Henrietta Johnston’s portraits of Colonel John Moore and his wife, Frances Lambert Moore
A new book on the art and life of sculptor Daniel Chester French
The most in-depth biography of the pre-eminent American sculptor Daniel Chester French (1850-1931) is now out. French—whose works include the statues of the Minute Man in Concord, Massachusetts, and Alma Mater at Columbia University in New York—has long deserved a comprehensive exploration, and historian Harold Holzer’s Monument Man: The Life and Art of Daniel Chester French (Princeton Architectural Press, $35) has been eagerly anticipated.
Five Leaves Left
It’s not often you get to celebrate the 150th anniversary of a twig. Yet that is exactly the opportunity that presented itself this past October 13. On that date, back in the year 1868, Sophia Thoreau leaned over a sprig of five shagbark hickory leaves and inscribed them, in indelible ink, with some lines from a poem by her brother Henry.
Beautiful Desuetude
Even as it awaits restoration, the historic Bronson House in Hudson, New York, reveals its architectural charms
Curious Objects: Let the Market Decide–Economist Friedrich Hayek’s Assets Head to Auction
The weighty thoughts and worldly goods of Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek—whose belongings, including a 1974 Nobel Prize, are being offered by Sotheby’s in London—are the subject of this episode of Curious Objects, which stars Duke University professor Bruce Caldwell and Sotheby’s specialist Gabriel Heaton.
At the Palmer: John Sloan and His “wonderful roofs”
The term “Ashcan school” is applied to artists as varied as Robert Henri, William Glackens, and Everett Shinn, and yet it was most likely coined in response to one particular member of their circle and his work: John Sloan, with his warm and sympathetic depictions of the life of the common man in New York in the decades after the turn of the twentieth century.
Arms and the Man
We spoke with Joel Bohy, a specialist in historic arms and militaria for Skinner Auctioneers and Appraisers, about his vast and varied knowledge of military history and material culture, his expeditions to archaeological digs at battlefields, and his talent for making reproduction arms and uniforms.
Ring Master: Tolkien at the Morgan Library
Before writing The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, J. R. R. Tolkien had been hired by Oxford and Leeds Universities to teach philology, the study of languages. The attention he paid to words was at the heart of his creative process, which goes under the microscope this winter at the Morgan Library and Museum in Tolkien: Maker of Middle-Earth.
Starting a Conversation
A new exhibition of artworks from the National Academy of Design creates a dialogue between artists across the centuries
Get thee to Williamsburg
If there’s bright spot in the heart of late winter, it’s the Colonial Williamsburg Antiques Forum. This year’s edition, the seventy-first, opens on February 22nd and runs through the 26th, with the theme “Hidden Treasures: New Findings and Rediscoveries.”