A photographic essay: The Rock Posters of Rich Black.

Nature in the form of searing sunlight and raging storms increasingly blotted out the works of man in the later paintings of Turner. This was an ironic juxtaposition of his painterly vision with the spirit of his times. For the progressive spirit of early Victorian Britain was propagating a world view whereby the industrial juggernaut of railroads, steam ships and factories would reshape the world to suit humankind’s fancy.

A favourite theme which recurred again and again in wall paintings was the satyr creeping up behind a nymph to catch her by surprise. In at least one case the nymph, her veil ripped away, turns out to be a hermaphrodite, to the satyr’s theatrical dismay, and the observer’s amusement. Some wall paintings showed homosexual sex and, because African motifs were popular, another depicted picnicking pygmies enjoying a group orgy under a tent.

‘Coffee table book’ is a familiar pejorative used to describe an intellectual lounge ornament which, should the need arise, can also serve as a doorstop, table prop or weapon in marital dispute.

It was partly in reaction to the religious discord and iconoclasm of the Reformation, that artists in Europe around 1700 began seeking inspiration from sources removed from Christian spirituality. And where European innovators led, artists of other traditions and cultures would in time follow. The journey on the road to “art for art’s sake” had begun.

A photographic essay: Art Deco in Havana, Cuba.

For all of his own moral blemishes, Caravaggio knew exactly how to please the princes of the Catholic Church. He completely rejected the pretentious intellectualism and coy erotic themes that had preoccupied the Mannerist painters.

In this, her debut book, Harvard graduate Rachel Cohen weaves a literary tapestry encompassing the lives of 30 of America’s great writers, photographers and artists, into 36 distinct chapters. Part biography, part flight-of-fancy speculation, Cohen’s final product, complete with references, source material, and footnotes was 10 years in the making.

“The book is a conversation about freedom that seeks to inspire the reader to think for themselves about what freedom means to them.”

Museums are designed – and public museums are mandated – to act as the stewards of the nation’s or a city’s heritage. The New York Public Library failed dismally in this respect, a failure only eclipsed by the National Gallery, which quite frankly is serving as the bagman for the theft of public art treasures from New York City and Philadelphia.