AJ Four Ways: Text Only (by date) | headlines only
DANCE
IDEAS
- Who Owns The Stage Now?
Good Afternoon,
Byron Allen built a media empire on one insight: the money is in owning the content, not performing it (Los Angeles Times). Several of today’s stories read like institutions taking that lesson to heart. Cincinnati Opera is committing $6 million to three new works by Black creators (Cincinnati Business Courier). Roxane Gay and Debbie Millman bought The Rumpus rather than launch something new, wagering an established name is worth more than a clean slate (Publishers Weekly). And Lincoln Center is making its biggest commitment to dance in decades (The New York Times).
The counter-move came from Fox, which spent $22 billion not on shows but on Roku — buying the pipe instead of what flows through it (Vulture). Underneath all of it, the stakes: Sydney’s Song Company, 40 years old and one of the world’s finest vocal ensembles, filed for liquidation (Limelight).
On a lighter note, London’s Shaftesbury Theatre will become the Judi Dench Theatre (The Guardian).
Doug
- How Byron Allen Went From Standup Comic To Media Mogul To Stephen Colbert’s Time Slot
“He was one of the first entertainers to recognize that there was more money to be made in owning your content, rather than just performing it. Over the last three decades, he has built a multibillion-dollar business, Allen Media Group, which now has 2,000 employees across various media properties.” – Los Angeles Times (MSN)
- Rex Reed Hated Everything
In my ongoing conversations with him, along with the despairingly pungent emails he regularly sent from his AOL address Rex seemed to interpret the glut of mediocre films he was forced to endure as a highly personal affront to strict standards of taste, decency and class. – The Hollywood Reporter
- New from MolokoA. Robert Lee’s Omnibus Edition Is Here to Go
<a href="https://www.artsjournal.com/herman/2026/06/new-from-molokoa-robert-lees-omnibus-edition-is-here-to-go.html" title="New from Moloko
A. Robert Lee’s Omnibus Edition Is - The Song Company, Australia’s Leading Vocal Chamber Ensemble, Is Closing Permanently
Founded in 1984 in Sydney, The Song Company, which consisted of six to eight singers, regularly performed music ranging from the Middle Ages and Renaissance through the Romantic era up to newly-commissioned works. The ensemble went into receivership in 2019 due to financial difficulties; now it has filed for liquidation. – Limelight (Australia)
ISSUES
- The Hague’s Mauritshuis Museum May Keep Its Rembrandts, Rules Judge
Abraham Bredius, museum director from 1889 to 1909, bequeathed the Mauritshuis 25 of his own Old Master paintings — by Rembrandt, Jan Steen, and others — on condition that the works be displayed and not lent out. Because the museum doesn’t display all of them all the time, Bredius’s heirs sued — and lost. – ArtDependence
- The Art Commissioned By The Obama Presidential Library
For the Obama Presidential Center on the South Side of Chicago, Barack and Michelle Obama commissioned original works by 30 artists from diverse backgrounds, a bold move never seen at such scale at a presidential library. – The Guardian
- 11th-Century Cathedral In Kyiv Set On Fire By Russian Missiles
“A massive Russian missile and drone attack on Kyiv has badly damaged the Dormition Cathedral in the Pechersk Lavra monastery complex, a UNESCO world heritage site and one of Ukraine’s most significant religious and cultural sites.” – The Guardian
- Sagrada Familia Might Have Topped Out, But Big Challenges Ahead
“The biggest [challenge] will be Glory Facade, which is the main facade. Maybe it will take 10 years, but we don’t yet have a fixed schedule.” – Dezeen
- Behold The New Obama Library
After standing in the glow of this new South Side landmark, I admittedly feel like a buzzkill focusing on documents, kind of like visiting the Sistine Chapel and contemplating the plumbing. – The Atlantic
MEDIA
- Highmark Mann Center Opens On A Roll
The Highmark Mann opened five decades ago as the Robin Hood Dell West, the local summer retreat for the Philadelphia Orchestra, and it has evolved into a bona fide arts center that feels both sylvan and city. – Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)
- Preservationists Sue To Block Trump’s “National Garden Of American Heroes”
“Congress has made clear that the National Mall is … not a personal sandbox for each President to renovate however he likes,” argues the lawsuit. “To that end, Congress has decreed that no new ‘commemorative work’ shall be located within ‘the great cross-axis of the Mall’.” – USA Today
- Federal Court Orders Kennedy Center To Make A Plan For Staying Open And Offering Programming
“Judge Christopher R. Cooper of Federal District Court in Washington asked for a status report from the Kennedy Center that would include plans for ‘public access and ongoing programming, activities and operations’ should the center stay open past July 4, which the president proposed as a closing date.” – The New York Times
- A Professor Despairs Of What AI Reveals About Students
There will always be idealistic, ink-stained people who want to devote their lives to scholarly pursuits—their role to inspire young people to love ideas as they do. But this transfer, more than anything else in the academy, has been increasingly blocked by A.I. in the classroom. – The New Yorker
- What We Learned About How To Celebrate A Divided America’s Birthday From The Bicentennial
Philadelphia, as the cradle of American independence, was supposed to be the center of attention 50 years ago. From the beginning, deliberations involved arguably the most important architect of the late 20th century, Louis I. Kahn. – Architecture and the City
MUSIC
- Publishers Sue Website For Pirating
Fresh off of last month’s victory against pirate web site Anna’s Archive, 13 publishers across all segments of the industry have allied to sue yet another pirate site, WeLib, for copyright infringement. – Publishers Weekly
- New Owners Roxane Gay And Debbie Millman Relaunch Online Lit Magazine The Rumpus
“We’ll still be covering, with the same rigor and integrity, fiction, essays, poetry, book reviews, author interviews, and so forth,” said Millman. “But we’re also going to include more design criticism, art criticism, and overall cultural coverage. The soul of the writing … will be very similar; topically, it will be different.” – Publishers Weekly
- Have New Books Gotten More Expensive? Yes, But …
Hardcovers which for years cost around $20 are now routinely marked at $30 or more. However, both publishing executives and booksellers maintain that the price of new books has not kept up with post-2020 inflation in the economy as a whole (including their own supply chains). – USA Today
- “Graphic Journalist” Joe Sacco Says Penguin Random House India Censored His Book On Sectarian Riots
The Indian subsidiary of the publishing giant has withdrawn Sacco’s The Once and Future Riot, an account of the 2013 street battles between Hindus and Muslims in Muzaffarnagar. Sacco says the publisher sent him a list of edits that amounted to “finding excuses” not to release the book. – The Wire (India)
- Are Most Children’s Books “Crud”?
“There are so many bad kids’ books,” Mac Barnett writes, “and kids’ books are bad in so many different ways.” He states that “a big reason for our low opinion of children’s books is simply that lots of children’s books are bad.” – The New Yorker
PEOPLE
- Who Owns The Stage Now?
Good Afternoon,
Byron Allen built a media empire on one insight: the money is in owning the content, not performing it (Los Angeles Times). Several of today’s stories read like institutions taking that lesson to heart. Cincinnati Opera is committing $6 million to three new works by Black creators (Cincinnati Business Courier). Roxane Gay and Debbie Millman bought The Rumpus rather than launch something new, wagering an established name is worth more than a clean slate (Publishers Weekly). And Lincoln Center is making its biggest commitment to dance in decades (The New York Times).
The counter-move came from Fox, which spent $22 billion not on shows but on Roku — buying the pipe instead of what flows through it (Vulture). Underneath all of it, the stakes: Sydney’s Song Company, 40 years old and one of the world’s finest vocal ensembles, filed for liquidation (Limelight).
On a lighter note, London’s Shaftesbury Theatre will become the Judi Dench Theatre (The Guardian).
Doug
- How Byron Allen Went From Standup Comic To Media Mogul To Stephen Colbert’s Time Slot
“He was one of the first entertainers to recognize that there was more money to be made in owning your content, rather than just performing it. Over the last three decades, he has built a multibillion-dollar business, Allen Media Group, which now has 2,000 employees across various media properties.” – Los Angeles Times (MSN)
- Rex Reed Hated Everything
In my ongoing conversations with him, along with the despairingly pungent emails he regularly sent from his AOL address Rex seemed to interpret the glut of mediocre films he was forced to endure as a highly personal affront to strict standards of taste, decency and class. – The Hollywood Reporter
- New from MolokoA. Robert Lee’s Omnibus Edition Is Here to Go<a href="https://www.artsjournal.com/herman/2026/06/new-from-molokoa-robert-lees-omnibus-edition-is-here-to-go.html" title="New from Moloko
A. Robert Lee’s Omnibus Edition Is - The Song Company, Australia’s Leading Vocal Chamber Ensemble, Is Closing Permanently
Founded in 1984 in Sydney, The Song Company, which consisted of six to eight singers, regularly performed music ranging from the Middle Ages and Renaissance through the Romantic era up to newly-commissioned works. The ensemble went into receivership in 2019 due to financial difficulties; now it has filed for liquidation. – Limelight (Australia)
PEOPLE
- Who Owns The Stage Now?
Good Afternoon,
Byron Allen built a media empire on one insight: the money is in owning the content, not performing it (Los Angeles Times). Several of today’s stories read like institutions taking that lesson to heart. Cincinnati Opera is committing $6 million to three new works by Black creators (Cincinnati Business Courier). Roxane Gay and Debbie Millman bought The Rumpus rather than launch something new, wagering an established name is worth more than a clean slate (Publishers Weekly). And Lincoln Center is making its biggest commitment to dance in decades (The New York Times).
The counter-move came from Fox, which spent $22 billion not on shows but on Roku — buying the pipe instead of what flows through it (Vulture). Underneath all of it, the stakes: Sydney’s Song Company, 40 years old and one of the world’s finest vocal ensembles, filed for liquidation (Limelight).
On a lighter note, London’s Shaftesbury Theatre will become the Judi Dench Theatre (The Guardian).
Doug
- How Byron Allen Went From Standup Comic To Media Mogul To Stephen Colbert’s Time Slot
“He was one of the first entertainers to recognize that there was more money to be made in owning your content, rather than just performing it. Over the last three decades, he has built a multibillion-dollar business, Allen Media Group, which now has 2,000 employees across various media properties.” – Los Angeles Times (MSN)
- Rex Reed Hated Everything
In my ongoing conversations with him, along with the despairingly pungent emails he regularly sent from his AOL address Rex seemed to interpret the glut of mediocre films he was forced to endure as a highly personal affront to strict standards of taste, decency and class. – The Hollywood Reporter
- New from MolokoA. Robert Lee’s Omnibus Edition Is Here to Go<a href="https://www.artsjournal.com/herman/2026/06/new-from-molokoa-robert-lees-omnibus-edition-is-here-to-go.html" title="New from Moloko
A. Robert Lee’s Omnibus Edition Is - The Song Company, Australia’s Leading Vocal Chamber Ensemble, Is Closing Permanently
Founded in 1984 in Sydney, The Song Company, which consisted of six to eight singers, regularly performed music ranging from the Middle Ages and Renaissance through the Romantic era up to newly-commissioned works. The ensemble went into receivership in 2019 due to financial difficulties; now it has filed for liquidation. – Limelight (Australia)
THEATRE
VISUAL
- Why Older People Are Happier, And What We Can Learn From Them
- “Teaser” Events Have Become A Powerful Way For Pop Stars To Introduce Their Projects
From a marketing perspective, this approach blends internet culture and storytelling to create a memorable experience for fans. These teaser releases are particularly effective at generating fan theories, sparking speculation, creating memes and helping create stories with fans. – The Conversation
- Mathematics And The Tools Of Reasoning That Ai Is Tackling
Understanding is a lively topic for philosophers, but not for the tech industry. In their race to the ultimate prize of AGI, Silicon Valley’s main players instead see the mechanization of reasoning as the main hurdle. For them, mathematics is the supreme AI challenge because it is the purest form of reasoning. – Boston Review
- Jurgen Habermas And The Public Sphere
Habermas’s death might mark the end of a mode of main-stage philosophizing that, in the German-speaking world, reaches back, by way of Adorno, Heidegger, Nietzsche, Marx, Schopenhauer, and Hegel, to Kant himself. – The New Yorker
- The Aesthetic That Fits Our Times: Tragicomic
This cockroach of forms—adaptive, resilient, unkillable—was named by the Roman dramatist Plautus in the second century BC, enjoyed its heyday in 17th-century Renaissance theater, and was revived in the 20th century to describe a slurry of existential despair and absurd farce. – ARTnews
