🌞 Picasso piece found

As you’re reading this newsletter, Nedd Brockmann is probably running. If you open this email later today, he’ll probably still be running.

Two years after capturing the hearts of Australians as he ran from Perth to Sydney over 46 gruelling days, raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for charity, Brockmann has his sights set on another epic task: 1610km (1000 miles) over ten days with the target of raising $10m for homelessness charity We Are Mobilise.

The current world record for a 1000-mile run is about ten and a half days, set by legendary Greek ultramarathon runner Yiannis Kouros in 1988. To beat it, Brockmann is running 160km (about four marathons) a day around an athletics track in Sydney.

Anyway, guess it’s time to get out of bed now…

A junk dealer in Italy has stumbled across an original Pablo Picasso piece in an abandoned home.

Luigi Lo Rosso, who spent many of his days trawling through abandoned possessions, happened across the rolled-up canvas in the basement of a villa near Capri nearly sixty years ago.

According to an interview with his son, Lo Rosso (then 24 years old) didn’t think anything of the small ‘Picasso’ in the top corner. Instead, he put the canvas painting into a cheap frame and gave it to his wife, who wasn’t overly impressed by the artwork.

The artwork sat in their family home for about 50 years, until Lo Rosso’s son saw Picasso’s ‘Buste de femme Dora Maar’ in an art history book, and went home to ask his parents about the familiar piece.

Realising the work in their home might be both deeply valuable and historic, the family then spent decades trying to authenticate the piece.

Last month, it was confirmed that the painting is authentic. It’s believed to be valued at a cool $AU9.7 million - not bad for abandoned ‘junk’!

A woman in Chile watches the solar eclipse wearing protective glasses. A solar eclipse happens when the Moon passes between the Sun and Earth.

One woman and two men with severe autoimmune conditions have gone into remission (a period of time when an illness is less severe or is not affecting someone) after being treated with bioengineered immune cells.

According to Nature, the three people from China were “the first people with autoimmune disorders to be treated with engineered immune cells created from donor cells, rather than ones collected from their own bodies".

How does this work? Well, I would try to explain it in my own words, but they’ve done it so well, so here goes: “CAR-T-cell therapy typically involves extracting immune cells known as T cells from the person being treated. The cells are embellished with CAR proteins that target B cells and are then re-infused into the person’s body.”

Turns out that this could be a really major step forward in terms of producing these sorts of therapies, especially for those people with severe autoimmune conditions. Researchers will continue tracking those patients to understand if they remain symptom-free in the years to come. Definitely one to keep an eye on!

This year marks the 10th anniversary of Indigenous Business Month, and we're spotlighting some Indigenous businesses making an impact:

This week’s community good news comes courtesy of Bridge It. If you’re not familiar with the work of Bridge It, it’s an incredible organisation that provides women who have experienced the out-of-home-care system or homelessness with a place to live, a support system and a community.

Bridge It already had nine existing homes in Melbourne, but recently, the group opened seven additional studio apartments to support more young women.

Through this program, Bridge It is able to offer 12-18 month stays, along with wrap-around services to pave the way towards independent housing and employment. There really is a lot of good in the world when you start looking for it!

This week’s recommendation is absolutely and utterly unoriginal, but it’s too good not to recommend. ‘Nobody Wants This’ on Netflix, starring Adam Brody and Kristen Bell, is just *chefs kiss*. The basic premise is that Brody’s character is a Rabbi who starts dating Bell’s character, who is not Jewish. It’s based on the true story of Erin Foster’s life (though her husband isn’t a Rabbi) and it’s just wickedly funny and a real rom-com.

It should be said that there’s been some criticism levelled at Foster for the depiction of Jewish women in the show, which you can read about here.

Have any of you watched it? Let’s chat!