"The Powerpuff Girls" have returned to the Cartoon Network, looking streamlined and shined up for 2016. "Gilmore Girls" is picking up its dropped threads for a comeback series being filmed for Netflix. "Full House" is now "Fuller House," thanks again to Netflix. 

The kids of the '90s have been granted their nostalgia golden era, and that means the '90s and early aughts are back with a vengeance. So it's an appropriate time for Rooney to reemerge with its first album in nearly six years -- an album, called "Washed Away," that's dripping with '90s flavor. 

Okay, Rooney isn't exactly a hit TV show, but the rock band, fronted by musician and sometime-actor Robert Schwartzman, will likely also bring back early '00s fuzzies with their return. Since the group cameoed on the era-defining teen soap "The O.C." in 2004, performing the energetic hit "I'm Shakin'" from their first album, they've been inextricably bound up with that time in so many millennials' lives; then-tweens or teens who loved the sunny, uneasy glamor of "The O.C." and who eschewed boy bands for bands that dared to play instruments and sometimes even sound discordant.

Rooney hit that lovable sweet spot between pop and rock. You could dance to their songs, sing along, and have them jangling around your head for days, but they featured quirky lyrics and raw guitar that felt real, less canned than much of the pop machine. 

After six years, things have changed for the band. Aside from Schwartzman, the lineup is entirely new. And as for the band's frontman -- who's been busy with solo projects and his film as a director, "Dreamland," which just debuted at Tribeca -- he's not quite the smooth-faced, floppy-haired heartthrob who slayed young female fans 15 years ago as Michael Moscovitz, or later in a sun-drenched video for Rooney's hit single "When Did Your Heart Go Missing."

When Schwartzman met me in the lobby of The Ludlow in the East Village on a recent Tuesday afternoon, he was sporting heavy stubble and long, sleek locks he kept gently stroking across his forehead. His energy seemed boyish and sweet. He jokingly clapped his hands to sync up the two recorders I used and sternly instructed me to quit with the lingering cough that kept interrupting my questions.

When it comes to Rooney, though, he's earnest and thoughtful, as well as eager to establish how hard they've worked, how much they appreciate what they have, and how little he's taking for granted with the new album. Though he never shies away from mentions of his family -- his brother is actor Jason Schwartzman, and directors Gia and Sofia Coppola are cousins -- a desire to establish his bona fides as a hard worker would be understandable.

Schwartzman says he shaped his album to have the classic Rooney sound, and if anything to have even more of a '90s rock influence. But he's emphatic that this doesn't mean Rooney is resting on its laurels or trying to relive its early years. "I think I'm kind of just starting out now anyway," he told me, when asked how he thinks Rooney's trajectory would be different if they were a new band today. "To me it's a wonderful thing to have a history, but it's not going to define me going forward. I have to allow this time now to define myself. I'm not cruising through this campaign, you know what I mean? This is a rebirth and a redefinition of Rooney."

During our chat, Schwartzman opened up more about his music-making process, the state of the music industry, and what he really wanted to be when he grew up:

On the musical influences of "Washed Away":

"I really wanted to go back to the '90s in this record. Like, that was my goal. I grew up driving to school listening to '90s alternative radio, and going to shows that were '90s rock bands. So to name a few: Supergrass, Blur, Oasis, Elastica. The Cardigans were one of my favorite bands. Granddaddy, I want to make sure to mention. These were bands I just listened to so much and I was so into.

"There's '90s rock that's kind of sloppy, but poppy, but guitar-driven, but like, wrong and right at the same time. I just like a lot of that kind of stuff, and more guitar-driven pop stuff, but sounding rich and full and big. The song 'Love Me Like There's No Tomorrow' and 'Washed Away' have it. Like, it's a little -- the attitude, and the guitar focal point, to me kind of captures a little of that '90s flavor that I loved growing up."

On his music-making philosophy:

"I've always worked hard when I've made Rooney records to try to make every song have something special so that there's no filler. It's just all killer. That's the saying. I don't try to just write singles and then just put a bunch of junk on the record. I want every song to be the best song on the record.

"What's been cool over the years is fans will say to me, 'I don't know which song is my favorite, I love track three, I love track seven, and track one, and the single I like...' and to me, that's when I feel like I've done something right, is when I've written a record that is diverse enough that there's a lot of entry points for people."

On singles:

"I don't think we've ever lived or died by our next single, and I think that's actually the sign of a true pop artist is when they die or live by the next single, and I've never been in that game. I'm in the game of trying to make a really good album, with really beautiful packaging, and a great music video, and play, like, an awesome show, and just make sure fans know I care and I'm here, and I think that's the recipe for something to build off of. But I think it's important to mention that because I think so many bands are like... they're not here, and then they have a single on the radio all of a sudden and they're big again or something. I don't get that. I'd rather build brick by brick, and have every album be another brick in this wall."

On musical trends:

"I don't get too deep into following what's hot right now. I think that today's music is kind of everywhere. It's all over the place. I don't think there's a sound of today. It's a food court. I think it's interesting because I don't think everyone's flocking to one thing. Most times the music that's this underground, cool music that's big, like, the darlings of music festivals, is very different than what's on pop radio."

"'When Did Your Heart Go Missing' gets played so much still today. So that says something; it says... maybe it's just about songs. Maybe it's just about people wanting to hear good songs. I've never chased a sound. I don't want to just be whatever's hot right now. It's not even that I don't want to be; I just don't even think about it. I just try to write music, and just make music I think sounds good. Maybe that's a good thing, because maybe that means you're not going to get stuck as the sound of this time... I don't think you can date a good song. I think good songs last."

On the Rooney identity vs. the Robert Schwartzman identity:

"There's something just about the Rooney project to me that has an identity outside of myself that I just identify with, and I feel like some songs would work well for the Rooney project."

"I let the instruments sometimes dictate the sound of the song, too. So if I'm writing piano, it tends to be a different song than the guitar, and if I'm writing on acoustic, it tends sound different than if I'm writing on electric, and if I'm writing with the synthesizer, it tends to be a different-sounding project in itself. So I let the instrument define the project, and then I kind of imagine where it's going to live, as far as all these things I want to do."

On building a career in the music world:

"Rooney had the advantage of starting at the end of 1999, putting out a record in '03, and being on a major label that supported the band and put a lot of money and marketing and attention into this project. I think the band worked hard always to build an audience and maintain an audience. Cause I remember using my message boards, you know, in 2000, and printing T-shirts and sampler CDs and handing them out after my show and trying to market myself. I remember trying to create a word-of-mouth groundswell in 1999 at my high school. That's no different from what I'm doing today, I'm just using other tools... 

"I approach this like it's a brand-new band. 'The O.C.,' radio, MTV, whatever -- the things that have happened in the past are in the past, and I can't for one second think that's going to make me now. I have to approach this like a brand-new project, but there's an advantage because Rooney's had a name."

On how the industry has changed since the band was signed in 2002:

"The nature of the beast was, you had to duke it out with your record label to continue to put music out. It was an uphill battle. They had to validate you, give you the green light. You couldn't get a song on the radio unless they said yes. They forced you to do things you didn't maybe ultimately want to do. So I had to live through that with Rooney on Geffen, and Interscop. And today, after this hiatus, I feel like I can do anything I want to do now. I'm completely liberated from that old model."

"There are bands today that are baby bands who find a way into a community through their determination and persistence and marketing themselves, and they're very clever. Today I think you have to be a marketing wizard by yourself. And I think the people that excel have a great strategy, which is called consistency and regularity. I think today's audience needs constant stimulation to stay engaged, or else they forget about you."

On the value of music today:

"But I think something's been lost with major labels. What's been lost in this industry is a sense of value. Valuing music. Putting value on music. I think that music -- and I myself take it for granted as well -- but music is like tap water. It's just flowing through our pipes. And I think a lot of people work really hard to bring water to our city. But it's taken for granted, and we go buy bottles of water. The stuff flowing through the tap, it's just there. We don't realize what it takes for that to happen."

"I think it's important for artists to establish the value of their music, and to change the cultural perspective on the value of music. Because it is up to artists. Artists do define this industry. We can't forget that. We can't just roll with it. And you see it when big artists, like Adele or these people say, you can only buy my album as a whole. But these top-level bands don't define the industry. It's a bottom-up change, it never is top-down. It's always funny to me when I read an article where it's like, 'Beck says today's industry is better than ever!' and it's like... yeah, for Beck, maybe. Those guys are so established and have such a big audience that they could do anything, to some degree, and people are going to take notice of it."

On Rooney's fans:

"The fans of the band have stayed very patient and have been willing to allow there to be another Rooney album. I'm excited about the vibe that's out there, and I really appreciate the support, because I don't know if every artist actually can go away and come back and be received again."

"I would say I come across people every day -- not every day, but I come across people at random times that say Rooney really was a band they loved growing up, or that got them through something, or 'I always loved your music...' To me, that's a meaningful thing, because it's not easy to have that."

On the music he loves to listen to:

"I think most bands love a lot of the usual suspects. I love Tame Impala. That's really good music. I'm really impressed by it. Phoenix, I love... There's a band called La Sera I like. I like Best Coast... I've always loved Weezer."

On his first dream career:

"I've always wanted to be a director, and that was my goal even before I started Rooney or acted in any movies. I was shooting with my friends after school. I wanted to really make movies. I started doing some acting, and I thought that was awesome because I got to be on set, meet filmmakers, be around it, learn it, and then I went away to the film program one summer and got to play around with all these great cameras.

"And then I came home and started a band. All of a sudden I've been in Rooney. But I've been revisiting this initial urge I've had to make movies. Now I get to take my experience as a musician into the movie industry. I think in music I've learned you've just got to start recording. You've just got to start somewhere."

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Rooney's album "Washed Away," will be out May 6th. It is currently available for preorder. To find out more and check out tour dates, visit the band's website.

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Warning: This article contains images of a man rubbing paint onto breasts under the pretense of art. Proceed with caution.

"Hot girl nipples make surprisingly good paintbrushes" is the title of the New York Post's quick video feature on Daniel Gill, professional rubber of paint onto women's boobs.

As creepy as the it sounds, words can't quite communicate as powerfully as this image of Gill "in the studio." 

If you are curious as to the particulars of Gill's artistic process, the New York Post describes it in full, and I will explain it to you now. First, he puts paint on women's boobs. You with me? Then, he presses said boobs against a canvas. The end. Day of hard work complete. 

The resulting images resemble (drumroll please...) a paint-colored boob smushed against a canvas! Think a toddler's finger painting, but made by a 54-year-old man, with any resulting sense of giddy, creative innocence replaced with a sad stomach ache and an instinctive ew. 

Boobies are fun. Many people likes boobs. And if you can find someone to offer up a breast to smear with paint, all the more power to you. But please don't refer to whatever adolescent fantasy you're living out as art. Not when too many women artists, regardless of age or experience, have been silenced, judged, censored and criticized for folding their own bodies into their work in ways that are challenging, thought provoking and unorthodox. Not when nude art created by women is deemed narcissistic, frivolous, pornographic or grotesque.

Not when you're clearly not even trying, dude. At least draw a little flower around the nipple or something. 

H/T The Cut

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This article contains nudity and may not be appropriate for work environments.

For centuries, (male) artists have perpetuated a relatively consistent image of the female nude: She's soft, willowy, and docile. Sensual but not sexually aggressive. Flirtatious but not confrontational. She's not quite a human but, mediated through the lens of a camera and the eyes of a man, an object of desire in the flesh. 

But how effectively, in recent years, feminist artists have been able to flip the switch, transforming nude subjects from objects of lust into agents of chaos, sex, power and fear. A contemporary exhibition titled "In the Raw: The Female Gaze on the Nude" features 20 women artists framing the naked body with their cameras. In radically different ways, the photographers release the female nude from her one-dimensional expectation to delight, inspire and arouse. These images capture women unprocessed, unbridled and lit aflame. 

The exhibit, curated by Indira Cesarine and Coco Dolle, uses the history of art as an entry point to talk about the naked body, which, to this day, remains a strangely forbidden subject of "serious" thought. "I think it's really interesting how the nude is in many respects still considered taboo by society, yet is such an integral part of the history of art," Cesarine told The Huffington Post. 

The curators hope, through the show, to combat the historical domination of the "male gaze," a term coined in 1975 by Laura Mulvey in reference to the way women appear on film. "Woman... stands in her patriarchal culture as signifier for the male other," Mulvey wrote, "bound by a symbolic order in which man can live out his fantasies and obsessions through linguistic command by imposing them on the silent image of a woman still tied to her place as bearer of meaning, not maker of meaning."

When you look at the history of art, television, advertising, and media in general -- the image of women has always been how men wanted them to look, versus how women do look and feel -- inside and out.

"It is the idea that content in general is created by men to appeal to a masculine sensibility," Cesarine continued. "The male gaze generally presents women for the pleasure of a male viewer. Women have become so accustomed to viewing themselves through the eyes of men, it is important to present the alternative."

One artist on view in "In the Raw" is Amanda Charchian, whose "Pheromone Hotbox" series strips down her subjects to capture not just their fleshy parts, but the humming, invisible energies, smells and chemicals that give a woman her essence and elixir.

Charchian takes her photographs in various mystical, natural landscapes around the world, from Cuba, to California’s Death Valley, to Costa Rica. Her photographs -- collaborations with her muses, who are themselves mostly artists -- are odes to feminine creativity and collaboration, and the way those come together to look a lot like magic. 

"For years, I have been preoccupied by the idea of pheromones and the emissions of our bodies as extrasensory devices of communication," Charchian explained in an earlier interview with The Huffington Post. "Clothes distract from that. I am interested in photographing the part of a person that cannot be expressed solely with speech or a look from the eye. One’s nude body cannot convey a character it does not actually, for lack of a better word, 'embody.'"

Also on view is the work of Leah Schrager, who uses nudity as a weapon for obtaining full creative and economic control over her own image. As a former model, Schrager was accustomed to feeling like images of her body were not her own. Through her work, navigating between the gallery and the Internet, the genre of fine art and self-promotion, Schrager questions what turns us on, what we take seriously, and when those two overlap. 

In the image above, Schrager embraces her alter ego Sarah White, also known as the Naked Therapist. In an attempt to harness the vulnerability of nudity and the buzzing thrill of sexual arousal, White attempts to reach men who would normally be too proud or apathetic to engage in therapy. She's naked, they can be, and the two engage in an honest conversation over Skype, chasing intensity, honesty and an intimacy that extends from the physical to the personal. 

The exhibition includes work by artists from North and South America, Asia and Europe, and, in Cesarine's words, were "inspired by ethnically diverse subjects in their works." One such subject is Jiz Lee, a genderqueer porn star who often speaks on the paradoxical nature of performing gender neutrality. "I think that 'knowing my gender' or being 'aware' of my gender is a process that sometimes correlates to how I identify and sometimes strikes discordance," Lee explained in an interview with GenderFork. "'I' may know that I am genderqueer; however, how I am perceived by others influences my gender performance whether I want it to or not."

In Sophia Wallace's photograph, Lee stands before an empty picture frame in black and white, their bare chest exposed beneath a leather jacket. Amongst the majority of images championing a woman's right to present herself on her own terms, Wallace's photograph challenges what we mean when we talk about "female bodies." There is, aside from Wallace's work, a palpable lack of non-conforming bodies on view, or even bodies of color. 

Fourth-wave feminist artwork and its accompanying ideology, dubbed "selfie feminism," has been criticized, and rightly so, for its privileging of conventionally attractive, able-bodied, white, cis females that appear in the work. As Aria Dean explained in her New Inquiry essay: "Selfie feminism likewise claims a universal female experience located in 'the female body.'" Often, although the selfie feminist movement claims to speak for all women and girls, bodies of color, gender non-conforming bodies, and other diverse bodies are kept out of sight in what Dean calls a "basic-bitch politic of visibility."

When asked about the diversity of the artists on view, Cesarine noted: "I felt in order for the exhibit to be powerful, it was important to present works not just with the point of view of one female artist, but of many, each with their own set of personal experiences and history... I also felt strongly about it being a multi-generational exhibit, featuring works by younger female artists as well as mid-career and more established female artists."

Through the show, Cesarine also hopes to change the dominant, mainstream understanding of the naked female body from something explicit and demanding of censorship. "The emphasis on nudity as a taboo is becoming a dated notion and it's about time we are liberated from that kind of conservative mindset," she said. When the female body is no longer viewed as something inherently sexual and obscene, women can proudly inhabit the forms they were born with, free to imagine their bodies beyond the restrictions of the predictable male imagination. 

"I think it is extremely important for women to be liberated from perceiving themselves only via the eyes of men," Cesarine said. "A one-dimensional view of the world is not reality. There are so many more points of view that are relevant aside from that of the heterosexual male, and it's time for those voices to be heard."

"In The Raw: The Female Gaze," curated by Indira Cesarine and Coco Dolle, runs from May 3 until May 21, 2016 at Untitled Space Gallery in New York. 

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Artist Nick Cave "is like a rock star in the art world," said his primary dealer Jack Shainman, in a phone interview with artnet News. "When I see people starting to ask my artists for autograph, that changes into a different realm."

Boosted by major museum shows, public performances, and substantial exposure at art fairs in recent years, Cave's most famous works -- his signature "Soundsuits" -- have become wildly popular. And it's not hard to see why. Though the styles, themes and materials vary widely, they all tend to be dazzlingly elaborate and fantastic sculptural forms based on the scale of the artist's body.

The Soundsuits "camouflage the body, masking and creating a second skin that conceals race, gender, and class, forcing the viewer to look without judgment," according to a description on Jack Shainman Gallery's website.

Cave himself, and the many dancers he works with, often perform in the suits. His acclaimed show at the Cranbrook Museum of Art in Detroit this past fall, "Hear Here," featured a city-wide program of performances and related events.

The artist is currently working on a massive installation for MASS MoCA titled "Until" that will open October 16. Shainman was hard-pressed to describe the details of the monumental project except to say he understands that it will be "immersive" and that the artist has described it as "being on the inside of a Soundsuit."

For the past two and a half decades -- Cave created his first Soundsuit in 1992, as a response to the LAPD beating of Rodney King and the ensuing riots -- interest in the Soundsuits has been building slowly and steadily, though it seems to have hit a tipping point of late.

"There is not a day that people aren't calling about buying his work or museums interested in putting on shows," says Shainman, adding, "I think it's what's called a 'luxury problem' but we've been having to turn down museum shows."

Along with intense demand for Soundsuits on the primary market -- the Seattle Museum of Art is among a recent buyer, said Shainman -- some Soundsuits have been turning up at auction in recent years as well.

According to the artnet Price Database, there are just 16 results at auction for Cave. Nine of these works are Soundsuits.

The highest price to date was $150,000 for a 2008 Soundsuit that Sotheby's offered in its contemporary day sale this past November (estimate: $80–100,000). Another example, from 2007, sold for $118,750, also at Sotheby's, in November 2013, on an $80–120,000 estimate.

Charlie Moffett, a Sotheby's associate vice president and head of the contemporary art day sale, remarked on their rising popularity. "In the last few years, as they come to market, more and more people are recognizing that not only are they incredibly beautiful sculptural works that have a performative history, but they are also an investigation into each of the stories for the impetus for their creation." He noted one such Soundsuit in the Cranbrook show, "TM13," was a tribute to Trayvon Martin.

Both Cave and Moffett affirmed that the appeal and demand for Soundsuits do not seem to be limited to a particular material or style (though Shainman notes: "People love the button Soundsuits" ).

And though Shainman says "we prefer them not to come to auction," he says the prices achieved so far are generally in line with the primary market -- if a tad higher -- a trend that is undoubtedly reassuring to any dealer concerned about speculative activity.

Another sign of the broad appeal and depth of context of the suits is the inclusion of one in the Brooklyn Museum's newly opened show "Disguise: Masks and Global African Art," which runs from April 29 to September 18.

artnet News spoke with Kevin Dumouchelle, associate curator, arts of Africa and the Pacific Islands, at the Brooklyn Museum. Dumouchelle explained the changes that the Brooklyn Museum made to the show, which originated in Seattle, at the Seattle Art Museum including putting in the Cave Soundsuit from the museum's own collection.

He explained: "The show explores the connection between historic African masquerade and contemporary artistic practice, including looking at artists who are rooting themselves in some way -- either directly or indirectly -- in ideas and practices that we can trace back to African masquerade," said Dumouchelle. "Even just on the surface level, Nick Cave seems like an obvious candidate…"

As Cave busies himself with a major upcoming Mass MoCA installation, interest and demand for the Soundsuits keeps getting more intense. "I wouldn't be surprised if we continue to see an increase in value for these works in the years ahead," said Moffett.

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For Imogen Poots, 2015 marked a new beginning. Across the better part of a decade, she'd scored noteworthy roles in movies like "28 Weeks Later," "Solitary Man" and "Jane Eyre" without ever quite transcending emerging-actress limbo. But as the 2010s inch forward, Poots has always been on the cusp of breaking through -- with the vampire horror-comedy "Fight Night," the rowdy bromance "That Awkward Moment" and the noisy Aaron Paul racing vehicle "Need for Speed." 

But it's the movies that have struggled to secure much shelf life where Poots has found her true calling. She played Philip Seymour Hoffman and Catherine Keener's daughter in 2011's "A Late Quartet" before starring as Linda Keith, one of Jimi Hendrix's lovers, in the under-appreciated 2013 biopic "Jimi: All Is By My Side" and as an earnest call-girl-turned-Broadway-hopeful in Peter Bogdanovich's 2015 screwball comedy "She's Funny That Way." This year alone, she's appeared in the Sundance drama "Frank & Lola," Terrence Malick's existential pilgrimage "Knight of Cups" and the gnarly punk thriller "Green Room," which is now in theaters. This summer, Poots will transition to television for Showtime's behind-the-scenes rock series "Roadies," created by "Almost Famous" director Cameron Crowe. 

The Huffington Post recently chatted with the 26-year-old U.K. native about "Green Room" and how she's found fulfillment in her still-burgeoning career. Here are a few highlights from our conversation. 

On the Los Angeles hedonism displayed in "Knight of Cups"

"What I found interesting about it when I finally saw it was that it actually reflects the myth of Los Angeles -- the whole mystical quality surrounding Hollywood. Hollywood, in some respects, is so interesting because of its grotesque nature. I find that Hollywood Boulevard, right in the center, is like a theme park. It’s very strange, and yet, as a passenger flying on a plane into LA, you still get this inexplicable thrill when you see the Hollywood sign. It’s quite interesting that that word has come to mean something to culture. I think, in terms of Malick’s version of that, a lot of the characters are archetypes, but there’s a nostalgia at play there. You love to miss it, but when you’re experiencing it, it can be a very sinister environment that you’re subjected to."

On being expected to look like a certain package

"That’s just an inevitable hurdle that will appear for a blond actress. So you relish opportunities when people like Malick -- or Jeremy Saulnier, with 'Green Room' -- let you find something deeper within. But the whole idea, actually, a lot of the time, is you let other people lay things onto you to transform you, but actually directors are very interested in that stripped-down place of what’s actually innate in humanity. That’s the characterization I look for."

On her own foray into the type of heavy metal featured in "Green Room"

"I’m a big fan of that type of music, embarrassingly enough. Actually, not embarrassing. I’m proud to say that when I was 13 ... I was very much into that band Korn, and Marilyn Manson. Then, obviously from there, you kind of grow up a little bit and put on Johnny Thunders. He has that element. There’s such catharsis to music like that. But my favorite band of all time is The Smiths. That’s my happy place -- a little mellow."

On needing a new challenge after "Need for Speed"

"When you look back on the choices that you’ve made, it’s interesting what stands out to you. I’m very, very cautious to ever speak in a condescending way about a project that I’ve done because a director has decided to hire you for something and you’ve made a decision to be a part of that. ... I think certainly working with Peter Bogdanovich gave me that. It’s funny because in terms of 'All Is By My Side' or 'The Look of Love' or 'Filth,' I love those projects. And then when you make a decision to do something like 'Need for Speed,' you’re either going to like it or you’re going to reconsider some things. So it was certainly around that time that I thought, 'All right, it’s time to stop doing work -- or at least try to do work that I really, really believe in, and something that I would want to go see.' If you’re a writer, you can’t spend time focusing on a subject that doesn’t interest you or that you don’t believe in. ... I feel very, very happy right now and it feels very right. A few years ago, I certainly did not feel as comfortable, in a sense, about finding work. It was really challenging. It was asking more of you than to be a device."

"Green Room," co-starring Patrick Stewart, Anton Yelchin and Alia Shawkat, is now in theaters.

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This article originally appeared on ArchDaily. 

The American Institute of Architects (AIA) and its Committee on the Environment (COTE) have selected the top ten sustainable architecture and ecological design projects for 2016.

Now in its 20th year, the COTE Top Ten Awards program honors projects that protect and enhance the environment through an integrated approach to architecture, natural systems, and technology.

A recently released study, entitled "Lessons from the Leading Edge," reports that design projects recognized through this program are “outpacing the industry by virtually every standard of performance.” The 2016 COTE Top Ten Green Projects are:

1. Biosciences Research Building (Galway, Ireland)

The design of the BRB embraces the moderate climate of Ireland. By locating low-load spaces along the perimeter of the building, the project is able to take advantage of natural ventilation as the sole conditioning strategy for the majority of the year and is supplemented less than 10 percent of the year with radiant heating. Due to this approach, 45 percent of this intensive research building is able to function without mechanical ventilation. This is an extremely simple, yet radical approach and is rarely implemented to even a modest extent in similar laboratories in comparable U.S. climates.

2. Center for Sustainable Landscapes (Pittsburgh, Pa.)

The CSL is an education, research and administration facility at Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens. Designed to be the greenest building in the world, it generates all of its own energy and treats all storm and sanitary water captured on-site. The CSL is the first and only building to meet four of the highest green certifications: the Living Building Challenge, LEED Platinum, WELL Building Platinum, and Four-Stars Sustainable SITES. As an integral part of the Phipps visitor experience, the CSL focuses attention on the important intersection between the built and natural environments, demonstrating that human and environmental health are inextricably connected.

3. Exploratorium at Pier 15 (San Francisco, Calif.) 

The Exploratorium is an interactive science museum that also demonstrates innovation and sustainability in its design and construction. The building takes advantage of the historic pier shed’s natural lighting and the 800-foot-long roof provided room for a 1.3 megawatt photovoltaic array. The water of the bay is used for cooling and heating. Materials were used that are both sustainable and durable enough to withstand a harsh maritime climate. The project is certified LEED Platinum and is close to reaching its goal of being the country’s largest Net Zero energy museum and an industry model for what is possible in contemporary museums.

4. H-E-B at Mueller (Austin, Texas)

H-E-B at Mueller is an 83,587-square-foot LEED Gold and Austin Energy Green Building 4-Stars retail store and fresh food market, including a pharmacy, café, community meeting room, outdoor gathering spaces, and fuel station. It serves 16 neighborhoods and is located in Mueller, a sustainable, mixed-use urban Austin community. Strategies include a collaborative research, goal-setting and design process; integrated chilled water HVAC and refrigeration systems; the first North American supermarket propane refrigeration system; optimized daylighting; 169 kW roof-top solar array; electric vehicle charging; all LED lighting; and reclaimed water use for landscape irrigation, toilets, and cooling tower make-up water.

5. Jacobs Institute for Design Innovation (Berkeley, Calif.)

Founded on the conviction that design can help address some of society’s most pressing challenges, the Jacobs Institute for Design Innovation at UC Berkeley is devoted to introducing sustainable design innovation at the core of university life. The project provides a new interdisciplinary hub for students and teachers from across the university who work at the intersection of design and technology. It is designed as both a collaborative, project-based educational space and a symbol to the region of the University’s commitment to sustainable innovation, modelling high-density / low-carbon living and learning by reducing energy use 90 percent below national baseline.

6. Rene Cazenave Apartments (San Francisco, Calif.
)

This supportive housing for formerly chronically homeless individuals replaces a former parking lot and freeway off-ramp with a high density, transit oriented, and healthy living alternative. Filtered ventilation, low emitting materials, ample daylight and views combine to aid the residents, many with mental and physical disabilities. Energy costs for the residents and non-profit owner are minimized by a combination of high efficiency lighting and hydronic heating, a continuously insulated rain-screen building envelope and a roof top solar canopy with both hot water and photovoltaic panels. Water is carefully managed by a vegetated roof, smart irrigation, a courtyard storm water tank and reclaimed water piping.

7. The Dixon Water Foundation Josey Pavilion (Decatur, Texas)

The Josey Pavilion is a multi-functional education and meeting center that supports the mission of the Dixon Water Foundation to promote healthy watersheds through sustainable land management. Traditionally livestock has caused more harm than good by overgrazing and not allowing native prairies to play their important role in habitat and watershed protection, and carbon sequestration. As a certified Living Building, the Josey Pavilion facilitates a deeper understanding of how grazing livestock as well as the built environment can work to do more good than harm. Just like the Heritage Live Oak that defines the site, the building tempers the climate and enhances visitor experience by shading the sun, blocking the wind, and providing protected views.

8. The J. Craig Venter Institute (San Diego, Calif.)

This not-for-profit research institute, dedicated to the advancement of the science of genomics, was in need of a permanent West Coast home. Their commitment to environmental stewardship led to challenging the architects to design a net-zero energy laboratory building, the first in the U.S. The result is a LEED-Platinum certified, 44,607-square-foot building comprised of a wet laboratory wing and an office / dry laboratory wing surrounding a central courtyard, all above a partially below-grade parking structure for 112 cars. The holistic approach to the design revolved around energy performance, water conservation, and sustainable materials.

9. University of Wyoming -- Visual Arts Facility (Laramie, Wyo.)

The Visual Arts Facility (VAF) consolidates the fine arts program from its scattered locations throughout the campus. The building provides a teaching and learning environment that is both state-of-the-art in occupational safety and in its concern for discharge of pollutants from building. The roof area is fitted with one of the largest solar evacuated tube installations in the U.S. Heat flows from the evacuated tubes to support the hydronic radiant floors, domestic hot water, and pretreat outside air for ventilation. The building was oriented and shaped through a process of studying the sun’s interaction with interior spaces, simultaneously distributing reflected light while eliminating solar gain.

10. West Branch of the Berkeley Public Library (Berkeley, Calif.)

The new 9,500-square-foot West Branch of the Berkeley Public Library is the first certified Living Building Challenge zero net energy public library in California. The building’s energy footprint was minimized through integrated strategies for daylighting (the building is 97 percent daylit), natural ventilation and a high performance building envelope. An innovative wind chimney provides cross-ventilation while protecting the library interior from street noise. Renewable energy on site includes photovoltaic panels and solar thermal panels for radiant heating and cooling and domestic hot water. The library exceeds the 2030 Challenge and complies with Berkeley’s recently-enacted Climate Action Plan.

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"Abortions are the largest genocide of black people; God won't forgive you for having one."

That's what an anti-abortion protester told Acevedo as he or she held a cross near her face. The poet, who said in the poem that office is next to a Planned Parenthood, had the perfect response to the person's damning and hypocritical statement.

In her poem titled "An Open Letter to the Protesters Outside the Planned Parenthood," performed at the 2016 Women of the World Poetry Slam in Brooklyn, New York, Acevedo gave the protester some historical -- and present-day -- context.

"[T]ell me more how you care about this largest genocide of black people when I never see you at Black Lives Matter protests," the poet said. "Tell me, that you mourned Aiyana and Tamir and Jordan just as hard as you celebrated the shooting of a clinic in Colorado."

Acevedo turned the mirror on the protester and said the God she knows is much more understanding of the strife and turmoil black women have faced for centuries. The God she knows isn't the same God the protester spoke of, she said:

"My God understands how slave women plucked pearls from between their legs rather than see them strung up by the neck. My God does not condemn us women who are faced with having to take claim of our bodies, do so with our chins unchained to the ground. Do you know how many years bodies like mine have been the choice for someone like you to make? Do you know how many years women like me have been equally afraid of both hangings and hangers? Yet we're still here everyday, carrying ourselves."

Chills.

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Nicolas Berggruen scuffs along a dirt road overgrown with foxtails, high in the Santa Monica Mountains. The Los Angeles basin falls at his feet.

The skyscrapers of downtown, the gantry cranes at the port and the peaks of Catalina are diminished by a vast panorama stretching from Saddleback Mountain in the east to the blue of Santa Monica Bay below, from Mt. Baldy in the haze and a slice of the San Fernando Valley at his back.

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The lesbian romance "Carol” nabbed six Oscar nominations, including one for its leading lady, Cate Blanchett. It turns out, however, that the hit film was an anomaly in a shaky year for queer themes on the big screen, a new report has found.

Only 17.5 percent of 126 major movies released in 2015 contained characters who identified as LGBT, according to GLAAD's 2016 Studio Responsibility Index. Although this marks no change at all from the previous year, there's been a clear decrease in the quality of that representation.

GLAAD created the annual report in 2012 to map the "quantity, quality and diversity" of LGBT people as in films released by Hollywood's seven largest studios (Disney, Fox, Lionsgate, Paramount, Sony, Universal and Warner Brothers) in theaters during the calendar year. Films are evaluated not just for its inclusion of LGBT characters, but also the presence of general LGBT content and anti-LGBT language or "humor," according to press notes.  

Only eight of the 22 major studio films to include an LGBT character(s) passed GLAAD's Vito Russo Test, which measures how those characters are presented in the context of the film in a similar way to the Bechdel Test. This was the lowest percentage since GLAAD began examining films with this criteria in 2012. 

Even among films that were deemed inclusive, LGBT representation was very uneven. Gay male characters were featured in 77 percent of those films, while 23 percent featured lesbian characters and 9 percent were bisexual. Only one film, "Hot Pursuit," which starred Reese Witherspoon and Sofia Vergara, was deemed trans-inclusive. 

Still, that movie wasn't enough to help Warner Brothers, which was slapped with a "Failing" grade alongside Paramount and Disney. Lionsgate, Fox, Sony and Universal were rated as "Adequate," while no studio received a "Good" grade. 

According to GLAAD President Sarah Kate Ellis, television has changed the game for LGBT-inclusive programming with hit shows like "Orange Is the New Black" and "Transparent." Hence, what was once considered an "adequate" portrayal of an LGBT character on the big screen is "no longer adequate at all," she said. 

"The film industry must embrace new stories reflective of the actual world if it wants to remain competitive and relevant. Lucky for them, there are plenty more stories to be told," Ellis said in the report. "Leaving LGBT people out of the picture -- or including them only as a punchline -- keeps old prejudices alive and creates an unsafe environment, not only here in America, but around the world where most audiences see these depictions."

She concluded, "Hollywood must do better to improve the messages they are sending." 

To read more about GLAAD’s 2016 Studio Responsibility Index, head here. 

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How do animators convey personality, atmosphere and even soulfulness in their stories?

Danielle Feinberg, director of photography at Pixar, delivered a TED talk explaining the magic behind some of the film company's most beloved movies, including "Finding Nemo," "WALL-E" and "Toy Story." In the talk, delivered in November and published on YouTube on April 28, Feinberg discussed one of the essential ingredients for creating stories and characters with "soul." 

Lighting, she said, is one of animators' key tools to tell stories, set the time of day, create the mood and guide the audience's eye. It's also the part of the animation process where animators can bend the rules of science to give scenes a sense of wonder.

"We use science to create something wonderful," Feinberg said. "We use story and artistic touch to get us to a place of wonder."

As an example, Feinberg discussed the difficulty her team had bringing the character of WALL-E to life. Because the robot's binoculars were the primary way he could communicate and convey personality, she said, the animators had to find the perfect lighting that would make him "that sweet, soulful robot we've come to love."

When they reach that perfect blend of science and artistic expression, as they did with WALL-E's binoculars, Feinberg said, animators are able to "elevate the world" of their stories "to a place of wonder, a place with soul, a place we can believe in, [and] a place where the things you imagine can become real."

Check out Danielle Feinberg's full TED talk above.

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Misty Copeland has officially been turned into a Barbie. And for the 33-year-old principal dancer for the American Ballet Theatre, the doll is about much more than seeing her face on a toy she used to play with as a kid.

On Monday, Barbie introduced a doll made in the likeness of Copeland, who became ABT's first black female principal dancer in 2015. And unlike the stereotypically blonde, white, mostly immobile, permanently-in-high-heels dolls that come to mind when you hear "Barbie," Copeland's Barbie doll is meant to be powerful.

"It's so empowering for this generation to see a black ballerina doll that has muscles," Copeland told The Huffington Post during a chat at a New York City hotel on Monday.

HuffPost sat down with Copeland to talk about the importance of representation in all spaces, what it's like to have her very own Barbie, and the amazing thing Prince did in her name.

What went through your mind when you first heard there was going to be a Barbie made in your likeness?

Just having the opportunity to go and meet with them, I was like, "Wow, this is so cool." Getting to see all of the iconic people that have had Barbies made after them was so amazing. Being a huge Barbie fan, playing with Barbies since I was 13 years old, it was just such a moment. And then to find out that it was actually going to happen, it was just very surreal.

The first thing that jumped out at me when I saw the doll was the way she can move.

Yeah, she can actually go into positions. It's a very powerful message for this generation of boys and girls to see themselves represented through a doll that's so iconic, such an iconic image.

How were you a part of the design process?

The Barbie is wearing the "Firebird" costume [from one of Copeland's iconic ballet roles] to give her not just any old tutu or costume, but something that was significant to me and my career. "Firebird" was the role that I feel gave my artistic director an opportunity to see me as a principal dancer, and that was four years ago. 

But yeah, they sent me many prototypes and I got to say, "Change this, make her boobs bigger." Even her facial features, I wanted her nose to really mimic mine and not be as narrow as Barbie's and have fuller lips. The shape of her eyes, the hair color, everything. So it was definitely collaborative.

Aside from those features, is there anything specific you knew this Barbie had to have?

Muscles. That's so much a part of me. And something I've been criticized for and celebrated for. It's OK to be strong, and you can still be feminine. Dancers are athletes. Why try and hide that feature? We need these muscles to do what we do. It's beautiful.

How does it make you feel that little girls and boys are going to grow up playing with this doll -- one that looks very different than Barbie dolls made even a decade ago?

It's amazing. It's changing this generation's mindset and views of what's possible for them. The power of imagery is so strong for young people, and that's so much a part of what I speak about. The power of being able to see yourself represented in different spaces means so much for the growth of a young child, to be able to think they can be anything.

This Barbie is introducing a lot of people (not just kids, but their parents as well) to the world of ballet. What's one thing you wish people knew about dancers?

Again, that we're athletes. It's a lifetime of hard work and dedication and focus that doesn't end until you stop dancing. This art form is meant to be this beautiful performance that you see on the stage, and not so much about what it takes to get there. But in this day and age, I think it's OK to show the work that goes into things and invite people to see behind the scenes. We are real people, we're not these fairytale little swans that are just up there twirling around. We work incredibly hard to make our dancing look effortless.

Your doll is part of the Sheroes line, which also includes women like Ava DuVernay. What's it like to be in the company of women who are also trailblazers in different fields?

It's incredible. It's weird when you're put next to these people that you look at not in the same way you see yourself. It's such an honor to be able to stand next to women who are making a difference and that have a voice that are encouraging people. It's nice to be a black woman who's being celebrated for positive things as they are as well.

[#BlackGirlMagic] is about empowering this generation of brown girls to see opportunities for themselves in every space.

Who do you think should be made into a Barbie next?

Michelle Obama. That would be amazing. Or if we could do a Serena Williams Barbie. Oh my gosh.   

You made history when you became the first black female principal dancer at the American Ballet Theatre in 2015. What does #BlackGirlMagic mean to you?

It's about empowering this generation of brown girls to see opportunities for themselves in every space, to feel that it's OK to be yourself and that you are beautiful no matter what kind of hair you have, no matter how long or short it is, what skin color you have, what your body type is. You are beautiful just the way you are. And it's amazing to have people look at me in the way that I'm representing them. I'm representing their grandmother. I'm representing what their mother wanted to be. It's amazing to be this vessel of positive messaging for black women.

You've had the opportunity to work with Prince. What are your best memories collaborating with him?

There are so many. He constantly wanted to teach people everything he's learned in his life and throughout his career. Lessons were always flowing out of him, and I learned so much in that way, but it was a completely different experience to be on stage with him. What I got from his energy and his spirit, that's what made me into the artist that I am today. I'm so grateful for everything that he's done for me and also for the ballet community. He wasn't always seen for the work that he was doing because he didn't feel it was necessary for him to say, "Oh, this donation was made by me." But he gifted donations to different dance companies in my name. He was such a giver and cared so much about inspiring new artists to set their own paths and succeed and stand on their own and just really speak their truth.

If you could go back and tell 13-year-old Misty or 15-year-old Misty that you would be where you are today, would you do it?

I would. But I don't think I'd believe it, at all. I definitely didn't have the confidence that I do now, and I didn't have a voice. I literally didn't have a voice. I was so shy. I would never speak. Even people who believed in me, my first ballet teacher would say you're going to be a principal dancer with [the American Ballet Theatre], you're going to dine with kings and queens and with the president and all this stuff and I'd sit there and go, "She's really crazy."

But you've actually done those things.

And it's crazy! But I think that it's also good for you to stay focused, and for me at that age to keep striving and working towards being the best dancer that I could be.

The American Ballet Theatre's spring season opens May 9th. This month, Copeland will be reprising her famous role in the "Firebird."

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

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"Hamilton," the founding fathers-themed musical that you cannot escape (nor should you want to), made history of its own this morning when it received a record 16 Tony Award nominations. 

The production -- a mix of hip-hop, musical theater homages, and semi-biographical information about the late, great Alexander Hamilton -- earned nods for categories including Best Musical, Best Score, Best Book of a Musical, Best Director, Best Scenic Design, Best Costume Design, Best Lighting Design, Best Choreography, Best Orchestrations and a slew of acting nominations.

The musical trumped the achievements of "The Producers" and "Billy Elliot," who previously shared the record for the most Tony nominations, with 15 each.

Lin-Manuel Miranda, who wrote and stars in the musical, already has a Tony, an Emmy, a Grammy and a Pulitzer to his name, among many other awards, like a MacArthur Genius Grant. As an actor, musician, writer and composer, he's neatly poised to nab that coveted EGOT acronym if he vies for an Oscar. (He is set to star alongside Emily Blunt in the upcoming "Mary Poppins" reboot, so there's hope!)

But more than that, Miranda could become the third person in history to acquire the even fancier PEGOT title (acknowledging his Pulitzer win), as Richard Rodgers and Marvin Hamlisch did before him.

Let's face it, he slayed during his performance at the White House. He can do anything.

If you're not familiar with the musical "Hamilton," congratulations on your safe return back from Mars. Now that you're comfortably rested and able to peruse the Internet, please catch up here, here and here.

See a full list of the 2016 Tony Award nominations here.

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Best Play:

"Eclipsed"
"The Humans"
"King Charles III"
"The Father"

Best Musical:

"Bright Star"
"Hamilton"
"Waitress"
"School of Rock"
"Shuffle Along"

Best Revival of a Play:

"Long Day’s Journey Into Night"
"Blackbird"
"A View from the Bridge"
"Noises Off"
"The Crucible"

Best Revival of a Musical:

"The Color Purple"
"Fiddler on the Roof"
"She Loves Me"
"Spring Awakening"

Leading Actor in a Play:

Gabriel Byrne, "Long Day’s Journey Into Night" 
Jeff Daniels, "Blackbird" 
Frank Langella, "The Father"
Tim Pigott-Smith, "King Charles III"
Mark Strong, "A View from the Bridge"

Leading Actress in a Play:

Jessica Lange, "Long Day’s Journey into Night" 
Laurie Metcalf, "Misery"
Lupita Nyong’o, "Eclipsed"
Michelle Williams, "Blackbird"
Sophie Okonedo, "The Crucible"

Leading Actor in a Musical:

Zachary Levi, "She Loves Me"
Alex Brightman, "School of Rock" 
Danny Burstein, "Fiddler on the Roof"
Lin-Manuel Miranda, "Hamilton"
Leslie Odom Jr., "Hamilton"

Leading Actress in a Musical: 

Laura Benanti, "She Loves Me"
Carmen Cusack, "Bright Star"
Cynthia Erivo, "The Color Purple"
Phillipa Soo, "Hamilton"
Jessie Mueller, "Waitress"

Best Director of a Play:

Rupert Goold, "King Charles III"
Jonathan Kent, "Long Day’s Journey Into Night"
Joe Mantello, "The Humans"
Liesl Tommy, "Eclipsed"
Ivo van Hove, "A View From the Bridge"

Best Director of a Musical:

Michael Arden, "Spring Awakening"
Thomas Kail, "Hamilton"
John Doyle, "The Color Purple"
Scott Ellis, "She Loves Me"
George C. Wolfe, "Shuffle Along"

Best Book of a Musical:

Steve Martin, "Bright Star"
Lin-Manuel Miranda, "Hamilton"
Julian Fellowes, "School of Rock"
George C. Wolfe, "Shuffle Along"

Best Original Score:

Steve Martin and Edie Brickell, "Bright Star"
Lin-Manuel Miranda, "Hamilton"
Andrew Lloyd Webber and Glenn Slater, "School of Rock"
Sara Bareilles, "Waitress"

Best Featured Actor in a Play:

Reed Birney, "The Humans"
Bill Camp, "The Crucible"
David Furr, "Noises Off"
Richard Goulding, "King Charles III"
Michael Shannon, "Long Day's Journey Into Night"

Best Featured Actress in a Play:

Pascale Armand, "Eclipsed"
Megan Hilty, "Noises Off"
Jayne Houdyshell, "The Humans"
Andrea Martin, "Noises Off"
Saycon Sengbloh, "Eclipsed"

Best Featured Actor in a Musical:

Daveed Diggs, "Hamilton"
Brandon Victor Dixon, "Shuffle Along"
Christopher Fitzgerald, "Waitress"
Jonathan Groff, "Hamilton"
Christopher Jackson, "Hamilton"

Best Featured Actress in a Musical:

Danielle Brooks, "The Color Purple"
Renee Elise Goldsberry, "Hamilton"
Jane Krakowski, "She Loves Me"
Jennifer Simard, "Disaster!"
Adrienne Warren, "Shuffle Along"

Best Scenic Design of a Play:

Beowulf Boritt, "Therese Raquin"
Christopher Oram, "Hughie"
Jan Versweyveld, "A View from the Bridge"
David Zinn, "The Humans"

Best Scenic Design of a Musical:

Es Devlin and Finn Ross, "American Psycho"
David Korins, "Hamilton"
Santo Loquasto, "Shuffle Along"
David Rockwell, "She Loves Me"

Best Costume Design of a Play:

Jane Greenwood, "Long Day's Journey Into Night"
Michael Krass, "Noises Off"
Clint Ramos, "Eclipsed"
Tom Scutt, "King Charles III"

Best Costume Design of a Musical:

Gregg Barnes, "Tuck Everlasting"
Jeff Mahshie, "She Loves Me"
Ann Roth, "Shuffle Along"
Paul Tazewell, "Hamilton"

Best Choreography:

Andy Blankenbuehler, "Hamilton"
Savion Glover, "Shuffle Along"
Hofesh Shechter, "Fiddler on the Roof"
Randy Skinner, "Dames at Sea"
Sergio Trujillo, "On Your Feet!"

Best Lighting Design of a Play:

Natasha Katz, "Long Day's Journey Into Night"
Justin Townsend, "The Humans"
Jan Versweyveld, "The Crucible"
Jan Versweyveld, "A View from the Bridge"

Best Lighting Design of a Musical:

Howell Binkley, "Hamilton"
Jules Fisher and Peggy Eisenhauer, "Shuffle Along"
Ben Stanton, "Spring Awakening"
Justin Townsend, "American Psycho"

Best Orchestrations:

August Eriksmoen, "Bright Star"
Larry Hochman, "She Loves Me"
Alex Lacamoire, "Hamilton"
Daryl Waters, "Shuffle Along"

See a complete list of the 2015 Tony Award winners here.

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Welcome to the future, humanoids. 

A theme park in Japan is preparing to open a "Kingdom of the Robot" land run by more than 200 androids who will cook, bartend, serve and bus tables for visitors. 

The park is Huis Ten Bosch in Nagasaki, and its robot realm will open in July, Hideo Sawada, president of the theme park's operating company, told the Nikkei Asian Times. 

You may have already heard about the robot hotel inside the theme park, where animatronic women and T. rex dinosaurs help guests check in for their stays and even carry luggage, along with human backup. 

The forthcoming robot kingdom is intended to cut costs and serve as a testing ground for new robot technology, the Nikkei Asian Review says. 

"Robots will arrive in this kingdom one after another, and the time will come when those technologies will be in use worldwide," Sawada said. Whoa.

But the weirdest part is that this isn't even the theme park's strangest quirk. Although located in Japan, Huis Ten Bosch was a built to look exactly like the Netherlands.

Yup, we're talking windmills, tulips, clogs and canals... in Nagasaki. Check it out:

Huis Ten Bosch looks just like a 17th-century Dutch village, a nod to an old Japanese trade agreement with Dutch sailors from the 1600s, Atlas Obscura explains. 

While roaming streets of neatly-organized tulips and canals, visitors can also witness a show that re-enacts Holland's historic "great flood" and tour a model of an authentic Dutch sailing ship.

...And soon, a robot skipper may join them, too. All aboard!

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In Turkey, there has been a crackdown on press freedom that its journalists are describing as a "witch-hunt," the Guardian reported just a day before World Press Freedom Day. Reporters have been prosecuted, harassed or deported for speaking out against corruption, "insulting religious values" or criticizing President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. In December, 14 journalists were behind bars in Turkey -- among 199 imprisoned worldwide. 

Journalists across the globe are operating under “a climate of fear and tension,” according to Reporters Without Borders, or RSF. The 2016 World Press Freedom Index published by RSF in April reveals that there has been a general decline in media freedoms worldwide between 2013 and 2016.

In an exhibition titled, "A Cry of Freedom: Cartoonists for Freedom of Information," organized by Reporters Without Borders, Spanish cartoonists highlight the dire state of journalism around the world, while capturing the bravery that journalists show in the face of danger and repression. The exhibit opens at the FNAC Castellana in Madrid on Thursday, before making more stops in Valencia, Alicante, Barcelona and Malaga.

According to RSF, the decline in press freedom and independence worldwide can be explained by "increasingly authoritarian tendencies of governments in countries such as Turkey and Egypt, tighter government control of state-owned media, even in some European countries such as Poland, and security situations that have become more and more fraught, in Libya and Burundi, for example, or that are completely disastrous, as in Yemen."

The World Press Freedom Index highlights that in Africa, journalists have been victims of terrorism, armed conflict and election crises. Media freedoms have also declined in South America in 2015, due to such factors as institutional violence, organized crime and corruption.

The Middle East and North Africa has continued to be one of the world’s most challenging and fatal regions for reporters; independent journalism has suffered in the crosshairs of terrorism and abusive counter-terrorism, according to RSF.

Among the deadliest countries for journalists so far in 2016 have been Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Turkey, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. 

"A Cry of Freedom: Cartoonists for Freedom of Information" coincides with World Press Freedom Day, an opportunity to reflect on the status of media freedom and independence worldwide. Some of the cartoons below are featured in the RSF exhibit.

A version of this post originally appeared on HuffPost Spain.

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A gay teen finds solace, strength and social awareness through his love of a secret superhero in Draw the Line, author Laurent Linn’s debut novel for young adult readers.

The Huffington Post got a sneak peek at Draw the Line in an exclusive trailer, which can be viewed above, as well as the images below. The novel, which hits retailers on May 17, follows Adrian Paper, a closeted 16-year-old who uses art as an escape from the personal struggles he faces growing up in a conservative Texas town. Inspired by Graphite, a gay superhero he's dreamed up, Adrian decides he's ready to step out of the shadows after a hate crime hits close to home. 

The project represents a new chapter in Linn's professional journey, too. The 49-year-old Texas native, who is an art director at Simon & Schuster, told HuffPost that years of collaborating with "mind-blowingly amazing" authors inspired him to try his hand at writing a novel. Having designed Michael Ian Black's Naked as well as picture books by Toni and Slade Morrison, Linn didn't have to leave his artistic talents behind for Draw the Line, as the book features over 90 pages of his rich, detailed illustrations. 

"I've always felt an real connection to the projects I've worked on and put energy into. But I hadn't been the original creator of those things -- I was always happily part of the creative team for something someone else had dreamed up," Linn, who spent 11 years with Jim Henson's Muppet Workshop before his foray into publishing, said. Still, he admitted to experiencing some unexpected challenges when he sat down to write. "Being the one who faces the blank page and relying on yourself for all the ideas takes time to adjust to," he said. 

Certainly the gay fascination with superheroes is well-established, with Marvel and DC Comics acknowledging that cult following directly in recent storylines. For Linn, the queer appeal of what some might dismiss as "muscle boys in tights with adorable sidekicks" goes far beyond the superficial. 

"I believe it's the secret identity and often hiding those parts of us that make us special," he said. "It's ingrained in us, isn't it? Living a life where a magical and powerful part of you is often not only misunderstood by others, but feared and despised. We can hide our true identity, wear our Clark Kent clothes and blend in, but that's not who we are."

While elements of Adrian's story were inspired by his own adolescence, Linn stressed that the book is not intended to be read as a memoir. 

"My job as an author is to use my personal experiences with specific purpose, then remove myself from the story and make it Adrian's truth," he said. More than anything, Linn said he wanted his protagonist to use his art as a tool for social justice: "Each of us has something special about us that could be our real life superpower and change the world."

Ultimately, Linn hopes readers come away from Draw the Line thinking "about the power of their own talents in a new way."

"That would be truly meaningful for me," he said. 

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Lupita Nyong'o knows what society expects her to do, but that doesn't mean she's going to do it. 

In an essay featured in Tuesday morning's edition of Lenny Letter, the star of the Broadway play, "Eclipsed," wrote about how a journalist once asked why someone with her Hollywood status would decide to do "such a small play." For her, the question "felt quite silly" because the story of "Eclipsed" is far from "small." She wrote that the question exposed bigger societal expectations of women, especially women of color.

 "I knew there was a sense of what was expected of me, but this play felt so important to me that I had to do it, expectations be damned," she wrote. 

"I think as women, as women of color, as black women, too often we hear about what we 'need to do,'" she wrote. "How we need to behave, what we need to wear, what’s deemed as too much or not enough, the cultural politics of what society considers appropriate for us and for our lives."

Nyong'o, who is nominated for a Tony Award for her "Eclipsed" performance, wrote that she turned down projects in order to do the play because its message was so important to her. For inspiration, she looks to the careers of "fearless actresses" like Viola Davis and Tilda Swinton who "approach every role without ego or vanity" whether they're the star of the show or have a minor part. She also keeps in mind the damaging tropes about women of color that exist in Hollywood in an effort to combat them.

"So often women of color are relegated to playing simple tropes: the sidekick, the best friend, the noble savage, or the clown," she wrote. "We are confined to being a simple and symbolic peripheral character — one who doesn’t have her own journey or emotional landscape."

Nyong'o's decision to take on a project ultimately comes down to two vital questions. 

"What I am learning is that the most important questions you can ask yourself are 'What do I want?' and 'Who do I want to become?'" she wrote. 

And "Eclipsed" is exactly what Nyong'o wanted, "a work of incredible power" that is visible on stage and behind the scenes.

"I look at this play — it’s the first play on Broadway to feature an all-woman cast, playwright, and director, and the fact that we are all women of African descent makes it even more incredible — and I feel profound gratitude to be a part of it," she wrote.  

In her essay, she applauded the many women involved in the play, including her co-stars. She also applauded herself for taking on the project, a decision she made all on her own. 

"I am proud of my decision to take the time to sit with myself and not get caught up in what others want for me."

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A creative initiative is helping stitch together the lives of Bangladeshi factory workers outside of their grueling jobs.

Since February 2015, volunteers for the U.K.-based nonprofit Lensational have been giving free photography workshops to 35 female garment factory workers in Dhaka and Gazipur, who then have free rein to take photos in and around their workplaces.

These women typically work on hundreds of thousands of pieces of clothing for 14 to 16 hours every day, with only a short lunch break and no opportunity to chat during work hours, Sunnie Chiu, Lensational's program manager, told The WorldPost. They often feel lonely and alienated, she said.

Yet despite those long hours at work, Lensational discovered a group of creative and hopeful women eager to tell their stories.

There are at least 3 million factory workers in Bangladesh, the majority of whom are women.

"What we wanted to do was to overcome the victimized image of these workers. We want to change the perception that they also have agency and their lives are not just churning out clothes that we wear," said Bonnie Chiu, Lensational's co-founder and CEO (no relation to the group's program manager, Sunnie Chiu). "It's not just being confined to a space. They also have their own stories as mothers, as daughters."

Many of the women are illiterate, she noted. "For them, photography is a way to overcome the language barriers so they can share these stories with the wider world. They don't need to know how to read or write, but they can still share [their stories], because photography itself is a universal language."

The workers at the Dhaka garment factory initially recoiled from the cameras, Sunnie Chiu said. They were afraid that they would break them and wouldn't be able to afford to pay them back.

But after receiving encouragement and guidance on how to take the photos, they gained confidence by leaps and bounds. One woman said she never imagined that she would learn how to operate something other than a sewing machine, Chiu recalled.

"It was really hard for us to take the cameras from them" at the end of the session, said Mahbub Rahman, Lensational's Bangladesh program manager. Lensational's team continues to give photographic guidance and support to the women via text and phone.

Lensational's volunteer-led workshops are possible thanks to donations and proceeds from the sale of the factory workers' photos. The nonprofit relies on individuals and corporations to donate secondhand digital cameras for the workers to use.

Although the women participating in Lensational's workshops do not receive individual photo credits -- Bonnie Chiu told The WorldPost that the participants have assigned the copyright to Lensational -- they receive half the profits from the sale of their photographs.

The nonprofit plans to hold more workshops in the future, but doesn't currently have enough cameras to scale its work, Chiu said.

Lensational also operates beyond Bangladesh. Since the nonprofit was founded on International Women's Day in 2013, it has worked with 300 marginalized women in nine countries, from street hawkers in Myanmar to foreign domestic helpers in Hong Kong.

See more of the garment factory workers' photos below.

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One Florida man has proven he has stacks on stacks of compassion.

Greg Smith recently shared a story on Facebook about having lunch with Amy Joe, a homeless woman he befriended, every Tuesday in downtown Orlando. But their routine changed when she shared further information with him.

"Amy Joe kind of dropped a bomb on me," Smith, who is 25 and works downtown, explained in his post. "She began to tell me any money that she can collect she uses to rent books that help with learning to read instead of buying FOOD." 

Since then, he's been not only helping her to read, but he's also started a GoFundMe page to create the Amy Joe Foundation. Through the group, he hopes to help others in need.

"I want to be able to help anybody, whether it be giving them some food or clothes," Smith told ABC News. "I don't want to just narrow it down to helping people read because there's so many other people that need more help."

On Tuesdays, Smith reads a book from the library with Amy Joe. The woman uses the rest of the week to brush up on her reading skills. 

The 25-year-old mentioned in his Facebook post that he's been having lunch with Amy Joe every Tuesday for a few weeks now, and during their time together, he's felt charmed by her attitude. 

“For 30 minutes to an hour, I get to hear how positive she is even though she really has nothing.”

When Amy Joe told Smith about her will to read, and how her lack of reading skills has made it difficult to find a job, Smith felt emotional.

"This crushed me!!! She would rather learn to read to maybe find a job then eat!!!" he explained in the post. "I have been blessed with two amazing parents and a family that has always had resources to provide me with anything I wanted to do. Amy Joe has not."

Though Smith has been helping Amy Joe with reading since that conversation, he stresses that there are other individuals who also need a helping hand -- which is why he started work on the foundation. According to ABC News, he has reached out to a lawyer to get the organization off the ground and has decided to make the group's slogan "one person at a time." 

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This morning, the sweetheart of musical theater, "Hamilton," shattered records by earning 16 Tony Award nominations in categories spanning acting, directing, composition, design, choreography and more.

The recognition was hardly surprising, given the fact that the production has dominated headlines, skyrocketed to the tops of Spotify playlists, and essentially sold out its shows until January of next year. Tony speculators were practically licking their lips in anticipation of Lin-Manuel Miranda's domination, predicting weeks before the announcements that his hip-hop-infused musical relaying a different kind of Founding Fathers' saga would surpass "The Producers" and "Billy Elliott," securing a record number of nods for any one Broadway show. 

Just because the nominations weren't surprising, though, doesn't mean they aren't exciting.

The nominations for "Hamilton," along with other plays and musicals like "The Color Purple," "Eclipsed," "On Your Feet!," and "Shuffle Along," reveal a picture of Broadway far more diverse than seasons before it. These shows feature actors of color in lead roles, highlight the experiences of women and minorities in the U.S. and beyond, and empower writers and directors breaking barriers in their categories. They prove, along with a litany of shows that weren't nominated, that this year was a different kind of year for the Great White Way.

Mashable's Aliza Weinberger summarized the broader 2015-16 season succinctly:

Of the 15 new musicals that premiered between the fall of 2015 and the spring of 2016, 11 feature cast members of color. Four of those shows include only actors of color in their lead roles. And of the 16 returning shows running this season, eight feature diverse casts and stories -- ones that don’t just focus on white people and their problems -- while six more boast non-white cast members.

"Diversity is the theme for the entire season," Tony-winning producer Ken Davenport ("Kinky Boots," "Spring Awakening") explained in an interview with The Huffington Post. "We're experiencing a selection of shows that nominators have to choose from... it's the most diverse group of artists and shows we've seen. Especially when compared to the lack of diversity in Hollywood."

Broadway's offering something that Hollywood isn't.

The pop culture world was rightly angry when the Oscars recognized only one person of color in its lead categories (Best Director, Best Picture, and all four acting categories): Alejandro G. Iñárritu for "The Revenant."

However, following a year of #OscarsSoWhite, critics across the Internet are using a different kind of hashtag ahead of the theater world's version of the Academy Awards: #TonysSoDiverse. To compare, in its lead categories (Best Book and Best Score, and all eight acting categories), the Tonys recognized a highly deserving and robust group of acclaimed writers and actors of color this year: Danai Gurira, Pascale Armand, Saycon Sengbloh and Lupita Nyong'o for the play "Eclipsed"; Miranda, Leslie Odom, Jr., Phillipa Soo, Daveed Diggs, Christopher Jackson, and Renée Elise Goldsberry for "Hamilton"; Cynthia Erivo and Danielle Brooks for "The Color Purple," George C. Wolfe, Adrienne Warren and Brandon Victor Dixon for "Shuffle Along"; and Sophie Okonedo for "The Crucible." 

While Broadway has long been a venue for storytelling that moves beyond cis white male American history (think: "Rent," "Fun Home," "West Side Story," even Miranda's previous "In The Heights"), a quick look at the plays and musicals offered up to Broadway-goers this year gives a glimpse into why the Tonys are putting the Oscars to shame this year in particular.

Davenport first lists the familiar "Hamilton" -- filled out by a largely non-white cast of singers and dancers -- as an "exceptionally diverse" example of this year's Broadway offerings, and a reminder of how casting can work in favor of the non-realistic, imaginative art form that is theater. "The brilliance of it is that none of the people on the stage look like the Founding Fathers," he said. "By making specific choices, from actors to the music, we can make a strong artistic statement."

The stories being told this year -- I think, finally, they're all American stories. They don't just have to [feature] a bunch of white faces, we know that now.
Ken Davenport

Productions like "Shuffle Along" (subtitled: "the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed") and a revival of "The Color Purple" similarly give way to strong casts of people of color, telling stories that go beyond white narratives. Gurira's "Eclipsed" relays the tale of five women brought together by political upheaval in their home country of Liberia, featuring the first all-black, all-female cast. It's also directed by a black woman, Liesl Tommy.

This year's musical productions have also drawn audiences to stories told by historically marginalized minorities including Asian- and Hispanic-Americans. The musical "On Your Feet!," based on the lives and music of Cuban-American singer Gloria Estefan and her husband Emilio, stars a predominately Hispanic cast including Ana Villafañe and Josh Segarra. The musical recounts Gloria and Emilio's efforts to cross over from the Latin market, cracking relevant jokes along the way: "You know how white those people are?" Emilio asks while in Sweden. "It was like watching a room full of Q-Tips bouncing all over the place." 

Jay Kuo's "Allegiance," which did not nab a Tony nod despite an acclaimed performance by George Takei, relays the story of the Kimura family, a part of the 120,000-person group of Japanese-Americans forced into internment camps following the events of Pearl Harbor during World War II. And there's still more productions lifting up writers and actors of color: "Amazing Grace,""Disaster!," James Earl Jones and Cicely Tyson in "The Gin Game," Forest Whitaker in "Hughie."

"The stories being told this year -- I think, finally, they're all American stories," Davenport told HuffPost. "They don't just have to [feature] a bunch of white faces, we know that now."

Davenport even hoists up his own Tony-nominated show "Spring Awakening" as yet another example of the many sides of diversity we're seeing in the 2015-2016 Broadway season. "Half of the cast is deaf or hard of hearing," he added, "and it features the first ever woman in a wheelchair. It's hard to believe it's taken this many years for that to happen."

OK, so Broadway isn't perfect.

"It’s been an extraordinary year for diversity on Broadway," "Hamilton" star and creator Miranda told Here & Now's Karyn Miller-Medzon. "But that being said, it’s all an accident of timing."

Last year’s Tonys, he emphasized, were just as white as this year’s Oscars. So before producers and directors pat themselves on the backs, Miranda thinks its worthwhile for the theater industry to recognize that this year could be a lovely anomaly if steps are not taken to ensure that the "three theater owners and 40-something theaters" that make up Broadway are continuously working to bring diversity to upcoming seasons.

In fact, a Guardian article written in August of last year remarked specifically upon the absence of plays by women or writers of color. Writer Alexis Soloski noted that less than 25 percent of plays produced in America during the 2014-2015 season were by women, while over the last three years, only 12 percent of American plays were written by people of color. Perhaps casts look different today, but the writers' rooms, Soloski posits, are still very white. 

Forbes published a similarly dismal report earlier this year, comparing Broadway's historic lack of diversity on and off stage to #OscarsSoWhite. "Since the awards began -- 1929 for the Oscars, 1947 for the Tonys  -- over 95 percent of all nominees have been white, with the Tonys recognizing more people of color by 1 percent," Lee Seymour wrote. "The big difference is in the ratios: The Tonys recognize twice as many black artists, but the Oscars recognize three times as many Asians and Latinos."

The New York Times' Michael Paulson acknowledged that other smaller plays have also been able to draw diverse audiences with diverse casting choices, including a revival of "Fences" with Denzel Washington and Viola Davis, and Chris Rock's "The ________ With the Hat." But because these plays generally have limited runs in smaller theaters, they tend not to influence the larger theater landscape like a longstanding musical or play can. This is why this year's list of Tony Award nominees -- stacked with nods for "Hamilton," "The Color Purple," "Off Your Feet!", "Spring Awakening" and "Shuffle Along" -- is so important.

Unfortunately, according to some predictions, the next season on Broadway is unlikely to be as diverse as this one. Broadway has never experienced a season as diverse as this past year, at least when it comes to the people on stage. And if theater bigwigs want to ensure that diversity in theater is a movement, and not a moment, they'll have to address the lack of women and people of color behind the curtain. 

So what can be done to ensure #TonysSoDiverse continues?

It's no secret that money -- and the potential for making it -- is a driving force behind a Broadway season. "Broadway’s decision-makers simply don’t prioritize racial equality," Seymour wrote in another Forbes piece. "Several producers and ad execs ... told me that 'green is the only color that matters.'"

In essence, financial calculations are being made, and those calculations rest at least partially on audience statistics: Who exactly, the producers ask themselves, will buy our (oftentimes highly priced) tickets? Well, women, first of all. "Women generally represent 68 percent of the audience," The Broadway League reports. "Moreover, women are more likely to make the purchasing decision than their male counterparts."

The Broadway League also found that the predominately white audiences have been slowly declining; while 83 percent of Broadway goers were white five years ago, today the count measures 80 percent. Mashable points out that we'll have to wait until 2017 before we know how demographics have changed this season, but there's reason to believe Broadway mined new audiences in 2016, and theater executives should take note.

Theater unions have been doing their part to raise awareness of the importance of diverse cast and crew choices, too. Ultimately, though, in order to ensure that #TonysSoDiverse continues, and that new crops of audiences venture to Manhattan, the theater community needs more diverse writers telling stories that move beyond the traditionally white experience.

If you want more diversity on our stages, than we need diverse writers.

"If you want more diversity on our stages, than we need diverse writers," Davenport reiterated in our interview. "I like to use this analogy: If you want a different color flower, you plant a different seed, a seed that grows roots and sprouts the type of flower that you want. The seeds in this analogy are the writers. Of course, people tend to write what they know. The more diverse writers, the more female writers, the more we'll see those types of experiences."

Zakiyyah Alexander, a member of the Kilroys, a group of Los Angeles-based producers and playwrights tackling gender parity in the theater world, agrees. As HuffPost reported last year, the Kilroys are behind an annual project subtly titled "The List," which collects together the names of female and trans playwrights who’ve written plays in the past year. "We created The List because time and time again we heard that artistic directors would love to produce female playwrights, but were having trouble locating good plays," Alexander explained to The Huffington Post. "Ultimately, we know it’s possible to program an exciting season of theater that reflects the landscape we live in, which is more than just a landscape of men."

We'll have to wait a few months before we know what's on the Broadway horizon in 2016-17, but in the meantime, Hollywood executives should be taking notes. Studio heads need only tune into to the Tony Awards this June to see what a truly diverse celebration of the entertainment industry looks like. And they need only peruse the #Ham4Ham chronicles of social media to know that audiences are on board.

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