Raymond Pettibon brings a raw, aggressive visual voice to his works, and clearly knows how to draw when he needs to.
Embarking on a limited tour, the charming musician uses an unusual instrument to lend welcome new textures to familiar classical music.
On her latest album, the cellist offers a wide range of originals, jazz repertoire and pop tunes.
The 17th-century printmaker who pioneered techniques well ahead of his time and earned a cult status among modern and contemporary artists.
She embodied a unique approach to art and was one of the last remaining eyewitnesses to and participants in the New York School.
In the late 1940s, a young black king returns from England to his native land in southern Africa with a white bride.
A look at Istanbul’s feline population and its special bond with the city’s human inhabitants
The trumpeter’s new album fuses the traditions of his hometown, New Orleans, with modern jazz, hiphop, mixtape and spoken-word cultures.
Ben Hecht had a hand in films from ‘Gone With the Wind’ to ‘Notorious’ but always disdained Tinseltown, believing it derailed his career as a novelist.
How Henri Matisse inspired generations of American artists—from Arthur Dove to John Baldessari
In Mary Zimmerman’s new production of Dvorák’s opera, the title character is always ‘the other’—physically awkward in the forest and hesitant in the human realm.
Leo Tolstoy’s ‘The Death of Ivan Ilyich’ tells the story of a wasted life capped with a moment of grace.
An unflinching look at writer and social critic James Baldwin’s life, his struggle for civil rights and his unfinished book
How a short-lived magazine sparked an influential art movement that challenged authority.
Debuts, roles revisited and a pair of world premieres mark a season that highlights some of the most talented names in ballet, including Tiler Peck, Justin Peck and Chase Finlay.
At the Morgan Library & Museum, a treasure trove of objects offers a rare chance to truly meet the reclusive poet through both her work and her web of relationships.
By telling their unique stories, figures like Julie Dash, Kathleen Collins and Camille Billops paved the way for future generations of underrepresented filmmakers.
The composer’s score for Wayne McGregor’s ballet draws inspiration from Virginia Woolf’s novels, diaries and other writings—including her suicide note.
The album mixes William Onyeabor-style electro sounds, early-’70s Motown, and James Brown-influenced African rock.
A timely exhibition looks at the way digital images help causes spread their message, from environmentalism to the alt-right.
A boxed set documents two shows that celebrate the importance of Ornette Coleman’s music: his final live appearance at a concert in 2014 and a funeral service for the jazz legend from 2015.
With his clear, crisp diction and use of digital effects, Theo Bleckmann makes some of the most interesting music in recent history.
Daniel Barenboim and the Staatskapelle Berlin are playing a complete cycle of the nine numbered Bruckner symphonies—reputedly the first such performance in the U.S. during a single season.
Violinist Gidon Kremer has spent years reviving the reputations of overlooked composers; his latest project turns the spotlight on the emotionally direct music of Mieczyslaw Weinberg.
An exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, celebrates a rich banquet.
Delicate Steve’s new album solidifies his status as a distinctive guitarist and talented composer.
The hip-hop duo’s new album is unapologetically aggressive and progressive, but a recent show in Philadelphia felt uninspired.
A series of Nicholas Ray’s films, including ‘On Dangerous Ground,’ ‘The Lusty Men’ and ‘Rebel Without a Cause,’ reveals his tendency to embrace unlovable protagonists.
Virginia Dwan’s support of artists, both through her galleries and direct financing, helped popularize figures like Robert Rauschenberg and Ad Reinhardt.
Classical, jazz and Afro-Cuban sounds meld together on an album that defies genre.
A composer who shouldn’t be popular, but is.
At the Prototype Festival, multimedia works fuse genres while taking on sexuality and race.
Visiting the new Elbphilharmonie, a decade-long project that hopes to make the German city a destination for music lovers.
Are Presidential Libraries first drafts of history or monuments to self like the ones royalty once erected?
On its ambitious new album, the xx has created a vital, magnetic blend of electronica, balladry and pop.
A far cry from today’s scene, there once existed a New York art world marked by grit and character.
At 88, Hal Prince returns to direct a close recreation of the opera-house staging he originated.
A chance to explore the Wadsworth Atheneum’s rarely seen Japanese holdings, including a wall-size ukiyo-e painting exhibited only once before at the museum.
The first major survey of Degas in nearly 30 years tries to give shape to an artist notoriously hard to define.
This world premiere tells the story of the Dutch-born exotic dancer and courtesan who was executed as a spy by the French in 1917.
Kim Allen Kluge and Kathryn Kluge’s score may have been ruled ineligible for an Oscar, but it is an important part of Martin Scorsese’s new film.
A selection of the artist’s earliest works presages how the painter would master the play of light in his later career.
Largely forgotten by the time of his death in 1950, Chareau was a master of contrast, taking the cold hardware of industrial modernism and combining it with velvety textiles, alabaster light fixtures and exotic woods.
Having written for and performed with some of the biggest names in country, Natalie Hemby is releasing her own album.
The story of timekeeping’s evolution—from disparate calendars to more standardized waterclocks—in the ancient world.
There were New Year’s Eve fireworks of a different kind in this production of Charles Gounod’s opera at the Met.
In a musical landscape as diverse as the one in 2016, the biggest commonality was noteworthy artistry and technical expertise.
Used to a nomadic existence thanks to his lengthy touring schedule, Simon Green—working under the Bonobo name—considers what it means to be settled..
The multimedia artist’s respect for European music and art shines through in this tightly focused midcareer retrospective that mixes absurdity, warmth and melancholy.
Jazz musicians are returning to the hybrid style, putting their own twists on the 1970s genre in records with crossover appeal.
How Jasper Johns drew from the work of Edvard Munch to push his own art forward.
Previously unreleased live recordings of two jazz titans are charged with intimate immediacy.
Before he was a titan of color theory, Albers explored people and the passage of time in his photographic experiments.
A contemporary of Rodin and a fellow pioneer of the modern movement, Rosso combined sculpture’s solidity with painting’s evanescent illusionism.
History, politics, art and, of course, religion are explored in an illuminating exhibition.
Exhibitions celebrate the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther nailing his 95 Theses to a church door in Wittenberg.
Day for Night offered its own take on presenting contemporary music and featured acts like Björk, Run the Jewels and Aphex Twin.
Tchaikovsky’s Christmas classic gets a Chicago-centric staging from Christopher Wheeldon.
Performances at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and the Met Fifth Avenue continue to explore the potential of staging opera in new contexts.
The country star’s double album fits her image as both an arena-filling rock girl and a subtle, experienced singer-songwriter.
Both bold innovation and thoughtful renovation defined the year in architecture.
Despite the deaths of iconic artists, there remains an abundant supply of good music.
Yale’s natural history museum is unique in the field, a point the trove of objects in its anniversary exhibition drives home
Emiliana Torrini teams with the Colorist to reinvent her own songs—and create a couple of new ones.
An exhibition at the Museum of World War II commemorates the 75th anniversary of the attack and humanizes a larger-than-life historic event.
On the anniversary of the composer’s death, a massive collection spanning 240 hours, 4,000 tracks and 200 CDs offers all of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s known works.
An overlooked modernist sculptor from the West Coast scene gets her moment at the Crocker Art Museum.
A five-decade sampling from an iconic minimalist dancemaker
The affecting story of a troubadour who sends his music across the Mediterranean to his lover is only the second opera by a female composer to play the Met.
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The 1993 coming-of-age movie directed by Robert De Niro is now a Broadway musical
This ambitious legal series goes beyond today’s headlines and digs into the past.
The Grammys overwhelmingly favor popularity over pure talent, but there is still superior work recognized if you look for it.
Robert De Niro’s washed-up comic doesn’t warrant laughs
In this sci-fi romance, a boy from Mars and girl from Earth share a dramatic vacuum
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A pair of documentaries look at terrible events while excavating the roots of the radical right.
Agatha Christie’s classic short story gets a new adaptation.
When an Iranian couple move into a new apartment, its previous tenant remains an unsettling presence.
Animatronic cameras disguised as animals capture footage of creatures in the wild.
In Lasse Hallström’s screen version of the novel by W. Bruce Cameron, man’s best friend always finds a way home—even if it takes a few lifetimes.
Matthew McConaughey stars as a prospector bent on finding gold in the Indonesian jungle.
Even with formidable challenges, two Oscar hopefuls prove that the theater still has a place on the big screen.
The building recast museums as interactive cultural facilitators.
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The first edition of Henry Watson Fowler’s A Dictionary of Modern English Usage offers advice on useful distinctions and so much more.
Richard Brooks’s screen adaptation of Truman Capote’s ‘In Cold Blood’ is a portrait of waste, loss and spiritual emptiness.
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In his ‘In a Station of the Metro,’ Ezra Pound tried to change the way poetry worked.
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The sculptor’s ‘Penitent Magdalene’ is surrounded by a sense of timelessness.
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Piet Mondrian’s ‘Composition in Black and Gray’ finds the spiritual in the abstract.
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The piano piece by Ferruccio Busoni is the ultimate statement of the Romantic concerto.
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‘Brighton Rock,’ Graham Greene’s first Catholic novel, rejects absolutes.
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Among the structure’s many oddities is a Renaissance church built in the middle of the mosque’s prayer hall
Stephen Adly Guirgis’s Pulitzer-winning serious comedy gets a staging in Florida.
Florida’s Westcoast Black Theatre Troupe production of the Great Migration parable is the latest in a welcome flood of Wilson’s works.
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Wilson’s 1979 work about a cab company that would reliably service black neighborhoods finally gets its Broadway debut.
In this revival of the 1971 play, a talentless songwriter considers trading in his life in Queens with a depressed wife for a shot at Hollywood with his gold-digging neighbor.
A birthday, love triangles and a pistol drive the story in this updated ‘Platonov,’ starring Cate Blanchett in her Broadway debut.
This year, the most compelling productions were off-Broadway and out-of-town.
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Its status as Broadway’s first a cappella musical is the only original note in this second-hand confection.
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The New York Theater Workshop’s production, starring Daniel Craig and David Oyelowo, reduces Shakespeare’s portrait of the human soul in extremis to an off-the-rack buddy flick.
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An Egyptian orchestra’s fumbles in Israel propel this big-hearted, small-scale musical.
A shy nerd finds sudden popularity thanks to a lie in a Broadway musical that lives up to the buzz.
Michael Keaton stars as Ray Kroc, the entrepreneur who made McDonald’s and fast food ubiquitous.
In M. Night Shyamalan’s latest, a man suffering from dissociative identity disorder abducts high-schoolers and threatens them with something even darker than kidnapping.
A castaway discovers the pleasures of nature with some help from a shelled friend in Michael Dudok de Wit’s animated feature.
The government enlists one hacker to catch a hacker in Aram Rappaport’s convoluted financial thriller
A documentary follows Benjamin Millepied’s brief, reformist stint as the head of the Paris Opera Ballet
How three black women in the segregated South helped put a man into orbit
A father, a daughter and the father’s alter ego figure in Maren Ade’s German-language comedy, which is outlandishly funny and improbably moving
Ben Affleck’s prohibition-era gangster film is a technically proficient effort in which feeling is forgotten
Mike Mills’s comedy, set in 1979, follows a diverse group of family and friends in a story about coming of age and coming into feminist awareness.
The six-film collection, recently released by the Criterion Collection, follows a shogunate executioner and his toddler son who roam the countryside, leaving destruction in their wake.
Damien Chazelle’s “La La Land” and a handful of other films lit up an otherwise unremarkable year.
A collection of largely forgotten movies made by black filmmakers for black audiences, from the silent era till after World War II.
Martin Scorsese’s film follows two Portuguese Jesuit missionaries who travel to Japan in the 17th century.
A sagacious monster helps a sleeping boy with his waking-life nightmares.
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After awakening early from hibernation on an intergalactic journey, two passengers have the ship to themselves.
Pedro Almodóvar’s film, based on stories by Alice Munro, reflects on fate, generation gaps, and a mother’s quest to find her daughter.
A dramatization of the Boston Marathon bombing depends on an unusual density of detail
Denzel Washington and Viola Davis star in August Wilson’s play about the struggles of a black family in 1950s Pittsburgh
Pablo Larraín’s film follows a Pablo Neruda on the run from a cop who might be an invention of his literary mind
Will Smith plays a devastated father who corresponds with Love, Time and Death
Joe Morgenstern reviews the latest entry in the “Star Wars” universe, which follows the rebel forces on a mission to steal the plans for the planet-destroying machine.
Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling star in a joyous musical that evokes Hollywood’s golden age.
Natalie Portman stars as Jacqueline Kennedy in the period during and after her husband’s assassination.
Recently freed from many of life’s responsibilities, a still-vital philosopher confronts her future.
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An Indian boy adopted by a Tasmanian couple uses Google Maps to discover who he is and where he’s from.
A trove of primary sources sheds new light on the attack and the country’s response to the outbreak of war.
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On PBS, Lucy Worsley leads viewers through the scandalous, bloodstained history of Henry VIII’s spouses.
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The Stones’ 2016 performance on the island recaptured the past while flouting the regime.
Jude Law plays a youthful pontiff with an inflexible plan for the future of the church in HBO’s new series.
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Gone is the series’ original vitality, replaced with predictable politeness.
This Frontline documentary looks at the deepening conflicts in American society from the Obama presidency to the election of Donald Trump.
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An HBO documentary about the recently deceased mother-daughter stars aims for fun but comes off as occasionally ghoulish.
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A reboot of the ’70s-’80s sitcom is filled with updated topical hooks, featuring a Cuban-American family headed by an ex-military matriarch.
A PBS profile of the director of such films as ‘12 Angry Men,’ ‘Dog Day Afternoon’ and ‘Network’
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Jonny Donahoe stars as a man who is compiling a list to remind his mother of everything that makes life worth living.
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A viewer’s guide to seasonal offerings.
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A dramatization of a young Barack Obama’s time in New York comes to Netflix.
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Benedict Cumberbatch, Sophie Okonedo and Tom Sturridge star in one of Shakespeare’s histories.
Spies and cults, politicians and predators brought drama to our screens this year.
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Patrick Creadon’s sports documentary revisits the heated 1988 meeting between Notre Dame and the University of Miami.
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The comedian plays arborist in this seasonal special on Adult Swim.
Though he couldn’t play a note, Mr. Hentoff made indispensable contributions to jazz.
Want to learn about classical music? Pianist Daniel Barenboim turns to YouTube as a teaching tool.
‘Immersive’ art is more popular than ever, but is it just a passing trend?
Whenever you’re going to read a play you’ve never seen, follow this one simple rule.
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