When first shown “American Gothic’ was celebrated as an ode to regional conservatism. Is that what Wood really thought? Most likely he was gay. His landscapes “imply a freedom that Wood rarely had. It has to be significant that he’s airborne in these views, floating above the earth, maybe even escaping the fraught region that was his life.” More images are here.
New York’s Met has introduced compulsory admission fees. Doesn’t it still believe in “the general mobilization of the mind”? ‘User pays’ seems part of the answer. And then there is the cost of the Met, a history-focused institution, getting into contemporary art. Absent this venture, the Met “could have [allowed] nonmandatory admission fees … for all visitors, forever.”
Mary Beard claims this 16th century silverware is “the greatest jigsaw puzzle on earth”. Twelve plates, dazzling in their quality, were made, one for each of the first 12 Caesars. But who made them and for what purpose? Further, why were they pulled apart and then incorrectly put back together? Extraordinary eye candy, if you will, as this video (3.5 min) shows.