Special

WTF Art History

5 Translation Mistakes That Changed Art History

Why did Michelangelo portray Moses with horns? Why are there monkeys in Giulio Romano’s Chamber of Giants? And why does the Nativity scene...

Arianna Richetti 27 January 2025

Art State of Mind

From Toys to Means of Transport: Balloons in Art

When we think of flying objects in art we might not put balloons at the top of our list, and yet they appear everywhere. As the words from Jethro...

Sarah Mills 27 January 2025

Artist Stories

The Mysterious Pinturas Negras Reveal Goya’s Darkest Secrets

There are already several articles that treat in detail the life and works of Francisco Goya. If you want to learn about his career or most famous...

Magda Michalska 27 January 2025

Masterpiece Stories

Masterpiece Story: The Ambassadors by Hans Holbein the Younger

The Ambassadors by Hans Holbein the Younger is one of those paintings that we know so well we tend to forget to look closer. It’s like the Mona...

Joanna Kaszubowska 27 January 2025

Jacques-Louis David, Napoleon Crossing the Alps, 1802, Château de Versailles, France. Detail. Masterpiece Stories

Masterpiece Story: Napoleon Crossing the Alps by Jacques-Louis David

Jacques-Louis David’s Napoleon Crossing the Alps is one of the most famous and politically iconic images of European art history. However, it is a...

James W Singer 26 January 2025

Alexandre Cabanel, Cleopatra, 1887, Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp, Belgium. Detail. Masterpiece Stories

Masterpiece Story: Cleopatra by Alexandre Cabanel

Queen Cleopatra is a popular subject today – as she was in the late 19th century. Alexandre Cabanel’s Cleopatra explores a single moment of her...

James W Singer 26 January 2025

Masterpiece Stories

Masterpiece Story: The Oath of the Horatii by Jacques-Louis David

In a Neoclassicist masterpiece painted on the eve of the French Revolution, Jacques-Louis David depicts the beginning of an epic Roman story in The...

Coleman Richards 26 January 2025

Masterpiece Stories

Masterpiece Story: Washington Crossing the Delaware by Emanuel Leutze

Throughout history, artists have documented grand historical events motivated by national pride, political propaganda, or as a lesson for...

Rachel Witte 26 January 2025

Quiz

QUIZ: How Well Do You Know Salvador Dalí?

Joanna Kaszubowska 25 January 2025

Quiz

QUIZ: So You Think You Know British Art?

Ruxi Rusu 25 January 2025

Académie Vitti, c. 1889, Montparnasse, Paris. History

Académie Vitti: Parisian Art School for Women

A private art school in Paris founded in 1889, the Académie Vitti was one of the first schools to accept female students and to allow women to study...

Natalia Iacobelli 24 January 2025

Women in art academies. Alice Barber, Women's life class, 1879, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA, USA. Women Artists

Education Matters! Women in Art Academies

From the 17th to the 19th century, art academies across Europe and America excluded women from their classrooms. Only a few of them count as...

Jimena Escoto 24 January 2025