A belated shout out to Festival Albertine Books in French and English held at the Cultural Services | French Embassy in the US last month.

There could not have been a more timely event—and we didn’t even know Trump would be president then.

This series, moderated by Ta-Nehisi Coates, explored how France and the US are, or are not, addressing the issue of race in the arts.

A highlight for me was the dance panel moderated by Jennifer Homans ofNew York University and with the first public confession by Benjamin Millepied of just exactly went wrong for him at the Paris Opera. Normally these things are stuffed under the rug. But Benjamin’s outing of the Paris Opera Ballet’s historical racism—common to most ballet companies—was an eye opener.

What are we to do about cross cultural and cross racial collaboration and participation in the coming four years? Albertine attempted to at least define and describe it. Solutions will be even harder to come by, but must be in place in order to combat what will surely be a retreat from global exchange.