Blog
Fresh perspectives on art, life, and current events. From deep dives to quick takes to insightful interviews, it’s the museum in conversation. Beyond the walls. Outside the frame. Around the world.
The Latest
Art Inspires: Novelist Norah Labiner on the mystery of the vanishing curator
I never knew my great uncle Barton Kestle. He disappeared before I was born. He belongs, too, to a disappeared world of typewriters and teacups. In old family photographs he is captured in profile, always off to the side, distant, blurred, as though trying to escape the camera. On a Saturday night in March 1954, ...
Saved from the salt mines: Part II of rediscovering an incredible 1948 exhibition of art stolen by Nazis
Last week, I recounted how a phone call launched a research project deep into the archives of the MIA, where I uncovered information about a 1948 exhibition of Berlin paintings saved by Monuments Men from the salt mines of Germany and Austria. Here’s part II: the story of how the paintings ended up in the ...
Saved from the salt mines, part I: A phone call sparks the rediscovery of a historic MIA exhibition that captivated the country
On February 28, I received a voice mail from Ann Pflaum, the University of Minnesota historian. With all the recent talk of the Monuments Men and looted art during World War II, Ann recalled seeing an exhibition at the MIA of paintings rescued from the salt mines of Germany and Austria. Only it wasn’t a ...
Who's voicing Matisse? Precisely the Twin Cities actor you'd hope
The audio guide to Matisse: Masterworks from the Baltimore Museum of Art, the irresistibly colorful exhibition at the MIA, opens with an accordion in full musette mode (which may mean something only to accordion nerds like myself). It’s Paris in springtime (we can dream), the Montmartre cafes crowded with artists. You hear from the curator, ...
Who’s voicing Matisse? Precisely the Twin Cities actor you’d hope
The audio guide to Matisse: Masterworks from the Baltimore Museum of Art, the irresistibly colorful exhibition at the MIA, opens with an accordion in full musette mode (which may mean something only to accordion nerds like myself). It’s Paris in springtime (we can dream), the Montmartre cafes crowded with artists. You hear from the curator, ...
Matisse the marketer: how great artists wooed patrons
In the photo on the right, Henri Matisse appears to be on the phone (he’s not), and I imagine that he’s taking a call from Claribel or Etta Cone, “my Baltimore ladies,” as he liked to call them. They were his greatest patrons and their collection of his work from every period of his career ...
Art Inspires: Poet Alex Lemon, celebrating a new book, on a photograph of life's terrible beauty
THERE IS HARDLY ANY LIGHT after “Untitled,” 1961, by Ralph Eugene Meatyard Blanket of mud. Blanket of rot, of always, Of cloying. Always, a soaked blanket Knotted around the face. Shallows ruffled By Blackgum, spiderwillows— Their knobbed roots tangled beneath the mucked Skim, leaf-knotted—slick as oysters Jellied ...
Art Inspires: Poet Alex Lemon, celebrating a new book, on a photograph of life’s terrible beauty
THERE IS HARDLY ANY LIGHT after “Untitled,” 1961, by Ralph Eugene Meatyard Blanket of mud. Blanket of rot, of always, Of cloying. Always, a soaked blanket Knotted around the face. Shallows ruffled By Blackgum, spiderwillows— Their knobbed roots tangled beneath the mucked Skim, leaf-knotted—slick as oysters Jellied ...
We asked an 11-year-old to review the museum's new Half Pint cafe for families. He came, he ate, he wrote.
This winter, the MIA opened a new cafe in the first-floor lobby across from the family center. Called Half Pint, it’s a fresh and creative take on family food from the fun folks at Stock & Badge (Parka, Victory 44). We think it’s pretty sweet, a cool complement to the new Dogwood coffee shop in ...
We asked an 11-year-old to review the museum’s new Half Pint cafe for families. He came, he ate, he wrote.
This winter, the MIA opened a new cafe in the first-floor lobby across from the family center. Called Half Pint, it’s a fresh and creative take on family food from the fun folks at Stock & Badge (Parka, Victory 44). We think it’s pretty sweet, a cool complement to the new Dogwood coffee shop in ...