What This Week
Roll up, roll up, come in and marvel at this week’s cultural extravaganza!
Museums Without Men
To state that there is a huge gender imbalance in museums and art collections will come as no surprise. Take the Met Museum for example; less than 4% of the artists in the Modern Art sections are women, but 76% of the nudes are female. To aid in the movement to address this, Katy Hessle has created an audio guide project, Museums Without Men (MWM), which launches today to coincide with the beginning of Women’s History Month. From New York’s Met to the Tate, some of the world’s most high profile galleries have signed up for the audio guides, which aim to shift the focus onto women and gender non-conforming artists.
Book Clubs Booming
Gen Z are putting down the cocktails and picking up their sprayed edge special editions; tell us something we don’t know, right?! New data from event listing companies is showing huge growth in ticket sales for book clubs and bookish meet-ups, rising by a whopping 350% on Eventbrite. Celebs such as Dua Lipa and Kaia Gerber have launched their own book clubs, which perhaps has influenced a new community of baby book lovers, and #booktok is thriving - again, this isn’t news to us. But it’s great to see the facts and figures; keep doing what you’re doing, bookish friends. This is a great place to be.
New Sally Rooney incoming
Huge news for fans of Sally Rooney; the Irish writer has announced her next novel, Intermezzo, due to be published this autumn by Faber and Faber. Focusing on two brothers, it’s the tale of their changing and complicated relationship in the wake of their father’s death. Competitive chess player Ivan and lawyer Peter have little in common; but, as they struggle to navigate relationships with the women in their lives and each other, change is afoot. I, for one, cannot wait to have my heart broken; I’m assuming that’s what will happen, anyway.
ACE Backtracks Amid Backlash
Arts Council England (ACE) has released new guidance confirming it will not penalise organisations for working with artists who make political statements, after earlier advice suggested “overtly political or activist” work could break funding agreements and risk reputational damage. It states that it’s essential to ‘support freedom of expression’ - we couldn’t agree more, and the collective sigh of relief from those who have been protesting and pushing back on their initial communications on the matter is audible. Is this the end of the saga? Watch this space.
Lyle’s Golden Syrup Removes Lion and Sends me Spiralling
Lyle's Golden Syrup is removing the image of a dead lion surrounded by bees from its logo after more than 140 years. If, like me, you had a fascination with the logo after many mornings of childhood confusion at the breakfast table (is this syrup made of dead lion, is it honey from the bees then, well why is there a dead lion and bees on the label, etc) you may feel a little put out by the news. The iconic green and gold tin holds the Guinness World Record for the ‘oldest unchanged brand packaging’ and was last altered in 1883. If you’re still confused about the logo, it seems a fitting time to clear that up as we bid farewell to our unfortunate lion friend; the product's tagline 'Out of the strong came forth sweetness' is in reference to a Bible story where Samson kills a lion, then later returns to find bees have constructed a hive in its carcass. Got it? Good.