Opponents of a plan to move the Barnes Foundation and its world-renowned art collection from a Philadelphia suburb to a downtown site asked a Pennsylvania judge on Monday to reconsider his 2004 decision allowing the relocation. Lawyers for the Friends of the Barnes Foundation, a community group, and for the government of Montgomery County, where the Barnes has been since its founding in the late 1920s, appeared before the judge, Stanley R. Ott of the Montgomery County Orphans Court in Norristown, to request that he reopen the case. Judge Ott s ruling in 2004 permitted the foundation, which has struggled financially, to bypass the charter and bylaws of its founder, Albert C. Barnes, who stipulated that no picture in his collection could be lent, sold or moved from the walls of the galleries that he built in Merion. The judge said he considered the move the only viable alternative to save the Barnes from bankruptcy. But the opponents contend that the collection s financial troubles have been overstated and that new ways to raise the money to prevent a move have emerged. The county has offered, for example, to buy the foundation s buildings and land for $50 million or more to keep the collection in place. But lawyers for the foundation and for the Pennsylvania attorney general s office argued before Judge Ott that the county s plan had come too late and that it could expose the foundation to extraordinary financial risk. .

Arts, Briefly: For Mets Tristan, a Star Is Back
It looks as if the Metropolitan Opera s Tristan und Isolde will have a happy ending. The Canadian tenor Ben Heppner, right, who missed the first four of six scheduled performances because of illness, will appear as Tristan in the final performances, on Tuesday and Friday, the company confirmed on Monday. Mr. Heppner, the reigning Wagnerian tenor, was initially said to be suffering from a virus, but The Vancouver Sun reported that he had said that his illness had been misdiagnosed in New York. Mr. Heppner told The Sun that after consulting his doctor in Toronto, he had decided to go home, and at North York General Hospital, the doctors discovered that I had a blood-borne infection that had abscessed in the pelvic region. I was immediately put on heavy-duty antibiotics to attack the infection, and the abscess was drained through a surgical procedure. I felt so much better immediately and began the road to recovery. .

Stars on Bill at Lincoln Center s July Festival
Drama will be center stage at the Lincoln Center Festival this summer, with productions of Euripides and Samuel Beckett, Laurie Anderson s latest performance piece and a rare production of Die Soldaten.

Theater Review | ‘Attorney for the Damned’: Justice as a Game Played Rough, if Tunefully
Attorney for the Damned is a rock musical articulating satirical, nightmarish views of the criminal justice system.

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