From the Smithsonian: The artwork that took 30 years and 200 acres to create

• Arts & Letters

  Bach, Rachel Carlson, and MC Escher

  October 14, 2022 · 1 min read

  I’m a fan of MC Escher’s art. And Rachel Carlson’s writing. And Johann Sebastian Bach’s music. (Who isn’t?) But did you know that they are connected? Escher and Carlson were inspired by Bach. And each was also…

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• Arts & Letters

  From

  February 16, 2022 · 1 min read

  “I’m writing to let you know I’m releasing you. I’m amputating you. Be happy and never seek me again. I don’t want to hear from you, I don’t want you to hear from me. If there is anything I’d enjoy before I…

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• Arts & Letters

  The Ara Pacis Museum

  July 1, 2022 · 1 min read

  Every time we are in Rome, K and I stop by the Ara Pacis, a museum built around a 2,000-year-old altar dedicated to the goddess of peace. The altar itself is a never-flagging source of pleasure. Enclosed, as…

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• Arts & Letters

  Performance Art or Wanton Destruction of Property?

  July 8, 2022 · 1 min read

  On Monday, July 4, two people from a group calling itself Just Stop Oil went into the National Gallery in London and glued themselves to the frame of John Constable’s The Hay Wain. They also covered the…

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• Arts & Letters

  Things Worth Remembering: W.H. Auden’s Poetry

  March 24, 2023 · 1 min read

  It might have been 40 years ago. I was walking by a church in Manhattan and noticed a sign on the door indicating that Auden, WH Auden, one of the greatest English language poets of the 20th century, was…

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