Nothing can be compared to you, Rome
Image: Emperor Maximilian I My headline comes from a poem written in the 12th century, but its opening line does not prepare one for the punchline. The four lines in…
A Glorious Homage to Folks with dis-Abilities[1] – Amy and the Orphans
Dis with a dash because historically people with disabilities have been shunned by society when indeed their condition(s) show us what we lack. That is this writer’s sole opinion. Let…
Beat 4 Beat: Ten Years of Transforming Lives Through Music
Austin music education nonprofit Beat 4 Beat celebrated a decade of empowering youth through the transformative power of music at its 10-Year Anniversary Party this past weekend at Meanwhile Brewing.…
Adventures in the Louvre
This fact-filled book had been called “essential reading for anyone visiting the Louvre─for those who already know it inside and out and for those who have never been”. This book…
Quantum Color Memory Projections: The Art of Charles Heppner
In his Austin home studio, amidst canvases alive with sweeping ovals, kidney shapes, and Rorschach-like kaleidoscopic nature designs, Charles Heppner moves between paintings, photography, and sculptural boxes. The room hums…
The Rebel Romanov
Placing Julie of Saxe-Coburg in the tangled web of European royalty is actually quite easy: she was the niece of England’s Queen Victoria. And she came very close to being…
A Tapestry of Letters
The appeal and meaning of a tapestry is best appreciated by distancing oneself from it. Especially for large tapestries, one has to stand back 15-20 feet to take it all…
Dazzled by Poetry
A philosopher with a poetic style? That apparently was what the world needed in the early years of the 20th century, as Henri Bergson achieved a level of fame and…
The Conqueror’s Gift
It is typical for an author to summarise the chapters of a book in the Introduction. Sort of like a film teaser, where you get a glimpse of the best…
The Book of Genesis Lay in Ruins
When I first saw the title of this book, Impossible Monsters, I thought it was about members of a certain state legislature whose prime purpose for existence appears to be…