Book Review
The Brief and Illustrious Life of the Telegraph
Time Machines reveals entanglements between the largely forgotten optical telegraph and artistic movements in 19th-century France.
Book Review
Book Review
Alice Austen’s Pioneering Lesbian Gaze
Her intimate photographs of women include humor and playfulness, and speak to her closeness to her subjects.
Book Review
Henri Matisse Never Really Left Morocco
Inspired by the colors and textiles around him, the artist’s two trips to Tangier became an impetus for growth and exploration.
Book Review
If the US-Mexico Border Could Talk
Echoes from the Borderlands, which transcribes a sound installation tracing the border, insists on the land’s inextricability from the history to which it bears witness.
Book Review
How Painting Saved One of Our Most Iconic Designers
A visit to Michaels craft store helped restore book jacket designer Peter Mendelsund during a deep bout of depression.
Book Review
A Visual Archive of Diasporican Liberation
A new book pulses with artistic forms by Puerto Rican artists born of necessity, urgency, collaboration, and activism.
Book Review
Jewelry Deserves a Place in Art History
Beyond Adornment explores what the depiction of jewelry in art says about adornment, artists, and their subjects, from Charlemagne to Frida Kahlo.
Book Review
Why Are We Still Obsessed With Pompeii?
In The Buried City, the director of the archaeological park brings a more humane and soulful version of the site to life.
Book Review
Do We Need to Vindicate Paul Gauguin?
Sue Prideaux’s new biography of the artist reveals both a discomfort with his complex legacy and that, in 2025, redemption arcs sell.
Book Review
Unraveling the Imperial Impulses of Chinese Textiles
Like an art history detective, Mei Mei Rado mines textiles and techniques to reveal cross-cultural Chinese-European liaisons driven by nationalism and a keen interest in design.
Book Review
A Mystical, Obsessive Encounter With the Ginseng Root
Craig Thompson’s rhizomatic new graphic novel about the root’s farming industry exposes the paradoxes of Trump’s America.
Book Review
Internet Misinformation Is the New Medieval Magical Thinking
Readers might enjoy the gross and gory fairy-tale quality of this new book — or its parallels to the Trumpian internet.