art history

9 Stories

Scrolling Online, He Saw Portrait With Unusual Rounded Top

Turns out art historian spotted a lost 16th-century portrait of King Henry VIII

(Newser) - A lost portrait of King Henry VIII has been rediscovered in the UK just 14 miles from where it originally hung after its commission in the 1590s. But that's not exactly where art historian Adam Busiakiewicz found it. The Sotheby's consultant was perusing X last month when he...

Story Behind Painting Reveals Historic First

James Alexander Simpson work was likely commissioned by formerly enslaved woman

(Newser) - Experts have unraveled the background of a portrait currently on display at the Baltimore Museum of Art—and they say it is likely the first work commissioned by a formerly enslaved American. James Johnston writes in the Washington Post that the painting is of Mary Ann Tritt Cassell, a woman...

Experts: Nude Mona Lisa Is a Real Da Vinci

Sketch suggests he created different version of painting

(Newser) - Art experts have found tantalizing clues that suggest 500-year-old rumors Leonardo da Vinci painted a nude version of the Mona Lisa are true. A charcoal drawing of a nude Mona Lisa that has been sitting in a museum north of Paris for 150 years is now believed to be the...

In Remote Chile, Skeleton of Gauguin's Dad Found

Remains at Chilean fort believed to be his

(Newser) - Artist Paul Gauguin was a little more than a year old when his parents left Paris bound for Peru. But during a stop at a Chilean fort near Antarctica on Oct. 30, 1849, Gauguin's father, Clovis, died suddenly of a heart aneurysm. His family saw him buried, but the...

Degas Painting Panned as Discolored Hid Secret Image

Had Degas used thicker paint, the face may not have been possible to see

(Newser) - In 2008, a researcher in the Netherlands used an advanced X-ray technique to show that Vincent van Gogh's 1887 work "Patch of Grass" was actually done over an earlier painting of a woman's face. The practice is thought to have been common for van Gogh, with an...

Ellsworth Kelly Didn't Expect the World to Love His Art

Ellsworth Kelly started out painting WWII tanks

(Newser) - Ellsworth Kelly, widely seen as one of the greatest artists America has ever produced, has died at his home in upstate New York after 70 years of creating his own style of abstract art. He was 92. Kelly started out in an artistic US Army unit in France during World...

Obama to Art History Majors: Sorry I Dissed Your Field

Sends professor handwritten note

(Newser) - At the end of January, President Obama raised the ire of art historians with a comment about their field; now he's apologizing, via a handwritten note. Speaking at a Milwaukee-area General Electric plant, Obama told the crowd: "I promise you, folks can make a lot more, potentially, with...

DNA Tests Begin in Quest for the Real Mona Lisa

Bones unearthed in Florence could belong to painting's model

(Newser) - A three-year quest that has put researchers on a path toward what they hope is the "real" face of the Mona Lisa winds closer to its conclusion: Silvano Vinceti says DNA tests have begun on a skeleton his team unearthed in July 2012 in Florence , in an effort to...

Van Gogh 'Self Portrait' Really His Brother

Museum uncovers only known painting of Theo Van Gogh

(Newser) - Vincent Van Gogh's younger brother Theo was his closest ally, and many found it strange that the artist never painted him. Researchers at the Van Gogh Museum, however, now believe that an 1887 painting long thought to have been one of Vincent's dozens of self-portraits is actually a...

9 Stories