As human beings living in this world, we are often bombarded with materialistic desires that may fuel our sufferings. We can be led to believe that our lives would be better if we only had more—more money, more affection, more education, more beauty, and so on. Pursuing more, however, often leads to more hardship. For…

In every sound of the violin there is the breathing of its trees. —Antonio Stradivari, luthier The story of the world’s greatest violins begins in the musical woods nearly 400 years ago. Standing high atop the Italian Alps, at an altitude of over 5,575 feet, the magical spruce trees grow very slowly. Having endured the…

Consider the lilies how they grow: they toil not, they spin not; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. —Luke 12:27 Lilies are a powerful symbol throughout the Christian Bible, and this becomes most apparent during Easter. In traditional European art, lilies are…

An Interview with New Masters Academy Founder Joshua Jacobo Many of us have been inspired to pick up a drawing pencil at some point in our lives. We may have been motivated to capture the beauty of a scene or depict a vision in our head, or perhaps, tempted by a row of instructional art…

We’ve all heard the phrase “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” but what does this mean and does it hold weight? In this series, we’ll take a casual look at the philosophical debates concerning our experiences with beauty and art. Through questions and reflection, we hope to gain a deeper understanding of beauty…

The Associated Press posted an article in 2007 about an Italian musician, Giovanni Pala, who believes he found a piece of musical composition hidden within Leonardo da Vinci’s famous painting “The Last Supper.” Pala, a composer and computer technician, raises the possibility that da Vinci may have left behind a somber composition intended to accompany…

Despite shutdowns that spread across the world last year and caused the performing arts industry to grind to a halt, finding a musician with idle hands remained as difficult a task as ever. “Some of my colleagues said, ‘Oh, I can finally play “Hammerklavier,”’ or, ‘In lockdown, I learned book one or two of “The…

Sitting on a high rock, he would sing as he gazed out to sea. … In this way Polyphemus shepherded his love with singing. —Theocritus, “Idyll XI,” trans. Neil Hopkinson Serenity rules over the meadows, peace over the sea. Clouds part as white gulls hover among rocky peaks and rich leaves. It’s in this bucolic…

After more than a year of being cancelled, Laguna Beach is bringing back its First Thursdays Art Walk April 1. The event, which runs from 6 to 9 p.m., provides a relaxed environment for art lovers to explore Laguna’s plethora of art galleries, boutiques and restaurants. Integral to the First Thursdays experience, the Laguna Beach…

It is impossible to talk about museum visitor experience, virtual or otherwise, without first addressing the devastating effects the pandemic has wrought on art institutions across the country and globe. Now after the first anniversary of the crisis, what was naively thought at first to be a brief, temporary shutdown of museums, lingered painfully for…