Culture
European culture: art, music, film, books and ideas.
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BBC trials elderly care robot comedy as broadcasters capitalise on automation anxieties
The corporation’s new series featuring a secondhand care bot highlights how European and global media companies continue to moneti…
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A Close Shave/A Matter of Loaf and Death review – Wallace and Gromit knit together a cracking double bill
These two half-hour classics of stop-motion pack in nods to more earnest cinema but are never distracted from producing pristinely…
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James Taylor review – 70s legend’s golden baritone shines best when stripped bare
Edinburgh Castle The AI-style backing videos are terrible and his accomplished band can be overly slick at times, but Taylor’s civ…
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Munich restricts water use as engineers push underground storage
A ban on filling private swimming pools in Munich highlights a deepening groundwater crisis that is forcing European cities and fa…
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BBC Radio 1 hires TikTok creators as traditional presenters exit
BBC Radio 1 is replacing established presenters with digital content creators in a strategic shift that highlights how European pu…
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‘People are picking the dumbest fights’: the tortured history of America’s culture wars
In a new book, Isaac Butler goes back to the 1980s to trace how battles started against the arts, from Piss Christ to Mapplethorpe…
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‘Frank Bough told me: I do have a very big cock’: how Fern Britton survived in TV in the 1980s – and beyond
The much-loved presenter had 10 years on This Morning before suddenly deciding she had to get out of there. She discusses sexual h…
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Hidden Creatures by Dino Martins review – the revolting world of parasites
From maggots to viruses, this gross-out compendium also manages to celebrate the awe and inventiveness of nature When Craig Venter…
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Andy Serkis Animal Farm adaptation draws criticism for sanitizing Orwell satire
A new animated film adaptation of George Orwell’s classic allegory has sparked backlash for replacing its bleak political critique…
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Bayreuth Festival Confronts Nazi Legacy Amid 150th Anniversary Controversies
As the Bayreuth Festival marks its 150th anniversary, intense scrutiny over its handling of Richard Wagner’s antisemitic legacy th…
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The First House by Avni Doshi review – an intense portrait of marriage and freedom
In the follow-up to the Booker-shortlisted Burnt Sugar, a woman seeks liberation from her controlling relationships Avni Doshi’s s…
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Lucky review – Anya Taylor-Joy’s daft thriller is classic summer viewing
This series about a conwoman fleeing for her life is packed with explosions and preposterous coincidences. It’s bunkum with bells …
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Hong Sang-soo’s latest film examines media boundaries and celebrity control
The Korean director’s new black-and-white feature explores the blurred lines between journalistic inquiry and celebrity image mana…
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Mapalakata captures South Africa's shifting industrial frontiers
A new photographic study of Mpumalanga province reveals how successive waves of resource extraction have continuously rewritten th…
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Gillian Armstrong remembers Sam Neill: ‘I can’t believe that the very next day he was gone’
The Australian director who gave the actor his big break in My Brilliant Career remembers ‘a smart, gentle, decent, passionate, lo…
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TV tonight: an eye-popping account of Katie Price in the Playboy mansion
More candid confessions from the tabloid star and her exes. Plus: unflappable paramedics deal with the aftermath of a bonfire acci…
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Rock stars bid to turn Glasgow's troubled CCA into music hall of fame
A coalition of major Scottish musicians wants to take over Glasgow's struggling Centre for Contemporary Arts, a move backers say c…
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Del LaGrace Volcano to stage UK shows as queer archive expands
After decades of commercial shortfall and cultural marginalisation, US photographer Del LaGrace Volcano is bringing their influent…
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Tender review – passion and dangerous promise in surreal horror romance
Bush theatre, London Francesca Amewudah-Rivers is a phenomenal presence in this queer thriller that leaves a little too much unexp…
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Ride or Die review – Hannah Waddingham’s comedy caper is the perimenopausal TV of your dreams
This tale of a 50-year-old assassin going rogue – and having to confess all to her best mate – is so much fun. The chemistry betwe…
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T-Rex fossil sells for record $50.1m as private wealth outbids science
A 67-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton has sold for a record $50.1m in New York, underscoring how soaring alternative as…
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Publishers and author Scott Turow sue Google over Gemini AI copyright infringement
Major publishers and a prominent author have filed a lawsuit in New York accusing Google of using millions of copyrighted books to…
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Nine of ten UK fiction bestsellers feature murdered women
A new analysis of the UK's top-selling paperbacks reveals a publishing market where the murder of women is the dominant commercial…
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T. rex skeleton 'Gus' fetches record $50.1m
A Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton has sold for $50.1 million in New York, highlighting the rapid inflation of the alternative asset mar…