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Smart News / Smart News Arts & Culture

Kendrick Lamar makes history with Pulitzer win

Future of Art

Why Kendrick Lamar’s Pulitzer Win Is History-Making

Smithsonian curator Dwandalyn Reece calls the award an important “recognition of the cultural, musical influence of hip-hop and rap”

Open Heritage shows Bagan, an ancient city in Myanmar, before and after the 2016 earthquake.

Check Out the World’s Largest Archive Digitally Preserving At-Risk Heritage Sites

Open Heritage features 27 sites in 18 countries with more locations to be added in the future

Elle Fanning as author Mary Shelley

Coming Soon

Watch: The First Trailer for ‘Mary Shelley’ Explores the Many Inspirations for ‘Frankenstein’

The biopic will follow Mary Wollstonecraft’s scandalous teenage romance with the older Percy Bysshe Shelley and the events that shaped her most famous book

Remember me?

The Hottest Place to Play Retro Handheld Computer Games? Try the Internet Archive

A new project hopes to save vintage technology before it is gone forever by preserving playable versions of your favorite old-school games

Police are on the lookout for the woman who stole a $17,500 rock from a Yoko Ono exhibition.

Wanted: $17,500 Rock Lifted From Yoko Ono Installation

The rock was part of the ongoing interactive piece ‘Yoko Ono: The Riverbed’

Malacites of the Wanabaki Confederacy standing along the edge of the water at French village, Kingsclear, celebrating Corpus Christi Day, ca 1887.

Researchers Are Tracing Wabanaki Canoe Routes in New Brunswick

The First Nation routes were ancient “highways” that traversed rivers, creeks and streams

Japanese director Isao Takahata photographed in 2003

Trending Today

The Sprawling Legacy of Isao Takahata, Co-Founder of Studio Ghibli

Here are five things to know about the visionary Japanese director who died on April 5 at the age of 82

Josef Küblbeck (l) with "Seppi" and Oliver Storz with "Moni"

Germany’s New Dachshund Museum Is Not Just for the Dogs

The Dackelmuseum is stuffed with 4,500 sausage dog-related items

‘Our Bodies, Ourselves,’ the Revolutionary Feminist Health Book, Will No Longer Print New Editions

In the 1970s, the book promoted nonjudgemental discussions about women’s sexual and reproductive health

Crown, gold and gilded copper with glass beads, pigment and fabric, made in Ethiopia, 1600-1850

London Museum Says It’s Willing to Return Looted Ethiopian Artifacts on Long-Term Loan

A new exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum grapples with Britain’s seizure of cultural treasures during the 1868 Battle of Maqdala

Judy Chicago's Sappho plate

Cool Finds

Now You Too Can Eat Off of Judy Chicago’s Famous Feminist Dinnerware

Reproductions of four plate designs from “The Dinner Party” are available for the first time

This Colorful Exhibition Was Made for Instagram

Artist CJ Hendry’s latest house-like installation assigned each room a distinct color

Cool Finds

“Lost” Feminist Dinner Set Goes on Public Display for the First Time

The 50-plate “Famous Women Dinner Set” by Bloomsbury Group artists Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant includes portraits of the well-known and the overlooked

The Invisible Enemy Should Not Exist

Europe

Ancient Statue Destroyed by ISIS Resurrected in London—With a Twist

Iraqi-American artist Michael Rakowitz has created a reproduction of the statue using 10,500 date syrup cans

A scene from The City Without Jews.

1924 Film That Anticipates the Holocaust Found and Restored

A collector found a complete copy of the film at a flea market in Paris in 2015

Cool Finds

400-Year-Old Painting by Dutch Master Found in Iowa Storage Room

Otto van Veen’s “Apollo and Venus” was likely hidden away by the Des Moines Women’s Club for showing too much skin

A rendering of the Statue of Unity.

India Is Building the World’s Tallest Statue

The monument will stand nearly 600 feet tall and it honors India’s first deputy prime minister, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel

Last year, Sesame Street introduced Julia, a Muppet with autism.

Sesame Place Becomes First Theme Park to Be Designated a Certified Autism Center

The International Board of Credentialing and Continuing Education Standards announced the honor on World Autism Day

New Statue Immortalizes Mary Thomas, Who Led a Revolt Against Danish Colonial Rule

It is the city’s first public monument to a black woman

Two related images from The Book of Ishness, a sketchbook of abstract paintings that Tolkien began while he was an undergraduate at Exeter College, Oxford. The images date from early 1914 when Tolkien was in his third year.

Europe

Unseen Illustrations by J.R.R. Tolkien Are Coming to Oxford

“Tolkien: Maker of Middle Earth,” opening at the Bodleian libraries this summer, will include manuscripts, letters, maps and artwork

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