Megan

OKAN band members stand on a stage as an audience claps and waves

Full house for OKAN tonight 🥹

Another moment of joy: OKAN performed for our largest K-12 audience ever 🥹

A recital hall with a full crowd applauding a string quartet and pianist onstage

A moment of joy: a full house and standing ovation for the Takács Quartet and Stephen Hough at @theclariceumd.bsky.social

dunno, just feels relevant somehow

And of course she saves the day, all while having to stand up for herself to mean kids and being obsessed with a pop star

She calls him a liar to his face with her whole chest while all the adults try to appease him and save face, even as their research and home fall apart

Watched an old favorite this weekend: Zenon, Girl of the 21st Century

It’s about a teenage girl and her distrust of a rich guy who is actually sabotaging her space station and all the great scientific research being done by her parents and friends so he can profit financially from their downfall

New Kennedy Center board elects Trump chair, fires Rutter as president President Trump’s refashioned board of trustees voted him chairman and replaced the Kennedy Center’s president Deborah Rutter with Trump ally Richard Grenell.

Bracing for the impact of this and mourning alongside all those (artists, staff, audiences, etc) who found an artistic home at KC

wapo.st/3CCgjzD

'Chilling effect': Arts organizations react to end of DEI initiatives from fed agency The NEA will no longer fund arts programs that promote DEI or "gender ideology." The federal agency has cancelled grants that have funded programs for underserved communities for more than 20 years.

The NEA will no longer fund arts programs that promote DEI or "gender ideology." The federal agency has cancelled grants that have funded programs for underserved communities for more than 20 years.

Column | How Trump’s Kennedy Center takeover could change the arts President Trump’s plans to police DEI language and control the Kennedy Center show an intent to use the government’s enormous coercive power over the cultural sector.

The last words of this column capture my exact thoughts at nearly every performance or exhibit I see now: “…One wondered if anyone would complain, and how long it will be before this kind of program elicits extra scrutiny, if it isn’t scuttled altogether.”

wapo.st/3CxbYxC

Moment of zen | #shorts YouTube video by Monterey Bay Aquarium

In a time full of change and uncertainty, allow yourself a gentle break—a kind moment to clear your mind and find peace. Like this bat ray gliding through the blue, a shark cruising with quiet confidence, or a giant sea bass drifting in the gentle sway of the sea.
youtube.com/shorts/sAgHY...

This, the changes to FY26 National Endowment for the Arts grant guidelines, the dissolution of the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities, naming the NEA chair to America250 task force—it all signals that dude and handlers understand that the arts are powerful. And they want to control it.

Visited @peoplesbooktakoma.com for the first time this morning and being there felt like a warm hug.