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Francis Crick's Nobel Prize
I don't know why it hadn't occurred to me that there is a robust market for Nobel Prizes. After all, one can buy old Olympic Medals, Academy Awards, and Super Bowl rings. On April 10, Heritage Auctions...
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The Great Leap Forward
Is it possible for my blog statistics to provide insights into global political shifts? For more than a year and a half, this blog has scarcely been viewed by anyone inside China. While there could be...
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The Lion and the Mouse
The Lion and the Mouse is one of Aesop's Fables later retold by Jean de La Fontaine (1621-1695). Willy Pogány's unpublished illustration of this fable was sold for $900 in 2009 at Bloomsbury.Willy...
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Spring Break
I myself never went to Spring Break in Fort Lauderdale--big shocker, I know--but I did go to see the 1983 movie about it. The trailer pretty much shows you what to expect from the movie, which is not...
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Arthur Szyk's Haggadah
Arthur Szyk's Haggadah was published in 1939. Swann Galleries lot description calls it "the artist's best-known work and the most celebrated modern illustrated Haggadah." The limited edition is highly...
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Peter Arno's Robinson Crusoe Condensed
Here's a long-forgotten Peter Arno drawing of castaway Robinson Crusoe. Munro Leaf, the author of Ferdinand the Bull, wrote a one-page condensed version of Daniel Defoe's novel for publication in a...
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MoCCA Arts Festival 2013
Michael DeForge, MoCCA Arts Festival 2013It's just ten days until MoCCA Fest 2013, April 7 and 8 at the 69th Regiment Armory in New York City. This is an annual festival held by the Museum of Comic and...
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Dragon Garden Ornament
Asia-Barong of Great Barrington, Massachusetts boasts that it is the largest Asian art store in America. Judging by the size of the dragon in the front yard, this may very well be correct.Dragon Garden...
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Minnie Mouse's Easter Bonnet
Minnie tries on her Easter bonnet for the March 1937 cover of Mickey Mouse Magazine. Oh, I could write a sonnet...but I won't.Walt Disney Studios,Mickey Mouse Magazine, March 1937...
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Irving Berlin's Easter Parade
Judy Garland and Fred Astaire prepare to step out onto Fifth Avenue in all their finery at the conclusion of MGM's "Easter Parade" (1948). Now if only Irving Berlin could write a great song to go with...
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Peter Arno's Easter Parade
On a 1931 New Yorker cover, Peter Arno's gangly jogger disrupts the pomp and pageantry of Fifth Avenue's Easter Parade.Peter Arno,The New Yorker, April 11, 1931671
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Pogo's April Opening Day
By some cosmic coincidence, the beginning of the baseball season and April Fools Day are quite close together on the calendar. Walt Kelly takes advantage of this anomaly of the calendar in his Sunday...
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Augmented Boobery
Silicone breast augmentation was first introduced in 1962 and within a short time many women chose to have their figures surgically enhanced. Not coincidentally, it also allowed filmmaker Russ Meyer to...
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From Hegel to Harvey: A Dialectical Materialist Crtique of Richie Rich
It should be obvious that this blog isn't being used as a resource nearly enough in the ivy-covered halls of academia. In fact, there isn't a single college course anywhere that regularly assigns...
View ArticleA Post-Freudian Subtextual Analysis of "Afternoon Delight"
Once again, the rigorous academic jargon presented in the post title above can be used to demonstrate to college professors the utility of this blog in promoting shared higher educational goals. This...
View ArticleProustian Olfactory Recollection and Its Influence on a Legendary American...
In the past, college film courses have had to get by without referring students to this blog. This resulted in film school graduates who were book-smart yet vaguely aware that their expensive education...
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Ed Koren: Hot Tub Versus TV
This original artwork by Edward Koren shows four people serenely relaxing in a hot tub together while a fifth person opts to watch television instead. Everyone seems fairly contented. As it turns out,...
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The Norman Rockwell Museum
On March 19, I paid my first visit ever to the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, a place I'd been meaning to come to for years. It was snowing when we first arrived.The downstairs...
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Moebius Futurescape
Artist Moebius (Jean Giraud) created a panoramic landscape that manages to combine elements of ancient art, futuristic invention, and a prehistoric creature. Well, why not? The preliminary ink artwork...
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The Other Queen by Philippa Gregory
The Other Queen (2008)Philippa GregoryAfter reading The Other Boleyn Girl, I supposed I had read Philippa Gregory's best work and that her other novels would seem weak by comparison. I am therefore...
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