In a light hall with a stucco cornice and crystal chandelier, a woman with a microphone and three guests face a crowd. Black-and-white photographs hang on the walls; photographers film on th

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Photography exhibition opening in a stuccoed hall: speakers and gathered guests

NB! · Art · Pop Culture · Humour

Giacomo Ceruti's (1698-1767) "Beggar" Wears Vintage Comme des Garçons, 2000

Black-and-white photo: a dark-haired man in a richly embroidered tailcoat, white trousers and jabot leans against a ladder beside a studio lamp and coiled cables.

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Man in an embroidered military uniform among studio lighting equipment

NB! · Cinema · Observations · Pop Culture · Humour

It seems Bonaparte himself was not as good at being Napoleon as Marlon Brando managed to be in 1954

Marble statue of a bearded Christ with a bare torso and drapery at the hips, in a dark gallery with a red-lit wall.

NB! · Faith · Art · Observations

Jacopo Fantoni’s Marble Risen Christ of 1520 with Unusual Facial Features

What unexpected features and expression the Risen Christ of Jacopo Fantoni, 1520, possesses. And he looks far older than in the traditional iconography

NB! · London · Monarchies · Mores · Humour

Camilla Parker Bowles's Favourite Biscuit

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Spielberg Is Making a Miniseries About Napoleon

NB! · Observations · Nature · Humour

Brunhilda the cat wishes you a good morning and reminds you that all of life is a battle; the main thing is not to sleep through it

NB! · Art · Monarchies · Humour

Take a porcelain cup, fit it with a silver stem, and you have a goblet

Take a porcelain cup, fit it with a silver stem, and you have a goblet. So thought some craftsman of the Elizabethan age. Four hundred and some years on, this hybrid goblet of the Ming Dynasty and Elizabeth I has fetched a tidy sum

Colour plate showing a lady's bedroom in Art Nouveau style with a canopied bed, a fireplace with a mirror, a chest of drawers and a patterned carpet.

NB! · Archive · Art · Observations · Mores

French Art Nouveau lady's bedroom interior and curtains resembling Soviet ones

Looking through sketches of French Art Nouveau interiors, I came upon some curious curtains that might easily have belonged to an old Soviet interior. At any rate, I keep at home valances and throws from the early twentieth century with almost exactly the same pattern

NB! · Art · Paris · Pop Culture

In 1938 Elsa Schiaparelli presented the "Skeleton" dress, designed by Salvador Dalí

NB! · Humour