Witness describes seeing George Floyd 'slowly fade away'

Williams, a former wrestler who said he was trained in mixed martial arts including chokeholds, testified Monday that he thought Derek Chauvin used a shimmying motion several times to increase the pressure on Floyd. He said he yelled to the officer that he was cutting off Floyd's blood supply.

Understanding Heidegger on Technology

The  Nazis  were  opposed  to  the  two  dominant  forms  of government  of  the  day  that  Heidegger  associated  with  “global technology,”  communism  and  democracy.  In  another  of  Heidegger’s infamous  political  remarks,  made  in  that  same  1935  lecture,  he  claimed that  “Russia  and  America,  seen  metaphysically,  are  both  the  same:  the same  hopeless  frenzy  of  enchained  technology  and  of  the  rootless organization  of  the  average  man.”  The  Nazi’s  rhetoric  about  “blood  and soil”  and  the  mythology  of  an  ancient,  wise,  and  virtuous  German  Volk might  also  have  appealed  to  someone  concerned  with  the  homogenizing consequences  of  globalization  and  technology.  More  broadly,  Heidegger’s thought  always  was  and  remained  illiberal,  tending  to  encompass  all matters,  philosophy  and  politics  among  them,  in  a  single  perspective, ignoring  the  freedom  of  most  people  to  act  independently.  The  ways  in which  liberal  democracies  promote  excellence  and  useful  competition were  not  among the  political  ideas  to  which  Heidegger’s  thought  was open.  His  totalizing,  illiberal  thought  made  his  joining  the  Nazis  much more  likely  than  his  condemning  them.

New Covid vaccines needed globally within a year

Survey of experts in relevant fields concludes that new variants could arise in countries with low vaccine coverage

A petition in support of a suspended teacher who showed students a caricature of the Prophet Mohammed has passed more than 50,000 signatures

The school, in Batley, near Bradford, West Yorkshire, is facing calls to reinstate the teacher after a petition in support of him reached more than 50,000 signatures in two days

Arashiyama mankai (Cherry blossoms of Arashiyama)

Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858)

10 seconds more electricity than the entire studio over the past 2 years

French artist Joanie Lemercier spent the past few years working to lower the carbon footprint of his studio only to learn that his first “drop” of NFT artworks on Nifty Gateway “consumed in 10 seconds more electricity than the entire studio over the past 2 years.”

NFTs and the market places that sell them are touted as an alternative to a Wall Street-dominated financial system

If the hype is to be believed, it is a system ripe with democratic potential, will eke power from the art world’s elites and hierarchies, and will allow artists to create, sell, trade and be paid on their own terms

What an artwork is? (what is no more than a fraud?)

It’s mildly interesting to see what Beeple’s early art influences were: punk drawer Zak Smith, cartoon painter Victor Castillo, and, interestingly, Martín Ramírez, the self-taught former janitor who made most of his work while institutionalized in a California mental hospital, and developed his own private, haunting lexicon of images. Beeple dedicates an entire series of “Everydays” to redoing themes from Ramírez, whom he refers to as a “tard.”

A guide to Iannis Xenakis's music

A Greek man in his early 20s fights for his homeland as part of the Communist resistance at the end of the second world war. Shrapnel from a blast from a British tank causes a horrendous facial injury that means the permanent loss of sight in one eye. He is sentenced to death after his exile to Paris (a sentence that was later commuted to a prison term, with his conviction finally quashed with the end of the junta in 1974). By the time he returns, he has become one of the leading creative figures of the century: an architect who trained, worked, and often transcended the inspiration of his mentor and boss, Le Corbusier; an intellectual whose physical and mathematical understanding of the way individual particles interact with each other and create a larger mass - atoms, birds, people, and musical notes 

A failure to eliminate racial discrimination will continue to force innocent people to flee and fear for their lives

Violent and deadly attacks against Black, Brown, Asian and Indigenous people, toxic language, and daily and sustained racially charged acts have rightly forced painful - but necessary - conversations to re-examine prejudice, privilege, the way we view the world, and most importantly how we act. We must take this opportunity to work towards a world that is not just against racism, but is actively anti-racist.

Las Abejas (The Bees) is a Christian pacifist civil society group of Tzotzil Maya formed in Chenalho, Chiapas in 1992

As the Zapatista Army of National Liberation uprising took place in 1994, Las Abejas stood in solidarity with Zapatista ends and principles, but not their violent means. Las Abejas paid a high price for their support when the December 1997 massacre in Acteal killed 45 members praying in a church.

The Threat of Cascading Extinctions on Earth Could Be Greater Than We Thought

In the delicately tangled web of an ecosystem, snapping certain anchor lines can bring the whole thing tumbling down faster than severing other threads

Dark Matter

Sholette, a politically engaged artist, argues that imagination and creativity in the art world originate thrive in the non-commercial sector shut off from prestigious galleries and champagne receptions. This broader creative culture feeds the mainstream with new forms and styles that can be commodified and used to sustain the few artists admitted into the elite.

Tibetan monasteries barred from organising religious festival

These days all the religious activities in Tibetan monasteries are directly controlled by Monastic Management Committees, which comprises a group of Chinese government officials who are permanently stationed in the monasteries. The committee replaces the centuries-old tradition of senior lamas overseeing the study and practice of Tibetan Buddhism. 

Womanhood, as Seen by 12 Inspiring Female Photographers

To celebrate International Women’s Day, "we" invited 12 photographers – who have either contributed to or been featured on AnOthermag.com – to send us an image in response to the brief of ‘womanhood’. Here are their brilliant submissions

The Bride

a revealing, unfinished painting, titled The Bride and found in his studio after his death from pneumonia in February of 1918. On the right hand side is a scantily clad female figure, her legs akimbo, her pubic region portrayed in meticulous detail. Over the top of this, the artist has begun painting a patterned skirt, which presumably would have obscured the subject’s nether regions. Viewers have often wondered what is happening beneath the hefty drapery covering the protagonists of The Kiss and other such works, and if The Bride is anything to go by, the answer is a lot.

Girlhood (It’s complicated)

commemorates the anniversary of woman suffrage by exploring the concept of girlhood in the United States, but also how girls changed history in five areas: politics, education, work, health, and fashion. We argue that girlhood has an unexpected and complicated history and that girls, like suffragists, used their voices to make a difference.

How Nefertiti Became a Powerful Symbol in Contemporary Art

Since its discovery in the early 20th century, the bust of Nefertiti, a work of limestone and stucco crafted by the sculptor Thutmose around 1345 B.C.E., has cemented the ancient Egyptian queen’s relevance as a global pop-culture icon. 

Tibet ranked as the joint-worst place in the world for civil rights and political freedoms

summary of political rights and civil liberties in Tibet is expected to be released later this year. It is likely to include further restrictions on freedom of religion, the detention of Tibetans who criticise the Chinese government or carry out peaceful protests, torture and the ongoing “vocational training” programme, which last year saw at least 500,000 rural Tibetans encouraged or coerced to move from the land they have historically stewarded and into menial jobs.

Dissenting Artists Around the Globe Were Jailed and Killed at an Alarming Rate Last Year, According to a New Report

The survey found that governments may be using the pandemic as a pretense to crack down on artists.