Welcome back to The Weekend Press! Today, Suzy Weiss on Ariana Grande’s disturbing turn. Liel Leibovitz on the trouble with “Ted Lasso.” Two Drinks with Al Roth, the Nobel laureate who thinks buying an organ is fine. The young man who quit finance to become a vagabond. And more!
But first: Caitlin Flanagan wants to tear down a Los Angeles museum.
Not all art is created equal. Human beings have understood this ever since a guy drew a woolly mammoth on the wall of a cave—and have argued, sometimes ferociously, about what deserves to be lauded, and what can be consigned to the dustbin of history.
When we do this, we’re really asking some of life’s big questions: What’s meaningful? What makes us feel something? What will still be true a century from now?
But then along came a theory that caused art history to eat itself from the inside out. It decreed that valuing some things more than others was problematic, actually. There should be no hierarchy. And the Western canon isn’t based on an objective sense of truth and beauty but on racism, colonialism, bigotry.
Critical theory, as it’s known, has become an orthodoxy of the art elite—and it has seeped into the institutions they run.
Which brings us to the newly renovated Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), which was once the largest encyclopedic museum west of the Mississippi—but now, according to our columnist Caitlin Flanagan, looks more like a sinister garage sale.
Michael Govan, the CEO of the museum, scoffs at that idea. To quote him: “We’re going to create knowledge by putting things in categories and distinguishing.” And so, writes Caitlin, in the new LACMA artworks from wildly different eras and areas are jumbled up together, for no discernible reason: “Sumerian relief structures next to black-and-white photographs and, depending on the day, a performance artist on a bicycle pedaling around.”
The message is this: “They’re all the same.”
“Would it be churlish,” asks Caitlin, “to point out that if people hadn’t been creating knowledge by ‘putting things in categories and distinguishing,’ Govan wouldn’t be able to preside over a museum that hangs in midair?”
The truth is, if more of our museums fall to this destructive philosophy, future generations will never benefit from the knowledge that allowed Govan to take a sledgehammer to categories: the knowledge of how artists are linked, how one era followed another, how new styles were born. A knowledge of art history, in other words.
And Caitlin, for one, doesn’t want that to happen.
”I visited the new LACMA three times over two weeks, and it radicalized me,” she writes in today’s essay. “Here was the first museum I’ve ever wanted to tear down.”
“Watching the first episode of the new season of Ted Lasso is a little like running into your ex at the mall,” writes Liel Leibovitz. “First comes a burst of involuntary excitement—remember all those wonderful biscuits your ex used to bake?” Then, upon closer look, you realize: “Now I remember why we broke up.” As Liel sees it, that’s because the new season, released on Wednesday, replaces real complexity and depth with empty progressive values—a move that pleases pundits and academics, and precisely no one else.
What is bad about prostitution? Why is it wrong to eat horses? If someone asks you if you know a hit man, do you call 911? For most people, these are the kind of sticky ethical dilemmas you hope to avoid—but Nobel Prize–winning economist Al Roth delights in provocative moral questions; they are the subject of his latest book. And in this week’s Two Drinks, Roth persuaded Peter Coy that buying a kidney might not be such a terrible idea, even if “some people think that not only is that a bad idea, but it’s the kind of bad idea that only bad people have.”
“You’re not just wasting your time. You’re wasting your life.” That’s the voice that rang in investor Jack Raines’s head as a young man. At age 24, he was well on his way down the “correct” professional path—he’d secured a job as a financial analyst for America’s largest logistics company, and an offer to matriculate at Columbia Business School the next fall. But then he stumbled upon Rolf Potts’s “Vagabonding.” “There are a few books in my life that have made me feel something,” he writes in today’s Things Worth Remembering. “There is only one that has ever made me do something.” Specifically, he booked a one-way ticket to Barcelona, and left everything he knew behind.
Second Thought
This week, a concerningly skeletal Ariana Grande released a music video in which she takes a chainsaw to some entertainment executives and ends up covered in their blood. Then, a couple of days later, she announced she was taking a step back from public life after the completion of her Eternal Sunshine tour. In the latest episode of Second Thought, Suzy Weiss and Dan Ahdoot unpack what’s going on here, before diving into some other goings-on, like MAHA’s new favorite plastic-free water brand.
“They say there’s a whole credit card in your brain full of microplastics,” Suzy says. “I hope mine’s platinum.”
Click below to watch the video, or listen wherever you get your podcasts. And for more of Suzy’s thoughts on the gory Grande story, don’t miss her newsletter!
Knock Knock, It’s Cupid!
A new batch of ads from single Free Pressers is live on the site. Click here to meet a California conservative, a recovering workaholic looking for love nearing retirement, or a man who built his own house and is now ready to build a relationship. Your special someone could be just one email away! If you’d like to take a chance at Free Press love, write a paragraph that defines you, including your age, where you live, and what you’re looking for, and send it over to Cupid@TheFP.com.
This week, Larissa Phillips asked: Should I buy a gun? Read her essay on the dilemma, then read the comments, in which Free Press readers gave their advice. Also this week, Joe Nocera wrote about the man who just lost $35 billion, and River Page tried making the recipe featured in RFK Jr.’s new cooking show. . .
How should you spend the rest of your weekend? We asked our assistant editor Josh Code for his recommendations…
📚Read… Interpreter of Maladies, by Jhumpa Lahiri. I picked up this book because I loved its title, and because it won the Pulitzer for fiction in 2000—back when that sort of thing mattered. Ever the cynic when it comes to identity-centric literature, I was surprised to find myself incredibly moved by this short story collection themed around the Indian diaspora (yes, there were tears). The characters are desperate and unvarnished. The narrative twists and turns feel earned. The author’s prose is that rare sort where you find yourself wanting to reread each story to study it, to figure out how the hell she pulled that off. My favorite stories from the mix were “A Temporary Matter,” “Sexy,” and “The Third and Final Continent.”
📺 Watch… Madonna: Truth or Dare. Awed by the catchiness of Confessions II, Madonna’s 10th chart-topping album in her five-decade career, I recently dedicated myself to the study of Madge history (herstory?). This particular documentary, filmed during her 1990 Blonde Ambition world tour, captures the star’s life on the road. There are celebrity cameos, scandals, and diva moments, but the best part is seeing the family she forms with her backup dancers and singers, whom she leads in prayer before every show. Fans of the singer will no doubt enjoy the film. For the unacquainted, consider it a portrait of a woman living the American dream, warts and all. It’s definitely not the film Madonna would have made about herself. It’s a time capsule of what celebrity meant—and what it cost—in a pre-influencer world.
🌮Eat… Code’s EZ Tacos. If you missed this week’s inane drama on right-wing Twitter, what you need to know is: The burrito prices are too damn high. If you’re looking to save a buck, or the employees at your local Chipotle are starting to recognize you, try making this taco recipe at home. Cook one cubed potato in oil until it’s golden brown, then add half an onion and a few cloves of garlic, season with salt and pepper, and drop in a pound of ground beef. Mash up the beef, brown it, then add your favorite taco seasoning and a half cup of water. Mix it all together and cook for a couple more minutes, then serve with whatever toppings you like. Live más, for less!
Last but not least: Behold this stunning photo of Madonna, captured on her Blonde Ambition tour.
That’s all, folks! Have a great weekend.
I got here in record time.
Is the LA "ART" museum tax exempt from local property taxes or fed income taxes ( and do donors get tax deductions)? If so RESCIND ALL SUCH TAXPAYER SUBSIDIES NOW.
Maybe there is a trend here of sorts; i am not an art or architecture expert but those who are perhaps can draw comparisons to the recently opened obama library in Chicago ( including the the extent to which those who helped construct the museum were also stiffed).