The Morning News

Artist Ai Weiwei creates a series of face masks to support human rights and relief organizations.

↩︎ designboom 11h

How pandemics have previously ended: “a long and difficult process” of people, at different times, deciding they're done.

↩︎ The New York Times 11h

An appreciation of Stephen's Shores early 1970s series "American Surfaces" finds echoes in much of contemporary photography.

↩︎ ARTnews 11h

Archaeologists in northern Italy unearth a well-preserved mosaic floor thought to date to the third century A.D.

↩︎ Smithsonian Magazine 11h

A "new" Philip Glass work has emerged, having gotten "lost" at some point in the 1970s.

Performed a handful of times in 1970, the manuscript of the piece went missing until the score was rediscovered at Christie’s Auction House in New York City in late-2017. Composed right in the middle of Glass’s Minimalist period, in early 2018 the score was obtained by Glass’s publishers, Dunvagen Music Publishers. Alex Gray, music assistant at the publishing company, thought it would be interesting to realize the work for the instrumentation of the Philip Glass Ensemble: woodwinds, keyboard, and voice. As part of Gray’s research, he copied the score, made a synthesized demo of the piece, and he wrote a thesis on the project. The Philip Glass Ensemble then organized performances of this lost piece in the spring of 2020. It was to be the first time audiences would hear this music in five decades.

Members of the Ensemble recently recorded their parts at home. Via kottke.

20h

Portraits of older Vermonters staying inside.

↩︎ NPR 20h

“There is no moral excuse for writing off the elderly.” As we ease off lockdowns, older people remain disproportionately at risk.

↩︎ Nautilus 20h

Why stock prices are currently so highly correlated: "Every stock these days feels like a vaccine stock."

↩︎ Marginal Revolution 20h

Some book covers of note for spring and summer.

↩︎ The Casual Optimist 20h

Reading outside during lockdown offers "the stark opposite of that sweaty topless man barreling down the pavement."

↩︎ Penguin UK 20h

Do many queers love Springsteen because nearly every song he has produced in his 50-year career reflects a crushing, unabiding sense of alienation and longing—and what could be more queer than that?

An essay by Naomi Gordon-Loebl on Bruce Springsteen’s ability “to speak not only to queer pain but also to queer survival.”

↩︎ The Nation

20h

In case you're still baking your way through the pandemic, Mark Bittman offers tips for his popular no-knead recipe.

↩︎ Berkleyside 20h

A poem about the dangers of being seen.

"Connubial," by Stephen Dunn.

Because with alarming accuracy
she’d been identifying patterns
I was unaware of—this tic, that
tendency, like the way I’ve mastered
the language of intimacy
in order to conceal how I felt—

I knew I was in danger
of being terribly understood.

Via Poetry, February 2009

20h

Due to its trade war with the US, China now trades more with Southeast Asia.

↩︎ Quartz 20h

Photos of various types of plastic barriers put up to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

↩︎ The Atlantic 1d

How an increase in disposable income in post-plague England gave rise to pub culture.

↩︎ Atlas Obscura 1d

With its curve unflattened and new cases still on the rise, India is ending the world's largest lockdown.

↩︎ The Washington Post 1d

Then, as now, people viewed diseases as coming from faraway lands, from “them,” not “us.” By the 1700s, the plague was sometimes even referred to as “la peste Levantina” or the Levantine plague, referring to the region of the world occupied by present-day Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Palestine, and much of Turkey.

When the plague hit Marseille in 1720, officials began a misinformation campaign—even hiring doctors to claim it was only a fever.

↩︎ STAT

Summer never ends at the chillest place on the internet, Poolside.fm, which crossed a million listening sessions in the past year.

↩︎ The Verge 1d

So far, predominantly Democratic counties have been hit harder by the coronavirus—due to population density, race, and economics.

↩︎ The New York Times 1d