New owner for Art New England

Art New England has been acquired by New Venture Media Group, which has offices in Boston’s Fort Point community and publishes the bi-weekly visitors' magazine Panorama and the Boston edition of Playbill.

If you care about local art – and its local coverage – it’s important to watch how this plays out. Art New England was founded by Carla Munsat, a transplanted Los Angelino, and Stephanie Adelman, a transplanted New Yorker, who felt Boston’s art scene was split up and isolating. They decided to launch a magazine in December 1979 to try to bring the local community together in discussion – and to expand what the idea of the local art scene meant.

As Art New England approaches its thirtieth anniversary later this year, it plans to launch a redesigned and expanded website. The press release adds that New Media Venture Group’s “interests include Show of the Month Club, the country's oldest member-based theater and travel club, and Panorama Custom Publishing, which provides editorial, design, marketing and printing services to a variety of for-profit and not-for-profit businesses and organizations such as The Newbury Street League, Massachusetts Lodging Association and Commonwealth Shakespeare Company. … The company also owns and operates a theatrical development and producing subsidiary, New Venture Entertainment LLC, in partnership with a Korean investment group with offices in Seoul and Tokyo. Recent projects include the Tony-nominated Broadway musical, “Cry-Baby;” last fall's South Korean tour of Boston Ballet; and in September 2009, a two-week engagement of the Broadway tour of “RENT” in Seoul.”