Dazzled by Art

The Mona Lisa hasn't always been a huge tourist attraction. It turns out the most famous painting in the world owes its legend to a brazen Italian thief who stole it from the Louvre and vanished for more than two years. Early on the morning of August 21, 1911, a brazen thief dressed as a museum employee entered the Louvre in Paris without raising an alarm. The building was only open to staff when the Italian man entered the famous Salon Carré, scanned the wall of priceless artworks and walked up to a portrait of a smiling woman. After checking the coast was clear, he took the painting off the wall and lugged it into a nearby stairwell, where he extracted the piece from its heavy frame. The artwork was Leonardo Da Vinci's Mona Lisa. With the portrait hidden under his white smock, the thief then walked out of the building, escaping into the crowd at the Rue de Rivoli. As with all famous art heists, conflicting accounts of how the man managed to pull the crime off have emerged ...

Plus, Skims opens a flagship store on the Sunset Strip and Regen Projects presents Rachel Jones’ first L.A. solo exhibition The post Burberry Announces Multi-Year Partnership With the V&A Museum’s Fashion Gallery appeared first on TheWrap. Burberry announces a partnership with the V&A Museum in London, Skims opens a flagship store on the Sunset Strip, Regen Projects presents Rachel Jones’ first L.A. solo exhibition and Alain Ducasse at The Dorchester comes to Hotel Bel-Air. Burberry partners with the Victoria and Albert Museum in London to redevelop its iconic Fashion Gallery Burberry, the British luxury brand known for its iconic trench coat and signature check design, announced Monday it will be supporting the transformation of the Fashion Gallery at the Victoria and Albert Museum in South Kensington as part of a multi-year partnership with the London-based arts and culture institution. The museum’s fashion collection spans five centuries and is the world’s largest most...

ART WILL S8T YOU FREE, at the Museum of Tolerance in Beverly Hills is art therapy in action, in works artist Tomer Peretz made with 10/7 survivors and first responders Poster for exhibition Art Will S8t You Free at Museum of Tolerance Poster courtesy of Tomer Peretz and Simon Wiesenthal Center Museum of Tolerance The healing power of art is a phrase one hears a lot, but in a new exhibition, ART WILL S8T YOU FREE, at the Museum of Tolerance in Beverly Hills, one can see art therapy in action, in a collection of eight works that Los Angeles-based Israeli-American artist Tomer Peretz, the first artist in residence at the Museum of Tolerance, made with October 7th survivors and first responders. The exhibition is all the more meaningful because doing so was part of Peretz’s own response to his traumatic experience as a first responder to Kibbutz Be’eri, one of the most murderous sites of the Hamas-led pogrom. What one sees in the lobby of the museum are eight works made collaboratively ...

Around St. Paul and the Twin Cities, explore big canvases and big themes, from mental health to incarceration to how we perceive ourselves and others. Across St. Paul and the Twin Cities, fine-art curators and gallerists are living large. Sometimes this is literal: At The Museum of Russian Art, an exhibition aims to showcase the largest canvases curators could track down. The Minneapolis Institute of Art’s major exhibition, showcasing art owned by musicians Alicia Keys and Swizz Beatz, is titled “Giants.” But the focus on going big is figurative, too. A cool show at the Minnesota Museum of American Art explores portraits as mirror-reflections of our emotions and relationships more broadly; at Calendula Gallery, photographer Jared Arvin explores the expansiveness of St. Paul at night. And speaking of growing — or thinking small? — conceptual art gallery Night Club, which for a while was downtown thanks to a program offering free rent for vacant storefronts, is moving to a pocket-size...

Lonely Planet was once the Bible of travel. Then Google and social media influencers stepped in and became the new messiahs. David Vanderhoef was concerned about his guidebook to Kenya. A 39-year-old former bar manager from Connecticut, Vanderhoef had been on a grand world tour for several years with his partner when he picked up the latest guidebook from Lonely Planet, the legendary travel company, ahead of his trip in October.That year's edition was only about half as long as the 2018 version he also owned. Hotel and restaurant listings, store hours, bus routes, and other swaths of content historically found in Lonely Planet's meticulously researched guides were either significantly pared down or slashed entirely. In their place were a lot more photos.More alarming to Vanderhoef, the new book made almost no mention of safety or crime."Even the staunchest Kenyan patriot will readily admit that one of the country's biggest problems is crime," the 2018 edit...

Dazzling art jewelry highlights from one of the world’s leading design fairs, which is on in Paris until April 6. La Gloria earrings by Antonio Seijo, 2021, with mirrors, sapphires, tsavorites, paraiba tourmalines, ... More diamonds, 18K gold & silver, on show with Second Pétale at PAD Paris. GaryEdwards.es The PAD Paris fair set up camp in the Jardin des Tuileries gardens April 2-6, bringing with it antique, 20th and 21st-century design treasures from a host of international galleries. PAD has been running since 1998 and remains the leading international art & design fair, with avid collectors browsing stands including a cohort of solo art jewelers and specialized art jewelry galleries. Amongst those on show, French jewelry designer Elie Top has his own stand for the first time, as well as PAD regulars 5 Octobre, Karry Berryby and Arina Pouzoullic, of the Paris-based contemporary jewelry gallery Second Pétale, who back for her fourth showing at the fair. Pouzoullic has a st...

Want to earn versatile travel points at a fast rate? Aeroplan credit cards are a great place to start. The post The best Aeroplan credit cards in Canada for 2025 appeared first on MoneySense. Aeroplan is Canada’s largest airline loyalty program—and one of its most lucrative. Owned by Air Canada, Aeroplan offers a ton of flexibility compared to other airline loyalty programs. You can redeem Aeroplan points with more than 50 partner airlines and even transfer points to other programs. Here are the best credit cards Aeroplan has to offer. Featured credit cards Compare Aeroplan credit cards Whether you’re looking for a no-fee card to get you started earning Aeroplan points or a full-service travel card with all the bells and whistles, there’s an Aeroplan credit card for you. MoneySense award winners Check out the pros and cons of our top Aeroplan and premium Aeroplan credit cards, as well as a few alternatives for point collectors. Best Aeroplan credit cards Gold: TD Aeroplan Visa Infi...