The UK's arts councils announce the 12 commissions, worth £5.4m, that have been selected for Artists Taking the Lead, one of the schemes for the Cultural Olympiad. This is one of the few major Olympics arts projects that shows tangible progress; since the Royal Opera House chief executive Tony Hall was announced as the new Cultural Olympiad chair this summer, and a fresh board was created, the new team is, I understand, taking the Cultural Olympiad back to first principles to work out what it really ought to consist of. We may expect to kiss goodbye, then, to some of the more airy-fairy schemes originally dreamed up by Hall's predecessor, Southbank artistic director Jude Kelly. But what will take their place? The Tate's new collaboration with Aardman, in which primary-school-age children up and down the country will help make an animated film, is one obvious contender. Meanwhile, the board is even now firming up a job description for a director of the Cultural Olympiad, a post that has lain vacant for over a year.