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ALPHA OMEGA ARTS By Gregory Disney-Britton One of our core tenets is valuing the nontraditional forms of art of the religious imagination. For example, back in 2013, we went to a reading by David Javerbaum of his book, The Last Testament, A Memoir by GOD at the JCC of Indianapolis. After a hilarious reading, he autographed our copy with: "To Adam & Steve, Let thy freak flag fly," and we've been enjoying his tweets from God ever since. This week, a new play based on the book opened on Broadway, and that's why An Act of God (above) featuring Jim Parsons is my NEWS OF WEEK .

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Jeannette Catsoulis HOLLYWOOD---Balanced precariously on the twin pillars of female sexuality and male sadism, Raj Amit Kumar’s “ Unfreedom ” conjures a pandemonium of religious violence and rampant homophobia. Structured around two unrelated kidnappings, one in New Delhi and the other in New York City, the movie toggles between them in such a muddled, histrionic style that timelines and geography blur. It’s easy to see why this first feature from Mr. Kumar was banned in India , but he’s a hot-blooded talent who may yet gain control of his Bollywood excesses. And his love of titillation. [ link ]

NEW YORK BUSINESS JOURNAL By Gary M. Stern CW Pencil Enterprise in March, a Lower East Side reliquary of wood and graphite NEW YORK---Can a pencil store thrive on the trendy Lower East Side? The Lower East Side of New York has spurred many innovative stores. The Meatball Shop debuted on Stanton Street, Clinton Street Bakery prospers, and so, in its heyday, did Streit’s Matzos. And now one entrepreneur has introduced a niche business that is going against the tide of apps and smartphones: a pencil store. Weaver tested out the pencil business online in November 2014 and started generating money right of the starting gate. It currently thrives because of online sales, which constitute 70 percent of revenue and 30 percent from the retail outlet. [ link ]

MINNEAPOLIS STAR TRIBUNE By Kavita Kumar At Department 56 offices in Eden Prairie, this is one of the Christmas season offerings. MINNESOTA---The Department 56 die-hards who still line up to have their miniature holiday villages signed by their artists are dominated by a graying set. But these days, newer faces are also in the crowd. To better cater to younger customers, Department 56 has been ramping up its presence on social media and focusing on licensed products that tap into newer trends such as Disney’s “Frozen,” Elf on the Shelf and the television show “Downton Abbey.” About two-thirds of its business is still funneled through the hundreds of mom-and-pop gift and Christmas shops around the country. But most of the recent growth has been from the remaining third with national retailers such as Sears, Macy’s, Dillards and Hallmark stores. Amazon has also become one of its biggest customers. [ link ]

THE NEW YORKER By Ben Mauk Home of the Boro's Collection in Berlin of around seven hundred pieces by eighty artists where owners/collectors live in their penthouse on the roof GERMANY---Among some fans of contemporary art, the private collection has emerged as an alternative model to the mega-museum, one that function simultaneously as cultural institution, status symbol, and philanthropic outlet. The Boros Collection is one of three significant, privately owned collections of contemporary art open to the public in Berlin, along with the Haubrok and Hoffman Collections. Their collections, he (Hal Foster) writes , are “auratic as an object yet fungible as an asset. Although they get tax breaks (because they are nominally open to visitors who can book the pilgrimage), these neo-aristocratic institutions don’t pretend to have any real connection to the public sphere. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Charles Isherwood God, as portrayed by Jim Parsons, with a new set of Commandments. Credit Sara Krulwich/The New York Times NEW YORK---If God were really as adorable and funny as Jim Parsons in the new Broadway show “An Act of God,” perhaps many more of us would be minding our morals, rapaciously atoning for our sins and generally doing unto others as we would like to be done unto, all in the hopes of a breezy welcome at the pearly gates. How funny is the guy? He’s J on Stewart funny, plus Stephen Colbert funny. (Mr. Javerbaum has written for both.) More obviously, it might be said that Mr. Parsons as Mr. Javerbaum’s tell-it-like-it-is God is, yes, divinely funny. [ link ]

THE GUARDIAN By Alexis Soloski Holy realistic: Jim Parsons, left, and Christopher Fitzgerald, in An Act of God by David Javerbaum. Photograph: Jeremy Daniel/AP NEW YORK---Blessed art thou, the Lord our God, king of the universe. And hey, congratulations on thy Broadway debut in An Act of God . And OK, admittedly, I wasn’t expecting thou to choose Jim Parsons of The Big Bang Theory as an avatar. Was Mandy Patinkin not available? And listen, please don’t take this the wrong way, because thou hast a habit of turning thy doubters into pillars of salt, but couldn’t this have been funnier? Concluding the show with the new commandment “Thou shalt believe in thyself!” feels a little new agey for an old God like you. [ link ]

THE OBSERVER By Tom Teodorczuk UNITED KINGDOM---P layful’s ability to commission and develop new plays is subsidized by an unusual business model: the producers take on the workmanlike roles of general manager on unrelated productions in the West End. The principals deal with contracts, arrange auditions and troubleshoot on shows without producing them, specializing in overseeing London musical imports from the U.S. such as Wicked, Shrek and Kinky Boots . It’s akin to running an international restaurant chain while spreading the risk and covering overheads by providing cutlery and menus to rival eateries. [ link ]

NPR By Maanvi Singh Photographer Gabriel Garcia Roman's "Queer Icons" series portrays queer people of color as saints and warriors. Jahmal Golden is a poet and a student at The New School. Courtesy of Gabriel Garcia Roman NEW YORK---Photographer Gabriel Garcia Roman's portraits feature friends and acquaintances, activists and poets, Americans and immigrants — some naturalized, some undocumented. All of them are queer people of color. "I wanted to specifically focus on this community because queer and trans people of color are so rarely represented in the art world," says Roman, who is Mexican-American and also identifies as queer. [ link ]

THE GLOBE & MAIL By Kate Taylor The Aga Khan Park, which draws inspiration from gardens in India and Spain, won’t be as welcoming in winter. (Darren Calabrese for the globe and mail) CANADA---Around five on Tuesday afternoon, the northbound traffic on the Don Valley Parkway at Eglinton Avenue was almost stationary. The southbound lanes, however, were flowing nicely, fast enough to emit a continuous roar that could be heard from the newly inaugurated Aga Khan Park. Will the delights of this place eventually outweigh its disadvantages? Let’s hope so, because this rich museum and its gracious park bear many of the characteristics of a white elephant. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Scott Reyburn UNITED KINGDOM---The Australian collector David Walsh is selling Chris Ofili’s 1996 painting “The Holy Virgin Mary,” which caused a furor when it was shown at the Brooklyn Museum in October 1999 as part of Charles Saatchi’s touring “Sensation” exhibition of works by Young British Artists (YBAs). “The Holy Virgin Mary” will be included in Christie’s June 30 auction of postwar and contemporary art in London, estimated at about $2.3 million. [ link ]

DESERT NEWS By Jennifer Johnson The Mocking of Christ," by Carl Bloch UTAH---Carl Bloch's painting "Christ Healing the Sick at Bethesda" will soon be joined by another Bloch piece at the BYU Museum of Art. The museum has acquired "The Mocking of Christ," a painting Bloch completed in 1880 that was only recently rediscovered. The piece depicts Christ, eyes on the painting's viewer, while a soldier leans over his shoulder and presses a crown of thorns into his head. It is painted in shades of gray, black and brown on mahogany. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Neil MacFarquhar The sculptor Salavat Scherbakov, at work on a model in his studio. Tens of thousands have signed a petition against the statue. Credit James Hill for The New York Times RUSSIA---Moscow does not exactly want for colossal statues. What the city lacks is a spectacular monument to a religious figure, but the Russian Orthodox Church and the culture minister, Vladimir Medinsky, are determined to change that. They have championed a project that will alter the cityscape by erecting an 82-foot-tall statue of St. Vladimir, Russia’s patron saint, atop one of the few hills in Moscow. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Andrew Keh Synagogues, Sausages, and Psychological Warfare in South Bend INDIANA---Not long ago, the oldest synagogue in this college town underwent a $1 million restoration. The building, to the relief of many, was salvaged from disrepair and possible demolition. But in the process, its character was markedly changed. Today, atop rows of red brick, the interlocking triangles of the Star of David sit alongside the interlacing ovals of the Toyota logo. Inside one doorway, the words of Exodus 25:8 curl in illuminated script across a cream-hued wall. “Make for me a sanctuary,” the verse reads, “and I will dwell in their midst.” Outside, a sign above the entrance denotes what this 114-year-old sanctuary has been renamed: the Cubs Den. [ link ]

ALJAZEERA By Guy Hedgecoe The Mezquita (Mosque) of Cordoba is a Roman Catholic cathedral and former mosque situated in the Andalusian city of Córdoba, Spain. SPAIN---When Christians re-conquered Córdoba, they built a Catholic cathedral, completed in 1236 in the heart of the Great Mosque. Two decades ago, it was described as the “Mosque-Cathedral” in official literature and tourist brochures, a term that acknowledged its shared heritage. In 1998, the Catholic authorities changed that to the “Cathedral (former Mosque)” and since 2010 it has been simply “Córdoba Cathedral.” [ link ]

THE CHRONICLE FOR HIGHER EDUCATION By Marc Perry Damien Hirst's skull tasteless? That's the point Solomon, Greenberg, and Pyszczynski have now spent a quarter-century studying how the fear of death shapes human affairs. The result is an empirical behemoth built on the foundation of a few simple propositions. One, that our awareness of death creates tremendous potential for anxiety or terror. Two, that we learn to manage that terror by embedding ourselves in a cultural worldview that imbues reality with order, meaning, and stability. Three, that we gain and maintain psychological security by sustaining faith in that worldview and living up to the values it conveys. [ link ]

ARTNET | NEWS By Christie Chu Belgian art collector Alain Servais is known for bringing his background in finance together with his passion for art, and for being an early supporter of Cindy Sherman and Gilbert & George (see artnet News Top 200 Art Collectors Worldwide for 2015 , Part Two). Servais draws a parallel between the luxury goods industry and art industry. The problem of branding, expanding, and money coming in "from all over," according to Servais, is that it leads artists to produce work that sells, since "that's the only thing they can show in galleries." [ link ]

THE TRIBUNE EXPRESS The exhibit features works of 10 artists. PHOTO: ABID NAWAZ/EXPRESS UNITED ARAB EMIRATES---“Geometric shapes have great significance in Islamic art,” Curator Aamna Hussain said on Tuesday. She was speaking at the first day of Built-in—an exhibition featuring the work of 10 artists at Alhamra on The Mall. Hussain said she had put together the work of artists who drew heavily from geometry. Artist Sadia Farooq said her work was about self-exploration and spirituality. The exhibition also features the work of Sarwat Rana, Manisha Jiani, Ghulam Hussain Guddu, Abbas Ali, Moattar Zafar and Sajjad Ali Talpur. It will conclude on June 5. [ link ]

METRO TIMES By Lee DeVito MICHIGAN---For the past decade, Dearborn's Arab American National Museum has celebrated Arab culture of all kinds with exhibitions, productions, concerts, and other programming. To celebrate this milestone, the museum is showing "Ten: The Exhibition," a showcase of contemporary Arab-American artists (including two from Michigan — Joe Namy and Wafer Shayota). [ link ]

WCPO | CHANNEL 9 By Kevin Eigelbach This is an illustrated Purim megillah, or scroll, and filigreed silver case created by silversmith and illustrator Ze’ev Raban, a master of Israel’s Bezalel School, dated 1927. Megillot are read on the Jewish holiday of Purim. This piece was a gift of Joseph B. and Olyn Horwitz of Cleveland. OHIO---Stored out of sight for more than a dozen years, a large collection of Jewish artwork and historical documents will see the light of day again in a new home, Cincinnati’s Skirball Museum. Earlier this month, the B’nai B’rith Klutznick Collection arrived at the museum on the campus of Hebrew Union College -- Jewish Institute of Religion in Clifton. The donation, from Washington, D.C.-based B’nai B’rith International, is triple the size of the Skirball’s existing collection of Jewish memorabilia, or Judaica, said Skirball director Abby Schwartz. [ link ]

THE GUARDIAN By Stephanie Kirchgaessner VATICAN CITY---A senior Vatican official has attacked the legalisation of gay marriage in Ireland. The referendum that overwhelmingly backed marriage equality last weekend was a “defeat for humanity”, he claimed. “I was deeply saddened by the result,” Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s secretary of state, said at a conference in Rome on Tuesday night. “The church must take account of this reality, but in the sense that it must strengthen its commitment to evangelisation. I think that you cannot just talk of a defeat for Christian principles, but of a defeat for humanity.” [ link ]

ARTDAILY Basohli style, Pahari, The portrait of Rama c 1730. Opaque watercolour and gold on paper. National Museum, New Delhi, India. AUSTRALIA---Today the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra opened The story of Rama: Indian Miniatures from the National Museum, New Delhi, the first major initiative under the Australia-India Memorandum of Understanding on Arts and Culture. ‘This exhibition of vibrant and exquisite Indian miniature paintings is important for the Gallery, and forms part of our commitment to share the art and rich cultural heritage of India with all Australians’ said Gerard Vaughan, Director. [ link ]

CHRISTIANITY TODAY By Jackson Cuidon Image: Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures 'Tomorrowland' HOLLYWOOD---When I review sub-par kids’ movies for this site, I frequently have to re-write my conclusions to be something other than just “Watch The Iron Giant/The Incredibles again instead of this.” And, on paper, Tomorrowland is pretty similar to all of those movies. When I say that it sounds good on paper, it turns out that, in practice, that’s the only place it works. [ link ]

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS TIMES By Tim Marcin If Pamela Geller had her way, the winning cartoon from her organization's "Draw Muhammad" event in Texas -- which led to a shooting in early May -- would be on the sides of Washington buses and displayed at public transportation stations. The president of the American Freedom Defense Initiative submitted the drawing to be run as an advertisement on public transportation in the District of Columbia, according to a post from Geller on Breitbart.com. [ link ]

MAIL & GUARDIAN AFRICA By Dulue Mbachu NIGERIA---While Islamist militants loyal to Boko Haram in northern Nigeria and Islamic State in Syria destroy cultural sites they consider idolatrous, some Christian activists in the south of Africa’s most populous nation are also targeting ancestral religious worship. So far no one has been injured in the raids. More than 500 traditional-worship sites, mainly in the south, have been burned down in the past decade, along with artifacts that are often hundreds of years old and of historical significance, according to Emeka Uzoatu, a researcher affiliated to the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, in the south east. [ link ]

THE KOREA HERALD By Lee Woo-young “Avatamsaka Sutra (The Flower Garland Sutra),” created in 1334. (Horim Museum) KOREA---Around 1247, Empress Hampyeong of Goryeo (918-1392) commissioned an artisan known for his skilled silver engraving to inscribe patterns of clouds and lotuses on a bronze vase in a prayer for the well-being of her family and country. It was after her two sons were sent away as punishment for attempting to remove a general who took power in a coup d’etat, while her daughters had to marry his sons. The new exhibition at the National Museum of Korea sheds light on those patrons of Buddhist art. [ link ]

ARTDAILY Buddha, Japanese. Edo period (1603-1868). Wood, lacquer. Irving Dwinnell Bequest. AGGV 1967.080.001. CANADA---The Art Gallery of Greater Victoria is showcasing two-thousand years of Buddhist art, creating a stunning portrait of one of the world’s great religions. Buddhist Arts of Asia, opening May 22 and running through August 30, 2015, traces the styles and influences of Buddhist art through more than 100 paintings, sculptures and ritual objects from the AGGV’s renowned Asian arts collection, including several recent acquisitions. Artists have been depicting Buddha and Buddhism through art since the religion was founded by Siddhartha Gautama more than 2,500 years ago in northern India, at a place now inside the border of Nepal. [ link ]

ARTNET | NEWS By Sarah Cascone Ai Weiwei's Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads (2010) Photo: Phillips Tech entrepreneur Sean Parker, founder of Napster and founding president of Facebook, was the buyer of Ai Weiwei's  "Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads" (2010), which sold at Phillips London in February for $4.4 million, artnet News has learned. The gold-plated statues are each 28-inches tall, and depict the Chinese zodiac signs. The piece is based on a set of 18th century sculptures created by Jesuits for a fountain clock in Beijing's Summer Palace that was later looted, and references China's history of copying and cultural repatriation. [ link ]

ARTDAILY A file picture taken on March 14, 2014 shows the citadel (background) of the ancient oasis city of Palmyra. AFP PHOTO/JOSEPH EID. EGYPT---Leading Sunni Muslim body Al-Azhar said Sunday the world must unite in a "battle of all humanity" to prevent the Islamic State group from destroying Syria's ancient city of Palmyra. The appeal came a day after Syria's antiquities director said that IS fighters had entered the museum in Palmyra and raised their black flag over the ancient citadel that overlooks the archaeological site. "Protecting archeological sites from destruction and plundering is the battle of all of humanity," the Cairo-based Al-Azhar, a prestigious seat of Islamic learning, said in a statement. "We have to unite our efforts in order to protect one of the most important archaeological cities in the Middle East from being destroyed by Daesh," it said, using an Arabic acronym for IS. [ link ]

TRANSPOSITIONS By Sarah Howell We as Christians have got to get over the Christian brand . There are so many things out there that get slapped with an Ichthus fish on the label and suddenly can be marketed to church groups. Y’all—we are people of faith, not an advertising demographic! We worship a God who created all things, not just Christian things. There is a lot of Christian music, art, and theology that is destructive, and sometimes we can find more beauty and truth in other spaces. We should not be afraid to encounter God in these unfamiliar ways. Here are a few of the lessons I’ve picked up: [ link ]

KERA: ART & SEEK By Jerome Weeks ‘The Angel,’ by Michael Borremans , oil on canvas, 2013. Photo: Jerome Weeks TEXAS---KERA’s Jerome Weeks joined the artist and the show’s curator, Jeffrey Grove, as they installed the Dallas Museum of Art’s sizable premiere, " Michael Borremans: as sweet as it gets ." In 2012, Borremans hit a mid-life crisis. Then a friend offered him an old, empty chapel at a school. “I was raised Catholic,” he says, “but I no longer practice. I have serious doubts about religion. People are going to laugh at this, but I felt inspired by the chapel.” The works that came out of it were given resonant titles: The Angel, The Virgin, The Son. [ link ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS By Gregory Disney-Britton In  Mark 12:31 , Jesus says "Love your neighbor as yourself" is the second greatest commandment. This week, voters in Ireland stood with their gay neighbors and sent a message to the world about Christian love, loyalty, and friendship. From Hozier's " Take Me to Church " to  Joe Caslin's embrace murals , Irish artists helped inspire this sweeping victory for marriage equality. It is in that spirit of Christian love, that " The Claddagh Embrace " (above) by Joe Caslin is my NEWS OF WEEK .

THE NEW YORK TIMES By David Motadel An anonymous painting of Turkish Emperor Mahmud II leading his troops. THE last several months have brought a dramatic escalation in conflict across the Middle East, almost all of it involving tensions between Sunni and Shiite Muslims — which are in turn fueled by a power struggle between Shiite Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia for regional supremacy. And yet, as new and disturbing as these developments may appear, the linkage of sectarian and secular interests is a return to the classic geopolitics of religion in the Middle East. Solving these problems will not be easy. Religious protectorates have proven remarkably persistent; yet they have also proven too dangerous to ignore. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Danny Hakim and Douglas Dalby A couple at Dublin Castle on Saturday. IRELAND---Ireland became the first nation to approve same-sex marriage by a popular vote, sweeping aside the opposition of the Roman Catholic Church in a resounding victory Saturday for the gay rights movement and placing the country at the vanguard of social change. With the final ballots counted, the vote was 62 percent in favor of legalizing same-sex marriage, and 38 percent opposed. The turnout was large — more than 60 percent of the 3.2 million eligible voters cast ballots, and only one district out of 43 voted the measure down. [ link ]

JEWISH FORWARD By Anne Joseph ISREAL---AMOCA (Arab Museum of Contemporary Art) is the first museum of its kind to open in an Arab-Israeli city that had, until the biennale , little contact with contemporary artworks. Photographs by the French-Moroccan artist Mehdi-Georges Lahlou are perhaps the most mesmerizing, playful and provocative pieces in this exhibition. Born to a Catholic mother and a Muslim father , his work addresses the cultural meeting between Islam and the West, questioning issues of identity and gender. Here, a series of photographs portrays the figure of a woman wearing a veil, taken from different perspectives. Yet the woman is actually the figure of the artist himself. [ link ]

DEADLINE HOLLYWOOD By Jeremy Gerard Jim Parsons Transforms Into God for 'An Act of God' NEW YORK---Who says Times Square is godless? That hasn’t been the case at least since Disney came back to Broadway, though as usual the deity must co-exist, however uneasily, with Mammon. At the Shubert-owned Booth (where, we hope, He has a wicked sense of humor and a taste for, well let’s just say the exotic), best-play Tony nominee Hand To God is building: 88% of the seats were filled. Meanwhile at Studio 54, which the Roundabout Theatre Company is renting out for the limited run, Jim Parsons ’ first full week of previews in the comedy An Act Of God took in $774K, or 73% of its $1 million gross potential, filling 80% of the seats. [ link ]

KXAN By Phil Prazan TEXAS---A new bill is on its way to the Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk that would protect the clergy’s right to say “no.” It would allow pastors to excuse themselves from performing weddings that violate their religious beliefs. The final product garnered overwhelming support. I just wanted to clarify,” said Rep. Sylvester Turner, D-Houston, “this cannot force a church to perform a wedding it doesn’t want to. As it exists under current law.” [ link ]

ART MEDIA AGENCY Zachary Harris. Linen Last Judgement, 2013-2014. Water-based paint, ink, linen, wood. 72 x 54 1/2 x 3/4 in. 182.9 x 138.4 x 1.9 cm. © Zachary Harris / Image provided by Feuer / Mesler Gallery and David Kordansky Gallery. NEW YORK---The Jewish Museum in New York , in the United States, will hold a group exhibition called “Unorthodox”, from 6 November 2015 to 27 March 2016. The large-scale group exhibition will present more than 50 contemporary artists from around the world, whose practices cross forms and genres, without the constraints of artistic conventions. Even though the artists come from a variety of social situations and generations, they are united by their independent spirit and individuality. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Randy Kennedy A prayer service inside the mosque installation created by the artist Christoph Büchel on May 8. Credit Casey Kelbaugh for The New York Times ITALY---The police in Venice closed an art installation in the form of a functioning mosque on Friday morning.... The Icelandic Art Center , which commissioned the installation, said in a statement that it believed the aims of the mosque had been realized, in a sense, even if the installation was not allowed to remain open, as originally planned, over the course of the Biennale through November. [ link ]

THE SYDNEY MORNING HERALD By Penny Webb Offerings, 2014, by Damon Kowarsky and Muhammad Atif Khan. Photo: Supplied AUSTRALIA---Peripatetic Melbourne artist Damon Kowarsky ​ likes to collaborate on projects. This show is his second with established Pakistani artist Muhammad Atif Khan . What's immediately apparent about these two dozen or so small, monochrome etchings is that in terms of visual motifs and graphic power the cultural capital is all Khan's. Khan is an image-appropriator; Kowarsky is an artist-observer who draws. [ link ]

SAN FRANCISCO WEEKLY By Jonathan Curiel Untitled94 Olive St. (at Polk) mural by John Vochatzer CALIFORNIA---The Mitchell Brothers' skin house on O'Farrell Street has an "anything goes" history of pay-to-play lasciviousness. As a night manager there, John Vochatzer has seen it all, and his new artwork on the back wall of the theater — which takes up a corner of Polk and Olive streets — is also "anything goes." On the far left, almost two stories tall, is a four-armed Hindu goddess with bloodshot eyes, see-through midsection (complete with ribs and blood passages), and the hairy legs of a monkey god, sitting Lotus-like on a reptile. Fish float above her in the sky, connected to three other giant figures, smaller men in togas, an Earth-like planet, and myriad plants and buildings that complete the work's otherworldly feel. [ link ]

BROADWAY.COM NEW YORK---Following speculation, it's been confirmed that stage and screen star Taye Diggs will take over for Darren Criss in " Hedwig and the Angry Inch ." Diggs will assume the role of our favorite internationally ignored song stylist at Broadway’s Belasco Theatre on July 22 for a 12-week engagement. In addition to Criss, the show currently stars Rebecca Naomi Jones, who will continue in the role of Yitzhak. Hedwig will mark Diggs’ return to Broadway after nearly 12 years, when he briefly played the role of Fiyero in Wicked opposite his wife at the time Idina Menzel (the two separated in 2013). [ link ]

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR By Meredith Hamilton, Staff writer In this May 9, 2015, file photo, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal speaks at the Freedom Summit in Greenville, S.C. LOUISIANA---Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal signed an executive order Tuesday putting part of his “Marriage and Conscience Act” into law after the Louisiana House voted against his original proposal. By siding with conservative Christians, Governor Jindal appears to be bucking public opinion trends supporting same-sex marriage. But he also may be positioning himself for a 2016 presidential run. Several similar religious freedom laws have been passed in recent months, most notably Indiana’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) in March. Arkansas tried to pass a bill in 2014, but it was vetoed by Gov. Asa Hutchinson. [ link ]

HYPERALLERGIC By Ryan Wong nstallation view of ‘How to catch eel and grow corn’ at Wilmer Jennings Gallery, with a mandala by Nadema Agard in foreground (all photos by the author for Hyperallergic) NEW YORK---Where are the indigenous stories, communities, and artists within “American” contemporary art? As we wait for big institutions to grapple with this question, two gallery group shows — which were simultaneously on display for a few weeks — offer an answer. At Wilmer Jennings Gallery at Kenkeleba was How to catch eel and grow corn, curated by Stephen Hepworth, and at Radiator Gallery is You Are on Indian Land , curated by Erin Joyce (who’s also a Hyperallergic contributor). Both exhibitions show artists investigating America — its psyche, history, and landscape — with eyes unfazed by the stories it tells about itself. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Laura Collins-Hughes Eric Soto in a scene from "In Vestments." NEW YORK---As the play begins, the priests face a quandary: What to do with sacramental wine that was tainted by plaster falling from the ceiling at the moment of transubstantiation, just as the wine became the blood of Christ? Set in a Roman Catholic parish called Our Lady of Perpetual Sighs, it’s performed in the intimate chapel of West Park Presbyterian Church on the Upper West Side, where the audience sits in pews lining the walls. Presented by Theater 4the People , with free admission, “In Vestments” is a sort of dramaturgical jambalaya, flavored with the full-throated music of Jacques Brel, sung by Pierre Marais. [ link ]

ANSAMED EGYPT---Italy is co-funding repairs on the Museum of Islamic Art in the Egyptian capital, one of the most important ones in the world, which was heavily damaged a year ago by a car bomb. The initiative was relaunched during the Cairo presentation of the campaign #Unite4Heritage promoted by UNESCO as a direct response to recent attacks on the cultural and architectonic heritage of Arab nations. The campaign aims to unite all governments and populations against acts of destruction and damage to archaeological sites of priceless historical and cultural value. [ link ]

THE TIMES OF ISRAEL By AP An engraving featuring the Jewish Star of David, illustrative (Abir Sultan/Flash 90) GREECE---Faced with blistering criticism over objecting to the presence of the Star of David on a monument dedicated to Holocaust victims, the mayor of Kavala in northern Greece told protesters Sunday that the dedication ceremony, originally set for this Sunday, will take place “very soon.” Mayor Dimitra Tsanaka confirmed that councilors from her list had objected to the size and placement of the Star of David on a commemorative stone, although she denied she shared the opinion or wanted the star removed, as the Central Board of Jewish Communities has alleged. [ link ]

THE GUARDIAN By Jonathon Jones Stained glass windows from the 12th and 13th century go on display inside Canterbury Cathedral. Photograph: Andy Hall for the Guardian UNITED KINGDOM---Some of the oldest stained glass windows in the world, their glowing, 800-year-old detail normally visible only to passing pigeons, have temporarily come to ground level at Canterbury cathedral, while the massive window that is their normal home is rebuilt. Although it has been repaired many times – with the mixture of types of stone and mortars adding to its problems – the huge window dates back to the 1420s. [ link ]

ARTNET | NEWS By Sarah Cascone Joe Caslin's mural. Photo: David Sexton. IRELAND---As Ireland prepares for this Friday's referendum on marriage equality, artist Joe Caslin has created a powerful image in support of the law. Plastered on the exterior of Caherkinmonwee Castle in Galway, two 50-foot women embrace in a pose that evokes one of Ireland's most famous paintings, Frederic William Burton's 1864 watercolor, " Hellelil and Hildebrand, The Meeting on the Turret Stairs ." [ link ]

THE ADVOCATE By Trudy Ring LOUISIANA---Louisiana’s antigay “religious freedom” bill has died in a state House committee, but Gov. Bobby Jindal says he’ll issue an executive order to accomplish the bill’s goals. The bill would have prevented the state from penalizing a business because the operator expressed religious or moral objections to same-sex marriage — for instance, in refusing to provide goods or services for a same-sex wedding. Shortly after the vote, Jindal issued a statement saying he’ll make the bill’s provisions law via executive order, the paper reports. [ link ]

WVXU.ORG By Ann Thompson Master silversmith Franz Anton Gutwein designed this gilded silver Torah breastplate in Augsberg, Germany, an important center for Jewish liturgical art, in 1801. Credit Hebrew Union College OHIO---Over the next few weeks and months the staff at Hebrew Union College's Skirball Museum will be unboxing its newly acquired art collection. It contains 1,500 items including Rembrandt etchings, baseball memorabilia, and contemporary Israeli silver jewelry. The art was a gift from B'nai B'rith International, whose Washington, D.C. museum closed in the early 2000s. The organization said the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR) Skirball Museum was "an optimal partner to showcase this distinctive collection." [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Martah Schwendener Zanele Muholi: Isibonelo/Evidence Xana Nyilenda (2011) in Newtown, Johannesburg, on view at the Brooklyn Museum. Credit Zanele Muholi, Stevenson Cape Town/Johannesburg and Yancey Richardson, New York NEW YORK---"Zanele Muholi: Isibonelo/Evidence,” an exhibition of 87 works at the Brooklyn Museum by a South African artist, ends with a celebration. But it begins on a much darker note. Describing herself as a “visual activist,” Zanele Muholi , who was born in 1972 in Umlazi township in Durban, South Africa, and studied at the Market Photo Workshop in Johannesburg, founded by the photographer David Goldblatt, has dedicated herself to increasing the visibility of black lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people with notable success. Her stark, powerful photographs have been included in multiple biennials and international exhibitions. [ link ]

THE HINDU By J.S. Ifthekhar Paintings of Jamini Roy to be displayed at a special exhibition at Salar Jung Museum in Hyderabad.– Photo: Arrangement INDIA---Painting is silent poetry and poetry is a speaking picture. You come away with this feeling after seeing his works. Broad brush strokes, simple forms, flat colours and an emphasis on lines. The paintings of Jamini Roy leave one bemused long after one has taken eyes off them. Thanks to the Salar Jung Museum (SJM), now one can look at some of the well known and critically acclaimed paintings of Roy, a household name in Bengal. SJM is showcasing the original paintings of Roy to mark his 128th birth anniversary. [ link ]

ARTNEWS By The Editors of ARTnews Shirin Neshat Rahim (Our House Is on Fire), 2013 Ink on digital chromogenic print 60 x 48 in. (152.4 x 121.9 cm) Photograph taken by Larry Barns © Shirin Neshat. Courtesy Gladstone Gallery, New York and Brussels “Shirin Neshat: Facing History” is on view at the Hirschhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden opened today and runs through Sunday, September 20. The solo exhibition sheds some light on the cultural and political influences that have informed Neshat’s work throughout her career. The exhibit will feature a number of films, photos, as well as items from the artist’s personal library. [ link ]

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD By Daniel Kany “They Write the Rules” by Natasha Mayers MAINE---One of the most difficult things to convey about Western art history is the presence of the Church. The Church was the law, philosophy, cosmology, ethics, morals and essentially the very personality of Western society. Most art and music was commissioned in the name of the Church. Crossing the Church didn’t work out for anyone – particularly artists. The 84 works in Natasha Mayer’s exhibition at the Maine Jewish Museum , “Men in Suits,” are not about the Church. But they address a similar effect: the deep and buried relationship between culture and the ultimate seat of society’s power. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Celestine Bohlen NEW YORK---If it weren’t for Marc Chagall and his paintings of rabbis and fiddlers, goats and lovers floating above its rooftops and church spires, Vitebsk would be just an obscure provincial city in Belarus, a country that remains eerily frozen in a Soviet-era past. “I did not live with you, but I did not have one single painting that did not breathe your spirit and reflection,” he wrote in an open letter to Vitebsk, published in a New York newspaper on Feb. 15, 1944, just as the city’s Jewish past was being snuffed out. [ link ]

JEWISH NEWS Freud’s Benefits Supervisor Resting, a depiction of one of the artists’s regular models Sue Tilley, sold at Christie’s in New York. NEW YORK---A Lucian Freud nude portrait has sold at auction for more than £35million after four bidders became locked in a battle to buy the modern masterpiece. Freud, who died in 2011 aged 88, was the grandson of psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud and the brother of the late television personality Sir Clement Freud. He was born in Berlin in 1922, but his Jewish family fled the city in 1933 and he become a British citizen in 1939. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim NEW YORK---Most of the time the new-music ensemble Counter)induction looks resolutely to the future. But on Saturday evening it turned its gaze inward and back with a program titled “Epitaphs: Music in Memoriam.” Inside the solemnly graceful crypt of the Church of the Intercession in Washington Heights the ensemble’s performances of works by Douglas Boyce, Kyle Bartlett, Eric Moe and Lewis Nielson became a meditation in which thoughts of death intertwined with the promise of consolation. [ link ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS L’arche de Noé XXI TW 2,12 Rami al Ali - HC Summer 2012 Photo studio Bastille, Paris, 13th April 2012 Color-print from original polaroid 31 1/2 x 43 3/8 in. Edition of 10 UNITED KINGDOM--- Hamiltons art gallery presents Noah’s Ark an exhibition by French German photographer Cathleen Naundorf , 14 May – 20 June 2015. Noah’s Ark , Naundorf’s latest body of work, is largely unseen and features a series of taxidermy animals alongside unique haute couture pieces by leading fashion designers including Dior, Chanel, Valentino, Gaultier, Elie Saab and Stephane Rolland. These elaborate sets embody a sense of extravagance - the dresses, headpieces and models posed against painted backdrops in a photo studio or on location - juxtaposed with the Biblical story and quest for a better life. “I am telling the classic Bible story, Noah’s Ark. Saving the animals and mankind; leaving earth as we know it – in a boat – and believing there is something better for the future.”

THE DIPLOMAT By Poppy McPherson The Buddhist Bug at the Malay Heritage Centre in Singapore earlier this year. Image Credit: Flickr/Jnzl  (surveying) CAMBODIA---Starring the artist dressed as a giant orange insect, Anida Yoeu Ali’s multi-media installation and performance project, The Buddhist Bug, is nothing if not unique. Last week, one single print from the unusual series won its Phnom Penh-based creator the Sovereign Asia Art Prize for emerging artists. Known as “The Bug” for short, the installation features a fantastical orange creature made from a soft, flexible tube and worn by Ali in various urban and rural settings. It’s a playful exploration of displacement from the perspective of a Cambodian Muslim woman raised in the United States. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Alastair MaCaulay A marble statue thought to be of the Greek god Dionysus, center, from the east pediment of the Parthenon, at the British Museum. Credit Matt Dunham/Associated Press UNITED KINGDOM---The classically ideal body, as established in sculpture in Greece in the fifth century B.C., has been the most constantly copied style in all the arts. Without making an issue of what influenced what, this exhibition places ancient Greek art in the contexts of Assyrian, Egyptian and Cycladic antecedents and of Indian and Roman sequels. It also shows depictions of people other than Greeks. (Two Greek images of Africans are especially arresting.) What this exhibition shows is that the body in movement, both realistic and transcendent, was at the center of Greek art and thought. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Fintan O'Toole IRELAND---If polls are accurate — in a corner of Europe hardly thought of as a bastion of liberalism, like Sweden or the Netherlands. In spite of opposition from the Roman Catholic and Presbyterian churches, from Islamic leaders and conservative civic groups, surveys of public opinion consistently show more than 70 percent in favor of the government’s starkly simple proposal to add a line to the Irish Constitution: “Marriage may be contracted in accordance with law by two persons without distinction as to their sex.” [ link ]

WISHTV.COM By Dick Wolfsie INDIANA---An art exhibit about the work of Dr. Seuss is on display at the Fashion Mall. The Art of Dr. Seuss project offers a rare glimpse into the artistic life of the famous children’s book author. Dr. Seuss, whose real name is Theodor Seuss Geisel , is also known for his WWII political cartoons and his work in the advertising world. Also on exhibit at the Fashion Mall is a unique look at the iconic hats of Dr. Seuss. The Dr. Seuss hat exhibit can be seen on the second level of the mall’s east wing, next to Paper Source, May 15 through June 1. [ Video ]