Saturday 18 March 2017

Reading list, 18 March 2017

Indian author and MP Shashi Tharoor on the need for a museum communicating British colonisation of India.

US technology writer Farhad Manjoo on the cultural supremacy of the camera (and Snapchat).

Margaret Atwood's introduction for a new edition of The Handmaid's Tale.

Teju Cole's latest essay 'A Photograph Never Stands Alone'. Also, he's coming to Auckland Writers Festival.

Kyle Chayka for Racked on why gray clothes feel appropriate now.

The full New York Times special museums section.

Ugh. There's loads in Daniel Grant's Observer piece 'The Admission Fees Are Too Damn High' that I disagree with (like the tone of "art museums around the country are struggling mightily to make themselves appealing to millennials and to what we now call “diverse” audiences by creating their own apps, as well as by acquiring and exhibiting contemporary art, as well as art by women, latinos, Africans, Asians and whomever else", let alone "Pleasure and prestige for museum curators and directors is acquiring more works for their permanent collections, not in seeing more and different people come through the doors.") But the central thesis - that American museums could divert some of their major acquisition funds into defraying admission charges - is interesting. His argument that America's entrance charges are the only thing keeping wider audiences away however is disputed by the data.

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