Douglas McLennan
Doug is the editor of ArtsJournal
Have America’s Cities Entered A “Doom Loop”?
Scholars are increasingly voicing concern that the shift to working from home, spurred by the Covid pandemic, will bring the three-decade renaissance of major...
New “Democracy’s Library” Aims To Bring Research To The Masses
Democratic governments, at all levels, spend billions of dollars publishing reports, manuals, books, videos so that all can read and learn. That is the...
The Unstoppable Tania Leon
León says she never planned to become a composer, much less one who earned a Pulitzer Prize. - NPR
Woman Artist Finally Gets Old Master Cred
After her death in 1689 in Brussels, Michaelina Wautier largely became a footnote in art history, occasionally drawing a mention here or there. Much...
It’s Worth Reviving The Fading Art Of Writing Longhand
I’m old enough to remember writing by hand when it was the only choice. Then I fell to the seductions of these newfangled things...
Italian Government Fights Over Museum Policy: Free Museums?
During the election campaign Giorgia Meloni, defined culture as a “cardinal strategic point”, noting that the country’s arts industry generates roughly €85bn annually. The...
Time To Reconsider David Mamet?
Since Mamet’s 2008 essay in The Village Voice, “Why I Am No Longer a Brain-Dead Liberal,” he has been subject to a towering wave of enmity from the...
Twenty-Five Years Ago The YBA’s Took The Art World By Storm. Here’s Where They...
The YBAs are now all middle-aged. Hirst is 57, Emin 59, the Chapmans 56 and 60 respectively, and the years have been kind to...
Is The BBC “Dumbing Down” To Appeal To Lower Income Viewers?
The broadcaster also said it would try to attract viewers from lower socio-economic groups by making sports documentaries and crime shows, after criticism from Ofcom that...
Internet Culture Now Is Mainstream Culture
Boundaries between “traditional” culture and online culture have been breaking down. Television audiences have shrunk. Newspaper circulations are in terminal decline. Meanwhile, people have been...
Democrats New House Leader Has Been Congressional Champion Of Music
Hakeem Jeffries co-sponsored the Music Modernization Act, the most important copyright law passed in decades, as well as the Copyright Alternative in Small-Claims Enforcement Act...
Phillips Collection Gets A New Director
He replaces Dorothy Kosinski, who led the Phillips since 2008, increased endowment from $18 million to $100 million, expanded art holdings from 2,000 to...
Why Is Theatre Dealing With (Or Not) Climate Change The Way It Is?
“Perhaps the way we respond to the crisis is part of the crisis,” observed Bayo Akomolafe. Producers can’t decide how climate change should be...
Why Is TikTok Obsessed With “Alvin And The Chipmunks” Music
The whole music culture, it seems, is now under the sway of a chipmunk aesthetic. This, to my way of thinking, is even more foreboding...
When Did Being “Clever” Become A Bad Thing?
Is there really something wrong with being clever? Even if it can get on our nerves sometimes, its associations remain overwhelmingly positive: Cleverness is...
Alexa Now Helps Kids Create Stories
To create a new story, your child would begin by speaking, “Alexa, make a story,” and then following several prompts. The AI then generates...
A Prescription For Our Age: Long Poems?
Long poems really had been popular, with wide and diverse readerships, at various times in literary history. Is this a kind of reading that...
Berlin’s Massive New Museum Of The 20th Century Under Attack As “Climate Killer”
There has been growing criticism of its main construction material, concrete – one of the highest contributors to carbon dioxide emissions – and of...
Artwork Rescued Before The Bombing Of Kyiv Goes On Show In Spain
Titled “In the Eye of the Storm: Modernism in Ukraine, 1900–1930s,” the show is branded as the most comprehensive survey of Ukraine’s avant-garde movement. -...
Plans For Makeover Of London’s National Gallery Assailed As “Clownish”
The architect of the controversial Sainsbury Wing of the National Gallery in London has publicly hit back at plans to completely rebuild it, accusing the...
Public Libraries Are Setting Up Their Own Music Streaming Services
Introduction to local artists is common among local libraries using streaming services. “It turns out that people who think they know their city’s music...
Qatar Announces New Round Of Big New Museums
In the run-up to the tournament, the country’s authority for cultural institutions and heritage sites has announced a wave of future construction projects—and revealed...
Disney Superfans: Bob Chapek Didn’t Understand Disney’s Magic
We also pushed to have Mr. Chapek fired because he didn’t believe in Disney magic. Disney is so much more than just another big...
AMC Networks To Cut Staff By 20 Percent (Including CEO)
Today’s staff memo from AMC Networks chairman James Dolan, whose family is the company’s controlling shareholder, was particularly grim, noting that “the mechanisms for...
This Year’s Venice Biennale Sets Attendance Record
It must, however, be noted that the 2022 exhibition ran longer than usual, stretching over 197 days instead of 173 days in 2019. According...
