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Smart News / Smart News Arts & Culture

Mask, Jackson Pollock, 1941

Before He Created His Vibrant Drip Paintings, Jackson Pollock Took Inspiration From Pablo Picasso

A new exhibition in Paris demonstrates the influence that the Spanish artist had on the young American painter who would help usher in the Abstract Expressionist movement

The four songs are expected to sell for around $261,000. 

Four Unreleased Jimi Hendrix Demo Recordings Billed as ‘Better Than the Originals’ Are Going Up for Sale

Created in London in the 1960s, the tracks are heading to auction as part of a larger collection of memorabilia connected to the famous American guitarist

The grand Biltmore house will reopen on November 2.

Asheville’s Biltmore Estate Will Reopen for the Holidays After Sustaining Damage From Hurricane Helene

The sprawling estate, which is the largest privately owned home in the country, will open its doors in November after a month-long closure

 Portrait de Berthe Weill (Portrait of Berthe Weill), Émilie Charmy, 1910-14

This Art Dealer Paved the Way for Picasso, Matisse and Modigliani. So Why Haven’t You Heard of Her?

A new exhibition in New York celebrates Berthe Weill, an often overlooked but visionary figure who jumpstarted the careers of many of modern art’s giants

Shrunken Head Bob from Beetlejuice Beetlejuice claimed the top spot on this year's rankings.

The Top 25 Trending Halloween Costumes of 2024, According to Google

This year, celebrants will likely be channeling characters from hit franchises like “Beetlejuice,” “Inside Out” and “Deadpool”

Kansas City has more than 100 barbecue restaurants, plus the World Series of Barbecue competition and the Barbecue Hall of Fame.

The World’s First Barbecue Museum Is Coming to Kansas City

Opening next spring, the new venue will have exhibits and a barbecue bean-themed ball pit play area for kids

The newly discovered jade dragon artifact, as seen from different angles

Cool Finds

Archaeologists Discover Mysterious Jade Dragon Artifact at a 5,000-Year-Old Tomb in China

Hundreds of artifacts have been unearthed at a burial mound in the city of Chifeng, but researchers are particularly intrigued by the six-inch-long object

Travis Gienger nicknamed his pumpkin "Rudy" for the Notre Dame football player who inspired the movie Rudy.

Minnesota Teacher’s 2,471-Pound Gourd Triumphs in Annual Pumpkin-Weighing Competition

Travis Gienger, who nicknamed his prize-winning pumpkin “Rudy,” has been growing gourds for nearly 30 years

The seven-foot-tall Apollo Belvedere is thought to be a Roman copy of a Greek statue.

See the Vatican’s Magnificent Marble Statue of the Greek God Apollo Restored to Its Former Glory

Experts added a carbon fiber pole to help anchor the “Apollo Belvedere,” which had developed cracks along the legs and knees. Now, the looming Roman sculpture is finally back on display

An aerial view of the new park modeled after Vincent van Gogh's 1889 masterpiece The Starry Night

This Park Recreates Vincent van Gogh’s ‘The Starry Night’ With a Dazzling Display of Plants, Trees and Winding Pathways

At a new park in Bosnia and Herzegovina, two dozen gardeners have spent years replicating the Dutch artist’s masterpiece using the land as their canvas

Marina Abramović standing on the Great Wall of China during her collaborative piece with Ulay in 1988

Nearly 40 Years After She Walked the Great Wall of China, Marina Abramović Returns to the Country With a New Exhibition

“Transforming Energy,” the artist’s first museum show in China, focuses on “artworks and objects that actively engage the audience”

Around Halloween, hundreds of revelers dress up as witches and warlocks and hit the water.

Why Are Witches and Warlocks Going Stand-Up Paddleboarding to Celebrate Halloween?

Across the country, revelers are dressing in costumes and gliding across bodies of water on stand-up paddleboards to ring in the spooky season

Thousands of treasure hunters have tried to locate the owl statue.

Cool Finds

A Treasure Hunt for an Ornate Golden Owl Buried in France Has Ended After 31 Years

The quest drew thousands of curious participants hoping to solve a series of elaborate riddles—and win a bejeweled statue worth an estimated $165,000

All the Good Times We Spent Together (2016) by French artist Alexandre Lavet is a painted recreation of two Jupiler beer cans.

Museum Workers Have Rescued an Artwork From the Trash After a Mechanic Mistook It for Garbage

A Dutch museum famous for displaying art in unconventional locations had placed a pair of painted beer cans in a glass elevator shaft

Two lynx shelter from the wind behind their parent, who looks into the camera.

See 15 Winning Images From the Wildlife Photographer of the Year Contest

Breathtaking shots shine a light on the wonders of wildlife and the threats that human activities pose to the natural world

Volunteers looked at the original artworks in the museum and posters in the gift shop.

Art Meets Science

Seeing Vermeer’s ‘Girl With a Pearl Earring’ in Person Stimulates the Brain More Than Looking at Reprints, Study Suggests

Scientists used EEG headsets, MRI machines and eye trackers to study volunteers’ responses to five paintings housed at the Mauritshuis museum in the Netherlands

Bord de Mer (Seaside), Claude Monet, circa 1865

A Rare Monet Painting Has Been Returned to the Family of Its Rightful Owners—Eight Decades After It Was Stolen by the Nazis

The Gestapo seized the Impressionist painting from storage after its owners fled from their home in Vienna. Now, the piece has been returned to their granddaughters

Han Kang has been a celebrated author in South Korea for decades.

Han Kang Becomes the First South Korean Author to Win the Nobel Prize in Literature

Best known for “The Vegetarian,” the novelist and poet was praised for her “intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life”

Self-Portrait With Loose Hair, Frida Kahlo, 1947

This Exhibition Is Betting That You Don’t Know Frida Kahlo as Well as You May Think

“Frida: Beyond the Myth” aims to paint an intimate portrait of the artist through dozens of works created by Kahlo and photographs taken by her loved ones

Andy Warhol made 46 copies of this print depicting Vladimir Lenin.

The FBI Recovers an Andy Warhol Print Worth $175,000 That Vanished From a Private Home in 2021

A man is expected to plead guilty for trafficking the print, which reappeared at a Dallas auction house shortly after it went missing from a California residence

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