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Frankenstein, Yunnan, and the Opium Trade
The Year Without a Summer inspired authors from England to Southwestern China. But horrific famines would also compel farmers to turn to a lucrative…
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Nicole Miras
Van Gogh's "Starry Night" Up Close
"Just as we take the train to get to Tarascon or Rouen, we take death to reach a star."
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Nicole Miras
11
The Year Without a Summer
Mount Tambora's 1815 eruption was the largest volcanic event in recorded history, with broad implications for the global climate, agriculture, the arts…
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Nicole Miras
2
The Most Hated Artists in the World?
Nothing divides museum-goers like Abstract Expressionists. How did they become a global phenomenon, and what did the CIA have to do with it?
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Nicole Miras
23
Crossroads Roundup: Ed Sheeran's Painting Career, Extraordinary Maya Burial, and Egypt's First Ruler
This month's news in art, archaeology, culture, and more.
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Nicole Miras
1

July 2025

The Alchemist Who Broke China's Porcelain Monopoly
Johann Friedrich Böttger made the terrible mistake of promising a king that he could turn base metals into gold. When life hands you lemons, make…
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Nicole Miras
Last Call at the Café: Manet's Final Years
In the last installment of our series, we examine Édouard Manet's work at the end of his life.
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Nicole Miras
A "War on Beauty": Manet and the Impressionists
Manet refused to participate in the First Impressionist Exhibition. Nevertheless, his name was inexorably tied to the Impressionists and their radical…
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Nicole Miras
Édouard Manet in the Shadow of War
All was well at the Café Guerbois, until Manet, Degas, and their friends heard the news: France had declared war on Prussia.
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Nicole Miras
Art Doesn't Have to Be Snobby
Exclusivity is the thief of joy.
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Nicole Miras
1
Manet Breaks the Fourth Wall
After the 1865 Salon, Édouard Manet befriends a young group of painters with wild ideas, and finds himself again at the center of controversy.
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Nicole Miras
Cézanne Summer!
As the Cézanne 2025 festival kicks off in Aix-en-Provence, let's look back on the artist's most favorite place in the world, and the summers he spent…
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Nicole Miras
8
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