Arts

Arts

How denim evolved to become an American wardrobe staple

5:34pm February 05, 2022

NPR's Michel Martin speaks with fashion historian Emma McClendon about the history of jeans and the new documentary Riveted: The History of Jeans on PBS American Experience.

Children's author and illustrator Ashley Bryan has died at age 98.

Books
Arts

Ashley Bryan, children's illustrator and author, has died at 98

5:01pm February 05, 2022

by Elizabeth Blair

He created stories centered on African and African American folk tales and his vibrantly colored collage and paper-cut illustrations adorned the pages of some 50 books.

Lou Stovall's Glazing, 1972. screenprint, 26 x 40 in

Arts

How Lou Stovall took silkscreen-printing from grocery stores to gallery walls

3:20pm February 05, 2022

by Susan Stamberg

The famed silkscreen printer, whose work is on display at the Kreeger Museum's exhibition "Lou Stovall: On Inventions and Color," pioneered an artform while building community in Washington, D.C.

Books
Arts

A woman embraces change in the 1960s in Tessa Hadley's novel 'Free Love'

11:09am February 05, 2022

by Heller McAlpin

Phyllis Fischer, a 40-year-old wife and mother, is drawn into a liberating relationship with a much younger man. She soon realizes that perhaps she wasn't so content as she thought.

Books
Arts

How did the 20th century learn to act? 'The Method'

10:03am February 05, 2022

by Scott Simon

Scott Simon talks with author and critic Isaac Butler about his new book, "The Method: How the Twentieth Century Learned to Act."

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Historian Shermann "Dilla" Thomas uses TikTok to explain why Chicago is the coolest city in the world.

Arts

'Wait Wait' for Feb. 5, 2022: With Not My Job guest Shermann 'Dilla' Thomas

8:59am February 05, 2022

Historian Shermann Thomas is Chicago's most popular TikTok star, and he got there by telling cool facts about the city he loves. But what does he know about goats? We ask him 3 questions to find out.

Painter Irfan Mohammad works on a truck at a sprawling workshop in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.

These eye-popping, hand-painted trucks rule Pakistan's roads

8:02am February 05, 2022

by Hannah Bloch

Around the world, trucks are essential everyday vehicles. In Pakistan, trucks are also canvases for dazzling works of art. Truck art has served a social good too, and helped recover missing children.

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A ski jumper flies overhead on the 60-meter ski jump at the Suicide Hill Ski Bowl in Ishpeming, Mich. on March 7, 2021. The Suicide Hill Ski Bowl is home to 5 ski jumps - one being the infamous 90-meter Suicide Hill Ski Jump.

America's birthplace of organized skiing is in Michigan, here's what it looks like

7:29am February 05, 2022

Michigan photographer Nic Antaya started a documenting Ishpeming Ski Club to understand how it has birthed a handful of Olympic athletes and its culture.

Friendship Hospital in Bangladesh, winner of the 2021 RIBA International Prize. The hospital's zig-zag canal collects rainwater and aids in cooling the site.

A rural hospital in Bangladesh is named the world's best new building

5:00am February 05, 2022

by Nell Clark

The prestigious architectural prize celebrates the 80-bed hospital's human-centered design, built in harmony with the waterlogged local environment with a modest budget and local low-cost materials.

Books
Arts

Coming of age with three contemporary YA novels

3:21pm February 04, 2022

by Caitlyn Paxon

In each of these stories — Full Flight, Required Reading for the Disenfranchised Freshman, Ophelia After All — a girl stands at a junction in her life, on the brink of deciding who she wants to be.