The American Alliance of Museums’ Code of Ethics for collections, which states that sale proceeds can be used only for “acquisition or direct care of collections” [emphasis added]. Brooklyn’s disposals may serve as a role model for other financially pressed art museums, because it’s a pioneer on this new trail. – Lee Rosenbaum

Many of us in the arts are cynical about holiday productions. But these performances are meaningful in the lives of our audiences and I think should be respected as such. I’ve been thinking abut what is lost when audiences miss out on holiday shows this year. – Hannah Grannemann

The screen announces “The Philadelphia Matter 1972/2020,” and glimpsed behind it is the large, alarmed face of its creator: choreographer David Gordon. The piece (no surprise) is propelled, guided, and shaped by words. Postmodern poetry — written and uttered by Gordon and/or his wife, Valda Setterfield — repeats and enlarges upon itself. – Deborah Jowitt

“Poignant” is a word that I’ve never before seen (and hope never to see again) in connection with the Holocaust. These paintings soft-pedal and aestheticize photos that were taken of gas chamber victims while their remains were being burned and disposed of. – Lee Rosenbaum

Pianist Denny Zeitlin’s stunning new trio album for the Sunnyside label is one that we have been hoping for weeks to call to your attention: It’s a highlight among recent releases in all jazz genres. – Doug Ramsey

I’ve been planning to call out the lamentable decision of the Everson Museum in Syracuse to jettison its only Jackson Pollock painting “in order to refine, diversify, and build the museum’s collection for the future” (in the words of the museum’s self-justification). – Lee Rosenbaum

Dvořák’s “New World” Symphony may not have been the work of a Black composer. But Dvořák embraced the African-American experience to a degree that would be controversial today. – Joseph Horowitz

On “the Porgy Exchange,” in which an ordinary woman changed, on the spot, the opinion of two prominent Black opera singers that white baritones should be able to take on the lead role in Gershwin’s opera. – Joseph Horowitz

I’ve suggested that the Met’s radical downsizing of staff (necessitated by the Virus Crisis) might give its leaders an opportunity to install their own hand-picked team “sooner and less controversially than would have otherwise been possible.” “Sooner” turns out to be immediately. – Lee Rosenbaum

Celebrations and stories about experiencing reopening of arts organizations are being shared, and they are joyous and poignant. Here are four of my favorites. – Hannah Grannemann

Two years ago ArtsEngaged created the Facebook group Become Indispensable as a mechanism for people interested in community engagement in the arts to learn and share. That group’s advisory board has had its first meeting, and here are some of the changes and ideas we discussed. – Doug Borwick

It’s with dejected déjà vu that I report the imminent departure of some 90 Metropolitan Museum staffers from more than half a dozen departments. – Lee Rosenbaum

No one had any idea if people would tune in to all this arts content when the digital floodgates opened in March. Now arts organizations are reporting massive increases in online audiences driven by viewers and participants who have never set foot inside their buildings. – Hannah Grannemann

“Battle Instructions is Burroughs the self-styled revolutionary in 1960 at his most historically explicit, the courageous whistle-blower denouncing and exposing moguls, political leaders and scientists as part of a larger, deeper conspiracy at work behind the scenes of the mid-20th century.” – Jan Herman

While the persistent lag in hiring minorities is arguably a manifestation of museums’ systemic racism, it is also a “pipeline problem” — the relative scarcity of well-trained minority candidates. But if a museum official were to state this publicly, it would likely be dismissed as a cop-out. – Lee Rosenbaum

“Orchestras are better than ever” – if you mean that, literally, you mean that in terms of the role the institution plays in Minneapolis or Philadelphia or Boston, it has a bigger and more important role than it’s ever had in the past. Anybody who says that – they don’t know what an orchestra is. So this is a dangerous thing to tell young musicians. – Joseph Horowitz

Bach isn’t exactly the kind of composer for which Lang Lang became famous. In fact, he’s known the Goldbergs for a long time now, and the piece fits him better than you might expect. – David Patrick Stearns

One of the primary benefits of this pandemic is that artists and arts organizations were all forced to experiment – even though they didn’t feel ready. This wide-spread spirit of experimentation is itself an achievement. I don’t care that it took a collective “spaghetti at the wall” approach; we really needed a shakeup. – Hannah Grannemann

My goal as guest editor of Lynne Conner’s blog for the next six months is to share and respond to what I’m seeing happening during this crisis through the lens of the audience. Every day there are new ideas, plans, calls to action, reasons to despair and reasons to celebrate. In this space I will be sharing and responding to what I’m seeing – and I ask you to share and respond as well. – Hannah Grannemann

Either Max Hollein and Daniel Weiss, the director and president of the Metropolitan Museum, were knowing participants in Yoko Ono’s mischievous potshot at their august institution, or they fell for her prank. – Lee Rosenbaum

We need a significant, stable ongoing source of new funding for the arts that is politically insulated, inflation-proof, and expands the definitions of non-and for-profit arts. – Douglas McLennan

As New York City’s major museums prepare to reopen, the experience of the the first major U.S. art museum out of the re-starting gate — the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, which intrepidly invited its public back three months ago — is an object lesson on how it might (or might not) work for others. – Lee Rosenbaum

“People have been saying to me, ‘Oh, I’m so sorry you had to go through that!’ Well I’m not sorry — I think it’s the best thing that could have happened to me, considering where I am now. I feel reborn. Everything seems fresh to me. Now, how are things with you?” – Howard Mandel

I have to hand it to Holland Cotter: For better or worse, the NY Times‘ co-chief art critic was right. I was wrong. – Lee Rosenbaum

Instead of reading the sonnets in the numbered sequence of the 1609 quarto, which is the usual way, they examine them in what they believe was their order of composition. This puts a special focus on the considerable tinkering that went into them. – Jan Herman

For a lot of us, these last few months have provided an opportunity to clean out and organize our closets, cupboards, garages, and workshops. (Stick with me, there will be a point to this.) – Doug Borwick

One stands back and marvels how horizons have kept expanding in the music before J.S. Bach, with modern premieres of 400-year-old works by names you’ve barely heard of — and leave you wanting more. – David Patrick Stearns

Showing a courage and candor that’s been in short supply among museum officials navigating the choppy waters of racial tensions, political unrest and economic difficulty, Salvador Salort-Pons has publicly engaged with a Change.org petition calling for his removal. – Lee Rosenbaum

Already battered financially by the pandemic, many art museums now find themselves barraged by attacks from aggrieved staffers and former employees accusing the higher-ups of racism, harassment and micro-aggressions. But until Alex Nyerges candidly responded to my post about the firing of Montreal Museum of Fine Arts director Nathalie Bondil, I hadn’t come across any major museum officials who dared to publicly contradict the critics. – Lee Rosenbaum