Politics 10 Practical Reasons Why We Need to Fund—and Defend—the National Endowment for the Arts The most common arguments against the NEA, and answers to them. By Ben Davis, Mar 4, 2020
Opinion How Gen Z’s Meme Artists Are Reshaping the Political Battlefield + Two Other Illuminating Ideas From Around the Web Plus, an epistolary exchange highlights the plight of Chilean artists and Art Spiegelman surveys the work of Rube Goldberg. By Ben Davis, Feb 26, 2020
On View Arkansas’s Crystal Bridges Museum Just Opened a Sprawling Show About the State of American Art Today. Here’s What It Looks Like Plus, take a first look inside the Momentary, Crystal Bridges's new outpost for cutting-edge contemporary art. By Ben Davis, Feb 24, 2020
Opinion Why a New Yorker Cartoonist Is Up in Arms About Appropriation Art + Another Illuminating Idea From Around the Web Plus, America's most popular picture is of a dog on a toilet. By Ben Davis, Feb 12, 2020
Opinion What Shaker Furniture Can Teach Us About the ‘New Minimalist’ Trend + Two Other Illuminating Pieces of Criticism From Around the Web Plus, considerations on John Cage's revolt against Musak, and the rise of "Rural Futurism." By Ben Davis, Feb 7, 2020
Art World How Fox News Weaponizes Art + Two Other Illuminating Pieces of Criticism From Around the Web Have you noticed that the blur is everywhere? By Ben Davis, Jan 31, 2020
On View How Stanley Kubrick’s Vision of the Future in ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ Predicted the Way We Consume News Today The Museum of the Moving Image's show gives a glimpse of headlines from a hypothetical future digital New York Times. By Ben Davis, Jan 26, 2020
Art World From the Sugar Sphinx to Beast Jesus, These Were the 100 Essential Artworks That Defined the 2010s—Ranked In case you missed it. By Ben Davis, Jan 2, 2020
Opinion The 100 Works of Art That Defined the Decade, Ranked: Part 4 In the final installment of this four-part series, our critic reveals his picks—number 25 through number 1—of the key artworks of the 2010s. By Ben Davis, Dec 31, 2019
Opinion The 100 Works of Art That Defined the Decade, Ranked: Part 3 In the third installment of a four-part series, our critic reveals his picks—number 50 through number 26—of the key artworks of the 2010s. By Ben Davis, Dec 30, 2019
Opinion The 100 Works of Art That Defined the Decade, Ranked: Part 2 In the second installment of a four-part series, our critic reveals his picks—number 75 through number 51—of the key art of the 2010s. By Ben Davis, Dec 29, 2019
Opinion The 100 Works of Art That Defined the Decade, Ranked: Part 1 In the first installment of a four-part series, our critic reveals his picks—number 100 through number 76—of the key artworks of the 2010s. By Ben Davis, Dec 27, 2019
Reviews What One Mysterious, Easily Overlooked German Painting Taught Me About How to Visit a Museum in the Age of Blockbusters Untangling why a little-known painting by Christoph Paudiß feels so prescient today. By Ben Davis, Nov 25, 2019
Opinion Why Art Fails to Make a Difference on Its Own: More Thoughts on Hans Haacke’s Urgently Relevant Survey at the New Museum The second of a two-part essay about "Hans Haacke: All Connected" at the New Museum. By Ben Davis, Nov 18, 2019
Opinion How Hans Haacke’s Rise Coincided With the End of 1960s Activism and the Birth of Corporate Museum Sponsorship The artist's New Museum retrospective traces the genesis of his particular brand of "institutional critique." By Ben Davis, Nov 6, 2019