Art History

Picasso in Place Ravignan in Montmartre in 1904

Why French Authorities Placed a Young Pablo Picasso Under Surveillance

Police suspected the 19-year-old Spanish expatriate of harboring anarchist views

Still from "Masterpiece" featuring Coca-Cola's take on The Scream (1895)

Coca-Cola Uses Famous Paintings By Warhol, Munch and More to Sell Soda

The company's new ad campaign, "Masterpiece," brings iconic artworks to life

During World War II, Executive Order 9066 authorized the incarceration of 120,000 Japanese Americans (above: In Los Angeles in April 1942, dozens of families wait for a train to Manzanar War Relocation Center in Owens Valley, California).

Japanese American Artists Recall the Trauma of Wartime Incarceration

Smithsonian podcasts explore the legacy of Executive Order 9066 and the camera that almost didn’t make it to the Juno spacecraft launch

Edward Brooke-Hitching's The Madman Gallery spotlights such artworks as John Singer Sargent's Portrait of Madame X, a statue of Glycon and Franz Xaver Messerschmidt's Character Heads.

The Most Enigmatic Works in Art History

A new book highlights 100 artistic curiosities, from the nude "Mona Lisa" to portraits of a dog-headed saint

On the show, experts give contestants advice about Vermeer’s lost paintings.

Dutch Artists Compete to Paint Like Vermeer in New Reality Show

The contestants are tasked with recreating six of the old master's lost works

The hazy quality of works like Turner's Rain, Steam and Speed (1844) was influenced by air pollution, a new study says.

Art Meets Science

Did Air Pollution Influence Famous Impressionist Painters?

Artists like Turner and Monet painted the smog they saw in London and Paris, a new study says

Johannes Vermeer's Girl With a Pearl Earring at the Mauritshuis museum

Did Vermeer's 'Girl' Really Have a Pearl Earring?

A real pearl of that size would have been "astronomically expensive," art historian says

The Gordon Strong Automobile Objective at night

Hundreds of Frank Lloyd Wright's Designs Were Never Built. Here's What They Might Have Looked Like

So far, David Romero has digitally reconstructed more than 20 of the famous architect's unrealized projects

The middle section of Dance on the Beach (1906) by Edvard Munch

This 13-Foot-Long Munch Painting Was Hidden From the Nazis in a Norwegian Forest

"Dance on the Beach" will be going up for auction for the first time since the 1930s

Portrait of a Woman, painted by Italian Renaissance master Giovanni Battista Moroni, is joining the Frick’s permanent collection.

The Frick Adds Its First Renaissance Portrait of a Woman to Permanent Collection

The stunning 16th-century painting by Giovanni Battista Moroni is now on display

The Resurrected Christ Appears to His Mother by Peter Paul Rubens

Italian Police Seize Rubens Masterpiece From an Exhibition

Four people are under investigation for illegally exporting the painting and money laundering

Police in Boulder and Lakewood found all five pieces of stolen artwork in a hotel room.

Police Recover $400,000 Worth of Stolen Artwork in Colorado

The suspect allegedly broke into a locked truck that was transporting five high-end pieces across the country

Philip Pearlstein (above in his studio, June 1971) was "unwaveringly interested in the landscape of the body,” says Stephanie Stebich, the director of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. 

Philip Pearlstein Painted the Naked Truth

Smithsonian curators remember the celebrated artist, who died last month at 98, and who viewed humanity with biting realism

Girl With a Pearl Earring, Vermeer's most famous painting, will be on display at Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum starting next month.

Largest Exhibition of Vermeer Paintings Ever Staged Will Open in Amsterdam Next Month

Of the Dutch artist's 35 known paintings, about 28 will be on display at the Rijksmuseum

The Collaboration, which stars Paul Bettany and Jeremy Pope, makes its Broadway debut.

'The Collaboration' Brings Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat to Broadway

Starring Paul Bettany and Jeremy Pope, the production explores two art icons' complex relationship

Hector Guimard, who gained acclaim from his work with the Paris Métro subway system, is the subject of an exhibition on view at the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum in New York City.

Meet the Designer of the Fanciful Subway Entrances to the Paris Métro

The celebrated architect Hector Guimard was also a passionate advocate for workers’ rights, even as he honed his reputation in the business of luxury

Fascinating finds unveiled in 2022 ranged from a 2,000-year-old statue of a dog to colorful sarcophagi at Saqqara to a Qing dynasty vase.

Cool Finds

Ninety-Six Fascinating Finds Revealed in 2022

The year's most exciting discoveries included hidden portraits by Cézanne and van Gogh, sarcophagi buried beneath Notre-Dame, and a medieval wedding ring

The 1989 photograph, Maya Lin working on Civil Rights Memorial by Adam Stoltman, is among numerous works including 3D models, sketchbooks, personal papers and family photos in the exhibition, "One Life: Maya Lin," at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery. 

The Private World of the Public Artist Maya Lin

A biographical exhibition reveals the profound origins of her intensely engaging art

A tableau of sculptures or living beings, the Nativity scene (as well as the closely related Adoration of the Magi) traces its origins back some 1,500 years.

What Nativity Scenes Tell Us About the Evolution of Christianity

From ancient mosaics to Saint Francis of Assisi, depictions of Jesus's birth reflect the changing conventions of the world's largest religion

Cézanne's Still Life With Bread and Eggs, housed at the Cincinnati Art Museum

Cool Finds

For 158 Years, a Cézanne Portrait Hid Behind a Still Life of Bread and Eggs

While examining the painting, a museum employee had a hunch—and called for an X-ray

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