One city that's getting arts accessibility right
Plus, artists and choreographers who should be on your radar.
Hello. Since the last time we spoke, I have:
Finished Adam Ross’s Playworld.
Seen Buena Vista Social Club, the musical (great vocal and instrumental performances).
Seen New York City Ballet’s Balanchine I program, which featured Apollo (the real standout for me), Ballo Della Regina, Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux, and Chaconne.
Seen A.I.M. by Kyle Abraham perform four pieces at the Joyce. The absolute highlight for me was Andrea Miller’s YEAR, though I was also transfixed by Rena Butler’s Shell of A Shell of The Shell. A.I.M.’s dancers are remarkably athletic and musically exact, but what stood out to me the most was their incredible chemistry with one another, which had the effect of making their group movements appear like the workings of some larger, alien organism, and moments of pas de deux like moving, living works of sculpture. Altogether, a great program.
Now, the news.
In case you missed it, the climate change-focused activist group Extinction Rebellion protested at New York City Ballet’s spring opening on Tuesday. I wrote a whole thing about it on Wednesday.
Recently, we spoke about how to actually get people to the opera, and that’s a task that Houston Opera seems to be nailing. The New York Times recently checked in with the company ahead of its production of Wagner’s Tannhaüser. CEO Khori Dastoor, who has led the organization since 2021 has managed to nearly double its endowment to $120 million, increased ticket sales compared to pre-pandemic numbers (though it’s not exactly selling out shows), and manages to maintain a performance season of around 40 main stage shows with a budget of $33 million—less than half that of Lyric Opera of Chicago and about a third of that of San Francisco Opera. Dastoor understands that the company must grow its audience in order to survive, and that goal has informed Houston Opera’s push into different kids of events, like a family-friendly performance and a pop-up at the rodeo.
Funding for the arts continues to be tenuous, and not just because federal funding has been decimated (even more than it already had been) through recent executive orders. The New Yorker reports that three major foundations—the Mellon Foundation, the Ford Foundation, and the Doris Duke Foundation—have all, in recent years, started shifting their giving strategies, which has led several larger arts organizations, which had grown to anticipate these foundations’ continual giving for their operational support, to struggle forward. For instance, the National Dance Project and the National Theatre Project—which supported development and touring of new dance and theater works—have effectively ended after Mellon concluded its “decades-long funding arc.”
It’s not that these foundations are shifting their energy away from the arts—in fact, all of these major givers continue to support the arts and have largely increased the amount of funding distributed, but their grant-giving strategies have changed. Largely, that means they are more likely to support first-time grant recipients rather than longtime beneficiaries. That can be a good thing; a 2017 study showed that 58 percent of arts funding went to 2 percent of U.S. arts groups with budgets of at least $5 million. Still, these larger groups are often the ones that have the infrastructure to better support the smaller ones through commissions, performance space, and the like. And as we saw through a report by the nonprofit Cave Canem on Black American arts organizations recently, arts organizations are better set up for longevity when funding goes to general operations, rather than individual projects or commissions.
We’ve also talked before about how foundations often do not—or cannot—support specific organizations indefinitely, and how that doesn’t necessarily set any of them up for future success, especially at a time when charitable giving is on the decline. So what’s the solution? I am honestly unsure, and I’ve found myself growing increasingly interested in the historical context of arts funding and pathways forward to a more sustainable system. All this to say, I’m researching more…but it’s clear there is much work to be done.
Meanwhile, after Gov. Ron DeSantis eliminated all state arts funding in Florida last year, some art advocates are hopeful that at least some of those dollars will return, as a pair of bills in the state legislature are changing the guidelines (read: making it a lot harder) for how organizations may be approved for funding, the Palm Beach Daily News reported.
Rest in peace, Pope Francis, who was arguably the most literary pope, writes Nick Ripatrazone for LitHub. Last summer, Francis published a pastoral letter wherein he extolled the virtues of poetry and literature, writing “reading prepares us to understand and thus deal with various situations that arise in life. In reading, we immerse ourselves in the thoughts, concerns, tragedies, dangers and fears of characters who in the end overcome life’s challenges. Perhaps too, in following a story to the end, we gain insights that will later prove helpful in our own lives.”
He was also a literature and writing teacher before he undertook the papacy, and he often encouraged students to read what they were most drawn to, rather than sticking to a syllabus, and inviting Jorge Luis Borges to speak to his class. Francis—then Jorge Mario Bergoglio—published 14 short stories by his students in a small book titled Cuentos Originales; Borges himself wrote the prologue.
More museums and galleries are relying on young curators to push the boundaries of visual art, tell more diverse stories, and get people excited about new exhibits (through both their curation in general and their social media prowess), the New York Times reports. Even the Metropolitan Museum of Art lowered its years of experience requirement for curators from 14 to 10. Younger curators (which often means those in their 30s to mid-40s) “are critical in shaping the discourse on our history, on contemporary ideas, on who gets to be heard, and who gets to speak,” says Lauren Rosati, a 39-year-old associate curator of modern and contemporary art at the Met.
In the lead-up to the U.S.’s semiquincentennial (if we make it to then), several museums are putting together exhibits that examine the American Revolution, the NYT reported. The Virginia Museum of History & Culture has already opened its “Give Me Liberty” exhibit, which has a strong focus on Patrick Henry (of “give me liberty or give me death” fame), the Museum of the American Revolution in Philadelphia will put on an exhibit about the global and historical impact of the Declaration of Independence, the Museum of the City of New York will show an exhibit that, unsurprisingly, focuses on New York City during the Revolution, and Boston’s Museum of African American History will soon open Black Voices of the Revolution.
Meanwhile, museums around the country are still contending with attacks on DEI initiatives. But many, like Detroit’s Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, are standing strong. The museum’s president and CEO Neil Barclay told the NYT: “We see African American history as part of American history and not separate from it. Inclusion is part of our mission. We want to use the resilience and courage of African Americans as a source of unity and not divisiveness.” That museum, which is one of Detroit’s biggest tourist sites, is celebrating its 60th anniversary. Because it relies very minimally on federal funding—instead getting funding from big corporate donors, foundations, and the city of Detroit—its position, compared to other museums more dependent on federal grants, is relatively secure.
Anyway. I wonder which artists are going to apply to make a statue for Trump’s Garden of Heroes, for which they will be paid $200,000—money that will be pulled from the canceled National Endowment for the Humanities grants.
A few museum expansions to keep on your radar: Kansas City’s Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art has chosen the New York-based architecture firm Weiss/Manfredi (founded by Marion Weiss and Michael Manfredi) for its $160 million expansion that will add a library, theater, restaurant, event spaces, and educational spaces. Chicago's Intuit Art Museum, which focuses on outside art, will reopen in May after a two-year, $10 million renovation that tripled its space. And Chicago’s Obama Presidential Center, which is expected to open in early 2026, has commissioned artist Spencer Finch for a 70-foot-long tiled mural for its lobby and artist Lindsay Adams for an adaptation of one of her paintings into fabric panels, for the Center’s cafe.
The shortlist for the 2025 Turner Prize has been announced. This award, which is in its 41st year, is one of the most prestigious recognitions for a contemporary artist; it is specifically granted, via a jury organized by the Tate, to British artists or artists working in the U.K. This year’s shortlist includes sculpture artist Nnena Kalu, photographer and installation artist Rene Matić, painter Mohammed Sami, and installation Zadie Xa. Sami, a Baghdad-born refugee, appears to be the frontrunner. The last painter to win the prize was Tomma Abts in 2006.
Love to see it: Juilliard announced on Thursday that it is beginning a $550 million fundraising drive in order to fund a forthcoming tuition-free policy. It has already received $180 million in commitments, though it’s not clear when the policy will actually be enacted.
Choreographer Annabelle Lopez Ochoa is having a big moment. Her zany version of Carmen—loosely inspired by “Poker Princess” Molly Bloom—for Miami City Ballet just opened, and her Frida Kahlo-inspired work Broken Wings was just onstage at San Francisco Ballet. In May, Atlanta Ballet will debut her piece Hypnagogia, which explores the “fascinating state of consciousness that bridges wakefulness and sleep.” Obsessed with this diva…
Boston is emerging as a major player when it comes to arts accessibility. Good job, mayor Michelle Wu! She announced in late March that the city would launch BCYF Creates, which will double the amount of free arts instruction offered at 14 Boston Centers for Youth & Families community hubs. We’ve also mentioned the city’s pilot program that offers free admission for school-age children and their caretakers to several Boston museums; recently, she announced that seven arts institutions—Arts Emerson, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Ballet, the Huntington Theatre, the Boch Center, the Wheelock Family Theater and the Boston Lyric Opera—would soon begin offering free tickets for kids and their families as an expansion of this Boston Family Days program.
In May, the Boston Public Art Triennial will also put 20 commissioned artworks on display at participating museums and around the city. The mayor’s office has supported the Triennial, which cost $8 million to produce, with $500,000 in funding. The goal of the exhibit, she told the NYT, is to “create an experience that cuts across barriers in the city—geographic, generational, cultural—to really draw everyone in.” ▲
Boston! Great insights