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Nelson A. Rockefeller examining one of the paintings to be hung in the museum's new building.

How MoMA and the CIA Conspired to Use Artists to Promote American Propaganda During the Cold War

The Museum of Modern Art was among several institutions that aided the CIA in its propaganda efforts, according to the new book ArtCurious.
Seal of the CIA nestled against a background of modern art.

Was Modern Art Really a CIA Psy-Op?

The number of MoMA-CIA crossovers is highly suspicious, to say the least.

How 'Good Design' Failed Us

What's the role of functionality in design?

Things as They Are

Dorothea Lange created a vast archive of the twentieth century’s crises in America. For years her work was censored, misused, impounded, or simply rejected.
Joan Mitchell, Helen Frankenthaler, and Grace Hartigan

How New York’s Postwar Female Painters Battled for Recognition

The women of the historic Ninth Street Show had a will of iron and an intense need for their talent to be expressed, no matter the cost.
"Sunrise at Northport Harbor" painting by Arthur Dove.

Unpopular Front

American art and the Cold War.
Artists on the roof of 3-5 Coenties Slip, New York, 1958. Photograph: Hans Namuth

Remembering the Slip: The Manhattan Street that Birthed a Generation of Artists

The tiny downtown passage, where artists burned pallets for warmth, was home to Ellsworth Kelly and Agnes Martin.
Good Housekeeping cover with girl looking at wedding cake topper

Wedding Cake Toppers: Miniatures, Excess, and Fantasy

Tying frilly white doves and normative bride-and-groom couples to feminist art and DIY craft practices that offer opportunities for creativity and fantasy.
A child in the backyard of the Avenel Cooperative.

The Most Dangerous Architect in America

Gregory Ain wanted to create social housing in Los Angeles. Dogged by the FBI, his hope for more egalitarian architecture never came to be.
Cartoon of Buckminster Fuller with spirals in his glasses and hands out as if hypnotizing the reader.

Space-Age Magus

From beginning to end, experts saw through Buckminster Fuller’s ideas and theories. Why did so many people come under his spell?
Ansel Adams photograph of a baseball game with the Sierra Nevada mountains in the background.

An American Landscape

In 1943, Ansel Adams traveled to photograph Manzanar—one of the ten internment camps that together detained 120,000 Japanese Americans during World War II.
Revenge of the Goldfish by Sandy Skoglund, 1981

Obscura No More

How photography rose from the margins of the art world to occupy its vital center.
Gordon Park's photograph of law enforcement officers kicking in a door

When Crime Photography Started to See Color

Six decades ago, Gordon Parks, Life magazine’s first black photographer, revolutionized what a crime photo could look like.
An image of President Donald Trump holding a Bible in front of a church.

The Dangerous Power of the Photo Op

American photojournalism has always been entangled with race and religion.
Collage by Romare Bearden depicting African Americans in an urban setting

The Many Lives of Romare Bearden

An abstract expressionist and master of collage, an intellectual and outspoken activist, Bearden evolved as much as his times did.

Philip Johnson Was Very Nazi

A new biography of the architect shows why it’s hard to ignore the authoritarian characteristics of some of his most celebrated work.
Photograph of murder victim by Weegee.

The Lost World of Weegee

Depression-era Americans viewed urban life in America through the lens of Weegee’s camera.

Immaculately Restored Film Lets You Revisit Life in New York City in 1911

Other than one or two of the world's supercentenarians, nobody remembers New York in 1911.

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