Listen · 0:44 · Roman portraits
What happened to her hair?
Two small holes above the forehead once held a separate marble hairpiece — the fashion of a decade, missing for centuries.
Listen · 0:44Stories
Every work has a back side.
6 works from 4 museums. 2 you can hear, 4 you can read — each with its full text and the museum record it was written from.
Listen · 0:43 · Japanese prints
Where is the mountain?
Look past the wave. In the trough, small and white, sits Mount Fuji — the subject of the whole series, hidden behind the sea.
Listen · 0:43
Read · Renaissance portraits
The painting with a back side.
Turn the panel over and there is a wreath of juniper, laurel and palm with a motto. Look closely at the front and you may find the artist’s fingerprint.
Read the story
Read · 19th-century sculpture
A father who couldn’t.
Dante gave him a canto. Carpeaux gave him two tons of marble: a starving father biting his own hands while his children beg him to eat them instead — and he can’t.
Read the story
Read · Dutch interiors
Why is the milk the only thing moving?
Everything in the room is still except a thin stream of milk — the one thing Vermeer lets happen.
Read the story
Read · Paris, 1880s
Whose monkey is that?
Among the parasols and top hats, a woman on a leash walk with a monkey. Seurat never explained her.
Read the story- Demo set
- 6 works · 4 museums
- Rights
- Open access or public domain — credits on every story
- Audio
- 2 stories scripted · recordings to follow
- Every story
- Has its full text and its source