Douglas McLennan
Doug is the editor of ArtsJournal
How The Tampa Museum Prepared For A Hurricane
“Our facility has been designed to withstand a direct hit from a category three on the second floor, we just completed a 25,000 square-foot renovation,...
The Internet Archive Has Been Hacked, Taken Down
An illicit JavaScript pop-up on the Internet Archive proclaimed on Wednesday afternoon that the site had suffered a major data breach. Hours later, the...
Who Invented The Marvel Multiverse? Look Back To Balzac
I believe the first person to master the fictional multiverse was the 19th-century French novelist, Honoré de Balzac, in his monumental work La Comédie Humaine (The...
Cleanup On Aisle 3! DVD-Rental Company Goes Bankrupt, Strands Its Retail Boxes Across America
Redbox’s parent filed for bankruptcy in the summer, saying it lacked the cash to buy the rights to many new releases, and the kiosk...
Monet Pastel Stolen By Nazis Returned To Family Generations Later
Adalbert Parlagi and his son Franz kept meticulous ownership and search records. After Franz’s death in 2012, Françoise Parlagi stumbled upon her father’s cache...
Manhattan’s Trinity Church Bells Host Musicians In Ringing Contest
Bands had traveled as far as hundreds of miles to climb into the landmark Trinity Church tower and strike eight bells in a complex,...
New Toronto Opera Festival
Opera 5’s Toronto Opera Festival is Toronto’s first-ever festival to combine opera and musical theatre in a celebration of Canadian creators and performers. - Ludwig...
Pittsburgh Ballet Advertises On Streaming Services And Sees Returns
Beginning last season the ballet company also began advertising its more family-friendly shows on big-name streaming services like Hulu and Disney+ and even in...
Today’s AJ Highlights
Good morning: Here are today's highlights:
Remembering Lewis Lapham, My First Boss: "It’s a strange thing to have a walk-on role in the fifth act...
A Provocative Art Premise Challenges Convention
While the court’s decision to uphold MONA’s right to maintain a women-only space is significant, it’s Kaechele’s performative celebration outside the courthouse that deserves...
A New Jazz Club Model In Pricey Seattle?
In pricey, increasingly corporate Seattle, the Fellowship venue represents a conspicuously unlucrative exercise. Its modest 48-seat layout and limited wine and beer bar give...
Canadian Prairies Try A “Got Milk?” Style Campaign To Promote Arts
The creatives from Winnipeg’s Show and Tell Agency are relatively safe, especially compared with Michael Bay’s bonkers original “Got Milk?” commercial. But there’s a...
Why Do Some Arts Organizations Do Better Than Others?
"When it comes to finding and delighting audiences, I have found the Trend Busters fall into two participation philosophies: a Go Broad approach and...
Close Examination Of AI Art Reveals Human Side
Close reading even such an unserious set of prompts and images offers clues about the scaffolding behind these operations, as well as broader insights...
Soprano Storms Onstage To Demand End To Colleague’s Encore
The celebrated soprano Angela Gheorghiu, who was singing the title role in a performance on Sunday, stormed onstage and demanded that he stop, according to local...
Is It Important To Distill One’s Philosophy To A “Saying”?
When I think of sayings, I think first of the early Greek philosophers—the so-called pre-Socratics—whose ideas, if they wrote them down at all, survive...
What Does It Mean For Writing To Be “Great”?
The Swedish Academy is not here to tell you what writers you might like. Greatness is not the same as popularity. It may even...
Exploring The Dudamel Phenomenon
Not since Leonard Bernstein has a conductor done as much as Dudamel to make classical music accessible — or so thoroughly captured the public...
Today’s AJ Highlights
Good morning: Is there any reason opera shouldn't be THE art form of 21st Century? We live in a time of story, of multimedia,...
Longtime Houston Alley Theatre Managing Director To Step Down
The Alley put out a press statement that included a long list of financial achievements during the years Dean Gladden has been managing director....
The Fake Van Goghs That Fooled The Experts
Experts at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam say three paintings in private collections previously believed to be by the artist are fakes, including...
The Case For Why Painting Still Matters
In an age of cold digital screens and AI-enhanced visual manipulation, we have been told that canvas, oil and pigment are becoming irrelevant, or...
Kansas City’s Iconic Nelson Atkins Museum To Expand Again
The institution has launched a global competition as part of a larger rebranding for the museum, unfolding in 2025. The renovation, it hopes, will attract wider...
Richard Serra And The Tension Between Site And Context
"If you go into a community to make a work and you try to follow the demands of the local people, which are never...
Can Opera Ever Be Widely Popular Again? (And What Would It Look Like?)
“We can’t dumb down the audience. We have to continue as composers of opera in the 21st century to move people, and you don’t...