Art · Mores

The word charlatan changed from meaning a street vendor to meaning a deceiver

Both of these images are called "The Charlatan". The word, derived from the verb "ciarlare", to chatter, to speak in a pompous manner, originally denoted street vendors who drew attention to their wares with colourful patter, wares that were often connected with the prolongation of life,

Watercolour costume sketch of a human figure with a radish for a head and a dress of green leaves.

Archive · Art · Observations · Humour

Costume designs for Luigi Manzotti’s ballet “Love” at La Scala, 17 February 1886

Which Fruit or Vegetable Do You Feel Like Today? Costume sketches for the ballet "Amor", presented by Luigi Manzotti at La Scala on 17 February 1886. One would, of course, like to be a salad, but all one manages is a potato

NB! · Art · Books

King Lear and Cordelia, Ford Madox Brown, 1854

NB! · Art

Oskar Zwintscher, Grief, 1898

NB! · Faith · Art · Rome

The Separation of Light from Darkness

The Separation of Light from Darkness. Fresco on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, 1508-1512, Michelangelo Buonarroti

Faith · Art

So-called mixed-hypostasis icons of the Holy Trinity, depicting Jesus with three faces and four eyes, were banned by both the Catholic and the Orthodox Church, although they once had a broad iconographic tradition

So-called mixed-hypostasis icons of the Holy Trinity, depicting Jesus with three faces and four eyes, were banned by both the Catholic and the Orthodox Church, although they once had a broad iconographic tradition. The Holy Synod forbade the depiction of God the Father, the Son and the Holy

NB! · Art

The Maiden and Death

The Maiden and Death. Edvard Munch

Architecture · Art · Paris · Humour

Has everyone found Vera Mukhina's Worker and Kolkhoz Woman?

Painting by the French artist André Devambez, "The Paris World's Fair of 1937, View from the Eiffel Tower"

Detail of the painting: a bearded rider in a red headdress, a horse’s head and a frightened fair-haired young woman with her mouth open.

NB! · Art · People

Arnold Böcklin’s painting “War”, created in 1896

Arnold Böcklin. War. 1896

Faith · Art · Books

Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came every one from his own place: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite; for they had made an appointment together to come to mourn with him an

Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came every one from his own place: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite; for they had made an appointment together to come to mourn with him and to

NB! · The East · Art · People · Rome

Self-Portrait of Horace Vernet in His Studio in Rome after His Return from a Journey through North Africa, 1835

NB! · Art · People

Thomas Schweicker (1540 - 1602) was an artist who had no hands

Thomas Schweicker (1540 - 1602) was an artist who had no hands. He worked sitting on the floor, holding a sheet of paper steady with one foot and guiding the pen with the other