News
The Competition for This Year’s Creepy Doll Contest Is More Horrifying Than Ever
These horrifying dolls definitely won’t murder you in your sleep.
Halloween
Film
Spooky, Sensual, and Nostalgic Halloween Shorts
Amid the ups and downs of episodic horror, a few gems stick out from the rest in Hulu’s Bite-Size Halloween collection.
Art
Happy Doll-o-ween! Museum Displays Its Creepiest Haunted Dolls
The History Center of Olmsted County is embracing the Halloween holiday season with a showcase of nothing but the creepiest dolls from its collection of historical and clearly damned objects.
Test 2018 posts
Art History Parades Around the Streets of Japan Ahead of Halloween
"Beast Jesus" is finally getting his due alongside works by Picasso, Vermeer, and Munch.
Art
From Bosch's Bird to Kusama's Spots, Arty Halloween Costumes
Halloween brings out the creative spirit in everyone but the art community may very well do the day of dress-up the best.
Books
A 19th-Century Guide to Seeing Ghosts Everywhere
The 1864 Spectropia used optical illusions to manifest ghosts in Victorian homes, and was designed to attack the quackery of Spiritualism.
History
Vintage Halloween Cards Are the Stuff of Nightmares
Anthropomorphic pumpkins, mirror divination, and space-traveling witches all appear in the curious collision of imagery on vintage Halloween cards.
History
A 1903 Proposal to Preserve the Dead in Glass Cubes
In 1903, an inventor patented a method of preserving corpses in glass, one of a number of radical inventions that has sought to resist death's decay.
History
Elaborate Halloween Costume Tips from a 19th-Century Guide to Fancy Dress
Looking for a Halloween costume? Here's a 19th-century guide to dressing for fancy balls, with costumes for witches, carrier pigeons, glowworms, and air.
Art
Why Chinese Art Is Swarming with Colonies of Tiny Bats
If the bat is an animal associated with spooky stories in the West, the bat motif has a whole different connotation in China, where the creatures symbolize good luck.
Comics
Tips for a TRULY Scary Halloween Party
Spider webs and peeled grapes are scary, but you know what would make a really scary party?
In Brief
From Bob Ross to a Monet Haystack, This Year's Best Art-Related Halloween Costumes
There were the usual Andy Warhols, of course, but it's not often you see a Louise Bourgeois with phallic sculpture in hand.