Boston Globe

The investigative stories depicted in "Spotlight" and "Truth" although based on events that occurred not that long ago represent that last gasp of the tradition of great American journalism. Beyond entertainment these films raise issues about the ever diminished means by which we get the news.

A feature of the New York conferences of the American Theatre Critics Association is a lunch with Broadway stars at Sardi's. It was my pleasure to introduce Marlee Matlin. Other guests were Tony winner, Michael Cerveris, actress Kathleen Chalfant, creator of legendary musicals (Fiorello!, Fiddler on the Roof, She Love Me) Sheldon Harnick, actor Brian D'Arcy James, Tony winner Judith Light, director Bartlett Sher, four time Emmy winner, Marlo Thomas, Tony winner Doug Wright and playwright Arthur Kopit.

When I curated a solo exhibition of work by the Visionary artist Paul Laffoley it was his first Boston show in 20 years. The exhibition was ignored by the Boston Globe. A few years later, during his brief time at the Globe, Ken Johnson declared Laffoley to be the most important Boston artist of his generation. In recent years he enjoyed national and international recognition

Regarding Boston Theatre it is broke and time to fix it. This fall as one shoe after another dropped the Boston Theatre Community seemed to collapse like a house of cards. In 2004 through a partnership between Druker Development, Boston Center for the Arts and the Huntington Theatre Company the multi-stage Calderwood Pavilion was created in the South End. Is it possible that Huntington can swing a similar development to save, renovate and expand its antiquated facility? That's just a part of dramatic changes for the city.

Strauss's early operatic masterpiece follows its Greek model closely to reveal the neurosis at the heart of modern life. Andris Nelsons led a white-hot BSO performance of a lurid, fin-de-siecle masterpiece. The cast, led by Christine Goerke, Jane Henschel and Gun-Brit Barkmin, was stellar.

If bad luck comes in threes what's next for the Boston theatre community. Today we have reported on the break up of a 33-year-old relationship between the Huntington Theatre Company and Boston University. Now we report news the Emerson College, the owner of the 115-year-old Colonial Theatre has plans to convert it into a student center. These developments were predicted several years ago by then NEA chair Rocco Landesman. As he suggests, here in the Berkshires, there are too many arts organizations pursuing the same limited potential donors.

The renowned playwright John Guare was in Pittsfield recently for the first days of rehearsal of his play His Girl Friday. It is being directed by Julianne Boyd for Barrington Stage Company. He and others in the production met with the media for a lively give and take.

Since the 1980s Francine Koslow Miller had been a formidable presence in the Boston art world as a critic for Art Forum, professor at Mass College of art and organizer of exhibitions and projects. As an alumna of Brandeis she was defender of the Rose Art Museum when there was a plan to sell the collection and close the museum. She died this week at the age of 64.

Nederlands Dans Theater was founded in 1959 and with some 600 works in its portfolio has been one of the most influential global companies. In 1978 a younger second company was formed and this is its first week in Becket since 2007.

During the Pluralism of the 1980s the Italian born artist Francesco Clemente was a part of the neo expressionist movement. Having recently reinvented himself the artist who lives in New York and India had a series of glitzy decoratve tents fabricated by artisans. The artist has painted the interiors with provocative, fluid, naive narratives. This imajor installtion in Mass MoCA's vast Building Five has been paired with the cartoon inspired, theatrical scaled paintings of the populist artist./ musician conceptualist Jim Shaw. The work is obviously fun and accessible but skates on thin ice.

On June 5 at The Mount in Lenox, Mass. the publisher/ editor of Berkshire Fine Arts, Charles Giuliano, will launch Shards of a Life. From 5:30 to 7:30 PM on the porch there will be a reception and reading. In 1970 Giuliano coined and was the first to publish the now common word gonzo. The book of poems continues his development of the unique gonzo style.

The book of poetry Shards of a Life by Charles Giuliano will be launched with a reading and book signing at Edith Wharton's The Mount. The free reception will will occur on Friday, June 5 from 5:30 to 7:30. The critical essay "Beyond Gonzo" was written as the introduction for the book by J.M. Robert Henriquez

Now in his final weeks as director of the Clark Art Institute Michael Conforti hosted a media event promoting a blockbuster season for Northern Berkshire County. There were presentations by Joe Thompson for Mass MoCA, Tina Olsen for the Williams College Museum of Art, and Mandy Greenfield for the Williamstown Theatre Festival. Notably absent from the media event were North Adams based arts presenters Downstreet, The Eclipse Mill Gallery, The Rudd Museum of Art and the fall annual Williamstown Film Festival.

In 2009 Michael Rush, then the director of the Rose Art Museum, took the fall when Brandeis University schemed to close the museum and sell its $350 million collection. In 2010 he became the founding director of the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University. He died recently at 65.

Tony Simotes was summarily ousted from Shakespeare & Company when he got on the wrong side with a micro managing now former board president Sarah Hancock. Significantly, she is a close friend of founding artistic director, Tina Packer, whose vision of the company was very different from Simotes who replaced her. Rick Dildine who was brought in with a mandate for change soon realized the chain of command and hastily departed. In a matter of months the company went from plan B to plan C. When we met with Simotes for a long lunch he was not inclined to sort out those loose ends. He is upbeat about new possibilities as second in command to Kate Maguire and the richly enhanced Berkshire Theatre Group.

Belinda Rathbone, daughter of Perry Rathbone, the director of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston from 1955 to 1972, discusses her book The Boston Raphael: A Mysterious Painting, an Embattled Museum in an Era of Change, and a Daughter’s Search for the Truth at the Clark Art Institute on Sunday, April 26 at 3 pm.

Recently Kenworth Moffett posted a succinct account of his theoretical views and tenure as founding curator of contemporary art at the Museum of Fine arts. This is part one of a followup interview with Moffett. Here we explore his education at Columbia and Harvard as well as a unique relationship with Clement Greenberg the leading critic of his generation.

In this installment of an extensive interview the pratfalls of modern and contemporary art in Boston are explored. It was a peripheral topic in Belinda Rathbone's biography of her father, former MFA director, Perry T. Rathbone.

The Boston Raphael is the first major book on the Museum of Fine Arts since Walter Muir Whitehill's centennial history in 1970. This is part one of an in dept interview with biographer Belinda Rathbone about the New York Times best selling profile of her father, former MFA director, Perry T. Rathbone.

The Guggenheim Museum in New York will close the ZERO exhibition on January 7, 2015. It is a comprehensive survey, highlighting more than 40 artists from 10 countries in Europe, South America and Japan. They were members of major artist groups and developments post WWII during the 1950s - 1960s.The second part of this article is dedicated to Otto Piene at CAVS/ MIT - and all who came to work or knew him and The Center.

Yesterday's lively press conference at Mass MoCA, announcing the $54.4 million Confluence Campaign, was preempted by a news leak of an embargoed press release by Geoff Edgers of the Washington Post. While that story provided a tantalizing overview the press conference covered many of the complex and exciting details. This updates our prior reports with more to follow.

Completing a $145 million renovation and expansion the Clark Art Institute repoened this summer. The occasion was launched with a stunning range of special exhibitions. During a recent opening of Magna Carta we asked the museum's fast moving director, Michael Conforti, for an overview of the season and when we might expect to see Treasures from the Prado?

Twelve days after breaking news the New York Times has reported on $25.4 million in Commonwealth funding for the $50 million renovation of the final phase of build out for Mass MoCA. While damning the museum with faint praise the Times drags up an eight year old controversy of a botched installation by Christoph Buchel. The reporter probed far and wide for on and off the record smears of the museum and its critical reputation.

The artist Jim Hodges came to New York in the 1980s at a time when AIDS was decimating the arts community. Like others of his generation his work responded to a sense of devastation and loss. A retrospecitve of his eclectic conceptual work is on view at Boston's ICA until September 1.

Popular contemporary company Hubbard Street Dance Chicago returns to Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival for the first time since 2010, bringing a sensational mixed-bill program. Directed by Glenn Edgerton, the 18-member company performs the dramatic Mediterranean-inspired Gnawa, choreographed by Nacho Duato, and Jiří Kylián’s vivid Falling Angels, a stark all-female work danced to “Drumming” by contemporary composer Steve Reich.