By Nina Heyn — Your Culture Scout Paris at the end of the 19th century was packed with sophisticated men who loved art. They were making it, discussing it, and selling it. There were those who created new styles—like Monet, Gauguin, or Cézanne. Others excelled as art dealers, like marchand Paul Durand-Ruel, who handled sales…
By Nina Heyn – Your Culture Scout The world is watching bad—and then worse—news coming out of Ukraine every day. Millions of people, even those who last month were not sure where Ukraine actually is, now follow the tragedy of people losing their lives, homes, livelihoods, and a homeland. There is one more thing that…
The Comet of 1680 over Rotterdam. Lieve Verschuier (1680). Rotterdam Historic Museum. Photo: Wikimedia Commons Public Domain “As above, so below.” ~ Hermes Trismegistus (6th century AD) By Nina Heyn – Your Culture Scout A sudden appearance in the night sky of an exotic shape of a ball and a shiny tail would be hard…
Gideon. Sketch for a fresco. Franz Anton Maulbertsch (1796). Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest. Photo: Wikimediart.org By Nina Heyn – Your Culture Scout There is a longstanding intellectual debate about whether an individual can change history. Attila the Hun, Alexander the Great, and Adolf Hitler come to mind in support of this argument, with countless…
By Nina Heyn – Your Culture Scout “For we fight not for glory, nor riches, nor honors, but for freedom alone, which no good man gives up except with his life.” ~ Declaration of Arbroath, 1320. National Museum of Scotland. We are used to seeing ideologically engaged works in modern art museums. Twenty-first-century artists often…
By Nina Heyn – Your Culture Scout For 15th-century Europeans, sub-Saharan Africa was to a great extent terra incognita until Portuguese explorers started venturing further and further south along the continent’s western coast. These expeditions culminated in 1497 with Vasco da Gama’s voyage all the way down to the Cape of Good Hope and on…
By Nina Heyn – Your Culture Scout There are bigger world problems than this, but you may have noticed that your favorite sheets are not in stock at Ikea—it is the global trade disruption, compliments of the pandemic. As “out of stock” notices affect our ability to obtain our favorite snacks, shoes, a sofa or…
By Nina Heyn – Your Culture Scout The Oscar season in Hollywood is like the Baltic sea after a storm, when crumbs of precious amber are churned up to the surface. Various movies that would perhaps go unnoticed at any other time are being re-released and submitted by their producers. That’s how you can discover…
By Nina Heyn – Your Culture Scout Art serves many social purposes, such as creating a magic ritual, preserving memories, announcing praise or condemnation, revising history, and (obviously) providing esthetic enjoyment. It’s no wonder, then, that art has also been used to warn people of the potential consequences of their actions. The British Museum houses…
The belief in a supernatural source of evil is not necessary; men alone are quite capable of every wickedness.” ~ Joseph Conrad, Under Western Eyes (1911) By Nina Heyn – Your Culture Scout The struggle between the forces of good and evil lies at the root of all religions. In India, one of the most…