art
With a new telescope on the horizon, we reflect on the best pictures of space that came before.
Just as storylines make sense only when you have the context of the beginning and the end, listeners need to understand the impetus for why the album was even made.
The most technically impressive feats of animation often strike us as eerie instead of impressive, and it’s all thanks to the uncanny valley.
The singer-songwriter distilled the essence of the holidays into a hit song, and for her efforts she was crowned the Queen of Christmas.
Released in 1972, "Ways of Seeing" has proven to be as worthy of study as the artistic traditions it investigates.
Using DNA from samples of extinct flowers, synthetic biologists managed to approximate long-lost floral scents.
The German thinker wrote both treatises and songs. He approached each form of expression with the same level of interest.
Haunting photographs depict the dead as "still with us."
Music is often labelled a “universal language,” and according to the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, there is a good reason for that.
In hell, we assume a position of moral superiority, looking down over the sinners and the poor decisions that led them to this wretched place. In heaven, Dante is looking down upon us.
Portraiture is one of the most intimate genres in all of painting, and it has reinvented itself many times across European history.
Studio Ghibli movies celebrate the natural world using a very Japanese mixture of Shinto, Buddhist, and Daoist themes.
Bolsheviks planned to erect a towering monument to the socialist cause, but their quixotic ideas never got off the ground.
Although the statue’s political connotations faded over time, its eyes remain fixed on a key moment in Florentine history.
The German artist painted death as it appeared in life – omnipresent and hidden in plain sight.
Ever wondered what oxytocin receptor proteins sound like?
Due to deteriorating health, all Beethoven left behind for his final symphony were some musical sketches.
In the perilous mountains of Tibet, archaeologists unearthed ancient hand and footprints that seem to be the creative work of children.
Journey to the West is rightly considered one of the most influential novels ever written, but the real reason for its success may be its charismatic poster-boy: The Monkey King.
Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes is often labeled a quintessential Spanish artist, but his allegiance may well have lied with the French Enlightenment instead.
This freshly unearthed image drastically alters the meaning of one of the artist's most celebrated works.
Russian movies continue to be used as a mouthpiece for the country's political leadership.
The Rijksmuseum employed an AI to repaint lost parts of Rembrandt's "The Night Watch." Here's how they did it.
Ernst Chladni proved that sound can be seen, and developed a technique of visualizing vibrations on a metal plate.
A machine learning system lets visitors at a Kandinsky exhibition hear the artwork.
Using urinals, psychological collages, and animated furniture to shock us into reality.
Sometimes, moral lessons can be learned from blowing away zombies.
A curated list of must-watch films from Big Think readers.
From action shots to locking down the perfect lighting, you can master the art of photography with these online lessons.