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Smart News / Smart News Arts & Culture

Bodo Mende (left) and Karl Kreile (right) are the first couple in Germany to celebrate a same-sex wedding.

Germany Celebrates Its First Same-Sex Marriages

The country’s marriage equality law, which was passed in June, went into effect on Sunday

Rock Hudson in 1954.

The Hollywood Star Who Confronted the AIDS ‘Silent Epidemic’

Rock Hudson died of AIDS-related complications in 1985

Le Corbusier's vision for cities profoundly influenced New York, though never to the degree that this concept (originally designed for Marseille, France) was ever built.

How a Controversial European Architect Shaped New York

Le Corbusier’s ideas arguably helped shape the city more than his own designs

A typical 17th-century coffeehouse scene. Controversial, right?

This 17th-Century “Women’s Petition Against Coffee” Probably Wasn’t About Women, or Coffee

It probably wasn’t written by angry, sex-deprived wives–although stranger things have happened

The front of a Nobel Prize medal.

The Perks and Pitfalls of Being a Nobel Laureate: Early Mornings, Performance Anxiety

On the plus side, at UC Berkeley you get free parking

New Research

Da Vinci Had a Hand in the “Naked Mona Lisa”

A preliminary study suggests the master painter worked on the drawing called the “Mona Vanna”

Printer’s Manuscript of the Book of Mormon Sells for $35 Million

Adjusting for inflation, Bill Gates’ $30.8 million purchase of Leonardo da Vinci’s Codex Leicester in 1994 remains the most expensive manuscript sale

The 2015 winner of the "GIF It Up" competition.

Competition Wants You to Turn Cultural Heritage Into GIFs

The latest round of “GIF It Up” seeks the best GIFs made from public domain prints, photos, paintings and more

This 1966 portrait of Hugh Hefner will go on display today in the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery

Hugh Hefner’s Legacy as Told Through National Portrait Gallery Artifacts

Three objects explore the complicated and controversial life of the late founder of the Playboy empire

The Village of Whitesboro's old seal (left) adjacent to its new seal (right).

New York Village Changes Controversial Seal Showing a White Settler Wrestling a Native American

The seal was widely mocked and criticized after villagers voted against changing it last year

A Coco Chanel Little Black Dress, released in 1926.

Why Coco Chanel Created the Little Black Dress

The style icon created a… well…. style icon in 1926

A modern mocha

Your Mocha is Named After the Birthplace of the Coffee Trade

The port city of Mocha, in Yemen, was once a vast coffee marketplace

Cool Finds

Degas’ Rare Sculptures Are Stuffed With Wine Corks

X-rays show the artist fleshed out his wax and clay personal projects with bits and pieces found around the studio

Could New York be the Gotham we prize without the Guggenheim?

What to Know About the Controversy Surrounding the Chinese Art Exhibit Coming to the Guggenheim

As questions of animal cruelty, artistic freedom swirl, three major works were pulled from “Art and China after 1989: Theater of the World”

The inspiration for the bendy straw came while Joseph Friedman was watching his young daughter try to drink from a tall glass.

Why You Should Appreciate the Invention of the Bendy Straw

It’s the straw that bends, not the person

In this Saturday March 29, 2014 file photo, a woman drives a car on a highway in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, as part of a campaign to defy Saudi Arabia's ban on women driving. Saudi Arabia authorities announced Tuesday Sept. 26, 2017, that women will be allowed to drive for the first time in the ultra-conservative kingdom from next summer, fulfilling a key demand of women's rights activists who faced detention for defying the ban.

Trending Today

Saudi Women Win the Right to Drive

Next June, women in the ultra-patriarchal society will become the last in the world to receive driver’s licenses

Jennifer Zetlan who plays Rhoda in "Rhoda and the Fossil Hunt"

Family Travel

Watch a Dinosaur Opera at New York’s American Museum of Natural History

Sink your teeth into the family friendly “Rhoda and the Fossil Hunt”

Guillaume Rondelet was an early anatomist who founded his own dissecting theater, which was a thing people did in the sixteenth century.

A Sixteenth-Century Hot Date Might Include a Trip to the Dissecting Theater

Anatomy theaters were an early site for science as spectacle

Africa’s Largest Contemporary Art Museum Opens in Cape Town

But some critics have questioned whether the institution adequately represents black African artists

Make your art better with this highly trained AI named Vincent

Watch This AI Turn Sketches into Masterpieces

Trained on the ‘history of human art,’ this system can transform your scribbles

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