Obelisk

Antonio Sant'Elia

Prophet of the violent, industrial future

Antonio Sant’Elia lived the quintessential futurist life: short, violent and driven by an all-consuming desire to remake the world. He was born in 1888 in Como, Lombardy, and at age 19 became a draftsman. read more

The Etruscans, 400BCE

Chimera of Arezzo

This is an undeniably modern interpretation. The chimera, like most beasts of antiquity, was the bad guy. Child of the giant serpent Typhon and the half woman half snake Echidna (you know her from the Starbucks logo) the Chimera was an abominable thing, unnatural combination of lion and goat, with the head of a snake for a tail. Her brothers and sisters live in legend. read more

Toyen

What's in a name?

Names are assigned to us before we are aware of their meaning, and we grow into them as much as they come to reflect us. In Japan artists often changed names after milestones in their lives, but in the west, once you've been given a name, you're usually stuck with it—a rigidity that makes claiming a new name even more powerful magic. read more

Sascha Schneider, 1904

Hypnosis

To Sascha Schneider the male body was perfection, and the world its antagonist. Schneider worked in Germany in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, during the development of Freikörperkultur, free body culture, also called the Health and Hygiene movement. Freikörperkultur aimed to counteract the restraint and stress of industrialization with a restorative mix of open air nudity, exercise, and healthy diet. read more

Born on July 24

Alex Katz

How to paint faster than you can think

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