Combine the artistic sensibilities of the Bayeux Tapestry with the epic scope and milieu of Moby-Dick, add a dash of Barnumesque showmanship, and you get The Grand Panorama of a Whaling Voyage ’Round the World.
Armenia gets its due
An exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art shines a spotlight on the impressive cultural oeuvre of an overlooked civilization.
An early American art entrepreneur at the Speed
Let the Thomas Coles and Sanford Giffords of the world woo rich patrons, the artist Thomas Chambers went after aspiring members of the middle class, eager to have tokens of refinement in their home—a sweeping vista of Niagara Falls or the Bay of Naples, or a stirring depiction of a battle at sea.
New Life for a Renaissance Woman from Brooklyn
Back in January, a painting at Skinner Auctions’ sale of American and European Works of Art caught the eye of journalist and historian Eve M. Kahn. It was striking: a seated, semi-nude woman wearing a long, flowing train, tightly cropped and rendered with deft, impressionistic brush strokes. Kahn was eager to learn more about the artist, Edith Varian Cockcroft (1881–1962), but the facts of the Brooklyn native’s life proved elusive.
Eda Lord Dixon rediscovered
In 2014 the American Wing of The Metropolitan Museum of Art received a gift from devoted patron Jacqueline Loewe Fowler of a stunning Arts and Crafts silver and enamel hand mirror by Eda Lord Dixon. At the time, Eda was virtually unknown, even among Arts and Crafts silver scholars, principally because she rarely signed her work.
Folk art from the post office
Philately is a subject that has rarely, if ever, been covered in the pages of ANTIQUES, but when we saw these “Waterbury fancy cancellations” in the announcement of an upcoming postage stamp auction, we couldn’t resist.
Farther afield
In Antwerp, an arts festival toasts the legacy of Peter Paul Rubens
Glazing points
A pair of reverse-painting-on-glass miniatures offers new insights into the work of early American portrait artist Benjamin Greenleaf
Curious Objects: #YourCuriousObjects
This time it’s your turn. For the last two months, we’ve asked listeners to post their curious objects on Instagram, tagging #mycuriousobject and @antiquesmag.
Stage right: Museums and contemporary conservatism
“I actually checked to ensure this was not a leftover April Fools’ story.” That was how my colleague Christopher Wilk, a curator at the Victoria and Albert Museum, sent me word of a “Brexit Museum” now being mooted in the UK.