“The Empress of Art” by Susan Jaques is an art-focused biography of Catherine the Great, Russia’s most famous female ruler. Turns out, Catherine was a boss. Originally a German princess, she was married off to the crappy future Russian Tzar Peter III. When Peter rapidly began running Russia into the ground (he was wildly unpopular…Read More
Literature
Sunday Snapshots
From left to right: 1) Spent a few days in Baltimore toasting the town. 2) A fun opening at Reynolds Gallery. 3) Beautiful row houses in Charm City. 4) Always communing with art. 5) Guess which tag is mine. 6) Amtrak necessities.
What I’m Reading: Russia
One of my coworkers gave me this compact 1,000-year history of Russia for Christmas. It’s been a joy to read. The book starts with Russia’s beginning as “Rus,” a collection of disparate tribes centered in Novgorod. It follows the country as they begin to form a centralized state and establish government. This is a fascinating…Read More
Sunday Snapshots
From left to right: 1) Living in the galleries, per usual. 2) Tools of the trade. 3) Coordinating coffee cups and books. 4) Thanksgiving treats. 5) Ballet season. 6) The only thing I love more than looking at art is watching other people look at art.
The Gilded Years
This week I took a break from reading about death (whoops, uh-oh, what’s wrong with me?) to check out The Gilded Years by my girl Karin Tanabe. The historical fiction novel is based on the true story of Anita Hemmings, the first African American woman to graduate from Vassar. What makes it a story? No one…Read More
What I’m Reading: Execution
You can spot the flaws in humanity with a brief scan of the daily paper. Bombings, deceits, murders, lies, we have some pretty fatal tendencies. But if there was any doubt about our interest in the grotesque, Geoffrey Abbott’s Execution dispels it. The book covers the history of 70 different modes of execution, organized in alphabetical sections. As…Read More