Douglas McLennan
Doug is the editor of ArtsJournal
Can African Museums Transcend Colonial History?
Is an African museum, designed by an African architect, capable of undoing this level of institutional violence? Can it go beyond a restaging of...
How Classical Music Influences Heavy Metal Pop
One can be forgiven for failing to see any common threads between these two seemingly divergent entities. However, a closer look reveals evidence to...
The Bridgerton Factor: Viewers Flocking To English Country Estates
The regal properties are reporting a “Bridgerton factor” as people enchanted by the baroque interiors and bucolic gardens of the hit show decide to...
How Neuroscience Is Failing To Explain How Art Works
“If you define neuroaesthetics as the use of neuroscience to explain art and aesthetic experience, then it is not surprising that neuroaesthetics fails: art...
Media Critic Eric Boehlert, 62, Killed On Bicycle
A frequent commentator on television and radio, as well as a prolific writer, Mr. Boehlert never shied away from searing critiques of what he...
The Rot Of American Higher Education Was Put On View Last Week
The unspoken secret had been fleetingly exposed: Free labor is a fact of academic life. “These arrangements are common in academia.” - The New York...
The Case For Nationalizing An American Cultural Treasure
Like the Delta blues or Yellowstone National Park, baseball is as indelibly American as it is painfully uncommercial. Left to fend for itself, the...
The Thinking Behind The Mellon Foundation’s Unusual New Logo
Moving away from “literal sensibilities” for logo choices, Opara tells It’s Nice That, the team went for a more symbolic direction, developing a morphing...
Russian Oligarchs Have Given Hundreds Of Millions To US Cultural Institutions
Wealthy Russian businessmen, many of whom are now sanctioned, have donated between $372 million and $435 million to more than 200 nonprofits in the US...
Why It’s Important (And Difficult) For Computers To Learn Common Sense
For certain kinds of tasks—playing chess, detecting tumors—artificial intelligence can rival or surpass human thinking. But the broader world presents endless unforeseen circumstances, and...
Theatre In Ukraine Right Now
Theaters and art venues appeared to be one of the most fragile institutions with the war. Most of them stopped functioning and closed up...
As The BBC Turns 100: The Radicals And Mavericks Who Built It
The BBC was formed in 1922 to control and discipline what was then a poorly understood new medium of mass communication. - The Conversation
The Carpet Cleaner Who Speaks 24 Languages
By his count, it is actually 37 more languages, with at least 24 he speaks well enough to carry on lengthy conversations. He can...
The Kronos Quartet’s Fifth Member
Those scrappy days of shoestring budgets and ad hoc responsibilities — with everyone, including the members of the quartet, pitching in as needed —...
Bringing In Gamer Culture To The Museum
What if we put video game designers inside the gallery context? How could they reimagine the world of gaming for a more collective audience...
On Rewriting Beethoven
These modern bastardizations have eighteenth- and nineteenth-century precedent. Singers notoriously inserted their preferred arias into opera scores, however unrelated to the opera at hand. -...
No, Artists Do Not “Deserve” To Be Paid
Artists do not deserve financial support just for being artists. Selling one’s art is a different story altogether and requires at least 2 parties to be in agreement....
Canadian Conductor Boris Brott Hit, Killed By Hit-And-Run Car
Brott was a pedestrian involved in a hit-and-run incident. Following the news of his death, social media tributes poured in from the Canadian classical...
Visionary Detroit Symphony Chief Anne Parsons, 64
Determined to avoid another labor dispute and eager to make the orchestra a pillar of Detroit’s civic revival, she spent the next decade rebuilding...
Old Wax Cylinder Recordings To Be Heard For The First Time In 100 Years
The earliest, putty-colored cylinders deteriorate after only a few dozen listens if played on the Edison machines; they crack if you hold them too...
Joseph Stalin, Intellectual?
“Stalin was no psychopath but an emotionally intelligent and feeling intellectual. Indeed, it was the power of his emotional attachment to deeply held beliefs...
The Hermitage Has Become Isolated
Once a leader in Russian cultural diplomacy overseas, the Hermitage is now isolated by the cultural boycotts of Russia that have multiplied through the...
The Good And Bad Of Virtue Signaling
Virtue signalling is more nuanced and more interesting than the picture painted by conventional wisdom and political rhetoric. As it turns out, there are bad and good things...
Uffizi Became Italy’s Most-Visited Attraction Last Year
Once a slow-changing bastion of tradition, it was announced on Monday that the institution famous for its Renaissance masterpieces had last year leapt past...
How Languages Figure Out In What Order Words Occur
So, what is grammaticalization? Roughly speaking, it is the series of steps by which collections of individual words that refer to objects and actions...
