Cultural News Today

A typically fragmented, moody, visually ravishing Wong Kar-wai production, In the Mood for Love (2000) stars Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Maggie Cheung Man-yuk as neighbours in a Shanghainese community in Hong Kong in 1962. The pair form an intense bond when they suspect their partners, both unseen throughout the film, of having an affair. Marysia Juszczakiewicz, founder of the Peony Literary Agency, which represents authors including Su Tong, Han Han and Chan Koonchung, explains how the film... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2yYgByY

Regardless of whether the global perception of Hong Kong has any basis in reality, the city has maintained a hold on the popular imagination for decades. However, the West’s fascination with Hong Kong has often been reductive. As interest in the place has grown, the more Hong Kong – as it appears in music, literature, television, works of art and video games – becomes less like a city actually populated by human beings. Nowhere is this more clear than in the portrayal of Hong... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2tSiwzj

Amanda Petrusich writes on the feeling of solidarity at the march in New York City on Saturday to protest the Trump Administration’s zero-tolerance immigration policy. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2MDGRRk

“I would rather cry in a BMW than smile on a bicycle” – that was one Chinese woman’s take on the ideal mate when she appeared on a matchmaking TV show. Many viewers were shocked by her materialistic response in 2010, but the sense that money can buy love persists today. A Chinese man who recently gave his girlfriend a gigantic heart-shaped bouquet of “flowers” made from 334,000 yuan (US$52,300) in banknotes triggered a heated online debate on the danger of... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2lK33xC

The Betel Nut Tree Mystery by Ovidia Yu Constable 4/5 stars Ovidia Yu is one of Singapore’s finest living authors. She began her literary career as an experimental playwright, exploring feminism, motherhood, and homosexuality among other things through comic, avant-garde works. Today, she writes what seems on the surface like cosy crime fiction, but it contains sharp political critiques in its depths. Her best-known books follow the adventures of wealthy culinary entrepreneur Aunty Lee.... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2KBxIbj

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2NcDaDe

In bustling big cities, some people find peace on a yoga mat; others in meditation. For Gwendoline Cho-ning Kam, it is a 600-year-old Chinese operatic style known as kunqu. “Life has a fast pace in metropolitan areas, especially in Hong Kong,” the 32-year-old Hong Kong native said. “When listening to kunqu, we slow our life speed and feel peace in our minds.” Kunqu, a form of Chinese opera that originated in the eastern Chinese city of Suzhou in the 14th century,... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2IJmcZw

Brian Phillips writes on the speed of the nineteen-year-old French forward Kylian Mbappé, whose two goals on Saturday helped France beat Argentina, 4–3, and advance to the World Cup quarter-finals. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2tImFXa

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2N7CEX7

Compton Verney, Warwickshire Four centuries of automata jolt into wondrous life in a show that’s as much performance as it is exhibition Standing sentry at the door to this enthralling exhibition is a lively figure known as The Connoisseur . He wears a linen suit and an expression of expert discrimination. Press a button and he leans forward to examine some unseen object, then gradually backwards to give serious weight to his judgment. He might be one of us, a fellow visitor who is also our surrogate. Tim Hunkin’s sculpture – made out of papier-mache art reviews, some from this very newspaper – is comical, mechanical, exquisitely expressive. It is both a work of art and an automaton. So it was with the earliest automata: the mythical clay figures animated by Prometheus; the female statue that Pygmalion brought to life and loved; and so it remains. This is one crucial difference between an automaton, a robot and a puppet. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.

The author on being known for his depression memoir, the dangers of social media, and Winnie-the-Pooh Matt Haig is a writer of novels and nonfiction books for children and adults, including The Humans and How To Stop Time . He is also the author of Reasons to Stay Alive , a bestselling memoir about his descent into depression, aged 24, and his subsequent efforts to climb out of it. His new book, Notes on a Nervous Planet (Canongate, £12.99), explores how to stay sane in our fast-moving, anxiety-inducing world. Why did you decide to return to the subject of depression in Notes on a Nervous Planet ? Not wanting to be nauseatingly name-dropping, Stephen Fry warned me after Reasons to Stay Alive not to become Mr Depression, and I thought he must know what he was talking about. So I wrote a book about Father Christmas [ A Boy Called Christmas ] and a novel, How to Stop Time , and tried to concentrate on other stuff. But the subject kept coming up at readers’ events. What struck me rea

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2yXaA5L

Ironic moniker aside, this Mike Skinner-mentored rapper doesn’t hold back when tackling police brutality and racial tension You shouldn’t judge an artist by their stage name. British rapper Oscar #Worldpeace (surname unknown) may sound like the leader of an ill-fated Twitter campaign, but it’s clear that the Tottenham-born rapper is also a formidable talent. Growing up in the same north London area as grime stars JME and Skepta, #Worldpeace was surrounded by the frenetic lyricism of that burgeoning scene, as well as his Ghanaian and Jamaican grandparents’ reggae records. Subsequently, his approach to music has been DIY: he got behind the mic in his cousin’s home studio and self-released his assured debut, Recluse , last year. Its engrossing blend of gritty production and nonchalant lyrical delivery caught the ears of his current mentor, Mike Skinner of the Streets, who has since released and remixed #Worldpeace’s tracks No Change and Right Now. Continue reading... from Culture | Th

A look at “Bored on the 4th of July,” a series of photographs by Chris Maggio, which captures, in suburban summer scenes around the Northeast, unlikely combinations of the colors red, white, and blue. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2ySBZFM

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2lLjCcq

The Viking sites Haithabu and Danevirke in northern Germany are part of the world heritage of mankind! This was decided by the UNESCO World Heritage Committee at its annual meeting in Bahrain. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2lGB1D8

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2yZbIpu

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2tFaAC2

The only thing anywhere near as big as leading South Korean boy band BTS is their fan club: the BTS Army. There are so many BTS fans that they could form real-life armies in their home nations – according to the fan club’s figures, the largest number of Army members live in the Philippines, followed by South Korea, Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia. Meet the K-pop star: BTS’ Jungkook – more than just a golden voice And while the Army cheered on their idols as BTS won three... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2Kje0EY

Kashana Cauley writes a humorous piece about the racist reasons that white people might call the police. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2yZ6yKa

Ahead of a Dublin exhibition of the poet’s archive, the Heaney family explain how they put together a new collection to reflect his life as a husband and father, as well as a Nobel laureate In 2011, when Seamus Heaney announced that he would donate his papers to the National Library of Ireland (NLI), it was a source of much pride, and a little relief, for the library. There had been some speculation that the archive would go to Harvard, where Heaney had taught for many years. When the day came for the papers to be delivered, “I think the director of the library presumed there’d be a van and minions”, recalls Heaney’s son Michael. “But there was Dad carrying the boxes. He’d put them in the back of the family car and brought them round himself. It was all done very casually, but there was also a weird sense of momentousness, so much so that it felt right for us to have a drink to mark the occasion with my brother, Christopher, afterwards.” The episode is emblematic of Heaney’s status

From Leave No Trace to Little Mix, here’s our pick of the best films, concerts, exhibitions, theatre and dance over the next seven days Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2lFnvQ4

I stopped using ellipses when I became convinced that no discourse should ever be suspended Some cautious notes on ellipses. They are pleasing. They’re like stepping stones, the sort that stick out of the water and are a risky pleasure to jump on when you want to cross a stream without getting wet. Today, especially in emails and texts, they have such power of suggestion that we distribute them by the handful. The canonical three dots are no longer enough; there are four, five, even six. “I’m here… I’m in anguish…. I wonder where you are….. I’m thinking of you…… I would like to see you again but…….” They’re very communicative and indicate many things: anxiety, embarrassment, timidity, uncertainty, the mischief of saying and not saying, a moment when we were about to exaggerate and then let it go, or even just a pause. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2MxRogU

Politicians and media figures are starting to let their roots show, and this meme is about them Every era gets the art it deserves. So Reaganism got Top Gun, in all its shallow, flashy and unexpectedly enduring glory. The Clinton era produced Jerry Maguire , a movie that seemed so smart in its time, but now just looks platitudinous, yet I find myself falling for its shallow charms again every time it’s on TV. Similarly, Blair had Damien Hirst and Oasis, all of whom seemed seminal in their time, but now just look embarrassingly of their time. The Bush era produced the first of Michael Bay’s Transformers, a crazy mess, the reverberations from which American cinema is still suffering. Clearly Obama, the sui generis politician, produced the sui generis show, Hamilton, a glorious celebration of multicultural America, and one so good that the first thing Trump did after being elected president was attempt to go to war with it: soon after the 2016 election, the audience at the Broadway sho

As the Man Booker prize turns 50 and readers vote for their favourite ever recipient, novelists reveal the highs (and lows) of winning ‘the Oscar’ of the literary world Reading group: help us choose a Booker winner to read this month Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2Ndb8HR

Richard Ekkebus, the culinary director of The Landmark Mandarin Oriental, grew up in Vlissingen, a coastal port in southwest Holland. He often visited his grandmother’s restaurant as a child and later, as an engineering student at university, he worked in restaurants, first as a kitchen porter and then as an assistant chef. Eventually his love of cooking won over and he left his engineering studies to pursue his career as a chef. Five books Save the Children CEO Amy Fong can’t live... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2KnRprb

2018 is shaping up to be a great year for movies. In fact, it isn’t even half gone and our film critics have already given out four five-star reviews. Here, in alphabetical order, is our list of the best-reviewed movies released in Hong Kong cinemas in the first six months of the year. Read also: The 25 best films of 2017 released in Hong Kong 120 Beats per Minute A passionate and moving testament to the power of public action, French writer-director Robin Campillo’s thrilling 140-... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2KrWXA7

from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2yWmZXB

from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2lJEOzL

from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2yWQ4Sx

Philip Gourevitch on what the International Committee of the Red Cross could teach Trump about reuniting families separated by his Administration’s zero-tolerance immigration policy. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2MCsgWj

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2KzOB6i

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2KofvSE

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2NabPS1

without downloading another app from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2lKTIFS

The pair was spotted kissing in Los Angeles. from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2IhfycX

Dennis Lim on Donald Trump’s America and the artistic visions of David Lynch, as seen in “Twin Peaks” and “Blue Velvet.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2tPjlc9

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2NdnGi2

From Moscow, Joshua Yaffa writes about the upcoming summit in Helsinki on July 16th between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, and what the Russian President will seek to get out of the meeting. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2KxdzmG

On The New Yorker Radio Hour, Hasan Minhaj, Naomi Klein, and Yotam Ottolenghi, in live conversations from the New Yorker Festival. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2tPtQw1

In the town plaza of Nou Barris, a festival feast mixes together the spices and flavorings of the world’s cuisines from Arts & Culture | Smithsonian https://ift.tt/2IDkI2Y

Ben Wallace-Wells on the shooting at the Capital Gazette, carried out by Jarrod Ramos, and on the value of local newspapers. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2KmDbGE

Clint Smith writes about the early departure of Senegal, Nigeria, and the other African nations from the 2018 World Cup. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2IDuzGh

John Cassidy on how Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the surprise winner in a New York Democratic congressional primary, showed how to renew the Democratic Party’s message of economic empowerment. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2MAz9Y1

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2yST16T

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2IDN39h

A team of Colombian students has created a wool-like material from coconut fibers, hemp and mushroom enzymes from Arts & Culture | Smithsonian https://ift.tt/2IGyOR8

Matt Palmer’s Scottish thriller took the top honours at Edinburgh, and proves an enterprising and interesting reworking of genre conventions The winner this year of the Michael Powell Award for best British Feature at the at the Edinburgh film festival (a surprisingly rare achievement for a Scottish film), this Highlands-set thriller reworks the hoary old standby: the hapless-urban-travellers-vs-angry-locals conceit. On a beat-by-beat basis, writer-director Matt Palmer’s feature debut skates close to the edge of cliche – only to swerve suddenly in an interesting new direction almost every time. It makes for a work that feels simultaneously familiar and fresh, just like a good, solid bout of genre-tweaking should do. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2lFbcDA

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2tRKCLb

The author's 1985 bestseller, Perfume: Story of a Murderer, has been made into a series. Audiences in Munich, and eventually around the world, are in for major surprises as the plot is now set in present-day Germany. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle http://www.dw.com/en/munich-film-festival-premieres-perfume-tv-series-based-on-patrick-süskind-book/a-44462997?maca=en-rss-en-cul-2090-rdf

Responding to a survey that found the median author income had dropped to £10,500, Publishers Association said the figures were ‘unrecognisable’ The Society of Authors has issued a sharply worded challenge to the UK’s biggest publishers after the chief executive of the Publishers Association questioned new figures revealing the plummeting incomes of writers, describing them as “unrecognisable”. Related: Publishers are paying writers a pittance, say bestselling authors Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2z4TDqb

As Julia Roberts joins Instagram, her posts suggest a breezy logo T-shirt vibe, a far cry from how Madonna, Will Smith and other big names started out I have two pieces of wonderful news for you. The first is that Julia Roberts has just joined Instagram . The second is that, if her first two posts are any indication, Julia Roberts possesses an innate flair for expressing herself through clothing. Take her first post. In it, she sits smiling on the floor, reinforcing the basic sentiment of the image by having “LOVE” splashed across her sweater. The second image is trickier, as evidenced by the “You can’t make everyone happy. You are not an avocado” slogan on her T-shirt. What does it mean? Is it a veiled message to someone? Does she literally have to remind herself that she is not an avocado? We may never fully know. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2IGiqjA

The composer Robert Schumann, the clarinetist Sabine Meyer and the composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein are in focus at the statewide music festival in the North of Germany from June 30 - August 26. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2IBVHW2

ATMs are closing thanks to contactless payments Rural consumers are hit hardest by the spread of contactless payments 29 Jun 2018 News from Life & Culture https://ift.tt/2lGOpqP

In March this year, 52 female Brazilian reporters started the campaign #DeixaElaTrabalhar (“Let her do her job”) to speak out against the sexual harassment they suffered on the job. But despite an outpouring of support on social media, it has not put a stop to unwanted advances in the industry – as the ongoing soccer World Cup has shown. How undercover female reporter brought down men-only London charity A third female reporter was harassed on air this week while reporting on... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2yTvgvf

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2lHTtvh

Late-night comics also discussed Rod Rosenstein’s hearing before House Republicans and the supreme court vacancy Late-night hosts on Thursday discussed the supreme court seat soon to be vacated by Justice Anthony Kennedy and ongoing tensions between congressional Republicans and the Department of Justice over the Robert Mueller probe. Related: Colbert to Justice Kennedy: 'I never thought I'd say this, but you're only 81!' Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2lJGzgo

The museum, which will be known as MiQua, will focus on Cologne's Jewish history from the Middle Ages through the present day. German politicians at the ceremony discussed German anti-Semitism of the past and present. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2IBEeNv

EU summit, government coalition crisis: There is an active political debate going on among politicians and on the internet. Communications researcher Gerhard Vowe tells DW why that is a good thing. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2KiMFCY

Richard Brody recommends the director’s cut of four films: Jean Renoir’s “The Rules of the Game,” Max Ophüls’s “Lola Montès,” Blake Edwards’s “Wild Rovers,” and Charles Burnett’s “My Brother’s Wedding.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2IA7OCN

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2MyBIKl

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2Km3pZS

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2tU7LN8

Superstar standups, daring dance, Brexit cabaret and a Bon Jovi musical … Dive into our guide to some of the shows at the world’s biggest arts festival Gilded Balloon Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2Nb9N48

The American standup, actor and writer on the things that make him laugh the most The Miles Davis autobiography. The stories he tells are insane and hilarious. Nothing is funnier than a true story told by a bitter old black man. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2N8xiuA

He wrote more than 1,700 stories, film and TV scripts – so here are five of the best by a giant of speculative fiction, who has died aged 84 Related: Science fiction writer Harlan Ellison dies aged 84 I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream This nightmarish short story – published in 1967 and winner of a Hugo – comes from a “special place of anguish”, Ellison said. It is set in a future where a supercomputer, AM – Allied Mastercomputer – has wiped out all of humanity apart from five people, and spends its time devising tortures for them underground. “There was virtually nothing out there; had been nothing that could be considered anything for over 100 years. Only the blasted skin of what had once been the home of billions. Now there were only five of us, down here inside, alone with AM,” the narrator explains. “He would never let us go. We were his belly slaves. We were all he had to do with his forever time. We would be forever with him, with the cavern-filling bulk of the creature mach

Emin and others survey the state of sculpture, Glenn Brown takes his decadent imagination to Newcastle and artists offer northern exposure – all in your weekly dispatch Frieze Sculpture Park Tracey Emin, Barry Flanagan and John Baldessari are among the artists decorating Regent’s Park with a free survey of the state of sculpture. • Regent’s Park, London , 4 July until 7 October. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2IDCpPV

The crowdfunded true-crime film Gosnell: The Trial of America’s Biggest Serial Killer is free to be released, following legal action by a judge portrayed in it A controversial film based on the real-life case of abortion clinic doctor and convicted murderer Kermit Gosnell will now be released in US cinemas, after the conclusion of legal action against it by the judge involved in Gosnell’s 2013 trial. Variety magazine reports that the makers of Gosnell: The Trial of America’s Biggest Serial Killer, are free to release their film after they settled with Judge Jeffrey P Minehart , who objected to his portrayal in the film. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2KvDqyr

Ustinov, Bath Elizabeth Freestone’s highly kinetic production matches an often vulnerable Henry with a wonderfully punky Katharine Henry V is a king in name only at the beginning of Elizabeth Freestone’s highly kinetic production at the Ustinov studio. He tears off his shirt and tie to reveal himself in full party-boy mode, surrounded by drinking pals. They drink and dance to the Ordinary Boys song Boys Will Be Boys before Henry collapses to the ground, sleeping off his hangover in his clothes. When his kinsmen and advisers arrive to discuss war with France, they have to scoop him up off the floor first. Canterbury describes “the Gordian knot of it” while tying Henry’s tie around his neck so he can receive the French embassy. This is a liminal king, caught on the threshold of adulthood. The diplomatic and military demands of war compel him to set aside the past. Ben Hall captures Henry’s transformation with one of his own: at first, he seems a man unhappy with his own height, stoopi

Hampstead theatre, London A sparkling cast including Harry Enfield star in Jemma Kennedy’s unwieldy play about the commercialisation of conception Jemma Kennedy’s play about the IVF industry stems from personal experience. Coinciding with the 40th anniversary of the world’s first test-tube baby , the piece is also timely. But, while Kennedy’s comedy has some sharp things to say about the commercialisation of conception, it aims wildly at too many targets and, at two and three-quarter hours, cries out for dramaturgical treatment. In attempting to take us all round the subject, Kennedy weaves together a number of stories. Serena and Jeff are a fraught young couple who, having exhausted the limited IVF possibilities of the NHS, go to the expensive private clinic that gives the play its title. Meanwhile Bridget is a 40-plus banker who, having placed her own frozen eggs with the same firm, now arranges for it to be floated on the stock market. To complicate matters further, Bridget is de

Daily Cartoon Slide Show. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2xaSyqE

The gooey snack became popular thanks to technological advances of the Industrial Revolution, which brought cheap sweets to the masses from Arts & Culture | Smithsonian https://ift.tt/2Mxv7iZ

Over 500 women who were staging a sit-in against Donald Trump's hardline "zero tolerance" immigration policy were arrested in US congress buildings. Those charged included the Oscar-winning actor and a congress member. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2lFtpAR

Pia Guerra’s Daily Cartoon considers the effects of following the news. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2ICepwE

Many movie fans see Munich as Germany's true home of film. With the 2018 Munich Film Festival in full swing, we talked to Munich Film Museum director Stefan Drössler about great films set in the Bavarian capital. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2tR7v1j

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2N6ECa2

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2KwKGXJ

Rock, punk, hip-hop: The Swiss jazz festival has always been a celebration of the world's best — and most eclectic — music. Rock band Deep Purple is also back in the city where it famously recorded "Smoke on the Water." from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2KjFXfZ

Sam Spero and Patrick Goodney write some satirical quotes from the World Cup that could also double as Donald Trump quotes. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2KkiLyg

Emily Flake writes a humorous piece from the perspective of the computer algorithms that know everything about you. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2Mvm4PE

The rapper Drake played Fortnite Battle Royale with the professional gamer Ninja, and a video-game phenomenon was born. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2z43JYn

With smartphone cameras and digital message trails, ‘what actually happened’ is more available to us than it has ever been. So why is public life saturated in both illusion and delusion? When Melania Trump recently visited the detention centres at America’s southern border while wearing a jacket printed with the words “I really don’t care do u?”, the responses of Washington pundits were sharply divided. For one side, the jacket was a message; for the other, there was no message. As the MSNBC journalist Chuck Todd joked: “Perhaps this is like Laurel and Yanny and gold dress and blue dress … each opinion is right yet somehow also completely wrong.” Those two globally popular memes produced a lighthearted, absurd sectarianism that reflects the polarised nature of our times. It took about three years for us to find a worthy successor to “that dress”’, whose true colours split the planet. Was it blue and black or white and gold? The illusory garment provided what is often called now a “t

Jesse and the gang are back on the road to God knows where in Preacher, and is it the end of the line for the synths in Humans Fans of the original comic-book series will be pleased to hear that the third season of this freewheeling adaptation is now venturing into some of the original fiction’s best and darkest areas. It’s time to explore Jesse Custer’s difficult childhood. Don’t expect too much hugging and learning, though; Preacher remains, by turns, funny, daring and brutal. Available now, Amazon Prime Video Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2KlxybK

This ‘official’ look at the Metropolitan Opera offers an inadvertent and fascinating history of New York’s West Side, amid quietly absorbing shop talk R uben Östlund’s The Square necessarily took the fictional route in order to have wicked fun at the expense of the great cultural institution. But “official” accounts don’t have to be a dead loss: The Opera House, commissioned to mark the 50th anniversary of New York’s Metropolitan Opera setting up shop at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, joins 2014’s The Great Museum as a documentary with pressing questions about the place and weight of culture in modern society. Given the ululating Valkyries and moustachioed tenors available, it’s a surprise when The Opera House quickly gets deep into the nuts and bolts of the federal urban renewal plan in the US. Yet it’s here, describing the slum clearance that took place to rehouse the Met in a new cultural quarter, that the film – directed by Grey Gardens ’ co-editor Susan Froemke –

Images of catastrophes bombard us every day, but an exhibition at Hamburg's Kunsthalle shows how such depictions are nothing new. "Nature Unleashed" also reveals how shocking natural disasters were once seen as positive. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2tNyQ4l

Sony and Valiant Comics are teaming up to make the ‘sci-fi-loving geek with telekinetic superpowers’ Hollywood’s first plus-sized superhero Hollywood is breaking new ground with its first plus-sized superhero, as a film featuring Faith Herbert , AKA Zephyr, from Valiant Comics’ Harbinger stories gets underway. According to Deadline , Sony have hired writer Maria Melnik ( American Gods ) to work on the project. The film is part of a 2015 deal the studio made with Valiant to develop movies from the publisher’s stable of characters. (Sony currently has the Vin Diesel starrer Bloodshot in development.) Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2ICs9ro

When the Norwich duo emerged aged 16, critics dismissed them as pop puppets. Their new album bristles at the disparagement of teenage girls – and the restrictions of femininity Rosa Walton and Jenny Hollingworth – AKA Let’s Eat Grandma (or LEG) – don’t understand why anyone would find their music unsettling. On their 2016 debut album I, Gemini, released when they were just 16, they juxtaposed folk whimsy with anxiety inducing electronic beats and macabre lyrics. “My cat is dead, my father hit me,” they sang on Rapunzel, sounding like something out of a Tim Burton film. A review in this paper described the album as “deeply creepy”. But for Walton and Hollingworth, the whole thing was “just a bit of a lol”. “I don’t think I ever viewed the album as dark before everybody said it was,” says Hollingworth. “What people see in a record is more a reflection of what they’re thinking than what we were thinking when we wrote it,” says Walton, sipping on an afternoon pint. But what about the pe

ITV had billed explosions on this evening special, but the eclectic panel of guests couldn’t quite live up to the hype ‘Where is the geezer?’ Danny Dyer rages at Cameron over Brexit It was billed to be possibly the most ITV thing to have ever happened. Hyped all week to deliver maximum mayhem, Good Evening Britain, a current affairs-meets-World Cup special, displayed the channel’s usual flair for format mashups. Related: Move over, Piers Morgan! Richard Madeley is breakfast TV's new oddball king Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2ICKaWq

The actor was among hundreds of women charged in Washington at a rally against the US president’s immigration policy Susan Sarandon was among 575 women arrested in Washington on Thursday after they staged a sit-in protest against Donald Trump’s zero-tolerance immigration policy inside a Senate office at the Department of Justice. The actor tweeted extensively from the rally, at which she and fellow protesters held aloft placards demanding an end to immigration camps and declaring, “We care” – a reference to the controversial jacket worn by first lady Melania Trump when visiting a detainment centre last week. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2KiRw71

The 32-track album will include previously unheard recordings made by the late musician before and after his time with the Clash A new compilation of Joe Strummer ’s output beyond his recordings with the Clash will include 12 previously unreleased songs. The 32-track double album Joe Strummer 001 was overseen by Strummer’s widow, Lucinda Tait, and Grammy winner Peter J Moore, and includes recordings by his bands the 101’ers and the Mescaleros in addition to solo material. Related: The day I spent on the underground with the Clash | Tony Parsons Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2KwrHfV

Premium cable network Showtime announced the series, which will hope to avoid the fate of previous flawed adaptation attempts Blockbusting video game Halo is to be adapted into a 10-part live-action series, which will aim to succeed where a doomed film project and a poorly received web series failed. In an announcement, David Nevins, the president and CEO of premium cable network Showtime, creators of the show, said that it would focus on “ an epic 26th-century conflict between humanity and an alien threat known as the Covenant ”. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2KfsoOJ

The girl group are scoring Love Island: The Pool Party, Ariana teams up with Nicki Minaj for a thumping banger and Sir Paul is back to the comfort food Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2MyyJRY

The heartbreaking My Life as a Zucchini (2016) makes viewers care deeply for little models of children, and that’s no mean feat. The stop-motion animation, which looks like Henry Selick and Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) but feels more like an anime by Hayao Miyazaki, is set in a child­ren’s home. The beauty of this sad movie is that it’s tinged with a realistic kind of hope that’s grounded in the attainable rather than dreams. Director... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2Mvpylq

The award-winning writer Harlan Ellison has died at the age of 84. In his career, Ellison wrote over 1,800 short stories, screenplays, novellas, essays, critiques and teleplays, winning eight Hugo awards. His wife Susan confirmed the news via her friend Christina Valada on Twitter. “Susan Ellison has asked me to announce the passing of writer Harlan Ellison, in his sleep, earlier today,” she tweeted. “‘For a brief time I was here, and for a brief time, I mattered.... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2NcGMFk

At the last Irish pub in the northern Manhattan neighborhood, the barkeep wears a necktie and chats about the past. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2Myphhs

Anthony Lane on the uncanny dismay of Stefano Sollima’s border-set sequel, and the tense foreboding of Xavier Legrand’s domestic drama. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2KhD7Im

At two new restaurants in Brooklyn, the Louisiana natives John Verlander and Matt Pace offer a taste of the Crescent City with po’boys, oysters, and jambalaya. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2MAo2OD

The composer of “Hedwig and the Angry Inch” returns with “This Ain’t No Disco,” set in 1979. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2Kvl7JJ

On June 29 the renowned Nigerian concert series once again hits Lagos. Its organizer, German-Nigerian musician Ade Bantu, sees Afropolitan Vibes as a venue for political criticism and a way to promote young musicians. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2Kux1DW

This week’s new release, The Bookshop, is the latest in a glut of nostalgic movies centred on Britain in the period in and around the second world war From today, you can pop into The Bookshop, a new period drama adaptation of the Penelope Fitzgerald novel. While you are browsing, you can get to know a courageous widow (Emily Mortimer), a melancholy recluse (Bill Nighy) and a snobbish busybody (Patricia Clarkson), all of whom live in a coastal town in 1959. The only snag is that you may feel as if you have visited this particular shop already. You may get a frisson of deja vu from the china teacups and the crystal champagne glasses; the ankle-length skirts and the three-piece suits; the cobbled streets and the unspoilt woods; and all the other signs that the UK film industry’s latest obsession is Britain as it was a few decades ago. British films have always idealised our great nation’s glorious past, of course, especially when that past is embodied by Henry VIII, Queen Victoria, Mr

Julia Davis and Vicki Pepperdine have puerile and infectious fun mocking local radio gurus, while Decoder Ring asks the big questions, including: is Sherlock Holmes gay? Hear Here podcast tips: sign up now for more audio delights Julia Davis and Vicki Pepperdine’s podcast isn’t one for the faint hearted. Unsurprisingly, from the minds behind Getting On and Nighty Night , this is dark fare set in the heart of the UK’s underbelly: local radio. Joan and Jericha are two tell-it-like-you-see-it hosts who play bewildered agony aunts that lack one of the vital emotions needed to do the job: empathy. They’re ornery, clueless and feed off each other until some responses spiral off into the gloriously absurd. It’s totally unique and one of the most cringe-inducing comedy podcasts yet. LB Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2lDvHjU

(Impulse!) The spinechillingly emotional saxophonist Albert Ayler said of his 1960s contemporaries John Coltrane and Pharoah Sanders: “Trane was the father. Pharoah was the son. I was the holy ghost.” That sax triumvirate have many heirs (notably Kamasi Washington ), but the spiritually restless Coltrane will always be the master. When the story broke of an unreleased Coltrane studio session, lost since its creation on 6 March 1963 but recovered from his late first wife’s archives, it was big news. That tape, featuring regulars McCoy Tyner on piano, Jimmy Garrison on bass, and Elvin Jones on drums, is now released as a single seven-track CD or LP, or a deluxe version with all 14 completed pieces. The Lost Album eavesdrops on a day in the short life of one of modern music’s giants in a period of turmoil. Coltrane is audibly striving to release himself from the shackles of traditional song structures here, despite still being drawn to their improv challenges, and simultaneously pursu

(Warner Bros) Hot on the heels of their 2017 record Humanz – a guest-star-strewn collection of gloomy dance music – comes the sixth album from Damon Albarn’s animated outfit. Unlike its predecessor, The Now Now enlists few collaborators: jazz guitarist George Benson supplies opener Humility with a gorgeously funky riff, and Snoop Dogg and house producer Jamie Principle contribute vocals to the spiky strut of Hollywood, but that’s it. Instead, Albarn supplies the bulk of the vocals, largely minus the effects that have previously characterised his voice as Gorillaz front-cartoon 2-D. This isn’t an entirely new mode for the group. In 2010 they released two albums: the first, Plastic Beach, sported hordes of big-name musicians; the second, The Fall, just a handful. The latter has much in common with The Now Now. Both were recorded during North American tours for the band’s previous album, and include numerous songs named after US locales. Yet while The Fall exhibited a slightly gentler

The recent Oscar winner lends his voice to a moronic thriller about a woman trapped by artificial intelligence, which sits alongside other genre missteps on the streaming platform It’s a long and noble Hollywood tradition: an actor scores the coveted Academy Award at long last, and then promptly squanders that industry cachet on the most mortifying work of their entire career. Mere days after picking up a statuette for Boyhood, Patricia Arquette was off solving computer-crimes on CSI: Cyber. Eddie Redmayne took home the gold for The Theory of Everything, and celebrated by bellowing his way through an utterly incomprehensible turn in Jupiter Ascending. A decade and a half out from his win for The Pianist, and Adrien Brody is still doing this. Related: Science friction: can Netflix figure out its blockbuster problem? Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2lGNBSQ

Restoration is an essential step in the conservation of old sculptures, paintings and buildings. But without thorough knowledge, the correct materials and attention to detail, such rejuvenations can have unintended results, as this week’s news of a second botched art restoration in Spain reminds us. Spain’s Salvador Dali Triangle, and what’s to see and savour In a well-intentioned move, a church in the small northern Spanish town of Estella took the initiative to restore... from South China Morning Post - Culture feed https://ift.tt/2KvolwU

Two quickfire seasons have made it one of this year’s standout shows, but which were the best episodes? While things in the US are divided politically more than ever, at least there are five queer dudes who are trying to bridge the gap between the scruffy rural everyman and the urban elites who sometimes look down on them. It’s as if the Fab Five on Netflix’s hit revival of Queer Eye are trying to Make America Gay Again. So far the technique is working. Not only are they showing dudes how to put pomade in their hair (start from the back and work forward), the finer points of a french tuck, or how to slice up an avocado, they’re also getting them to challenge their political beliefs and change the courses of their lives for the better. We’ve ranked all of the makeovers so far over the two seasons in descending order. Related: From burning toupees to breaking boundaries: why Queer Eye is TV's most political show Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2

Jonathan Blitzer on Mabel Gonzales, a Honduran pastor who, months after her own children were taken from her at the border, started to document the cases of other women in detention. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2KvURMf

In Michael Shaw’s Daily Cartoon, Donald Trump considers a new Supreme Court appointee. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2Ksd8NL

“Nanette,” Reviewed: Hannah Gadsby’s Netflix Stand-Up Special Forces Comedy to Confront the #MeToo Era from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2Kfk9Sx

Jennifer Blackman reviews Lykke Li’s “Hard Rain,” from her new album, “So Sad So Sexy.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2MshPo7

O2 Arena, London The musician-producer marks his 85th birthday by inviting stars from Mick Hucknall to Corinne Bailey Rae to reprise his hits, while he sprinkles anecdotes from the sides What better way to celebrate the 85th birthday of one of American music’s lasting legends than to put together an event heavily redolent of a single-artist-focused version of Jools Holland’s Hootenanny ? A couple of A-listers, some local-radio-friendly MOR stars, a couple of those major-label-backed artists who are well liked but have never quite made it, and a couple of people of whom you have no idea what to expect. Then throw in an orchestra – an admittedly brilliant orchestra, conducted by Jules Buckley – and some awkward interviewing of the star guest, and you’ve got a Jools full house, minus the boogie woogie piano. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2lD8GO5

As we reach that time of year when debates heat up over which track will be named most likely to soundtrack the hotter months, which songs are Guardian writers picking? Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2KuAv6b

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2Kr4Yll

Performers from all over the globe gather with traditional instruments to perform at this year’s Folklife Festival from Arts & Culture | Smithsonian https://ift.tt/2yMiPkS

Hulu’s chief has suggested that the Handmaid’s Tale could run for a hefty 10 seasons, a figure that already feels excessive. But how long should a show go on for? We crunch the numbers … Great news – knockabout family romcom The Handmaid’s Tale may continue for 10 seasons. This, according to Hulu chief executive, Randy Freer, who points out: “One of the benefits for creators in the streaming world [is that] shows can take a natural progression, they can live for as long as they should live or they can end.” Or is it? The second season has already been criticised as “ torture porn ”. Episode one featured kicking, electrocution with cattle prods, being burned on a gas stove, and having urine dumped over people standing on the gallows. At the present rate, it’s hard to know where the dystopia could end up by season 10, except a real life version of Clockwork Orange’s Ludovico technique. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2tMX1Qv

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2IyaelB

Deptford, London This tour of the capital’s streets at nightfall catches some beautiful unorchestrated moments from other people’s lives Tethered together with a rope, we are taking a night-time guided tour of Deptford, south-east London. We start in the library, drop our bags and leave our phones behind. The landscape outside makes a beautiful stage, with boat under brick under crane under star. The leash between us garners some unusual looks, but Krista Burāne and Andy Field ’s quiet promenade performance is about seeing, not being seen. Running for three hours as the sun melts away, Nocturne is slow, at first gloriously so. The group stops to observe a swarm of insects, a fox, a blackbird bobbing across a fence. Animals and humans sharpen under the soft scrutiny Nocturne encourages. Unorchestrated moments drop us in on people’s daily lives: someone practising the piano; friends dancing behind half-drawn curtains; a boy playing basketball. Other than our guides, this piece contai

Alan Burdick writes on how the goalkeeper Manuel Neuer’s proclivity to roam outside of his penalty box resulted in Germany conceding a second goal against South Korea on Wednesday, in a loss that sent them crashing out of the World Cup. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2yPKph1

Disbanded 700 years ago, the most famous of the medieval Christian orders is undergoing a 21st century revival from Arts & Culture | Smithsonian https://ift.tt/2IA7dRv

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2tN4mzk

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2MvvD11

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2MsTlv2

The exhibition Gerhard Richter: Abstraction, held at the Museum Barberini in Potsdam, focuses on works by the renowned German painter which reveal his abstract strategies and techniques. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2yNjEKl

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2MvvD11

The owners of 1400 hectares in Sussex joined the rewilding revolution and brought back a profusion of plants and animals Lament for the human destruction of the non-human world dates back to at least The Epic of Gilgamesh , which was written in about 2100 BC. “We have reduced the forest to a wasteland,” says the eponymous hero: “How shall we answer our gods?” That such despoliation has accelerated in recent decades is now a familiar idea, but I recommend anyone prone to despair to read Wilding – for Isabella Tree’s apparently quixotic tale of Exmoor ponies, longhorn cattle, red deer and Tamworth pigs roaming free on an aristocratic estate is a hugely important addition to the literature of what can be done to restore soil and soul. The book describes an attempt to renew the ecosystem, after decades of intensive agriculture of some 1,400 hectares owned by Tree’s husband Charlie Burrell at Knepp in West Sussex. The project, which began in 2001, is perhaps unique in England, and the re

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/2MsTlv2

Ruth Margalit on a recent unannounced change in Israeli policy in which Palestinian cancer patients from the Gaza Strip are unable to gain permission to travel to Israel for medical treatment unavailable in Gaza. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2N12gF3

Mummies no longer walk among us, but now we can walk among them — at the Roemer and Pelizaeus Museum in Hildesheim, that is. There, technology is being used to strip away a mummy's layers, uncovering its very bones. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2Mw3V4i