On the 16th of May 1770, the wedding of Marie Antoinette and Louis-Auguste was held at Versailles in the Chapel Royal. Following three centuries of rivalry, France and Austria had finally become allies in 1756, so in order to cement their fresh diplomatic ties, Louis XV and the Empress Maria Theresa arranged the marriage of […]
Author Archives: ArtLark
World’s Voyage to Eternity in Katherine Anne Porter’s ‘Ship of Fools’
posted by ArtLark
On the 15th of May 1890, the American Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Katherine Anne Porter was born in Indian Creek, Texas. During the next ninety years, she came to experience the most extraordinary social, political and technological transformations, all of which constituted merely a background to her very eventful life. After losing her mother and grandmother at […]
Oona O’Neill Chaplin. Behind Every Great Man…
posted by ArtLark
… There is a Great Woman. One such woman, Oona O’Neill, was born on the 14 of May 1925, in Warwick Parish, Bermuda, to talented parents, the prize-winning playwright Eugene O’Neill and writer Agnes Boulton. We can only assume that this saying must have been true in Oona’s case, as her true character remained an […]
Is God a Woman? The Visions of Julian of Norwich
posted by ArtLark
Here is a vision shown by the goodness of God to a devout woman, and her name is Julian, who is a recluse at Norwich and still alive, A.D. 1413, in which vision are very many words of comfort, greatly moving for all those who desire to be Christ’s lovers. (Julian of Norwich, Showings) On […]
Inorganic vs Organic in Paul Nash’s ‘Totes Meer’
posted by ArtLark
On the 11th of May 1889, British Surrealist painter and war artist Paul Nash was born in London. The older brother of the artist John Nash, he started his professional education at the Chelsea Polytechnic, from which he moved on to the London County Council School of Photo-engraving and Lithography. Eventually, after being spotted by […]
The National Gallery Before Trafalgar Square
posted by ArtLark
“Monday, 10th of May, 1824, probably did not strike contemporaries as especially notable. At the Guildhall Court ‘Eliza Cockburn, a rather interesting-looking girl, about 15 years of age, was charged with attempting to set fire to the house of her master.’ Kean was unable to appear in the title role in Richard III at Drury […]
Political Criticism in Harold Gray’s ‘Little Orphan Annie’
posted by ArtLark
On the 9th of May 1968, American cartoonist Harold Gray died in La Jolla, California. His death marked the end of a very prolific career, but the fame of his newspaper comic strip, Little Orphan Annie, outlived him for a very long time. The story of an innocent vagabond girl wandering through a world of […]
The Story Behind Gauguin’s Biographic Noa Noa
posted by ArtLark
On the 8th of May 1903, the iconic French Post-Impressionist painter Paul Gauguin died in Atuona, Marquesas Islands, French Polynesia. In 1891, Gauguin sailed to French Polynesia allegedly to escape European civilization and “everything that is artificial and conventional”. As a record of his travels, he ended up writing a book titled Noa Noa describing his experiences […]
Hurricane Katrina, The Eye-opening Disaster
posted by ArtLark
On the 7th of May 1718, New Orleans (La Nouvelle-Orléans) was founded by the French Mississippi Company, under the command of Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville. Not long before that date, Bienville, who was the Governor of Louisiana at the time, set out from Dauphin Island to select a place on the banks of the […]