May 25 – August 25, 2024

July 19 – August 24, 2024

The fluffy, fashion-filled Netflix shows has introduced a surprising plotline

June 29 – August 24, 2024

July 13 – August 25, 2024

Zoe Kravitz's directorial debut has "smart ideas" – does it work as a thriller?

Experts dissect why Sabrina Carpenter's disco bop has dominated the season

June 9 – September 15, 2024

June 7 – September 1, 2024

The surprise appearance of an actor from the original Alien has gone down badly

What not to miss this month, from Beetlejuice Beetlejuice to Wolfs

July 27 – August 31, 2024

March 31 – August 25, 2024

How a dramatic six-day bank siege helped inspire the art of hostage negotiation

The recently published summer novels you need to read

How two US female wrestlers are paying homage to Golden Age Hollywood films

When Netflix cofounder Reed Hastings purchased Utah’s Powder Mountain ski resort in 2023 for an undisclosed sum, the first thing he did was turn it into a private members club. He cordoned off 2,000 acres of the mountain and only made it accessible to people who own houses nearby for an annual fee between $30,000 and $100,000. Hastings did inherit $100 million of debt with his mountainous purchase, so he has to cut the deficit somehow.

To show that he’s also a man of the people, Hastings, who is the chairman of Powder Mountain, has opened up the rest of the mountain to the hoi palloi. He also recently announced that Powder Mountain is developing a public art park that will be filled with large-scale sculptures and land artworks.

Artists James Turrell, Nancy Holt, Jenny Holzer, and Paul McCarthy have all been tapped to create works for the project, which is slated to open in 2026.

Turrell’s walk-in light installation, titled Ganzfeld Apani (2011), was originally commissioned for the 2011 Venice Biennale and will be installed in a new trailside pavilion within the mountain’s 156 ski runs and numerous hiking and biking trails.

“At Powder, we want every experience—from the ski resort to the residential community to the outdoor art museum—to be intentional, and the integration of art into the mountain is a manifestation of that consideration,” Hastings said in the statement. “We aim to transform Powder into a multi-season destination that blends recreation, art, and meaningful connection for our entire community.”

Matthew Thompson is the director of Powder Mountain’s new arts program. He conceived the initial plan alongside Alex Zhang, the company’s chief creative officer, and independent curator Diana Nawi (who was appointed curator of contemporary art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in July).

The central six-ton altar stone at Stonehenge may have come from more than 450 miles away, according to a new study published in the scientific journal Nature.

Stonehenge is thought to have been erected in several phases between 3100 BCE and 1600 BCE, with the circle of large sarsen stones placed there between 2600 BCE and 2400 BCE by Neolithic and Bronze Age people. While larger local stones may have been moved by hundreds of individuals with ropes and log rollers, the Welsh bluestones could have been transported by sea using rafts.

Researchers have already established that the sarsen stones came from 16 miles away from the site, in what is now the British town of Marlborough, and that the smaller bluestones were brought in from 125 miles away, from the Preseli hills in what is now Wales.

Until now, it was believed that the partially buried altar stone came from the same area in Wales. But this latest study suggests that the center stone is from the old red sandstone in the Orcadian Basin in Northeast Scotland, more than 450 miles away.

The study was conducted by researchers from Aberystwyth University, University College London, Curtin University, and the University of Adelaide. The source of the stone, they believe, is a region that includes the Orkney isles, John O’Groats in Caithness, and a narrow strip along the coast that extends to the Moray Firth around Inverness.

Next May, one of Yayoi Kusama’s most famous “Infinity Rooms” returns to Dallas, ending an infinitely-Instagrammed museum tour. 

The Dallas Museum of Art jointly acquired All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins in 2017 with the Rachofsky Collection, which is also based in Dallas. Like other entries in the series, viewers are invited to step inside a small mirrored room filled with Kusama’s whimsical, often polka-dotted sculptures, in this case, her signature yellow and black pumpkins. The effect is a kaleidoscopic sea of sculptures stretching into oblivion—very selfie-friendly. 

All the Eternal Love I Have for the Pumpkins is “key to understanding [Kusama’s] practice,” Gavin Delahunty, a contemporary-art curator at the museum, said in a statement in 2017.

Due to its popularity, the installation comes with a recommendation of one to four visitors at a time, though that didn’t prevent property damage during its stint at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C. In a headline-grabbing 2017 incident, a visitor tripped on one of the hand-painted acrylic gourds, shattering it in the process, while trying to take a photo. The Washington Post reported at the time that the museum instructed for no security to be in the narrow room with visitors, who are allowed 30 seconds inside of viewing. 

A Hirshhorn spokesperson told the Post that the cost of replacing a pumpkin was “negligible,” and the site-specific nature of the installation allows for seemingly endless reconfigurations, all of which are executed in consultation with Kusama.

Archaeologists from the University of Cádiz have uncovered 57 ancient Roman-era sites in Spain’s Guadalete River region, according to a story published in the Independent. The find suggests that the area may have been a significant hub within the Roman Empire.

Led by Macarena Lara, the team employed ground-penetrating radar to reveal structures and settlements across the Arcos de la Frontera, Bornos Villamartin, and Puerto Serrano regions in Spain. Some of these structures were previously unknown to historians. 

They indicate a complex network of settlements, strategically located along trade routes, and could further historians’ understanding of Rome’s influence in southern Spain. 

This discovery marks the first comprehensive study of these sites, many of which were initially identified decades ago, in the 1980s and 1990s, but had never fully explored. 

“Our main objective is to continue carrying out excavations and surveys with non-traditional techniques and tools that will be completed with the study of the contexts found, as well as analyze techniques on the documented materials that will allow us to obtain a holistic vision of the Roman settlement and the territory in the area around the Bornos and Arcos de la Frontera reservoirs,” Lara said in a statement.