At the end of September, I drove to Detroit to attend a panel discussion featuring two descendants of Vincent van Gogh. Josien van Gogh, Vincent’s great-grandniece, and her daughter, Janne Heling, had come to the Motor City to help kick off a new exhibition at the Detroit Institute of Arts, titled Van Gogh…
There are so many cool and interesting things happening in the world! Each month, I look forward to sharing some of the fun and informative news items that I’ve come across. Here are my picks for May 2021. In many cases, I provide a link that you can follow to…
While I’ve had this blog for a few years, I didn’t start writing regular posts until the Coronavirus pandemic hit and life ground to a halt. Writing is something I’ve wanted to do for a long time, but I wasn’t sure I could maintain the pace of producing a post…
Last year I received an email that contained a poem by Jean de La Fontaine, the French poet whose fables are classics of French literature. These poems are delightful and that day, I enjoyed lingering over Le petit Poisson et le Pêcheur. However, what struck me more than the verse…
Last weekend, one of France’s most celebrated graphic novelists passed away. You might be surprised to learn that he was Japanese. Indeed, Jiro Taniguchi was “knighted” as a chevalier in France’s Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 2011. While hailed in the press as a manga author, Taniguchi’s style was…
