their country of origin.” – History

The most common method for evaluating a candidate’s potential is the unstructured job interview, which is a weak predictor of future job performance. The interview is especially used to assess culture fit. At worst, it boils down to a gut feeling of good chemistry or rapport that interviewers get from the candidate. At best, this results in well-meaning interviewers trying to ignore the very factors that cause that experience, such as charisma, attractiveness, and likability, as well as any attributes or background they share with the candidate. – Fast Company

The tradition has its roots in religion, of course, but also in immigration patterns. At the beginning of the 20th century, Jewish people were one of the largest non-Christian immigrant groups in the United States, as were Chinese people. That meant there were new populations that, by and large, didn’t see December 25th as a holiday. While most other shops and restaurants in U.S. cities closed their doors for a day, many Jewish and Chinese immigrants found something of a shared experience. – CityLab

The authority shared the call for submissions on Twitter earlier this month, asking: “Do you have a passion for design and creative branding development? Can you create a simple but visually impactful logo that captures the spirit of an exciting cultural and creative programme?” But the message attracted more than a dozen critical responses, with several users seeing the competition as a request for design work at below market rates. – Arts Professional