If the Winter Show were a person, it would be one who is curious, intelligent, openminded, sophisticated in taste, generous of spirit, and eager to learn.
The Other Side of History
Michelson’s work introduces the history of Native Americans during the Revolutionary War, using video, sound, print, and AR to reveal forgotten layers of the past.
Less Than Mint Condition
About a decade ago, when I worked at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, a little joke was making the rounds.
In Defense of Ornament
Is less more? Or is too much never enough?
A Moon with a View
An itsy-bitsy sphere just outside my window, motionless, tucked into the velvety blackness of space. That is how Michael Collins remembers the earth as seen from lunar orbit.
Editor’s Letter–November/December 2019
Last autumn in this space I wrote about some of the younger folks I have been pleased and heartened to meet in the course of my work—still in their twenties and with a deep, abiding interest in the fine and decorative arts and architecture of the past.
Capture the Flag
We hadn’t heard much about Betsy Ross for—oh, about forty years or so. At the time of the Bicentennial, she was the most famous woman in American history, a figurative mother of the country who “gave birth to our collective symbol.”
Declarations of Dependence
America has been many things to many people: a city on a hill; a beacon of freedom; a melting pot. Now, the worry is that we’ve become a piggy bank.
Editor’s Letter: July/August 2019
The Statue of Liberty Museum opened in May on Liberty Island with much fanfare and celebrity wattage, Oprah Winfrey leading the lights.
Maker’s Mark
Downtown Philadelphia is organized around a Calder family retrospective. It was my Uncle Fred, who has lived in the city for more than fifty years, who first pointed this out to me.