Brazilians have organized a protest with a difference. Members of Rio de Janeiro’s samba schools danced their way through the streets of the city to demonstrate against proposals to slash funds for next year’s Carnival. They say Mayor Marcelo Crivella’s decision to cut by half (to 270,000 euros) the amount each school receives is driven by his religious beliefs. The former evangelical bishop and gospel singer plans to put the saved money towards child care centers.

Sitting in my bedroom, 200 miles from Aleppo, social media makes it easier than ever to spectate the atrocities of the civil war. But has social media changed the reality of organising a protest on the ground? [...] There are a small number of major competitors for protest organisation platforms. Facebook, of course, has cornered the market. Twitter also plays a role. ​

The theme this year is "All the World’s Futures." And in an introduction to the Biennale, the curator, Okwui Enwezor, writes, quote, "How can artists, thinkers, writers, composers, choreographers, singers, and musicians, through images, objects, words, movement, actions, lyrics, sound bring together publics in acts of looking, listening, responding, engaging, speaking in order to make sense of the current upheaval?" 

Following a violent protest and rising political tension, the danger of internal violent conflict becomes ever more possible, which only adds to the local populaces' reasons to fear.

For about three hours Wednesday morning, the Ukrainian flag was flying high over Russia’s capital city. Protesters fastened a blue-and-yellow banner to the Soviet star atop the spire of one of Moscow’s Stalin-era “Seven Sisters” skyscrapers on the Kotelnicheskaya Embankment about a mile from the Kremlin.