All-Women Shows Are Popular Again

“While some artists are ambivalent about being viewed through the lens of gender, the all-women’s group show, which fell out of favor in the ’80s and ’90s, is flourishing again. At least a dozen galleries and museums are featuring women-themed surveys, a surge curators and gallerists say is shining a light on neglected artists, resuscitating some careers and raising the commercial potential of others.”

How The Metropolitan Opera Puts Together A New Production

“It is grand opera done grandly in an era of budget pressures and challenges in attracting new audiences. To capture the work that goes into a staging that will be performed just eight times this season – an expensive, labor-intensive undertaking that helps explain why the Met’s budget will be almost $300 million this year – James Estrin, a photographer for The New York Times, observed weeks of rehearsals.” (photo journal)

Crystal Bridges Museum To Turn Kraft Cheese Plant Into Contemporary Art Center

“The 63,000-square-foot space is intended to function somewhat in the way that MoMA PS1 in Long Island City, Queens, serves as an edgier, more experimental affiliate of the Museum of Modern Art. It is expected to open in 2018, … and the location, in downtown Bentonville, [Arkansas,] would not only provide a place to show more contemporary art but would also continue a transformation of the small city.”