Coming Attractions
Our expert critics supply a guide to film, visual art, theater, author readings, television, and music. More offerings will be added as they come in.
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The Arts Fuse Currents
Music
By Paul Robicheau In Groton, the veteran ensemble leans into mood and understatement as its final touring year begins. Hard to believe that it’s been 27 years since bassist Reid Anderson and drummer Dave King co-founded The Bad Plus. Originally a piano trio with Ethan Iverson (and then briefly Orrin Evans), the group was like…
Visual Arts
A Provincetown exhibition pairs data and aesthetics to reveal how artists and scientists alike are driven to understand—and protect—the ocean’s shifting world.
Film
From Anne Packard’s irresistible presence to a polarizing slasher homage and a breakout no-budget film, this year’s roundup offered plenty of satisfactions and some surprises.
Books
In “1968,” historian Alexander Bloom challenges the clichés of counterculture and reflects on a year of global rupture.
Poetry at The Arts Fuse
This week’s poem: Joe Elliot’s “after No Other Land”
Dance
Shakia Barron’s “The Gathering” transforms the stage into a shared space of rhythm, improvisation, and release.
Theater
Despite striking choreography and a tour-de-force lead, the A.R.T.’s adaptation of Black Swan can’t escape the film’s excesses—or its own thin score.
Television
In the series “Alice and Steve,” Nicola Walker anchors a dark comedy that’s less about laughs than about longing, aging, and emotional dysfunction.
Podcasts
Host Elizabeth Howard talks to Peter Bouteneff about the power of silence in the music of Estonian composer Arvo Pärt.
Short Fuses
Each month, our arts critics — music, book, theater, dance, television, film, and visual arts — fire off a few brief reviews.
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About the Arts Fuse
The Arts Fuse was established in June, 2007 as a curated, independent online arts magazine dedicated to publishing in-depth criticism, along with high quality previews, interviews, and commentaries. The publication's over 70 freelance critics (many of them with decades of experience) cover dance, film, food, literature, music, television, theater, video games, and visual arts. Support arts coverage that believes that culture matters.
Arts Commentary: The Kennedy Center and the Boston Symphony Orchestra — A Tale of Two Crises
A court-ordered reset in Washington and a self-inflicted rupture in Boston expose deeper failures of leadership, transparency, and trust.