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School Shirts Art Exhibition Highlights Problem of Knife Crime in Bristol

Knife Crime Awareness Week runs from 19 to 25 May and is an annual campaign by the Ben Kinsella Trust. (University of Bristol)
Knife Crime Awareness Week runs from 19 to 25 May and is an annual campaign by the Ben Kinsella Trust. (University of Bristol)
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School Shirts Art Exhibition Highlights Problem of Knife Crime in Bristol

Knife Crime Awareness Week runs from 19 to 25 May and is an annual campaign by the Ben Kinsella Trust. (University of Bristol)
Knife Crime Awareness Week runs from 19 to 25 May and is an annual campaign by the Ben Kinsella Trust. (University of Bristol)

An art exhibition showcasing school shirts emblazoned with anti-knife crime messages will go on display as part of Knife Crime Awareness Week, a BBC report said on Tuesday.

Created by young people in Bristol, the exhibition will be held at the Lord Mayor's Chapel on College Green, Bristol, from May 19 to 25.

In the “Empty Shirts, Lost Childhoods” project, participants aged 13 to 25 were invited to decorate plain white school shirts with poetry, slogans, artwork, and memorials that reflect their feelings and experiences of knife crime.

The University of Bristol's Dr. Jade Levell, who led the project, said the exhibition “shines an important light” on young people.

Knife Crime Awareness Week, which runs from May 19 to 25, is an annual campaign by the Ben Kinsella Trust that aims to raise awareness of knife crime's devastating effects and promote preventative solutions.

Levell said: “Writing on school shirts is a rite of passage for many young people as they graduate from formal education.”

“Children involved in youth violence often miss out on this milestone, due to being excluded from school, victims of violence, or perpetrators in custody,” she added.

The project represents the culmination of a unique creative project spearheaded by the University of Bristol in collaboration with local schools and youth organizations.

It also invites community members to respond by contributing to a “community manifesto” that will be shared with the Bristol City Council and other partners to inform future youth violence prevention strategies.

Duncan Stanway, assistant director at Barnardo's, said: “It is important that we listen to what young people who are affected by violence say about their lives.”

He added: “We see too many young people who are seriously harmed through exploitation and violence.”

The initiative is part of a broader citywide effort, led by the Bristol City Office, to address serious youth violence through collaboration between community groups, academics, police, and public health bodies.

Avon and Somerset Police and Crime Commissioner Clare Moody praised the initiative, saying: “It powerfully captures the voices and experiences of young people affected by violence.”

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Varieties

Astrophysics Study Suggests Venus May Have Swallowed Its Moon

Data from NASA's Magellan spacecraft and Pioneer Venus Orbiter is used in an undated composite image of the planet Venus. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/Handout via Reuters)
Data from NASA's Magellan spacecraft and Pioneer Venus Orbiter is used in an undated composite image of the planet Venus. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/Handout via Reuters)
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Astrophysics Study Suggests Venus May Have Swallowed Its Moon

Data from NASA's Magellan spacecraft and Pioneer Venus Orbiter is used in an undated composite image of the planet Venus. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/Handout via Reuters)
Data from NASA's Magellan spacecraft and Pioneer Venus Orbiter is used in an undated composite image of the planet Venus. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/Handout via Reuters)

A California-based astrophysicist presented a new theory on Monday to explain why Venus, the planet most like Earth in size, mass and structure, lacks its own moon. Call it a case of celestial cannibalism.

The extremely slow speed at which Venus rotates on its axis would have doomed any natural satellite that may once have orbited that planet to gradually spiral closer to its parent and ultimately be consumed in a cataclysmic smash-up.

So goes the theory offered by scientists at the University of California, Riverside, and published on Monday in The Astrophysical Journal, marking a departure from past explanations for why Venus, the second planet from the sun, is without a lunar companion.

"If it had a moon, and it ‌likely did at ‌some point, it could not have kept it," astrophysicist Stephen Krane, lead ‌author ⁠of the study, told ⁠Reuters on Monday. "That moon would have crashed down on the planet in a relatively short time scale."

Krane said data from computer models based on planetary physics and simulating the gravitational mechanics of hypothetical Venusian moons of various sizes showed them all meeting the same fate - sooner or later collapsing into their mother planet.

Such a presumed moon-gobbling event likely occurred within the first billion years in the history of Venus, Krane said.

Scientists previously theorized that Venus, ⁠known as Earth's "twin," either never acquired its own moon to begin ‌with, or possibly had a moon that was obliterated in ‌the massive impact from another celestial object.

EARTH SPINS MORE SWIFTLY THAN VENUS

The UC Riverside study, focusing on Earth-moon ‌dynamics, found that planetary rotational speed was the key factor.

In contrast to Venus, which takes 243 ‌Earth days to complete a single rotation - slightly longer than its orbit around the sun - Earth spins on its axis every 24 hours, more than 200 times more rapidly than Venus, Krane said.

The transfer of energy from Earth's faster rotation is gradually pushing our moon farther away, causing it to recede from Earth at the rate of ‌4 centimeters (1.6 inches) a year - precisely measured by mirrors left on the lunar surface in 1969 by Apollo 11's astronauts.

Venus, the third brightest object ⁠in the night sky ⁠after the sun and moon, looms large as point of study for scientists seeking to learn more about Earth's history, and its future.

Similar in its rocky structure but slightly smaller than Earth, Venus is enveloped in a thick, toxic atmosphere that has created a runaway greenhouse effect, scorching its surface at temperatures as high as 880 degrees Fahrenheit (471 degrees Celsius), hot enough to melt lead.

While there is no proof a Venusian moon ever existed, it is unlikely that Venus, in its infancy, somehow avoided the kind of world-shattering collision with another proto-planet that is widely believed to have formed Earth's moon, according to Krane.

The dawn of the inner solar system was crowded with large rocky objects hurtling through space and smashing into one another, with Venus probably taking more celestial hits than Earth because Venus was closer to the sun.

Scientists hope to unlock more secrets of Venus with two forthcoming NASA missions set for launch in the late 2020s or early 2030 dubbed DAVINCI+ and VERITAS to study the planet's atmosphere and geologic features.

Varieties

Chinese Architect Ma Yansong Melds Nature with ‘Futuristic Feel’

Chinese architect and founder of MAD Architects Ma Yansong poses for a photograph in Beijing on August 7, 2026. (AFP)
Chinese architect and founder of MAD Architects Ma Yansong poses for a photograph in Beijing on August 7, 2026. (AFP)
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Chinese Architect Ma Yansong Melds Nature with ‘Futuristic Feel’

Chinese architect and founder of MAD Architects Ma Yansong poses for a photograph in Beijing on August 7, 2026. (AFP)
Chinese architect and founder of MAD Architects Ma Yansong poses for a photograph in Beijing on August 7, 2026. (AFP)

From a distance, it looks as though a giant spaceship has just landed in the palm tree-dotted streets near downtown Los Angeles.

It could also be a wide-canopied tree or a low passing cloud -- but for its Chinese architect Ma Yansong, as long as the building "sparks curiosity", he's achieved his purpose.

Over the past two decades, Ma has created dozens of visually striking projects in his home country and abroad, integrating nature with sleek, modern designs.

In some ways, his seemingly sci-fi-inspired style is a perfect match for his newest project opening on September 22, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles, founded by "Star Wars" creator George Lucas and his wife, Mellody Hobson.

"The building takes on a futuristic feel that generates excitement," Ma told AFP at the Beijing office of MAD Architects, the firm he established in 2004.

"When people visit the Lucas Museum, they will each bring their own unique perspectives," said the 50-year-old, who last year was included on Time magazine's list of the 100 most influential people.

"They might catch a beam of light, see it cutting through the building, glimpse the clouds, the sky, or even the cosmos.

"This sparks curiosity and new ideas -- and those diverse thoughts are incredibly valuable."

- Mountains and water -

A Beijing native, he grew up in a courtyard house typical of the "hutong" alleyways that crisscross the historic center of China's capital city.

"There was a very close connection to nature," he said, recalling the trees and small pockets of open space interspersed in hutong neighborhoods.

Later, he went overseas to train as an architect, graduating from the Yale School of Architecture and working briefly at the studio of acclaimed Iraqi-British designer Zaha Hadid.

Ma and his firm have conceptualized landmark works all over China, including the Harbin Opera House, a vast, swooping structure perched dramatically on the banks of the frigid Songhua River.

Abroad, his notable projects include a pair of twisting residential buildings called the "Absolute Towers" near Toronto, Canada, and a migration-themed museum that opened last year in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

Ma's architectural vision draws inspiration from traditional Chinese paintings known as "shanshui", or "mountains and water", usually depicting natural scenery.

The Lucas Museum is closely interwoven with its external environment by lawns, trees, running water and a roof covered in vegetation and solar panels.

"If you look at a Chinese garden, it is a completely natural environment, even though it is artificially designed," Ma told AFP.

"There is a global conversation (now) about ecology and how to bring people closer to nature, yet I find that traditional Eastern architecture mastered this long ago," he said.

- People-centered architecture -

Ma told AFP that he embraces what he calls a "major shift" in architecture towards placing people, rather than the buildings themselves, at the center of the design concept.

"We aren't using architecture to flaunt wealth or power," he said.

Although many of MAD's clients wield significant financial resources, Ma said his focus is not merely to impress, but also to create "uniquely valuable space for people to enjoy".

MAD's Beijing office is located in the heart of a hutong neighborhood near where Ma attended school in his youth.

"I like these small streets, with their trees, the people walking by and that certain atmosphere of everyday urban life," he said.

Ma said when he designs a building he wants to make sure it gives "freedom of movement" to residents -- a concept which drove his design of the Baiziwan Social Housing project in Beijing, a subsidized residential compound for low-income communities.

"Many low-income individuals feel they cannot integrate into the city," said Ma.

"Often, such housing is walled off, isolating residents," he said, adding: "It's a psychological barrier -- they feel the city doesn't accept them."

Unlike the closed, block-like apartments that have sprung up in Chinese cities during decades of rapid urbanization, Baiziwan features an open layout with an elevated garden level and a design that optimizes sunlight.

Ma said he doesn't want his buildings "to be a palace or a temple-like structure that demands reverence".

"I want it to be open, a place where everyone feels they are the masters of the city."

Varieties

Saudi General Entertainment Authority Wins Gold at 2026 Middle East & North Africa Stevie Awards

The award recognizes GEA's efforts to develop and implement an integrated human capital development strategy for the entertainment sector. (SPA)
The award recognizes GEA's efforts to develop and implement an integrated human capital development strategy for the entertainment sector. (SPA)
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Saudi General Entertainment Authority Wins Gold at 2026 Middle East & North Africa Stevie Awards

The award recognizes GEA's efforts to develop and implement an integrated human capital development strategy for the entertainment sector. (SPA)
The award recognizes GEA's efforts to develop and implement an integrated human capital development strategy for the entertainment sector. (SPA)

Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Authority (GEA) has won a Gold Stevie Award at the 2026 Middle East & North Africa Stevie Awards, recently presented in Istanbul.

GEA won in the "Award for Innovation in Workforce Upskilling and Reskilling - Government" category.

The award recognizes GEA's efforts to develop and implement an integrated human capital development strategy for the entertainment sector. The strategy has resulted in impactful, sustainable practices and initiatives that have improved workforce readiness and strengthened professional capabilities in line with the sector's growing needs.

The recognition reflects GEA's success in developing and implementing an integrated model for workforce upskilling and development. The model responds to rapid changes in the entertainment sector and strengthens its ability to attract, develop, and qualify Saudi talent in line with the sector's needs and future objectives.

The Middle East & North Africa Stevie Awards are among the leading international awards recognizing innovation and organizational excellence across workplaces in the region.

The 2026 edition, the seventh of the awards, received more than 1,400 nominations from organizations in 15 countries across the region. The entries were evaluated by more than 155 international experts serving as judges on specialized juries.