Draft:Art Tavana

Art Tavana is an American journalist and author from the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles. He initially achieved notoriety as a music journalist at L.A. Weekly. , covering everything from the Burger Records scene to the reunion of Guns N' Roses.

As a columnist at L.A. Weekly and Playboy, Tavana won an L.A. Press Club Award at the 59th SoCal Journalism Awards.

On April 1, 2016, Tavana became the only journalist to attend and review the Guns N' Roses reunion show at the Troubadour. The review (published in the L.A. Weekly) went viral and helped Tavana secure a book deal with ECW Press.

His first published book was Goodbye, Guns N' Roses (2021), which was described by PopMatters as an "important contribution to conversations about the legacy of hard rock and the ways we reckon with problematic art."

Career
Between 2013 and 2017, Tavana wrote a weekly column for L.A. Weekly. His profile of former porn actress and author Sasha Grey was nominated for an L.A. Press Club Award. Grey commented on the notable profile by stating, "Who is Sasha Grey anyway? I'm glad they [Art Tavana] wrote this story because maybe I'll find out."

Tavana has written features for Pitchfork, VICE , Spin, Billboard , The A.V. Club , Paste, and Consequence of Sound , among others. In 2014, Tavana profiled the reclusive internet celebrity and "Hollywood Heiress" Lauren Alice Avery in a cover story for L.A. Weekly, which would mark one of Alice Avery's final public appearances.

Tavana's coverage focused predominately on profiling female musicians such as Colleen Green, The Death Valley Girls , The Vivian Girls , and L.A. Witch , the Go-Go's , and Lana Del Rey.

However, on June 17, 2016, Tavana published a provocative essay on indie-pop star and "indie sleaze" icon Sky Ferreira titled "Sky Ferreira's Sex Appeal is What Pop Music Needs Right Now," which received a wide-range of criticism, including a response from Ferreira herself. Author Bret Easton Ellis would defend Tavana in an "excoriating monologue," describing Tavana's critics as "snowflakes" and "social justice warriors." Tavana's writing was later discussed in a chapter of Easton Ellis's first work of nonfiction, White (2019).

Between 2017 and 2019, Tavana was a columnist at Playboy, where covered the emerging culture wars with profiles and interviews with everyone from Fox News' Tomi Lahren to provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos. Tavana conducted the final interview with legendary political satirist and former National Lampoon editor P.J. O'Rourke, who passed away on February 15, 2022.

That same year, Tavana was hired as the Arts & Culture editor of The Spectator . Tavana's work has been discussed by BBC Radio 5, TMZ, The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast, Business Insider , Nylon , and New York Magazine.