Number 583 in The Amazing Spider-Man series will see the well-know super-hero attend Barack Obama's inauguration day, according to publisher Marvel. The comic book will be on sale on January 14, one week before Obama takes up office.

When Peter Knapp launched his career back in the 1950s he was one the very first art directors. His prolonged spell at the French fashion and lifestyle magazine "Elle" enabled him to reinvent the codes of print layout.

French gourmet desert chef Gaston Lenôtre passed away at the age of 88 on Thursday, according to the chef's company, Maison Lenôtre. He became famous worldwide for his gastronomic creations.

The world-famous red, white and blue portrait of President-elect Barack Obama, designed by Shepard Fairey, has been acquired by the Smithsonian Institution and will be on show at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC.

A Chinese millionaire will welcome tourists into the Hong Kong mansion of martial art and cinema legend Bruce Lee. For a short period after the actor's death in 1973, the house served as a brothel.

Japan's imperial family attended a sombre ceremony to mark the 20th anniversary of the death of Emperor Hirohito, who was seen in the West as a symbol of the country's World War II aggression.

Giovanni Venosa, who played a clan boss of the Camorra, the Naples mafia, in the hit film Gomorrah, has been arrested a second time, near Naples, for mafia activities. He is the third actor from the film to have been arrested for mafia activity.

Jett Travolta, the teenage son of actor John Travolta (pictured), died suddenly after a seizure during a family vacation in the Bahamas. The sixteen-year-old, who was Travolta’s only son, had a history of seizures.

This year in France, 15 people have been named ''masters of the arts''. The title is awarded by the minister of culture to artisans with exceptional talents and skills.

The six major US film studios each exceeded one billion dollars in revenue for their overseas operations in 2008, according to a media report. Hollywood productions in all topped a new record, with 9.9 billion dollars in overseas profits last year.

French actress Isabelle Huppert, two-time Cannes best actress winner and inductee into the Legion of Honour, will head the 2009 Cannes jury, say organisers. This year's festival, the 62nd edition, will take place from May 13 to 24.

Ibrahim Malouf is half-French, half-Lebanese. He is the son of Nassim Malouf, the musician who re-invented the trumpet for the Arab world.

An average show at Paris's can-can capital, Le Moulin Rouge, features 1,000 costumes on 70 dancers. Glamorous and feminine, cabaret fashion has enjoyed renewed popularity since the film "Moulin Rouge" with Nicole Kidman.

Millions of American viewers may lose access to MTV, Nickelodeon and more than a dozen other cable television channels on Thursday if media giants Viacom and Time Warner fail to agree on a renewed licensing agreement.

In this new edition of the magazine: Chico, the founder of Gipsy Kings, presents his new album, and Mistubishi's robot Wakamaru performs Japanese theatre.

Fashion designer Ted Lapidus, whose career soared in the 1960s and 1970s with the unisex and safari looks, died on Monday of leukemia at the age of 70 in a hospital in Cannes on the French Rivera. Pictured: a Lapidus design.

The "One Laptop per Child" foundation has used a digital reconstruction of the former Beatles singer John Lennon's voice and image in a TV campaign designed to promote access to solar-powered laptop computers for the world's poorest children.

Serzh Sarkisian, president of Armenia, has granted his country's citizenship to the 84-year-old French singer Charles Aznavour. Declared a "hero of the Armenian people", Aznavour also serves as a cultural ambassador for Armenia at the UN.

US singer and actress Eartha Kitt, a double Emmy award-winning actress who was also nominated for two Tonys and two Grammys in more than half a century of performing, has died at the age of 81 from colon cancer, according to her publicist.