The Long History of Art Inspired by Solar Eclipses
Elissaveta M. Brandon Contributing Writer Drivers in Dallas earlier this year may have noticed a curious trio of billboards on the side of Highway 67. Instead of advertising for the…
Feast Your Eyes on These Paintings From the Impressionist Era
In Still Life With Brioche, c. 1890, Victoria Dubourg Fantin-Latour captures the buttery crust of a signature pastry. Known for her tablescapes, she met her artist husband Henri when both…
These Colorful Drawings Defy Expectations of Shaker Art
An 1851 ink-and-watercolor gift drawing titled A Type of Mother Hannah’s Pocket Handkerchief by Polly Jane Reed, a Shaker in New Lebanon, New York. Andrews Collection, Hancock Shaker Village, Massachusetts…
How an Experiment to Amplify Light in Hospital Operating Rooms Led to the Accidental Invention of the Snow Globe
The Original Vienna Snow Globe Factory produces roughly 300,000 snow globes per year. Joe Klamar/AFP via Getty Images In the opening scene of the 1941 mystery Citizen Kane, the eponymous…
The Remarkable Legacy of Artist and Feminist Audrey Flack, Dead at 93
Samantha Baskind Museums Correspondent Audrey Flack laughed when remembering that painter Alice Neel called her a whippersnapper in the 1970s. Just after celebrating her 90th birthday in 2021, far from…
In His Garage, an Untrained Artist Created a Work of Sublime Divinity
The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations’ Millennium General Assembly, James Hampton’s strange and transporting magnum opus. Chris Gunn For some 14…
For 100 Years, Santa Feans Have Burned New Mexico’s Boogeyman in a ‘Sacred Rite of Purification, Laughter and Rebirth’
Heather Mundt Freelance travel writer Each year, thousands of people gather at Santa Fe’s Fort Marcy Park on the Friday of Labor Day weekend to face their proverbial archnemesis, a…
Later in Life, Claude Monet Obsessed Over Water Lilies. His Paintings of Them Were Some of His Greatest Masterpieces
By Jackie Wullschläger Author, Monet: The Restless Vision The French art critic Louis Vauxcelles described a day trip to Giverny in summer 1905, to visit the home of artist Claude…
An Astonishing, Rarely Seen Islamic Art Collection Goes on Display
Iznik tile, 16th to 17th century, Syria or Turkey. Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art When Hamid Hemat accepted a curatorial post at Connecticut’s Wadsworth Atheneum in 2022, the refugee from…
Meet the Italian ‘Fruit Detective’ Who Investigates Centuries-Old Paintings for Clues About Produce That Has Disappeared From the Kitchen Table
By Mark Schapiro Photographs by Simona Ghizzoni When Isabella Dalla Ragione assesses a Renaissance painting, she doesn’t immediately notice the brushstrokes or the magnificence of the imagery. The first thing…