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Artist Birthday: Claes Oldenburg

Tuesday, January 28, 2025 | Karl Cole

Claes Oldenburg believed that art should literally be made of the ordinary world. His theory was that the reality of art would replace everyday reality. An important early work was The Street (1960). ...

Curator's Corner

Jewish American Heritage Month 2024

Tuesday, May 28, 2024 | Karl Cole

May was proclaimed Jewish American Heritage Month in 2006 to celebrate 350 years of Jewish contributions to American history and culture. To celebrate Jewish contributions to American art, this week I ...

Curator's Corner

National Poetry Month: Tang Yin

Monday, April 22, 2024 | Karl Cole

April is National Poetry Month in the United States. This celebration of literary pursuits was begun by the Academy of American Poets in April 1996. The celebration encourages anyone connected with bo ...

Curator's Corner

It's Still Autumn: Noguchi Shōhin

Monday, December 4, 2023 | Karl Cole

It may feel like winter, but technically it’s still autumn until the 21st of December. I like nothing better than celebrating autumn—my favorite season in New England—with an artist ...

Curator's Corner

Pride Month 2021 I: Martin Wong

Tuesday, June 1, 2021 | Karl Cole

We end Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and begin LGBTQI+ Pride Month with a wonderful, gentle soul. Martin Wong was part of the vibrant art community in the East Village of New York ...

Curator's Corner

African American History Month: Martin Puryear and Margo Humphrey

Friday, February 14, 2020 | Karl Cole

Contemporary African American artists use diverse techniques, ideas, and the history of African Americans in works of art that speak in new and exciting ways, including these works from the 1980s and ...

Curator's Corner

Recognizing Pride Month: Glenn Ligon

Monday, June 24, 2019 | Karl Cole

Last week I featured an artist from the 1800s, Mary Ann Willson, for Pride Month 2019. Today I continue my Pride Month posts with a look at contemporary artist Glen Ligon. ...

Curator's Corner

New Year for the Sensibilities

Tuesday, January 3, 2017 | Karl Cole

Leave it to Honoré Daumier to sum up a personality that could be any number of jerks in our current narrow-minded, materialistic, me-me-me culture. In honor of the advent of 2017, I decided to ...

Curator's Corner

The Beauty of Wayō Shodō

Friday, October 30, 2015 | Karl Cole

Did you known that the Japanese did not have a written language up until the 400s CE? I find cursive Japanese so incredibly beautiful. The story behind its development is very interesting, and I bet y ...

Curator's Corner

African American History Month 2015: Jae Jarrell

Monday, February 23, 2015 | Karl Cole

The G.I. Bill after World War II (1939–1945) allowed unprecedented numbers of African Americans to attend art schools. Since African Americans served with distinction in both WWII and the Korean ...

Curator's Corner

Thoughts About Abstraction: Totoya Hokkei

Monday, July 30, 2012 | Karl Cole

Abstraction is any art that does not represent observed aspects of nature or transforms visible forms into a stylized image. Another definition (which I prefer) is that abstraction is the extreme simp ...

Curator's Corner

African American History Month 2012: Glenn Ligon

Monday, February 13, 2012 | Karl Cole

During the Harlem Renaissance (ca. 1919–1939), African American artists encouraged each other to document the black experience in the United States. This included uplifting scenes of Afric ...

Curator's Corner

The Subject as Art: Yoon Kwang-cho

Monday, January 16, 2012 | Karl Cole

Did you ever find it hard to decide what the most significant aspect of a work of art is? This can happen when we look at a work and find multiple levels of meaning, aside from purely aesthetic concer ...

Curator's Corner

Three Friends of Winter: Yabu Chōsui

Monday, December 27, 2010 | Karl Cole

I’m celebrating the beginning of winter by showing you an image that goes along with the "Looking and Learning" theme for December in our SchoolArts magazine: Stories. I don’t re ...

Curator's Corner

21st Century Calligraphy: Son Man-jin

Wednesday, July 7, 2010 | Karl Cole

Since my post on the first of June, I seem to be on a tear about updating tradition. Did you ever get the feeling when you’re working on your own art that there is nothing that hasn’t been ...

Curator's Corner

Poetry as Visual Art: Iko no Taiga

Monday, July 13, 2009 | Karl Cole

I’ve written before in this blog about my fascination with LINE, one of the Elements of Art. I’ve pointed out that when it comes to calligraphy, line is not only defining the shapes of a w ...

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Artist Birthday: Claes Oldenburg

Jewish American Heritage Month 2024

National Poetry Month: Tang Yin

It's Still Autumn: Noguchi Shōhin

Pride Month 2021 I: Martin Wong

African American History Month: Martin Puryear and Margo Humphrey

Recognizing Pride Month: Glenn Ligon

New Year for the Sensibilities

The Beauty of Wayō Shodō

African American History Month 2015: Jae Jarrell

Thoughts About Abstraction: Totoya Hokkei

African American History Month 2012: Glenn Ligon

The Subject as Art: Yoon Kwang-cho

Three Friends of Winter: Yabu Chōsui

21st Century Calligraphy: Son Man-jin

Poetry as Visual Art: Iko no Taiga

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