2025: The Year in Five-Star Arts & Culture Stories

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We’re here to brag about our arts and culture reporting this year, which featured stunning profiles, critical dissections of trends, sparkling literary criticism, and a topic haunting so many creative folks: how to make a living as an artist:

 

The Death of the Middle-Class Musician BY LUC RINALDI It’s easier than ever to make music, and harder than ever to make a living from it

Souvankham Thammavongsa Doesn’t Mind If You’re Jealous of Her Career BY ARIELLA GARMAISE In both her writing and life, the two-time winner of the Giller Prize does exactly what she wants

How Instagram Upended the Art World BY TATUM DOOLEY Sex, blood, and perfectly lit fruit

What’s Missing in Margaret Atwood’s New Memoir BY AMARAH HASHAM-STEELE

Her book promises the “flesh-and-blood person” behind her fiction but delivers something far more cautious

The Artist Who Tries to Paint Trump’s Soul BY RICHARD WARNICA Can art reveal the true nature of the American president?

The Film on Palestine Everyone’s Talking About but Few Can See BY FILIPA PAJEVIC Politics, controversy, and industry caution keep No Other Land off major platforms

Hell Is a Lot of Fun in Lorna Goodison’s Update of Dante’s Inferno BY AMANDA PERRY The brilliant translation sends readers to an underworld of Caribbean colonizers, politicians, and pop-culture villains

Small Press, Big Machines, and the Last Run of Canada’s Most Stubborn Publisher BY THEA LIM From its shop in Nova Scotia, Gaspereau defied the industry for three decades

Cinema May Be Dying but the Old Auteurs Still Have Plenty to Say BY DYLAN ADAMSON Cronenberg, Scorsese, and other filmmakers of the generation are making some of their most revelatory work

Can Rayne Fisher-Quann Shift from Internet Princess to Bestselling Author? BY ARIELLA GARMAISE The publishing industry is hinging its hopes on a twenty-three-year-old with a Substack and a devout following. Can she deliver?

Climate Change Is Happening. Why Don’t We See It? BY BOJAN FÜRST The photographers making us look at ecological destruction in new ways

“Why Do I Write?” You Might Not Like My Answer BY MIRIAM TOEWS Are writing and suicide related? The same thing? Or estranged relatives, at least?

Oscar Peterson at 100: The Heart of Canadian Jazz BY THE WALRUS LAB Celebrating a Canadian icon whose joy, artistry, and advocacy continue to inspire musicians and audiences around the world The post 2025: The Year in Five-Star Arts & Culture Stories first appeared on The Walrus.