Today’s AJ highlights: The Washington Post has decimated its arts staff in a series of paper-wide layoffs, a retreat from curated expertise that leaves the nation’s seat of power without its primary critical mirrors. This media contraction coincides with deepening skepticism over the Kennedy Center’s planned two-year closure; while the facility undoubtedly requires upgrades, arts management experts are questioning whether a total shutdown of the campus is a necessary renovation or a convenient administrative erasure.
Bruce Springsteen’s “Streets of Minneapolis” has emerged as a prototype for the digital-age protest song—a rapid-response circulation that bypasses traditional gatekeepers to meet the moment in real-time. This energy is seen in the growth of “Resistance Theater,” where artists are creating rapid-fire work in response to administration attacks. Perhaps the most “incisive” blow, however, comes from the judiciary: Judge Fred Biery’s recent ruling challenge to executive power is being celebrated as a “mischievous” and “erudite” piece of prose that marshals history and literature to defend civil liberties.
The aesthetics of the new economy are also coming into literal, golden focus. While boosterism is being analyzed as a quintessentially American economic strategy—one that bets on optimism as a viable fiscal engine—crypto investors have literalized this “optimism” by paying $300,000 for a 15-foot gold-leaf statue of the President. Finally, the Philadelphia Museum of Art has reversed its disastrous rebrand of last fall following public and staff outcry.
All of today’s stories below.
