Blog

Twin brothers Romulus and Remus founded Rome on April 21, 753 B.C. on the site where they were suckled by a she-wolf as orphaned infants. According to the legend, the twins were the sons of Rhea Silvia and the war god Mars. Fearing that they would claim his throne, Rhea’s uncle Amulius ordered them drowned […]

Everyone knows that Friday the 13th is an unlucky day, right? According to Wikipedia, there is no record of this superstition existing before the late 19th century, and different cultures ascribe the unfortunate day to Tuesday the 13th or Friday the 17th. Meanwhile, many superstitions popular in the Middle Ages did not make it to our era. Visit […]

On April 12, 1861, Confederate shore batteries opened fire on Fort Sumter in South Carolina; in response, President Abraham Lincoln called for 75,000 volunteer soldiers to quell the Southern insurrection, marking the beginning of the American Civil War. The conflict had been building up for some time before the attack: Following Lincoln’s election the previous […]

From those fabulous poems by Roman bad-boy Catullus (84-54 BC) to today’s contemporary poet rock-stars like Billy Collins, poetry might not enjoy the same mass popularity as it did in ancient times, but when you dive in, poetry is its own universe of aural, oral, and cerebral pleasures. Poetry and art are intertwined—two art forms […]

Happy Jazz Appreciation Month! While the attributes of jazz are difficult to describe without getting technical, the key element that ties together its many sub-genres, from swing to bebop to avant-garde, is improvisation—or as Louis Armstrong put it, “Jazz is music that’s never played the same way once.”

The Artstor water cooler is abuzz with excitement about the premiere of The Hunger Games this weekend. The books by Suzanne Collins have made their way around the offices over the past couple of years, and the movie was a good excuse to do some “research” in Artstor for somewhat-relevant imagery.

Pioneering modern artist Josef Albers was born on March 19, 1888. Albers was an influential teacher, writer, painter, and color theorist best known for the Homages to the Square series and the groundbreaking book The Interaction of Color. In partnership with the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation, the ARTstor Digital Library features 2,100 images of […]

Julius Caesar, “dictator in perpetuity” of the Roman Empire, was murdered by his own senators on the Ides of March (March 15), 44 BC. Caesar had raised the ire of his already-resentful Republican senators after he appointed loyal members of his army to rule the Empire while he was away from Rome to fight in a […]

Happy Pi (∏)Day! Today is 3/14, the first three decimals of ∏ (3.14). To celebrate, here is a 16th-century woodcut of the Greek letter ∏ from The Illustrated Bartsch. Too dry? Try these pies from Pop artist Wayne Thiebaud, courtesy of the Museum of Modern Art: Painting and Sculpture. Not enough? Visit this site from the University of […]

The Artstor Travel Awards are back! Five winners will receive $1,500 each in support of educational and scholarly activities, such as flying to a conference. The contest is open to graduate students, scholars, curators, educators, and librarians in any field. To apply, submit one or more Artstor image groups and a single accompanying essay that […]