Michael Lobel

"Memory Training," a picture Jacob Lawrence painted in 1944 while serving as a war artist in the US Coast Guard. This black-and-white photo is the only image we have of the painting because it, along with others, was apparently lost sometime after WWII

it me

Hadn't heard of her before, but she's so good- just lovely

👂🎶🙏

Tune in now for a calm & soothing start to your weekend👇

bsky.app/profile/mlob...

Read this to learn about so-called architectural "delineators"—a term, and occupation, I hadn't heard of before—and for an introduction to a horticultural designer with the perfectly fitting name M. Betty Sprout...!

Feels like @kentremendous.bsky.social should see this, given his past interest in the trolley problem

Why Is DC’s Phillips Collection Selling Off Its Masterpieces? The museum’s decision to deaccession works by Georgia O’Keeffe, Pablo Picasso, and more has come under public scrutiny.

I try to be as measured as possible on social media, but everyone in the art world—including art historians!—who in recent years has focused incessantly on "the contemporary" is at fault for developments like this. This is what happens when you fail to value history hyperallergic.com/1058320/why-...

I still haven’t found my Creative Self. I’ve come across some of his abandoned camps, picked up some of his notes and used them the best I can, but he’s still not ready to come back out and risk the vulnerability he work demands.

I'm really loving this passage in particular- thanks so much for sharing🙏

If you haven't already followed the link, the National Galleries of Scotland has more to say on the title...

Probably a good time to point out that during WWII Jacob Lawrence served in the coast guard on the first racially integrated ship in the US military, where as an official war artist he painted scenes of racially diverse crew members working & at play together. But that was a different time I guess

Not every single museum has to collect the work of living artists—which is exactly why the Phillips says they're doing this. Preserving priceless, irreplaceable artworks from the past, and making them available for future generations, is enough..! Thank you for coming to my Ted talk

Why Is DC’s Phillips Collection Selling Off Its Masterpieces? The museum’s decision to deaccession works by Georgia O’Keeffe, Pablo Picasso, and more has come under public scrutiny.

I try to be as measured as possible on social media, but everyone in the art world—including art historians!—who in recent years has focused incessantly on "the contemporary" is at fault for developments like this. This is what happens when you fail to value history hyperallergic.com/1058320/why-...

Dorothea Tanning, Tableau Vivant – Living Picture, 1954 www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-arti...

A very orange sky because clouds and early morning sunrise making everything glow nice

Friends! Set your alarms! A new First Light is heading your way this Friday from 8-10a on @eastvillageradio.bsky.social

eastvillageradio.com/first-light-...

Dorothea Tanning, Tableau Vivant – Living Picture, 1954 www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-arti...

A large bronze bear sculpture sits prominently, depicting the bear in a seated position. The background features modern high-rise buildings and a partly cloudy sky. The sculpture is mounted on a black base.

The 9.5 metre tall “Seated Bear With Friends” by artist Dean Drever, overlooking the new park and playground at the Crosstown development in Toronto.

I do understand: you want permission. There’s a machine in the corner wrapped in human skin that makes things out of shit and blood to look like whatever you want (as long as you don’t look too closely). You gave one to your teacher and they didn’t notice. Your boss told you to use it after they laid off half the team and it was fine. You fed one to your kids and they liked it. You want to know you can use it sometimes without me thinking less of you. You don’t need me to believe it’s useful, you just want me to be polite about it. But I am a hater, and I will not be polite. The machine is disgusting and we should break it. The people who build it are vapid shit-eating cannibals glorifying ignorance. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself.

I cosign every single word of this

anthonymoser.github.io/writing/ai/h...

Cover of Carlo Ginzburg's "The Cheese and the Worms: The Cosmos of a Sixteenth-Century Miller"

It's a deep cut but I would say Carlo Ginzburg's "The Cheese and the Worms," which made a huge impression on me in grad school and made me think totally differently about writing history

UMass-Amherst is hiring “a specialist in the visual arts, architecture, and/or material culture of the Islamic world” !
careers.umass.edu/amherst/en-u...

Anthropomorphic eggs gathered around a table with a turkey dinner, with broken egg at left

Prepping for class on figuration in the age of AIDS & this one is coming just in time for the holiday next week: "Eggs Having Turkey Dinner," 1985–95, painting in nail polish on metal tray by inimitable artist & drag performer Jerome Caja

so relatable

Two exhibitions — at VPAM and the Cheech — put Chicanx bodies front and center Work by Teddy Sandoval at VPAM and a multigenerational exhibition at the Cheech dig into queerness, gender and the politics of the body.

Currently reading @cmonstah.bsky.social on queer Chicano artist Teddy Sandoval in preparation for seminar on figuration in the age of AIDS www.latimes.com/entertainmen...

Monkey scribe surrounded by tulips with owl on its shoulder

it me

Setting with lots of monkeys, focusing their activities on tulips

Monkeys with tulips, detail of a painted scene

For those who say art history is an esoteric discipline, here's a painting that's looking very relevant if you're tracking the AI bubble right now: Jan Brueghel the Younger, "Allegory of Tulipomania," 1640s. Tag yourself on the right

Ruth Asawa: A Retrospective | MoMA Exhibition. Through Feb 7, 2026. “I’m not so interested in the expression of something. I’m more interested in what the material can do. So that’s why I keep exploring,” said artist, educator, and civ...

Asawa's work is now featured in a full-dress retrospective at MoMA, on view through early February www.moma.org/calendar/exh...

Thanks to @joshuajfriedman.com & @rachelholliday.bsky.social I've been enjoying @maggietokudahall.bsky.social's pigeon paintings & thought she might appreciate Ruth Asawa's similarly themed works on paper, with flocks of birds on cobblestoned backgrounds

Joel Meyerowitz, McDonald's Sign, November 15, 2001 www.artic.edu/artworks/219...