Art & Culture

Canary Islands – October 30, 2026 -- STARMUS VIII, the eighth edition of the science-and-music festival, ran for six days from 17 to 22 October 2026 across Tenerife and La Palma in Spain's Canary Islands.

Musicians and scientists share the same stage

The programme paired music with science. Sir Brian May played his Red Special guitar, and Andrea Bocelli and Sarah Brightman performed. Nobel Prize-winning scientists presented their discoveries.

NASA's Artemis II astronauts, who are preparing for humanity's return to the Moon, also took part. The festival, titled "The Search for Truth," included tributes to Stephen Hawking and Jane Goodall.

Two medals mark the festival's milestones

This year marked the 10th anniversary of the Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication. The festival also inaugurated the Jane Goodall Earth Medal, which links space exploration with protecting the planet.

Tacoma – October 30, 2026 -- Car owners in Tacoma and the greater Pacific Northwest can now submit their vehicles for a museum exhibition, with entries open through December 14, 2026. LeMay – America's Car Museum (ACM) is building Local Flavor, a community-driven show opening Saturday, January 23, 2027.

The Museum wants meaningful stories, not just rare cars

ACM is inviting residents, businesses, car clubs, collectors and enthusiasts across Tacoma, the South Sound and the Pacific Northwest to take part. Eligible entries range from family heirlooms passed down through generations and beloved neighborhood vehicles to local racing history, custom creations and motorcycles.

Curator Bruce Patton said, "The goal isn't necessarily to find the most expensive or rarest vehicles." The aim, he said, is to find the stories that make vehicles meaningful.

Frankfurt – October 30, 2026 -- Luxury travel brand FYNE Travel is building trips to Cairo, Abu Dhabi, London and Los Angeles around new museums, from Tutankhamun's treasures to George Lucas's narrative art collection.

The idea: the museum is no longer a side stop on a city break but the reason to go. FYNE Travel says it has seen a clearly increased demand for high-end trips to Cairo and Egypt since the Grand Egyptian Museum opened near the Giza pyramids.

Cairo's Grand Egyptian Museum holds more than 100,000 artifacts

The museum is the world's largest dedicated to a single civilization. It houses the complete collection of Tutankhamun's grave goods, with more than 5,000 objects from his tomb. The building itself, with its monumental architecture and views of the pyramids, is an attraction in its own right.

Munich – October 30, 2026 -- A 3x2 meter triptych about birth, life and death on a farm was presented to about 80 guests at the Herrmannsdorfer bistro on Munich's Viktualienmarkt, with ham that had matured in the same room as the painting served alongside it.

Gischel witnessed birth and death in Glonn

Munich artist Rebecca Gischel spent several months on the project. In June she stayed at Herrmannsdorfer in Glonn and experienced birth and death at close range. The cycle she followed runs from piglets being born, through their lives in the woods, to their deaths and our food. She then painted the triptych. In September the work returned to Glonn for a first period of maturing.

Cologne -- The musical "KICK LIKE A WOMAN" runs from November 12, 2026 to April 11, 2027 at Depot 1 in Cologne-Mülheim, with TV host Ruth Moschner attending the VIP premiere as its ambassador.

Moschner visited rehearsals before the premiere

After a visit to the rehearsals, Moschner plans to accompany the November 12 premiere in person. She says female role models have always existed and deserve the spotlight. In her view, the pioneers of women's football changed more than the sport.

A true story from the early 1980s drives the plot

In the early 1980s, the German Football Association (DFB) barely took women's football in West Germany seriously. When Taiwan hosted the first, unofficial women's football World Championship, the association declined to take part.

Leipzig – October 30, 2026 -- A new MDR documentary is streaming now in the ARD Mediathek, and the people behind one of Germany's biggest post-reunification data scandals appear on camera for the first time. "Der große Stasi-Leak – Helden oder Verräter?" (The Great Stasi Leak – Heroes or Traitors?) airs on MDR-Fernsehen on November 10 at 8:15 p.m.

An anonymous 1992 list named 4,500 alleged informants

In 1992, an anonymous list circulated in Saxony-Anhalt naming 4,500 alleged Stasi informants from Halle/Saale. Who published it stayed secret for decades. After more than 35 years, the authors now tell their story for ARD History.

Smuggled microfilms and secret hiding places drive the story

The participants describe how they decided to make the names public. They recount smuggled microfilms, hiding places and covert operations. The film frames the events as a historical true-crime and espionage case.

Beijing – October 30, 2026 -- Visitors to Jinghong City in southwest China's Yunnan Province can browse more than 100 booths along a 1.2-kilometer stretch of the Lancang River, where the Lancang-Mekong Treasures Carnival opened on October 28.

The carnival is a key supporting event of the 14th Culture and Art Festival of Countries in the Lancang-Mekong River Basin. Jinghong is the capital of Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture. The event runs under the theme "encounter the Lancang-Mekong, encounter fine treasures."

Booths are split into six themed sections

The booths are organized into tea, beans, crafts, fruits, rainforest food and rainforest stays. Travel photography and cultural creative scenarios are set up alongside them.

Local specialties, delicacies and handcrafted goods share the riverbank with products from Lancang-Mekong countries.

NEW YORK – October 30, 2026 -- For $70, you can spend Halloween night inside Hudson Yards' 150-foot Vessel while a string quartet plays haunting melodies by candlelight. A Haunted Evening of Halloween Classics, a one-night-only Candlelight concert presented by Fever, starts at 9 p.m. on October 31.

Thriller and Psycho get a string-quartet makeover

The Highline String Quartet will reimagine music from classical works, film, television and pop culture. The program includes Michael Jackson's Thriller, Bernard Herrmann's Psycho, the theme from Stranger Things and music from The Nightmare Before Christmas. Saint-Saëns' Danse Macabre and Mussorgsky's Night on Bald Mountain round out the set.

Los Angeles – October 30, 2026 -- VIZ Media's manga catalog is now available on MangaPlaza, and readers can earn 10% back in points on VIZ titles for two weeks. VIZ Media and NTT Solmare Corp. announced the launch on the platform, which the companies describe as one of the largest digital manga libraries in the U.S.

The 10% reward caps at 3,000 points

Users earn 10% in point rewards when they unlock VIZ Media content, up to 3,000 points. The promotion runs from October 29, 2026, at 7:00 PM through November 12, 2026, at 6:59 AM Pacific Time. Participation runs through a dedicated promotion page on MangaPlaza's website.

MangaPlaza offers 170,000 chapters and a $6.99 Premium tier

MangaPlaza partners with more than 120 manga publishers, including Kodansha, KADOKAWA and SHUEISHA. Its catalog holds over 170,000 chapters across romance, fantasy, action, boys' love and horror.

Tokyo – October 30, 2026 -- A pilot tour in Tokyo's Asakusa district will take visitors through a traditional craft workshop, a neighborhood walk and an introduction to ozashiki, the intimate setting where geisha and hōkan entertain guests. Organizer ROJICOYA has not yet opened bookings, and details on availability, duration and participation requirements will appear on its official website.

The tour is built around three experiences

ROJICOYA organizes cultural experiences, walking tours and events centered on Edo culture and traditional performing arts, primarily in Tokyo. For this pilot, the guides are the people who sustain Asakusa's traditions: a rakugo storyteller or a hōkan leads the walk, and geisha and hōkan perform at close range.