Many great inventions came out of the Victorian era, from the photograph to the electric lightbulb. The elastic opera hat and the anti-cholera belt, however, are not among their illustrious numbers.
Books
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The Curious Collecting Life of London’s Newest Museum Proprietor
Last month, the Viktor Wynd Museum of Curiosities, Fine Art & Natural History opened its doors on a clutter of curios in East London.
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Grappling with a Family Ghost in an Interactive Photography Project
Photographer McNair Evans’s faith in his father was rattled when the patriarch died and the secret of the family agricultural business being near insolvency was revealed.
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Does It Suck? Another Look at ‘Showgirls’
Long brushed off as a horrendous excuse for a film, Paul Verhoeven and Joe Eszterhas’s epic flop Showgirls may have more than meets the eye. Or, at least, its vulgar superficiality may be worth critical re-evaluation
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Relentless Complexities: Trevor Winkfield’s Art Writing
While visiting Philadelphia a number of years ago, the poet and critic Wayne Koestenbaum asked me “Is Trevor Winkfield a real person?”
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Repicturing Black Fatherhood
I overheard a man suggest to another that Father’s Day be renamed. For him, and for so many other black men he knew, there was or is no biological father to celebrate the holiday with.
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The Economic Divide in Video Games
It’s all fun and games until the thinly veiled artifice of a virtual world becomes all too real.
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Illustrating the Invisible Spaces of Migrant Detention
Migrant detention centers are almost as invisible as the people they hold, their plans classified, photography prohibited. Toronto-based artist Tings Chak created a visual narrative through Canada’s centers that’s a mix of graphic novel and architectural design.
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New Monograph Explores Our State of Being Like “Characters in a Disaster Movie”
Photographer Hiroshi Watanabe describes our state of being in his new monograph as like “characters in a disaster movie.”
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Photographs from an Underground Laser Laboratory
Deep beneath the University of Texas in Austin, the Texas Petawatt Laser can reach a power of 1,000 trillion watts — around 2,000 times that generated by all the country’s power plants combined.
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An Astronaut’s Photographs of our Planet’s Beauty and Mutilations
Astronaut photography has been influential on the perception of our planet almost since the first space missions.
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A Colorful Compendium of Infographics for Understanding the World Now
From the amount the potential tax revenue from legalizing drugs worldwide to disappearing seed varieties, data journalist David McCandless transforms abstract information into engaging visuals.
