Cultural History

Gotham Chamber Opera

Galileo: Star Witness

F. Murray Abraham embodies Brecht's complex, compromising hero at CSC

Here's What $388,375 Worth of Equations Look Like

via Heritage Auctions​We may finally have the answer to the eternal question posed by struggling algebra students everywhere: "When will I use this in real life?" The above image is from Heritage Auctions, and what appears to be a scribbled-in math quiz is actually the work of Apollo 13 Missio ... More >>

White Hills

via Heritage Auctions​We may finally have the answer to the eternal question posed by struggling algebra students everywhere: "When will I use this in real life?" The above image is from Heritage Auctions, and what appears to be a scribbled-in math quiz is actually the work of Apollo 13 Missio ... More >>

2 or 3 Things I Know About Her

via Heritage Auctions​We may finally have the answer to the eternal question posed by struggling algebra students everywhere: "When will I use this in real life?" The above image is from Heritage Auctions, and what appears to be a scribbled-in math quiz is actually the work of Apollo 13 Missio ... More >>

Dodes'ka-den

via Heritage Auctions​We may finally have the answer to the eternal question posed by struggling algebra students everywhere: "When will I use this in real life?" The above image is from Heritage Auctions, and what appears to be a scribbled-in math quiz is actually the work of Apollo 13 Missio ... More >>

Tennessee State Rep. Fails to Grasp Basic Facts About Einstein

The above is a charming moment from the Tennessee House of Representatives floor. Republican (obviously) state representative Frank Nicely argues that Albert Einstein would have wanted creationism to be taught alongside evolution in public schools, because "Albert Einstein said that a little knowl ... More >>

New York to Get a (Never Been to) Space Shuttle

Not Enterprise, as it is preparing to go into space.​Last month we reported on the different museums and institutions vying to display America's retired space shuttles. The Wall Street Journal reports that NASA is going to announce this afternoon that New York will soon be home to one of those ... More >>

Mark Flood, Judith Linhares, and Others Who Don't Need Your Darn Network

The badass and the 30-year hallucination

Starry Messenger Aims Its Lens on Galileo

Ira Hauptman tries to follow up Brecht

Rome, Open City

Ira Hauptman tries to follow up Brecht

The Last Laugh

Ira Hauptman tries to follow up Brecht

Dodeska'-Den

Ira Hauptman tries to follow up Brecht

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

Ira Hauptman tries to follow up Brecht

WOMAN’S WORK

Look back at the best female pop artists

Tabu

Look back at the best female pop artists

Park Row

Look back at the best female pop artists

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

Look back at the best female pop artists

Creation Commits the Sin of Thoughtfulness, and Is Quite Moving in the Process

Look back at the best female pop artists

"On the Beach, A Tiny Infant Grins at the Universe": The Jim Morrison Triptych

​Above is the letter Jim Morrison sent artist Thomas E. Breitenbach in response to Breitenbach's earlier offer to paint a record cover for the Doors. Morrison's concept, in part: "Try doing a triptych. The left panel depicting a radiant moon-lit beach and an endless stream of young naked coupl ... More >>

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

​Above is the letter Jim Morrison sent artist Thomas E. Breitenbach in response to Breitenbach's earlier offer to paint a record cover for the Doors. Morrison's concept, in part: "Try doing a triptych. The left panel depicting a radiant moon-lit beach and an endless stream of young naked coupl ... More >>

Iron Giant

​Above is the letter Jim Morrison sent artist Thomas E. Breitenbach in response to Breitenbach's earlier offer to paint a record cover for the Doors. Morrison's concept, in part: "Try doing a triptych. The left panel depicting a radiant moon-lit beach and an endless stream of young naked coupl ... More >>

Metropolis

​Above is the letter Jim Morrison sent artist Thomas E. Breitenbach in response to Breitenbach's earlier offer to paint a record cover for the Doors. Morrison's concept, in part: "Try doing a triptych. The left panel depicting a radiant moon-lit beach and an endless stream of young naked coupl ... More >>

A Good Month for New York Food History

​In the last three weeks or so, the publishing world has bestowed upon us no less than three books dedicated exclusively or in large part to the cultural history of food and dining in New York. William Grimes's Appetite City: A Culinary History of New York, David Sax's Save the Deli, and Andre ... More >>

SWELLS! ATTACK!: Steven Wells's First and Last Column for Sound of the City

About a year and a half ago, a pitch fell into my lap from Steven Wells, the infamous NME writer who'd been highly praised and enthusiastically recommended by a determined string of collegial forwards. ("Crazy, brilliant Brit," went one such thumbs-up.) Wells wanted to write a column for this blog j ... More >>

Galileo, Peered Through the Wrong Lense By Milk Can

About a year and a half ago, a pitch fell into my lap from Steven Wells, the infamous NME writer who'd been highly praised and enthusiastically recommended by a determined string of collegial forwards. ("Crazy, brilliant Brit," went one such thumbs-up.) Wells wanted to write a column for this blog j ... More >>

Bones' Beat: Gustave Caillebotte: Impressionist Paintings from Paris to the Sea at the Brooklyn Museum

All images courtesy Brooklyn MuseumGustave Caillebotte, Oarsmen Rowing on the Yerres, 1877 French Impressionism has a remarkable and, it seems, endlessly renewable currency in contemporary museum culture. The recent show of Van Gogh nocturnes at MoMA spawned an agitated, gelatinous daily mob of fan ... More >>

LOLITA COMPLEX

Thank heaven for little girls

From the Pole to the Equator

Thank heaven for little girls

What Crisis? Some Promising Futures for Art Criticism

Thank heaven for little girls

Abstract Expressionism: A World Elsewhere

Thank heaven for little girls

Vik Muniz's 'Verso'

Thank heaven for little girls

The 3D Adventure Fly Me to the Moon

Thank heaven for little girls

After the French!

Germans, Spaniards, and Russians invade expanded galleries at the Metropolitan Museum

Nina, Meet Jesus

Three new artists and the black diaspora

Rocket Men

Reliving the glory of America's giant leap for mankind

Vienna Lust House?

"Cocksure" behavior leads to trouble for all in Phallacy

'Joan Jonas: Study of the Artist With Dog'

"Cocksure" behavior leads to trouble for all in Phallacy

Pablum Picasso

Moving beyond its current Picasso exhibit, a new vision for the Whitney

Hopelessly Devoted

A gigantic pictorial engine that changed art history

Our Picasso?

A line drawn in the psychic sands of American sexual and cultural values

Unequal Partners

Discerning the difference between the good and the great, the talented and the tremendous

Film

Discerning the difference between the good and the great, the talented and the tremendous

A Fine Line

Art and agitation: Parmigianino as the inventor of a new kind of art-for-art's-sake beauty

MOMA's Boys

Friendship + Rivalry = Great Radical Art

Sex and Sensibility

Friendship + Rivalry = Great Radical Art

Only Subvert

Friendship + Rivalry = Great Radical Art

The Dark Side of the Moon Landing

Friendship + Rivalry = Great Radical Art

A Page From History

Friendship + Rivalry = Great Radical Art

Boobism and Cubism

The trouble with the Met's latest fashion exhibit