The Lost World of James Smithson: Science, Revolution, and the Birth of the Smithsonian
Reviewed by Dr Bill Palmer, Associate, Curtin University, Australia.
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Place: London
Price: £
Heather Ewing provides her readers with a portrait of James Smithson, who was in his time well known as a scientist, but who is now better known as the founder of Washington’s Smithsonian Institution. The Smithsonian has become the largest museum and research complex in the world.
However the book is largely about James Smithson himself (born James Macie) and how he came to leave a large sum of money to a country that he had never visited. Ewing explains in the Prologue that much of the information that the Institution had about Smithson including his papers was destroyed in a terrible fire in , before the contents had been properly catalogued and summarised; this has made the task of writing a Smithson biography very difficult. Quite frequently during the narrative there are places where it is really not known where Smithson was at a pa
Kevin Young
"Keeping up with him is like trying to keep up with Bob Dylan or Prince in their primes. Even the bootlegs have bootlegs."
—Dwight Garner, New York Times
Biography
Kevin Young is the Andrew W. Mellon Director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. He previously served as the director of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Young is the author of fifteen books of poetry and prose, including Stones, shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize; Brown; Blue Laws: Selected & Uncollected Poems , longlisted for the National Book Award; Book of Hours, winner of the Lenore Marshall Prize from the Academy of American Poets; Jelly Roll: a blues, a finalist for both the National Book Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Poetry; Bunk a New York Times Notable Book, longlisted for the National Book Award and named on many “best of” lists for ; and The Grey Album, winner of the Graywolf Press Nonfiction Prize and the PEN Open Book Award, a New York Times Notable Book, and a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for criticism. The poetry editor of
Romaine Brooks
Artist
born Rome, Italy died Nice, France
- Also known as
- Beatrice Romaine Brooks
- Romaine Goddard
- Born
- Rome, Italy
- Died
- Nice, France
- Biography
Romaine Brooks, the daughter of a wealthy, unbalanced woman estranged from her husband before Romaine's birth, had a miserable and unstable childhood. An insane older brother received mother's love and attention, leaving Romaine scarred from lack of affection and acceptance. Inheritance of the huge family fortune in granted her independence, but she remained enslaved by memories of her mother's cruelty. She studied in Rome, meeting an avant-garde group of artists, writers, and intellectuals with whom she associated in Capri, Paris, and the French Riviera.
Her Self Portrait depicts a steely figure attired in a riding habit, carrying herself confidently and with elegance. She stares relentlessly at us from beneath the brim of her hat, with eyes that could be either frightened or condemning. Her mouth, corners upturned, either smiles or sneers. The ruins behind her, as ambiguous as her expression, add to the air of uncertainty about where she is and what she is thinking.
Brooks r
Born in Passaic in New Jersey, Robert Smithson (January 2, —July 20, ) was an artist who expanded what art could be and where it could be found. For over fifty years his work, writings, and ideas have influenced artists and thinkers, building the ground from which contemporary art has grown.
An autodidact, Smithson's interests in travel, cartography, geology, architectural ruins, prehistory, philosophy, science fiction, popular culture, and language spiral through his work. In his short and prolific life, Smithson produced paintings, drawings, sculpture, earthworks, architectural schemes, films and video, photographs and slideworks, writings, and all the stops between. From his landmark earthworks to his “quasi-minimalist” sculptures, Nonsites, writings, proposals, collages, detailed drawings, and radical rethinking of landscape, Smithson's ideas are profoundly urgent for our times. By exploring the conceptual and physical boundaries of knowledge Smithson raised essential questions about our place in the world.
Smithson’s New Jersey upbringing formed his artistic sensibility: he was born in Passaic, and soon after moved to nearby Rutherford, and later to Clifton. Throughout hi
Biographies you may also like
Luca vittorio missoni biography From , the couple's children, Angela, Luca, and Vittorio Missoni, took over the management of the fashion house, sharing the creative and financial aspects, [5] while Rosita Missoni .
Baba sarathi dev biography of williams Find Sarathi Baba Latest News, Videos & Pictures on Sarathi Baba and see latest updates, news, information from Explore more on Sarathi g: biography · williams.
Ayatollah khomeini biography iran contra Ayatollah Ruhollah Musavi Khomeini () was the founder and supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran. The only leader in the Muslim world who combined political and .
Hasan kleib biography of alberta Dictionary of Ukrainian Canadian Biography of Pioneer Settlers of Alberta, Heritage Collection: Author: Vladimir J. Kaye: Publisher: Ukrainian Pioneers' Association of Alberta, Missing: hasan kleib.
Tom drake actor and isabelle dunn Tom Drake, born Alfred Sinclair Alderdice in Brooklyn, New York, was an American actor. Drake made films starting in and continuing until the mids, and also made TV acting .
Dita sandico ong biography Dita Sandico Ong has Mindoro as her whole playground while growing up. She rode horses through hills and valleys and was mesmerized by gurgling waterfalls, swirling .