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Category / Editor’s Picks

The “Other” Lost Generation of Black American Artists in Paris

Originally, this was supposed to be a pretty straight-forward piece on an American ex-pat artist whose enchanting paintings of 1930s Paris I’d recently had the fortune of stumbling across via the internet. She was a young woman who had moved to France before the war, where her painting career began to flourish. I was going…

Chronicles of an Affair with his Secretary, Found in an Abandoned Suitcase

The briefcase was found three decades after the affair took place, abandoned in a German apartment and later sold at auction. The contents of the suitcase, an extraordinary collection of materials that chronicled the adulterous relationship between a businessman and his secretary in the late 1960s and 70s. Exposed to our own voyeurism, a recent…

The Mystery of Baudelaire’s Maddening Mistress

There’s love. There’s lust. Then there’s Jeanne DuVal, who embodied something between the two in her tumultuous relationship with Charles Baudelaire, France’s original “bad boy” poet. As a muse to the rebellious Parisian dandy, she inspired some of the most haunting, revolutionary verses in history – odes to the woman he loved to love, and…

13 Things I Found on the Internet Today DCXXX

1. The Perfect Winter’s Picnic Found via the Hobnob Journal / Hobnob Mountain Club. 2. Keith Haring painting Grace Jones Grace Jones was 36 in 1984 when she, Andy Warhol, Robert Mapplethorpe, and pop artist Keith Haring all converged in Mapplethorpe’s studio in New York City. The reason for the epic get-together was to shoot…

He Painted the Feverish Nights of the Harlem Renaissance

You can almost feel the rhythm of the music through his paintbrush. Archibald Motley was one of the only artists of his time willing to vividly and positively depict African Americans in their vibrant urban culture, rather than in impoverished and rustic circumstances. Skin tone is celebrated as something diverse and inclusive in his work.…

The Strange, Unspoken Glorification of Sexual Assault in Art History

There’s something not quite right about that painting, wouldn’t you say? The many depictions of Leda and the Swan are hanging on the walls of some of the most prestigious museums and galleries across the world, and yet, there’s a conversation we’re not having. The Greek myth in which the Spartan queen Leda is seduced…

Meet the Original “Victoria’s Secret” Beauties of the 1920s

When looking at black and white photographs of women considered glamorous in the 1920s and early 20th century, I often find it difficult to relate to their look. Their make-up is strange and melodramatic, their hairstyles usually unflattering and even macabre; almost like there was a preference for a rather un-natural beauty. But then I came across…

Secretly Documenting the Intimate World of 19th Century Sex Workers

No one knew that William Goldman led a double life. A model citizen and well-respected photographer in Reading, Pennsylvania at the turn of the century, he became treasurer of the State Photographers’ Association and was a valued member of numerous social organisations. It wasn’t until nearly 80 years after his death that his vast collection of…

The Mysterious Art of the Falling Panties

Apparently, women’s underwear in the 1950s was just pants. (Sorry, I couldn’t resist). I stumbled upon the work of a Chicago-born artist, Art Frahm, who was best-known for his pin-up paintings between the 1940s-60s, in particular, his “ladies in distress” series, depicting doll-like damsels whose panties would perilously fall to the ground in the most public of predicaments. Since 1996, American…

Today I Stumbled upon a Secret Kingdom of Lost Toys

What is it that makes someone start a collection which alters the course of their entire life? For Mel Birnkrant, it was an iron Mickey bank he saw at the Paris flea market in 1958. His hotel room rent was $30 a month and the toy was $10. It was in that moment, at the iconic Marché aux Puces,…

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