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Arts & Culture

Museumgoers can read the labels on the backs of the paintings, which may provide clues about each work's provenance.

Who Are the Owners of These Nazi-Looted Masterpieces—and Could Displaying Them at One of France’s Most Popular Museums Help Track Them Down?

A new permanent display at the Musée d’Orsay showcases artworks that may have been stolen or sold under suspicious circumstances during World War II. Officials are still hoping to find the families of their rightful owners

Ellen Wexler

Winnie-the-Pooh and his friends live in a case at the New York Public Library.

The Real Winnie-the-Pooh Lives at the New York Public Library. When Queen Camilla Visited the Bear, She Reunited Him With a Dear Friend

The game has taken a variety of twists and turns.

How the Classic American Game of Twister Went From Risqué to Record-Breaking

A damaged portrait of Mary Magdalene by Artemisia Gentileschi (left) and a similar version of the same scene (right) housed at the Pitti Palace in Florence, Italy

Rolled Up in a Cellar for Decades, This Artemisia Gentileschi Painting Is Now Up for Auction. Why Is Mary Magdalene’s Face Missing From the Portrait?

A detail of Lucknow From the Gomti, made between 1821 and 1826 in India

A Mysterious, Monumental Scroll on Public Display for the First Time Paints a Picture of Artistic Fusion in Colonial India

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Two young boys at a Georgia cotton mill. Their slim arms and tiny hands were considered ideal for machine work.

America at 250: The Revolutionary Spark

When a Photographer Turned His Focus on Social Injustice, It Helped Usher in the First Child Labor Laws

Lewis Hine didn’t consider his job as taking pictures; it was “detective work.” Sometimes gaining access with ruse and subterfuge, he captured stark images that touched hearts and changed minds

This painting, titled Excelsior, shows Liberty and Justice as allegorical figures. A new exhibition “moves past symbolism to center the real expertise and labor of women who navigated a world of blurred allegiances to help found the United States,” says Louise Mirrer, president and CEO of the New York Historical.

America's 250th Anniversary

During the Revolution, American Women Fought for Freedom, Spied on the British, Cared for the Sick and Fell in Love. A New Exhibition Reveals Their Rich Wartime Stories

Now on view at the New York Historical, “Revolutionary Women” spotlights figures with connections to the state, including a Jewish chocolatier, a Mohawk leader and a woman who disguised herself as a man to enlist in the Continental Army

Robinson Theater, Richmond, Virginia, 2013. Opened 1937, architect Edward Francis Sinnott Sr., original seating capacity 597.

In a Plea to Preserve Them, One Photographer Has Captured 1,200 American Movie Theaters and Counting

For more than 40 years, Benita VanWinkle has photographed vintage movie houses in all 50 states

O’Keeffe’s New Mexico studio Ghost Ranch. Opposite, a 1918 photo portrait by future husband Alfred Stieglitz.

America at 250: The Revolutionary Spark

Georgia O’Keeffe Ignored Advice to Mimic Great European Masters. Her Goal Instead Was to Be a Great American Painter

The genius of her work was in painting things as she saw them through her own eyes. So when she surrounded herself with beauty, her work reflected it

The true story of the gin and tonic is less about a singular invention and more about the convergence of science, medicine, commerce and empire over several centuries.

The Gin and Tonic Is a Cocktail With a Storied History. Don’t Overlook Scotland’s Connection to the Classic

The country’s scientists, doctors, merchants and distillers all played significant roles in transforming the simple combination that packs a complicated mythology

Brendan Fraser (left) as Dwight D. Eisenhower and Andrew Scott (right) as James Stagg in Pressure, a new WWII drama about the weather forecast for D-Day

Based on a True Story

One Weather Forecast Changed the Course of WWII. Here’s the Real Story Behind ‘Pressure,’ a Drama About the Meteorologist Who Convinced the Allies to Delay D-Day

A new movie starring Andrew Scott and Brendan Fraser dramatizes the tense 72 hours before the Allied invasion of Normandy, revealing how meteorology helped determine Operation Overlord’s success

This view of Barcelona's Sagrada Familia taken last week shows the newly revealed cross that completes the temple's main Tower of Jesus Christ. 

From Casa Vicens to the Sagrada Familia, Architect Antoni Gaudí Left an Indelible Mark on Barcelona

To honor the pioneer of Catalan Modernism, who died 100 years ago, learn about both his lesser-known and famous works

Rhys Ifans (standing in second row) as the chief designer in "Star City," a spinoff of Apple TV's "For All Mankind" 

Based on a True Story

Soviet Cosmonauts Trained at Star City as They Raced to Beat America to the Moon. Now, a New TV Series Imagines What Happened Behind the Base’s Walls

Apple TV’s “Star City” takes place in a world where the space race never came to an end. A spinoff of “For All Mankind,” the show is told from the Soviet perspective

Sweetgrass basket weaving is one of the most enduring cultural traditions of the Gullah Geechee people, descendants of Africans enslaved on the rice, indigo and cotton plantations of the southeastern United States.

From Basket Weaving to Oyster Reef Conservation, Gullah Geechee Women Are Preserving a Living Heritage

Along America’s southeastern coast, descendants of enslaved Africans pass down traditions and knowledge of crafts, ecology and food through generations

By studying brain waves, heart rate and shifts in neurotransmitters and hormones, researchers aim to quantify the experiences of beauty and art.

Does the Experience of Beauty Show Up in the Brain? With Electrodes and a Museum Collection of Artifacts, These Neuroscientists Aim to Find Out

Researchers are tracing the brain and body’s response to aesthetic expression in search of a scientific value to art

Sue Schubel hand-paints around 500 a year from her workshop in a converted barn steps from the ocean in Bremen, Maine, a tiny town in the lower third of the state’s craggy coast.

How ‘Seabird Sue’ Blends Art and Science to Attract Birds Back to Lost Habitat

For the past decade, Sue Schubel has been making detailed decoys of terns, puffins and other seabirds to entice real ones to restored or new homes

The subject of this portrait is often identified as Mary Boleyn.

History Remembers Mary Boleyn as the Scandalous ‘Other Boleyn Girl.’ New Research Debunks the Myths Surrounding the Tudor Mistress

Sylvia Barbara Soberton’s latest book challenges the perception of Anne Boleyn’s sister as “promiscuous, intellectually incurious and unambitious”

John Hancock left this trunk of documents at a Lexington tavern. Paul Revere and fellow Bostonian John Lowell recovered the trove of papers and carried it across the village green.

America's 250th Anniversary

Everyone Remembers Paul Revere’s Midnight Ride. But His Forgotten Race to Secure a Trove of Documents Reveals How Government Records Helped Win the War

During the American Revolution, both the British and the patriots fought to keep sensitive papers out of enemy hands

The game has taken a variety of twists and turns.

How the Classic American Game of Twister Went From Risqué to Record-Breaking

Sixty years ago, Johnny Carson and Eva Gabor played Twister on the “Tonight Show,” and the public took it as permission to buy the controversial game

This map shows an English flag flying over Calais, an English territory lost to France in 1558.

Cool Finds

A Collection of Maps Owned by England’s First Queen Spent Centuries Overlooked in a Family Library. Now, the Rare Volume Is on Sale for $1.6 Million

Created for Mary I, the first woman to rule England in her own right, the book is “perhaps the most significant artifact of Tudor intellectual history still in private hands,” the seller says

An aerial view of the Ford Motor Company's River Rouge plant, circa 1945

Walt Disney Visited a Ford Factory in 1948. What He Witnessed There Laid the Groundwork for What Would Become Disneyland

A new book argues that the film producer’s trip to the River Rouge plant in Michigan inspired him to embrace the power of automation when designing the first Disney theme park

A festivalgoer shows a child how to "grunt" for earthworms.

In This Tiny Town in Florida’s Panhandle, Fishermen Are Hooked on ‘Worm Grunting,’ and the Worms Are Still Taking the Bait

Luring earthworms out of the soil to use as live bait is a long-running tradition in Sopchoppy, home to the annual Worm Gruntin’ Festival

The Mona Lisa returning to the Louvre in 1914

Andrew Lloyd Webber Says He’s Writing a New Musical About the Time the ‘Mona Lisa’ Vanished Without a Trace in 1911

Known for spectacles like “The Phantom of the Opera,” Broadway’s most commercially successful composer now wants to tell the story of the world’s most famous painting

An 1818 John Trumbull painting of the presentation of the draft Declaration of Independence to the Continental Congress

In 1776, the Declaration of Independence Was Breaking News. Here’s How the Founding Document Reached the American Public

A new book by historian Emily Sneff records the journeys of the Declaration’s first printed copies, tracking their reception in the Thirteen Colonies and overseas

Málaga’s famous espetos, or sardines, are cooked over an open flame in traditional blue fishing boats right on the beach.

Coastal Cities of Europe

Chiringuitos Offer the Quintessential Beach Bar Experience on Spain’s Costa del Sol

Steeped in history, the seafood joints are evolving to keep up with a global clientele and tightening environmental regulations

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