People

Hummel was 19 when she began working as an assistant for William Moulton Marston, the psychologist who had created the character and the comic a few years earlier. Jill Lepore writes in The Secret History of Wonder Woman: “At first, Hummel typed Marston’s scripts. … Soon, she was writing scripts of her own.” – The New York Times

Gregorian, an immigrant from Armenia who became a scholar and leader of Brown University and the Carnegie Corporation, “was best known for resurrecting the New York Public Library from a fiscal and morale crisis. It was a radical, midcareer change from the pastoral academic realm, and a risky plunge into the high-profile social and political wars of New York City, where the budget-cutting knives were out.” – The New York Times

McCrory’s husband, actor Damian Lewis, announced the news of her death on Twitter. “I’m heartbroken to announce that after an heroic battle with cancer, the beautiful and mighty woman that is Helen McCrory has died. … We love her and know how lucky we are to have had her in our lives. She blazed so brightly. Go now Little One, into the air, and thank you.” – The Guardian (UK)

Nancy Holt was always serious. Her journals show how other artists loved talking through ideas with her. She was very close to Michael Heizer, Richard Serra and Joan Jonas. She exchanged concrete poetry by post with Carl Andre and Sol LeWitt. But when I ask Le Feuvre if the men saw her as a peer, she answers: “Yes, but.” They valued her input . But she wasn’t exhibiting in the same places they were. Similarly, it’s not that critics were dismissive of her work. They just didn’t mention her at all. – The Guardian

“Tatsiana Hatsura-Yavorska, the director of the Watch Docs Film Festival in Belarus, has been released from prison and had charges against her dropped following an international outcry from film festivals and human rights organizations. [She] was arrested in Minsk on April 5, allegedly for her role in organizing an underground photo exhibition celebrating Belarusian health workers.” – The Hollywood Reporter

As Menand puts it in his new book, The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War, “Trilling thought that people’s literary preferences tell us something about the kind of human beings they wish to be and about the way they wish other human beings to be—that is, something about their morality and their politics.” – The Point

For nearly half a century, Lévy has been one of the most visible public intellectuals in France and a master at manipulating philosophical and political controversy. With his good looks and outsized ego, Lévy is a compelling performer. He is also an irresistible target for critics from the left, right, and center. – Foreign Policy

“Still in her teens, Ms. Moylan began to perform principal roles with the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, where Balanchine, ever more enthusiastic about her work, was the resident choreographer. … [Her] career began and largely took shape before Balanchine formed Ballet Society and, in 1948, the New York City Ballet. But her career was closely associated with his work. … And yet her death, almost a year ago, went largely unnoticed in the dance world.” – The New York Times

“Buzzing through his sprawling work space, the architect said he has now reached a point in his career where he has the luxury of focusing on what matters to him most: projects that promote social justice.” – The New York Times

Raphan’s “genius” films – about people with unusual minds and talents – weren’t quite documentary; they were that, but more. “Up From Astonishment (2020), her most recent film, is about Emily Dickinson. In it, ink blooms on a page; butterflies pinwheel; there are empty bird nests, an abacus and various inscrutable shapes. Susan Howe, a poet, and Marta Werner, a Dickinson scholar, are the film’s narrators, but not really. Ms. Raphan had sampled clips from her interviews with them and used their words strategically and evocatively.” – The New York Times

In the 1980s, Colalucci led the team that restored the Sistine Chapel. “To paint the Sistine ceiling, Michelangelo labored atop a towering scaffolding, his neck craned skyward and paint dripping onto his face. In an enterprise that captivated the international art world, Mr. Colalucci assumed the same position for the delicate task of cleansing the chapel of the layers of filth that had accumulated during the intervening centuries.” – Washington Post

Beatts helped shape the early days of Saturday Night Live. “‘It was pretty much any adjective you want to throw at it,’ she told the Orange County Register in 2013. ‘It was exciting, stimulating and fabulous. It was also horrible, boring and exhausting.'” – Washington Post

Ahmed, whose performance in The Sound of Metal has been nominated for countless awards this season, doesn’t prefer the easy life. When he was a kid, he says, “I wanted to perform in some way, but I didn’t think it was viable. Teachers told me I should be a barrister, because I was always arguing with them.” – The Guardian (UK)

Gabriel began working at RCA when she was a student at Temple University, testing records for manufacturing imperfections. And she didn’t leave. “Gabriel often said that she had produced some 2,500 records. [Documentary researcher April] Tucker said officials at Sony, which now holds RCA’s archives, had told her that the number may actually be higher, since contributions were not always credited.” – The New York Times

Paul McCartney invented the details of her life as recounted in the famous Beatles song, but he found her name on a gravestone in a village church cemetery on the outskirts of Liverpool that he and John Lennon used to take shortcuts through. Yes, the grave is still there, and we do know a bit of her actual biography. – Atlas Obscura

As head of Calgary Opera he was one of the most innovative champions of the art form. “I think he truly changed opera in Canada. I think there was Before Bob and there is After Bob.” – The Globe and Mail (Canada)

“Bush’s painting style is inelegant: his subjects’ eyes are often misaligned, his colors are sometimes muddied, and even though he attempts to create depth and shadow, the facial features ultimately fail to convey anything resembling human warmth. The book, providing an honorific framing, bestows a dignity upon his subjects that his presidential policies did not.” – ARTnews

Night after night, through multiple performances of a production’s run at the Met or New York City Opera, Lois (the city’s entire opera community referred to her as Lois) was in the audience, and more often than not went backstage afterwards to solicit autographs and talk to singers. “She could tell you anything going on in your performances on any given night — this or that particular phrase and what it meant,” says soprano Aprile Millo. “For a singer, it gave you the feeling that you were being heard.” – The New York Times

Even as others have been canceled or have dialed back their aggression, Rudin’s behavior has continued unabated, leaving a trail of splintered objects and traumatized employees in his path. – The Hollywood Reporter

“For more than 50 years, [he] was an indefatigable contributor to the contemporary experimental dance scene in Philadelphia and around the world. … Mr. Fischbeck; his former wife, Brigitta Herrmann; and fellow innovator Hellmut Gottschild founded and directed Group Motion Multimedia Dance Theater in 1968. The Philadelphia dance troupe, internationally known for its avant-garde performances and outreach to enthusiasts, is celebrated locally for its continuing Friday night workshops [for] nondancers.” – The Philadelphia Inquirer

“A self-described ‘freethinking intelligence yet a child of the ghetto,’ … [he was] a public intellectual who examined such topics as the cultural ferment of the 1960s, the artistic legacy of the Depression and the evolution of the American novel in works that were both penetrating and penetrable, offering a model of what he regarded as the ideal role of the critic in modern society.” – The Washington Post

Rembert’s art “told the story of the Jim Crow South. It was exhibited in galleries and museums and helped support his family, though they lived in poverty.” – The New York Times

Kopit “thrust Off Broadway into a new era with the absurdist satirical farce Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mamma’s Hung You in the Closet and I’m Feelin’ So Sad and earned Tony Award nominations for two wildly different plays, Indians and Wings, and the musical Nine.” – The New York Times