In Samah Sabawi's play, Tales of a City by the Sea, lovers struggle to stay together in war-torn Gaza; Verdi's opera Luisa Miller, a tale of doomed love, played by two of Opera Australia's hottest young stars; and Perth-based Geoffrey Drake-Brockman who combines visual art and computer science to create colourful, interactive works of art.

Productivity Commission recommendations will allow the bulk importation of cheap books, but how will that impact on writers and publishers? The Common Threads Wearable Art Competition puts elaborate garments in the spotlight, in a fully-staged theatrical production; Vis & Ramin, the ancient Persian love story, remade for Australia; and a fictional take on the Hindenburg disaster.

A post 2016 wrap of the state of arts funding, Book to Film looks at the new screen adaptation of Jungle Book, the first in a new segment - Expressions of Interest - about words and phrases, an exhibition of Gen Y Muslim artists in WA, and poet Chris Wallace Crabbe's sonnet to mark the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's death.

The highlights of Next Wave, Australia's biennial festival of young and emerging artists; Maggie Nelson's novel The Argonauts, which radically reinvents love, marriage and motherhood; best-selling American children’s author Mo Willems; and for Mother's Day 2016, a fresh look at Louise Bourgeois' memorably unnerving sculpture Maman.

We head to Alice Springs for the Something Somewhere Film Festival, chat to Australian actor Pamela Rabe about The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, and hear from philosopher Alain de Botton on The Course of Love - his first novel in twenty years.

Post the 2016 Budget, arts commentator Esther Anatolitis examines the Government's current models for arts funding, Thornton McCamish has written a biography of Australian journalist Alan Moorehead, mosaic artist Rachel Bremner talks about working with this ancient artform, and the Vinyl Frontier rings the bells!

Disgraced by playwright Ayad Akhtar, explores questions of identity and prejudice in post 9/11 America, Australia's surfing history on show in an exhibition, UK writer Chris Cleave on his new novel which is set during World War Two, and a new series about words and language, called Expressions of Interest.

An exciting collaboration between the Tinalley String Quartet and singer Lior; a new exhibition at the Arts Centre Melbourne is shining a light on the underappreciated work of set and costume designers; and an all-female cast tackles one of Shakespeare's most masculine plays, Coriolanus.

Happy 200th Birthday Charlotte Bronte. How to write about dance. Sound from the ground: making music in a graveyard. Top Shelf - Virginia Reeves.

Talking about food security through performance art, an exhibition of works by nine Gen Y Muslim contemporary artists, American writer Garth Greenwell chooses his five favourite artworks, and Book to Film looks at the new film version of Jungle Book.