Thursday, August 07, 2014

WaPo gets two new art reporters

Announcement from Liz Seymour, Washington Post's executive features editor, David Malitz and Mitch Rubin, deputy features editors, and Christine Ledbetter, arts editor:
We are thrilled to announce two terrific arts reporters are joining Features. Peggy McGlone of the Star-Ledger will cover the local arts beat and Geoff Edgers of the Boston Globe will be our national arts reporter.

Peggy has covered a variety of news and features beats during her 27 years at the Star-Ledger. She created the arts beat, covering and (and uncovering) public art controversies, concert industry secrets and ethical lapses at the state arts council. Former Star-Ledger Editor Jim Willse described her as “one of my favorite people in any newsroom.” At the Post, she will be our point person on the Smithsonian, the Kennedy Center and other cultural institutions. A lifelong Jersey girl and a Mets fan, Peggy graduated from Seton Hall University and has a PhD from the City University of New York. She is the mother of three and two of them are students at Loyola University in Baltimore. We don’t know if they are as happy as Peggy is to be moving closer to campus.

Geoff, a 12-year veteran of the Globe, has written about pop music, classical music, museums and just about every big cultural story to hit Boston. The Globe announced his departure by writing: “Smart, enterprising, energetic and resourceful, Geoff has simply excelled.” Prior to the Globe, he was a reporter at the Boston Phoenix and the Raleigh News and Observer, and freelanced for a variety of magazines including GQ, Details and Wired. He produced a full-length documentary about his personal mission to reunite the Kinks and was the host/writer on the Travel Channel series “Edge of America.” Geoff will have a broad reach to write about arts, entertainment and cultural issues across the nation. A Brookline, Mass. native, he graduated from Tufts University and lives in Concord, Mass. with his wife Carlene Hempel, a writer and full-time journalism teacher at Northeastern University, and their two children. Geoff will be based in Boston but will be appearing in the newsroom frequently.
I will ask Ms. Ledbetter if these two new writers will also cover the DMV's visual art galleries, augmenting Mark Jenkins' most excellent and refreshing coverage.