Dia Art Foundation

Playwright and poet Brighde Mullins will become director of the University of Southern California Master of Professional Writing program, starting July 1. The organizer of reading series at REDCAT, LACMA and New York's Dia Art Foundation, Mullins directs a writing program at the California Institute of the Arts. Her plays include "Fire Eater," performed at Venice's Electric Lodge in 2004. The faculty for the USC program includes writers Janet Fitch, Judith Freeman and Sandra Tsing Loh. -- Scott Timberg

When Michael Govan was named director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 2006, there was reason to hope that LACMA's campus — in its jumbled, sprawling form something of a microcosm of Southern California urbanism — might finally gain some architectural coherence. Govan arrived at the museum with an impressive architectural track record, having overseen the construction of a terrific satellite campus for the Dia Art Foundation, designed by artist Robert Irwin and the architecture firm Open Office, in Beacon, N.Y. Before that he worked alongside Thomas Krens as the Guggenheim director plotted a program of global expansion starring the world's leading architects.

Jeffrey Weiss, curator and chief of the department of modern and contemporary art at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., has been appointed director of the New York-based Dia Art Foundation. He will succeed Michael Govan, who became director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art last spring. During his 13-year tenure In Washington, Weiss helped to build the museum's collection and organized many exhibitions, including the current show of Jasper Johns' paintings.

Playwright and poet Brighde Mullins will become director of the University of Southern California Master of Professional Writing program, starting July 1. The organizer of reading series at REDCAT, LACMA and New York's Dia Art Foundation, Mullins directs a writing program at the California Institute of the Arts. Her plays include "Fire Eater," performed at Venice's Electric Lodge in 2004. The faculty for the USC program includes writers Janet Fitch, Judith Freeman and Sandra Tsing Loh. -- Scott Timberg

Fred Sandback, a Minimalist sculptor whose sparse installations made of colored yarn, wire or string delighted art critics, died Monday in his New York City studio. He was 59. His wife, Amy Baker Sandback, said her husband, who had suffered from depression for some time, committed suicide. His early interest in stringed musical instruments led him to make dulcimers and banjos as a teenager. He said music was important to his work. At times he retreated to his grandfather's woodshed in New Hampshire and listened to recordings of cellist Yo-Yo Ma. "It is as if you are inside the cello," he said of the resonant sound.

It's a temple of art for devotees of Minimalism, Conceptual sculpture and earthworks. It's a day in the country for those who prefer their art in a pastoral setting but not too far from the Manhattan action. It's the latest example of an economically depressed town trying to revive itself, in this case by turning a printing plant into a contemporary art center.

When Michael Govan was named director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 2006, there was reason to hope that LACMA's campus — in its jumbled, sprawling form something of a microcosm of Southern California urbanism — might finally gain some architectural coherence. Govan arrived at the museum with an impressive architectural track record, having overseen the construction of a terrific satellite campus for the Dia Art Foundation, designed by artist Robert Irwin and the architecture firm Open Office, in Beacon, N.Y. Before that he worked alongside Thomas Krens as the Guggenheim director plotted a program of global expansion starring the world's leading architects.

THE ARTS COMMUNITY IN LOS ANGELES has always seemed to exist somewhere in the shadows of the glitz, glamour and even scandals of the Hollywood entertainment world. But with the opening of the Getty Center, Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Broad Contemporary Art Museum, the appointment of conductor Gustavo Dudamel to the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the numerous theater world-premiere offerings and the emergence of the Los Angeles Opera, the "city of the future" is once again trying to establish itself as an internationally recognized cultural center.

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art is close to naming a new director, sources say, and the leading candidate is Michael J. Govan, director of the New York-based Dia Art Foundation and a specialist in contemporary art. After a quarterly museum trustees meeting Wednesday, the facility's top staff and board officials stressed that no vote had been taken to appoint a new director, and museum employees said no staff announcement had been made.

FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. - Flying a couple of thousand feet above a volcanic field in Arizona near the Painted Desert, it's fairly easy to spot the extinct volcano known as the Roden Crater. It stands alone in the field, apart from hundreds of other volcanoes. It shows signs of being a manmade monument, with paths winding around it, a small building with the horizontal thrust of a Neutra home embedded in one side and an entrance nearby. And down in the center of the crater's bowl, a 44-foot-wide concrete ring surrounds a large hole - looking up like a giant, unblinking eye. FULL COVERAGE: 2013 Spring arts preview You can imagine people thousands of years from now puzzling over its function, much the way people today wonder about Machu Picchu or Stonehenge.

THE ARTS COMMUNITY IN LOS ANGELES has always seemed to exist somewhere in the shadows of the glitz, glamour and even scandals of the Hollywood entertainment world. But with the opening of the Getty Center, Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Broad Contemporary Art Museum, the appointment of conductor Gustavo Dudamel to the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the numerous theater world-premiere offerings and the emergence of the Los Angeles Opera, the "city of the future" is once again trying to establish itself as an internationally recognized cultural center.

Jeffrey Weiss, curator and chief of the department of modern and contemporary art at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., has been appointed director of the New York-based Dia Art Foundation. He will succeed Michael Govan, who became director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art last spring. During his 13-year tenure In Washington, Weiss helped to build the museum's collection and organized many exhibitions, including the current show of Jasper Johns' paintings.

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art is close to naming a new director, sources say, and the leading candidate is Michael J. Govan, director of the New York-based Dia Art Foundation and a specialist in contemporary art. After a quarterly museum trustees meeting Wednesday, the facility's top staff and board officials stressed that no vote had been taken to appoint a new director, and museum employees said no staff announcement had been made.

Fred Sandback, a Minimalist sculptor whose sparse installations made of colored yarn, wire or string delighted art critics, died Monday in his New York City studio. He was 59. His wife, Amy Baker Sandback, said her husband, who had suffered from depression for some time, committed suicide. His early interest in stringed musical instruments led him to make dulcimers and banjos as a teenager. He said music was important to his work. At times he retreated to his grandfather's woodshed in New Hampshire and listened to recordings of cellist Yo-Yo Ma. "It is as if you are inside the cello," he said of the resonant sound.

It's a temple of art for devotees of Minimalism, Conceptual sculpture and earthworks. It's a day in the country for those who prefer their art in a pastoral setting but not too far from the Manhattan action. It's the latest example of an economically depressed town trying to revive itself, in this case by turning a printing plant into a contemporary art center.

A large collection of Andy Warhol's art may find a home in a proposed museum in Pittsburgh, where the artist grew up. The museum would become "the most ambitious single-artist museum in the country," said Phillip M. Johnston, director of the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh.