Three Things to Read

Arts and Letters Daily has coughed up three articles of interest to the historian today. One is a nice retrospective on the lovable Scourge of God, Attila the Hun from the Smithsonian's "Past Imperfect" blog. Although author John Man is cited as one of the sources for the blog, his more balanced audio book, Attila: The Barbarian Who Challenged Rome is available at the Ames Free Library. That Scourge of God moniker has done much to keep the Attila trademark alive, but for really creepy mass murders its hard to beat the Nazis. Here I direct you to "Nazi Family Values" by David Jacobs from the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. The article features pictures from the family albums of Heinrich Himmler and Julius Streicher and explores the use of art in propaganda. A chilling article that reminded me of my favorite independent study student David Togut who spent a year looking at how the Nazi used stagecraft to maximize the effect of the Nuremberg rallies.

On a somewhat happier note is a review of several books on Edward Burne-Jones the Victorian artist. Burne-Jones stained glass windows share space in Trinity Church with those of John LaFarge It's nice to see a realist painter getting some ink since the mainstream of art historians (the dermatologists of the history profession) have given them little notice while they have pimped for the Impressionist, Expressionist, Abstract Expressionist, and whatever you'd call a loathsome "artist" like Jeff Koontz. Now don't put me down as a reactionary, I really enjoy Monet, especially the series paintings, and many, many modern artists like the late Helen Frankenthaler, but despite some saccharine exceptions I think that realism in painting deserves more recognition. Check out the Art Renewal Center if you agree. Start with my favorite artist John Singer Sargent. Financed by a millionaire art collector, this website features hundreds of artists who have some claim on painting what they saw. Sadly downloads of large scale and hi-res paintings used to be free, but now requires a membership. Probably worth it-I've downloaded hundreds of pictures to create a collage museum for my computer backgrounds.

Expect traffic jams on Center Street today as people move out of Chestnut Knoll to live in the soon to be rent controlled trailer park in South Easton. At least that's one of the arguments I thought I heard at Town Meeting last night.