Douglas McLennan
Doug is the editor of ArtsJournal
We’ve Been Obsessing On The End Of The World Since Time Began
Apparently, we’ve been thinking about wholesale termination at least since about 1800 B.C., the date ascribed to the myth of Atrahasis, a Mesopotamian creation...
Netflix Is Coming For Broadcasters Worldwide
Netflix and the other streaming giants are reshaping media systems across Europe. An audience survey in four European countries (Denmark, Germany, Italy and the...
A Life Of Psychological Riches
A psychologically rich life is one filled with diverse, unusual and interesting experiences that change your perspective; a life with twists and turns; a...
Storytelling And The Art Of Advice
A traditional story forgoes psychological realism in favor of a universality that can be integrated into the lives of its listeners. The novel, on...
Two Seattle Theatre Companies To Merge
ACT, founded in 1965, has a fiscal year 2025 operating budget of $6.8 million while Seattle Shakespeare Company, founded in 1991, has a current...
How Hollywood Plans To Help Rebuild LA
“Rebuilding is not just about money,” Bob Iger, CEO of Disney, told The New York Times. “It’s about ingenuity and determination.” - Christian Science...
Using Art To Unlock Potential In A Small City
“People drive out to Gary and see nothing but blight,” says artist Lauren Pacheco, who grew up in Chicago and moved to Gary nine...
What Happens To Our Culture When The Skill Of Handwriting Disappears?
Our mixed feelings about machine-made signatures make plain our broader relationship to handwriting: it offers a glimpse of individuality. Any time spent doing archival...
A “Vibe Shift” In Our Culture? Maybe Not
The term “vibe shift,” which was apparently created by the members of the scene and sort of stolen by journalists and interpreters, is itself...
Are Smart Phones Really Ruining Our Children’s Mental Health?
It’s this imperfect yet fascinatingly complex ultrasocial world that we have thrust our children into. Nearly 20 years on, we are all a bit...
Postmortem: What Brought Down The Pitchfork Festival
The relief Mike Reed expressed came, he said, from witnessing Pitchfork stray from his original vision of a curated weekend of independent music, designed for...
Your Memories — Guided By Your Online Digital Trail
The moments that these photographs recall have no active hold in my memory. Still, upon seeing them—presenting themselves as the definite proof of truth,...
DeepSeek AI Omits Answers About Ai Weiwei And Other Dissident Artists
Responding to a series of questions asked by Hyperallergic about dissident artists, cultural institutions in Taiwan and Tibet, and the destruction of mosques in the Xinjiang...
Simon & Schuster Will Stop Requiring Book Blurbs For Its Books
How often does a blurb from a filmmaker appear on another filmmaker’s movie poster? A blurb from a musician on another musician’s album cover?...
Opera Australia Chief Abruptly Resigns
Her departure comes less than six months after the abrupt exit of artistic director Jo Davies, the first female artistic director in the history...
US Copyright Office Expands Copyright Law To Include AI-Assisted Creation
The Copyright Office said it makes decisions on a case-by-case basis but clarified that it will approach such questions by examining the degree of...
Brands Are Appropriating Our Peak Cultural Moments
There’s something sinister about the way brands keep finding bigger, flashier ways to repurpose great moments in art to sell products. I guess this...
Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art Starts Charging Admission For The First Time
What else can MCA do if its core costs have shot up 20% from 2022 to 2023, and its revenue has not increased at...
The Super-Communication Technologies That Separate Us
The cost-benefit calculation is complicated and nuanced, requiring us to find a course between apocalyptic visions of civilizational decline and the naive utopianism of...
The Former Chicago 7-Eleven That Will Now Dispense Classical Music
The venue, designed by Chicago-based JDJ Architects, will be called the Checkout, a nod to the building’s former life as a 7-Eleven, and doubles...
Spotify Paid A Record $10 Billion To Music Rights Owners In 2024
Spotify’s $10 billion payout figure means that it paid music rightsholders an average of $833 million every month in 2024. - Music Business Worldwide
Paul McCartney And Elton John Protest Proposed Changes To UK Copyright
McCartney told the BBC that the proposed changes could disincentivise writers and artists and result in a “loss of creativity”. - The Guardian
The Small Publishers Shaking Up Africa’s Books Culture
Othuke Ominiabohs started Masobe – which means “let us read” in the Isoko language – in 2018 with a $7,000 (£5,600) loan from his...
Sotheby’s Reports Declined Sales
Sotheby’s auction sales were down 28 percent, to $4.6 billion, from $6.4 billion, but private sales were up 17 percent, climbing from $1.2 billion...
Louvre’s Decision To Move “Mona Lisa”: Misguided?
The decision, dramatically announced by Emmanuel Macron, to move the Mona Lisa to a special hygienically isolated gallery where les idiots who flock to take selfies in...
