The experience of viewing “No Discipline,” the first major U.S. retrospective of the virtuosic, Israeli-born designer Ron Arad, is less like seeing an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art and more like walking through a carnival funhouse. That’s intended as a compliment.

This article is filed under Art, Art & Design.

When its doors first opened in 1734, the Capitoline Museum, which stands upon the hilltop that is the very heart of Rome, was one of the first European public museums and a favorite haunt of the wealthy Grand Tourists from all over Europe. As of July 30 this venerable museum offers something novel to all tourists—a chance for a fresh look at a relatively neglected period of Roman history and the arts, the Middle Ages.

This article is filed under Archeology, Art & Design, History, Italy.

Perhaps what fascinated him about these portraits was that they show this urge to create and to communicate through art. More though, Alÿs’ display highlights the ways in which art inhabits a space of its own – outside of museums and critical appraisal. The works he has collected pay homage to the fact that it can be made anywhere, by anyone. The art changes and becomes personalized as it is interpreted and lived by individuals

This article is filed under Art, Art & Design, Mexico.

Matisse, in an essay written many years later for another Philadelphia Museum of Art exhibition, appraised the new approach to art that Cézanne had bequeathed to him and other leading spirits of Modernism. “There is an inherent truth which must be disengaged from the outward appearance of the object to be represented,” Matisse wrote. “This is the only truth that matters …. Exactitude is not truth.”

This article is filed under Art, Art & Design.

In 1921, the Constructivists announced the end of painting. To mark its passing they held the exhibition ‘5 x 5 = 25’ and declared that they would now only make art for everyday life; Productivism. The Tate has devoted a room to this last exhibition of painting, the highlight of which has to be Rodchenko’s ‘Pure Red Colour, Pure Yellow Colour, Pure Blue Colour’ (1921).

This article is filed under Art, Art & Design, Russia.

2009 is officially “The Year of Astronomy,” commemorating Galilei’s first observation of the Moon through his telescope in November of 1609. Born in Pisa, Galileo Galilei worked in Florence, where the fourth centennial of his discovery is being celebrated with a stunning and sophisticated exhibition which took four years to prepare.

This article is filed under Art, Art & Design, History, Italy, Science.

Tooker’s paintings are questions not answers. The drama takes place away from the picture plain, as viewers grapple with the implications of what they see before them.

This article is filed under Art, Art & Design.

“There are a handful of original wildlife artists and the rest are members of the ‘elk in the meadow’ or ‘moose in the water’ schools. We are all influenced by society and by history, but you have to take those examples, put them through your own filter and make them your own.”

This article is filed under Art, Art & Design, Nature.

Duane Michals expressed it well when he said, “Photography deals exquisitely with appearances, but nothing is what it appears to be.” An inner life is uncovered in the nature of x-ray photography and in the nature of the subjects.

This article is filed under Art, Art & Design, Photography.

Kubin had something quite different in mind: with his hallucinatory incantations he was seeking to disturb the viewer; he felt driven to solve the riddle of humankind and creation in a spellbinding act.

This article is filed under Art, Art & Design.