What’s Happening: Sonic Sphere, a floating concert hall on view at the Shed, promises a groundbreaking listening experience stemming from the radical vision of late composer Karlheinz Stockhausen. As another activation at the New York institution proves, “going inside the music” is tricky to pull off.

The Download: At the 1970 World Exposition in Osaka, the radical German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen revealed one of his most perplexing works. (No small feat for an artist who once sent musicians in helicopters to play airborne string quartets.) Billed as the world’s first spherical concert hall, the Kugelauditorium enticed one million visitors with compositions specially adapted for the space that promised to move sound above, below, and through their bodies. It never quite took off during Stockhausen’s lifetime, but thanks to a team led by Ed Cooke, the concept—newly billed as the Sonic Sphere—is living on through pop-ups in France, Mexico, and at Burning Man. Now, a giant 65-foot iteration is suspended inside The Shed’s soaring McCourt space through the end of July.

Sonic Sphere promises a novel auditory experience, hosting listening sessions of music—the xx’s debut record, playlists by Yaeji and Carl Craig—remixed for its spherical build. Visitors enter via a raised platform and totter around on vertigo-inducing mesh until they recline on netting beds and luxuriate in the sounds emanating from 124 meticulously arranged speakers, complete with flashing lights. Early reviews range from “sublime” to “overwhelming,” with a child even saying the experience felt akin to entering an “alien mothership.” The pod’s metal framework has also drawn comparisons to the Death Star—and perhaps unfortunately, a Wiffle ball.

Justin Davidson, writing for Curbed, questions what new modes of thought and action this iteration of Sonic Sphere is equipped to plumb. (“It strikes me as an orb in search of a point.”) Similar skepticism hampers another one of the Shed’s future-thinking musical experiences, a mixed-reality concert of the late Japanese composer Ryuichi Sakamoto. Strapping on a steampunk headset in a dark room with dozens of others might evoke a séance more than a concert; error messages that occasionally pop up in one’s field of vision do nothing to improve the vibe (nor does the revelation that the gear isn’t designed to fit people needing prescription eyewear). What’s missing most is the chemistry between performer and audience—Sakamoto’s likeness, programmed after Tin Drum filmed him for three days, exists merely as a specter.

In Their Own Words: “These all sound like necessary minor inconveniences on the road to progress,” Max Lakin writes about the Sakamoto performance in the New York Times. “But is this progress? Being in a room with a mirage while the music is piped in is hardly more transcendent than watching a standard video recording, which, really, is what this is anyway. It is an effective transcendence of death, but so is any audio or video recording, or photograph, or any piece of art. Good art, like Sakamoto’s, does that, with or without the light show.”

Surface Says: While flawed, these sound experiments are still a cut above those gimmicky “immersive art experiences” that just won’t go away.

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In the heart of the Tramuntana Mountains of Mallorca, Virgin Limited Edition’s Son Bunyola Hotel opens its doors, breathing new life into a 16th-century finca on a 1,300-acre estate teeming with almond and olive groves, vines, and citrus fruit trees. The property, a love letter to the Balearic Island from Richard Branson designed by local architect Gras, seamlessly merges past and present, featuring a meticulously restored main building and several annexes, including the Tafona, where the historic olive press was located and now harbors two showcase suites.

Local designer Rialto Living infused each of the 26 rooms and suites with a touch of Mallorcan charm, while the hotel’s two restaurants serve Mediterranean and tapas dishes under the guidance of executive chef Samuel G. Galdón. The hotel’s wellness program takes advantage of its natural surroundings, with outdoor yoga sessions, historical walks around the UNESCO World Heritage site, and a picturesque swimming pool overlooking the idyllic rock formations of the Foradada peninsula.

Steffany Tran grew up splitting time between San Jose and Sài Gòn, developing a strong affinity for the richness of Vietnamese art along the way. Her nascent studio Vy Voi allows her to reinterpret the country’s creative traditions through her own design language, yielding richly textured vases, lamps, and soon furniture that draw from the fleeting charm of organic occurrences like mushrooms sprouting and moss blanketing bark.

If print is, as they say, dead, then zines are increasingly rare snapshots of artists’ crossover with such a uniquely tactile and approachable medium. At New York Life Gallery, a downtown bellwether for artists of the moment and those whose work is in the midst of a resurgence, three new zines will celebrate photographers Daniel Arnold, Sam Penn, and the late Victor Arimondi. At different ages and moments in their careers, the shared commonality between Arnold, Penn, and Arimondi’s bodies of work is an eye for striking moments of intimacy. A launch of the publications at the gallery (167 Canal Street, Floor 5) on June 28 brings together their work and audiences.

Last week, Creative Capital celebrated its 2023 “Wild Futures” grant recipients with a night on the town—and on the water—in New York. The evening kicked off with a reception and showcase of grantees’ works in the disciplines of literature, performing arts, and technology downtown at Metrograph. After a reception with remarks by Creative Capital’s president and executive director Christine Kuan, artists and supporters mingled in Metrograph’s Commissary bar. The group then departed on a dance party and cruise around the Statue of Liberty, capping off a year of hard work and accomplishment for the organization’s rising artists.

When was it? June 22

Where was it? Metrograph and Circle Line Cruise

Who was there? Allison Glenn, Camila Falquez, Noor Tagouri, Meredith Talusan, Jesse Krimes, and more.

Gobsmacked by high paint prices? You’re not alone. According to the Producer Price Index, which uses a normalized scale as opposed to dollar values, costs to manufacture paint and coating jumped 28 percent from 300 in early 2020 to an October 2022 peak of 420. Blame plunging temperatures and ice storms, which knocked out Texas’s power grid and forced offline the state’s producers of petrochemicals and resins, a byproduct of oil refinement. Texas produces 42 percent of America’s crude oil, so the consequences of extreme weather gridlocked the manufacture of a product with a relatively long supply chain to begin with.

The Future Perfect is a platform for distinguished and emerging contemporary designers. With locations in New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, The Future Perfect works closely with designers to commission limited-edition pieces and to develop special exhibitions.

Surface Says: The Future Perfect put forth a new paradigm for the design showroom: a curated commercial space that felt like home, only far ahead of its time. As an early adopter of current superstars, founder David Alhadeff has proven to be a bellwether for greatness.

This modernist L.A. house may or may not be designed by Richard Neutra.

Is a 42,000-year-old Mongolian pendant the earliest example of phallic art?

A mysterious graffiti artist keeps tagging outside Anna Delvey’s apartment.

Dieter Rams is famously prolific, but we bet you haven’t seen his ice scraper.