Smart News: Arts and Culture | Smithsonian Magazine

Verona, the home of Romeo and Juliet, is preventing new eateries from opening that primarily serve kebabs, gyros and fried food

March 4, 2016

The country could drop the Union Jack in favor of a design with a more distinctive national symbol

March 3, 2016

Artists are up in arms over Anish Kapoor’s exclusive rights to “vantablack”

March 2, 2016

Sled dogs may not have enough snow during the 2016 Iditarod.

Could a warm winter make the famous sled race go to the dogs?

March 2, 2016

The Eleanor Roosevelt Monument in Riverside Park, New York, was dedicated at 72nd Street on October 5, 1996.

Cool Finds

It’s Way Too Hard to Find Statues of Notable Women in the U.S.

Only a handful of the country’s sculptures honor women

February 29, 2016

Beijing's CCTV Tower has been compared to a pair of glorious pants.

Cool Finds

These Are 10 of China’s Strangest Buildings

Chinese officials want to ditch the country’s bizarre architecture

February 26, 2016

Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton (Mrs. Alexander Hamilton), 1787, Ralph Earl (1751-1801).

Cool Finds

Elizabeth Hamilton Once Posed for a Portrait in a New York City Prison

There was a dire need for painters to immortalize America’s elites

February 25, 2016

Shackleton brought everything from trashy novels to accounts of Arctic rescues with him to Antarctica.

Cool Finds

Historians Finally Figured Out What Was on Shackleton’s Bookshelf

The brave explorer likely found solace in his library

February 25, 2016

Cool Finds

This Twitter Account Turns Emojis Into Gallery Art

Tiny pictures, high art?

February 24, 2016

Cool Finds

Listen to a Rare Interview With Harper Lee

“[A]ll I want to be is the Jane Austen of South Alabama,” she told radio host Roy Newquist in 1964

February 23, 2016

From the Met to the MoMA

February 22, 2016

NASA's OSIRIS-REx project will send a craft to a near-Earth asteroid and take a sample to study back on Earth.

Cool Finds

NASA Wants You to Send Your Art to an Asteroid

The agency is looking for creative contributions as it readies its mission to study and sample a near-Earth asteroid

February 22, 2016

Cool Finds

This French Town Is Covered in Citrus Sculptures

Ten-foot-tall lemon sculptures herald the Fête du Citron

February 19, 2016

Cool Finds

This Stunning Dragon Dance Was All for the Sake of Tea

Your next cup could be filled with New Year’s luck

February 19, 2016

This photograph of Harper Lee was taken in 1961, one year after she wrote for the Grapevine.

Five Things to Know About Harper Lee

The spunky and eloquent author is dead—but her legacy lives on

February 19, 2016

Little accent, big debate

February 18, 2016

Dissident artist Pyotr Pavlensky appears at Moscow's Tagansky District Court on suspicion of vandalism.

Judges walk out in support of the provocative performance artist

February 18, 2016

Try to refrain from eating the art

February 17, 2016

Cool Finds

A German Composer Uncovered a Collaboration Between Mozart and Salieri

Their epic rivalry might not have been all that

February 16, 2016

The four-year restoration will cost a pretty penny

February 16, 2016

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