Arts

Tracing AIDS-Driven Cultural Production Across Generations

by Mackenzie Lukenbill

The collected papers of AIDS educator and activist Chloe Dzubilo stand as a "counter-archive," which does not just preserve a record of the past but makes it a trigger for thought and action in the present. 

The Method is the Main Character: A Conversation with Isaac Butler

by Lauren Goldenberg

Isaac Butler has recently published an acclaimed book on the rise of the method school of acting and its origins with Konstantin Stanislavski's "system" of training the inner creative life of actors.

Malcolm X Returns to the Opera Stage

Anthony Davis's 1985 opera "X" was slow to catch on in the American repertory, a fact that would have been no surprise to its subject. 

We Need Poets as Much as Physicists and Artists as Much as Actuaries

by David P. Barash

We need the expertise of scientists and technologists to solve big problems, but we need artists to make people care enough about those problems to demand solutions.

Allon Schoener, 95, Dies; Curator Caught in Furor Over ‘Harlem’ Show

Schoener always insisted that critics misunderstood the purpose of the exhibition, which didn't include original paintings by Black artists but did highlight African American photographers. But with distance from the furor, he dismissed claims that he was an early victim of "cancel culture" by recognizing controversy as the price of progress. 

Hidden in Plain Sight: History Teaching Needs to Take Advantage of Art and Material Culture

by Elizabeth Stice

"Where there is passion, people will pursue the past. A sneakerhead can tell you about the innovations in Air Jordans over the years and oftentimes quite a bit about the economic and cultural context of each shoe. Art and material culture can lead people to their own study of the past."

‘Soul!’ Brought Black Culture to TV in 1968. A New Doc Tells Its Story.

“Mr. Soul!” spotlights Ellis Haizlip, the host of a show that gave Stevie Wonder, Wilson Pickett and James Baldwin a platform.

Rethinking Who and What Get Memorialized

The notion that history can be rewritten is a powerful one. It starts by taking the pen from the authors we’ve always had — and giving it to someone else.

A Public Arts Program for Racial Reconciliation? (video)

A group of cultural organizations calls for a "New Deal" to support community arts and cultural organizations as a key part of advancing racial justice and reconciliation. 

Once Upon a Time, When America Paid Its Writers

In Jason Boog’s new book, "The Deep End," he offers colorful and often grim profiles of nine Depression-era writers and connects their stories to the struggles that writers face today. Even before our current economic crisis, it was a depressingly apt comparison.

Artists Helped Lift America out of the Great Depression. Could that Happen Again?

Art historian Jody Patterson, an expert on public art in the 1930s, discusses the legacy of the New Deal's support for the arts and efforts to establish art as a public good. 

Pencil Leaners

by Jeff Sparrow

As Australia considers government support to artistic workers inspired by the US New Deal, important differences in context should be observed. 

CEOs Talking About Racism is Good. Telling its Story is Better.

The New Deal era Negro Theater Project brought the story of the black experience to its audiences. Modern media industry leaders should use that framework when addressing racial injustice.

Art Of The New Deal: How Artists Helped Redefine America During The Depression

Music, art classes, posters, plays and photography funded by the federal government were supposed to unite a nation in turmoil.

Local Activists on How this Racial Justice Movement Fits in Oakland's History

Protests on Oakland reflect the energy of young organizers but also a legacy of African American activism. Five community leaders reflect on continuity and change in the city. 

Shakespeare Wrote His Best Works During a Plague

by Daniel Pollack-Peltzner

The most heartening lesson from Shakespeare’s era is that the playhouses will likely survive and reopen, again and again. What plays to perform when they do?

In a Lost Essay, a Glimpse of an Elusive Poet and Slave

George Moses Horton's “Individual Influence” is interesting not just for his lofty, abstract words about the primacy of divine influence, but for the context in which they were preserved: in a scrapbook of material relating to a prominent scholar who was forced out of the university after publicly opposing slavery.